Freelancers, Chapter 25
#27 of Freelancers (Mass Effect fanfiction)
"You are not Saren."
Valeria shivered at the sound of the deep, booming, mechanical voice as she stared at the recording on the screen on the lounge's far wall. The archive entry was one she'd gained access to after her reinstatement to Special Tactics and Reconnaissance - Commander Shepard, Garrus Vakarian, and Tali'Zorah standing in front of a Prothean beacon. The beacon was gone now, along with the cloning facility in which it had been stored, the whole place vaporized by a nuke. It had been one of Saren's bases, a lab he'd used for studying the process that had come to be called "indoctrination," as well as growing an army of krogan clones.
Before Shepard had destroyed the base, he'd triggered the beacon and received another infodump directly into his brain, which had eventually helped him piece together what Saren was doing and where to find him.
And then, seconds after the download finished, a communications array had activated - and in front of the beacon, a red-tinted, holographic image of a vaguely squid-shaped machine had appeared, towering over the human, quarian, and turian standing barely two meters away.
"What is that?"_Garrus stared at the projection, his mandibles twitching slightly."Some kind of VI interface?"_
"Rudimentary creatures of blood and flesh,"_the chilling voice continued, _"you touch my mind, fumbling in ignorance, incapable of understanding."
The door to her left slid open and Valeria glanced over as the Sulaco's crew filed in. Everyone had been ready to depart except Chula, who had made a quick run to Dr. Michel's clinic to pick up a prescription. While waiting for Chula to return, Val had decided to review what information she had about Shepard's mission two years ago. Despite the Council's insistence that the Reapers were merely a myth and Saren had acted on his own when attacking the Citadel, there had been some good chunks of evidence to back up Shepard's claims.
One of which was this very recording. Fortunately, he and his two teammates had the presence of mind to start recording with their Omni-Tools the moment the holographic image appeared.
"I don't think this is a VI," Garrus muttered.
Val paused the playback, waved at the others, and turned to her husband. "Hi, Irv."
"Hey, honey." He sat beside her and each of them slipped an arm around the other's shoulders.
"Chula's on her way back," Dakka said. She plopped onto a chair, grasped Quint's hand, and pulled him onto her lap. She put her arms around him and he grinned. "She should be here in a few minutes."
"Okay. I was just going over some files on the assault on the Citadel two years ago. It's not really relevant to our next job, but the way things are going, we'll need to know this stuff sooner or later." Valeria nodded at the screen. "This is from a short time before the attack, when Shepard tracked Saren down on Virmire."
"I've heard bits and pieces about that," Magnum said. "It'll be nice to see a record that hasn't been heavily redacted."
"I'll send copies of everything to each of your Omni-Tools, plus everything Dr. T'Lura's team has found so far." Val resumed the playback.
"There is a realm of existence so far beyond your own, you cannot even imagine it,"_the low, grating voice continued. _"I am beyond your comprehension. I am Sovereign."
Shepard's eyes opened wider. "Sovereign isn't just some Reaper ship Saren found. It's an actual Reaper!"
"Reaper? A label created by the Protheans to give voice to their destruction. In the end, what they chose to call us is irrelevant. We simply ... are_."_
Val shook her head slowly.Gotta give all three of them credit for holding it together as well as they did. She tried to imagine herself facing that almost-monotonous, cold, powerful, arrogant voice, and doubted she wouldn't have given in either to fear or anger at its sheer implacability.
"The Protheans vanished over fifty thousand years ago,"_Garrus said. _"You couldn't have been there. It's impossible."
"Organic life is nothing but a genetic mutation,"_Sovereign replied coldly. _"An accident. Your lives are measured in years and decades. You wither and die. We are eternal, the pinnacle of evolution and existence. Before us, you are nothing. Your extinction is inevitable. We are the end of everything."
In the corner of Val's eye, General Kurakova raised an eyebrow, hunched forward, and propped her chin on her left hand. Beside Val, Irving shivered. She reached over with her free hand and rested it on top of his.
"Whatever your plan is," Shepard said, glaring up at Sovereign's image, "it's going to fail. I'll make sure of that."
"Confidence born of ignorance. The cycle cannot be broken."
"Cycle?"_Tali's glowing eyes widened slightly. _"What cycle?"
"The pattern has repeated itself more times than you can fathom. Organic civilizations rise, evolve, advance, and at the apex of their glory they are extinguished. The Protheans were not the first. They did not create the Citadel. They did not forge the mass relays. They merely found them - the legacy of my_kind."_
Everyone else exchanged startled glances.
In the recording, Shepard scowled and shook his head. "Why would you construct the mass relays and leave them for someone else to find?"
"Your civilization is based on the technology of the mass relays. Our_technology. By using it, your civilization develops along the paths we desire. We impose order on the chaos of organic life. You exist because we allow it, and you will end because we demand it."_
"Shit," Quint whispered.
"They're harvesting_us!"_ Tali glanced at the other two. "Letting us advance to the level they need, then wiping us out!"
"What do you want from us?" Shepard glared up at Sovereign. "Slaves? Resources?"
"My kind transcends your very understanding. We are each a nation - independent, free of all weakness. You cannot grasp the nature of our existence."
"Where do you come from? Who built you?"
"We have no beginning. We have no end. We are infinite. Millions of years after your civilization has been eradicated and forgotten, we will endure."
Shepard flicked an unsettled glance at the others before regaining his composure. "Where are the rest of the Reapers? Are you the last of your kind?"
"We are legion. The time of our return is coming. Our numbers will darken the sky of every world. You cannot escape your doom."
Lia crossed her arms tightly over her chest.
Shepard sneered up at the Reaper's image. "You're not even alive! Not really. You're just a machine - and machines can be broken."
"Your words are as empty as your future. I am the vanguard of your destruction. This exchange is over."
Sovereign's image faded away. Seconds later, the roar of a ship's engines rattled the whole building, the volume increasing until it reached a crescendo - and then every window in the room exploded inward. Shepard, Garrus, and Tali ducked and threw their arms up over their faces. The sound faded gradually and they stood up straight and glanced around.
Valeria stopped the playback and took a slow breath.
"Well," Chula said from the doorway, "that's enough nightmare fuel to last at least a couple of lifetimes."
Val nodded. She'd been so distracted by the video, she hadn't noticed the door opening again.
"Not really," the general said as she leaned back in her chair. She turned to Val and added, "As I said before we left C-Sec headquarters, the Reapers aren't indestructible. Sovereign was taken down two years ago."
"It was a costly victory, though." Lia rubbed her upper arms, as if feeling a chill even though her envirosuit kept her body temperature regulated. "For months after the battle, it was almost all I saw on the news. The Systems Alliance fleet alone lost eight ships, and I don't even remember how many the Citadel fleet lost. Thousands of lives."
"And if the Destiny Ascension had been taken out as well, we'd have to add the ten thousand crew members and the Council to the body count, as well." Valeria let a quick breath rush out. "And that would've just been the beginning of a galaxy-wide extinction event."
"Here's the thing, though." Kurakova took a few seconds to make eye contact with everyone. "You could hear the arrogance in Sovereign's voice, and that's probably the main reason he ended up blown to hell. He honestly believed he couldn't even be scratched by our weapons."
"That's a good point, Nana. It's likely the other Reapers - however many there are - have the same arrogance, which might make them careless."
"Not only that, but if they truly were invulnerable, they wouldn't need to use scare tactics like all the bloviating we heard in that recording, or monstrosities like the husks you encountered on Chasca. If they were unstoppable, they'd just trample everything in their path from one side of the galaxy to the other. But instead, they deploy Dragon's Teeth that turn people into husks and other devices that indoctrinate people to turn them against us. Those are all very small-scale compared to the attack on the Citadel, or what the Collectors were planning to do - but those tactics do have demoralizing and disrupting effects."
"Which wouldn't be necessary unless the Reapers weren't as powerful as Sovereign claimed they were," Dakka said. Then she shrugged. "Assuming the Reapers don't do all that stuff just because they get a kick out of it."
"Well, _that's_not a disturbing thought." Quint sighed. "No, not at all."
"Sorry, babe." She winked. "If this stuff keeps you up tonight, I'll do what I can to wear you out."
"Hmm, I might just have to take you up on that offer." He grinned.
Valeria chuckled. "Like I said, I'll send you all the info I have on the Reapers, but we can go over it some other time. A little of this goes a long way."
"Does it ever," Irving muttered. He chuckled, but it sounded forced.
Val nuzzled him before glancing over at Chula. "What's our status?"
"The supplies you ordered are aboard and stored away. We've finished up our business here and the crew's all aboard. Malcolm and Dr. T'Lura have promised to keep us updated regularly on their progress." Chula laughed softly. "And I've picked up all the immuno-boosters and other meds I could get my hands on, plus my own prescription for that dextro-levo compatibility medication you and Irving use, just in case I get lucky sometime soon. So, we're good to go."
"Glad to hear it. Though I hope I'm not imposing by asking you to ferry me around."
"We had no previous engagements," Weyland said.
Lia flicked a quick glance at him and Yutani. Her apprehension was understandable, given the history her people and the geth shared. And with the mysterious attack on the geth supply ship by a quarian crew added to it, as well as the fact that the quarians' governing bodies weren't aware of the geth's willingness to coexist ... the upcoming mission would likely be a delicate situation at best.
But it had to be done before things escalated beyond the point where they could be reigned in. Weyland and Yutani hadn't informed the rest of the geth of the attack yet, but if the incident were repeated, they'd only hold themselves back for so long before retaliating.
"Thank you," Val said. "Well, I guess we should be on our way, then."
Chula nodded. "I'll head up to the cockpit, then. Next stop - the Migrant Fleet."
"We're under way," Chula said as she returned to the lounge. "We'll reach the relay in a few hours and meet up with the Flotilla a couple of hours after that." She plopped onto the sofa and glanced around. Everyone was present except the two geth units - busy packing away the supplies delivered before the Sulaco launched - and Valeria and Irving. "Val and Irv head back to their quarters again?"
"Yep." Dakka grinned.
"I know they were porn stars until recently," Lia muttered, "but they have a _lot_of sex."
"It's something Irving started taking when Fornax hired him. I forget the medical name, but it's commonly referred to as 'boosters.' It was developed with funding from Fornax, same as the dextro-levo stuff Chula picked up. It increases semen production so the user can, um, perform a lot more often."
Magnum chuckled. "I read about that stuff a while back. Guys who use it kind of have to ejaculate five or six times every day, or it causes some unpleasant side effects. From, uh, buildup, I guess."
"What, like blue-balls?" Quint grimaced.
"I dunno. Probably something like that. I never looked too deeply into it."
"So," Dakka said, "if Val isn't there to help him out, he has to take care of it himself. Not that she seems to mind. She said it's a bonus for her as much as it is for him."
Kurakova cleared her throat. "I really don't need to hear about my grandson having sex, thank you very much."
"Oops." Dakka giggled. "Sorry. Wasn't thinking."
"No worries." Kurakova chuckled and prodded her Omni-Tool. The screen on the wall came to life and a list of archived recordings blipped up. She turned to face the screen, selected one of the entries near the middle of the list, and sipped from her tumbler as the playback began.
_The Citadel battle._Chula remembered it all too well. As Lia had said, it had been just about all that was on any given vid channel after the attack. The record currently playing had been pieced together from dozens of cameras installed on the Citadel and the ships involved in the battle, many of which had been destroyed before they could capture more than a few seconds of footage.
The on-screen image changed from the fleet of onrushing, insect-like geth ships to the squid-shaped Sovereign plowing through the Citadel fleet. The Reaper smashed head-on into a trio of turian cruisers - ripping them apart, knocking the debris aside, and continuing on toward the Citadel as if it hadn't even noticed the ships at all.
Lia, sitting on the chair to Chula's right, shivered and crossed her arms over her chest.
Kurakova skipped to the next file. This one had been recorded after the Citadel's five arms had closed, sealing the station's inner surfaces off from the battle outside after Sovereign had already made its way inside. The Reaper closed in on the tower rising from the Presidium ring, extended its "legs" and clamped on. Flexible tubes stretched from Sovereign and connected to ports set into the tower's walls.
The general paused the video and pointed at it. "According to Shepard and his team, the Citadel was built by the Reapers, not the Protheans, and that business with the cables linking up supports it. Those connections appear to have been built for the exact purpose we're looking at right now."
Chula nodded. "I've been skimming the reports. That thing used Saren and his army to secure the Citadel, then it locked everything down. Shepard had to lead a team along the outside wall of the tower to get to the Council chambers, where the control center was located."
Lia shuddered again. "That was how the Reapers invaded every fifty thousand years. One of them would arrive first, lock everyone else out, take over the entire mass relay network, and open the floodgates for the rest of the Reapers. Then, every advanced civilization in the galaxy was wiped out over the next few centuries."
Given the long life spans of asari and krogan, that means some of them probably lived long enough to see everyone they loved exterminated._Chula shook her head slowly. _And it would've happened again, if Shepard and his crew hadn't gotten to the Citadel in time to stop it.
Kurakova skipped to the next record. This one started moments after Shepard's team reached the control center, killed Saren, and opened the Citadel's arms to let the Alliance fleet in.
Over the next few minutes, the fleet attacked Sovereign, but none of the hits could penetrate the Reaper's kinetic barriers. A few more minutes passed, and Sovereign returned fire for the first time since the battle started - slicing a nearby Alliance ship in half with an intense beam.
Sovereign continued firing, destroying one ship after another.
Kurakova paused it. "That's the weapon the Thanix cannon is based on. A stream of liquid metal fired at a fraction of the speed of light. Alliance ships are being upgraded with the new guns, as are turian and asari ships, but it's not happening fast enough. If there are any more Reapers in the galaxy, on 'standby' like Sovereign was, then one of them could hit us at any moment."
_Yeah ... enough nightmare fuel for three or four lifetimes._Chula propped her boots on the coffee table and nudged her hat into a slightly different angle.
Kurakova resumed the playback and the slaughter continued.
Until something odd happened. Sovereign suddenly stopped firing, detached from the tower, and drifted away, hanging limp in space. A few seconds passed, and then the remnants of the fleet attacked with renewed ferocity.
"Whatever happened to it," Lia muttered, "it knocked Sovereign's shields out."
Shots from the ships' main cannons continued unimpeded to Sovereign's hull and blasted small chunks out of it.
The SSV _Normandy_passed by the camera and raced toward the far end of the Citadel. Then it rotated to face the Reaper and pushed its engines to maximum burn. The small ship surged straight toward the still-limp Reaper and fired one last shot. The projectile punched straight through Sovereign and secondary explosions began tearing it apart from the inside.
The Reaper finally burst into hundreds of pieces. A huge amount of the debris plowed into Tayseri Ward, resulting in damage that was still being cleaned up and repaired two years later.
A large chunk of Sovereign tumbled toward the Council tower and smashed into it, very nearly killing Shepard and his team.
"Ah-hah," the general muttered. "A Reaper's shields can handle just about any kind of attack - but drop 'em and it's as vulnerable as any of our ships. The Normandy killed that thing with a single shot."
"Yeah." Chula nodded slowly. "Not nearly as tough as they want us to think they are - just like you said."
"That's more like it." Quint sighed and glanced at the time display in his Omni-Tool interface. "Got a couple more hours to pass before we reach the relay." He slid his hand along Dakka's thigh. "Your quarters or mine?"
"Yours are closer." Grinning, she hopped to her feet, grabbed Quint's hand, and towed him out the door. He tossed a shit-eating grin over his shoulder an instant before the door slid shut behind him.
Chula burst out laughing. "Nothing like seeing how close to dying we all were to crank the ol' libido up, huh?"
Valeria flopped onto her back and gasped for breath. Once she'd regained her composure, she rolled over and draped an arm across Irving's chest.
"Holy shit," she finally whispered before bursting into laughter. "Now that was some pent-up passion."
"Sometimes I think the boosters work a little too well." He grinned and slid his hand slowly up her arm. "That and the records we saw of the Reaper. Guess it scared me enough to trigger my 'carpe diem' mode."
"It worked out pretty well, then." She winked. "Still, try not to let it worry you. Like Nana said, those things aren't invulnerable. All we have to do is find a way to disable their shields and our ships can rip them apart. At least, the ones with the new Thanix cannons."
He nodded. "Even so, remember what Sovereign said about their numbers darkening the sky of every world. If there really are that many Reapers ... I'm hoping the next invasion doesn't happen in our lifetime."
"I can certainly understand that." She sighed. "But that'll just make the Reapers someone else's problem after we're gone. We've been lucky enough to get our hands on a lot of information about them, and that'll give us a fighting chance. That data could be lost between now and whenever they attack next, and trillions of people could die in every fifty-thousand-year cycle, for who knows how many cycles afterward." She shook her head. "I'd love it if we could live out the rest of our lives in peace. But there's a part of me that wants to fight the Reapers - and stop them before they can wipe out any more civilizations. I couldn't even look at myself in a mirror if I had a shot at them and didn't take it, and countless innocents paid for it later."
Irving propped himself up on his elbow, reached over to stroke her mandible, and smiled. "I know you never wanted to go back into the Spectres, but what you just said proves you belong there. You're in it to protect innocent people, not just maintain the status quo. With Spectres like you and Shepard, the Reapers don't have a chance."
"Hah. Flatterer."
"Just being honest." He grinned. "Being married to one of the biggest badasses in the galaxy is such a turn-on."
She laughed. "And all along I thought you married me for my bubbly personality."
"Well, that's one of the first things that caught my interest, back before I even knew you were one of the galaxy's elite." He grinned and leaned over to nuzzle her forehead. "I also married you because you're hot. And because you're one of the few genuinely kind-hearted people I've ever met. And because you're an amazing lay."
She burst out laughing. "Well, I'm glad to know I have a few other talents aside from kicking people's asses."
"Oh, a lot more, yeah." He kissed her. "Have I told you lately how much I love you?"
"Fairly often, but I won't complain if you keep it up."
He brushed his lips over her neck and she shivered. "Ready for round three?" He cocked an eyebrow. "Or would it be four?"
"I lost count." Valeria laughed softly. "I'll take as much as you can dish out."
"Oh, ho, ho. Now it's_on_." He grinned and slid on top of her. She giggled.
The comm panel beeped. Both of them froze and then sighed in unison.
You're kidding. Now, of all times? She reached over and tapped the glowing button. Chula's face appeared in the holofield.
"Oh. Sorry, guys. Guess I should've assumed you'd still be at it." Chula winked.
"Hah. Your timing could've been worse. We just finished, but in a few more seconds we would've been ... busy. What's up?"
"We're approaching the Flotilla. We'll arrive in about an hour."
Just enough time to shower, put my armor back on, and get myself into the proper headspace for dealing with insular politicians. Whee."Thanks. I'll meet you in the cockpit shortly."
Chula nodded and her face faded out. Val sighed and cocked her head at Irving.
"You gonna be okay for now?"
"Should be good for the rest of the day." He smirked. "Can't promise I won't need to wake up for a quick wank in the middle of the night, but ..."
She laughed and gave his ass a light swat before she heaved herself off the bed. "If the politicians on the Admiralty Board or the Conclave start driving me nuts, I can always use your boosters as an excuse to get away from them for an hour or two."
"Sounds like a plan. If you can't deal with it anymore, just shoot me a quick text message and I'll call you and demand sex."
She laughed. "Will do." She leaned over to run her talons through his hair before stepping into the bathroom. The rest of today should be ... interesting.
"About half an hour left." Chula tilted her seat back, propped her boots on the console, and held her hands lightly around her mug of dextro cocoa. She'd dimmed the lights in the cockpit a while ago so she could take in the view out the main window. "The Fleet arrived at Dranen recently and are discharging their drive cores."
Valeria nodded as she and Irving took vacant seats to her left. Irving stared out the window and smiled.
"Ah, there it is. Kinda pretty."
"Sure is." Chula inserted the straw through her helmet's intake membrane and sipped her cocoa. Dranen, the third planet in the Aysur system in the Caleston Rift, was a green gas giant streaked with bands of darker green and several cyclonic and anticyclonic storms that had lasted for more than five centuries. Pretty, as Irving had said, but nasty. One of those storms had a diameter of more than three times that of Earth.
"The Council has an interest in a couple of its moons, if I remember correctly," Valeria said as Dranen grew slowly larger in the window.
"Yep. Alahya is being engineered into an ammonia-based world for the volus, and Arvuna has several human colonies. Plus, the humans and the volus have multiple interests in the rest of the Caleston Rift, despite steady raids by pirates here and throughout the whole Attican Traverse. The Council doesn't want to risk an all-out war with the Terminus Systems, so they don't get their military involved, but they're happy to let the humans set up colonies since their military can handle it without the Council getting their hands dirty."
"Yeah. Politics." Valeria sighed. "The Migrant Fleet's arrival here, taking up so much time coming through the mass relay and preventing other traffic from coming or going, probably set a lot of people's nerves on edge." She chuckled. "Some people would accuse the quarian leadership of doing it deliberately."
"And I'd be one of those people." Chula shrugged and laughed softly. "My people aren't above using shady tactics to get their hands on resources. They've been in a precarious situation for the last three hundred years, so they do what they have to do to survive. Sometimes local governments offer them bribes to pass a star cluster by and not tie up the relay for days at a time. Stuff like that."
"Honestly, I don't blame them at all for poking the rest of the galaxy with a stick every now and then, given the way the Council has treated your people over the centuries. Treating you like pariahs because of something that happened centuries before any of you were born. Like we've discussed before, it doesn't sit too well with me."
"Yeah. The problem with the Conclave and the Admiralty Board is that their focus is too narrow. After young quarians return from Pilgrimage, most of them spend the rest of their lives in the Fleet. They remain isolated from the rest of the galaxy and gradually forget everything they learned during their Pilgrimage, yet they still think they know everything they need to know." Chula shivered. "But we know there's a bigger picture. If the various species in the galaxy don't stop antagonizing each other and learn to work together, we won't be able to stand up to the Reapers."
"Hey, guys," Dakka said from behind her, and all three of them jumped slightly. Chula glanced over her shoulder and found Dakka squeezing through the doorway, followed by Quint. They took a pair of seats across from Val and Irv.
"Holy shit," Irving muttered, holding a hand to his chest. "No offense, but how can someone your size sneak up on anyone, let alone a Spectre?"
"Lots of practice." Dakka laughed. "Most krogan have a pretty limited fighting style. Doesn't take much for an enemy to learn their moves. So I've spent years learning every style I could except krogan. Including stealth tactics."
"Sorry she startled you, though." Quint fired off a lopsided grin. "I suspect you're worked up enough about meeting with the quarian leadership."
"Eh. I admit I'm kind of dreading it just because they're politicians - I'm fully expecting to lose a bit of my sanity over the next few days. And it's going to be kind of awkward because of the questions I'll have to ask them. But it's still better than being shot at."
"Hah. I wouldn't be too sure about that." Chula grinned and faced forward again. The_Sulaco_ had moved close enough to Dranen for several of its moons to enter visual range, as well as what appeared to be an immense, glittering cloud - actually the viewports and running lights on the fifty thousand ships comprising the Migrant Fleet. "Just from what little I've heard about how the Admiralty treated Tali'Zorah, I'm not looking forward to meeting them."
"There's not much to worry about beyond a few heated words." Val winked at her. "Arriving with a Council Spectre does have its advantages."
"But since my people aren't really part of galactic society, they won't have to recognize your authority if it becomes inconvenient for them." Chula turned and met Valeria's gaze. "Just be careful while you're there."
"I will." Valeria stared out the window. "I don't like to rely on my reputation, but if the admirals looked up my service record, they'll know better than to try anything."
"They don't even need to go back that far." Irving grinned. "There's plenty of evidence of my wife's badass nature from the two years we made porn vids for Fornax."
"Oh." Dakka rubbed her hands together and leaned forward. "Such as?"
"The stalker." Irving glanced at Val and she glanced at the floor.
"Heh. Yeah. The stalker." She looked up at Dakka. "It happened a little while after Irv and I got together and started making vids and doing photo shoots. Around the time we started seeing each other outside of work, too. There was this turian who absolutely hated humans - he'd lost most of his family in the First Contact War, and blamed the entire species instead of the individuals who killed them. Anyway, to him, one of us mating with one of them was the worst thing in the universe. He was constantly sending emails to _Fornax_going into detail about why everything they did was wrong, weaseled his way into interviews just to bitch about us, staged protests during some of our vid and photo shoots, and so on."
Irving nodded. "It was bad enough that we were doing it just to earn money and entertain people - but when things got serious between us, it was more than he could handle. I think what set him off was the moment we officially became a couple. It happened while we were shooting one of our vids."
Val laughed softly and held his hand. "We'd just finished having sex and were holding each other and catching our breath. Irv gazed into my eyes and blurted, 'I love you!'"
"I had no idea I was about to just announce it like that. It crossed my mind, but for a few seconds I didn't think I'd actually said it. But Val froze and stared back at me, and that's when it hit me."
"I stared for a few seconds, looked into his eyes, and I could see that he _meant_it. And that's when I realized I felt the same way about him. So I whispered, 'I love you,' and nuzzled him. And the whole thing ended up in the finished vid. I guess the stalker saw it and popped all of his rivets."
"If I find out I don't like a certain type of vid, I just stop watching them and move on to something I actually enjoy. But this was one of those people who decides that everyone else has to hate the same things he hates, and kept watching our vids just so he could have something to froth at the mouth over."
"He hunted us down while we were prepping for our next vid and a round of interviews. Irv and I returned to our hotel room on the Citadel after lunch and found him waiting for us with a huge knife."
Dakka's jaw dropped. "Oh, shit."
Irving laughed. "Before that day, I didn't know Val used to be a Spectre and had no idea she was such a badass. The stalker didn't, either, apparently. He rushed her as soon as we stepped through the door. Guess he expected her to scream and cringe. Instead, she charged him, laid some moves on him so fast I couldn't even see exactly what she did - and the next thing I knew, the guy was on the floor with a broken arm, snapped leg, and his own knife lodged in his spine. Luckily, the door was still open, and several people in the hallway saw the whole thing, so Val didn't take any heat for it."
Val glanced away and coughed. "Um ... yeah. It wasn't that long after my last assignment as a Spectre, so I hadn't had time to get rusty. And, honestly, I was afraid I'd just scared Irving off."
He snorted. "Come on. That was the most awesome thing I'd ever seen, up to that point in my life." He glanced at Dakka and grinned. "Later that night, I asked Val to marry me."
"And here we are." Val leaned over to nudge her forehead against his.
Dakka squeed. "That is_so_ hot!"
Valeria laughed, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. "Well, this took my mind off the dread of meeting the Admiralty."
"Excellent." Chula glanced out the window again. The Sulaco was now close enough to the Flotilla for her to make out individual ships. "Not to kill the good mood, but we'll be there in a few more minutes."
Val nodded, stood, and tugged on her armor to make sure it was straight. She gazed at the Fleet as the Sulaco continued its approach, and took another slow breath.
"Well, this should be_fun_."