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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Liara T’soni appreciation week. Day 3: AU/Missing scene

@protheanexpert

Meta

As much as it pains me to say, I have to agree with many who don’t like Liara in that she is privileged compared to other characters and romances. She has far more development than other companions, even if those have equal if not greater potential. And it makes romancing Liara easier, as it requires little efforts to fill in the blanks. The only missing content one needs are about the headcanons one have about Liara or Shepard.

Personally, I make Shepard romance Liara and Thane simultaneously (you just need to not kiss or sleep with Thane in ME3 for it to work), and so I add more depth to Shepard’s emotional growth and her relationship with Liara. But beyond that… what is there to say? For example, Jack goes from barbarian to teacher in the academy, I would love to see how she made the jump, what pushed her to do so. Miranda becomes a fugitive, How is she handling it since it’s for the first time? Garrus’s task force which work to soften the damage of the Reaper war is still alive, how fun it would be to have interaction with them? Liara’s path is detailed enough to leave little question.

I think what is most lacking is also something many people who don’t like her share: Her apparent ineptitude at being an info broker. The game never truly dive in that aspect of her, since it is mostly an action adventure. No time for slow study, deduction, investigation, blackmail, and bargaining. There’s a war to win! So all of Liara’s achievements go off-screen and, like a plumber, you only notice her work if she fails. Well, let’s remedy that.

Short Fanfic

The hospital room was too white, too clean. The air was just lightly perfumed of antiseptic, but to Shepard it was unbearable. It smelled of death. A clean death, a silent death, lost somewhere in the legions of the quietly sick, hidden behind white curtains, forgotten in the depth of a registry. She hated it.

Exercise was her only escape the gloom, and soon the smell of her own sweat chased away the odor of white decay. Hanging above the ground, firmly grasping at a side bar with one hand, she pulled herself up another time. Time and time again. Her therapists insisted she rested, but she couldn’t just wait around for her body to recover, she had to wake it up herself. Besides, she needed it for more than just distraction. She needed to train the latest scar. Her prosthetic arm.

She pulled herself up again, blowing through the mouth, letting herself feel her muscles arch and burn within her body. All, but the right arm. She felt it flex, she felt it resist at the effort, she even felt a bit of pain under the stress, but it was all cold. Distant. Creepy.

-What would the doctors say? Smiled a voice behind her. -Probably the same things they always say, she replied, letting herself drop, but there’s only one doctor I care about.

She turned around to see Liara leaned on the frame of the door, watching her with that fake distance she always wore in public. But she couldn’t fool her, and in an instant she was on her, barely a few centimeters away from her face. Her lips tasted of outside, fresh and firm. As always, feeling her so close made her heart skip a beat.

-I missed you. -So I see… -How was your day? -Well… I may have made some progress.

Shepard slowly backed away, inviting her lover in her room by the hand. It was bare, just an empty room with a bed right in the center, surrounded by machines buzzing quietly. Miranda had insisted to have the cleanest environment possible, and also to have room for a full team in case of emergency. The commander had protested but to no avail. So Liara sat on the bed, back against the wall as Shepard returned to her workout.

-So! She said. Last time you were here you said something about renting an apartment? -Yes, but it turned out I needed to solve this heist case first. -It’s never simple with you is it? Well, I’m all ears.

-You’re hiding something Miss Penoka! Roared the turian detective, pushed to the limit of his patience.

On the other side of the table, in the interrogation room, the salarian didn’t move an inch. Partarus was righteous, but also very suspicious and cunning. She had hoped for a more gullible target, but he wasn’t her first. With a brutal move designed to be intimidating, the officer threw papers and photographs on the table. Maps with military supply lines highlighted, report of a smuggling ring leader matching her description, photographs of her entering a mining complex south of London.

-You see all this? That’s enough to put you for life! Executed if the krogans learn of it. -You have quite the eye, she sassed. You might make a good photograph when people realize you suck as a detective. -Ho you like my work? How about yours. What’s your job? Where’s your apartment? Because it sure wasn’t the one you gave us, we checked! -Are you sure? I seem to remember you “checked” the video feeds of the trucks too. You got nothing on me, otherwise we wouldn’t discuss.

The turian was a proud man. He had been saved by a human squad who had evacuated him just in time before being mowed down by reaper forces during the final push of the war. He had swore to honor them by protecting the survivors until the wounded recovered. He put his great investigative skills to the service of the local law enforcement, and knew his worth. Making her comments all the more insulting. Wotol had entered the service as a “witness” a heist that was, so far unsolvable. Her testimony had helped the case progress considerably, but Partarus had become suspicious. His own background checked had revealed a number of inconsistencies that did put her in a shady light, and he acted on it. Of course it wasn’t enough, she was very cautious. But she loved to see police squirms.

-Three days ago, he recited while regaining his calm, you assured us you had seen a suspicious military truck entering the garage of a disaffected building, except the vids proved that the trucks had been emptied, not stolen. And it turned out that yes, the vids were tampered with and the driver was on it. But there was only one thing that didn’t add up: you were nowhere near the building the day you claimed to have seen the truck!

He took a report from the pile of files and presented it to her. It was a listing of communication made by Wotol’s omnitool, showing clearly she was on another continent the day at the time she claimed she saw the truck. Her hand twitched almost imperceptibly.

-I never thought you’d stoop to crime detective. I’m actually impressed. -Don’t insult me! Loyal men don’t need to steal, when I showed the judge evidence that you were a smuggler, she authorized the warrant. -So what? Are you going to free the bandits because you think I lied? Come on detective, we have nothing to talk about.

The turian was ready to explode, when a single bip of his ear-com captured his attention. He listened attentively for a short while, regaining a cold, professional attitude, before grinning. A video feed sprung from the detective’s omnitool as he circled around the table, closing in on the salarian. The video showed her entering through the back door of a restaurant and not coming out for several hours. The feeds continued to fast forward, showing it happened several times a day, with her often bringing bags with her. I was harder for Wotol to concentrate with the turian’s breath on her neck.

-Very hungry I see, he growled, ominously calm. -Shit… Penoka’s eyes twirled as she slowly came to the realization. Listen, you’re making a mistake! -Ho I’m sure. After all, it’s one of the only five star restaurant left on this island. It even has “diplomatic privileges”. You can’t go in unless you are Council Approved. Except… you’re not. -You don’t understand I’m being set up! -Are you now? You mean it’s not you there? -It’s me but… -You’ve been smart, we can’t enter the restaurant without a month long wait for permission. But I’m smarter. While we spoke my men were analyzing the radioactivity of the restaurant and the floors above. When we got to the heist team, some equipment were missing their eezo core. You can’t track those via satellite, but from one building to another? All I had to do is let you gloat to give my men enough time… -Wait! I’m not working alone! I can give them for deal! -You’ve served me lies for three days in a row miss Penoka. What was it you said? Ho yes. We have nothing to talk about anymore.

And he left her in the room, as other policemen entered to put her under arrest. Partarus was exhausted. He had worked non stop on the case since the heist, and as much as he didn’t like to admit it, he was near his limits. A human appeared right besides him, holding a cup of warm smelling liquid.

-Good job! Tea? -Judge Monroe, he exclaimed, you startled me. -Sneaked upon by a bureaucrat, shame on you Partarus.

The turian laughed weakly and took the beverage. It was far from his favorite, but right now, everything tasted like victory. The two friends walked toward the judge’s office. The police station was filled with life, everyone walking around with purpose, or studying meticulously their own case. Since the end of the war, many had found their vocation, either in crime or in law enforcement, and Judge Monroe was one of them. A pencil pusher from the Citadel, transformed into the most trusted ally of an overwhelmed turian.

-I still don’t understand though, said Monroe, Miss Penoka was a smuggler. Why give up the team? -Liability. She did it once on Omega, paid for a heist, stole the supply and rained the authorities on the culprit before they could retaliate. To be honest Charles, if you hadn’t spotted her entering the restaurant, she would have gotten away with it. -Ho you should thank my friend. She’s the one who spotted her when we were eating yesterday. I was just here for the lasagna.

They laughed and parted ways. The detective went home to finally get some sleep while the judge ordered the closing of the restaurant until the end of the investigation. Neither realizing the part they played in the bigger picture…

-Of course, continued Liara, I was the one who spotted Wotol while eating with judge Monroe at The Ducé. From here on out, it was just a matter of time for them to discover this was where she hid her stash. -That’s quite the coincidence, groaned Shepard, still lifting herself up. -It would have been. If I wasn’t the one who organized the heist in the first place. -You what? -Several days ago I needed a quick way to shut the restaurant down without arousing any suspicion. Wotol was one of the Shadow Broker’s agent of an agent, so I was aware she stayed in London. I contacted her to pull off the usual trick of her. Find a team, do a heist, ditch the team. And I, of course, provided her with the drop point. -The restaurant. -Wotol is good, so I had to make sure she was spotted. Here comes my good friend Monroe. We had been in contact since my days on Illium, and I kept track of him ever since. I knew he had potential. -There must be an easier way to close a restaurant. -There was, but Wotol had become too… ambitious. She was a good way to dispose of criminals, until she decided to risk the secrecy of the operations out of greed. Two birds in one stone.

Shepard let herself drop, panting. Her arm still felt… unnatural, estranged from her body, but at least her flesh was still there, hurting and living. Taking a bottle of water, she continued.

-And why the restaurant? -Do you know what the Council’s attaché do when they follow the Council members on a different location? -I don’t know, talk to each other? -Yes, and they do so in restaurants. Until now, the only place all the attachés were together was on the Citadel, and it was extremely well guarded. As soon as the Council decided to stay in London until the Citadel was up again, I placed bugs and agents in the most likely locations where their attaché would dine. Unlucky me they chose The Ducé, and I hadn’t come around to place any surveillance there. Now that it is closed, they’ll have to switch. -You hope to learn from their conversation? -Ho I hope more than that. I’m aiming to make spies out of them.

Liara’s eyes sparked with excitation. She was always so passionate about her work, as someone who had found her true calling. Shepard had a hard time approving everything she did. She knew Liara had the good of the galaxy in mind, but that last operation had nonetheless made her betray her own agent, sent that agent to the same prison where the heist team was, ensuring she would be silenced, dented or maybe crashed a restaurant and its staff in her path, all to discover some weakness in the attaché of the most influential people of the Galaxy. And it was probably the cleanest job she would talk about, because Liara knew very well how Shepard had trouble dealing with such devious tactics. But the commander trusted her. She more than most knew that honor and frontal confrontation only got you so far, and that pragmatism always won the day. During the war, Liara was at the head of a gigantic web of criminals, and had to make very cold choices. In the name of helping the Crucible, she had sacrificed dozens of assets, leaving soldiers behind, betraying agents just to make sure the final battle would be the end of the Reapers. She had saved countless lives, if only by organizing smuggling operations and directing pirates the other way. No, Shepard just wasn’t wired to those methods. Perhaps that’s why she was so proud of her loved one. So appreciative. Liara T’Soni. The Shadow Broker.

#!!!! yes!!!#it was somewhat believable for her to become the shadowbroker but it would have been so much more interesting to actually see how she #became accustomed to working in the shadows. You showed how more much goes into being the shadowbroker than just 'knowing everything'#and that she's still the same person she was in me1 but just older and more aware of the universe she in #i agree w/ what you said in your meta part #in the future do you think you could put longer posts under a 'read more'?#long post #day 3 #meta #fic

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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Liara Week - Day 3 AU

I wrote this a few weeks ago but never posted it on tumblr, so I’m linking it now as part of Liara week hosted by @protheanexpert —

Informational by @bioticfox Jack/Liara T'Soni |Teen | 1k | ME3, Mild canon divergence

The Normandy answers a distress call during ME3 and picks up a passenger. “Alright, Freckles. I want information and I want it now.” A woman with a frankly alarming amount of tattoos burst through the doors of Liara’s cabin, stopping in the entryway, blocking as much of it as possible. The amount of space such a small human could occupy seemed to defy the laws of physics. Read on AO3

#!!! i never thogh of this pairing but itssuper interesting #i loved the pacing and how each chatacter is so done #liara x jack #fic #day 3

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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Sketching a cutie for Liara week! <3

#i love it so far!!!!#really cute nose #liara #day 2 #art

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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Liara T’Soni appreciation week. Day 2: Favourite relationship

@theprotheanexpert

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This one is a bit hard, because I never really tried to imagine a situation that didn’t involve Shepard, at the exception of my take on what happens 15 years after the Reaper War. I didn’t really cared about how the characters would interact with each other until this very day, mainly because everything orbited around Shepard.

I find it amusing to observe, and perhaps I’m not the only one. One of the reason Andromeda got squashed was because Shepard wasn’t there. There’s an emotional bond between this character and the player which I can’t explain. Nonetheless, for this day I’ve decided to take a little step outside my comfort zone and imagine Liara’s own life in the Mass Effect universe, independently of Shepard.

What struck me was how lonely she ultimately is. The name Liara could be a derivative from the Hebrew name “Liora” which means “I have a light”. In this case it would be fitting considering Shepard is Liara’s only light. In ME1, she is fascinated by her. As soon as she lost her she becomes noticably darker, more violent, whether in ME2 or the intermediary comics. During the Lair of Shadow Broker, Shepard re-enter her life, and she become a good, if shady, person again. In ME3, everything she does is for Shepard as her progression shows. She starts panicking about the scope of it all, and wonder how Shepard keep it together. As the game progresses, Liara’s efforts bring her to create a legacy in case they fail, legacy in which she includes Shepard.

Writing about relationships outside of Shepard made me realize how different she must seems to others, or to people who don’t know her. Cold, callous, ruthless, far away from the sensitive, curious, almost schoolgirlish archeologist we came to know. She would keep everyone at a distance, see people as resources, benevolent but implacable nonetheless. We see glimpse of that during the Citadel DLC when she speaks to other team members.

It would make her quite unlikable to many. Still, this gave me plenty of thoughts, and one particular idea.

Short Fanfic.

-Am I interrupting?

Liara looked away from her datapad to see the newcomer. Garrus Vakarian, in formal suit, two cups of coffee in his hands, smiling the way turians do. She smiled back, welcoming her companion with a fake surprise. She had hacked into the hospital surveillance and saw him entered a few minutes ago, but he didn’t need to know that.

-Of course not. Please sit down.

Turians were taller than humans, but thankfully less wide. If he dwarfed the asari, at least he could still sit comfortably. Human hospitals had those waiting rooms where people could just make themselves comfortable while waiting for news. Liara had conquered a corner of the room for herself in the last week, much to the dismay of the staff. There were piles of data pads, four computers, a holocom display, as well as a sleep bag, all spread over five seats. But they had too much work to do to try to dislodge her, Earth was in ruins, millions, billions were in need of help and the emergency hospitals that had grew all over the globe. This one was special though, better equipped, better protected, more adapted. This is why Liara had chose it.

-Human coffee for you, aaaand dextro oil for me, or whatever they try to make it look like. -I’m afraid they didn’t have the turians in mind when they furnished this facility. -Even if they did, the Hierarchy and Migrant Fleet both drained the surrounding systems of all dextro food and medicine. Considering they’ll be traveling for a while without the Relays, it seemed smart to ration everything. The fact that they didn’t touch that stuff worries me a little.

Indeed, the war was over. Most of the fleets had departed as soon as they could, hoping to establish corridors of humanitarian aid as soon as possible. Without the relays, it would take time to reach the nearest cluster, but the sol system wasn’t rich enough to sustain them anyway. Now the task at hand was to rebuild the relays, and Liara had thankfully gathered all the data they had on them long before the final battle. Her datapad was monitoring the progress of the engineering team left behind to solve the problem. The asari absentmindedly returned her attention to it, neglecting both Garrus and the coffees he was still holding.

-Sooooo, how’s Shepard? -They successfully restarted 75% of her implants, and the doctors are optimistic about her neurological damage. We can’t see her right now, she’s on the operating table. Again. -I’ve seen some of those doctors while walking by. They seemed… motivated? -Indeed, Liara chuckled, Miranda has made herself manager of the team. As I hear, they do not like her, but considering she has resurrected Shepard once…

The datapad trembled in her hand. The memory of her beloved’s death shocked away her smile. Liara had lost her once already, not so long ago. At that time she had done everything she could just to reach her remains, and ended up making a faustian bargain. Shepard was clinically dead at that time, and Miranda was an agent of the enemy, but even if things were different now the mere thought of it… The idea it could happen again…

-Hey, whispered Garrus with a soothing voice. It’s all right. -I know… She toughened up, relieving the turian of her cup and taking a sip. I know. Sometimes it just feels the war is not over. There’s always the next step, the next worry. The next danger. -I suppose I couldn’t just convince you to relax a bit?

She smiled again. Garrus was one of the few who could. She knew him since he was an hesitant ex-C-Sec officer, trying to learn from Shepard, his mentor in all but name. And he met her when she was still a naive archeologist, trying to wrap her head around an adventure ten time too big for her. She wasn’t a people person. Her line of work mandated distance, paranoia, but him. He was close, he had earned it. Time and time again.

-Garrus. I wanted to apologize.

The turian said nothing. He just listened, drinking his cup bit by bit.

-After Shepard died… I… went on my own. When I found clues about her body I didn’t warn any of you, I didn’t even try. And afterward… Well, I’m just not that good at keeping friends. And… You’re the best friend I have. -Wow. Wrex is going to be jealous. -Pfft… I’m trying to be serious! -Haaaa, we’ve gone through enough together Liara. You don’t need to check on me every week for me to know I can always count on you. I like that about you. In the past year we fought, every time I was looking at a map showing people fleeing the reapers, every time a shipment of Tungsten went missing, every time comms suddenly went dark in a corner of the galaxy I knew there was someone out there who was trying to help them. Maybe you’re not as obvious as most, but I know you’re doing what you can. And I know your heart is in the right place, whatever you do.

She wanted a hug. But she just smiled a bit uncomfortably. Notifications had added up since the start of the conversation, and she had to make sure everything was going well. Garrus took a peak.

-Speaking of which, what are you doing? It’s not like you can contact the other clusters now that the relays are gone, how are you so busy? -There is always much to do. I may have less ground, but I have no agents now. -Don’t tell me you didn’t sneak a few on the fleet. -Perhaps. But if I contacted them… -Then they’ll know you are around Earth. You take the anonymity very seriously. -I had to reveal my… “business” to a lot of people. I do not intend to expose myself any further. -I guess that’s why you’re one of the big shot and I just shoot people. But that’s fine by me.

Liara stopped typing.

-Is it? -What do you mean? -Is it fine? To be a simple soldier?

Garrus evaded her eyes and dived into his cup. It was obviously horrible to drink, but it seemed better than to answer to the question right away. Around them the nurses were walking energetically, chatting among themselves, like any other busy day. Garrus was vaguely looking at them while trying to find an answer.

-Honestly, I don’t think I can be more than that. I mean, I’m all for leading small squads, but all the officer stuff, the big decision, the responsibility… It’s just not me. -Says the one who were the Primarch’s first counsel for the last year. -It… It wasn’t like that. He was there, I was too. Circumstances.

The asari skipped her turn. Turians were almost incapable of telling lies, except to themselves. But Garrus wasn’t like most turians. The old soldier continued, desperately trying to convince himself.

-I’m not cut out to be an officers. Turian officers… they’re disciplined, obedient. They follow the rules. Me, I’m not exactly that. He sighted almost immediately in defeat. That’s the same thing our current Primarch said when we recruited him on Menae… It’s just that I don’t feel ready. I couldn’t even hold on to a job, first chance I got I escaped to Omega to shoot people. I’m far from a model citizen, Hierarchy or otherwise. -Garrus, did you think I was ready when I acquired my present resources? Two years before, I was digging in the dirt, obsessed with my research. You saw me at this time. Did you think I was ready to carry the burden? -You may have had a lot to prove. -And was my time at the head of said resources a great victory? Didn’t I get bested by Cerberus, time and time again? If it wasn’t for Taylor… -You’re too hard on yourself, The Illusive Man had far more experience in this kind of play, you couldn’t be expected to be perfect right away. -Then why do you think you should?

He just finished his coffee in one go, preferring the atrocious taste to the turn of the discussion. Liara thought of pressing, she knew he who he could become. She had seen it in his eyes, the same fire than in Shepard’s. if only he was just a bit more ambitious…

-I’ll drop it. For now. -Thanks I’ll… I’ll just think about it ok? -Think fast. You never know what could happen.

The turian froze.

-Doctor T’Soni, what did you do? -Just a pleasant conversation with a dignitary, before he departed with the fleet. We just agreed that some adjustments had to be made in order to… revitalize certain aspects of the Meritocracy. -Liara… -It was innocent, really. For now. But who knows, maybe they’ll need an ambassador in the future. -Now I know you’re messing with me. There’s no way anyone could think making me an ambassador would be a good idea. I shoot problems, I don’t talk about it, e-v-e-r-y-b-o-d-y knows that. -Maybe we agreed that’s exactly what a Turian-Krogan liaison needed to do.

His eyes widened. She could almost see the visions of horrors on his face, as he pictured himself between a legion of stuck up turian diplomats and a horde of walking diplomatic incident in the shape of tanks. He saw the never-ending meetings spent convincing politicians that the ever growing empire of super soldier who almost wiped them out last time wasn’t a threat. He imagined having to deal with every revenge-frenzied krogan who thought killing a turian was their birthright. And worst of all, he almost heard Warlord Wrex, laughing his ass off.

-That’s it! He sprung on his feet, snatching the cup from Liara’s hands. No coffee for you!

He immediately departed, fleeing the battlefield and the asari’s bursts of laughter. As he disappeared in a corridor, looking for the nearest trash, Liara relaxed. For the first time in weeks, she relaxed. Garrus Vakarian, she thought. Her friend.

#meta #fic #day 2 #!!! i never thought about her friendship with garrus #you charaterized them perfectly #especially w/ the war being over and her having to re just #i love your writting asdfghjjklhds #long post

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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Day 2 of Liara week: Favorite Relationship

Keep reading

#it me #day 2 #art #fic

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protheanexpert · 6 years

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Liara Appreciation week. Day 1: first impression

@protheanexpert