Fic: Desiderata (10/?)
Chapter Title: Collide
Fandom: Mass Effect
Characters: Miranda, Samara, Oriana, Jacob, Jack
Pairing: Miranda/Samara, I told you it was a fucking slow burn
Story Rating: R
Warnings: I don’t think any specific warnings apply for this chapter. Certainly nothing that doesn’t apply to the fic as a whole. Just assume any past warnings remain relevant.
Chapter Summary: The ‘flashback’ storyline comes to an end at the party on the Citadel. In London, Miranda’s insomnia is affecting her worse than ever before. Then Samara shows up at her door. And everything implodes.
Author’s Note: “If I'd have said I love you, she'd have said it back. And then everything would have been different.” - Sue Trinder, Fingersmith. Featuring Citadel dates that aren’t dates except they’re totally dates part II. I’m not going to lie, I’m kind of proud of myself here with the contrasts and parallels going on between the flashback scenes and present day scenes. People at their best, versus, well, close to their worst. Spotify playlist below the cut again.
(Link to Playlist)
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Miranda had been on the run from Cerberus for so long that it still hadn’t fully sunk in. She wasn’t hiding anymore. Wasn’t looking over her shoulder every waking moment. Didn’t get startled awake by every sound she heard in her sleep.
Somehow, she’d done it. She’d turned against The Illusive Man, and lived to tell the tale. For now, anyway.
The events at Sanctuary were so fresh in her mind that she’d barely had the chance to stop and catch her breath since. The bruises had mostly healed, but she still felt lingering echoes of her fight with Kai Leng, which could have ended a lot worse had she gone in unprepared. Not even ten days had passed since she hugged Oriana on Horizon and said her goodbyes, perhaps for the last time.
And yet she wasn’t thinking about what lay ahead. Not really.
Miranda was here. Living in the now.
For this one night, she was able to just...stand in one place, and enjoy the moment. That was something she had never taken the time to do previously, before all this came to pass. On an unconscious level, she had always taken tomorrows for granted. Never stopped or cared to appreciate today.
Suffice it to say, her head hadn’t quite fully caught up to where her body was, and that this was no mere illusion. It felt like at any second she would wake up and find herself alone in the dark again, scurrying like a rat through the shadows in hidden passages of the Citadel where nobody but the keepers could find her.
But this wasn’t a dream. It was really happening.
It meant all the more that at this particular moment she was surrounded by familiar faces from The Normandy she hadn’t seen in months, plus a few new ones. For a while there, it had felt like she would never see them again.
It was something to savour. So she did.
Miranda drew a deep breath and allowed herself to be present. To exist. To not be in her own head. She took in the scene as she made her way through Shepard’s apartment, letting her eyes wander the party going on around her, her gaze landing on each person she could see as she passed them by.
Liara and James Vega had spent a good portion of the evening arguing whether biotics were superior to brawn, or vice versa, with Jacob and Ashley having joined in on the great debate earlier. That still seemed to be ongoing, from what she could tell. The answer should have been eminently obvious to anyone, Miranda thought. Then again, she didn’t feel the need to convince anybody why her own preference was correct when she already knew she was right, as usual.
On a related note, Miranda might not have been the best judge when it came to reading signals between people, but even she was starting to get the sense that James and Ashley might be more than just shipmates by the end of the night, if they weren’t already. Good for them.
Tali, the last time she’d seen her, had been very much enjoying how uncomfortable EDI was making Samantha Traynor, talking openly about the crush Sam had on her voice. Although, come to think of it, Miranda was pretty sure Traynor had at long last managed to escape that awkward conversation and gone to hide under a table somewhere. Or maybe she’d just locked herself in the bathroom until she felt safe to emerge again. Either way, fair.
Speaking of potential couples, it hadn’t eluded Miranda’s attention that EDI and Joker had definitely become, shall it be said, a lot closer ever since EDI got a body. In retrospect, that wasn’t surprising, although the idea of the two of them becoming...entangled in that way had obviously never occurred to her before. Why would it have? But, come to think of it, the two of them had always bickered like an old married couple even when EDI was just a disembodied voice. From that perspective, Miranda supposed it kind of made sense.
And lastly on the list of possible relationships, there was also a...vibe coming off of Tali and Garrus, which was by far the most unexpected. And a little weird. Jacob had picked up on it before Miranda had, and she wished he hadn’t pointed it out. It was like finding out that two people she had thought of as more of a brother and sister might be hooking up. But it was none of Miranda’s business. In any event, the two of them seemed to mostly be avoiding each other. Perhaps they hadn’t confronted whatever this was between them yet.
She’d also caught sight of Zaeed and Samara admiring the artwork adorning Shepard’s new apartment. Miranda had thought about intruding on that, since that duo included the one person at this party she had been hoping to speak to tonight above all others, but she ultimately elected not to disturb them just yet. There would be other opportunities to catch up with her.
Somehow, she got the sense that Zaeed had finally been brave enough to shoot his shot with Samara after all this time. Judging by the expression on his face, and given that he was now drinking alone and very much not with Samara, presumably it had gone exactly as smoothly for him as had been predicted a year ago. She would be lying if she said she felt sorry for him.
A big group that included Joker, Garrus, Wrex, Steve Cortez and Javik had been arguing about guns and target practice or some similar nonsense, which hadn’t sounded particularly riveting to her in all honesty. Boys and their toys. They were still in that discussion from what she could hear. Unfortunately, Shepard seemed to have encouraged that line of thinking, which Miranda wished she hadn’t. Guns and alcohol were not the best mix.
Meanwhile, Kasumi had been popping in between all groups almost as much as Shepard had, like the perpetual snoop she was. She always loved getting up in everybody’s business. Miranda would have been a pretty big hypocrite to take issue with that, though. Although, when Miranda spied on people, it was for entirely professional reasons, not because she liked to gossip.
She had heard Grunt yelling at party crashers over the intercom a while back too. Who better to be a bouncer for a party than a genetically perfect krogan? She didn’t care to interrupt him. He’d done a good job of keeping the riff raff out.
And, honestly, for as much as Jack still grated on her nerves, a small part of Miranda had been somewhat relieved to see her there too, because if nothing else that meant she had survived long enough to attend this reunion. Miranda may not have liked Jack in the slightest, but if anybody thought she was actively rooting for any of her former Normandy comrades not to make it through this conflict, even Jack, then they really didn’t know Miranda at all.
Sure, they had instinctively traded barbs when they unintentionally crossed paths, because god forbid Jack actually behave like a fucking adult for once. But then Shepard had appeared out of nowhere and, for some bizarre reason, suggested that they, quote unquote, ‘work out all that unresolved tension between them’ and go have sex, or words to that effect.
In a weird way, that stupid comment had inadvertently somewhat doused the animosity between herself and Jack because, for once in their lives, they finally agreed on something - being that that would never fucking happen, and they would sooner drink broken glass than even think about it.
Credit to Shepard, though, Miranda and Jack hadn’t fought after that.
Maybe that had been the point.
Unfortunately, not all members of The Normandy had made it this far. There were missing faces. Only a few, but too many. From what she knew, they had all gone out like heroes, whatever that meant, and if it made any difference.
Thane had died giving his life to protect the Council from Kai Leng when Cerberus attacked the Citadel. Mordin had sacrificed himself to end the genophage, undoing what he had in retrospect come to believe was his greatest mistake. And Legion, well, to the extent that Legion could be considered ‘dead’, he had certainly ceased to exist in any recognisable form - giving up his ‘individuality’, for lack of a better word, to achieve peace between the quarians and the geth.
It wasn’t until after being forced to go into hiding for so long, believing some Cerberus agent would find her and put three bullets in her head before she saw any of her Normandy comrades again, that Miranda began to regret that she never took the chance to get to know her shipmates better, especially now that there were some with whom those lost moments could never be reclaimed.
What was that saying - you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone?
Yeah, this was definitely one of those instances.
She’d always liked Thane, come to think of it. There was little to dislike. He had been one of the few on the ship who had never been anything other than extremely civil towards her, even when, admittedly, Miranda hadn’t been particularly courteous in return, misjudging him as a man of tenuous loyalty.
He never complained or questioned any task he was given. He just did it. A consummate professional. Exactly the kind of person she would want on any team.
Mordin, she respected. Hadn’t trusted, no, nor completely understood, but respected. They’d teamed up on a fair few field missions with Shepard early on when they were still studying the Collectors. Between her warps and Mordin’s incineration tech, they could tear through any armour in seconds. And he was undeniably a genius. Back on The Normandy, he was probably the only other person who’d spent as much time hard at work as Miranda. Maybe more.
With the benefit of hindsight, she wished she had taken more of an opportunity to pick his brain, and work with him on his endless list of projects. Even if he did talk at a million miles a minute, it was only because he had so much to do and no time to waste doing it. A sombre smile came to her face as she thought how many of the galaxy’s ills the two of them could have solved given enough all-nighters and enough pots of coffee between them.
And then there was Legion. In truth, she hadn’t had much time to speak to him, much less get to know him. He had been on The Normandy so briefly. Less than a month had elapsed between finding him, and Miranda being forced to leave. He was the one she knew the least. But he was unique.
She had been wrong about Legion, hadn’t she? Miranda still didn’t fully know where she stood on the whole question of whether machines could be considered ‘alive’, but that wasn’t the point, was it? Did it even matter if they weren’t? Either way, it would have been wrong to send him to Cerberus, like Miranda had initially suggested. If that had happened, Rannoch might not be at peace right now. With his final sacrifice to unite the quarians and the geth, Legion had definitively proven himself to be more than the mere sum of his programs.
So the question remained. Why hadn’t Miranda taken the initiative to get to know them? To speak to them? It wasn’t as if she hadn’t known that the time Thane and Mordin had was short, irrespective of intervening events. She’d just...not bothered.
It hadn’t occurred to her back then to think that was something she ought to have done. The old Miranda hadn’t cared to do such things. Because other people didn’t really matter to her.
By the time Miranda had started to defrost and emerge as a more tolerable (and, in turn, more tolerant) person to be around, it was already too late. The mission was over. The Alpha Relay was destroyed. And everyone went their separate ways.
But there was no changing the past. Perhaps there was no sense in wondering what could have been, or what she would have done differently if she had known then what she knew now, or if she had been the person back then that she was now, because that just wasn’t possible. And Miranda could do many things, but even she couldn’t make the impossible possible.
Well, not usually.
She couldn’t have those days back. But she still had this day. This one night. Best not to dwell on what was missing or the mistakes of yesterdays gone by when there was so much that she had to be thankful for. And, moreover, so much which she had, for once in her life, finally learned to appreciate.
And it wasn’t lost on her that this one night of joyful reunion was almost certainly the last one they could ever have like this. The last time they would all be together. The last time that all the faces in this room would still be here to celebrate as one.
Because they wouldn’t be alive much longer.
The reality was, the whole galaxy was at war. And it was a war they were currently losing. Their chances of victory were slim to none. From what Miranda had gathered, all organic life was essentially banking its hopes on some ancient miracle superweapon passed down from previous cycles called The Crucible that they didn’t even fully understand or know how to use yet. And if that failed?
...There wasn’t a plan B. Not yet, at least.
Even if The Crucible worked and they somehow defeated the Reapers, the chance that more than a handful of people in this room would survive the war was infinitesimally small. And, perhaps more than anyone else at that party, Miranda had no expectation that she would be among the living when the dust settled. Because Miranda had never been happier than she was right then. Never had more to live for. And if that wasn’t a curse that put her right at the top of the list of ‘most likely to die’, then she was not only naive, but delusional.
The universe was a cruel place. The people who had the most to live for were always the first to die. There was no way that Miranda could rationally believe that the future she now saw for herself and Ori after the war might ever actually come to fruition. Because, if there was one thing that Miranda’s thirty-six years had taught her, it was that she would never get to be that fucking happy.
Things like that just didn’t happen. Especially not to people like her.
Or, if they did, then they shouldn’t.
Seeing what Cerberus had become, knowing she’d spent just shy of twenty years of her life working for them? No, she didn’t deserve a good ending.
As that thought went through her head, Miranda glanced up, and spotted a singular, solitary figure standing alone by the second floor balcony, watching the scenes playing out below. Samara. Somehow, that she was by herself was the least shocking thing Miranda could have imagined.
Finally sensing her long-awaited chance to catch a private moment with the one person she had been more eager to spend time with than any other, Miranda ascended the stairs, a glass of wine curled in her grasp.
“Not mingling?” Miranda asked as she joined Samara’s side.
“I am content to observe,” Samara replied, maintaining an upright posture with her hands clasped behind her back. She seemed to mean it, preferring to watch and listen from a distance than to be directly involved in the action for the most part. Considering she was about four hundred years out-of-practice when it came to this sort of thing, being a passive onlooker probably genuinely was the most enjoyable way for her to experience this party at her own pace.
“Normally, I would do the same.” Miranda leaned on the railing beside her.
“Yet you appear to be enjoying the festivities,” Samara noted, pleased with that.
“I know. It feels incongruous, doesn’t it? Me, being social? A year ago I would have been telling you all to stop wasting time and focus on the mission,” said Miranda, finding it rather bizarre to consider how far she'd come from the cold, aloof person she was previously. Well, not that she couldn't still be those things. But she was less so now. Especially among this dysfunctional bunch of misfits she had reluctantly become fond of, despite her better judgement.
Being part of The Normandy crew had changed her irrevocably. More than she'd realised at the time. Meeting her sister had done that too. And Samara, of course. And so had losing all those things when she went on the run. It made her appreciate aspects of life she wouldn't have otherwise.
It was almost enough to make her call them all her friends. Even Jack.
...Almost.
“You do not need to deprive yourself for my sake,” Samara assured her, gesturing towards the party going on beneath them, as if believing Miranda was only approaching her out of a sense of obligation to ensure she didn't feel excluded.
“I'm not. I enjoy your company. I always have.” Nothing had changed in that respect. No matter how much time had passed, Miranda would never feel any less at ease in Samara’s presence. She just had that effect on her. A vague smirk came to her as she thought back on the last time they spoke, toying with her wine glass. “I was right, you know?” she said, recalling her own words from all those many months ago. “I did miss you more than anyone else.”
“Even Shepard?” Samara inquired, her lip quirking with amusement.
“Even Shepard,” Miranda confirmed, taking a sip. “Don't pass this on, but Shepard was always barging into my office when I had a lot to do. Ask Garrus and he'll tell you the same thing about his calibrations.” She gestured to their comrade, currently setting up a number of glasses on the bar, resembling a firing range. That was going to end badly. “That was something I always liked about you.”
“What was?” asked Samara.
“You might be the only person I've ever met who never wanted anything from me,” Miranda explained, having had plenty of time to think about that in her loneliest moments this past year. “Not to be presumptuous, but it wasn’t because you simply didn't care, or wanted to get rid of me. You just...accepted me, as I was. I never felt as though I had to earn your approval, whether through my usefulness, or my accomplishments, or even through keeping you entertained with conversation. I could just...do nothing around you – literally, just sit there and say nothing in your presence, and that was fine with you.”
That was no exaggeration. They had spent hours together in serene silence, or in meditation. Maybe more than they had spent talking. It never mattered what they chose to do. One was never any more or less welcome than the other.
“It was,” Samara confirmed, her voice soft and reflective. “And, no, you are not being presumptuous. You may be more forthright than I am about such things, but, if I ever desired to be left alone, believe me, I would not have made a secret of it.”
“Ah, good, so you weren’t secretly dreading it whenever I showed up because you were too polite to tell me to bugger off this entire time,” Miranda joked. She already knew that, of course, but it was nice to have it on record.
“I am unfamiliar with that term. But no, I was not,” Samara answered kindly. “I would be a fool not to value your abilities. The things you have accomplished are remarkable, let alone what you have yet to achieve. But such things are only possible because of who you are. That is what is truly important. And I asked nothing of you, because I already enjoyed your companionship.”
Miranda wasn’t prone to blushing like an idiot, but it took an uncharacteristic amount of effort not to glow at such sincere praise. “You aren’t so bad yourself,” Miranda wryly replied, gently nudging Samara with her shoulder.
“No, I am terribly dull. I assure you, I am aware of this,” Samara replied, a self-effacing smile tugging at the corners of her lips at the misplaced compliment.
Miranda snorted at that assertion. “Are you kidding? You were the only one out of this lot I found even remotely interesting to talk to most days. And, considering the company we keep, that’s saying something,” she said, indicating their cohorts below, who included some of the most famous heroes and infamous outlaws in the galaxy. “You’re one of the most fascinating people I’ve ever met. Besides, I owe a lot to your wisdom and advice. More than you know.”
“It pleases me that you feel that way. However, if I may, I do not consider myself especially wise,” Samara humbly responded, downplaying her role. “If I appear so, it is only because experience has taught me one lesson that can make even the most dimwitted person appear well-considered in their thoughts, and that is to speak as little as possible, until I have something worthwhile to say.”
“See? That’s the most intelligent thing I’ve heard all evening,” Miranda pointed out, earning a faint chuckle from Samara. “In all seriousness, though, I really have been looking forward to catching up with you.”
“And I you. Much has come to pass since last we met. For both of us, I suspect,” Samara reflected, as if she had often wondered in her journeys where her friends were, how they were faring, or what they might be doing. Miranda knew, because she had done the exact same thing. “If it would not trouble you to share it--”
“I killed my father,” Miranda nonchalantly answered, filling in the gaps of what had transpired over the past few months before Samara could even ask her to, bringing up the subject about as casually as she might remark on the weather.
“Good,” Samara enthused, without a hint of hesitation. She didn’t even need to ask whether or not he deserved it. She already knew the answer.
That Samara took it so in stride almost made Miranda laugh. That exchange would have sounded so bizarre out of context. “Couldn’t have happened to a nicer man,” Miranda commented, taking another drink from her glass, nearing half-empty. “So, yeah, I’ve gone from having the absolute worst year of my life so far to feeling pretty bloody wonderful, if I’m being honest.”
“I am glad to hear you say that. However, if I may...are you sure you are alright?” Samara asked with the warmth and gentleness Miranda had come to expect from her. Although her own experiences with Morinth were very different, no doubt they gave her an insight that, irrespective of how much Miranda hated her father or how justified she was in her actions, killing the man who had been her only family for sixteen years of her life might unearth some complicated feelings. “It would be no failure on your part whatsoever if you are not.”
“Yeah. I’m fine. Believe me, if there was any small part of me left that might have wanted to let him live, or might have felt something resembling an attachment to him, that part of me died the moment he hurt my sister,” Miranda declared, her voice unwavering. She glanced down. “Unfortunately, I...should have gotten there sooner. Oriana’s adoptive parents weren’t spared. They didn’t make it.”
“I am sorry,” Samara said, her sympathy sincere. “Is there anything you could reasonably have done to prevent this from happening?”
“No, probably not,” Miranda acknowledged. She had been fighting so hard just to survive some days. To stay one step ahead of The Illusive Man and his agents. She’d kept an eye on her as best she could, but it hadn’t been possible to watch over her and protect her the way she used to from such a position of powerlessness. She hadn’t even known she was in danger until it was too late.
“Then you must not blame yourself,” Samara encouraged, ever the voice of compassionate wisdom. “If your actions could not realistically have changed anything that transpired, then you cannot be held responsible.”
“I suppose not,” Miranda conceded, staring down at her glass.
More than anything else, Miranda hated that feeling of helplessness. Knowing that Oriana had suffered and felt pain she never wanted her to experience, and there was nothing she could do to shield her from it. She would have traded her own life in a heartbeat to take it all away and wind back the clock for Ori and her family, if it were within her power. But such things weren’t. It couldn’t be undone. It couldn’t be fixed. They just had to keep moving forward.
“Enough about me. How about you?” Miranda changed the subject. “I tried to keep tabs on everyone but...you are a hard woman to find, Samara.”
“That is my way,” Samara affirmed, calm and quiet. “I have no possessions, but that which you see before you. And I often journey through very remote places.”
“You’re off-the-grid,” Miranda translated. Certainly, Samara was about as disconnected from galactic society and unplugged from the network as it was possible to be in this day and age, short of eschewing those things completely.
“You could say that, yes,” Samara gave a firm nod, accepting that description. She stepped away from the balcony, gesturing with her hand as she spoke. “You may not know this, but there are villages in remote parts of asari space where people have...returned to a simpler way of being, rejecting modernity and embracing tradition in every facet of life. Even though their ancestors may have come to those worlds by spaceflight, they prefer to live as their predecessors did thousands of years ago. It would not be an exaggeration for me to state that several such places I have visited recently would still not currently be aware there is a war going on as we speak, and would never have heard the term ‘Reaper’.”
“Doesn’t sound that strange. There are people and places on Earth that haven’t changed at all in the past two hundred years, if not longer. As long as they aren’t holding back social and scientific progress for anyone else, why force them to adapt?” Miranda shrugged. If people wanted to stay stuck in the past, that was their business. She would happily continue moving forward and enjoy all the trappings and privileges of modern life that they rejected.
“...I have always liked such places, at least since I became a Justicar. They remind me of my temple somewhat,” Samara confessed, her eyes losing focus, drifting into thoughtful contemplation. “Just as there is tranquility in being surrounded by nature, there is truly no wiser woman than she who is content with her life, however humble it may seem. Would that we could all achieve such harmony.”
The hint of sombreness in Samara’s final words wasn’t lost on Miranda.
“Speaking for myself, give me twenty-second century technology any day,” Miranda remarked, both because it was true, but partly in an effort to lighten the atmosphere. It wasn’t clear whether Samara even heard her, in all honesty. “So where did you go after that?” Miranda asked casually. Given that she was here, she must have run into Shepard again somehow.
At those words, a sudden flicker of sorrow passed across her features. Samara turned away, one hand falling across her face, as if struck by a surge of sadness, and needing a moment to collect herself.
Needless to say, that reaction definitely didn’t escape Miranda. She moved closer to Samara, concerned. “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”
Samara summoned a heartbroken smile as she looked up at her once more. “Forgive me. My thoughts turned to the day I encountered Shepard,” she began, a hard story to tell. “I heard that the monastery where my daughters were taken four centuries ago had issued a distress signal, and none who had been sent to investigate had returned. As soon as I knew they were in peril, I did not hesitate. I had to go to them. I feared the worst, and my fears were not misplaced. The Reapers were indoctrinating Ardat-Yakshi, turning them into…” Samara couldn’t even say it. There weren’t words to describe those creatures.
Miranda listened to her recount the events in heavy, dread-filled silence. Nobody had told her that. She had no idea about any of this.
“Fortunately, both Shepard and I arrived in time to rescue Falere from that fate. However, we were not quick enough. I lost...I lost Rila.” Samara’s voice caught in her throat, choked by a sob as she relived the all-too-raw pain of her death.
Her oldest daughter. Gone.
Miranda’s heart sank. “Samara, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know,” she said with heartfelt remorse. Miranda never would have brought this up if she had suspected anything had happened to what little family Samara still had left. Why hadn’t anybody said anything? Why had no one told her about this?
“No, it is…” Samara shook her head, raising a hand as if to signal that it was not her fault for inadvertently touching upon an open wound. As if she thought the only misstep made was her own for letting grief cloud the moment, when she had so much still to be thankful for. “I should not. Not today.”
Miranda didn’t quite know what to make of that reaction, but if Samara didn’t want to talk about the death of her child, she couldn’t exactly blame her. She certainly wouldn’t force her to.
Their moment of quiet was interrupted by glass shattering somewhere below.
“Oh, God,” Miranda groaned miserably, getting the sense that the boys were in fact about to break out the guns and start shooting after all. She was not particularly keen to be near them when that happened. “Do you want to go somewhere a little quieter?” Miranda asked, thinking that would be best.
“As you wish,” Samara replied, gesturing for her to go ahead, composing herself as she followed in Miranda’s footsteps. With that, they retreated into Shepard's bedroom, seeing that it appeared empty.
Out of the corner of her eye, Miranda glimpsed something. Shepard's closet was open, but the clothes were shifting ever so slightly as they hung there. Hmm. She had a fair idea what was causing that. However, this wasn't the time to address it. Not when this moment with Samara could be one of the last they ever had. She made a mental note to file her theory away for a little later.
Ignoring the disturbance, Miranda stepped inside. She supposed they could have sat on the bed, but, somehow, that just didn't seem fitting. “Here, for old time's sake,” she said, sitting down on the floor, her legs crossed, patting a spot beside her. “I know the view isn't as good, but—“
“I have spent many years gazing out over the stars, and I will see them again before my days are at an end,” Samara interrupted Miranda, joining her by her side, mirroring her posture. “In comparison, I have spent far less time with you. This is more worthy, do you not agree?”
“Definitely.” Miranda glanced down, having reflected on that sort of thing a lot recently. “Cutting myself off from...everything like I did made me appreciate the value of how I spend my limited time in this universe. I’ve come to understand what I want to do with my life, after all this is done. Assuming there is an ‘after’. And it turns out you were right, but you probably already knew that.”
“I...do not,” Samara replied, mildly perplexed. “If I said something in the past that you are referring to, I am afraid that I do not recall it.”
That happened a lot, Miranda thought. She had a near-perfect memory, by human standards. It felt entirely natural to her to harken back to conversations that had taken place long ago as if they’d happened only yesterday when, almost invariably, by that stage, the other party had forgotten them completely.
“You remember how you would encourage me to concentrate less on devoting all my energy to my work and other external achievements and to focus more on my inner development instead? Well, you asked me once which of those two things ultimately has greater meaning to me,” Miranda refreshed her memory.
“That does sound like something I would say,” Samara acknowledged, certainly remembering words to that effect, even if a few more specific details had faded.
“You did. And you were right,” Miranda continued. “I had a lot of time to myself these past several months. Completely to myself. And when that crushing isolation was just starting to tip me over the edge, I thought of you. I thought of us, our time together. And so I tried my hand at meditating again. It succeeded at calming me down and clearing my head but, more importantly, finding that state of tranquility gave me the first chance I’d had since leaving Cerberus to really stop and think about my life, and the direction it was heading, even before this.”
Samara’s expression revealed she knew that epiphany all too well, as if she had undergone something similar in her own life. Possibly more than once. It was no wonder she considered meditation such an essential facet of her existence.
“Serenity is the key to mindfulness. The only key. Even the simplest truths are often lost to us in the noise and chaos of life, or clouded by impenetrable shadows of anger and despair,” Samara spoke sagely, from the benefit of experience.
That was the truest and most astute thing Miranda had heard anyone say in a long time. And beautifully poetic. And, as she looked at Samara then, Miranda had to once again wonder how she could possibly believe herself to be dull or unwise, even if she had only made those disparaging remarks about herself in jest.
“What came to you in the silence?” Samara prompted, keen to hear it.
“I thought of the person I was before I met you, and, out of nowhere, it suddenly hit me - really hit me - that all that time I spent working for Cerberus was...wasted. It meant nothing. And I knew it meant nothing because all I could think was that, if Cerberus did catch up to me and kill me, then I would be leaving behind absolutely nothing that I could look back on and say, ‘Yeah, you know what? I’m satisfied with that.’ Not one thing. Except for bringing Shepard back, but any contentment I feel about that has less to do with me, and more to do with Shepard.”
“Because you were never satisfied with anything you produced,” Samara intuited, sensing what Miranda had come to terms with. “Nothing could ever truly meet your own unattainable standards that you set for yourself. And no amount of work could ever fill the void that you felt inside. A void that festered because you were...completely avoiding focusing on your inner life.”
“Yes, I was. And, no, it couldn’t fill it,” Miranda confirmed, seeing now what she had been too distracted to see before. “And, although I didn’t realise it at the time, I really did not like the person I was when I was working for them. I was not happy. I thought I was, compared to the life I had before. But, in actuality, I wasn’t any less trapped with them than I was with my father. I was like Shepard’s stupid hamster, running in a wheel, doing the same things over and over again, thinking I was getting somewhere, but going nowhere. Deep down, I was...I was fucking miserable. And...honestly, I think I was lonely.”
Samara watched on, her eyes glistening with unfeigned sympathy and understanding. “I gathered as much,” Samara admitted, barely above a whisper. Miranda wasn’t surprised to hear her say that. She wasn’t sure at precisely what point it had occurred to her to suspect that Samara’s spiritual intervention in her life might be intentional, but she’d made no secret of her guidance.
“I’m glad you noticed, because I never would have. It was you who gave me that gentle push that made me re-examine what I was doing with my life, how badly I was treating myself, and reflect on what really mattered to me,” said Miranda. Hell, Samara had known what Miranda was missing better than she knew it herself. “So, as I was having this moment of insight and meditating on all those things you said to me, it made me think, maybe the path I’ve been taking until now isn't what's fulfilling to me. That's why, once the Reapers are defeated, if I make it out alive...I think I'm done,” she stated frankly, shrugging her shoulders.
“Done?” Samara echoed, curious as to her meaning.
“Done being that person,” Miranda clarified. “Done leading my life that way. Or at least I’ll try to be someone different for a while, until I figure out what I really want to do now that there’s nobody controlling me anymore. I'm not planning to be a puppet for another shadowy organisation. I'm not going to go off on some grand mission to save the galaxy. I’m not going to spend sixteen hours a day hunched over my computer screen, stressing over worthless administrative tasks to meet the arbitrary standards of people who don’t care at all if my crippling addiction to perfectionism sends me to an early grave,” Miranda announced, voicing that commitment aloud as though it were a vow. “If I’m finally going to take charge of my own life, then I'm going to focus on what's most important to me.”
“And what is that?” Samara asked, suspecting she already knew.
“My sister,” Miranda answered without hesitation. Oriana was her be all and end all. Whether she knew it or not, she always had been, ever since she was brought into this world. She made Miranda feel complete, or as close to whole as she had ever felt, anyway. “I made a promise to her that, when this is over, we're going to find some nice, quiet place on a colony world and start living our lives together as a family. And that's the only thing I want to do. The only thing I know will make me happy. I don't care about anything else.”
“You are...retiring?” Samara inferred, tilting her head in questioning.
“In a manner of speaking, I guess you could say that,” Miranda affirmed. As she glanced over at Samara then, it wasn’t lost on her that, while she was clearly impressed with the level of growth Miranda was demonstrating, suffice it to say that there was a hint of scepticism. “What?” Miranda prompted her, always preferring people to be direct rather than refrain from speaking.
“Forgive me. It delights me to hear that you have chosen a path which you believe will bring you inner fulfilment, but...with greatest respect, after our many conversations, I find it difficult to imagine you content with embracing idleness,” Samara noted with interest, even though she obviously supported her decision. She knew it drove Miranda crazy when she didn’t have enough work to do. She was perpetually busy, by choice. She hated being bored more than anything.
“No, I'm not saying I’ll be idle. I mean, I am only thirty-six, and...well, you've seen what I'm like,” Miranda conceded that fault, aware of her workaholic tendencies. She didn’t expect those qualities to fade, and she wasn’t sure it would be a good thing if they did. They were part of her personality. “But the point is that I’ve been doing the exact same thing for twenty years and getting nothing in return - except money, I guess. Before that, I was my father’s prisoner. I’ve never had the chance to be my own woman. I need a clean break. A hard reset. To steer things in a new direction. I need some time to...do or be something else, for the first time in my life. I need to…” She trailed off, struggling for the right words.
“Find yourself?” Samara suggested.
“Something like that,” Miranda confirmed. She’d never had a chance to discover herself and her identity except insofar as it related to her upbringing, or to her career with Cerberus. What else was there? Who was Miranda Lawson when she wasn’t working? Or wasn’t busy solving all the galaxy’s problems?
She would have loved to know. It was a shame she wouldn’t get to live long enough to meet that person. But, God, did it feel good to live in denial, and allow herself to hope, for just one night.
“I don't know how long this experiment will last, or what this phase of my life will look like,” Miranda continued, “And I'm sure that at some point in time I'm going to find ways to keep myself productive, because I probably can't do otherwise. But, whatever I decide to do with my time and my skills, I'll be doing it of my own volition. Not because I'm tethered to anybody else. Not because somebody else is running my life and telling me what to do. It will be because I took time to think about it, and found a way to devote myself to something that actually makes me feel good when I do it. Whatever that ends up being.”
That was the core of it, when it came down to it. She wanted to be her own master. To have control over her own life. To be her own boss. Wanted the freedom to cut ties with anyone or anything that was toxic to her quest for self-actualisation.
“Either way, from now on, all those other things are going to be secondary, because my family is my priority. Oriana is,” Miranda professed, and that was immutable. “And, while I already knew that, you helped me realise what that means. So thank you for that.”
“If I was able to be of any assistance, then seeing you embrace your innermost desires is thanks enough. I am glad that you and your sister have found one another,” Samara said, her sincere smile reaching her eyes. “Truly, you have come so far from when I first met you. Wherever your path takes you, I wish you nothing but happiness. And I hope you both lead very long and peaceful lives.”
“Don’t we all?” Miranda remarked. That was the hard part, though. The entire galaxy was under attack by genocidal, unknowable cosmic horrors. But nobody wanted to think about them right now. Not tonight. “What about you and Falere?” Miranda asked, hoping she wasn’t treading on too sensitive ground by asking that question. “Will you do the same with her?”
“...I cannot; my adherence to The Code does not end with the salvation of the galaxy,” said Samara. Though it was clear she accepted that, her response left her visibly conflicted. No doubt, she wished it could have been otherwise. “I am the last of my Order. When I perish, so do the Justicars perish with me. It may seem futile to continue to walk this path when there is no one left to demand it of me, but I must. I must, for those who can no longer walk it with me.”
Samara’s devout pledge carried a hint of sadness, but it was well-camouflaged. What she personally wanted was irrelevant, ever since she'd renounced her former life and sworn her service to the Justicars. Being their sole living legacy only further cemented what had already been true. She wouldn't turn her back on her obligations, no matter how tempting it was to savour every moment she could with her daughter. She could never forgive herself if she did.
“However, I have also promised Falere that I will return, if I survive – when I am able,” Samara continued, though her tone did not change. It remained distant. Almost resigned. Layered in over four hundred years of history between them.
Miranda couldn’t quite make sense of the mixed emotions she sensed in Samara’s voice. Perhaps she was disappointed that they couldn’t be as close as she would like - that there were restrictions standing in the way of them fully reuniting in the same kind of way Miranda and Oriana had. Falere was still an Ardat-Yakshi, after all; she could never live a normal life. It was too dangerous.
“But you will see her? You will have a life together?” Miranda surmised, in a subtle attempt to encourage Samara to think of her circumstances more positively.
“...Yes,” Samara answered hesitantly, deciding that was indeed true, in part.
“Then, if both of us have reasons to survive, I don't like the Reapers' chances,” Miranda spoke with false confidence. If she said it with enough self-assuredness, perhaps she might actually start to believe it. But she wasn’t trying to convince herself. Only Samara. “If we've said we're going to do these things, then we already know what the outcome of this war has to be.”
Samara didn't share in her display of bravado, but she did appreciate her sentiment. “Though I am not afraid of death, I certainly have found a great deal more to live for than I ever thought I would have again...” Samara trailed off at that thought, her eyes briefly drifting out of focus, almost pensive in her reflection.
“Here's to living,” said Miranda, raising her mostly empty glass in a salute, finishing the last of her drink.
At that, Samara shook herself from whatever temporary trance had come over her. “Yes. Indeed. As you once said to me, I will…’see you on the other side’,” Samara echoed Miranda’s words from The Collector Base, nodding her head in agreement. There was nothing more worthy of affirmation than the desire to emerge from the ashes when all this was over. “The hour grows late, and I fear I have kept you too long. Do you wish to return to the festivities?”
“You go on ahead,” Miranda encouraged. “And don’t just sit in a corner and meditate all night. Go...fucking have fun, Samara. You deserve it.”
Samara uttered a soft chuckle. “I am not entirely sure what that means, but if you are insistent, then...I will try to avail myself. The atmosphere is certainly...energetic,” she commented, as if sounding faintly overwhelmed by the party.
Miranda didn’t need to be a genius to recognise that it had been a long, long, long, long (too many longs to possibly put into a sentence) time since Samara would have experienced anything like this. The young Samara she had heard tales of had definitely been a wild child, but she had ceased to be that person even before her personal tragedy befell her. As a Justicar, she had been travelling alone, in total solitude, for over four hundred years, barely even speaking to anyone for most of that time, except as required to carry out her duties.
How many centuries had it been since she was able to get together like this with a group of friends? Since she even had a group of friends? Since she...relaxed and unwound? It was no wonder that, so far, she seemed content to watch from the sidelines more than actively participate in the unfolding chaos.
Still a little sad, though. At least from where Miranda was sitting.
“Will you join me?” Samara asked, extending her hand as she got to her feet.
“In a bit,” Miranda declined. “There's something I have to take care of first.”
Samara didn't ask what Miranda meant by that, respecting her decision. “Very well. May we speak again soon,” she said, taking her leave and rejoining the others.
Once Samara was gone, Miranda uttered a faint disgruntled sigh. “I know you're there, Kasumi,” she said, annoyed. “Samara may not have noticed, but I did.”
“Aw, what gave it away?” Kasumi playfully whined, de-cloaking in front of Shepard's closet.
“The movement as you rifled through those clothes,” Miranda answered plainly.
“Ooh, you're good,” Kasumi acknowledged. Most people wouldn't have seen it.
“Genetic enhancements. Superior vision. You've heard this story,” Miranda explained, waving that nonsense away. She elected not to ask what Kasumi was doing by rifling through Shepard’s clothes. That was the least unusual thing about this. “So, were you riveted by our conversation?” she asked.
“Actually, yes,” Kasumi replied, her answer apparently unfeigned. “Samara wasn’t kidding; you really have changed your perspective for the better. This new you, it's nice. You seem happy. I hope everything works out for you and your sister.”
Miranda couldn't quite manage to be cross with her after that kind response. “Yeah, well...I’ll never hear the end of it if the crew thinks I’ve gone soft and sentimental, so don’t go telling anyone. Besides, I haven't changed so much that I won't be capable of making your life hell if you let word of this spread around,” Miranda idly threatened, not meaning it at all.
Kasumi lost any trace of heartfelt sincerity after that. “On the other hand, I was also enthralled because I thought your little love session was going to end with you and Samara christening Shep's sheets,” she teased.
Miranda arched an eyebrow. Her and Samara? How absurd. “Of all the comebacks you could make...Really? A gay joke? In this day and age? What century are you from?” Honestly, it was the lack of creativity and wit that disappointed her more than anything. Kasumi was normally funnier than this.
“Who’s joking?” Kasumi wryly replied. “I was going to take bets from the others on which one of you topped. I picked you, for the record.”
Miranda snorted, not even humouring this nonsense. “Sure. If you say so.”
“Be dismissive if you want, but I was right across the hall from Samara. I overheard more than one of your conversations. I know nobody else knows how much time you spent together, but I do. Besides, Shepard has it all wrong; Samara's a much better match for you than Jack would ever be,” Kasumi nonchalantly commented.
Miranda sighed heavily and let her head fall in her hand, massaging her forehead in visible annoyance. “What is it with everyone tonight--”
As soon as Miranda began to utter the question, she found that Kasumi had already cloaked herself and disappeared, leaving her by herself. Miranda rolled her eyes, not even slightly shocked. Kasumi had done that to everyone all night.
Seriously, though, why was everyone suddenly so intent on getting her to sleep with women at this party? They knew she was straight, right?
* * *
Drip.
Drip.
She stirred at the disturbance. Her right eye flickered open, but the other didn’t respond. Twisted metal and exposed wires loomed over her against the backdrop of an empty sky.
Drip.
Drip.
A body hung out of the seat above her. Half a body. A cracked ribcage visibly protruded from a burned uniform. Entrails dangled from the open corpse. Droplets of blood ran down a lifeless arm swaying limp in the light breeze.
Drip.
Drip.
Miranda had been here before. So many times. But this time, she was frozen in place. Trapped. Stuck. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t shift her body. Could only feel the blood and the viscera. It surrounded her. She was practically floating in a pool of it beneath her.
It was still warm.
Drip.
Drip.
She could taste copper in her mouth. She was covered in sanguine from head to toe. She wasn’t sure how much was hers, and how much was the pilot’s.
Drip.
Drip.
Her eyelid fluttered as a drop landed directly in her iris. As she blinked, she noticed something she’d never seen before. The pilot’s neck was bent back the wrong way. But there was a head. Half a head. Split clean open. Down the middle.
Her helmet had come off, exposing blonde hair. Stained with a crimson mask.
Drip.
Drip.
Miranda’s instincts reacted before she did. Her heart began to race - her pulse quickening with a deep, abiding dread. Adrenaline surged through her veins. And she didn’t know why. Until she saw.
Until she saw the body above her move.
Drip.
Drip.
That bent-backwards broken spine shifted consciously. And, with a wilful snap, suddenly that limp neck was above her. Hanging. That half-skull hovered directly over her. Looking at her. Appraising her.
Drip.
Drip.
Miranda tensed with the urge to fight or flee, but she was frozen in place, as if made of stone. She couldn’t move a single part of her body below her neck.
Drip.
Drip.
That torn face, broken in two, shifted back and forth, as if studying Miranda. Examining her. Asking itself…why did this stranger live, when I died?
Drip.
Drip.
With one click of a button to release her harness, the pilot dropped to the floor, freed from her restraints. Miranda could only watch as that unliving corpse of the woman blasted in half by the Reaper unnaturally positioned itself above her. Then the thing looked over to one side. Its eye was fixed on Miranda’s left arm.
Her wounded limb hung like dead weight from her shoulder. Fractured. Lifeless. Her forearm was twisted around completely the wrong way from the elbow down. Miranda couldn’t so much as twitch her fingers in self-defence.
Drip.
Drip.
Without warning, it seized her left hand.
“Ah!” Miranda gasped in pain, but couldn’t fight her off. Couldn’t move.
All she could do was lie there helplessly and watch as this dead creature lifted her broken, mangled arm. She willed herself not to scream from how much it hurt. Not to give it the satisfaction of breaking her.
Drip.
Drip.
The pilot stared down at her, unmoved by her anguish. It felt nothing.
It never broke eye contact with her as it lifted her backwards-twisted hand towards itself. Until Miranda’s fingers were almost touching that split-open face.
Miranda would have resisted if she could, but it felt like her arm would rip clean in half at the elbow if she pulled back with even the slightest force.
Drip.
Drip.
And then the pilot opened her mouth.
And a river of maggots came pouring out.
Wriggling.
Writhing.
Miranda could do nothing except watch as those horrible, crawling larvae spread from her fingers, down her palm, and to her wrist. And everywhere they touched, her flesh was consumed with rot. Infection. Disease. Death.
She could smell it.
She could fucking smell it.
And they just kept coming.
Drip.
Drip.
Some of the vile things fell onto her abdomen, there were so many of them. And the rot took hold there too. Turning her skin sickly septic. Pestilent. Necrotic.
The pilot let go of her arm, letting it fall to the floor as the maggots swarmed her.
That half-body reached down and grabbed a fistful of the squirming things that were feasting on her still living corpse. It held that pulsating mass above her.
Drip.
Drip.
“No,” was all Miranda could say, knowing what it intended.
But there was nothing she could say that would stop it.
Drip.
Drip.
It shoved that handful of maggots directly onto her face.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Instinctively, Miranda reached over and slapped the alarm off before anyone else would hear it. The next thing she did was bite down on her pillow to keep from screaming, or vomiting, stifling the lingering echoes of her nightmare.
Once the panic subsided, Miranda flopped onto her back, catching her breath.
Four forty-five in the morning.
This had been her bright idea to get some sorely-needed rest. She’d set her alarm to go off every half hour - to wake her before she could dream. It worked for the first three cycles. That was the fourth. Another failed solution. Another plan that hadn’t helped. Every time she slept, it was hell. It was always hell.
Miranda lay there in darkness, staring at the ceiling, listening to her ear ring. At least she’d got two hours before the nightmares struck this time. Thank Christ for that small mercy. But she was still so tired. She was so fucking tired.
Miranda could run on far less sleep than the average human. Persevere longer before frayed edges started to show. But even she had limits on what she could withstand. The longer this went on, the harder it got just to function.
How long did she have before she was physically incapable of staying awake?
Miranda had given up trying to pass time during the night. With anything. Didn’t use her computer. Didn’t read. Didn’t listen to music. Didn’t go out for walks by the river. Didn’t do any of the things she turned to in the past.
It was all so...boring. Everything was. Every single thing in her life that she used to use as a crutch to ward off these dreams had lost its lustre. Nothing was worth the effort of doing anymore. Expending the energy. All she had to keep herself awake anymore were her thoughts. And that sound.
That relentless
Fucking
Sound.
Days bled together in a blur. It almost didn’t feel like the past few hours had even happened. Fresh memories were like watching scenes from someone else’s life. What little release she’d had from getting off with Shiala earlier that night had already worked its way out of her system. It had been nothing more than a fleeting distraction, which offered scant relief from the problems that plagued her. And now she was back to this. A torment she’d been living with for so long that she no longer even remembered how it felt to be rested.
But thinking about literally anything else was preferable to dwelling on the nightmares, and she could only count the same cracks in the ceiling so many times before that would drive her clinically insane. So Miranda replayed the night in her head, trying to make sense of it all, and where it left her.
If sleeping with Shiala had accomplished one thing, it had proven that her feelings for Samara weren’t just in her head. No, the desire she’d felt when she imagined Samara in Shiala’s place, picturing her body beneath her, had not been some mere delusion. Those physical reactions couldn’t be faked or exaggerated. The sheer fucking want. That was real, vivid, stark, and intense.
So that was just great. After all that, not only had she not managed to convince herself that she was any less in love with Samara, she was now painfully conscious that she was sexually attracted to her. Extremely so.
It was the opposite of what she’d hoped to achieve. Fucking Shiala hadn’t been a release for her feelings. If anything, it had only crystalised them.
It was no wonder why Samara was dominating her thoughts. This obsession with her was about the only thing Miranda could feel at all anymore, outside of her nightmares. When it came to everything else in her life - all the death, the destruction, her own survival, her injuries, and the loss of all but a small handful of people she knew - everything else that should have provoked her to feel something, anything...there was nothing there. A hole. A void. An empty space.
She was just so fucking…
Blank.
Neutral.
Numb.
She couldn’t feel anything at all. Just hollowness. Except when Samara was there. And then, when she looked at her, when she felt her standing by her side, everything got so intense and so achingly real and corporeal that it burned. She came so alive in her proximity that she damn near couldn’t stand it.
But Samara wasn’t there.
She had gone again, leaving her to wilt in the dark.
And there Miranda lay. Staring at the ceiling. Avoiding her dreams. Listening to her ear ring. And she felt dead inside. Like every breath she took, she wasn’t getting enough air. Like she was asphyxiating, bit by bit. Suffocating so slowly that nobody would even notice if she simply stopped breathing. Not even herself.
But what the hell did she have to complain about?
She was still here.
Millions of others weren’t so lucky. Hell, billions.
As her mind began to wander in the way that minds could only wander when they were desperately tired and teetering on the verge of sleep, she thought about The Normandy. About the shockwave that had destroyed the mass relays, and all ships anywhere near them. The faster-than-light blast that killed her friends.
Miranda hadn’t even been conscious when it happened. She’d only heard descriptions of what it looked like when the Crucible fired. It painted a pretty grim picture. Jacob had told her how he’d seen people standing only a few feet in front of him scream as they disintegrated in front of his very eyes. Torn apart on a cellular level, in a single, bright, flash.
Was that what happened to The Normandy? Had it been sudden? Had they been scared, in their last moments? Had they felt pain? Did they even know that they were in danger? That they were going to die? Or did they just...blink out of existence, blissfully quickly?
Did it matter?
People didn’t go anywhere when they died. There was no soul. No afterlife. No heaven. No hell. There was just...nothing. People were, and then they weren’t.
They would never even find any trace of them, would they? They would never have anything to bury or lay to rest. Even reading out their names as she had done hadn’t added a sense of catharsis or closure to it. It still didn’t feel entirely real, even though Miranda knew it had to be. The Normandy would have either reported in or been found by now if anyone had survived.
And then she thought of the people who were serving aboard The Normandy when it disappeared. People she had spoken to only a few months ago - a mere matter of days before the battle for Earth. People she would never speak to again. People she probably hadn’t earned the right to call her friends.
Tali, Miranda had never had a problem with. They only talked when it was directly related to the ship or the mission, which had been an ideal working relationship from her perspective. She wasn’t on The Normandy to make friends. That wasn’t something she wanted or thought she needed back then. It was only around the time of Shepard’s party on the Citadel that Miranda had finally begun to twig that Tali actually did not like her at all, and never had. To her credit, she had simply been far too professional to let it show, or interfere with her job.
That was perfectly fine, honestly. And, if Tali really did hate Miranda this whole time, that made her not a bad judge of character, in fairness. She hadn’t realised it about herself when they served together but, in truth, Miranda hadn’t liked herself all that much either. Still didn’t, on some level.
Garrus, by contrast, was notoriously snarky and sarcastic towards her. She’d never thought turians could smirk before, but Garrus had proven they could. He would meet her commands with smart-arse quips and a wry glint in his eye. He never took Miranda’s shit. Needless to say, she hadn’t been his biggest fan because of that but, in retrospect, she couldn’t blame him. With the gift of hindsight, she now recognised she had been pretty intolerable to be around at times. If she’d had a better sense of humour, they could have traded some witty banter. But the old Miranda took herself far too seriously for that.
Liara, Miranda had met earlier than any other member of The Normandy, save Jacob. Miranda had enlisted her help to retrieve Shepard’s body from the Shadow Broker, before it fell into the hands of the Collectors. It was strange to think that that brief crossing of their paths had set all subsequent events in motion.
Miranda had been so focused on her own goals at that time that she never formed particularly strong impressions of Liara, beyond a mixture of respect for her capabilities, tinged with appropriate suspicion and mistrust. That mistrust had mostly faded through a combination of being there when Liara took down the Shadow Broker, and perhaps more importantly from getting to know Shepard well enough to trust her judgement about the company she kept.
She didn’t know Liara well enough to speculate as to whether she shared that sentiment. Miranda rarely cared to ponder others’ opinions of her. Presumably Shepard didn’t have quite as many positive things to say about Miranda as she did about Liara, given their relationship. But they’d never had any issues.
James, Javik and Ashley, Miranda obviously didn’t know. She’d barely been introduced to them, really only meeting them when Shepard threw that party. She hadn’t formed particularly noteworthy opinions of any of them, beyond that James was a bit of a meathead (albeit, a fairly charming one), Ashley was what happened when the quintessential military brat grew up and became a soldier, and Javik was coping with being the loneliest man in the universe by staying alive through the sheer burning willpower to avenge the destruction of his people.
Then again, maybe she was wrong about them.
Joker and EDI, though, Miranda definitely knew. Joker had never been shy when it came to talking shit about everyone on the ship. Miranda was no exception, although he was more cautious about her than most, given that she scared the crap out of him. Still, that hadn’t stopped him from spending an entire week humming the Wicked Witch of the West theme every time Miranda approached - a reference Miranda hadn’t understood (because of course she didn’t) until Jacob explained it to her, which led to her swiftly putting a stop to that.
And EDI? Well, EDI was The Normandy. The closest thing it had to a soul.
It was difficult to say whether Miranda could truly consider her a ‘person’, but on some level she supposed she did. She did think of her as one. Miranda had always found herself being instinctively polite to EDI, even in moments when she didn’t extend the same politeness to anyone else. But for as calm and helpful as EDI could be, she also had a personality. A sense of humour. Desires. Wants. In some ways, maybe she was more human than Miranda herself.
And then there was Doctor Chakwas, and Gabby and Ken, and Engineer Adams, and Kelly Chambers, and Mess Sergeant Gardener. So many people. So many faces that had become part of her world. She didn’t even like all of them, but they were there. And now they weren’t.
And Shepard.
Where did she even start when it came to Shepard?
Meeting Shepard had changed Miranda’s life on a fundamental level. She’d led by example, and shown her a different way of being. She was the undeniable proof that being kind and empathetic wasn’t a weakness, but a strength. That making friends with the people around her wasn’t a distraction from more important work, but an essential tool she used to build a strong and loyal team.
She was, without exaggeration or qualification, as close to a perfect human being as Miranda had ever met. If humanity strived to be more like Andrea Shepard, then the galaxy would be a better place.
Huh. What would Shepard say if she could see Miranda now?
Do you even miss us?
At all?
Good question, Miranda thought. Was this what it was like? Was this how a normal person was supposed to act when they missed people who had died? Because it didn’t feel that way. If this was a test, she was failing. Despite what Samara had said about there being no correct or incorrect way to grieve, it certainly didn’t feel like she was mourning the right way, whatever that meant.
Do you even care that we’re gone?
You haven’t cried.
Not once.
Not even the faintest sting in your eye.
No, she hadn’t. She’d never really been able to do that. Only Oriana ever brought that out of her. And Miranda wasn’t speaking to her right now. Because she still had nothing positive to say.
At this rate, it wasn’t looking like that was going to change anytime soon.
Miranda lay there in the dark for two more hours, forcing herself not to slip into slumber. It was seven in the morning when she finally willed her weary limbs to get her up and out of bed. She had already heard the pipes going, so she knew some of the kids were awake. Sometimes she got up before them, but she usually waited for them to stir as her signal to stop pretending to sleep. It aroused less suspicion if she wasn’t the first one up every morning. And her ruse must have been working because so far none of them had noticed.
She got up, had her shower, got dressed, and joined the early risers for breakfast.
“Morning, Miss,” Leah Brooks greeted her.
“Morning.” Miranda opened the fridge, her voice slightly hoarse. She stopped, blinking as she glanced back at the students. “...Is that actual fresh milk in the fridge?” she asked, wondering if she was just hallucinating from insomnia.
“Sure is,” Rodriguez confirmed.
“How on Earth do we have that?” said Miranda, on a slight delay.
“Black market,” Rodriguez answered with a shrug.
Miranda gave her a single nod of approval, grabbing the glass bottle. “Good girl.” She was teaching them well. It was worth every credit to have food that didn’t come in powder form whenever they could manage to get their hands on it.
With that, Miranda poured herself a bowl of cereal and joined the kids at the table. They ate in silence for a solid two minutes. Despite not paying the students much mind, she didn’t fail to notice that they were sneaking surreptitious glances at her, and being awkwardly quiet. They were usually chattier. She didn’t ask them what this was about, because she didn’t care. It was always some teenage nonsense with them. As long as it was harmless.
“...Screw it, I’m gonna ask her,” Reiley eventually broke the silence.
“Don’t! Don’t fucking ask her,” Rodriguez warned, hushing her voice as if that would somehow make her imperceptible, even though Miranda was sitting right across the table and could see her and hear every single word uttered between the two of them. “I’ve played this game, it doesn’t go we--”
“Miss…” Reiley began, completely ignoring Rodriguez’s protestations. “Is it true you banged an asari last night?”
Miranda fumbled her spoon.
Fuck.
“First of all, that’s a very inappropriate question,” Miranda responded, not at all impressed with Jack’s students. And she stood by that assessment, even if she knew damn well she was being a giant hypocrite, because she was also prone to asking questions she wanted to know the answers to without caring who she offended in the process. But the key difference there was that she did that to other people, and this was now happening to her. And that was obviously unacceptable. “Secondly, where is this even coming from?”
“I overheard you talking to Mr Taylor last night,” Leah solved that mystery.
At that, Miranda’s normally faultless composure cracked. “You...what?”
“We sleep right there.” Leah pointed at her room. “Voices carry.”
Instead of coming up with some elaborate fiction, which she was far too drained to do, Miranda simply ran her fingers through her hair and uttered a frustrated groan. Damn it, Jacob. She should have guessed at least one of them might be awake and listening through the door when she came home.
“Holy shit. You were right. She did,” said Rodriguez, finding all the proof she needed in Miranda’s reaction, and complete lack of any defence.
Leah made a gesture with her fingers. “I told you. Pay up.”
“You know it's rude to eavesdrop on people,” Miranda pointed out, displeased.
“Pfft. You would do it to us,” Reiley remarked.
“No, I wouldn't. None of you have anything remotely interesting to say,” Miranda countered, going back to her cereal, seeing little point in denying the truth, although there was no way in hell she was going to divulge anything further.
“Yeah, well, if we did, you would,” Reiley replied with a shrug.
Miranda never liked admitting when other people were right so she didn’t respond.
“Was it Samara?” Rodriguez asked, immensely intrigued, or at least pretending to be for the purposes of screwing with her. “I know I sensed a vibe between the two of you. So were you lying when you said she wasn't your girlfriend?”
Miranda rolled her eye. She hated her life. She hated everything.
“You will run out of cereal eventually, and then you’ll have to talk,” Leah teased.
Miranda fixed her with a one-eyed glare as she ate, making it plain that this pestering would get them precisely nowhere but ignored. She really did wish that Jacob hadn’t made her be nice to these teens. Back when they were intimidated by her, they never would have pulled this stunt.
At that instant, Prangley emerged from his room, half-asleep, rubbing his eyes.
“Jason. Good to see you,” Miranda called his attention to her, seeing an opportunity to escape this torment. “Do me a favour. Bring my pistol over here and shoot me with it, would you?” Miranda requested with an entirely straight face.
Prangley blinked blearily, certain he must have misheard. “What?”
“Kill me,” Miranda reiterated, in the same tone. “I don't want to live anymore.”
“What? Why?” asked Jason.
“She boned an asari last night and Leah overheard her and Mr Taylor talking about it,” Rodriguez explained. “It was totally Samara,” she added in an aside.
“Oh. Nice,” said Prangley, continuing his march to the kitchen, unfazed.
Miranda exhaled in annoyance. “Damn it, Jason.” He’d been her best hope of backing her up and putting a stop to this. And he’d failed her. She was disappointed. “You were this close to being my favourite,” she complained in jest, holding her thumb and forefinger a small distance apart.
Jason shrugged. He wasn’t about to interfere with this. She was on her own.
“Samara seems really cool, Miss,” Reiley commented, nodding in approval.
“And also super hot,” Leah chimed in. “And I mean that in both a feminist way and a lesbian way. So, you know...good for you.”
Jason snorted. “Did you just congratulate her on who she had sex with?”
“Yes. Absolutely,” Leah confirmed. “I mean, have you seen Samara?”
“It wasn't Samara!” Miranda insisted, finally getting fed up with this.
Rodriguez gasped excitedly. “So you're seeing someone else? Who is it? Is she your girlfriend? Is that why you and Samara aren't together? Wait, oh my God, Miss, are you cheating on Samara? Is that why she left London?”
Miranda let her head fall forward and hit the table with a thud. This was why she normally chose to stay silent when they tried to get a rise out of her like this. Shame she’d forgotten that strategy in her exasperation.
“Wow. You’ve officially done it. You’re all dead to her now,” Jason noted.
“Oh, I crossed that boundary a long time ago,” Rodriguez assured him, evidently proud that she’d finally managed to break Miranda. “I have nothing to lose.”
“How about the roof over your head,” Miranda retorted, picking up her cereal, deciding she would rather starve than continue to be subjected to this.
“Pfft. You don’t mean that,” Rodriguez brushed her off. Miranda just silently arched her eyebrow at her as she limped away. Rodriguez began to sweat, turning to her partners in crime. “She...She doesn’t mean that, right?”
Jason just pulled a face, as if to say he’d warned her.
* * *
“I heard a rumour about you,” Shepard began, approaching Miranda near the lounge on the second floor.
The party had gone fairly late into the evening by that point, and the energy was starting to wind down. Miranda hadn’t asked but somehow she got the sense that everyone was planning on crashing at Shepard’s for the night, since nobody had made any motions to leave yet.
“I’m the subject of many rumours, Shepard,” Miranda dryly replied, sitting back against the armrest. “You’re going to have to be more specific. Although, if it’s the one about the incident with the drop bear, I swear that only happened one time and only three people died.”
“Drop bear?” Shepard echoed curiously, tilting her head, as if trying to work out whether that was Miranda’s serious voice or her sarcastic voice. Miranda just gave an ambiguous shrug. If Shepard couldn’t tell, then she wasn’t going to spoil it. “Nah, it was nothing that exciting. Although remind me to ask you about that later. I’ve been told you’re considering an early retirement?”
Miranda sighed, not needing to guess where that had come from. “Kasumi...”
“Mhmm,” Shepard confirmed the source of her information. “And, from that look, I'm starting to think it's true. So, this is really it for you, huh? Once we get rid of the Reapers, you're out – you're done.”
“Well, not immediately. I'm not about to leave people dying in the streets. But yes, you heard correctly,” Miranda replied, taking a sip from her freshly refilled glass of wine. It was a relief that not every single bottle or glass had been destroyed when Garrus set up that makeshift shooting gallery. “I’m my own woman now.”
“Really?” Suffice it to say, Shepard didn't seem to be buying it. “Not working for anyone at all, other than yourself. Ever. You're sure?”
“I haven’t made up my mind about ‘ever’, but yes. As of right now, that's the plan,” Miranda answered.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but who are you and what have you done with the real Miranda Lawson?” Shepard teasingly remarked, since this was the single most uncharacteristic thing the Miranda she had come to know a year ago could possibly have said or done.
“Oh, she’s dead. I buried her under the floorboards. I probably should have mentioned, I’m also an escaped Cerberus clone. You are the fake Shepard, right? Because if you’re not, then this is a joke and you should forget I said that,” Miranda responded, her tone completely deadpan.
Shepard laughed, moving to sit across from her on the opposite sofa. “Seriously, what brought this on? Where is this coming from all of a sudden?”
Miranda exhaled, shifting until she was seated on the armrest, deciding to stop being snarky and start being direct. “Being on the run this past year...It's been the worst year of my life. Including all the years I lived with my father. But if nothing else, being on my own for so long made me realise that, for as long as I've been alive, everything about me has always been controlled by other people. In one way or another, I've never been free to make my own choices. Except for a few months with you. I need to take some time away to breathe. Just be me, without anyone expecting anything from me. Figure out how to be...”
“What?” Shepard prompted, when Miranda fell silent.
“I was going to say ‘an actual fucking person’ and then I realised how depressing that was,” Miranda muttered with appropriate self-awareness, earning a light chuckle from Shepard. “I guess that’s the whole point. I don’t even know who I am when I’m not working myself to the bone. I could be anybody under all this.” Miranda vaguely gestured at herself.
“And what if you can’t stand having nothing to do?” asked Shepard.
“Then I change plans,” Miranda answered plainly. She wasn’t so attached to this idea that she couldn’t be flexible if it didn’t work out, and she wasn't sure why it mattered. As it stood, the chances of any of their dreams for the future coming to fruition were slim at best. “But how can you be so certain that I'll hate it? I'm not; I've never had the freedom to do nothing before. Maybe I'll thrive.”
“But you were always putting yourself under pressure to stay busy, even when you didn’t have to. You love how much of a workaholic you are. Don’t deny it. You were practically begging me to give you more stuff to do towards the end there. What would you even do with your time if you’re no longer devoting yourself to some kind of high-powered career?” Shepard wondered aloud.
“I don’t know. There are a lot of things I’ve never done before, and never thought I’d do.” Miranda shrugged. “Maybe I’ll try being a blonde for a while. Maybe I’ll get a tattoo. Maybe I’ll become Wiccan. Maybe I’ll get fat.”
Shepard stared at her sceptically, sensing the obvious sarcasm.
“What? Don’t think I couldn’t do it if I set my mind to it. I’m secretly a foodie at heart, you know,” Miranda pointed out, her tone drier than her wine.
“And you have a superhuman metabolism,” Shepard countered.
“Ah. Right. Scratch that one off the list then,” said Miranda, taking another sip from her glass. “Blonde, tattooed Wiccan it is.” Shepard laughed, entertained.
“Well, when Hell freezes over a million years from now, I look forward to meeting that version of you. But, until that happens, you know it’s not a two-party system, right? You don’t have to choose between going in a totally new direction forever, or staying exactly as you are right now. There's a lot you can do that isn't either of those things,” Shepard reminded her, gesturing as she spoke. “You'd excel at anything you tried. It doesn't have to involve life or death struggles over the fate of the galaxy. And, if you’re sick of bringing people back to life, you can retire from science and move onto something else. I could definitely see you taking well to life as a lawyer, or a CEO, or even a political leader.”
“Politics?” Miranda snorted, reaching out across the gap with an insincere handshake. “Hi, I’m Miranda Lawson, former terrorist. Vote for me.”
“Point taken,” Shepard conceded.
“You also realise that all the professions you listed have a higher than average ratio of sociopaths compared to the general population,” Miranda noted.
Shepard scratched the back of her head. “Sunday school teacher?” she offered.
“Can’t do that. I’m becoming Wiccan, remember?” Miranda quipped. “Did you really come and find me just to try and talk me out of this?”
“No. No, I didn't. It's...actually the exact opposite,” said Shepard, shaking her head and leaning back against the cushions. “Because the truth is I've been thinking the same thing; that this is the end for me too,” she confessed, piquing Miranda's intrigue. “If I make it through this...I don’t know if I can keep fighting other people’s battles anymore. If I can, I don’t know if I want to.”
“I guess after stopping a galactic genocide, all other conflicts start to look petty in comparison,” Miranda mused, swirling her glass, strangely empathising with that sentiment. What would be the point of Shepard saving the entire goddamn galaxy from the Reapers, only to then continue imperilling her life, risking getting shot and killed day after day over some insignificant political squabble that didn’t matter the slightest bit in the grand scheme of things?
Shepard had been lucky enough to get a second chance at life. Literally. She had more reason than anyone to realise how precious that was. And also how fragile.
It would have been beyond tragic if Andrea wouldn’t get to savour a calm, peaceful future if the war with the Reapers ever ended - a future that would only be possible because of her. Because she was the one person who saw what truly mattered, and valued collective unity over selfish, shortsighted division.
“Don’t take anything I’ve been saying about you as an attack. It’s not,” Shepard assured her. “I'm just surprised, and maybe projecting a little, because...I have no clue what I'm going to do after this, and it's terrifying to me. I’ve never...I’ve never not been a soldier. I don’t even know how to be an...an ‘actual fucking person’, like you said. And neither do you. And yet here you are, and that doesn't bother you at all. I thought it would have been the other way around.”
“Me too,” Miranda conceded. “But things are different now.”
“You mean you're different now,” Shepard added, impressed by Miranda’s growth.
“You helped,” said Miranda. She crossed the floor and sat down beside Shepard, sinking into the seat, leaning her head back on the lounge to look up at the ceiling. “I’ve been cognisant for a very long time that I’m not a normal person, Shepard. Not only that, but...I don’t have the faintest clue how to pretend to be normal,” Miranda elected to be frank about that flaw. Though she rarely showed weakness, she felt safe sharing that with her. “My whole life, I’ve never seen the point trying to fit in with other people when I know I can’t, and don’t even want to. So, while I might not be showing it...I am more scared than you think. But I’m also just kind of over worrying about anything anymore? Maybe because I’ve spent most of this past year living in constant fear. I think I got sick of it.”
Shepard paused, considering Miranda’s words. “Can I be honest with you?” she began, after several seconds had passed. Miranda gestured for her to go ahead. “I also have no idea how to be a normal person. I think that’s what’s freaking me out about what comes next. What if I’m bad at it?”
“What a horrible thought. Being bad at mundane problems,” Miranda dryly commented, hoping her sarcasm would help Shepard put her anxieties into perspective. “What if you mix up your recyclable plastics with your non-recyclables? Perish the thought. That’s a disaster, right there.”
“I’m being serious,” Shepard insisted, though it was obvious she got the meaning behind Miranda’s comment. “Look, you get what I’m going through better than anyone. You and I, we’re both...not to sound arrogant, but we’re both fuckin’ good at what we do,” Shepard stated plainly. And she wasn’t wrong. They were the best of the best. “What if we suck at everything else?”
Miranda shrugged. “Then it was a fun experiment, both of us trying to be ordinary people for a while. I think it will be worth it.”
Shepard exhaled, and rested her head on her hand. “So...what does being a regular, everyday person look like to Miranda Lawson?” she wondered aloud. “What does a nice, safe, boring future look like to you?”
That was a question Miranda had no problems answering. She had a singular vision. “I’ve promised Oriana that we’re going to find a quiet spot on a colony world. We’ll buy a big plot of land far away from anyone else, and build our dream house. Somewhere with a view, where we can sit out on the deck, watch the sunset, drink wine and eat sashimi while we talk about our day,” Miranda revealed, trusting Andrea enough to tell her what she said to Ori before she left.
“...That sounds pretty great,” Shepard said softly. In that simple description of what life after the war meant to her, and the goal she was fighting for, it had instantly clicked into place why Miranda was so content with the idea of ‘retiring’.
“What about you?” Miranda asked, gently nudging Shepard’s knee with her own. “Where does Andrea Shepard see herself in five years’ time?”
“That’s the million credit question, isn’t it?” Shepard spoke quietly, barely above a whisper. She sat forward, electing to just give voice to what was in her heart. “Honestly, this is going to sound corny as hell, but...when I think of my future, I can’t see anything but Liara. That’s it. Nothing would make me happier than just...I don’t know, having a boring fuckin’ house with a yard and a white picket fence, and lots of little blue children running around.”
“Maybe I’m getting sentimental in my old age, but that might possibly be the most adorable thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” Miranda commented, eliciting a sheepish chuckle as Shepard rubbed the back of her neck.
“Oh, God, we are getting old, aren’t we? And we’re only in our thirties,” Shepard realised aloud, as if it had hit her that both of them had been through enough to fill several lifetimes. No wonder they both wanted to ‘retire’ so young.
“Mhmm. And I’ve got five years on you, so I can promise you it’s all downhill from here,” Miranda confirmed, taking another sip of wine. “But I meant that, though. Don’t be ashamed of that dream. Lots of people would kill for something like that.” Herself included, she thought. “And you will make an excellent…father? Father’s the correct word in this context, right?” Miranda asked aloud, earning a nod. “Take it from someone who killed hers: you would be the best Dad ever.”
“Now you’re just making fun of me.” Shepard gave her a light knock on the arm.
“I’m not. I’m really not. Okay, I know it sounds like I am, but…” Miranda trailed off for a moment, a thought occurring to her. “Huh. You know what? I just realised something. You and I actually both have the exact same dream,” she pointed out, turning to face Andrea. “We want a family.”
“...Yeah. Yeah, we do, don’t we?” Shepard nodded in agreement, seeing the clarity in Miranda’s words. “Ours just look a little different from each other.”
“So, that settles it. We’re both going to hang up our weapons and retire somewhere nice and dull so we can each have the families we always wanted,” Miranda reiterated. Despite her efforts to be hopeful, at those words, she couldn’t keep a pessimistic sigh from escaping her. “Now, we both just have to convince ourselves that we'll live long enough to do that.”
“I'd bet on you,” Shepard acknowledged, glancing over at her.
“And I’d bet on you,” Miranda replied with a bittersweet smile, but it lacked the conviction to reach her eyes. “Don't get me wrong; I haven't given up, and I'm going to fight for that future as hard as I can. But I can't believe that it's going to happen until I'm standing in the rubble and the Reapers are all gone.”
Shepard exhaled heavily, sinking lower against the couch. “That makes two of us.”
The more Miranda thought about it, the more it became painfully apparent that their odds of getting to lead those lives they were imagining were slim to zero. Even if by some miracle they did find a way to defeat the Reapers, it was virtually impossible that both she and Shepard would survive whatever came next. At best, it seemed like a binary choice. One or the other. And Miranda knew which of the two of them was least likely to endure if push came to shove.
Her body tensed imperceptibly. An apprehensiveness fell over her. A sense of urgency rose in her stomach. Words she couldn't leave unsaid.
“...Shepard,” Miranda began, her tone serious. “If anything happens to me—“
“Miranda,” Andrea attempted to cut her off, but Miranda ignored her interruption. She couldn't forgive herself if she stayed silent about this.
“Just listen, Shepard. If I can’t be there for her, for whatever reason, promise you'll keep an eye on Ori for me?” Miranda persisted, needing to hear Andrea give her word on that, because she understood what this meant to her, and she would absolutely follow through. Even if Andrea had to die to honour her commitment to Miranda, it wouldn’t stop her. “Make sure she's okay.”
“You can do that yourself,” Shepard replied, either refusing to fear the worst, or determined not to let her crew see that she possessed any doubts that they would live to see those tomorrows, come what may.
“Hypothetically, then,” said Miranda, rolling her eyes at Shepard’s reluctance to answer the question. “If something happened to me, whether now or twenty years from now...I need to know: would you look out for Oriana if I couldn't?”
Andrea relented, realising what she was asking, and why. “Of course I would.”
“Do you swear?” Miranda pressed.
Shepard sighed, and held up her pinkie. “I swear.” Eyeing that gesture somewhat peculiarly, Miranda eventually extended her own little finger. However, Andrea pulled away before they could interlock. “Uh uh. But before we do that, I need you to make the same promise to me. So, if--”
“Liara does not need protecting, Shepard,” Miranda reminded her.
“You had your turn. Let me finish,” said Shepard. Miranda signalled for her to take the floor. “Thank you. Now, if anything ever happens to me...you’re the one person I trust more than anyone else to step in for me when I’m gone. No matter what, you’ll have your shit together, and you’ll do what needs to be done. So, if I can’t be here…” Instead of articulating it all in words, Shepard flicked her gaze out towards the balcony, down to the lower floor, where everyone else was. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but...just do what you can for them. Watch over them for me. Make sure they’re alright. And, if they’re not...do what you think I would do.”
At that request, Miranda softened. It hadn’t been what she’d anticipated Andrea would say, but perhaps she should have seen it coming. Shepard loved her crew like family. She was their North Star. A guiding light who united so many disparate personalities in a common cause, and brought out the best in all of them.
Shepard really was a hero.
A bloody icon.
How could Miranda possibly say no?
“What else is a second-in-command good for if not that?” Miranda extended her hand once more. At that, Shepard finally locked pinkies with her, swearing on it. “You know I’ve never done this before - pinkie promised,” Miranda noted, finding it a bit juvenile.
“Of course you haven’t.” Shepard shook her head, not at all shocked by that. It was at that particular moment that a certain AI came up the stairs, into view. Shepard called out to her. “Hey, EDI. I have a question for you.”
“What would you like to know?” EDI asked.
“What the hell is a drop bear?” said Shepard.
Miranda arched her brow, and took a long drink, saying nothing.
“One moment.” By the time she finished saying ‘one moment’, EDI had already concluded her search of the Extranet. “Here is what I’ve found: the drop bear is a hoax Australian folklore creature. The origins of the drop bear hoax are unknown, though it appears it may have originated as a campfire story in the early-to-mid-20th century. Australians have been known to pretend the drop bear is a real creature so as to frighten and confuse tourists and non-Australians for their own amusement.” EDI paused for a beat. “It is a joke.”
“Thank you, EDI,” said Miranda, concealing a smirk. Way to ruin the fun.
Shepard slowly turned to her, eyeing Miranda in quiet bewilderment. “...Did you of all people just prank me with a two-hundred-year-old joke?”
“Not that I’m that attached to it, but I’m pretty sure I would be stripped of my citizenship if I didn’t do that at least once before I die,” Miranda informed her.
Shepard’s expression didn’t change. “Mhmm.”
* * *
“So are you gay now?” was the first thing Jack said to her the next time they saw each other, a week after their last meeting.
Miranda sighed. God damn it. Nobody could keep their mouths shut about anything, could they? “I’m something,” she muttered, taking off her wet jacket. It had been raining all day. And not the usual soft English drizzle that didn’t even warrant mentioning, but actual rain.
“Good for you,” Jack replied, not actually interested. “Let’s play.”
Miranda slumped down into the chair across the table from Jack, the raindrops pittering off the windows behind her. “Your advice was terrible, by the way,” she told her as she moved her first piece.
“Nah, you’re just a shit lay,” Jack countered, making her own opening.
Miranda flicked her eye up at her, unamused, but decided it was best not to validate that comment with a response.
All of a sudden, Jack started laughing at something unsaid.
“What?” Miranda asked suspiciously.
“...‘Meh’-randa,” Jack remarked, making an appropriately nonchalant gesture.
Miranda exhaled heavily, rubbing her temple in annoyance. “Jack, I need you to understand this,” she began, placing her elbow on the table and leaning forward as she spoke, eerily calm. “One of these days, you will forget that this conversation ever happened. You will go on with your life, and there will come a day when you are blissfully ignorant and happy. And on that day, I will come to wherever you live. And I will break into your room. And I will suffocate you in your sleep.”
“Fair,” Jack conceded. “Worth it, though.”
Miranda leaned back in her chair, oddly relieved to have gotten that off of her chest after biting her tongue for so long. “God, that felt good. Why did I ever stop insulting you?” she wondered aloud, starting to think she should snap back at her more often instead of taking every jibe Jack threw at her in stride.
“Because you’re a fucking pussy now apparently.” Jack shrugged, focused only on the game. “Shut up and play me.” Miranda didn’t need to be asked twice.
She didn’t know what it was about that particular day. Maybe it was the dreary weather, and the sound of the rain making the tinnitus a little less abrasive for once. Maybe it was how long both of them were taking between moves. But, for whatever reason, Miranda found herself stifling yawns as the game went on.
She moved a pawn, and leaned her head against her hand as Jack studied the board, weighing up her strategies, keen to avoid falling into another trap.
God, she was so fucking tired.
It had been three days since she last slept. Or...wait, was it four? She couldn’t remember. Six or seven days seemed to be her absolute limit before she started passing out irrespective of willpower, and that was because she was, quote unquote, a ‘genetic freak’ as Jacob had once put it. She’d only managed two hours of thirty-minute naps the last time she got any rest at all.
Her eyelid felt so heavy. Every single time she blinked, it stayed dark a little longer, and it took a little bit more effort and time to open it again.
What harm would it do to just rest her eye for a second, she wondered? It wasn’t like she was going to fall asleep, sitting up like she was. Although, leaning on her hand felt so fucking comfortable. She didn’t want to move.
So Miranda let her eyelid drift shut for a moment, listening to the rain.
…
…
...
“Hey, eyepatch.”
…
…
...
“Eyepatch?”
Miranda was vaguely aware that someone was talking, but it didn’t reach her in the darkness. That was, until Jack hit the table, hard, and startled her awake. Miranda’s head slipped off her hand. At that jolt, she panicked and reflexively reared back so hard that she damn near fell out of her chair.
“What? What? What is it?” Miranda took a few moments to blink and remember where she was after being shaken from her stupor. It only clicked when she found Jack sitting across from her, looking thoroughly unimpressed.
“Am I boring you?” Jack remarked, arms folded across her chest impatiently.
Miranda shook her head, trying to save face. “It’s called ‘thinking’, Jack. You should try it sometime,” she retorted, moving a piece quickly as if to prove she hadn’t just blacked out for a couple of minutes.
Jack glanced down at the board. “You can’t do that.”
“What?”
“That’s not a legal move,” Jack pointed out. Miranda checked the board. She honestly didn’t even know what piece she’d just touched. Jack reached across, and dragged her knight back to where it should have been. Jack sat back in her chair and fixed her with a stare.
“...Fuck me dead,” Miranda muttered under her breath, realising she actually had to stop and concentrate to figure out her next move.
“Forget it. I’m out.” Jack pushed her chair back from the table and stood up.
“No, no. I’ve got it,” Miranda insisted.
“I don’t care. I don’t want to beat you when you’re like this. That wouldn’t even count,” said Jack, gesturing listlessly towards her, having lost all interest.
“I’m not ‘like’ anything. I’m just…” Miranda trailed off, staring at the board, stuck for a move. Her head was so full of fog that she couldn’t see any options. The whole table was a blur. A featureless mush. Every piece looked the same. She couldn’t even fucking think. If someone asked her to name a single rule of the game in that instant, she would have drawn a complete blank.
“Go home. Take a fucking nap or whatever. Don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you look like death, by the way. More even than usual,” Jack casually observed, opening her fridge and pulling out a can of energy drink.
“I’m fine!” Miranda barked, a little too loud, willing that lie to be the truth.
“I honestly don’t care. You could jump off a bridge for all the difference it makes to me. I wouldn’t stop you,” Jack said frankly, nonchalantly gesturing with her drink in her hand. “All that matters to me is making sure you don’t have a fuckin’ excuse when I destroy you. So get the fuck out of my apartment, and don’t come back until you stop sucking at the only reason I keep you around.”
Miranda swallowed a groan, the pain in her head only growing. Jack obviously wasn’t going to change her mind. This game was over. “Alright. Fine. Suit yourself,” she grumbled as she got up, collecting her things. “See you next week.”
“Only if you don’t look like complete shit by then,” Jack commented, prepared to close the door in her face if she wasn’t going to play her at her best.
Miranda left and went out into the cold December rain, which showed no signs of easing. The problem was, she didn’t have anywhere to go. She couldn’t go home. There was nothing there to keep her awake. And she absolutely was not ready to fall asleep, and contend with the nightmares that awaited her.
She couldn’t go to the bar, because drinking would make her tired. The last time she got drunk, the nightmares were so visceral that she woke up vomiting.
She thought about it a bit longer, and then one option came to mind. She still had a key to her office. Bailey had banned her from working weekends out of concern for her wellbeing if he didn’t, sure, but he wouldn’t be there. Even if he was, she could avoid him seeing her. Nobody else would question her presence. She ranked above them. They would just assume something had come up, and most of them were too intimidated by her to talk to her anyway.
So Miranda fell back on her one and only crutch. Her only coping mechanism. Her favourite distraction from her problems. She buried herself in her work.
“Director Lawson,” the man at reception greeted her. She glanced at his name tag to remember who the hell he was. “What are you doing here on a weekend?”
“Losing control of my life, Ian,” Miranda remarked as she limped right past him, heading straight for the lift without stopping.
He chuckled at that. “Aren’t we all? You have a good day, now.”
Miranda rolled her eye as soon as he looked away. As predicted, there were no interruptions between her and her office. Nobody thought to question her.
She didn’t even glance at the clock as the hours ticked by, and file after file went across her desk. Task after task got done. When she finished her own matters, she moved onto work delegated to her subordinates, just to stay there longer. Nobody bothered her. Even without distractions, it was hard to concentrate. Her mind was full of fog. Everything she did was lost in a haze, forgotten mere seconds after she did it. But, in the present, it was something to focus on.
It wasn’t easy, though. She had instances where she...lost time. Just drifted into space for a few seconds, here or there. When that happened, she would go and fill up on coffee. She only decided she’d had too much when she started to feel her heart beating a little too fast in her chest, and her fingers got jittery, and she had to flex her hand to keep it from shaking. If she had any more she would probably start hallucinating, as if she wasn’t on the verge of that already.
So maybe she’d hit her limit as far as caffeine toxicity went.
But she was awake.
She was fucking awake.
It was dark out, and still raining by the time she was snapped out of her work-induced daze by a text message alert. She already knew who it was. Miranda squeezed her eye shut, resting the base of her palm against her forehead, fighting off the constant, nagging pain that had become her permanent companion. She knew she shouldn’t look. But she had to. She couldn’t resist hearing from her.
Miranda opened her message tab on her computer, and clicked on Oriana’s name.
“Still not talking, huh?” said the first message. And then a second and third popped up. “Okay. That’s fine. Take your time. I’ve got more jokes.”
Oriana could see that Miranda was reading her messages in realtime. She would know that she was there on the other end at that very moment, not replying back. And yet, in typical Oriana fashion, she wasn’t calling her out on it or judging her for it or demanding a reason for her silence. Just letting her be.
“A horse walks into a bar and the bartender says, ‘Why the long face?’ And the horse says, ‘I have crippling depression, Steven. I’ll thank you not to mention it’.”
When that joke garnered no response, Oriana sent another.
“A glazier invited me to high tea. It didn’t go well. Turns out people in glasshouses shouldn’t throw scones. Eh? Worked on that one for ages.”
Miranda felt the warmth of a single, stray tear trickling down her cheek. God, she loved Oriana. She loved Oriana so much it physically hurt. No one else could be so...bright, and radiant, and happy, and genuine about it. Her positivity and cheerfulness wasn’t faked, or feigned, or insincere. She was just like this. Just funny, and kind, and...and fucking perfect.
“Why did the funeral director need to go to the doctor?” Oriana asked. “Because he couldn’t stop coffin--okay, no, that one was atrocious even for me. I’m sorry. Please delete that. You deserve better.”
If she were in a better mental and emotional state, all of this would have brought a smile to her face. Of course it would have. Oriana always did. Miranda thought about finally texting her back. Saying something. Anything. Even started to type. Just wanted to let her know she was okay. Just wanted to talk to her. Needed that connection with the person who mattered to her most.
But she stopped herself.
What the fuck did she have to offer Oriana right now? What could she say to her that was worthwhile when she was this dour and miserable?
She could just see how it would play out. She would say something, and then Oriana would eventually start asking questions. She would need, and deserve, some sort of explanation as to why Miranda had been so quiet. So distant. Any half-hearted excuses would be recognised for the lies they were.
Oriana would ask her if she was okay, because of course she would. And, then, if Miranda started telling her the truth, that she really wasn’t, and hadn’t been for a long time, she didn’t see how she could stop the floodgates from opening. Everything she’d been holding back since the shuttle crash, Oriana would bring it out of her, like a torrent after a storm. And she just...refused to be that person. Refused to drown her little sister in her unresolved trauma.
Oriana was the Sun. She was light, and warmth. Basking in her presence for even a few minutes could make even the lowest person feel uplifted, and stronger, and brighter. She was doing just fine without Miranda. She always had.
Why bother her? Why disturb that?
In fact, all the best times in Oriana’s life had been the moments when Miranda had pushed her as far away as possible. When she wasn’t involved. When she kept herself at a distance. Ever since Miranda introduced herself to Oriana on Illium, Ori’s life had only gotten worse. Never better. A downward spiral.
Perhaps that was a sign.
What did she really think was going to happen when they met up with each other again anyway? That they were going to spend the rest of their lives together? As if. Oriana was twenty. She would be twenty-one before too long. She was only just starting to grow into her own as an independent adult. She would want to go do things normal twenty-one-year-olds did, without anyone cramping her unique personal style, or getting in her way as she formed new connections.
The Reaper Invasion had cut short her degree and compelled her to start work earlier than expected, but she probably planned to finish her education at some point. Chances were she would want to move in with friends her own age. Eventually, of course, she would meet some boy she liked (who Miranda would absolutely hate) and she would want to find a place with him. Statistically speaking, that would happen more than once over the course of her life.
She wasn’t a kid anymore. Oriana was an adult. At exactly the age where families like theirs...tended to drift apart from one another. When young women like Ori wanted to go out into the wider world and discover themselves, and carve out an identity free of any ties to their childhood. And it was at that moment that a thought abruptly struck Miranda that had never connected before.
When she and Oriana had talked about finally getting to be a family, they probably had very different ideas of what that looked like.
And Miranda’s vision of that future was completely fucking delusional.
It always had been.
She wasn’t helping Oriana by being near her. Wasn’t protecting her, because the man who posed a danger to her was dead. With Henry Lawson out of the picture, Ori didn’t need her in her life. In many respects, she never had.
Miranda wasn’t some noble self-sacrificing big sister anymore. She was a fucking leech. Sucking her sister’s energy and her positivity, consuming it for herself. She was a chain holding Oriana down, when what she truly deserved was to spread her wings and fly wherever she wanted like the free spirit she was.
Wasn’t that precisely why Miranda had denied herself the connection she craved with Ori in the first place? Wasn’t that why she had given her up? Because she knew it was the right thing to do? Because, deep down, she knew that the best thing she could do for Oriana was to ensure that she grew up completely isolated from her - so that she could become as unlike Miranda as possible?
She’d succeeded at that, at least.
Where Miranda was cynical, Oriana was optimistic. Where Miranda was closed-off and antisocial, Oriana was outgoing and friendly. Where Miranda was rigid and concrete, Oriana was creative and open-minded. Where Miranda was bitter and sarcastic, Oriana was lighthearted and funny. Where Miranda was cold, Oriana was warm. Where Miranda was dark, Oriana was light. Where Miranda lacked empathy, Oriana was sensitive, and the kindest person she knew.
They couldn’t have been more different.
And Miranda wanted it to stay that way.
None of her qualities were things she would wish upon Oriana. And, if Oriana did become more like her, Miranda wasn’t sure she could ever forgive herself.
The most loving thing Miranda could do for Oriana was just let her live her life in peace, the way she had done for her before. She really would be better off just being cut loose, without her older sister weighing her down, shackling her to the weight of despair, damage and loneliness.
So Miranda didn’t text. She deleted the message she’d started typing, and the three dots to signal that she was writing were erased. She closed the app, got up and left her desk, deciding to head home.
She didn’t see the next message her sister sent.
“Miranda? Whatever is going on with you right now, please just remember that you are my most important person. I love you more than anything. And I’m here for you whenever you need me. You do know that, don’t you?”
Miranda limped home in the dark in the rain. It was freezing. She didn’t know how late it was. She hadn’t kept her eye on the time. She dragged her weary body up the stairs. Aside from the fact that her head was killing her, parts of her body that had never hurt before were starting to feel sore, and tight, and tense.
“Hey, Miss,” Seanne greeted her when she heard her key in the door. A few of the kids were gathered together in the main lounge, watching some sort of movie on the television. “We saved dinner for you. It’s in the fridge.”
“I’ll have it later,” Miranda muttered, not hungry at all. Just tired.
“No problem,” Seanne replied, too focused on the film to pay her any mind.
Without another word, Miranda retreated to her room, and shut herself away, prepared for another night of staring at cracks in the ceiling in the darkness in a desperate attempt to ward off her dreams.
She slumped on her bed and ran her hand through her hair, staring into space.
And that was when it hit her. She didn’t...know what she was doing with her life anymore. Or why. She didn’t have a plan. A goal. For the first time since she’d reunited with Oriana, she no longer had a future she was working towards. Because that hope, that dream, had been snuffed out. A lie. A delusion.
The one thing that had made getting up every morning worth it since the shuttle crash - believing that, one day, she and Oriana would start a new life where nothing tore them apart ever again - had been exposed as a figment of her imagination.
With that dream dead, when she pictured her future now, there was...nothing.
Absence.
An empty, black abyss. Filled only by the ringing in her ear.
Miranda lay down on her bed. Curled up. And stared. And listened to that perpetual sound. And her mind, like her future, was blank. She watched the time tick by on the clock. Barely even registering it in her fatigue.
One hour.
Two hours.
What was the point of anything anymore?
What was the fucking point?
Three hours.
Four hours.
It was after midnight when she was disturbed from her near-catatonic state by an urgent knocking at the front door. It came once, such a strange and unexpected sound that, at first, she wondered if it was just a trick of her mind. But then it came again, even more insistent.
Reluctantly, Miranda dragged herself out of bed and shuffled into the entryway, not even bothering to grab her cane. She saw the door to one of the students’ bedrooms was open. Jason was leaning out, as if to go investigate.
“I’ve got it,” said Miranda with a dismissive wave as she limped to the door, assuming it was probably for her. “Go back to sleep.”
Jason gave her a nod, but lingered in the doorway, just in case.
The frantic knocking came again. With an annoyed grunt, Miranda undid the lock, wondering who the hell was bothering them at that ungodly hour.
“Jesus Christ, what is it--?” The words caught in Miranda’s throat the second she flung the door open. Her weary eye flickered wide awake. “Samara?”
* * *
Miranda stepped over snoring bodies and discarded glasses on the floor, not keen to wake anyone up when half the crew were spread out at various points on the spectrum between ‘fast asleep’ and ‘passed out drunk’, and all of whom were likely to be very cranky if awoken. Miranda hadn’t drunk as much as most of the others, and neither was she prone to going to bed early.
Indeed, she was very much awake, not even close to tired. And it was not her idea of a fun end to the night to hang around being as quiet as a mouse, forced to pretend to doze off because everyone else was such a goddamn lightweight.
With that in mind, Miranda crept over near the door to where Shepard kept her keys, pinching them for herself so she could let herself back into the apartment. Shepard wasn’t going to miss them. She and Liara had gone to bed some time ago for very obvious reasons. They wouldn’t be seen again until morning.
However, Miranda’s cunning plan was not one concocted purely for herself. A thought had occurred to her while she waited for everyone else to nod off, being that there was one other person she expected might be awake. Someone who, by all appearances, had not been a drinker for centuries. Someone who Miranda was eager to spend a lot more time with one-on-one, particularly given that it was not lost on her that this might well be the last opportunity they ever had to do so - the last time they might ever see one another.
Sure enough, she found that very person meditating under the stairs.
“Samara,” Miranda whispered just loud enough to be heard. Blue eyes opened, and shifted her way. “Can’t sleep?” Samara did not respond verbally, but let her current state speak for itself. “Me neither.” At that, Miranda held up Shepard’s keys and made a signal towards the door. “Feel like going out?”
Samara glanced at her slumbering companions scattered over the lounge. After a moment, she held a finger to her lips, and silently stood.
Taking that as acceptance of her invitation, Miranda stealthily snuck over to the door, and held it open for Samara. She closed it behind them as quietly as she could. There was a faint ‘click’ as it automatically locked.
“Do not mistake my surprise for protestation, for it is not, but...to what do I owe this?” Samara asked, once they were safely out of earshot of the others. Evidently she had not been anticipating this - that Miranda would seek her out.
“What, did you really think I’d just forget about you after a single conversation?” Miranda rhetorically remarked. “I told you I missed you more than anyone else.”
Samara allowed herself a small smile, touched by her intentions. “You did.”
“Since you and I are both still awake, and I have way too much energy to sleep, I figured, hey, the Strip is right here, and nothing ever closes - let’s go enjoy it while we can,” Miranda offered, circling Shepard’s keys around her finger before slipping them into a discreet pocket. “Nobody will even notice we’re missing.”
“No, they certainly will not,” Samara concurred, clearly not regretting her temperance when it was apparent most of the crew would be nursing hangovers come morning. “I must admit, given I saw you partaking earlier, I did not expect you to be in such a better state compared to our other comrades.”
“Good genes, plus I know how to pace myself,” Miranda casually explained. She gestured for Samara to follow her. “Come on. Let’s go be stupid for a while.”
Samara suppressed a chuckle. “An enticing prospect. Very well. Lead the way.”
“I was planning on taking you back to my favourite sushi place - you know, the one we went to before. Unfortunately, it’s not open right now.” Miranda sighed, putting a hand on her hip. “There was an incident. Shepard was involved.”
“I see. That is unfortunate,” Samara commiserated, needing no further explanation as to what had happened. For as much as they both loved Shepard, it was no hyperbole to say that trouble followed her everywhere.
Ultimately, Miranda didn’t have a preference as to where they went, or what they did. This entire venture was little more than a flimsy excuse to spend time with Samara without anybody else interfering. A throwback to those intimate moments on the Starboard Observation Deck, and a means of paying her back for all her kindness, assuming Miranda succeeded in showing her a good time.
“There is the casino,” Miranda thought out loud. She’d been there before, and didn’t mind the atmosphere of the place. Plus another drink or two wouldn’t go amiss to kick things off - she was still a fair few away from her limit.
“After you,” Samara gestured for her to go ahead, trailing in Miranda’s footsteps. A reverse of the last time they had visited the Citadel together.
Unlike the Presidium, the Wards didn’t operate on artificial day and night cycles. Virtually everything on the Citadel stayed open at all hours, with everyone resting and working shifts according to their own personal needs and wants. Thus, when they came to the casino, to nobody’s shock, it was still as busy as ever.
The people here had been affected by the war, of course, but there was a sense of safety and security that existed nowhere else. As all the homeworlds fell, the Citadel stood strong as the heart of Council Space - the one place most species would unite to protect. If anywhere would survive the war, this was surely it.
“Can I get you anything? The food here’s not bad, if you’re hungry,” Miranda offered as they both made their way up to the bar.
“Just water, thank you,” said Samara. Miranda ordered something much stronger for herself, and the bartender filled up their respective glasses.
“So, how have you been, Samara? Really?” Miranda asked, keen to make up for lost time. Now that they were alone, they were free to talk as long as they wanted, which was something they couldn’t really do at the party. That was precisely her intent in sneaking out like this. It would be several hours at least before anybody else woke up and wondered where they were. The Silver Coast Casino was no Starboard Observation Deck, but it would serve well enough.
“That is a...complicated question,” Samara acknowledged, still a little caught off guard by Miranda’s genuine eagerness to catch up with her, as if she hadn’t expected to warrant her attention. “Some days have been kind to me. Others have not. Many somewhere in between. I imagine you could say the same.”
“Most of my days have ranged between terrible and awful since I left. I’m glad you had some good ones.” Miranda took a sip of her drink.
“Forgive me. I am aware this past year must have been difficult for you.” Samara bowed her head, as if she had misspoken. “As a Justicar, I am not unfamiliar with the peril of knowing there are many people who would seek to have me killed, nor am I a stranger to looking over my shoulder expecting to see a gun each time I turn my head. Although, by the same token, my status affords me many privileges. Many asari will lend me aid or support without question, for no other reason than because they see my armour, and know what I am. You do not have that luxury.”
“No, sadly,” Miranda confirmed. Hiding like a cockroach in parts of the Citadel not fit for human habitation had not been fun. Having any allies she could have safely turned to, beyond her few limited contacts with Shepard, would have made a world of difference. “But I’m out in the open now. If anybody still wanted me dead, I would have been executed days ago. I think it’s safe to say what little is left of Cerberus no longer sees the point in targeting me.”
“I hope you are correct.” Samara instinctively cast her eyes about the place as she said that, scanning for signs of any suspicious activity. Miranda picked up on that, of course. “If it would be safer--”
“Samara, seriously. It’s fine. You can let your guard down. You don’t need to be on alert. Not for my sake,” Miranda assured her, reaching out to touch her hand to make sure she understood that. Nobody was hunting her anymore.
“If you are certain…” Samara took her at her word, despite a hint of hesitancy.
“Yes. Relax. I insist. If you don’t, it somewhat defeats the whole purpose of going out,” Miranda pointed out. At that, Samara seemed to concede she was right. Being paranoid would only spoil their time together. “Enough talk of serious subjects. Have you kept up reading human literature?”
“When I have been able, yes. Although, I must confess, I did not have such access when I was travelling in asari space. The Citadel libraries have been a source of great assistance. Tell me, I must know, was this ‘King Arthur’ a real person?” As soon as she asked, Samara just as swiftly changed her mind. “No, no. On second thought, I would prefer you do not answer. I fear I would be disappointed.”
Miranda laughed, endeared by Samara’s odd, childlike fascination with such figures. If it wouldn’t have sounded so patronising to describe a woman in her mid-to-late 900s as ‘adorable’, that label definitely would have applied.
“Oh. That reminds me. Kurosawa,” said Miranda. Samara tilted her head in questioning, not sure what that meant. “Not an author, but a director. I’ve been told, if you’re interested in samurai media, his films are the place to start.”
“I see. Thank you.” Samara nodded, taking that recommendation on board.
“What is it with you and this sort of thing anyway?” Miranda decided to finally broach the question that she had been wondering for a while, earning a curious glance. “Knights. Samurai. Why are you so interested in them?”
Samara did a poor job concealing a grin. “Yes, why would I, a lone wanderer who adheres to a strict moral code and seeks to bring justice to the places she visits, see any appeal whatsoever in stories about virtuous, heroic wanderers who adhere to strict moral codes and seek to bring justice to the places they visit?”
Miranda couldn’t argue with that logic. “I withdraw the question.”
“You did not withdraw it. I answered it,” Samara corrected.
“No, no. I withdrew it,” Miranda maintained in jest, as if she had come to that conclusion entirely on her own, without any assistance. Samara affectionately shook her head. During that pause in the conversation, the song changed. “You know, I saw you dancing before,” Miranda said with a smirk, indicating the dancefloor. “I’m glad you listened to me about enjoying yourself tonight.”
“I did. However, if I remember correctly, you once stated to me that you would dance when I danced,” Samara reminded her. Miranda raised her eyebrows and took a drink, averting her gaze. She’d really hoped Samara had forgotten that conversation. “And yet you did not join me. How perplexing.”
“Oh, so you haven’t noticed that I’m a pathological liar until just now. Good to know,” Miranda joked, toying with the stem of her glass as she placed it down.
“You must be. You keep insisting to me that you are not funny, even though you clearly are,” Samara cleverly countered, a glimmer of mirth in her kind eyes.
“I--” Miranda stopped before she could retort, taken aback by that comment. Nobody had told her that before. Nobody thought she was funny, because she wasn’t. According to everyone else, she was just mean and sarcastic and unpleasant to be around. Eventually, Miranda awkwardly rubbed the back of her head, managing to mumble a response. “I think you have a very different definition of ‘funny’ than everyone else in the galaxy, but...if you say so.”
It didn’t seem lost on Samara just how much that compliment actually meant to her. But she didn’t harp on it, letting it stand unchallenged. “There is still time for you to keep your promise to me before we part ways,” Samara pressed and, though her tone was lighthearted, it was evident the offer was genuine. “After all, there is a dancefloor here, and I am finding this music rather persuasive...”
“Still time for me to continue breaking my promise forever, you mean? Yes. I intend to. Glad we’re in agreement,” Miranda remarked. Samara’s enquiring gaze didn’t shift. “...Okay so I did dance at Shepard’s tonight, just a little bit.” Miranda reluctantly held her thumb and forefinger slightly apart.
“Good. I am delighted to hear it,” Samara enthused, pleased to see that Miranda had heeded her own advice and let herself go, and allowed herself to have some fun at the party. “My only regret is that I did not witness it.”
“You didn’t miss anything,” Miranda assured her. “But I fulfilled my end of the bargain.”
“No, you did not. This imbalance must be rectified immediately,” Samara persisted, getting up from her seat and extending her hand. Miranda did not accept the invitation, quite intent on not moving anytime soon. “You made a promise to me, Miranda Lawson. As a Justicar, I must insist that you keep your word. You said you would dance when I danced, and I am going to dance. Hence...”
“No. You knock yourself out, but I am very comfortable on my stool.” Miranda shook her head, waving Samara off, making her stance plain.
“Then hand me the keys, and I will return to the apartment,” said Samara.
That got Miranda’s attention. “What?”
“You were the one who said, and I quote, ‘let us go and be stupid for a while’, and it was you who suggested we both sneak out after midnight for this purpose,” Samara noted. “That was the evening that was represented to me - one spent in inane, ridiculous frivolity. Yet, so far, you are being extremely sensible. If you are not going to do this with me, then I fear I have in fact been misled.”
Miranda saw right through Samara’s feigned disappointment. “You’re evil.”
“In this moment, perhaps,” Samara conceded, but she still extended her hand.
“This is peer pressure,” Miranda complained.
“Yes, it is,” Samara confirmed, without shame, her mischievous smile widening.
Miranda sighed, but it was hard not to be uplifted purely from seeing Samara this outgoing and cheerful. That was a rare privilege. The last time she’d seen her like this was...well, the last time they visited the Citadel together, which must have been around nine or ten months ago by that point.
“You’re in an abnormally good mood tonight, aren’t you?” Miranda observed, certainly not complaining, but wondering what had made her so upbeat.
“Why would I not be?” Samara asked plainly. “I am with you.”
Miranda’s heart skipped a beat. Honestly, Miranda was so thoroughly charmed by that response that Samara could have asked her to do anything in that moment, no matter how embarrassing, and she would have been powerless to resist.
“...If you’re trying to butter me up to get me to dance with you...good strategy, because it’s working,” Miranda admitted defeat, seeing no point in even pretending to warn her otherwise. No doubt Samara could tell the warmth in her cheeks had nothing to do with the alcohol. “Flattery will get you everywhere.”
Samara was evidently entertained by that reaction, but equally quick to dismiss any notion that her words were coming from an insincere place. “It is not falsity. The time you and I spent together aboard The Normandy was the most I have enjoyed myself in many years. Longer than you can possibly imagine.”
“Oh, wow, that's depressing,” said Miranda. “Because I am not fun at all.”
“Neither am I. Perhaps this explains it,” Samara quipped.
Miranda didn’t agree with that, but that wasn’t the point. “You’re not dropping this are you?” she deduced, realising she didn’t have a choice in this.
“I am afraid I cannot,” Samara confirmed, as if the decision was out of her hands. “Just as you have sensed that I am in a good mood, I have also been astounded by the change in you tonight. I have never seen you so unshackled from your burdens as you are now. So, if we are ever going to keep our promise and share a dance together, I fear this will be our only opportunity. We may not get another. And I cannot abide a broken promise,” she pointed out.
She wasn’t wrong. Tomorrows weren’t exactly guaranteed.
“Well, you bloody got me, alright? Now that you’ve accused me of being good company, I feel compelled to live up to the hype.” With that, Miranda threw back her head and downed her drink, determined to be ‘fun’ for once in her life. “You get one song.” She held up one finger. “And only because it’s you.”
“One song will suffice,” said Samara, taking Miranda by the hand at long last, leading her to the dancefloor. That was all she had been promised.
Maybe it was just the drinks talking, but as she let go of her inhibitions, started moving to the music and surrendered to not caring whether she looked stupid, Miranda found herself having a far better time than she would have thought.
Most of all, the best thing about it was getting to see Samara let go of her usual restraint, and glean a rare escape from the harsh and austere lifestyle that she was required to abide by as a Justicar. It went without saying how much she deserved this reprieve. Not merely to have fun and enjoy the evening, but to have a chance to let her walls down and be herself. Her real self, beneath the armour. Just one fleeting night in however many centuries, free of worries or cares.
If Miranda could give her that, then making a fool of herself would all be worth it.
Miranda didn’t know what had suddenly made Samara so open to things like this she would have politely declined a year ago, aside from the same ‘carpe diem’ reason that applied to everyone at the moment, nor did it really matter. The point was that they were here and they were doing it while they could. And any time spent with Samara, no matter what they were doing, was never time wasted.
One song turned into two. And two into three.
In truth, because the music all blended together with similar rhythms and chord progressions, it was hard to tell where one track began and another ended. And, for the first time, Miranda began to understand that perhaps that was the whole point. It would have been pretty jarring and moment-ruining to have the flow disturbed by each new song. So, for now, she stopped being critical of that.
It was as the music changed to a fourth song that they were rudely interrupted.
“Heyyyyy, ladies,” a complete stranger wandered up to them, making finger guns and clicking his tongue. “Can I be the meat in your sandwich?”
Miranda gave the man an unimpressed look. “Mate, if that line ever actually works on a woman...she deserves you,” she said, earning a confused expression in response as the insult went over his head.
“...Is that a no?” he asked, clueless.
“Yeah, look, I’m in a good mood, so just save yourself some embarrassment and…” Miranda signalled for him to walk away, not particularly keen on wasting time and effort verbally destroying him when she would rather not bother.
To his credit, he took that rejection without a fight and left without causing a scene.
“Sorry about that.” Miranda turned to Samara. Unwanted male attention was something that happened to her a lot, so she was used to dealing with it.
Samara seemed more perplexed than perturbed. “He made this gesture.” Samara somewhat awkwardly mimicked his finger guns, as if she’d never seen anyone do that before. “...I assume I should not interpret that as a threat.”
Miranda blinked. Then, as soon as it clicked that Samara was in fact joking, cracked up with laughter. She’d never forgotten how funny Samara could be, but that sneaky delivery of hers still took her by surprise when it came out.
“Why are you laughing? We may be in grave danger,” Samara feigned ignorance.
“Alright. That’s it. That was the last song,” Miranda declared, taking that disruption as their cue to leave. “Since neither of us are gamblers, I think we’ve seen as much as there is to see of the casino. We should move on.”
“Where should we go next?” Samara prompted, letting Miranda take the lead.
“Hmm.” Miranda pondered that. What she would ordinarily do versus what Samara would expect of her on a night devoted to frivolity were two very different things. Fortunately, the Strip did serve the latter quite well. “There's an arcade not far from here. Did you know I've literally never been to one?”
Samara looked rather impressed with that suggestion, given that it was entirely out of step with Miranda’s usual character, and hence very much in keeping with the evening of inane silliness she had been promised. “I believe you humans have a saying that 'there is a first time for everything'.”
“Alright. Arcade it is.”
It certainly wasn’t far to get there. And Miranda wasn’t kidding when she said she had never had the simple pleasure of playing these games in her childhood. Or any games. She had been deprived of anything resembling fun growing up.
That being said, the lightgun game came pretty naturally to her, even if Miranda did maintain the only reason she didn’t score higher was because the controller was a shitty piece of plastic and the sensor must have been broken. If Samara thought otherwise, she just smiled and didn’t correct her.
By contrast, Samara definitely did recognise some of these games from her youth.
“You’re telling me that some of these machines basically haven’t changed at all in nine hundred years?” said Miranda, arching a sceptical eyebrow.
“No, they have not,” Samara happily confirmed, an audible tinge of excitement colouring her voice at the prospect of coming across something familiar.
Miranda snorted. So much for creativity.
“Oh. This. I remember this.” Samara went over to a particularly old-fashioned machine in the corner. ‘Whack The Thresher Maw’. “It was not thresher maws when I played it. I do not recall what it was. But I was very little. I could not have been more than...twelve? I remember vividly; it was shortly before my father left Thessia to come live here on the Citadel. That was the only day I spent together with both my mother and father - the only day that they ever both took me out together,” she spoke softly, nostalgic for that fond memory.
Miranda’s eyes twinkled as she stood by her, listening to Samara reminisce about her past. She said nothing as she waived her credit chit over the machine, spurring it to life. When Samara glanced at her in questioning, she leaned against the wall, and gestured for Samara to go ahead and play. And she did.
The next game they played was a version of what Miranda would have called air hockey, using a virtual puck. Miranda was winning up until Samara cheated, using her biotics to subtly move Miranda’s wrist away from the goal.
“I would never cheat,” Samara professed, not even trying to conceal her guilt.
“Mhmm.” Miranda fixed her with a knowing look. Two could play at that game. The very next round, she used her own biotics to move the table right when Samara least expected it, allowing her to get her goal back. “I would never cheat,” Miranda echoed back to her, mirroring Samara’s false innocent voice.
“Hey!” At that, one of the arcade workers pointed at a sign behind the counter which clearly stated ‘no biotics’, giving them no further warning than that.
Keeping track of the scores kind of went out the window when they could hardly make it through the next few rounds without cracking up. They called it a draw and gave up before they did something that got them both banned for life.
They moved on. The next thing that caught Samara’s eye was the claw machine.
“I used to be very good at these,” Samara noted, examining it.
“Really? I thought they were all rigged.”
“No, not at all. Certainly made to be difficult, yes. But if you could not win, that would be illegal. There is a skill to it,” Samara explained. Miranda gestured for her to go right ahead and show her. “I have no money,” Samara pointed out. “And I could not keep the prize even if I won.”
Miranda sighed. “...Just because I’m doing this doesn’t mean I don’t know this is a waste of money on the same level as gambling,” she said, making it clear that nobody was to know she had done this. She put credits into the machine.
Samara appraised the prize spheres to see which would be the easiest to grab. “Aim for that one,” she advised, indicating a sphere that was higher up than the others. “It may take more than one attempt, but if you line it up correctly…”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ve got it,” Miranda waved off her backseat driving, still sceptical that it was even possible to win.
The first time, she didn’t get it at quite the right angle, and the claw slipped off. The second time, she was sure she lined it up properly, but the claws snapped shut above the prize sphere, without picking it up, like the prize was too heavy.
“See? The machine is rigged,” Miranda insisted. “It’s not possible.”
“You are very close. And you have one play left,” Samara encouraged. Miranda rolled her eyes, reluctantly deciding she may as well use the game she had already paid for. “Try coming at it slightly more from the left.”
Miranda did as Samara suggested, and this time, the claw grabbed it. She blinked as the claw lifted the prize and took it all the way to the chute. “Huh.”
“I believe the appropriate phrase is ‘I told you so’,” Samara teased.
“Alright, alright. No need to get cocky,” said Miranda, opening up the prize sphere to see what she’d won. It was a keychain in the shape of Blasto the Hanar Spectre. She uttered a tssk. “I’ve never seen any of these movies. They look like rubbish.”
“Sometimes, that is precisely the appeal,” Samara advised. Miranda didn’t share the sentiment. “I think that triumph signals that we have overstayed our welcome here,” said Samara, aware they were still being watched by the same employee from before in case they cheated again. “Where to next?”
“Hmm.” Miranda glanced around as they left the arcade, thinking of options.
“There is a combat simulator here, is there not?” Samara piped up, as if she’d been holding onto that idea for a while. “I would be eager to try that.”
“By all means. Though what people find fun about a laser arena is somewhat lost on me,” Miranda remarked, probably because her father had subjected her to similar combat programs when she was a kid. “It just feels like training.”
“Its intent is to recreate something we experience as a regular part of our lives. It is fun for them because it is unfamiliar. For us, it is not a deviation from the norm, save that for once we have the liberty of not being in any actual peril,” Samara astutely observed. She had a point, Miranda thought. It wasn’t the most relaxing pastime, but Miranda could run combat sims in her sleep. She had no problems teaming up with her if that was what Samara wanted to do.
“Okay, that absolutely was rigged,” Miranda loudly complained as they emerged from the combat arena a while later. “I hit that soldier dead between the eyes, and he still had twenty percent health left? That's nonsense. No human being could possibly survive that,” she argued, gesturing as she spoke.
“We still did extremely well,” Samara pointed out, content with their performance.
“If this program was realistic, my name would be on top right now,” Miranda proclaimed, waving her hand towards the scoreboard. She was nothing if not competitive, when she wanted to be anyway. Her rant was interrupted when Samara uttered a quiet, amused chuckle. It was impossible not to soften, seeing the unfeigned affection shimmering in Samara’s gaze. “What is it?”
“Nothing.” Samara shook her head, her smile reaching her eyes. “I simply...I did not forget how much I missed spending time with you, but...in a way, I forgot just how much I missed spending time with you,” Samara acknowledged, well aware of the contradiction in her own words, but unable to say it another way.
Miranda knew exactly what she meant. Memories of the Starboard Observation Deck were no substitute for the real thing. They didn’t do justice to just how at home she felt in Samara’s company. “Yeah. Me too.”
“And do not think I did not notice,” said Samara, a very proud look coming over her. Miranda tilted her head in questioning. “Reave. You mastered it,” Samara clarified, somehow wholly unsurprised to witness that.
“Oh. Right. That.” Miranda brushed that off. It wasn’t a big deal.
“Do not undersell yourself. It is not an easy feat,” Samara told her, not about to let this go unremarked upon. “Well done, Miranda. You are the first, and I suspect only human ever to learn this ability. And it would be a great achievement even if you were asari. Indeed, I have personally never met anyone, other than some fellow Justicars, who have mastered it.”
“Well, I owe that entirely to you. So here. Present for you.” Miranda held out the Blasto The Hanar Spectre keychain she'd won from the claw machine earlier, as a token of her appreciation for Samara’s teachings a year ago.
Samara smiled, politely raising her hand to decline. “Although I am grateful, I am afraid I cannot accept this; Justicars eschew personal possessions.”
Miranda's brow crinkled, looking down at the stupid thing in her hands in abject incredulity. “...It's a keychain.”
“That is not the point,” Samara reminded her, although clearly not at all shocked or offended why someone who had not chosen a religious life might fail to understand this. The fact that the gift had no material value did not make it any less of an indulgence. “I have sworn an oath to the Goddess. I can own nothing but what you see before you - my weapons and my armour - for that is all that is essential for me to carry out my duties as a Justicar.”
“Alright. Allow me to rephrase,” Miranda began, sensing a solution to this issue. “This is a...tactical keychain,” she informed her, arching an eyebrow as she twirled the chain around her finger. “It provides an entire additional square inch of armour plating. So I insist that you take it for your own protection.”
Samara laughed, more freely than Miranda had ever seen her do so. “There is that sense of humour you maintain you do not have again,” Samara wryly commented. “I will never comprehend why you insist on claiming that you are not funny.”
“Because I'm not.” Miranda shrugged, wearing a small, self-deprecating smile. “You also described yourself as ‘terribly dull’ earlier when you’re by far the most captivating person I’ve ever spoken to, so if we’re going to start this debate right now, then I’m pretty sure I’m going to win.”
“You would not be a stranger to that, would you?” Samara sighed, realising Miranda would not relent from her position. “Very well, then. You have convinced me.” She took the keychain, clasping it in her fingers. “Make no mistake, this is still yours,” she said, pointedly. “However, I will hold this in safekeeping on your behalf. And I will return it to you the next time we meet.”
“See? Was that so hard?” said Miranda, glad they'd reached a compromise.
Samara tried not to smile, because it was evident that she knew she was technically stretching the rules by accepting this gift, even on loan (though Miranda naturally assumed that she was kidding about intending to return it later), but despite her intentions she couldn't really fight it off. Not tonight.
“If you do not mind my asking, I know what your plans for the future are in the long term, but what of the short term?” Samara asked her, curious to know where Miranda would go when she left the Citadel.
“What else is there to do but get ready for whenever Shepard needs us?” said Miranda, leaning against a nearby railing overlooking a lower section of the strip. “I’ve taken command of a small ship and started putting together a team of Cerberus defectors. So, whatever happens, I’ll be there.” She looked over at Samara. “I suppose I don’t need to ask you, but...what about you?”
“I am as I am,” Samara answered, confirming Miranda’s assumptions. “When the day comes, I will walk into the fire, alone, with nothing but what you see before you, and fight to my last breath. And, should I die, I can only pray that my final acts honour the memory of all the Justicars who perished before me.”
“...I don’t see how they wouldn’t,” Miranda said softly. “I mean, you’re you.”
Samara didn’t respond to that. “Miranda, I...” Samara hesitated. Her expression was unsettled, but she swallowed, quickly finding an equilibrium and settling on what she intended to say. “Though I imagine we will be fighting on the same battlefield in the near future, it has not eluded me that we may not get a chance to speak like this before that time comes to pass. Or...ever again.”
“I know,” Miranda admitted, glancing down. The same thought had been swirling in her head even before Shepard’s party. She wasn't sure if they were meant to address that, or if that looming spectre of death was an open secret they weren't supposed to confront, but she was glad Samara had raised it. The problem was, there were too many things she wanted to say if this was going to be the last conversation they ever had. Thoughts she hadn’t even put into words in her mind, and could never fully express. “...I really am sorry about Rila,” was where Miranda chose to begin. It would have felt wrong not to tell her that.
Samara swallowed and nodded her head, trying to stay strong. Then her resolve cracked, and the tears came. Her hands went to her face, unable to stem the tide. Even the strongest woman in the universe could only carry so much.
For a split-second, Miranda thought she had made a mistake bringing this up, seeing how much Samara was hurting over her recent loss. But then it occurred to her. Maybe Samara breaking down in front of her didn’t mean she’d done anything wrong. Maybe it showed just how much she needed this moment of connection with someone she trusted - to allow herself the vulnerability to be hurt.
Had anyone even comforted Samara at all since it happened?
Had anyone given her the chance to grieve for her daughter?
“I did everything I could to save her. Even though I should not have. Even knowing it might mean putting myself in the position of choosing between my children and The Code. Even while the rest of my Order gave their lives to save so many on Thessia.” Samara drew a deep breath, but it wound up shallower than she intended in her sorrow. “...I violated one of my Oaths, Miranda.”
“What do you mean?” Miranda asked, not knowing enough about the Justicars to understand what that meant. “You mean you broke The Code?”
“No. No, I would never...never break The Code. Not while I draw breath,” Samara insisted, making that clear, even through her tears. “But the first step to becoming a Justicar is to take the Oath of Solitude. That means you are forsworn from any family, including children. I did not utter a single word to Falere or Rila in four hundred and thirty-one years, save for when I wrote to them a year ago to let them know Mirala was dead. However, when I heard their monastery may be under threat...I did not go to them as a Justicar.” Her breath hitched as the moisture trickled down her cheeks. “I went to them because I am their mother.”
“Of course you did,” said Miranda, feeling nothing but sympathy for her, and a touch of anger towards the Justicars for subjecting Samara to that dilemma in the first place. For depriving her of the shattered, broken remnants of a family she had left, and making her feel ashamed for protecting her daughters from certain death. “There’s no oath in the universe anyone could swear that would make a mother stop loving her children. Not a mother like you.”
“No, there is not,” Samara confirmed, her voice breaking under the strain as her body was racked by another sob. “I saw so little of Rila before she died, but what I saw...I could not be prouder of the woman she became, in spite of the cruel hand fate dealt her. I always knew her to be the most responsible of my daughters, always taking care of her younger sisters, though she was barely any older than they were. But she was so strong, Miranda. I never knew she was so fearless. So ferociously protective. She gave her own life so that Falere could live.”
“And you,” Miranda added. “So that you could live too.”
Samara didn’t reply to that.
“How’s Falere?” Miranda asked, after Samara didn’t respond.
“She is well. Alone, but well.” Samara glanced down at her hands, her tears beginning to dry on her cheeks. “She was always a gentle and sensitive soul, so much like her fath--” Samara’s voice caught on that word. She couldn’t say it. It hurt to speak of her. “The woman she has grown into...she is so much kinder than I could possibly have imagined. She had not seen my face or heard my voice for four hundred and thirty-one years. She had every right to hate me. But, instead, she...when all was said and done, she embraced me.”
“Why wouldn’t she?” said Miranda, thinking that should have gone without saying. “She’s your daughter. She loves you.”
“That is more than I deserve.” Samara’s voice was low, barely above a whisper.
Miranda couldn’t stand to hear her talk about herself that way. “Samara--”
Samara raised a hand to silence her. “Respectfully, Miranda...It is no fault of yours, but there are some things that are beyond even your understanding. I believe this is one of them. I would prefer not to argue with you.”
Miranda sighed. She hated to admit it, but Samara had a point. If she felt that way, it wasn’t like it was a poorly-considered opinion. She had lived her own life for nearly a thousand years, and the disconnect between Samara and Falere had been there for centuries. It wasn’t Miranda’s place to debate with her about her perception of herself, or where she stood with Falere, much as she wanted to.
“...But you weren’t lying before, right?” Miranda pressed, unable to leave that thought alone. When Samara said things like this, it made her worry about her. “You are going to keep seeing Falere, aren’t you?”
“My Oaths say I should not,” Samara acknowledged.
“But you will,” Miranda intuited.
Samara held back the last of her tears, the first signs of a conflicted, broken smile coming to her lips. “I have no choice. In truth, there is no power in the universe, nor within myself, that could force me to stay away,” she said honestly, recognising she did not have the willpower to resist seeing her daughter again, especially knowing Falere had nobody else to look after her.
“Good,” Miranda forcefully enthused. For as much as she respected Samara, she might have had to slap some sense into her if she said otherwise. “No offence, and I know this is easy for me to say because I don’t have a single religious or spiritual bone in my body, but any oath that would compel you to stay away from the one person in your life who makes you happy isn’t an oath worth keeping. For me, that person is my sister. For you, that person is Falere.”
At long last, Samara allowed herself to smile again, her eyes glistening from her tears, but shedding no more. “She is.” Her voice was soft, perhaps even fragile, but Miranda had never heard it filled with so much tenderness. “I should not permit myself to feel this way, but...if you thought you perceived a change in me tonight, Miranda, you did,” she admitted. “Though losing Rila broke my heart, and my wounds for her will bleed until my dying days...even so, I have never felt more at peace than I do at this moment. Or, if I have, then I cannot remember it.”
Miranda could only imagine. In her own life, she had gone without seeing Oriana for nineteen years. And, the moment they met on Illium, it was like a weight she hadn’t even known she was carrying had been lifted off her shoulders. That was nothing compared to what Samara had endured.
Going four hundred and thirty-one years not seeing her daughters, the people who mattered most to her...it must have been torture. Now, that torment had finally stopped. Even though Rila hadn’t lived long enough to be part of this new reunion, Samara had still regained a connection with Falere she never thought she would have again. She had some semblance of her family back.
That was life-changing.
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Miranda said sincerely. After everything she’d lost, Samara had more than earned her just reward. "And, for what it’s worth, I hope this is merely the start of newer and brighter things for you and Falere.”
After recollecting her composure, Samara faced her. “Thank you, Miranda.”
Miranda was not anticipating that shift in focus. “For what?”
“For this. For tonight,” Samara clarified, gesturing at their surroundings. “For allowing me to enjoy myself more than I have in centuries. And for reminding me to savour these effervescent glimmers of happiness while I still can.” She paused for a moment, averting her gaze down towards her hands on the railing. “I think, perhaps, on some level, you sensed I needed this. But perhaps you do not appreciate just how much I did. So, again, I thank you for spending your night in the company of this poor, tired old woman, when it was not required of you.”
Miranda hesitated at that. Of course, it meant a lot for Samara to tell her that she had gotten so much out of their time together, and that it had helped her in some way. But Miranda never liked it when Samara made those resigned, self-defeating comments about herself. They made her sound like some washed up, retired old racehorse about to be put down with two barrels behind the garden shed. And that was the furthest thing from reality.
Samara was amazing. Beyond compare. She had not lost a step. Aside from being a matriarch and continuing to get stronger with every passing year, she did not show a single sign of age. It certainly hadn’t hindered her yet, and probably would not for many decades yet to come. Asari regularly lived to be over a thousand years old. Hell, although hitting eleven-hundred was rare by most accounts, even that wouldn’t be unheard of. Not by a long shot.
Not that Miranda was an expert, but just from knowing her, she would guess Samara was still a long way off from the natural end of her life. About as far off as any of the human members of The Normandy. So why did she so often talk about herself like she was past the point where she had anything of worth left to offer - a broken relic of a bygone age to be carelessly discarded and cast aside?
Did she think Miranda was just doing this because she felt sorry for her?
“...I didn’t invite you out with me because I pity you,” Miranda broke the silence, glancing over at Samara. That had never been what this was, and she would correct any such mistaken assumptions as promptly and frankly as possible, so that there was no chance for misinterpretation. “I wanted to spend time with you because I like you, and I care about you. You know that, right?”
“I do,” Samara confirmed, returning Miranda’s gaze. “And I hope you know that I did not spend time with you because I was merely seeking some distraction from what has come to pass in recent weeks.”
“I do,” Miranda replied in kind. She folded her arms across the railing, seeing no reason not to continue being so transparent. “This probably isn’t going to be a shock to you, because there aren’t exactly a lot of contenders for the title, but did you know you might very well be the best friend I’ve ever had?”
Jacob may have been her friend for longer, sure, but they butted heads a lot, often on pretty fundamental things. There were some things she hadn’t told him, and may never tell him. Some things she couldn’t go to him about. Whereas Samara just...knew her so intimately. She got her on an entirely different level. One that didn’t even require words, a lot of the time.
Samara’s eyes dipped slightly. “It...occurred to me, some time ago, in fact, that...I could possibly say the same thing about you,” she replied. Miranda was taken aback by that, and it must have shown on her face. “You doubt me, but you have a stronger claim to that position than you know.”
Miranda brushed that off, finding it too hard to believe. Samara had been alive for over nine centuries. She’d definitely had better friends. “You’re just being nice.”
Samara squinted at that comment, visibly perplexed. “I do not know where you have garnered this impression that I am ‘nice’, or would say things I do not mean just to be thus. I can assure you, I have never at any stage of my life been renowned for being particularly ‘nice’ to anybody. Quite the contrary,” Samara assured her, wanting to clear up that mischaracterisation. “I mean no offence, but...in that regard, you and I are more alike than you seem to think.”
“None taken,” Miranda nonchalantly replied. She supposed she understood where Samara was coming from by not accepting that description. If anyone tried to tell Miranda she was ‘just being nice’, she would have looked at them like they had grown a second head. “And I guess you do have a point. I mean, the first time I met you, you crushed a woman’s skull with your foot.”
“You would have used a gun,” Samara noted.
“Yeah, probably,” Miranda conceded. “You were always nice to me, though.”
“Not always. There were times when I challenged you. Like you, I am not prone to remaining silent when I disagree with someone. If I am less stubborn and stern than I once was, it is only because experience has humbled me, and I have spent many centuries practicing patience and mindfulness,” said Samara.
Samara wasn’t wrong about any of that, Miranda thought. Samara had indeed called her out on her bullshit a couple of times, although whenever she did offer advice she had always treated it as something constructive rather than an exercise in judgement, which was largely why it had been so effective.
“However, if despite all that you perceived me as being especially nice to you...I probably was,” Samara admitted with a small sigh, willing to concede that wasn’t misplaced. “It is easy to be nice to a person you are already fond of.”
“Why though?” Miranda couldn’t help but ask, earning a confused look. “That’s something I’ve never been able to figure out. Look, I know I’m not the most self-aware person, but I’m better than I was. And, God, I could be fucking intolerable sometimes.” Miranda grimaced in annoyance at her own memory of herself, eliciting a faint smirk from Samara. “But even at my worst, you never had a problem with me. So, why did you like spending time with me?”
“How long do we have before our absence will be noticed? Because, if I answered that question comprehensively, we would be here a very long time,” Samara stated. That was, without question, the most heartwarming thing Miranda had ever heard another person say about her. “If I am being truly honest, I have often wondered the same thing about why you chose to spend your time with me.”
“Is that a joke?” Miranda asked, not sure how Samara could even question that.
“You know very well that it is not,” Samara said astutely. She wasn’t a liar.
“Well, then, you and I remember things very differently, because you had countless things to offer me. Wisdom. Insight. Friendship. A place where I could just sit in silence for a while. You've taught me so much, but somehow you never made it feel like you were lecturing me. Even when you clearly were,” Miranda remarked, with a hint of teasing to her tone. “The only problem is that I've gained so much more out of knowing you than you have from knowing me.”
“That is not true,” Samara firmly insisted, the quickness of her response catching Miranda somewhat off guard. “The life of a Justicar is a solitary one. We meet many people, but have no companions. I had no companions. Until you. The connection we share is unlike any I have known in centuries. Or...even before that. You have enriched my life. I am better for having known you.”
“You don’t mean that,” Miranda instinctively replied. Samara was...well, she wasn’t a ‘perfect’ person per se, because they didn’t exist. But she was as close as Miranda had ever seen to one. She was a perfect version of what she strove to be. So how could Miranda make her better than she was? How could she possibly do anything to improve upon such sheer mastery of the self?
“Goddess, you do not even know…” Samara’s suddenness took Miranda by surprise. She watched as she let her fingers fall across her face, sighed deeply and shook her head, choosing her words carefully. “Forgive me. It is difficult for me to say this, but...when we travelled together, there were times where I thought…” Samara stopped herself, as if reconsidering what she intended to say. “Perhaps I did not always recognise it then, but in hindsight there were days where I do not know how I could have withstood my burdens if you were not with me.”
Miranda didn’t know what to make of that. It just...didn’t make sense. Samara was so strong. “But I didn’t do anything,” Miranda pointed out.
At that, Samara uttered a quiet sound, almost like a short, sombre laugh. “But you did,” she said, meeting Miranda’s gaze once more. “You were there. And you have shown me nothing but kindness from the moment we met.”
Miranda still couldn’t accept what she was hearing. Besides, she didn’t remember doing anything that would strike a normal person as especially compassionate, because that wasn’t who she was. “But I’m not kind,” she said.
“No, perhaps you are not,” Samara acknowledged, never blind to the person Miranda was. She was not known for being sensitive or sympathetic, for good reason. “But you were to me,” she stated plainly. That was all that mattered.
Miranda didn’t completely agree with that. But she was glad Samara thought so. And, if nothing else, it was true that Samara did make her want to try to be a better person than she was, and had brought different shades out of her in a way that nobody else had, irrespective of whether they came naturally to her.
That was the thing about people like Samara, Miranda thought. When a person had a special connection with someone else, a special relationship, then they got to know a version of them that didn’t exist for anyone else. Parts of them nobody else ever saw. Truths nobody else ever knew. So maybe the Miranda reserved for Samara's eyes only really was gentler than the one everybody else had met. But, if so, that was only because their friendship brought that out of her.
As the silence lingered, the memory of one very unkind thing she had done emerged in Miranda’s mind. It wasn’t lost on her that there was still one regret she had in their friendship. One mistake for which she’d never made amends.
It was not something she had forgotten about. She recalled with discomforting clarity how she’d never taken her numerous chances back on The Normandy to confess to Samara about looking into her past without her consent. She’d never apologised for it, though she had intended to do so, eventually. She would have done it after The Collector Base but, when the Alpha Relay was destroyed, the thought had genuinely completely fallen from her mind amid so much death. By the time she thought about it again, it was too late. They had already parted ways.
So many months had passed since all of this transpired that part of her just wanted to let sleeping dogs lie, and not raise the subject now. But Miranda knew this was the only chance she would get. If she was ever going to apologise, this was her moment. She had to take it, or live with being a coward.
“...Samara, can I say one more thing?” Miranda broke the silence.
“You may always speak freely with me, Miranda. Indeed, that you always say precisely what is on your mind is perhaps my favourite thing about you. Certainly, one of them,” Samara said with a charming twinkle in her eye.
“Okay, then.” Miranda took Samara’s encouragement at face-value, and elected to come out with it, even if it was a heavy subject. “What happened to your family wasn't your fault,” Miranda began, deciding to approach the topic from that angle. The unexpected shift in the conversation caused Samara to stiffen visibly. “And you know I'm not the sort of person who'd say something I didn't think was true purely to make you feel better, no matter how much I like you. But you didn't do anything to make that happen. None of it is your fault. None. So please stop blaming yourself for what happened four hundred years ago.”
Samara didn't seem to know how to react to Miranda’s words, as they were the last thing she had anticipated. It was obvious it was a message she struggled to accept, even after all this time. Of course, she had no idea how much Miranda knew about her past, beyond the broad picture she’d painted. Not yet.
“Has anyone ever told you that before?” Miranda asked, curious.
“...They have not,” Samara answered, no less taken aback. From prior conversations, Miranda knew she had scarcely spoken about her past. Her daughters’ diagnoses made her a pariah as soon as they happened, leaving her nobody to turn to, and Justicars did not discuss the people they were before they swore their Oaths. Samara had carried her burdens alone every day since.
“Then I'm glad I said it,” Miranda replied, already feeling a sense of relief just from stating that out loud, though she knew she was far from finished when it came to things she had to get off her chest. “I should have said it a long time ago.”
“Then may I also say something I should have said a long time ago?” Samara cut her off, speaking rather quickly. Miranda gestured for her to go right ahead. If she was being that abrupt, then it must have been important. “I wish you loved being Miranda Lawson as much as everybody else believes you love being Miranda Lawson,” Samara spoke plainly. “Because she is and has always been a far, far better person than you seem to think she is. And there is not a single thing about her that makes her a ‘failure’. It wounds me whenever you think otherwise.”
Miranda was totally blindsided. She hadn’t expected Samara’s response at all, since she would never say anything unless she truly meant it. In fact, any prior thoughts Miranda had were completely ripped from her mind.
Samara didn’t need to ask whether anybody had told Miranda that before. She knew they hadn’t. Evidently, that knowledge bothered her a great deal.
“Miranda, I...” Samara reached out and touched Miranda's arm, as if considering saying something more. She swallowed, glancing away for a moment before meeting Miranda's eyes. “I think we have been gone longer than we ought. We should return before our absence becomes a cause for concern,” she said, mustering a faint smile, sensing they had both lost track of time.
“Of course,” Miranda concurred, too dumbstruck by Samara’s confession to remember that there were words she had left unsaid. “After you.”
With that, Samara led the way back towards Shepard's apartment.
As she trailed behind her, Miranda discreetly wiped at the corner of her eye, maintaining her composure, masking any lingering signs that betrayed any frailty, and just how much Samara’s words had touched the core of something she hadn’t even known was as raw and vulnerable as it was.
It may have been a scant two hours that they’d shared there alone on the Silversun Strip, but stealing that precious time together felt like the best decision Miranda had ever made. It may have been over sooner than she would have liked but, if nothing else, at least she could look back on this night in the coming days and feel content with the way she left things between them.
She wanted to part ways with Samara on a high note. After all, deep down in her heart, Miranda knew it was the last time Samara would ever see her again.
* * *
Of all the people Miranda had expected to be banging on her door in the middle of the night, Samara was not high on that list. She hadn’t expected to see her anytime soon, given she had left only two weeks ago. And, when they eventually did meet again, Miranda hadn’t imagined Samara would look like this.
“Samara, what are you doing here? It’s freezing out, and you’re drenched--”
“I must speak with you,” Samara cut her off, her voice firm, and her eyes ablaze with a strange intensity Miranda had never seen in her before. It seemed as though Samara didn’t even feel the ice-cold rain on her. “It cannot wait.”
Judging from her tone, that wasn’t a request.
“Uh...Of course,” was all Miranda could mutter as she held open the door for her, closing it behind her. It wouldn’t have even occurred to her to say no. Not when Samara was in such a state, moving with such urgency. “In here.” Miranda gestured towards her room. Samara marched in without hesitation.
Suffice it to say, Miranda was a little stunned. What the hell was happening?
She followed her inside, and clicked the door shut. There wasn’t much space in her small room, but Samara found enough to pace back and forth. She was uncharacteristically wringing her hands as she wore wet tracks in the floor. These were things Miranda had quite literally never seen her do before.
“Samara, what is this? What’s going on?” Miranda asked.
“Forgive my intrusion. But I needed to see you. I could not...the way we left things, I…” Samara paused for a moment, meeting her gaze. “I fear that perhaps you already know what has brought me here, and what I wish to discuss.”
Miranda said nothing, too disoriented and sleep-deprived to be capable of doing anything other than staring at her in a dazed silence. She had no idea what she was talking about, or what could make her act so out-of-sorts. Miranda had never seen Samara so dishevelled. So discombobulated. So...frazzled.
“Oh. Oh, I see. You do not. I see. Very well, then. I…” At that realisation, Samara resumed her pacing, running her hand along her crest. “I suppose I shall have to start from the beginning, then. I do not know why I expected to avoid this.”
“Samara, please slow down.” Miranda raised her hand, her mind far too clouded with fog to make sense of any of this. Even just watching her march back and forth felt like running a marathon, which would have been an exhausting prospect even if she had slept in the past four days. Her request fell on deaf ears.
“Miranda, I was...I was dishonest with you the last time we spoke,” Samara began. “No, worse than dishonest. I have been deceiving you, for no other reason than because I have been too craven to admit the truth. What is worse, I fear that you have sensed my deceit, and that this is what has damaged our friendship. I cannot...I cannot abide this. I cannot continue to lie to you.”
Miranda could barely even make out what she was saying as she paced. She was speaking so quickly, and with such adamance that it felt like she might spontaneously combust from internal friction if it weren’t for the rain soaking her skin. Miranda had never seen Samara in this state. She was like a completely different person. A stranger wearing the face of someone she knew.
Samara was so restrained. So dignified. So elegant. She was a woman who had walked alone, unflinching into mortal peril thousands of times with no regard for her own life, and somehow emerged unscathed, even where countless others had fallen around her. She was the most fearless individual Miranda had ever met.
There was none of that here.
She was...overcome.
Her proverbial armour had cracked.
“Samara, respectfully, you’re a category five hurricane right now. I need you to bring it down to a stiff breeze,” said Miranda, gesturing for her to cool her frantic energy just a little bit, because right now this was impossible to follow.
At last, Samara halted, and stood still. “...Yes. Yes, of course. You have my apologies,” Samara replied, no less anxious, but at least she seemed able to recognise what an incoherent onslaught her words must have sounded like.
Miranda leaned back against the chair that was tucked into her desk, gripping it with her hand to take some weight off her bad leg. Whatever could have left Samara so shaken, it had to be serious. Nothing ever rattled her.
Except apparently this.
“What have you been lying about?” Miranda asked, that being about the only thing she had managed to make out of Samara’s hasty, jumbled rant a moment ago.
At that question, Samara held her stare, a distant expression falling across her face. “...After all this time, you truly do not suspect, do you?” she asked aloud, the realisation sinking in, as if that was a possibility she had not contemplated.
“Suspect what?” was all Miranda could say, tempted to utter a desperate laugh as she shrugged her good shoulder, not because there was anything remotely funny about this, but because she was so fucking tired, and so fucking lost.
“Why I abandoned you as I did. Why I fled this city and deserted you. Why you have been forced to contend with so much pain, suffering and death alone, when I ought to have been here to share those burdens with you, and taken care of you when you needed me by your side,” said Samara. Her voice was shaking.
Miranda softened when she heard that. Did Samara really think she was angry at her for leaving? “Samara, no.” Miranda shook her head, unconsciously gesturing with her amputated arm as if to strike that thought from history. “Of course I understand why you left. You’re a Justicar. You have your Code--”
The moment that word left her lips, Samara laughed a humourless laugh, laced with turmoil and despair. Miranda was struck mute by that. It was so unlike her.
“Oh, my sweet Miranda, you truly still believe that about me?” said Samara, her hand on her forehead, as if she couldn’t fathom what she was hearing - that even now people still trusted her at her word. “No. No, my dear, it is a fiction. A comforting lie. A shadow I hide behind.”
Miranda damn near recoiled in abject confusion. “But you are a Justicar.”
“Yes, but that is not why I acted as I did. When I turned my back on you, it had nothing to do with The Code,” Samara unburdened herself at long last, revealing a secret that had been silently killing her. “When I left, it was for one reason only. And that was because I...because I could not be here to watch you die…”
Samara’s voice cracked on the last word, and her hands covered her face as tears began to swell from beneath the surface.
Miranda was dumbfounded - rendered speechless from utter astonishment. She had only seen Samara break like this twice before. Had only seen her cry twice before. That was when she killed Morinth. And when she opened up about losing Rila. Only the deaths of her daughters affected her like this.
Samara trembled, her hand over her mouth. Her eyes shone with remorse as she met Miranda’s frozen visage across the room. “I am so sorry,” Samara told her sincerely, her words cut by the hitch of a breath. “I know my contrition means nothing, but I am so deeply, deeply sorry. I do not blame you if you despise me. You should. I know I deserve it, because the truth is that I failed you. I failed you because I am weak, and I am broken, and I could not...I could not lose you.”
Miranda’s heart tore in half when she heard that. Her head fell, and she pressed her palm to her eye, squeezing it shut. Was this why Samara thought Miranda had snapped at her the last time they spoke? Was she responsible for hurting her like this? God, she regretted that day even more now than she already had before.
“You didn’t fail me, Samara,” Miranda quietly assured her. “You saved my life.”
“That, too, was selfishness,” Samara confessed, owning up to her sins. “When the dust settled, I saw you had not returned. When I realised how close you had been to the Conduit, I went searching for you. And only for you.”
“That’s not true,” Miranda interjected, refusing to let Samara denigrate herself for what had been unparalleled heroism. “You saved dozens of lives in the wasteland.”
“Because The Code demanded I must, and my life would be forfeit if I did not. Every time I came across another survivor, I had to stop and render aid. But, though The Code compelled me to do everything in my power to rescue those in need, I tell you plainly I did not want to. I did not care about any of them. I would have abandoned every single one of them if I could,” Samara said starkly, stripping bare her truth. That revelation hit Miranda like a shockwave. It was something Miranda would have said. Not Samara. “People thought me brave, but I was not. People thought I was saving lives, but that was never my goal. My deeds should not entitle me to praise, but rather scorn, because I was selfish. I was so selfish. My only reason for going out there again and again was to find you.”
Samara swallowed. Miranda would have, but her mouth was suddenly dry.
“...And I did,” Samara continued, her features softening as she gazed upon Miranda. “You were caked in blood and dirt when I found you. So much so that I could barely recognise you. And then you...and then you stopped breathing.”
Samara took a moment to compose herself, affected by those painful memories. She drew a deep breath, and wiped a stray tear from her cheek.
“I did not merely believe that you would die. I knew it. I was certain of it,” Samara quietly admitted. “The infection had already reached your blood. It was shutting down your organs. There seemed to be no hope that you would survive. The only reason you were breathing was because machines were doing it for you. Your pulse was so weak. Your condition showed no signs of improving. As I sat by your bedside, I came to understand that I was doing nothing but watching your life slip away before my very eyes. Every day, you were slowly dying in front of me. And I could not endure it. I...I broke. I ran away, rather than face it.”
“But you left me that message,” Miranda pointed out, struggling to fit the puzzle pieces together in her clouded head between things she already knew, parts of the story she had been told by others, and what Samara was saying now.
“A lie,” Samara said bluntly, her voice too strained to speak louder than a whisper. “To convince myself that I had not forsaken you. That I was not hiding in the shadows from my fears. That I was merely doing as I ought to, as a Justicar. A lie that rang hollow.” Samara glanced down at her feet, ashamed of her actions. “If I truly believed that you had any chance of recovering, I tell you from my heart, I would not have left. Never. And, if I had sincerely been forced into some temporary departure by my Code as I claimed, I would have placed a much better message beside your bed for you to find when you awoke. But I did not do so. I did not do so, because I could not bear to step into your room again. I was afraid each time I went near you, it would be the moment you would…”
Samara couldn’t even finish that sentence. She didn’t have to.
Miranda didn’t interrupt her, too overwhelmed to respond.
“This is why I have returned now. To apologise for my selfishness. Not to seek your forgiveness. Just to apologise,” Samara explained, repentant for her recent failings. “You have earned nothing less than that.”
“I…” Miranda didn’t know what to say. Couldn’t...form the words. It was a lot to take in. She could scarcely process it in her heavily fatigued state. She couldn’t think. She was so tired. So confused. “I still don’t understand. You’ve seen death before. Why couldn’t you be here? Why did you have to leave?”
“Goddess…” Samara turned away, facing the wall. “You truly do not know…”
“No, I don’t. So tell me,” said Miranda, growing exasperated with how Samara kept doing things like that. Acting like there were things she should already know, which she didn’t. She wasn’t psychic. She couldn’t read her mind. Obviously not. Samara had come all this way to throw this confession at her feet out of fucking nowhere. Why hold back now? “You’ve already said so--”
“Because I could not bear the pain of losing you!” Samara snapped back, her voice sharper and louder than before, as if she had to force the words out, fighting against herself to speak them. But, once they were said, they couldn’t be retracted. “I did not trust what I would do. How I would withstand it. Goddess, Miranda, I was coming apart. I had already broken The Code for you!”
Miranda’s eye widened. “What do you mean?”
“You know this. You said it yourself.” Samara faced her once more, moving a step closer. “I...I threatened to murder doctors, because they wanted to turn off your life support,” Samara confessed, hard as it was for her to say. “You were functionally dead, and I was prepared to harm innocents rather than accept it - to use violence against healers so I could keep you hooked to those machines.”
Miranda’s heart stopped in her chest.
Wait, what? That wasn’t something Jacob had just misunderstood? Her weary mind went black. She couldn’t even comprehend that revelation.
“I breached two tenets, in total. Not only by threatening innocent medics, but that I lied about The Code in order to compel them to spare you,” Samara confided in her, exposing her transgressions, her shame. “This is not permitted. I was unjust. Had I any sisters left to judge me, I might be expelled from the Order for this. At worst, perhaps even executed. Though, if there is but one small mercy to be found, it is that my words, evil though they were, were only words. I took no violent act, drew no weapon, and made no attempt to carry out my threats. Had I done so, The Code would not suffer me to live. Nor should it.”
“...You…wait…” Miranda couldn’t hear herself, her ear was ringing so loud.
What the fuck was happening? This couldn’t be real.
“In what small part of me was still capable of thinking rationally, I knew my behaviour had made me a danger to myself and others,” Samara continued. “If you passed, I could not take the risk of what I might do. At least, that was what I told myself. In truth, by that stage, I was simply too afraid to stay. Afraid of how much it would hurt when you...” She trailed off into silence, her meaning clear.
Miranda didn’t even catch all of that, her thoughts blank. No, this didn’t make sense. Samara was a Justicar. A servant of her Code. She was the embodiment of her way of life. She stuck to it rigidly. She never bent the rules, much less broke them. She would never do that. She was so disciplined. So loyal to it.
Samara hadn’t even broken The Code when it came to her own daughters. An Oath, yes. But not The Code. From what Miranda understood, that was the difference between breaking a promise, and breaking the law. She had told Miranda straight to her face that she couldn’t do the latter. That she would never.
And yet now Samara was standing there in front of her telling her that she had not merely violated The Code, but that she had done so consciously. For her.
Twice.
“Now you see me for what I truly am. Frail. Weak. A fraud.” Samara glanced aside, accepting that what she had done would forever tarnish her in Miranda’s sight, as it should. “So, like a coward, I ran. As far as I could. Every day thinking, is this the day she died? Is this the day? Surely, she must have passed by now, Samara. Just go back. Just go. Confront this. Be with her. But I could not. I could not return, because I was not ready to know. Because I was not ready to feel--”
Her voice caught, rendering her unable to finish that bleak thought.
Miranda felt a heavy tide rising inside her. Like she was swimming in a maelstrom. Sucked in under the water. Unable to breathe. Unable to think or react. It was so much all at once. It was as if she’d been consumed by a tsunami.
“...Why are you telling me this?” Miranda asked through the haze.
“Because you do not deserve to believe you are at fault,” Samara insisted, taking another step towards her. “I abandoned you in your hour of need, not because you mean nothing to me, but because you...you are so important to me it scares me. But that is my burden, not yours. You should not have to suffer for my lack of bravery. I could not bear it if you thought that I have treated you so carelessly because you have slighted me in some way. You have not. I am to blame. Only me. The failure is mine, and mine alone. I am the monster here. Not you.”
“Please don’t say that,” said Miranda. It hurt to hear Samara berate herself like that. She was the opposite of a monster. “I wouldn’t even be here if not for you.”
“But I should have been here.” Samara took another step. As the space between them shrank, Miranda felt a shiver pass through her body, but not because it was cold. “I should have watched over you. Cared for you when you awoke. Been by your side as you rebuilt this city. Weathered the terrible news with you when you learned what became of our friends. But I could not. Instead, I left you. I let fear take hold, and surrendered to despair. Worst of all, I gave up hope. I did not have faith in you, when I should have known you are beyond extraordinary.”
“You don’t owe me anything--”
“Please.” Samara quietly cut her off, refusing her forgiveness, feeling unworthy of it. Even so, she could not refrain from reaching out, curling stray strands of hair back behind Miranda’s ear. Miranda’s pulse spiked, thundering like a drum. “I was distraught for so long. Too paralysed with sorrow to return, and face the news. So convinced that everything I dreaded had come to pass. That I had been too late when I found you in the wastes. That you had succumbed while I was away. That I would find nothing here but your grave.” Samara’s eyes shone as she looked upon her, a warm smile coming to her face. “I do not know how I ever doubted you would defy the odds. You are truly incredible. You always have been.”
Miranda didn’t dare to breathe, Samara was so close. All those bottled up feelings came flooding to the surface. It felt like somehow Samara should just know. That she should be able to lay eyes upon her, and glean from a single glance how easily Miranda came undone in her presence.
God, the things it did to her for Samara to be this near, her fingers on her skin. It was too much. She should have withdrawn and pulled away, but she couldn’t. She didn’t want Samara to stop. She needed her, with every fibre of her being.
Miranda couldn’t take it. For her own sanity, she had to force herself to turn her head away. To look somewhere else. Anywhere else but Samara.
"Do not hide from me.” Samara’s fingers curled beneath her chin, lifting her head, compelling Miranda to lock her eye on Samara once more. “I know I ran before, but it was not because of you. Do not think it was ever to do with you.”
She realised then that Samara must have assumed the reason Miranda averted her gaze was because she’d felt self-conscious in that moment. Of her wounds. Of the scars on her face. Little did she know that had nothing to do with it.
It became achingly apparent then as she got lost in that shimmering sapphire stare that Samara had no idea what Miranda felt towards her. And that those feelings were so powerful and intense that they were threatening to devour her.
How could Samara not see what she was doing to her?
She was laid open. Bare. Exposed.
Samara’s fingers combed through Miranda’s hair until they grazed the cord that held her eyepatch in place. Miranda was so transfixed that she almost didn’t even feel her touch it. “May I?” Samara asked her permission to remove it, gauging whether Miranda trusted her enough to show the extent of her scars.
Miranda swallowed and nodded, giving her consent. That was never the problem. Least of all with Samara. Miranda stood stiff against her desk, knuckles turning white against her chair as Samara carefully slipped it off.
Samara released a slow exhale as she set that black cloth down on the table, a wave of heartfelt warmth washing over her features as that barrier fell by the wayside. As if on instinct, her fingers reached out to touch her face, but she stopped her hand just short of Miranda’s scarred cheek. “Will it hurt if I…?”
Miranda shook her head, almost too tense to speak. “Not if you’re gentle,” was all she could manage. And when was Samara ever anything less?
With Miranda’s tacit approval, Samara softly cupped her cheek. Miranda’s breath hitched. How could she be so on edge that such a feather-light caress could make her feel like her entire world was on the verge of exploding?
“I have been devout in my faith for a very long time, and yet...Believe me when I tell you, the only time in my nine hundred and seventy-one years of life that the Goddess has ever answered my prayers was when I turned around on that balcony, and saw you standing there in front of me,” Samara professed.
If she moved so much as a single muscle, Miranda wasn’t sure there was any power on Earth that could stop her from crashing her lips against Samara’s, no matter how wrong she knew it was, or how bad of an idea. She willed her body to stay stone still, because it was all she could do to control herself.
If Miranda hadn’t been leaning so heavily on the desk and chair behind her, she was certain her legs would have given out right from under her. Samara’s skin was still so cold from the rain, but her touch was hotter than fire, and Miranda like wax beneath her fingertips. She could have melted into a puddle on the floor.
“I know I should not, but…” Without another word, Samara tilted Miranda’s head down, and pressed a tender, savouring kiss to her forehead. Miranda’s palm shook against her desk. She was trembling like a leaf. When she parted from her, Samara let her head rest against Miranda’s, cradling her jaw. “...I am sorry, but that is all I have wanted to do ever since I learned you were alive.”
Miranda’s heart wasn’t just pounding. It was screaming.
Somehow, she just knew, if she dared to utter a single sound, she wouldn’t be able to keep from shouting the truth at the top of her voice. The desire to say those five pivotal words seeped from every pore. She was bursting at the seams.
“No, I should not have done that.” Samara shook her head, taking a step back. It was only then that Miranda realised she hadn’t taken a single breath in the last minute, and sharply gasped for air. “I have been selfish. Allowed myself to…” Samara stopped herself, as if suddenly coming to her senses. “Forgive me, Miranda. I have said all I needed to say. I should--”
The instant she turned to leave, Miranda’s hand shot out and seized Samara by her wrist, grabbing her as tightly as she’d ever held onto anything in her life.
“Don’t you dare walk away,” Miranda growled. “Don’t you fucking dare.”
Samara hesitated, caught off guard. “...I thought you did not want me here.”
“Why would I not want you here?!” Miranda shot back, her tension built to breaking point. She felt like she was going insane, trying to find her balance on shifting sands. Nothing made sense anymore. For all Samara’s honesty, she still didn’t understand what the hell was going on.
“Because I abandoned you,” Samara answered. That had been the whole reason for her confession. Her apology. “Because I hurt you. Because you hate me.”
“Hate you? Samara, you idiot, I’m in love with you!” the words tore themselves from Miranda’s chest before she could stop them. Samara froze. Miranda released her tight grip on Samara’s wrist. Her hand flew to her mouth in horror as she realised what she’d said. But it was too late to stuff that confession back in.
God damn it. She’d really just said that out loud, hadn’t she?
“Fuck…” Miranda cursed under her breath, realising there was no going back. It was out there now. She had to confront it. “I’ve never...you’re the only person who’s ever made me feel this way. It’s like a kind of madness.” She wasn’t sure what to say, or whether it was even a good idea to keep talking. But she had to. Now that she’d said it, she had to. “That was why I asked you to leave me alone before. Not because I hate you, but because...I feel the exact opposite.”
Miranda pressed her hand to her forehead, fighting off the incessant pain in her skull. The insomnia that made it so hard to think. To put these complicated feelings into words. She was so not in the right frame of mind to have this conversation.
Yet here they were.
“I’m pretty sure I have for a long time, actually. I was just too bloody stupid to figure it out any earlier. But...” In place of adding anything further, Miranda simply gestured, leaving her feelings out there, in the open, for Samara to do with as she wished. It was a horrible position to be in. She hated every second of it.
“...No,” was the first thing Samara said. Her voice sounded so distant. And it was tinged almost with a sense of...dread. “No. You do not. You should not.”
“I know I shouldn’t, but I do. I do. I think about you all the time. And I don’t...I don’t know what to do about it,” Miranda admitted, shrugging her shoulder.
“No,” Samara repeated herself, more insistently. Her suddenness startled Miranda a little. “You...you are mistaken.”
“I’m not,” Miranda reflexively answered back. She couldn’t help but get defensive, hearing Samara tell her she was wrong about her own feelings, when she knew painfully well she wasn’t. “I tried to convince myself that I was, but--”
“You do not know what love is. And you do not know who I am,” Samara coldly shut her down, refusing to hear this. “If you did, you would know there is nothing about me that is worthy of you.”
“Fucking hell, Samara…” Miranda ran her hand through her hair. This was not how she would have planned this to go. For one thing, she never anticipated she would have to contend with Samara being in staunch denial about her dramatic love confession. But then she paused, as the final part of Samara’s sentence gradually registered in her tired mind. “...I’m sorry. What did you just say?”
“You…” Samara swallowed heavily, realising she had perhaps revealed more than she ought. Maybe because she thought her own feelings had already been blatantly obvious, and it hadn’t occurred to her to think Miranda wouldn’t have realised them by now. But she didn’t take it back. “No, I cannot do this.”
Samara moved for the door as if to leave. In response, Miranda extended her hand, biotically lifting Samara six inches off the ground, holding her in place.
“No,” Miranda sternly commanded her, not letting her run off and hide again. She was getting pretty bloody sick of that. “We’re talking.”
Samara could have overpowered her easily if she wanted to. Miranda was no match for her biotic prowess, especially not in her current state. She could have broken out of this grip with little more than a shadow of a thought. They both knew that. But she didn’t fight. She didn’t resist.
After a moment, Samara just gave her a nod, as if to confirm she would stay. Miranda let go. Samara’s feet hit the floor. She didn’t so much as stumble.
“You were saying,” Miranda prompted, losing patience for her evasiveness.
“...You heard what I said. It is as it seems,” was all Samara could bring herself to say, not denying Miranda’s suspicions. She would not lie to her.
“Do you feel the same way about me?” Miranda asked, forcing her to acknowledge it out loud. To put it into words. There was no room for misunderstanding here.
“That is not the point,” Samara responded, tersely.
Miranda sighed heavily, intuiting what she meant. “Of course. You’re a Justicar,” she said. It didn’t matter what Samara felt about her, if The Code forbade it.
Samara’s eyes narrowed in confusion. “I...am uncertain what you mean by this.”
Miranda’s expression mirrored Samara’s, equally bewildered. “Doesn’t the Justicar Code forbid...?” Miranda didn't finish that sentence, simply glancing down at the space between them, choosing to be deft in her words. Using any specific term that entered her mind might be perceived as demanding or presuming too much, or too little, and she wouldn’t risk that.
Samara stared at her, the open-ended meaning not lost in the silence. It was obvious from looking at her expression that she wished her status as a Justicar permitted her to speak falsely. That would have made things so much easier. “...It does not,” she replied to Miranda's myriad unspoken questions, and the words running through her mind. It was the same answer for all of them.
At that, relief dared to trickle through Miranda’s skin.
“That was never the problem,” Samara continued, not allowing Miranda to think that information changed anything. It didn’t.
“Then what is?” Miranda replied. “There’s obviously a connection between us. We both feel it. And if your Code says there’s nothing wrong with that, then--”
“Because I deserve to be alone!” Samara professed. “That is my penance.”
Miranda recoiled. It actually, physically hurt to hear that. “How can you say that?”
“Miranda, listen to me,” Samara implored her, holding her focus. “You are a remarkable woman. You are brilliant and exceptional, in every respect--”
“So are you,” said Miranda.
“No, you are not listening.” Samara raised her hands, determined to continue. “You are so young. You still have so much life ahead of you. So much potential. When others see you, as I have seen you, the entire galaxy will fall at your feet. As it should. You have nothing to gain from me. I am...I am regret, and ruin,” Samara told her, a faint glint of unshed tears in her eyes. “If you truly saw me for what I am, you would know there is only death and misery for you here.”
“I do know you, Samara,” Miranda spoke quietly. “I know that, despite all the tragedy you’ve endured that would break a lesser person, you somehow still manage to wake up each day and choose to be warm, and kind, and good--”
“I am none of those things,” Samara assured her.
“You are to me,” Miranda persisted, undeterred. “I know you are, because you found me when I was at my most jaded, my most cynical, my most closed off--”
“Miranda, no.” Samara shook her head, pleading with her not to feel this way.
“And, instead of rejecting me, you...you reached out to me,” Miranda continued, talking right through any interruption, or resistance. Because this needed to be said. “You made me smile more than anyone has ever made me smile. You showed me that...that opening up to someone you trust and letting yourself be vulnerable around them isn’t a weakness, but that it takes bravery and strength.”
“Please stop this,” Samara begged her, her voice a whisper.
But Miranda didn’t stop. “You single-handedly made me a better person than I was before I met you.” There was no denying that. Without Samara, she wouldn’t have learned from her past mistakes. She would have kept perpetuating the same cycles, and never stopped to reflect on her preconceived notions about what mattered to her, and what made her happy. “So, if you’re unworthy of love, then what does that make me? Because, from where I’m standing...Samara, there aren’t enough superlatives to describe you.”
“Enough!” Samara swept her hand across her body, signalling for this to cease.
But Miranda wouldn’t.
“No.” Miranda pressed forward. She was pouring her heart out. She’d never done this before, because she’d never felt this way about anyone. And, now that she’d started, she couldn’t stop. “Don’t you get what I’m saying? You’re it. You’re it for me. I will never feel the way about anyone else that I feel about you, and I know because I’ve tried, and those efforts failed so hard I didn’t even think the ability to fall in love with someone existed in me, until I met you. You’re not just beyond comparison to everyone else. God, you’re...you’re fucking transcendent.”
“Do not...say these things!” Samara cut her off, her voice so loud and forceful that there was no doubt it bellowed through the whole apartment. Miranda had never heard her raise her voice before, let alone like that. “You know not of what you speak. You love a shadow. Nothing more.”
Miranda’s gaze narrowed. “What is it you think I don’t know, Samara?” she challenged, determined to prove herself. “I know more than you think.”
“I killed the last person I loved!” Samara shot back, refusing to subject herself to that indescribable agony a second time. She would never let that happen again.
“No, you didn’t, Samara. She killed herself,” Miranda curtly replied.
“You know nothing of it!” Samara insisted through her teeth.
“I know everything,” Miranda interrupted, unshaken by what Samara thought were secrets. They weren’t. “I know every little fucked up detail you didn’t want me to know. I know you tried to kill yourself too, and the only reason you failed is that your neighbour found you. I know you blame yourself for Mirala becoming Morinth because you think whatever you said to her the night before her test scared her into running away and melding with her best friend to prove she wasn’t an Ardat-Yakshi. I know the police blamed you and wanted to charge you with something, anything, and that you broke down during your interrogation and told them you blamed yourself for everything too. I know the whole world turned against you for something that wasn’t your fault. I know it all.”
Miranda’s response thrust Samara into stunned silence. Miranda had the decency to look contrite, already seeing the fire of betrayal in steely blue eyes. Exactly like she expected. Exactly why this admission had been so easy to put off.
“There’s nothing about you that’s a mystery to me,” Miranda continued, quieter than before. “I looked into your past when we were aboard the SR-2. I’m surprised you didn’t already assume I did. I mean, this is me we’re talking about.”
As that slowly sank in, Samara stepped away and shook her head. “I am disappointed in you, Miranda. Yet I suppose you are correct; I cannot claim this was a shock,” said Samara, in a tone Miranda had never heard before. “After all, you have at all times been nothing if not transparent about your duplicity.”
Miranda’s eye darkened. That hurt.
“Fuck you, Samara. You don’t get to turn this around on me right now. In case you haven’t noticed, between the two of us, I’m not the one lying.”
“Yes, how very dare I be hurt by your treachery,” Samara countered, looking her in the eye once more, her words laced with biting sarcasm. “I should know better than to criticise you, or confront you with consequences for your actions. After all, you are Miranda Lawson. You can do nothing wrong.”
“I’ll apologise as much as you want later. But that’s not what this conversation is about. So don’t change the subject,” Miranda snapped.
“What more is there to say?” said Samara, her arms folded across her chest, unwilling to discuss it further. This hadn’t helped. “You know my answer.”
“There is so much more to say, because you’re pulling away and I don’t even know why. To punish yourself for some imaginary sins? Is that it? Look…” Miranda crossed the distance between them, reaching out and gently clasping Samara's hand, guiding it to rest upon her chest, where she could feel her heartbeat. “Whatever this is, I...I want this,” Miranda assured her. “Do you?”
Samara withdrew, resisting the temptation. “What I want is irrelevant.”
“Why is it irrelevant?” Miranda pursued her. “You’re a person, Samara. An incredible one, but still just a person, with feelings, and wants, and needs. You've spent four hundred years being selfless, to a greater degree than your Code required you to be. You don’t have to do that. You’re allowed to feel things. To want things. To need things. You’re allowed to...to move on with your life.”
“Move on?” Samara echoed incredulously. She turned her body away, refusing to look at her, visibly caught up in a tempestuous tumult of conflicting emotions.
Hurt.
Anger.
Grief.
“If you knew me half as well as you claim to, you would understand what an insult it is to me that you would tell me such a thing,” said Samara, shaking her head in contempt and disbelief. “‘Move on with my life’. The audacity...”
“I'm not saying that to get something from you. Genuinely, I'm not. You don't have to...” This wasn’t working, was it? “What I’m trying to say is that, whatever this is between us, this doesn’t have to go the way I want it to. I’m not even sure what that is, or what that would mean. I was so convinced this could never happen. But don't you deserve a bit of happiness?” she asked, trying to catch Samara’s eyes, though she was intent on avoiding her. “If I bring that to you, then—“
Before she could finish, Samara exhaled heavily and stepped closer, until the space between them virtually evaporated. Miranda trembled as she stumbled backwards on instinct, until she could go no further, and hit the wall near the door.
“Do not speak of happiness.” Samara pinned Miranda in place without exerting any force whatsoever. Without touching her. Whatever Miranda had intended to say before swiftly fled her mind. “My happiness died centuries ago. And I promised myself -- I promised myself, I would never...never betray that.”
Miranda moved to protest, but stopped abruptly when it became apparent Samara wasn’t really talking to her, but rather that she was arguing with herself.
“But, I...you were not...you were not part of that plan. I did not foresee how much I would...how much I would come to...” As her dilemma tore at her soul, Samara grimaced and braced herself on the wall, as if in physical pain. “I do not know what to do. I know I do not deserve this, but...perhaps we can, without...”
“Yes,” Miranda all but whimpered. Whatever she meant, her answer was yes.
She wanted this. So bad. Even if it might have been a terrible mistake. Even if it might have ruined everything they already had. At that moment, she didn't care.
Miranda wanted to kiss her. To sink her teeth into her neck, and tear her armour off. Her body was screaming at her to do those things, desperate to touch her, and powerless to resist if this was what Samara chose. But, in what little part of her brain could still think, she knew she had to let Samara take the initiative for whatever happened next. If she didn’t, she would push her away forever.
They probably only stood like that for a few seconds, but time moved so slowly it felt like minutes. Miranda could see the cogs spinning in Samara’s head. The conflict. The indecision. Temptation. Torn between resistance and surrender.
Samara’s fingers brushed her bare arm. She’d leaned so close Miranda felt her breath against her lips. Then, blue eyes went black. And Miranda felt the magnetic sensations she recognised as a meld beneath Samara’s fingertips.
In an instant, everything changed.
A wave of sheer, uncompromising despair crashed over Miranda, plunging her into the deepest, darkest, blackest abyss she had ever known. It felt as if her very soul had been ripped from her body and murdered in front of her, leaving behind only a hollow, empty shell. Any memory of happiness or joy was stripped from her mind, and shattered into a million pieces at her feet.
She had never felt more devastatingly, crushingly alone.
Bereft of hope.
And, although it had come over her as suddenly as the blink of an eye, it felt like she had never known anything else.
Abruptly, Samara glowed blue, her biotics repelling Miranda, like a barrier between them, pressing her back against the wall. The meld ended only a fraction of a second after it began, leaving both of them visibly shaken. The moment they separated, Miranda's hand flew to her lips, trembling as tears spilled from her eye, coursing down the unscarred side of her face, beyond her control.
Samara staggered backwards, as if she had seen a ghost. “No, I...I cannot.”
“No, don't...” Miranda could hardly speak, overcome by a grief that she could not name. She shook her head. What was happening? She never cried, unless her sister was involved. But this sorrow. It had lasted only a fleeting moment, but it was intense and crushing and it dwarfed any sadness she had ever felt. So much so that it hurt just to breathe. Just to be alive. “I'm sorry, I don't...I'm not...I'm not normally like this. I don't know why this is happening.”
“Because it came from me,” Samara answered, her lips scarcely moving.
“...What did you say?” Miranda lifted her head, staring at Samara, shellshocked. But she hadn’t misheard. Whatever she was feeling, these weren’t her own emotions. In that brief instant that they had started to meld, Samara had inadvertently transferred whatever she was currently feeling onto her.
“I did not mean for this to happen. I am so sorry. I...I thought I could contain myself. My boundaries. I never wanted you to experience this...” Samara whispered until her words trailed off into silence, confirming it to be true.
That realisation struck Miranda to her core, that agony still permeating her being.
“...Is this how you feel about me?” Miranda asked, a deep, dull ache pooling like lead at the base of her heart at the very thought - that this was how miserable she had made her by putting her in this position. Samara didn’t respond, neither confirming nor denying it. “Is this how you feel all the time?”
“It does not matter. This cannot happen,” Samara stated, her voice hollow.
“Samara.” Miranda reached out for her, but Samara raised her hand, signalling for her not to come closer, convinced this had been a terrible mistake.
“In another time, or another life, this would have been...” Samara didn't finish that thought, shaking her head. “I cannot contemplate this. I must not.”
“So, what? You’re just going to run off again?!” Miranda’s shout was enough to momentarily stop Samara in her tracks. Her throat was strangled with emotions that weren’t entirely her own. But some of them sure were. “Tell me, Samara, when did the strongest woman I’ve ever met turn into such a pathetic coward?”
“This is what I have always been!” Samara hissed in response, despising herself for this horrible misdeed. There was no hint of the stoic, composed, restrained person Miranda previously knew. “I have always been a coward. A fraud. A monster. A mistake. A worthless, selfish waste! I have the blood of over a thousand murders on my hands! I am nothing! I should not even be here!”
“Then why don’t you just fucking go!” Miranda shot back, lashing out in pain.
Samara took her at her word, looking at her one last time before she stormed out. Miranda heard the front door slam. The instant it did, Miranda slid down the wall, tears spilling from her eye, the weight of what just happened combining with Samara’s despair, still coursing through her body.
She felt so cold. Like everything right, or good, or light was just...absent.
There was only shadow.
Only grief.
A shaky exhale escaped her lips. What had she done? This was exactly what she’d been afraid of. She’d told Samara the truth, and pushed her away forever. They would probably never speak again. Not after this.
She didn’t even realise that the door to her room was still open until a few heads peeked around the corner to see her. Obviously, they’d been roused by raised voices, and the door slamming. The walls weren’t that thick. They probably hadn’t heard everything. But they would have heard enough.
“Are you okay, Miss?” Reiley asked, visibly concerned.
Miranda wiped her eye and picked herself up to her feet, refusing to let herself look vulnerable in front of them. Even though it was too late for that. “I’m fine,” she said through gritted teeth, taking her eyepatch off the desk and putting it on.
“You don’t look fine,” Jason pointed out as Miranda limped her way past them.
“Samara left in a hurry. And we heard fighting,” Rodriguez noted, not really sure how to approach this. “...Did you fuck things up between you?” she asked, in what sounded like an effort to be understanding and comforting. It wasn’t. Jason chastised her insensitivity with a light slap to the back of her head. “What? It’s fucking obvious they just had a fight…”
Miranda ignored them, grabbing her things, pulling on her jacket and scarf.
“What are you doing?” said Jason, shaking his head at her. For a second, it almost sounded like he was the responsible adult in the house. “Where are you going?”
“Out,” Miranda answered stonily.
“It’s 1:00am,” Jason pointed out, as if convincing her to see reason.
“I don’t care.” Miranda slipped on her shoes, and took hold of her cane. She couldn’t stay there. Couldn’t lie there and think about this. Couldn’t feel this.
“Are you coming back?” said Reiley, confused.
Miranda was tempted to lash out at them and say no out of sheer bitterness and spite, but she couldn't. Unlike Samara, she didn't run from her problems.
“...I'll see you in the morning,” she said, before she closed the door and left. None of them knew it then, but they would not, in fact, see her in the morning.
And, when they did see her again, they would wish they hadn’t.
So would Miranda.
* * *
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Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Bonus 4.2 - UTDP (Still Mostly Kaito Edition)
This is postgame content, so people shouldn’t be reading this without having already finished the main game anyway. But just to be safe: while this is non-canon character stuff, I will sometimes be mentioning events that happened in the main story, so there will be spoilers for the main game.
Last time in the first half of my Kaito-centric Ultimate Talent Development Plan coverage, it was all about Kaito helping people! Kaito encouraged Shuichi to use his detective skills to help out his schoolmates, and Shuichi passed some of Kaito’s advice about relying on people onto Kyoko. After some incredibly stubborn persistence to even get her to open up in the first place, Kaito nudged Maki into letting Kaede play piano at her orphanage, and Maki also bonded a little with Chihiro over keeping secrets and projecting their issues onto a dead bird. Then, after a brief sports festival interlude, Kaito helped Mondo be more positive about his future, and I lengthily compared Mondo and Chihiro’s relationship to Kaito and Shuichi’s one in canon, because both had similar issues and dynamics going on.
There’s still a bunch more Kaito-related stuff to cover in this mode, so let’s start off this second half on a high note, shall we?
Ryoma (featuring Kaito’s issues)
Another of Kaito’s friendly events is with Ryoma, so you can bet I’m interested in it. Remember, Kaito’s fondness for tennis meant he looked up to Ryoma as a hero, and as a result, all of Kaito’s unreasonably high standards for heroes that usually only apply to himself also apply to Ryoma. Ryoma therefore provides a delightful look into Kaito’s hero issues that can’t really be found anywhere else in this AU, since Kaito hasn’t been dying, and nor has Shuichi been saving everyone’s lives in class trials without seeming to need Kaito’s help.
This scene also features Usami – yes, she’s also here in this mode, as is Monomi, though never at the same time. I don’t even know, just go with it.
Usami: “I just came to talk to Ryoma! I’m everyone’s teacher… so if you ever wanna talk to me about something, please feel free!”
Ryoma: “Thanks, but there’s nothing to talk about. Don’t bother with me. Go back to your students. It feels… wrong for such a cheery mascot like you to be around someone like me.”
Kaito: “Really? I think talking about stuff will help. Come on, just talk to her.”
Of course Ryoma talking about things will help! And it’s… actually rather surprising to see Kaito doing something that amounts to trying to help Ryoma get stronger, by encouraging him to do this. Kaito is usually so hung up on Ryoma being weak in the first place that he can’t even get as far as suggesting some kind of help for him. So I can only assume that the reason he manages to do so in this instance is because Usami was the one to suggest it first, which made Kaito actually briefly see Ryoma as someone in need of support for once, because she was treating him that way, and agree with her.
Ryoma: “Hmph… is being nosy your talent or something?”
In my Kaito-isn’t-into-tennis AU, I wrote Ryoma’s POV describing Kaito as “nosy” for reasons I couldn’t quite place, but it seems I was subconsciously remembering that he does so here, even though I didn’t recall the details of this scene back then. Kind of like how Maki considers anyone worrying about her to be “gross”, “nosy” may well be Ryoma’s way to refer to people who are going out of their way to help him, as a way to try and brush off their help because he doesn’t consider himself worth it.
(In that sense, yes, being nosy practically is Kaito’s talent. Or at least it is with everyone except Ryoma.)
Kaito: “What did you say?”
Usami: “Hey! Fighting’s a no-no!”
Kaito: “We’re not gonna fight. There’s no use butting heads with him anyway. Because this guy’s a total sad sack now. He used to be an amazing athlete before.”
Being called nosy probably wouldn’t normally rile Kaito up, not when he considers it a good thing to be invested in other people’s wellbeing. But apparently something about it coming from Ryoma in particular gets to him and causes him to snap right back to his Ryoma-specific mindset of “he’s not worth helping because he’s supposed to be a hero but he’s weak”. Specifically, I think it might be because the “nosy” comment was essentially Ryoma brushing off Kaito’s attempt to offer help. That refusal to even try and get stronger is another kind of weakness – and a more meaningful kind, one that it makes more sense to be upset at someone about, because it’s a choice.
Not that that’s a thing that usually stops Kaito from trying to help someone, of course! He openly called Maki a coward for running away from her issues at first, but that didn’t change the fact that he knew she had the potential to be brave enough to face them, if he just pestered her stubbornly enough to convince her. It usually takes a lot for Kaito to conclude that someone really is beyond help and isn’t ever going to decide to change, as we saw with Kokichi in canon. But not when it’s Ryoma, apparently. Even though Usami got Kaito to temporarily see past Ryoma’s initial weakness and try to help, refusing that help even once and not wanting to change is even more weak of Ryoma, and is therefore again disgraceful for a hero and sent Kaito’s opinion of him right back to square one.
Which seems quite relevant to how Kaito was in canon, considering how much he refused any help with his own weaknesses. Particularly in trial 4, where it was very apparent that he was struggling to face the truth and should have reached out for support, and he was only making himself look even more obviously weak by not doing that.
This moment here with Ryoma, thanks to Usami letting Kaito get as far as offering help at all, is essentially illustrating to Kaito that if a hero does do the unacceptable and be weak in the first place, then refusing help for it when people can already see that he needs it only looks even weaker and even less heroic of him, and he should at least cut his losses and accept help. I would say that if only a moment like this with Ryoma had happened in canon then it might have served as a lesson of How Not To Be A Worse Hero (When You’re Already A Bad One) and taught Kaito to actually accept the support he needed. Buuuut I still very much doubt that, because Kaito here definitely seems to have fallen too far back into his general frustration of “heroes shouldn’t be weak at all!!!” to be using this as any kind of example.
Ryoma: “You knew about me?”
Kaito: “A little, yeah…”
Ryoma: “So you get it now. The Ultimate Tennis Pro… I’m not that guy anymore. That’s in the past.”
Kaito: “Yeah, I guess not… The Ryoma I knew was invincible and would go up against any opponent.”
Oh, Kaito, why am I so right about you. Throughout all of the lengthy rambles I’ve written about Kaito’s unhealthily unrealistic standards for heroes, including the fact that he also applies these standards to Ryoma, I had basically forgotten about this scene and didn’t use it to help me figure any of that stuff out. And yet here Kaito is, describing the Ryoma that he looked up to as invincible. Of course he saw him that way. Kaito’s writers have always known exactly what they’re doing and I love it.
Usami: “K-Kaito… Is everything okay!? Please calm down!”
Kaito: “My bad… I’m gonna go cool off.”
[Kaito leaves the room]
I like how Usami managed to notice, even though it wasn’t showing that much in his face based on his sprites, that Kaito was beginning to get really worked up about this. And credit to Kaito for actually acknowledging this when it’s pointed out, apologising for it (a more worthwhile apology than like 90% of the ones he ever gives) and leaving to calm down. Kaito can often react to things that upset him with a cycle of getting more and more riled up until he snaps in some way. At least in this case, he realised that he doesn’t want to end up lashing out as that doesn’t help anyone, and that the best thing for him to do is to just step away from the situation before he reaches that point. This is Kaito actually showing decent self-care! That’s rare.
…It’s probably only because Usami pointed it out to him. I said it’s ridiculous that she’s even here in this AU, but… Usami actually subtly did a lot for Kaito in this scene. Maybe he ought to talk to her. (You know, because Kaito is so good at talking to people about his issues.)
Usami: “The air feels so tense… It’s all my fault… I shouldn’t have said anything at all…”
No, Usami, you did a good. If you hadn’t been here and it’d just been Kaito and Ryoma, Kaito wouldn’t have even vaguely acknowledged the possibility of helping Ryoma and might have actually lashed out at him. This is a scene about Kaito’s issues with Ryoma, but it seems the writers included Usami in it for a reason.
The scene ends with Ryoma acknowledging that Usami cares about him, but also saying that he’s still not planning on actually talking to her and accepting her support. Damn it, Ryoma, you aren’t helping yourself either. He needs someone a lot more stubborn than Usami to really get through to him, but… yeah, there’s an issue with that, isn’t there.
There’s also a final year seasonal event that somewhat follows up on this. Ryoma heads to the gym to help Himiko set up for her Christmas magic show and finds Kaito already there.
Kaito: “Oh…”
This is Kaito’s evasive face. This particular kind of reaction rather reminds me of Kaito’s reactions to Shuichi’s presence in early chapter 5. Which is only appropriate, since this is a similar situation of him awkwardly not really wanting to talk to someone who sets off his issues, but not wanting to admit why either.
Ryoma: “Did Himiko get you to help her out, too?”
Kaito: “Well, something like that. You too?”
Ryoma: “Yeah. I may not be as fit as I was back in my glory days, but it should be enough…”
Kaito: “How pathetic… An athlete at your level should say stuff like, ‘I’ll take on any challenge!’”
Heroes like Ryoma are meant to be full throttle, larger than life, all the time, with no half measures. That’s what Kaito’s like when he’s setting an example for his sidekicks and anyone else he’s trying to inspire; Ryoma’s supposed be like that too!!
It’s not even acceptable that Ryoma is saying he’s still strong enough to get the job done and is going to do his best. Simply admitting to any kind of weakness in the first place isn’t allowed and will definitely prevent anything else he says from ever being inspiring. (Won’t it?)
Ryoma: “Hmph… Don’t bring up such an old story now. Those days are long past.”
Kaito: “I don’t care about your past!”
Kaito, you extremely care about his past. Not about the past of him being a murderer that led to all his self-loathing, because he doesn’t have to let that define him and can move on from it and do better in future. That’s a lot like Maki’s situation, and obviously Kaito doesn’t care about her past in that sense, so I can believe he also wouldn’t do so analogously with Ryoma. But here they were actually talking about Ryoma’s past before the murders, when he used to be a superstar athlete. Kaito very obviously still cares about that past, because that’s why he can’t deal with Ryoma properly. If Kaito was capable of seeing Ryoma as nothing but the person he is today, then he’d be able to help like can usually help anyone.
Kaito: “There are plenty of tennis players that look up to you. They’re trying to surpass your memory. One of them might become the next Ultimate Tennis Pro! So quit it with that mopey face you’ve got on all the time! When you see a tennis fan, can’t you just smile at him and say, ‘Tennis is pretty great, huh?’”
Kaito is kind of giving some reasonable advice here, but only on the level on which he looks up to Ryoma as his tennis hero. He’s managing to encourage Ryoma to be a little better at being that hero to people who look up to him, even if he’s not necessarily ever going to pick up a racket again. That’s something, but it’s not remotely what Ryoma really needs; it’s really more just what Kaito wanted from him.
Kaito: “That’s all… I just wanted to say that to you before we graduate.”
Apparently this really has been bothering Kaito on and off for the past three years such that he would have regretted not getting to say it in the end. But still, “you should be a better hero” is not remotely addressing the real problem here, Kaito. Three years and Kaito was still too hung up on Ryoma being a disappointment of a hero to actually be able to figure out how to help.
Ryoma: “Were you… just waiting for a chance to talk to me about tennis?”
Ryoma, perceptive as he is, does seem to have picked up that this whole speech Kaito just gave him was really more for Kaito’s own benefit. He just did it because he wanted Ryoma to become someone willing to talk to him, or at least others like him, about tennis.
Ryoma: “Well, even if I agreed to… do you really think you’re qualified to talk to me about tennis? Well… you’d probably say that something like that didn’t matter.”
Kaito: “Heh, so you do get it after all!”
Kaito has a point here, though. Someone shouldn’t have to also be a superstar with ridiculous anime tennis superpowers to be able to have a conversation about tennis with Ryoma, and if Ryoma’s trying to claim that just to avoid talking to people genuinely interested in tennis, then he’s only making excuses. (And I like how Ryoma’s perceptiveness lets him realise Kaito would say that to him before he even said it.)
Apparently Ryoma and Kaito do then end up chatting about tennis with each other as they set up the stage, which is at least some level of progress for both of them. Ryoma would probably have refused to talk about tennis if this’d been earlier on, but by now it seems he’s mellowed out enough – for reasons that have nothing to do with Kaito, of course – to be up for it if pushed. On Kaito’s end, though, this is still only him interacting with Ryoma as a fan of his and a fellow tennis enthusiast. He hasn’t stopped being incapable of properly seeing and helping with Ryoma’s real problems because of his own messed-up standards for heroes.
But even though Kaito still wasn’t able or even really willing to help him, we don’t have to worry about Ryoma in this universe. We can see this most clearly in one of Mahiru’s third year winter scenes in which she’s giving him some photos that he asked her to take as keepsakes of his time here…
Ryoma: “I won’t let it end so easily. During the three years we spent in this academy… I found something I don’t want to let go of. Something I thought I’d never find again… And your pictures… have captured their smiles so clearly. These pictures will always remind me that the time I spent here was worth every second.”
…so, Ryoma’s going to be okay. He’s found his new reason to live.
Year 2 seasonal events
Year 2’s seasonal event is the school festival in which a lot of the students are doing shows or exhibits displaying their talents. Kaito isn’t doing anything like that himself and only helped set up the stage, but then he can check out one of the shows afterwards.
- Can’t miss Kaede’s recital
Kaito’s POV wording for this option is great. It’s not just that he’s checking out Kaede’s show because eh why not – he actively doesn’t want to miss it!
Kaede: “Huh…? You came by yourself, Kaito?”
Kaito: “Yeah, my bad. Shuichi’s not here yet, but he’s on his way.”
Kaito, why are you apologising just because you didn’t bring Shuichi when she didn’t even ask you to? The fact that Kaito apparently on some level feels like this counts as doing something wrong suggests that he assumes Kaede doesn’t think much of him on his own and only ever cares about seeing him if he has Shuichi with him.
(I’d be surprised that he doesn’t know Kaede better than that, but… maybe what other people think of him is another inherent blind spot in Kaito’s intuition. I never quite thought about it in that way before, but that really does make a lot of sense and is kind of heartbreaking to think about. Oh, Kaito, you idiot.)
Kaede: “I-I didn’t mean it like that! It’s just… I’m a little surprised you came to listen to classical music.”
But of course Kaede didn’t mean her comment in the way Kaito assumed! Instead, however, it seems that she similarly assumes that Kaito doesn’t think much of her on her own and would only ever come to her recital if he was tagging along with Shuichi, rather than for his own enjoyment.
Kaito: “Hey, of course I’d come. You’re the one playing, so there’s no way I’d miss it.”
Obviously, though! Kaito respects and admires Kaede a lot, so of course he’d want to see her doing the thing she’s best at and loves so much! Classical music may not be personally Kaito’s area of interest, but that doesn’t mean he can’t appreciate Kaede’s passion for it and get excited about it anyway!
Kaito: “I know you’re gonna do great! As far as I’m concerned, you’re the best pianist out there!
Everyone is supposed to think Kaede is the best pianist out there; that’s literally the point of her being the Ultimate Pianist. So I love how Kaito doesn’t care about that, and instead he makes a point that her being so great at this is his opinion of her.
While it’s less prominent in this AU, Hope’s Peak tends to do the rather unhealthy thing of putting people’s talents first and acting like that’s the only thing about them that matters. If Kaede is the Ultimate Pianist, then that means that her being so great at the piano is just the baseline expectation for someone with that title and not really anything special at all. But Kaito doesn’t see her as an Ultimate who’s already destined to be good at her thing – he sees her as a fully-rounded person first and foremost who just happens to have an amazing talent that deserves to be praised and admired rather than expected of her. And he does this despite spending all day every day surrounded by Ultimates and being one himself to the point that someone being talented at a particular thing should be difficult to see as anything special any more. He’s so good.
Kaito: “Be confident and knock their socks off. I’ll be watching from the seats!”
Kaede: “Hahaha, thanks. That’s so Kaito of you.”
I love Kaede using “Kaito” as an adjective, much like I’ve done many times throughout this commentary. His personality is so impactful and distinctive that sometimes there’s no better way to encapsulate it than that. And the fact that Kaede does this goes to show that she also appreciates Kaito’s outlook a lot, because she wouldn’t describe it in this way that expresses just how uniquely him it is if she didn’t.
Both Kaede and Kaito assume that the other doesn’t think much of them or see them as anything more than another close friend of Shuichi’s, but they’re so wrong! You should be better friends with each other as well, you two! You have so much in common other than just being Shuichi’s friend!
Kaito’s other two options for the festival aren’t especially noteworthy. He can talk to Ibuki before her concert and see that she’s already plenty hyped up about it without his help, or he can check out a fashion show featuring the class 1 girls and have “Junko” (really Mukuro) accuse him of being a perv when he’s genuinely just interested in the show. (Why wouldn’t he be interested? There’s nothing unnecessary in this world!)
However, Kaito’s appearances in other people’s events for this school festival are all quite noteworthy in one way or another.
One of these festival events is with Byakuya. This is not someone you’d expect Kaito to go out of his way to talk to, because he’s empatically neither someone Kaito respects for being invested in helping others, nor someone who might benefit from Kaito’s support. But apparently there is one reason Kaito is interested in him, and therefore approaches him after a speech he was giving at the festival…
Kaito: “I’ve got a question for you! The Togami Corporation funds all kinds of stuff, right? What about space exploration?”
…Which is, of course, SPACE.
Byakuya: “That is within our power. The Togami group, and myself, can move mountains. We are obligated to spread our grasp into space. A loser like you wouldn’t understand.”
Byakuya, you asshole, you are talking to the Ultimate Astronaut; if you actually cared about a Togami space program then he’d be an incredible asset to that. Evidently Byakuya does not actually care about space travel itself and is only interested in doing this as a way to make his name seem even more big and important.
Kaito: “I’m no loser! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”
…At one point in the main commentary I mentioned that Kaito never actually responds to being called useless (which “loser” is pretty analogous to) in this overblown way. But that was because that kind of overblown response would have sounded like an obviously-desperate defence during the times when he actually was afraid he was useless. Here in this AU, though, Kaito has no such issues going on, so all that’s happening here is his genuine overblown confidence. Being called a loser just bounced right off him; he knows he’s not.
(Also look at how Kaito would rather inform Byakuya that he’s the Luminary of the Stars, even though him being the Ultimate Astronaut is pretty relevant to this conversation. His luminary title is so much more important to him.)
Kaito: “But I see you understand how great outer space is.”
I am kind of surprised though that Kaito didn’t pick up on the fact that Byakuya doesn’t understand how great space is, at least not in any meaningful way.
Kaito: “Alright! I’ll make you my sidekick!”
…Kaito? Clearly Byakuya is not a potential sidekick, what are you doing.
Kaito then apparently spends a while following Byakuya around and pestering him about space despite his protests. Given this, I can only assume that in this instance Kaito means a somewhat different kind of sidekick, one that only applies in the context of space travel. Obviously Kaito is the foremost authority on space around here, so he wants to teach Byakuya all about space exploration and how he can make the Togami corporation the best at space. Maybe Kaito does realise that Byakuya only “understands” how great space is in the sense that he superficially recognises it’s big and important, and so Kaito wants to teach him exactly why it’s so great so that Byakuya will definitely decide to throw all of his money at it.
Kaito, cut your losses, dude. You could do so, so much better than him for a space sidekick.
On a similar but much more interesting note, Kaito can also interact with Izuru Kamukura. (Yes, he’s in this mode like it’s no big deal. Hajime is also in this mode. They’re never both seen or mentioned in the same scene, so I guess we’re just running with two alternate universes here?)
Kaito: “How about it? You wanna become my sidekick, too?”
And Kaito just casually offers this out of nowhere after they’ve done nothing but help set up the stage together.
Izuru: “It wouldn’t make sense to have a sidekick who is better than you at everything, right?”
Oh, Izuru, you don’t get it at all. Kaito absolutely can have sidekicks that are better and more capable than him. The only thing required for them to be his sidekick is that there’s something standing in the way of them reaching their full potential, something that Kaito’s support can help with.
Kaito: “Heh, Ultimate Hope? That’s nothin’! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”
Heh, there’s another instance of him seeing his luminary title as far more meaningful than any of these Ultimate talents, even the most Ultimate one of them all.
Izuru: “I can analyze everything about a future you would follow.”
Kaito: “Analyze? You’re just talking about predictions. My destiny’s too big to be predicted! Plus… I’ve got Shuichi and Maki Roll as my sidekicks. If we include their strengths, the possibilities are endless.”
Silly Izuru, assuming Kaito has limits, that there are things that might just be impossible for him. That’s not how Kaito works! And I love that Kaito brings his sidekicks into it, too; he believes in their potential so much! More than that, he believes that when people work together, they have unlimited potential that could never be predicted!
Izuru: “As I predicted, you are an idiot. How boring…”
Kaito: “That’s a bad habit. If you keep saying that, you’ll start to think everything’s boring. Are you okay with that?”
…See, Kaito gets it. He knew exactly what he was doing in this instance when he asked Izuru to be his sidekick. It doesn’t matter that Izuru is infinitely more talented than him – he still has weakness that he needs help with. After nothing but a brief session of helping each other with some manual labour, Kaito managed to pick up on that. His intuition is incredible.
This weakness of Izuru’s – to see everything as boring because he’s such a super-genius that he can predict every possible outcome – is, as far as I understand it, ultimately the reason he ended up contributing to the apocalypse in his canon storyline, because Junko convinced him it was the least boring thing he could do. But it didn’t necessarily have to be that way. If he’d only had the right help, he could have ended up using his talents to do far more productive things than ending the world.
If anyone could teach Izuru how to have more passion for life, to see the value and excitement in things even if he already knows everything about them, surely it would be Kaito? If anyone could let him realise that people are inherently unpredictable and he’s never going to always know everything that will happen, surely it would also be a beautifully reckless doofus like Kaito?
Plus, Izuru was supposedly implanted with every single talent imaginable, but only insofar as he’s one person. He evidently doesn’t have Kaito’s talent, because that’s all about teamwork and co-operation. Izuru is already a super-genius, but he could be so much better than he is. If Kaito could convince him that this interpersonal kind of talent is worthwhile to have as well, then he could teach him that, and Izuru would learn to value other people’s strengths no matter how predictable they are! There’s just so much Kaito could do for him.
Unfortunately, Izuru brushes Kaito off as boring again and ignores continued attempts to sidekick him, so we can only assume that Kaito eventually backed down and decided it wasn’t worth it because Izuru wasn’t willing to try and change. Which I’m only begrudgingly accepting because if Kaito did succeed in making Izuru listen to him then that’d be the beginning of a whole storyline that this side mode just doesn’t have the capacity for. Otherwise, I really do believe Izuru had the potential to change, and that Kaito would believe that too and not give up so easily.
Just… man, imagine Kaito being a part of actual Hope’s Peak canon and just casually averting the apocalypse because he saw Izuru’s weakness and did his usual Kaito thing and it worked.
At some other point during the festival, Nagito approaches Kaito and is disappointed to hear that the Ultimate Astronaut isn’t putting on any kind of show about space today.
Kaito: “Oh, are you interested in space, too?”
Nagito: “Of course I am! The vastness of space… that’s the only stage suitable for your talent, right!? There’s no mistake that you’ll be able to bring hope to the world from outer space!”
Kaito: “Hmm… something feels off.”
Nagito: “Off? What do you mean?”
Kaito: “You’re not interested in space… Or me. That’s how it feels. Like it’d be weird for you to cheer me on…”
Kaito’s intuition is so good. He barely knows Nagito, but he can sense well enough just from a few sentences that Nagito doesn’t actually care about Kaito himself or his interests at all and is only obsessed with the “hope” that he thinks Kaito represents. (Not that Nagito’s concept of it is anything close to the actual meaning of the word “hope”, but let’s not go into that again.) Kaito hasn’t seen enough of Nagito to know for sure that this is the kind of creep he is (like I imagine Nagito’s classmates are probably fully aware by now), but even without that, he can instinctively pick up on it straight away.
Kaito would probably have a lot of very interesting things to say to Nagito if he was exposed to him more and got to know his deal better, especially if it’d been in the context of an actual killing game. …But really, Kaito’s already had to do more than enough giving a piece of his mind to a selfish asshole who keeps making the killing game about himself and his own bullshit philosophy, and there’s so much more to Kaito’s character than just being stuck doing that all the time. Let’s give him a break.
Nagito: “Hmm… did I get too excited? I’m sorry if my blabbering made you uncomfortable… But it’s true that I want to cheer you on, Kaito…”
Kaito: “Well, I guess you’re not lying… My bad.”
No, Kaito, not your bad, because you were right! Just because he really isn’t lying about “wanting to cheer you on” doesn’t necessarily mean he cares about you.
This shows something neat about how Kaito treats his hunches that never really came up in the main storyline. If Kaito’s hunch about someone is negative, then he won’t act on it without further proof. Despite how much faith he puts in his intuition, he’ll give someone the benefit of the doubt if they deny whatever negative thing he suspects about them. (We saw this kind of thing very briefly in trial 2 when he picked up that Kirumi was trying to save an “everyone” who wasn’t here but then stopped pushing the subject when she denied it, even though she was lying and he probably still suspected that.) After all, it’s just a hunch. Kaito doesn’t want to form firm negative opinions of someone based only on that, because that’s not fair. That’s just being a dick to someone for what’s really no good reason, especially if it then turns out he was wrong about them and they didn’t deserve it.
Of course, Kaito is quite happy to act upon unfounded positive hunches about people, because why shouldn’t he? There’s nothing wrong with being nice to someone for no reason! Maybe it’ll turn out he was wrong about them and they didn’t really deserve his kindness, but then, still, no-one was hurt; he was just being a bit too reckless by believing in them is all. Kaito is so often recklessly kind like that – yet we can see here that he also tries not to be recklessly unkind. He’s so good.
Elsewhere in the school festival, Mikan is working as a receptionist for the haunted house exhibit. In an attempt to attract more guests, she tries inviting passers-by… one of whom happens to be Kaito. As you can imagine, this does not go down well.
After his initial freakout over the idea, which rather startles poor Mikan, Kaito tries to calm down and talk himself into it.
Kaito: “Wait, wait… I’m not scared. Everything in there is just fake, right?”
Obviously he doesn’t want to be seen as a coward, but this could also be partly because he feels bad for freaking out at Mikan when she was genuinely just trying to be a good receptionist for the exhibit and doesn’t want to disappoint her.
Mikan: “Yes… they’re all just props for the festival. So it’d make me happy if you tried it… sorta…”
Kaito: [looking ill] “Sorry… I still can’t.”
But I’m glad he realises that he’s not going to be able to handle this and backs out before actually forcing himself through the exhibit and fucking up his health a lot more. Sometimes these things just can’t be helped, and that’s okay, Kaito. Looking after yourself is more important than saving face or preventing someone from being mildly disappointed. (And don’t apologise for it, you moron.)
Since Kaito already did make himself feel a little ill just thinking about it, at least he happens to be with Mikan, so she’s able to take care of him.
What interests me the most about this scene, though, is just the fact that it’s here at all. I went over at great length in the main commentary how I’m absolutely convinced that Kaito’s phobia only existed as something that Tsumugi deliberately wrote into him so that she could weaken him when she wanted to. It didn’t make sense for Kaito to have that phobia for any other reason – it was in-universe bad writing that was justified in an out-universe sense because Tsumugi was a lazy writer.
But in this AU, Kaito is not a fictional character written by Tsumugi and nobody is trying to nerf him. There’s no in-story reason for Kaito to have the phobia in this AU – the only reason is that “he had it in canon”, but the reason he had it in canon does not apply here. Every other one of his character traits is here in this AU not only because he had them in canon, but because they’re all a part of what make him Kaito. But I think it could be argued that his phobia is not a part of what makes him Kaito – it sure as hell isn’t connected to anything else about his character at all – and therefore that it doesn’t need to be here.
So it honestly would have been entirely plausible to me to see Kaito not have the phobia in this AU. They could have instead had a scene of Kaito excitedly going into the haunted house exhibit with absolutely no explanation as to why he’s okay with this, because why should there be an explanation for something he’s never had a problem with in this universe? It would have been a delightful subtle hint as to the reason behind his phobia in canon. I’d have loved that. Alas.
Instead, it seems the writers just decided to take the in-universe bad writing that gave Kaito his phobia originally and make it a part of the out-universe writing for Kaito in this AU. Which I guess is acceptable if we consider that Gonta is also here at all.
Gonta had by far the most obviously-fictional backstory – raised by a race of creatures from a videogame? – and so that shouldn’t be a thing in this universe where he’s not made from fake memories. However, they also can’t just briefly edit it so that in this universe his forest family really were wolves, because wolves don’t have a proper language. Apparently, if a human child is isolated from any kind of language for a prolonged amount of time at the ages Gonta would have been at, it severely fucks up their ability to grasp language at all and they become basically non-functional. This is not an issue with fictional-Gonta, because Reptites are sapient and have a language that he’d have learned instead, so his backstory is perfectly consistent with the person he is. But if some kind of sapient non-human creature is not able to be part of his backstory… Gonta’s entire character falls apart and does not make sense. So Gonta existing as the Gonta we know in any non-fantasy universe in which he wasn’t made from fake memories is bad writing.
The writers had Gonta exist in this AU anyway, of course, because obviously they didn’t want to deprive us of our lovely gentleman friend in this mode, and if that means there’s technically some bad writing here, then so be it. So I guess with Kaito as well, they used that same philosophy of keeping him exactly as he is in canon, even including the parts that make a lot less sense when he’s not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story. Hence Kaito’s phobia still being a thing even when it kind of actually shouldn’t be.
A few more miscellaneous scenes
Kaito’s last friendly event isn’t nearly as interesting to me as the rest of them and I’m not covering it in full, especially because it features Leon and Teruteru and I refuse to quote a single word that comes out of Teruteru’s mouth. But it’s still at least a little worth talking about. The gist of it is that Leon and Teruteru begin to discuss going after girls and are shallow and gross, but they’re vague enough about it at first that it somehow spurs Kaito to start talking about “a man’s passion” and sound like he might be agreeing with them.
Kaito: “I never said I wanted to peep! I’m talking about chasing after unknown worlds!”
But he was never agreeing with them; they were actually having two entirely different conversations at once without realising it. When Kaito said “a man’s passion”, he was talking about going to space, obviously, what the hell did they think he meant?
Kaito: “Listen up! I’ll teach you what a man’s passion really is!”
Kaito’s concept of manliness does not and never did have anything to do with gross sexualising misogyny, and if anyone thinks that is what being a man is supposed to be about, then he’s going to set them straight, dammit!
…Okay, admittedly that is probably not what Kaito’s about to do – presumably he’s just going to try and tell them how great space is, incidentally sidestepping the actual problem with how they were behaving. Danganronpa’s occasionally-shitty writing is thankfully not so shitty as to directly include Kaito in it (except for the literally four single lines in the main story in which he is still nowhere near as bad as these idiots and which are out-of-character outliers that should be ignored). However, it’s unfortunately still bad enough to not go and actually have the dudes who are shitty be called out by another guy for being like this. But if Danganronpa’s writing wasn’t Danganronpa’s writing, I really feel like this is the kind of thing Kaito would absolutely do.
While the writing isn’t letting Kaito properly acknowledge how gross those two are being, it is otherwise at least having him be very Kaito about this. Even if the other two were being legit and non-gross about it, Kaito would still rather talk about going to space than getting a girlfriend, obviously; space is way more exciting! (…Which, actually, means that this scene is some actual evidence supporting that that one line in one of his Salmon Team hangouts about crushes on girls is likely to be out of character for Kaito. And the one about reading dirty books, for that matter. Ha! Take that, clueless intern!)
Anyway, thankfully this is the last piece of Danganronpa shittiness that goes anywhere near Kaito that I am ever going to have to defend him from being seen as a part of. Let’s move onto something better.
The final year���s seasonal event is less of a specific school event; it takes place in winter close to graduation (the Japanese school year ends in March) and generally involves characters reflecting on their time here over the past three years. I’ve already covered a bunch of the ones I find interesting in conjunction with friendly events they’re connected to, but here’s a few of interest that are a bit more standalone.
Shuichi happens to come across Maki and Himiko on the morning of the winter closing ceremony. This is an unusual trio to see together in this universe and definitely has no particular out-universe reason behind it at all.
Shuichi and Maki are both feeling rather sentimental about the fact that graduation is coming up soon, but Himiko is having none of it.
Himiko: “Ugh, don’t make that face! It’s not like we’re graduating today!”
Shuichi: “H-Himiko?”
Himiko: “Besides, we can still see each other after we graduate! I’ll invite you all to my magic show! My magic can still improve. The next time I show it to you, it’ll be even more amazing! See? Why don’t you guys try to think of the future in a more fun way? Look forward to it!”
Look at her go! She’s been spending enough time with Tenko over the past three years to have reached basically the same point in her development that she reaches in canon in terms of how upbeat and optimistic she’s able to be. This is just the kind of thing that can help cheer Shuichi and Maki up when they’re feeling down, and also exactly the kind of role she’d be playing in this trio in canon as they’re trying to get by and deal with their trauma in the outside world. Since this scene rather pointedly has these three together (when they’re otherwise not seen together in any other scene in this mode), it’s got to be a deliberate nod to the canon ending, so it serves to show us that this is the kind of thing Himiko would have been doing for them there, too. In this universe she’s not been specifically inspired by trying to fill Kaito’s shoes or anything, but she’s doing this anyway simply because she’s a performer and this is what her magic is all about.
Shuichi: “Hey… Kaede played a performance at Maki’s orphanage, right? Why not have Himiko do a show at the orphanage too?”
Himiko: “A show for orphans, huh? Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
Aww, that would be adorable! Both Kaede and Himiko perform to make people smile, and those kids definitely deserve to smile. Also it’s lovely to see confirmation that Kaede really did end up going to Maki’s orphanage and it went off without a hitch.
Himiko: “I might even get an apprentice. How about it, Maki?”
Maki: “…I can’t imagine you as a master. I think you’re moving too fast.”
Nah, Maki, I think Himiko would be great at that. She ended up greater than her own master despite seeming to be the apprentice on the surface, so I think that makes her plenty qualified to be a master herself and train her own apprentices now.
(Since Himiko’s master actually exists in this universe, I am Very Invested in her reuniting with him one day. She needs to help him realise that having messed up in front of her one time doesn’t mean he’s failed her because she still looks up to him and cares about him even if she’s become greater than him, and he was being an Idiot to ever feel like she’d be better off without him because they are not just master and apprentice but also friends.)
Meanwhile, for Kaito’s final year event, one of his choices is obviously the most correct and worthwhile, but I’ll save the best for last. If he instead chooses to go for a walk on his own, Kaito bumps into Kokichi and has a predictably infuriating conversation with him, most of which I’m not going to bother covering, but there’s one part of it that I find interesting enough to talk about.
Kaito: “You haven’t changed a bit in these last 3 years…”
This seems at a glance just like a general way to express exasperation, but it is very like Kaito to focus on Kokichi not having changed. After all, Kaito’s watched his sidekicks grow and change so much and is generally invested in the idea of people changing as they meet and form friendships with others. But of course none of that happened to Kokichi over these three years, because, as ever, he refused to let himself change.
Kaito: “You’re still like this at your age? Doesn’t it make your parents cry? Do you even visit?”
Some very good questions! What is going on with regards to Kokichi’s parents? Did he live with them? Does he visit? Are they in the picture at all?
All questions that like hell we’re ever going to get the answers to, of course, and I don’t have nearly enough basis to bother speculating. But I do love that Kaito has thought about this. He’s trying to make some sense of why Kokichi is this way, but he’s also thinking about what Kokichi being this way must be doing to the people out there who actually unconditionally care about him.
(At least, Kaito is automatically assuming that Kokichi’s parents care about him, even though them being assholes could potentially begin to explain a few things. Apparently Kaito considers parents being decent to be the norm, which is another indication that his own parents being assholes is not the answer to why they’re not around.)
Kokichi: “Hey now, you don’t really ask the supreme leader of evil such normie questions. Also, if you wanna know my origin story, you’re gonna have to bet two lives for it.”
Kaito: “Idiot, everyone’s only got one life and there’s no way I’d waste mine on your story!”
Kokichi: “Aw maaan, how boring. If you’re not gonna bother learning the truth about me…”
Kokichi, of course, responds with some evasive insincere bullshit rather than actually be honest about himself for a second, and then acts like it’s Kaito’s fault for not caring enough to want to learn. It couldn’t possibly be that Kaito really does want to understand him better and Kokichi is just refusing to open up because of his trust issues, nope, not at all, nothing is ever Kokichi’s fault.
For the other obviously-not-correct option for his winter event, Kaito goes to the dining hall and comes across Hifumi, who just finished submitting some fan comics of his before the end of the year.
Hifumi: “The crunch time for them was difficult for even my golden hand… But as you can see, I overcame it and triumphed! I’ve raised the bar for fanfic yet again!”
Kaito: “In other words, you wanted to show your manliness, huh? Good for you!”
While I’m not entirely sure why he decided to bring it up now out of nowhere, Kaito’s concept of manliness is still not inherently gendered. He’s just talking about Hifumi giving it his all and wanting to show how good he is at what he does. It’s about being true to yourself!
Kaito: “Alright! Then next you can make a manga about me, Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”
Hifumi: “Huh? A manga about you, Mr. Momota?”
Kaito: “It’s gonna be a legendary manga! If you make it about me, it’s gonna be a global hit! Cuz it’s gonna be filled with manga-style adventure before it even gets to the space part!”
What an absolute dork. What I can only assume he means by this is that he’s going to have Hifumi manga-ify the ridiculous make-believe games he played as a kid. Obviously that’s the kind of story that everyone’s going to be able to appreciate, children and adults alike, right? And in his narration at the end of this scene, he calls this his biography, because it’s all definitely true. Oh, Kaito.
Hifumi: “Well, that aside, if I’m gonna make it… It’ll definitely be a global hit! You’ve got a good eye for talent, Mr. Momota!”
Kaito: “Of course! I’m a hero with many sidekicks!”
Kaito is citing his status as a hero with sidekicks not as part of why his story will obviously be a global hit, but as a separate thing, in terms of why he’s good at spotting talent. Because he is! His hero-and-sidekick thing is all about seeing the potential in people and bringing it out of them, and he’s so good at it!
Reflections with the sidekicks
But anyway, speaking of Kaito’s sidekicks, let’s get back to the obviously correct option for his final year event.
The stars are especially pretty tonight… What will you do?
- Take a walk with my sidekicks
Kaito’s POV is again being wonderfully Kaito – of course he’d notice that the stars are pretty. He definitely goes for walks on clear nights all the time just so that he can look up at them. Space.
(How many times do you want to bet he’s tripped over something and made a doofus of himself because he was too busy looking up at the stars to watch where he was actually going? A lot. The answer is a lot, I will accept nothing lower.)
Kaito: “You can see the stars pretty well tonight, yeah? Before long, I’ll be up there with ‘em!”
Maki: “The stars are pretty, but… is this really the only reason why you called me out this late?”
Shuichi: “He does this a lot…”
See, he does do this all the time! And what better way to enjoy the beauty of the night sky than by sharing it with his sidekicks? This isn’t even a training session; they’re just hanging out under the stars.
Shuichi: “But isn’t it kind of fun?”
Maki: “…I never said this wasn’t fun.”
And Shuichi and Maki have come to appreciate Kaito’s impromptu starlight walks too! They are friends.
Kaito: “So many things happened in the last three years after I met you guys! We did some school stuff, went to Sonia’s country during the break and solved a case!”
This is indeed another thing that happened. One of Shuichi’s friendly events is with Sonia, in which she tells him about an unsolved conspiracy causing problems among the nobles of her country that ultimately boils down to a lot of missing pets. Since that’s his area of expertise, Shuichi offers to look into it for her, and Sonia takes him up on that. This is more of him trying to help people out using his detective skills, like Kaito was encouraging him to do near the beginning!
And while Shuichi didn’t mention his friends at all during that conversation with Sonia, apparently Kaito later heard about it and invited himself and Maki along. He probably just wanted the three of them to have an adventure together, didn’t he.
Maki: “Hm, I still don’t know why I had to tag along, though.”
Kaito: “You were great at wiping out all those assassins! That’s my sidekick for you!”
Maki: “Correction. I protected us from danger and Shuichi solved the case…”
It sure sounds like they did have quite the adventure, too. Maki used her assassin skills to protect her friends! She even seems to realise this! (Kaito’s wording doeees kinda imply that, while he’s trying to gloss over it, she might have straight-up killed those enemy assassins, though. That’s a shame if so, but it was probably the only way to keep her friends safe.)
Maki: “If anything, I don’t know why you’re tagging along, Kaito.”
Shuichi: “If Kaito hadn’t invited you, Maki, then Sonia and I could have been in big trouble.”
Kaito: “Issuing orders to sidekicks is the most important job a hero has!”
Maki: “Then your job was over before we even left the country.”
Kaito was helping, you guys. His decision to bring Maki was a good call, but then he also came with them for, uh, you know, moral support! …Which probably genuinely did help them, at least a little, because Kaito is the actual best at moral support. If Maki did kill those enemy assassins, they could potentially have been the first people she’s killed since enrolling in Hope’s Peak, which might have caused a setback in her growth that Kaito would definitely have helped talk her through.
Kaito: “After graduation, when I’m in space, I’ll look for you guys from up above!”
Maki: “Huh? You’d never find us.”
Shuichi: “Ah, well, he might be able to see the approximate area…”
It’s lovely how Kaito says this even though it’s extremely unrealistic to think he could actually see them from there. He wants his sidekicks to be able to feel, even while he’s gone, that he’s watching over them from space!
(This is also a sentiment that very much applies in canon when he really is gone. He died up there in space, which means he’s still up there and watching over them from among the stars, isn’t he?)
Kaito: “And then I’ll take you guys into space one day. After all, I need my sidekicks to help me out.”
Kaito pulls this out of absolutely nowhere despite how clearly unfeasible it is. And the idea that it’s because he’d need them to help him is obviously an excuse, because that’s not what the word “sidekick” actually means to him.
Kaito just… doesn’t want to be without them for such a prolonged amount of time. He’s so positive-minded that he’d always have thought of only the good things about going to space, so his comment just a moment ago might have been the first time it’s properly occured to him that going to space does have its downsides, because he’s going to have to say goodbye to Shuichi and Maki and leave them behind for months at a time. There’ll be video chats and such, but it won’t be the same. Kaito wants to keep being with them all the time not just for their sake but for his sake, because even if he still isn’t calling them this in this AU either, they’re his best friends and he loves them to bits.
So obviously that just means that they’ve got to come to space with him too, yep, that’s definitely plausible and definitely something they’d both want, and Kaito’s not going to think about anything else.
Shuichi: “You need us to save you, Kaito?”
Maki: “Well, yeah… We’re the only ones who would do it.”
Kaito: “Hey, Shuichi, what do you mean ‘save me’!? Maki Roll, what do you mean, ‘the only ones’!? Geez, what sassy sidekicks. I gotta teach you guys some manners.”
They are the best sassy sidekicks and I love the way they’re making such affectionate jabs at him like that. He’s an idiot in some ways, but he’s their idiot and they wouldn’t have it any other way. And they really would be there for him if he actually genuinely needed help, even though they’re making it sound like a joke on the surface and Kaito is bound to be assuming that they don’t mean it as anything more than that, goddammit Kaito.
Shuichi: “…How did we end up agreeing to go into space with Kaito?”
Maki: “There’s no way it would go that smoothly. You really are all talk, Kaito.”
Kaito: “Shut it! The impossible is possible, all you gotta do is make it so! It’s already been decided!”
Bad sidekicks, stop telling Kaito it’s impossible! And, okay, technically it isn’t completely impossible for Shuichi and Maki to potentially become astronauts and go to space with Kaito if they both trained hard enough. But that’d require them to put in far more effort than they’d be willing to do just to be able to keep Kaito company in space, considering that space isn’t their passion and they have their own lives they want to lead. Of course Kaito knows this – he just doesn’t want to think about leaving them behind, and so he’s trying to use his own line to tell himself that bringing them to space with him is something he’s totally allowed to imagine happening.
Kaito: “Both of you gotta keep up your training!”
Shuichi: “I don’t know if we’ll ever end up in space, but… I’ll keep on training.”
Maki: “…If I feel like it.”
But regardless of how unrealistic the space part is, they will definitely be keeping up their training, even while Kaito’s up in space without them! Including Maki, despite that she’s acting all dismissive about it here. (She’s smiling when she says that.)
You made a promise for the future with your sidekicks…
Kaito, no, that is not what you did. They did not actually promise to come to space with you. (It’ll be okay, though! You’ll be friends with the other astronauts too, because that’s what astronauts do! And you’ll get plenty of time to see Shuichi and Maki in between missions when you’re back on Earth, and plenty of video chats from space!)
Since this scene is only available while you’re playing as Kaito, it has more of a focus on Kaito’s perspective. Of course Shuichi and Maki also each have a third year seasonal event with Kaito that I’m about to get to, and theirs focus more on their perspective, namely what Kaito’s done for them. Because that gets covered in their scenes, Kaito’s scene is free to be about what Shuichi and Maki mean to him, beyond the purely selfless sense of him being proud of how much they’ve grown – and they’re his best friends that he wants to keep hanging out with and having adventures with forever! This scene isn’t really about them as his sidekicks. They’re more to Kaito than just that, even if he still won’t actually use the word “friend”, the big doofus.
Let’s move onto Maki’s scene, then, and talk about what he’s done for her. (Both Maki and Shuichi’s scenes with Kaito are only one-on-one, so Shuichi’s not here for this.)
Kaito: “It was a lot of work taking care of you guys these past three years. You didn’t even try to talk to people in the beginning.”
Maki: “Yeah. If you hadn’t annoyed me so much with your constant pestering… I probably would have never been able to talk to Shuichi and the others so casually.”
Kaito helped her relearn how to be friends! Here is confirmation that he very much did employ copious amounts of stubborn pestering to get through to her, not that that aspect of how it happened was ever in question. Kaito is even actually more or less admitting that it was pretty hard work getting through to her – he refers to both her and Shuichi when he says that, but let’s face it, he definitely had to put in a lot more effort in Maki’s case at first.
Kaito: “You’re being pretty frank today. It seems you finally understand how great I am!”
It is unusual for Maki to be openly admitting things like this – which is also a big sign of her progress! And it’s very like Kaito to respond to her genuine expression of how much he’s done for her by being over the top about it rather than just directly, earnestly accepting it. In this instance it’s definitely not that he’s having any issues that make him not truly believe he deserves such thanks. So I guess it’s instead just due to him feeling kind of awkward when it comes to heartfelt, down-to-earth things like this, and he’s more comfortable putting on the super-awesome-hero fiction for it. (More on this in Shuichi’s scene.)
Kaito: “Or… are you sad because graduation is getting closer?”
Maki: “…Yes.”
Kaito: “…That’s a bit too frank.”
It does seem that Kaito’s also kind of awkward just thinking about generally sentimental things at all. After all, we saw in his scene that he doesn’t like thinking about the fact that he won’t be seeing his sidekicks every day any more once they graduate.
Maki: “Well, there’s no point being sentimental. It’s not like we won’t ever see each other again.”
Looks like Maki could tell that Kaito’s also feeling more sentimental than he wants to be. At least Maki is capable of being pragmatic about it even while she’s feeling sad. (Kaito would of course be capable of being as optimistic about it as he can, but for his part he doesn’t even really like to think about the sad bits in the first place if he can avoid it.)
Kaito: “Yeah… you’re right. It’ll be hard for me to see you on a daily basis after this, but… it’s not goodbye forever.”
Maki: “What do you mean, it’ll be hard?”
Kaito: “Hm? Well, because I’ll be up in space, obviously.”
Maki: “Oh, yeah… You still want to go there.”
Obviously! Keep up, Maki Roll! Don’t tell me you ever thought for a second that he wasn’t serious about going there, or that he’d change his mind one day! I’m going to instead put this reaction down her just having not quite properly thought about what that means in terms of the future of their friendship, in that he’s not going to be able to be around as much. Kind of like how Kaito himself in his scene apparently hadn’t thought about it properly until now.
Maki’s looking distant and a little sad in her last line there, and it seems like Kaito picks up on that.
Kaito: “But you’re my sidekick! If something happened to you, I’d fly back here, right away! I look out for my sidekicks! Cuz I’m a hero!”
Therefore obviously it’ll totally be possible for him to do this if Maki needed him to! Aborting a space mission on short notice in the middle of it and zooming back to Earth for personal reasons is definitely something an astronaut can do, right? This is adorably like the previous scene in which Kaito insisted they could totally come to space with him. He really does not want to think about the fact that going to space will unavoidably separate him from his sidekicks for months at a time.
While the last scene was more from Kaito’s perspective and was therefore about what he’d want – his sidekicks in space with him! – this one is reversed. This scene has been about what Kaito’s done for Maki, and her talking about that has made him focus on what she’d want. So of course he would selflessly abandon space and come right back to help her if something serious happened and she really did need him! …If only he could. His reluctance at the idea of being separated from his sidekicks is, just as you’d expect, also partly out of selflessness for their sake, in terms of him not being there to support them like the hero he’s supposed to be. Kaito can’t bear the thought of Maki needing him and him being uselessly stuck out in space, not able to help her.
(She’d be okay, though, Kaito! Maki’s got other friends too who’d be able to help her in person. And if she really did need Kaito in particular, video chats would be enough, because Kaito always helps the most with just words.)
Maki: “Huh… that again? Well… I’ll be waiting, but I won’t be expecting much…”
Maki is of course fully aware of how unfeasible these claims of Kaito’s are, but it seems, based on her wistful smile at the end, that she at least understands and appreciates how much he genuinely wants to be able to do that for her if she ever needs it. He is a hero who looks out for his sidekicks, after all, and Maki knows this, no matter how ridiculous she might think that way of wording it is.
Last but not least, Shuichi’s scene begins with him waking up early on the day of the winter closing ceremony. (This is remarkable in and of itself, considering how emphatically not a morning person Shuichi was in canon. Perhaps that was partly for mental health reasons, though, and after three years of being friends with Kaito and Kaede and working on his issues, he’s got better at waking up in the mornings.)
Thinking about only having a short time left at this academy makes you sad… And from that comes restlessness. What will you do?
- Exercise is perfect at a time like this
It’s lovely how Shuichi thinks of this entirely by himself as something that’ll improve his mood. Kaito really has taught him well!
So Shuichi heads to the school field and finds that Kaito had the same idea as him.
Kaito: “Oh, hey there bro! Are you training too?”
Shuichi: “Yeah! It’s good to sweat some things out!”
Kaito: “Right on! That’s the spirit! It’s all thanks to your training with me!”
Of course it’s all thanks to his training with Kaito! Shuichi would never have even considered doing this kind of thing to help himself if Kaito hadn’t been his friend.
Shuichi: “…You’re right. You befriended me, and encouraged me, and gave me advice… You’ve… helped me so much, Kaito…”
Kaito: “Hey, hey. What’s all that about? Don’t dampen the mood, bro.”
…But Kaito still can’t quite just earnestly accept such heartfelt gratitude. This is kind of a reverse of last scene with Maki, in which he responded to her acknowledgement of how much he’d done by being kind of flippantly over-the-top about it. This time, he started with the over-the-top “well, it’s because I’m awesome!”, but Shuichi responding with an earnest “no, you really are, thank you so much,” still managed to wrong-foot him. And again, this isn’t the canon storyline where Kaito had heaps of issues and ended up with a gaping hole in his sense of self-worth, so it’s not because he doesn’t feel like he deserves any kind of thanks at all.
It seems bizarre to be using this word for Kaito, but… he might actually be kind of modest? Sure, he’ll act over-the-top about his achievements, but it’s like he only really thinks of that as a fiction for the sake of keeping up his usual luminary image, an image that people might buy into and play along with because it’s fun and it helps encourage them, but not because they really think he’s that ridiculously amazing. If someone takes his overblown words at face value and seems to genuinely feel that they’re true, then he’ll back up and try to brush it off, because nah, he’s all right, but there’s no way he could really be quite that awesome. (You are that awesome, Kaito. At least when it comes to supporting your sidekicks.)
Shuichi: “Ah, sorry… I was just thinking about what we’ve built over the years…”
Friendship! You built the best adorablest friendship, is what you did. (Also what are you doing apologising for this, Shuichi; there is absolutely nothing wrong in telling Kaito how amazing he’s been even if he’s too much of an awkward dork to properly accept it.)
Shuichi: “If I ever find myself in trouble, I can look back at my time with you for inspiration, Kaito.”
Just like he’s also able to do in canon even though Kaito’s not there any more!
Kaito: “That’s true, but… Graduation won’t be the end for us!”
But thankfully, in this universe, Kaito is always going to be there. (Just maybe sometimes only over video chats, from space.) He doesn’t ever want their friendship to end!
Kaito: “Listen up! Even if things get tough in the future…”
Shuichi: “Don’t bear it all by yourself, right?”
Kaito: “Oh… well if you get it, then it’s all good.”
Pfft, I like how Kaito seems almost miffed that Shuichi stole his line. But it definitely is okay so long as he understands that, and evidently Kaito has told him this enough times over the years that Shuichi has that well and truly ingrained in his mind by now and already knew exactly how Kaito was going to finish his sentence.
Kaito: “When things are bad, me, Maki Roll, or Kaede will help you carry your burdens. As long as you understand that, you can get stronger.”
And it’s good to see that Kaito isn’t just focusing things on himself as the sole figure of support (after all, he wouldn’t have any reason to in this AU where he hasn’t been having massive issues). He’s happy to remind Shuichi that he has other friends as well who’ll be there to help him.
Shuichi: “The same goes for you, Kaito. If there’s anything I can help you with, just say so.”
Shuichi is also so very good. Every time Kaito says something along those lines to Shuichi, I’m always burning with the desperate urge to tell him that goes for you too, Kaito, you selfless idiot, you deserve it – so it’s really lovely and cathartic to see Shuichi actually telling him that. He’s such a caring friend and really would be more than happy to do anything for Kaito if he ever needed it.
Kaito: “Heh, now we’re talking. Of course you’d help me! I’m the hero and you’re my sidekick!”
…
*tilts head almost 180 degrees*
Who are you and what have you done with Kaito.
This is not how Kaito works. He seems to be actually acknowledging that helping the hero is one of the roles of a sidekick, but no it isn’t, not in Kaito’s definition!
Okay, so. When I was starting to think about writing these UTDP bonus posts, I had one hell of a hot take in mind for this line. That take was that the reason Kaito says this here is because in this AU, he’s not “fictional”.
As I explain in greater length in my post about Kaito’s entire character arc from my main blog, it seems reasonable to assume that Kaito’s childlike black-and-white view on heroes and sidekicks comes from the fact that he was in-universely written to be the perfect ideal hero to inspire Shuichi. It’s somewhat unrealistic to think that if Kaito had actually experienced growing up, he wouldn’t have gradually gained a more nuanced appreciation for fiction, as he started reading more complex stories containing more fallible heroes who were still capable of being inspiring not despite but because of that. So I was going to say that Kaito not being fictional in this AU and having actually grown up meant he’d been able to gain that greater understanding of what made a hero inspiring, which’d mean that Kaito’s usual double-standard about heroes simply doesn’t exist in this version of him, and therefore that he genuinely means it here when he says of course Shuichi can and should help him out too.
…Except that clearly doesn’t track with some of the other scenes in this AU, now, does it. Mostly I’m talking about the scenes with Ryoma, in which Kaito’s issues about heroes clearly still apply to Ryoma in the same way they did in canon. There’s also that one scene with Hifumi in which Kaito is quite happy to have his ridiculous childhood games made into a manga and doesn’t seem to be aware of the fact that mayyyybe a lot of people wouldn’t actually find them to be particularly compelling narratives.
And while the scene with Kaito’s phobia isn’t about the hero issue, the point I was trying to get at there is related to this. It doesn’t quite make sense that Kaito has his phobia if he’s not “fictional”, just like it maybe doesn’t quite make sense that he has this view of heroes either. But ultimately, when writing this AU, the writers just decided to keep the characters entirely as they were in V3 canon, even including the parts of them that don’t actually quite make sense if they’re not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story.
So never mind, scratch all that. I only brought it up because I found it an interesting concept to think about, but it’s definitely not what’s going on here. Kaito not being “fictional” in this AU is not actually why he’s willing to admit that of course Shuichi would help him out as his sidekick.
Instead, presumably the reason Kaito is saying this here is that… he doesn’t really mean it, the idiot. It is at least not quite as bad as in canon where he knows full well he already has problems and is consciously lying when he insists that he’d totally ask for help if he needed it. Here, it’s more just that he’s never expecting he will need help and so he’ll never have to actually think about whether or not this claim is really true. Ultimately, it’s easier for him to just casually claim this here, because the alternative is being all “oh but I won’t need your help!”, which’d just make him sound like he doesn’t even appreciate Shuichi’s willingness to be there for him.
I do like to believe, though, that whenever Kaito does run into some kind of trouble in future in this AU (and I say “when” not “if” because nobody can ever go through life without having at least some problems here and there), he’ll actually be able, with Shuichi and Maki’s prodding and reassurance, to admit it and ask for help. Without the stress of the killing game making Kaito tunnel-vision into the fact that he needs to keep supporting his sidekicks and that the only thing that matters is how much of a difference he can make to everyone’s survival, I think he’d be a lot less completely and utterly averse to acknowledging weakness. Plus, hopefully his astronaut training will drill it into him that part of good communication is telling your teammates when there’s something wrong with you, because holy crap is it only going to make things way worse not just for you but for everyone involved if you don’t, you moron. And the more Shuichi and Maki grow and the less obviously they need his help and support most of the time, the more Kaito will come to consciously see them not just as his sidekicks but as his friends, and friends can open up to each other about anything.
One way or another, Kaito is bound to eventually realise what an idiot he’s being and overcome these issues of his. He just needs to live for long enough to get that far.
Kaito: “Alright then… wanna run for a while? Better hurry, or you’ll be eating my dust!”
Shuichi: “Ah, hey! No fair, Kaito!”
Working up a good sweat, you chased Kaito all the way to homeroom.
Aaaaa look at them racing each other off into the sunrise. They are friends and they are going to live happily ever after. Kaito is going to go to space multiple times under normal circumstances and come back alive each time, and also one day learn not to be a hypocrite about asking people for support. Shuichi is going to start his own detective agency where he exclusively takes on jobs that involve helping people and continue to have confidence in his talent in between relying on his friends for help when he needs to.
And Maki… I refuse to accept that she’s just going to have to go back to killing people in this universe when she’s come so far; that is Not Okay. Either Hope’s Peak really is going to somehow absolve her of being an assassin as part of its “set for life” policy, or Kaito and Shuichi are going to do something about it. Maki may still try to claim that assassins are necessary and therefore that totally justifies her being an assassin – there’s no real evidence in this AU that she quite got over that part of her issues – but Kaito would be having none of that. So Shuichi’s first job as a full-fledged detective may have to be to find evidence of her assassin cult’s awful deeds and report it to some kind of authorities that can take it down and take custody of all the kids from the orphanages and give all the other child-slave assassins some goddamn therapy because the rest of them don’t have a Kaito. Then Maki can rid herself of her awful past forever and get a normal job, maybe as an actual child caregiver, where she never has to think about killing anyone ever again and can live a relatively happy life after everything she’s been through, because I say so.
I just love these three so so so much and want them to get to be happy and keep being adorable friends for the rest of their lives, because they’re the best and they deserve it. So I’m glad we have this AU where nothing particularly drastic goes wrong at all, everyone is fully real, and their adorable friendships are still there like in canon, so that there’s at least one world in which we can imagine that they really are going to be okay.
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