Love and War

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"Maggie, you were attacked." Kandros replied firmly, though he still didn't open his eyes. "I never hated you, only what that bastard did to you."

"Brave? That woman?" Quinn snorted. "I hardly think so. She was a brainless idiot who only cared what would make her dear husband happy."

Quinn's newly powerful limbs held Tyros tightly before rolling him beneath her, something she would not have been able to do before. It had felt like the entire galaxy was against them sometimes, and then other times... he knew just what to say and everything felt like it was exactly as it should be. 

"Just like you don't know I won't kill you in your sleep if you don't give me the ship." Brutus chuckled, holding Maggie's gaze before leaning back to the position he had started in.

"Kandros told me that Hunter murdered you father. I was never able to tell you how sorry I am." Tyros told Quinn several hours later as they laid together on the bed. "I'm also sorry I wasn't there to stop it. It should have been me. I know how much he meant to you."

Maggie snorted,  trying to pretend she was brave like her husband. "What can you do, sir? You're chained there and doomed to die. It seems I'm the one with the upper hand on this."

Quinn again seemed to be struggling to express herself with words, though for different reasons this time. "That's what scares me." She finally breathed. "All my life I had just wanted the love of at least one parent. Then when I had it... it got snatched away. What if that happens to us? You're everything I ever wanted, Ty... I'm so scared someone will take you away too."

"Honey, I've been chained a lotta places." Brutus snorted. "You really think some little human cage is enough to hold me?"

"Kalahira herself couldn't take me away from you." Tyros promised, smoothing back her hair. "Let's go kill something. A human or two. That will make it better." He teased her, thumping her nose.

"There's not just humans here, Brutus. But...i don't plan to treat you like a monster unless you deserve it." Maggie told him gently. She knelt in front of him, daring to bend her head to unlock the chain. "You have a deal. A ship and money in exchange for a job. Probably the easiest job you'll ever have."

Quinn's eyes crinkled as she laughed. "Is that the kett bloodlust talking?" She teased, brushing her lips to his before he could answer.

The second he was able Brutus' fingers shot out, sliding around Maggie's slender throat. "So easy..." he breathed, though let go a moment later. "You are far too trusting, or is it desperate?"

"We're never going to get out of this bed." Tyros groaned, rolling his wife beneath him. "I had plans to take you shopping." He teased, nuzzling her neck.

"The latter." Maggie admitted. To her credit she didn't even touch her neck as she continued to face down Brutus. "I want Tann and General Talos to suffer in the worst way and I'm more than willing to bet you can make it happen. But...Brutus...for a half million credits...this has to be the worst thing you've ever done."
For the next hour the little blonde hashed out her plan. She wanted this enormous turian to seduce the daughter of a human General and the future wife of the Nexus director, Tann. She wanted it done in such a way that the woman was not only broken hearted but devastated. 
"So?" Maggie asked when she finished her plan. She let out a sigh that betrayed just how much the cruelty was bothering her. "What do you say?:

"You don't need to." Quinn assured him. "But... I don't suppose you saved any of my dad's files, did you?" She ased, almost afraid to hear the 'no' she was so sure was coming.

Brutus didn't interrupt Maggie once as she laid everything out. He was now sat back with his arms folded across his chest. "Right, and I look like I could seduce a random stranger, do I?" He asked finally, though was indeed intrigued by the pure cruelty of the plan.

"Not that I understood them." Tyros said with a shrug. "He wrote completely in quarian and I can't read. I...never learned to read. We never got around to it." He sighed. 

"Actually, yes. Otherwise I wouldn't be asking." Maggie said, her eyes never leaving his. "I'm not a complete idiot, sir."

Quinn smiled and patted her husband's cheek lightly. "Well now we can start, and I can show you what we were working on before, well... you know." She breathed.

Brutus smiled and reached out, thumping a large finger against Maggie's forehead that jerked her head back roughly. "Coulda fooled me, sweetheart." He snorted. "Alright, let's say we go with your plan, what makes you think this, what was her name... Lori? What makes you think she would abandon her position of power with the director so easily?"

"Not the book I had when we first met, right?" Tyros asked her with a wicked grin. "Didn't you tell me that was not a good thing?"

"I never said it would be easy. Lori adores the General and he wants her in this marriage. But love...trust me when I say it makes a person do crazy things. When she falls for you...all gets are off."

Quinn's pert nose wrinkled up and she whacked Tyros playfully. "Well back then I didn't think you would be stupid enough to marry me." She teased.

Before Maggie could stop it, Brutus had mocked her from her seat and had her pinned beneath him, his weight held above with his hands by her head. "Seems like you might be the one wanting seducing, princess." He mused.

"You knew I was stupid. I kidnapped a woman who was more insane than those kittens who had been dropped in water you told me about. " Tyros laughed.

Maggie gritted her teeth and glared at him. "Sorry, you're not my type. I like the heroes. Not the monsters." To her credit she didn't flinch or give in to her fear. She knew better.

"You kidnapped a soldier to be your school teacher." Quinn laughed. "Good thing I happen to find you adorable, or I would just call you dumb." She teased.

"No such thing as heroes." Brutus breathed, his lips close to her ear. "Your boy is just real good at hiding the moster within." He added, then moved away from her.

"What's so special about your father's notes is so important?" Tyros asked as they cleaned the mess that was Qim's office. So far it had produced nothing.

Maggie was silent as she returned to Kandros' beside that night. She believed him to be sleeping as she sat and stared at the wall.

"Not just his notes, mine too." Quinn corrected gently. "He was teaching me, helping me become more than the trained muscle the general made me into." She added as she sat down at Qim's desk. "We..." she hesitated, wondering if Tyros would take what she was about to tell him the wrong way. "He was helping me find a way to reverse what the kett did to you, we thought it might help you remember your past too."

"You're back late." Kandinsky rose was wondering if Maggie would tell him the truth of where she had been without him telling her he had seen it all."

Tyros laughed. "I will never be my old self again. Sadly all of my memories are long since faded as well. I no longer remember what even my mother looked like. They will never return, beloved." 

Hearing him awake was all she needed. Maggie climbed into the bed with him and buried her face into his uninjured shoulder. "I'm a terrible person, Kandros. I...spent all our savings on a merc. I hired him..." in between sobs she began to confess everything.

"We can still try, can't we?" Quinn breathed, worried he was simply trying to find a kind way to tell her he didn't WANT to remember.

Kandros held his wife close and simply let her sob until she was done. "Alright, it's done, and I don't care about the money. But... what about Connor? Does this merc have a way to find that bastard Reegar's ship?"

"Is it possible?" Tyros breathed. "I'm mean really?" The more Quinn talked the more he realized she was not joking. She and Qim just might have a way to change things...

Maggie nodded. "That's the thing about Lori. It's her job to keep tabs on all the ships that came from the milky way. Unlike the General she is on good terms with everyone. 
"Once he works his way into her...he can get to that information before ruining Tann. That way it's fool proof for us." Maggie admitted. "I had hours to sit and stew on this while mother decided what to do with me."

"I can't be sure, but we were working on it before I ran off to find Maggie." She breathed. "But... its only if you want it. It wouldn't be just your memories, it would also restore the Drell in you. I got the idea when the kett first took me, they started to make me like them, but somehow what they did got reversed."

"Speaking of..." Kandros was gently stroking Maggie's hair now. "I'm not just going to forgot that that bastard and your sister just left you alone on a kett ship, or that she let him trade you for her in the first place."

"I...i don't have faith to be honest." Tyros admitted. "I've done nothing but broken everything I touch. I cannot see how this could possibly go right. Are you sure? Is it...what do you want?"

"I'm not worried about Quinn." Maggie said softly. "She's a walking disaster. Always has been. She'll hurt herself. There's no need for us to intervene."

Tann was grinning like a fool when he saw the size of the turian that stepped into his office. "You are perfect." He nodded. "All we need is approval from the General and you will be my fiancee's body guard. Have you ever worked in security before, my friend?" He asked. He had no idea he'd fallen into Maggie's trap more cleanly and quickly than she'd fallen into his.

"I don't care either way." Quinn assured her husband. "I just thought it must be horrible not being able to remember your life before andromeda?" She added, though suddenly seemed to need to get something off her chest. "I thought I was leaving my family behind when I came here. Even though Maggie insisted on coming, in the end I was glad. Though we didn't always see eye to eye, I always hoped she knew I would have given my life for hers, which is what I truly thought I was doing many times over." It's was unclear if Quinn's words would be quite so heartfelt if she knew how her sister really felt about her.

"But Maggie..." Kandros began. "She betrayed you, so many times. She let her pet trade you like you were worthless. Doesn't she deserve punishment?" He added, obviously unaware of the punishment Quinn had indeed received when she sacrificed herself so he could return to her sister.

Brutus smiled slightly, enjoyed the ease of this job immensely. "Does it matter if I haven't?" He asked. "I killed my own mother for the right price." The large turian added. "You keep paying well, and your precious little woman will be safe as salarian family records."

"You aren't curious to know what I'd look like as a drell?" He asked her. "Do you think it will hurt? Will you...still love me?"

Tann was practically rubbing his hands together as he opened the door to the General's office. The elder human looked up, his scarred face twisted in a scowl. "This had better be important, worm. I am too busy to bother myself with you!" He barked, not bothering to look up.

"I'll always love you." Quinn breathed, her cool hand pressing gently to his cheek. "No matter what you look like."

"You don't wanna meet the man protecting your daughter?" Brutus asked gruffly, clearly no scared of the general as Everyone else was.

"When can we get started?" Tyros asked, threading his fingers through her hair. "I...i think you would like me better as a drell..."

"This moron seems to think she needs someone. I don't." The general snapped. "Do what you like but keep your hands off her. You aren't good enough for her. God himself isn't good enough for that girl. Get out of my office. Now." The General seemed to speak in one firm sentence. It left the almighty Tann scrambling to obey.

Quinn closed her eyes and smiled dreamily as Tyros thread his fingers through her hair. She had been about to cut it back to its usual jaw length style a few days ago, until he had expressed his fondness for the longer length. "Not possible." She finally breathed, opening her human eye first, and the cybernetic implant a moment later. 

Brutus didn't move at first, few people dared speak to him this way, given his large size for a turian. "Ain't got no use for a fragile human female anyway." He finally grunted in reply before following Tann.

Tyros found himself struggling to breathe as he watched Quinn work. He didn't tell her he was terrified of needles. He remembered what Betty had done to him and the agony it had caused. Even if he no longer knew who he was he his body remembered. He struggled to get past the pain, even if he knew she would never hurt him on purpose. Not like her mother had.

Tann was already rattling off instructions, ignoring what the General had said. "At night I will be sleeping outside her apartments so there will be no need for you. In the morning you will meet me promptly at 5 so I can rest. She is never to know of this. I will pay double for you to keep your mouth shut."

Quinn knew that look in her husband's eyes, as she had no doubt it had been in her own when he had found her. If only she knew the pain returning his memories to him was going to bring her. "Just a few little pin pricks, that's all." She assured Tyron with a warm smile, stroking her face with one hand as the other expertly slid the first needle into his arm.

Brutus watched the angry Salarian with an amused smirk. "And if someone tries to get to her while you sleep outside? Little weed like you won't do much good." He snorted.

It wasn't until hid body began to twist and bend that Tyros began to scream. His loss of consciousness came from the memories that slammed into him at the same time. 
He screamed a name that did not belong to his wife, or so it seemed. "Anika..."

"Nonsense. It won't be long until she is my wife. I won't have that long to wait until I find myself in her bed. She pretends to be pious. All women are whores. As I'm sure you know." Tann chuckled.

Quinn stood there, seemingly frozen in place. She had been about to try and comfort her husband until she heard him scream an unfamiliar name. The dark haired woman shook herself from her stupor and was once again touching Tyros' face gently. "It's okay... it's over. You're save, with me... remember?"

"The human ones sure are." Brutus agreed with a grin. "Should you really be talking about the generals daughter that way though? He only had to look at you and you damn near pissed your pants."

Tyros opened unfamiliar black eyes and took in a gasping breath. "Anika...you...she was in cryo. I was keeping her there so she would be safe. Kalahira...what have I done?" 

"I didn't hire you to speak your mind." Tann snapped. "What he doesn't know won't hurt him..." 
He paused, pointing across the way at a young woman who was sitting on a bench with her head bent. "Isn't she lovely?" He breathed. "I've never met a creature so gentle and kind."