Love and War

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"I swear to even the Asari goddess that when I get out of here, that lizard Kandros will wish I was an exile for what I'm gonna do to him!" Quinn Talos raged as she was unceremoniously shoved into a holding cell on the operations deck. The dark haired woman paced for time, thinking it was would all be straightened out once Tann got wind of what Kandros had done. She should have known better. As far as she believed, human's still weren't exactly favourites of the other alien species. On earth Quinn had an excellent service record within the Alliance, just as most members of her family did, but she had wanted more. She wanted to explore, to see things no human ever had, which was why she signed up for a place on the Andromeda Initiative. The only problem was, she wasn't the pathfinder, and her superiors didn't believe in security personal leaving the Nexus. As well as she performed her job, the call sign 'Cutie', thanks to her unfortunate initials, meant she wasn't exactly taken seriously. Quinn was slumped on the floor with her back against the wall now, glaring at the Turian guard outside the forcefield. She had fought her hardest for the safety of everyone on the Nexus, and this was her reward; being called a traitor and about to be dumped on some godforsaken planet with the rest of the exile scum. All because Kandros feared losing what little power he had to her. The asshole can keep it, she thought bitterly.

Betty narrowed her eyes slightly as she held Hunter's gaze, then seemed to give up. "Oh fine! But you still owe me a human female!" She pointed out.

There was a long pause on Quinn's end as she thought about that question. "I don't know what I am..." She breathed, not thinking the comm could pick up her voice as a whisper.

"Patch him up while I put this one away." Hunter hissed at her. "I'll take him with me to find your human. I don't know why she means so much to you anyway." He grumbled.

"That's an odd thing to say. Sounds more like a machine thing. But you don't sound machnical. You are alive...right? I'm not going to get this creator bit when you open the pod I'm in are you?" Qim sighed.

"Why does any of this mean anything to you?" Betty countered, though her back was already to Hunter as she began fixing the damage she had caused Drak.

"Machine? Like asking if this unit has a soul?" Quinn asked, her lips quirking into a slight smile.

Hunter didn't answer as he took Lexi to the holding tanks and came back for Drak. He missed the sight of a turian hiding in the shadows not far away. 

"Yes! It was my ancestors that it happened to. Highly annoying when the whole galaxy blames you for the geth attacking the citadel. Long story...you don't want to hear it." Qim sighed.

Betty missed this too, too wrapped up in examining the grumbling krogan as she sealed his wounds. "Oh stop your complaining, its just blood." She muttered.

"I quite like hearing about the geth." Quinn replied, recalling childhood memories of pestering a friend of the family into telling her why the geth hated organics. "Alright, I take the hint." She mused. "What about your family? Did they come to Andromeda with you?"

Maggie was having a hard time waiting the darkness. After several hours she and her bladder had had enough. She slipped out of the tiny office. The lights were back on. That had to be a good sign. 

"Actually...i came looking for them. Another long story. My lover and my daughters..." Qim said almost too softly. "I have lost contact with all of them. I don't know whether they live or not..."

It was simply not Maggie's day. Betty had finished with Drak, and was quickly growing bored of the human settlement. It was almost like this particular species were old news to her, with nothing to learn.

"They were all on the expedition?" Quinn asked as she ran her fingers through her hair, fighting fatigue to keep this alien talking.

Maggie slammed into Betty as she turned down the hall she'd seen Kandros disappear into. The thicker skinned creature didn't even budge as the two women collided. She landed on the floor, shaking her head. 

"My daughters were. Their stepfather convinced my lover to send them for their own good. The elder of them was...sick...long story..." he paused to cough. "The younger...i was hoping...this will sound cruel but...i was hoping that if my sweet Maggie passed her sister would be able to spread her wings and be free."

Betty simply stared down at Maggie, making no effort to help her up, or keep her from running. The elder alien was shaking her head. "So weak." She commented. "It's a wonder your species survived at all."

There was a long silence from Quinn that seemed to drag on forever as she stared at the controls in front of her without really seeing them. Space sickness. That was it. She hadn't let herself hope this quarian was the one she was looking for, too much of a coincidence in the vastness of space. But for him to find her, and for him to be the kind of father who cared what happened to her... Yes, definitely space sickness making her see what she wanted most.

Maggie shoved to her feet, her eyes scanning the hallway for an exit. "Why are you alone? Your kind never travel in less than a pack." Maggie said softly, backing toward the wall.

"Hello?" Qim's voice was filled with uncertainty. "Are you still there? Were you ever there?" He sighed softly and then coughed.

"Know a lot about kett, do you, girl?" Betty asked, well aware of what Maggie was looking for.

"Your youngest... You don't think her reason for being is over, if something happens to Maggie?" She finally managed to ask.

"I do. More than I want to." Maggie said, taking tiny steps in the opposite direction. "You don't seem to have any weapons but I'm willing to bet that doesn't mean anything either..." she didn't wait to finish before she turned to run.

"Kelah no! Her reason was never because of Maggie. No matter what my lover's husband may have told her. The boshtit." Qim said bitterly.

Betty sighed heavily, though didn't give chase. The female kett was calling Hunter over her comm. "Remember that human you said you would get for me?" She's running away!" She practically screamed. 
Maggie wouldn't actually get very far before she was on the ground again after hitting something hard, though this time she was dragged out of the corridor and into a silent room. 

"Hard to believe otherwise when you never see the outside of a lab." Quinn snorted bitterly. "It was never hard to see how much Maggie meant to them... and how little I did." She added, giving up on pretending she was anyone else now.

Maggie fought like a cat about to be dumped in water. She clawed and squirmed, her entire body alive and on fire. Kandros had asked her to live for him. She had a promise to keep. 

"Quinny..." Qim whispered. "Now I know I'm dreaming. My little rain baby...Now I know I'm hallicinating...my fever is worse..keelah...sing to me. Sing the song. Our sing. Do you remember it?"

"Good work, princess." Kandros breathed in Maggie's ear, even as he tried to keep her still.

Quinn was suddenly finding it hard to breathe, let alone sing. She had never been able to explain why she knew that song she heard over the comm. Her parents certainly never sang to her, so how did she know it? "You used to sing to me..." She breathed, even if she didn't consciously remember it.

Maggie sagged in her lover's arms as she heard his voice, the tension in her body easing in an instant. She wanted to laugh and cry all in the same moment. 

"You were so afraid of the rain when I first brought you into it. But when I started singing to you, you started laughing. You wanted me to let you down so you could dance." Qim laughed softly.

Kandros held Maggie close, though he was keeping a watchful eye on the door also. "I've never seen kett like these two before..." He breathed. "It's like they have a personal grudge."

Quinn started to laugh, until she was forced to remember the much darker memory that followed this one. "That was the last time I saw you." She breathed. "He took so many samples of my blood, and then... He sent me to the alliance military school, far away from everything I knew."

"I ran into one in the hall. She acted strange too." Maggie admitted. She shivered. The woman had bothered her more than she wanted to admit. 

"Yes. That night I asked your mother to run away with me and she said she couldn't. I told her if she was afraid then to at least let you and your sister go. To give you both the chance that she was too terrified to take. He shot me...your mother wouldn't even help me. She..I'm sorry...this isn't something you care about...i am rambling again." He paused to cough yet again. "Fever is highest yet. Makes sense. Quinny...you are dead are you?"

Kandros nodded his head. "I heard her talking to the large male, something about collecting the samples?" He breathed. "Have you seen Lexi? I saw them take Drak somewhere, but that's all."

"No, please... please don't talk like that!" Quinn practically wailed. She hadn't been sad to leave her parents behind in the milky way, but now she understood why it may have been harder for Maggie. "We're coming, please just hold on a little longer!" She pleaded, unaware she had divulged that she wasn't coming alone.

Maggie shook her head. "I haven't seen anyone. I've been in that office the entire time. I didn't leave until the lights came back on. I should have waited for you but..." She paused, looking frantically around. The room provided a bathroom that she was looking for and she ran for it. 
"So what do we do now?" Maggie asked growing when she felt a tiny flutter of movement from inside her belly. It was too soon for that. It had to be.

"We? Is Maggie with you? Your mother? Keelah...tell me I have finally had the good fortune to find you all...ive tried...ive fought so many...my sweet Quinn vas Reegar. I need to see you again. My heart aches at the thought."

Kandros honestly didn't know. Morally, he knew he should defend the settlement, look for survivors. But honestly? He just wanted to get Maggie out of there. "They didn't hurt you, did they? I mean, you said you ran into that female in the hallway, you're not injured, right?"

Quinn screwed her eyes shut, no longer ashamed when a fat tear rolled free. "Mom isn't here, she never left the milky way." She replied after a moment, thinking it to be the truth. "And Maggie..." The young woman stopped there, that was a painful conversation she wasn't yet ready to have.

"I don't know how I did it but I got away from the one I ran into. She was alone." Maggie told him. "She yelled something about the human I told you to find and then I ran into you. And...I'm fine."

"Your mother is there. I put her in cryo myself. She went on a smaller ship. It left later than the others. But I gave her instructions to the location of the ship where you and Maggie were." He paused. "Your hesitation...does that mean....oh more poor child...Maggie...did she...?"

Kandros was rather ashamed to find he was disappointed by this. The scared and unsure coward in him had hoped something had happened, that Maggie's forced pregnancy was gone. He knew he shouldn't wish harm on such an innocent being, but such was the hatred he held for Tann. "Good." It felt like it had taken him a lifetime to force out that one simple word. "Then we need to leave. Now."

Quinn didn't really have any feelings towards her mother being here,one way or the other. "Maggie is well. As always." She informed Qim, her tone rather cold now. "And, as always, she excels at making me feel like shit."

The fact that it had taken Kandros so long to confirm he was glad she was unharmed stung. So much so that Maggie flinched. "I need to make sure Quinn is okay." She muttered, unable to meet Kandros gaze. He was disgusted by her now. There was nothing that could change that. 

"Quinn. She is your sister." Qim admonished gently. "You know that's not true. Maggie loves you. It's not her fault she is always sick...it's mine."

"Maggie..." Kandros reached out for his lover's fingers. "Quinn isn't here." He breathed, having seen all he needed to. "She betrayed you all, she made a deal with the kett for her own safety."

"Sick I can deal with." Quinn replied thinly. "Sick doesn't make her..." She let her voice trail off, again feeling like she could never compare to Maggie. "We're going to be navigating a debris field soon, I'm turning the comm off now." She breathed, needing the conversation to simply be over for a while.

Maggie didn't touch his fingers. She closed her eyes at the news her sister had betrayed these people. It twisted her insides. 

Tyros groaned in the silence, shifting in pain. "Quinn..." he whispered. His stomach was on fire and he couldn't figure out why.

Kandros let his hand drop away, trying not to think about the significance too much. "She was the one who cut the power in the first place, all for her pet. Then I saw that Hunter give her access codes before she took off in a ship." He added, almost gleeful in the knowledge that he had been right about Quinn all along. He never for a second thought he may have been wrong.

As there was no real debris field, Quinn left the ship on auto pilot and pulled herself away from the controls. The young woman returned to where she had left Tyros and crawled up next to him. Everything had gone so wrong so quickly, and now she was labelled a traitor. She screwed her eyes shut and simply laid her head against her lover's shoulder.

"You're just jealous." Hunter purred outside the door. He saw no reason to despute the words he was hearing. "The girl gets to live and the two of you do not. Knock knock."

Tyros didn't even open his eyes. He simply slid his arms around his lover and held her close. "It will be all right, Quinn. You will see." He breathed.

Though she had rejected his hand earlier, Kandros pulled Maggie into his arms this time anyway. He didn't answer Hunter, silently looking for a way out of that room. In his worry for Maggie he had foolishly trapped them in a room with only one exit.

"Until I came to Andromeda my life was lived for other people. For Maggie... for the Allience..." Quinn whispered. "I never asked Maggie to come here with me, but now... The first time I tried to do something for myself, and she calls me a traitor."

Maggie turned her head toward the bathroom door but kept quiet. "Come now, human. There is no running from me. I'm afraid to make my dear one happy I will be making a trophy out of you." 

"When are you going to listen to me?" Tyros asked her, pulling her to straddle his hips. "No one matters but you and I."