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."

This seemed to be all it took to silence Tyros. The drell knew she was right. He had never been a monster. It didn't matter what skin he wore. He'd been kind and good and it never made Quinn happy. He was not whay she wanted, even when she had been what he needed. 

"That's a long story and all part of Maggie's happy ending. Though I think Kandros went about it the wrong way. He was always so afraid of losing Maggie. He had a really hard time seeing what was right there all along." Lori was still smiling. "Sounds. Like something right out of a cheesy romance novel doesn't it?"

"Of course..." Betty saw the realisation in Tyros's eyes, but still wasn't done with him. "If you brought me the head of Quinn's step father General... I could be inclined to reward you, in some way."

Brutus laughed and nodded in agreement. "He basically sold Quinn to the pirates just to get into bed with Maggie. Sounds like something out of fiction alright!"

"No. I won't harm someone else for my stupidity." Tyros said softly, refusing to look at her. "I will let her move on. I can't just keep clinging to a dream that doesn't want me to."

"I feel so bad for them. They went through so much.
" When my dad told me I was getting sisters, I was so excited. When they were little I did everything for them
 But the moment they were old enough...Betty started telling them awful things about me. Maggie used to cry when my father would ask me to babysit and Quinn...she'd find ways to torture me. One time she cut my hair to the scalp while I was giving them a bath..." Lori sighed softly. "I was so excited about being a big sister and one day I just...gave up...i realized that only my father could love me."

Betty clucked her tongue and lost all interest. "Then coming here was a grave mistake." She informed Tyros darkly. "If you can't take the head of the man who emotionally abused her, then how do you think you can keep her safe from my entire army?"

"Did you... always know they weren't your fathers children?" Brutus asked curiously, thinking back to all the things Maggie had told him. "Because they didn't, not until they came to Andromeda."

"What?" Tyros stomach lurched. "No! I can't let you do that. More than just my beloved will be hurt." He hissed. 

"Yes. My father has a trait with the hair. When he as young his hair was this color too. The girls didn't even have his eyes. They had the color of his servant. A man named Qim. 
"How do you know they didn't know?" Lori asked.

"Will they?" Betty asked, watching Tyros closely now. "Because my arm would have no reason to fight... if I had what I wanted."

"A lot of radio chatter happens when you aren't bound within the walls of the nexus." Brutus replied. "I heard there was a quarian, here in Andromeda. The only one of his kind, until he had his spine ripped out by a kett. Know who was the only witness? Your sisters. Which had me asking questions; why were they on a kett ship? How did that quarian get himself involved? That's the kind of shitstorm happening out there right now." Brutus shrugged his large shoulders as he sat down. "Trust me, princess, you're safer here, even with that snake following you around."

"Give me the tools to do it And I swear I will murder him and his whole family." Tyros swore. He remembered being an assassin. It would easier than he thought.

"I wouldn't be so sure. There's a rumor going around that Tann raped Maggie. If it's true...after I marry the bastard I'll take it out of his slimy hide every day for the rest of his life. She may not love me but I love her, damn it." Lori swore angrily.

"And if she hates you for what you've done? What then?" Betty asked, proving to be a rather fickle creature.

Brutus inwardly groaned, every moment this job became harder and harder. Lori would do that for a sister who was only using her as a pawn for her own revenge. "You would still marry him, with even the slightest suspicion of what he did to her?"

"Then I will live with my sins and know that she is free." Tyros whispered. "Come on,  Betty. Give me what I need to get started."

"I have to obey my father, bull. But at least i can make something of it and get revenge for Maggie while I'm in the middle of it. Right?" Lori laughed softly. "Not like anyone will notice...or care..."

"You will need to return to the nexus. My ex husband has made himself quite at home there. No doubt he has surrounded himself with excessive security since my... liberation." Betty replied, waving another kett over. "Draw too much attention with firepower, and they will put you down long before you even get close to him."

"And what happens on your wedding night? We just made a big deal about humans remaining untouched until marriage, he will know the difference. But even if he doesn't, what happens when the time comes when you tell him no, and he won't listen? If he raped your sister, he is fully capable of raping you." Brutus warned sternly.

"I understand." Tyros said. "They won't see me coming until he is already dead." He promised, disappearing into the darkness.

Lori shrugged. "I'll be okay. I can handle myself." She answered softly. "You worry too much, bull." She turned back to the monitors and began her daily reports, pushing her hair behind her ears in concentration.

"Get in touch with our contact on the nexus, I don't want any screw ups." Betty informed the Kat soldier she had waved over.
Quinn had fallen in love with just one set of armour she had seen, and was pleased to find it was an almost extortionate price. That will teach Ardwin to slam the door in her face. She thought with a smirk as she sat drinking strong coffee in one of the shops that had popped up on the nexus promenade.

Brutus let Lori work for some time before he had leaned forward, tracing a talon lightly along the rim of her ear. He was trying to annoy her, and smiled as he did it.

Tyros was above her in the ventilation shaft, watching her every move. He loved her. He couldn't help it. He hoped that no matter what she discovered Quinn found something inside her that had loved him too. 

Lori closed her eyes, a delicious heat sliding through her insides as his talon tickled her ear. "Bull..." her voice was nothing but a sultry purr. "Be careful..."

Since she had seen him embrace his wife at the air lock, Quinn had done her best not to think of Tyros. She had been left feeling like a fool for loving someone who she believed could never really love her. Even when she had sold herself back to Ardwin, it was all so she would have a distraction from just how well her heart had been broken.

"Afraid someone will see?" He breathed with a grin, finding such a predicament an all too enticing thrill. "I'm not doing anything... there was a bug." He added with a smirk.

As if on cue Ardwin appeared and sat down at her table, but not before stealing a heated kiss from her lips. That was all Tyros needed to see. He didn't wait to see anymore. He disappeared down the ventilation shaft without another word.
Which meant he missed the rough slap that followed the kiss. "The most expensive suit on the Nexus? Really?" Ardwin snorted. "What makes you think yourself worthy of that?"

Lori spent much of the dinner with her father and Tann with a flushed face. She kept thinking about the mess she and Brutus had made of her office as he helped her "search for the bug". The way he'd breathed her name, promised to keep her safe...she'd known it was a lie, but it was so wonderful to pretend that someone cared for her, even for those fleeting moments. 
Her giddy thoughts came crashing down when her father slammed a hand in the table in front of her. "Wake up, girl!" He hissed. "As usual you and your bubble headedness are about to ruin everything! Where are you tonight?!"

Quinn's face remained turned to the side for some moments, able to taste blood inside her mouth. Slowly she turned her gaze back to Ardwin, a murderous rage right there in her eyes. No man laid a finger on her and got away with it. "What makes you think I won't kill you while you sleep, darling?" She spat, planning on doing more than that once she had gotten what she wanted.

Brutus wasn't all that far away. He knew no harm could come to Lori at that dinner, but he still didn't trust her father. Maggie had told him in graphic detail what Tann had done to her. The job was getting ever more complicated, though he told himself again was the one who would be hurt and humiliated by all this, now that Brutus's feelings for Lori were real.

"You think you'll get that close while you're sober?" Ardwin snorted, waving over an asari woman to order a drink for himself. Coffee with a shot of something stronger than what was on their visible menu sounded good to him. "Don't kid yourself." 

Lori sighed softly. "I'm sorry. I just...I'm not sure I..." 
"Don't you say it. Don't you dare." The General hissed, his hand leaving bruises on her wrist as he tightened his grip on her. "If you love your father you'll do this. You owe me for what you did to your mother." 
When Tann returned to the table the old man stood and brushed off his uniform. "You'd better walk her home, Director. Your future wife doesn't look like she's feeling so well. Perhaps that's why she's been so rude this evening?" His voice was gruff and hateful, his emerald gaze locked on her in a hateful glare.
"Yes, my throat is feeling a bit raw. I'm so sorry Tann..." She said softly, keeping her own eyes locked on the table.

"I think you're only human, and humans are weak." Quinn responded icily. "So afraid to be forgotten, you have to hurt others to make your place in the galaxy."

Brutus was leaning over the edge of the upper level that housed the more important initiative members, a bottle of something strong in his hand that he drank from every now and then. He wouldn't look suspicious standing there, as many people came to admire the view. The difference was, Brutus was listening for the sound of the general's door opening.

"I think you need to learn your place. You are too much like your mother. You think you deserve the galaxy and you don't. You deserve to be broken and forgotten." Ardwin hissed, nodding to the asari who brought his coffee. 

Tann led Lori out into the hall, frowning deeply. "You humans are so breakable." He muttered. "I don't understand how you can be I'll. You were fine before." He steered her toward the regular apartments, his own thoughts heated as his hand wandered beneath her shirt. The General wouldn't say anything if he did what he was longing to. He'd probably be happy he took initiative. 
It was with this thought in mind that he pushed Lori into an alleyway. She wanted to please her father so much she probably wouldn't protest at all...

Oddly, Quinn was smiling, though paused to simply sip her own coffee. "Says the man who needs the broken woman to stop another woman."

Brutus' said senses were on high alert when he realised that Lori and Tann hadn't passed him, which they should have done if they were returning to her apartment. He tossed the bottle he was holding in the trash, then walked the path back to the general's residence.

"You re called bait." Ardwin snorted. "Once again, like your mother you believe yourself worth more than you are!" 

"Tann...no!" Lori shouted. The salarian director had her up against the wall in the alley, her hands pressed above her head. "Get off of me!" He was getting bolder. She couldn't believe he was trying to get away with this.

Quinn scoffed and rolled her eyes. "You really think Betty would have ever let me go in the first place if she wasn't done with me?" 

Tan wouldn't see it coming as the large turban grabbed him by his scrawny neck and tossed him to the ground of the alley, a large foot them pressed to his chest to hold him down. "Is your translator broken? I believe the lady said no."

Ardwin grabbed the front of her armor and yanked Quinn against him. "Youre still breathing, arent you? Then Betty isnt done with you. Your husband escaped from Ana's place last night. One can only guess that he went back to Betty asking for his old Kett skin back. Wonder why..."

"Your father will hear about this..." Tann hissed at Lori as the young woman grabbed, the back of Brutus' gun belt and dragged him away. 
"Thank you." She said softly, once they were far enough away. "I thought you said you were going to find an asari and do things I was too boring to."

"You're mistaken. I have no husband." Quinn replied coolly. "A man can only be married to one woman at a time." She added, her cybernetic fingers slowly crushing around Ardwin's hand that had grabbed a hold of her. 

"The only blue I like in a woman... is her hair." Brutus breathed, now being the one to press Lori to a different wall as he looked her over. "Now do you see why I didn't want you alone with him?" He whispered. "What if I hadn't found you in time?" He added, touching her cheek gently.

Ardwin didn't flinch though his grey eyes told otherwise. "Do you know what I had to go through to revive her when I figured out who she was? Do you know that like Betty she is certifiably crazy? They say that death does that to you. 
The General loved his wife so much...he couldn't handle the grief. Blamed his little girl for what happened.  It was her fault after all...." Ardwin chuckled. "Children born of death. It's no wonder you two are nothing but bad luck."

Lori gave him a confused look, not sure why he seemed to care so much. "I'm ok. Tann was just...he drank too much. You could smell it on him."

"The general's wife? You mean... Lori's mother?" Quinn asked, her eyes looking into Ardwin's for any sign that he was lying. "I wasn't born of death, I was created. Nothing more to it. I'm just a by-product of the cure they needed for Maggie." She added, always hiding behind that lie when scared like she was now. Qim genuinely had loved Betty, and had wanted a family with her. He wasn't to know she was bat shit crazy.

"You're making excuses for the asshole?" Brutus asked gruffly. "You know he is capable of rape, and you're still excusing what he just tried to do?!"

Ardwin was laughing at her. "Those voices you hear at night when you shouldnt...why do you think that is?" He whispered in her ear. "It's because you don't have a soul. You belong with the dead. Like her. And Maggie. She was pregnant with Maggie when she died. That's why your sister struggles so." He pulled away, when she did, rubbing his wrist. "Why do you think Betty likes to open things up? She wants to see why it lives and she doesn't. Why do you think she took you apart? Because you are like her and it confuses her. And then there's the killing of girls. She's looking for her first born. Her beloved Lori."

"Wait.." Lori felt her eyes water and it humiliated her. "You don't understand. I was...damn it, bull. Just leave it alone. Okay?"

Quinn was ashamed when her full lower lip trembled as she looked up at Ardwin. With very few words he had managed to make her feel small and frightened all over again. It had never truly been her step father she feared when growing up... it really was Betty. Her beautiful, but crazy, mother. "You can't possibly know any of this." She managed to breath weakly. 

"No." Brutus replied bluntly, his large form still somewhat pressed against Lori's. "Don't you get it yet? I love you, you silly girl." He breathed. "All the evil in this galaxy, and you remain so... soft." He added, rubbing his flat nose against her smooth cheek.

"Oh but I do. And so much more. Did you think I was kidding when I said I went through he'll bringing Tyros' wife back? No. He was going to screw up every thing. Now I'll let the dead get rid of him and you'll reign in your mother."Ardwin laughed softly.
"All these years of work nearly ruined by a dead little girl and a drell..."

Lori closed her eyes wishing she could truly believe what he as saying. And wishing his words didn't come at such a high cost. 
After a moment she slid her arms around his waist and took in a shaking breath.

Quinn shot to her feet, her chair tumbling over behind with the sudden force. She had never told anyone about the voices, not even Maggie. He was looking at Ardwin like he was truly some kind of monster now. "I am not what you say I am! Even if souls are real, of course I have one!" She insisted, her eyes darting about now, looking for the quickest exit route.

"Spend the night with me." He breathed, and not even meaning it in the way they had spent the previous night. "Come back to my apartment, they won't see a thing there. I promise you will be safe."