(Back to Illium. Shepard goes to visit Liara in her office)
Liara: Shepard! It's good to see you again
(Liara hugs Shepard)
Shepard: Didn't you have an assistant?
Liara: Her barriers needed practice. Practice I'm afraid she won't be getting. So, what can I do for you?
Shepard: You said you were looking for the shadow broker. Cerberus gave me data on where to find him. Interested?
Liara: Absolutely! I had no idea... Let's see what you've got!
(Shepard hands Liara a datapad)
Liara: It looks like a leaked transmission between some of the shadow broker's agents. Some hints as to the location, and... It's about Feron. He's still alive
Shepard: Who's Feron?
Liara: He was my friend. He helped me recover your body from the shadow broker
Shepard: What? Why did the shadow broker want my corpse?
Liara: He was going to sell you to the collectors, but Feron and I stopped him. Feron sacrificed himself to save me
Shepard: So you're the one who rescued me? Then how did I end up with cerberus?
Liara: Well, they gave me intel to help recover you. They actually put Feron with me in the first place. After I got out, I gave you to them. They said they could bring you back
Shepard: You kept me out of the collector hands. You saved me. Without you, I wouldn't have come back. Thank you
Liara: You don't know what that means to me, Shepard. I didn't know who you'd be when you'd came back. If you'd feel... They brought you back, and now they're giving me a chance to find Feron. After two years, I hadn't even dreamed...
Shepard: Sounds like you and Feron were close
Liara: It's funny. He betrayed me more than once. He was double dealing for cerberus and for the shadow broker. But in the end, he sacrificed himself for me. I owe him
Shepard: Any friend of yours is a friend of mine. What's the next step?
Liara: I... I don't know. I need to prepare. To think. I'm going home. Use my terminal if you need any local intel
Shepard: Are you ok?
Liara: I've spent two years plotting revenge. Now I have the chance to make it a rescue
Shepard: Let me help. I'll come by your apartment?
Liara: Ok. Hopefully I'll have a plan by then. Thank you, Shepard
(Shepard had planned to meet Liara at her apartment, but when he gets there, he sees it sealed off and swarming with cops)
Cop: Seal off those trace samples and get them back to the lab
Cop: We have multiple shots fired. Yeah, techs are going over the place now
Cop: Central, we got an open carrier on this end. Switching to a coded relay
Shepard: What's going on?
Cop: This area is sealed off. Please step back, sir
Shepard: Sealed off? Why?
(An asari spectre named Tela Vasir shows up)
Vasir: Somebody tried to kill your friend, Commander Shepard. Thank you, officer. Your people are dismissed
Cop: What? You can't do that!
Vasir: Spectre authority. Already done
(The Illium cops all pack up and leave)
Vasir: Tela Vasir. Special tactics and recon
Shepard: Another spectre?
Vasir: I heard your status was reinstated. Good. You're one of the council's most famous operatives. Might even get you to sign my chest plate. So, I assume you had business with your friend this evening, Commander?
Shepard: Liara was following a lead on the shadow broker
Vasir: The shadow broker? That's a dangerous enemy to have
Shepard: What are the facts so far?
Vasir: About a half hour ago, somebody took a shot at T'Soni. Note the bullet holes in the glass over there. Whatever rifle the attacker used wasn't standard issue. It was able to break the kinetic barrier and penetrate the glass. Your friend stuck around for almost 4 minutes before leaving the building. Whatever she was doing was important. There's no blood or body, so she definitely got away
Shepard: Liara was expecting me. She would have left a message here. Her office wasn't safe
Vasir: I'm not surprised. Illium is just Omega with expensive shoes. I haven't found anything useful for tracking her down yet. You know T'Soni better than I do. Where would she have hidden her backup?
Shepard: Let me have a look around. I'll see if I can come up with something
(Shepard looks at a display case and sees the chest plate of his old N7 armor)
Shepard: Hey. It's a piece of my old armor
Vasir: Looks like someone didn't like you much either
(Shepard looks around Liara's apartment for clues, and when he picks up a picture to look at it, it changes)
Shepard: Hmm. The picture changed when I touched it
Vasir: It must be keyed to your ID. What does it show now?
Shepard: A prothean dig site. Liara did leave a message
Vasir: There are a few prothean looking objects around the apartment. Lets see what we can find
(Shepard and Vasir start looking around the prothean relics in Liara's apartment, and they find a data drive)
Shepard: Vasir. I've got something here
Vasir: A backup disc. Lets try it on her terminal
(Shepard plugs the backup disc into Liara's terminal and watches it with Vasir. It shows Liara talking with a salarian, and they're talking about tracking the shadow broker)
Vasir: So, she really did find something
Shepard: She's in danger. This must be important. The shadow broker's people have already tried to kill her before
Vasir: I know where the dracon trade center is. My car's outside. Lets go
(Shepard and Vasir hop into a car and speed over to the trade center)
Vasir: The baria frontiers offices are located on the third floor. I don't hear police chatter. We must've missed the party
(All of a sudden, a bomb goes off on the third floor, and the explosion damages the trade center building)
Shepard: Shit! Liara's in there!
(More bombs go off, knocking Shepard and Vasir off their feet)
(Now there's a bunch of dead civilians and guards around, and the building's on fire)
Vasir: Holy shit. They just took out three floors to make sure she was dead! I'll grab my skycar and seal the building off from the top!
Shepard: I'll take the ground floor and work my way up!
Vasir: Leave some for me!
(Shepard and Vasir split up to cover more ground)
Shepard: Detective Anaya, we need police and medical to the trade center!
Anaya: I saw the explosion from here. They're on their way
(Shepard starts looking through the bottom floor of the trade center, not finding anything except wreckage and flames)
Shepard: Vasir, the elevators are out, and the building's security is down
Vasir: No alarms, and no police. Very professional
Shepard: No time to fix it, I'm taking the stairs
(Shepard starts running up the building's stairs, coming across a non-detonated bomb along the way)
Shepard: Vasir, I found a military grade explosive device. It hasn't been armed
Vasir: Sounds like something mercs would use. Sloppy work. You only use that kind of hardware when you don't have time to plan
Shepard: I'm at the baria frontiers office. According to the terminal, Liara signed in a few minutes before the explosion
Vasir: Understood, Commander
(All of a sudden, a door is breached, so Shepard closes his eyes and covers his ears as a flashbang grenade goes off)
(A group of shadow broker agents rush into the room guns blazing, so Shepard rolls into cover and draws his assault rifle)
Shepard: Vasir, I'm pinned down! Mercs, and well armed!
Vasir: Say hello to the shadow broker's private company, Commander! I'm dealing with them on my end too!
(Shepard and Vasir both run through their parts of the trade center, fighting off shadow broker agents)
(Eventually, Shepard opens the door to find a shadow broker agent standing over the corpse of the salarian from Liara's backup disc footage)
(Vasir comes in and headshots the agent with her pistol, killing him instantly)
Vasir: Dammit. If I'd been here a few seconds sooner I could have stopped them
Shepard: Is that Sekat?
Vasir: Must've been
Shepard: No sign of that data Liara talked about. Looks like a dead end
Vasir: Speaking of which, did you find your friend's body?
(From that question, Shepard gets suspicious, so he has his pistol in his hand)
(But then, Liara makes a dramatic entrance holding her submachine gun)
Liara: You mean this body?
Shepard: Liara! Is there something I should know?
Liara: This is the woman that tried to kill me!
Vasir: You've had a rough day, so I'll let that slide. Why don't you put the gun down now?
Liara: I saw you! I doubled back after I left and watched you break into my apartment!
(Vasir draws her gun)
(Shepard and Liara also draw theirs and point them at Vasir)
Shepard: It makes sense. So, what, you were just using me to find the message?
Vasir: Nothing personal, Shepard. I just needed a little help tracking down Liara
Liara: Once she had my location, she signaled the shadow broker's forces. They bombed the building to take me out. She found Sekat, took his data, and killed him. I'm guessing she still has the disc on her
Vasir: Good guess. Not that you'll ever see what's on it... you pureblood bitch!
(Vasir uses her biotic abilities to shatter a window and send the glass shards flying as projectiles)
(Liara puts up a biotic dome shield to protect herself and Shepard from the attack)
(Shepard rushes forward and tackles Vasir out the window, and they both hit the ground below with a loud thump)
(Liara dives out the window, flips mid-air, and uses her biotic abilities to float the rest of the way down)
(Vasir breaks into a sprint)
(Shepard fires some shots at Vasir, but her shields deflect the bullets)
(Shepard and Liara both chase after Vasir)
(A couple of shadow broker agents try to block them, but Liara slams one against a wall with her biotic abilities, and Shepard shoots the other one)
Liara: She's getting away!
Shepard: We need to catch her before she leaves with that data!
(Shepard and Liara keep running after Vasir, taking down any shadow broker agents that get in their way)
(Eventually, Vasir reaches the port and takes cover behind some crates. She whips out her pistol and starts taking shots at Shepard and Liara)
(Shepard and Liara spread out and start returning fire at Vasir)
(No one can really land a solid shot. And any shot that does land gets deflected by shields)
(Vasir uses her omni-tool to call her car to her location. She jumps off the edge, lands in her car, and starts flying away)
Liara: Dammit! Come on!
(Liara hops into her skycar, and Shepard gets into the passenger seat. They take off after Vasir)
(Now, a car chase on Illium goes on between the two spectres)
(The two cars speed through a construction site, weaving through the debris and being careful not to hit anything)
(Vasir tries to lose Liara in the buildings, but she's able to keep up with every twist and turn Vasir makes)
(Vasir takes drastic measures and drives right into oncoming traffic, but Liara isn't letting her get away with the data)
(Both cars make fast turns to avoid the traffic, but Vasir starts dropping proximity charges)
Liara: She's dropping charges!
Shepard: What kind of guns does this thing have?
Liara: It's a taxi! It has a fare meter!
Shepard: Wonderful...
(Shepard opens the window, uses one hand to hold on, and the other hand to aim his pistol)
(Shepard hangs out of Liara's car and shoots the proximity charges with his pistol before they can hit the car)
(Vasir drives into a tunnel with Liara still on her tail, then Shepard gets back inside)
(She rams a truck, making it turn to the side and block the tunnel)
Shepard: Truck!
Liara: I know!
(Liara quickly turns to the side and kills the engines, so the car lets off a bunch of sparks as it "drifts" under the truck along the bottom of the tunnel)
(As soon as the car slides off the edge of the tunnel, Liara sparks the engine back on and resumes the chase)
(Vasir goes into an area packed with buildings and traffic, so Liara has to maneuver the car a little crazily to avoid all the obstacles)
(Once they get past that, Liara's car catches up to Shepard's)
(Shepard hangs out the window again and fires some shots at Vasir's car)
(Vasir's windows are bulletproof, so they only crack instead of breaking)
(Vasir rams Liara's car from the side, throwing Shepard back inside)
(The force of Vasir's ram makes Liara's car head straight for a truck, so Liara swerves out of the way)
(Liara rams Vasir's car from the side)
(Vasir rams Liara's car from the side)
(But all of a sudden, a third car side-swipes Vasir's car)
(Vasir's car and the third car spin out of control and crash onto the top of a building)
(Thorne hops out of the third car and starts shooting his pistol at Vasir, who takes cover behind her crashed car, taking potshots at him)
Vasir: I've crashed on Azure! Get me some damn backup!
Shepard: Thorne? How the hell did you get here?
Thorne: Well, gunshots, explosions, dead bodies, and a car chase? That tends to attract a lot of attention, so I checked your helmet cam, and, well...
Shepard: Get back!
(Shepard shoves Thorne away from himself and ducks down)
(Some bullets hit the wall, narrowly missing them)
Thorne: So, I'm gone for what, five minutes and it all goes to shit?
Liara: Watch out! They're dropping reinforcements in to slow us down!
Thorne: Liara. Always a pleasure
Liara: Hello again, Thorne
(A bunch of shadow broker agents arrive on the scene with their guns raised, ready for combat)
(Shepard and Thorne draw their assault rifles and take the fight directly to the shadow broker agents. Liara supports them with her submachine gun and biotic abilities)
(During all the chaos, Vasir manages to put a little distance between herself and her pursuers)
(Shepard, Thorne, and Liara slide over the hood of a car in their way and shoot a glass window in their way, so they can rush through a hotel)
(But Shepard looks on a large screen and sees a "lustful video" of a bunch of nude asari women)
Thorne: The hell kind of hotel is this?
Liara: Azure. It's a luxury resort with an... exotic edge. Azure is slang for a part of the asari body in some areas of Illium
Shepard: Where?
Liara: Mainly the lower reaches, near the bottom
Shepard: I meant where on the asari body
Liara: So did I
(Shepard, Thorne, and Liara keep running through the hotel, and they see Vasir's blood in a trail on the ground)
Liara: Vasir's lost a lot of blood. We have to be getting close
Shepard: She's tough, I'll give her that much
Liara: She's a spectre. Of course she is
Thorne: I kinda like her style. Are we still recruiting?
Shepard: No
(They keep running, following Vasir's blood trail, and they eventually find her limping)
Liara: Vasir! It's over!
(Vasir quickly grabs a civilian named Mariana and takes her hostage at gunpoint)
Vasir: Hey! Hey, you. Come here. What's your name?
Mariana: M- Mariana
Vasir: Mariana... You want to live, don't you? Tell those people right there that you want to live
Mariana: Please... I want to live!
Shepard: Escaping won't help you. Even if you get out of here, you'll lose your spectre status and get thrown in a cell. You attacked the trade center
Vasir: You think so? I think maybe cerberus terrorists did that. Which story do you think the council will believe? All you had to do was walk away. Now it gets ugly
(Mariana begins to shed tears)
Mariana: Please... I have a son!
Vasir: A son? I hope he gets to see you again. I've heard losing a parent is just horrific for children. Scars them for life
Liara: I'm going to end you, Vasir
Shepard: Relax, Liara. We'll handle this the usual way
Vasir: You want Mariana's little boy to grow up without a mommy? Thermal clips on the ground, now. Power cells and grenades too
Thorne: Liara, I need to ask a favor of you
Liara: What is it?
Thorne: Please don't kill me for what I'm about to say
(Liara looks at Thorne weirdly as he drops his assault rifle)
Thorne: Hiding behind a hostage, Vasir? You're pathetic. No stomach for a real fight. Typical asari
Vasir: Your rifle. Kick it away
(Thorne kicks his rifle away from himself)
Thorne: I hope your plan doesn't rely on a single hostage. I sacrificed over 300,000 batarians to keep the reapers from returning. You should go back to shaking your ass in a club. You know, play to your strengths
Vasir: You think insults are going to get you out of this? Typical human arrogance
Thorne: No. But I'll show you how a real spectre gets things done. A single hostage will only slow the bullet down, not stop it
Vasir: You're bluffing
Thorne: It's a smart move taking a hostage. A spectre does whatever it takes to get the job done
Vasir: Yes, we do
Thorne: But you're forgetting one thing...
(Thorne draws his pistol)
Thorne: I'm a spectre too
(Thorne aims carefully and fires a bullet from his pistol)
(The shot travels through Mariana's arm, and right into Vasir's chest)
(Both women fall to the ground bleeding)
Mariana: AAAH! My arm!
Vasir: URGH! DAMMIT!
(Shepard, Thorne, and Liara walk over to the dying Vasir)
Vasir: You think I'm the bad guy? Look in the mirror. You know what cerberus is! Sending biotic kids to death camps! Killing alliance admirals who ask questions!
Shepard: I know who they are and what they've done. Which is why we're going for them next
(Vasir shakily gets herself up)
Vasir: So, what now, "hero"? Are you going to slap the cuffs on and take me away?
Shepard: In the alliance, I was taught to spare the lives of friend and foe. That no matter what someone's done, they're redeemable... But we're not in alliance space anymore. Are we?
(Liara lifts a table with her biotics and throws it at Vasir)
Vasir: OOF!
(The table knocks Vasir off the roof, sending her falling and screaming to her death)
Thorne: Here, this medi-gel should seal that wound. I'm sorry
(Thorne applies to medi-gel to Mariana)
Mariana: Thank you. A shot to the arm is better than one to the head. How can I repay you?
Thorne: The only thing I'm asking from you, is to give your little boy a hug when you get home
(Mariana nods)
(Liara intercepts a message that was sent to Vasir from the shadow broker)
Shadow Broker: Eliminate T'Soni and retrieve the data. Civilian casualties are not a concern
Liara: I'm putting the data through to the Normandy's computers. We can be at the shadow broker's base in a few hours. He'll know about Vasir's death before long. If he decides to kill Feron...
Shepard: We won't give him that time
Liara: We'll need the Normandy's stealth systems to get us in close undetected. The shadow broker's agents are still shooting their way through Illium. With luck, they won't notice we've left until it's too late. This will be simple. Get in, get Feron, and get out
Thorne: And maybe hunt ourselves a shadow broker along the way. I'll... go and... get Joker caught up
(Thorne hops into an undamaged skycar and speeds towards the Normandy)
Shepard: Wait. Liara. We'll be jumping across several lightyears. There's time to talk
Liara: About what?
Shepard: About us
Liara: Shepard, listen. I'm glad you're here. But...
Shepard: But what? You worried there might be terminals you need me to hack?
Liara: That's not fair. You were dead for two years!
Shepard: I came back!
Liara: It's not that easy! You can't just come back and have two years of mourning suddenly vanish!
(Liara sighs)
Liara: I'm sorry, Shepard. I can't get into this. For now, lets just focus on rescuing Feron