gtfoourgalaxy | [IC Inbox -- Snowblind]

[For all the pose of confidence she struck at House, the previous day had been an absolute nightmare. Shepard had seen Miranda's math; she knows how likely, or unlikely, revivals really are. She'd been trying to digest it, somehow, the idea that Miranda - this Miranda, but the distinction blurred into nothing when she'd seen the obituary - had lived through the Collectors' base mission, and through months of the Reaper war, only to die here. A small death, frozen in the night. Courage ending in nothing. Shepard might have told her, don't try -

But Shepard would've tried herself, of course, so she didn't have that. Just guilt, and an almost painful oscillation between hope and the grim resolve she knows from the Skyllian Blitz. Hold the line because there's no one else. She doesn't remember how to be that woman anymore.

So her response to seeing Miranda is a moment of pure, unbridled joy. It shines through her face and she has barely got it under control when she speaks.]

I knew you'd beat the odds. [She laughs a little, more dry now as the initial elation balances out.] So now you know how that feels.

You had more confidence than I did, then, or I wouldn't have bothered to say goodbye. I take it you got my message?

[ Miranda had held out hope that she'd be one of the few, maybe due to her genetic tampering, maybe just from pure dumb luck. But she was never one for self-delusion and she knew the odds as well as Shepard did. Maybe better; she still remembered the near-frantic moment that lead to her compiling them.

Shepard wasn't wrong about her death: it had been quiet, miserable, undignified in the end. Though it had been undone, the thoughts she'd faced down alone in the freezing darkness won't ever really leave her now.

She can't find it in herself to summon another smile. ]

I have a little more empathy for you. We're probably not meant to remember our own deaths.

Can't keep a good woman down, Miranda. [She knows Miranda might not take that description of herself so easily, but right now she doesn't care. She can tell that there's pain in there, in the grim absence of an answering smile, and she's determined to fill that absence for both of them. Enough damn optimism to last.]

I got it. Yeah. He told me what happened. [Her voice softens.] You did something brave. I wish those always worked out. [She's not expecting that to be a comfort, definitely not for Miranda, for whom things are supposed to work out. It's more like an opener. For some of her crew, it's easy to reach out and prop them up, but Miranda's always needed to hold herself up first of everything. Shepard's ready for that.

She hopes it's still the right thing to do.]

It wasn't brave.

[ Miranda startles herself with the candor; she'd intended to play things a little closer to the vest than that, but she supposes she's more emotional than she'd thought.

She clears her throat, loudly enough to be heard on the tablet, before continuing in the face of Shepard's optimism and belief of in her better nature. ]

It was a rookie mistake. I never meant to sacrifice myself to find that boy's body. Maybe that's something you'd do, but I don't want to die here. Not if it doesn't matter.

[Well that was... alarmingly easy. Shepard does her own small double take. But they are talking about dying. It's a topic that gets unexpected responses out of people even when they didn't actually die.

Maybe even Miranda has her limits.]

Didn't say it was smart. [There's dark humour in her voice. She'll give Miranda that much.] But I know it wasn't just about the kid. Claiming ground in combat is always risky. When you're the vanguard, you always go in knowing you'll get hit worst. [She leans in, closer to the tablet, aiming to look Miranda in the eye.] This town's a battlefield. And we're gonna have to take risks.

Shepard...

[ There's a hesitance there, but not for long. Miranda had never been reluctant to argue Shepard down before, even when their relationship was a lot more tender behind the closed doors of her office. She's certainly not about to get shy now. ]

This isn't home. Of course we have to take risks, but more importantly we have to survive, and I'm not sure how to do both when every advantage I have is gone in this place. No guns, no biotics, no limitless financials or galaxy-wide network of contacts. We're not soldiers anymore, not here.

[Hearing her lay it out like that is a bit like being hit behind the knees. Which Shepard figures is much, much worse from Miranda's end, saying it. Every advantage gone. Miranda used to have all the advantages.]

Remember when Cerberus threw enough money to run a small planet into bringing me back? [Shepard never asked the cost, but Miranda would know it to the tenth point past the decimal.] If it was just guns, or biotics, or contacts that got anything done, that's where they'd have spent at all. But even they knew it isn't. It's people. It's us. Sure, we've got new tricks to learn, but this is what we do.

[That said, she can dial down the patented Commander's Intensity. Just a little bit.]

Let's just... try to make sure our learning experiences don't always come with that a high a price tag.

[IC Inbox -- Snowblind]

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