The message caught him on the way down to the lair; everybody stopped at the rude buzzing of his omni.
It was from Benezia. Perhaps the last message he’d ever get from her. He signaled Shiala to wait, and then lingered. As if the act of reading it had the power to sway the outcome of the inevitable encounter. Which way would it sway?
Nihlus tried to hold Liara back, but wasn’t quick enough even though he’d known she’d run for it. She had been keeping up a brave front but… oh, who was he kidding. He’d have done the same if it had been Saren there, standing atop the elevated platform, hands against a thick glass cage. As it came into full view, Nihlus saw that it contained an enormous creature, doubtless another type of rachni, but different from everything that they’d encountered. The brood-mother.
Sound of Silence is another Saren/Nihlus story from the time just before The Candidate. It tells about Saren’s days of loneliness aboard the Virial after driving Nihlus away in an outburst of anger.
I wrote this a long time ago, but the feeling that it’s unfinished kept plaguing me, making me go back and question each scene, each word, a thousand times. I wanted it to be perfect, to speak perfectly in Saren’s voice, the voice I hear so clearly in your writing, dear MA, but know I can never reproduce. This one is entirely for you: both inspired by and dedicated to.
At the same time…
Shepard had been shocked when she saw the geth for the first time, because hey! Nobody had seen the geth for three hundred years so obviously there was no need to fear them, right? Right?
The security measures at the ExoGeni research station were laughable. Saren went through them like a plasma cutter through omnigel and the building was taken in a matter of minutes. He ordered the scientists herded in a large conference room, and sent out the geth to hunt down those few who had managed to escape and hide on the lower floors.
Shepard squinted through the thick glass wall. Her breaths were drawing white hearts on it, because 286K passed for room temperature on Noveria. It looked warmer in the bar on the other side. Unlike her turian teammates, who were constantly shifting from foot to foot and occasionally emitting sounds suspiciously reminiscent of chattering teeth, the guy sitting inside, three tables to the front and two to the right, didn’t seem uncomfortable at all.
