Mass effect Demi-humas

Chapter 6

Liara tossed and turned in her bed trying to fall asleep, but the guilt prevented her from getting any decent sleep. What happened to Zenna still weighed heavily on her to the point where she could think of nothing else. She moaned as the thought bounced around her head. She had heard plenty of remedies for not being able to sleep, warm milk. A human remedy, since she was on a human ship it would be the best idea. It wasn't likely that they would have others.

Getting up and out of bed she walked into the refectory area only to discover she wasn't the only one who was burning the night oil. Shepard sat on a chair in little more than a bra and shorts curling a dumbbell while a pot cooked on the stove. Liara was about to move away before Zenna stopped that by looking over to her.

"Well, look who else is up," she said with a slight smile. "Can't sleep?"

The young asari nodded and bowed her head. "Yeah, sorry," she said.

"It's ok, come on and pull up a chair," the commander said with a smile.

Not wanting to refuse Liara pulled up a chair next to the commander. "I'm guessing that you cannot sleep because of the guilt of what you did to me?" again Liara nodded with her head hug in shame. "Don't beat yourself up," she then said but the asari didn't look to her. "Look this wasn't your fault, no one could have expected what happened to happen. It's just bad luck,"

Liara then looked up at the minotaur. "You serious?"

"Yeah, look Liara this problem couldn't have been foreseen. At least now we can deal with it and move on," Shepard said before placing the dumbbell on the floor and walking up to the pan on the stove. "I don't blame you for what happened, same as the crew. Let it go and you'll sleep easier," she then turned off the cooker and walked back to her seat. "Got to let it cool down now,"

"You are cooking milk?" Liara asked with a slight surprise.

"Yeah, it's a good way to heat up the chemicals that allow you to sleep," Liara nodded as she got a good look at the commander's body.

It was covered in scars, not just bullet wounds, but blade cuts and teeth marks. It looks like as if she went though the grinder more than once. The only thing on her body that wasn't a scar was a tattoo around her right bicep. It was a simple tattoo of triangles around the bicep. (think Korra's armband but black.) But other than that, there was little else in terms of markings. Other than that Shepard was impressive in terms of muscle mass. Liara knew minotuars were strong, but she didn't know that they could have this kind of bulk. She blushed a little.

"Checking out my scars?" again Liara nodded.

"I... errrr," the asari blushed.

"It's ok, people tend to anyway, minotaurs are rarely ashamed of their bodies," Zenna then looked at her arm. "As for me, some of these I ware with pride. Others not so much. Tell me what was your childhood like?"

Liara was shocked at the question but felt like the commander wanted some company for now. "Well, my family wasn't poor, but we weren't rich either. I had few friends, mostly I took time to study, I wanted to know what happened to the Protheans. That's all I could really think about, all I could focus on. Mother was there to help me, but when she wasn't it was hard. Being pureblood made my life no easier as I had to resist bullying and being discriminated for my blood. While it wasn't always good, I feel like I had a good childhood,"

"You had it lucky," Shepard said as she looked down. "I wasn't born to a family like yourself. If I did have a family, I don't remember. I grew up in the streets, fending for myself. Stealing, killing rats, whatever I could get a hold of," she sighed, "It wasn't easy, I had to beat people to get even scraps. Until the anti-demi group got me. After that, I was in a military orphanage doing what I can. The way I saw it, the military was the best option of getting out of that life. And here I am now," she then looked to Liara's shocked face. "We all have baggage, some more then most. Don't beat yourself up if my baggage comes up ok,"