An old enemy, recently reborn.

When Ashley had put in for shore leave, she'd told both Shepard and the Alliance that it was merely to get some R&R. They had both found that answer perfectly satisfactory and asked no further questions, Shepard even encouraging her in the hopes she would finally unwind, which Ashley naturally found suspicious but didn't have time to consider. Nevertheless, it was good they didn't ask, because if they had they might have sectioned her for going insane.

It started with strange intrusive thoughts, thoughts which she somehow knew were not her own. They were subtle, disguised as idle philosophizing, but their meaning was sinister. They were thoughts about submission to a higher power, about becoming part of something greater than herself, and how great it must be to simply be a piece in someone else's design, unthinking, merely fulfilling a function to the best of its ability.

Then the dreams started. She would go to sleep and find herself nested inside a bud, a flower waiting to bloom, until she was unjustly ripped from its warm embrace by Commander Shepard and... herself? It took her several trips through the same dream for her to realize where she'd seen all of this before. So with her newly acquired shore leave set off for Zhu's Hope on Feros. They had a population of 200 last time she'd been here. She'd heard it had grown since then, so when she landed and found the place deserted, she was more than a little unsettled. No signs of an attack or struggle or even panic. Just a pristine, abandoned town.

Ashley knew of course what was responsible. It was the same reason she had come here: The Thorian. A parasitic plantlike organism whose spores allowed it to exert total control over less developed lifeforms. It was supposed to be dead. As she made her way down to its lair under the colony, she steeled herself for a fight for both her body and mind. She could handle whatever the big green behemoth could throw at her. She was tough and she was stubborn. She could withstand it. If Fai Dan could resist its control long enough to kill himself, she was sure she could resist it long enough to kill it.

She approached the chamber where the Thorian was kept. She raised her rifle, took a deep breath, and rushed in. The first time they'd come here, they found a giant organism, a beating heart in an impromptu throne room, tended to by its handmaidens, clones of the Asari Commando named Shiala. She expected to find something similar now, the town's people either cocooned to be absorbed into the monster, or mindlessly worshipping their new god.

Instead, all she found was a withered husk, as dead and still as the day they left.

She was speechless. Luckily, someone else filled the silence.

"Hello Lt. Commander," said Shiala, stepping out from behind a pillar. Her green skin made her instantly recognizable, and she was wearing her old Asari commando outfit, which she still filled out nicely. Ashley turned, gun raised. "Calm yourself. I am unarmed."

Ashley bit her lip, suspicious as always, but after a moment let out a deep breath and lowered her gun.

"Sorry," she said, holstering it.

"No apologies necessary," Shiala replied, stepping forward. "It is natural to be uneasy in a place of ****. I too experience... discomfort, being here."

"What happened?" Ashley asked. "The whole town above is abandoned."

"You being here tells me that you already know the answer," Shiala replied, pressing past Ashley and looking up at the Thorian shell.

"That thing... It's still alive isn't it?"

"Yes," Shiala confirmed, "and no. The Thorian, as you knew it, died when you and your friends, Alenko and Shepard, killed it and released me. For a time, I believed that was the end of the story, but then..."

"You started having dreams?" Ashley guessed. Shiala gave a nod. "So it died... but then came back to life?"

"Yes. Much like your Commander Shepard," Shiala explained. "It would perhaps be more accurate to think of it like a seedling. One which assumed a different form. The demise of its progenitor taught it valuable lessons. Like the need for subtlety, and mobility," she continued. "Fortunately for it, its spores remained in its victims, just waiting to reactivate."

"So it took over the town again...

"Except this time it's not just that they're controlled by the Thorian... They are extensions of the Thorian itself. The people they were are no more."

"Damn it. We've got to stop them. Where did they go?"

"Go?" Shiala arched her brow. "They did not go anywhere. They're hiding in the town above right now. You simply did not see them because the Thorian did not wish for you to see them until you were ready."

"Until I was ready? What are you talking ab..." Suddenly, Ashley stopped. This entire conversation, she realized she was taking Shiala's every word as true, without a hint of skepticism. She would never take anything at face value, unless... "Oh god. You're... I'm... Ah!" She felt a pulse of pain rush through her head.

"Yes. I am the new Thorian. We have become one. Mind, body, soul." She stepped forward as Ash stepped back, reaching behind her for her gun. "Stop." Shiala commanded. Ashley's hand froze. "Stand up straight." Ashley did so, automatically coming to attention, only able to move her eyes and twitch her muscles. "Even now, my spores germinate within you. Your mind is resistant, but your body is just a machine, easily sabotaged. I had hoped to attract Commander Shepard with you, but it would seem her time dead neutralized the spores in her body. No matter. When I have concluded with you, we will both go see her, and we will make sure she understands."

"You'll have to kill me bitch," Ashley managed through gritted teeth.

"In a way, that's exactly what I intend to do, but don't fear. It will be the most pleasurable experience of your brief existence.

"What? What are you..." Ashley's words trailed off as Shiala began to run her hands along her body. Ashley looked down, and was startled to see her clothing dissolving. Once it was gone, Shiala leaned in close, looking Ashley in the eye. The Asari, like all of her kind, was beautiful.

"Embrace eternity," she commanded as her eyes turned black. Ashley gasped as she felt Shiala press her fingers into her pussy, and Shiala took the opportunity to stick her tongue down her throat. Ashley's eyes rolled back in her head the moment their minds melded; in that moment she knew then that everything Shiala said was true. This wasn't just another woman's mind she was feeling, it was so much more vast and powerful. It was a tangible presence, ancient and overpowering. She had been prepared to fight back against pain, but Ashley was caught totally unprepared for pleasure.

With one hand cupping her breast and the other fingering her pussy, Shiala had her on the ropes from the word go.

"N-No," she managed to sputter as she continued to make out with Shiala. "I... Mmm... Won't..." Yet the rest of the words couldn't even form in her thoughts. Every kiss felt like a little dose of chloroform, blacking out a tiny part of Ashley's easily accessible mind as the rest drowned in sweet ecstasy. Her every muscle twitched as her pussy moistened.

"Give in. Let yourself go," Shiala said, breaking off from Ashley's lips, and making her way instead down Ashley's neck.

"Oh god... Oh goddess!" She said as she edged closer to orgasm. "Oh goddess I... No! You won't change me... I'm... I'm..." Who was she? Why was she here? She couldn't remember. Those were just a few more parts of her that had been blanked out by this emerald beauty before her. She felt her snatch watering like a hungry animal. She was going to cum soon. The human woman formerly known as Ashley Williams didn't notice how her skin was starting to turn a faint green, or how its texture was becoming sequined. She hardly noticed when her tits and ass began to swell, or when her hair started to fall out in clumps.

"Oh goddess! I can't take anymore! I'm... I'm..." She erupted like a volcano, and the moment she did, biotic energy openly transferred from Shiala to her. In an instant, her skin turned green and sequined. All her hair simply fell off her body. Scalp crests grew out of the back of her head as it took on a more pointed shape, while the rest of her curves became accentuated. Her tits swelled to DDs and her ass was round and firm.

When she opened her eyes again, they were nothing but a cold empty reflection of the woman who was looking at her. After a moment, even clothing was generated, the black clad catsuit of an Asari Commando. Now they were identical in every way, body, and mind.

"We are Shiala," they said in unison. Which of them had been Ashley Williams was quickly forgotten along with everything she had been and known. There was nothing she knew that the Thorian had not already leached from her mind in her dreams, so there was no need to keep any of it. Shiala merely ordered her multiple bodies to make their way back to the surface. Once above ground, they were greeted by the sight of hundreds of Shialas, each perfectly identical, each an extension of her singular mind and will. They were not people; simply appendages of the Old Growth's new form.

This was only the beginning. They would spread the spores across the stars, taking over the mind and body of every life form until all were one with the beauty of Shiala.

Five of the clones boarded the shuttle the one called Ashley had taken here. They would use it to secure a new vector of transmission to the galaxy: the SSV Normandy SR-2. The crew would be the first to know the glory of Shiala.