Talk About Tonal Dissonance

first, we got Ashley still reeling from Eden Prime and starting to feel insecure about her ability to actually help fight the kind of shit they're up against. And also floundering in denial about being jealous of Liara and Femshep. It comes to a head on Noveria, watching how Shepard comforts Liara...

The party bunks down at the hotel rather than go straight back to the Normandy, because they all need a rest after that. And Ashley winds up at the bar being chatted up by the secretary-spy-whatever lady they had to run errands for earlier. Ashley catches the vibe, considers it... but chickens out. (No skin off professional hit-n-quitter Gianna's back. Plenty of fish in the sea!)

Damn it, she just wants Shepard. She pines all the way through the end of ME1. But by then, it's clear that Shepard and Liara are the real deal, and she has no choice but to move on... until Shepard tragically dies in action, and grieving her best friend reopens all the old wounds.

Meanwhile! We got serial monogamist Samantha "I play for keeps" Traynor deployed to Port Hanshan to establish a rachni study lab. She's homesick, lonely, and anxious (and also Noveria is cold as shit and she needs someone to keep her anemic ass warm) so obviously, the answer is to work her uhaul witchcraft on local fuckgirl Gianna Parasini. Things are rocky; they're basically 2 years deep and Samantha still can't figure out if Gianna really sees a future together, or is just passing time. It's almost a relief when she's reassigned to Vancouver for the retrofit project, and they have an excuse to finally cut things off. Which they both, but particularly Gianna, promptly regret.

Before reporting to Vancouver, Samantha takes leave to visit the fam on Horizon... where Ashley happens to be stationed. It's a convenient rebound for Samantha and a convenient outlet for Ashley who's spiraling over Shepard again... but we all know what happens next. Logically, Samantha and Ashley both know that Ashley isn't to blame, but trauma tends not to follow logic. So that whole situation ends terribly, with Samantha projecting her grief and anxiety onto Ashley and Ashley reeling having the first real connection to another person she's had in a hot minute implode like that.

Meanwhile! Gianna's out getting that paper, getting mixed up in all kinds of shit, getting sent on longer and farther and more dangerous assignments for the Executive Board. Dark matter and such, etc. She hears about what happened on Horizon and it takes her far too long to gather the courage to reach out to Samantha to find out if she's even alive. But she does, even if it's inadequate, and in doing so reignites unresolved feelings for them both, which neither of them is willing to fess up to, so that gets left to fester for months.

after Horizon, Ashley probably should be put on psych leave but she's Anderson's second favorite child, so he puts her on light duty far away from Collector activity instead. Where? Port Hanshan of course, where a lab has been commissioned to work on improving the seeker swarm anti-venom or something like that. An operation for the Operations Chief to oversee. Which needless to say drives Ashley up the wall and straight into...

Uhaul #2, Gianna and Ashley edition. They remember each other from before, cash the rain check, and Ashley just kind of doesn't leave Gianna's apartment (just like a marine to shack up for a place to stay lol). It's easy because they're basically the same person, but also hard because they're basically the same person. Ashley feels unmoored and useless and also it's her first actual relationship with a woman after exploring her bisexual feelings blew up in her face, and Gianna is technically not on the rebound but is also definitely on the rebound, and also feels weird about the general lack of direction in her life. But! They do settle into a rhythm, and Ashley even gathers the balls to tell her family about her girlfriend...

which also blows up in her face (realistically? no surprises there) when she's summoned to Vancouver for Shepard's tribunal, and the Reapers invade Earth, and then she winds up back on the Normandy................. with Shepard and Samantha.

On Samantha's end? She's terrified, distraught. She's felt guilty about how things ended with Ashley for months, but she has a bit of a tendency to seek a particular kind of comfort when faced with uncertainty. Everything happens so fast that it's not like she creates a plan or anything, she just feels drawn to the strong women aboard... especially the one she's already intimately familiar with.

Fortunately (?) there's not much time for Ashley to be emotionally terrorized by being stuck in a tin can with the two women who opened the closet doors for her who also were right there to witness her greatest failures and/or regrets, during the greatest crisis ever faced by any living creature, irrespective of the fact that she has a little wifey out there who probably thinks she's dead, because she's promptly maimed on Mars.

Ashley's mom reaches out to Gianna, who hauls ass straight to Huerta, and is forced to come to terms with just how much she really does love Ashley,

much like how Samantha is also forced to confront her regrets and lingering feelings-slash-developing-feelings for Ashley, which drives her also to pay a visit...

and thus Gianna and Samantha are both completely gobsmacked to be unexpectedly reunited over Ashley's comatose body. Which brings all their unresolved feelings crashing down.

And then Ashley wakes up and adds her shit to the shitstorm.

Gianna loves Ashley, but never stopped loving Samantha; Samantha never stopped loving Gianna, but then her feelings for Ashley morph from a yearning for someone strong to protect her to a yearning to protect Ashley, too; and Ashley loves Gianna, but the connection she felt to Samantha back on Horizon comes rushing right back.

What they all say is different from what they all feel... and they all know it. But there are too many moving parts to get a handle on things quickly: Samantha has her duty on the Normandy, and Gianna's job takes her all over the place inbetween helping take care of Ashley's family on the Citadel, and Ashley has her recovery and then her Specter duties. Gianna and Ashley are still together, but with each of them individually orbiting and being orbited by Samantha. It only really makes sense when they're together, the three of them in the same place at the same time. They try to be friends. They fail.

The turning point is Ashley's reinstatement on the Normandy. She and Samantha can barely look at each other; the tension's so thick that it might as well be a fourth in the mix, but Ashley's no cheater, and Samantha's no other woman. Ashley still feels guilty as hell when she talks to Gianna, though.

And Gianna's no cheater, and Samantha's still no other woman, but... they talk. Probably more than they should, especially since they don't tell Ashley. They talk about anything but Ashley, themselves. Gianna still feels guilty as hell when she talks to Ashley, though.

And Samantha feels guilty as hell pretty much always. Not to mention lonely, which breaks both Ashley and Gianna's hearts. Whenever they talk, or get together, it feels like something's amiss even though their feelings are stronger than ever.

Then Gianna has intel. Cerberus has gotten its claws all over Noveria, but if the Normandy crew were to take out a particular fighter base...

Intel, leaked to Samantha. Cerberus asses, whooped by Shepard, Liara, and Ashley.

There's a lot of deja vu for Ashley: being on Noveria with a disgustingly in love Shepard and Liara, being on Noveria with Gianna. And for Gianna too: the love of her life boarded an Alliance vessel and left her standing on the dock with a heart full of regrets once before and she never got over it. And now there's two of them.

She's the one to crack. Samantha and Ashley are being too fucking awkward. Shit is getting super real in the galaxy and she can't stand watching the three of them piss away what may be their last chance to be together - all three of them, together. The Normandy's docked for a few hours to refuel and such; it's now or never.

The ensuing conversation in the Starboard Obs Deck is excruciating. None of them say the right things (Gianna definitely kicks things off on the wrong foot lol), but what they feel is right. Everything isn't completely resolved, but they're finally on the same page.