In the dark corners of his mind Garrus Vakarian was screaming. As he went about his day, helping to secure places for the Turians marooned on Earth, a long dark howl echoed through his internal peace and it remained as he worked for the good of the whole. His Turian upbringing had served him well in this case, he kept working, kept his placid demeanour, but the few who knew him had seen the peace leave him. He had known it was a one way trip, he had just assumed it would be a one way trip for both of them. He had been reluctant to leave on the Normandy after Shepard had been taken up to the Citadel, but there had been an emergency and she would not have wanted him to wait on her when he should be leading the team. So he had done his duty, fortunately they had just hit the Sol relay when they began to blow dumping them at the edge of the solar system. Joker had managed to limp back to Earth where they landed on an island somewhere, if it hadn't been for the comm systems and falling Reaper debris he might have considered it a different world.

Whilst the mass relays had failed, the FTL drives still remained operational, but there were still millions of sentients trapped outside their home systems and it might take decades to clear the backlog. Still Garrus walked through the motions of helping them move the Turians, played his part, went to the small room the Alliance could spare him at the end of the day and stared at the ceiling until sleep claimed him. He had once told Shepard he always assumed the worst so didn't see the point in wasting perfectly good sleep with bad dreams and it was still true. He had good dreams, seeing her with him, in the sunlight and he slept blissfully. It made waking up every day more gruelling.

'Hey Garrus!' He looked up and gazed at the man waving his arm at him.

'James.' He acknowledged with a nod, seeing the N7 armour and feeling a fleeting pang. 'Don't often see you around this neck of the woods.' He'd gotten better with human idioms after being around the young marine.

'In the middle of Turian HQ? I think it's fair to say you've never seen me in this neck of the woods.'

Garrus shrugged and exposed his teeth, smiling was difficult and baring teeth just felt hostile to him but it put humans at their ease so he tried. 'I see you completed your N7 training.'

James smirked and thumped his chestplate soundly. 'You know what I had to do for this? I had to face down an army of rampaging Asari, on my own, with a pen knife.' He smirked and Garrus chuckled softly.

'So why are you here? As naïve as I am, I don't think it's because you desire my company.' At least not dressed in battle armour anyway, they'd shared some beers, or their Turian counterparts, a couple of times since the… unfortunate incident.

The marine hesitated and Garrus lifted his head, it was not like James to be hesitant and it signified something big. 'Well yeah, about that… The Alliance are asking for your help off world for a bit.' Garrus waited, the big-mouthed man couldn't let a silence sit unfilled and he wasn't disappointed. 'They've found something that requires your delicate touch.'

'Does it require calibrating?' Garrus asked with a mildly amused tone and James grinned before pausing and then shrugging.

'Not as such, it's classified but as a friend, I think you should come.' Garrus frowned at the tone of voice.

'Is it about Shepard?' He asked. Some members of the Alliance had tried to keep his relationship with her a secret, the idea of their war hero fraternising with an alien was unappealing, especially when they had to "breed up a new population." He'd really wanted to shoot the admiral who had said that. Of course, he'd spent a good deal of the past ten months wanting to shoot everything in sight so it was nothing new.

'It's classified soldier.' James said in a tone that reeked of testing out Shepards old commander shoes. Garrus watched the man for a moment.

'I don't think I could live with having to bury her a second time, actual remains or not.' He said after a moment, going back to the console. He was surprised as James' hand took hold of his.

'You need to see this.'

Garrus gazed at the moon from the window of the shuttle, his armour was new, he'd donated the old set to sell for more supplies for the camps. Funny how much people were willing to pay for armor that had survived a full frontal reaver assault. That and it reminded him too much of what he had lost the last time he'd worn it. 'You know I came to moon base four years ago.' He said in passing.

'Why is that.'

Garrus considered the rogue VI he'd helped put down. 'Classified.' He said with a smirk. It wasn't the memories that hurt so much, at least not at that time, she'd been involved with Kaidan after all, it was the idea that they wouldn't get to make new ones. 'So now I'm on the shuttle are you still unable to explain why I'm here?' James looked at him for a moment and then at the Earth in the distance.

'Yeah, I think I can.' He took a deep breath. 'It's not good news.' He took a long breath and Garrus considered that his tone of voice was at odds to that statement. 'And it's not really bad news either if I'm honest.'

'So what you have is really just "news"?' He asked, watching the man's face as he tried to get a clue, he'd taken a long time to learn the body language of the human species and sometimes he found it difficult.

'Yes, I just don't want you to get all crazy on me or anything, thinking it's good.'

'And now you have piqued my interest.' Garrus leant forward, it could be any number of things but he let himself have the luxury of not leaping to the obvious conclusion and being disappointed.

James looked at him, his face squirming as he tried to find the words. 'We found something that looks like Shepard.' There was a significant pause as he let that settle on his friend.

Now this was an interesting development. 'Found something that looks like her but is not her?' He asked, understanding why James was talking in this convoluted manner but finding it tiresome already, Garrus had been hurt enough that another splatter of pain would only damage him a little.

James was not used to this skirting the edge of an issue. 'No, it's her, according to the bioscans it's her anyway, DNA matches.'

'But the brain and mental faculties are long gone?' He questioned, knowing that this would be difficult for him to come to terms with, if the body was there but the brain had been damaged to the point it wasn't her anymore.

'Not gone, more, what's the word they used? Subsumed.'

'By what?' Garrus asked intently, knowing that the reason he had been tapped was his bond with Shepard, he felt his grief lift a little, maybe he could bring her back, she wasn't completely gone if James was to be believed.

'I don't know, the scientists wouldn't let me ask her.'

'You've spoken to it?' It, not her, not yet. James did a double take at the word but nodded in agreement with the term.

'Yeah, it recognised me, smiled at me and then back to naval gazing.' Garrus blinked at the phrase.

'I don't think I know that one.' He offered.

'Oh, it thought about other things.' James said hastily. 'It's tapped into a whole load of wires and cables, hooked up like Legion was back when we found him.' Garrus sat back in his chair and considered the fact presented to him, mulling over each one.

'You have a theory?' He asked the man, wanting to share the thoughts out loud.

'I think it's the Citadel.' He said. 'She went up there, did… well they wouldn't let me ask her, it, that either, then she gets tapped into a giant machine. I mean, you've seen the vids.'

'Actually I haven't.' Garrus said. 'But I get the point.'

'Well, they're now trying to free her from it.'

'What do you mean now?' He asked. 'How long have they had it?' He wasn't an angry person, but for this he might be willing to make an exception.

'I don't know, longer than I've been involved, which is three months, just getting that out there.' James saw the stare that drew. 'I was under orders Garrus, and I didn't want you to get your hopes up anyway.' Garrus scratched his forehead and sighed. 'You should know that Kaidan's there too.' Garrus' frown was a little too quick. 'He's Alliance, Garrus, and he failed to grab her attention any more than I did.'

'So it's time to bring in the Turian.' He could see their point, bringing home their war hero would be a boost to Earth if it could be managed. 'Would she want to live like this?'

James shrugged. 'I don't know, greater good and all that shit.'

'You think people will be harmed if she's unconnected?'

'You'll understand more when you see it, they'll do a demo so you don't hate them.'