"I'm Shepard! You here me asshole?! I'm Shepard!"

"No, you're not."

Diving out of cover, Shepard made a run for the Clone shooting the M-11 Wraith out of his hands. However, the Clone quickly retaliated by knocking Shepard's M-7 Lancer away with a Biotic Throw. Annoyed this was going nowhere fast Shepard spear tackled the Clone over the railing of the shuttle bay, rolling down the ramp together in the process. Shepard managed to recover quickly; as they approached the edge of the shuttle bay ramp, stopped the role landing 2 solid punches one after the other. The crunches could be heard by both Liara and Wrex who had only just realised what had happened and chased after the two.

The Clone kicked Shepard off, returned to his feet, only to fall over again, this time over the ramp of the shuttle bay barely clinging on for dear life. A quake had stricken the Normandy due to the terrible flying by the CAT6 Pilot, 'Joker and Cortez are doing their jobs alright.' Shepard thought.

Shepard too had been shaken by the quake and was also dangling over the edge of the shuttle bay ramp. Both men were struggling to cling on, desperately trying to find a hand hold as too pull themselves back up again.

"Look at you. What makes you so damned special?" The Clone stated, bitterly. "Why you and not me?", He seemed broken, almost devastated. Shepard could do and say nothing as he was too busy hanging on for dear life himself.

"Shepard!" Liara shouted, "Hang on." She reached out towards her bondmate grasping him with all her strength, Wrex managed to find a handhold and acted as the anchor keeping her supported.

"Get your ass up here Shepard!" Wrex cried out in semi annoyance. Together Wrex and Liara managed to haul Shepard back onto the Normandy. Meanwhile the Clone looked towards Brooks hopefully as she appeared at the edge of the shuttle bay, however she turned away leaving the Clone for dead. Utterly crushed at this revelation, the Clone just waited for his fate to be decided.

"Thanks." Shepard called out to his squadmates. Clambering back up the ramp, Shepard paused and turned back to look at his struggling Clone.

"What about this Pyjack?" Wrex stated, curious as to how the Commander was to handle this situation.

Shepard thought for a moment, 'to hell with this.' He finally deduced. Shepard walked over towards the Clone, standing over his struggling doppelgänger for a second, he bent down and offered his hand to the Clone.

"Here, take my hand." Shepard couldn't believe it himself, after everything that had happened, he was offering to save a man determined to steal his life.

The Clone simply looked up at Shepard utterly bewildered. "And then?", He asked.

"And then you live."

"For what?", The Clone reeled back letting go of the ramp, after realising he had nothing left to fight and live for.

Shepard saw what was going to happen. Leaping forward, the Commander grabbed his Clone by the arms, determined not to let him go. Liara and Wrex acted in an instant, grabbing the Commanders legs desperate to keep him from falling a few miles to an unpleasant end.

"Why? Why save me?!", The Clone was inches from death; yet the Commander had gone against everything to save him.

"Everybody has something worth living for." Shepard stated, hauling the Clone back up onto the ramp of the shuttle bay. Wrex lifted the Clone to his feet and shoved him back towards the safety of the Normandy.

Cortez and Joker, were now safely back on the Normandy and strolling through the shuttle bay talking with Shepard. Wrex, Liara and the Clone were all gathered in the armoury section with Wrex on babysitting duty, he occasionally grumbled to himself about being stuck with the same job again. Liara could only nervously chuckle; sitting on James workbench with her back to the Clone, unable to look him in the eyes.

"Fortunately, they weren't here long enough to do much real damage." Cortez informed the Commander. "Although I may need some help from James to clean up the damage to the shuttle bay." Cortez then started walking to where Brooks was standing cuffed, ready to be lead away. Neither he nor Joker he actually clocked the fact Shepard had saved his Clone and was now sitting not to far away from them all.

"Plus they overloaded the heat diffusion system firing at us." Joker added. "Not sure if you noticed, but Shuttle Guy here did some crazy stunt-flying to keep us in one piece."

Cortez obviously humbled by the compliment turned back around and said "It's just nice to fly something a little more manoeuvrable than the Kodiak."

"What about EDI? Is she back online?" Shepard inquired to Joker.

"I am once again fully in control of the Normandy." Said the voice of the AI of that name, over Shepard's com unit.

"Glad to hear it. What about the mercs? Any survivors?" The Commander asked, unsure of how many other members of CAT6 he had to take out in the intense firefight that had transpired.

"Just one crappy-ass pilot and her. Alliance is taking her to a high-security facility. Maybe she can give them some dirt in Cerberus." Joker answered, Brooks had been lead into view by Cortez.

"I'll be more than happy to cooperate with the authorities." She snidely remarked.

"Until you escape." Shepard shot back in a threatening voice.

"Me? Escape? But I'm not a field agent!" Brooks replied, feigning innocence. Shepard was getting really ticked off now. He approached Brooks his body language clearly stating he won't hesitate to pull the trigger if needed.

"Stop. Just stop. You betrayed me and the Alliance in the middle of a war." Little did Shepard know, Brooks was taking the opportunity to start to hack off her cuffs off.

"I was young and naïve." Brooks looked up at the Commander with false innocence, she was stalling for time. "Admit it, Commander. You'll miss me." She was about to break the cuffs and run when Shepard unexpectedly turned back around and approached her again.

"No, I won't. Because you're going to stay in your cell and do your time."

Brooks was completely taken aback, this was not something she was expecting. "Afraid I'll escape, come back for revenge? Is the great Commander Shepard pleading for his life?" She remarked with a smirk.

Shepard looked her dead in the eyes and in a hushed growl, uttered "I'm pleading for yours."

Brooks was utterly defeated, she gave up with hacking the cuffs off her wrists. "So thoughtful." She sighed deeply. "Then I suppose I'm off to lock up." Shepard returned to where Joker was standing. "You know" Brooks began causing Shepard to turn around again. "*HE* wouldn't have left me live."

Shepard knew she was referring to his Clone and simply replied "You can't clone everything." Brooks was shoved forward by Cortez to get her moving. She just looked disheartened.

*Bang!*

All of a sudden a shot rang out. Brooks fell forward. Dead. Shepard looked towards his squadmates on instinct. He saw the smoking barrel of Liara's M-6 Carnifex, only it wasn't holstered and she wasn't holding it, the Clone was.

"No, *HE* wouldn't." He spat.