A/N: This is not a Kaet & Kaidan. This is Jho's fault. Blame her. This is not the usual Shepard and Kaidan, either. Rache Shepard is true to her name and a renegade. She will do whatever it takes to get things done. Her experience with batarian slavers left her with a distrust of aliens. That distrust was passed on to Kaidan who is also a renegaded version of himself. It was a challenge to write. Thank you, Jho, for the image that inspired it and made me stretch my skills a bit. I have never written a renegade Kaidan before. I think...I liked it.
A/N2: Any similarity between secondary characters and a certain scifi movie is not my fault. They started it.
A/N3: This is uncharted territory for me in my writing, taking a character I love and renegading him. Don't be shy. Let me know what you think.
"Word has come down from paychecks bigger than mine. Commander Shepard is to be brought in to face charges of treason." The mild, gravelly voice of Admiral Hackett flowed across the war room, catching the attention of every man and woman in it.
"Count me out." Came the immediate response from Judson's sprawled body near the back of the table.
"I already had." Hackett answered, neither his voice nor his volume changing as the others in the room laughed.
In the shadowed corner where he'd chosen to lean against the wall, the better to keep an eye on those in the room, Kaidan Alenko began to inch toward the door.
"Pendejo." The word was directed at Judson and came from the diminutive dark haired woman standing near the wall opposite Kaidan, a tall man with a scruff of blond hair at her back. "Where is she, Admiral? Point me the way and you can pick up the pieces when I'm done."
"I heard that, Velasquez." The blond, Draco, bumped her fist, grinning like the sociopath he was.
Kaidan made himself a private bet that the pair of them wouldn't last longer than three minutes against Shepard. A drunk Shepard.
"As much as I respect your skills at death and destruction, Velasquez…" Hackett addressed the comment to her, but his gaze encompassed Draco as well. "I believe a more subtle touch is required."
Kaidan shifted closer to the door.
"We could set a trap for her." Mused the cooler logic of Sergeant Epona as he chomped on the edges of a thick cigar. "We'd need bait. Maybe put a family member under arrest. A lover or friend."
Kaidan opened his mouth almost from reflex and quickly clamped his lips together again. He needed to get out of here and he needed to do it now.
"Her family was killed during a slaver attack at Mindoir." Hackett shook his head. "As for a lover or friend…" Pale blue eyes moved to the back of the room and settled on Kaidan in his hiding place immediately. "Would you have any knowledge of such a person, Commander Alenko?"
Bastard.
Kaidan kept his expression impassive. "I don't think Commander Shepard would be foolish enough to fall for that kind of a trap, sir."
"How come everything I heard about Shepard is how great she is?" Judson demanded in nasal tones that grated. "I mean, what the hell is so special about her, hunh?"
"You mean other than being dead for two years and getting better?" Kaidan pointed out in blunt tones. "How about the fact she stopped Saren? And the Collectors who were working for the Reapers."
"Reapers. Right." Judson scoffed. "Next it'll be the Rachni and we can all go on a big bug hunt."
Kaidan wondered if anyone in the room would mind if he smashed Judson into the ceiling with a biotic lift. Biotics were crazy, weren't they? They could call it temporary insanity.
"The Council…under Councilor Udina's instruction…has asked that we bring her in. I want solutions, people, not complaints." Hackett's voice was threaded with iron this time.
"I say we attack the Normandy while it's in orbit." Burkle spoke from his position at the left of Hackett, the better to kiss his ass from. "It's the only way to be sure."
The pack of them against the Normandy? Against Joker's flying skills? Ten minutes. Tops.
Kaidan rubbed the back of his neck and wondered how much longer this idiocy was going to last.
"A single person would have better chances at success." Hackett made no pretense of who he thought that person should be, his gaze directly on Kaidan. "Someone she's served with. Someone she trusts."
"No." The response was guttural and implacable.
Hackett arched an eyebrow at him, his expression more amused than offended. "I beg your pardon, Commander?"
Kaidan straightened almost to attention. "I just thought that maybe there is another option, sir. Shepard isn't a fool."
"Neither are you." Hackett glanced about the room. "Epona, I want your people ready to back up Commander Alenko when he makes his move against Commander Shepard. Once we've put a plan in place you'll be briefed. Dismissed. Commander Alenko, a word, please."
"All right, people, you heard the man." Epona surged to his feet. "Move it."
Kaidan watched the crew swagger out, his mind frantically searching for some reason he couldn't be involved in this idea.
"She trusted you at her back when she fought Saren." Hackett said without preamble as the door closed behind Epona. "She'll let her guard down with you."
"Whatever currency I had with her got burned on Horizon and we both know it." Kaidan pointed out with a bite before deciding to try a different tactic. "Admiral, this is a crock. Shepard is not a traitor. Hell, she put the current Council in power when she chose to keep our men back to take on the real threat of Sovereign. She chose Udina for his post and now he treats her like this? She isn't going to trust a thing that comes from the Council, the Alliance or from me."
Hackett sucked in a deep breath for a heavy sigh. "I agree." He said, effectively cutting off Kaidan's outrage.
The skinny commander of Fifth Fleet crossed the room on silent feet to the liquor bar, pouring himself a splash and then offering a second drink to Kaidan.
"The problem is we need her, Kaidan. The Alliance needs her. The Council needs her." Hackett sipped the drink. "You need her."
Not for the first time Kaidan wondered just how much Hackett knew about the fraternization rules he and Shepard had broken on the first Normandy. "Sir…"
"Don't protest what I don't know about." Hackett waved a hand dismissing Kaidan's attempt to claim innocence. "I'm an old soldier, Kaidan, and I've seen a lot of young ones come and go. I have never seen another soldier like Shepard. There is an aura about her, a command. A luck, if you will. Like some great force is guiding this universe and keeps her alive no matter what just so she can get the job done."
That would explain her coming back from the dead, Kaidan mused with bitter cynicism.
"We need her on our side, Kaidan. Not Cerberus'. She's too dangerous to be left with them."
"You think a trial is going to put her on our side?" Kaidan demanded, his voice angry. "A trial is only going to piss her off. People who piss her off don't survive long."
Hackett's sad looking pale eyes studied Kaidan for a long moment. "I am not denying her accomplishments, Kaidan. In fact, it's those very accomplishments that have caused this situation. Shepard is the most dangerous kind of soldier of all…she's a kingmaker. The Council knows they owe their positions to her, especially Udina. Their greatest fear is that what she gave to them she can take away. That is why I have been ordered to bring her in."
"I know Shepard, Admiral." Kaidan's voice came closer to begging than he liked, his jaw clenched. "I know how she thinks. If you try arresting her you're going to get her killed. If you succeed in arresting her, she'll never live to stand trial because she knows too many secrets that scare too many people."
"If she can't be brought in, she'll be killed." Hackett's voice remained soft, but the steel in his voice didn't bend. "You need to decide how best you can help Shepard right now, Kaidan. I don't think Cerberus is going to pay to bring her back to life a second time."
Kaidan's eyes sank closed. A muscle in his jaw clenched and throbbed as he considered the matter.
"It needs to be done right. She isn't a fool. She'll never fall for me as bait. I'm not even sure she'd care." The words were flat and bitter as if each one were being dragged unwilling from the depths of his own personal hell. "But there is a way. There is one person, one situation, she will respond to. One she won't expect us to use."
Hackett arched a dark eyebrow and listened as Kaidan laid out his plan.
"On my tombstone I want the words Commander Rache Shepard. She pissed off the Universe."
The young asari in the chamber gave a soft laugh, a ghost of the former naïve archaeologist she had once been. "It is true. After one has been around you they leave either a friend or a foe. Usually the latter."
Rache rubbed her forehead and turned angry, pale green eyes to the only other occupant of the room. "I know this is a stupid question…you being the Shadow Broker and all…but how sure are you of your information, Liara?"
The asari took no offense, simply called up in the intelligence on her omni-tool. "Very sure. The ship was captured by batarian slavers twelve hours ago. They have set a course for Arattia, a space station that is also a popular hub for slavers looking to either buy or sell merchandise. I do not know if Talitha is still alive, Shepard, but I do know she is on that ship."
"Slavers. Again." Rage dripped from Rache's voice. "I think it's safe to say what little sanity Talitha managed to keep is long gone now. The batarians weren't satisfied twisting her once, they've got to make sure they finish the job by taking her again." Anger had her pacing in a circle, fingers stroking over the butt of her Phalanx. "I guess they just moved up on my list of things that need to be killed. What the hell. We wouldn't want my aim to get rusty, would we?"
A soft smile of understanding curved Liara's lips. "You're going to go after them."
"If I killed all of the batarians in the universe, Liara, would it be considered genocide or housecleaning?" Rache randomly asked before reaching her hands ups to her long auburn hair. Fingers, long experienced with twisting back the thick mass to a contained knot, made quick work of the chore.
"Be careful, Shepard." Liara called as Rache headed toward the door. "I've heard rumors about the Council wanting you contained or dead."
Rache snorted, her pale green eyes flashing with the heat of anger. "Ungrateful bastards." She muttered. "If they're smart they won't piss me off until the Reapers are dealt with and if they're even smarter they'll start to pray I forget they even exist." With those words she was out the door and headed to her ship.
Talitha. There but for the grace of the Gods, Rache mused shaking her head, not liking the faint thread of fear that trembled through her at the thought that could have been her. She could have been broken like that. Until the day she'd met Talitha, Rache had never considered that by dying at the hands of the batarian slavers, her family had actually had the better part of the bargain over those who had been captured.
She wouldn't allow it.
Rache lifted her head with determination, a familiar rage burning in her gut. She would find that ship, find those slavers and she would leave a message that batarians across the systems would hear and remember. Commander Rache Shepard would no longer tolerate humans being taken as slaves. If the batarians wanted to improve their economy, they could go after turians, asari or any other number of species and if those species didn't like it, they could do something about it…or more likely, just sit on their collective asses and wait for the Council to do something about it.
You wanted something done, you got a human to do it. Even Kaidan had come around to believing that after the former Council had proved time and again that any move they actually would make would be the wrong one.
"We have rules, Rache." In disgust, she shook her head, annoyed at how easily her thoughts had turned. "What is the one name, the one face we do not think about, do not talk about? What is the one ass we do not compare all others to?"
Too late. His image was there, now. The scorn on his face as he found out she was working with Cerberus. The indignation as he'd accused her of betraying him.
Man, she'd wanted to pounce on him right then and there. To Hell with those standing at her back, to Hell with the stench of the dead and fried surrounding them both on that field. Her field, her triumph, her damn victory over Harbinger once more. The adrenaline still coursing through her veins, demanding to be burned.
The uncertainty had held her back. The fear. Knowing that of all the men who had come and gone in her life, he was the only one who had ever left an imprint on her. The only one she had ever considered as more than a casual fling. The one that, in the middle of the night when she woke up craving the hot touch of a man, his face was the only one she could see.
Snarling at the thought, she stomped aboard the Normandy.
"Joker, Liara is sending some coordinates through. Get us there. Tell Grunt and Miranda to prep for battle."
"Yes, ma'am." Joker responded.
Slavers first, Rache told herself, her expression grim as she headed to the armory, intent on choosing her weapons with care. She doubted there was anything left of Talitha worth salvaging, but in her rescue of the broken woman she would make sure the batarians heard the opening volley of a war she would finish.
Kaidan specifically had marines standing at windows on either side of the batarian slave freighter they had commandeered for this mission. The ship sensors wouldn't know when the Normandy arrived, but anyone with a pair of eyes would be able to see her and he knew they would need whatever warning they could get before Rache…before Shepard got here.
He'd warned the marines, too. Given specific orders that they were not to engage the former Spectre. From the expressions of rebellions on their faces, the idiots had no clue he'd just saved their lives with that order. The marines were to be the distraction. The ones who separated Shepard from her backup and left her still very dangerous but isolated. Away from the trigger happy misfits who followed her, Kaidan knew he had a chance. It would be brief, it would require exquisite timing and it would require him to betray Shepard.
Or was he saving her? He couldn't remember any more.
A bittersweet smile curved his lips. Shepard was clearly the better fighter. Smarter than the Council by light years, too, but they had something Shepard didn't…especially after coming back through that relay after the suicide mission. The Council had sheer numbers. Even Shepard would eventually fall under wave after wave of soldiers being thrown at her.
"Commander, we have a visual." Winter, from his position on the port side reported.
"You know your orders." Kaidan responded. "Separate whatever crew she has with her. I will deal with Commander Shepard directly."
"Sounds like love to me." Judson's voice sang over the come.
"You stow that, Judson!" Epona ordered.
"Ferral, the minute they are on board, I want you to blow the hatch and get us out of here and back toward Council space. Got it?" Kaidan ignored the exchange.
"Roger that." Ferral, the pilot of the freighter they were in responded in tones almost mechanical in their professionalism.
"I will engage Shepard directly. You are not to intervene unless I order it. I'm the only one she won't kill on sight." Kaidan continued.
"I feel safer already." Judson drawled.
Epona cracked out a second order to shut up, but Kaidan ignored them. They weren't important anymore.
Rache would soon be here.
No proximity alarms. No greeting party at the airlock.
Rache shook her head in disgust. This wasn't the first time she'd boarded a ship and wondered where everyone was, it most likely wouldn't be the last. Mattock in hand, she advanced, Grunt and Miranda flanking her, everyone on look out as they passed through a long corridor and down to the cargo hold of the ship.
"This is too quiet." Grunt mumbled.
"It hurts! This one will obey! This one doesn't want the hitting!" Talitha's broken and screaming voice echoed from the far end of the cargo hold and sent Rache's blood cold as the smack of flesh being hit and cries of pain continued.
By whatever Gods you chose to name, she was going to kill every batarian on this ship, Rache vowed, her blood heating with the promise.
"Behind us!" Miranda called as shots began to slice through the room and the overhead lighting was doused leaving only the emergency illumination to help them see.
"Keep them busy!" Rache ordered as Talitha's screams increased and she began pleading for the Masters to let her go, she didn't want to go with them. "I'm going for the girl before they kill her!"
Grunt nodded, laughed and began to return fire with a malicious glee toward their attackers.
Rache left them to it, trusting they would get the job done…after all they'd survived the Omega IV Relay when so many others had fallen…and raced toward the far door, following the terrified cries, shoving back her own shattered memories of fear even as they pushed her to quicker action.
Kaidan waited until she was through the door before using his omnitool to cycle it shut and engage the locks. She whirled about then, hearing the clank of the bolts and for the first time he began to see a wary suspicion on her face…a suspicion that would hurt his ability to capture her if he gave her time to think.
"Rache." He hadn't meant to say her first name. Had meant to keep this professional.
A twisted smile curved his lips. Who was he kidding? He hadn't been professional with Rache since the night before Ilos when he'd said to Hell with the regs and gone to her cabin.
"Kaidan?" She turned, warrior swift, toward him, her confusion growing. "What are you doing here?"
The faint hope in those last words nearly killed him. Staring at her he remembered the night before Ilos. He remembered the forbidden thrill of entering her cabin, determined that before he left he would taste the mouth he'd come so close to kissing before Joker's interruption. Determined but hoping for so much more. He wanted more now. She was so close and his thoughts were teasing him mercilessly with the memory of how soft her skin was beneath that hard armor.
Opening his mouth, the prepared lies on his tongue, Kaidan found he couldn't give them voice. Knew he didn't even need to. Crossing the corridor, his weapons still holstered, his hands clenching and unclenching, he reached out, the fingers of his armored gloves seeking the soft, naked skin of her neck, sliding over a path that led to the base of her neck. Thumbs supporting her jaw, he pulled her close and closed his mouth over hers.
Hot, hard and demanding, he punished them both with the stroke of his tongue, the nip of his teeth, the soft forgiveness of his lips. She answered, at first startled and then like an addict tasting their drug of choice after years of being clean, pressing into him again and again as if she couldn't quite get enough and needed so much more. Sucking in air when breathing became necessary, only to dive back as if even that brief separation were painful, he didn't let her go. This was his moment, now, and he would not waste it.
Rache stumbled, a knee buckling, but her mouth clung to his, muttering a curse about his armor as her hands tried to find a hold on his hips. She wobbled again and seemed to lose some of her strength. Sluggish, she pulled back almost driving him to weep. Pale green eyes blinked blearily at him.
"Kai..da…" The name was a question slurred from her lips and his right arm moved swiftly about her, supporting her as she sank limply against his side.
No. Too soon.
The denial burned with the hot, heavy blood pulsing through his veins. Instincts older than civilization pumped from his DNA demanding that he take the woman he could smell and brand her as his, warning all others off.
The civilized part of him waged a determined war and won.
"A sedative gel smeared on my gloves." Kaidan said quietly not caring that she was nearly past listening. "It seeped through your pores when I touched your neck."
Green eyes blinked at him. "Oh." Was all she managed before her lids slid down to half mast and she became completely dependent upon him to stand.
She wasn't out. Not completely.
Concern jarred Kaidan into action. Had he used too much? Not enough? Was she having an allergic reaction to the drug?
His left arm swung up and fingers on his right hand that clutched Rache too him paused long enough to activate his health diagnostics. Lines reading…
What in the Hell had Cerberus done to her?
His jaw clenched as his medical training caught the biosynthesis melds with flesh. There were additional modifications he could only guess at, but several could only be for chemical neutralization and explained why she was still awake, if only barely.
Kaidan swore and scooped up Shepard tight against his chest. She wouldn't be loopy for long and when she realized what he had done, it would really be in his best interests to not be in hitting range.
She stood in the middle of her cell, defiant and tall, her chained, bare feet flat on the cold floor. The manacles about her wrists looped through the belt at her waist and back up again to the choker at her neck. All told, her restraints weighed an easy thirty pounds and yet she had been standing in that position for hours.
As if she were waiting.
Kaidan motioned Judson back from the kinetic field separating the inside of the cell from the rest of the room with a wave of his hand.
Pale green eyes followed his movement as Kaidan released the field and approached her.
"The slavers were your idea, wasn't it." There was no question in her voice, no emotion. "Talitha was a nice touch."
Kaidan gave a slow smile. "Her doctors, after some persuasion, decided it would be therapeutic for her."
"Clever bastard, aren't you." There was no heat in the words, simply an acknowledgement. "It must look really good on your resume. You caught the rogue Spectre Rache Shepard. Maybe you'll even get a promotion out of this."
Anger creased his features. "You think I did this for a promotion? Rache, they were going to kill you if you couldn't be captured!"
A scoffing expression lightened her pale features. "Oh, well, silly me. I should be thanking you for choosing captivity over death for me, shouldn't I?"
"Yes!" He snarled coming close. "Rache, we need you. You were an Alliance soldier. Your loyalty…"
"Don't you dare." She cut him off, her voice low and hot, her eyes burning with a hell that made the green glow yellow. "Don't you dare talk to me about loyalty."
"Oh, I get it." He pulled back slightly from her, his head nodding as his hard gaze dueled with hers. "I'm supposed to be loyal to you, but you're not required to give me the same. I'm supposed to do whatever you want, no matter what. Be whoever you need me to be, no questions asked. God forbid anyone should question the almighty Commander Shepard."
"Garrus did!" Rache flung back.
"And look what following you blindly got him!" Kaidan retorted. "An empty grave. I loved you, Rache, but I was never blinded by you."
"I never asked for him to follow me blindly or for you…your…" She tried to force the words out, he could see that. See the anger that flooded her cheeks. "Shut up, Kaidan!"
He answered her with bitter laughter and looked away, silence settling tensely between them.
"Tell me something that has meaning, Rache." Kaidan's finally demanded, the words terse and buoyed with fury, shaking his head as he said them. "Tell me something that is easy and simple. Something from you to me that I don't have to guess at the hidden meaning of."
"Udina is a dumbass and the Council is a bunch of useless pricks."
The words caught an unexpected bark of laughter from him and he unwillingly grinned at her. "Go Team Milky Way." He offered and was rewarded with her chuckle.
Another silence grew between them.
"Kaidan, you know the Council is incompetent. Why are you still serving them?" The question burst from Rache, her expression showing consternation and genuine confusion.
He couldn't meet her gaze, he'd asked himself the question too many times. "It used to be the uniform. You salute the rank, not the person." He quoted softly. "I thought with Udina…with a human led Council things would change for the better."
"You always were a fucking optimist." Rache scoffed with more weary resignation than heat. "The Reapers are coming, Kaidan. I can't fight them stuck here." She shook her chains at him. "And the damn Council refuses to believe they exist."
He was already shaking his head at the underlying plea in her voice. "They'll kill you if you're free, Rache. I would rather have you alive and hating me than dead."
"Oh, that's a great choice." Rache's voice turned harsh again. "Why don't you make popcorn and we can sit here at the Citadel in the perfect seats to watch the end of the Universe? Kaidan, let me go!" The chains raged with her temper as she gestured violently.
"Don't you get it, Rache?" Kaidan moved closer, grabbing her upper arms to still her movements. "You're here. They're going to put you on trial. This is your chance! You can make your voice heard! Your words still carry weight in this universe, Rache, you can convince the people that the Reapers are coming! Force the Council to act on your warnings!"
Rache's expression held incredulous disbelief as she studied the earnest brown eyes boring into her. "Oh, Kaidan, no one is going to believe the boogey man is coming. He only comes for other people, other species, other planets. Not them. Never them."
"What other choice do you have, Rache? You turned your back on the Alliance, the Council. You broke your ties with Cerberus. You don't have a whole lot of friends left. You need us every bit as much as we need you."
She shook her head. "Not anymore, Kaidan. This is beyond the Council. Beyond Cerberus. If I'm going to defeat the Reapers, I have to be free to act regardless of species, regardless of borders drawn on a star map and definitely regardless of any politics. I have to make the hard choices and I can't if everyone is screaming their agenda in my ears."
He stared at her confused. "So what? You go outlaw? Become a pirate? Rache, that's insane. You need the armadas the Council can call to fight the Reapers."
A bitter laugh bubbled from her. "Oh, I'll need more than that." She shifted and the chains were heard again. "The Council won't listen, Kaidan. They'll go for a quick neutralization. They want me silenced. If I live to be put on trial, it will only be because the Council is more incompetent than I first thought."
He wanted to argue with her. Wanted to tell her he would protect her, he would keep her safe, but he'd seen the same fools she had make the same stupid decisions and use the same ham handed tactics to try and clean up the messes that resulted. And as messes went, leaving Shepard alive and free was at the top of the list.
But what was the answer? He believed that the Council, for all their idiocy, was the best chance against the coming Reaper threat. Shepard was just one woman. A strong, beautiful, competent woman who had one ship, a frigate, and a crew of less than twenty. That wasn't enough to stop the Reapers. They needed the power the Council could call up. They needed to convince the Council the threat was real.
"Rache, there has to be a way." He focused on her and found her closer than expected, found his body reacting, wanting, aching.
"I'm tired of talking right now, Kaidan." The words were weary, as if fighting him had cost the last little bit of her strength and she lifted her mouth in a question that he was more than willing to answer.
Kaidan sank into her taste, spicy and strong and determined, not caring who watched, not caring that he would most certainly be barred from visiting her because of his obvious bias. Her hands smoothed noiselessly over his shoulders before sliding up his neck, her fingers diving deep into his thick hair until her nails scraped against his scalp.
Noiselessly? She was wearing chains.
Kaidan stiffened, trying to pull back, but the grip on his hair turned painful and then the world exploded in a violent burst of fireworks that died to utter blackness.
Rache eased the unconscious body to the ground, her fingers snatching the hand cannon from Kaidan's holster and aiming at the marine just now realizing she was free. Before she could fire, he crumpled to the ground.
A shadow blurred into view from behind him.
"Wow, Shepard, that was one hot kiss." Kasumi said with bright envy. "I think I'm the one that needs a cigarette."
Rache shook off the remnants of the manacles that Kasumi's cloaked figure had released while she argued with Kaidan, before turning her attention to the choker. "Where's Joker?"
"At the controls of a pleasure yacht I've had my eye on for a long time but never got around to stealing. Until now." Kasumi laughed, the universe her greatest toy. "The Normandy is a system away, cloaked."
Free of her restraints, Rache looked about the room, searching for enemies.
"I've disabled the alarms and looped the video feed on the cameras." Kasumi grinned. "Right now, those watching will be seeing the kiss poets aspire to write about."
Still Rache hesitated, not even sure why. This is what she wanted. This was her breaking the last tie, the last bit of restraint keeping her from doing things the way they needed to be done. Her way. The Council would not forgive her turn to outlaw and they would hunt her from one end of the universe to the next.
So be it.
Rache lifted her chin, steeling her resolve. Let them chase her. Let them try and stop her. She had bigger things to worry about than shortsighted fools who refused to see what was coming. She would get things done. She would prepare. Let them call her outlaw and pirate. She would be the outlaw and pirate who stopped the Reapers from destroying this universe again.
Pale green eyes fell to the unconscious man at her feet. A slow smile curved her lips as she decided what her first act would be.
Every pirate needed to steal some booty.