This idea plays on "What if Garrus and Shepard lived during the First contact war?" and "What would happen if they were left on a strange world."

Chapter 1: Contact

Shepard came from three generations of soldiers; and like them she grew up on earth just like many humans of the era. Her father was a hardened soldier and had a military history decorated with colorful language, hard work, honesty, bravery, and smart choices that had landed him with many: medals, certificates, and audiences in some of the militaries best clubs, groups, and vocal authorities.

Because of this she had grown up with a great admiration for her father. To Sheppard her father was one of the most honorable men she had ever grown up knowing. He never helped dishonest people but those who remained loyal and honest he helped climb up to heights he himself was at gaining him good favor amongst his peers and inferiors. People often joked about his name Shepard and much he was like one taking in troops and watching over them making sure they understood a soldier's life. Most had aspired to greatness.

Shepard had also grown up learning of her many historical back grounds. From famous historical figures she couldn't name but known what they had done. She was taught thoroughly on the many back grounds and cultures her family had generated from. The mixed views and ideals is what had become her and made her who she is, the cesspool of cultures as some called, had done to her what most others said was idealism which was teach her the importance of a well blended society that everyone wasn't perfect and shouldn't looked at as some single fraction or nationality everyone was the same hate and ignorance only lead to a barrier that blocked most people from realizing that.

It had been many years since Humanity had sky rocketed in finding the Prothean ruins, the once well accepted idea that the speed of light was the limit had been disproven as most things made with a limit usually are. Now they were in the process of activating old machines by Protheans so they could advance far beyond. If even possible they could finally come in contact with other sentient beings, the things humanity could learn from them. After all a child's greatest dream is a world beyond their own with creatures unimaginable and fantasies galore.

The idea to Shepard, even if it was as old as mans first thought of space beyond sky, was refreshing. Something new and adventurous and all she had ever dreamed of compared to this planned out career in the military. Even more cultures, people, and the life lessons, the knowledge and excitement were without end.

She could still remember the day when she began training ready to be a part of this great search the only way she knew she could make her father proud. By the time she was six she knew how to use a pistol, by the time she was fourteen she was able to shoot a shotgun without the kick almost knocking her back, now she could say she could use a grenade launcher when the rare occasion called for it. She was now one of the alliances top soldiers.

Sadly the day she could remember the most was the day when humanity had made first contact with sentient life, her dream. It was live on footage; no one was really paying attention as everyone ate in the mess hall. The news which had been put up on the TV was mandatory as it was a part of their lives to watch such things because it was their job if need arise that among their own species to see who their new boss was or who was at war with whom, heck maybe someone famous died that they could discuss about on their long boring trips through space.

But everything had been so boring and repetitive if it wasn't for one soldier dropping his lunch on the floor startling his friend beside him as he hollered to everyone else to be quiet no one would have even heard the news anchor.

Today was worse than any celebrity dying, this would be no idol chat or small talk, and this would the beginning of a war, a darker part of human history as humanity from then on would be labeled as hostiles and war hungry. The news broadcasted the upcoming battle of an unknown alien ship opening fire at a large number of civilian and alliance ships that were working on the 314 Relay. Only one made it and now the alliance had decided to retaliate, this however escalated as humans had received strange transmissions and messages from alien groups.

It would also be the loss of Shepard's great idol, her father, Commander Shepard of the Prestige, had been placed on the missing in action list. He was dead. Her dream had become her nightmare and her idealism would be forgotten for many years.

The year was 2157, the beginning of the Contact wars.

Chapter 2: Probes

What they had first feared as the protheans themselves they had found were actually a race called the Turians. They had learned a lot by taking back bodies from battles much too some politicians displeasure saying they weren't helping the cause with Turian ambassadors and negotiations towards peace.

Today was one of Shepard's first time being so far away from Earth. As exhilarating as she had once imagined this to be she now held no excitement behind the commanding mask she had made for herself. She wasn't a talker though she had been told she was a good speaker and an excellent listener. She had earned her own line of medals and accreditations that had made her rise through the ranks. Just like her father.

She was now in the Captains position and commanding a whole crew of alliance soldiers on a trip through Turian space on a mission to find out about their ships and what seemed to be habitable planets. Her, Alliance, ship was a bit run down and needed repairing more often than not which didn't seem like an appropriate vessel for their newest task. They collected a precious cargo of probes that still had active nuclear war heads which thanks to Alliance funding where to be taken back to Alliance scientists to have their information downloaded then sent back out. Due to the vast colonization of ongoing planets human resources had been stretched out thin. Due to this fact the ship she had now been Captain of was not (definitely not) safe or secure enough.

She knew she was right as she saw a large Turian vessel appear in front of them shooting them with advanced weaponry that had made their armor look as tough as fluffy white clouds. Strangely however they didn't do enough damage as to destroy as much as immobilize.

This was clear to Shepard as she ran through the ship in full armor and head gear as she watched bits and pieces of her ship explode and catch fire life support had taken it the worst but was still working well enough, dead bodies of crew who had been caught in the blasts made only imagining what the worst possibilities of the nuclear warheads (probes) she had stashed on her ship that much easier.

Normally her first response would be to kill those on her ship but with it falling apart she stayed in the observation and fed her engineers, crew members, and had the soldiers keep them safe as she told them the safest possible routes to the evacuation pods. If she were to follow she would be putting them and herself in a very bad position. She was more likely to get back alone then if she took a whole mess of people with her.

After the order had already been given to evacuate as a transmission was sent out to reach the closest Alliance vessel. The message was simple, that because the worst possible outcome had come the ship it was to be destroyed getting rid of all research data and taking out any enemy ships with it. Hopefully by the time Sheppard had set the bombs the crew would have floated out far enough to not be hit by the blast.

Now, as the ship began to fall apart, it seems as though the cocky bastards had sent in tech experts and combat operatives to take out the rest of the crew and take whatever valuable bits and pieces back for analysis or experiments. Routine military knowledge was the Turians strong points who seemed experts in the art of well planned militaristic war. They were not savage or cruel but were rather what seemed as a race of people who lived by strict codes and rules. It almost made her sick as she could think of nothing but her father in that string of words.

She had never seen once before in her life what one of those Turians looked like, she just did what she was told which was fire, and never hesitate. That thought was almost foreign to her. She got the basic outline of what they looked like. She had seen dead Turian soldiers still wearing armor and helmets, the basic outlines of their bodies raised interest in her. Many times had she wanted to go over and remove a helmet wanting to see if they really looked like some strange "carapace covered dinosaurs" as one of well seasoned crew members had said they looked like.

"Yep, I saw one of those ugly bastards once. Helmet slit wide open and blue blood, BLUE BLOOD! Dripping everywhere pointy teeth and these funny plates like a raptor with a shell. Freaky mother fucker scared me even when he was dead." He said to his buddies loud enough for the whole crew to hear as he explained how his team had defended one of the human colonies near a mass relay. Then he described what they looked like and that played on her mind and made it almost impossible for her to really imagine them as real.

Whether or not they were some freaky Dinosaur Shepard wasn't afraid. Shepard had learned many things in her days in the academies as a soldier, a fighter and a survivor. She was damn well not going to die the same death her father had died. However if it had to come down to such a thing Shepard wouldn't go out alone she would take some bastards with her to hell, and she would win fucking medals for it!

Chapter 3: Luck be this lady

She made it to the main control room surprised at how easy it was to get there wondering if the Turians had already gotten what they wanted or were exploring a different part of the ship. It didn't matter as she went to the ship's cargo hold. It seemed as though they had already been here by the fact all the doors had been hacked and she could still see bullet marks and blood but the aliens seemed weary of the strange human weapons. At first she couldn't help but think how idiotic it sounded to make live weapon probes but now she could see benefits to it, a clever disguise and a good defense.

She went over to one of the probes taking off the plate that accessed the main control box. She began typing in the binary code as one of the young Turians making his way to the room. Sadly he hadn't noticed the human. From what the scanner had said no human life was left on board and he had seen the evacuation pods from the ship fly off to some unknown space as his people overpowered their vessel. He had just visited this room a few moments earlier and was now bored as he waited for his next orders. He couldn't help but see how primitive their ship and armor was. They didn't even have effective mass effect shields yet and wondered if his people were really even more primitive then this as he moved through the ship looking at the burned and shot up bodies of those who didn't survive.

He had seen many humans before and always found a hard time trying to figure out the males and the females seeing as he had been told females usually wore long hair and had… what were they? Asari had them too… though he never bothered with them… breasts maybe? Either way he found them rather strange looking as they laid there some with eyes wide open like they were still alive and just staring. It gave him the creeps.

He had been in the Turian fleet when he was 16 his father's request before he went back to work on the citadel like his dad but when his older brother died he had to rejoin. He had to fight, these humans were no small matter, but as much as he disliked them he couldn't say he hated them either. It was just disinterest in them; a sense of not caring that ate his emotions more than hatred, and a sense of loss of someone important that pushed him.

"Garrus," a voice could be heard over his omnitool.

"Yeah, what is it Gavorn?" He answered back lowering his weapon letting his guard down.

"We're ready to go back, the Captain wants to move the human's weapons back to the ship but we're going to need more people before we do anything. Head on back we'll be leaving soon."

"Understood, over and out."

Shepard ran franticly to each one of the bombs setting in the code she had stashed in her mind. Typing in as she set each so they would go off in about seventeen minutes in unison giving her seven minutes to get out safely.

Garrus could hear something, a slight tapping like footsteps in the background, someone was still alive. He stood to the side of the door where she couldn't see him. He could tell this one was a female based on her anatomy and based on looks and skin tight armor she was a higher rank then most of the other humans he had seen burnt and bleeding. He leapt out from his spot by the door.

"Don't move." He said as he raised his gun and aimed for her. Instinctively, not out of cowardice but because of her training she followed orders of the voice as she was told and stood still. "Who are you?"There was no answer, never give rank or name if they don't know your name they just kill you. If they do know your name and see importance you can experience a fate worse than death when they use your rank and importance against you for bribery and information.

"I said give me your name Human or I'll shoot." He didn't shout but she could sense the threat looming in his voice but there was hesitation whether he knew it or not. His training taught him to shoot on sight but he hadn't shot anyone just yet. He was a sniper and a damn good shot but he wasn't some ruthless mercenary. He was instead assigned to protect the group of techs as they went about the ship and then when they had done their job was to look through the ship for survivors.

But he watched as she stood still and turned around looking him in the eye her shoulders straight and posture perfect the look of someone with a commanding presence. She didn't cower or beg for her life and it almost held an elegance he wasn't familiar with in this species. What made this worse was the dark helmet she wore leaving her faceless and somber. It was almost a sense of acceptance this human had that kept him at bay. She realized he had control of the situation and that old sting shot through him telling him this wasn't his choice but necessity. These people wouldn't hesitate to kill him why should he. His finger quivered on the trigger as he aimed for the middle of her forehead. "Just part of the job," he reassured himself, as she didn't say a single word. His hesitation to Shepard was nerve racking as one single thought claimed her mind. "Come 'on why doesn't he just shoot?"

As if just for the moments sake a part of the rooms electrical wiring sparked and blew out over head causing the Turian to break his trance and look up just in time and instinctively cover his face as he put as hot sparks flew down. Now it was Shepard's turn to take out her gun. She knew what the problem was. It was poor electrical wiring that the crew engineers had been working on. The pipes where still loose so taking the shot she aimed towards the high ceiling to the metal hinge joints of the open ceiling where they had been working on the wiring. It fell with two shots falling on the Turian hitting him with a thud as his helmet cracked sending him to the floor and knocking the gun out of his hand.

For the brief moment he saw the world in a blurry haze through the thick cracked see-through strip of material on his helmet. "Thank the spirits," he thought as he pulled off his helmet in his daze not really sure what he was doing anymore as the initial shock of what happened overwhelmed him and he took in deep breaths. He heard the click of a pistol and looked up to see one shoved in his face. DAMN! He knew he should have taken the shot.

Now she was in control of the situation the way she was used to. She could take the shot easily now he was exposed but that was what stopped her. She couldn't help but take in his face. She couldn't help but see what people had been talking about he looked like some creature she had seen before, she just couldn't place it. Like a lobster, cat, bird. She just wasn't sure and the thought sent her spiraling as she looked into the sharpest blue eyes she had ever seen. She couldn't say he was ugly, it kind of stumped her, the first Turian she had ever seen and she was too busy taking in his features to make a shot to his face.

"Well," he said. She took notice of the way his mandibles, she thought was the correct term, and his lower and bottom jaw all seemed to move in some detached matter showing pointed teeth. He looked at her just the same as she had looked at him, expecting the worst but the difference was he didn't see her face but he saw hers. The now faceless enemy had a face: mouth, nose, and eyes that looked at her knowing her next move. Without even realizing it she lowered her weapon a bit.

Some people believe that soldiers just go around shooting people. They see there comrades' die and there first instinct is to wave their guns and shoot. It may be true but when faced in strong situations where personal matters are put in place a soldier can quickly lose their fighting spirit.

The same rule that applies to a soldier in the means of a name can also be applied to the other. You don't give a name and you don't take one. You never let it get personal; personality on the battlefield is as useful as an infected leg. It kills, slowly and discretely, one of Shepard's oldest memories was being at the academies when they told her "The Truth's" of war. The instructor told her old soldier's stories about men who would snap and lose themselves on the battlefield, letting themselves loose to the pressure. They would drop their guns and run into enemy fire as if to just end their own suffering.

War was no child's game when you kill it becomes its own personal scar. Not as though she hadn't killed many before this was one of the more leisure missions the alliance given her. Before then it was safe guarding colonies and what not. The fact that it bothered her not to kill some other species… when she had even killed her own for less reason then war… Spiteful eyes and faces she saw as common. Now that she had seen a foreign face, a kill that was so calm and unafraid, it became that personal wall, it was far too personal and she knew she was deadly close to "biting bullets."

She looked down at her cheap military version of an 'omnitool' something that the military had taken from Turian soldiers, made copies of and distributed to alliance soldiers. Time was running out and she now had five minutes left if she was to make it out safe. The ship was going to blow up anyways would it really matter if she shot him now. Would it be worth it?

"Of course!" said a small voice in the back of her mind. Look at what they did to your crew your ship. Just like your father, but she couldn't help but sympathize they knew the risk when coming out here. It was an inevitable fate that they would be attacked. Would one Turians death bring them all the crew back? No. Would it save the ship, no. Would he die in the blast probably anyway? Maybe.

So would it truly be worth the fret?

"Not today," she said, her voice sounding sadder and more worn then she would have liked it to, and she kicked his gun away and lowered her weapon to her side. Giving him one last look before running like hell. He sat for a second wondering if that had really just happened. He stood up and walked over to the bomb looking down over it. She was running from something and he knew what it was.

"Gavorn," he said as he opened up the channel on his omnitool.

"Yah Garrus, what is it?"

"Get out of here I think the bombs are going to go off, and I have a feeling that it is going to be pretty soon."

"What do you mean go off? Did you do something Garrus, what happened!" he said as his voice held concern but frustration. Garrus had been known as a good soldier but not so much for his reliability he was known not to be too great with following orders and then there was a small habit of getting into trouble every now and then when it came to authority. He always said he wasn't that good at being a Turian.

"I don't have time to explain just go!"

"What are you going to do?" Good point, he looked out the door and down the corridor the human had gone through.

"Don't worry; I have a vague idea of what to do. Over and out." The yellow and orange screen flashed off as he went in her general direction. She couldn't just be running just for the exercise.

Chapter 4: You sympathize more then you realize.

Shepard made her way to the section of the ship that had the evacuation pods. If she was lucky there would still be some left. Sadly she wouldn't remember which; the ship was mainly miles of pipes that lead to ventilations and tanks. With half the ships wiring on the frits it seems as though a pipeline from the life support room chose to melt enough to let a high concentration of oxygen leak. Fire lives off oxygen, in case the common man doesn't know, and when a high concentration of pure clean oxygen that was originally meant to be redistributed into the vents is instead thrown into a dry fire. It had become like a small bomb in itself sending Shepard flying, and then darkness.

Garrus on the other hand made his way concentrating on her fresh sent trough the hot air that burned his lungs and made the exposed hide on his neck slowly bead with sweat. He could feel the vibration of a blast as he shielded his face from a burst of heat. Something had blown up but didn't hesitate by waiting a moment before going on. He stopped as he saw the body of the women from before. She must have been hit from the blast.

"Damn," he wasn't sure why he said it. Maybe he just marveled at her bad luck with a sense of pain kind of like watching someone being hit or falling off something. The piece of wall looked like it had crushed her if she wasn't already killed by the blast. In a way he probably couldn't have cared about her death unless if she had been a mercenary or thug he just saw the pods and jumped over her.

He could hear a cough, a wheeze. He looked back behind and down at his feet. Was she still alive?

"Damn," he said again this time out of out of sense of amazement. Humans were said to be small and squishy, though he never delighted in really finding that out, but they were also small and weak looking compared to Turians. Blunt nails and no real means of natural protection. "Oh well," He turned around ready to go into the pod quickly hacking it then about to step in.

He heard another cough and looked back at the unconscious body. Again he felt that unknown sting of guilt. He heard the deep soothing voice through the helmet say, "Not today," all over again. All its sympathy and forgiveness, she didn't take the shot and if it wasn't for her he wouldn't have found the pods. His conscience told him he owed her but was that really true. She seemed to have as much of a conscience as he had. She could have shot him. He would have shot him, he knew many of his own species that would have shot him, he knew many other species that would have shot him, but she took mercy's route.

They had both had the chance to kill each other so now he was faced with the biggest decision after all that flip-flopping should he help her or flee.

He also had a feeling he didn't have much time to debate this.

"Damn," he breathed out slowly and sighed. He grunted as he picked up the piece of metal that held her and threw it off before throwing her over his shoulder unceremoniously and got into the pod putting her down and shutting the door behind them. The timing wasn't perfect but in some miraculous way they had made it only 35 seconds after the time needed to get away safely giving them that ten minute boost sending them zooming away at a fast enough speed that the ship now looked like a speck as they sped away safely and the ship blew up. The pod which had been made with enough lead in it saved Shepard from being affected by the radiation and kept them safe from the sonic boom that ripped through the vacuum of space. Whether or not Garrus knew if his fellow crew was safe was unknown to him and he could only ask the spirits that they had all returned without harm.

Whatever didn't affect them had affected the pods communication systems and guidance systems as it steered off course and ripped through the atmosphere of a medium sized uninhabited planet.

In a strange sense with the gravitational pull of the planet as there pod seemed to burn through the atmosphere he felt himself slip much like he had just hump off a building his mind not able to take the feeling and pressure of the fall. The pods safety mechanisms activated as it sensed a crash course into the planet's surface and braced itself as it landed into a small but deep body of water gently rocking them both to shore.

I hope you enjoyed. I also hope it made sense. :3

I am not used to writing science fiction but I love this game so much and Garrus is my favorite alien EVER! Also I am bored and I thought this would be an interesting idea. Everyone seems to do the same story of Sheppard and Garrus on the Normandy and I thought what it would be like to put them into a different scenario. I am not going to go into any specific detail on my Shepard so you don't feel like it's… well I like the feeling when I go into a story that it's my Shepard. Just makes the whole experience that much better. I am also not giving her a first name either that always gets me.

Anyways if this didn't make any sense in some way tell me and I can correct it. I really am trying with this story it took me a whole week to get this the way I wanted it and I still feel funny about it. (I probably read through it more times than anyone else ever will)

Also this Sheppard is more of a Paragon Shepard then a renegade. I tried to make her seem like she was making decisions like what Boiware gives you like "kill a foe" or "persuade him." I also hate renegade female Shepard, sorry guys in my own opinion she is just a b****! Plus if you romanced anyone in mass effect 2 sometimes being renegade Shepard didn't really get you any if you know what I'm saying.

Send reviews please!