Thank you for reading! I don't own any Mass Effect characters, plot lines, or anything.

"No matter what happens," Shepard said, coming up to cup his face in her hands, "Know that I love you. Always."

She didn't care about the bullets flying all around them. Her eyes were so dark they were almost black, staring into him like they were willing him to remember her. Because she didn't think she was coming back.

And neither did he.

There was only one thing to say. Down at the bottom of the pit where all their hopes for any kind of future were being shredded in a hail of bullets, only one thing mattered.

"I love you too," he said. And she turned to leave. But one of the shots caught her, right in the neck. She was bleeding out. Liara dropped him, going to Shepard immediately and using her biotics like a kind of field bandage. He limped over to the cargo bay comm and told Joker to get them out of there, to get them all out of there.

And when they lifted off, her eyes met his. She was hurt, he was hurt, the whole battle might be lost. But no one was charging off alone today. Her mouth opened like she was going to say something. But all that came out was a chiming bell.

Kaidan woke in the cockpit. His headache had dulled to manageable levels. And his omnitool was chiming.

Because Shepard hadn't been shot, she'd made it into the Citadel. And now he was waiting to find out if she was alive or dead.

He'd thought that getting into an armed standoff with the woman he loved was a hell of a thing to happen in a soldier's life. But wishing she'd been shot in the neck was surely worse.

Hell, they had medigel. She would have been fine. And she'd be here, right next to him. The Reapers would probably still be wrecking Earth, though.

This day was a special kind of bad. He'd go crazy if he started thinking about what -if.

Kaidan lurched out of the co-pilot chair, and jogged to the Comm room. His mouth tasted like a varren had molted in it, and he had a whole collection of aches and pains to go with the headache.

He answered the call without looking to see who it was. Admiral Hackett's image formed, and he breathed out relief.

"Sir," he said, nodding in respect. "Is there any news?"

"That's why I'm calling you, Major Alenko," Admiral Hackett said. "My rescue team just contacted me to say that they have found a section of the Citadel center that remained sealed when it exploded. And there is a life form in there. Unfortunately, that's all they know."

Hope seared through him, more crippling than any kind of despair. Kaidan swayed on his feet. When Shepard died the first time, despair had kept him numb. He was totally unprepared for what hope was doing for his heart.

But she needed him. He had to get it together. Right now.

"How are they going to get her out without depressurizing the sealed area?" Kaidan asked, his brow furrowing. "Shepard wasn't wearing her helmet when she went into the beam. It would be unwise to assume that she has a supply of oxygen."

"That's exactly the issue that I wanted your help with, Major," Admiral Hackett said. "My team doesn't know how to proceed."

With difficulty and after several slow blinks, Kaidan decoded that as 'I didn't want to make a rash decision and piss off the last standing human Spectre. Who has my best ship.'

That was new. That was new, and it was awesome. If Hackett was checking in before making decisions about Shepard's rescue he could make sure they were made right.

Kaidan pulled up his omni tool and contacted Tali. "Admiral Tali'Zorah, please come to the comm room on the double. A rescue team based out of Earth may have located Shepard but they've encountered a snag that you have unique insight on."

"When did you. . . what is. . . I will be right there," Tali said. Kaidan flinched in guilt. He hadn't told the crew that they'd scrambled a rescue team. He hadn't kept them apprised at all. Shepard would never have done that. He was keeping them in the dark just because he was too busy.

Well, no longer. He was going to fix that. Soon.

"Admiral Tali'Zorah is a spacer with experience in every kind of depressurization emergency." Kaidan made sure to keep using her title in case Admiral Hackett started to feel like he was asking an ensign to solve his lofty problems. "She is used to working with substandard equipment, too."

"Are you calling my fleet substandard?" Tali said behind him. She was wearing her full biotainer suit. Garrus, in full armor, came through the door behind her. Had no one on this blighted ship actually taken a rest period?

"Admiral Tali'Zorah," Kaidan said, glossing over any and all references to her home fleet, "We may have found Shepard. There is a section of the Citadel center that is still sealed, and the rescue crew that Admiral Hackett scrambled found life signs inside. They need to find a way to get in without depressurizing it."

"Or sending rubble off in all directions," Garrus mused, almost like he was thinking out loud.

"Admiral Hackett, does this ship have a functioning drive core?" Tali asked, dismissing everything else from her attention. Admiral Hackett shot Kaidan a look. The resolution on his image wasn't clear enough to be sure, but it seemed to be exasperation. Kaidan flinched in guilt again. No leaving the crew in the dark. Got it. His headache was getting worse again.

"It never had a drive core. This ship is twenty-four years old. It was one of the last we made during the contact war, before we had access to mass effect technology," Admiral Hackett said. "It relies on manual docking and locking procedures. In order to get close to this particular part of the Citadel, the rescue team needs to manually lock onto something in part of the rubble. The crew has some machinery that can shift rubble, but they're concerned that any attempt to move rubble will depressurize the area. They've locked down the life signs to a ten-meter square area. But because they're trying to scan through debris they can't get a better grasp of where she is."

"What makes them think this is Shepard?" Garrus asked. He was leaning against the doorway, out of frame for the vid connection. But still audible. Admiral Hackett didn't seem surprised to have an audience.

"We honestly don't know who it is. Or even what species. We can only hope," Admiral Hackett said. Garrus grunted, but let it go.

"I don't know of any way to keep the area under pressure without a drive core," Tali said. "A ship with a drive core could extend their mass effect field out past the ship to encompass the rubble. It would be like working in a bubble, but stable. For hours. But without a drive core. . ."

"A mass effect field can prevent depressurization?" Kaidan said. "I've never tried that. But it makes sense." Perfect sense.

"If you can't use tech, look to the crew," Garrus said. Kaidan had never wished in his entire life to be able to teleport so badly. She needed someone just like him, he could save her, but once again he was just not where he needed to be.

"Are there any biotics on this crew?" Kaidan asked. Admiral Hackett pulled up a data reader, then nodded.

"There are two. Also a doctor, two engineers, a pilot, and a handful of soldiers who have previously done spacer rescue and recovery. It's the best crew I was able to scramble at the last minute. I had to pull most of them out of support roles, because the best front line troops were all here in London," Admiral Hackett said.

"Is there a way to speak to the biotics?" Kaidan asked. "And the recovery experts. And the engineer? Does their ship have the capability to talk on this frequency?"

"I'll send their contact information right away, Major," Admiral Hackett said. "We are currently having to operate on a lot of old hard line tech but I was able to send a mobile comm unit up with this ship."

"Thank you, Admiral Hackett," Kaidan said, coming to attention. Admiral Hackett nodded, then blinked out of his blue existence.

"What the hell, Kaidan," Garrus said, as soon as the three of them were alone.

"Is this what you've been doing this whole time?" Tali demanded. "Sitting here waiting for someone else to rescue Shepard?"

"Whoa," Kaidan said, holding up his hands. "As soon as the comm link was up, I contacted Admiral Hackett and talked him into scrambling that search party. It's the best I could do."

"Glad to see you haven't gotten your head up your ass, Alenko," Garrus said. He gestured toward the comm system with one clawed hand. "Now are we going to contact that team, or what?"

What would Shepard do?

"Not yet," Kaidan said. "We need ten minutes to brief the crew and gather ideas. It was a mistake to keep you all in the dark before. I'm not going to mess this up because I was in too much of a hurry to get all the intel I could." Shepard always stressed the importance of intel. Tiny pieces of seemingly irrelevant information could make or break a mission. But I'm the man who's always been two minutes too slow to save her. "But we need to make this a quick meeting. Can you two gather everyone in the mess hall? And I do mean everyone. Quick as their feet can carry them. Wake people up. This is a three bell alarm."

"Why the mess hall?" Tali asked, hands on her hips.

"Coffee's in the mess hall," Kaidan said. If they'd been Alliance he would have said one of the old in-jokes about naval coffee. But somehow he didn't think they'd get the punch line.

He stopped by the cockpit on his way down and got that stimulant the Doctor had given him earlier. He took it without hesitation. It would make the headaches worse, play hell with his stomach. Better than being a dull stone right now.

Vega, Joker, and Liara were already in the mess hall when he got there. Vega had made coffee already, like a good Navy Lieutenant, and handed him some before he even asked. It was thick and black as tar. Just like his old Sergeant used to make back when he was an ensign.

"Thanks," he said, to which Vega just waved his hand. Joker was tapping out a rhythm on the tabletop, absorbed in some inner vision. Liara had changed, got cleaned up. But she was tense as hell.

"I'm sorry I didn't come get you as soon as the comm came through," he said to Liara. "We may have found Shepard."

Liara sat down so abruptly in one of the mess hall chairs that in someone younger, less graceful, it would have been called falling. Kaidan realized that he suddenly had the rapt attention of everyone in the room. Should he go ahead and tell them, or wait? Which would be faster in the long run? How was he supposed to make these kinds of decisions when the world was all sharp edges and super bright lights?

He was saved from making a decision, and possibly guessing wrong, by the arrival of Tali and Garrus trailing Engineer Adams, Dr. Chakwas, Javik, Traynor, and Donnelly, Daniels and Adams from the Engineering bay. He nodded to them all, in lieu of more drawn out greetings.

"We may have found Shepard," he repeated. A few of the people who had been going for coffee stopped in their tracks. He couldn't imagine any other topic that would rivet their attention so fast. It was easy to forget he wasn't the only one who had a personal stake here.

He realized for the first time that while he'd been in the comm room they'd all been working on getting the Normandy working. Shepard would probably want him to focus on the crew, on getting them safe. Hell, if their situations were reversed and he was the one lost out in space he'd want her to just focus on getting everyone else home. Good thing she didn't get a vote.

"Liara and I got the comm system running and convinced Admiral Hackett to send a rescue group to the Citadel. They found a sealed pocket of debris near the Citadel center, and there are life signs inside. The issue is going to be getting into the debris field without depressurizing it. And every minute counts," Kaidan said.

"They could use the drive core to extend their ship's mass effect field around the debris," Engineer Adams began. But Kaidan threw up a hand to stop him following that line of thought.

"This ship doesn't have a drive core. It's from the first contact war. All original Earth tech. That's why they were able to get it up there so quickly. They didn't have to stop and repair a bunch of damage from that blast that took down the Reapers," Kaidan said.

"So it did work, then," Garrus said, quietly. "The Reapers are gone?"

Oh hell. This was why the fraternization rules existed. He was so focused on Jamie - no, Shepard - that he was totally falling down on his duties as a commanding officer. Though, to be fair, he didn't exactly command Garrus.

"Admiral Hackett confirmed that all the Reapers, and Reaper creatures, on and around Earth were killed by that blast. We know that it traveled through the mass relays to other systems and we can hope that it killed Reapers in all of those systems too," Kaidan said. Garrus accepted this with a small nod.

"A biotic could use a mass effect field to keep the debris pressurized," Liara said, slowly. "But I think. . . yes. I think that they would still have to work fast. It should be possible to prevent any unwanted debris shift or any depressurization. But a complete airtight seal would be beyond the abilities of most biotics."

"There are two biotics on board," Kaidan began, but Dr. Chakwas interrupted him.

"Have they been able to determine anything about her state?" Dr. Chakwas said. "Is she severely injured?"

"Yeah, what about like shock and blood loss and stuff?" said Joker, a frown etched deeply into his face.

"Oh, shock isn't a problem," said Dr. Chakwas. "Not if her cybernetic implants are at all functioning. Even after taking a lot of damage her neural implants would prevent her from going into shock or blacking out."

"Wait, what?" said Kaidan, suddenly more awake than he'd been in hours. "You mean she might be severely injured, but still conscious?" Alone in the dark and in pain?

"Well, yes." Dr. Chakwas shifted uncomfortably. "I did several scans of her implants over the last two years. There are several redundant systems built in. Cerberus designed those implants to keep Shepard going through a suicide mission against the Collectors. As long as her major organs aren't injured she could be alive for a long time. The implants would keep her breathing, keep her heart beating. And the neural implants seem to focus on keeping her adrenaline production up for a battle. She shouldn't be susceptible to shock. And she wouldn't pass out unless she lost so much blood that . . . well, she wouldn't pass out unless she wasn't going to wake up again."

Kaidan swallowed panic. Panic would not help.

"It's good for us to plan on her being awake, anyway," Liara said. "This is Shepard. Even if she's very badly hurt, she might kill a few of the rescue workers before she realizes they aren't another Cerberus faction out to rebuild her."

"That is the most frightening compliment I have ever heard," Traynor said, crossing her arms over her chest.

"The team they were able to get isn't very experienced." Kaidan cut across this with his best Major voice. "At least, the biotics aren't. We will know more about the experience of the engineers and rescue operatives when we talk to them. For now, we need to find a way to address the three problems we have set in front of us. We need to talk the new biotics through maintaining pressure in a field of debris. We need to know how to move debris without destructuralizing the entire pocket. And we need to find a way to make sure Shepard doesn't kill the rescue team." He paused to gather them all in by eye. "Does anyone have any other issues or concerns that they want to see addressed?"

"How would they get her back on that ship at all?" asked Donnelly, raising his hand. "A ship like this one, you can just open the cargo bay and extent the mass effect field. But they have to be able to wrestle her into an airlock."

"Good question. Anyone have an answer?" Kaidan asked. There was a moment of silence. "Every minute counts. We need solutions fast."

"Maybe. . ." Engineer Adams began, then stopped. He looked around. "I wouldn't have thought of that, I guess, but it did used to be a pretty common problem back before mass effect fields became commonplace. I remember having classes on that back in school. I think the common practice was to have spacer equipment for the person being rescued, and at least four outriders in full space suits to clear a path. I hope they have hand tractors to move the rubble. A lot of crews rely on having a biotic on board now, but there are machines that can keep rubble off the rescue party."

"Yeah, these biotics might be busy. We'll ask about the hand tractors," Kaidan said. He looked around. His headache was reacting nicely to the stimulant. On the one hand, he was very awake now. On the other hand, he could practically hear his blood throbbing through his head. "That's good work. Does anyone else have any concerns?"

Silence, for three throbbing head-aching heartbeats. Then Liara shook her head and shrugged.

"I don't have concerns, but I do have a thought. I have previously used my biotics to assist in a depressurization emergency. It's been a few decades but I can coach the new biotics through it." Liara nodded reassuringly.

"I have a thought, too," Tali said. "About the debris field. On salvage missions it is very important to save tech that might be floating among heavy wreckage. You want something slow and finely tuned for that. There is a trick one can do with a standard calibration pump that makes it perfect for that."

"Excellent. Tali, you'll tell the rescue team how to do that, and how they operate it," Kaidan said. "I think, if the rescue team takes their comm links and turns the output out super high, your voices should be audible to Shepard. That should reassure her and keep her from doing anything to injure the rescue workers or herself."

"You should be on the comm, too, Kaidan," said Dr. Chakwas. "Your voice is very distinctive. And you are the one person Shepard will know is absolutely not working for Cerberus."

Because even looking the woman I love in the face, knowing she'd been given back to me from the dead, I still called her a traitor and walked away.

"Yeah, okay," Kaidan said. He vastly preferred to gloss over how and why that was a good idea. A man could only deal with so many things at once. "Good work everyone. Let's get moving."