AN: Well I'm glad to see that, as of the moment I'm writing this, that the first chapter has been well received.

Themes will be redone, as obviously the old one's don't match the new take on some characters. You can honestly blame this theme for why I wanted to do this reboot so badly. (Also kind of wish FF would let us insert links)

Character Theme(s):

Hannah/Eva & Evalyn: Red Like Roses Part II by Jeff and Casey Williams

S&S

Beacon Technologies stock saw a surge yesterday following a surprise announcement by CEO, Azime Circe. While cybernetic enhancement has become a common sight in many parts of the world, the reveal of fully synthetic bodies that can extend a human life past that of the body has caused both approval and uproar across the globe. There have been thousands of calls to the Government to have this technology banned from all UNAS territories, but civil rights groups have been lobbying hard since the moment the announcement ended to protect their right to reside in whatever body they so choose… (Continued on page A-2)

-Washington Post, 2061 CE

S&S

Four Months After Akuze

The blonde woman growled as she continued to punish the heavy bag in front of her, sweat caused the loose shirt to cling to her form, though tellingly not her right arm. Finally, with a shout of effort she slammed her right fist into the object of her ire, causing the object to rock on its mount despite the tension being set to the maximum.

She made her way over to where a towel and a bottle of water was waiting for her, grumbling as she moved the artificial arm through several different poses, four months and her replacement limbs still didn't feel right. The leg wasn't as bad, but the arm was a continual work in progress as she was continually uncovering new flaws in the design.

As she retired to her corner of the room she used that opportunity to size up the quartet that had been watching her since she had arrived, most of them looked like marines freshly returned from their first tour, but the one in the front she recognized as Rear Admiral Mikhailovich's son, whose name escaped her at this moment. Which meant he was likely both stupid, and charmingly hostile to both aliens and enhanced humans.

Then again that was the norm this deep in human space, Arcturus rarely allowed aliens on board, and there had yet to be a single alien allowed into the Sol system, at least officially.

Deciding that now was the time to make their move the group of men made their way towards her, the Admiral's son had the type of grin on his face that only those with a complete lack of understanding of their own abilities could possess.

The man leaned back on his heels, "You're, Shepard, right?"

She sighed as she pushed her hair back, letting her mismatched orbs bore into him, it was an unsubtle method to unnerve people, but effective, "Yes, can I help you, Lieutenant?"

The big man gave her a smirk, "The boys wanted to know if you could beat me in a sparring session, we just got back from our tour and none of them were a challenge. I figured if I had the chance I should start at the top."

She knew she shouldn't, but she also really wanted to hit him if she was being honest, "Fine."

The group was obviously surprised by her agreement as the three men behind him began to whisper among themselves as she pushed through them, stopping in the middle of the marked off area she turned to glance back at the man who hadn't moved since she had agreed, "Are you coming, or was that just talk?"

His hangers-on's gave a chuckle at that, which just served to fuel the petty anger that was no doubt coursing through his veins. He stormed across the room to take his position opposite of her as he took up the standard alliance hand to hand stance, Evalyn in turn mirrored him but she was leading with her left instead of her right.

He moved first, a powerful but clumsy swing which she just backed out of, darting in to slam a left into his torso which the large man just shrugged off. He smirked victoriously while her own face was a mask, though she could concede that at least he was in shape, even if he was an idiot.

A crowd was already beginning to form around the pair, though not many were cheering for her she noted, not that she was surprised having become essentially a non-person to the Alliance military since Akuze. And those that had been ambivalent to her had quickly changed sides when her, difficulties, in adjusting had surfaced.

She dodged or blocked his next combination of blows, before hooking her left leg behind his resulting in the overextended marine falling face first into the mat. She moved a few paces back as she let him get to his feet, her face reflecting how bored she felt about this fight so far.

Her opponent glared at her as he pushed himself to his feet, a growled question emerging from his mouth, "Do you plan on fighting?"

"Do you plan on making me?" She was fairly certain it was her emotionless tone, and not the words themselves that caused him to surge forward with a surprising amount of speed, forcing her reflexes to dictate her action resulting in her blocking the blow on her artificial arm.

The moment she blocked the strike she knew that he realized what he had hit, her injuries had been kept under wraps so it was not something the rank and file knew about. Before he could say anything she lashed out, pushing him back with a series of strikes as she danced inside of his guard.

At least until the mat under her feet shifted and she caught a fist on her chin, she stumbled backwards noting that two of his lackeys were suspiciously near the edge of the mat that had betrayed her, but had little time to bother with that when her opponent surged at her again.

But she was done with this little game, more importantly she was done with being a show for these marines, and so she caught the oncoming fist with her replacement appendage, yanking him forward so that he stumbled past her only to be knocked to the ground with a swipe from her leg.

"Stay down. This match is done."

She could hear him already pushing himself to his feet, a sigh escaping her lips as she was forced to deal with someone who just couldn't handle their own failings. She turned to regard the man, noting that he was bleeding from his nose, likely having hit the mat badly from his fall. His eyes had the type of anger in them that caused people to do stupid things, and as he opened his mouth she knew she wasn't going to be disappointed, "Fucking, synthetic bitch, this match is done when I say it's done."

That stopped her cold, as a flare of anger burst to life from her chest. She found herself wordlessly propelled towards him as her pulse throbbed inside of her skull, casually catching the punch that he threw at her. But stupid to the extreme he just smirked at her, "So you get any other fun bits added along with the arm?"

"Well this can be pretty fun," and with that she squeezed, the man's screams caused the crowd to recoil from the pair, and as he dropped to his knees thanks to the inhuman pressure she was able to apply to the, oh so fragile, bones of his hand, she felt a ghost of a smile form on her face. "I'd demand an apology, but I know that you are too stupid to realize you overstepped." She squeezed again causing another fresh bout of blubbering, "Next time you decide to run that mouth of yours, just remember this moment."

She slammed her left fist into his skull, causing her opponent to slump to the ground like a piece of meat, "If you can remember this moment that is."

Her eyes were drawn to her still trembling fist, noting for the first time the biotic field that had wrapped itself around her hand. She had hoped the flareups would start to fade, but four months and it didn't seem like that was going to be the case.

She turned from the slumped form, and began to make her way towards where her few items in the room lay, noting that the throng of people around the ring hadn't begun to disperse she just kept moving forward, "Either make a hole, or I will." She let her biotics flare intentionally this time for good measure, quickly resulting in people stumbling to get out of the blonde's path.

As she stuffed her things into the bag she had brought with her she quickly made her way out of the room. She just wanted to get back to her room and shower, before she found herself forced to sit and listen to another lecture that Anderson was no doubt going to give her.

S&S

He found her sequestered in the corner of the mess hall glaring at the food in front of her, "It's been almost an hour, Anderson. I think you're getting slow in your old age."

The man in question just chuckled as he slid into the seat across from her, "Your A.I wouldn't tell me where you were."

A frown momentarily flickered on the blonde's normally impassive features, "She's not my A.I, all that I did was forge her chains, it was the Alliance's decision to lock her in this," she gestured vaguely with her cutlery, "prison." Anderson flinched at the monotone that Evalyn spoke in, it was well known that she had strong objections to what had been done to Eliza, but it had been made clear in no uncertain terms to the then Academy student that she could either shackle the A.I or never join the Alliance.

And so she had done it, in fact she had done her job so well that the Alliance had decided to move the A.I from Jump Zero to Arcturus. Eliza currently operated everything from elevators to the station's guardian defenses, all enforced by the myriad of commands and physical blocks that Eva had devised. Few actually knew that she was an A.I, most just thought that she was a collection of extremely sophisticated V.I programs all operating under the same name, in fact most visitors from the Citadel complained about how useless Avina was in comparison to the human construct.

Of course that wasn't to say there wasn't internal debate on how to treat the A.I, the Admiralty was firmly of the opinion that she was merely hardware to be used. In fact, David was quite certain that if they had been able to convince Eva to do the process again they would have a shackled A.I in every base and dreadnought by this point.

Oddly enough it was the politicians for a change that were attempting to grant the A.I some, albeit very limited, rights. Arguing that the Alliance charter did not specify that a being born in the SA had to be organic, and there was no argument that Eliza had been born inside of Alliance held space.

"Anderson, did you come here for a reason?"

The blonde's annoyed tone snapped him out of his reverie, and suddenly reminded of why he came here a sigh came out of the older man's lips, "You know why I'm here."

"I'm afraid I haven't the slightest clue," and from the utter lack of reaction he would have been inclined to believe her, if not for the fact that this was the third such incident in as many months.

"Evalyn, I understand that he did challenge you to the match, but you took it too far, again." His gaze dared her to deny his allegation again, and after a few moments he saw a flash of something in her eyes, "He insulted me."

At that Anderson could only tilt his head, "He insulted you."

"Yes."

The utter lack of concern caused anger to flare in the older man's chest, his fist slamming into the table, "You fractured his skull, Eva."

That sudden anger died just as quickly as there was barely even a flicker of reaction from his momentary loss of control, just that cold dead stare that was all the girl was seemingly able to muster lately, well aside from when she was enraged.

After a few moments of her calculated starring she moved her left hand to her temple and started rubbing, her reply coming out softer than he expected, "I know that I shouldn't have, David," she bowed her head and closed her eyes, as he saw the steady rise and fall of her chest he realized she was slowly going through those old breathing exercises Hannah had taught her, "He called me, well I'm sure you know what he called me, or at least have a pretty good guess. Then all I could feel was the anger, like fire in my veins and I just had to get it out." Her eyes finally opened again and there was a flicker of some life in them, "The flareup wasn't intentional, I lost control of my biotics, again."

Anderson couldn't help but nod sympathetically, the myriad of problems that had come out of Akuze didn't limit themselves to just the physical damage, and the psychological wounds, the girl's biotics had been behaving erratically and the Alliance's 'specialists' had no idea what was the cause. And Evalyn refused to have an Asari look at her, which left only a handful of specialists in the galaxy who could treat her but since she was grounded in Alliance space that wasn't happening.

"Have you thought any about what that Doctor told you?"

A scoff came from the blonde, "You mean that my flares are from suppressed trauma," she gave a harsh laugh, "trust me if there is something that I'm not suppressing I'd be surprised," and while the flippant remark was more normal for the blonde he could see that there was something else she wanted to say.

"Eva, what is it." The blonde was quiet for a few minutes, obviously debating internally before she began to speak, almost haltingly so, "My Mom. I saw her."

Internally David sighed, this was not the type of news he had been hoping to hear, "I'm not sure I understand, do you mean you saw her recently? Or did you see her on Akuze?"

"Akuze, and no, or maybe yes," the last bit was practically whispered before an angry growl emerged from her throat, "I don't fucking know okay! Whenever I try to remember it seems to fade away even further, but then I'll wake up from some fucking dream, and for a few moments I can see her leaning above me clear as day."

Anderson just let her continue, before almost quietly interjecting, "Child, you were on the brink of death, we've all wished to see our loved ones when it looks like we aren't going to make it."

The sound of tortured metal filled his ears as he realized that Evalyn's hand was warping the table it was gripped on to, "This wasn't the figment of a girl with fucking Mommy issues, David! She was there, it was on a ship, and, she looked older, and her hair was different. Why the hell would I imagine my Mother with different hair!"

He was aware that the rest of the room had suddenly focused their attention on the pair following the outburst, but he paid them no mind.

Instead he could only shake his head at the content of the shout, he knew that Hannah's death had hit Evalyn hard but he had thought, hoped really, that she was past this by now. The girl had sworn that following her Father's death she had seen her Mother, and now yet another sighting. And as much as he didn't want to be the one to do this, he knew he had to before she did something incredibly stupid, "Evalyn, you were picked up on Akuze by the Alliance," he paused before gently adding, "And this isn't the first time that you've seen her, is it. You remember that right?"

Mismatched eyes glared at him, obviously going back to the arguments that had raged between herself and the tag team of David and her Grandfather. Her words emerged in little more than a hiss, "She, was, there."

Then in a move that proved that, despite her own complaints, the girl was having no trouble adapting to her new limbs Evalyn had slipped out from the table, and was halfway to the exit by the time Anderson had made it to his feet.

"Evalyn, you can't just walk away from a truth you don't want to admit to."

She turned to glare at him as she reached the exit, and he would admit that if it wasn't for the wrong colored eyes it was like Hannah was back from the grave, "I won't force myself to accept what you see as the truth, but I can certainly walk away."

Her artificial limb caressed the door's access panel as she walked through, and he realized what she had done the moment the door slammed downward, an angry red symbol proclaiming him to be locked on the opposite side of the doorway that he wanted to be.

An annoyed sigh emerged from his lips, "Eliza, could you please open this door for me."

S&S

Evalyn made her way towards where she knew Hackett's office was, what few soldiers were on duty simply accepted her presence while the few commands she tapped into her Omni began the process of wiping her presence from any non-organic surveillance.

It was their fault that she could do it after all, did they really think she hadn't added her own backdoors to the system when they installed Eliza into Arcturus.

Her footsteps faltered as she made her way past Admiral Lindholm's office, her Father's former office. Shaking her head irritably she resumed her march towards her goal, Hackett's office was of course the furthest down this corridor. And she noted a single guard stood in front of the Admiral's office, and he was obviously squirming as he saw her approach.

"How can I help you, Ma'am?"

He shifted uncomfortably as she starred at him for before replying, "I need to speak with the Admiral, is he in?"

"Uh, no, he's out." At her raised eyebrow the man stammered, "I mean, he's out, Ma'am."

She sighed, "Well would it be possible for me to wait inside for him, my biotics are acting up and I'd prefer not to have a flareup because of all this noise," she made a show of wincing at a particularly loud noise in the distance, "migraines."

The sheer level of fear that simple sentence drew from the man was honestly somewhat pathetic, but it was more then enough for him to open the door and step aside in an effort to get away from what was viewed as modern day witchcraft.

She probably should have felt guilty, but she didn't.

The moment the door shut she brought up the hall's security cameras in her HUD to make sure she wasn't caught, and satisfied she was covered on that end she went to work.

It was the work of only a few moments to get into Hackett's terminal, the Alliance put far too much stock on their physical safeguards. Then again who would think that a Shepard would be hacking into a man who had been a primary figure in her life, she knew that she was having a lot of trouble reconciling her actions with her sense of duty.

But she needed these answers.

She limited her search to files that were processed during the time period just shortly before Akuze, the frown that had begun forming only deepening as she realized the sheer amount of paperwork the Admiral dealt with on a daily basis.

"Think, Eva." Her eyes lit up when she remembered that she had supposedly been picked up by an Alliance medical frigate, "Transfer orders."

Her eyes narrowed as she realized the frigate's position had been shifted, "When did he contact them?" Her eyes scanned the log of calls but came to a screeching halt as she read a single innocuous line.

Captain Carol Danvers.

The name of her Mother's favorite superhero, and the address listed had the hallmarks of being a false return. She knew that this wouldn't convince anyone, but she didn't care about convincing anyone but herself, and this was enough for her to think that maybe she hadn't snapped as much as she had thought.

But that didn't change the fact she couldn't make sense of any of this, the more pieces she found the less sense the puzzle made, "What the fuck is going on."

She shook her head in annoyance as she pulled whatever data she could relating to this 'Danvers,' before she shut down the system and wiped all traces of her search, no need to push her luck.

She opened the door and briefly glanced at the marine, "I'm feeling much better now, so I think I'll just go and track him down myself. I suspect it will be faster this way too." She flashed him what she hoped was a reassuring smile as she past by him, she had had very little reason to smile these past few months.

S&S

She was itching to tear into the data she had just acquired, but as she rounded the corner towards her quarters she stopped cold. Two fully armored marines, her eyes narrowed as she amended her assessment, two N5's were waiting outside of her door.

She stiffened her posture as she schooled her features into that imperious look her Father had always pulled off so effortlessly, and began to approach the pair.

One of them spotted her and tapped the arm of the other, gesturing her way, the man who spotted her speaking up, "Commander, we are to bring you to meet with Admiral Hackett."

She frowned internally, he shouldn't have been able to detect her intrusion this fast, and she had no intention of giving herself away if this was a ploy to get her to react, "Alright then, lead the way," she pulled up his service record from the passive hacking program she constantly had active, "Major."

His posture tightened at that, but he gave her a terse nod as he took a position to her right, while his partner was on her left. And as they made their way through the station she had to wonder what the sight must have looked like, a blonde woman in civilian clothes being escorted by two special forces members, both of whom were fully aware that she was the more dangerous individual, and constantly kept shooting glances at her if she made any move other than walking forward.

Then again maybe they had simply heard rumors of her occasional losses of control, soldiers did love their gossip.

They were waved through several checkpoints as they reached the nerve center of Alliance Command, aides could be seen dashing with memo's too sensitive to be trusted to electronic communications. A trait that the rest of the Council races saw as adorable, but there was a reason that the Shadow Broker had only gained limited access to the SA.

It was far harder to gain access to information when it only existed in one location, that wasn't to say leaks hadn't occurred. The Okuda incident was one example, though she had been tinkering with her own variant of the Graybox tech ever since then, the only thing stopping her from implementing it was that it would push her over the acceptable limit for cybernetics.

Fucking Red Line legislation.

They halted at a non-descript door that led into the room that the Admiralty met in, which meant that this likely wasn't about her little visit to Hackett's office. He would have wanted to meet with her privately if that was the case, he wouldn't risk her airing his secrets in front of the other Admirals.

She gave a small nod to her escorts, civility never hurt anyone after all, and palmed the door interface.

The door itself shut behind her the moment she had crossed the threshold, and she found herself on the opposite end of the table from Admirals Hackett, Lindholm, and Drescher.

Hackett she had known since she was born, the man had been her Father's best friend and confidant. But he also was a man who weighed the odds constantly to ensure that the SA came out on top, and he had never been shy when it came to skirting or outright breaking the rules when it suited him.

Lindholm was from Eden Prime and had the size and build of her Nordic ancestors, she was also bloodthirsty to put it bluntly. The woman was a skilled tactician, and had managed to achieve a N6 ranking before deciding to leave the program when she was offered First Fleet following her Father's death. But she lived for combat, and if she couldn't have the real stuff she was doing simulations, or war games. The First Fleet was probably the most formidable of the SA's forces, a fact made all the more impressive thanks to the fact that she was made up of the oldest ships in service.

The Turian's loved her.

Drescher meanwhile was the head of Second Fleet, and had been the Admiral who had liberated Shanxi from the Turians. She had been involved in the negotiations originally but had quickly ended up excusing herself after she had ended up trying to strangle a Turian Captain. It would later come to light that the Captain in question had been one of those involved in some, less than strategic strikes upon soft targets during the occupation.

Drescher had also met her wife, one of the Asari diplomats, during that time. Of course they had been forced to sign numerous agreements before the SA would allow her to marry an Asari and keep her commission, scuttlebutt had it that neither of them were allowed to leave SA space without an approved escort.

Hackett, of course, spoke first, "Please take a seat, Commander." She walked up and took the sole remaining chair, which meant that her Grandfather and Admiral Singh were not expected to attend, and found herself directly opposite of Hackett while the other two Admiral's sat at his flanks.

Drescher glanced at her, everything from her posture to her tightly braided gray hair screamed control, the woman's dark brown eyes boring through her, "You know why you are here, Commander?"

"I have to assume it has to do with the incident from this morning, Ma'am."

A sigh came from the woman, "It isn't just about that incident, Commander. This is simply the latest in a string of such events, and you have shown no sign of improvement these past four months."

"Not that we're saying Mikhailovich's kid didn't deserve it, if he is just half as annoying as his Daddy." Both Hackett and Drescher shot their fellow Admiral a warning glare who quickly quieted.

Hackett looked directly at her, "Evalyn, we think that a position less stressful might be better for your recovery. You have a gift when it comes to machinery, perhaps it is time to focus on your strengths and leave combat to those," he left the unspoken sentiment hanging. Before Lindholm added, "Shepard, I respect all the work you went through to get that N7 designation, but eventually we all have to admit that our life has a course that is different from what we envisioned."

The Commander's eyes narrowed, "You mean to say that you would prefer me to toil away at R&D, making whatever toys you lot wanted."

"Yes." Drescher's answer was cold, but truthful, and Eva couldn't help but sigh in response, "And if I refuse?"

Lindholm shot her a look that bordered on pitying, "Then you'll be discharged as being mentally unfit for duty, you've given us more than enough ammunition to pull it off, Shepard."

"And there is always the Red Line legislation, the exact method of interpreting when one is over the limit can be rather, flexible." Drescher's threat hung in the tension filled air as Evalyn kept her gaze squarely on Hackett, her voice subtly betraying the shock she was feeling, "And what does Harrison have to say about this."

"It was his idea."

Hackett's statement was like a cold knife to the chest, that her Grandfather would threaten the life she had chosen just to get her in the gilded cage he had been trying to stick her in since her Father died.

"No."

The trio of Admiral's glanced at her with some confusion, before she added more emphatically, "My answer is no. I don't care if you destroy me in the press, ruin my career, you can even convince the entirety of human space that I'm some kind of monster that needs to be controlled," she was surprised as she felt a smirk pull at her lips, "because we all know who the real monsters in this room are."

She stood up, still sporting the same smirk, "I'll assume that I'm to be escorted to my quarters?"

S&S

The trip back was rather uneventful, but she used that time to plan her next move. It was becoming painfully obvious that something had happened on Akuze that the Alliance, or at the very least Hackett, didn't want anyone finding out about, and that if she planned on doing anymore digging on that subject she was going to have to get off this station, maybe even leave SA space entirely.

The idea of abandoning the Alliance sat uneasily with her. Her family had dedicated themselves to serving the organization, she had been fully prepared to do so as well, but she also had never been one to simply accept the answers given to her.

Her guards stopped just outside of her quarters, "Ma'am, you are to stay inside with the door locked, any attempts to leave your quarters will be met with force. If you need to leave for any reason please inform Eliza, and if the request is approved we will escort you." She just ignored him as she made her way through the door, and the moment it shut she began the process of pulling the gear she had hidden about the room.

She quickly assembled a pistol whose components had been hidden inside various items throughout the room, while she had hoped to never have a reason to use it she had also been betrayed too deeply in the past to not have a backup plan.

She pulled on the lightly armored bodysuit that would in normal circumstances go under her armor, but lacking that she instead pulled out a pair of beat up jeans that would disguise the thicker layer underneath, before slipping into the combat boots that sat near the door along with a few other pairs of shoes. She yanked open her dresser and pulled out a loose black shirt, before yanking on a light white jacket which was equipped with a holster hidden in the lining on the right side.

Content with that she yanked the desk in her room to the side, and used her metal limb to pry off the panel behind it before reaching in to yank out the bag hidden inside. Her emergency kit as she called it was stocked with medical supplies, credit chits that were linked to a couple of hidden accounts she kept from the taxman, and a half-dozen false identities good for a single use in the SA, if she got to Citadel space quickly enough she could probably extend their lifespan significantly thanks to the laxer security.

She slipped into the bathroom and pulled her hair from its ponytail letting it fall loose, she got to work brushing it over to one side so that it covered her cybernetic eye. Had she more time she probably would have tried dying it, but this was the best she was going to get at this exact moment.

She had just re-entered the main living when a voice came out across the room, "Going on a trip, Evalyn."

Her head swivelled until it landed on Anderson who was standing near where she had tossed the bag, the object in question hanging loosely in his grip. She took a few steps toward him, "Give me the bag, Anderson," she moved to take it from him but he pulled the bag out of her reach.

"This is a mistake, child."

"It's my mistake to make then!" The outburst seemed to surprise them both, but she recovered fast enough to wrest the bag from his grip, "I'm not asking permission, and I don't give a damn about the fallout, but I will not be some goddamn windup toy for the Alliance."

She took a step back as she saw the hurt register on his face, her voice coming out a hair above a whisper, "I'm sorry."

Then she struck, knowing that he would be emotionally compromised because she was too at that moment. David had taught her most of what she knew about combat, after all he had been the closest thing she had to a parent after her Dad's death, and that meant he always had a blind spot when it came to her.

Which was why there was no attempt on his part to block, or counter. Just her hitting him, and him collapsing to the ground, leaving her standing above his prone body, "I'm sorry about that too." She could feel her eyes begin to grow damp as she realized what she had just done, but a new voice shocked her out of the emotional response.

"Assault on a ranking Alliance officer detected, please stand down Eva or I will be forced to alert the guards."

She dropped her head down as she sighed, "I'm sorry for a lot of stuff today it seems," before raising both her head and her voice, "Execute override Echo Mike Sierra, hard reboot into safe mode."

They really should have known better than to have her shackle an A.I.

Placing Eliza in safe mode would ensure that the system would run as normal, but her more advanced subroutines, and the Alliance's, or anyone's really, ability to give orders to her was removed until they rebooted her back out of it.

Which would take them roughly four hours.

She palmed open the door and quickly lashed out a kick at the closest marine's knee, which quickly bent at the wrong angle thanks to the force her artificial limb could dish out. The other marine was still in the process of bringing up their gun, only to have the hand that latched on to the weapon turn it to so much scrap as the metal gave way to her grip. She let out a scream of effort as she summoned her biotics and slammed the strongest lift field she could on to the soldier, which in this confined space more akin to watching a pinball shoot upwards only to then rebound right back downwards.

She reeled a little from expending so much energy so quickly, but she managed to land a wobbly kick to the skull of her initial target to finish the fight.

And once she had dragged their unconscious bodies into her former quarters there was no evidence that anything was amiss, well aside for the human shaped bump in the ceiling, but overall, a satisfactory outcome.

S&S

She moved across the station at a brisk pace, using her knowledge of the stations access ways to avoid detection, quickly making her way to the civilian side of the station. At this point she had to slip out into the busier halls that were bustling with people going about their daily lives, and it also forced her to pull on a pair of black gloves to hide her cybernetic limb. Unlike in the military where cybernetics were rare, but not entirely uncommon, most civilians could go their whole lives and never see a single piece of cyberware.

Her feet carried her to one of the busier spaceports, named after some Alliance founder whose name didn't ring a bell for her, and she was just about to buy a ticket when she realized someone was sending her a communication through an old relay network she had setup on the station.

She let out a sigh as she realized who is must be, and she moved to a quiet corner so as to not give away where she was, "Hello, Cora."

"Evalyn, what the fuck do you think you are doing? Eliza just went into safe mode, and while the idiots on duty might not have noticed I did."

She winced, Lieutenant-Commander Cora Addison had once been both her best friend, and rival. A relationship that had ended explosively after Evalyn had been targeted during their graduation ceremony from Arcturus Academy.

Most of the graduating class had died, those who survived blamed her, as did Eva herself as the Asari who had been behind the attack had also been her lover.

Now that she thought about it, that was probably the longest sentence Cora had spoken to her since then, "I'm leaving, Cora. You can go ahead and inform the higher ups, but I'll be long gone." She debated just leaving it there, but her mouth got ahead of her brain, "And I'm sorry, I'm not sure if I ever said it to you, and I know that an apology is worthless. But I am sorry. Goodbye, Cora."

She shut off the link as she manually disabled the relay system, Cora would probably have it up and running again in a matter of minutes but every second she could buy was precious. She approached a nearby kiosk and grabbed a spot on the quickest departing transport to Earth, even deciding to spoil herself with first class.

Because after today, she needed a drink.

S&S

She pulled the coat closer around her body in an effort to keep out the cold that permeated the Spring air, her footsteps slowed the closer she got to her destination until she finally stood in front of a pair of graves, her parents' to be more specific.

"Hi, Dad." She bent down to knock off some persistent snow from the headstone, "You are, well you're probably furious at me, and that's okay. But my life, is mine, and I'm going to live it how I see fit. I hope that you can understand that, and maybe even be proud of me for doing what I think is right."

She sighed, even in death she still felt like she wasn't good enough for him, "Good talk," she muttered to herself.

She shuffled awkwardly before glancing at the other grave of the pair, "Mom, I don't know if you are dead. I, I kind of hope you are, because I don't think I'm strong enough to handle you being alive." She angrily wiped away the line of tears that had begun to fall, a whispered confession stolen from her lips by the wind, "Why wasn't I enough for you to stay."

She continued her vigil, she wasn't sure if she was actually expecting an answer but she stayed there until something inside of her clicked. That part of her brain that reminded her that the Alliance would eventually figure out what ship she had departed on, and so she began the trek back down to where she had left her rental vehicle.

She simply tapped in the address of the hanger that was her destination, feeling no need to manually pilot the sky car to her destination. The area in question was an old industrial zone that was too far from any exploitable resource to be worth repairing once most people had been forced by environmental collapse to move to the massive mega cities that dotted the globe. The Shepard's were one of the exceptions, maintaining a compound in the northern reaches of UNAS territory, though there were so many restrictions and hoops they had to abide by that her Father had always grumbled that he was going to burn the place down when he retired.

As the transport touched down she slid out, pulling her bag which was sitting on the passenger seat out with her. She tapped a command sending her temporary conveyance back to the depot, her new ride was inside after all.

She ripped the corroded chains off of the main door with a single motion from her arm, she would normally enter from the side door but today she was going to need a much bigger doorway.

The giant door squealed in protest as she shoved it open, the door's workings having been damaged by the intense acid rain that often ravaged the area. And as light began to pour into the interior of the hanger with each step she took, a gleaming white and blue ship was revealed.

The Shanxi had begun her life as a courier ship, before being modified for General William's personal use prior to the First Contact War. After that it had fallen into her Mother's hands, and when she had died it had been one of the few ways Evalyn felt that she could connect with the now absent woman.

Hannah had always been tinkering with the ship, and her daughter had been no different, in fact most of her time off had been spent in this hanger. Either working on the ship, or on other projects, which reminded her of the other item she was here to pick up.

She moved over to an empty corner of the hanger, gently feeling along the floor for the subtle groove that was hidden below several layers of dust. Finally, she found it and with a grunt of effort heaved up on the metal panel, revealing the safe she had hidden there long ago.

She pulled the glove off her left hand and pushed her palm on to the biometric scanner, before entering in the code, a few moments passed before the safe soundless slid open. She pushed aside a few sentimental keepsakes that she had put in here when she was younger, nostalgia having forced her to keep them, and finally her right hand gripped upon the object she was hunting for.

The core in her hand was, at least at this time, her greatest achievement. The Intelligence housed inside was effectively a blank slate, designed to over time acquire the knowledge that it was taught. Her attempt to solve the problem that so many of the Alliance's A.I attempts had fallen into was that an intelligence intrinsically reflected the nature of their purpose.

Eliza had been designed to oversee the functions of a base, or space station, as such she was personable and enjoyed interactions with her charges. But the same principle was why the Alliance's attempts to create a combat A.I had been mixed to say the least, often times they were violent to the extreme, and attempts to shackle those impulses had led to such drops in performance that multiple V.I's working in concert were more effective.

And so she had created an A.I that you could raise, teach it not just it's primary task overtime but ensure that it could comprehend why certain actions were not to be utilized. Of course it would take longer, and the A.I would start off even lower than a V.I, but the potential was there.

"I always wondered what else you had been up to when you came here."

She whirled toward the sound, the pistol clearing the holster as she pulled it into her left, aiming it squarely at the head of her Grandfather who stood at the entrance of the hanger.

He was an old man, but he still stood tall and proud, his eyes a dull gray in this lighting as they bored into his only living relative.

"Always hated that ship, should have had it destroyed before you started tinkering with it."

She shot it a quick glance before returning her gaze to him, "Dad would never have let you."

A chuckle came from the elderly man, "No, I suppose he wouldn't have. Your Mother had him wrapped around her finger, even after she died."

Her hand tightened unconsciously on the pistol at his statement, her steps were measured as she slowly made her way towards the ship. Her cybernetics connecting with the ship, and commenced its warmup sequence, "I hope you didn't take anyone with you."

He shook his head, "I came alone, I would prefer not to have any casualties on my conscience." He noted the ladder that extended from the side of the ship, "Do you really intend on walking away from your legacy."

"Legacy!" Her strides lengthened as anger propelled her forward, "The Alliance is not my Legacy! It was my duty! Up until you tried to turn me into you little toy soldier!" She halted so close to him that they were but a single step apart, "My legacy is what I choose it to be," she held up the core in her hand, "and this, this is just the first fucking step!"

A fist swung out and caught her across the jaw, but she had sparred with him enough to dance away from the follow through, cursing herself for allowing her anger to make her vulnerable. With the added distance she had brought the pistol back to the task of keeping her Grandfather in his place, the man's anger practically emanating from him, "You would turn your back on everything that your family has stood for, and for what? What is driving you to turn away from your own species, because trust me Eva there is no happy ending on the road you are heading down."

She didn't fight the sad smile that formed on her features, "I stopped believing in happy endings when I was seven."

By this time, she had wrapped one hand around the ladder, and slowly made her way up it once the ship informed her that all systems were green. She halted just before she dropped into the cockpit, debating on how to say goodbye, but with a sigh she just shouted across the hanger, "And if I were you I would keep a closer watch on Hackett, he's up to something."

The moment the hatch closed she sighed to herself, "Should have said something nice, Eva."

S&S

Nihlus groaned as a ping from his omni woke him, to be more precise the blue elbow of the person the ping had woken up was what woke him up, but cause and effect, "Nihlus here."

Jondum Bau's face appeared on his omni, and while Nihlus had video on his side disabled he knew from the old Salarian's smirk that he knew who else was there with him, "Good news, Nihlus. Your application for Evalyn Shepard has been approved."

That was surprising enough to get the Turian to sit up, he hadn't expected anything to come from that application for another couple of years, probably when the humans had hopefully calmed down a little and started playing nice.

"What changed?"

The Salarian gave a small nod, his way of noting that that was the correct question to ask, "She's been discharged from the Alliance, the rumors that I have heard claim that she escaped Arcturus, made her way to Earth, then escaped the system before vanishing entirely."

Nihlus groaned, "So what good is her application being approved, I mean we don't have the resources to track down a single human even if she is Spectre materia-" He stopped speaking as he noted that amused smirk that had formed on the amphibian's lips, an annoyed huff escaping the Turian, "They're making me hunt her down aren't they?"

"Indeed."

"Spirits," he rubbed his talons along one of his mandibles, a habit from his youth he still had yet to break, "do we have any leads?" The Salarian just gave an amused shake of his head, "And from all accounts she is more than skilled enough to ensure she leaves no electronic trail to follow," he gave Nihlus an overly wide grin, "Happy hunting, Nihlus."

As the Salarian blinked away the Turian let himself collapse backwards in the now dark room, thumping solidly into the mattress, a voice mocked him in a singing tone coming from the darkness to his right, "Someone got the bitch job."

"Be quiet, Tela."

An amused chuckle came from beside him as her undressed form was illuminated as she tapped a few searches into her omni, "Oh, the girl's got skills, and quite the ass," she noticed the look Nihlus was giving her, "-et." She pouted at him, "It's not my fault that human's get our blood going, their women are exotic Asari. With their pink skin, and their weird crest."

An exasperated sigh came from the Turian, "Hair."

A purr came from the Asari that plopped herself on to his chest, "Hair, that's it. Don't you ever wonder what it must feel like." Nihlus just shook his head, grumpily stating, "No, I can't say that I have."

Tela let out a melodious laugh, "Don't be like that love, I don't get mad at you when you look, you aren't allowed to get made when I do."

The Turian just gave a small nod of acknowledgement, before he cut off the question he knew was coming, "I'm not swapping jobs with you."

A blue hand swatted his chest, "You're no fun."

S&S

Credit Song: Can't Say Goodbye to Yesterday performed by Carla White

AN: Huzzah another chapter.

Tela's opinion is something that, I think, has been in some other fics, but I found it weird it never really came up in the games. I mean we know from the bar trio that the Asari are seen as exotic by well seemingly every species, but would humans, specifically women, be seen as exotic by the Asari. Especially given that on top of at least having a somewhat similar anatomy there is no chance of producing an ardat.

Aside from that, expect more Tela and Nihlus, because I'm a horrible person. Also I can't write a not flirty Tela, blame Logical Premise.

Tess' origin has been altered obviously, to more accurately showcase how little of a toss that Evalyn gives about the Citadel A.I conventions.

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