13/02/2011

~ Finding The Heart ~

The Russian Doll

Disclaimer: The characters in this story are the intellectual property of Bioware, not mine.

WARNING: Rated for MA for future chapters (even though I haven't written them yet – they could very well be). 16yrs+ readers only please. Foul language, adult concepts.

Author note: I've purposefully tried not to describe Shepard too much, after all, fans of Mass Effect will each have their own versions of Shepard, so I leave those parts up to your imagination.

Shepard reviewed her messages. She was thinking about Zaeed, just as she had done all night. It had been a long time since she'd found herself in this kind of position. It was easy enough to deal with people failing themselves (the way Zaeed was failing himself) when they were not in any way close to her. But Zaeed was crew, and damn it all if she didn't always grow attached to crew. She'd tried to keep her distance from this mercenary though – never too fond of people who killed for money. Thane was an interesting comparison, but he was so well grounded and to him it was not a means to money it was always fulfilling someone else's needs – that was his job and he had a kindness to him and a sense of right and wrong. Zaeed on the other hand, was only in it only for himself, and he'd made that very clear on a number of occasions.

She was relieved to note that this morning Zaeed had indeed made it to the infirmary. Maybe there's hope for him yet, she scowled. She considered the prospect of hope, then quickly dismissed it. Don't get your hopes up. Rare for someone to make it back out of this kind of problem, especially as at the moment you can't distract him with "point and shoot" instructions. It's been too quiet – whole crew is getting itchy feet. Just as she was musing over the prospect of wanting trouble, trouble it seems, came looking for her (in a manner of speaking). Her door beeped.

"Who is it EDI?"

"Mr Massani is here to see you. Do you want me to permit him to enter?"

Shepard sighed and checked to see if there was anything she did not want visible on her console to visitors and closed down anything she was working on that could not be accomplished with distractions. "Yes, go ahead EDI – thank you."

"Shepard." He announced quietly as his footsteps approached her back – he stopped a meter or so away. She didn't look up from her console, only motioning for him to go and sit down in the seated area with the coffee table, maintaining the pretence that she was very busy, and things were business as usual. He hesitated for a moment, then the sound of armour and boots followed her directions.

"Zaeed." She acknowledged without missing a keystroke as she shifted a couple of documents from her console to her portable pad, "Visit to Dr Chakwas?"

"You already know I've been." Taking that tone with me is not going to score you points, Mr Massani.

"Progress?" Transfer complete, she laboriously keyed the console to close a few windows at a time – various other documents she would have to attend to later – working her way towards closing her access to the terminal.

"Meds – pills and n' injection. Says my liver needs a rest." She could hear the dark humour in his voice, she knew the smirk he'd be wearing.

"Good. Anything else I should know?" She timed the question with the power-down key stroke of her console as she turned around and glanced at him through the glass between her models. She knew he'd spot the movement. He took a deep breath and let it go.

There was a long pause. "...Yeah." Another aching sigh was let out. "Look. Shepard." He stared at his hands with his shoulders slumped as she grabbed the pad and rounded the corner of her model display. She had expected as much: the first words out of his mouth were going to be defensive. She approached him casually and sat on the sofa a few feet away. She scrutinised him with an even stare, waiting on his words. "This isn't easy. I've spent 10yrs with little more than a bottle and a gun to keep me company. Before that? Hell I never realised it, but life wasn't really that much better... I just thought it was."

OK... I'll give a little if you give a little. "You've had a lot of bad people in your life. A lot of betrayal." Shepard acknowledged patiently, with a measured tone of sympathy – too much and he'd likely storm out.

Zaeed chuckled, "Bad people? Hell Shepard I am 'bad people'. I'm as bad as you ever dreamed a man could be and still be sane." He did so seem to enjoy toying with her righteous attitude. On the brighter side at least it was a sign he was seemingly getting back to himself if he was able to make 'I'm a badass' jokes again.

Shepard raised an eyebrow with just a hint of a smile as she rolled her eyes and said: "Sure. Rotten to the core if you want to call yourself that. It makes no difference." She shook her head, then purposefully sobered her expression back to her logical, emotionless facade. "It's always going to be hard fitting into a crew like this. Doesn't make it any easier that I run this ship tight, and I expect everyone to look out for each other."

"Yeah..." He gusted. "Not really used to 'avin' someone 'ave my back Shepard. Last time I let someone do that he paid six of my men to restrain me while he put a gun t' my head n' pulled the trigger."

"Vido is not someone I would have ever trusted at my back. But I need to be able to trust you, Zaeed." I can be high and mighty about that, because I'm damned right.

"If I've got such bad judgement, then what the hell should I do about deciding if I should trust you to do the same, eh?"

"For starters I saved your ass on Zorya despite the fact that you lied to me about the mission, and despite the fact that on that day you proved you could sometimes cause more trouble than you were worth."

"That just makes you naive or stupid." He scowled at her under furrowed brows.

"No it makes me an excellent commander. I know when you are useful, I know when you are not, but I always give members of my crew a chance to demonstrate the former even if they demonstrate the latter first." Shepard sighed. "I know Cerberus has had me picking up a lot of strong personalities – it's naive of them to think I can work miracles and make everyone get along. Just look at Miranda and Jack." She shook her head. "I won't lie to you – I did not want you on my crew. Not one bit. But I took you onboard 'for the cause', and because I still felt like I owed the Illusive Man a little leeway and should humour him on his choices, at least at the beginning. We're all in it 'for the cause'. But... If we're going to meet that cause head-on and make a difference, we have to work together. That means trust. That means I also get to stick my nose in where it isn't wanted, because it's my job to get to the bottom of things."

"Don't appreciate people interfering with my life..." Zaeed sneered.

"I'm not giving you the choice. Now you either talk to Chambers, or you talk to me. Whatever it is that is driving you to act the way you have been the past month or so has got to come to an end."

Shepard sat there in silence, waiting on the man to respond. She was, to put it bluntly, rather surprised he'd not had some smart-ass comeback to that. When she realised what he was working up to, she could barely believe it. It had been a long time since someone this deep in trouble had chosen her to bear that burden with them. Truth be told a part of her didn't want him to, she didn't want to know. People have to help themselves – Tali, Garrus, Samara? Those are people smart enough to learn that, so I am able and willing to help them. But you? You remind me too much of someone who doesn't want to take responsibility for himself. But I guess I have to give you at least one chance to prove to me you can be more than that. So she gave him time, watched as he stared at the glass of the fishtank hard enough to burn a hole in it, watched as he breathed laboured breaths and observed the clenching and unclenching of his jaw. One hand was curled around the fist of the other as he sat resting his elbows on his knees in contemplation. Slowly his face relaxed a little, and he started talking.

"I wasn't always like this, y'know." He started softly, "But life can make a man hard when he has no options left to him." Shepard leaned back against the sofa and relaxed. It seemed to be his way of detaching himself from things past: telling them like a story. She knew if she stayed silent, he'd slip into a sort of trance as he spilled out the answers to her questions as a narrative. Sure enough he continued. Let's see if anything interesting turns up, and how you deal with it.

"Terminus systems – what a shithole to try to raise a family. Dunno what my parents ever expected of me, dragging me around like unwanted baggage. By the time I was 17 I'd carved out my own way of taking care o' myself. I was big enough and tough enough to take people my own age down easy enough. I discovered force was a good way to get what you want. Never had much conscience 'bout it either. Vido was always my wingman. Had been since he was 12 and I was 16. We were neighbours, see. Anyway, he'd set 'em up and I'd knock 'em down. Folks started to fear us, others wanted to join us – wasn't long before we'd got bodies to spare. Delegation Vido called it –" Zaeed chuckled, "– give them the shit to do, take most of the winnings for ourselves." Zaeed had a sadistic grin on his face. Shepard refrained from shaking her head disapprovingly.

"Had our choice of girls, too, of course. Bad boys... What they say about women wantin' what ain't good for them certainly rings true in my experience. Like moths to a flame. Stringin' along several at a time..."

When did this turn into reminiscing about sexual conquests? Seriously, what makes him think I'd ever want to know these things?

"...and of course the richer we got the more choices we had. Occasionally we'd get other gangs who o' course didn't like the fact we were getting all the action – both on the field and off. They'd come at us and we'd take 'em out, recruit anyone fast enough to swear their allegiance to us, kill the rest – less trouble that way." Shepard again tried to hide her gut reaction, and hoped he didn't catch that little flit of her eyes as they tried to roll. Thankfully he was well-set into his storytelling now. She wondered if he'd notice if she got up and made herself some coffee. If the story was going to continue like this she might just need it. How did I end up in this position? She asked herself as he continued. Why couldn't he chose Kelly? Why the hell did I even give him the option of telling me all this?

"But they say in every man's life there comes a time when a woman gets under his skin and messes him up."

Wait. What?

"I guess you could say that happened to me." Zaeed's voice took on a softer tone, quieter. "Pretty little thing she was. I used her, same as I did the others. But she... She had this tenderness, see?" He raised his eyebrows and pulled an expression Shepard had never seen before. He was – heaven forbid – almost smiling, but it was a gentle smile and that's what made it unprecedented. "After a while," he continued, "I started to notice things, little things about her. She'd have bare cupboards if I checked, but when I dropped by she'd have a proper meal for me to eat. 'How was your day darling?' she'd ask."

His smile was kind as he stared at the floor in recollection of the memory. Shepard looked at this aging bounty hunter. Just for that moment she thought she could see a different man altogether – perhaps it was the shadow the man Zaeed could have been. Her stomach tingled as if she'd just witnessed some amazing magic trick, and she was left just as baffled.

"'Don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, right? Don't I know that all... too... well." He shook his head and rubbed at his eyes, wrinkling his nose. The smile faded. "Somehow she'd clung to my life for a year or two, and s'pose you could say we were 'stable'. I'd stopped seeing other girls behind her back – I just... lost interest in them n' I didn't know why. For the first and only time in my life I can honestly say I felt like the more I gave? The more I got in return. Hell... I'm not sure if I ever considered marrying her, not back then, but by God I should 'av. But I was young, n' I was stupid, and I was cocky - that much ain't changed. But by that time me n' Vido were getting close to founding the Blue Suns, so we were making no few enemies winning contracts left, right and centre. Never seemed to catch us up to us though: we took 'em all on, and we took 'em all out. We were invincible."

Shepard watched as his face turned cold and pale. His fingers now laced to form a moustache across his mouth. Beads of sweat started to form on his forehead, and for her part she had a sick feeling in her stomach as she anticipated what was coming after the huge sigh he let out.

"They got to her." His eyes widened as he spoke, "Another gang, I mean." He flinched a nod of his head in Shepard's direction when he caught the fact he'd not explained. "I was gonna tell her the news that we were starting the Blue Suns that evening and I was gonna get her out of that damp-ridden apartment and somewhere bigger that very weekend. Plan was I'd give her a stable income. Plan was – I don't know – that I'd keep her. But when I showed up at her apartment with a bottle of wine, turning the corridor I got this whiff of smoke and burning furniture." He almost spat as he spoke, and clenched his fist as he snarled. "I dropped the bottle and ran flat out. Door wouldn't open, and I damn near fried myself kickin' it open. The pressure difference threw me back against the wall like a rag doll, knocked me cold. Somebody dragged me outta the place. When I came to on the concrete I stared up at the block as the whole place burned..." Zaeed's eyes glistened, and the rims reddened as he whispered, staring off into the memory: "There was nothing... nothing but flames..." He shook his head slowly from side to side.

The sight of this man as he was now, could be described in one word: broken. Shepard found herself wanting to reach for the man's hand. She could see the pain in his eyes – the anger and overwhelming sorrow. But... surely this was years ago? Why is it messing him up now..?

"For years I wondered if I'd tried to make it through the flames if I'd have been able to save her. The whole place was scorched to ashes and me damn near with it. Not a trace of anything left. I couldn't go to the police – I was a wanted man and they had no few crooked coppas working for the older gangs that it would've been stupid to go to them. There was nobody to answer the question of if she had been there – the residents had scattered. All witnesses disappeared. But Vido got a message the day later, sayin' that it was payback and a warning not to mess with the Demon Maw gang. At least then I knew why all the witnesses fled like rats from a sinkin' ship. They were our last and biggest rivals – the Demon Maws - and they had a long-standing reputation of makin' sure nobody who saw them do their dirty work dared tell about it. Normally 'cause they were dead. Those sons of bitches had gone through her to get to me. When Vido read the things they said they'd done to her before they burned her my blood boiled n' I went fucking beserk! Vido pulled me together and got me moving, and the pair of us hunted them down and killed every last one of them – slowly, one by one." He snarled, and grinned a horrid smile at the memory. Shepard felt ill – she knew what that likely meant.

"There wasn't a chance she could 'av escaped. Not a chance. They burned her alive." He sank his face into his hands. "After that I swore I'd never have anyone close to me who couldn't take down 20 armed men on their own – man, woman, or alien." He shook his head and shrugged. "I used prostitutes for anything else I needed. I got mean. Vido and me we got the Blue Suns started and in the months that followed I threw myself into getting the band up and running. It was a lotta work. I didn't mope. I just got even against the world. I took it out on every son-of-a-bitch that stood in my way and I enjoyed my work. Enjoyed it ever since." Zaeed let out this growling sigh. "I'd be lying if I said I had even the slightest inkling of what she really meant to me back then. Rage is a hell of an anaesthetic."

So this is what it takes to make a monster. Poor bastard, no wonder he's such an asshole... It's what he comes from. But now I'm wondering: how much of this was a path he chose, and how much of it was a path that had been laid out before him to follow..? God sometimes you have a sick sense of humour, you know that right?

"Zaeed..." Shepard began, assuming this was the end of the story as he had stopped speaking and now looked at her with a haunted expression, "I don't know if anyone knows about all this except Vido but... I think I understand. Give it some time and I think..." you and I could be friends. You don't have to get past this on your own. So she meant more to you than you realised, and you regret you didn't do more to appreciate it at the time. Sometimes life just doesn't give you a chance... Was what she was going to say but he cut her off, a look of maddening desperation on his face as his voice faltered with the venom in it as he spoke:

"No you don't understand!" Shepard was frozen to the spot by the fact that now he was staring straight at her. "Here on the Normandy, no would-be competitors to shoot, no whores to fuck and less easy access to liquor than I'd like I started thinking. Started thinkin' about the day she died again. Shear fucking boredom got me using EDI to hunt for information. That AI should be a fucking detective. It was just news reports from the time, things like that at first. Then the more I looked at it the more things didn't add up." He raised a hand and clenched it into a fist. "There had been reports that the fire had spread and there had been people escaping the apartment complex, but when I saw one particular piece of footage shot by a passerby of a woman being rushed into an ambulance my heart stopped beating. It was her Shepard. I was sure."

He got up and started pacing back and forth, arms gesturing agitatedly. "After I'd done some digging around, I finally tracked down one of the neighbours. After some persuasion I got him to talk to me. Turns out one of the other neighbours heard what was happening. Too much of a Goddamned coward to do anything about it as they raped her, but he waited for the gang to leave then rushed into the apartment to find her, and took her to the hospital."

His eyes watered, "She was alive Shepard! All this time I never knew!" He technically was smiling as he leaned down towards Shepard, but if this story had a happy ending that smile was far too crazy for to believe it. The man was getting seriously unhinged, and part of Shepard was getting unhinged with him. "At first I couldn't believe it. Then it hit me hard – like a rail transit bus to the face at 100 mph – how much she'd meant to me. How much she could still mean to me. Remember we took leave? Well I went to find her." Shepard recalled the brief leave she had afforded the crew, and she remembered how unusually cheerful Zaeed had been that day.

He paced away again, stopped when he reached the fish rank, back turned. His shoulders slumped, and his head dropped. Shepard had to strain to hear the low mumbling of his voice from where she sat: "I don't know... what I wanted..." He shook his head. "To say sorry? When we took out the Demon Maws it was big news, and our reputation hit the headlines – we had to get off-world. Thinking she was dead I wanted to get as far away from that place as possible anyway. Other side of the damned galaxy if I could have had it my way, but the Alliance would have been out to get us following the police reports. I never knew I left her Shepard! Maybe I still would have had to leave to save my own skin back then but, damn it when I found out she survived all I wanted to do was... to go back to her."

He looked as though he'd just gone weak at the knees. He reached out an arm and braced himself against the fish tank as he smacked his head into it. "I went to find her." He continued, his voice was much, much quieter now. Shepard slowly rose to her feet and drew closer to hear, watching him closely as he explained: "I found her alright. I found her grave..." He paused to let go a deep, agonising sigh and his voice shook as he spoke. "She'd married someone ten years after I left. Died of some beggar's disease round about the time you n' me went to Zorya. Zorya! While I was hunting Vido down she lay dying in a hospital. I don't know if I could have been that man she married. But I.." Shepard was sure she heard the hitched breath of a sob, "Maybe I... Maybe I could have been a different man. But I'll never know the man I could've been. I missed my chance."

Shepard found her own eyes were watering. It all made sense now – the bad attitude, the spitefulness, the anger he seemed to wear like a protective cocoon, and lately his loss of control over his drinking. She found she couldn't speak either. He was such an arrogant, confident son-of-a-bitch she had really wanted to punch him on occasion. But... He was also a survivor, and she's had the impression that when it came down to it, nothing could break his will to survive. There was something heart-wrenching and humbling about seeing someone like Zaeed fall to pieces, like this.

"Damn it -" Zaeed's fist slammed into the bulkhead between the fishtank and her armour design panel, making Shepard's heart skip a beat. "Damn it I need a drink..."

She was almost afraid to see what she would find if he turned his face to her, but she wanted to ease the pain. She'd felt so helpless trying to reassure Tali when they'd found her father dead. She really wasn't good at this, not really. She reached out her hand and laid it on his arm.

"I don't want your pity!" He yelled as he yet again grabbed hold of her and threw her against the nearest wall – the glass of the fish tank. But the look on her face must have caught him by surprise. Hell she was surprised herself that she didn't react at all to his motion to grab her. She simply remained still, and slowly raised her hand to rest on his forearm gently. She hurt for the absence of words, and she couldn't think of any to fill the void. All she could think of to say was...

"What do you want?" She asked quietly, her pulse ringing in her ears as she knew she was blushing as she frowned at him. Somewhere at the very back of her mind there was a little voice asking: ask yourself the same question. She stared at him soberly.

"I..." He started as he stopped holding her so tightly. "I don't know..." He swallowed. "He began, then shook his head dismissively. "What game are you playing Shepard?"

"No games." Her voice was low and serious, but soft and quiet. She sucked her tongue and swallowed. He had to think about that as he tried to second guess her meaning, as did she. Slowly he leaned towards her. She didn't flinch. Her eyes slid half-closed as she was absorbed by the sensation of his warm breath against her cheek. She turned her face towards his and her nose brushed against his. His lips were so close she could almost taste them. His hand hovered next to her neck, his thumb ever so gently brushed the base of her jaw just under her ear, like he was afraid to touch her. Oh god... I can't breathe...

He cleared his throat and swallowed. "I'm sorry... Shepard..." He whispered huskily and pulled back. "I didn't meant to..." He shook his head, eyes wide in shock. "I... I better go." With that he practically ran for the door. Shepard was too stunned to move, her own shock too deep-rooted in her larynx for it to work. It's alright Zaeed... You didn't do anything wrong... She mouthed as the door shut behind him. She wanted to go after him, but her conscience sternly told her off and warned her not to. Leave him be. The poor guy is messed up enough without you messing him up even more – you don't even know what your intentions are in this! Whatever this is...

She scolded herself when she eventually caught her breath and moved away from where she had been pinned over to the sofa. She dropped her head into her hands. "What the hell am I doing?" she growled into her palms. She heard the telltale sound that gave away EDI once again being confused as to whether or not Shepard was talking to her or herself. When Shepard did not respond to the silence, the telltale sound chimed again as EDI had decided she was not being summoned. Poor EDI. She tries so hard.

"You're learning EDI." She thought she should grace the AI at least with an acknowledgement of that. The noise of EDI connecting to the com channel chimed again:

"Thank you Shepard. Is there anything else?"

"No that will be all EDI. Just wanted to let you know you're making progress." Mind on other things, and quickly. She told herself.

"It is difficult to know for certain whether you are addressing me or yourself, but your latest suggestion appears to be working well. There have been no oversights of questions you have directed towards me that have gone unanswered, and 98% of responses to vocal enquiries since implementing your last advice have been deemed appropriate."

Then again, all I'm going to do is get frustrated if I talk to EDI while I've got this at the back of my mind...

"Certainly an improvement EDI." Now all we have to do is either stop me from knowing when you're about to engage a response and don't, or get you to stop picking up when I'm talking to myself at all...

"Do you have any more suggestions on how I can further improve my personal relations with you and other crew members on this matter? The sample size is I believe now sufficient for conclusions to be drawn about your last suggestion, and I am ready to run new tests."

And also teach you when to drop a subject...

"None that I can think of right now EDI. But I will let you know when I think of something. That'll be all for now." She tried not to sound too forceful in that last sentence, but EDI did perhaps correctly assess the tone.

"Logging you out, Shepard." She almost sounded remorseful... Damn it when did I start worrying about hurting the ship's feelings on top of everything else?

With EDI gone Shepard thought about the event that just transpired and tried to clear her thoughts. Well the simplest thing was to start with the obvious: admitting that she was attracted to the man. However 'why' that would be now, when it had never happened before... Well... when did it happen, and what happened running up to it? She skimmed her memory, but she was pretty certain that this pretty much started with today. If she found him physically attractive before that, it was too heartily outweighed by her loathing for his character. Indeed... That's what's changed, isn't it? She thought to herself, I've seen a different side to him. I can't just dismiss him as that asshole bounty hunter Cerberus had me pick up and dump in the port cargo hold anymore... There's more to him than all that bluster, that's what my instincts are telling me now, isn't it? He's like a bloody Russian doll and I want to find the Zaeed at the core of it all don't I? Shepard face palmed, yes you sure do know how to land yourself in trouble don't you?

Profuse apologies for taking the last chapter down and putting it back up again. I'm out of practice! I forgot to change the date and info at the top, plus a few other things. I promise I'll try to be a better perfectionist before publishing the next chapters.