Shepard blinked rapidly as she heard the hiss of gas from the punctured container, waiting in her cover for the imminent explosion. Somehow they'd found themselves trapped again. When the Reaper's barriers rose to contain them, she couldn't help but think that the Illusive Man had drawn them into another trap. The husks were almost overwhelming them at every turn. The research team was dead, entrapped by indoctrination. And a geth sniper that knew her name was shadowing them. She was getting tired of surprises.

The surrounding ship groaned with movement, the sound vibrating deep through her feet. Hearing the explosion, Shepard looked between Garrus and Thane, checking their position before she turned the corner and traced to look for stragglers. The bang dissipated in the open space, muffling into the golden gale sky overhead.

Advancing along the platform with her heavy pistol drawn, Shepard checked her corners, working with her men to investigate behind every crate, wary as sounds were sucked out into the weightlessness around them. The husks had been crawling up from everywhere, undaunted by their gunfire and ravenous in their mindless task. Seeing them never ceased to settle a chill in her gut, hardening her resolve.

The ripple of biotic energy around Thane faded as he came to Shepard's side, eyes sweeping with trained diligence as his voice broke through on the comm, "All we need to do now is destroy the mass effect core."

"Then we get off the ship - fast." Garrus dropped a heat sink as he reloaded his assault rifle, and Shepard's head swivelling between the two of them before motioning to cover by the door.

"We still need that IFF. Those researchers can't have died for nothing." Shepard moved to the door, kneeling down to bypass the lock. The moment of down time let her catch her breath, the winds of the brown dwarf howling all around them With a subtle click, the door slid open, and Shepard rose to lead them in.

A moment of relief came to her as she saw the Cerberus terminal, and Shepard's fingers flicked over the keys to access the data. The door slid closed behind the turian and drell, leaving them in sudden quiet.

"This must be it." Garrus flexed his fingers about his rifle, gaze sweeping around the tunnel.

"So the Cerberus team did recover it."

Shepard nodded to Thane as the data came through, and she keyed in the sequence to unlock the mechanism with her omni-tool. Released from the port, she snatched up the IFF.


Hands aching in the wake of the shot, Shepard staggered back as the Reaper drive core exploded, the silvery shimmer of its energy dissipating rapidly into darkness. Underfoot the dreaming God lurched with a low, metallic groan. Scattered about the gangway were the broken bodies of more husks. It seemed like such a waste that they might have been people, to wonder where they'd been and if they'd had lives.

The Reaper pitched more heavily, and they had to regain their balance in the darkness left without the mass effect core to light their way. At Shepard's feet lay the geth who had opened the barrier and let them in, the sniper who had pegged husks around her head with neat, protective precision. Thane and Garrus came to her sides.

"Shepard - that geth. I think we should bring it. It's behaviour was... strange."

Shepard looked from Thane to the crumpled form of the geth, reaching out a hand to regain her balance as the ship pitched more heavily.

"Leave it. We have enough trouble."

The deep, unstable screech of buckling metal under rode their words, and a raspy moan seeped through. Shepard turned around. The blue-glowed limbs showed at the edges of the ramp, another wave of husks pulling themselves up, bloodhounds on their scent.

Eyes lingering a moment more upon the advancing husks, Shepard looked aside to Garrus, "Tali said no one's ever captured a geth intact."

"You know the risk. That's all I'm going to say."

Shepard shook her head even as they all wobbled with the growing instability of the ship around them, "There's no time for a debate. Move out."

Gathering her hand into a fist, a flicker of brilliant blue fire licked up Shepard's limbs, and with a wave of her hand spiked bursts of biotic power descended the platform, sending husk limbs flailing through aside.

"Cover us."

Thane shouldered his rifle at the command. Despite his protests, Garrus knelt with Shepard to gather the dead weight of the geth up over their shoulders like a fallen comrade. Weight distributed between them, they moved with greater ease past the grave hands coming up from the depths. The distinct pulses from Thane's precise shots echoed in the space as they jogged through the doors, hesitating as the outer set opened, letting in the full force of the 500 kph wind.

"Hang on folks." Joker's voice wavered over the radio.

Shepard had to let the weight from her shoulder, tapping her comm. "Open the port side."

They staggered forward with the geth as the roar of the Normandy's engines joined the splitting cacophony of the Reaper being sucked into the brown dwarf. Another set of husks collapsed, pegged by Thane's sweeping barrel. Dragging the synthetic to the edge of the platform, Shepard gauged the distance. Nodding to Garrus, they lifted their cargo, its body partially buoyant in the failing gravity. With dumb luck precision, the geth corpse floated weightless through the orange sky, clunking through the door of the Normandy. Shepard's order was lost in the gale of winds overhead as the mass effect field of the Reaper collapsed further. The derelict machine underfoot rocked and fractured, but the obedient, mindless husks advanced on them further. Shoulder locked, the Commander covered her team, eyes tracing targets to let her heavy pistol find its mark, as Garrus and Thane jumped the semi-weightless void.

The tint on Shepard's visor darkened as her heat sink emptied, the glare of the star bright. Slapping the pistol in its place on her thigh, she turned and made a run for the gangway. The Normandy looked impossibly far, and her right mind cried out caution. Pushing hard, she leapt off the grav-boot-secured safety of the deck, and her limbs swivelled for balance as she took to the sky.

The wind hit her body, illuminated against the burning blaze of the brown dwarf, and Shepard clenched her jaw with resolve as her momentum carried her. Boots slamming down onto the Normandy, she turned as her weight threw her in against Thane and Garrus.

"We're clear. Go."

The exterior door slid shut with a pressurized hiss, and Shepard unconsciously leaned back into Thane, his steadying grip resting her against the wall. She looked between her companions and shook her head with a dry laugh.

Collapsing his assault rifle, Garrus looked to her and said, "Good fun, but can we try to stop playing 'blow-it-up-and-run'? I can't keep winning like this."

The decontamination sequence ran as they stood in the airlock, and Shepard scoffed before saying, "Aw, c'mon Garrus, you're getting good at it."

"I don't think we'd know the losers for long."

Shepard slipped back against the wall, smirk unseen as she looked to Thane. Garrus offered a clipped 'hah'. The sterile scan swept over them again as they all adjusted their posture and looked at the package on the ground.

Tali is going to shit a brick. Shepard put her hands on her hips with a sigh.

"Call me crazy, but I don't think Tali is going to be too happy to hear you brought an intact geth aboard." Garrus' eyes were on her.

"I'll handle her." Shepard sighed again and knelt down, cautiously turning the synthetic over. What she saw confirmed her original, hasty observation. There was a piece of N7 armour grafted to its right arm, incorporated into its own. It was heavily scuffed and marked up.

"Is that...?"

Shepard stood up, eyes still down as she said to Garrus, "I wouldn't discount it. The way my life goes, there are way too many coincidences." Shepard put a hand to her comm, "Joker, send two crew to the hatch. We made a special friend."

"Sure thing, Commander."


Thane ate with a casual delicacy, listening with a burgeoning grin as the Commander relaxed into her story more, posture and tongue loosed by the wine shared at dinner, and by their privacy in her quarters. His glass remained untouched.

"Needless to say, he wasn't too happy some girl broke his nose. Never mind what it did to his pride."

A low rumble in Thane's throat gave his assent at the curious anecdote. All that he read never quite acclimated him to the norms of each species and the sexes within them. Shepard knowingly smiled at him, and he pulled out of his thoughts to rest his plate down on the low table beside them and shift closer to her.

"So you activated the geth?"

Shepard crossed one leg over the other, her hand waving aside as she drew a breath. Her complexion was flushed. "I did. He - it... is called Legion, now. He's going to work with us against the Collectors."

"Garrus mentioned something in the airlock." Thane reached across to trace a stray lock of hair from Shepard's brow.

"He's wearing part of my old armour. From before I died." The tipsy haze bled from Shepard's eyes, her gaze not meeting his. "I asked him about it, and I think I confused him." She sat back, reaching an arm up over the edge of the couch.
"Oh?"

"'There was a hole.' was what he said. Of all the armour and debris, he didn't have any better reason then that." Shepard's unfocused, thoughtful gaze turned to the drell close beside her. "Thank you for backing bringing him aboard."

"I don't have the experience with the geth that you do, but it was obviously different."

"I was surprised Garrus wanted to leave it. He would know just as well as I do how abnormal the behaviour is." Their hands twined together and Shepard's voice fell away, leaving a casual grin tugging her lips. She sat up more fully and reached across to touch her fingers to his cheek.

An explorative touch led Shepard's fingers over the ridges that defined the Thane's forehead and crown. He was watching her as he often did, and her expression was more serene than it rarely ever allowed. Her eyes followed her fingers, studying the detail they took in.

"Garrus is very protective of you."

Shepard's eyes tugged down to his, the half-innocent curiosity evaporating from her expression as she grinned again. "He is. He's family, really."

Thane's head tilted, eyes narrowing at her as her hand dropped along the fluted frill high on his cheekbones. The pads of her fingers traced each groove, prompting Thane's hand to pull from the grasp of her other.

"Jealous, Thane?"

A low sound clipped in his throat, the vibration felt in her roaming fingers. Shepard's close-lipped grin widened as he leaned in at the invitation.

"I have no reason to be, siha." Thane's hand rose up over her knee, slipping under the bottom hem of her uniform. "I'm here. He's not."

Shepard sat up into his lips, and kissed him in affirmation, the affection bringing their bodies closer and letting Thane's hand slip higher up the curve of her backside. Their lips parted, the woody richness of the wine on her tongue, warm and heated against his own.

Weight shifting, Shepard's crossed leg pressed into his hand, and there was softness, the sculpted muscles giving as he squeezed, testing. Her knee turned to slip down between his own, resting on the seat beneath him. Leaning over Thane, her fingers dropped along his throat in a tenacious caress, urging a sharp intake of breath to disrupt their kiss.

The hand on her backside pulled Shepard closer, her free hand down the curve of Thane's neck, trailing to linger high on his chest. The foray of hands each challenged the next, and Thane let his other fingers seep under her uniform, inching up her thigh as she tilted her head into their kiss. The fabric bunched along his forearms, and sinking to sit in his lap, his fingers plied over the small of her back.

Jerking in against him, Shepard's hand fell from his throat, and she stifled a laugh against his lips, their tongues disentangling. Thane's head dropped back, dark eyes opening to hers in a moment of concern. His hands pressed down, flat along the back waistline of her pants, gauging her expression, a mix of embarrassment quickly hidden, a contained smile, flush risen in her lips; thankful to see, to remember, burned and ingrained, the moments she revealed herself more and more.

"I'm alright. Promise." Shepard murmured, breathing out against his chin, kissing him again before he was allowed any reply. She leant in, deepening the kiss with a simple tilt of her head, and Thane's hands rode up over her undershirt, spreading out against the curve of her spine.

Knee relaxing aside, Shepard 's weight sunk, straddled over Thane's thigh, and he breathed deep, the scent of her skin and body filling his senses, driving his pulse as her hand alighted over his throat once more. The kisses left him heady with needed breath, but he was falling in, tangled in their extrinsic pairing, netting on a wrist, fathoms calling.

Shepard's lips broke away, and a throaty breath tugged in through Thane's lips, spurred as much by need as by the presence of her lips on his neck. Her fingers ran up over the plated scales of his brow, encouraging his head back as her lips traced, parting to let her tongue play over the crimson pleats. Thane's fingers flexed, reflexively pulling her frame closer, his eyes closing to the focus of sensation, her breath there too, cooling saliva and magnifying the sensations. Shepard's uniform caught between her and Thane, his fingers gathered fabric and skin alike.

Mouth leaving his skin, Shepard closed her eyes, face tilting to trace her nose up the curve of Thane's cheek as her pulse palpitated unnaturally in her throat. The world softened in her view as she sat back, muted into some filtered vid. Her hand dropped to tug at the bottom hem of her uniform, the body-hugging fabric drawing up over her, and Thane read her intent, his hands pulling too. Left in just her clinging white tank, Shepard's fingers slipped down along the edge of his coat once more, playfully tugging the collar as she leaned in, lips-to-lips.

"Not fair."

Thane's fingers rode up the curve of her spine, and she blinked with the shiver through her, eyes open to the tilting world. She kept her lips with his as he leant in more, a ghost of a smile parting her lips, defined pulse high in her throat, when she found his eyes. Her heartbeat was erratic, unnatural, and his eyes deeper, collapsing stars that pulled her in. She must have made a sound.

"Siha?"

Wiry muscles cradled her body close to him, and Shepard blinked a number of times, trying to focus as her eyes followed the movement down over Thane's pliable skin. Her odd stare was broken by another few blinks as she tried to shoo the erroneous additions to her vision, things she knew shouldn't be there. But they were. Drell skin. She tried to swallow the palpitating lump in her throat, but her pulse was on a path of its own, pupils dilated.

"Yes?" She spoke in a breath, looking to Thane's eyes again.

Hands about her sides, the barest of smiles warmed Thane's expression, and he held her snugly. His lips pressed hers again, and Shepard's free hand reached to steady herself on his knee as he let her go. Her hand slipped further down his chest, snagging the zipper with a defined sound, unclasping links down the front as she tasted him again, tongues meeting to test and ply the other, a challenge that stirred something in her belly.

A soft sigh escaped Shepard's lips as Thane dropped his shoulders back, tugged away from their kiss to contort and tug the tight sleeves of his coat, baring his arms. Her fingers took to the exposure ravenously, tracing the colouring of his scales, and the intimate shape of his lithe musculature. A shape so similar, but firmer than her own. The space behind him distorted again, almost imperceptibly, and Shepard exhaled a short breath, leant back to give him the space.

Coat left rumpled behind him, Thanes hands naturally found their way back up the curves of Shepard's body, his own eyes following their touch. Hairline surgical scarring marred the fallow skin about her shoulder joint, and his digits swirled over them before drifting to similar ones over her breastplate. She shivered at the touch, turning a little, eyes half-lidded but dilated wide.

Shepard sat back, perched on his knee as her own hands drew together along his chest, fingers widening the zippered opening down to his abdomen. The muscles tensed under her touch, harkening a subtle smile as she leaned in for his lips once more.

Arms entangling around the woman in his grasp, Thane's fingers dragged up the back of Shepard's neck, catching into her hair, loosening the bun further as his lips parted, a growing familiarity in the coordination of their lips. His other arm wrapped around her back, holding her firmly, nearly pinning her arms between them. With precise fluidity he turned, revelling in the off-guard tension delayed in her muscles as he pressed her down aside him, leaning over her on the sparsely cushioned sofa.

Sound muffled against lips, Shepard's eyes opened, restraining a grin as Thane moved her, and her leg freed from its kneeling, swung errantly aside. The light 'tink' of metal was met by a carpeted thud and soft slosh, and Thane's lips broke away, a brief chuckle in his throat before he kissed down into her neck.

"Was that..?"

"Yes." Pausing only for the word, Thane's tongue fluttered down the defined edge of her collarbone, and the spill-borne cringe on Shepard's face dissolved into something new. His hand traced the swell of her breast, depressed into the unique softness, and her back slightly arced in reply, a quiet groan in her throat.
Sitting up with a relaxed posture, Thane let his hand continued down over the exposed, relaxed muscle of Shepard's abdomen, the white cotton bunched up by her breasts. His fingers made a curious sweep about the dip of her navel, eyes over her body, imprinting each little movement, sight, sound, and the intricacies that made her, her.

Shepard's back relaxed upon the couch, eyes slivers that focused on his face, shoulders loosened to rest. His eyes stayed on her body for a few moments longer before her rose and disappeared up the steps with fluid ease. Sitting up to look where he went, Thane soon reappeared, and much to her amusement, knelt down to soak up the spilt wine with a towel, putting his empty glass back upon the table.

"Guess I'll have to stop pouring you wine."

If you're reading this... get the hell outta this place! Now!

Nice.

Shepard sighed and swung her arm aside, handing the data pad to Garrus. With a click, her pistol extended, charging the incendiary bullets in place.

"You know all the best parties, Commander."

Garrus tossed the datapad back onto the shipping crate, the assault rifle on his back easily unslung. The echo of dripping water filled the wide cavern around them, and Shepard turned with care as she scoped the mining tunnel. It was quiet. EDI had found life in it. Her intuition said it wasn't the miners. Thane was further down the tunnel near the door, and he motioned to her.

The familiar sound came like a spider up the back of her neck, and Shepard tensed as the door open, snapped into position and ready to fire. An exhalation of breath echoed inside her helmet, pre-empting her order.

"Move."

Her companions worked forward alongside her through the cover, and as they rounded the rocky bend in the tunnel, her suspicion was revealed. At their presence, the husks turned and began their slow, staggered advance, the sounds of their haunting moans echoing off the surrounding rock. Precise shots cut them down, and they pushed ahead through the tunnel.

The mines were filled with them, and the biotic glow of energy rippled through the tunnels, a cool light in the dark spaces. They hadn't encountered any bodies or survivors, just the husks that moved without thought, ever advancing. The work felt methodical and it wasn't till they were deep in that the true cause was revealed.

The miners had found a device deep in the minds, an alien machine. She'd seen it happen before on colonies and mining sites. Tampering with the unknown that lead to the ultimate enslavement and demise of all those there. Thane stood at her side, his head sweeping through the diverging cavern behind her while she went through the data.

"They look just like those on the derelict Reaper."

Shepard's pistol stayed in her hand as she leant on the console, shaking her head before closing the data file. Stabbing in a few commands into her omni-tool, she copied what information she could in case it was needed.

"That they do."

Turning about, Shepard motioned alongside her as she crept forward to peer down the two passages that were their options. Their lighting was similar, and she suspected they led to the same place. One inclined upward. It might grant them better position.

"We go right."

Her voice echoed off the wet rock around them, and Shepard took the lead, advancing at a brisk pace up the ramp.


"They're gone, Jeff. The Collectors took them."

Moreau looked up from the engineering terminal, even as his hands still moved over the glowing orange keys, hastily entering commands. His face was grave.

"Aw, shit."

Entering the last sequence, Jeff turned towards the core, limping with as much hurried finesse as he could. The improperly healed joint ached from the frantic flight to engineering, but he made it the last few steps without faltering.

"I am sealing the engine room."

Jeff hurriedly entered the commands, hesitating only a moment as he looked up to the core, his heart racing erratically like it had so many times the ship had been in peril. The mass effect field sprung to life about the core, flickering fog that roiled to a brilliant glow of blue-white. He lifted an arm in reflexive defence, stepping back from the console. With EDI's activation, the charging sound of the field overpowered the bleat of the warning parameter.

"I have control."

The Normandy sprang to life, the sudden force throwing Jeff back against the ground, and he groaned at the crack of his hips against the floor, a ripple of fractured pain through him. His consciousness wavered, air knocked out of him, but he cringed and moved none the less, hearing EDI again as the brilliant light about the core faded.

Jeff's ears rang and the AI's words barely filtered through. Slowly he sat up, frail limbs throbbing with the impact. He put his hand down beside him, closing his eyes once more. After a bit of manoeuvring, he found the best way to gingerly pull himself up to his feet.

"Send a message to Shepard's shuttle. Tell them what happened..."


Shepard motioned to Thane and Garrus, instructing them behind cover as she turned and smashed the husk clamouring at her with the reinforced elbow of her hardsuit. With a frazzle of electrical current, it collapsed to the ground. Before she could turn, the stacked canisters behind her exploded, flooding her back with the licking warmth of flames, catching a few more husks in its path.

A small knot undid in her abdomen, satisfied to know the device, distinctly Reaper technology, was destroyed. She turned around as the initial blast died, watching the sections of the apparatus fall to pieces, smouldering and crumpled. Rock from the surrounding cavern broke free, further smothering the indoctrination device.

Her comm crackled with static, coming back to life as nothing but a low fire remained. Tali's voice broke through.

" -mander Shepard? Shepard!"

Shepard's stomach lurched at the panic in the quarian's voice, and she immediately put a hand to her comm.

"Tali. I'm here."

"Th - they're gone Shepard, they're all gone! The Collector's came for the Normandy!"

Head snapping between her partners, Shepard turned and broke into a sprint back out of the mines. Her limbs pumped as adrenaline rushed through, and tapping her omni-tool, stims flooded her, invigorating her to push harder yet.

"Are you alright, Tali? Bring the shuttle. We're on our way."

Garrus and Thane flagged behind her as she rounded the bend past the terminal they'd been at scarce fifteen minutes before. She felt the helpless thud of her heart high in her throat and temples as she ran, mind running to every scenario, unable to escape the last sight before she died; the golden beam slicing through the remnants of the SR-1.

"Y-yes we're fine, it's a message from EDI."

Huffing out a breath, Shepard stepped up into a full run, easily picking over the collapsed bodies of husks and making it back to the surface ahead of the turian and drell. She stopped out in the middle of the small canyon they'd been dropped off in, looking up to the darkened, orange sky and the rain that fell from it. The droplets hit her helmet and visor, leaving outlined rivulets as they slipped away down the domed face. She couldn't hear the engines.

Touching her comm mute, Shepard balled her fists, turning as a blue brilliance licked up her body, and she cried out in aggravation, smashing her armour-clad fist into the rocky edifice beside her. The biotic energy dissipated into the unmoving stone, and she clenched her jaw with the grunt the impact brought. It made her shoulder ache, but she didn't care.

"Shepard?"

Fingers still clenched, Shepard turned around to see her landing party standing a few paces back. The drell took another two steps towards her, but she just raised a hand. He stopped. Garrus stepped forward past him as Shepard touched her comm back to life.

"Commander, it might not b-"

"Do you think EDI - no, not even EDI, do you think Tali would sound like that if-"

"No Shepard, I don't, I'm just saying..." Garrus threw up his hands defensively, turning aside.

"We need to wait till we have the full story." Thane clasped his hands together behind him.

The high whine of Kodiak's engines broke over the subdued patter of rain, and Shepard said no more, turning around to look skyward again. She put her hands onto her hips, swallowing away the rebirthed desire to pummel the stone.