Disclaimer: Chapter one is where it's at, yo.

I am quite sorry my updates are still going so slow. As an apology, I made this one was longer.

Butler received word that his wife had managed to safely get transit off of Omega and would be arriving on Illium shortly. That might have been something of a relief, but there was a hollow note in Butler's voice that seemed to indicate that the measure was something he must have considered as a last resort. It made some sense, after all; Omega was his home, his wife's home, and the fight that he'd lost his leg for, lost friends for, was the fight to take it back from the mercs. Now, it was property entirely to their enemies, and he couldn't even say that a spot of floor space belonged to them for their efforts.

Mierin could understand the feeling, but at least he still had Nalah. She had lost both Sensat and Vortash in such a small amount of time, and being cut loose from Omega was just as disorienting for her. She briefly thought about what it might be like to live on Illium, then immediately dropped the idea. She'd been to Illium before; it was a fake place. It smelled like ozone, from where the impurities and dirt where burned away into nothing. It was all crystal spears and clean roads that didn't look at all hospitable. And though you're more likely to see a batarian there than, say, the Citadel, it was aloof with asari, chittering about merchandise and all those things they want and would stab you in the back for, then they clean up the mess and go to the next client.

Putting it that way made her sound racist against her own kind.

Though it wasn't like she felt like she was an asari. Sure, she always tripped along side her mother's skirts as she grew older, but her mother was a merc—a commando—and she was among batarians her entire life. Maybe she knew her mother's softness, and she so wanted to be beautiful and feminine like her, but it didn't make her childhood that different from Vortash's.

Thoughts of her nephew and her lover still made painful jabs in her chest, but she was finally past the point of wiping away those stupid, hot tears from her eyes every time they crossed her mind. She didn't even lounge with fatigue and defeat like she had been for the past few days.

No, now she was boiling with rage.

This wasn't something she could just "talk about", either. Maybe Kelly Chambers knew what she was going through and knew her job well enough. Maybe her remaining friends were used to the occasional outburst of anger by now. But, not from her. Never from her. Sensat got angry. Vortash got angry. She was supposed to be above that. Maybe she was young for an asari, but she had more years than all of them with the exception of Krul.

She didn't need to get angry. That wasn't her job. Her getting angry meant people got hurt. It meant people got killed because she's apparently too young and stupid to keep herself from having an immature reaction.

The starboard cargo area was unoccupied, which was exactly what she needed: a space, to herself, where she could throw about empty shipping containers in relative peace. No human psychiatrists, no reminders of what she lost, nothing but the crackling sound of biotics as they lift and slam heavy crates against each other. The charged, empty boxes echoed with each collision and the entire cargo hold rang with the sound.

It was the first thing she'd focused on since she left Omega. Really focused on. She wasn't even imagining the crates as Blue Suns or Eclipse or the nameless killers of her last pieces of family. They were just metal crates that made a very loud and amusing BANG! with every power she threw at them. She easily lost herself into the drills.

Her concentration was jarred as if she'd been woken when someone entered into her space without warning. "Well, well, well. I thought I heard someone slapping around their biotics up here."

Mierin turned to see the strangest looking human she'd ever seen. It took her a few moments to even identify her as a female, and she was covered with so many tattoos that the asari, at first, thought she was wearing some sort of strange, skin-tight suit. The shaved head was even weirder. The males of their race often kept their hair short, but the females were more likely to keep it long for aesthetic purposes. And, yet, this woman seemed... very aesthetic.

"Oh, what's wrong? Cat got your tongue?" the human said, walking over with more of a swagger than a saunter.

"I didn't think I was disturbing anyone by it."

"Disturbing?" The human snorted. "The only thing 'disturbing' is how piss-poor you are at it. Aren't you asari supposed to be biotic geniuses or something? Like, don't you have your tea parties by holding up the cups and crumpets with your mind?"

"That's not—" Mierin tensed and tried to roll her shoulders back to keep from showing agitation. They ended up squaring in a tall posture, instead. "Look, if I'm not bothering you, is there some other reason you're here?"

"Maybe I just like sizing people up," was the response, and she crossed her tattooed arms with something between a smirk and a sneer on her full lips. "Though one look at you tells me you're nothing to worry about."

The boxes all clanged against the bulkheads of the walls at once with the burst of energy from Mierin before she could stop herself. Every muscle in her body was engaged, attempting to hold back the energy crackling in her fists and over her skin. There was no reason she should be getting this upset and she knew it, but, damnit, who was this girl to try to rile her up like this?

"I've been having a bad week," Mierin warned in a low tone, "So, I'd appreciate if you—"

"Oh, suck my clit, you and your 'bad week'," she spat, then went to circling, because she knew damn well what she was doing. "Better yet, burrow your face in between the Cerberus cheerleader's legs. She could probably use the stress release."

A scream ripped through Mierin's throat as she leapt forward with the energy balled in wide globes over her fists. The wild rampage she was intending on was quickly cut off when, even as the boxes around them shuddered, the human woman didn't even budge when her small hands caught Mierin's glowing arms. She absorbed all the momentum head-on and at most leaned back on one booted foot before an even bigger wave of pressure—the biggest Mieirn ever felt that wasn't from explosives—swept up from her opponent's side and slammed into her.

Next thing she knew, Mierin was gasping for the breath just knocked out of her lungs and she was against the wall across the room. She only had a glance up before she saw the human advancing in a crisp march, dark tendrils flowing all around her as if the ink on her skin had come alive.

"Now that's more like it!" The last two steps turned into a sprint and all the black light congregated over into one fist as she went for a charged upper-cut. Mierin dodged to the side. The punch went through air, but the energy grazed over the worked metal bulkheads of the wall. The galvanized outer coat warped inward with her fist's passing with a hiss and a whine.

Dear Goddess, was this crazy human trying to kill her?

Faced with either run or fight for your life, Mierin took a chance and threw a singularity. The human rolled to the side and into cover behind one of the tossed boxes, but erupted back into sight as she launched herself up and over them. With a barbarian yalp, she came down on over Mierin again, forcing her to dodge and the brunt of the attack going to the floor. With so much direct energy, this time the covers crinkled inwards.

The dodge was enough to give Mierin an opening, so she took it. She threw a huge push at her opponent, and it succeeded in staggering her back long enough to go in for a follow up move. This time, one of her direct attacks made good contact with the human, and she threw her into one of the crates.

"I saw my nephew die!" Mierin cried out and swiped one of the boxes in to hit the human. It was narrowly avoided, but she still had the upper hand. "My nephew—half my age—whose birth I witnessed—whose eyes I saw open for the first time to his given name—whose first words and steps I was present for—who was half my age and still took care of me since I'm still a stupid kid! He died protecting me!"

"Boo-fucking-hoo!" This insane woman shot the nearest crate at Mierin's legs across the floor. It contacted, but Mierin managed to keep her stance.

"He wanted to see me having children! Children that could never come because my lover died just days before that and he knew it!"

"'Cause you asari mate for life, right?"

"What do you know?" She forced out another shockwave—her biggest yet—but the biotic human ran into it and it shattered like a hemisphere of glass. There was a flash of blinding tattoos, and she was on the ground, a piercing, burning pain radiating from her left breast, up to her neck, and down to her hip. She gasped desperately for air and her hands clawed at the buckled floor.

"Jack!" a different voice came in, followed by the clack of heels. It was the other human biotic, Miranda. "What the hell were you just doing?"

"Playing with the asari over there." Mierin had a feeling that "Jack" was looking over at her like she was a child in a playpen as a gesture, but she couldn't move her neck to make sure. "Figured both of us could do with a little bit of sparring practice."

"More like attacking her. The commander won't be so kind when she finds out you've been accosting other members of this crew."

"If it bothers 'the commander', then she can tell me, herself. You, on the other hand, should be getting to work making sure that I have access to all those files that I'm going to need in order to keep that deal straight with me."

"You have the clearance, already. Maybe you should keep your mind on your side of the bargain with Shepard."

"Hey, I agreed enter into her crazy mission, didn't I?" She barked a laugh and plodded away, down the hall. Instead of mercifully following after her, Miranda clacked further into the cargo hold and knelt beside Mierin.

"How badly injured are you? Can you move?" She didn't sound very concerned; more like she was asking if there was a malfunction in engineering. Mierin was actually a little glad for that.

"I can't move much of my left side." she admitted.

"EDI," Miranda called up, "Have someone come down and bring her up to the medbay with a stretcher."

"Medical personnel has already been alerted, Operative Lawson."

"Commander, I thought you might like to be informed that there was an engagement between Mierin and Jack in the Starboard Cargo Area."

Shepard, in the meantime, was busy hashing through some code on her console with a dull, annoyed look on her face. When the blue sphere had appeared in the corner of the loft, she didn't even turn towards its glow.

"Great." Her tone was dry and flat. "Exactly what I need to hear right now. Is Mierin in therapy with Chambers or in the medbay with Chakwas?

"She is with Chakwas. Should I alert Yeoman Chambers, as well?"

"No. I'm sure the last thing she needs right now is a shrink breathing down her neck. What sort of damage did she sustain?"

"Mierin's wounds are relatively minor. There is extensive bruising and some trauma to various tendons, but no fractures or lesions were detected."

"How about Jack?"

"I believe Jack enjoyed the conflict. Although Mierin was technically attacked first, Jack had obviously led her into the altercation."

She huffed a breath through her nose. "Of course she did."

"Do you require Jack detained?"

"No, that'd be pointless." And messy. "I'll just talk to them both later when I have the chance."

"Understood, Commander. Logging you out."

Shepard leaned back in her chair and rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. She wasn't going downstairs now, damnit. Second shift was almost over and there was no way she was going to be going down to hash out more orders when everyone—including herself—was getting jumpy and frazzled.

She could tell when she was acting off. Hell, she made a fucking smiley face when she was texting Garrus earlier. Who the fuck even makes smiley faces anymore? That went out of style even before wireless access through personal telephones became obsolete. Did that even mean anything to turians? He hadn't responded since then, and she had spent her downtime trying to access his panel remotely from here (which had served no purpose except to remind her how much code has already evolved in just two years).

She was better at splicing panels in secured doors, anyway.

Her "talk" with him wasn't something she had any sort of advantage for, either. He was severely bothered by... something dealing with the two of them. It wasn't affecting his performance mission-wise, but what the hell was he getting suddenly hesitant about? It's not that he didn't want her. That was clear enough.

Fingers drummed across the tabletop just below the keyboard. Then again, he didn't seem to expect getting into any sort of physical relationship with her, nor did she to be fair. Maybe he was attracted to humans—or to her—but he was still a different race with a different biology and a different culture. It wouldn't be out of character for him to get caught up with the details of interspecies mating despite the fact they both seemed to have the proper goods and definitely had the proper will.

Maybe it was a chirality thing. Dextro-vs-levo could have some bad results, depending on the person, but she knew one woman in basic that ate turian sweets because they didn't "go to her hips". It couldn't be that bad, right? In seconds, to reassure herself, she typed out "dextro amino allergic genitals", and proceeded to not be reassured at all. In fact, she protectively tightened her thighs inward and cringed. For a human woman, it looked like a lot of red and burning and inflammation. Fuck, and she was about to swallow that one time in the bath. Anaphylactic shock didn't seem so laughable, all of the sudden.

It was one thing to tell herself that it didn't matter, but damned if she still hadn't unclenched her thighs since she saw those images.

Okay, it wouldn't do to be suddenly unsure and hesitant on her side if Garrus was starting to lose confidence. Surely, it was just as easy to find evidence on the Extranet (and, perhaps, a few tips) to remind her of the good things she's trying to get herself into. A shortage of porn, especially after humans entered the galactic arena, was never something complained by anyone with a link-up to their omnitool. And it couldn't be that unusual, not with all those asari. They had to have worked out the finer details of protein-mixing long before the turians and humans bumped into each other. It would also be a good excuse to figure if turians even did the whole oral thing and why Garrus was so good at it.

Some normal, turian-man-on-turian-woman porn proved that, oh yeah, they definitely did the whole oral thing. Not all "genitals in the mouth going to town" really, but tongues were apparently very damn useful. And appreciated. Though it looked more like teasing rather than a way to actually get off due to their teeth and, well, Garrus had gained a new... respect for her lips from earlier.

They didn't just confine themselves to their nether-regions, either, which pointed out pretty well on the turian erogenous zones. And did wonders for the hesitation she had a few minutes ago. She let a hand slip down behind her waistband as she clicked thumbnail after thumbnail, even established a good rhythm that had her putting her shoulders into it. About the time she was considering unbuttoning her pants to give her hands a little more room to work and maybe take the little laptop to her couch was when she noticed a strange sound from her left.

Garrus was frozen mid-jerk from where she caught him, apparently just as off-guard and unsuspecting as she was. His eyes were wider than she'd ever seen on a turian, and every muscle was locked up in inward working. There was a slow hiss of intake—mandibles out—for a moment, which stopped just as abruptly when they clacked back on his face. Was he even afraid to breathe?

They were in such a still picture for what felt like a minute. Shepard was the first to move, shooting out a hand to close the (still moving) display, and gave Garrus liberty to get some oxygen and shift his feet awkwardly. When she turned to him again, she wasn't sure if the proper face she should have on was abashed or indignant or straight up mortified.

"I thought you were coming in after second shift was over," she tried. Other than the effects of a suddenly dry throat, her voice at least sounded good and even.

"Um... I did."

She blinked at him and furrowed her brows, then looked down at the time display on her desk: one minute after third shift start. "Jesus, Vakarian, did you just wait outside my door until the clock struck?"

He gave a weak laugh. "You know I like to be prompt, Commander."

"Yeah, well—" She moved to stand, realizing half-way that her hand was still down her pants. It pulled out and she turned away from him, cringing and holding her face with the other hand in what she hoped translated as annoyance and not embarrassment.

Garrus cleared his throat. "So... it turns out you do have fetish for turians? Should I be warning Melanis?"

She huffed a breath through her nose and allowed herself to face him again and grin. "She's safe from my horrible, xenophile clutches. Besides, didn't you notice that she acts a lot like a turian Ashley?" After letting a beat pass to see if he had a response on the ready, she went to move past him to the couch. "So, you said you had something to talk to me abou—"

One large hand stopped her by grabbing her shoulder and turning her in his direction again, his other took her wrist and brought her still-moist fingers to his mouth. A blue tongue wrapped around them and took away some of that moisture to replace with its own and his eyes were directly and steadily set on hers. And since that wasn't a mind-numbing enough action for him to perform, the hand on her shoulder slid up behind her neck and pulled her forward into a kiss.

Oh god, she should do something. Why wasn't she doing anything? She never had trouble reacting before. Here was Garrus, sliding his magnificent blue tongue over hers, and she was embarrassingly having trouble even keeping up. Shouldn't her hands be busy distracting him or turning him on? But the one is still in his hand. What about the other that's just kind of hanging there? Wait, what should she with it?

He pulled away before she could decide and, as if to answer an unspoken question, said, "You—ahem—said you liked how you tasted on me."

She had a stupid look on her face and she knew it, and those words just flushed her skin up into her scalp and down past her neck. Garrus Vakarian just caught her off guard and she knew it. Worse, he knew it, too, and he looked far too pleased with himself.

Shepard swallowed and managed to grin back at him. "Keep that up, and we may never get to actually talking."

He hummed a purr at her. "Says the woman just caught getting herself prepared."

"You make it sound like I had myself spread out across a table with all the trimmings." Aha! He blinked and floundered a little at that one. She regained some confidence and went to sit on the couch, motioning for him to follow. He did silently, obviously still in a fluster, but he sat with his thigh touching hers.

"I actually do have something I want to talk to you about," he said with his tone still quite sheepish.

"Which is?"

He heaved a breath and looked at her, then reached up to touch her face lightly with his gloved talons. She doubted he could feel her skin through those. "I just—I've been so glad to see you. Not to say I didn't greave, but something about a funeral where Joker gets kicked out for screaming 'it wasn't the geth'… makes you want to find out what really happened."

"I remember you telling me about that. Hard to think of Joker freaking out like that." When she first saw him again on the Normandy, he turned his chair and looked at her like she just came back from a mission. He even gave her some sarcastic line about seeing her spaced and how she never could sit still.

He smiled. "I don't count finding you as finishing my investigation, but that's not my point. I went out for more or less the same reason I joined you two years ago, and here I am with the result. We're both alive, with living comrades, and all the responsibilities associated."

"You're not complaining, are you?"

"Of course not. I need to be in this fight with you, Shepard. There's nothing else I could do right now that could be any more important."

What he said was said with such purpose that the ensuing silence after was unnerving as Shepard waited for him to continue. When he didn't, she forced herself to relax backwards into the cushions of the couch. "I'm still not sure what it is you wanted to talk with me about, Garrus."

"I... I just thought you to know that, even with everything happening, I didn't want to miss a chance with this." He punctuated his point by taking her hands into his. "Maybe I shouldn't want that. There's a lot going on, here. A lot on the line that could be jeopardized."

Shepard's brows furrowed. Was he talking about sex or a full-blown relationship?

"I might seem a little distant lately, and I have more guilt than I should carry dealing with what Sidonis fucked up before I found you... but, I can't just let..." His nervous voice trailed off and his mandibles twitched like he was trying to control them from flaring in and out and failing.

A relationship. He wanted a relationship. What the hell was she supposed to do with that? Say yes? No? String him along like the same sort of cock-tease bitch that would flaunt at him while he was under stress? She frowned, but before Garrus could panic at the severe silence that fell over her, she leaned her shoulder against his and huffed.

"I just came back to life with two years lost and the Reapers still coming," she began. "Hell, the fact that I even did that throws 'permanence' right out the window. But..."

"But?" his voice was soft, like he was a little choked up.

"I don't want to miss out, either. Maybe take this a day at a time? No pressure, just see how it pans out for us both."

His body shifted where he sat, then he pulled himself forward and faced her, looking to where she still reclined. His face was hard to read because she'd never really seen it before on a turian. Hopeful and strangely resolute, like he just found something unbelievably important. "I can do that. Definitely."

Shepard smiled and pulled up a hand to run her fingers across the marks in his face. He melted into her touch, and it was crazy how satisfying that felt to her. "Why don't we start by lounging up here and you telling me about your team? I didn't get to meet all of them, you know."

I love Jack. Shepard should text her a smiley face. Bitches love smiley faces.