"Mr. Moore, perhaps I should simply leave one of the beds with you name on it for future use?" Dr. Chakwas asked as she finished setting up the IV. She tapped it a few times to make sure it flowed correctly. "The only other person to show up covered in blood more often than you is Commander Shepard."

"Not my fault. Someone put a psychopath in my way," I grumbled and leaned back into the pillow. The pain medication she'd already given me had taken the edge off, but my accumulated injuries still seemed to be intent on forming some kind of coalition for a hostile takeover.

"At least you had a chance to hit him back," complained a weak voice to my left.

I turned my head and looked over at Jenny Goldstein. Bandages still covered her wrists, and she looked tired, but her eyes were open, and her color had returned.

She scowled. It made her look like a petulant child and my slightly drug-addled mind responded in kind. I stuck my tongue out at her. Bastion of maturity and self control, that's me.

Dr. Chakwas rolled her eyes and finished setting up the last of my medication. "All three of you should get some rest. And I am not above sedating you to accomplish it."

I started to giggle but subsided as my ribs complained, my breath coming in short little gasps. I mentally added bruised ribs to my list of "Things I don't want to do again."

Jenny's expression softened. "Sorry."

"Nah, It's fine. It's all good." The giggles welled up again. Whatever the doc had prescribed, it had to have been the good stuff. Tingles ran through me, little pinpricks of sensation replacing aches and pains.

Jenny smiled crookedly, though even through the haze of drugs it look strained. "You are totally high, aren't you?"

To my right, Kelly laughed breathlessly and leaned back into her pillows. "Yes. Yes, he is."

"Yes, I am," I agreed boisterously to the room, a stupid grin plastered on my face. The pains and aches continued to fade. At the same time, everything felt heavier, my arms and legs weighing down on me like someone had cranked up the gravity.

Chakwas finished setting up Kelly's medication then turned to all of us. "Sleep. All of you. I mean it."

I tried to raise one hand to wave at her, but the gravity in the room seemed to have reached levels that I couldn't fight against. That hardly seemed fair, but as my eyes started to close on their own, I realized that it didn't matter. Sleep was happening, regardless of my wishes.

Sleeeeeeeeeeep.

I stared blearily at the wall as I started to wake up, the warmth of the blankets and covers settled over me like an invisible net, preventing me from rising. Getting up seemed like such an arduous task. Why bother?

A satisfied smile crept across my cheeks. The Normandy always felt cold. This was a nice change. I rolled over, soaking in the heat. And came face to face with a giant stuffed animal.

I blinked several times, trying to clear my vision, to make the image of the furry thing not seem so blurry to my barely conscious mind.

Tan and black, smashed face, dark glass eyes, pink tongue sticking out. A giant stuffed Pug?

Why does that seem so familiar?

I stared at it, trying to jog my brain into motion. It sat on the end table next to the bed, like some kind protector statue. Except, you know, stuffed and furry.

A sense of unease started to slide through my gut, my muscles tightening as a memory nearly fifteen years old clawed its way to the surface, icy talons of dread and hope spiking through my mind. I recognized this thing. I had won it at King's Island. I had given it to ….

Sylvia.

I jerked upright and ripped the covers back and away, silencing the siren song and becoming suddenly aware of what had woken me in the first place: a shouted argument somewhere nearby.

I tore out of the guest room of the apartment. My apartment. The apartment that I had shared with Sylvia.

It was all a dream. It was just one long strange dream.

Hope kindled to life in me like a newborn star. My parents were alive. Sylvia was alive. It had just been a long and twisted dream, a passing fantasy and nightmare. And the dream was over. I could fix things, I could make it right. I made it around the corner into the living room, and skidded to a halt.

Sylvia stood at the edge of the kitchen, her back straight as a board, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Fury rolled off of her in a tangible wave, her cheeks flushed. "Damn it, why do you have to be such an asshole?"

Her words brought me up short, deja vu hammering into me all the empathy of a freight train.

"I'm an asshole? At least I have some other settings besides pissy! You've been shitty with me for days, and won't even tell me why!"

Nothing hurts quite as much as crushed hope. The flickering star in my chest guttered and died, leaving a void that sucked the will out of me. I turned to face the second voice. I turned to face myself.

Other-me stood just inside the doorway. My doppelganger appeared just as angry as Sylvia, face twisted up in a scowl that gave him a feral cast to his features. My features. He took a step into the living room, dropping the backpack. "I've been home ten damn minutes, and you already want to fight," he snapped.

"I didn't start this, you did." Sylvia snatched her keys from the counter. "And I could spend all day telling you what you did."

"Oh, please do." My doppelganger snarled and followed Sylvia as she made her way to the door. "What? All this and you're just gonna walk out?"

"Yes. Yes, I am." Sylvia jerked the door open, and paused in the halo of light from the outside. She didn't look back, and her voice dropped to a whisper that I could just make out. "Goodbye, Micah."

The door slammed closed and with it went the last vestiges of my hope. My doppelganger froze in place, staring at the door, confusion clouding his face. My face. A dull ache threatened to pull my heart into the black hole that the collapsed star of hope had created. I remembered this. I remembered how the anger had faded to confusion, then to worry.

"This was the last time you saw her," Sylvia said from behind me.

I spun in place, whipping around so fast the room blurred.

Sylvia stood behind me. Not the Sylvia who'd just walked out the door moments before, but it was her just the same. She smiled and swayed in the same white sun dress I remembered her wearing in my last dream. "Hey."

My mouth felt like the Sahara as I stared at her, trying to figure out just what to say, just how to react. Stunned didn't even come close. Confused simply didn't convey the scale.

Sylvia reached up and interlaced her fingers with mine. She drew me towards her, and I went, pulled by inexorably in her wake. Sylvia opened the door to the main bedroom and sunlight blinded me for several seconds. I heard the door shut behind us, and a warm breeze rippled by, carrying the smell of fresh-cut grass. I blinked as my eyes adjusted, taking in the rolling hills, and woods. On all sides, small fields nestled between swaths of woodland and hills, with a single winding road cutting through. Long drives branched off it like tributaries of a river, leading up the to the few houses I could make out from here.

I stopped and looked back. The trailer home looked exactly how I remembered it; simple and comfortable. A little worn, but also cozy in its own way. And also not the apartment we had just walked out of.

I am the master of time and space?

"I'm dreaming," I said aloud and turned to face Not-Sylvia.

She smiled and tugged at my hand, turning us toward the open field that would lead us down to her grandparents house. "Yes, you are. And you know I'm not actually Sylvia."

I blew out a breath before I answered her. "Normally this is the point when the dream falls apart, and I wake up. But I'm not."

"You also have close to a hundred stitches and are dosed up on enough pain medication to drop a cow," Sylvia pointed out, her smile widening. "Guess you're stuck with me for a bit."

"Which begs the question; who exactly are you. Am I talking to my imaginary friend?"

"Maybe. Maybe I'm your memory of her. Maybe I'm the Sylvia you wished she'd been. Or maybe not." She stopped and let go of my hand as we reached the fence, and opened it. I followed her through, and she closed the gate and latched it behind her before taking my hand again. "Or maybe I'm just a part of you."

"So I'm talking to myself? That's not typically a good sign, all things considered," I said, a snorted laugh escaping me.

"That depends, and you know it," she chided back. "Think of me, rather, as part of your subconscious. You were dreaming of Sylvia, and it just seemed the easiest way to accept a conversation, considering the circumstances."

I mulled that thought over a moment, the grass crunching slightly as we walked. "Alright. It's not quite as crazy sounding I guess. Though, why?"

"Because of what happened at Purgatory with Hadley. He might have sounded crazy, but you know that he didn't start that way. Something was pushing him." Sylvia sounded troubled, and she spoke slower, like she was tasting the word before she shoved it out into the air for both of us to deal with.

"Indoctrination."

"Yeah. That's kind of what I was thinking," I answered her. I flashed back to the screaming madness Hadley had been spewing. "And a name, too, for the good it'll do me."

Sylvia's solemn nod punctuated her words. "Harbinger. It knows about you. More, if Hadley's reaction is anything to go on, it considers you a threat, or something that might turn into one." Sylvia's tone grew even more sober. "And whatever Harbinger is, it's coming. I'd be a bit concerned about that."

I didn't answer her. I had more questions than answers at this point, and the very idea that I'd garnered the attention of something capable of rearranging the inside of someone's head took the terror of this much larger galaxy to whole new levels.

"And there is something else to consider. Alice Wake." Sylvia turned our course, taking up towards the garage. "Anyone who worries Miranda Lawson like that is scary. And she tried really hard to separate you from the rest of the group."

"I don't suppose you have any good news for me?" The words seemed bitter and harsh even to me, but I found it hard to care. The sky was falling, and I didn't have anywhere to run.

She tightened fingers in comforting squeeze. " You aren't alone. Not anymore."

My cheeks went to DEFCON level 1 in the space of a single heartbeat. "I am not ready to talk to my subconscious, who's dressed as my ex-girlfriend, about that."

Sylvia threw back her head, her silvery laughter filling the air for a moment as she revelled in my discomfort.

And considering that my embarrassment and determination to apologize is how I met Sylvia, that is pretty much exactly right ….

Thunder boomed in the distance as if in answer to the laugher, and we both turned to look. Clouds manifested at the horizon and rolled toward us, dark and ominous. The deluge appeared to be more waterfall than rain storm.

"We're out of time," Sylvia said, frustration making her words come out clipped. She turned back to me, and reached up to wrap her arms around my neck, her lips so close I could feel her breath when she whispered. "The Normandy isn't safe. Keep your eyes open. And take care of Kelly. I know you: you're afraid you'll mess it up, like you did with the other me. But just be there, and she'll be there for you." She released the hug and pushed me towards the garage. "Run. Run, you clever boy. Run, and remember me."

The wall of water raced towards me, and I backpedalled, gaining the door. I looked back at Sylvia just as she vanished from sight, disappearing into the flood of water. My fingers fumbled at the handle of the door, and I shoved it open and rushing through just as the rain hammered down at me.

I opened my eyes to dim orange light and familiar grey-white bulkheads. My back burned with sullen fire as I sat up, the stitches stretching in that weird combination of sensations that go along with being held together by sutures. The overhead lights had been turned down—a setting that I seemed to be getting used to—and the only illumination came from the glow of the console at Chakwas's desk. My body declared its various needs and complaints as I got out of bed, but what rest I had gotten seemed to have worked miracles. Or maybe Chakwas was a miracle worker.

Dr. Chakwas, Medicine Woman? I can see it.

My steps slowed as I came alongside Kelly's bed. She'd rolled over, pulling the covers up around her face. A shaft of sunshine flickered to life in my chest, reflecting up to my face as a smile. I tugged the blanket up a little bit more, and let her sleep. She needed it just as badly as I did.

I crept out of Medical, and only stumbled once on the way to the bathroom. I took care of the essentials and leaned heavily on the sink for a moment, letting the hot water run over my scraped-up hands. The warmth felt amazing in contrast to the cold deck plating, and the sensation gave me another point of reference I badly needed as I struggled to shake off the sureal dream. A thousand questions ran through my head like some kind of strange herd of buffalo.

Why does the name Hector come to mind? Hector the Buffalo?

I shook my head, then instantly regretted it. My stomach did somersaults for several seconds before settling down in a semi-smooth landing that thankfully didn't end in puking. "Ooookay, Micah. No more of that," I grumbled to myself, and started back to my bed in Medical.

Where I'm going to what? Lay in bed, staring at the ceiling? I'll just sit quietly under the stairs, making no sounds and pretending I don't exist.

The thought of lying in the dark while the memories of Hadley's words bounced around in my skull, whispering uncertain endings didn't appeal to me. I stopped and stared at the darkened Medical Bay and then glanced to my left at the elevator. No, I had other options. I reached over and punched the call button. If I couldn't sleep, maybe Ken could find something to keep me busy.

The door to the main engineering compartment opened on something that I hadn't heard since nearly my first few days on the Normandy: Ken and Gabby arguing. The beam of sunlight kindled to life again as I came around the corner to them acting like the old married couple that they clearly were destined to be.

Gabby's eyes widened as I stepped into view, and she stopped mid-sentence, before sputtering out a greeting. "Micah! What are you doing out of bed!"

Ken spun to face me, his own startled expression almost matching Gabby's perfectly. "Bloody hell, man, Chakwas is going give you enough tranqs to drop a krogan if she catches you."

My smile widened, and I hobbled over closer. "She tried that. It didn't take, clearly." I came to a stop and leaned against the railing. "Couldn't sleep, and lying there in the dark didn't appeal. Figured I could be productive if you all had something I could handle."

The console behind the two engineer chirped, then Joker's voice filtered through the section. "Damn, and I thought we'd topped out on crazy workaholics. Guess I was wrong."

"Naw, I'm operating on flex time. I'll slack off double later to make up for it," I said, "You miss me, Joker?"

"Me? Not a chance. Jack, I think, missed you though. I'd say go for it, but she doesn't seem like the sharing type, and a little bird told me you and Kelly seem to be getting along," Joker answered, his voice dripping with smug satisfaction. "I totally called it."

My cheeks went up in flames so fast, I had to have been soaked in gasoline. "How—"

Gabby clapped her hand over her mouth, her eyes going wide as she tried to keep from giggling. She failed, and leaned back against her console, shaking with laughter.

Ken rolled his eyes. "You two have been doin' this little dance since the day you came on board. Though I didn't think you two would figure things out while being kidnapped."

If embarrassment could reach lethal levels, I would have spontaneously combusted. I rubbed the spot of tension between my eyes. "Okay, how?"

"EDI," Ken supplied, "When Kelly used your omnitool on Purgatory, EDI picked it up. Audio, Biometrics, a little video."

Joker cut in, "And I put two and two together, and just had to share with a few good friends. And maybe posted a few notifications to the crew at large." An awkward pause followed that. "I mean, once we knew you were gonna make it. We were totally focused on your guys' safety, honest."

I groaned and closed my eyes. "Awesome. And this is now …." I rubbed the spot between my eyes, feeling the pressure in my head start to build. "Awesome."

"Hold that thought guys, it's go time," Joker cut in. "I'll patch you in, hang on."

I peeked with one eye and mouthed the words "Go time?" at Gabby.

"Shepard's hitting the Broker base right now," Gabby whispered back, motioning me closer as she did. "They landed about ten minutes ago."

"And this is the guy that tried to kill us on Omega." Fire boiled in my belly, a rumbling anger that demanded satisfaction. I'd just have to settle for a proxy.

Author Note: Thanks guys for reading! The dream sequence was one of those scenes that played itself out in my head months ago, and demanded to be used. When I started working on this one, it felt right to put it here, instead of my original tentative slot farther down the road. I hope you enjoy it!

On a more frustrating note, my laptop, may it rest in peace, is dead. A moment of silence for our fallen brother.

Mkay. On to business. What this means, is that for the last week (and this week) I've been steadily falling behind in things, as a tablet and my phone just aren't capable of doing a lot of things a real computer can. I borrowed a computer to upload this. I've been attempting to get a chapter out every two weeks, but, obviously, this one is late and the next one may be as well. I'll do my best, but this is just a heads up. I'll try and get back on schedule soon.

And, again, thank you to my wonderful and amazing betas (Kim, Pie, Tori) for keeping me rolling on this and helping kick it into shape!