A/N: thanks for the story faves & follows, author fave & follow, and the lovely reviews :)

"If you're here to talk to Bex, you're shit out of luck."

"How's she doing?"

"Not great. She's sleeping a lot, ignoring everything and everyone when she's awake."

"Even you?"

"Especially me."

Bex sighed to herself as she listened to the conversation taking place just outside her hospital room. It was true that she'd slept a solid two days after they'd docked at Arcturus, but since then, she'd mostly just been faking sleep to avoid having to talk to people. While she was grateful they'd gotten her out, now she wished they'd all just fuck off. She didn't want their questions, their company, and especially their goddamn pity.

"You can't avoid everyone forever, Shepard."

Bex cracked one eye open and glanced over at Admiral Faulkner as he sat beside her bed. "I can bloody well try. Sir."

He waved off the title. "I think after what we went through, you and I are beyond such formality in a friendly setting."

"Sorry, sir. You can call me Bex if you like, but you'll always be Tamara's dad, which makes you an adult."

He chuckled. "I seem to have that effect on a lot of people. Even Mandy decided my name should be Admiral Grandpa." He glanced for a moment across the room to where Zaeed still stood outside, talking to Hackett before turning serious eyes on Bex. "How are you, really?"

"I'm..." She shook her head as she looked down at her hands, picking at the bandages on her wrists. "I'll be all right. Probably. How about you?"

"Can't seem to sleep more than a few minutes at a time," Faulkner admitted. "I end up reliving it all, the sounds anyway, since there were blessed few sights."

"Yeah. It gets easier though, eventually. How long are you stuck in here?"

"A couple of days, maybe less, though I'll probably stay on the station a bit before I head back to London."

"Lucky you. I'm here probably another week at least."

"Not a fan of hospitals then?"

Bex shook her head again. "Nothin' good ever happens in them. 'Sides, the sooner Zaeed's away from Arcturus, the better. Alliance makes him itch."

"I've noticed. I'm surprised he's been able to hold a civil conversation with Hackett this long."

As if on cue, the conversation outside the door seemed to quickly become heated and it wasn't long before Hackett left and Zaeed stormed back into the room, looking at Bex in surprise. "Oi. You're actually awake."

"Yup."

"And actually acknowledging someone's existence?"

She nodded toward Faulkner. "He started it. So what'd you say that pissed off Hackett?"

Zaeed narrowed his eyes. "What the hell makes you think I pissed him off?"

"Because I may not know him all that well, but I do know you really goddamn well and you have no bloody clue how to have a conversation without turning into an argument." She held up a hand when he started to argue. "One, you just proved my point, and two, well... you are usually the one that turns it into an argument."

He was about to respond when a nurse popped her head in through the doorway. "You've got more visitors, Shepard," she said with an apologetic smile. "Important ones by the look of them."

Bex groaned. "Can't you just tell them I'm not up to more visitors right now?" Important visitors in a place like Arcturus could only mean Alliance brass, and she did not have the energy necessary to keep her mouth from spouting off all the curses she'd been thinking of since Faulkner's revelation about her hearing.

The nurse shook her head with a muttered "sorry" seconds before Hackett returned, followed by three other men that Bex instantly recognized as the rest of the voting members of the Admiralty.

"Good, you're already here," one of them said with a nod to Faulkner, ignoring the painful and stiff salute Bex gave.

Faulkner frowned. "What do you mean already? You were expecting me to be?"

"They want to do the Torfan hearing," Hackett said, looking decidedly pissed off at the idea. "Here and now."

"You want to what?" Bex snarled, sitting straight up in the bed.

"Silence! You've stalled on this long enough, Shepard," the first man snapped. His dark eyes bored into her pale ones as he continued, "You can't keep avoiding -"

"You can not be fucking serious!" she muttered angrily. She fell back against her pillows in a mix of shock at their stupidity and pain from moving too much too quickly. "I wasn't avoiding anything, sir. Vido -"

"Just stop, Shepard," another of the admirals said. "We know all about your supposed history with Vido Santiago and the Blue Suns. And then you dragged Admiral Faulkner into your drama to avoid repercussions for your actions on Torfan."

As the room fell into stunned silence, Bex felt the familiar tingling coursing through her limbs as her biotics warmed up. She cursed the fact that they seemed to respond most effectively to her anger, especially considering that the doctors had warned her to keep her biotics offline for at least a week while she regained strength.

An angry and stern voice from the doorway broke some of the tension in the room. "What the hell is going on in here?" Bex's doctor, a short white-haired woman, snapped. "This is a hospital room, not an interrogation room. Lieutenant Shepard needs rest." She narrowed golden brown eyes at Admiral Faulkner. "As do you, sir, if you wish to leave this hospital tomorrow."

The three admirals who had come in with Hackett began arguing with the doctor. "You have no right..." "She can't keep avoiding..." "Do you know who -"

"Get. Out." The doctor's voice was now eerily calm as she stared down the three men, all of whom were at least a foot taller than her. "You may give the orders on the field of battle, gentlemen, but in this hospital, I do. If I find out you've disturbed either the lieutenant or Admiral Faulkner again, I will have you barred from the premises."

Bex fully expected further argument, as the one who'd spoken to her first looked ready to unleash a barrage of insults on anyone in his vicinity, but the other two merely turned toward Bex and nodded once. "We'll be in touch, Shepard," the older of the two said. "This... this is not over."

Once the three admirals had gone, as well as the doctor, Zaeed stood up and began pacing the room. Truth be told, Bex had nearly forgotten he was still there.

"The goddamn nerve of those bastards," he muttered, tightly clenching his jaw. "To actually accuse -"

Bex turned to Faulkner. "They don't actually believe that, do they? That I dragged you into my drama?"

Hackett answered instead. "Wells does. He was the one who organized the rescue, tried to order the men to leave you there if you and Joe happened to be in the same location." He glanced at Zaeed. "That was the reason I tagged along. To make sure that order wasn't followed, or that they didn't just decide to finish her off."

"Would have been a fucking mercy killing, the way I felt," Bex muttered quietly so only Faulkner heard. He reached over and gently squeezed her hand as she looked up at Hackett. "What's Wells got against me, anyway?"

"It's not you, Shepard," Hackett said, taking a step toward the door to prevent Zaeed from leaving the room. "You're... a proxy for his grief."

Bex raised an eyebrow. "I'm sorry?"

"Do you remember in your N-school class, there was one whose N7 test went sideways and almost everyone died on the Blue Suns base?"

She nodded silently, wondering where the hell he was going with this.

"Wells' daughter was part of the squad at that base, and as I'm sure you remember, the leader of said squad was one of the many who died on Torfan."

"So what you're saying is Wells is trying to punish me for his inability to punish the dumbass who got his daughter killed."

"Yes."

"Can't you do something about that?"

"We're trying," Faulkner said. "Believe me, we're trying."