Note: The chapter where I smush two stories together and expect it to make sense to anyone but me.

Shepard cracked her neck and rolled her shoulders as she stepped out of the taxi and onto the Citadel. She'd wanted to just bring Garrus—so she could have some more time to try and talk him out of this—but Alex had cornered her in the mess hall and actually asked her if he could come. It had been so surprising that she had agreed, and he'd grinned and vanished before she could second-guess herself.

She glanced over to where Garrus and Ale—Shepard blinked. Alex wasn't… well, Alex. She'd seen him do that before, a disguise as he called it, but it was still startling to suddenly have your crewmate transform into someone else entirely. He turned green eyes towards her to meet her incredulous stare and smirked.

Now that was the Alex she knew.

"Like what you see, Shepard?" Alex smirked wider, raising a blond brow as Shepard shook her head to clear it. Even his voice was different.

"No," she deadpanned. "You say this Fade guy's in a warehouse, Garrus?"

Garrus checked something on his omni-tool as 'Alex' hefted what looked like a dark version of the Widow he'd used on Aeia. Shepard held up a hand to stall Garrus' reply and stared at the gun in Alex's hands.

"Alex, where did you get that rifle?"

"I made it," came his nonchalant reply, shrugging. A grin pulled at his lip. "I call it the Black Widow. Clever, eh?"

Shepard sighed and motioned for Garrus to go on. She'd wonder where Alex got the parts to recreate that later.

"C-Sec intel says Fade has contacts in the shipping warehouse on level 26. I've already set up an appointment."

Shepard nodded approvingly as they headed for the security checkpoint. She and Garrus stepped through without issue, but when Alex stepped up the light sputtered and flashed briefly before the turian officer glanced up from his screen.

"Welcome back to the Citadel, Mr. DeMoss. Been a while."

Alex smirked and nodded. "That it has."

Shepard looked at him oddly before shrugging and continuing on towards the Wards. "Care to explain, Mr. DeMoss?"

"Not particularly." Alex motioned for a large warehouse with two rather conspicuous bystanders arguing outside it. "That it?"

Garrus checked his omni-tool. "Looks like it. Come on; I can't wait to have a chat with Fade."

Alex sighed and shifted feet while Garrus and Shepard interrogated the little ball that turned out to not be Fade. The volus was quite obviously not impressed when his krogan bodyguards had backed off at the first sign of possible violence, and honestly neither was Alex. What kind of krogan doesn't want to shoot something?

Alex frowned as he shifted feet again, rubbing at the shoulder of the 'armor' he was wearing. He hated the helmet, though, and never formed it when he took this shape. He knew better than to think he could enter the Citadel as his 'normal' shape. The scanners out front would have a field day trying to put a name to his face, and on the off-chance it actually did recognize him, he was pretty sure he was flagged as a terrorist or something else equally condemning.

For a race with such short life spans, humanity had very long memories.

When Garrus brushed past him like a turian on a mission, Alex drifted back to the present and turned to follow him. Alex glanced at the irritated former C-Sec officer and folded his arms.

"So? Did he know where to find Sidonis?"

Garrus sighed, 'frowning' again. "No, but he did give us Fade's name—a familiar one. Harkin. He's in an old factory in the Factory District. I can get us there no problem."

Shepard appeared on his other side, looking displeased. "Garrus, it's not too late to rethink this."

Garrus didn't look at her as he called a taxi from the terminal. "Come on; don't want to let Harkin get away."

Alex let the turian get on before he took Shepard by the arm to stop her, catching her eye. "If you met the batarians that raided Mindoir, would you 'rethink' anything?"

Shepard stiffened, staring at him before shaking free and boarding the shuttle behind Garrus. Alex eyed the shuttle with a frown. Enclosed spaces and Alex Mercer had never mixed well.

"You're making me sit in the back?" Alex protested. "I never get to sit in the front seat."

Shepard smirked. "It's not like you're going to get car sick. Just get in, Alex."

Alex rolled his eyes but stepped in, sitting with folded arms and grumbling. "Fine. But I call shotgun for the ride back."

Shepard was not all that surprised when Harkin turned out to have an entire Blue Suns squadron or two guarding him. Alex wasn't either, judging by the look of faint distaste on his face, but he didn't hesitate to raise that Black Widow of his and blow through the armor of one of the mercs and separate his head from his shoulders. Judging from the recoil on that thing, anyone else would have had their shoulder dislocated. Alex just grinned and fired again without reloading; obviously the new version could hold more than one round at a time.

Shepard lined up a shot and Alex stood from cover to draw their fire. It never ceased to amaze her when Alex did that as if being shot in the torso didn't even hurt. One clipped him in the head and he staggered back for a moment before the wound regenerated itself, and he returned the favor with a sniper round through the forehead.

He really should wear a helmet.

Shepard idly noticed one of the mercs behind a crate stiffen at Alex's display, before he ducked back down and stopped firing at them. Either that merc was a lot smarter than his friends, or he had just passed out.

Finally the rest of the mercs were dead—or about to be—so Shepard stood slowly with Garrus and held up a hand to keep the others back, motioning to the crate with the lone man behind it. She lifted her rifle and crept around the side of the cover, ready to fire as soon as the merc came into view.

She saw the merc's assault rifle first, lying on the ground with the heat sink removed, and his helmet resting nearby. It was enough for her to lower the rifle a bit.

"Stand up and put your hands behind your head!" Shepard called out, surprised when the merc did just that. He looked older than she had expected in a Blue Suns merc, maybe upwards in his late thirties, with a brutal scar on his jaw. "Why did you surrender?" she couldn't help but ask. She had never had a Blue Suns mercenary give up peacefully.

"Harkin doesn't pay me enough to tango with Zeus."

Shepard's eyes widened in surprise at the name. She looked at Alex expectantly, but he had no emotion on his face and kept the Widow trained on the merc. "You know each other?"

The merc laughed. "Any merc with half a brain knows Zeus. What name you goin' by nowadays, Meat?"

'Meat' smirked, not lowering his weapon. "You should know better than to ask me that, Ethan."

Shepard sighed. "A—Zeus," she corrected herself, and caught Alex's eyes flick to her at her slip-up. "You know this man?"

Alex shrugged. "He's not a complete asshole. For a merc."

Garrus made an impressed noise. "That's high praise from you."

The newly dubbed Ethan kept his hands behind his head but he nodded towards one of his fallen comrades. "If you get on the radio and tell 'em Zeus is in the building, they'll fall back. None of us want a repeat of that Massani incident."

Shepard hesitated. It would be a hell of a lot easier to get to Harkin if the Blue Suns weren't in the way, but it seemed almost too convenient. "Your thoughts, Zeus?"

Alex took a slow breath and narrowed his eyes, considering it. "Well, if they find out I'm here they'll either run back to mommy or swarm us en masse. Might be safer to just kill them all."

Ethan frowned. "You really haven't changed at all, have you?"

Alex grinned in reply. "Oh you have no idea."

This was seriously complicating things. Ethan was here? What were the odds? Alex remembered him from his years with the Blue Suns; the man had been one of the only ones that didn't piss themselves when Alex walked in a room. Half of him wanted to pull the trigger and send Ethan to an early grave, but the other half was reluctant to kill one of the only friendly acquaintances he'd managed to make since leaving Earth. And it looked like Shepard was being utterly unhelpful and was leaving the choice up to him.

Shoot Ethan in the head and rip apart the rest of this company to get to Harkin. Live up to your name. Zeus. King of the gods.

Or let him go and send the Suns running. For old times' sake.

Alex sighed through his nose, tightening his grip on the Widow. Damn it, he really was going soft. Ten years ago and he'd have already consumed the bastard, now here he was debating with himself like some kind of human. He growled low and stared Ethan in the eye. The man was utterly unafraid of his fate, despite having witnessed firsthand what Alex could do when pissed, and that was a rare thing. Even Shepard was still uneasy whenever he used one of his abilities for anything other than rudimentary healing.

"Damn it," Alex swore, jerking the Black Widow down and pulling the trigger. Ethan cried out and jerked back as the round went through his leg, sending him to the ground. Shepard jumped in surprise.

"Alex!" she snapped, glaring at him. "What did I say about shooting unarmed prisoners?"

Alex stepped forward and kept the Widow trained on the downed merc, who was actually chuckling a bit. "That was for shooting me in the back."

Ethan fumbled for some medi-gel and pressed on the wound in his leg as Shepard paused in her rant, looking confused. Alex would have to explain later. "So it's Alex now, is it?" Ethan managed, glancing up, still unafraid.

Alex grunted. "You can call me Zeus." He bent over and snatched Ethan's earpiece from where he'd dropped it and put it in his ear, immediately being assault by concerned radio chatter wondering why Delta Team wasn't checking in. "Yeah, Delta Team is dead," Alex informed them, and everyone immediately fell silent. "Well, except Ethan here, and that's only because I owe him a debt. The rest of you bastards better reconsider your career choices, because if I have to carve a path through your corpses I'm going to be seriously pissed. And you don't want to know what happens when Zeus is pissed."

Alex pulled the piece from his ear and tossed it back at Ethan, who caught it in one hand.

"I don't know about the rest of you," Ethan began, holding the earpiece to his face as he struggled back to his feet, "but I'm not paid enough for this shit." There was a pause where Ethan sighed and looked at Shepard. "If they're smart, they'll get out of your way. If they're not…" he shrugged, grinning at Alex as if he hadn't just shot him the leg earlier. "Well, you know what to do."

Alex smirked back, brushing past the old merc and stopping in the doorway, looking back at Shepard and Garrus. "Well? We've got a free pass to Harkin. What are you just standing around for?"

A/N: Mmyeah, so Ethan is from my spin-off of this crossover called "Alpha and Omega." The events they're referring to haven't exactly... happened yet in that story, but still. Fighting through a bunch of Blue Suns who are rightfully terrified of 'Zeus' seemed counterproductive considering Alex made a name for himself in that organization back when he worked with them.

And yes, in my version it was Alex who created the Black Widow used in ME3. The wiki entry says it was the Alliance who made it, but who's to say they didn't just get the idea from Alex and take the credit?

One more chapter or so finishing up Garrus' loyalty mission and then we get to hit the Collectors where they live! Yaaaaaaaaay!