"Shittier evening than normal, Commander?"

Shepard quirked a smile at Gardner as he thrust his obligatory mug of spectacularly bad coffee into her hand while she walked past as part of her nightly tour of the ship. It really was amazingly bad coffee, quite possibly the worst Shepard had ever had in her life... and she'd spent six weeks in a jungle drinking a rancid batarian blend made with what had literally been piss water... and it was therefore a thing of exquisite beauty. She took a long appreciative sip, eyes sparkling up at him over the edge, before she replied with a brutal honesty that was hidden deftly by the well-calculated sparkle, "You have no idea, Sarge."

"Neither do you, Commander," he replied completely un-self-consciously. "Turns out krogans don't handle fiber well. And I thought the shitters around here were bad before. I don't suppose that brilliant fresh fruit idea was yours."

"No, I don't think so," said Shepard. "Perhaps you should check with Miranda. There was an incident with melon in her office." She meandered off, cheers-ing the mess sergeant over her shoulder as she did every night, and took another sip of the terrible coffee.

Her smile faded as soon as she turned away, sipping the awful coffee, once again lost in thought.

She wasn't quite sure where she had gone wrong. This concerned her on several levels... the first and most important being the fact that if she didn't know where she had gone wrong, she had virtually no hope of correcting the problem. She considered her missions, all of them and no matter the nature, to be maps: there was a starting point, an ending point, a myriad number of ways to get between the two, and each available option could be weighted to reflect effectiveness, speed, difficulty, and risk. And she did consider speaking to Alenko - one on one, about something obviously contentious and painful for the both of them, with something so critical on the line - to be a mission; the only reason she wouldn't would be that it was actually harder than killing Reapers and calling it a mission kind of detracted from how fucking hard it really was.

She could see the map clearly in her mind. She was at one of the two starting points, Alenko at the other: hers was in the upper right-hand corner, marked with a yellow A, and his was in the lower left-hand corner, marked with a blue B. They were separated both from each other as well as from their joint target, the peacefully green Point C at the far left of the map, by a seemingly impossible number of formidable-looking natural formations: a snow-capped mountain range here, a massive desert there, a raging river here, a jungle full of bloodthirsty insects and bad batarian coffee blends there.

She'd known the trip to C would be hard. She'd known that. The problem, though, was twofold. First, she had thought she'd known what the landscape looked like between A and C, thought she'd identified all the mountains she'd freeze trying to climb over, all the rivers she'd drown trying to swim across, all the deserts she'd find herself lost in. And maybe she'd identified them all perfectly and had successfully either beaten or avoided them all... but if she had, she had missed the others, others that had tripped her up, used the last of her food reserves, doomed her trek to C to failure. And second... she'd thought Alenko would be able and willing to brave the same treacherous, unknowable landscape.

She didn't know if he was unwilling to or unable to.

She didn't know which was worse.

"Here you are, Commander." Donnelly's cheerful brogue broke through her reverie and she instinctively reached out, the nightly engineering summary report appearing in her hand a moment later.

"Thanks, Donnelly," she said, offering him a quick, effortless smile over the top of the report before scanning it quickly. "How are we doing on those power consumption rates?"

Donnelly muttered a curse in his native language, one that somehow managed to sound both lyrical and spectacularly profane, and Shepard was pleased to note that he didn't bother offering her an apology about it. She'd been working on him for weeks to stop with the apologies. Maybe that poker game had finally convinced him that she was serious about it. God only knew he'd spent most of that game cursing.

"She still doesn't feel right," Donnelly sighed. "We're really close, Commander, and she's definitely good enough to fly... but not good enough to brag. Yet. Gabby and I are convinced we can get it better. We're thinking another shift or so until she's perfect."

Shepard handed the report back to him. "Then make her perfect," she said. She patted the nearest console then turned to go. "Nice work, Donnelly. Tell Daniels to stop slacking off."

"Will do, ma'am," Donnelly said. "I'll be telling her twice if you don't mind."

Shepard made a cheers-ing gesture over her shoulder once again. "Three times if she needs it," she said. "Can't let her get a big head about it all. I'm trusting you to handle this personally, Donnelly."

"You can count on me, Commander," Donnelly called after her. "Don't you worry."

Shepard's smile faded once again as she left engineering.

If Alenko was unwilling or unable to get to Point C... She didn't know what that meant. She just didn't know. If he was unwilling... could she somehow convince him to make the trek? Was it something that... that if she could just get him over the initial hurdle, he'd be willing to try? Or if he was simply unable to... was it something she could do for him? Could she carry him? Was she a strong enough swimmer to get the both of them across the rivers, a strong enough climber to pull them over the summit? Could she get them both there?

She probably could.

… but what if he didn't actually want to go? What if it wasn't simply a matter of not being able to climb the mountain or not wanting to cross the desert? What if he just... didn't want to be at Point C anymore?

Did Point C even exist without him?

And if it didn't... then where was she going?

Besides Point D ("End The Reaper Threat-ville") and Point E ("Save The Fucking Galaxy-opolis"). Those she had to visit.

But besides those...

Except there obviously wasn't anything besides those.

She turned on a heel and marched into Lawson's office.

"I'm taking the amp," she announced without preamble. "I need your recommendations on my terminal within the hour."

Lawson, sitting primly at her desk with her back characteristically straight, looked up at Shepard, the surprise in her blue eyes fading first to a mild curiosity and then to a weary realization. She sighed, then turned her attention back to her terminal and the detailed holographic brain projected above it.

"Did you leave him in one piece or do I have to find another consultant?" she asked.

Shepard blinked, her mug of terrible coffee halfway to her lips.

Lawson waved her hand impatiently. "Alenko," she said. She didn't wait for an answer, huffing an abrupt sigh and muttering, "I don't think you realize how hard it actually is to get good Alliance types on our project team, Shepard. The bad ones are a dime a dozen but it actually takes a whole lot of planning to get the good ones and even then, they can be hit or miss. Trying to find another one this late in the game is going to be -"

"He's fine," Shepard said.

Lawson paused in her typing long enough to raise a sculpted eyebrow at Shepard.

"In one piece," Shepard qualified. "How did you know?"

"He ran out on me earlier," Lawson said. "I was certain he'd do something straight out of the holos, something dashing and reckless and ridiculously over-the-top. Break onto the Normandy somehow to find you, fight through unending waves of evil Cerberus commandos, almost fall but find renewed energy as he remembers your face, find you and declare his love for you, and whisk you away to his magical kingdom... possibly to the accompanying swells of a full orchestra."

"You should talk to Kasumi," Shepard said.

"Not bloody likely," snorted Lawson. "While I have you here, though... which do you think is more likely: him coming in through the primary external vent system for the IES... or him disrupting the power distribution grid temporarily and just coming in through the bay?" She drummed her fingertips on the desk. "I calculated a ninety-two percent chance that he'd try to come aboard via stealth rather than force but I can't decide -"

"The vent to the maintenance shaft network," Shepard said.

"Really?" Lawson looked down at her predictive model, a frown crossing her face. "Huh."

"He worked in there after migraines," said Shepard. "Dark and quiet, I guess. No foot traffic."

Lawson sighed. "Well, hell," she muttered, drumming her fingertips again. "We could simply just go silent running for an hour every four, I suppose; that would keep the maintenance network inaccessible, even with high-end heat resistant hardsuits... but really, the last thing I want is to start showing off the IES to the nosy upstarts around here. Not that they don't already know we probably have an IES, thanks to you. Way to paint 'Normandy' across the hull. Really helps make sure that even the people who don't know enough about ship design to recognize the SR-1's core design package can tell what we're capable of."

"Well, I figured 'Pearl Harbor' would be more accurate but we didn't have enough space," Shepard said. "Needed smaller stencils."

"Ha ha," said Lawson, eyes on her terminal. "Maybe we'll just have EDI monitor the shafts for heat signatures. He'd use a stealth microweave in his armor, I'm sure, but even the high-end ones aren't perfect. Is Alenko coming back in the morning or not? It looks like there are a couple possible replacements floating around on the Citadel. None with his power or experience, of course but... " She sighed. "I was really hoping we'd be done with this nonsense before you two decided to try to clear the air which - as I suspected - has done nothing but make things worse."

"I don't want to talk about it," Shepard said.

"Good," said Lawson, "because I don't want to hear about it. Alenko already put me over today's quota for emotional upheaval. Is he coming back or not?"

Shepard paused, considering. "I don't see why he wouldn't."

Lawson blinked. "You don't see why he..." She sighed deeply and ran a hand through her once-again brown locks. "I know I shouldn't be surprised anymore by how you can be so exceptionally perceptive in some ways... and so completely idiotic in others. The onus is really on me to remember that. You've been nothing if not consistent about it."

Shepard wasn't convinced that was entirely fair. She was usually quite good with people when she had the distance and perspective to observe them neutrally. "I'm not good with emotions."

Lawson raised another unimpressed eyebrow at her. "Saying you're 'not good' with emotions is kind of like saying you're 'not good' with your biotics, Shepard: it's a colossal understatement," she said. "You're phenomenally and almost inconceivably incompetent at expressing both."

"Thank you, Pot," said Shepard. "All my love, Kettle."

"Don't turn this around on me," Lawson said, returning her attention to her screen. "I'm a cold and calculating bitch because I choose to be one and like everything else, once I put my mind to it, I really am quite excellent at it. You, on the other hand, are a cold and manipulative bitch because you're scared of the alternative."

Shepard arched an eyebrow, folding her hands over her chest. "Can't say anyone's ever called me a coward before," she said. "Or that I've ever given them a reason to."

"I most certainly do not think you're a coward," Lawson said without looking up. "I just think you're an idiot."

"Oh," said Shepard. "Well, that's much better then."

Lawson sighed, pointedly and rather melodramatically paused the rotation of the holographic brain slowly turning around in front of her, and folded her hands neatly in front of her. "Look, Shepard," she said. "You are a master compartmentalizer. You are eminently rational. You can reduce even the most painful emotional conditions to a series of zeroes and ones that you can use to either maximize your gains or mitigate your damages. You do this without thinking, most of the time without effort, and this is one of the many things that makes you an exceptional leader. One of the greatest even. And the greatest leaders always stand alone."

"I have to stand alone," Shepard said.

"I'm not arguing," Lawson replied with a dismissive wave of her hand, "and in fact, I agree wholeheartedly. If there's one thing I like about you, Shepard, it's the fact that you had the decency to recognize your singular importance to humanity and not bitch about what we've done to you because of it." She gazed up at Shepard, raising her folded hands to rest her chin on them. "I know this hasn't been easy for you: dying, resurrecting, losing two years of your life, trying to piece something together for yourself from what little we've given you. I can't actually empathize with you and never will because unlike you, I'm not worth the four-billion credit price tag."

She paused, a slight frown forming. "Though, for the record, also unlike you, I would have had the safety signs placed in more prominent locations around the ship to avoid the spacing death in the first place."

She waved her hand again. "But yes, anyway... I know it hasn't been easy. The fact that you tapped all of that down - stashed it all into conveniently-sized containers, each clearly labeled and ready and waiting for processing at a later time - to do what needed to be done without being told to do it and without a word of protest proves that you are the leader we need. But you can't expect others to do the same. You can't expect them to be able to do the same."

She turned back to her terminal, adding, "This doesn't mean I think you're psychologically sound, by the way. It just means I think you're effective."

"Good to know," Shepard said.

"Alenko, on the other hand," Lawson continued with an unmistakable edge to her voice, "was at least moderately psychologically sound and at least moderately effective as of earlier today. Thanks to you, though, I'm sure I can now safely reduce both of those from 'moderately' to 'completely and totally not'. Thanks for that. EDI, get me a list of all the registered human biotics currently on the Citadel. Include their rankings against asari standard, any known alliances or affiliations, and whether or not Cerberus has had dealings with them before."

"I am unlikely to find a candidate with Commander Alenko's unique qualifications," EDI cautioned her.

"Yes," said Lawson with a pointed look at Shepard. "I realize that. I'm sure Commander Shepard does as well. She just decided to waltz in and destroy him anyway."

"You're assuming quite a bit," Shepard said.

"Of course I am," Lawson said, "but given that I'm completely right nonetheless, I don't see how the distinction matters. You walked in, armed with good intentions. He countered with defensiveness. You reacted with rationality. He responded with agony. You retreated. He let you." She folded her hands on her desk and looked up at Shepard. "Is that about right?"

Shepard considered. She wasn't quite sure she could have distilled it so efficiently. "That's about right," she said.

"And did it occur to you that all of this could have been avoided," Lawson said slowly, enunciating each word as if she were speaking to a small child that was just a little bit hard of hearing, "if you'd simply walked in and showed him that you were hurting as much as he was?"

"He doesn't need more pain," Shepard snapped. "I'm a big girl, Miranda. I can handle my own boo-boos. I'm not about to go inflicting them on people who are already suffering."

"I've no doubt of that whatsoever, Shepard," Lawson said with remarkable patience, "but he's a big boy too. He didn't want you to solve his problem. He doesn't need you to solve his problem. All he wanted, all he needed, was for you to acknowledge that there was a problem... and that it was hurting you as much as it was hurting him."

Shepard tried to process that. She wasn't quite sure she succeeded. "People look to me for strength, Miranda," she said slowly.

"Yes. We look to Commander Shepard for strength. We all do. All of humanity does. Hell, after the Saren fiasco, most of the other Council races do too. But I'm willing to be that he wasn't looking for Commander Shepard. He was looking for someone else, someone I suspect only he'd ever gotten to see."

Lawson sighed again and re-folded her hands in front of herself. "Shepard, Alenko thinks your inability to use your biotics is psychological," she said. "We may disagree about how to deal with it but I happen to agree with the diagnosis. There are two things you never compromise on: 1) control and 2) protection of those under your care. This leads us back to what makes you such a good leader... what makes you the leader, what makes you so invaluable. But it's also why you can't use your biotics. You won't let yourself. You lost control once and almost blew a hole in the ship... so you're simply forcing control on the situation to make sure such a thing doesn't happen again. You want to learn how to use your biotics... but some small part of you, some small but very powerful and very fundamental part of you, is unwilling to unshackle it for fear of what might happen."

She turned back to her terminal "And you're doing the same thing with Alenko. You lost control once and destroyed everything... so now you're simply forcing control on that situation to make sure such a thing doesn't happen again. But that same small, powerful part of you is reminding you what happened last time."

Shepard's throat felt tight. "How is that wrong?" she asked. "How is it wrong to want to do things better?"

"It's not," Lawson said. "I think it's eminently rational and why you're so good at your job. But we're not talking about your job here, Shepard... and outside of this whole saving the galaxy business, there's a difference between doing things better and doing things right."

Shepard stared at her.

Lawson sighed. "Fine. Let me put this in terms you'll understand, Commander Orchestras-Tune-To-The-Sound-Of-A-Tactical-Ballistic-Missile. The last time you met a Collector ship, you ended up dead and your ship ended up destroyed. Right now, you're working the crew nearly around the clock to get the Normandy's new ablative shielding in place and perfect... not because you know the Collectors are going shoot at us but because you know they might. Knowing what happened last time, you'd never face the Collectors again without that shielding in place just in case. You made a mistake not having that the first time and everyone paid the price for it. This is your chance to fix it and do it right. Right?"

Shepard folded her arms over her chest. "Right."

"So you're doing the same thing with Alenko," she said. "Knowing what happened last time, you configured your own ablative shielding before marching in to face him a second time. But here's the wrinkle, Shepard." She leaned forward, blue eyes piercing. "You didn't do anything wrong last time. You didn't make a mistake. You didn't forget something. You didn't fail to take something into consideration. The way he felt when you died? The way you feel now? The way he feels now? Has it occurred to you that it's all normal? That there might be nothing to fix?"

She sat back, running a weary hand through her hair again. "You can't have both, Shepard," she said tiredly. "You can't tell him you love him, expect him to love you back, and then somehow arrange it so that a loss doesn't hurt. That's impossible... even for you. Especially for you. Either you keep him on the line knowing and accepting that a loss at either end will cripple the other, something I suspect he knew and accepted at a deep, fundamental level the moment he realized he loved you... or you cut the line now and throw him back into the water. He'll find another line. It might not be as strong but there will be others. They won't be the best... but they'll be good enough."

Something flickered in her eyes. She sighed. "You can't have both. Not even you, Shepard. I'm sorry. I really am." She turned back to her terminal and the holographic brain she was studying started rotating once again.

Shepard gazed at her for a minute before asking quietly, "Who was yours?"

There was just the faintest break in Lawson's typing before it deliberately resumed. "Aleks," she said, voice clipped, brisk, as she continued her work without looking up. "Aleksander Meshkov. Research head for one of my previous cells; specialized in temporary disruption of water-based ecosystems to allow for easy extraction of non-human sentients from planets of interest. Marine biologist now. He and his wife live in a small island city on Trident. Wife teaches chemistry at the new middle school. His daughter, Abby, just turned seven last month. Smart as a whip. Biotic."

A pause.

"Didn't Cerberus have a cell on Trident?" Shepard asked after a moment. "Involuntary human experimentation? Biotic-suppressing drugs? Severe brain damage?"

"Yes," Lawson replied brusquely. "I tried to get Aleks and his family off-world just in case. He didn't answer my messages."

Another long pause.

"Are we done bonding now?" Lawson asked finally. "I think I'm starting to get hives."

"Yeah," said Shepard. She scratched her forearm through the uniform sleeve. "I'm getting a little itchy too. Why are you studying my brain?"

Lawson rolled her eyes. "Contrary to this entire conversation and Cerberus's annual budget for the last two years, Shepard, not everything is about you," she said. "This is a side project Commander Alenko and I are working on... or, returning to my original point regarding you irresponsibly destroying him, were working on. The one you probably eavesdropped on, actually. Nice touch staying out all night to throw me off, by the way. Bar fight?"

"Quarian youth hostel," Shepard replied. She pointed at the holographic brain. "That's my brain."

"It can't possibly be your brain," Lawson countered. "I'm not sure why this was even in the Heracles project files yet but it was encrypted which means it's important... and with all due respect, Commander, this project is about advancements in mass relay tech. That's a little bit out of your academic wheelhouse. There are at least one or two million brains out there that would have more to offer on the subject."

Shepard took a step forward, paused the rotating hologram, then pointed at a series of flashes of neural activity, showing up in the hologram as smatterings of light flickering across the brain's surface. "Neurological activity in the temporal and occipital lobes," she said. "Apparently, the pattern is weird. Really weird. Singularly weird. My brain's been doing it since Eden Prime. No idea why or how but I guarantee if you show that to Chakwas, she'll tell you in under ten seconds that it's mine."

Lawson opened her mouth... then slowly shut it, blinking at the hologram. "Why... would data on your brain be in the Heracles project files?"

"I have absolutely no idea," Shepard said. "Sounds like something in your academic wheelhouse though. Good luck with that. Let me know what you find. And get me your recommendations for an amp."