Kaidan had been silently moody the entire night, but it was as Jenna was expecting. It wasn't as if she was her best sparkly self, either. How could having one of them go away temporarily leave a hole like this? It wasn't as if she'd been left alone, Kaidan was right there. But she'd just really started to click with John, to bond with and grow used to him, and then he was gone.

This is how this goes. It's part of what you signed up for. They did without you when you went to Rio. True, but that hadn't seemed like this. Or it hadn't for her...she'd just assumed that since John and Kaidan were together, not alone, that they wouldn't have missed her. It was a sobering realization that not alone didn't mean that the third party's absence was easy.

"You sleeping in the spare room again?" Kaidan meant for the question to be straightforward, bland in its neutrality, but Jenna read right through it. Or she read her own reaction into it. The idea of being alone tonight was a pretty harsh one.

"No. I'm sleeping in the bed with you, on your left side." That would put him on her uninjured side, just in case. Neither of them seemed to be restless sleepers, if anything, John slept like a corpse and Kaidan wasn't much more fidgety than he was. Her earlier concerns that one or both of them would have night terrors or worse had not come to be. No, if any of them was a restless sleeper, it was her. She just wanted to sleep next to him, like she was the most comfortable with. She wanted to face the next day on a good night's sleep...her return to work and a late afternoon meeting with a Public Affairs representative marked an end to her unplanned vacation.

"If you think that's safe enough." It was obvious that Kaidan was wavering between what he wanted and what he thought was prudent and cautious. Jenna loved him for it, but her mind was made up. She could always move later but she didn't think it was going to be necessary.

"I think it's safe enough." She didn't want to sleep alone and she knew he didn't either. "Kaidan, he'll be..." What? She couldn't say that John was simply going to be okay. It would be an empty thing to say. He'd already been through the end of the world, but it had almost killed him. It should have killed him. And whatever had come before that was the shadow that Kaidan didn't like to talk about...the first time that Kaidan had assumed him dead...was just another one. She didn't know, she'd never asked, but it lingered there, just below the surface of their dynamic.

"He'll be John." He answered simply as if that was enough and she guessed it was. "Let's just go to bed, okay?" He sighed, resting his fingertips on her elbow.

"Sure." It was still a little early, but Jenna could think of few things that sounded better at that moment than to slide between the sheets and maybe do some cautious snuggling before falling asleep. And everything she could come up with required ingredients that had become difficult or impossible to get... human contact with him was free and right there.

She walked into the bedroom, undressing and hanging her uniform up before joining Kaidan under the covers. He was warm against the chill and she snuggled into him, breathing in bliss as he rested a hand against her belly, gently rubbing. This was what she'd been seeking for ages, intimacy and closeness that did not necessarily lead to sex. Both John and Kaidan had mastered that art that Mitch seemed to have failed to grasp the very basics of, the fact that they could touch her without leading into more. Touch her while she was plastered up to them, nude...as they were. Mitch would have turned away from her, frustrated that her injury meant there was no chance in hell. Kaidan simply rested his hand on her belly, closed his eyes, took a deep breath and vanished into sleep.

Jenna woke up to the sound of the shower and she peeled an eye open. A thin blade of light escaped from the bathroom...he'd left the door open slightly in an attempt to begin to stir her gently out of sleep. It had worked and she gingerly sat on the edge of the bed. Stiff as hell, sore still when she moved wrong, but still an improvement over yesterday. Which had been an improvement over the day before. As expected, he'd done nothing at all during the night to even shift her from sleep, much less cause injury. All good, all good.

She stood, paddling into the brightly lit bathroom and blinking against the onslaught, wiping the mirror down to survey the damage. The bruise was darker, purple all of the way across...the brilliant red center had dissipated and the welt had subsided.

"Well?" Kaidan asked, his voice carrying over the water, his form a cappuccino colored blur through the textured glass of the shower enclosure. "You going to live?"

"I am going to live." She affirmed, stepping into the shower with him. It wasn't as generously sized as the vacation home's main shower, but there was more than enough room for the two of them. The three of them would be a tight squeeze, but it sounded like it would be a fun idea to try...when she was back at a hundred percent. His gaze rested on the bruise for a moment, the faintest of lines deepening between his brows but she grinned stubbornly back at him. "And we are going to get breakfast." It was still early, more than early enough for that and Jenna intended to face the day with a full belly and coffee.

He chuckled, resting his forehead against her right shoulder. She drank in the moment, sliding her arm under his elbow and giving him a half embrace in answer. What had she done to deserve this man? What had she done to deserve all of this? It was everything she had ever asked for, and more... "Hurry up and get clean, then. I don't want to have to wait for a table."

That was enough to get Jenna moving, scrubbing down and stepping out into the towel that he held at the ready. A few minutes later and they were dressed, out on the streets and headed for food.

It was great, and it was comforting to walk the bustling streets of Ground HQ, keeping Kaidan to the side that she didn't want bumped by passersby until he left her at her building door and carried on towards his own. Now she had nothing left but to go inside and face her brand new commanding officer. She grimaced, but gathered her nerves together and stepped into the building, following the halls to his office.

Hollen was in the hallway when she turned the corner and she did her best to suck in her belly and stand as straight as she could in the split second before he noticed her. "Good morning, sir."

"Good morning, Chief Rolfsmeyer." He stared for a heartbeat and she stared right back. She was good. She'd walked here without a problem. As long as she wasn't being sent out again, she'd be fine. "We've got your station set up over here, already linked to your civilian node. We've had incoming civilian traffic coming in since you made contact again with the resistance, and the only person they'll talk to is you. If they have information, we want it. I need you to liaise with them."

She was shown to a quiet workstation set up in the back of a room, off by itself. As promised it had already been linked to the radio in the vacation house, the monitor displaying all of the controls exactly as she was used to seeing. Sixteen confirmed contacts on standby, that would mean the majority of the surviving resistance cells in the three province area had checked in since she'd gone out to Myra. But if what she'd been told and already encountered was accurate, then they'd all be gunning for this group...now just as much as the Alliance was going to be gunning for them. That wasn't going to be allowed to fester in their backyard...

She sighed, wiggled down into the comfortably ergonomic chair she'd been supplied with and let go of 'Chief Rolfsmeyer'. If they wanted to talk to that, they'd have spoken to the first personnel who had taken their contacts. No, they wanted to speak to Jellybeans. They wanted to speak to her.

It was a long day, working through the obligatory greetings, congratulations, 'how you doing, girl's, and small chit chat. But each contact had concrete information, intelligence that they were more than willing to share...both of the cult, questionable spots, last contact with friendlies and last known enemy emplacements for cleanup. This would keep them busy for weeks, months...

Her alarm chirped and she was yanked back to reality. Shit. Public Affairs meeting in thirty minutes, she'd completely let it slip her mind. What was the use of it, anyway? She understood that any wedding that involved John Shepard or Kaidan Alenko was bound to be a scene. Add both of them together and that interest grew exponentially. Before, this would have spawned a vid ready explosion for the media...glittery, expansive, blingy. Now...what? It wasn't like Robson Street was foaming with tulle dresses...no, Robson was now an adjunct motor pool, its upscale shops ground into dust. Well, that didn't matter, they had requested her presence and they'd get it. They probably just wanted to make certain she understood reality, as if she wasn't surrounded by it on a daily basis.

It was overcast and chilly when she made her way outside and she bent her head against it, following her 'tool's directions. Why it wanted her to go there, she wasn't certain. Public Affairs was in the Headquarters building, with the Admiralty offices...with Hackett's groundside staffing. Not out here, on the edge of the port, overlooking the wonder of shattered concrete and rebar pushed back to make mountains until it could be reclaimed and recycled. "If you're wrong about this, I'm taking you apart for scrap parts." She muttered, taking a look around. It definitely seemed to think she was supposed to be in that low slung, unprepossessing beige building in front of her. There was absolutely nothing about it that said it should have anything at all to do with Public Affairs, but Jenna walked into it anyway, her fingertips caressing the grip of her returned pistol. She was an idiot, but repeated queries all came back as confirmed...this was where Public Affairs wanted her to be.

"Ah, Chief Rolfsmeyer. Yes, this is where I wanted to meet you at." The front room of the building was as equally bland, equally utilitarian as its exterior, empty save for a couple of battered chairs. The woman moving towards her wore the correct uniform, every hair in place, every tooth in place in that perfect greeting smile. Jenna's omnitool, set to security alert, easily identified her and gave her a pass. "I know it's not our offices but it was closer to where you were coming from and we'd just end up here this afternoon anyway. Chief Greer, Public Affairs. I've been put in charge of our end of your wedding."

"Ah, okay?" At least the woman did not grossly outrank her, and Jenna was certain that was purposeful. She breathed stripped down presentability, the sort of person who stood behind the important person on camera.

"We've locked in your requested date until you can settle on a venue...sparse as those happen to be." The woman chuckled, shaking her head. "I'm here to try to give you everything you want, and here is where we get started."

"Right." Jenna didn't bother to bleed the doubt from her voice and Greer laughed outright, opening a door and hitting the lights to reveal a vehicle bay. It had been emptied of equipment, and filled with... "You have got to be kidding me."

"No. I'm not kidding you. You're going wedding dress shopping in a Mako bay. Not many women can claim that."

"How?" Each of these were new, still securely packaged in white zippered bags. And this wasn't a sparse handful, it was dozens of dresses...hanging on rolling racks. When Jenna unzipped the closest one it escaped in a puff of tulle and crystals... the price tag still attached claimed it had once commanded a price easily half of her last annual income.

"They were in the basement of a building we've cleared. Salvage. They're all close to your size as well, I've presorted them and released those that don't have a chance of fitting you."

"We've salvaged wedding dresses?" Jenna echoed dubiously, tucking the explosion of tulle, ruffles and crystals back into its bag. It was too much, not the one.

"We've salvaged everything we can. We forecast a wedding boom once things settle down and people start looking to the future and we want to be prepared to make that as..." Greer waved her hand slightly towards the racks, "Normal an experience as possible. Something to look forward to. Go on, look at dresses."

Jenna moved through the racks, uncertain. She'd never considered that this would be a possibility, never really set down the details in her mind that would have been useful for this... Her fingers paused. In a sea of white, ivory, and cream...an edging detail that was just a shade lighter than the dark blue Alliance dress uniform. That same uniform that Kaidan would be wearing, that John would be wearing. That she was authorized to wear, that she had earned.

She pulled the bag from the mass, sliding the zipper open. "Nice one." Greer stated, "Very lovely. It would work well on you. You want to try it on?"

Yes. It was less exorbitant than those that Jenna had already passed over, not plain by any means, but not...too much. The blue edge on the top of the sweetheart neckline broadened into a wide blue panel in the back, which became the train, embroidered thickly with the same bright white as the main body of the dress. She let Greer help her into it, standing on an ammo box while the woman oriented a full length mirror towards her. "Well?"

Yes.

"We're done here." She didn't need to see any more. She didn't want to. If she simply ignored her surroundings, if she simply ignored the dark contrast of a dessert plate sized wine dark bruise all too visible over the edge of the bodice, this would be exactly what she'd dreamed of.

"You're easy to work with. Good. Good. But no, we're not done here. So...blue for the bridesmaid dresses? And a veil. We have veils...they're over there." The woman motioned her off of the ammo box to free her from the gown and store it carefully away in solitary glory on its own rack.

"No. Yellow." Blue and yellow. Once she let herself go there, it came easily enough. The color was easy, the women to put in them...less easy. The veil, easy. Again, Jenna knew it the moment she saw it...it had probably been intended to go with the dress in the first place. But then, she'd never been an indecisive shopper. The dresses for mythical bridesmaids...once she saw the yellow ones, again, it was a moment of clarity. "Those."

"Alright, then. I'll release the rest to the distribution point...if you're certain you've made up your mind and these are it." Greer grasped the rack that had started off empty and now wasn't.

"I'm certain."

It's real. It's happening. That's your dress.