It was one of those sights he'd come to associate with working with Shepard—the strange, the impossible, the inspiring, and occasionally the unnerving.

Shepard stood in brisk conversation with a geth Prime, several more gathered around her. She looked so small compared to those massive hulks. His last experience with geth—barring minimal contact with Legion—had been most unpleasant.

It was simply strange to see the Prime to which she'd been speaking salute her and stomp off briskly to do…whatever.

"Please tell me you've got painkillers for the mother of all headaches?" Shepard asked sounding tired and a little plaintive. "I'm out."

Alenko frowned, mentally calculating how long it would take her to work through the doses issued to the average operative, then produced two pills, which she downed. "You feeling alright?"

"It's been one of those days," Shepard shook her head (then winced), covering her eyes for a moment as if blocking the light would help.

He knew something about headaches like that. "Shepard…how long has this been going on?"

"I've forgotten," she sighed, removing her hand. "It's fine. Just stress."

He nodded, unconvinced but unable to argue. Stress headaches were the worst.

Shepard turned to one of the Primes. "Any more problems, Ix?"

Alenko arched his eyebrows. Ix?

A Prime with the mark of a technician's pen designating it IX (which, Alenko realized, was just another way of saying 'nine') focused on her. "I believe I am sufficient to the task, Shepard-Captain."

"Thank you." She clapped it on the elbow as she might for an organic. "Let's get this team where it needs to be. It's a bit of a walk, but not too terrible," she said to Alenko, watching the geth unit transporting Raan enter the camp.

"A geth named Ix?"

"They haven't got around to picking names yet," Shepard answered distractedly.

Alenko reached up, gently pinching the back of her neck between his thumb and forefinger.

Shepard rolled her shoulders. "I'm fine."

At least until she didn't have anything left to do. "So why are we walking in?"

"Because nervous people do stupid things and there are a lot of nervous people around here. I'm bringing my teams in, Tali is heading quarian teams, and everyone comes in on foot."

"So…like straw in a crate? Keep things from rattling."

Shepard nodded once.

"Good plan. I like it." He didn't know what else to say.

Nor did he know what to say about the army of geth setting up temporary shelters—much of it salvage from damaged vessels—or moving about among the quarians or sometimes moving the quarians (probably injured, but treated) into said shelters.

None of the geth were armed, and however nervous the quarians permitted to shuttle to the surface were, none of them were armed either. That was good in case of sudden movements. He doubted the geth would be quite as twitchy as organics, but it was better safe than sorry.

And with them not being armed, it seemed less like a detention camp.

Alenko did not linger with Shepard, though he would have liked to. Her mask of calm neutrality was hanging terribly crooked, and he could see that the loss of her geth comrade had hit her hard. Or maybe it was just one more loss of someone close to her, mingled with the pressure of her position.

He bit the inside of his lip. If he knew how to ease that load she carried he surely would…

He snipped the thought in the bud; it wouldn't help him and it certainly wouldn't help her at the moment. Shepard was the sort who could put things off if she had plenty to do and, at this moment, she did. Facilitating interactions between the Fleet and the geth sounded like a full-time job to him.

"Shepard?" he asked intro his radio.

"Yes?"

"Grab yourself a ration bar if you haven't already. That might help with the headache."

He watched as she produced a ration bar, peeled it back, nibbled it, then refolded the wrapper. He scowled at her.

"I'll try again later." There was something in her tone that suggested 'I'm not feeling so good.'

"Don't forget, please."

"I'll try."

He set a ten minute timer on his omnitool. He'd remind her. That attended, he moved on to the real reason he was here.

His work was a bit more complicated than usual, if only because he wasn't dealing with injuries he could reach. It was also a lot less than he expected. The only reason he could think of for having so many organic hands when the need was so much lower was A) expedience and B) an increased organic presence to reassure those unused to the idea of geth that didn't want to fight.

Mostly, he found himself resetting broken bones, or providing reassurance and painkillers.

He did notice he had a geth shadowing him, but since this did not seem uncommon he didn't remark upon it. He had to resist the urge to flare nervously. The last time he had seen geth—barring Legion—he'd stopped keeping score.

Yeah. Definitely the reason for the surfeit of organics down here.

His timer went off. "Shepard. Try the ration bar again."

"If I eat anything just now, I'm gonna throw it back up. Those pills aren't sitting well."

Alenko looked around, but couldn't see her. "Shepard, if your head is hurting that bad through the painkillers—"

"I'm fine," she answered irritably.

Alenko scowled at her. She must have heard it in the silence, for she answered it.

"Let me get things settled here—"

"They are settled, Captain," EDI broke in gently. "Geth units will allow delegation if it is understood that you have reached your organic limits."

"I hate you both right now."

"You'll love me later." The words were out before he could stop them.

Shepard didn't answer him, but she did give a wry chuckle as though acknowledging the eventuality. "Alright. Lead on, McDuff."