Chapter 79: Piracy

The plunder of a castle
Does not a king make

It took nearly an hour to locate the vaults the rest of the squad had been stuck in and find their way back to the hole they entered through. By the time they had crawled their way back out, the skycars they'd arrived in had disappeared, presumably having been apprehended by the CAT6 mercs to cover their tracks.

Presumably thanks to EDI's quick thinking once they were back in a section of the archives that again had working COMMs, though, Joker promptly arrived in a skycar of his own to pick them up. "I've got room for Shepard plus two. And pick fast because the other Shepard is stealing my ship!"

Terra quickly climbed into the passenger seat. "Wrex, you're with us." Garrus (not even needing to be called to know, obviously) and Wrex clambered into the back seat. Just as they were about to take off, though, Terra glanced back at the others and saw them all sulking. "What?"

"Well, I wanted to go," Solana "whined."

"Tell me about it," James shook his head, "I never seem to get picked."

Terra shook her head at them all. "Joker's coming back for you! Just get your own transport or wait five minutes!" Before this could turn into an argument, she turned to hurry Joker and they took off.

"This is why I hate shore leave," Joker shook his head as they raced towards the docks, "I swear, you park the ship for five minutes…!"

"Can you contact C-Sec and warn them the ship's being stolen?" Terra suggested, "Get them to deny the departure request or even remotely initiate the lockdown?"

"Tried. All the COMMs in the area are being jammed. Probably to make it easier for them to steal me ship!"

"We'll stop them, Joker," Terra assured her pilot, "We just have to—" That's when she realized something. "Wait a minute! If you're here, where's Violet?!"

"Relax!" Joker waved her off, "Vi's been through enough, I'm not risking putting her through more. I hit all the locks in the apartment."

"You mean the apartment that 'Brooks' has been inside of and that's security is synched to the biometrics that the clone just jacked?!"

Joker froze. He hadn't realized that. "…uh—"

Terra all but flung herself at the pilot before Garrus reached over to hold her back. "Terra, calm down! She knows how to hide and all the mercs will be guarding the docks by now. Joker hasn't been gone that long. She'll be fine."

"She better be!" Terra snapped, "'Cause if anything happens to her, I'm killing Joker first."

Joker knew her well enough not to take the threat more seriously than some angry posturing, yet he still noticeably slumped in his seat.

It was less than a minute later that they were in sight of the docks. The second Terra caught sight of mercenaries milling around her ship, all the rage inside her came to a peak and she drew her pistol to make sure it was loaded and ready. "This ends now. No matter what it takes."

"Yeah!" Joker jumped to cheer her on, "You go kill the crap out of…you!" Of course, though, it wasn't as simple as driving right up and he had to drop them off at the end of the dock. "The defense systems are active. Any closer and they'll open fire."

"We got this," Terra promised as she jumped out, Garrus and Wrex right behind her, "Go back and get the others."

"Right. They can't have gone far. …unless they called a cab or something." With that, he took off again, racing back to where they'd left the rest of the squad.

Terra started running with an urgency she hadn't felt before. Somehow this mission felt like the stakes were higher than any other. Later, she'd reason that out into a combination of her beloved ship being a symbol of hope to the galaxy and a home to her crew and her only means of protecting the galaxy she couldn't bear to lose. Right now, she stormed right down the docks, shooting down every merc she found in agreement with Wrex's proclamation of "I was hoping we'd get to shoot something!"

Right as they got past the first squad of mercs, though, Garrus noticed something wrong. "The engines are starting up!"

"They're taking off?!" Terra demanded as they made their way down the landing halfway along the docks, "When we want to do that, there's a half hour of pre-flight checks! They can just gun the engine and go?!"

"Oh, you didn't hear?" Wrex asked, "I complained about the wait a few times and Tali told me half of those checks are just to make the captain feel better."

"And no one told me?!"

"Maybe we should just skip the checks from now on!" Garrus remarked.

"I am seriously considering it right now!" Now she was annoyed, something that prompted her to make use of their limited element of surprise to snipe a few of the mercenaries in the last squad barring their path. This did serve to startle them, giving Garrus a chance to follow through with a couple headshots of his own before Wrex could go charging in.

"It's Shepard!" one of the mercs shouted, "Radio a warning!"

"We can't!" another answered, "COMMs are jammed, remember?!"

Looks like your brilliant plan came back to bite you, Terra smirked to herself before firing a shotgun into her next target. The mercs put up a good fight, but they never stood a chance. Even if Wrex hadn't been there tearing them to shreds, Terra and Garrus together could've taken out twice this many in less than two minutes. In no time at all, they were charging up the steps to the Normandy's airlock and heading in.

Right as they reached the inner door, Traynor was coming out. "And I don't even—" She froze when she saw them, specifically when she saw Terra. "Wait. What?! You…you were just on the Normandy! You…you fired me! 'Dishonorable discharge for conduct unbecoming'! You kicked me off the ship with barely enough time to grab my toothbrush!" Just to prove her point, she held up the toothbrush in question like Terra would wield a weapon.

Terra suppressed the urge to glare at her. "What—I can't fire you without a disciplinary hearing, Traynor! …and seriously? The first thing you grabbed is your toothbrush?"

"It's a Cision Pro Mark 4. It uses tiny mass effect fields to break up plaque and massage the gums." Then she started putting the pieces together. "Wait…if that wasn't you, then—"

"She's got an evil Cerberus clone," Wrex explained as Garrus hacked through the door, "You stay on the Normandy long enough, you get used to stuff like this."

Traynor just looked at him in confusion before turning to Terra, dumbfounded.

"Look, we can explain later," Terra waved her off, heading for the door, "For now—" She stopped in her tracks when she reached the door. Hacking it had only activated the locks. "It's sealed!"

"The engines are online!" Garrus said, "They're about to take off!"

"Surely there's still someone onboard who can help us."

"No," Traynor stepped up, "they're all on shore leave. I was only here because I helped with the retrofits."

Terra then got her idea. "You were. You were! You know this ship inside out! Tell me there's another way in!"

Traynor took a second to think it over before nodding. "There's an emergency exit hatch for evacuations." She knelt down, fiddling with the flooring. "It should be right…here!"

Terra knelt down to inspect the door as Traynor lifted the tiles covering it. "Manual lock. And it's only meant to be opened from the inside." She turned to Garrus, the one there with the most tech knowledge. "Any ideas?"

Garrus gave the locks a quick scan. "It's not automated, we can't hack in. We might be able to unhook the latch, though, if we had a very small, very precise mass effect field."

3…2…1… All eyes turned to Traynor.

Traynor looked between them reluctantly before holding up her toothbrush and turning it on.

Two minutes later, Terra was leading Garrus and Wrex on a crawl through the ducts. "If you'd told me this morning that a toothbrush was going to save the Normandy, I'd have been very skeptical."

"If it's any consolation," Garrus remarked, "I'm pretty sure we broke it getting the hatch open."

"Oh. Remind me to reimburse her for that."

"Right. I'll make a note of it."

It was about then that they drew close to the CIC. Terra started moving carefully towards the hatch—

"What did they size this shaft for, keepers?!" Wrex complained.

"Quiet!" Terra hissed, "They'll hear us!"

"Yeah, yeah, get off my tail."

Terra rolled her eyes at him before returning to the quiet crawl towards the hatch. They were at the space in the ducts that ran under the walkway from the CIC to the bridge, so she could hear the mercs chattering above them.

"Alright, you heard her. Find Shepard—the real one!"

"Hey, wait. What did she mean 'slow her down'? We're allowed to kill Shepard if we have to, right?"

"She said 'slow her down' because she thinks we're cannon fodder!"

"…oh."

Terra smirked to herself. The clone and Brooks knew they were aboard, apparently, but these unfortunate mercs had no way of knowing how close. She came to the hatch, right under the stairs, and did a quick examination of the hatch. Coming up with an idea, she drew her pistol and waited, hand on the button to open the hatch. When one mercenary came close enough, she fired between the steps in the grating to lower his shields, slammed the hatch open, and then jumped to drive her omni-blade into his chest.

"WATCH OUT!" a mercenary across the room cried out in response as Garrus and Wrex leapt out behind her, "THEY'RE IN THE CIC!"

Too late to stop them. By the time the mercs had the sense and line of sight with which to open fire, Terra, Garrus, and Wrex had all found cover to start tearing through them.

Wrex started laughing delightedly when they had their opposition's shields collectively worn down enough for him to charge in, shotgun blazing yet again. "HAHA! I've always wanted to do this!"

"You've always wanted to have a fight in the CIC of my ship?!" Terra demanded.

"And it isn't even my birthday!"

"Definitely one of my favorite places to fight," Garrus concurred, "Right there above the gardens and below the electronic shops."

"And antique shops, as I recall," Terra smirked.

"But only if they're classy!"

Terra could always count on Garrus (and apparently on Wrex) to lift her spirits. The mercenary presence was relatively light, so the fight was over quickly. She was starting to trade her buried-under-layers-of-infuriation fear of loss for hopeful anticipation. "Looks like we've got this. EDI! This is the real Terra! We've cleared the deck! See if you can track the clone and lock down the ship!"

…silence.

"…EDI?"

Garrus winced. "Sounds like she's got problems of her own."

Terra sighed. "We better move fast." She headed straight for the elevator. Still functioning. Good. She signaled Garrus to step in and program the interface to return to the last floor it was on, taking them down to deck 5.

Ironically, it was only now that they all felt like this elevator was as slow as the one on the SR-1.

Smirking at that thought, Garrus leaned against the wall. "So. Anyone wanna talk about their people's history?"

"No," Wrex immediately declined.

Garrus gave him a look. "So I'm the only one who misses when we used to chat between missions back in the old days?!"

"Yep."

"…so disappointing."

Terra sighed, laying her hand on his arm. "Don't worry, hon, you've always got me."

"Terra, dear, we're way past 'chatting.'"

She shrugged. "Doesn't mean we can't." She then turned to the door, finding they had arrived at their destination, and hit the button, stepping out with her weapon at the ready.

The deck was eerily quiet. Until someone stepped out from behind the armory. Someone who looked exactly like Terra…right down to her hairstyle and armor (though this one luckily had a blue N7 stripe rather than a red one, as if to differentiate them).

"Alright, that's just creepy!" Terra snapped, immediately raising her pistol and opening fire.

The clone shot back, forcing them both to dive for cover. "You wanna stop shooting up my ship?!"

"It's not your ship!"

"It will be! I've taken your name, your Spectre rank, even your fingerprints!"

Terra growled as she stood up and started closing in to flank the clone's chosen cover. "And then you left me to die…only I didn't! And do you really think some fake fingerprints would ever fool the Council, Hackett, Primarch Victus? You don't think your little anti-alien view is gonna get you exposed the first time you talk to a turian or someone asks you about Palaven?" She could've kept going, but she opted to sneak up to the crate her clone was hiding behind… "How's that big plan looking now?!" …and whip around to take aim behind it. But there was no one there.

Suddenly, a battle-cry went off behind her as the clone jumped from the other side to drive her own omni-blade down into Terra's back.

"TERRA!" Garrus called out the second he saw what was happening.

Between her mate's warning and her own instincts, Terra moved just in time. Whirling around, she drew her own omni-blade and countered the attempted strike. The two wound up in a deadlock for five seconds straight before Terra was finally able to push her clone away.

"I'd stop now if I were you!" Brooks' voice came from across the deck…dragging Violet with her.

Terra reacted as any sister would: making a note to herself to tell of Joker later and then jumping to her sister's defense. "Vi!"

Brooks responded by tightening her hold on Violet and arming her weapon, enough threat to stop Terra in her tracks. "Since you're so insistent on spoiling our plans, it's time we try something different."

Garrus growled even as he lowered his own weapon. "This is low. Even for you."

"You don't know me as well as you thought you did," Brooks sneered, turning her glare in his direction, "Now drop—!"

She didn't even get to finish the ultimatum before Violet shocked them all (except Garrus, who, of course, had baited Brooks into giving an opening for exactly this) by stomping on Brooks' ankle, hooking her foot around to unbalance her, and then simultaneously throwing her head back into her captor's nose and elbowing her in the stomach. Considering Brooks was in armor, it was likely more shock than pain that caused her to let go, but that was enough for Violet to scramble away. Even a skilled infiltrator like Brooks clearly hadn't anticipated that a frightened former slave whose greatest accomplishments were all musical could fight her way out of that position, let alone competently.

Garrus smirked as Violet got behind them. "You picked that up even quicker than your sister."

Terra realized what had happened now and turned to give him a look. "You—?!" She figured now wasn't really the time for a debate on the matter, though, and shoved Violet into the elevator. "We'll talk about this later!"

No sooner had she said so than the mercs arrived and the fight broke out.

Terra barely made it back to cover before the bullets started flying. The mercs, as usual, proved no match for the three of them, but the clone and Brooks somehow were. Brooks was evasive and manipulative and resourceful (in combat as well as reality), and the clone had the same skills Terra had as if they were a hard-coded genetic trait. True, the clone hadn't had such a long history in which to develop those skills, but the hardware it was employing made up for that in a way, especially considering the grenades came in clusters that left trails of fire wherever they went off. It wasn't looking like this fight would be as fun and simple as any of the ones in the archives.

Then, as if to disprove that notion, Terra's COMM sparked on. "Vega to Lola, do you copy?"

"Lola here," she answered as she rolled out of the way of a grenade, "What's your status?"

"We just managed to cut through the jamming so EDI could reinforce our COMMs," Liara explained, "Solana is securing us transport so we can try to catch up with you before they leave Citadel airspace."

"Uh, speaking of which, the Normandy's prepping for an FTL jump," Joker piped in, "Can you get to the cockpit? Like soon?"

"No good," Terra responded as she popped out of cover just long enough to shotgun a merc, "We're occupied in the shuttle bay."

"Wait!" Violet jumped in, "I'm already in the elevator and you cleared the CIC! I can get there!"

"Vi, no! I'm not putting you in danger after what just happened!"

"It wasn't exactly a close call. I can handle myself now, at least if they don't see me coming."

"What, Vi's on the ship after all?!" Joker jumped in, "How—" He sighed. "I'm never gonna hear the end of this one, am I?"

"Doesn't matter. At least not if I can help. And since you're not exactly in a position to stop me, you're just gonna have to trust me."

"I do," Terra said, "I just can't lose you again."

"Why do you think I had Garrus show me how to fight? I got this one."

"Don't worry, commander," Cortez added, "We can back her up with plan B."

"Right," Joker countered, "…hold on, what exactly is 'plan B'?"

At this point, Terra figured her best course of action would be to focus on the fight. She caught sight of the clone amid the skirmish and rushed in to flank her. This worked right up until she got close. She managed to take down her clone's shields, but the clone then proceeded to make her regret coming so close by turning to make use of her omni-blade again. Terra once again countered it, but it was a serious test of strength to finally throw her off and get out of the exposed position this had left her in before the clone could fire back. Wrex charged in after her to fire a few rounds into the clone's armor and disable her, only for the clone to promptly stagger him with a concussive round and then withdraw to use a medi-gel pack on herself. It was safe to say the fight wasn't going well.

"Don't worry, Terra, we're moving out now," Solana assured her over the COMM.

"So are we," Cortez said, "Hang tight, we're gonna draw their fire. Hopefully, we can distract the pilot long enough for Violet to sneak in behind them."

"Wait, 'plan B' stands for 'bait'?!" Joker demanded, "We're bait?! AGAIN?!"

"No, no," Solana said, "Just you two. The rest of us are trying to sneak onboard and give Terra some reinforcements."

"Oh, right, 'cause that makes it so much better!"

"Hey, you didn't see EDI shut down and then reboot herself cut off from the ship. That's gonna haunt me."

Terra was kind of glad she missed that part and felt bad for EDI being cut off from her ship. She also didn't like the sound of this plan. Either way, she was in the middle of something far more pressing. She finally managed to corner Brooks and wear her down only for the spy to cloak herself and fall back, presumably so the clone could spend another medi-gel pack on her. Terra found this particularly infuriating but told herself that those supplies couldn't last much longer. They just had to—

"Everyone hang on!" Cortez called, "We're moving in!"

Right on cue, the ship lurched.

Terra bunkered down in a corner, hanging onto the walls to keep herself steady. The cybernetics in her hearing allowed her to catch the entirety of the following conversation.

"What's going on up there?!" the clone demanded, "Get us out of the nebula and jump to FTL!"

"We can't," a frustrated merc answered over the COMM, "A skycar keeps blocking our path."

"Then shoot it."

Terra could feel the subtle vibrations of the batteries her mate had so carefully tended for so long going off. They went off more than once, indicating they weren't hitting their intended target. She wasn't sure whether to worry about the ensuing collateral damage or scoff at how terrible a shot that pilot must be if the batteries Garrus had calibrated weren't striking true.

"Can't you guys weave a bit more?" Solana finally jumped back in, apparently concerned that their dodges were cutting it too close.

"We need to stay within 30 degrees of the nose to block course plotting," Joker answered.

"That makes us a perfect target!" Cortez snapped.

"No, that makes us the bait! Do you want me to drive?!"

"NO!"

Luckily, the clone finally seemed to realize that, perfect target or not, shooting the skycar wasn't working. With a growl of exasperation, she told the pilot "Launch the shuttle and blow that thing out of the sky!"

In response, the shuttle bay opened to launch the Kodiak, which promptly started to chase Cortez and Joker's skycar away.

Right as they lost their position jamming the navigation, though, the plan worked. Violet had moved quietly and carefully down the CIC to the bridge doors. Creeping up behind the pilot, she got the drop on him and only needed to pickpocket his weapon and give him one sharp whack in the head to eliminate the problem entirely.

Then again, this meant that there was now no one steering the ship, which immediately started turning on its side.

"VI, THAT'S NOT HELPING!" Terra instantly called down the COMM when the entire deck started shifting to one side.

"SORRY!" Violet called back, lunging for the controls, "I'm turning on the autopilot!"

To her credit, she did manage this, the ship almost immediately righting itself.

"…thank you," Terra groaned as she regained her footing.

Garrus, though, couldn't help but notice that the entire deck was still uneasy due to another unresolved issue from Violet's assault. "Watch out! The bay door's still open!"

"Don't worry, that part just makes the rest of the plan easier!" That was when two other skycars flew up and, before automatically parking themselves, dropped Solana into the shuttle bay with the rest of the squad behind her. "Guess who's back!"

Just like that, the entire Normandy squad was back in the game together. In less than ten seconds, every merc on the deck was down and it was just a matter of pinning down Brooks and the clone.

"You ruined everything!" Brooks snapped between dodges, "My plan was perfect!"

"Except for the part where you're losing!" Ashley retorted.

"I am the Normandy!" EDI affirmed, "And I will see you dead!"

"And I am Tali'Zorah vas Normandy of Rannoch!" Tali concurred, "And this is what we do to pirates where I come from!"

A few bursts of combined fire forced Brooks into retreat. The clone took the front in her place with two medi-gel packs left. "And I am Commander Shepard!"

"Oh, please!" Wrex scoffed, "The real Shepard would've blown my head off by now!"

"My team's just as good as yours!"

"'Team'?!" Liara sneered, "You have minions! And in case you haven't noticed, you've run out!" She accented this statement with a warp blast.

The clone flipped to dodge the hit, but it still drove her back and forced her to use another medi-gel. Down to one. "I'm the one who can stop this war! She's just a lost little orphan with a gun and a few scars!"

"That's just it," Terra stepped up, "I found my purpose as an orphan. Found that gun at home with my family. You know where I got those scars? On Mindoir, on Palaven, on Elysium, on Eden Prime. And on Feros, Noveria, Virmire, Ilos, Alchera, Horizon, Menae, Tuchanka, Rannoch, and Thessia! I earned these scars protecting the galaxy! You think you're better just because you don't have the 'baggage' that drives me? Come out and prove it!"

It was just as she delivered the taunt that Brooks struck. Coming out of a cloak to surprise attack from behind, she could easily have disabled at least one of them if not taken out all their shields. But Javik apparently had four eyes for a reason because he caught sight of her, whipping around to slam her fiercely with a biotic strike.

All this happened in the space of three seconds. That was all the clone needed to jump out. Laying down one last torrent of grenades to scatter the squad, she dove to spend her last medi-gel pack on Brooks before turning her furious attention squarely on her counterpart. With the rest of the squad temporarily out of reach as the grenades went off in a wave, the clone pounced.

So hard it sent them both tumbling down the open ramp.

Terra just barely caught herself halfway down the slope, fortunately landing in the half of the roll where she was on top and able to deliver a few solid blows to her clone. The clone recovered quickly, kicking her in the stomach hard enough to throw her onto her back so it could get up and retaliate.

That was when the ship veered to one side to avoid a collision, unbalancing the ramp just enough to send them both falling towards the edge. They both managed to catch the edge, just barely, but they were barely hanging on and had nothing with which to leverage themselves back up.

The clone took a moment amidst the struggling to turn and glare at Terra. "Look at you. What makes you so special? Why you and not me?!"

As if to answer this question more eloquently than words ever could, that was when the squad abandoned the struggle with Brooks to rush in. Garrus practically dove for it to get to his fiancé, the others promptly forming a line behind him with Wrex holding on at the end to make sure no one went over the edge.

"I've got you," the turian sniper told his human as he took her by the hand and dragged her back up, "I won't let you fall."

"We helped, too, you know!" Solana called from just behind him.

Terra smirked as she came back up the ramp. "Thanks." As she regained her footing, she turned to look back at the clone. It was meant to be gloating, but then she saw where the clone was looking.

Having witnessed the Normandy crew's combined efforts to pull Terra back, Garrus' words probably having the greatest effect, the clone had looked back for Brooks. The infiltrator had taken all of two seconds to look regretful before turning her back on her partner.

Terra distantly noticed that some of her friends were indeed asking what to do about the clone now. After seeing this, Terra felt her earlier suspicions justified. The clone had been through all this, probably mostly through prodding from Brooks herself, because she had felt hard done by. The truth was that she had been. Because of Cerberus. Terra couldn't help but think that perhaps the similarities truly did run deeper…perhaps this was a grim vision of what might have become of her had she not found Palaven or the Normandy or even a way out of that dark hollow on Mindoir. Maybe Brooks could be so cold, but Terra couldn't turn her back on that. Not if there was a chance to redeem it.

So she ignored her friends' astonishment and scattered silent protests to approach the clone. "Take my hand!"

The clone simply glowered at her. "And then?"

"And then you live!"

"…for what?" With that, the clone let go, falling to her death in the Wards below.

Garrus watched his mate fall into stunned silence, finally drawing closer to lay a comforting hand on her arm and draw her away from the ramp. Whatever the outcome, it was over.

In ten minutes, Joker and Cortez had come back aboard. Cortez immediately started surveying the damages incited by the attempted piracy, finally announcing "They weren't here long enough to do any major damage…though I'll need some help from James cleaning up the damage to the shuttle bay."

"Plus, the CIC is full of dead bodies, exploded monitors, and spent thermal clips," Tali sighed, "An engineer's work is never done."

"Not to mention they overloaded the heat diffusion system firing at us," Joker shook his head, "Don't know if you noticed, but shuttle guy pulled us through some insane stunt flying to get out of there."

Cortez shrugged. "It was nice getting to fly something a little more maneuverable than the Kodiak."

"And EDI?" Terra asked.

EDI stepped up, smiling as her systems reconnected. "I am once again in full control of the Normandy. Thank you for asking."

Terra smiled. "Good to hear. What about the mercs? Any survivors?"

Violet beamed triumphantly as she stepped in. "Just one unconscious, not-very-good pilot."

"And her," Joker sneered, gesturing to Brooks as Cortez brought her up in cuffs, "Alliance is taking her to a high-security facility. Maybe she can give up some dirt on Cerberus."

Brooks smirked. "I'll be more than happy to cooperate with the authorities."

Terra immediately scowled at her. "Maya, I know that voice."

"Do you really?"

"In case you haven't noticed, you'd have a pretty hard time getting off this deck any other way. I'd go along with it if I were you."

Brooks scoffed. "You're not afraid I'll escape? Come back for revenge?"

"You're smart enough to see how that would end, too."

Brooks looked between them all. If she was intimidated, she didn't show it. But it was safe to say they all by now shared Terra's opinion that it was Brooks and not the clone who was to blame for all of this and had to pay for it. She knew better than to go against them. Now or ever. "…she wouldn't have let me live."

Terra wasn't so sure anymore, but there was no point in doubting it now that she was gone. Instead, she stepped back, casting a saddened glance at the floor. "You can't clone everything."

Brooks simply looked at her before letting Cortez shove her aside.

Garrus sighed as he laid his hand on Terra's shoulder again. "I'm sorry."

Solana shook her head. "I'm sorry we didn't shoot her."

Terra glared at her briefly before smirking and delivering a playful nudge.

"It is not too late to throw her out the airlock," Javik suggested.

Violet blinked behind him. "You know, ordinarily, I'd object to that…"

Wrex laughed. "I like this kid!"

By the time the banter wore down, the Normandy was safely returning to its dock. Terra took satisfaction in walking down the ramp this time and knowing that the whole incident was behind them and the Normandy was safe.

"Worst," Tali spoke for all of them, "Shore leave. Ever."

Terra laughed. "Come on. Maybe we can catch some actual time off now. No explosions or anything. Just us."

"Don't know about 'no explosions,'" Wrex shrugged, "but…'just us' sounds…perfect."

"Yeah, I'll believe it when I see it," Garrus said, "…but it's worth a shot."