Garrus's talon gently pressed the trigger, and another head exploded. His Mantis venting the excess heat, he ducked back into cover, evading the frantic return fire from the human terrorists.

The last week had been nothing but this. After leaving the Citadel, Shepard had originally planned to look into Wrex' stolen family armor, but on the way there, they had received a transmission from Admiral Kahoku – the one who had sent them to Edolus to look for a missing platoon of marines. He had found the culprit – a human terrorist group called Cerberus. They had apparently originated as an Alliance black ops unit, but had since gone rogue. Given the monstrosity of what had transpired on Edolus and the fact that the admiral seemed to fear for his life, the Commander had immediately postponed the search for Wrex's armor and had set course for Binthu. There was also the fact that Edolus seemed to stir unwelcome memories in him, at least that's what Garrus thought. Not that he blamed the man. The similarities to Akuze were uncanny.

What they had found on Binthu had been unsettling, to say the least. The fanaticism of the Cerberus troops – always fighting to the last, killing themselves with cyanide capsules if they were non-lethally incapacitated – was impressive proof of how far off the rails this group had gone. Even finding Admiral Kahoku's corpse, the marks of chemical torture on it, had only been the second biggest shock of the day. No, the real surprise was the presence of honest to the spirits Rachni in one of the facilities on Binthu. Everyone had been dumbfounded except Wrex, and even the Council was apparently genuinely worried for once. And so Shepard, who had been irritated before but was positively seething after finding Kahoku dead, had, with the explicit blessing of the Council, dedicated himself to hunt Cerberus down as far as the nazga hole went, at least as long as no new leads on Saren presented themselves. Nepheron had been their next stop, data from Binthu indicating that here was where the organization's head quarters, or at least their most important outpost in the region, were located. That had been true, and the place had proven a veritable treasure trove of sensitive data.

And so they had used the data secured on Nepheron, together with information provided by the Shadow Broker who had contacted the Commander after the raid, to track down Cerberus in several other bases. What they found just got worse and worse. On Chasca, they had found an entire research outpost converted into Husks, the technological abominations the Geth were known to turn humans into they could get their hands on. After the fierce fighting against the 'cyborg zombies' , they had surveyed the logs in that place,but it had not been made entirely clear what had happened, how the Dragon's teeth had gotten there or who had placed people on them for conversion. But it was clear that Cerberus was involved. The general mood only darkened with that.

And now, they were on a planet called Nodacrux, and all they had seen from Cerberus so far paled in comparison to what they had found here. An entire colony, hundreds of men, women and children, had been caged like animals and abused for Cerberus' savage experiments. Some of them had been turned into Husks, others were being subjected to chemical injections. At some point, some of the Husk's cells had failed, and the escaping monstrosities had butchered the poor sods in the adjacent cells. So the current situation was a complete three-way clusterfuck consisting of Cerberus troopers, Husks, and the Normandy ground team.

Garrus' head whipped around upon hearing the snarling of Husks to his left, but Shepard was already on it. Wielding his favorite set of weapons in close quarters, a heavy pistol in his left and his machete in his right – a weapon Garrus had thought about as archaic and out of place until the moment he had seen it's brutal effectiveness in dealing with the Husks – he shot two of the monsters through the head, their lifeless bodies collapsing to the ground. Then the rest of them were on him. With Shepard moving wildly and erratically between him and the targets, Garrus could only watch as the commander hacked a deep cut into the head of the leading one and split the next one's lower jaw in half with the backhand of that strike, embedding the blade deep in the skull of the beast, where it got stuck. With his weapon being pulled from him by the falling corpse, Shepard was brought out of balance and tackled hard by the quickest of the three remaining Husks. The two combatants went tumbling to the ground, and so Garrus took the chance to dispatch one of the two Husks that remained on their feet with his Mantis. At that point , Shepard, warding himself from the claws of the thing on top of him with his right, had brought up his left and fired a salvo into the Husk's torso, killing it. But as the thing slumped off him, the last of them was already there, striking out with it's talons, swatting the pistol out of Shepard's hand by sheer, dumb luck. The rifle overheated again, Garrus scrambled for his sidearm. Shepard caught one wrist with his right. His left tried to do the same for the Husk's other hand, but he was slightly too slow, and a deep, red gash was opened up on his upper left arm. Snarling, the Husks bared it's fangs and went in for the kill. Garrus' pistol was only half way up. The sharp teeth of the beast closed with Shepard's face...when a black and purple blur impacted with the thing, sending it slamming into the wall half a meter away. A shotgun barked, and it was dead for good. Garrus let out a breath he had not noticed he was holding. Tali had been there at the last second; the one to do so being her really wasn't surprising, when one thought about it. Those two were developing more and more synergy in combat, moving with the coordination of veterans who had spend years together after a mere two months. While he was still reminiscing, the Quarian had already helped Shepard to prop himself up against the wall to see to the wound and apply medigel, Alenko rushing in to secure the flank that nobody was taking care of now. Garrus pulled himself loose from the sight and focused on the remaining Cerberus troopers again, just to see that they had been all but taken care of already. A singularity from Liara had lifted several of them into the air, a biotic warp from Wrex detonating it the exact moment Garrus' laid his eyes upon the scene. The two conflicting fields of biotics exploded in a terrifying display of light, noise, and pressure, tearing the terrorists to shreds. The last two ones, taking pot shots at the team from behind a pillar in the back of the room, soon found themselves suppressed by a long burst from William's assault rifle, Liara adding to it with her SMG. Garrus brought up his rifle and comfortably waited for his opportunity to line up a shot, but it was not to be. Wrex had apparently decided that the time had come to end this and had simply rushed up to the two hostiles, dispatching one with his shotgun, and the other ….also with his shotgun, but by using it as a club. Neither action's result was in any way pretty.

Silence fell. Garrus relaxed and let his eyes wander over the group. Wrex was coated in blood both of his own and his enemies, but mostly his enemies. Ashley had a a new gouge in her armor, but nothing serious. Liara still had the haunted look on her face she always had after combat. The day would come when she too would be too jaded for that; someone else might have wondered if that was a good or a bad thing, but Garrus' was a Turian, so he didn't. Shepard came to stand next to him. "That's it. That's gotta be the server hub behind that door there. We will get any and all data from there - " he said we, but looked at Tali when he said it, and the Quarian got the message, taking off to go to work immediately – and then we will make a push towards the last cell block." He sighed. "Let's hope we find some more survivors over there. This day could use some more good."

Garrus shared the Commander's sentiment. They had won, another base of operations of these bastards taken out, and dozens of civilians saved. But with the pictures of the grizzly remains of children who had been ripped to shreds by Husks still in his mind, victory failed to taste sweet.

….

The teams usual table in the mess hall was unusually quiet. The squad ate mostly in silence, only short exchanges instead of the normally lively conversations happening. Garrus was sitting at one end of it across from Tali. About halfway through the meal,Shepard finally joined them, plopping down on the chair to Garrus' left. All eyes were on him, expecting to hear from the man about what would be next. They all knew that Shepard had spend the last hours going over the data from Nodacrux and coordinating with the Alliance ships they had called in to take care of the survivors and the cleanup. "All surviving colonists are sheltered and fed. No idea what will happen to them, they themselves probably don't even know what they want. Regarding the data...so far I have only skimmed it, but it is obvious already that everything we discovered is regarding the operation there. No leads on other cells." He shrugged. "Maybe the intelligence specialists will turn up something useful in their more thorough search of the base, but for now, that's it. The trail is cold." His frustration obvious, he began picking away at his plate with little enthusiasm. The rest of the team exchanged uncomfortable glances. Except for Wrex of course. They did not know their commander like this. Over the course of the entire mission so far, they had not once seen him display negativity as openly as this, always the steady rock in the tide. Awkwardly finishing their meals, one by one, Kaidan, Ashley and Liara shuffled out of the mess. Garrus found himself drawing out his meal; he felt like he should say something, but he knew not what. Tali seemed to feel the same, sitting there with her foodtube attached to the bottom of her helmet, but with the slurping sounds giving away her eating having grown infrequent.

Finally, Wrex finished his gargantuan portion and stood. "Stop brooding Shepard. We kicked them good this past week. They'll feel this for a long time. And we have our own prey to go after." Nodding once at Shepard,he turned and stomped away.

The group now reduced to three, Tali apparently was comfortable enough to speak up. Finishing her tube with a long slurp, she disconnected it and set it down upon the table. "He is right Shepard. We saved a lot of people today. And we killed a lot of Cerberus. Today was a good day."

The commander sat his fork and knife down and sighed. "I know, Tali. Just doesn't feel like it."

She looked at him quizzically for a couple of seconds before lowering her gaze. Garrus cut in. "I feel the same. Too much went down on that planet that any day on which you see it could feel like a victory, even if it was one. " Spritis, I really am a terrible Turian.

Shepard nodded. "Exactly."

Tali's glowing eyes still bore into the table top, her hands playing with the empty nutrient tube. "I...understand very well. Keelah...the...the children..." She trailed off, getting lost in her finger's fiddling with the tube, when Shepard reached across and laid a hand on top of hers, ending it. Her eyes shot up to his face.

"Try not to...hell, who am I kidding." Taking his hands off of hers, he leaned back and continued eating. "I still see them too. Don't think too many of us will sleep all that well tonight..."

She jolted from that touch like touching an electric pole. Does he even know what impact he has on the girl?

The Quarian nodded weakly. "Probably not..." Putting the last fork of food in his mouth, Shepard leaned back in the chair, looking into his own lap, dejected, before looking back up to Tali, a sad smirk on his face. "Guess I'll be seeing you later tonight?"

She snorted. "Guess I'll start trying to pick a movie..." They chuckled weakly. And then that...they're doing this almost every other night. On a Turian ship, they'd already be going at it. Spirits.

"You could just let Chakwas give you something to put you to rest, you know? I don't know about both your species sleep requirements, but it can't be healthy to spent half of almost every other supposed sleep cycle watching vids." They both looked over to him, Tali's face naturally unreadable, a slight scowl on Shepard's. "Dunno about Turians, but for humans, the magic sleep pill with no side effects doesn't exist. They make you drowsy after waking up, and you get dependent if you take them any length of time. Not an option for me. And Tali just needs to get used to the new ship. She's already gotten much better over the last couple of weeks..."

Garrrus flared his mandibles as he pondered the objection. "Got it. So, it's not the solution for your general problem, Shepard. But why not on a day like today? You could use some rest."

Shepard nodded. "We all could. But I'm not opening that door. Not even a little. I'll get enough sleep to keep running. Always do. There'll be some time to properly unwind and rest soon enough. I'm thinking about setting up a proper shore leave soon if nothing urgent comes up." Garrus nodded and gave up trying to convince the human. In fact, he hadn't even been truly trying to do that in the first place; he was asking in order to understand, not to change the man's mind. The commander would know best how to deal with his sleeplessness.

Shepard let his gaze wonder over the now mostly empty mess hall. "I just...I just wished we had found another lead on the bastards. We haven't seen the last of them. And with what we've seen down there...the thought that there might be another base out there where the same shit is going on, it's driving me nuts. "

Tali was still there with them, listening intently, probably wondering how to make her friend feel better. She's a good one. A better Turian than me, probably. He almost chuckled at his own dumb thought. Just never tell her you thought that...I don't think she'd appreciate it.

Before the Quarian could come up with something, Shepard continued. "I know it's a big galaxy with a lot going on. As we speak, there is probably a slave grab going on somewhere in the Terminus or the Traverse. And Saren...god knows Cerberus is not the biggest fish out there. But they just rub me the wrong way. The fanatical goons, how bloody spread out they are...the stunt at Edolus. Goddamn Edolus."

While Tali seemed confused, Garrus' eyes widened in understanding. "You're thinking about Akuze, aren't you?" The commander's features darkened, but the Turian did not regret bringing it up. He was sure now, and there was no harm in bringing up something that had already brought itself up anyway. Shepard grunted in a vaguely confirming manner and got up from the table, mumbled "See you guys later." and made his way over first to the trolley with the dirty dishes, and then to his room.

Garrus found himself confronted with a glaring Quarian. "You had to bring that up."

He shrugged. "He was thinking about it anyway. And he's not wrong, the similarities between Edolus and Akuze are curious."

She cocked her head. "Are they? I...don't know a lot about what happened there. Only the stuff that everyone knows. You know, thresher maw attack, only one survivor."

Garrus leaned back, thinking. "I don't know much more myself, just the basics of how it went down. Distress beacon lured them into the open, thresher maws – more than one - out of nowhere. They tried to fight but couldn't, so they ran. He tried to keep his men together, but it was no use. In the end, he survived by sheer luck." Tali was sitting stock still, listening intently. "I'm surprised you don't know more about that. You two seem to be the best of friends."

She looked down momentarily, probably blushing under that mask of hers. "W-we get along well, yes. We both often can't sleep very well, so we spend some time together. But I try to avoid these topics...why would we even talk about that? You think I'm going to bring up the things any sane person would rather forget just to satisfy my curiosity? "

Garrus sighed, he hadn't meant to set the Quarian off again. He was not a jackass, so he understood Shepard very well. "Many soldiers have similar problems. Saw it in the Turian military, too. Most don't like to talk about it. Just would've taken Shepard for the type to be more open about this, with how much he always keeps digging into all of us." He flared his mandibles in a Turian grin. "Sometimes I'm not sure if he's our commander or the ship's councilor."

Contrary to what he had hoped, Tali didn't giggle or even snort at his quip, in fact she didn't react at all, staring in the direction of Shepard's room instead. "Yes...yes, he is like that." If the topic had been less somber , he might have grinned again. Joker was right, she really had it bad. He decided to get up and hit the pod early, it had been an exhausting day. But he'd have to give the young woman at least something in parting, or she'd just be sitting here brooding over Shepard brooding. "You can't force these things. If he ever feels like talking about this stuff, he will, if not, he won't. Either way, we're doing him good by just being around." She nodded, seeming not entirely convinced, and kept sitting. He walked off; he'd given her his advice, she'd have to decide herself what she wanted to do with it.

Once more, Tali turned from one side to the other, trying to make herself more comfortable even though she knew full well that comfort was not her problem here. The pod was as comfortable as it always was, it was herself who just wasn't suited to sleep this night. She glanced at the time; 0300. As part of the ground team, she belonged to the majority of people on the ship who worked in the 'days'. It had taken her a little to get used to the 24 hour schedule on human ships, but not in a bad way; a day on Rannoch was 32,3 of the human hours long, but still Quarians required about the same amount of sleep as humans did. Part of the price these aliens who were so remarkably similar to her people paid for being generally larger and bulkier, she supposed. And so where humans strived to sleep eight hours out of twenty four, she was perfectly fine with six, and could get by with four. A fact she was very happy with given how poorly she slept on the Normandy. She wasn't sure if she had been able to to do her job properly otherwise. This night, it wasn't the silence that got to her; in fact, it had been bothering her less and less recently. Instead, her head kept going over the events of the day over and over again. She knew that it was pointless to obsess this much over the fate of complete strangers, or at least she thought that such an attitude might have helped her at the moment, but she couldn't bring herself to not do it. The thought of those small, mauled bodies on Nodacrux simply would not fade from her inner eye. They were so little. They had everything ahead of them. And now they're gone. It's not fair! And the way they di- ...oh ancestors. She had been tossing and turning about for the better part of two hours now, after initially finding sleep somewhere around 2300. A nightmare she couldn't remember – something she should probably be grateful for – had ripped her out of it. Her mind wandered towards the memory of the one fight that had taken place in the third cell block they had cleaned out. They had opened the doors remotely and made some noise to lure the Husks into their set up field of fire, as they had done before. And again, it had proven a good tactic, with the cybernetic undead being mowed down harmlessly. But she would never forget the view of the little forms that emerged from the doorway last, eerie and terrifying with their little, clumsy bodies with the proportionally too large heads that all mammals were genetically programmed to perceive as adorable and deserving of protection – defiled by the Geth's implants, the tubes, the glowing eyes, the fangs and talons. When they appeared, the team's fire had trickled away, only Wrex continuing to fire unperturbed. Garrus and Shepard had eventually, after a couple of seconds, joined in. Tali got it; there wasn't just nothing that could be done for them, they weren't even themselves anymore, for all intents and purposes, they were already dead. If anything, putting them down was a mercy, if not to themselves, than to the memory of whom they had once been; and put down they had to be either way, otherwise they'd be a danger. But still, she had not been able to bring herself to pull the trigger on them. Perhaps her fear and survival instinct would have overridden her shock if the things had ever made it close; but they were too slow, and the three seasoned killers aimed too true. Since then, she had reprimanded herself for this moment; she should have fired. It was her duty. She had let the others out to dry over her personal misgivings. Nobody had said anything, and the way she knew Shepard, he didn't think in those terms at all; he was understanding like that.

Shepard. There was the other thing that sometimes refused to leave her mind alone – not that much this night, this night was in the tight grip of the day that had preceded it – but on occasion, she had spend quite some time trying to come to terms with the embarassing fact that she was crushing on her commander, and hard. It really was silly. And so ancestors damned cliché. A pilgrim falling for her pilgrimage captain. It was one of the classic tropes of quarian romance novels, which Tali had read quite a lot of when she had been some years younger. Perhaps a few too many of them, she thought now. Though it wasn't her damn fault that he just personified all the traits of the archetypical captain so well : A stoic, strong man, who was also empathetic and had his heart in the right place. And just so happened to have saved her life and whisked her away on the adventure of a lifetime. If she took a step back for a second, she really couldn't blame herself too much. At least there were no other Quarians around on the Normandy; they would have had probably noticed it by now. But among humans and the three others aliens, nobody seemed to be adept enough at reading her body language, and for once, the blasted mask obscuring her face actually helped with something by covering the blush she had for what felt like half the time speaking to the man. The one possible exception being Joker. Then again, the scrawny human was probably just teasing her, he was like that. She clung to that explanation for his comments; the possibilities of what the pilot might get up to with that knowledge did not bear thinking about. Keelah, this is so silly. He is another species, and my boss, she thought, not for the first time. She sighed, exasperated by the stupidity of her misguided feelings, but unable to help herself. But at least the thought of Shepard had temporarily cleared her mind of Nodacrux.

And there the damned name was back in her line of thought. Grumbling curses to herself, she gave up, and started the somewhat laborious process of getting out of the sleeper pod. When she had finally made it, she quickly brought her realk back in order before beginning to groggily walk towards the mess in order to get some water, and if she was lucky, company. After all, Shepard had not actually been joking at dinner earlier; the man slept poorly at the best of times, and today had not been that. She rounded the elevator to find the mess empty, to her disappointment. She walked over the counter and got behind it, going for the cupboard with the purified and sealed water. In her tired state, she closed it a little more forceful than had it been necessary, producing a loud crack that actually startled enough to make her drop the bottle. The bottle was not harmed in the slightest, but with the mood she was in and the fact that she had actually gotten quite spooked for a second by the unexpected noise, enough irrational anger rose up in her to make her blurt out a frustrated "Uurgh, Bosh'tet!" before realizing that she was standing a mere meter away from Shepard's cabin. She really didn't want to wake him up if he somehow had managed to sleep after that mess of a day that lay behind them. And so she quietly stalked away, hoping that her outburst had not done any harm. But it was not to be; she had not even gotten half the way over to the table she had been planning to sit down at when she heard the sound of doors opening behind her, and then his voice.

"There you are. I was already wondering ."

She turned around, feeling caught and embarassed. "I'm sorry...I didn't mean to wake you..."

He grinned. "You didn't. I haven't closed an eye so far. Been going over my mission reports for this entire Cerberus mess, they were a little bare bones."

She wrung her hands, unsure of where to take it from here, before deciding to just tackle it. "Too much on your mind to sleep? ...I can relate."

His smile took on a sad quality. "Yeah." There was silence for a couple of seconds, before he pushed himself off of the door frame he was leaning on and awkwardly gestured to his room. "Wanna come in?" Not trusting her voice right now, she nodded and just started walking in way of a response. She had been in Shepard's cabin before, but only for mission related talks. Their private conversations and all the vid watching had taken place in the mess, or in the last couple of weeks, sometimes in one of the mostly empty stations in the corridor leading to the forward battery, making themselves comfortable in the gigantic operator seats that could easily fit two in if they didn't mind having the outer cheek partially sticking over the edge and being smushed against each other in the middle – and she most certainly didn't. Keelah, if Joker hears of this... She shrugged the thought off and sat down in the armchair, Shepard, upon seeing that Tali was taking him up on his offer, already having plopped down on his office chair. He was looking at her now, his blue eyes boring into hers as if the mask didn't exist, with the same look on his face he always had when he was concerned for one of his team. "What we found down there was the kind of stuff you don't ever forget it, wasn't it?"

She nodded, her thoughts going back to the children husks again. Somehow, he knew. "The little ones?" She nodded again, twice this time, and looked down. Perhaps now was the time for her deserved reprimand after all...? Instead, Shepard just leaned back in his chair and sighed. "Yeah, I understand. Believe me."

Fidgeting for some seconds, she finally bit the bullet and brought up the thing, or one of the things, that had been tormenting her brain for the last twelve hours. "I'm sorry about what happened. I hesitated. I should have been more decisive. If there had been more of them, it could have be -"

She stopped when she heard him snort and chuckle to himself. "Jesus Christ, Tali. Will you ever stop beating yourself up over nonsense?" As relieved as she was that he didn't seem to mind - even though she had already suspected that - , she felt confused and a even a little offended by how casually he blew this off . He had to have known this was a serious matter to her. Apparently noticing this, he put his elbows to rest on his thighs and scooted his body a little closer on the screwed-down chair. "Listen Tali, it's good that you're not afraid to look at your own actions critically, but sometimes, you need to cut yourself some slack. Would you blame Liara too for not shooting them?"

"N-no, I mean it's only natural to be thrown off by something like that, and she's not a soldier after all, so..." she trailed off, realizing where he was going with his. Hell, in her mind, she had gone there herself more than once in the past hours, but somehow, she needed to hear it from someone else. From him.

"Neither are you, Tali. You're brave and strong, but what you aren't is jaded. And that's a good thing." He smiled sadly. "Enjoy it while it lasts." She just looked at him, hoping that he would keep on talking. And he did. "Kaidan didn't shoot either. Nor did Ashley."

This had been something that she hadn't known what to make of the entire time she'd obsessed over this. "But they're soldiers. Shouldn't they...?"

He shook his head. "We're all just human. Or, well...you get what I mean. Kaidan and Ashley have both seen their fair share of action. There are some really nasty things in their service records, slavers, pirates, the whole shtick. And you know Ashley lost almost all of her unit on Eden Prime. But..." He went silent for a while, evidently struggling with how to put into words what was in his mind. " I guess there's just a point where you've seen so much of these things that it doesn't bother you anymore, at least not in the moment. You don't think about it, you just function. Wrex has been fighting for centuries. He's had it all. Garrus...well, I guess Turians are just more hardcore than most us mammals." He snorted at his own weak quip, but perhaps it hadn't even been meant in jest. Turians were a predator species at heart, after all.

"And you?"

The question had just come up to the surface; Tali tensed up the moment it had left her mouth. Keelah, that's what Garrus talked about. And now you're doing it anyway, asking him about things he'd probably rather forget. Her curiosity about Shepard had gotten the better of her. Fortunately, he didn't seem to mind that much, showing the beginnings of a frown at the question initially, but relaxing afterwards, leaning far back in his chair.

"I had my fair share of sobering moments, I'd say. But If I had to pick one...Akuze. It's not exactly my favorite thing to think about..."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to...I shouldn't have..."

He waved it off. "It's fine. It's been years, and I've spent half that time thinking about it. I can talk about it, and...I guess it wouldn't hurt if you knew. Not like it's a secret anyway. "

She nodded awkardly. "I heard it mentioned a couple of times after coming aboard...so I looked it up. Only the gist of it, I didn't want to...it felt like prying."

He didn't answer for quite a while, gazing at the wall behind her absentmindedly before speaking. "Well, the 'gist' tells you enough to understand why it would be an event someone would never forget. Forty marines landed, only one left alive." He swallowed and frowned. "And that's the whole story as far as it's relevant, really. I could tell you the names of my friends who died that day, I suppose, but what's the point. I could've been a loner, and it still would've been what it was. None of that is what's been bugging me lately, anyway." She perked up. Shepard had seemed on edge, not just during dinner earlier, but for some days now. "When we found that dead recon platoon on Edolus, it reminded me of something. Back on Akuze...nothing added up. The distress call had alluded to a pirate attack, but we found little evidence of a struggle in the settlement. No bodies or blood, for example. But everyone, down to the last man, woman and child, was gone. Before we could make heads or tail of the situation, we were already under attack. By at least half a dozen threshers. Half a dozen! Threshers hunt alone. They've barely ever been recorded to work together, and never more than three! But there were at least six at Akuze! It can't have been natural!" He was rambling now, almost ranting even, and Tali clung to his lips. "And then...I didn't even report this, it didn't seem important at the moment, wasn't even sure if it was real or if I just imagined it, and there really wasn't much to report anyway...but...as we were running, at one point, the sun reflected off something on the hillside some hundred meters out. Like something made of metal..or glass."

Her eyes widened. "You mean...like a camera, or a scope."

He nodded grimly. "I didn't think about it at all back then, it's just burned into my memory like that entire day, but I never stopped to think about it. But now? Some sick fucks thought it'd be worthwhile to lure two dozen Alliance marines to their deaths on Edolus, the same people who turned children into zombies." Tali didn't recognize the word and it didn't translate, but she knew what he meant anyway. "Of course they would observe their," he practically spat out the word, "experiment."

"You...you think Cerberus did Akuze?"

His face contorted into a grimace of rage, but he looked down, and when he came back up, he had his features under tighter control again, though his feelings were still plain to see. "Yes. Hackett agrees."

"That's why you're so disappointed the trail is cold."

"Yes."

She tried to process the new information. Only that it wasn't new information, or at least nothing truly important was new. "I should've seen this myself. Garrus probably did.", she put her thoughts into words.

"He did.", Shepard confirmed. She was not surprised, the two men had become good friends lately, and from what she had picked up when walking by them, their conversations often had rather grizzly topics, mostly tales from each other's eventful careers. Silence took hold of the cabin, both of them lost in their thoughts. At first, Tali was unhappy with herself at not seeing the connection sooner, but that sentiment was quickly cast aside by her concern for Shepard. To be on the trail of the people responsible for something like that...to him, this hunt had to be like the way she felt about fighting Geth, just so much more personal. And now the trail was cold.

"I'm sorry that we didn't find any further leads."

He snorted. "Yeah, me too. And the poor sods probably being abused in some other facility right now, or tomorrow, too." She flinched at his acidic reply; she was not used to him being this negative. But after the past day, she understood. He rested his forehead against one hand. "It's just...the things humans do to each other. We always fantasized about the monsters that would wait for us in space, and the wars we would fight against them. And now that we're here, the worst monsters are ourselves again." He shook his head in frustration. Tali did not know how to answer to this; her mind wandered to the documentaries she had seen, the concentration camps and the genocides in humanities past. From there, it proceeded to the Krogan Rebellions, the Genophage, the wars of unification on Rannoch and the Batarian Hegemony.

"Your people aren't any more cruel than the rest of us, Shepard."

He raised his eyes to hers as she continued. "We're still gonna hunt them down and kill them all, right?"

Finally, a weak smile appeared on his face. "Yes."

Two weeks later

"Aaand we're on target, Sir. Take us right to the Citadel?"

"Yes, Joker."

"Understood, Sir."

The Normandy had just emerged from the Widow Nebula relay, closing in on the Citadel; the gigantic space station already visible from the viewports, even from thousands of kilometers away. They had come from the Pax system, where they had conducted a covert operation on Noveria. As they had been informed at the very start of their hunt, Saren was a major investor in Binary Helix, a research company that had a hazard laboratory on the planet; like many others companies that used the planet to dodge Citadel laws. Shepard had contemplated just raiding the place and see what they would find, but had decided against it; he wanted to use the place as a trap. To that end, they had infiltrated the system by use of the Normandy's stealth drive, snuck up to the planet, and then had Tali hack into Port Hanshan's systems, planting a program that would trigger an alert to the Normandy if Saren, Benezia or any other individual from a list of known associates of Saren's and Benezia's the Shadow Broker had provided them with were spotted by the Port's security cameras. Shepard had not yet decided how long he was willing to lie in wait like this, but for now, there were other things to keep them busy, so he would exercise patience.

The first thing on that list of other things was shore leave; the crew had been at it for over two months with only two resupply stops to spend at least some hours on solid ground. He was currently standing at the galaxy map, working on shore leave schedules with Pressly, when his plans were interrupted by a call from Joker. "Commander, incoming transmission from Admiral Hackett, flagged urgent and classified. I'm bringing it up in the comm room." Shepard tensed up; he was about to get orders, most likely. Not that he was technically required to follow them; but the Alliance supplied him with a ship and crew, so he couldn't exactly flip them off when they came asking for a favor. Not that he even wanted to do so; Shepard respected Hackett, the once lowly Private who had climbed his way all he way up to the most senior Admiral in the Alliance through nothing but an impeccable service history and more than one legendary victory against the odds, a great deal, and the Admiral never called for anything that wasn't worth his attention. Not wasting any time, he made his way over to the comm room in seconds, locked the door behind him with his Captain's codes and activated the terminal. The scarred face of Admiral Hackett appeared on the screen.

"Shepard."

He saluted, and the older man responded in kind. "Admiral."

"I just got word from Alliance intelligence. Some of the data you recovered on Nodacrux did yield a further lead after all." Shepard's eybrows perked up. "How so? I thought it was all purely related to the 'work' they were doing there."

"It was. But the list of personnel also mentioned some guest researchers from other Cerberus projects, who apparently dropped by for outside input on occasion. One of these names , when cross referenced, has some...troubling implications." The admiral leaned forward, closer to the camera. "I am talking about one Dr. Wayne. There is a photograph from about seven years ago, showing Wayne with three other scientists...who are all dead now. All shot in the last three months."

Shepard understood immediately. "You believe Cerberus is cleaning house, trying to stop these scientists from talking. For whatever reason someone who is associated with this kind of 'research' would possibly expose themselves."

The older man nodded. "Exactly. We need to get our hands on this man. Not only to learn what he was involved in seven years ago, but to uncover any still active contacts of his or other bases of operations he might know about now. And the best bit: We know his current location."

A predatory grin wormed it's way on Shepard's face. "Not that I'm complaining Sir, but why is the AIS sharing all this with us? They're not usually the types for that. One would think they have their own assets that are perfectly capable of capturing the good doctor."

Hackett nodded. "They have, but none of them can be there as quickly as you, and they seem to be worried enough about the time sensitivity of this one to see reason for a change. And the director made it very clear that they expect to be repaid for this information by us handing the man over...which I couldn't say no to if I wanted. The AIS will have a long heart to heart with this Doctor Wayne."

Shepard nodded. "Fine by me, Sir. I'll have to capture him first, though. Were is he?"

"Ontarom."

…

Wrex kicked the door out of it's hinges – it was a simple swing door, not one that slid into the wall as most doors these days did to preserve space- and the fight was on. Shoulder to shoulder with Shepard, Tali slid into the room, hiding behind Wrex's bulk as a veritable hail of bullets slammed into the Krogan's barrier.

Finding the bunker complex had not been an issue; the human intelligence agency had provided rough coordinates, and with the Normandy's scanners, that was more than what they even needed. And from what they had seen so far, the opposition wasn't anything special either. Just some ragtag mercenaries of several different species, if mostly human. The only thing worrying at all was, uncharacteristically, Shepard. The commander had been on edge again ever since he had gotten the assignment yesterday; which had promptly resulted in canceled shore leave and a new course at full speed. Tali didn't blame him, she knew what he was thinking after their conversation two weeks ago. There really was no good reason to be worried; but she couldn't help herself, seeing the man anxious like this bothered her.

Breaking off towards the rightward exit of the large room they were in, she dispatched a human with her trademark combination of an overload to the shields followed by a shotgun blast; a carnage blast like Wrex had taught her, in fact. She trusted her aim enough by now to put a lot of stock into her first shot hitting, and with carnage shots and weakened – or with most targets, simply completely depleated – shields after an overload, this maneuver reliably dispatched even enemies in heavy armor in one go, at least at short ranges like these. Having killed the enemy closest to her, she quickly got down, hiding behind a corner from the fire that now shifted to her, the mercenaries further in the back evidently spooked by the hell she had just unleashed on their companion. Letting her gun cool down in cover, she took a moment to scan the situation; Wrex had barreled into a Turian and was currently stomping him into the floor while Shepard was firing his pistol from behind the flimsy cover of an overturned table, his shields alight with the blaze of incoming fire, but holding for now. In his left was the machete, a bloodied human man on the floor next to him. His face was the mask of grim determination that was normal for him in combat, though Tali knew him well enough by now to think that there was an additional coldness to it today, an undertone of barely contained rage she had so far only seen when they had fought Cerberus soldiers, and that one time where they had crashed the party of a batarian pirate ship in the process of boarding a cargo hauler. There had been no prisoners in either of those situations. Today, Tali wasn't so sure; these were no Cerberus troops, so much was clear from the simple fact that the group was mixed race. The rest of the team had stormed through the doorway now, and since there was not enough cover to get behind, they simply continued advancing on the mercenaries entrenched in the back of the large room, spraying their weapons to keep the enemies' heads down. Grenades were thrown at them, a good move, bunched up as they were from coming through the single door leading here; but Liara's biotics caught the things mid air and turned them back towards their senders, taking out two of them at once just as another was caught in a deadly crossfire from Garrus and Ashley as he tried to get away from the explosives.

There was a brief lull in the fighting as the four of them finally reached cover and let their weapons cool down a bit, which the remaining mercenaries used to try and save their hide. "Wait! Wait!" Tali stopped shooting, looking to Shepard to confirm it, and he had stopped shooting as well, so she continued to hold her fire. "We're not getting paid enough to deal with bloody commandos!", a turian exclaimed.

Shepard mulled it over for a second, before bellowing: "Drop your guns and come out! Hands behind your heads!" The survivors complied, and soon enough, they were all restrained on the ground, Wrex and Kaidan watching the team's back while they did it. Huh, Tali thought. Some mercs with common sense, that's a new one. She didn't even realize the stark contrast between her now, a person who would have lighthearted, reflective thoughts just a minute after taking a life, and the innocent pilgrim she had been mere weeks ago. She was just happy they wouldn't have kill these people; she may not lose sleep over some mercenaries any more, but that didn't mean she enjoyed killing them. She didn't, not one bit. There was only one thing she liked to kill, and that was geth. And spiders. Two things, then.

Shepard stood over them for a second, seemingly contemplating something, before turning and striding towards the other door with a decisive gait. "Kaidan, guard them. The rest with me. We need to get to Wayne before he get's killed.", he growled. "It's time for answers." The rest of the squad seemed not to take notice of the comment, but Tali and Garrus exchanged a glance. Shepard had briefed them all on the target; a photograph linked him to three other men; all dead now. A photograph from seven years ago. The others had not understood the significance, but the two dextros did. Akuze was seven years ago. Might very well be just a coincidence...but the connection is there. Tali did not truly expect this day to reveal anything new regarding the most traumatic day of Shepard's career, but she understood well that even the mere possibility of it was enough to put the commander into a foul mood. She didn't blame him.

Rushing through the corridor, they soon heard agitated voices of two men. "So you called in your friends! They won't save you!"

"Please, I- "

"SILENCE!" A gunshot rang out, and they redoubled their efforts to move faster. Finally, they burst into a room. A trembling man in a labcoat was cowering on the floor, cuts and bruises on his face indicating that he had been beaten. A bullet mark in the wall, roughly on head heigth. Towering over him, a man in old armor, the lack of a helmet exposing his head. He was holding the doctor at gunpoint, but when the team entered, he whipped around. Before he could do anything else, Shepard barreled into him, knocking him to the ground. Their struggle was short, the man's gun flying across the room mere seconds later. Tali was moving up to assist Shepard in restraining him while Wrex simply put a foot on the doctor's chest, when the situation was changed by one, surprised, uttered word.

"Sh-shepard!?"

The man had stopped struggling, and finally she got a good look at him. What she saw made her wish that she hadn't; his face was a patchwork of scars and both decoloured and hyperpigmentized skin right next to each other, his hair in patches, having fallen out in some areas while being grey and even white in others – prematurely, judging by the man's relatively young voice. Averting her eyes from him, she locked them on Shepard. Her commander was still on top of the guy, but his fist that had been raised to knock him out for good had opened and the arm was slowly dropping down to his side, the other hand's grip on the man's collar loosening. His face betrayed utter shock.

"Toombs!?"

He knows this guy?

"Toombs! My god! Toombs!" Shepard bolted up, grabbing the stranger by the hand and pulling him up. Tali just watched, dumbfounded like everyone in the room, as the two men stood close, studying each other's face, until Shepard spoke again. "Toombs, what...what happened to you? How!?"

The face of the man whose name apparently was Toombs contorted into a grimace of hate. "Ask him." All faces in the room snapped to Wayne on the ground. "Akuze...it wasn't an accident, Shepard." Shepard's face worked through a thousand emotions, but no words left his mouth as Toombs rambled on. "They lured the threshers there...them and us...to STUDY them! STUDY how they would kill us! The bastards sat on the hills and watched! Watched as...as..."

He was panting now, and had to stop himself to breath before continuing, but Shepard beat him to it. "I...suspected that." That seemed to take the man aback. "But still...how did you make it? I...I saw you get hit by the acid, Toombs. Then you tumbled down that ridge...I thought you were dead. I...I'm sorry Toombs. My god, if I had known...Jesus..." Shepard dropped the pistol he had still been holding at his side and gripped his forehead, staring blankly at the ground. "Toombs, I had no idea...they...they said I was the sole survivor."

Toombs just nodded. "Yes, that's what they wanted everyone to believe. But the truth was different. The truth is that I was lying there. The acid only grazed me. Still ate the skin on my right arm away. You can't imagine the pain, Shepard." Even Wrex seemed uncomfortable now. "They found me after you and the evac team were gone. They were so delighted to have a surviving subject...someone they could test their hypotheses from the observation on." He turned away from Shepard, walking over to Wayne, who was looking at him in complete panic, still pinned under Wrex's foot.

"Pl-Please, you must help me! This man is insane! I do not kno-"

"SILENCE!", Toombs, screamed, his voice breaking. "You dare ! You fucking dare! The things you did to me! Shepard!" He whirled around. "Look at me, Shepard! Look at me!" He needn't not have implored Shepard like this, as the man was already transfixed at his former comrades visage, a scowl intensifying on his face. "Tresher acid! Right into my veins! And who knows what else! I only escaped three years ago!" Again Toombs stopped himself, panting. "For the..." he laughed mirthlessly, a shrill sound. "...for the betterment of humanity, they said." He shook his head.

At that last point, Shepard tensed, the shock of meeting a man believed to be dead apparently weathered, and picked up his gun. "Yes. I heard that one before. Perhaps it'd be for the betterment of humanity if Doctor Wayne died today."

"No! You can't do this! This is not justic! I dem-" Nobody heard what the doctor had wanted to demand, as Wrex increased the pressure on his chest, taking from him the air to speak. Toombs stepped closer to Shepard, looking him in the eye with a grim smile that looked absolutely terrifying on his disfigured features.

"So..you understand why I've been doing this? Punishing them?"

Shepard looked back, his face a mask of stone. "Yes, Toombs, yes I do."

Tali was starting to get worried, and she didn't seem to be the only one, as Liara and Ashley started shifting uncomfortably. "Shepard..."

He raised a hand, and Williams cut herself off. "Don't worry, Williams. I haven't lost my focus on the mission."

Shepard stepped over to Doctor Wayne and towered over him, a dark look on his face. "Doctor, you are under arrest. I will deliver you to Alliance Intelligence, who will have many, many questions for you, about Akuze and anything else you might have done with Cerberus."

Toombs grabbed Shepards shoulder, got in his face and exploded. "WHAT!? You'll let him live!? Do you see what he did to me!? What they did to all the others!? He must die! He deserves to die!"

"Toombs..."

"No! Not 'Toombs'! They ruined that man! And you want to let him live!"

"Toombs."

Toombs face was pure hatred now, even when looking at Shepard, and he started walking over to his gun. "That's what I thought! I was right after all, no justice unti-"

"CORPORAL TOOMBS! STAND AT FUCKING ATTENTION WHEN IM FUCKING TALKING TO YOU!"

The entire team safe Wrex jolted at the sudden outburst, and Toombs actually complied, standing straight in front of Shepard, who had gotten up close himself and was screaming in his face now, the strain of the situation clearly visible. "Think Toombs, for fuck's sake! These bastards fucked over more people than only you and our platoon! I've been hunting them down all over the Traverse! Entire colonies, killed, captured, experimented on! They turned children into zombies! And we have no idea how many more of them are out there! We need this man to talk!" His features, and voice, softened. "Come on, Toombs. You can't tell me you don't see this. This is more important than our revenge."

Toombs sagged, and Tali could see that Shepard had him. "Yes...I understand. I don't want anyone else to go through what I..." He stopped going for his gun, and walked over to Wayne instead, giving him one last kick in the ribs before turning towards the door. "So...what now, Shepard? I killed people. I won't apologize for it, but I know the law." He scoffed. "Maybe I'll get extenuating circumstances..."

Shepard swallowed hard. "You won't go to jail for this...and if I have to bust you out myself. I could drop you off somewhere, if you want. But if you want my advice...let me take you to Arcturus. You need treatment, Toombs. You look like a corpse. You're still Alliance, captive soldiers stay in the force. You have a lot of pay to collect, and any treatment you need, medical...and otherwise. Let them take care of you. Please." Toombs nodded, not turning around or looking up. "Alright, Shepard."

Shepard straightened himself. "Alright everyone. Take Toombs and the captives and get out of here. I'll be right behind you. With Wayne." Wrex complied without a word, just a short chuckle, but the rest of the team stood bewildered.

Ashley spoke up. "Shepard..?"

"No arguments, Williams. And now leave this room, all of you. I'm going to have a talk with the good doctor." He stood over the man now, cold anger in his eyes that made a chill run down Tali's spine. She felt like she should say or do something, but she did not know what, and she didn't dare, so she just shuffled out of the room with the rest, closing the door behind her.

Outside, Garrus put a hand on her elbow. "You and I wait here." She looked up to ask why, but he preempted the question. "He'll probably need help carrying Wayne when he's done with him." The way he just said that, like it's the most normal thing in the world. She had known that Garrus had a leaning toward a somewhat brutal application of justice, but it still shocked her how unfazed he was. Almost as much as the fact that Shepard would do something like this.

From behind the door, the unmistakable thuds of kicks and punches could now be heard, accompanied by Wayne's pained moans and screams. Tali flinched with each and every one. "I...I don't want to listen to this Garrus. You two can carry him without me. I- I need to get out of here..."

"Stay." The Turian still seemed completely unmoved, but something in his voice compelled her to oblige. He seemed...worried after all?

"Why? What do you need me here for?"

"I need you to talk sense to him if he loses it and goes too far. We need this bastard alive, unfortunately. I'm not sure if he'll listen to me, but he will listen to you."

She was still wondering if Garrus was correct, and why he would think something like that in the first place – I guess me and Shepard are good friends, but he is quite close with him too...they're battle brothers, aren't they? He respects Garrus, I know he does... Why would Garrus believe Shepard would be more inclined to listen to me than to him!? - when her thoughts were interrupted by more screams, but it wasn't the doctor now.

"Lieutenant Tasha Burke!"

Thud.

"Corporal Trevor Baker!"

Thud.

"Private Theodor Smith!"

Thud. A moan.

"Sergeant Igor Yevchenko!"

Thud. Another moan.

"Private Li Xao!"

Thud. A scream, Wayne this time.

"WHAT, FUCKER!? YOU WANNA SAY SOMETHING?"

Only silence answered the commander. Keelah, he is going to kill him. Even Garrus seemed concerned now, fidgeting with his hands and mandibles. Two hearts were beating in Tali's chest: On one hand, she wasn't sure how to feel about her captain essentially torturing someone for revenge. On the other, putting herself in his shoes, wondering how she would react, losing forty nine people in one day and then meeting the man responsible? She didn't dare trying to predict what she might do. Enough, she pushed those thoughts to the side. It doesn't matter now. What matters is the mission,and stopping Shepard from losing it completely. She took a deep breath and burst through the door. "Shepard."

The commander was towering over Dr. Wayne's bloodied form. The man was lying on the floor, a crumpled mess of cuts and bruises, but alive and breathing, silently whimpering to himself. Shepard was breathing heavily; his entire body was covered in blood splatters, even his face. His fists were basically drenched in red. He hadn't reacted to Tali's entrance, keeping his angry eyes on the man on the floor, nostrils flaring, jaw clenched. When she spoke his name, he turned his head towards her, making her flinch under his gaze. She had never seen him like this, not even when they had fought Cerberus or the Batarian pirates. For a brief moment, the man she had spend too much time thinking about last night again, her captain , scared her. He seemed to notice it, too; for as soon as he saw her taking a step back, his face fell, changing from anger to sadness, and...shame. She felt a pang of pain in her heart, and her inner dispute was settled. Shepard was still exactly the man she had taken him for; but that was just it, in the end, he was just a man. A wounded man, and today, one of his wounds had had its bandages torn off,salt sprinkled all over it and been poked around in. Could she really blame him for striking out like this? Her head told her that perhaps she should, but in her heart, she couldn't, and so she quickly walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder. He sagged, and finally spoke.

"I think Doctor Wayne and I are finished here...let's get off this planet."