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Captain Bailey looked up from his computer screen as Shepard, Thane, and Samara approached. He smiled a welcome. "Didn't expect you lot back so soon."

"A bit of an unexpected opportunity," Shepard told him.

Not being in the inner circle of Cerberus, Thane didn't know where the invitation to meet and potentially recruit famed thief Kasumi had come from, but it wasn't one Shepard had been willing to turn down. Knowing Kasumi by reputation, he had encouraged Shepard to add her to the team. That the recruitment opportunity would also bring them to the Citadel and allow him a chance to speak with Kolyat again was an added bonus.

Shepard turned to him now. "You'll be all right here?"

"Of course." Thane looked at Captain Bailey. "Would it be possible for me to see my son?"

The C-Sec officer nodded. "I'll have him brought down." His thick fingers tapped the keys.

"Shepard, I will meet you both back here in in three standard hours, yes?" Samara asked.

"Yes. Will that give you enough time to transact your business?"

"I believe I can find my contact in that time, thank you." The Justicar moved off through the crowds. Thane hoped she wouldn't be distracted—but he understood that she, too, was in search of a lost child, and imagined that would keep her focused.

Shepard put a comforting hand on his shoulder and squeezed it, and then was off herself. Thane didn't know what else she planned to do, should her pursuit of Kasumi take less time than she expected. He couldn't help remembering certain comments of Garrus's—was there a man somewhere on the Citadel? She didn't appear to be the kind of woman who would pursue one man while tied to another, but something unquiet in Thane's heart couldn't seem to let the suspicion go. Unfair, indeed, because he also couldn't seem to bring himself to take their relationship further, too afraid of the pain of awakening and reconnecting his heart with his body—but there you had it. Emotions were rarely controllable, which was why he had spent so much time trying not to have them.

A discreet cough brought his attention back to Captain Bailey. "Your boy'll be down here in ten minutes. He's doing well—a little sullen, maybe, but willing to help out and seems to have a knack for talking to the duct rats."

Thane couldn't help seeing Mouse as he had been, the dirty feet and the runny nose and the greedy, glittering eyes. Did Kolyat know that those were the children his father had spent his time with instead of going home to his own son?

"Come on," Bailey said. "I'll walk you over."

They didn't speak. Thane was lost in his memories and his guilt, and Bailey in whatever story Thane reminded him of.

Stopping in front of one of the interrogation rooms, Bailey said, "Wait here. He should be down in a minute. I'll see you later."

"Thank you, Captain," Thane said, aware of how much he owed this man.

"Happy to help." Bailey's voice rasped over the words, and he took off back to his desk before whatever emotion was rising in him could come to the surface.

When he was close enough to discern the identity of his visitor, Kolyat rolled his eyes. "Didn't get enough last time?"

"I came to the Citadel on business."

"Your business, or Commander Shepard's?"

Thane didn't reply to that one, waiting while Kolyat's guard led him into the room and unlocked his handcuffs. "You've got one hour," he said brusquely before leaving them alone in the room.

"You look well," Thane said to Kolyat when the guard was gone. It was true—his son looked more at peace than he had been the last time they'd seen each other, less desperate and lost.

"No thanks to you."

"That is true," Thane acknowledged.

"So what do you want?"

"I was here; I wanted to take the opportunity to see you."

"What, one more time before you die?"

The remark made Thane angrier than he had any right to be. "There is every chance I will not return from this mission; would you have me simply disappear from your life without further ado?"

"You already did that once, what would be different this time?" Kolyat asked. He turned away in an attempt to hide the tears that had come to his eyes.

The accusation, just and inarguable, pierced the balloon of Thane's anger neatly. "I hope that I am different. I regret the ten years lost more than I can possibly say. I thought I was doing the best thing for you, keeping the … darkness in me away, keeping you safe from those who thought to strike back at me through you and your mother, but …" Memory washed over him. "Soft lullaby, answering coos, creak of the chair as she rocks. 'Look, Thane, he has your mouth.'" Oh, Irikah, he thought, how I have failed you.

"Mother?" Kolyat asked. He closed his eyes as though his own memories were too much for him. "Sometimes I wish I didn't remember her so clearly."

"Yes," Thane agreed softly. "I, too."

His son shot him a look of dark, bitter, long-brooded-over anger. "How clearly can you remember her? You were never there."

"To my very great shame."

"You know this is all too little, too late, don't you?" Kolyat got up and walked to the window. "You've come back into my life only to leave it again, permanently, so what was the point? You could just as easily have written me a letter."

"Would you have read it?"

"No."

"Well, then."

"So this makes all the difference because I can't escape you?"

"No." Thane shook his head. "Because it is the only chance I have to make certain you escape my fate. I have led a life almost entirely disconnected, Kolyat, more asleep than awake. I wish for better things for you. I wish for you to be Whole."

Kolyat waved a hand impatiently. "No one believes that stuff anymore."

"I do."

His son's roll of the eyes said what he thought of Thane's adherence to the old beliefs. "Has it been an hour yet?"

"Not quite."

"And when it's over, you'll go away and not come back?"

"Very likely."

Kolyat shrugged. "Not much difference, really, from what my life has been like."

Thane cursed the impulse that had led him to set up this meeting; but he could not have done otherwise. He tried one last time. "In the time remaining, is there anything you want to ask?" He imagined he would receive only more abuse, but Kolyat turned around, his eyes, so like Thane's own, fixed on his father's face.

"Why now?"

"Because I have very little time left."

"No, I mean, why this thing with Commander Shepard?"

For a moment, Thane thought his son had been able to discern his feelings for Juniper, but when Kolyat's gaze remained steady, he realized it was the mission he was asking about, not anything deeper. He searched for the words, and at last answered simply, "She offered me the opportunity to die in a worthy cause. Not for some assassin's contract, but in the hope of sparing the galaxy a horrific fate."

"You actually believe in all this Reaper nonsense? Shepard was tricked by Saren, everyone knows that."

"She doesn't."

"So you're following her on some suicide mission because she's delusional?"

"No, I am following her because it seems like the right thing to do. Only time will tell whether it was or not, and since the alternative was to wait and allow the minutes remaining to me to run through my fingers like so much sand … I decided I had already done enough of that."

"Do you think, if this really does save the galaxy, it will make up for the lives you've taken?"

It was on the tip of Thane's tongue to tell his son that it was his body, acting on behalf of his employers, that had taken the vast majority of those lives, but Kolyat would see that as an empty distinction in this mood. "No," he said at last. "Lives cannot be weighed and measured in that way. Perhaps it will mean nothing, now. Or perhaps it will allow me to go across the sea with some measure of peace. Either way, it is worth the attempt."

Kolyat rolled his eyes one more time, crossing his arms over his chest and turning toward the window. Neither of them said another word until the hour was up.

Recruiting Kasumi took much less time than Shepard had been expecting, largely because Cerberus had already done her negotiating and promising for her, and naturally had neglected to tell her about it. So Kasumi had a task all ready to be completed in exchange for her presence on Shepard's team, and Shepard had little choice but to agree to it.

"You are easy to convince, Shepard," Kasumi said through the advertising screen she was using to communicate. "Cerberus have you over a barrel?"

"You come highly recommended."

"By Krios?" Kasumi asked. Shepard tried to hide the flash of concern she felt at how quickly Kasumi had jumped to the right conclusion, but the thief's chuckle told her she hadn't succeeded. "Of course I know who's already on your team—I wouldn't have agreed to come aboard blind. And Krios is by far the most likely person to know enough about me to recommend me."

"Have you met?" Shepard asked, hoping she sounded casual.

"Not that he knows of. But I've seen him work. He's the best at what he does."

"Like you're the best at what you do?"

"Exactly," Kasumi agreed. "I'll see you on your ship, Shepard."

She clicked off, and a moment later the advertisement came back on. Shepard left the kiosk, glad that she had a few minutes free for another errand. She made her way up to the Alliance News Network offices. An asari at the front desk looked up expectantly. "Do you have an appointment?"

"No, but I think Miss Wong will see me."

"She's very busy."

"Would you mind just telling her Commander Shepard is here?"

The asari's eyes widened, and she triggered the comm link at her collar. "Miss Wong, Commander Shepard to see you."

Shepard could clearly hear the response. "Well, it's about time! Send her in, Vesya."

Before Vesya could relay the message, Shepard smiled. "I heard. Thanks."

She pushed open the door to Emily's office. The reporter looked up from behind a desk littered with datapads and scraps of paper and half-filled cups of coffee. "Shepard! Finally, you check in."

"Finally had a few minutes to call my own."

"Cerberus keeping you on a short leash?"

Shepard hesitated. "This on the record?"

"Only if you want it to be." Emily smiled. "Please want it to be? It would be a huge scoop to get the first interview with you. Well, other than the one of you punching out Khalisah al-Jilani. That one got a lot of airtime, and was appreciated by a lot of people."

"I enjoyed it, myself," Shepard admitted. "I think this better be off the record, today. I promise, first interview is yours, just not today. Today I just wanted to say hi."

"Wish I had time to grab lunch with you."

"Well, I'm due back in a couple of hours anyway. Places to go."

"I won't ask where." Emily gestured to the chair across from her desk. Shepard moved a pile of folders off it and sat.

"Thanks. I wasn't going to tell you anyway."

"How've you been, Shepard?"

"Good. Well, dead for a while, but then good."

Emily shook her head. "Amazing. So it's true, Cerberus brought you back from the dead."

"Yeah, it's true."

"And you're leading a team looking into the disappearance of human colonies in the Terminus systems?"

Shepard nodded.

"Still no room on your ship for a reporter?"

"Not this job, Emily. Maybe someday."

Emily chuckled. "Well, that's farther than I got you to go last time I asked. I'll take it. You hear much from Lieutenant Commander Alenko?"

"Not in a while," Shepard said reluctantly. She didn't want to talk about Kaidan; she had tried not to think of him since they arrived at the Citadel, not to wonder if he was here. There was nothing there for her, and she had Thane now, even if Thane was reluctant to take things too far between them.

"Sorry."

Shepard shrugged. "It is what it is. How've you been? Any news on the Citadel I should know about?"

That got Emily talking about work, and they chatted pleasantly for a while. Shepard was glad she had come up—it was nice to think that she had a friend outside the Alliance fleet, outside Cerberus. She hadn't known anyone like that since Mindoir, and it was well past time that she did again.

When it was time for her to meet Thane and Samara and head back to the Normandy, she said her good-byes to Emily, promising to check in again next time she was on the Citadel, and Emily promised to make time for lunch. Even though neither of them was in control enough of their own schedules to actually be held to those promises, at least they both knew it.