The second chapter always follows the first closely with me, and the third more closely than most would think. Thankfully, I don't plan on either this story or my Skryim story falling into writer's block like the Naruto story has.

Lots of timeskips this chapter, as the time before Shepard gets a ship would probably not be too action-filled.

Enjoy!

September 3, 2183; Galactic Standard Time

"So the two of them finally managed to pair up, eh? Guess Tali finally let it slip how she felt about the Commander," Garrus said, finishing off the alcoholic drink in his glass. Joker, who was sitting beside him and gossiping like his job required at times, shook his head and chuckled.

"No, Garrus. That's what's so surprising about it. We all knew that those two spent a lot of time together, but you wouldn't believe who actually told the other their feelings first," Joker replied, cracking a grin when Garrus seemed flabbergasted. Joker polished off the rest of his drink and pushed his glass forward with his good hand, cradling his broken arm.

"You mean Shepard, the Commander Mathias "Denser Than Steel" Shepard, told Tali how he felt? Spirits, the world must be ending! Say a prayer for me before I die!" Garrus outlandishly jested, making Joker crack up and nearly spit out his own drink at how serous Garrus managed to sound.

"She asked him how he felt about her, but I don't think she was expecting as fully-fleshed an answer as she says he gave. She practically pulled Chakwas and I into a room to tell us. I can see why Shepard fell for her. She is kind of cute when she's excited," Joker finally managed.

"Careful there, Lieutenant. I don't want to see Shepard step on your toes or something," Garrus joked, "I think Tali was just about willing to tell anyone and everyone she came across about it. Shepard, the poor guy, has no idea what he's gotten into. That girl is absolutely in love with him," Garrus replied seriously. Tali was his best friend, and Shepard was like his brother. He could only hope that everything worked out for the both of them.

"Yeah, I know whatcha mean, but the other way around. The only reason you weren't here for when Shepard and Tali pulled the entire team into a room to talk to us about it over drinks is that you were out talking to C-Sec. Let me tell ya, I don't think Shepard could have told her how he felt if he hadn't been completely taken with her. She was all he would talk about after he got back from Engineering every night. I think they were just meant for one another, ya know?" Joker sincerely said. Garrus wasn't alone in his care for their shipmates. Shepard was like an older cousin or brother in a way, like he was to the rest of the crew save Tali, and the girl in question was so easy to get along with that he couldn't help but like the girl.

"I think you're right. Do you think either of us ugly mugs will ever meet our Tali? I mean, if Shepard can do it, I know I can, at least. Don't know about you, though. I think your hairline might be too far gone underneath that cap," Garrus chuckled, hearing Joker guffaw.

"Says the man whose race doesn't even have any hair!" Garrus laughed again, calling the bartender for another drink. Surprisingly, the attractive Asari tending the bar winked at Joker and turned to Garrus.

"I think your handsome friend here looks like he could charm more than a few girls' hearts, hair or not. You know, Asari don't care much for hair anyway." She kissed Joker on the cheek, filled Garrus's glass, then sauntered away to answer another customer's call. Joker blinked, then smirked and looked over at Garrus, who grumbled and snorted.

"Hmph. Fine, she proved your point for you. Let's finish these drinks up and head home before she breaks your other arm, or maybe even your hip," Garrus said, making Joker actually spit out his drink this time. Joker, despite being covered in whiskey, laughed aloud.

"Bastard! I'll get you back for that one!"

As Garrus carefully accompanied Joker back to the squad's apartment block, making sure the pilot never tripped or accidentally ran into anyone, he checked the time. It was nearing midnight.

Shepard stopped examining the datapad in his hands, the reports on the progress of the SSV Nelson's repairs lying alone on the chair as he stood up to get the door. He checked the time on his way and saw that it was just a quarter after midnight, and whoever was knocking was probably on his squad. He pulled open the door and raised an eyebrow when he saw Tali standing there, hands twiddling in front of her waist, looking up cutely at him from the doorway.

"Tali! Not that it's not good to see you, but what do you need at a time like midnight?" he asked, his brow still raised a bit.

"Erm... Well, you see, Shepard... Uhm... When we were on the Normandy, I told you about how it was hard to sleep in the quiet. Well, the gadget you got me to make noise was destroyed with the Normandy and I can't sleep again, so I came over to see if you... had anything that could help," she looked down at her feet for a second and then back up at him, tilting her head with a small smile as she saw him beam down at her.

"I forgot about that after I got you that little ticker. Sorry for not thinking about it earlier, Tali. Come on, let's head out," he said, grabbing his N7 windbreaker off of the hook by the door.

"Wait, right now? Shepard, you don't have to get me something right this instant! If you don't have anything, I can wait until tomorrow," she said, almost panicking. She thought he went out of the way for her too much already, and though she had never complained about him jumping in front of enemies or taking a few rounds for her, mainly because he wouldn't let her, she felt that this tiny amount of kindness was more than she deserved.

"That's nonsense, Tali. Come on, one day without sleep can ruin you for an entire week, trust me. We'll head out, see what shops are open, and if we can't find anything, I'll let you have my room, with the music player," he replied, hushing her argument almost instantly. She gave in and followed him out of the apartment complex, looking down at his hand as he led them off toward a shopping district. Without hesitating too much, she reached out and put her palm against his, feeling him wrap his fingers around her hand and rub it gently. She grinned behind her visor when she saw a gentle smile ease its way onto his face.

"Do you ever wonder what people would think about the great Commander Shepard if they found out he was dating a Quarian?" she launched from out of nowhere, though Shepard could tell from her tone that she was at least partially joking.

"Never even crossed my mind, now that I think about it. You know I've never really cared about all of the public opinion that comes with the job. You and the crew are the only people I want to be famous to. Why do you ask? Feeling self-conscious?" he replied, squeezing her three-fingered hand and looking left and right for open shops.

"I don't see any open shops on this block. Maybe we should move over another one and try there. And no, I don't feel self-conscious at all. How could I? It's not every day that a young Quarian girl out on her pilgrimage finds a Commander Shepard to snag with her feminine charms," she poked, her smile growing a fraction when Shepard laughed under his breath.

"Snag, huh? Didn't know I was attractive enough to be considered a 'catch,'" Shepard covertly fished for an answer, rejecting a Volus's shop that was open, but looked shady, and looking ahead again.

"Keelah, Shepard! Have you even been on the extranet since we took down Saren?" Tali responded, becoming confused when Shepard stopped and laughed, reaching one arm around her waist and pulling her in for a one-armed hug.

"I'm glad that you've been looking me up, Tali. Do I have something to worry about there?" he asked, trying to keep the laugh out of his tone.

"No... N-NO! No, Shepard, most definitely not. I mean, I've seen one or two of... I didn't mean to... Oh, damn it," Tali cursed, burying her visor in Shepard's chest to hide her face. She could feel his chest vibrate as he laughed out loud, wrapping his second arm around her and just holding her as her embarrassment ran its course.

"It's alright, Tali. I forgive you for being a little bit curious. I mean, you know that to humans, Quarians have attractive body-types, right?" Shepard tried to compromise by throwing her a proverbial life-preserver. If she thought he thought of her like that too (which he did; those hips were fantastic), she would get over her embarrassment much more quickly.

"I didn't know that. Is that really true?" he heard the girl ask, looking up at him from below. He put a hand on each of her shoulders and looked down at her with a comforting grin.

"There's really nothing to be embarrassed about. I knew there were some... less than appropriate vids of people imitating me out there, and I can't really blame you for being a little curious, though I'm sure you stumbled into them by accident somehow. As for your question, yes, Quarian body-types, at least the female ones that I've seen from you and some pictures you've shown me of the Fleet, are, well... I think Joker would call them 'hot,'" Shepard finalized, watching as Tali tilted her head to the side and let those thoughts simmer for a few seconds.

"And what about you? What do you think about my body?" she teased, and Shepard let a mischievous grin cover his face.

"I'm a lucky guy. You're quite the catch, yourself, if those hips have anything to say about it," he responded, matching her voice pound-for-pound, and her seductive facade broke down as she received a response she didn't expect. She buried her visor into his chest again.

"Keelah, there's no way I'd ever win a teasing match against you."

The two of them smiled, though neither of them could see the other's face. Shortly, Tali recovered, and the two of them set off to find an open trinket shop.

December 7, 2183; Galactic Standard Time

It had been three months since the crew of the Normandy had arrived for their extended leave on the Citadel. Nothing interesting had happened over the course of their stay, at least not that any of them knew about. Shepard and Tali had slowly grown a bit more comfortable with their relationship, and with enough healthy teasing from Shepard and every member of the squad, Tali was more confident about picking on Shepard in return. She was still shy around certain topics, and Shepard found fun in trying to make her blush.

Joker's arm had healed entirely, and Chakwas had basically set up a small clinic just for the crew in her apartment. The pilot of the crew was intent on keeping in practice for when he had another ship to control, and so Shepard had allowed him to rent shuttles and other smaller craft to fly, though the commander was adamant that Joker had to be careful, lest he end up in a medical dilemma with his bones' fragility. As a measure of extra safety, Chakwas had decided to accompany Joker on his flights, sometimes to her own detriment, considering how he liked to maneuver the shuttles.

Garrus bought (half with Shepard's money, that is) a few weapons stations and installed them into his room, spending his spare time jesting at Tali and Shepard, drinking with some of the crew, or taking apart and putting his guns back together. Shepard had joked that Garrus would sooner find someone he liked in a gun-shop than he would a bar or club. The Turian of their team was inclined to agree, even going so far as to put a sign up on his door that said "Single and deadly."

Tali had been in contact with Admiral Shala'Raan, convincing her to speak with the captain of the Neema, Admiral Han'Gerrel vas Neema, and see if she could talk him into releasing her for leave until Shepard's mission was over once she officially finished her pilgrimage. She was confident that it would go well enough since Admiral Gerrel was a friend to her family, and had practically been like an uncle to her. In the meantime, she found herself overly distracted by either physical training or her new love-interest, sometimes at the same time, since he was the one helping her with her exercises.

Shepard had been keeping himself in shape by trying to get Tali to keep up with him in some of the exercises he did before he entered the N7 program, which left her gasping for air as he easily surpassed her. He had calmly insisted that all she needed to do was keep the exercises on a constant schedule and make sure that she did her best each time and she would eventually be able to keep up with him. He had also taken the time to get a large vidscreen in his apartment room, something that made Tali incredibly happy to join him after dinner each night, though they rarely went out, preferring to stay in the apartment building and watch whatever was on for the night.

The repairs on the SSV Nelson were going along well, and Shepard expected that he would have the ship in the next three or four months, though he wasn't counting on it entirely. He knew how paperwork and delays worked, so he wasn't too sure that his judgment was correct. He came to the conclusion that any ship other than another Normandy-class frigate would feel too different from the Normandy for him to feel too comfortable with captaining it. He looked forward to the day when the Alliance finished the Normandy II-class design.

He had spent any free time he had after exercise on tracking down and removing certain mercenary, criminal, or trafficking threats, something that took up a significant portion of his time every day. Still, he was able to spend some time with Tali and keep in shape at the same time, so it wasn't like he would complain about his situation. He had even been paid a few stipends from the bounties of the criminals he would bring in. Life on the Citadel was going well, at least considering that he was still having to count down the time until he got a new ship to command.

He just hoped that after the time he was spending on the Citadel, he would still have enough time to prepare the galaxy for the threat of the Reapers.

"Give me the reports on the Alchera Incident," the rough, slightly accented voice of The Illusive Man called out, reaching a hand out to take a datapad from one of his informants, taking the yellow and gray device from the man's hands and pulling the documents up onto the screen. His agents had successfully scoured the surface of Alchera for the wreck of the Normandy, and he was looking forward to finding something useful that could lead to the betterment of Cerberus's goals.

"Sir, as you can see from the report, Commander Shepard's body was not found at the wreck's location, and the rest of the planet's surface shows no sign of his genetic material whatsoever. The probes returned negative on everything but the controls of the Mako in the wreckage. We were able to successfully collect deoxyribonucleic acid samples of each of Shepard's squadmates in the Mako, all except for Tali'Zorah," his agent reported, standing at attention and glancing at The Illusive Man in quiet anxiety.

The Illusive Man tightened his left fist at the lack of a body, but eased a bit after the report on the DNA samples. The council had been silent about the Alchera Incident, and no reports from his agents had arrived describing whether Shepard had turned up alive or dead anywhere else in the galaxy. He had assumed that Shepard had died on the wreck, as if he had survived, he assumed that the man would have a ship and a crew given to him within a day, going off to save the galaxy or something once again. There was also the fact that some of his squadmates; T'Soni, Alenko, and Wrex; had been spotted and tracked heading toward planets in different systems. Based on former behavioral patterns, The Illusive Man had determined that they would most likely only do this if Shepard had perished, or been permanently disabled as an asset.

"It's as good as I suppose we're going to get. Very well, get Team Orion working on the contingency plan immediately," The Illusive Man calmly said to his agent, watching as the man smartly saluted and left the room to contact Team Orion. If Cerberus couldn't have the actual Commander Shepard and his team, they would have to settle for the next best thing: Cerberus would make their own.

March 15, 2184; Galactic Standard Time

Shepard woke up to the sound of knocking on the door to his apartment, staring up at the ceiling as his eyes opened wide to the sound of a hand on the wood of the door. He blinked the moisture out of his eyes and looked over at the clock on the bedside table, noting that he had slept a few hours more than he would have a few months before. It was nearing 9:00 AM, late for any soldier. He looked down at the metallic feeling weight on his left shoulder, seeing that Tali had turned her head in her sleep and practically stabbed his arm with the bottom of her visor. Shepard rubbed the hand attached to that arm up and down her back, shaking her gently, hoping it wouldn't take much to wake her up.

"Tali, wake up. We have company today," he whispered, smiling as she mumbled something in Khelish, squeezing the arm she had claimed as her pillow. "Come on, Miss Zorah, it's time to get up," he repeated, shaking her with his arm again.

"Just five more minutes, Shepard. I want to finish this dream," she replied, half-asleep. He shook his head and let a small laugh out, carefully extracting his arm from her iron grip and getting up out of the bed, his pajama pants the only thing covering him after removing the blanket and sheets. When he heard the sharp knocking of a hand on a door again, he walked around the bed and rolled Tali onto her back, picking her up in a bridal carry and listening to her lightly cry out in surprise, slapping him on the shoulder.

"Come on, let's go meet whoever's calling for us," he insisted, smirking as she looked at him with a mock glare through her visor.

"It was a good dream that you just interrupted," she said, crossing her arms over her chest as she was carried to the door, bracing her legs when Shepard put her down in front of it. Shepard reached forward and opened the door, still quite uncovered except for his pajama pants, which were low on his waist due to morning laziness. Tali rested her head on his shoulder with her arms around his chest. She was quite keen on physical contact, he had found over the past six months.

It was unfortunate for the person on the other side that he happened to be nearly completely uncovered, for he opened the door to a short, pretty, redheaded ensign in Alliance blues. She was holding a clipboard under her right arm and her cap in her left hand, scratching at her forehead with the forearm of her left arm and placing the cap back onto her head before she looked up at the two people standing in the doorway and gawked, clearing her throat and looking away with reddened cheeks.

"S... sir. Ahem... Commander, that is... I'm Ensign Rachel Matthews. I have the latest reports on the SSV Nelson, straight from Admiral Hackett himself. I... Err... The ship's nearly finished with its repairs and I need you, sir, to, umm... I need you to accompany me to its port so you can go over the touch-ups," the poor messenger ensign looked anywhere but at Shepard, even settling for looking at Tali's face behind her mask as she clumsily tried to put the clipboard in Shepard's hand.

"Thanks, ensign. We'll be back out of our room in a moment. Please wait outside," he said, watching as the ensign was about to bring an arm up to salute. "And don't salute me while I'm in my pajamas, Matthews. Don't want you to get in trouble for breaking an Alliance code," he quickly finished, letting the nervous, flustered girl move a bit down the hall as he closed the door.

"She seemed excited," Tali teased, pushing Shepard toward their room, smiling as he didn't protest at all, instead enjoying the playful shoves his girlfriend was giving him.

"Oh, shush, Tali. It's your fault for making me sleep in this every night, you know," he poked back.

"What can I say? I like seeing you shirtless, Shepard."

The two were ready to go in a few moments, though that was to be expected when one of them was a man and the other was a Quarian. There was nothing for either of them to do but make sure that Shepard got dressed. Tali enjoyed being in the same room as the man as he changed out of his pajama pants, but her least favorite part of each day was seeing him put on a shirt for the day.

She really did enjoy seeing him shirtless.

The ship was massive in comparison to the Normandy. Shepard was sure that it would need at least twice the crew to run it as smoothly as the Normandy ran, but since his crew was merging with the surviving crew of the destroyer, he didn't think that would be an issue at all. In fact, by his calculations, he would have two or three extra hands on deck. That was only an issue when it came to supplies, but since he had been managing his credits in a very financially sound way, he could afford a bit of surplus on food and ammunition.

The only issue he had with the ship was its bridge. A captain's chair was in the center of the bridge, a few feet behind the pilot's chair. It was something that he would never use. The computing devices on the walls of the bridge where the communications and calibrations officers would reside for their shifts were arranged in a way that seemed deliberately less efficient than they could be. That was something that irked him slightly, but he would only be gifted one ship, so he had to let it slide. Finally, unlike the Normandy, the Nelson's bridge-to-ship communications were not at the behest of the captain. Instead, all communications from the bridge to the rest of the ship would have to be relayed through an internal communications officer in the back corner of the room.

That was the one thing he insisted be fixed before he would allow himself to captain the ship. If he needed something done for the mission, he needed it done yesterday, so there was no sense in making it pass through an extra middle-man. Fortunately, he was afforded a bit of leeway in touching up his ship, and he had been assured that the communications could be fixed to allow him to communicate directly with the crew. All in all, he was happy to have a ship, but it definitely wasn't as good for him as the Normandy was.

Tali was more disappointed than he was when it came to examinations of the ship, however. The technology in the engineering deck was slightly outdated, but not by much. That wasn't her complaint. Instead, she had an issue with the exact parts used in the engines and their interactions with the systems of the ship. Apparently, she had spotted a few parts on the deck alone that were unreliable at best, and so after a rant about the reliability of the engines defining the reliability of the ship, Shepard had promised Tali that after the ship was no longer under Alliance control, they would immediately update the ship's parts and systems. That had placated the irritated Quarian girl.

Overall, things were worse than they could have been, but if they each fixed a few problems, their situation was much better than either of the two expected. The galaxy would soon have its hero back, and he was intent on being ready for them to come. He wouldn't lose.

They would have to kill him first.