John

Sparks flew from his fingertips as he skidded across the duracrete decking attached to the building that broke his fall. He rolled, then bounced, his body smashing through a reinforced 'Unbreakable' window. His mind seemed to slow down enough to register the shocked expressions of the human and asari occupants of the room, before snapping back to reality in time to smash through another large window.

"Ouch…" John muttered to himself as he lay, half on, and half off, of a large bed. It was probably quite comfy once. As it was, he could only feel a deep ache in his...everywhere.

"John! John! Where are you?" He heard Liara's voice calling. How the hell had they gotten there so fast?

"He's in over there! He's awake, but hurt. Er...more," this time it was Tali.

"Creator-Tali'Zorah, we have located Shepard-Commander. He is in the place you indicated, and appears to be conscious," Legion. Very close. And shining that damned light in his eyes.

"Of course he is!" Tali snapped as she came into the room. "He's my Bondmate!"

"Alright, alright," John groaned as he sat up slowly. "This isn't the time to argue. What happened to Vasir?"

Garrus stepped through the rubble and offered John a hand, which he gratefully took. "She's not in the car," Garrus reported, helping him up. "Blood trail went away from the wreck. Big one. She won't be able to get too far."

"Not exactly top of the line myself," John winced as he rotated his limbs. Nothing broken, it all moved, if painfully.

"John…." Tali shoved Garrus aside and stepped in front of him. He could feel her anger warring with worry and relief. Anger won out. "When we get back to the Normandy, we are going to have a very long conversation about your...antics."

"Ah...I see," John nodded simply. Trying to defend himself at this point would only make things worse. "Well, let's stop the bad guy first."

Tela Vasir

With a grimace, Vasir spat out some blood and pressed a hand lightly over the wound in her side. It came away wet.

"Raa!" she growled, smashing a fist against a door frame, biotic energy she hadn't intended buckled the metal and twisting the door out of shape.

What the hell was Shepard, anyway? It was like she was in some bad action vid. Even worse than Blasto. Who does those things? Crashing out of a three story building? High speed chase through the busiest sections of Ilium? Hell, jumping from skycar to skycar? Who the fuck does that?!

At least he was finally gone. Even he would have to run out of luck eventually. The is no way he survived that crash. She had barely made it out and she had been inside, strapped in, with safety fields in place.

"Trail leads this way," a cursed damned voice called out.

"No fucking way!" Vasir fought down the urge to slam her head against the wall. Instead she hobbled faster. If it came down to it, there were plenty of hostages she could cut through. Shepard was known to have a soft spot for collateral civilians.

Tali

"Please….I have a son…." the human woman whimpered as Vasir ground the barrel of her pistol into the woman's temple.

"How old is he?" Vasir growled out, taking a step back, dragging her hostage with her.

"He...he's...seven…." Tears ran down the woman's cheeks, staining her face with the black makeup females seemed to rim their eyes with.

Make up was weird. Everybody got to show their faces to each other. They got to see who they really were. Then they went and painted them, so they looked different.

Though, honestly, before the Fleet, quarians probably did it as well.

"Hear that Shepard?" Vasir's cruel voice popped her back to reality. "Seven is awfully young to lose a mother. I hear it can to serious damage to a personality."

"Just let her go, Vasir," John's voice was metal and sharp as he held his heavy crusader aimed at the other spectre. "Give me the data I need and we can go back to what we should be doing."

"Right," Vasir snorted. "Did you make that argument to Saren too?"

Tali could feel the emotions roiling through John. He was angry. But not so much as she had seen in him before. He was in pain. But he pushed it down until it was almost unnoticed. But mostly, he was tied. He felt...stretched and exhausted of...everything.

"I did," John gave a small nod as he made a small step to the left.

"And we saw how that turned out," Vasir half chuckled as she took a small step back. She knew what she was doing, making small movements to keep the hostage as broad to them as possible. "Ah, ah….too much more and the girl goes down."

"If she does, you won't have anything else to hide behind!" Tali's teeth bared behind her visor. The level of aggression she was feeling was...not something she was used to. She could even feel her claws itch.

"That may be, but I'm pretty sure I can take one or two of you with me," Vasir's smirk turned dark, her eyes just a little too wide. "It wouldn't take much to kill yo-"

*BOOM*

The Spectre's words were cut off in an echoing report that turned the woman's right shoulder into a blue mist. The gun she had been holding on the woman tumbled to the ground, along with what was left of her arm.

"Good shot, Legion," John said, almost too quiet to hear.

"John?" Tali blinked looking from him, to Vasir, and back.

He held up a hand to her as he gently, but firmly, pushed the hostage toward Garrus, who took her aside, speaking quietly.

"Why?" John asked as he squatted down beside Vasir and held out a hand..

"Fucking….kidding…?" Vasir gasped, taking deep breaths as the blood pooled under her. She blinked hard a couple of times before her hand slapped into his, squeezing tightly. "Have any...idea how many….lives I've saved because of the Shadow Broker? Sure...I made some...money, but he..it...whatever...gave us intel we couldn't get any other...way."

"And how many people did you have to hurt?" John held the dying woman's hand, speaking quietly.

"Some," Vasir started to chuckle, but it quickly became a low, wet cough, blue blood coming up. "Some. But what do you expect? We...do the dirty work for the….Council….Shepard. We get our hands dirty...so they can throw us away. They...did it to you when you died. They will do it all again. Just ask...your...Hestalia."

"What?" John blinked, a look of shock crossing his face.

"Heh….Figured she wouldn't have the….quad to tell you," Vasir smirked again a moment before her grip went slack in John's.

"Okay...that was cliche as hell," Garrus snorted as he rejoined the group. "I mean, seriously, who drops that bomb then dies?"

"Story of my life, Garrus," John chuckled dryly as he set Vasir's hand over her chest. Tali could still feel the hurt deep in John. The regret. But Garrus gave him the opportunity to bury it.

"Shepard…," Liara spoke quietly, but with a tight desperation.

"I know, I know," John sighed, pulling the omnitool band from Vasir's left arm. He turned and gave Tali a tight smile that he probably meant to be encouraging. It was not. "Think you can crack it?"

Tali closed her eyes for a moment and pushed down her own worry and fear, then took the omnitool. "John? Really?" she pushed as much sass and arrogance into her voice that she could. He needed her as a rock right now, and she would be damned if she failed him.

"Sorry, honey," John chuckled, a bit more life coming to him. "I don't know what I was thinking."

Tali gave a small shiver as her called her her favorite name. She really needed to keep looking into getting out of the suit….

Miranda

She stood with her arms crossed under her chest and her hip leaning against the edge of the conference table. Around her, the rest of the ground tems sat or idled. They had been waiting almost ten minutes and, honestly, she was surprised they hadn't begum tearing the room apart in boredom.

It wasn't quite like Shepard to keep them waiting like this. When he had come back from Illium it had been obvious something had gone...not well. He, Tali and Garrus had gone straight to Shepard's cabin, the asari, Liara in tow. Reports from the planet indicated something about car chases, assaults, a bombing…. Standard Shepard things, really.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the quiet his of the doors as Shepard walked in, almost as if cued.

And he looked terrible. He had changed out of his armor and into what had started life as a Cerberus uniform. Naturally, Shepard had anything relating to the organization removed. Hell, he even had it recolored to Alliance blues and greys. Now, however it was rumbled, not like the pressed military fashion he normally kept. Dark circles hung under his eyes adding to his general look of exhaustion.

"All right people, let's pack in," Shepard said wearily. His voice had a rough sandpaper tone. Enough that Miranda could see the rest of the team exchange glances and take seats without the usual bickering. As Shepard can to the head of the table, Tali'Zorah, Garrus and, a bit to Miranda's surprise, Legion moved to their respective seats as Liara moved to stand to Shepard's side.

"As you probably heard, we had some issues on Illium," Shepard began. "We encountered Shadow Broker agents making attempts of Liara's life. And one of those agents included a Spectre."

"Well, fucking shit," Jack snorted, actually pulling a tight smile from Shepard.

"'Fucking Shit' indeed," John nodded as he keys into the table in front of him and bringing up a star map. "The Shadow Broker tried to steal my body, when I was dead, in a plan to sell it to the Collectors. Now he is moving on my former team members." He made a small gesture to Liara. "And I have reason to believe that the assassination attempt on Wrex was instigated by the Shadow Broker. Well...attempts."

"Oh...yeah," Grunt nodded, crossing his arms and looking slightly embarrassed. "I...uh..helped him with one of those."

"So I heard," Shepard chuckled for a moment before turning serious. "Unfortunately, I am not willing to wait for the bastard to get more desperate and go after our families. In fact, Edi, can you cross check the crew communications?"

The AI's small blue form appeared on the table next to Shepard and seemed to almost nod. "I can, Commander. Now that you are making the request in a situation that makes it a threat to the mission, I can divulge information that I was previously unable to convey."

"Did I mention I hate Cerberus?" Garrus grunted with a shake of his head before glancing at Miranda. "No offense."

"Not particularly thrilled myself," Miranda surprised herself with a genuine smile.

"The Normandy has, on several occasions received incoming communications to various members of the crew, usually in the form of letters from family and/or loved ones," Edi went on. "In many of these I intercepted code that would have created holes in our systems firewalls, leaving us vulnerable to attack or monitoring."

"Why weren't you able to tell us this?" Tali almost growled. "This seems rather important!"

"Reports were made, but my ability to monitor communications was deemed an important secret by the Illusive Man," Edi explained flatly. "I may, or may not, have leaked information from the crew because of it."

"Wait…'May, or May not'?" Zaeed did growl. It was the first time Miranda had heard him speak since the Hock...incident. "What the bloody hell does that mean?"

With a flash of red, Edi was silent for almost a second. "I am blocked from that knowledge," she said simply, an almost frustrated sigh in her inflection.

Wait...when the hell had she begun to think of Edi as 'her'? She was an AI. She was an 'it'. She shouldn't be able to be frustrated. Or sigh. And for some reason Miranda knew she wasn't going to report it. What has Shepard done to me…. She thought, but a casual glance at Garrus and Miranda knew.

"So...anything else you can tell us?" Miranda threw in. "I expect the Shadow broker has made more overt attempts."

"Yes," Edi confirmed. "I have deflected several direct hacking attempts each time we enter a major hub. I have included this in my reports, though I was unable in directly inform you of their origin. Just as I am unable to inform you of…" Edi flashed red again. Then again. "Other threats," she said at last.

"Keelah...can we just...I have no idea…" Tali threw up her arms as she dropped back in her seat.

"Well, seeing as how the Shadow Broker is beginning to shoot closer to home, I've decided to take the fight directly to them," Shepard leaned forward grimly. "If they have hooks in one Spectre, they have them in others. Vasir pretty well confirmed that. And if they are also in league with the Collectors or Reapers, they are a threat to be clipped now."

"Yeah, but nobody knows where they are," Jack tossed out before shrugging. "Well, I suppose we wouldn't be here if we didn't have a lead."

"Exactly," Shepard grinned and gestured to the asari next to him. "Liara has been spending a lot of time and resources tracking the bastard down. Because of her efforts, we have a location. I already had Joker put us on course and we will be dropping in system in forty-eight hours."

"Wow," Garrus trilled. Damn, she enjoyed that sound. Shit. Now she was thinking like Shepard and Tali did…. "That's a long way out, Boss."

"It is," the Commander nodded. "Get your gear cleaned up and rest in. I expect this to be a bit of a fight."