Author's Note: I notice a few more people beginning to read this story. Thank you so much for taking an interest and I hope you are enjoying everything so far =)

"Welcome to the Normandy Kolyat", Shepard said.

Her words were intimate in their own little bubble, loud enough only for himself to hear.

"Thank you, Commander Shepard," Kolyat grinned breathlessly, tilting his head down in respect. "You will not regret this."

Despite his exhausted appearance, the blue drell's expression was still just as light as before she had swiped his legs out from under him. Selene returned his smile, before coiling her body and flipping to her feet in one smooth motion.

Kolyat groaned, his body crying out in pain at the mere thought of moving. Shepard barked out a laugh as she nudged Kolyat with her foot, lending her strength and turning him onto his back. The young drell gave another loud, groaned protest.

"See that I don't, trainee."

Some of their lighthearted atmosphere cooled as Kolyat detected the hint of real warning clipped in her voice. Through the fog of exhaustion, he met her clear, fixed stare and gave a firm nod.

The two held each other's gaze for a few moments longer, assessing one another. Shepard could see the potential that Kolyat had, but she had not worked her way up to her position by trusting every shiny eyed private who begged her for a chance. She might be considered young herself, but she had fought and bled for her rank and it took dedication and sacrifice to be apart of a team like the Normandy. Despite this, his black eyes held a fire in them that not many soldiers had.

Even after the solid beating she had given him, Kolyat had stubbornly fought through the urge to give up. She had seen his intense force of will, the moment he had decided to fight back.

I live a dangerous life, she had told Kelly. Dangerous people fit right in.

Selene shook off the memory, wondering at what point in their match had she begun to regard Kolyat as someone who could be dangerous. Formidable, even.

"You did it, kid!" Garrus' voice suddenly boomed. "You survived, and even managed to knock Selene here on her ass! You should have seen the look on your face, Shepard, when the kid grabbed you."

Selene glanced up, moving away quickly. Too quickly if anyone had cared to notice. She turned her attention to Garrus and Thane as they made their way over to her and Kolyat.

Crossing her arms over her chest, she gave the turian an unamused stare.

Kolyat noticed the pleased look on his father's face as he helped him to his feet, and tried to ignore the emotions that welled up in him. Every muscle in Kolyat's body screamed in protested as he shifted on his feet, but he schooled his expression into one of unconcern quickly.

His brain absentmindedly latched onto something Garrus said a moment before.

"Selene?" Kolyat's eyes shifted to the Commander, a question in his voice.

"That's my first name," Shepard smiled. "You didn't think my full name was Commander Shepard, did you?"

For years there had been news reports highlighting the Commander's career, but he could not recall hearing her first name in the debriefings. Since her survival on Akuze, when her whole squad had been destroyed in a thresher maw attack five years ago, to her heroics in the Battle of the Citadel, the name "Commander Shepard" had been widely spread and well-regarded. There was an unexpected intimacy having her name on his tongue, it felt both forbidden and pleasant at the same time.

Kolyat could not dwell on the confusing notion for long as he was led to the dwindling crowed of people that had watched over their fight. Some had to return to their duties and congratulated Kolyat on his acceptance to the crew. The few that remained, he was briefly introduced to. The presence of a geth unit with a piece of N7 armor on their shoulder and a hole punched through their chest had been the most alarming. It was dizzying to meet such an array of different races that consisted of Shepard's ground team. His mind spun at the mentioning that there were more who would be at supper later.

"Come on," Shepard jerked her head towards the stairs. "It's almost dinner time. You're probably going to want to clean up beforehand. You will have the chance to meet the rest of the crew."

Kolyat nodded in appreciation as he was led out of the cargo bay. The group was patient as he limped behind, for which he was incredibly grateful as they maintained their familiar chatter with each other. The elevator chimed as they arrived on level three, the crew deck.

Shepard waved goodbye to everyone as they walked off the elevator. The Commander remained leaning against the back wall as the doors closed. Kolyat gave his father a questioning look before the man informed him that Shepard's private quarters were on level one above the CIC. The older drell led Kolyat to the right towards life support, where Thane resided, a steady presence at his son's side.

The first thing Kolyat noticed as they entered the space was the nameless cot set up across from the one with Thane's name scrawled neatly across the board at the foot of the bed.

"It appears that the crew has already thought to take care of you," Thane mused. Kolyat could get used to the efficiency of the Normandy.

Thane motioned toward the empty cot, encouraging Kolyat to gingerly lower himself onto the makeshift bed. Thane disappeared behind his own cot, rustling through a large leather bag. Once he emerged, he instructed Kolyat to lie back, and approached with a medi-gel distributor in his hands. As he lay back, Thane carefully and expertly injected a small amount of the medicinal salve into his son's arm. He nodded in approval as Kolyat's damaged body relaxed almost instantaneously.

A small part of Kolyat's brain noted the strangeness of his life now, enhanced by his father's presence and the medi-gel at work. He wondered if there was even enough time for him to hear all of Thane's stories, another part of him wondered if he wanted to hear them.

Kolyat watched in amazement as the crescent shaped puncture wounds on the side of his stomach knitted together within seconds, distracting him from his thoughts. Kolyat felt his eyes grow heavy, whether it was the effects of the medi-gel, or his long day, or a combination of both, he did not know. The young drell blissfully allowed the overwhelming exhaustion to overtake him.

The last thing he heard before entirely relinquishing himself to the succumbing darkness was his father's whispering voice, saying he should rest, he would wake him when dinner was ready.

Shepard's mind was preoccupied as she showered and decompressed from the day. Her mind was trying to process how many events had transpired in only one day. The addition of Thane's son to the crew had not been on her to-do list and had come as the greatest surprise of the last twenty-four hours. Thankfully, Kolyat was not completely hopeless as she had initially feared at the start of their contest. He had eventually handled himself very well and he appeared sufficiently humbled about falsifying his combat knowledge.

Under the relaxing spray of hot water against her tired muscles, Selene's mind wondered to her pervious musings of what Kolyat might become after a bit of proper training. An image of the blue drell's forceful stare flashed behind her closed eyes. Selene would admit, if only in the privacy of her own mind, that she found him to be strikingly handsome. Particularly his eyes, which held a keen soulfulness to them that contrasted with his young age and inexperience. Involuntarily, Shepard's light appreciation of Kolyat's person, sucked her back to the past, to Kadian and the old Normandy SR1.

Staff Lieutenant Kadian Alenko had been mildly enjoyable at best, a pleasant wave of occasional flirting and his persistent affection. They had had a brief involvement aboard the previous Normandy before she had died. He had vowed to follow her on their mission to take down the reaper Sovereign and the rouge Spector Saren Arterius.

It was clear that her feelings had not run as deeply as Kadian's did for her. She had still enjoyed their friendly conversations and eventually their light flirting was a welcome distraction. However, when she told him this before their mission on Ilos, the Lieutenant had not cared, convincing himself that he could give her the space she needed to come to him.

She had been foolish to allow their relationship to drag out, letting their lukewarm passion escalate into sex on a couple of occasions. She winced, remembering the genuine lack of care she had given his emotions, allowing herself to believe that maybe she would change eventually or he would lose interest.

Unfortunately, Kadian had taken her passing hard. The man had believed he was in love with her and had convinced himself that Shepard reciprocated his feelings without ever having said it. After two years of mourning her, the two had unexpectedly reunited on Horizon during Shepard's investigation of the Illusive Man's reports. She had thrown herself into work after returning to the land of the living, her mind preoccupied with the collector's possible attack on the colony.

She remembered with a twang of sympathy the feeling of Kadian lifting her into his arms, too overwhelmed with his own emotions to notice her awkwardness. She had begun to wonder if she was even capable of returning his feelings, if she could ever grow to love someone in the way that normal people do.

She had not had to wonder for too long, as Kadian had affectedly ended their friendship completely when he accused her of being a traitor to the Alliance.

Shepard could not deny the hurt she had felt over Kadian's fervent rejection of her, and his accusations. Even if she had not loved the man, she had at least thought him to be a close friend and she did not have many of those.

She could not help but remember how it had felt, knowing how vulnerable she had allowed herself to be under her misguided trust for the man. No, she did not love him, but she had thought Kadian had known her better than that. The harsh lesson she had learned that day had echoed in her mind down in the cargo hold, when she had stood with her foot resting on Kolyat earlier. Her poor grasp on a relationship with a crew member had only led to heartache and distrust and the memory sent warning alarms off in her head when she looked at the blue drell.

Her mind flitted back to after her match with Kolyat, as she had introduced him to a handful of crew members. Tali, Legion, Kasumi, and Jack had been the few remaining spectators left in the cargo bay besides Thane and Garrus. Kolyat had looked properly startled by Jack's air of intimidation, the violent woman telling him to stay out of her way if he was going to remain a part of the team. Don't let Shepard's kindness fool you, that was pathetic out there. Do yourself a favor and leave kid, Jack had told him. Selene had felt a twinge of protectiveness roll through her for reasons she could not place, nor did she wish to dwell on.

Selene sighed as she stepped out of the shower, intense steam fogging up her mirror. She had a feeling tonight was going to be just as exhausting.

Around the two rows of long tables, chattering voices rose up toward the ceiling of the mess hall. A man named Gardner boasted that, tonight, Kolyat had been accepted to the best damn team in the galaxy. Kenneth Donnelly and Gabriella Daniels from engineering, and two other humans, also enthusiastically welcomed him to the team on their way out of the mess hall and to their bunks.

"So, Commander," Zaeed's gruff and heavily accented voice called out to Selene. "Tell us again why you didn't drop the kid like you did the rest of us."

Selene sat at the head of one of the tables in the mess hall, where Zaeed sat across from her on the other side of the table giving her a critical stare. He was a burly man that held a powerful presence, with black tattoos climbing up his arms and out of the neck of his shirt. His piercing gaze, the right eye clouded over due to his half blindness from an angry looking scar, bore into Shepard's own unfaltering gaze.

Most of the team tuned into the conversation, unable to ignore the gruff mercenary's booming voice. Selene noticed Jack and Grunt nodding in agreement from the corner of her eye, disapproving of her sparring match with Kolyat.

Miranda Lawson chimed in, her own accented voice cutting through the din, "Shepard lost against the drell?"

Obviously, Shepard's Cerberus appointed executive officer had assumed she would easily take down the drell within minutes. That explained why the she had not attended the match like most of the crew.

"Shepard did not lose, Ms. Lawson," Thane murmured from her right side, the first time he had spoken since entering the mess hall with Kolyat earlier.

Shifting her gaze to the blue drell sitting next to here, Shepard noticed that Kolyat looked moderately better. Thane had expertly patched him up and proper rest, even just an hour before dinner, could do wonders for even the most battle wounded.

When they had entered earlier, Kolyat had stood stiff with his hands clasped behind his broad back, looking nearly like a mirrored image of his father, as he surveyed the packed room.

Selene slid her gaze back over to Zaeed, subtly shifting into her Commander voice, the even volume carried easily over the crew's, "I think I did my job well, Zaeed," everyone fell silent as she continued. "It wasn't a competition, or a fair match. In fact," she slid narrowed eyes over to where Kelly and Joker sat, shrinking under her gaze. "I distinctly remember not inviting a single one of you to my private assessment of a potential recruit."

Zaeed looked only slightly cowed, but he barreled forward regardless, "You aren't doing the little lizard any favors by taking it easy on him, Selene. That poor excuse for a fight should have been over in the first thirty seconds."

The former Blue Suns mercenary turned his cold gaze on Kolyat as he addressed him directly, "Make no mistakes, kid. If that had been a real fight, we would've been scraping you off the cargo bay floor."

"I think our Commander knows what she is doing regarding training of the crew, Mr. Massani," Thane's low voice nearly growled. The two men locked eyes across the table, ramping up the tension.

Kolyat shifted uncomfortably, the weight of the crew's discontent sitting heavily on his shoulders. He could understand their reluctance, it had certainly seemed like Shepard had gone easy on him in the training circle. However, worse than the idea of being disliked by the squad members, was relying on his father's protection.

He did not need anyone standing up for him, especially if he was to earn the respect of any of the ship's members. Before he could interrupt the intense staring contest, Shepard shot to her feet with incredible speed.

She jerked him to his feet with a strong hand wrapped around his bicep, although it felt gentler than it looked.

"I am going to say this once," she said calmly, her voice loud and commanding. "So, everyone better fucking listen.

"Kolyat is now the newest member of the team," her voice held no room for arguments or rebuttals. "He will act in a purely supportive role while training with the squad, until I deem him ready for ground missions. There will be no further complaints, comments, or questions on whether he deserves to be here. I have allowed him to stay here, and he has chosen to put his life on the line for this mission just like every single one of us.

"Now," she barked. "if I hear of anyone so much as questioning my decision to have him on board, I welcome you to come discuss your concerns with me yourselves."

She gazed out across the mess hall, challenging anyone to do just that. Her scars glowed brighter as she searched for any hint of a rebuttal, making her look fierce and otherworldly.

"Kolyat, do you have anything you would like to say?" Shepard turned her attention on him.

He was visibly startled, but quickly willed his face to remain impassive.

Kolyat could sense the moment she was handing him: a chance to define himself as an individual. Not just Thane Krios' son, but Kolyat.

"I would like to thank all of you for welcoming me onboard," he said softly, his voice sounding weak in comparison to Shepard's. The look of the crowd did not fill him with much courage. "Some of you have . . . reservations about me joining the crew. I will prove I deserve my place on this ship, whether you believe me now or not. Commander," he turned to Selene. "I do not intend on letting you or the crew down."

Most of you clearly respect my father, he wanted to say. I refuse to rely on him for my responsibilities, I refuse to rely on him for anything.

Instead, he offered a quiet: "Anything you have to say, the training you feel like I need, please do not hold back."

Giving a small bow, and a glance in Selene's direction that only she noticed, he ducked back into his seat.

Silence fell over the mess hall as Shepard returned to her own seat, undeterred by the heaviness in the room.

Suddenly, Jack chimed in from the other table, slicing through the tension, "Fuck it. Welcome to Shepard's band of misfits, blue boy."

With that, Kolyat was unofficially, officially accepted into the Normandy crew.

The noise in the mess hall grew as the food was finally served. All previous grievances fell to the wayside as the crew dug in, starving after today's excitement.

Kolyat took notice of the casual conversations surrounding him as he carefully chewed his food. Garrus, Shepard, Tali, and his father were speaking about possible training rotations Kolyat could be added to. Sometimes one of them would question his abilities with biotics or guns. His mind was distracted by the diversity of Shepard's team.

Kolyat's eyes travelled down to the end of their table where Zaeed sat shoveling food into his mouth, an air of intimidation around him. The human looked older than most of the squad, but his heavily scarred face and chiseled features hinted at his abilities.

"That's Zaeed Massani, the former founder and leader of the Blue Suns mercenary group," Selene murmured in his ear when she noticed his wondering eyes. "He was betrayed by his former lieutenant, shot in the head by the man and left for dead."

At the look of trepidation on Kolyat's face, Shepard gave him a light nudge with her elbow and gave a firm look of encouragement.

"All you have to do, is listen and learn," she continued when he didn't respond. "Zaeed will come around eventually."

Shepard smiled at him, silently trying to reassure him.

An asari sat to Zaeed's left, and Selene explained to him that her name was Samara. Currently, the nearly thousand-year-old asari was sworn to Shepard's service due to the Commander helping her with a matter on Illium. Samara had promised to serve in her crew until they succeeded, or she died.

They continued their meal in this manner: Kolyat took the time to ask her every question he could think of about each crew member. They leaned into one another, invitingly sharing each other's space as they spoke. By the time the crew in the mess hall had thinned out, Kolyat was familiar with everyone on the ground team.

Some of them had even chosen to introduce themselves, and congratulate him on being welcomed to the team.

After a while, only Shepard, Garrus, Kolyat, Thane, and Grunt remained in the mess hall.

"I found some schematics from the pod I was birthed from, Shepard," Grunt informed her. "They held plans for a modified shotgun called a Claymore."

The slight eagerness in his voice made her pause, but she reached over to grab the data pad and skim over his findings herself. The shotgun that Grunt described appeared to violate several of the Council Space's weapon's safety standards.

While Selene was unsure if the rest of the crew would be able to use the weapon, she was positive that Grunt could definitely handle the power.

"Pass these findings down to Mordin and have the shotgun assembled, Grunt," Shepard ordered with a nod of approval.

Grunt grinned and gave his battle master a fist bump, his own large hand dwarfing her own. Selene smiled affectionately and climbed on the table to press a kiss to the top of the krogan's head. Grunt growled low in the back of his throat, but his smile betrayed how much he enjoyed Shepard's attention.

Ever since Shepard had led Grunt through his Rite of Passage into clan Urdnot, he had begun to regard Shepard as more than his battle master. She felt more like a mother to the synthetically created krogan.

After receiving Shepard's approval for the weapon's research, Grunt gave the Commander an affectionate sniff before turning towards the elevators. Selene turned back to the remaining group and smirked as Garrus teased her about her pseudo-adoption of the adolescent krogan.

"Shepard, have you chosen our next destination?" Thane asked as she settled back in her seat.

"Yes," Selene answered around a large yawn. "I promised Jack that we would head to Pragia next. It will be a five-day flight, so everyone prepare for that." The Commander stretched as she continued, "That should give us plenty of time to integrate Kolyat into the squad's training schedule."

Selene shifted to look at Kolyat. "I plan on having you work with everyone on the team. We have the best specialists in the galaxy on this ship, and I highly suggest you utilize their knowledge while you're here. Almost every race in Council Space is represented here, for a reason. There should be no trouble whipping you into fighting shape," she gave Kolyat a pointed look. "If you can listen to their orders."

"Yes, Commander," Kolyat answered immediately, his eyes glinting.

Selene smiled in satisfaction before continuing. "Good. Tomorrow we'll test your weapon skills. Try to get a base reading on what you're most comfortable with."

Another yawn overtook Selene, a sign that the day was coming to an end. Shepard bid the remaining members goodnight and promptly disappeared into the elevator, escaping to her cabin.

Kolyat's eyes naturally followed her, as she retreated behind the wall. He absentmindedly wondered what the next day would bring for him, especially under Shepard's command.

"Well, hopefully you're not a sniper," Garrus broke through Kolyat's musing. "We have far too many at this point, and I don't want to crush another person's spirit by outperforming them in the field. I always seem to leave you father and Shepard behind every time."

Garrus grinned and stretched his arms over his head, leisurely rising from his seat as he waited to see whether Thane would take the bait.

"I cannot imagine you outperforming me in anything, Garrus," Thane answered stoically as he climbed to his feet.

Silence hung between them for a few moments. Kolyat glanced between the two men, trying to gauge whether they were serious or whether this was just a good-natured teasing between friends. Both men suddenly cracked, chuckling and clasping each other's forearms in a friendly shake.

"We shall see about that tomorrow, my friend," Garrus boasted. "I'll teach you and your young one what a real sniper looks like."

"I look forward to seeing you try," Thane paused, and leaned forward. "And failing miserably."

They released each other, and Garrus nodded in Kolyat's direction, reaching out his arm to the younger drell.

As Kolyat raised his arm uncertainly, Garrus grasped his forearm in a firm grip and jerked him forward. "Welcome to Shepard's crew, kid."

Kolyat tightened his loose grip and received an approving smile that made him feel warm. He nodded his thanks, and Garrus released him before turning to retreat to his own room.

That left Kolyat and Thane alone in the quiet mess hall. Kolyat detected a look in his father's large eyes, a glint of pride that made a weight lift from his shoulders, one he had never been aware of but had been with him his entire life. The relationship between Kolyat and his father had many complex layers, but today felt like a new beginning for both of them.

As Kolyat situated himself on his new cot, Thane tapped the wall next to his own bed and reached into the revealed drawers for his night clothes. Kolyat watched him carefully, and surveyed the room without really taking anything in. In less than twenty-four hours, Kolyat's entire world had been upheaved. He still had mixed feelings toward his father, towards the entire crew, but for the first time in a long while he felt optimistic about the future.

Despite the uncertainty revolving around the Normandy's mission, he felt like he could make a place for himself here among the crew.

Thane finished dressing and situated himself on his own cot. "So, what do you think so far?" he asked, facing Kolyat.

"This feels right," Kolyat answered immediately. "I'm glad I am here. . . with you." The last part he added hesitantly, but he could not deny its truth.

"Good," Thane responded with a hopeful smile. "I believe you are correct. This was the right choice for you, Kolyat. Despite whatever choices I would have made for you, I am proud of the man you have become."

Before he could respond, Thane continued.

"What do you think of the Commander?"

"She is something else," Kolyat answered quietly, his heartrate increasing at the mention of his new employer. "The reports do not do her justice."

Thane chuckled and nodded in agreement. "Indeed. When I first met her, she was destroying her way through a building full of Eclipses mercs, just to find me. I admit, I thought she might be there to kill me. When we finally caught up to one another, she revealed how she wanted to recruit me. I thought her insane when she told me about her mission to go after the collectors. Now I believe if there was anyone in the galaxy who would succeed in such a mission, it truly is her."

They spent the next hour talking to each other. Kolyat asked his father about more details of the mission, having only received the basics during their initial talk. Thane told him about the reapers and their plans for galactic genocide. Shepard had recently discovered a device called a reaper IFF, a piece of tech that was designed to identify a friend or foe. She intended to use the technology to pass through the Omega-3 relay, to both stop the collectors, and discover their full connection to the reapers. It sounded as if the collectors were just a small threat in the grand scheme of the reaper invasion, but Kolyat agreed their kidnapping of humans needed to end. Especially, if they were working for the reapers.

"Looks like I joined up just in time," Kolyat snorted. His father chuckled in agreement.

Kolyat's face sobered, "Do you think we'll survive?"

"I don't know," Thane answered simply, his face equally as serious. "But I know Selene is doing all she can to prepare us. Under her leadership, I believe we have the best chance of surviving." Thane gave his son a meaningful look before adding, "All of us."

Kolyat gave his father a small smile, which Thane returned.

"You should sleep, Kolyat, you have more work to do tomorrow."

Thane leaned back in his cot and tapped a few buttons on his omini tool. A moment later, a black holo shade appeared over the only window in the room. This blocked out the pulsing light from the drive core beyond the window.

Kolyat relaxed into his own cot, pulling the blankets over himself. He gave a deep breath, a content expression on his face as he thought about where he was. He stared up at the ceiling as his mind drifted. His eyelids grew heavy as his last coherent thoughts about silver-green eyes and orange scars on smooth skin floated away.

Author's Note: Thank you for reading! Sunday updates appear to be the normal routine that my sister (my beta) and I are shooting for. However, some chapters are getting particularly long after this one. I will give a warning if a chapter will take two weeks to post, rather than one ^.^

Hope you enjoy 3