Location: Serpent Nebula, Widow System, Citadel, Rylee's Apartment

Dammit, why does the morning ever have to show up. It would be so much simpler if we never had to wake up, just staying up all the time and never needing to force ourselves awake. It doesn't make sense why it hurts this much, I didn't even drink or go out last night. I'm meant to meet Nate in an hour to talk about something important.

I grabbed a nearby shirt and put it on after sitting up on my bed, the action which caused the man I was sleeping next to stir awake. When he looked at me he smiled weakly.

"Morning, LT."

"Morning, LT," I replied before bending down to kiss him on the lips. We both smiled into the kiss.

"How did you sleep?"

"Pretty good, no nightmares this time," I grinned. "But that's only because I had a big, soft, Canadian teddy bear to help me sleep," I teased, poking his abs.

"I am not soft… but if it means putting a smile on your face I'll be whatever you want me to be."

My room's built in phone started ringing before we could get any further, causing us to groan. This had better be important otherwise I'll skin whoever's calling me alive.

"You have one new message," Avina answered.

"Lieutenant Shepard, I have a job for you. I can't say any more in an unsecured communication. If you're interested in hearing my offer, meet me on the Citadel, so we can talk in person. I'll be waiting in the diplomats lounge on the Presidium," once the asari had finished her message, the hologram disappeared.

"Who the hell was that?" Kaidan asked.

"I don't know, but from the sounds of it, it seems we have a cornered politician looking to get bailed out. But why would she ask me instead of Nathan. He is a SPECTRE after all."

"Maybe she heard about the way you helped Emily Wong and thought you'd be a better fit."

"Unlikely, it's probably something she can't risk the Council finding out so she thinks I'm the safer option."

"Want me to tag along?" Alenko offered.

"If you want," I replied non-chalantly.

He responded by kissing me on the forehead and hopping out of bed, into the shower.

Kaidan… he's so sweet, honest and caring. Do I really deserve someone like him? He's put up with the night terrors I've suffered from ever since I was little. It's always either watching my father get killed, watching those people burn or the lonely days I spent, terrified in that collapsed building.

Every once in a while, I wake up screaming, in a pool of my own sweat; convulsing and shaking on the bed like an electrocuted animal. Normally I use the sleep pod since they drug you into going to sleep, so you don't dream about anything, but Kaidan makes things so much easier. He knows about Ethan and he hasn't pitied me for it, but instead he has just treated me the same. Not like some fragile toy that gets badly damaged if you play with it.

I hope he knows how much I appreciate him.

Location: Serpent Nebula, Widow System, Citadel, Unknown Ward

"Okay Rylee... Yeah… I'll meet you at the Apollo in an hour. See you later."

"I'm done with him. Have Blake deal with him, dropping him off in Alliance custody seems risky," I ordered one of the people Helena had sent me. He picked up Dr Wayne and had him discreetly removed from the building we used for the interrogation

We'd just dropped Toombs off at Huerta Memorial. He was being monitored by someone named Doctor Rahna Çalhanoğlu. We vetted every doctor in the hospital and everyone came up clean. Toombs should be safe from TIM there.

Rivera was a different story completely. After I told him about his wife and her new family he broke down. He understood that she had moved on and was glad she was no longer depressed and inconsolable following his 'death'; but it still didn't make it any easier. He made it clear that he wished to be alone at that moment so I granted him his wish. I told him that if he ever needed to talk I was available and I think he'll take me up on that offer. I had Blake assign someone to track his movements.

Unfortunately, Dr Wayne had no information to give. Whoever TIM is he has the fear of God instilled into his workers. I caused him unspeakable levels of pain and he refused to tell me anything. It was either he was resilient or he genuinely knew nothing. Either way it's better if we kill him. If he goes back to TIM, he'll probably get killed anyway.

I arrived at the café and quickly spotted Rylee, who was also with Kaidan.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"There's a situation at hand and we've been asked to fix it,"

"What situation."

"There's an asari diplomat named Nassana Dantius. She claims her sister has been kidnapped by slavers and their holding her ransom," she began.

"Problem is that she paid a ransom now the slavers want more. Since she negotiated with terrorists, she could lose her position and possibly be arrested by C-Sec," Kaidan finished.

"So she came to us to do the dirty work for her," I concluded.

"But I don't buy her story," Rylee said.

"Why?"

"Something about it just seems… fake. She was overacting, and she seemed more like she was desperately trying to get me to believe her story, than she was trying to save her sister."

"Do you think we should check it out?"

"My head is telling me that this is a trap and that we would be wasting time and resources by entertaining her little game."

"But what does your gut say?"

"It's telling me that this is something we should look in to. There's something about this whole thing that screams important," she guessed.

Should I really be basing my decisions off of Rylee's gut. Her instincts tend to be great as well as her intuition, but she's right that this could waste valuable time, time that we could be using to track down Saren.

A sound started coming from my Omni-tool and it was Helena. "What's going on Blake?"

"I just wanted to inform you that the Doctor has been dealt with. No need to worry about him anymore."

"Did you honestly call me just to tell me that?"

"No," she answered, before mumbling some insult with the word twerp in it. "As a matter of fact I have discovered something about your nemesis Saren Arterius."

That managed to catch all of our attention, but we couldn't have this conversation out in public in case someone was listening in, so we returned to my quarters aboard the Normandy.

"What did you find out?"

"We picked up some chatter about a mysterious Turian businessman called Tyrus picking up Cargo at different parts of the galaxy. He only surfaces every few months."

"How do you know that's Saren?"

"Because one of the techies cross referenced that to other sightings of Arterius and found that at 84% of the time this business man surfaces, Saren Arterius makes an appearance at a point of the Tyrus' interest. His previous transaction was organising an extraction of cargo from an ExoGeni colonisation project called Zhu's Hope."

We all looked at one another and nodded. Tyrus is Saren's alias, and no doubt he has many more considering his name is now poison.

"Find out everything you can about Tyrus and forward it to me immediately."

"I already have but it's not much. We had to pay Aria T'Loak for information pertaining to Tyrus and she gave us everything she felt was relevant."

"Relevant! She needs to give us everything she knows. Where is she? I will make her talk." Who the fuck does she think she is.

Rylee began staring at me incredulously. "You've never heard of Aria T'Loak. Considering your past, I would have thought that you'd have at least heard about her."

"I knew about most gangs and mob bosses who had ties to Earth. This Aria person probably doesn't."

"Aria T'Loak is an asari who controls the Terminus Systems. She runs a space port called Omega and believe me Commander, you don't want to aggravate her. You're SPECTRE status doesn't hold much credit in the Terminus systems and even the Council tend to stay out of Aria's way," Helena warned. Aria seems like an impressive woman.

"Back to the matter at hand, Tyrus has been ordering shipments of a planet called Sharjila in the Artemis Tau cluster. And another pick up is due within the next 75 standard hours."

"Good Work Blake. By the way I want you to give the tech who found this link a reward. They deserve it."

Artemis Tau, Macedon System, Sharjila

Joker had just dropped us off on Sharjila in the Mako. I opted to let Rylee take point on this one, she's a good leader and I should give her the opportunity to showcase her skills and prove why she's my second in command. She chose to take me, Wrex, Kaidan and Liara. It was a little biotic heavy, but the squad can still work. Taking Wrex might be a risk but I'll trust her on it.

What really surprised me was the fact that she chose Wrex to be in her squad. Wrex wasn't the easiest person in the world to get along with or even get in line. Maybe she has more faith in her ability to command him than I do.

"OK Lt. Shepard, what's our next move." I inquired.

"This world is remote, and the pressure is too high for anything hospitable to survive here. Assume all personnel encountered to be hostile," she declared.

She began to pilot the Mako in a much more controlled, smooth manner compared to what I do. There were certainly a lot of bumps along the way, but that was more to do with the fact that this thing drives like a brick, than her being a bad driver.

"Shepard, wait a minute! Sensors are picking up the heat signature of a shuttle. Looks like its parked 20m east of our current position," Kaidan explained.

"Do you think it's one of the slaver' ships?" Liara asked.

"No, if it was then there'd be more of them. And more importantly, why would they leave one of their own ships out here in isolation like this. Whoever this is I'm assuming their independent," Rylee decided.

"How can we tell who it is?"

"We don't. The mission parameters stay the same. Shoot first, ask questions later"

We rode to the base and found that it had no external defences, there weren't even guards surrounding the complex. I guess this atmosphere is just so inhospitable that they never expected anyone to actually visit this part of the planet.

"I don't like this. This is too easy," Wrex warned.

"Yeah I know… I expected a little resistance at least… Be prepared," Rylee instructed.

We entered the building without encountering any resistance whatsoever. Wrex is right, this is way too easy right now. I should expect the difficulty to get cracked to 1000 as soon as we encounter any resistance. Worst case scenario, we find that every hostile in the complex in one room.

It turns out it wasn't a room full of hostiles, but instead it was a diverging path. I decided to Kaidan and let Rylee take Wrex and Liara down the other path.

"Kaidan, I think I saw something moving over there," I said pointing at the other end of the hallway.

We headed to the last point I saw the figure. Whatever that was, it was way too fast for us to shoot with guns. It's probably going to come down to biotics, since it's that fast.

When we reached the end of the path, nothing was there. There was literally nothing there. It was a dead end and all that was there was a ventilation shaft. Unless we are dealing with a ghost this thing had to head into the air vents. We're both wearing full body armour so there's no way we're following it.

Whoever it is, they're probably the person who's ship we found outside. If they're running away from us that confirms they're not on the same side. But it doesn't say anything about whether or not they're hostile.

We kept on exploring the compound, hoping to find either Dahlia or Rylee's squad. We entered a room just in time to see an Asari throw one of the workers off the top of the balcony.

"Do you idiots realise just how much is at stake here! If we don't get this cargo over to Virmire, Saren will have our heads!" the asari bellowed.

One of her people cautiously approached her. "Dahlia please relax. Killing our men does nothing for business. Our engineers are working as fast as they can. Soon we'll have our ships up and running. We just need patients."

"Patience! Time is not something I have. We have an intruder running around the complex killing our men and disrupting business and slowing me down! If Saren brings Sovereign down here, and we have nothing to show for it, then I'm done for. That bitch Nassana had better bring me the help I demanded. Otherwise I will take her down before her pathetic career as a politician can begin." The asari seethed. She entered one of the rooms above.

"Move the cargo to the shuttle room. Kill the one who was crying this morning. We need to set an example," one of the slavers instructed.

I gripped my gun a little tighter at the callousness of his tone. He was a human and he was trading off other humans for slavery. I'll kill them all!

"Looks like Nassana lied to us. Dahlia is the slaver and she's blackmailing her sister. This is one twisted family affair."

"Rylee, come in," I radioed.

"This is Shepard."

"Change of plans. Dantius is a slaver. We're going to have to rescue the slaves in the complex,"

"What!? Why would Nassana do this?"

"Turns out Dahlia is blackmailing Nassana. Someone took out their shuttles so they have no way off world. Dahlia probably threatened to expose Nassana if she didn't help her."

"And that's when Nassana sent us to kill the 'slavers who captured her sister'… damn this is one fucked up family. Nassana probably had something to do with this before she became a politician."

"If that's true, there'll be a lot more bodies on the pile. Anderson out!"

Alenko and I moved toward the end of the corridor and made a left. There was only one door leading us out of this maze so we took it. Upon entering we were immediately outnumbered and outgunned by about 14-2. Every gun in the room was trained on us.

"Looks like we found our intruder men! Maybe now Nassana can finally have some peace of mind. You've caused us a lot of trouble over the last few weeks. Killing one of our top Lieutenants, disabling our shuttles, scrambling communications off world. You've been very busy haven't you?" he aimed the gun directly at my head.

I smirked through my visor. "I hate to break it to you, but we've only been on this planet for an hour at best. Whoever did this wasn't either of us."

Then an idea sparked in my head. "We're the help that Nassana offered. We've been having trouble trying to find our way to the shuttle room."

"How stupid do you think I am. Engineers don't come armed to the teeth like you two. I'd guess your Alliance given your bravado."

"We aren't engineer's jackass," Kaidan retorted, causing the mercenary to aim his gun at him. "We're the ride. We have a ship ready to take whatever you want off world. If the price is right of course." Kaidan lied.

"No ships have been detected by our scanners."

"The same scanners that missed the shuttle just on the outskirts of your base. If I were you I'd want my money back."

"Do you want to keep being snarky jackass then keep testing me. I'll blow your top clean off," he threatened.

"We have a stealth ship that's in orbit. Undetectable by any scanner in the galaxy," I interjected.

"And just where did you get your hands on one of those?"

"Commander Nathan Anderson, Special Tactics and Reconnaissance."

I noticed a shadow in the corner of the room. It descended down from the air vents and left something on the wall besides some of the mercs. If I'm not mistaken that's an explosive charge. Shit I can't move too suddenly otherwise this guy will shoot me to pieces. I'll have to wait until that blast goes off before I can find cover.

After a few seconds the bomb went off, killing 4 of the guards and knocking most of them over. This provided Alenko and I the opportunity to find cover so we can start firing back.

"Who the hell was that?" Kaidan asked.

"I don't know, but he just saved our asses. Another 10 seconds and he would have shot us."

"I say we take the fight to them whilst their confused and trying to regroup."

"Good idea."

We left our place of cover and began to hunt the slavers down. I shot one of them in the back as they ran away and I threw another into the ceiling breaking their neck.

Kaidan shot one of the oxygen tanks in the room and killed another three mercenaries. Which 7 left us more to deal with. He then threw a grenade towards another cluster of mercenaries hoping to beat us with brute force as opposed to strategy, but two managed to get away.

I took the HMWSG off my back and prepared for battle. This is close quarters, so shotguns are the best move forward. However, I doubt I'll be able to do my usual smash and grab tactics with only one person to bail me out if I'm in too deep.

"FLASHBANG!" Alenko roared before pushing me away from the grenade, forcing us out into the open.

He dragged a crate along the ground towards us for make shift cover. Thankfully, I didn't look at the light so all I'm really waiting for is for my ears to stop ringing.

I peered over the crate, trying to see what was going on, but was forced to duck behind cover when bullets started flying my way. "Alenko, stasis field."

I ran out into the open to draw their fire allowing Kaidan to lock her in a stasis field. Whilst she was helpless I lifted a nearby crate, raised it above her and let it fall on her head. She was a smear on the floor.

"That's enough out of you two!" the merc leader bellowed, pushing Kaidan and I to the ground. "I don't know how you managed to set the charge there, but it won't matter now."

Damn, there's only three left, we can do this but I need to buy time. I glanced up to the pile of crates and saw the shadow standing tall, ready to pounce. "You still don't realise that we're not the intruders you're looking for. Your funeral."

"You're not dying yet. We need to take a trip down to the interrogation room. You still haven't told us about what you're really here for. And if you think that dumbass engineering ex-"

He never had the opportunity to finish his sentence. The mysterious shadow jumped down from the top of the crate and never made a sound on impact. He moved as fluidly as the wind and with deadly precision. One punch to mercs throat left him unable to breath and two headshots ended the fight very quickly.

He bent down to the man with the crushed throat and snapped his neck, ending his suffering very abruptly. Then came the weird part. He just stood over the bodies with his head down and his hands together.

Kaidan and I got to our feet and approached the mystery man. He definitely wasn't human, but he was humanoid. He wore a jet black overcoat and sleek bottoms. His armour was clearly incredibly light, otherwise he wouldn't be moving the way he was. That probably meant he never expected to get into any skirmishes, he planned on getting in and out undetected.

"Who are you?" I asked. But I still received no reply. Instead he just stood over the bodies. This time I walked around to see the guys face. He was like no other alien I'd ever met before. I don't remember having any sort of interaction with his kind. They were reptilian but also like fish. His eyes were solid black with little shine and he had green scales covering the bulk of his face, with read etchings along his jawline. His build was leaner than mine, but he was much faster than me.

After a few more seconds of him presiding over the bodies he looked up to face me.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"I asked you first."

He studied Alenko and I. "Your form and combat style suggests military. You're too well armed to be regular soldiers and you're clearly not with the people who run this facility… why are you here?" he asked again.

"I'm here to kill the slavers,"

"Why would the Alliance be interested in this?"

"They aren't. Commander Nate Anderson. Special Tactics and Reconnaissance."

"Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko."

Kaidan proceeded to tell the alien about what we were doing on the planet and about Dahlia and Nassana's twisted relationships. I could tell by his expression the gears were turning in his head. He knew more about this situation than he was letting on and he was going to tell me.

"Why are you here?" Kaidan asked.

"I came on personal business. Dahlia is one of many who have yet to pay for their actions," he said stoically. But I could tell there was a deep, raw anger inside him he was struggling to control.

"I don't care about your reasons for being here. There's obviously something going on here that you're not telling us about," I interjected.

He sighed and paced around. "My plans have been accelerated considerably and I have been forced to act now. Saren Arterius is coming to this location with his ship Sovereign. They'll arrive within the next hour at the earliest."

Saren is coming here. Why would he be interested in small fish like Dahlia Dantius? She's barely known and her operation is small scale considering this is her only outpost. There must be something unique about this facility that has him interested and I'm going to find it.

"How do you know this?" Kaidan asked.

"He told Dahlia he'd arrive at 15:30 today, yesterday. She's been supplying Saren with a slave labour force. For what I'm not sure, but to be honest I don't care. I just need to kill her."

He's probably selling the slaves to the batarians or anyone in need. The Geth are more useful than organics at most tasks. However, it doesn't make sense for him to show himself over a couple creds in the slave market. There's something he needs specifically about these slaves.

"Then why is she in such a bad mood?"

"I've disrupted her shuttles. No one had been able to leave the planet for the past two weeks; I suspect that Saren is growing impatient."

"If Saren is here then this is our opportunity. We're going to take him down once and for all," I suggested.

"No that would be unwise. He will be arriving with his warship Sovereign. According to Dahlia's reports that ship is almost indestructible. The anti-aircraft defences didn't even put a dent in it and this is top of the line. If you're going to defeat Saren, you'll need to separate him from his ship and his geth army."

"How do you know so much about Saren and his ship?" I questioned. This guy was way too knowledgeable for him not to have some serious connections.

"I paid the shadow broker for information on anything pertaining to Dahlia Dantius. Some weeks ago one of his agents gave me information about his ship Sovereign and the attack on Eden Prime."

"I need that data."

"It's on my ship. Once we've dealt with Dantius then I'll give you the information."

"But why Dahlia?" I asked.

I didn't receive any response from the man. He just stared at his bare hands, almost as if he was expecting them to catch on fire, he then tried to shake his head, as though he was trying to shake something out of his head. But there was one thing for sure. The anger and hatred that he was radiating was palpable. Whatever Dahlia did to him must have pushed him off the deep end and there was no coming back.

"She and many others took my life. And for that they must pay with theirs." He said in a cool, calm manner. This clearly contradicted the vibe he was giving off. He's been trained to be like this, very rigorously, and I think it was probably some nightmare stuff. Killers like him are one in a billion.

I looked him in his jet black eyes trying to see if they contained deception. I was going to kill Dahlia regardless of how things turned out so having an extra helping hand wasn't going to change things. What's really bothering me is the fact that Saren is so close within my reach and I'm being forced to run away.

"Fine we have a deal. But you'd better be straight with me…" I left the pause so he could fill it in with his name.

"Thane Krios," he offered his hand out for me to shake but I passed up on the offer. I don't trust this guy not to kill me yet but I know for now we have a common enemy.

To his credit he didn't seem phased by my actions. He opted instead to act as if nothing had happened. "Dahlia's office isn't too far from here. I was initially going to crawl through the vents but it appears she has drones running through them. And with the noise we caused in here there's no doubt that next room is going to be well guarded. I'm going to need help."

"I take lead though, that's non-negotiable."

"Leadership isn't my strong suit. Lead the way," he gestured.

We went back into the corridor and navigated our way through the maze of a complex. If it wasn't for Thane's map, then I know for certain we'd have been wondering around the place for hours. I sent the map to Rylee and her squad. She had already rescued the slaves and her and Liara stayed behind to guard them in case any more guards turned up.

Wrex had apparently decided on his own that he would come over to where the real fight was and came to us. This is why I would have left him on the ship. He didn't run into too much trouble finding us, much to his disappointment.

Wrex stared at our new companion and asked "Who's this guy?"

"Thane Krios."

"Hn…" Wrex grunted.

The door leading to Dahlia's main office was getting nearer and nearer. The anticipation of what they would encounter continued to grow. Odds are that the mercenaries will be divided between dealing with my squad and Rylee's so it shouldn't be as difficult as the earlier battle.

"Thane, how big is the room we're entering," I asked.

"It's fairly spacious. Immediately upon opening the door there will be two crates on either side of the door. However, there is a clear path between the other end of the hallway and the door. If she's competent she'll have people positioned there to slaughter anyone who tries to get in. there is also a potential snipers perch on the balcony above. Her office is on the upper level of the room and the only way in from our position is through the stairs. There are 7 possible cover spots, 5 of which are susceptible to flanking." Thane finished.

Kaidan and I looked at Thane in disbelief. He must be very meticulous to have studied the room to such a great extent was incredible. One of the reasons I'm successful is because I can assess a constantly changing battlefield to exploit any openings. It has never once occurred to me to plan this much for a simple room.

"Drell have eidetic memory. He probably saw this room once and used his memory to plan this all," Wrex mumbled.

Thane activated his cloak and opened the door. I threw three of the flashbangs we picked up from dead soldiers into the room and in the chaos we ran into the cover which Thane had told us about. The following fire fight went as normal. We cleaned house. Thane was the sniper so he stood back and allowed us to handle the room.

Once most of the room was cleared I noticed that Thane's sniper rounds had stopped firing. An overload damaged his cloak so I should be able to see him right now. He wouldn't bail on me now so I can only guess that he's gone after Dahlia without us.

My suspicions were confirmed when I entered the hallway that led to her office and saw the string of dead bodies that lined the floor. I sprinted towards the office and I wasn't too surprised when I saw an asari's dead body on the floor and Thane nowhere to be seen.

Upon closer inspection I saw strangulation marks around her neck. Looks like the Drell is one sadistic bastard. With Dahlia dead we didn't have any reason to remain behind, but I still needed to find Thane so he could give me the information on Sovereign, but he's already left the planet and he has stealth systems aboard his ship.

I decided we couldn't waste time looking for Thane and it would be easier just paying the broker himself, so we took the slaves and had them sleep in the cargo hold whilst we headed toward the nearest hospitable planet so they could be taken to the Citadel.

Location: Serpent Nebula, Widow System, Alliance Docking Bay, SSV Normandy SR-1

These Citadel docking procedures are beginning to grow tedious. It takes 20-30 minutes to gain clearance to take off, they don't even care that Nathan is a SPECTRE.

I was glad to be back out in the field following Wrex's reckless behaviour almost killed me. He still hasn't apologised to me yet, but I shouldn't expect one from him anytime soon. The man is clearly a brute, at some point he is going to cross another line that Nate can't tolerate and then something regrettable will happen.

Speaking of the SPECTRE. I was a little bit surprised that he didn't choose me to go with him instead of Kaidan. We've worked well together before and I thought he would select me again but he didn't. That also left me with Wrex again and after the last time it wasn't a partnership I relished to renew.

After dropping off the former slaves at Huerta Memorial where they could be looked at and checked out. Nate had Blake search for this Planet Virmire that Saren was having the slaves sent to. Apparently the planet doesn't exist and there's no records of it ever being real. We even took it to the Council and they even said that they've never heard of it.

Could Saren completely remove a planet from every data bank the galaxy has to offer?

If that's correct then I wonder what else, he could be hiding?

"Hello… are you with me Liara?" Nate asked. He had just entered the room.

I snapped out of my trance and focused on him. "I'm sorry, I was just lost in my own thoughts."

"What were you thinking about?"

"The gravity of the situation we are in. We missed Sovereign by about 10 minutes and we were relieved. We are going to have to face it somehow, I suggest devoting some of your newfound organisations resources to discovering a way to destroy Sovereign."

He looked at me pensively for a moment before saying, "I never did ask for your thoughts about me acquiring my own personal cartel did I?"

"No you did not."

"Well I'm asking you now."

I took a deep breath and thought about how I should answer this. "I think it's necessary. You are hunting down a dangerous fugitive and you are acquiring whatever resources you need to bring him down."

"How about your opinion as a person and not as a logician," he pressed.

"It's a very dangerous choice you've made and it's one I would have tried to dissuade you from."

"Why?"

"Because in some ways it's a form of holding you back. You said it yourself that the gang life is empty and meaningless; you also said that you were glad to have escaped it. Now here you are back where you started but on a much larger scale."

"Wow… here I thought you were a shy, little, soft-spoken, nerd. Now you're mentally dissecting me. I can see where you're coming from but I want you to see where I'm coming from. Blake and the other bosses don't give a damn about anything other than making money and living a lavish lifestyle. I on the other care more about getting things done. Once this mission is done, I want to turn this organisation into something huge. I want it to be an opportunity for people to get off of earth and see the galaxy. I want people wasting their time killing each other on earth to redirect their anger at slavers and abductors. I have so many plans for this Syndicate to become a beacon of hope and safety for everyone," he declared passionately.

By the Goddess. He wants to prevent whatever happened to him from happening to someone else. He wants to dedicate the rest of his life to this cause, so he can save anyone he possibly can. I wish I could make all of his pain go away. I couldn't imagine being haunted by all of those thoughts every day.

"I never thought of that… it's a very noble cause you've chosen to champion."

"Thank you."

It's strange how I can view this man as a thug in one second only to be amazed at his willingness to help people in another. His methods are unorthodox but his intentions are pure. I can see he is genuinely trying to do better with aliens. After I offered to be his confidante he didn't really use me that often. He preferred to deal with things on his own, but as of late he's been coming to me more and more often. He's managed to build bridges between Garrus and the other Alliance personnel. They are slowly growing accustomed to having a Turian in their midst, but the subtle racism is still there.

"I have a question Nathan. Why did you choose to take Kaidan with you today instead of me?"

That looked to have legitimately caught him off guard. His eyes grew to the size of saucers and his jaw dropped slightly.

"Rylee and Kaidan are sleeping together," was his response.

"What? How do you even know?"

"SPECTRE training. I told you they've been training me to read body language and mannerisms, and I've used it on everyone. Their behaviour towards one another has become more wooden and cold. They avoid eye contact when in public and seem to be making an effort to not be seen together aboard the ship. But whenever we're ashore they're always together, add that to the look in Kaidan's eyes whenever she walks into the room then there's only one conclusion."

"Letting them go off together when they're in a relationship is a bad idea for now, at least when I'm not around to evaluate their performance. If they're not performing as well as they used to then I'll have to intervene."

"I never…. I mean I knew that they were interested in one another but I never expected them to go so far so soon," I responded.

Do humans really find it so easy to have sex with one another, I would have thought they would have more restraint.

"It's really not that much of a surprise. It's a stressful mission and they need release. I don't really blame them to be honest. I would have thought that Rylee would have worn him down a while ago. We've been on this mission for 3 months already and they only started showing signs 2 weeks ago."

"Commander, have you and Rylee ever-"

"No, but not for her lack of trying. She pursued me when we first met 4 years ago, but I said no. I wasn't interested."

"Do you have a sexual pref-"

"I tend to avoid having sex on principle. I haven't exactly had the best experience in that field now have I."

"So you haven't been with anyone since then?"

"I have had sex since then. I'm still a man with urges, but it just isn't that appealing to me. To answer your previous question, I only deal with women. Like I said earlier the slavery…"

"Oh…"

"Liara- are you a virgin?" Now it was my turn to be caught off guard by his boldness. "Interesting, you may well be the only one aboard the ship, well except for Tali. You two should start a club."

"I never responded!" I retorted

"Oh I'm sorry, tell me I'm wrong," he challenged with that handsome smirk of his.

"You are very much…" I was about to lie but then he started doing that thing where he wriggles his eyebrows, reducing me to laughter. "No fair, you're making me lose concentration."

"You need to concentrate when you lie, wow," He goaded again.

This man is insufferable at times. He can go from being infuriatingly immoral, to being tragically heroic, back to being childishly infuriating. It makes no sense but for some reason I'm enjoying this constant change of pace. Logically I shouldn't allow myself to get too close to him but there's something about him that keeps pulling me in.

I would call it attraction but it's simply too soon, there's no way I could be attracted to someone I've only known for such a brief amount of time. But there's no other way to explain just why he seems to consume my thoughts and he seems to be the centre of my desire.

Wait a minute I just realised something.

"Commander when you said you read everyone's body language and behaviour…" I trailed off, in the hope that he could catch my meaning.

"I meant everyone."

Goddess does that mean he knows.

"Commander, Pressley said that there's been a breach in the Normandy's communications system. It looks like whoever did it only used it to leave a communication link."

"Call it!"

"Aye, aye."

"Hello Commander, I suspect you didn't expect to hear from me again," Thane greeted.

"No actually I'm not. I knew you were going to reach out to me with the information you promised me, but I thought you'd go through Blake. I am however surprised you managed to hack into our communications network."

"Apologies Commander but I wanted this information to reach you and you alone. If you look in your quarters you will find a greybox underneath your bed. It's locked onto your DNA. Inside it should be everything I have on Saren and his ship Sovereign."

"Why didn't you just hand this into me face to face. Would have saved yourself a lot of effort."

"I couldn't risk you trying to arrest me during the meeting. My mission is too close to being complete for me to stop now."

"Thank you Thane. See you around."

"You should thank my associate Keiji Okuda. He's the one who encrypted the greybox and he's also the one who set this comm link up for the two of us."

"Tell him I might have some work for him in the future."

"I will Commander. Goodbye."

I hope everyone enjoyed me adding Thane to the story. I made it so that Dahlia is one of the people responsible for Irikah's death. I also wanted to show the change in Thane's character between hunting for his wife's killers and the stoic monk he became in ME2. This chapter was also my first chance to show how useful The Syndicate can be for Nate's cause and they will be involved more in the future.

Please tell me if there are any inconsistencies or plot holes in this story so I can fix them ASAP because now it's long enough that I can't quite keep track of it all.

There are only a few more side mission chapters before I continue with the main story and at some point I'll introduce the OC that's going to be a main fixture in my head-cannon. Til then REVIEW!