Yay, I'm on a roll with these chapters! Thanks for the reviews, please keep them coming and enjoy this chapter!

Oh, and I'm so close to finishing ME1. It's glorious.

xoxo

THR

Chapter 33

Your name was Commander Liz Shepard and it had been a long time since you had put on your formal uniform.

Considering that you weren't a real marine anymore, you didn't feel like the privilege of wearing the garb should have been granted to you. You were nothing more than an ally of the Alliance now, if you could even call it that. If anything, you had more jurisdiction as a Spectre. The Alliance wasn't supposed to mean anything more to you after your near-death incident and Cerberus run in. You didn't want that, though. Cutting ties with the organization that breathed life into your first career was hardly something you wished to go through with.

The pants of the outfit were too short and the coat was too tight on your bust line. In your case, that meant that it fit just right. You had never bothered to get the clothing fixed due to the infrequency of its public appearances. With the exception of formal ceremonies and the occasional marine ball, you kept it stuffed in a storage cabinet somewhere on the Normandy. Digging it up had been a chore; you should have suspected that it would be in your own room instead of tearing through the cargo bay where Grunt used to spend his time. Today's occasion wasn't one that seemed appropriate for the formal marine attire. You would have much rather put yourself in your usual suit of armor. It gave you more protection and, more importantly, more authority.

Your ship, which was now docked at an Alliance station, was chosen to be the host of a summit between a few select people. This exclusive group included Garrus, Admiral Hackett, Kaiden and yourself. You weren't keen on seeing Kaiden come back onto your ship. The thought haunted you day in and day out.

The last time you had been him was on the colony of Horizon when you were investigating for Cerberus. Needless to say, that ended up being the biggest disaster that you could have ever been involved in.

Feeling your now ex-boyfriend's quixotic embrace back then challenged your own feelings for your then budding relationship with a certain Turian. You didn't know what you were supposed to tell him. You still cared for Kaiden a great deal. You had a cold heart but this did not prevent you from having any sort of feeling for a man that you had allegedly loved. If he wasn't a romantic interest for you any longer, the least you could do was be a supportive friend towards him. He deserved that much.

Before you could deduce a social plan, he turned away from you and patronized your actions. Your association with Cerberus had thrown him off. He claimed that you had changed and that you weren't the woman that you had been back on your first mission together.

He later apologized more times than you could count. Email after email he sent in an attempt to get back to you.

You never responded.

This had been a regrettable decision in the long run.

This was going to make today's encounter with him a little more awkward.

As far as you knew, he wasn't aware of your relationship with Garrus. You were a single woman in his eyes and he could be preparing to try and mend the love that you had forged out of stress and devilish fraternization.

You adjusted the buttons on your coat and made sure everything was in place. There was only an hour left until a small group of Alliance personnel made their way onto your ship.

Your life of leisure was now replaced by your old one, which had been creeping up on you for some time. It was time for things to return to normal again.

"Looks like we're both stuck in outfits we don't want to be in."

A set of arms wrapped around your padded shoulders. They were covered in armor and clashed against the unused softness of your jacket, which was unstained.

Your fingers tickled the top of your boyfriend's gloved talons. You loved how he was larger than you and the way that his protective hear made him appear even more monstrous turned you on.

"C-Sec uniform, huh?" you mused. "I didn't think you'd be one to keep stuff like that."

He chuckled and pulled away, making your shoulders and collar bone feel bare again.

"Turians aren't ones for sentimentality. I figured I'd keep this for a special emergency. Considering the circumstances, I think this is one."

He looked so different in the blue and black plated outfit. As much as you wanted to tear it all off, maintaining a professional image did not allow this.

After fixing your hair one last time and deciding on the proper tube of lipstick to apply, you sighed and supported your body by resting your hands on your bedroom desk.

Garrus had moved to the bed, where he must have been checking something on his visor.

You turned to him and closed your eyes, which were lined and dusted with a dash of light cocoa colored eye shadow.

"Are you sure that this is going to go alright? With Kaiden, I mean. He knows nothing about all of this—I mean, us."

The Turian rose and shook his head while combing back his motionless horns.

"Don't worry about it, Shepard." he replied, his tone comforting. "We'll get through this."

You didn't know whether or not he was right or wrong. Quite frankly, it didn't matter. His unwavering support was the thing that you needed the most. Even if you did break down in front of your former cohort in due time, you could at least do it with somebody you loved at your side. You couldn't help but curse yourself for allowing your thoughts to be so cliché. This didn't stop you from continuing to fall for Garrus Vakarian more and more by the second.

Your name was Commander Liz Shepard and never before had it been so soothing to hear one man's voice.

Your name was Kaiden Alenko and you didn't know what this confrontation was supposed to bring.

You sat down next to your former Turian crewmate and waited for him to say something. Silence overtook the two of you. If there had been no activity throughout the hospital ward, the dead stillness would have made the tension rate rise to a ridiculous level. The pressure between you both was bad already; it didn't need to increase.

"Look, I hope you understand that we're both here for the same reasons. I'm the Spectre who forced himself into Shepard's case. This entire thing is a conspiracy that has to be uncovered!"

Your voice had gone into a low tone and you could tell that Garrus didn't want anything to do with your scheme. Speaking to him could now be considered a lost cause. No matter how many missions Shepard had brought the both of you on in the past, there was no way you would ever be able to cooperate at an entirely civil level. He believed that you hadn't atoned for what you had done before. His reasons were undisclosed and you preferred to keep them that way. There was no reason for the both of you to erupt into a fight, anyway. The PTSD patients being treated nearby didn't need to be subjected to that.

"I don't know what you have in mind, Alenko."

His reply was on the late side and you waited to hear the rest of his words. Before you could open your mouth to interject, he continued on.

"Whatever it is, I'd be willing to look into it. But if you even think about ruining what little happiness Shepard has left, I won't hesitate in ringing your soft neck. I don't care how many times I get put in jail for it. Forging a camaraderie with someone I hate isn't one of my strong points. You're a damn good soldier, though. Shepard seems to care about you more than I knew, too. For her sake, I'll do what I can."

This was the best possible response that you could hope for. It wasn't one that had an immense amount of certainty. It did, however, have a small sliver of optimism hidden in its context somewhere.

You just had to search hard to find it.

Now that you had the easy part over with, you chose to address a subject that may or may not come with violent consequences, such as a slap in the face.

"I also wanted to tell you something that's more personal." you began. A pause came after your statement to which he disapproved of.

"I'm listening." he prodded with an irritated tone. It took all of the guts you had to say your next sentence.

"I still love her."

Your name was Kaiden Alenko and that was the worst possible thing that you could have said at that particular time.

Your name was Dr. Karin Chakwas and you had just completed the most strenuous and out of protocol medical examination of your career. Accompanied by brandy and multiple psychological analyses, you pushed through four hours of work to complete Shepard's full medical examination from head to toe.

You had gained a wealth of knowledge from talking to the woman that you thought you knew inside and out. Many a time you had discussed personal issues with the Commander, whether it was on shore leave or from a casual encounter aboard the Normandy while on a mission.

This exchange had been so much more valuable than casual banter. You had discovered that you had done nothing more than scrape the surface of a woman who was the most in-depth person that you had ever met. All of your perceptions of her had changed in a matter of hours.

The person who was the strongest in the galaxy was the weakest in the end. The one who had the most striking personality from afar could be aloof up close.

The one person you could trust could be the one who betrays you in the end.

Although she was not wiser than you, she had experienced things that not even people your age knew about. She had seen everything from Reapers to bad politicians to even Rachni.

Her revelations stunned you. Her rationale made you think differently of her. Her character was still as genuine as it had been before, but it had bumps and kinks that you would have never learned about before.

The entire time that she spoke to you, though, you listened.

In the end, you were glad that you did.

After the period of ordered scrutiny had finished, you escorted her to your office. She had managed to get rather emotional throughout the whole ordeal, which prompted you to link arms with her for personal security. It even gave you some comfort as well. What you were about to tell her would require a large amount of confidence on your part. A fully physical examination had revealed some saddening things about the Commander's condition and it was going to pain you to tell her.

The most interesting thing didn't have anything to do with her mental issues, though.

You had discovered that Shepard suffered from infertility.

You figured that telling her wouldn't be important. Her biology didn't cooperate with her boyfriend's, making having children impossible if they chose to do so. The advancements that had been established nowadays could be able to take care of her problem, but it was unlikely that the process of conceiving would be a simple road to travel down. It was an unusual thing for you to come across. Combined with one too many groin shots and various circumstances, it created yet another issue that you were required to discuss with the disgraced marine.

The root of her cerebral conflicts was something that you should have expected from the beginning. The consequences of having her L2 biotics implants was starting to catch up to her.

You had discussed these issues with her and Kaiden long ago. Kaiden had experienced migraines that kept him bed bound on certain days. Shepard, on the other hand, didn't seem to have the crippling pain that came with the primitive implants.

It was now obvious that she was suffering.

In certain circumstances, L2 patients would have flare ups in situations that contained psychological or physical stress. You feel like it would be fair to say that facing a race of vicious sentient machines head on and feeling Death himself multiple times would fall into that category.

These implants could sometimes drive people to utter insanity. You didn't want to think that this was the case with Shepard.

Sometimes, though, you felt like there was no other hope.

Your name was Dr. Karin Chakwas, and this was going to be the hardest diagnosis that you would ever have to give.