Miranda was looking flawless, as usual, when Shepard trudged into the briefing room. Not a hair was out of place, her makeup was immaculate, and there were none of the dark circles beneath her eyes that the Commander himself sported, despite the early hour of the morning. He had stopped on the crew deck to pick up a mug of coffee on his way to the CIC, but the effects of the caffeine had yet to kick in, so just being in the same room with his bright-eyed and bushy-tailed XO had him experiencing both jealousy and an extra shot of exhaustion.

With a quickly suppressed yawn, he set his drink down on the long table that occupied the center of the room, mentally cursing the Cerberus personnel that had designed the most advanced communications array that he had ever seen yet still managed to leave out the chairs. Because there was nowhere to seat himself comfortably, he slouched to brace himself on the table's surface, both hands supporting the weight of his upper body. "What have you got for me?"

She didn't respond right away, instead frowning as she took in his rather haggard appearance. Always looking out for her science project, he thought fondly. "Is everything okay, Shepard? You look…" Trailing off, she raised an eyebrow inquisitively in lieu of an adjective that might offend him.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He offered a grateful smile, but waved away her concern. "I just have a lot on my mind lately. I've survived worse."

Though still appearing skeptical, Miranda replied with a knowing smile of her own. If anyone could fully comprehend the extent of his uncanny knack for survival, it was most definitely her. He had lost count of the number of times he had come back to the ship after rushing a charging krogan, or something equally rash, only to face the full wrath of Operative Lawson. She could be quite menacing when she wanted to be, and had so often greeted him with an exasperated scowl and a reproachful remark that could instill enough guilt to make a Catholic school nun proud.

"You obviously don't appreciate what a pain in my arse it was to put you back together."

He tried not to grin at the memory.

"Your friends at the Alliance want our help." One hand settled petulantly on her hip as if in a physical display of her distaste for the organization. "I knew once you broke ties with Cerberus that it was only a matter of time before they came crawling back."

"The Alliance? Really?" Shepard suddenly felt significantly more awake. "I was expecting to get a call from them just about the same time the first Reaper came knocking on the Citadel."

He tried not to sound too relieved for the sake of the moody woman across the table from him, but one of the many weights that he was carrying around on his back had actually started to lift at this piece of news. The Alliance had been the only home the man had ever known, after all. David Anderson was probably the only person in the entire galaxy, aside from his own crew, who Shepard trusted implicitly. He was willing to forgive their recent lack of support, if only for the reason that they didn't know the whole story.

He didn't allow himself to dwell on the question of whether Ashley Williams had anything to do with this.

"Yes, well, I'm sure they had to work themselves into a sufficient panic before contacting you." The brunette activated her omni-tool and brought up the message in question, her graceful fingers moving deftly over the device. "Admiral Hackett writes-" Miranda paused mid-sentence and glanced up at him with a shadow of a smirk. "Would you like me to skip past the inane boot-licking?"

Shepard actually let out a laugh, though had a feeling she was only making things up in an attempt to lighten his mood. He had never really taken Hackett for much of a boot-licker, even in the most dire of circumstances.

"Please do." He lifted a hand to rub at his chin, receiving a scratchy reminder that he had not yet shaved that morning. "I trust you to pick out the important parts."

"Of course, Commander," she assured, looking pleased at his amusement before getting right back to business. "The Alliance received reports of an attack on a human colony that was reminiscent of past attacks by the Collectors. They sent a team to investigate, but by the time they arrived, the perpetrators were gone along with all of the colonists."

"Definitely sounds familiar," he frowned.

"Well, that's about where the similarities end. The team found the colony in ruins with plentiful signs of resistance. Whoever did this was obviously without the advantage of seeker swarms."

He nodded, getting the feeling that he knew where all this was going. "So, what? They want me to solve this mystery for them?"

"Not quite. They already have a lead."

She plucked a data pad off the top of the small pile she had brought from her office, sliding it across the table to him. It was the dossier of a young human by the name of Roy Phillips.

"There was a ship in orbit when they arrived. When approached for questioning, it made a break for open space, and the Alliance vessel couldn't keep up." Miranda's voice took a bit of a sardonic turn. Even the ships in the Alliance can't manage to get the job done, it seemed to say.

Shepard strategically ignored it. "So how do they know this guy was on it?"

"Apparently, Phillips has been making quite a name for himself causing havoc all over the Terminus Systems." Another quick dance of her fingers and the holographic display around her forearm disappeared. "There were all kinds of bounties on his head before this incident. The investigation team recognized the ship."

"A pirate." He furrowed his brow as he stared down at the dossier. Something about this just wasn't adding up. "If they think a pirate did all this, why do they need my help?"

"I couldn't tell you, Commander," she sighed.

He sunk into troubled silence, still focused on the file of some punk Hackett should have been able to handle in his sleep. They weren't telling him everything - that much was blatantly clear. More and more, this job was sounding less like a peace offering and more like some kind of test of his loyalty. And while he could handle the idea of having to prove himself to the Alliance all over again, he had dealt with more than enough of this secrecy bullshit from the Illusive Man. Shepard wasn't one to tolerate being kept in the dark for very long.

The door hissed open on the other end of the room, and both he and Miranda looked over at the same time that Jack came strolling in. At the sight of her, Shepard smiled - Miranda did not.

"That was fast." He slid an arm around the lithe woman's waist as she approached, savoring the soapy scent that hovered around her skin and feeling one more pang of regret over the fact that they could have been in his quarters under a hot stream of water at that moment.

"Didn't want to miss anything good," she said, never actually acknowledging that the former Cerberus operative was in the room – an improvement on their usual relationship, as far as he was concerned.

Jack looked as if she might say more, but then stopped herself as she caught sight of the dossier on the table. Eyes narrowing, she snatching it up and then slipped out of Shepard's grasp, moving to the end of the table and hopping up to sit on its edge. He… was finished reading, apparently.

Miranda rolled her eyes in response to the damage the convict was already inflicting on their productivity, for the life of her not able to understand why the Commander allowed her to undermine his authority at every turn. She had grudgingly come to admit that the biotic was too advantageous in combat situations to just leave her on Omega where she belonged, but there was little else she could see in the woman to respect.

And that wasn't even to mention the utter enigma that was Shepard's romantic attraction to her. The XO once again took in the near scrawny form, the tattoos, the clothing that made her chest look flat and hid the bottom half of her altogether, and tried to see what their leader was so attached to. Jack was sitting with her back hunched and legs spread indelicately, holding the datapad between her knees as she read through the report. She carried herself like a teenage boy, for God's sake.

Not to sound bitter or anything.

As if sensing that there were eyes on her, Jack finally looked in Miranda's direction, a leer stretching across her face as she caught the officer staring. "See anything you like, Princess?"

"No," she answered quite honestly. When this prompted only a quick shake of the head instead of the typical barrage of cursing and name-calling, she realized what a decidedly good mood Jack must have been in that morning.

"What's your damage, Lawson?"

"I'm simply trying to remember when exactly I invited you to this meeting."

A surge of anger traveled visibly through the smaller girl's body, something that gave Miranda an odd sense of satisfaction. Perhaps if Jack hated being treated like a difficult child so much, she should stop acting like one.

It looked for a moment as if things might start to escalate, but Shepard moved to where the biotic sat at the end of the table, settling a calming hand on her shoulder and shooting a pleading look over at his second-in-command. Miraculously, Jack's tensed muscles melted beneath his touch and her softening glare shifted to aim at the ground. Miranda only sighed and lifted a hand in acquiescence, turning and beginning to pace the width of the room.

Once calm again, Jack lifted her gaze back up to the Commander. "What d'you want with this guy?"

He gave her shoulder one last squeeze before he broke the contact, then leaned against the table beside her. "Information. The Alliance found him skulking around where some colonists went missing and want us to find out what he knows."

"Not much, if I had to guess," she chuckled derisively, and when Shepard quirked an eyebrow, she gestured down to the datapad in her hand. "We've met. It was way before he turned into a bigshot, though."

"You know him?" Miranda paused in her pacing, narrowing her eyes marginally, "How?"

Jack sighed as if merely speaking to the other woman was a distasteful chore, then tipped her head to look at her. With both hands, she gestured down to herself, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Uh… pirate."

Miranda huffed, but let it go.

"I'll make this easy for you," Jack continued, speaking once again to the man beside her. "I'm your in. You find me a way to this guy, and I'll get all the information you want out of him."

"By yourself? As a mole, you mean?" A twinge of anxiety announced its presence on Shepard's face as Jack nodded an affirmative. "I never really took you for the type to play spy games."

"You tryin' to say I can't do it?" Her voice gained an edge, as if daring him to try to pull the protective boyfriend card.

"No. It's just dangerous is all. What if something happens? What if you need backup and we're half a planetary system away? How do we pull you out if we need to? I don't-" He paused, furrowing his brow at Jack's sudden frown. "What?"

"I thought you were gonna ease up with this shit."

"What shit? I'm only being practical."

"You know what shit." Her jaw set with determination, she lowered her voice to a point where Miranda could hardly hear it. "Let me do this. I can help you here." There was a long pause, and she closed her eyes momentarily, as if she had to work herself up to saying the word she muttered next. "Please."

"Jack…"

"Shepard."

Miranda looked back and forth between her Commander and her shipmate, the latter's stare becoming increasingly hard and unyielding as the two of them appeared to have some kind of silent argument that frankly went right over her head. They apparently managed to come to a resolution somehow, as eventually Shepard broke the eye contact and threw up his hands with a defeated sigh.

"Fine. Fine! You win."

He jabbed his finger in the girl's direction, stopping short the grin that had begun to crack her previously somber face. "But we're going to do this my way. And if Phillips sets one toe out of line – hell, if either of you do - I'm aborting the whole thing."

Jack seemed satisfied with this, tossing the datapad she still held on top of the pile with the rest and looking quite pleased with herself. If possible, the man looked wearier than ever. He picked up his coffee mug again and glanced at Miranda. Her lips were pressed thinly together in disapproval. Allowing the convict's insubordination was one thing, but he was putting her in charge of missions now?

God help them all.

"I want you to bring Legion."

Shepard watched as the smallest divot formed between Jack's eyebrows, something he found surprisingly endearing seeing as it was the first warning sign that she was about to start pouting. She shot a glance over at the AI core from where she was sitting on one of the beds in the med bay; the Geth was focused on Mordin as the professor was hunched over a nearby operating table, fiddling with an electronic something that looked like a tiny bronze Tic Tac.

"Siccing your watchdog on me?"

"Well… yeah," he admitted, smiling as she gave him a half-hearted scoff. "My way, remember?"

"His way" was already beginning to wear on her nerves, he noticed. Though up until that point, she had been quite cooperative. Usually he had to drag her kicking and screaming if he wanted to get her anywhere near that room; the fact that she was letting Mordin and Dr. Chakwas mess with her bio-amp long enough to hide a tracking device inside of it was nothing short of miraculous. Every so often, the mild-mannered doctor would interject from where she stood at Jack's right with a "Tilt your head this way, Dear" or a "You might feel a bit of pressure now." Shepard knew that the situation was putting the biotic on edge – she didn't exactly have the best track record when it came to doctors, after all – and she had nearly pitched a fit when Miranda suggested this plan. At the first sign of resistance, however, the ex-operative had taken one look at the scantily clad woman and astutely countered her protests with, "Where else are we going to bloody hide it?"

She had a point.

He glanced down at the tabletop between them where Jack was tapping her fingers uneasily against the hard surface and covertly shifted his hand to rest on top of hers. The tapping stopped. Without looking down, she gripped the offered hand with a pressure that could have snapped all his bones in two, though he tried not to let his discomfort show on his face for fear of being declared a pussy. Again.

"I'd rather go alone."

"I know." Shepard gaze was stern as it met hers. "Not an option."

She seemed to realize that this wasn't a subject up for debate, recognizing the decisive tone of his voice as one she could not negotiate with. Jack nodded reluctantly, and after a moment of silence he flashed a grin. "Though if you're that torn up about going with Legion, you can take Grunt instead."

The incredulous scowl he earned in reply to his efforts made him laugh. "That's what I thought."

"Smartass."

Mordin approached from the other side of the room where he had been working, holding the tiny electronic carefully between his thumb and forefinger. Jack eyed him suspiciously the entire way over, but the professor seemed happily oblivious to the fact that she seemed ready to give him a black eye if he made any sudden moves.

"Finished with modifications. Should be functional at quite some distance now. Will allow us to follow without rousing suspicion, even during space travel. Not yet tested during FTL jumps, however." He stopped to take a breath and smiled, looking from his latest project to the woman in front of him. "Will have to rely on you for field test, Jack. Should keep things exciting."

Jack raised her eyebrows though made no comment, shooting a look over to Shepard instead. He only shrugged; Mordin had always come through before, as evidenced by the fact that they had not all been eaten alive by seeker swarms the moment they had set foot on the Horizon colony. He wasn't about to start questioning the salarian's dizzying intellect any time soon.

"Doctor," Mordin continued, dropping the high-tech little pill gingerly into Chakwas' hand. "You may do the honors. Should pop right in."

"Pop right in?" Jack repeated, disbelieving. Mordin looked over at her inquisitively. "If you can just pop it in, why do we have to do this in the med bay? Why couldn't I do it?"

Apparently not fazed by her annoyance, he returned his attention to the doctor, peering over her shoulder as she placed the device. It camouflaged almost perfectly into the hardware that was already present. "Merely a precaution. Biotic implants sometimes touchy. Especially with biotics of your caliber. Without proper safety measures, can be dangerous, unstable."

"I'll show you unstable," she muttered under her breath.

Shepard pretended that he hadn't heard her. "Could you give her amp a full workup while you're at it, Doc?"

"For fuck's sake, Shepard! I'd know if anything was blown out from before. It's fine," Jack insisted, though Shepard still looked expectantly to Chakwas as the doctor made a few final adjustments to make sure the device was secure and hidden.

The greying woman smiled softly and gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze. "She's fine, John."

"Just relax, okay?" Jack pleaded. "I'll get it done."

Shepard met Jack's earnest stare and let out a quiet sigh. Whenever he thought about her going off on this mission without him, his mind slipped inevitably back to the Collector base, back to her bleeding and shaking uncontrollably in his arms as he asked the rest of his squad whether anyone had any medi-gel left. It wasn't until that moment that he thought of what happened afterward.

It was after the bleeding had stopped. After the sounds of the Collectors trying to force their way in through the sealed door behind them began growing louder, more insistent. After the lengthening pause in their assault started to make the crew edgy and anxious to move on. But Jack didn't look ready.

She was sitting on the floor, leaning back against the wall with her knees curled to her chest. She hadn't spoken since she had crushed that last seeker with her own bare fist. Shepard was afraid that she was having a breakdown as he watched her, seeing the occasional shiver ripple over her or a twitch like she could still feel something crawling but was trying to ignore it. She stared statically at the ground, her arms propped up on her knees and her head in her hands. He hadn't been able to bring himself to rush her.

Thane was the one to finally approach him. "Commander," he began in his deep, croaking voice. The assassin laid a firm hand on Shepard's shoulder, glancing toward his downed squad mate with sympathy in his large, black eyes, then over at the door that was the only thing keeping the massing Collectors from overwhelming them all. "We can't stay here much longer."

Shepard nodded grimly with a muttered "I know." He relented, approached Jack hesitantly where she was sitting away from all of the others.

He crouched before her, tilted his head to the side to catch her gaze. All the while he was trying to think of what they were going to do with her, how they could get her safely back to the ship without losing anyone else for the battle ahead.

"Hey," he began lamely, and she didn't reply. Was she okay? Did she need more medi-gel? Could she still walk on her own? Any of these questions might have been good places to start, what he probably would have asked anyone else on his team in the same situation.

"You still got some fight left in you?" was what he asked instead.

Her eyes snapped immediately up to his when he spoke, bright with tenacity – a stark contrast to the broken, haunted stare that he realized he shouldn't have been expecting. A wave of admiration swelled within him before she even gave him her answer.

"Fuck yes."

He smiled briefly, seeing the very same determination in her eyes.

"I know you will."

There was only one person to talk to when matters of the galaxy's dark underbelly were concerned, and luckily enough, the Normandy wasn't too far from where she sat atop her self-appointed throne.

The unspoken arrangement between Shepard and Aria T'Loak was a temporary one, certainly. It was a friendship of convenience, an alliance that one or the other of them would break as soon as it became too much trouble to uphold. Shepard knew this, trusted the asari just about as far as he could toss an angry krogan, but damn if securing a place on her good side didn't pay off. He kept reminding himself of this fact as he made his way through the dim and bustling streets of Omega, trying not to think about what kind of dodgy work she would cook up as repayment for this next favor he was asking of her. Legion, Jack, and Garrus were following close behind him, the four of them cutting rather imposing figures as they made a beeline for Afterlife.

He could feel the pulsing beat from the club practically as soon as he set foot on the station, as if Afterlife itself were some immense heart that kept the rest of the asteroid running. Following that analogy made Aria and her cronies the lifeblood – a metaphor that he was sure the pretty blue narcissist would have appreciated. They bypassed the line that stretched from the main entrance, eliciting much whining and groaning from those whom the elcor bouncer had kept waiting. The ones who caught sight of how heavily armed the passing group was, however, wisely fell silent. Once inside, the four were greeted by the usual flurry of lights and music and half-dressed asari dancers.

He glanced back at the rest of the team, holding back a smirk when he noticed that both Jack and Garrus couldn't seem to stop glancing over at the bar. "Why don't you three wait here? No sense in just standing around while Aria and I talk."

It was apparently the right thing to say, as immediately Jack broke into a grin and thumped the turian on the back. "Hell yeah! First round's on me, Vakarian."

Garrus watched as the biotic took off, then shot a glance back at his commander. At least he was putting some effort into not looking too eager to be drinking on the job. "You, uh… you'll know where to find us if you need anything."

Shepard nodded, watching for a moment as Garrus left to follow Jack with Legion wandering distractedly after him, the flaps on the top of its flashlight head flaring as it took in the sights around it. He then turned toward Aria's lair overlooking the club and caught Anto's eyes – well… a pair of Anto's eyes actually, and the rest followed suit soon after the batarian recognized who he was looking at. The guard's lip curled into a grimace, coaxing a small grin onto Shepard's face. Apparently somebody wasn't too happy to see him come back so soon since his last visit. But then it was kind of hard to tell; batarians always looked grouchy, didn't they? He hoped that Aria, at least, would be more hospitable.

"I'm not sure I see the point in tipping you off to any more easy scores if you're only going to blow them up."

Shepard stood at the foot of the staircase that led up to where the austere asari was seated, a half dozen of her bodyguards watching his every move. He paid no attention to them, having grown used to the scrutiny that he drew every time he came within about a hundred yards of T'Loak. Instead he smiled, just a little bit sheepish as he was reminded of the mission that had, admittedly, gone to complete shit. "So you heard about that."

"I heard that Pietas has a new crater." Aria smirked and nodded toward the seat beside her, signaling that he should make himself comfortable. It was just about as friendly as she ever got. "Who else would that have been?"

"Touché." He grinned briefly in reply and took the offered seat, trying to inconspicuously glance down into the club as he did so. He had agreed to rein in his protective nature when it came to Jack – he was confident that she could handle herself and intended to keep his word on that. He was not, however, quite so confident that all of the people around her didn't still need protection. He hoped that Garrus would serve as a calming influence. He couldn't get a clear view of them, but wasn't too worried; he would probably hear at least a few screams and explosions if anyone set her off.

"I'm not here about money. I'm looking for someone."

"I think you've already picked this station clean of genius scientists and suicidal vigilantes, Shepard," she quipped.

He shook his head. "I don't want to recruit him. Actually, I doubt he's going to be too happy to see me."

Aria arched her eyebrow, her interest piqued. He wondered whether she ever gave as much of her time to pirates as she did to ex-Spectres, whether she might have already been trying to decide whether continued cooperation with Shepard was worth throwing one of her other contacts to the dogs. "Name?"

"Phillips."

"Roy Phillips?" At Shepard's nodded confirmation, the asari chuckled to herself, taking the man off guard. It wasn't exactly the reaction he had been expecting.

"Well hell, Shepard. That's an easy one." Another smirk tugged at her lips. "He's here."

"Here?" He furrowed his brow, a touch of unease beginning to bubble up in the pit of his stomach. It was the feeling he got whenever things were about to stop going his way. "What do you mean he's here?"

"Last I saw, he was still down by the bar." She jerked her head back toward the crowded scene below them, where she claimed he could find the man that he was after.

Also where he had left his squad - where he had left the one woman on whom the success or failure of this entire mission was hinged. That one restless, volatile, impulsive woman.

Shit.

Author's Notes: Got a couple things to say:

1) I actually have no idea if that thing on Jack's ear is an amp. It is now because it makes things convenient for me.

2) Fallout 3 fans with good memories might recognize the pirate's name.