CHAPTER 27: BACK TO THE CITADEL

Kaidan. His name, and her voice as she said it, still rang clear in his mind. No one ever called him by his first name. In formal settings it was "Lieutenant", but off-duty it was always "L-T" or "Alenko."

Since she had recounted her experience on Mindoir, his CO had often occupied the front of his mind. Shepard was not at all the all-powerful, indestructible, indefatigable heroine the Alliance tried to portray her as. She was a survivor of a slave raid, soldier or not, Spectre or not.

Shepard had let a brief recount of her experience on Mindoir filter down from the officers and senior chiefs. She didn't tell the details, but outlined what had happened to her parents and what Balak tried to do to her. Even Wrex had softened on hearing the story, and from the krogan's reaction at her summary, the old battlemaster looked to want to be first in line to disembowel Balak and tear the batarian apart limb for limb.

As statistically unlikely as it was, in such a massive galaxy with countless people, Shepard had come face to face with Balak once again, more than a decade later. Despite how vast the galaxy was, she had encountered the one person who had assaulted her. Her panic on X57 was certainly understandable.

He sat in the mess as he ate, and to his slight surprise Shepard appeared just a few minutes later. He would have expected her to be resting. "Hi Kaidan," she said with a slight smile. She seemed better after their conversation the other day. While he did nothing other than listen to her and provide brief consolation, just that fact had seemed to help her.

"Commander."

She raised an eyebrow at him, her small smile changing to a small smirk for a moment. "'Commander?' Still using my rank while lounging in the mess?" she began as she took a seat across the small table from him. "After I cried on your shoulder the other day? I think we can safely say we're a bit past that."

"Sorry…Layla. Old habits." He didn't say anything for several moments. "Is there…can I help with anything?" he asked softly.

She looked at him for a moment before diverting her gaze, a momentarily sad look crossing her expression. "Just you listening…thank you for that. It helps, a lot," she said quietly. "It's been more than a decade since Mindoir. I can usually handle the memories, but…seeing and hearing Balak…after…everything…" her voice trailed off. "It's something you don't fully recover from." Kaidan's blood boiled at the thought of Balak, feeling an uncontrollable urge to kill Balak slowly, painfully, ripping him apart with biotics. She sighed, shaking her head. "I mean, what are the astronomically low odds that I'd encounter him again, on a redirected asteroid, of all places in the galaxy. Out of all the people in the galaxy, it has to be him. And it's…God, I can't tell you how bad I wanted revenge." She closed her eyes. "How much I wanted to chase Balak. Kill him, slowly, painfully, for what he had done, for what he tried to do..."

He leaned towards her, speaking softly. "As good as that would have felt, you couldn't let them sabotage the controls. You got there faster than anyone else. If you hadn't defended the control room…" he paused, his blood chilling at the thought. "They could have shot it, or thrown a grenade. And forty hours later…the asteroid would have hit. I don't know if I or even Wrex could have gotten there in time. You saved those lives. You saved millions of lives. Everyone on Terra Nova." She finally looked up at him. "While it may feel…like you didn't get justice for what happened on Mindoir…you saved millions of families on Terra Nova." He reached out to take her small hand in his, and he felt her tense up slightly. "You're…" he began, but the words he wanted to say died on his lips. "They couldn't have picked a better person to be a Spectre."

He looked into her eyes, and it took him a moment to notice that something slightly different appeared in her expression. He hadn't realized that he had taken one of her hands in his, and he quickly withdrew his gentle grasp. She looked away for a moment. "Thanks," she said softly, reaching back behind her hair to rub her neck.

A beep from his omni-tool slightly startled both of them. She sighed at the interruption with a small frown as Alenko read the message. "We just stopped to radiate, but there's something anomalous about the star." He was due to relieve Pressly in several minutes.

Shepard's eyes narrowed. "Did it say what?"

"No."

"Let's check it out," she said.

Both stood and took the stairs up to CIC. Shepard saw a few surprised glances directed at her; she was herself supposed to relieve Alenko in just over eight hours.

Pressly stood next to the sensors crewman, eyes narrowed as he studied something, along with the sensors crewman and another officer. "Wanted to give you a bit of a heads up before you take over in a few minutes."

"What is it?" Alenko asked.

"The star, sir," the crewman replied, bringing up the spectral properties of the star's radiation. "On first glance, a normal G4 main sequence star, about three billion years old. Its age, size, and effective temperature don't quite match up, though. Fairly unusual, but that's not the strangest thing. What really caught our attention, though, is this." His hands flew over the display and brought up a specific frequency.

Shepard scrutinized it, first looking at it from a signal analysis perspective, then trying to recall what she knew about astrophysics, running through each in her mind, trying to find an alternate explanation. "The signal…is that a pulsar?"

The crewman nodded in slight disbelief. "It's the same type of signal pulsars have, but much weaker, barely detectable even with our sensors. The only reason we detected it is we are approaching in-system nearly above one of the star's poles. But there's a couple major differences other than power." He reviewed the signal with everyone present. "I don't know what it could be."

"Neither do I," Pressly said. While he had the deck and conn, he still glanced to his CO to see if she was going to take the deck from him. She looked back to him, the look on her expression all but stating she was leaving all decisions to him. That was a refreshing thing about Shepard; she let subordinates handle decision-making and didn't micromanage. On the other hand, he thought with a brief flicker of amusement, leaving the decisions to higher pay grades about what a very expensive stealth frigate should do had its advantages. "Jump to zero point seven AU from the star. We'll collect for a while to see what a better SNR will tell us."

"Aye aye, sir." The crew rapidly processed the orders and the Normandy prepared to jump.

The commander stepped back, letting the crew work without interference from her. She pondered what could be causing such a regular, repeatable signal from a main sequence star. She suspected more data wouldn't bring them any answers, though. She turned back towards the crew deck, but not before turning back to Alenko. "Page me if needed. If not, I'll see you in a few hours."

Shepard awoke after a long nap, and took the deck from Alenko during an FTL trip. They were scheduled to run for another nine hours, giving the crew nothing to do other than monitor ship systems, and give a chance for a quiet shift rather than a hectic one.

The Normandy had just finished scouting for any geth presence in an isolated star cluster. Finding none, the stealth frigate was currently deploying to another cluster to check for a geth presence. While the Normandy could travel at high speed for long lengths of time, that time would be better spent following up on any leads they might have on Saren. But there had been nothing since Noveria, nothing in the past three weeks.

A couple of the crew brought up the data scanned of the star from several hours ago. They had better data after jumping close to the star, and mysterious signal indeed resembled a pulsar's. But the star was nowhere close to end of life, and could not form a pulsar anyway. No one on the crew had degrees in astrophysics, only the 101-level course, so any answers about it would have to wait.

She moved on to one of their other enduring mysteries. She brought up scans of Sovereign, studying the design and composition of the massive ship. Its shape so foreign, so…unsettling. Something about it gave her the chills. Compositions from the limited scans of Sovereign that the Alliance had been able to get from Eden Prime did not match any known ship or station design in the known galaxy.

She sighed, staring at the composition scans in a trance, not noticing that Pressly had entered CIC to relieve her. She finally and suddenly noticed him, visibly startling her out of her thoughts.

"If you keep staring at Sovereign that intently, who knows. It just might blow up."

A look appeared on her face. "I wish." She passed the watch off to Pressly, but instead of leaving, continued to stare at scans of the massive dreadnought. She sighed, closing her eyes. She kept thinking she was missing something important.

Greico had come over from his station, mug of coffee in hand, to confer with the two officers. "No records anywhere, in Council space or otherwise, match Sovereign. No ships, no stations, nothing."

The feeling of missing something important returned to Shepard, only this time stronger. She was close, so close, to a revelation, so close to something important. Think, Layla, think… She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, calming herself to reduce the frustration she felt.

Her eyes suddenly opened. "Ships…" she whispered softly. "Stations," she muttered, then the light bulb flipped on in her head. "That's it," she exclaimed, earning her a couple glances from the on-duty crew. Shepard brought up the ship's primary VI. "Calculate the match between our scans of Sovereign's composition and the mass relays."

The crew in CIC gave her muted looks of skepticism that quickly vanished when the results came back.

Despite the insight from several moments ago, Commander Layla Shepard gasped on seeing the results appear on the holographic display in front of her.

Sovereign's composition was a near-perfect match to the mass relays and to the Citadel.

"Sovereign…" she exclaimed in wide-eyed realization. "I-i-it's p-prothean," she stammered in disbelief.

Pressly scrutinized the data, but the results were obvious. "Why…no one has made this connection before?"

"If they did, they're not telling us," a crewman muttered.

"Wouldn't be the first time," Greico snorted quiet agreement.

"But Sovereign was first sighted a month ago. No one had ever thought to check its composition against prothean structures?" Pressly asked.

"Apparently not," Shepard finally replied, feeling silly that it had taken them so long to make the connection. She closed her eyes, shaking her head. Her hands danced over the displays as data quickly flashed past, then slowed. "And…because our database of known ship classes excludes the mass relays and the Citadel." She sighed, placing her forehead in her right palm.

Pressly still remained incredulous. "Out of this whole galaxy, no one thought to compare Sovereign's composition to the mass relays and Citadels?"

"Not many people know about Sovereign, and fewer still have access to its properties. That's even more pronounced for the other Citadel races. There's a lesson here about using our minds to think, and not relying so much on computers," Shepard said ruefully.

"An erroneous assumption is the basis for every major fuckup," Greico muttered.

"But still, what are the odds?" Pressly asked.

Shepard suddenly looked unsettled. "Probably about the same odds of running into Balak on X57," she said quietly, drawing her arms around her as she shuddered slightly, remaining silent for several moments. "We all just assumed that Sovereign was something new, since it didn't match anything in our databases. But we never thought to think about what is actually contained in our databases."

Pressly shook his head. "Unbelievable. Good thinking, Commander."

"I've thought about it for a long time. Too long," she replied. "We'll call this one in when we dock. But now that we know Sovereign is prothean, we have more questions. Where did he find it and how did he get it working."

"And if we can take it out," Pressly added. "Or find one of our own to use."

"According to reports, the mass relays can survive anything we throw at them without even a scratch. It'd take the firepower of the entire Alliance fleet to just put a dent in Sovereign," Greico said.

A chill ran up the commander's spine at the thought. Just how could they even fight a foe like that? Indestructible, faster, stealthy, and with a weapons power that she could only guess at. They wouldn't stand a chance. Was it even possible to destroy, much less damage, a ship like that?

After conferring with Pressly and Greico on their recent revelation on Sovereign, Shepard spent time in the comm room to catch up on classified reporting. Nothing new on Saren, no sightings of Sovereign…and no news on Balak. She shuddered, remembering the hatred and lust in the batarian's eyes. Glad that the colony had been saved, but angry she hadn't been able to kill Balak.

At the end of the messages, she saw there was at least a bit of good news. Several geth ships had been detected on the far side of the Traverse. While the Normandy was two days out from the location, and a task group was only eleven hours away from the last position fix. Shepard just hoped that the task group was large enough to prevent Alliance casualties…but what if it was a trap for Alliance forces? What if the geth were reading their secure messages? Compromised communications was probably the most serious threat the Alliance could face. If an adversary could read their mail, why didn't they just shut down even a fraction of communications in the galaxy? She didn't have an answer, and that worried her.

She left the comm room after two hours to find she had a message waiting for her on her omni-tool. Shepard opened it and read the message, becoming more and more displeased about what soon would be unfolding. It didn't look like she had an excuse to escape this one. As unpleasant as she found ceremonies, she suddenly felt concern that the geth or Saren could ambush the Normandy on the way to the Citadel. Since a time and place had been set, they would have to return to the Citadel quickly to get ahead of the geth, or do something else entirely. The orders were explicit, though, and she quickly saw they could take a myriad of routes to quickly return to the station.

The commander ordered the Normandy to drop out of FTL and link with comm buoy, and to plot an immediate course back to the Citadel. The stealth frigate would first radiate as she coasted towards the next relay. Shepard requested an audio call with Captain Anderson, and she wasn't surprised when he said he would be available in eighteen minutes. She grinned to herself that the captain was probably using it as an excuse to get out of something of little importance on the Citadel.

She headed back to the comm room, taking off her omni tool before entering, to read additional classified reports while she waited for the captain. Less than five minutes later the vid call request appeared on the screen from the captain, surprising Shepard, as he was several minutes early. Not expecting a vid call, she immediately closed the terminal and accepted the call, quickly moving to the center of the room. She then noticed that closing the terminal wasn't necessary, as Captain Anderson had set up a classified discussion. A highly classified discussion, she realized.

"Sir," she said in surprise – it was a vid call, he was early, and he set a highly classified call. "I didn't expect you until…well, a bit later."

"More meetings. This was an excuse to leave the last one early, and skip the next." A sly grin crossed the captain's features, but then a new face appeared on the screen to complement Anderson's.

Shepard's eyes widened slightly. "Hello, Commander," the deep voice of Admiral Steven Hackett said. She didn't say anything for a moment, even more surprised that Admiral Hackett was here as well. "Captain Anderson said that you'd like to chat."

"What is it, Commander?" the captain asked.

"Sir, I wanted to see if there are any Alliance tasks that the Normandy could assist with while we are out in the Traverse," she stated. She also hoped Anderson and Hackett got the hidden message – she didn't want the Normandy to be heading to an event at a known location and time.

"I'm in agreement with you, Commander; there are far more productive uses of your time than ceremonies. We've tried to postpone it, but enough rumors point to you saving Terra Nova. The Press Corps couldn't keep the media at arm's length any longer. I'm afraid you'll have to attend this one," the senior admiral said.

"It wasn't just me on X57," Shepard replied with a shake of her head. "It was the entire team. For the first half of that fight…I…" Her voice got quiet as it trailed off and she looked to the floor.

"How are you doing, Layla?" the captain asked softly.

"I'm…seeing him again…brought back memories. Memories that I try to forget. I've…been better, sir, but…the crew has helped," she replied slowly.

"If you need to ever talk about it, my door is always open," Anderson replied softly.

"As is mine," Hackett added, closely scrutinizing the commander.

Shepard paused for a long while. "Do we have any leads on Balak, sir? Any hints at all?"

"We're searching for Balak. After everything he has done, he's getting a main battery kinetic round from orbit," the admiral said.

"And we will find him," Anderson said coldly.

The commander paused. "What about Saren?"

"Nothing, Commander. While a lead on Saren would take precedence over anything else, and any ceremony, we have nothing new at this time," Hackett said.

"With the classification level of this meeting, sir…I presume there was something else you wanted to talk about?"

Hackett nodded gravely. "The information you are about to hear is classified at the level of this briefing. You need to be briefed on a human supremacy group known as Cerberus."

Her eyes narrowed in confusion. "Cerberus? I've never heard of them, sir."

"Not many have. They are often called human supremacists, but, simply put, they are terrorists." The admiral continued for a couple minutes.

The commander took this with considerable trepidation. "Sir…how bad is it? How bad is the Alliance penetrated?" she asked.

"Not sure, Commander," Hackett responded tersely, but his tone said the details were at an even higher classification level, and something she suspected he probably didn't want to say if the geth were listening into the Alliance's secure comms, if he had the same suspicions she did. "But it's nearly certain they had something to do with the thresher maw you encountered on Edolus."

Tentacles…acid…running… "Sir, you mean…that was a setup with the thresher maw?" she asked quietly, a lump appearing in her throat.

"We have high confidence that they planted the distress beacon to lure the MARSOC squad into that ambush. It would appear that they did not intend for you to arrive there when you did. And," he paused, taking a quick breath, "there is a possibility that Cerberus was behind Akuze."

"What do you mean?" she responded. "Sir, are you saying…that Cerberus lured Alliance marines to their deaths at Edolus and Akuze?"

"AIA has high confidence that Cerberus had involvement with Akuze as well," Hackett replied.

"What do you need me to do, sir? Where can we go hit them?" she responded immediately. She didn't know how they would stop Saren, and she didn't know where to find Balak, but she could deal with people who lured marines to their deaths. All she needed was a location.

"AIA is firming up the locations. It may take a bit of time, but we may send you after any Cerberus facilities that they locate in the Traverse. It is assessed they have several of them."

Shepard nodded. "Understood, sir," she said, her voice firm and resolute. If those Cerberus assholes had killed marines, she would make them pay. She could at least make someone pay.

"We'll keep you informed about Cerberus, Commander. Congratulations on the second full ship kill, by the way," Anderson said with a smile.

"Thank you, sir." Shepard returned it.

"We've only had a few snap shot engagements in the history of the Alliance, and you're the only one where we hadn't been required to perform any repairs on our ships. Every other engagement has required significant repairs. You've done an excellent job commanding the Normandy."

"Sir, to be honest, it really is the crew. They've done a tremendous job. I've spent a fair amount of time unconscious in the medbay since I came aboard. Sir, I know so-called 'celebration'…I couldn't have done anything this last month without the Normandy crew. I'd have been dead or captured at least four times for sure just since coming on board the Normandy. Edolus, Therum, Noveria…and X57," she said quietly. "Any celebration or recognition of any of my achievements means absolutely nothing if all of the people that have been keeping me alive aren't recognized."

"I know, Commander," Hackett replied understandingly. "And we'll make sure they get it. A ceremony for you, however, has been planned for a while. They wanted it to happen quickly after your induction, but we were able to get you deployed first."

The embassy just wants to show me off as the first human Spectre, Shepard thought. Nothing more, nothing less. "Okay," she finally said. "I'll do the ceremony, but we're canceling the interviews."

Hackett frowned in frustration. "I wish we could, but that's the embassy's doing."

"Sir, there's many reasons why putting me in front of cameras in a one-on-one setting is a bad idea," the commander responded with a shake of her head. "Saren, the geth, what happened on Noveria, X57, just to start with." She sighed, frowning. "It's going to be a lot of "no comments.' Can it at least be a press conference, with a protocol officer, someone to keep the more unruly questions in check? I know they will say I've had a lot of practice, but I'm still not good with the press. I think it would be better for everyone involved if I wasn't alone in a room with a reporter that could ask any questions they want."

It was Anderson's turn to sigh. "More of the embassy's doing. They want you to appear more human, rather than the more scripted feeling of a press conference."

"Which means the interrogato—questioners," Shepard quickly corrected her Freudian slip, to amusement from both men on the other end of the line. "Can ask whatever things they like."

"I don't like it either. I would rather have you do something more productive with your time, but the embassy is calling the shots. Comments have been made regarding your unavailability since becoming a Spectre, and the embassy is being very…" Anderson said with a frown.

"Much a pain in the ass," Shepard frowned, finishing the sentence. A thought entered her mind. It would be so easy to just order the Normandy far away from the Citadel, far from any prying eyes, where they could search for geth, hunt pirates and slavers, or simply gather intelligence. Something productive with their time. They had foodstuffs for several weeks, and nearly a full load of fuel; they wouldn't have to get more of the latter for at least a couple weeks, and they could refill from automated stations. As long as their payment wasn't declined…the commander thought with amusement if she would be cut out of her credit lines by the embassy and the Alliance if they disobeyed orders. Could she say that she received some eyes-only intel to her from the Council? No, Sparatus would be both quick and more than willing to call her on any lie.

Her thoughts must have shown on her expression, as Anderson started chuckling. "I know you're thinking right now, Layla."

"The thought's crossing my mind." She grinned, before it faded into a somber look. She debated telling them that they had realized that Sovereign was a prothean ship. But she didn't want to risk any more information than she had to over a potentially compromised communication line, even though it was classified and supposedly highly secure. "Do…do we have anything more intelligence on the Reapers?" she finally asked.

"Nothing more than you already know," Anderson responded. "Nearly everyone thinks it is too far-fetched, too fantastical, for them to exist. To be honest, I'm having a hard time believing they exist. But given the implications, even if there is just a slight chance that they are real, we have to them seriously."

"Saren and the geth think they're real enough."

"I know, but we have nothing new at this time," Anderson said with a sigh.

A beep chimed to interrupt their call, indicating that the Normandy was waiting for her call to end so the stealth frigate could jump through a mass relay. "Make sure and some rest. The interviews tomorrow and the ceremony tomorrow evening will make it a long day for you," Captain Anderson said. "We'll see you soon, and talk more then." The call ended, and moments later she felt the subtle shift of gravity as the Normandy transitioned through a relay.

Shepard sighed, and closed everything up inside the comm room. She wondered if Hackett and Anderson had the same concerns about their comms being penetrated. If so, why did they discuss Cerberus? Did they want the geth to search for them as well, figuring that the Normandy would be sent after both of them to mop up the remnants? But would that be leading the Normandy into a trap? She would have to wait for answers until she talked to them in person.

She retrieved her omni-tool and typed up a quick message to the crew, announcing that they would have leave scheduled on the Citadel. She quickly filled in Pressly, who had the deck, on what was to be occurring the next couple days, then walked downstairs to the crew level.

She returned to her quarters after chatting with a couple of the crew for a few minutes. She rubbed her right temple, as the visions momentarily returned to the front of her mind. She sighed as she closed the door, slowly pulled off her shoes and jumpsuit, and looked at herself in the mirror as she pulled her hair out of the bun.

She stared into her eyes as she brushed her teeth, the fatigue really hitting her. The nightmares from Mindoir had returned in full force since X57. She could still hear the screams of...she shuddered, and the sounds slowly faded. And for the nights before X57, the visions would rob her of a good night's sleep, and the pressure placed on her, both by others and by herself, did not lend itself to restful evenings. She didn't need to be anywhere until 1300 tomorrow to start prepping for the unfortunate media interviews. Information had been included as part of the messages, but she hadn't read anything yet. She figured rest would be her best preparation for the stressful gauntlet of one-on-one interviews. She removed her undergarments, tossing them into the laundry bin, and pulled on a nightgown.

She climbed into bed, her eyes half-open, the fatigue really hitting her now that she was alone. She tried to interact with her crew whenever possible, but keeping that up took energy, more than she had to spare, she knew. But she couldn't let them down, not after everything they had done for her. She couldn't let Captain Anderson down either; he had given up everything so she could have this chance. She couldn't let the Alliance or humanity down either; she was now even more their poster girl now that she was a Spectre. And, as reluctantly as they had made her a Spectre, she couldn't let the Council down either. So many people were observing her, were counting on her…and some simply wanted her to fail.

She shook her mind free of these thoughts – those weren't helpful at all to allow one to fall asleep. She performed tried-and-true techniques to try and fall asleep, but her prior worries continued to haunt her mind, and like many nights before, sleep would not come. After what seemed like an eternity, but what turned out to be a bit less than an hour, she got up and turned on the lights, grabbing a datapad and reading a few chapters of a nonfiction book for close to forty-five minutes. Feeling ready to fall asleep again, she went back to bed, but sleep still eluded her. She sighed, and knew it wasn't helpful at all to help with falling asleep, but she kept the lights out and turned on the vid screen on its faintest setting. She flipped on a comedy series and began to focus on the silly characters in the show rather than the enormity of the pressure placed on her. The thoughts distracted her from everything else on her mind, and she didn't realize until the next morning that she had fallen asleep less than ten minutes into the episode.

Shepard slowly woke, with a quiet moan as grogginess still filled her head. Yet another near sleepless night, she thought to herself, and it took her a few moments to realize that she had finally fallen asleep with the vid screen on. Well, at least she got a little sleep; she had wondered for a while if she would get any at all. But…the vid screen displayed a prompt asking her if she was still watching the series…which only happened after a few episodes were watched. She was partially awake now, and immediately awoke on seeing what time it was. Despite the trouble she had encountered falling asleep the previous night, she had still slept for nearly seven hours…which meant the Normandy had probably already docked at the Citadel. A quick check of telemetry confirmed it.

She jumped out of bed and quickly threw on a jumpsuit, rinsing her mouth out to wake herself up and get her mind and pulse going. It apparently was going to be one of those days, as her hair was deciding it was not going to cooperate at all, so she didn't bother. Why hadn't they woke her for her shift when her alarm didn't go off?

She hurried up to CIC to see the ship had docked about twenty minutes ago from the looks of it. Pressly and the on-duty crew were completing the power-down of the ship, and didn't look surprised to see her. She gave him a look, and he followed her into the comm room vestibule. She crossed her arms, but the XO spoke before she could. "Ma'am, it was decided when I passed the deck off to Alenko that I would take your shift. You need the rest more than the rest of us the next couple days with the…well, with everything, ma'am. You were already in your cabin at the time, so we did not want to message and wake you. I told Alenko to disable your alarm. The decision ultimately was mine, and I take responsibility for it," the navigator said.

The commander had thought she had fixed the glitch allowing for remote access to her alarm; apparently Alenko knew of another workaround. "Pressly, while I do…" Shepard sighed at the fact she overslept again, but couldn't conceal a small, relieved grin. If they hadn't let her sleep, and Pressly hadn't taken her shift, she probably would have had, at most, a couple hours of sleep last night, and would have a long day and evening trying not to make humanity, the Alliance, and herself look like an idiot. "You know what, forget it," she said, and the XO was puzzled at her expression and slightly concerned at what could follow. "I'm supposed to reprimand and lecture you or something about now. But, as you can probably tell by my current appearance, I really needed the sleep. So thank you," she finished softly.

The navigator was surprised, and slightly relieved, at her response. Maybe the saying was wrong, that good deeds did sometimes did go unpunished... "Well…you're welcome, ma'am," he said. "You do look kinda tired, and you have a lot on your plate, Commander. If there is anything myself or any of the crew can do to make things easier for you, just let us know. You need to be at your peak and well-rested when we get the next lead on Saren. Anyone on board can dock the ship…well, except for Wrex, but don't tell him I said that." Shepard couldn't help but briefly giggle at the thought of Wrex immediately getting frustrated with the approach protocols and simply slamming the ship sidelong into the docking bay. "Only you can kick Saren's ass when we find him."

She sighed. "Thank you, Charles," she said softly. "I take it no new intel on Saren or his murderbots?"

"No," the XO shook his head.

"So right now, the only thing we know is Saren was searching for a secondary relay that could link to any number of destinations, including undiscovered relays, and that is based off one piece of intel." She sighed, rubbing her head. "It feels like we're just grasping at straws, just getting lucky with breaks…"

"We've stopped an asteroid from wiping out a planet, killed two geth ships one-on-one, aided in the killing of four others, eliminated Saren's top lieutenant, and are protecting said lieutenant's daughter." He chuckled. "That's a helluva lot for just the last few weeks."

"True," she conceded.

"Are things always this, uh…exciting with you around?"

She shrugged and a small smile appeared on her face. "I guess it can be." She paused, her amusement fading. "Get a runner from Fifth Fleet to come to the Normandy. I want them to be informed of what we discovered about Sovereign."

The two officers left the vestibule. By that time the crew had completed the full shutdown of the ship, and now all power, water, and coolant were being drawn from the dock. Pressly took a couple more minutes to finish of the checklist with the crew, and after everything was set, both CO and XO went down to the crew deck.

"What time do they have you start with those interviews?" XO asked.

"I think about 1500; they want me there at 1300 to start prep," CO responded. "Make sure I don't say anything I shouldn't, like 'oh, we're hunting the rogue Spectre Saren Arterius and his army of geth murderbots. And this is somehow related to some ancient machine race called 'Reapers' that want to genocide everything in the galaxy. Yes, the Council has been a complete pain. Yes, we blew up a bunch of mining equipment and prothean ruins, but it had the gall to get in our way. Yes, we unleashed the rachni again; they're really hungry and are ready to eat the whole galaxy this time, not just a star cluster or two. More tea, anyone?'"

"Ha!" Pressly laughed. "Now I'm curious what they would actually do to you if you were to say those things?"

"If it's at the dinner, they would probably just say, 'Pfft, she's drunk, don't mind her. She's tiny, can't hold her liquor,'" she said, making a dismissive gesture with her hand. "At an interview though…not too sure. But yeah, probably would be in a bit of trouble." She stopped at the mess and continued, "Thank you, Charles. Don't forget to rest yourself."

He made his way towards the officers' quarters, and she followed him to her own. There wasn't anyone at the mess at this time as pretty much all of the crew was sleeping, so Shepard made a large meal to eat – she probably wouldn't be able to eat again until this ceremony started.

She returned to her quarters, taking off her jumpsuit and brushing her teeth as she stared at her appearance in the mirror. She took a long shower that served to clear her head and wash her hair, then tried to get said hair to cooperate after getting wet, finally succeeding after what seemed like way too much time and effort. She finally finished styling it, then moved on to makeup. Satisfied that her face and hair looked their best, she put on her formal dress uniform, reviewing her appearance from several angles in her own full length mirror in her quarters.

She actually was ready earlier than she expected, despite her hair's best efforts to the contrary, so she sat on her chair and quickly looked up the results of the Alliance's engagement a few hours ago with the geth. But the geth had vanished by the time the task group had arrived. The Alliance ships had been recalled a couple hours ago, as it was clear the geth weren't there and wouldn't be returning. Shepard was just glad it hadn't been a trap.

She spent fifteen minutes reviewing more information on the interviews she would have to do later this afternoon. While she had done these before, now she had far more scrutiny placed on her.

Grabbing her small purse, she left her cabin, feeling her heart start to pulse faster in anxiety. Her mind had processed that three crew were sitting in the mess, having just woken up and were eating "breakfast" before heading out on leave, but she was deep in thought about the upcoming interviews and started to feel a slowly growing dread.

She walked up the stairs to CIC, and was surprised to find Lieutenant Alenko at a station. He did a double take on seeing her, and said, "Uh Commander uh ma'am."

"Alenko, shouldn't you be resting? Or on leave?" she asked him with a small smile.

"I uh wanted to uh check a few things with the passive sensor input into the weapons system see if a few tweaks could be improved," he said, managing to limit his stammering but forgetting all semblance of grammar and punctuation. Though he had seen her up close and personal with her formal uniform before, it gave him pause again at just how pretty she looked in white. He mentally snapped at himself for thinking along those lines. Never think of your CO as pretty, Kaidan. Your ogling of Shepard is going to land you in deep trouble one day. Or as soon as five minutes if you keep this up.

"I think it can wait. Take a little time for yourself, Kaidan," she told him.

Kaidan knew while there were more than a few couples serving in the military, they could never be in the same chain of command. Besides, any sort of that type of involvement with the Angel of Elysium, and now the first human Spectre, was a fast way to get court-martialed. "You're heading to the ceremony and interviews?" Idiot, he snapped at himself. As if that isn't obvious to a three year old.

"Unfortunately," she said, then paused for several moments before asking her own question. "So…what are your plans for leave today?" she asked softly.

"Not sure yet," he replied quickly, wondering the reason for her tone. It almost seemed that she was a little…tense? "A few of the crew have already left, and there were talks about all of us hitting up a bar at some point this evening. We never got to have attitude adjustment before leaving Earth."

She shook her head as she looked at him, an exaggerated frown appearing on her face. "Don't tease me like that. You're all heading out to have fun somewhere, and I'm stuck with a bunch of politicians and diplomats all night."

"Will there at least be an open bar there?" he asked.

She grinned. "It wouldn't be a party with politicians without one. And I need to have a few drinks just to survive those things. Enough alcohol at these events can mellow people out enough to stop the personal disagreements from escalating into fights." She paused, and shrugged as she glanced up for a moment. "Or allow the escalation to fights, in some cases."

The lieutenant chuckled, imagining a couple dozen inebriated guests in white tie attire engaged in a barroom brawl. "What time is it going to end?"

She shrugged. "Unfortunately I have no idea."

The lieutenant raised an eyebrow. "They didn't tell you that?"

"No, and they may not even know themselves. These kind of parties usually end when either the bar has been emptied or everyone that remains is three sheets to the wind, whatever time that might be," she responded lightly. "I try to leave as soon as I am can. Also," she smirked as she raised an eyebrow, putting a hand above her hip and leaned slightly to one side, "hacking my alarm again?"

From her expression and tone, he knew he wasn't in trouble for doing it again. He shrugged innocently, though he kept his gaze averted so he wouldn't have to look at her. "I don't know what you're talking about. It was Pressly's idea."

"Then who disabled my alarm?"

"Uhh…Wrex," Kaidan said unconvincingly after a moment.

She laughed, giving him an amused look. "The fact that my alarm, and the rest of my cabin, are still intact means that he wasn't the one to disable it."

He could listen to her laugh all day, he thought. "Touché. Disable by smash."

Her omni-tool went off, and the noise was accompanied by a look on her face the lieutenant couldn't quite place. She glanced down to see the sender of the message, and let out a long sigh as she scanned the subject, her expression changing into a frown. "You've got to be kidding me. The embassy. They want to squeeze in another interview and start early." She shook her head. "Really?" she muttered incredulously.

"Just say no," the lieutenant immediately responded with a chuckle.

"I wish I could," she replied with a sigh. "I'll tell them that my hair wasn't cooperating this morning. And it actually…wasn't…" Layla paused as her eyes widened and her face lit up in sudden realization. "Why have I never used that as an excuse before!?" she exclaimed as she buried her face in her hands. "Now I'm thinking of the public events I could have skipped over the years!"

Alenko chuckled at the thought, picturing Shepard entering some ceremony with hair that looked like it was teleported from two hundred years in the past. Sorry, first human Spectre can't interview since she's having a bad hair day. "Would…that actually work?" he asked, wondering for a brief moment if it would.

"It…actually might. I guess there's only one way to find out," she replied after a moment, her eyes narrowing slightly as a mischievous grin appeared on her face. "I mean, they're not going to let you go on camera looking like a medusa. They'd probably just make you put it into a ponytail or bun or something. So…maybe it wouldn't work?" she half-asked, half-stated with a shrug.

The lieutenant always thought before he spoke. Everything he said was always thought through. He was cautious and controlled, and never acted or spoke before deliberation. He always thought before opening his mouth. Except around Layla Shepard. And this time, he blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "You'd look great regardless."

As soon as the last word left his mouth, he knew he was in trouble. All those inappropriate thoughts about his commanding officer that were popping into his head had just gotten him into deep shit. He froze, and Shepard remained silent. Mouth, meet foot. Head, meet ass. I'm going to get written up for harassment. She didn't say a word for several moments, and he was expecting to get a verbal lashing at any moment. Oh shit oh shit ohshit ohshitoshitshitshit –

But to his complete and utter shock, the only thing she did was reply with a quiet "thanks." She looked to the floor as she momentarily wrung her hands before fiddling with her tie tab, not making eye contact with him as she twirled one of the ends of her hair.

The lieutenant was glad for the current lighting on the ship, as it was orange and would hide the bright red spreading across his face. He still stood there, mute and unmoving, his mind was still frozen with inaction.

A sound from the commander's Omni-tool startled him out of his thoughts. She was receiving a call from someone, and looked down to answer it with a look on her face that the lieutenant couldn't decipher. "Hello sir."

"Did you get the message about starting the interviews early?" a male voice asked.

"I did, sir.

"We need you here immediately."

"I'm leaving the Normandy now, sir."

"Good. See you soon, Commander." The line went dead.

Neither Layla nor Kaidan said anything for several seconds, and it was the lieutenant who spoke first. "I-it seems they want you there early," he said nervously. I'm…not in trouble?

She nodded, an unusual expression on her face as she absentmindedly reached up to twirl a strand of her hair again. "Yeah…I should go. Thank you for chatting, Kaidan." She turned and quickly walked off, the only sounds the lieutenant hearing was his breathing and the sound of Shepard's shoes on the deck that fell silent as she entered the airlock.