Okey dokey, folks! I'm back, and in case you hadn't noticed; the previous chapter has been updated! Yes, you lucky viewers get two; count em two chapters for the price of one! Merry Christmas, and a happy post-end-of-the-world!

Oh, and disclaimer-disclaimer, blah blah... my sole copywrite in this is myself... meh.

The Citadel; Outside Sha'ira's

Zap!

"Yeaouch!" I gingerly massaged my aching finger, having poked my new pistol in a place it wasn't supposed to be poked.

"Yeesh, you'd think in two centuries they would've figured out how to deal with static," I muttered. Sticking the offending finger into my mouth, I glanced around. I was sitting against the wall outside of Sha'ira's establishment, waiting for Shepard to finish speaking with its namesake. I had therefore decided to familiarize myself with my phalanx.

To my credit I had a pretty good handle on where everything was in the general vicinity. However, I also realized that the Citadel was a lot bigger than I had anticipated.

I was garnering a lot of stares from the various Turians, Salarians, and humans in the area, so I stopped sucking my finger, holstered the pistol and crossed my arms with a huff. How long is Shepard going to take? He'd been in there almost fifteen minutes, and we needed to get moving. I decided that sitting there on the floor wasn't a productive idea and stood, stretching my arms.

One of the keepers had been working on a console beside me, and apparently finished whatever it had been doing in time to stomp point blank on my foot on its merry little blasted oblivious way. I hopped on my smarting foot and resisted the urge to cuss.

As it was a keeper, however, I could have gotten in serious trouble for clocking it on its smug little mandibles, so I contented myself with sticking my tongue out at it. A little childish, perhaps; I hadn't eaten or slept in the past twenty hours or so, and I wasn't used to deprivation in either state.

I examined the other side of the Presidium for the umpteenth time, noting that the graphics engine from the first game couldn't do this place justice. There was the Human ambassador's office, right next to a small café. And something I hadn't noticed before; in the same area were the offices of the three Councilors, which hadn't been there the last time I had played.

Of course, I thought ruefully. It's not going to be an exact replica. It's a real place. I sighed mournfully. I knew then and there I was probably going to get lost at some point or other.

Something caught my eye as I turned back to look at the embassies; the Turian clerk serving the same kind of function as Saphiria for the Councilor's offices appeared to be in a heated argument with an alien species I didn't recognize. I squinted, trying to make out the other figure. Too slight to be an elcor, too tall for a volus, not pink enough for a hanar… There were no head fringes, so that ruled out pretty much everything else.

The individual threw up its hands in evident frustration and started to stalk off, heavily favoring its arm. My breath caught in my throat when my brain finally caught up with my eyes: Three fingers… purple hood… bowed legs… envirosuit-

Tali.

I ran as fast as I could over the bridge, yelling "Hoi! Hold on a second!" I hadn't gotten half-way there when I tripped over my own still-stinging foot and landed on my face on the floor. By the time I had jumped back up again she was long gone, vanished into the shadows of the Presidium. I desperately scanned the slope of the embassies, trying to figure out where she had gone.

"Can I help you, human?" The Turian clerk obviously didn't have any clue what had just happened. I stared at him while my breath returned to normal levels, then spat: "Me? What about her?!" I pointed in the direction Tali had gone.

"Who, the suit-rat?" The Turian said loftily. "It was trying to con its way into the embassies. No doubt casing the place-"

"IT'S!?" I slammed my fist into the Turian's desk. "SHE is a PERSON, you jackass!" The Turian just looked over the top of his datapad and smirked.

"Incomprehensible insults will get you nowhere. If you have a problem with public policy-"

"Public- IS IT PUBLIC POLICY TO IGNORE AN INJURED WOMAN?!" I seethed. "What was that anyway, a gunshot wound?!" My mind flashed to a tidbit of info Tali had divulged in the third game: "And POLONIUM ROUNDS?! The hell were you thinking?!"

"I don't have to justify our practices to you, human." The Turian spat, looking thoroughly fed up with me. But I wasn't finished. I was tired, hungry, nauseous from all those damned elevators, and frankly couldn't care less what some stuck up clerk would sanction me with.

"Howsabout justifying threatening to kick a Quarian off the station while injured!" I snarled. I wasn't in a particularly observant mood or I would have caught the heavy boot falls behind me. "You use her species as an excuse to write her off as a worthless thief, and expect me to just stand by and 'gauhk"

That last bit was me gagging on my shirt collar as someone lifted me into the air and set me down none too gently beside them. "I'm sure he didn't mean any offense, sir." Lucky for me, it was Shepard. Unluckily for me, my mouth was still on overdrive.

"And I'm certain I DID." I rasped, rubbing my throat.

"Corporal Donovan," Shepard said warningly. I looked at him, the turian clerk, and back again.

"Fine," I growled, sticking my hands in my pockets. "I'm done dealing with this… this…" a portion of the Turians' Wikipedia page flashed in front of my eyes, and I grinned wickedly. "Bare-faced schutta."

The Turian blanched. "You take that back," he breathed.

"Only if you call that Quarian and apologize for insulting her people." I shot back defiantly. Two seconds later Shepard had to grab me by the collar again, placing himself between me and the clerk. This was likely the only thing that kept the two of us from throttling each other.

"All right, ALL RIGHT. Both of you calm down." Shepard gave me a glare that promised nothing good, and let go of the Turian when he had settled back into his chair, straitening his suit. "I'll deal with him," Shepard said to the clerk. He motioned me off to the side and gave me an appraising look when it became obvious I still wasn't done fuming.

"Do I really have to ask what that was about?"

"Nothing, Commander." I said sullenly, refusing to look him in the eye. "Just some racist jerk who couldn't be bothered to help an injured fugitive."

Shepard's eyes narrowed, and he whapped me upside the head. "And what does that have to do with us?"

"What does- Everything!" I paced in front of him. "Tali has intel we need to implicate Saren, and that schutta of a Turian just…" what I just said sunk in a moment later.

"'Tali?' You know this Quarian?" He glared pointedly at me. I gulped. Oops. Me and my big mouth.

"'Sigh' It's a long story." Before I could get any further though, my stomach made a very audible protest that sounded suspiciously like "Fooooood."

Shepard shook his head in exasperation. "Let's just head over to Chora's Den. Maybe you can grab something while we interrogate Harkin." I grimace slightly. "Yeah. That'll be fun." Shepard walked over to one of the rapid transit air-cars and added over his shoulder "And would you mind explaining what a 'schutta' is?"

Rapid Transit pad; Zakera Ward market upper level

"Next time," I urped, stumbling off the air-car and onto the bustling Zakera street. "Can we please use the stairs…" I covered my mouth and hiccupped slightly. Shepard just laughed. I glared at him.

"What, don't tell me you're afraid of heights." Shepard said. "No, just your driving," I answered. I counted myself lucky that we'd taken the air-car before I'd gotten anything to eat. Otherwise I'd be repeating my performance of Eden Prime, and I doubted I'd get any applause.

Shepard punched me lightly on the arm and dialed up his comm. unit. "Williams, Alenko: how's the Volus banker working out?"

"Just found his offices, Shepard." Kaiden's voice sounded harried. "Man, you wouldn't believe the size of this place."

"I would, actually." Shepard said sardonically. "The Corporal here," I had to resist the urge to stick my tongue out. "Nearly got us lost haring off after some random Quarian he had a crush on."

I felt my face grow hot enough to fry a thresher egg. "I do NOT have a crush on her." I mean, really. Reading that out of such a little-

"Oh ho, a she is it?" My face started to burn even harder, if that was possible. Shepard elbowed me in the ribs with a casual "You sly dog."

"I'm just going to stop talking now," I mutter. I started to walk off, gazing determinedly at the floor, but soon enough I ran headlong into somebody going the opposite direction. I steady myself by grabbing the front of the other person's shirt and look up just in time to see a human with blonde hair and a goatee gape behind me and exclaim "Wow, Commander Shepard?!"

Oh no. I groaned to myself. It was Conrad. We'd be there all day if this kept up, and my empty stomach was still complaining. It must have seemed trite to worry about food, what with everything else that was going on, but hey. I was hungry.

"Commanderrrrrrrrrrrr? I moan plaintively over my shoulder. He rolled his eyes, lightly nudged me to one side and addressed Conrad.

"Can I help you, sir? And could you make it quick, or my young friend here might just starve." He pointed a thumb at me and smirked. Apparently he wasn't over the "mock Conner" phase of our (admittedly tenuous) relationship.

"Huh? Oh!" Conrad bounced a little, and held up a purple paper (I assumed) sack with a goofy grin. "I have some extra from the Fish-Dog Food Shack! My date must have forgotten the time."

In the end, Conrad walked away with Shepard's autoprint and I was left standing there with a "stood up" fast-food sack, my mouth hanging open. 'Date must have forgotten the time…' Uh huh. I looked into the sack, at Shepard, and back again. "Do I really want to know what's in here?" Knowing my luck it was probably varren skewers.

Shepard sniffed my newfound meal delicately and said "Hey, it's gotta be better than our military rations. You said you were hungry." He gave me an evil grin and walked down the stairs. "Bon Appetite."

"Aheheh," I wheezed sheepishly, trudging along behind him. I steeled myself and opened the sack to find one end of a stick poking out. Eoh. Please don't be varrenpleasedon'tbevarrenpleasedon'tbevarrenpleasedon'tbevarrenpleasedon'tbevarren- I gingerly pull the stick (and contents) out to find: squid. Or something that closely resembled squid, at least it had tentacles and suckers, despite being a rather neon shade of pink and green.

I contemplate it for a moment or two as we walk through the marketplace towards Morlan's shop, hoping desperately it wasn't for dextros. Not likely to get anything more anytime soon. I finally work up my nerve and bite into it:

Carunch!

Ow. That hurt. Just how long ago did Conrad buy this?! I work my jaw despondently on the shattered remains of my teeth (not really; it just felt like it), and followed Shepard past Morlan and into an alleyway, muttering "Bleuhg. Hanar shish-kebab. Brilliant."

I stick another piece into my mouth, but before I could start chewing I heard two things: One, from my left: Shepard yelling "Conner! GET DOWN!" and from my front: two Turians shouting "That's him!"

I stood there, framed nicely in the alley by Chora's den, with two rifles pointed at me, and my only weapon a steaming mouthful of kebab.

Have I mentioned it hasn't been my day?

Okay, so I forgot to warn you guys that I replaced the last update with an actual chapter. So sue me. Actually, forget I said that. I can't afford it. Please R&R, you guys are 3/4ths of the reason I do this.