(25 minutes ago)

Jack watched Miranda depart and the rest of the group reluctantly hurry off to either fulfill her requests or sulk. The former she cared about, the latter couldn't even be given the most cursory of 'fucks'.

'You will need someone to go with you.'

The melodic voice prompted Jack's eyes to roll before she turned and faced the last of her detractors, Liara T'Soni.

'You're right,' Jack surprisingly agreed.

As if shifting gears, the Asari cocked her head mechanically at Jack's statement.

'I'm confused,' Liara dared. 'You told the others you couldn't protect them and would therefore be going alone, and now you've told me that you need someone. I fear the only logical assumption is that you are lyi…'

'Game changed, T'Soni. I was fooling myself before, but now I know better…and I wasn't lying to the others, I can't protect them, but I can protect one person.'

'Shepard,' Liara stated plainly, allowing the single word to act as both clarification and orientation of task.

'No,' Jack again shocked the Broker of Shadows with her contrasting view.

'Once more, I fail to see the logic in your words,' Liara argued. 'Should I simply accept that you won't be telli…'

''Yes', I need someone to go with me, but 'no' I can't protect them any more than I will be able to protect myself, once the Reapers close.'

'Once you find him, how do you propose to get you and Shepard back to safety?'

Jack turned her back on the Asari and faced in the direction of the beam toward Shepard's last known location.

'I thought I could do just that. Run out, light some fuckers up, and get us both back here, but…that's not the plan anymore.'

'Because Shepard will look to finish his mission,' Liara finished for her comrade. 'If I may, bring him back here. We will regroup and try another approach. Suicide Missions might be something you and Shepard accept, but there must be another way. Let us find that way…together.'

Keeping her back to Liara, Jack paused allowing a gust of hot wind to play with her ponytail and the few strands of hair loose from its constraint. With the departure of the breeze, Subject Zero's words arrived.

'Philosophy and planning will end us just as quick as the Reapers. Shepard believes that, and that's why he left the rest of you behind. He needed to know that his orders, even the suicidal ones, would be followed, so he took with him the two members of the crew that do just that: EDI and Vega, the machine and the soldier.'

'You know him better than all of us,' the Asari's voice held just a hint of bitterness at the fact. 'Tell me, what does Shepard believe will win this, the darkest of our hours?'

With tears bleeding from her eyes, Jack turned to face the scientist.

'No fraction of 'nice' is needed, no amount of 'safe' or 'careful' gets this thing done. Stop looking for the smart way through this, Liara. There isn't a 'right path', no short cut. Happily ever after isn't an option…it never was.'

The Asari's own eyes glistened, 'So what is your secret weapon against the End of Days? What do you have that Shepard didn't?'

Spinning back toward the battlefield, Jack whispered her answer at the giant death machines guarding the beam.

'Rage.'

Together the two women, each in love with the man known as Shepard, stared out toward where he waited. So different in their appearances, carriages, and beliefs, yet so similar in the merits that truly mattered: loyalty, strength and love, they cut a contradictory yet complimentary slice of the universe. Jack representing what was; Liara what could have been.

'Who?', T'Soni whispered. 'If not Shepard, who can you protect?'

Jack's eyes rolled to regard one of the few people in all the worlds that she respected. With a breath measured and metered in the plain trappings of the scene, Subject Zero answered.

'You.'

(Author's Note: Thanks to everyone for reading...it means the world to me!)