"Garm is dead." The simple admission shocked Shepard into silence, and she froze, staring at the newly instated Shadow Broker, surprise warring with sadistic glee on her face.

"Good!" Shepard spat, "I hope it fucking hurt."

"That is what I asked you here to discuss actually." Liara skimmed her fingers over the terminal, reports and surveillance clips flickering across the display, "and yes Shepard, I am very sure it hurt."

The final picture that settled on the screen actually made Shepard take a step back, mouth dropping open. "Holy shit..." If Liara hadn't forewarned Shepard that the dead Krogan she was looking at was Garm, she wouldn't have been able to guess. The massive krogan's face was so bloated with blood it had distorted his features into a rictus grin, the dull flash of metal under the swollen, gore slicked chin was the only hint of the thin cable that had been used to hang the former Bloodpack leader. Shepard allowed a slight smirk to twitch her lips, a hanging death for a species with such advanced regeneration as the krogan, was a brutal, slow way to die. Blood vessels, fragile tracheal tissues and nerves would have struggled to repair, even as Garm's body weight tore them apart.

With another tap at the terminal, Liara scrolled out, so the entire bloody wreck of krogan could be seen, and Shepard made no attempt to stifle the bark of sick laughter that bubbled in her throat at the sight. Garm had been stripped, his signature Blood-pack armor scattered in a circle around him, his legs were streaked with blood, all leading from the ruin of his groin; where there should have been a heavy double ballsack and thick cock, was now a gaping bloody mess. There was no surgical precision and the cuts that had castrated him were so savage the glint of pubic bone was visible.

"Well, this just makes my day!" Shepard gave Liara a cheerful thumbs up, "if I had known you were planning anything this entertaining, I would have brought beer."

"Honestly Shepard, you don't find this rather...convenient?"

"You think this is about Garrus?" Shepard shook her head, "I doubt it, Garrus couldn't have been the only person Garm..." biting that thought short, she muttered, "I mean, he must have made a lot of enemies over the years. Isn't it just as likely that this is retribution for any number of crimes? Or perhaps even a new gang looking to make an impression on the locals?"

"I had thought that too, until this," Liara pulled a closeup of the dead krogan's abdomen up on screen, and what had looked like random damage coalesced into a distinct pattern burned into the thick hide.

"What am I looking at?" Shepard tilted her head, trying to make sense of the symbol, "looks like some kind of bird, gang sigil maybe?"

"I wasn't sure at first," with a nod at the main screen, Liara added, "then I ran a recognition program through the Broker's archives, and it turned up this."

The video feed was slightly grainy, the archive tag at the bottom of the feed identified the location as Omega, roughly eight months ago. Shepard watched as a batarian and a turian dashed past the camera, the turian turned to say something over his shoulder, and Shepard recognized Lantar Sidonis, one of the victims of Garm's cruelty. Garrus loped into the screen with a salarian by his side, and as he turned to look behind him, raising his rifle, Liara froze the screen. Marking a small part of the image, Liara enhanced the screen until the emblem on the upper arm of Garrus' armor was clearly visible.

"Fuck me," Shepard breathed, looking between the emblem, and the etched burn on Garm's stomach. "Who is doing this?"

"That I don't know, the Shadow Broker...I mean, I, have limited agents on Omega," Liara looked almost smug, clearly enjoying the sudden power she wielded. "I can assign more to that area and I will put out feelers, I should have more for you in a few days."

"What do I tell Garrus?" the thrill of Garm's brutal demise eased at the thought.

"I would tell him the truth Shepard, and perhaps ask if he thinks it possible any of his squad did in fact survive."

"That's going to be a fun conversation," Shepard muttered, "and you honestly think that's possible, that one of his squad survived?"

Liara shrugged, "I can't think of anyone else who would have taken this...specific kind of action, unless you did it?" The asari's grin was sly and teasing, with just enough of a question in it to make Shepard shake her head.

"If I had done this, I would have thrown a station wide party," Shepard replied with a laugh. "So no, sorry, I can't take credit.

It was hours before Shepard returned to the Normandy, her eyes burning from staring at endless security feeds, searching for some clue as to who this new vigilante might be. Eventually she had to admit defeat, Liara had promised to ferret out any new information she could, and would be speaking to sources on Omega the following day; in the end, that had to be enough.

The ship was silent as Shepard padded through the airlock, the peaceful atmosphere counterpoint to the savage storms raging outside the hull. Joker was asleep in his chair, cap tipped over his face, legs stretched out in front of him. Most of the crew appeared to be off duty for the simulated night cycle, only Kelly Chambers was still at her CIC position, looking up brightly as Shepard entered.

"Commander, I was hoping to catch you," the yeoman dimpled prettily at Shepard, looking almost abnormally chipper given the late hour. "Someone has been calling your private terminal from a public access on Omega for the last few hours, they don't seem to want to leave a message. Do you want me to put it through to your quarters?"

"From Omega?" Shepard frowned, who would be calling from there? "Yes, thanks Kelly, put it through if they call again." Distractedly she palmed the controls for the elevator, as the doors were closing she added, "and go get some sleep, Chambers!"

Once in her quarters, it didn't take long for her comm terminal to chirp an incoming alarm, and Shepard sank down in front of it, slapping her palm on the touch activated screen. The face that filled the screen was haggard, tear streaked and exhausted, eyes burned holes in a face that had seen and experienced too much.

"Nalah, Nalah Butler?"

"Commander Shepard!" There is a desperate, gasping quality to her voice, fresh tears slick the tracks along her cheeks, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, but I didn't know who else to call!" She hunched forward then, curling her arms around the expansive swell of her belly, and Shepard realized she must be close to full term.

"Its fine, " Shepard's voice was heavy with confusion, "what do you need?"

"He's going to kill me, " Nalah whimpered, shaking hands pressed against her mouth, eyes wild. "He killed Garm, and he took Jaroth tonight...and he's going to find me... please, please, I don't want to die! I'm so sorry, I didn't know what would happen...I'm so sorry."

Nalah's voice fractured into hysterical sobbing, and Shepard had to raise her voice to make herself heard. "Whats going on Nalah, who's trying to kill you?"

"H..he came for the others, and I know he's going to find me!" Nalah twists to look over her shoulder, her skin reflecting greyish in the unflattering light, she looks like she hasn't slept in days.

"Who is coming for you Nalah?!"

"He is, " Nalah Butler turned wide, dark eyes to the camera. Her lips are dry and cracked, beading with blood as she whispers: "Archangel."

"What?" Shepard frowned, "that's... not possible, there must be some mistake..."

"No, no mistake commander," Nalah's voice was ragged with fear and exhaustion, "please, please commander, you...you have to talk to him, make him stop...my baby." Her arms are still curled around her midriff, as if those shaking limbs could offer any protection to her unborn child.

"Talk to who?" Shepard asked, "wait, you think Garrus is doing this?" At Nalah's hesitant nod, Shepard shakes her head, "he isn't, I can guarantee that. I don't know who is doing this, but it's not Garrus." Watching as shock and disbelief settle across Nalah's sallow face, the rest of the conversation cycles through Shepard's brain, and her voice goes soft and dangerous. "Wait...why would you be afraid of Garrus? What have you done, Nalah, what have you done?"

For a moment, Shepard thinks Nalah is going to disconnect, the last of the color drains from her face as her eyes rove away from the screen; when her gaze eventually returns to the display its like all the life has gone out of her face, and her voice is hollow and frail. "I didn't know what would happen, they told me they wouldn't...oh god, you have to believe me, I didn't know." When Shepard makes no response, she continues "I don't know how they found me, but I came home from the market and Tarak was in our house...he, he said that he would kill me and my husband if I didn't cooperate. He promised that if I gave him the information he wanted...that he would let us live, and the rest of the the squad as well. H..he said...he said they just wanted Archangel."

"And you believed that?" Shepard couldn't keep the disgust out of her voice, "and what was this information you gave to them?"

"The door codes," Nalah whispered so softly Shepard could hardly hear, "Garrus had given me access weeks before in case I needed a safe-house...I gave them the door codes." A fresh wash of tears flooded down her sunken cheeks, "but they promised...they said they would let my husband go. I hated myself for having to give them Garrus, but I just wanted my husband home...and they promised."

"And look how well that turned out," the fury in Shepard's tone makes Nalah flinch like she'd been struck. Shepard could hardly look at the screen anymore, all she can see is Garrus as she had found him on Purgatory; how in his mind all she had felt was pain, guilt and the terrible shame of degradation, all because of this woman. "Do you even know what they did to him, what he went through, because you couldn't keep your fucking mouth shut?" Shepard is dimly aware she is yelling, but the rage coiling in her gut is making her reconstruction scars burn, lathing her mind in a white hot anger.

Nalah nodded jerkily, raising a shaking hand to scrub tears from red-rimmed eyes, "I was there when they...when my husband died. T..Tarak told me to be there, that he was to be released... but they made me watch...they made me watch, and they laughed. Even after my husband was dead, they made me stay, so I would see... see what I had done. Th..they thought it was...funny...that's all they did: laugh."

Some small part of Shepard's mind feels pity for Nalah, but its eclipsed by the rising fury and disgust. "And after that, even though you knew he was alive, you let Garrus keep thinking that this was his fault? That somehow he had made a mistake that has cost his team their lives?" Nalah simply kept her eyes downcast, tears running down her cheeks to drip from the tip of her nose, as Shepard watches, she wretches, turning away from the screen to spit up raw bile.

Shepard knows she should have compassion, knows that Nalah was a stranger then to the cruelty and deception of Omega's crime lords; but somehow, when she thinks about the repercussions of the woman's naivete and cowardice, she can't find it within herself to care. "I will find out what is happening on Omega, but I won't do it for you, and I honestly couldn't care less what happens to you." Shepard's voice is cold as she adds, "now if you will excuse me, I have to figure out how to tell a friend that his life was ruined because you couldn't keep your mouth shut." Nalah looks stricken, her mouth just opening when Shepard slaps her hand down on the disconnect and the screen fades to a sombre darkness.