Roarkshop here: OMG sorry it's late. But it's technically still Monday for TWO WHOLE HOURS in Las Vegas, so I'm calling that a win. Buahahhaha. Sorry for the late update. Life is still crazy for another couple weeks.

Hope you like this chapter! I busted my ass to get it posted today and I really really REALLY didn't want to let you guys down, so I hope its caliber is acceptable.

My new music video: The Halo Effect, is up on youtube and getting a huge response so thank you to everyone who has watched it! ^_^ If you haven't, there's a link on my profile.

HOly crap, I'm going to bed now.

Lovelovelove

Roarkshop

"Well," Shepard said, rubbing the back of her neck as she left Anderson's office. "That could have gone better."

Zaeed shrugged, hands in his pockets. "Could have gone worse."

"Yeah. So that's it then?" she said. "You're gonna stay here?"

"I think I have to now, Kiddo. After what I've seen? Someone needs to get the fleet's collective asses in gear, or we're all incredibly fucked."

"Fucked we are indeed. Welp," she said, clapping her hands together. "I guess I'll be seein' ya."

She held her hand out to him as if to shake his, but he reached up and took her by the back of her neck.

"Red," he said, pressing his forehead to hers. "You are gonna go through that relay, kick some giant bugs back to hell, and come back home, you understand? If you die again I will kick your sorry ass."

She gave him a deprecating smile and nodded. "Yeah yeah, I hear you."

"Good," he said, patting the side of her throat with his hand. "Remember what I said will you?"

"About what?"

"Don't play dumb with me," he said with a grin, turning to walk away. "Get it done, Red, or you'll be sorry in the long run."

"Hey Z," she called after him.

He answered by turning, hands in his pockets, to look at her.

"Stay alive, Old Man."

"You first, Gutter-snipe."

She laughed as they both turned on a heel, and walked away from each other. She considered going back to her old apartment and finding some kind of formal wear to go into the club with, but her old combat briefs would do. In any case, it felt good to be in an Alliance sanctioned uniform again. She felt more confident in her Alliance casuals than she ever did in a dress.

And if there was anything she needed right now, it was confidence.

She idly made her way down the hallways to Purgatory, passing under the artificial lamp light as she walked. She tried to swallow down thoughts of the Omega 4, but they just wouldn't stay hidden. Rubbing a hand on the back of her neck, she sighed and made her way into the club, cringing against the beat and noise.

She picked out Garrus immediately, leaning into a rather intimate looking conversation with a woman. Whatever confidence she was feeling dropped directly into her feet. She seriously considered turning around and booking it out of the club, but she figured that would draw more attention than she wanted. Instead she turned and rested her elbows on the bar to her right, hoping against hope that he hadn't seen her come in. She caught her reflection in the mirror that decorated the bar wall. Her hair was in a messy knot, her casuals were wrinkled and old, her eyes were dark from her lack of sleep.

She was a hot mess.

Her attention moved to Garrus and his date, watching their reflections behind her. The girl shoved Garrus playfully in the shoulder and he laughed. Shepard felt the pit of her stomach lurch and looked away. She just had to wait it out. In a few minutes she could just casually walk out and no one would even know she had been there.

But, as expected of her god damn luck; she didn't have any.

"Shepard," he purred from behind her, beer in hand.

She turned around and hoped she succeeded in looking surprised to see him.

Garrus remembered it like it was yesterday.

Burner Derox was a hard headed private with a little too much respect for the rules. Garrus and he had never gotten along and he had always wondered what it was Stretch saw in him. But Garrus and Stretch hadn't had anything serious together so he made his way next to Burner in the Mess Hall, agreeing to try and coax the other soldier into revealing his partiality to him. It seemed a little similar to high-school drama, but Stretch was a friend, so Garrus obliged.

She had given him all the ammo he needed, and Garrus pushed all the right buttons to get the turian's temper going. She listened to the whole conversation through her ear piece and when Garrus eventually took the right-hook to the face for insulting her, Stretch had her answer.

The memory made him laugh, and now it was Stretches turn to get yelled at for his entertainment.

He had given Stretch plenty of things to get under Shepard's metaphorical plates. Nothing too serious, since she already had enough on her mind, but enough that it should ruffle her feathers a little. As he made his way across the club with the turian girl on his arm, the anticipation started to build up in his chest.

"Shepard," he said, forcing her to turn around.

She smiled and raised her eyebrows like she hadn't known he was coming.

"Hey Buddy," she said, eyeing his companion up and down. "What's up?"

"This is Yillis Strixen," he said, motioning to her. "We served on the Artamek together."

"Oh?" Shepard said, her eyes brightening a little. "Nice to meet you Ms. Strixen."

"It's an honor, Commander," she said, shaking her hand. "You can call me Stretch."

"I thought you were trying to get rid of that nick-name?" Garrus said.

She shrugged. "I guess it grew on me."

"Well," Shepard said. "The honor is mine, uh… Stretch," Shepard said, more out of obligation than sincerity.

"Stretch here was the best damn recon-scout on the unit," Garrus continued.

He saw the realization in Shepard's face.

"Recon-scout?" Shepard said as her face paled. "The recon-scout?"

The girl turned to Garrus with a smirk. "Been talking about me have you?"

"Don't flatter yourself," he rumbled. "I made it sound a lot better than it was."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, Miles."

"Oh good," Shepard said. "You have little nick-names for each other." She turned around and motioned a hand at the bartender. "Double whatever. Straight up."

Garrus cocked his brow, studying her for a moment. This might be more entertaining than originally planned.

"Well," Garrus said in an attempt to cover the tension. "I should go check on the crew. Don't want anyone getting out of line, right?"

"Yeah," Shepard said. She never hated Garrus more than she did in the moment she watched him walk away that night.

Wing-man was a role Shepard played for her army buddies many times. But she never expected to have to do it for Garrus. Or maybe she just hoped she would never have to. Either way, this is not how she had hoped she would spend her shore leave. Perhaps relaxing just wasn't in the cards for her.

She pushed the thought aside, it was irrelevant. This was her chance to do the right thing; maybe not for her, but for Garrus.

"So, Commander," Stretch said, leaning against the bar. "Garrus tells me you and he are close."

"We are," she said, tapping her fingers on the bar anxiously.

"I didn't expect to see him after so long. It was certainly a pleasant surprise."

"Yeah, I'll bet."

Garrus made his way around the club, deciding to stop rather close to the front door near Thane and Samara, since they seemed to be rather quiet and he could concentrate on listening. Shepard and Stretch talked in his ear piece and Garrus laughed as he turned to watch Shepard struggle through the pleasantries. Stretch didn't waste any time trying to get Shepard to talk about her plans for the future.

"Well you know how it is, right?" Stretch asked, obviously trying to make Shepard uncomfortable. "Strong woman like you has to get it. At a certain point you just… gotta stop chasing the fight and settle somewhere."

"I uh," Shepard sighed. "No, I wouldn't really know about any of that. I don't think I'm the settling down type."

"Really," she lilted. "No husband? No children?"

"Never really thought about it, what with the very real threat of a slow painful extinction lingering over the next hill."

Stretch cleared her throat uncomfortably and Garrus laughed. She was no match for Shepard.

"Well I'm certainly done," she said, changing the subject. "Settling down with a mate certainly sounds more promising than continuing on the path of war."

"If you're looking for me to talk you out of choosing Garrus, you're going to be disappointed."

Garrus felt his chest tighten as he looked on. That certainly hadn't been what he was expecting.

"What do you mean?" the turian said, turning to face Shepard.

"Garrus he uh," Shepard cleared her throat and turned around to rest her elbows on the bar, and tossed back the shot the bartender had poured her. She made a sour face before she continued. "He deserves that kind of life. He deserves a better life than this."

"A soldier's life?"

"A life following me," she said before motioning for another drink. "A life where the only thing you can count on is death and bullets. A life where a good day consists of baby-sitting me, and a bad day consists of following me into hell for people who don't give a damn about us. Garrus deserves better than that. He deserves a home and someone he can love. He deserves all of that, and he won't get it following me."

"You sound an awful lot like you have feelings for him."

"Feelings have nothing to do with it," she spat before tossing back her second double shot. "A good man is a good man no matter what colors he sports or how many fingers he's got. To think that he's gonna follow me around forever, standing on the precipice of death all the time, is pathetic of me. A friendship, no matter how strong you want to believe it is, it can never substitute a family of your own. It can never fill that void."

"Well that's certainly not what I was expecting you to say."

"And what did you expect me to say?"

"Usually in situations like this I get the 'he's a hell of a soldier, so don't think you'll be able to tie him down', speech."

"Both of those things are very true. But Garrus is the best man I know and I'll be damned if I let him be stuck in this life when I could have helped him have more."

Stretch laughed, almost in Shepard's face. "Well, you are quite the matchmaker, but I'm afraid I've given you the wrong idea. I wasn't talking about Garrus when I said I was going to settle down, Shep."

Shepard cringed. Garrus had told Stretch how she hated to be called that.

"Garrus isn't... what did you call it? The settling down type. I mean, yeah I'm glad I ran into him since my bed was going to be rather empty tonight. But no, I would never bond with Garrus. The very idea is… laughable."

"Is it?" Shepard asked, looking down into her empty glass. "How so?"

"Listen, Garrus is great and all, and I'm not saying I wouldn't give him a great deal of… personal time. But he's a casual thing, a passing fancy. Maybe it's different for humans, but a turian who voluntarily serves on a human ship when he could be serving with his own kind is not worth wasting more than a night or two over." She must have read the fury from Shepard's face because she continued to speak to explain herself. "Don't get me wrong, he'll certainly do for tonight. But I'm starting to think he's completely forgotten how to bring honor to his people."

Garrus watched as Shepard's head snapped up to lock eyes with the turian, and her face filled with a rage he was all too familiar with.

He suddenly realized this might have been a game he shouldn't have played.

Shepard's hands moved like lightning. She snatched the turian by the wrists and whirled her around before screwing her arm up behind her back. Shepard's other hand reached up and slammed Stretch's plated face into the bar-top.

"Now you listen to me you bare-faced bitch," Shepard sneered into her ear. "You say what you like about me but I will not allow you to talk about my crew. Least of all, Garrus. I have killed for Garrus, I would die for Garrus. He's going to do more for your people in the next few days than you will in your entire life, and I would rather stab out my own fucking eyes than stand by and watch you take advantage of him. So I take back everything I said. You come within 500 meters of him and I will rip every plate off that pretty face and cram them down your throat. Garrus deserves better than you."

"Why Commander," Stretch grunted out, struggling against Shepard's grip. "This certainly looks like more than your average crush."

"You're god damn right it is, Princess. Count yourself lucky that I didn't have just one more drink, because you'd be fucking dead."

Shepard shoved herself off of the girl and waved off the security coming to throw her out, very much planning on leaving voluntarily. She shook her head against the dizziness the liquor gave her, and turned to B-line it out of the club. Arms pinned to her sides, shoulders tense; she stomped toward the exit where Garrus had situated himself. She approached the small group he was standing near and took whatever drink Samara had in her hand and tossed it back before slamming it back down onto the table.

"I'm sorry Garrus," she sneered, her furious eyes meeting his baffled ones. "I can't be your god damn wing man."

She stomped out of the club and down the corridor. He watched until she disappeared behind the doors, and even after she was out of sight he watched the spot she had been in.

"I believe," Thane rumbled from the table, "that was your queue to go after her."

"What the fuck!" Stretch screeched in his ear piece. "Are you waiting for a smoke signal or something?"

Garrus turned around to see the turian rubbing the side of her face that Shepard had slammed into the bar top. He nodded at her, and sprinted after Shepard.

She was walking fast, but wasn't hard to spot.

"Shepard," he called after her. "Wait up."

"No," she shouted back, continuing her angry march down the abandoned Citadel streets. "I'm going to bed. Go back to your date."

"Like hell," he said, as he caught up. He took her arm and forced her to stop walking. "Will you just talk to me?"

"No," she said, yanking her arm out of his grip. "There's nothing to talk about."

"In what universe did you think you wouldn't have to talk to me about this?"

"The universe where you don't get to tell me what to do," she said back, crossing her arms.

"Damn it, Shepard, would you shut off the stubborn for five minutes? How do you expect me to apologize if you won't let me talk?"

"I expect you to- Wait, what?… you'retrying to apologize? What in the fuck would you have to apologize for?

"Shepard… Stretch was kind of-" he was cut off by the all-too-familiar sound of her omni-tool ringing with a message marked as urgent. They both exhaled anxious breaths as she brought up her omni-tool.

All the color drained from her face in an instant. Suddenly, nothing Garrus had to say seemed important.

"What?" he asked, but she didn't seem to hear him. "Shepard, what is it?"

Her jaw set and she swallowed hard before looking up at him.

"The IFF," she said softly before looking up at him. "It was a trap."

"What in the hell were you thinking? Unshakling an AI? You could have lost the whole ship!"

"Well, what am I supposed to do with Collectors, Miranda? Break my arm at them?"

"Enough!" Shepard bellowed. "This isn't helping anything." She leaned her palms on the comm. table and exhaled a breath. She rubbed the pads of her fingers against her forehead against the pain. The situation, compounded by the liquor, was not helping her concentrate. All she knew was that they were gone. Everyone who had been on the ship, save Joker, had been taken to the Collectors. How could she have been so stupid? How could she have not seen this coming? "If EDI wanted us all dead, we would be just that. Now everyone just take a deep fucking breath."

"What do you want to do, Commander?" Jacob asked, trying to ease the tension. "We're as ready as we're going to be, why keep waiting?"

"We can't just jump into this," Miranda said, putting in significant effort to calm herself. "Rushing into it now does nothing but get us all killed."

Shepard stared down at the table, pushing her hands into the desk so hard her arms were shaking.

"Maybe you're right," she said softly before raising her gaze to the other side of the room, looking at no one, but her gaze burning through the space. "But they took my crew, and we are going to show them why that was a mistake."

"Commander…" Miranda started.

"God damn it, Miranda, they have my crew!"

Her voice cut through them all. The fury, the devastation. All traces of the easy-going, warm Commander were gone. The tension hung in the air as the only sound was Shepard's furious breath.

"It is time for a tonal shift. I know this isn't a military vessel and I know that things have been more or less lackadaisical to this point. I have had an open door policy and I have heard all complaints and concerns up until this point. That ends now. I am the Commanding Officer of the Normandy and you will all do what I say, when I say it, or you will be blown out of the fucking air lock. Am I understood?"

Everyone said their own version of "Yes Ma'am".

"Jeff," she said, standing up straight. "Get to the cockpit and get us to that relay."

"Aye aye," he said before going to leave the room.

"Tali, Legion," she continued. "Go with him and do a flush of all systems. I want every trace of whatever the fuck sent out our location scrubbed out of my ship."

"You got it," Tali said.

[Affirmative] Legion added, following Tali out.

"The rest of you do what you have to do to prepare," Shepard demanded as she made her way out of the room. "Sleep, eat, fuck, I don't give a shit. Just make sure you are one hundred percent by the time we launch through the relay."

She disappeared behind the Comm. Room doors and Garrus leaned his hands on the table with an exasperated sigh. The crew slowly filtered out around him until only he and Thane were left.

"I do not suppose there is a way for us to prevent her from blaming herself," Thane said, half asking.

"No," Garrus confirmed, standing back up. "Asari are blue, Krogans are violent, and Shepard will blame herself for this." He exhaled and rubbed the back of his neck. "It's just the way it is."

"Then I suppose you know what she'll do next."

"She's probably already in the Cargo Bay," Garrus said, walking out of the room. "I should probably head down there."

He nodded at Thane and left the room, making his way to the elevator. He knew he needed to help her, and he knew exactly how to do it.

This was going to hurt.

The punching bags, brand new though they were, did nothing to quell the rage in Shepard. She knew that IFF was trouble. God damn her, she knew it.

She pounded her bare fists against the rubber as fast as she could, hoping she could drain some of the furious energy. She heard the doors open and shut behind her, and knew it was going to be Garrus.

It was always Garrus.

"I shouldn't have stalled," she said, stopping her attacks to lean her hands on the wall beside her. "If we had just gotten the IFF, installed it, and gone straight through the Omega 4, this wouldn't have happened. Or maybe it would have, but at least we would have been here. We would have been able to help them."

"Kicking yourself isn't going to bring them back."

"They have Lynn, Garrus. They have Lynn, and Kelly, and Kenneth. They aren't soldiers. For fuck sake, they're practically civilians."

"They signed up for this. They knew the stakes, just like we did."

"Then why wasn't it us?" She cursed, leaning her head on the wall. "Why didn't they come after me?"

"It's an unfortunate truth that anyone who knows you, even a little bit, knows that the only way to really hurt you is to go through your people. It's exactly what I would have done, were I in their shoes."

She finally looked at him, her eyes snapping to the side filled with an anger that was obviously fueled by hurt.

"I hate when you do that," she spat.

"Do what?"

"Sympathize with our enemy."

"If you don't respect the enemy you-"

"I know, I know, Garrus," She said, turning away. "It's a tune you've sang in that past. I just wish you'd keep it to your fucking self. I don't need your special brand of pessimism right now."

Silence as he did that thing where he exhaled through his nose.

"I know you're angry, Shepard, and you should be. But, if you're going to take it out on me, I'd prefer you did it with your actual fists rather than telling me you don't need me."

Shepard felt like a noose tightened around her heart, forcing her breath out. Her anger started to melt away as she realized how she was using him as a wall to knock down.

"Garrus," she said, starting to turn around. "I-"

She was rudely interrupted by him grabbing her by the shoulders and throwing her over his head onto the other side of the room. She shouted in surprise before grunting as she slammed into the opposite wall.

"What the fuck was that!" she raved, climbing back onto her feet. "Are you insane?"

He raised his foot and heel-kicked her in the chest, knocking the wind out of her and blasting her against the wall again.

"Wow," he said with a condescending laugh as he turned away. "It's like you're getting old."

She snarled and lunged at him from behind, tackling his legs and forcing him to catch himself on his hands as he fell. He pushed himself up and reared his foot up to kick her off his legs, which she dodged by rolling off of him. They both got to their feet, but he didn't want to give her a chance to figure out what was going on, so he advanced, giving her two wide swings she could easily deflect.

Her teeth gnashed in her mouth as she caught his wrist and jabbed at his throat with the flat of her other hand, which he just barely managed to block.

He had to stay on his toes; she wasn't playing.

Shepard used her grip on his wrist and ducked under his arm, wrenching it up behind him and slamming him into the wall. He grunted against the pain and struggled to pull his arm out of her grip.

"If you and your recon-scout slut-friend were the best hand-to-hand in your unit, I mourn for the future of the turian military."

"She was definitely better off of her feet," he taunted, pressed up against the wall.

He heard her heart lurch and saw the angry punch coming for his face, but it was wild, and uncontrolled. He leaned out of the way, forcing her to punch the wall, and whirled out of her grasp. He kicked the back of her knee, making her fall, and caught her with a hand around the back of her neck, so she hung in the air by it.

"Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy, Shepard," he teased.

She regained her footing and planted both feet into the wall, launching herself backward and into his chest, making them both fall to the ground. He grunted as he tried to keep his grip on her neck when his back slammed into the ground, compounded by the added weight of her on top of him. She scrambled to get leverage as they tangled about each other on the ground, but his grip was firm, and he managed to get his other hand on her wrist. He moved the hand that was on her neck to her other wrist and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, pinning her hands against her own chest. She kicked the inside of his leg and tried to turn around but he used her momentum to roll, forcing her face into the mat and climbing on top of her. He held her to the mat with his weight, pinning her face-down.

He could feel her breath pumping out of her as she lie there, with her forehead pressed into the mat, trying to regain control. He could feel her furious heartbeat through his chest against her back, and felt her shoulders struggling to pull away. But she knew she was pinned, she knew there was no way out.

Which was exactly what he'd wanted.

"God damn it," she whispered, closing her eyes tight to bite back the angry tears. He could feel her insides shiver as she tried, desperately, not to cry. "Why does it always have to be me," she said softly.

He didn't say anything, because he didn't have a good answer for her. In reply he pressed his muzzle against the side of her head and exhaled, hoping the contact was comforting.

They stayed like that for long minutes, until he could tell she was gathering her wits again. Garrus bent one of his legs so that he could take the pressure of his weight off her back, and propped himself up on his elbows a little. He released her wrists and she used the opportunity to roll onto her back. She lifted herself up and tucked her face into the side of his neck. He wrapped an arm around her back to hold her up, and used the other to support his own weight. He felt the silent tears trickle down the side of his throat.

"It's gonna be alright," was all he could think to say, holding her there against his chest. "We'll get them back."

Another few minutes of silence passed, and he spared a moment to relish the fact that she was in his arms, pressed against him. The situation certainly wasn't ideal, but Garrus took what he could get.

"Why is it always the Cargo Bay?" she said softly.

"I don't know, maybe you just like the ambiance."

She laughed, and he heard her sniffle in an attempt to compose herself. She let her head fall back against the mat and looked up at him.

"Why is it always you?"

He laughed. "I guess because I'm the only one who knows you well enough," he said with a smile, tucking her hair behind her ear.

She moved her arm to wipe the tears off of her face with a sleeve and let out a long breath.

"I should uh," she cleared her throat. "I should probably get back to the crew."

"Yeah," he said, lifting himself up onto his knees before standing. He offered her a hand to help her up and she took it and pretended to dust off her pants. "Thanks for the dance," she said with a sarcastic laugh before turning to walk away.

"Hey," he called after her, not even sure of what he was going to say. She turned back around, looking at him over her shoulder. "I'm here if you need me."

She smiled, almost sadly, and turned back around. "Yeah," she said. "Thanks."

He watched her disappear past the doors of the Cargo Bay. He knew she would spend the rest of the day busying herself, doing her usual rounds with the crew in an attempt to distract herself. But they still had 36 hours before they hit the relay, and it was always the night, when she was alone, that was the hardest for her.

Garrus decided then that, if nothing else, he wouldn't let her be alone that night.