Other than the drone of the engine core and the artificial atmosphere of the Citadel below, the Shuttle Bay is eerily quiet. Shepard and company slowly step out of the elevator, with Abby using a blade to destroy the controls and disable it. Stepping into the cavernous room, Jane gestures to Ash and Abby to take the flanks. The two nod and slowly separate, only to stop when the Clone herself appears. She's adorned with an almost exact copy of Shepard's armor, with the only differences being the red stripe on her arm instead of blue, and the absent helmet.
"Well, that's creepy." Shepard mutters. The Clone simply raises her shotgun and fires at the group. The metal shards bounce harmlessly off of everyone's Kinetic Shields, but nobody is taking chances. Ashley slides under the weapon workbench, Abby rolls behind a stack of crates to the right, and Shepard kneels behind Cortez's desk.
"Wanna quit shooting up my ship?" Shepard growls.
"This isn't your ship anymore." The Clone replies. "I've taken your Spectre rank, your name, even your fingerprints."
"Then you left us to die." Ash jeers. "Only we didn't."
Abby continues flanking to the right, using her size and dexterity to evade the Clone's line of sight.
"You think fake fingerprints will fool the Council?" Commander Shepard asks. "Or Hackett?" She slowly moves up to the Clone's last known spot. Overhead, Abby has once again taken to the rafters, silently hopping from one to the next until she's directly over the Clone.
"How's this grand scheme of yours looking now?" Shepard taunts, about to reach the corner. In the same moment, the Assassin pounces, dropping from the ceiling with her blades extended. Before she reaches the floor, a gunshot rings out that throws her off course, landing in a heap a few feet away. Everyone looks up to see 'Staff Analyst' Brooks standing next to her boss with a rifle raised. Abby scrambles up and away, with Maya hot on her heels. The Clone looks up to her rival.
"You ready to dance...Shepard?" She asks, pumping her shotgun.
The Commander narrows her eyes. "I hate dancing." She raises her rifle and fires, and the battle begins.
"Such a shame." Brooks says. "You were good….too good." Abby rolls over the crate she was behind and grapples with her, knocking her rifle away. The Assassin extends a blade and pivots it, bringing it down on Brooks, who easily catches her hands. Abby pulls her free hand away and unsheaths her other blade, attempting to skewer Brooks' side with it, only to get the blade stuck in the woman's armor. Brooks barks a laugh, pushing back Abby's hand and headbutting her in the face. Abby drops the blade in her hand, which Brooks catches and slices through the air at her attacker. The Assassin ducks, retrieving another blade from the holder under her hoodie and swiping at Brooks' face. The attack finds its mark, forming a deep cut on her cheek. The move snaps Abby's stuck blade, separating the two. Williams looks down at the broken blade in disbelief, as she had never seen one break before. Brooks rips the tip of the blade out of her armor and throws it to the side, while Abby retrieves her Locust and fires it at her assailant. The rounds bounce harmlessly off of her shields and the weapon soon overheats. Abby looks down at the gun, then up at Brooks.
"...Oh boy…" She whispers.
At the same time, Ashley could only look on as her sister and her Commander either attacked, or were attacked by, their foes. Unable to help in any real capacity, she instead opted to fire on any CAT-6 soldiers she could find in the room. However hairy her own fighting got, she always kept an eye on her young sister, who was now in a fistfight with Brooks.
"Commander!" Cortez suddenly calls over the radio. "Normandy is prepping for a jump to FTL!"
"Can you get to the Bridge, like soon?!" Joker follows up.
"Little busy right now!" Shepard responds, throwing a Shockwave at her Clone and making her stumble.
"Roger that. We'll go to Plan B."
"Wait...Plan B?" Joker asks. "What's Plan B? Steve...what are you doing?"
Ashley attempts to flank the Clone, only to be forced into cover by her massive shotgun.
"You call yourself Shepard?!" Ash taunts. "My little sister hits harder than you! And she just graduated high school!"
"Shut up!" The Clone shouts. She tried repeatedly to close in on Shepard for more effective Biotic attacks, but the Commander had annoyingly been able to keep her at arm's length, reducing the fight to a more long ranged gunbattle with occasional Biotics.
At the same time, Abby was beginning to gain an upper hand on Brooks. While the armor was very effective at blocking most attacks, it was becoming heavy and tiring. The Assassin, wearing only civilian clothes, was clearly at an advantage. In a last ditch effort, Brooks shoved Abby away and reached up to her armor's shoulder clasps. She rips them free, pulling off her armor and throwing it at the Assassin. Abby is able to dodge the unconventional attack, quickly closing the distance again.
"Ugh. Seriously?" She asks. "It's called deodorant, lady! Ever heard of it?"
Instead of a verbal response, Brooks is instead thrown off her feet and on top of the Assassin when the Shuttle Bay door suddenly opens and Kodiak 'Juno' takes off, chasing after what looks like a SkyCar. Abby extends another blade and attempts a stab, but Brooks catches her wrist and forces it to the floor, repeatedly hitting Abby in the face with her free hand. The two roll with each other on the deck as the ship suddenly becomes much more turbulent.
"You aren't Shepard anymore!" The Clone shouts angrily. "You're just an old lady with a fancy gun!"
"This 'old lady' is kicking your ass!" Shepard retorts as Ash throws a grenade in the direction of the voice. The Clone rolls to safety with less than a second to spare and throws a Warp at Ashley, which makes her fall backwards and begins eating away at her shields.
"You're just damaged goods! With scars and worn out Cerberus tech!"
Shepard stands up, suddenly enraged by the Clone's dismissive words. "You know where I got these scars?! Eden Prime! Feros! Knossos! Noveria! And Ilos!" She closes in on the Clone, overwhelming her with gunfire. "The Collector base! On Earth! And Palaven! And Tuchanka! And Rannoch! And Thessia!" With each planet named, another round strikes the Clone's Barriers, whittling them down further and further. "I earned these scars protecting the Galaxy! You got yours from a petri dish!"
The Clone staggers backwards and Shepard drops her rifle, charging towards her.
"To Hell with this." She growls. The Commander tackles her foe rolling with her down the Shuttle ramp. The Clone ends up on top and punches Shepard in the face several times. As the two fight, the CAT-6 pilot hits the speed brakes to avoid a collision with something, making the two Shepards roll to the end of the ramp. They catch themselves on the lip of the ramp, holding on for dear life.
"What makes you so special?!" The Clone demands. "Why you and not me?!"
Jane decides not to answer. Her Clone looks up the ramp to see Maya still fighting with Abby, clearly of no help.
At the same time, Ashley appears, reaching out to pull the Skipper to safety.
"What about her?" The Marine asks, looking at the Clone, who is still trying to pull herself up. Shepard approaches after a moment, towering over her.
"You…" The Commander growls. "Get off my ship." She stomps her heel on the Clone's hand and she falls, keeping eye contact with the pair until she slams into a building, being killed instantly. Ash nods, looking back to find her sister being overpowered by Brooks. The two step towards the pair, Abby's face a mess, before two unfolding weapons make the blows stop. Brooks looks up and unclenches her raised fist, raising both hands. Abby seizes the opportunity and unsheaths a blade, only to stop at Shepard's shout.
"We're keeping this one." The Commander says.
"Seriously?" Abby pants, the tip of her blade poking Maya's neck. "This lady just tried to beat the shit outta me!"
"Tried?" Brooks asks with a scoff.
"Yeah. Sure. Backtalk. Great idea." The Assassin quips. "Mock the girl who's holding a knife against your throat."
Ashley lowers her rifle and moves behind Brooks, grabbing her shoulder and pulling her away from her sister. Shepard stows her own and helps Abby to her feet.
"You okay?"
"Yeah...just peachy."
With the jamming signal from the Clone brought down by her death, EDI regains control of the Normandy and allows Steve and Joker to land inside the Shuttle Bay. The ship turns around and heads back to the decking bay.
"They weren't here to do much real damage." Cortez says after a short walk around. "Though I will need some help fixing up the Shuttle Bay."
"In that case…" Ashley says quietly. "I wouldn't go up to the CIC." Cortez eyes the Marine for a moment, before humming in reply and continuing on.
"Plus they overheated the diffusion system firing at us." Joker adds. "Shuttle Guy here pulled some serious moves back there." Steve shrugs modestly.
"It's nice to fly something more maneuverable than the Kodiak."
"What about the mercs?" Shepard asks. "Any survivors?"
"Just a shitty pilot...and her." Joker points to Brooks, who is being handcuffed by Abby. "We'll turn her over to the Alliance. Maybe she'll give them some dirt on Cerberus."
Brooks eyes the Commander for a moment, putting on an innocent-looking face. "I'd be more than happy to cooperate with the authorities."
"Good." Abby says from behind her, stepping around to the side. "I'd hate for all that coercion to have gone to waste."
"You're getting a chance to redeem yourself." Shepard says. "Don't waste it."
"Ohhh. So serious." Brooks sneers. Unbeknownst to the group, she begins tapping out a hacking code to disable the handcuffs. "Admit it, Shepard. Some part of you liked having me around. Looking up to the legend."
"Don't flatter yourself." The Assassin comments. Brooks ignores her.
"We had some laughs." Maya continues. "And who knows? Maybe we'll have more some day."
"No." Shepard cuts her off. "We won't. Because you're going to sit in your cell and do your time."
"Afraid I'll escape? Come back for revenge?" Brooks asks. "Is the great Commander Shepard pleading for her life?"
"I'm pleading for yours." Shepard hisses. Maya lowers her head after a moment. The quiet tapping behind her back stops. "So thoughtful of you. I suppose it's off to the brig for me then." The Commander steps back towards Ashley and Joker.
"You know…" Brooks adds as Cortez takes her arm. "She wouldn't have let me live."
"You can't clone everything." Shepard says in a low voice. Maya looks down, before being ushered away by Steve. The group watch as they leave, with Abby coming up alongside her sister.
"Think they'll let one of us do the questioning?" She asks hopefully, wiping up some blood that was trickling from her nose.
"Doubt it." Ashley answers. "She belongs to the Alliance now."
"Aww." Her little sister puts. "Why do they get to have all the fun?"
A short time later, the Normandy returned to the docking bay, which was swarmed by C-Sec. They were in the process of roping off the area and carting away any CAT-6 survivors. The shuttle that had left earlier had returned with the rest of the Normandy crew, with Samantha Traynor at the very front of their gathering. The SR-2 pulls into the dock, and Shepard, Ash and Abby descend the shuttle ramp.
"Abigail!" Traynor scolds, being the first to approach the trio. "What have you done to yourself? Tsk tsk tsk. I leave you alone for ten minutes."
"Sorry, mother." Abby says mockingly. "I promise it won't happen again." She looks back to Shepard as Samantha rolls her eyes once again. "So this is your brand of Shore Leave, eh? No offense, Shep, but you need to reevaluate your priorities."
"Very funny." The Commander says.
"This was a one time thing, Abby." Ash insists. "Now...is when the real fun begins."
A/N: Felt like it was about time to update this one.
As I said earlier, I have no intention of abandoning any of my fics, and this one was originally my only side project...at least until GuP came along.
So...yeah, the gang have recaptured their beloved ship, and Shore Leave is about to commence. Abby is eager to head to Omega, but she'll just have to be patient.
Thank you all for patiently awaiting these updates. I'm trying to keep up with writing, but adulthood has arrived with its unrelenting barrage of things to do.
Thanks for reading, thanks for the reviews, and I'll see you all in the next one!
