The tower was almost silent, with only a few murmurs from her team breaking the stillness. Shepard stood by the door, sniper rifle held tight, dividing her attention between a possible geth attack and the first aid work done inside.

Wrex didn't much care for his injuries. He had applied medi-gel so that, in his own words, he didn't make more of a mess on his armor, but he was up and standing guard too, shotgun in hand.

Ashley was half naked, while Garrus applied medi-gel over her back. A burst of geth pulse rifle fire had broken through her armor, but her injuries were not serious. Shepard knew she had a few shards embedded against her shoulderblade, but she didn't complain. She never complained.

Felawa had only injured his left arm. It was a pretty bad injury, and while the bleeding had been stopped with medi-gel, he wasn't going to be able to use that arm in a while. Ne needed to go back to base.

Which left Liara.

When she had rushed to check on the asari, her heart had fallen to her knees. There was so much blood. Liara laid on the floor like a broken doll, not moving a muscle. Then their gazes had met, and she had whispered Shepard.

She was alive.

The dropship's gun had caught her right after throwing a biotic attack to cover Shepard. She had gone straight for cover, diving forward behind a sturdy prothean wall. But the bullets had caught her on the legs, and had cut through armor and muscle with devastating effects.

Shepard wasn't even sure if she'd be able to walk, like, ever.

While Alenko worked on her, the Normandy had been notified. Chakwas had moved to the colony, with help from the crew to carry as many medical supplies as they could muster. They'd need to resupply after the mission, but it did not matter. Right now, medical help was just a short distance away.

"I've stabilized her, Commander," Alenko said. "But we should be careful."

"Good. Grieco, Wrex, carry Liara. And be fucking careful."

Her orders were followed to the letter, and they made a slow retreat to the colony. Many scared faces followed them as they emerged from the tower, but the relief was obvious when Shepard finally came out and no geth followed.

A brief respite. Shepard left them to it, and headed to talk with Fai Dan , followed by Ashley and Garrus.

"Thank you, Commander," Fai Dan said, the relief in his voice palpable. "Without you I don't know what we'd have done. We're on our last legs here."

"That's what we do," Shepard said.

"Yeah, the famous Commander Shepard," Arcelia said. "I heard of you Commander, I'm not impressed."

Shepard raised an eyebrow. "Well shit, you aren't? Then what the hell am I doing here?" She turned to Ashley. "You heard her, Chief. Let's pack up."

"Damn, and I was starting to like this place too," Ashley replied, smirking.

"Do you think this is a joke?" Arcelia snapped. "The Alliance ignores us, and when someone finally shows up, it's but a handful of people! Are you even here for us?"

"No, but I can multitask," Shepard said, and turned to Fai Dan. "Give me a rundown, what the hell happened?"

"The geth, they came for- They came for us," Fai Dan replied, grimacing as if in pain. "We don't know! Exogeni might- ugh, I don't know Commander," he added, putting a hand to his forehead and grimacing.

Weeeeeirdo. Ash might be right about these people.

"So they just showed up and started shooting?" Shepard looked at Arcelia. "What's Exogeni up to anyway?"

"We're just exploring the ruins!" she protested.

"Really? A corporation claims an entire fucking planet covered in prothean ruins, and this is all they bring to explore it?"

"So?"

…

Shepard just threw that in the bucket of many things that didn't make sense in her life, and turned to Fai Dan. "Right. So, what's the situation here? Need help with anything?"

"We're... low on many things, commander. Water, food, power. If this keeps up, the geth will be the least of our worries."

"Fine. Chief, see what you can do to help. I'm going to check the skyway."

"Alone?"

"I'll call you if I find anything fun," Shepard replied.

With a nod to Fai Dan, and a glance to Arcelia – who glared at her like she was owed money – she headed off. The tower was empty now, but an extra check was never out of place. Fai Dan had claimed the garage was locked, but she wanted to make sure.

If she stopped to think about it, it was a wonder that the prothean lift still worked. Then again, given how slow it was moving, it probably didn't have much wear and tear to worry about. The platform took a full minute to get her to the skyway, and the door opened to reveal a large, empty space. A modern door had been installed on the entrance to the garage, and the scanner showed no unknown signatures.

There was a known one, parked right in the middle of it. Shepard grinned ear to ear.

"Oh Garrus," she said, opening the comms. "Do I have something for you."

She patted the side of the Mako affectionately. Older model, only a machine gun mounted on the top.

"On my way, commander," Garrus replied. "What do you need?"

"Bring your calibrating pants," Shepard replied, and switched frequencies. "Adams?"

"Yes commander?"

"I'm going to need the biggest spare gun you've got. And Tali. And a barrel of omni-gel, probably."

I really didn't understand why the sewer system was such shit.

…

And by that, I mean it was crap.

Dammit, I mean it wasn't very good. It was old, rickety, and not future-tec at all. It was full of manual valves, limited releases, isolated portions, and mechanical parts. Things had been added on top of things like nobody had ever planned ahead for anything in there, and all they had done was retrofit on top of patches, fixes, and improvisation. It was a mess. I suppose it was a good thing, since that was the only reason why working in such filth paid so well, but it was a pain to be constantly fixing the same stuff over and over.

It was like Penelope's mantle. Work on it in the day, and the work became undone at night.

"Can you open the 125-C up there?" Mika called.

I did as she said, and was greeted by the smooth, hissing sound of a pipe working as it should.

For about three seconds.

"Gah! Cut it, cut it!" she yelled, banging on something. "You bosh'tet piece of-"

Cutting the flow, I peered over the open trapdoor. Poor Mika was ankle deep in something nobody should ever have to be ankle deep in.

"You all right?"

"Yeah, yeah," she said in a dejected tone. "I keep forgetting whoever set this up was probably colour blind."

I had to laugh at that. She hit one of the valves, and the reflux system started siphoning the liquid. Shaking my head, I pulled one of the hoses from the cleaning station, and sprayed her with cleaning chemicals as she walked up the ladder.

"This place is like a bad fucking joke," I said, giving her a hand and pulling her up to my level. Even with her suit, she was so light I could do it one handed. This girl needed to eat more.

"What do you mean?"

"You know, someone decided to make the most complicated system possible as a dare, and didn't tell anyone not to use his plans."

"My hypothesis is that someone dropped the plans and picked them up in random order," Mika said, her eyes narrowing in amusement.

"Haha! I saw a vid like that once. Pulp Fiction, very old."

"Huh, what's it about?"

"Hah, it's really silly. We should watch it sometime if I can find it."

"Uh... That... would be nice," she said, looking away.

Huh.

We finished connecting the correct but not colour-coordinated relays, replacing the tubing, and adding yet another custom note to the current blueprints of the sewer system. The blueprints looked a lot like the sewer system itself. Patches, notes, corrections, and appendices added to a base layer of chaos.

So, we moved on. No emergencies this time, just damage and blockages that could be re-routed while we fixed them. It would all had been faster if I had had an omni-tool, but I didn't. I had suggested it to Shala, my boss, that I could buy one if she gave me an advance, but she just told me that I had to finish my one week before she'd consider anything. Sounds like a hardass, but I was starting to think that she had simply had one too many people bailing on her after she gave them a hand. I didn't take it personal, we had a deal and I had agreed, so there was that.

Which brought me to the current situation.

"How did you end up working this place anyway?" I said, handing Mika one of the wrenches and pushing the trap door up.

"Erm... Nothing special, just, you know, it's a job."

"I hear ya. It sucks but at least it pays well. I don't think I'd have stayed as long as you have though."

"Not much of a choice," she said absently, looking down before jumping. She landed with well practised ease, and started unbolting one of the panels below.

"Eh? Why?"

She froze for a moment, then looked up. "No, nothing. I mean, I kinda need the credits too, like you."

"I see. Pilgrimage?"

"Y-Yes!" she replied, her eyes opening wide in surprise. "You know about the pilgrimage?"

"Yah, had a quarian friend on the ship I was in before this. She's on her pilgrimage too."

"Wow, that's great! Most people don't even care about knowing us or what we do."

"I'm not most people," I said, and gave her a wink.

She looked at me for a moment, then turned away and started working. "I noticed. Can you check the board?"

"Yeah, hold on..."

There were only two broken connections on the exchange, so it didn't actually take very long to fix the problem. Once again, everything was running smoothly, we had spent even more spare parts, and we were on our way to the next one. That was how most of the day went anyway. IT wasn't bad actually, despite being so shitty and smelly, it was relatively easy. Of course, when it went to shit, it really went to shit, as I had found out in my first day, which was probably the thing keeping most people away.

Wusses.

"So why did you leave your ship? Do humans go on pilgrimage too? You're a little old for that," Mika said as we walked down the corridor.

I had to laugh. "And how old are you?"

Her response was not what I expected. She looked away, almost in embarrassment, and started fidgeting before answering in a low voice.

"It's just taking me a little longer..." she said.

Shit. What the hell do I do now?

"Well, it's not pilgrimage in my case," I said, trying a change of subject. "I just got kicked out," I said, walking on.

I didn't get three steps before she rushed to me and grabbed my arm, pulling me back.

"Your captain expelled you?" she said, and sounded so surprised I didn't even know what to say. "Why? Wait, nonono, what am I saying? Sorry, I shouldn't have asked. I just mean I can't imagine you doing anything so- I don't-"

"Breathe, Mika," I said.

"Sorry..."

"Eh, it's fine. I got tired of being the butt of every joke, she got tired of me being a pain in the ass, I kept screwing up, and in the end who cares, it just wasn't working."

"Wow..."

I shrugged and resumed my walk, with Mika catching up a moment later.

"Human ships must be very different. To be expelled in the flotilla one would have to do something terrible."

"Guess it depends on the captain," I replied with a shrug.

"We're family. You don't cast away family so easily."

"That must be nice..." I muttered. She didn't answer.

"Take that, you four legged clanking piece of refuse!" Shepard shouted.

The Mako bounced off the colossus, and the latter tipped sideways, balancing at the edge of the skyway for a moment before plunging to the misty depths below. Shepard laughed almost maniacally and resumed the run. And what a run it was, she was in a hurry. The team back at the colony was in trouble, and Shepard just loved getting rid of trouble. With extreme prejudice, most of the time.

"Was that really necessary?" Garrus said, looking down from the turret.

"Of course it was!"

"Shepard, it had no head. It was dead."

"And now it's deader," Shepard replied.

Garrus exchanged a look with Tali, who did nothing but shrug in response. He shook his head, and went back to the gun, scanning the skyway. So far it had been easy. The monstrosity that they had concocted actually worked, which was a wonder on itself. They had jury-rigged a GARDIAN laser on top of the old Mako, added the power supply from the transmitter Chief Williams had found under the colony, encased it with an improvised heatsink made of geth parts and omni-gel (two barrels, they had needed two barrels of that stuff), and overwritten all security protocols that were meant to keep them from cooking alive if the thing misfired.

Shepard thought it was perfect. Garrus just thought it was insane. Tali had said that both were one and the same when it came to the Commander. Maybe Tali was right. He was starting to worry about the mental stability of the human. She went from angry to calm to downright crazy with far too much ease.

A heavy gust of wind caught them as they jumped over a broken ridge, and the Mako shuddered and tilted dangerously. They landed with a bounce, and for a moment Garrus gritted his teeth waiting for the inevitable crash to the side. Luckily, it didn't happen, the vehicle righted itself with a skid and kept moving.

The result of all the craziness they had bolted on the Mako was that the vehicle was severely top-heavy. Which Shepard didn't seem to mind. Still, he couldn't argue with the results. The laser didn't care about kinetic barriers, boiled geth armor away like nobody's business, and when it was all said and done, was deadlier than a pack of mutated varren. It had proven more than useful. They had cut a swath of destruction through the army of geth carried by the cruiser, rescued several survivors holed up at the bottom of the Exogeni building, and altogether brightened Shepard's day.

Which was probably the only reason she hadn't shot Jeong when the moron had pulled a gun on her. Lawsuit? He should have been a lot more worried about the somewhat insane human with a very unhealthy obsession with saving everyone she came across. It really wasn't good for her, Garrus only hoped it didn't one day get her killed.

None of that was anywhere near as impressive as Tali destroying the cruiser with a computer terminal and a door, though. Liara had been right, prothean buildings were made to last. The geth were probably still wondering what the hell had happened, one second they were hanging out, the next...

"What the hell is that?" Garrus said.

There were some curled up forms in front of the garage door, and as soon as they were near enough, they stood up. They looked somewhat humanoid, dark green and disgustingly looking. Shepard slammed the brakes, and jumped out of the Mako before anyone even realized what had happened.

"Check your targets!" Shepard shouted, bolting out of the vehicle. "Go!"

Garrus cursed loudly, scrambling to disentangle himself from the turret. Shepard was shooting already, moving in close to the plant... zombie things. Way too close. Williams had warned them about those things before losing contact. The latter being the reason why Shepard had been in such an insane hurry to get through the skyway.

He unracked his sniper rifle and took aim. Shepard was moving like a woman on a mission from the Spirits. She dodged one of the zombies right as it vomited acid aiming at her, clocked it on the back of the head, then finished it off with a burst of assault rifle to the back of the head. Without even blinking, she pulled her shotgun, raking the assault rifle with her other hand, and kept going.

"Alenko!" she shouted, pointing towards the entrance of the lift. There were two humans there, shooting at them. "Gas grenades!"

She was like a force of nature. As Garrus aimed around her, shooting for the zombies she was less likely to see, he could only think it was a good thing she thought of him as part of her team. He felt she'd never leave him for lost, even if a whole army stood between the two of them.

Not that he was planning on getting himself trapped in an impossible situation anytime soon.

This is a fucking nightmare.

Ashley Williams looked at the unconscious colonist, trying as hard as she could not to think about the pain. She had clocked him pretty hard on the side of the head, using the butt of her pistol. but looked like he was still breathing. With was about as much as she could say about herself. Those fucking zombies had come out of nowhere, it seemed, at the same time the colonists had lost their collective minds.

She looked at her left arm, and the only reason she didn't feel sickened at the sight was that she was too tired for it. Her back was killing her, even through Grieco had slathered her with medi-gel. She wasn't sure how well it'd work against the acid of those plant-like things.

"That's the last of them," Grieco said.

Williams fell to her knees, and would have faceplanted if Grieco hadn't come to her aid. Not that he was faring too well himself, but she had been jumped by one of those zombies from behind, and the results had been less than pretty. She had shouted for Grieco to shoot it as she struggled not to be covered by its acid vomit, but the resulting corpse explosion the fucking things did had been an absolute nightmare. Acid everywhere.

"Hows... the doctor..." she said.

"They didn't get past," Grieco said, pointing over his shoulder at the sealed door.

Good. They're safe in their side of the ship. Shepard would have had my ass if they had made it through.

"Shit Grieco, you're starting to convince me you're an actual marine," Ashley said.

"Please Chief, I might faint with all that praise," the marine replied, laughing.

They heard renewed fighting outside, which prompted Grieco to unrack his shotgun and aim at the door. They had locked the majority of the colony's wounded on the other side of the ship, and Chakwas plus her patients on their side of it. Which left the two of them alone between the two lots. Wrex was outside somewhere, but they hadn't heard from him.

Mostly because their comms were puddles of dissolved electronics, omni-gel, and zombie plant acid.

Freaking...

She struggled up to her feet, pistol in hand and aiming at the door.

"Chief, you should-"

"Not going anywhere, kid," Ashley replied between gritted teeth. "You ain't going to make it to gunnery chief if you can't kill a few space plant zombies."

"I just hadn't had the chance until now," Grieco replied. "I thought I had killed a few, but there were just batarians without a translator."

Despite the pain, Ash sniggered at the response. Whatever was coming through that door, it was not making it past her to the people she was guarding.

"Williams!" she heard a voice call.

Damn.

"Commander!" she replied. "In here!"

The door opened, to reveal Commander Shepard on the other side. And what a sight she was. Wisps of smoke rose from her armour, not from attacks, but looked like splatter from exploding acid zombies. Her helmet was gone, her hair a mess. And her eyes...

"We're fine," she found herself saying. Damn, but she looked fucking scary. Her legs wobbled, and ended up propped against the wall, Grieco coming to help her.

"Where's everyone?"

"Chakwas, Felawa and Liara are in here," Grieco said, pointing over his shoulder. "Wrex went outside, but comms are down, we haven't heard from him."

"I'll go find him, the lizard's probably having a grand ol' time," Shepard said. "The colonists?"

"We didn't kill any," Williams said, gesturing with her chin at the unconscious few around them. "But what a pain in the ass Commander."

"You don't know the half of it..." Shepard muttered, by the by recovering her presence. "Grieco, get the Chief to Chakwas and guard the door. We've got a giant weed to burn to a fucking crisp."

"Aye aye sir," Grieco replied.

"Commander, I'm-"

"-following my orders, right?"

…

She had said it softly, but hell if she didn't look pissed off. Ashley had a mind to protest, one arm or not she wasn't going to stand behind while the rest of her team went off to fight God knows what out there. Where were the fucking zombies coming from anyway?

Shepard just made an annoyed gesture and pointed at the door.

"Just get in there Chief, I really don't have the energy to argue right now."

And with that, she turned around, and hit the door controls to close it behind her.

The galaxy fucking hates me.

Space zombies. Space. Zombies. Made out of exploding acid. Shepard was going to find out who had made the call in Exogeni for the damn experiment with the Thorian and the colonists, and personally beat the shit out of them. Her team was in tatters, there were nearly a hundred colonists in need of medical attention, nevermind mental control infection or whatever the fucking plant did, and she still hadn't figured out what Saren wanted with that damn place.

Seriously, space zombies. What the hell is next, giant man eating insects or something?

She looked behind. Garrus and Tali were still with her. She had sent Alenko to help Grieco and Chakwas. Now they had to figure out how to get down-

"It wants me to kill you... It wants it!"

They all turned to the voice, raising their guns. Fai Dan was stumbling towards them, his hands trembling as he held his own pistol high.

"Put that thing down!" Shepard shouted.

"Pain... So much pain... It lashes at you, until you obey... But... But I refuse..."

"Put it down!" Shepard repeated.

"I won't allow it, I won't-"

*WHACK*

Fai Dan fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes, having somehow missed the enormous krogan sneaking up behind him. Sneaking krogan style, which meant stomping loudly and without a care in the world.

"Hmph," Wrex said, looking down at Fai Dan. "Weak minded fool."

"Bloody hell Wrex, what the hell happened to you?" Shepard said.

The krogan was an absolute mess, armor melted, flesh exposed, and skin ripped. He looked like he had been crushing zombies with his feet, then bathing in their flesh in the middle of a bloodrage rush.

I'm getting too familiar with krogan.

"Those things are annoying," he said, looking down at himself and shrugging. "They ruined my favourite shotgun too."

"Now that we can't have," Shepard replied. "Did you have fun at least?"

Wrex's guttural laughter was all the answer she needed.

"You really take us to the best places, Shepard," he said.

After using the nearby crane to lift the side of the cargo ship, they found an entrance to an underground stair. The stench wafting from the depths was sickening, and Shepard gave a small curse at having lost her helmet. She really didn't want to get any closer to the mind-controlling plant without a filter for its spores. But she also really wanted to set it on fire, so there was that. Wincing at the smell, she raised her assault rifle and started walking down, followed by her team. She had Tali behind her, Garrus third, and Wrex at the back. She'd have preferred Wrex right behind her, but then nobody would have a shot at anything in the narrow corridors.

They reached the bottom of the stairs after just a few cautious minutes. It was stuffy down there, and Shepard sneezed more than once on the way – paranoia or mind controlling bullshit, she wasn't sure.

Then they saw it.

"That's... bigger than I expected," Tali said.

"What in the Spirits' name is that?" Garrus echoed.

Shepard waited a moment, but didn't hear anything else, so she turned around.

"Wrex?"

The krogan merely shrugged. "It's big."

The Thorian. When they told her it was a plant, she had imagined a plant. A bush, maybe a tree. It was a massive brown-greenish growth with about a dozen roots shooting in all directions. As they stepped closer, a weird bulb above them burst open, spitting a foul-smelling ooze and-

A green asari. This keeps getting better and better.

"Invaders! Your every step is a transgression. A thousand feelers appraise you as meat, good only to dig or decompose. I speak for the Old Growth, as I did for Saren. You are within and before the Thorain. It commands that you be in awe!"

"Awesome," Shepard dearpanned. "I'm here for two things, getting what you gave Saren, and kicking your ass. What's it going to be?"

"Your blood will feed the ground for-"

*KABLAMMO*

Shepard didn't even wait for the asari to finish its spiel before she shot (it? her? She settled for her) with her shotgun, the rest of the team joining so quickly they probably had been expecting her to do so. The asari crashed, tumbled, and fell down the central shaft of the chamber towards its doom.

"Take that fucking thing down!" Shepard shouted.

Four weapons rose in unison, spitting hot rounds on the enormous body of the thorian. Green ooze and acid splattered on every shot, barely making any progress through the body of the huge lifeform.

"Shit, on the left!" Garrus called.

Zombies. Okay, they weren't zombies. She was tired of calling them zombies. This wasn't a bad vid, even though the script could have fit. Creepy things. Creepers.

Shepard turned and led the attack, hers and Tali's shotguns blasting in cadence like the notes of a symphony of destruction. The four of them pressed the attack as more zom- creepers poured through the opening, acid hissing and pooling closer and closer to their feet.

Out of the corner of her eye, Shepard saw more of those creepers moving, higher up and making towards the spiral staircase that surrounded the Thorian.

"Move! Press forward, to higher ground!" she called.

The soles of her boots hissed as she hit the acid, jumping over the pile of remains in their way. She didn't even bother killing the creepers on the stairs, shooting their legs to immobilize them and ordering her team to rush forward. She took the first flight of stairs two steps at a time, and was about to rush past the doorway at the top when a flash of blue caught her attention. She dodged by instinct, a biotic push rushing past the entrance and crashing on the wall behind.

Had she not been so far ahead of her team, that'd have caught Tali square on the chest.

"I've fucking had it!" Shepard shouted, coming out of cover.

"The Old Growth-" the green asari spoke.

"Shut up!" Shepard shouted again, rushing towards her.

She discharged with her shotgun as she ran, spinning out of the way of another biotic throw and catching the asari on the face with her elbow. Acid splashed from the asari's nose and onto her armour. Without missing a step, Shepard kicked the asari on the chest, shot it again, and the asari fell down the shaft, bouncing off the top of the Thorian before falling to the ground below. Far below.

For a moment, Shepard stood right in front of the Thorian, eyeing it like she wanted to set it on fire.

Then, the Thorian cried out in pain.

"What the..."

"Hah! I knew it!" Tali shouted behind her.

Shepard turned to see the quarian looking at one of the roots from the Thorian, going into the wall in front of them. She shot it again, and on the third discharge, the root broke, and the entire chamber trembled as the Thorian shook.

A murderous grin appeared on Shepard's face.

Clever girl.

One by one, each one of the Thorian's roots fell. One by one, they took the floors leading to the top of the chamber. The green asari appeared three more times, and three times Shepard took it single handedly before throwing her over the edge of the central shaft.

She was finding it oddly satisfying. She really needed to blow off some steam.

Even as they cut the roots, the Thorian never tried to... talk, if it could. The asari did nothing but shout angry threats and curses. By the time they got to the last root, the Thorian was hanging precariously from it, several tons of plant matter pulling it taut. Shepard looked over the edge of the terrace, down at the freaking monster.

"Any final words?" she said.

Tali, Garrus, and Wrex all opened fire at the base of the root, and the Thorian fell almost a hundred meters to its doom.

"I didn't think so," Shepard muttered.

She turned to see another of those weird growths on the wall split open, and dislodge yet another copy of the damn asari to the ground.

"For fuck's sake!" Shepard shouted.

She levelled her shotgun at the asari, ready to riddle it with holes, when Garrus suddenly smacked it up.

"Shepard, wait!" he said. Shepard looked at him in surprise, but he just gestured with his chin at the asari. "This one isn't green."

The asari was stumbling up to her feet, and was looking around like she hadn't expected to see the world ever again. Garrus was right, she wasn't green. Blue-purplish, proper asari blue-purplish, with the same face markings as the green asari she had been killing.

"I'm... I'm free..." she muttered, looking around until her eyes fell on Shepard. "Commander Shepard... It's you, isn't it? You freed me. Thank you..."

"Who the hell are you?" Shepard said.

"My name is Shiala," the asari said. She looked unsteady on her feet, but neither Shepard, nor her team looked ready to throw caution to the wind and go to her aid. They all kept guns roughly trained in her direction. "I serve... I served Matriarch Benezia. When she was still herself."

Shepard looked at Garrus, the C-Sec detective looked at her, and he shrugged.

"Okay, what the hell's going on?" Shepard said, finally lowering her shotgun, but keeping it in her hands.

"Saren. He... came to this place, to trade with the Thorian. My life, for the information he needed to decipher the prothean beacon."

"You volunteered?"

"I... I was not myself. I did as I was asked. We... Saren, he compelled us, compelled Benezia to his ways. We betrayed the galaxy, without even seeing what we were doing."

"Bullcrap," Shepard retorted. "You chose to join Saren."

"It's not so simple. His... ship. Sovereign. It bends people's will, they become indoctrinated to Saren's commands. Enslaved. Inside it, things that don't make sense suddenly do. It's hard to see, now that I'm free."

The fucking ship's possessed.

Shepard couldn't believe it. Roy was right. Heaven and hell, Roy was right. Her brain was trying to throw things at her at a rapid pace, trying to go over everything he had said. Even though it wasn't as much as she'd have wanted, apparently she should have been listening more closely. Damn him.

"What did Saren want?" Garrus said, having seen the tangent and not much caring for it.

"The Thorian is... was old. Older than the protheans. It possessed..." she swayed on her feet, putting a hand to her head and stumbling to regain her balance. "It possessed the knowledge of those it absorbed. This included many protheans. He gave me that knowledge, which I shared with Saren. The Cipher. It is the key to finding the Conduit."

Shiala stumbled again, and fell to her knees.

"Shepard, maybe we should continue this somewhere else," Garrus said.

"You're right. Keep an eye on her," she said in a low voice. "I'll go check upstairs. If it's clear, take her to the Normandy."

Fourteen hours later, I was finally done with my shift. I could have done eight hours, but I really didn't have anything better to do. And shitty as the job was, I actually enjoyed the company. It was refreshing not to be laughed at every time I screwed up something. And trust me, I screwed up a lot. That place was like a damn Chinese kung-fu Z-movie, more traps than you can shake a load of s'kak at.

Three showers, a vicious hosing down of the hazmat suit, and a double cycle on the sonic cleaner for my clothes, I was feeling like myself again.

Freaking hell. I bet Shepard has never been in some shitty underground tunnel filled with shitty ass liquids and crap.

I got out to the locker entrance to see Mika already clean and checking her suit.

"Another day, five more to go before I get paid," I said.

"Are you going to leave after that?" Mika inquired.

"I'm... not sure yet. Got a lot of things in my mind. I'll probably stay another week or two."

"I see..."

I bent down to look at her in the eye. She was sitting on the bench, and she was short enough that I had to bend down quite a bit.

"You gotta admit, it's a shit job."

She grunted at that, but didn't answer. However, after a moment she took a deep breath and looked up.

"Yeah, can't blame you."

I straightened up and sighed. "I'm starving, I'm going to get some food."

"Yeah, me too. Nutrient paste, whee."

"Hard bars, double whee," I deadpanned.

We looked at each other for a moment, and cracked up laughing at the same time.

"I bet I have it worse than you," Mika said, her eyes narrowing as she smiled.

"Deal. Hard rations are worse than nutrient paste."

"I can't leave my suit," she offered.

"I have to leave the hazmat suit and it can't seal like a quarian one," I replied. "Bonus points for the smell."

"I have to sleep on a hard cot."

"I have to sleep on the floor."

"We can fix that, then I win!"

"I- Wait, what?"

She giggled, and stood up, grabbing my hand and dragging me away. We went down the tunnel, to the hatch over the entrance to the keeper underground.

"What are we doing?"

"We're going to get you stuff!" she said.

"…how?"

"You'll see." She looked at me and shook her head. "Don't look at me like that, it'll be fun!"

So, down we went. Mika brought her omni-tool up, bringing the map of the weird secret tunnels she had charted, and led the way as we went through them. I had no idea what she was up to, but I didn't complain, mostly because if she got pissed at me, I'd be stuck down there. But other than telling me to follow her and that it'd be fun, she didn't offer anything.

Guess she wanted to surprise me.

I finally got to have a look at the tunnels a bit more. I hadn't ventured too far from the bit I knew, mostly because it all looked the bloody same, and I didn't want to get lost down there forever. There was a whole network of them, with completely empty rooms here and there but not particularly densely packed. Walls were smooth, but just like behind "my" room, there was a hum of machinery working behind every surface. Low enough that it could only be noted due to the complete silence in there. We came across several keepers, but they completely ignored us, just walking to and fro to do whatever it is the keepers do. Build and tear down stuff, I guess.

We walked for about twenty minutes, until we reached another trapdoor. This one didn't have a ladder.

"Okay, give me a boost!" she said.

I raised an eyebrow at that, which made Mika look at me quizzically, but I complied. I bent down, offered my shoulders, and when she sat on them, I stood until she reached the top. After she opened the hatch, she pulled herself up, stepping on my shoulders and my head to get up there.

"Mika!" I protested.

"Hush you. Can you get up here?"

Well, pullups were something I did on the regular, so yeah. It did take a bit of an effort, but I managed to get up. To my surprise, it didn't lead to the sewers, it just opened directly to a back alley somewhere in the Citadel.

"Where the hell are we?"

"There's a recycling point back there," Mika said, pointing behind me. There was, literally, a giant pile of trash in a pit back there. Not smelly or anything like that, it was things like large plastic frames, metal, even glass.

"Uh..."

"It's just stuff people drop. The keepers pick it up and it disappears forever! I thought of it when I saw the door in that room. We can grab some of that stuff, put it together, and wait until the keepers fix it! This is where I got that ladder too! They already pick this stuff to fix things in the Citadel anyway, so we're not stealing anything."

…

I looked at the pile, looked at Mika, saw she was bouncing on the balls of her feet in excitement, and gave a mental shrug.

"What's the worst that could happen?" I said.

Yeah, I really did say that.

Author's Notes: Feros is not my favourite mission to write about. You see, Therum is short, and events go like "Mako, fight, Liara, boss, leave". Simple, straightforward, you can spend time with the details. Noveria has loads of stuff happening, different stuff, so it's great. Feros is basically geth, geth, geth, pause to hear Exogeni are assholes, then geth, geth, geth, before getting to the Thorian and a more juicy bit. It's fun in the game, but to write it's a bit... meh. So I decided to have a bit of fun with PoV, and get Shiala to Shepard. Which is what this is all about. Mission was a bit of a clusterfuck, which is more fun than when it goes around swimmingly.

After last week I realized this fic needed a change of pace. A shake down really. So, next chapter is going to do just that. For one thing, reading back, SidJ, you're hitting it right with your critique. Thing is, I wanted Shepard a bit more unstable, like babying people really isn't her thing (not that it wasn't obvious already), but ideas depend as much on planning as they do on execution, and you're right that the execution is lacking. I think she needs a stern talking to like the one you've suggested - and that's exactly what she's going to get. I haven't introduced her mom yet, have I? (muahaha!)

(Note that the talk between Shep and Hannah was planned, just that I think you've hit the nail on the head with it, SidJ, so I'm going to try and channel my inner drill sergeant with it! So thanks a lot for the inspiration, and I'm hoping I can improve things too).

And yeah, what's up with Mika anyway?

Comments! Reviews! Follows and Favourites! Thanks!

BJ Hanssen: The off-script I've got planned has more chances of getting me booed off stage than the whole "Roy leaves the Normandy" part. Like, seriously, it's nearing crack fic territory but I can't help myself after I thought of it. Just trying to narrow down the details.

Mizuki: Thanks! Expect character development a bit more next chapter now that the mission's done :)

general-joseph-dickson: Hah! You're not wrong, just wait and see, I'm going to have some fun at Shep's expense :D

On the next chapter, a red herring, and a stern talking to someone really needs. Oh, and a race, if we get to it. A hell of a race, too (as in moving fast, not a new species). Stay tuned, and thanks for reading!