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n7inky-fanfics · 3 years

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One Day at a Time

The destruction of the Reapers did not mean galactic peace. While the treaties Shepard had brokered during the war remain mostly intact, there is no shortage of pirates, criminals, gangs, and terroristic organizations bent on creating chaos and destruction. The Council began directing their Spectres towards overseeing and protecting reconstruction efforts and maintaining peace. Now that scientists are close to unlocking the key to repairing the mass relays, the galaxy has settled into unease. No one knows if crime will get better or worse with the relays back online. All factions are getting agitated, and more fighting is breaking out.

Sometimes, Kaidan pities the poor soul on the wrong end of Shepard's gun. More than once, he has heard all sorts of people shout something along the lines of "Oh shit, it's Shepard!" as they realized they were about to die. Shepard is a skilled soldier who dominates the battlefield with equal parts strength and grace. Fighting alongside her can be almost beautiful in an odd and violent sort of way, especially when she used her biotics. It took her almost a year of practice fighting on her military grade prosthetic leg, but she has now found that grace on the battlefield again. In the end, her skills and her career could not be taken by the Reaper War. The galaxy kept its greatest protector.

Today, they are both back on Mars, of all places, fighting a remnant of Cerberus that is attempting to steal more data from the archives. If intel is correct, their goal is to find weapons they can use "for the betterment of humanity", which is their way of saying anti-alien terrorism. Kaidan does have to admit that some part of him enjoys taking down pieces of Cerberus. After all the horrible things he's seen them do, including all that they have put Shepard through, he's glad to eliminate every last cell in the galaxy. It's a worthy career goal.

As the smoke clears, Shepard begins checking the bodies for data pads, hoping to find anything to indicate how many of them are at the archives and what their exact plans are. After all, if this was just an outdoor lookout team, there's bound to be more already inside. She freezes as she reads one of the data pads. Kaidan can barely see her face through her helmet, but her reaction to the data pad can't be good. "Shepard, what is it?"

She clears her throat and says calmly "It's not pertinent to the mission. Let's move on." She drops the data pad and continues towards the entrance. Kaidan trusts Shepard, but curiosity gets the better of him and he glances down at the data pad as he passes by. It currently displays the owner's profile. He can see an image that he guesses matches the body they found it on and a name. "Andrew Mason".

As they enter the archive, they happily find a distinct lack of civilian and scientist casualties. This time, intel learned of the plan early and decided to evacuate the scientists and ship in more soldiers. Unfortunately, Cerberus still puts up a good fight and many of the Alliance soldiers were injured or killed before the Spectres arrived (travel between systems takes more time now that the relays are gone). Shepard hops on to the nearest terminal and accesses the system logs. "Ah, here it is. Someone opened an archive five minutes ago. We can take the tram there."

"Perfect. Maybe this time we'll make it through without getting shot at." Immediately after making the joke, Kaidan winces at the realization that bringing up their last mission on Mars might not be a good idea. Sure, they've worked everything out, but it still could be a touchy subject. He was pretty cruel to her last time, before he almost died in front of her.

"Doubtful." Shepard laughs lightly as they board the tram.

They ride quietly for a moment before Kaidan asks "So, will I get to know who Andrew Mason is?"

"Maybe later. Now's not the time."

"Fair." Kaidan says. He smiles at her, hoping she can see it through the helmet. His is much more open and visually blocks less of the face. Shepard's preferred gear usually allows less visibility, but it also has fewer structural weak points. He noticed a change in her treatment of her armor not too long after he got back on the Normandy, but he's never said anything. Without asking, he already knows why Shepard chooses armor with the most reinforced environment system, and why she carefully and almost obsessively maintains it. He would, too, in her shoes.

He refocuses himself on the task at hand as they begin approaching their destination. They've almost made it when a Cerberus soldier begins firing at the car. They both take cover behind the wall and the dance begins yet again. As the car docks, Shepard throws up a barrier and runs out, shooting at several men in a row as she charges to cover. Kaidan focuses on the heavy trooper slowly approaching from a distance and Reaves. Together, they feed off each other's energy. The can move in sync, watching each other's sixes and supporting each other throughout the entire battle. Before long, the docking zone falls silent as the battle ends.

They take turns clearing doors until they finally get to the archive. They take cover on either side of the door. He opens it carefully, and Shepard immediately swings around to cover him with her pistol. The immediate entryway is surprisingly empty. Shepard gestures for him to follow, then slowly and quietly moves inside the room until they reach a sharp turn. She takes cover against the wall and peers around the corner, gun at the ready. As soon as she does, she is thrown backwards by a large biotic force. Her gun fires before she even hits the wall. Kaidan swings around and unleashes a singularity that pulls the target into the air. Shepard fires again, making several headshots that eventually pierce the armor and hit their mark.

"Thanks for the cover, Alenko." She says, her smile coming through in the sound of her voice. She pats him on the back and pushes further into the room, where the target had been collecting data onto a drive. She plugs the data into her omnitool and runs it through analysis softwares. Liara would be able to tell them more, but it appears that intel was correct. They had been here for advanced weapons blueprints. Shepard begins forwarding the information back to the Normandy, then turns to head back to the LZ. Kaidan follows her.

Getting back to the Normandy and conferencing with Admiral Hackett is no big deal. After the verbal debriefing, they retire to her cabin to write their mission reports. Kaidan's ship, the SSV London (named for the Battle of London that ended the Reaper War), is still getting it's final touches before he'll be able to take it out on a shakedown run, so he rode along with Shepard for this mission and their last several. As they settle into the couch with their tea and data pads, he can't help but smile. This is a good life, one he hadn't expected to attain. Every day, sometimes several times a day, he still finds himself thankful that they had found Shepard after the Crucible. When the Alliance had formally declared her missing in action, with the caveat that she was most likely dead, Kaidan refused to lay down and wait for them to declare her death. He contacted Hackett with an emergency QEC on the Normandy and told him that until they found a body, Shepard was to be considered alive and in need of assistance. They all owed that to her. Seeing her here and now, living her life with him, is something he is grateful for every day.

As Kaidan is putting the final touches on his report, Shepard sets her data pad on the table and walks to her shower, stripping off articles of clothing as she goes. He fumbles over the keyboard, leaving a line of text that reads "ghdhshgdg" as he watches her go. Knowing that he's watching, she calls "finish your report first, and then you can join me." He deletes the line of typos, hurriedly wraps up the report, and follows her for an enjoyable interlude.

Their activities eventually end with them cuddling in her bed. She lay with her head resting gently on his chest, her hand absentmindedly rubbing circles on through his chest hair. He has one arm around her back and gently brushing strokes down her upper arm. He can feel her back subtly rise and fall with her breath. They lay this way for a while before he feels a slight dampness on his chest, where her head is. "Hazel, are you okay?" he asks, looking down at her. Her face is buried in him. She stifles a sob, and he feels the shift in her breathing as she forces herself to cry silently. He wraps his arms around her tighter. "Sweetheart, whatever it is, I've got you." Slowly, she pulls herself back and looks at him. He reaches up to her and gently wipes the tears from her cheeks. She pulls herself into a sitting position against the headboard, and he follows so that they are sitting side by side.

She leans her head on his shoulder and quietly says "You asked about Andrew Mason?"

"Yeah. Do you want to talk about it?"

"I knew him... from before the Alliance." she ends the sentence at barely a whisper. Her shoulders tense and she looks down at the floor. "He was one of the younger kids in the Reds before I left." He gently reaches for her hand and takes it in his as she continues. "I heard he'd gotten out, that he'd joined the Alliance some time after my death. I had hoped he'd do well and go far, but it didn't work that way. I checked his records when we got back to the ship. His team got ambushed by some pirates about seven months before the Reapers invaded. He was discharged honorably for medical reasons, for PTSD. I guess that's when Cerberus got to him."

"Hazel, I'm so sorry." he says.

"The hell of it is that I can see myself in that kid. In what he came from, in his escape. What if I somehow influenced his decision to leave like that? How many kids joined after hearing fantastical stories about my life, only to be swooped up by Cerberus when the Alliance didn't live up to their expectations or to die in battle before they got the chance to reconsider?"

"Hey, stop that. It's not your fault, Hazel."

"How many people died because of me? Will continue to die because of me? Because I failed?" Her voice cracks and she lets out a shuddering breath.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Backup. Failed at what?"

"I couldn't save them all. I can never save them all."

"Hazel, stop. Look at me." He gently places his hand under her chin and guides her to look at him. "You are not responsible for every person in the galaxy. You've spent far too much of your life fighting galactic wars practically on your own. Enough is enough. We stopped the Reapers. Now, we just do what we can to make things a little better. One day at a time, okay?"

She nods and he pulls her into a tight embrace. "One day at a time." She sniffles.

#fanfic #mass effect #commander shepard #female shepard #kaidan alenko #shepard x kaidan #f!shenko #shenko #shepard #fshenko

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incorrectly-quoted-queers · 4 years

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Drunk Punch Love: Chapter 6

Pairing: FemShep and Garrus Vakarian (Shakarian)

Rating: PG-13 (with some tossed F-bombs)

Summary: Their awkward, badass journey through saving the galaxy and accidentally falling in love

Chapter 6: Savior of The Citadel

Anya Shepard doomed the council. And worse, she knew that others would call it a bid for human interests. But sacrificing the Destiny Ascension meant that more people could live, and those still trapped in the Citadel could be protected.

At least, that's what she kept telling herself as she stood next to Saren's bloody husk corpse and watched everything explode outside the window, hoping what she just did was worth it.

She didn't know if she could live with herself if her choices didn't mean something. There were already way too many graves tied to the decisions she'd made.

Like hell she knew this would be her fate when they were coming up the turbolift to fight Saren. It would have been harder to know she had something damning in common with the turian she was about to face, but she doubted he felt as much compassion and guilt as she did.

In all honesty, all she thought about on the way up was how much she wanted to watch the fucker burn.

Then those turbolift doors opened and she, Wrex, and Garrus darted up those council steps that she had a Pavlovian association with disappointment and frustration. Anya could feel it building up in her as they got closer and closer.

Taking that last step to the council's podium, there he had been. And that time, after all the damnable near misses, she didn't give him a shot. Much like he did to Nihlus, Shepard put on her Infiltrator cloak, stood right behind him, and fired her pistol.

Anticlimactic, but so damn satisfying to see him drop like a rock. He didn't deserve a grand fight. He deserved to fall down without the luxury of final words.

Well, then Anya turned around and everything outside was burning and they were asking her to make the call. Thousands of Alliance soldiers and Citadel civilians, or the hundreds of people protecting the council. All she saw were the numbers and the innocence and she made it.

But it was over. It had to be over.

Of course it wasn't fucking over, but she wanted it to be. Something grabbed her leg, though, and crashed her down into a lower decks area. The creature before her had Saren's face, but it was dripping blue blood and was now three times her size. It looked like a goddamn demon with the skin texture of as husk. Wrex and Garrus dropped down to help her and that's when a real bastard of a fight began.

Sovereign just had to go and play god with Saren, didn't he?

Shepard's mind started running on full adrenaline, dodging Saren's husk and protecting her team. Wrex got a wicked face slash and Garrus got thrown into a wall, but the asshole wasn't going to take anyone else from her.

She collapsed him under some pillars and hoped she'd make it out alive. Part of her wondered at the time if i'd be easier if she didn't; after all, her job was only going to get harder now.

But she pulled herself out of the rubble, even though her ears were ringing, and Garrus carried her back to them. Anya was struggling to keep her memory on track just walking back into the safer parts of the Citadel. She was pretty sure her ears were bleeding and everything was kinda blurry. It just was nice to have a trusted arm around her shoulder keeping her safe.

And now she was stuck in a very loud, very overwhelming meeting with Udina and Anderson and it felt like she was just floating above it all. The destroyed Presidium couldn't be real, right?

Hell, everything the past couples days felt so wrong.

"Shepard? Are you listening? What do you think?"

Anya's body jolted and she looked straight into Udina's very pissed off face. She ran a hand through her hair; during the Saren fight her normally immaculate bun ripped open and her hair was all over the place and probably matted with blue blood. Whoever the hell thought she was the most capable to answer anything must've lost their damn mind.

Still pressing a wet cloth to her split lip, Anya tried to salvage things. "No. Sorry. What did you ask?"

Udina rolled his eyes and made a disgusted noise like she was a petulant child, but repeated himself, "With the council gone, new leaders need to be put in place, ASAP. And with humanity at its best, we're going to be at the forefront."

"Okay? And how am I involved in this?"

Anderson looked pretty uncomfortable, but he kept his hands behind his back and looked at her seriously. It was at least nice someone treated her like an adult who deserved a spot at the table. She always appreciated that about Anderson; he looked at everyone that way. "With your new fame as the savior of the Citadel, people will look to your for guidance. So Udina wanted your vote on who should lead the council."

She didn't mean to, but Anya laughed so hard that her definitely bruised ribs hurt like hell. She even had to put her wet rag down on the railing to hold her sides so they didn't literally split. "Me? The closest thing I know to council level seniority are you two." Udina gave her a pointed look and her stomach fell through the glass floor. What made either of these men capable of the job? She adored Anderson, he was a mentor and a friend, but he was no politician. And Udina knew his politics, but he quickly fell into "humanity first" mindsets. And that shit wasn't going to be helpful for a galactic war.

And yet here they fucking were.

Running a hand through her hair again, and trying not to grimace when she definitely caught something in her fingertips, she tried her best to answer them, "While just picking between you two is the dumbest shit I ever heard, my vote would be Anderson. We're heading into a war, and we need people who can get our asses out of it at the helm." But with a deep, slightly beleaguered sigh, she added, "But don't go too far, Udina. I still think you should advise him and kick diplomatic ass. I'm sure Anderson will need a lot of help not clocking anyone."

While Udina didn't look happy, he at least looked slightly amused. "If you're sure. Now on the matter of the Destiny Ascension-"

"If the extranet's going to burn me alive, let them. I let them die out there. They should hold me accountable, even if the law never will."

Anderson furrowed his brow and reached for her hand. Anya didn't mean to wince away so quickly. Instead, he just gave her these sad, soulful eyes. They didn't make her feel any better. "Somebody had to make the call."

"Of course somebody did. And today, it was me. Doesn't make up for the people dead, though." Rolling her shoulders, Anya stood up straight, removed herself from leaning against the railing. It was time to soldier up. "Don't worry about me, Anderson. I can take it. Just make sure there's a damn good statue or something for Willaims, will you? Without her, no one would've made it."

They both looked like they had more to say, and even Udina looked concerned. Maybe they should be. She was now the first human Spectre who now had the galactic authority to name or kill councilmembers. That was fucking scary. But Udina just said, after getting serious frown face from looking at something from his wrist, "We will. Now, Admiral Shepard is on the extranet. Threatened to "sick her bear" on me."

The universe was damn bleak, but of course her mother could make it better with one sentence. Looking Udina, she let him in on the secret, "She means me. She calls me her baby bear. But a warning, if she'd told me to rough you up, I would."

Anderson chuckled, but Udina only did that awkward laugh thing where he really means that he hates soldiers and wishes he didn't have to interact with them as much. Anya couldn't really blame him. Picking up her helmet and holding it on her hip, she nodded and them both. "I'll be in your office using the screen to deal with mother bear."

After she got into Udina's office and left the men to, probably, argue, she let the neutral look on her face fall. She let her face go heavy; as heavy as it felt. Hell, it probably should be heavier. Today had been a long fucking day.

But she had one more thing to deal with: Oksana Shepard.

Anya inhaled deeply and then sat down at Udina's desk. One or two clicks and she was calling the infamous Admiral Shepard. Within seconds of starting the call, her mother's short, bright blonde hair, gray eyes, and scarred cheek. And somehow, on this dark fucking day, she was smiling. Trying to give her own best grin, Anya said, "Hello, Mama."

"Detenysh! My little one! Today was a good victory. You did good. How does it feel to have that rogue Spectre eating metal?"

Shaking her head, she always found it hard to talk straight in front of her mother. She was a warrior through and through. Sure, Anya was a warrior, too, but if there never was another war again and she was out of a job, she could probably live with that. Oksana couldn't. She answered as honestly as she could without starting a fight, "Good to protect people. Less good to know how many dead it took to take him down."

"They died honorably, Anya. That's all anyone can wish for." While she nodded, Anya couldn't help but wonder: is it? But then her mother continued, "I am so proud that my daughter is the savior of the Citadel. Your father would have been proud, too."

Anya didn't really know what to say to that. She'd never met her father. "I hope so. I made a lot of hard calls today."

"They are all preparing you for the great Admiral or General you will one day be."

A million old conversations swirled around in her head. "Mama-"

"I know, I know. You'll find your own path. It's just pure coincidence I was right about all of it so far."

The smug way her mom said it kinda pissed Anya off, especially with that smirk on her face, but she was going to let it slide today. "I'm just happy to see you."

"And I you, Detenysh. You're the reason all my men are okay and so many people made it out alive today. When they chose you for a Spectre, they chose right."

Feeling herself get a tad bit emotional, Anya rubbed her face and tried to shake the feeling away. "Shh. Enough of that." With a crash from outside and a loud yell, Shepard could tell Udina and Anderson were arguing again. She flashed her mother another smile before ending the call, even though she knew this might be the last she saw of her for awhile.

Happens when your mother's specialty always was undercover missions. "I have to go be a hero a little longer. I love you, Mama."

"I love you too, little one."

And then she was gone. Anya could get more emotional about it, probably even have a year's worth of therapy about how her mother often popped in to give her praise but never was a consistent parental force in her life. But she really didn't have the time for counseling right now, and at least her mother was okay. Honestly, Anya would take any good news from today that she could get.

Logging off, she stood back up and put back on her stronger face. It was time to play babysitter to the two men she just appointed to run the Council together.

Why did anyone let her make big decisions?

///

Author’s note:

So happy a bunch of people enjoyed the last few chapters on here! I’m posting often to catch up to the story on other sites.

Thanks so much for reading, and double thanks to my lovely patrons:

Danyell Jones

Amy Connolly

If you'd like to support my stories, fandom communing, or Twitch aspirations, please go check out my patreon: patreon.com/gracejordan

I also tweet sometimes too: @Steph_Marceau

#Shakarian #Drunk Punch Love #femshep x garrus #Garrus Vakarian #Anya Shepard #Mass effect fanficton #fanfiction #fanfic #bioware romances #Citadel #Oksana Shepard #The Council

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hereliesbitches--me · 6 years

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Verse Page

I have an assortment of verses with many kinds of people. Some are open, some are exclusive to an extent in certain fashions

But if you have ideas, please let me know! I’m always happy to reach out and explore. Note that some verses may have been repeated, but that is only because its catagorized.

Open Verses:

Fallout 4- :V: Wasteland Wanderer :

Side note: this is the only game in the fallout series I have played . And this was some really goofy idea to an extent

She was taken by a gunner as a toddler when her family was killed on hit. Then her not so great caretaker got sick of rules and hopped over to run a raider group, and dragged along that same little girl into not so great situations to live in.

By 16, she managed to escape and live on her own in the wasteland with the gained skill of gunners and raiders combined, although she’s not at all cynical. Bearing cat features, she jokes that she’s some kind if vault dweller experiment that escaped, and by adulthood she lives her life day by day collecting shiny trinkets and narrowly escaping trouble with maxed out charisma and luck above all else.

She’s got a German Shepard and a Mutant Hound as her dearest companions, and she’s made friends and family amongst a colony of mirelurks.

Life is gooood for this lucky little wastelander. When will her luck be cut short is the real question.

The Walking dead/ Zombie Verse- :V: Last Stand:

He wasn’t supposed to die.. It should’ve been her. She’s not well enough to be left alone with their children, but by God is she trying hard. For their sake to overcome her mental illness.

Rosie was a soldier before the world went to shit, and while she already had a few odd ticks through a rough childhood. She served her time within the military until being honorably discharged as her mental state grew increasingly restless, thus she returns to civilian life. She would later meet her husband, Rocky, a former combat medic and now a simple jazz musician, and with his help he brings her back to a normal level of functioning- in addition to her two service dogs, Sergeant and Major, who were her partners in the field as an officer.

The two would settle down together, even have a daughter named Mia, while she returns herself to duty serving the public as an officer and sometimes detective. At some point, an undercover case goes sour does result in her assault, and later the birth of her son, Thursday. She keeps him despite the strain, unable to part with him, and her husband was a fairly understanding man that still took the boy as his own.

In the outbreak of the apocalypse, Rosie’s returning paranoia proved to be a useful asset. While they had evacuated to a shelter, Rosie’s previous military experience left her restless at the thought of being sitting ducks in a flock of people, and convinced her husband to wrack up what they could for an escape. They did so with impeccable timing, hours before the shelter would be overrun. With both she and her husband’s military experience, surviving the apocalypse was manageable to an extent, until Rosie’s mental state begins to deteriorate once more. Rocky was the positivity and foundation that kept the family going despite the grim world they now lived in, and he did his best to keep the moral high for his wife and kids. In his death, their world was further turned on his head with Rosie being the only caretaker alone, having not been on her own since she met her husband over 8 years before. She struggles to handle herself, living on raw soldier’s instinct while battling insomnia, dissociation, and depression for the sake of keeping the bloody world lighter her kids, as their father would have done.

While Mia, at 8 years old, carries on with the same optimism as her father instilled in her despite the heartbreak of his death

Thursday, at 6 years old, has not spoken in months since the incident.

Berserk- :V: Berserk:

Falling into the world was a mistake.

One second, she was fighting a war, and in another she found her body ripped apart by overwhelming emotions and grief, before she awoke on the ground in some unknown place. Her last memories was holding her murdered son.. Her abilities, still in the works of being controlled and easily swayed by emotion, has dropped her into the middle ages far from the world and time she called her own.

Disoriented, confused, unnerved, and desperate to find out just where she is, the fallen angels wanders aimlessly through midland for any kind of answers. And a way to return home to where her family still resides. Hoping for the best with the unknown fate of the world she fell away from.

Marvel- :V: Marvel:

A generic tag for any interaction within the marvel verse and muses. I often clash my own lore into it, just to keep things interesting. I Usually take up Rosie having her powers, and thus is a single mother of 2 while managing her ’Angel Project’

Modern- :V: Modern:

Main verse storyline with my own original world. The bio written corresponds to this verse, but an adaption of ity still consist of Rosie serving formally in military before becoming a cop in the big city. Using her authority and her well built reputation to work in the shadows and serve her own agenda, while keeping a warm, friendly, and professional public facade.

:V: Fate can be kind:

(Marvel Based, singleship with @osteum)

Upon coming to New York, Rosie has been in the city for months, and already she finds herself in a dilemma. The shift from a small town deputy in a a remote Tennessee town is a big change, however with no one else to occupy her time at home by caring for, she drowns herself in cases in hopes of building a reputation. With a shortage in trails to follow, with some research she decides to track down an old infamous journalist from years before who could help her out- Eddie Brock. Man was an old criminal, but he could write one hell of story. She had a fair deal to offer in exchange, and while the intention initially was with pure professionalism

Things do not always go as planned.

[ This verse is open to any involvement. One can ask questions on Eddie or events, and it will all be happily answers. I wouldn’t mind getting s big group started! ]

Open Original verses:

:V: Little Moon:

Taking place in the years before Rosie became human, these are the ages of innocence as a Moon Guardian naive to the true evils of the world. She is curious, kind, rather eager for relief from her solitude.

:V: Soldier born from the ashes:

Taking place in her years after leaving the Calvary, her 20s are spent taking care of a monster woman

who survives off the raw blood and flesh of humans. The first time she’s ever been truly living alone without the guidance of an older person or her military ideals, the adjustment is hard as she lives a life of lies in order to keep the past of she and the monster woman a secret. She starts her career as a cop in a small town in Tennessee, and begins building her reputation here.

In this stage, to cope with the drastic change and overwhelming guilt of lies and murderer piled upon each other, she suffers from sociopathic tendencies and an identity crisis. You may come to find that the sweet shy officer is not the same person behind closed doors.

:V: No Place like Home:

An alternate ending of Iniquitous Essence verse, the world has reset itself- and it’s Hell on earth. In the war between the heavens and Hell, it was the demonic to be the victors, with their Queen undefeated and unstoppable. Rosie had given herself to servitude of this Queen, once her sympathetic friend, in order to spare the remnants of her friends, family, and humanity

And in 7 years, the earth was left to prepare for their return. Though with more of ¾ of the human population vanquished, no matter what they did, they were unprepared.

Angels who fought the battle were bound to the earth, their wings ripped from them, and the gates to heaven sealed to keep the evils out. Demons now rule the lands, prowling predators, regions divided under the rule of arch demons, for as long as the Queen lives there will be no peace, for this is her ideals of justice. It’s a dog eat dog world, and the only stand for humans are the former earth angels who formed a rebellion.

After years of servitude as a general to the armies and as a warden to check on arch demond, Rosie breaks away from the Queen to search for her children she had to leave behind in order to spare them. With new knowledge to the death of the Queen, she travels the land in search of the rebels where she knows her children would have been part of, bearing a mask to hide one of the most hated recognizable faces in the world.

And by God, she hopes she can be forgiven.

:V: The Widow:

In the 1960s, it is an era of change to the world.

Rosie is a simple woman. A widow to a rich husband inherits his wealth after a tragic murder, when a lunatic broke into their home, beat the wife, and stabbed her husband to death with a broken wine bottle! Him and his friendly affair in the kitchen, what a story it made! Or the story they believed

Now the lovely widow finds comfort in her book club, a group of ladies she runs to pick out the stories of unfaithful husbands and wives with just the right price to send a cleanup crew to change the story.

By day, Rosie is the secretary to a multimillionaire businessman man named Jacob Alvin McCool, with whom she shares to trades of her husband with, and receives ¾ of the profit. His special cat doll to assure all business is going well, at all levels- both legal and illegal. At the evening she runs her hit man book club,using the unrest of society and other unlady like methods to keep it under wraps.

She has been nicknamed the Whore Widow

:V: Letters from War:

Set in the midst of WW2, there is more to war than just the fight amongst nations and radical ideals. Rosie is an American agent working in europe in a government branch which specializes in rescuing supernatural being like Vampires, Werewolves, and other immortals from the casualties of wars to keep their existence hidden from the clutches of the axis powers. She fights for a future for her daughter, for a world not divided by colors or by species.

:V: Mother to Monsters:

With @doctor-2-insane-andfriends

A combination between the lore of I and a friend of mine, Rosie - Release from the bindings which keep her trapped to her human body - mistakenly befriends a eldritch being whom she discovers travels across dimensions and galaxies spreading the ideals of The Void , speeding chaos and unrest through teaching which force beings to join the ranks of fear eaters in their conquest of domination.

Upon later understanding, she discovers the roots of these unholy creatures exist on the outer edge of the galaxy where a Moon much older than she no longer existed. A Moon who, much like her, had her own mind to show her worth through action rather than at a single post. Upon the revelation that the murder of that Moon had created the state of these poor fear eaters, the younger Lady Moon makes it her mission to pick up where her sister had left off. Taking on another portion do a galaxy to correct the methods of these creatures in a more productive manner,

To become the mother that had been lost before.

It is a long road ahead to fixing such a race in turmoil..

This verse is based absolutely on original lore of both myself and Lucas mun. If one has any questions on Fear Eaters or Moons, please ask us! It is open world and open to all sorts of interactions

#mobile: verses #short cut the mobile list #the longer list of my other twenty-something verses is on the main page to check out #i love all me partners so much..#thank u for reading

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ooachilliaoo · 6 years

Text

Tough Kid

Tough kid, he thinks.

Can’t help but think it. She’s a scrawny little thing, covered in scrapes and bruises and dirt and blood and she’s shaking like a leaf…

But the pistol she’s pointing squarely at his chest is utterly, utterly still.

Around her there are four bodies. Two humans, one man, one woman, and two batarians, both male. The humans lie on their backs their hands carefully laid across their stomachs, their eyes closed, so peaceful that they could almost be sleeping, but for the holes in their heads. By contrast, the batarians appear to have been left where they fell, their bodies twisted, limbs flung out at odd, awkward angles. All eight eyes are open, staring blankly at nothing.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened.

“It’s ok,” he says softly, using his best ‘soothing’ voice. “You’re ok now.”

“Who are you?” the girl barks and she’s still shaking, but there’s something hard and fiery in her eyes that both impresses the hell out of him and makes him cautious.

“My name is Commander Anderson,” he says slowly, carefully laying his rifle on the floor. “I’m Alliance, see?” He half turns away from her, tapping the insignia on his shoulder.

Slowly she lowers the pistol.

“You’re too late,” she says, her voice now small and unsure as her eyes flicker unseeing across the four bodies before her.

“I know,” he replies and God, they had been late, too late. The dead civilians told him that, the swathes of missing civilians told him even more. “But we’re here now, and we’re going to keep you safe.”

She nods but doesn’t meet his eyes and she still looks doubtful. Given what she must have been though recently he can’t exactly blame her for that.

It takes him a long while to coax her out from behind the couch where she seems to have made her refuge but eventually she does emerge. He doesn’t miss the fact that she chooses to walk the long way around, the route that has her stepping over the batarian bodies instead of the human ones. She won’t relinquish the pistol, no matter what he says and as they walk through the wreckage of what must once have been her home he senses the tension in her, sees the way her eyes dart about frantically, expecting danger at every turn.

“How old are you, kid?” he asks, attempting small talk in the hopes of taking her mind off her nervousness, particularly important while she still holds the pistol with her finger on the trigger.

“Sixteen,” she replies, her voice now strong and sure. “And I’m not a ‘kid’.”

Anderson smiles despite himself and decides to take a gamble.

“Hey,” he says, stopping amidst the carnage and reaching over to reposition her fingers on the pistol. “Keep your finger off the trigger till you’re looking at something you want to kill. It’s a good way to accidently shoot yourself otherwise.”

She looks at the gun, confused for a moment before moving her index finger from where he’d placed it, to the trigger and back again. Then she nods.

“Thanks,” she says plainly.

“You’re welcome.”

They continue walking and as they do he feels the shift in her, the subtle change from nervousness to alertness. By the time they reach the forward operating base he’s virtually stopped checking his three and six, because he knows she’s got that covered.

Her stomach gives a loud growl just as they pass the perimeter and it’s then he discovers that she hasn’t eaten a single bite in the last twelve hours. He marches her straight to the mess and, apologising for the lack of any kind of flavour, he dumps a tray in front of her. She only picks at the food with one hand, still unwilling to release the pistol, but she hasn’t once put her finger on the trigger since he moved it so he’s inclined to trust her with it, at least for now.

“What’s your name kid?” he asks, once he’s seen her eat a couple of mouthfuls.

“Sarah,” she replies. “Sarah Shepard.”

“Do you want to tell me what happened, Sarah?” he asks gently. He expects her to say no, he expects her to stop meeting his eyes.

She does neither. Instead she just shrugs.

“They killed my parents,” she says and there’s something horribly dead in her eyes. “So I took Dad’s pistol and killed them back.”

“That was very brave,” he tells her and after a little introspection is unsurprised to discover he means every word.

She shrugs again.

“I was just trying to survive.”

Tough kid, he thinks.

There aren’t many nineteen year olds, fresh out of basic (or rather, almost out of basic) who can take that kind of dressing down. Hell, he still considers it a personal failure if he can’t make at least one member of each crew he captains metaphorically wet their pants at least once. But she’s almost serene as she takes the verbal assault she both deserves and doesn’t deserve.

No-one has ever beaten the end-of-basic-training sim.

Or rather.

Before today, no-one had ever beaten the end-of-basic-training sim.

But then again, no-one had ever managed to kill their entire team and utterly destroy the power plant either.

He didn’t mean to be here. Or rather, he hadn’t intended to be here. His ship was docked at Arcturus for yearly maintenance and the walk back from his meeting with the admiralty board to his quarters just so happened to lead through recruit barracks. He’d heard the noise coming from the sim chamber as he passed and had glanced up at the board of names on reflex only to find that there, next to the title ‘Squad Leader’, was her name. Of course, he hadn’t been able to resist the chance to see her in action.

Once he’d entered the chamber, recognising the corridors of the ‘power plant’ mission from his own passing-out sim, he’d had no trouble believing that the soldier he saw was the same girl from nearly four years ago. He’d watched as she barked orders to her team, watched as they obeyed her without question.

That was the first unusual thing. Never, in all his years of service, had he seen a basic training squad without at least one uppity legacy child who believed they should have been squad leader and therefore questioned everything that the chosen leader said whether there was any merit in it or not.

But no-one gave her even so as much as a funny look.

The second unusual thing were her tactics. Her team was spread thin, way too thin. There were two ways that recruits tackled this particular sim; two ways that they were surreptitiously taught to tackle the sim. You either moved together and made a beeline for the data you had to send to Alliance Command or, you split into smaller teams, checked the building, kept an exit clear then went for the data. Both had advantages and disadvantages. The twist came when the nuclear reactor began to overload, blocking access to the data and forcing you to spend valuable time containing the reaction. Victory was usually measured in one of two ways, either you got your team out alive or you got half your team out alive and killed all contacts within the building.

She had done neither… unless, he supposed, you considered that the explosion would have killed all remaining contacts.

But, somehow, she achieved the actual objective and got the data.

From the beginning of the sim, she’d split her team into pairs rather than the usual three person squad. This had left three teams without an engineer but had given her an engineering team which she’d sent to clear the reactor. The three teams without technical expertise had twice come up against a door they couldn’t open and been forced to double back to find an alternative route. Since there wasn’t one, they found themselves unfortunately boxed in when the enemy hit and by the time Shepard had ordered them to just ‘blow the damn doors!’ they were already dead.

From there, the enemy swept through the building in a group too large for any two-person squad to handle and so, one by one, her teams died (though not without giving a damn good fight first). Everything had looked bleak until the engineering squad had managed to warn Shepard about the upcoming overload five minutes before it happened. She’d ordered them to leave it, to let the reactor overload. Then she’d ordered everyone out. To be fair to her team a few of them almost made it.

As soon as she’d barked the order to evac, she’d taken off like a shot. He’d never seen anything like it; nothing touched her as she barrelled through the power plant, leaping and bounding over cover, shooting as she moved, never stopping until she got to the data console. Then she’d held out, alone, for a minute and a half before the programmed collapse happened and she was left trapped in with the data console.

She’d sent the data to Alliance Command a full three minutes before the reactor blew.

The sim debrief has been going on for half an hour, and the drill sergeant is still bawling about ‘reckless behaviour’ and ‘unnecessary loss of life’ mixed in with ‘squad configuration protocol’ and the obligatory unfavourable comparisons of her to various bug or bug-like creatures.

“ARE YOU AWARE OF JUST HOW BADLY YOU HAVE FUCKED UP CADET?” he finishes, finally allowing her to respond.

“SIR, YES, SIR!” she responds automatically, standing stiffly at parade rest and staring at a spot somewhere over the sergeant’s left shoulder. “But…” she adds, just as the sergeant takes the breath necessary to being his tirade anew. “It was mission accomplished, sir, the data was sent.”

“Only because you have a staggering disregard for your squad’s life!” he barks back.

“Yes, sir,” she agrees. “But according to the mission brief the data contained in the package will power four colonies. Approximately fifteen point four colonists die per colony per year due to insufficient power, sir. I have just saved sixty one point six civilian lives at the expense of twelve soldiers. Sir.”

The room goes deadly quiet. He’s fairly certain no-one is breathing. In fact, he isn’t even sure he’s breathing.

Eventually the drill instructor lets out a whoosh of breath. “I don’t know whether you’re the worst soldier I’ve ever trained, or the best.” He pauses for an almost uncomfortably long time before continuing. “You pass. But you’re doing fifty laps around the mess and then after that, I’m buying you a drink.”

“Understood, sir.”

It’s as her squad are filtering out of the sim room that she spots him. When she does she immediately straightens to attention. He wonders whether it’s a reaction to the officer’s bars on his jacket or a mark of respect.

“Sir,” she says with a mixture of surprise and wariness. “I didn’t know you were here.”

“Sir?” A smile quirks his lips. “Don’t tell me you’re going all formal on me?”

She relaxes immediately.

“It’s good to see you, Anderson,” she says instead, coming to lean on the viewing gallery’s rail next to him.

“And you, kid,” he replies, fully aware of how genuinely he means those words. “That was an… interesting sim.”

Immediately the wariness comes back into her eyes and she stiffens ever so slightly.

“I did what I thought was best.” She pauses. “What did you do?”

“Me?” he chuckles. “I used the standard three-man configuration, lost the data, saved the team. But… if I’d thought to do what you did, if I’ve have had the courage, I might have done the same.”

She seems inordinately pleased at that, even though it’s only the truth and relaxes a little more.

“Come on,” he says, once he thinks she’s had enough of a moment overlooking her victory. “You have laps and then I might just owe you a drink as well.”

She grins and straightens what must be a weary, aching body. “Understood, sir.” She rolls her left shoulder in its joint and marches out towards the mess.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

It is her, even if her face is mostly covered in her own blood and completely unrecognisable, he could never mistake those eyes.

She’s sat on a makeshift hospital gurney that’s really a surfboard balanced on a box and covered with a blanket. A frustrated-looking nurse darts around her, attempting to clean and dress the wounds on both her face and body. She’s somewhat hampered in the endeavour by Shepard herself who seems intent on impatiently brushing her hands away whenever she gets close.

“For the last time, I’m fine,” she spits, batting the nurse’s hands away from an injury over her eye. “I can stand and I can breathe. I have no internal bleeding or life threatening injuries, perhaps you should attend to those who do!” She rushes out the last word as she’s forced to leap off the surfboard in order to avoid the nurse’s ‘sneak attack’ on a particularly nasty looking gash on her side.

“And my report said the fighting was over,” he comments calmly as he enters the room. His words produce the desired effect, she immediately ceases her efforts to evade the nurse and stiffens before spinning around and saluting.

“Sir,” she barks, standing perfectly to attention despite the many injuries he can now see.

He didn’t reply, just gave her the look, the one that reminds her she doesn’t need to be formal with him. She drops her stance almost immediately.

“Anderson.” She nods.

“Give us a minute,” he says to the nurse. She shoots him an impressively dirty look, her eyes darting to Shepard’s injuries in frustration before leaving with an unmistakable air of ‘your funeral’.

“Making friends I see,” he comments sarcastically.

“There are others who need her more,” Shepard bristles.

“Easy, Shepard, I understand,” he replies soothingly and she relaxes a little. It’s only the slightest easing but he understands that too. Most soldiers wouldn’t have survived what she just has. Frankly, he’d be worried if she were capable of completely relaxing after such an ordeal.

Hell, if she accepts what he’s come to offer her she probably won’t be able to relax for years.

But she’s ready for it. He’s almost certain of that; he just needs to be sure of one thing.

“So, batarian raiders on a human colony…”

“It wasn’t revenge,” she interrupts. He’s a little surprised that she’s worked out his angle but he supposes he shouldn’t be. She’s smart and he wasn’t exactly subtle.

“Are you sure?”

She leans against the makeshift gurney, chewing her lip as she gives the matter the introspection it deserves.

“I didn’t kill unless I had to,” she says after a moment. “I didn’t take uncalculated risks. My past was a factor, I didn’t want anyone to have to go through what I did, but it wasn’t one that adversely affected the mission, sir.”

She sounds like she’s reading out loud. Like she’s already considered the matter, maybe even drafted her mission report, but thought about it in more depth simply because he’d asked.

And that’s good enough for him.

“You know your mission was technically to try and enjoy some shore leave,” he tells her, leaning against the gurney too.

“Right,” she says, the ghost of a smile appearing on her face. “I abandoned that mission when the batarians destroyed the bar.”

Anderson nods. “Fair enough.” He waits for a moment, giving her the time and space she needs in order to pull herself away from the memories of the past few days. “I have something for you.”

He pulls a datapad from his back pocket, and she takes it from his outstretched arm, shooting him a confused look that he doesn’t respond to. She reads the first part; the ‘Star of Terra’ recommendation, the long winded but somehow horribly generic ‘thanks for her service above and beyond the call of duty’ with a bored but curious look. Then her eyes go wide and he knows she’s reached the important bit.

“N7?” she says, too excited to hide her delight. “I’m being recommended for the N7 programme?”

He shrugs. “You earned it. More than earned it. That’s why I recommended you.”

It’s clear that she’s having trouble processing that and once again he gives her space she needs.

“When do I report in?” she asks.

She’s still bleeding, just a little, countless numbers of scrapes and bruises all over her body which still need seeing to, not to mention that she still hasn’t really had the shore leave due from her last tour, and yet, somehow she’s prepared to dive into the next thing without hesitation.

Tough kid, he thinks even as he orders her to take the break… tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

To be fair, they’re all tough, she’s just the toughest.

He knows this because she’s the only one left standing, even if her oxygen tank is on its last legs

This time he had intended to be here. In fact, he’d gone out of his way to be here for this. He’d been keeping up with her scores, every single one of them. For the most part they had been exemplary, her shooting, tactics, leadership, and recon scores were virtually off the charts, even if she’d barely scraped by on tech and engineering. Still, her average was way above par, and now it all came down to this. To survival.

She’s the only one left on the asteroid now, but of course she doesn’t know that. He half-wishes he could tell her, just to see if it had any effect on her determination to continue. He suspects it wouldn’t. In fact, he’d bet good money that even if she knew she’d outlasted all her other classmates she’d go on just to see how far she could go.

The others have already been safely extracted. Despite what people thought, the Alliance didn’t let soldiers good enough to be recommended for the N7 programme die during the training.

This particular test was both the first and last taste of N7 training. The entire squad dropped onto an asteroid with an absolute bare minimum of supplies, a single oxygen tank and no nav data. The aim? To traverse as much of the asteroid as possible before you suffocated.

There were a multitude of things you could do to extend what little time you had, but in the end it all came down to endurance and control.

The last of her classmates to fall had been picked up about three to four minutes ago and are still in the infirmary being treated for oxygen deprivation. The first are already in the training centre alongside him, watching with a mixture of disbelief, envy and pride.

After another minute or so, he watches as her tank’s warning alarm changes from an incessant beeping to a high pitched continuous whine. A few seconds after he sees the tell-tale tightening of her jaw as she holds her breath. Three minutes later, she begins gasping but it’s still another full minute before she collapses and even then for four seconds more she manages to drag herself a few millimetres further.

He watches with bated breath as the drone speeds across the terrain and attaches its respirator to her helmet. Then the shuttle arrives and the medics bundle her onto a gurney and bring her back to the base.

He sits beside her as she recovers, watching for the moment her eyes slowly blink open.

“Hey,” he says when they do. She only blinks at him her gaze still foggy as she glances around the room and pieces together the chain of events that led her here. Slowly she lifts the respirator mask away from her mouth just barely able to summon the strength to drag it down.

“Sir,” she croaks, wincing at the sound.

“No need to be so formal, Shepard.”

She smirks. “Anderson.”

“Better.”

“How… How did I do?” He knows that the pause is due to the effort it takes to form the words and not because of any trepidation on her part.

“Last one standing.” He’s completely unable to stop himself from grinning at her.

But she shakes her head, tousling her hair against the pillow. “No,” she clarifies. “How did I do compared to last time?”

He has to actually look that one up, checking her time from the beginning of her N7 training against her latest time on his omni-tool.

“An extra 5 minutes,” he tells her, trying his best to conceal the fact that while all her scores had been exemplary, this is the one that actually impresses the hell of him. “You were only a little shy of the record.”

She frowns. “Damn. Whose record?”

He grins.

“Mine.”

He steps out of the way of the incoming medics who promptly usher him out of her room. Just before he closes the door, he catches one last croaky sentence.

“I’ll get you next time, sir.”

He chuckles to himself.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

Of course she’s fine. Well, ‘fine’ might be stretching it, but conscious enough to stand and gripe at Chakwas was close enough for him.

All things considered it’s been a hell of a shakedown cruise.

That she’s handled it well is no surprise, after all it’s part of an N7’s job to adapt. She’d barely blinked at the Spectre nomination, which had surprised him a little. Especially since he knew she had no illusions about the historical importance of the nomination or the burdens that would come from making the grade. The fact that it hadn’t changed her approach to the mission one iota only reassured him that they’d chosen correctly.

Although of course her chances of actually becoming a Spectre are now somewhat reduced anyway.

But if anyone could cut through the bullshit, it’s her. She’s a natural leader, to the point that if she told him her management of the platoon was entirely based on instinct, he’d not only believe her but he’d happily let it continue.

His optimism ends the moment she mentions Saren’s name. It’s a name that drags up a whole host of unpleasant memories as well as the uneasy feeling that at some point he’s going to have to tell her about his personal history with the Spectre. It’s odd but he finds he doesn’t really want to, doesn’t want to admit that he screwed up, not to her. But he knows she isn’t going to buy any vague untruths.

For the moment it’s all a political problem that he can happily slide Udina’s way. He may not like the man but his ability to deal with the Council was something to be lauded. The idea of having to deal with the Council himself is almost enough to bring him out in hives.

He suspects that her opinion of politics doesn’t differ much from his own. But as they’re going to have to at least dabble in politics he can only pray that she’s as good at masking her disdain as he’s had to. Not that watching her punch her way through the politics wouldn’t be infinitely amusing. If that is to be her approach, at least he’ll have a front row seat.

All things considered, he should have known that their first mission together would end in some kind of explosion. After all this is a woman who turned shore leave into one of the most famous fights in recent years.

At least he knows that she can handle whatever’s coming.

Probably.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

He chuckles to himself as he shakes his head, laughing at his foolishness for even thinking that she could have perished. Not that those few minutes where he’d believed her gone hadn’t been utterly awful. He was sure he’d never forget the sinking feeling he’d felt in his gut when the only answer her squad could give to the question ‘where is the commander?’ was a horrified look.

But, of course, she was fine. There had been a flicker of movement, a shift and suddenly there she was, climbing atop of a random piece of wreckage to grin down at them. Granted, she looked a little pained, a little tired but she also looked gloriously victorious and utterly elated.

Not that she was looking at him, he realised. No. Instead her gaze appeared to be entirely fixated on the lieutenant. Glancing to his side, he noticed that the lieutenant’s gaze was just as fixed on her. The expression on his face was hard to read, a mixture of a multitude of things relief, joy and…

Oh.

So that had happened. Or was going to happen soon. He didn’t want to know. He didn’t need to know.

He wasn’t surprised as such. Not about ‘them’. There had been evidence of some spark between them from the moment they’d both been aboard. It had only taken him a week or so to notice the signs; she smiled more around him, he talked more to her than he did anyone else on the ship, there had been a certain synchronised rhythm to their duties and reports. He just hadn’t bothered to call her on it because he assumed she wouldn’t be stupid enough to pursue anything while they were on duty.

But, judging by the looks on their faces, something had had to have happened between them.

He ought to box her ears for it.

But that would mean admitting that he knew, which would probably lead to an awkward, halting conversation about feelings and love and (horror of horrors) possibly even sex.

Yes. No. He wasn’t going to touch that with a ten-foot barge pole. She was a smart woman, right? Right. She knew the dangers, knew how to compartmentalize.

She’d be fine. They’d be fine.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

But not tough enough… this time.

The information had come in stages. The first report said only that the Normandy had been attacked, had been shot down. The second had told him that the escape pods had jettisoned. He’d breathed easier after that. The third report was just a list of names. The fourth report said Shepard was MIA.

He hadn’t believed it. He’d assumed it would be like last time, in the Council Chamber. Like all the times she had come close to death and emerged victoriously from the clutches of whatever had threatened to destroy her. He just kept waiting for the report from the SSV York that said they’d found her alive and well.

Obviously that report had never arrived.

He still hadn’t really believed it until the moment the lieutenant stepped off the ship. When he did, one look at Alenko’s face had been all the proof he’d needed.

She was gone.

He was supposed to speak at her funeral. They wanted him to talk about what a hero she’d been, what a boon to humanity she was, recite her exemplary service record.

He’d declined the honour. Passed it to Hackett.

There were two reasons for that. One, he’d been fairly certain that he couldn’t deliver something as generic as they wanted, and anything that wasn’t that generic garbage would be more detail than she’d want him to share, Two, he didn’t want to be stood up there, alone, with the empty coffin, trying to hide his grief and failing.

No, he much preferred to be sat, in the stands, beside the only person who felt her loss in almost the same way he did.

The lieutenant has barely spoken since he returned, and there’s been a horrible dead look behind his eyes. She would have boxed his ears for it, but he does nothing. It helps, being with someone who understands what it feels like. Someone who had also lost something important, even if one of them lost a lover and one of them lost a… whatever she’d been.

Somebody (he thinks it might, somewhat hilariously, have even been Saren Arterius) had referred to her as his protégé. He was right, in a way. She had been that, but so much more. He’s not entirely sure he could define it even if he tried.

He struggles with his grief for several weeks after the funeral, piecing himself back together in the way he’s had to do far too many times. After a month or so he feels well enough to check on the lieutenant. As he’d expected, the man is utterly destroyed. Then they drink whiskey and share their stories about her and after they are both a little better.

He promises her that he’ll look after her protégé, her lover. Both because he’s a talented marine and because he’s the only man she ever gave the entirety of herself to. Even if he’d never asked her about it, he’d known enough to know just what Alenko had meant to her.

“I’ll look after him, kid,” he tells her headstone.

Tough kid, he thinks as he remembers her on the first anniversary of her death.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

He watches the security feed, the secret, secured feed that he’d only been given because the title on his office door says ‘Human Councillor’ these days. The footage wasn’t much, just a back street in Omega somewhere, but the figure walking down the street is unmistakably her.

Or, perhaps, a damn good lookalike.

After a moment’s introspection he decides that, as unlikely as it is, he wouldn’t be utterly surprised to find that she’d cheated death. She’d always been capable of the impossible, and while coming back from the dead is perhaps a step above saving the entire galaxy, it’s not so great a leap that he could dismiss the possibility that this could somehow be the real Shepard.

But he also can’t dismiss the possibility that it isn’t.

Especially because the Shepard he knew would never work for Cerberus.

He scrubs a hand over tired eyes (always tired these days) and wonders what the hell he’s going to do about it all. Just thinking about it is enough to make him long for the days when all his problems could be solved with a rifle or a fist.

Of course, thanks to her, those days are probably long behind him, at least until the Reapers roll through. Some days he thinks they can’t come soon enough.

Wait… is he looking forward to the Reaper invasion?

Short answer?

Yes.

If it means the solution to all his problems can be easily found at the end of a rifle he’d take just about anything right now.

He’s avoiding the issue.

The only thing that he can decide upon right now is that he can’t possibly decide right now. At least not until he’s given her the chance to explain. He owes her that much.

He keeps the feed running on his terminal and uses a nearby datapad to type the message to her ship. He’s about halfway through when a shout and a thud draws his attention back to the terminal. Just in time to see her turn from the bar and unabashedly deck a batarian with her incredible right hook.

He tries not to smile, even though he knows she can’t see him. It’s good to see that some things haven’t changed.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

The moniker has never been more appropriate or more perfect because today she managed to do what he couldn’t.

She managed to leave Earth to save it.

And he couldn’t.

He’d planned to. He’d set up the Normandy as his mobile command base and had drawn up an excessive number of extraction plans to make sure he could get to it, no matter where the Reapers hit.

But somehow, when he’d been stood before the ramp he just couldn’t bring himself to make the leap.

He supposes that the guilt, guilt he knows she doesn’t carry, played a huge part in what is possibly the most snap, instinctual decision he’s ever made. In his heart of hearts he knows he should have done more to prepare for this day, this horrible tragic day that had loomed on the horizon for the past three years.

But the relative peace and safety of the Citadel, the Council’s constant focus on the day-to-day minutia, had made today’s death and devastation hard to imagine. Or, if not hard to imagine, at least hard to keep in his mind. He’d be lying if he said that it hadn’t made him a little bit lazy, and even in his worse moments, a little bit doubtful too.

He isn’t sure how, because the gunfire, explosions and whatever the hell noise it is the Reapers make ought to make hearing anything else impossible but, as he dives for cover under the nearest pile of wreckage, he swears he hears Normandy’s engines sputter to life over the cacophony.

His ship, leaving Earth without him.

And it is his ship. She might be forever linked to Shepard in the mind of everyone else in the galaxy, but he still remembers the moment Admiral Wright had said the magical words ‘she’s yours’ as they stood on the bridge of the SR1.

At least this time it’s his choice to stay behind.

Even if it means he’s once again letting the fate of the galaxy sit squarely on her shoulders while he does the busy work.

But that’s okay, she can handle it.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

She’s a tough kid, she’ll make it through this.

It’s what he tells himself but for the first time he isn’t totally sure. He can’t remember the last time he’d actually had to school her, talk to her as if she were like any other marine. But she’d needed that from him today. By God, she really had.

He can’t recall her ever losing before.

Sure, unfortunate situations had arisen in her time: Elysium, Eden Prime, Virmire, Alchera, not to mention all the others along the way even before then. It’s part of being a soldier, the inevitable price of battle.

But she’s never outright lost before.

Never come through something with only the loss to show for it.

It’s killing her. One look at her face had told him that, so obvious that it had even been visible over the grainy, patchy QEC interface that was the best he could get in war-torn London.

There were a lot of things he wished he could tell her. Most of all, he wished he could show her what her actions meant here on the front line.

The news that the legendary Commander Shepard had brokered an alliance between the Turians and Krogan had been met initially with cheers and smiles. But it was more than that. For weeks afterwards, the men had walked a little taller, smiled a little more and complained a little less. With news of every new victory, every triumph, things got a little brighter. Hope was a powerful thing and she’d been its champion throughout this whole ugly war.

At least until now.

Losing Thessia was a blow, no two ways about that, but it was a blow that could either extinguish hope or light the fires of vengeance.

It had to be the latter.

However, he wasn’t sure she had anything left.

All things considered, he was extremely worried about her. They’d had precious few chances to talk, but back before the war she’d made some off handed sarcastic comment about the whole ‘dying’ thing and he’d realised just how little time she’d had to process everything.

If she’d been a marine in a coma, she’d have had at least six months of physical and psychological therapy followed by a slow introduction to the rest of the world, and help reconnecting with friends, family and loved ones. There would have been follow-ups and counselling and she wouldn’t have been placed in any stressful situations until the Alliance were certain she could cope with them.

Instead she’d been thrown into combat from the moment she woke, then into a suicide mission, into the courtroom, and finally, into the war.

He’s pretty sure that the box of things marked ‘deal with later’ that all good soldiers keep at back of their minds is all-but full in her case.

He isn’t sure that there’s room for Thessia in that box.

He wants to tell her that he understands, that everything she’s already done is enough and no-one, not even him has the right to ask anything more of her.

But that isn’t what she needs.

“Shake this off, Shepard,” he says.

The change in her is slight, but instantaneous. She stands a little straighter, squares her shoulders and nods. “I will.”

And he believes it.

Tough kid.

Tough kid, he thinks.

He’s fully aware that this is probably the last time he’ll think it. Probably the last time he’ll think anything. He’s dying, but that’s ok. He doesn’t blame her for the shot, not at all.

He’s going to pass out before she does, if she even passes out at all. Tough kid.

At least he got to tell her she’s made him proud. Somehow, while the galaxy is ablaze before them, that’s important.

It takes a gargantuan effort to lift his head enough to see her out of the corner of his eye and maybe it’s the blood loss, maybe it’s the exhaustion, he isn’t sure - but for just a moment she almost looks like that trembling sixteen year old with the perfectly still pistol.

“Stay with me, sir,” she’s saying, but her voice is so distant and indistinct he can barely hear the words. “We’re… We’re almost through this.”

But the void is calling and it seems like too much to ask of his broken body, broken spirit to resist it.

She’ll survive. He’s certain of that.

Tough kid.

Tough…

#n7day #ten7 #Happy N7 Day!#Commander Shepard #Anderson #Space dad #fanfic #lil' bit Shenko #I've been working on this for a year!

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poweredbycoffeeandwine · 7 years

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I Don’t Mean To: Part II

Hello Lovelies!! Yes, I finally got around to finishing the next chapter. Hope you enjoy it! Features my Tavrien Shepard and Kaidan Alenko after Virmire. Here is Part 1, just in case you are interested.

Kaidan Alenko x Commander Shepard - Pre-Romance - ME:1

Part II:

Her hands continued to shake. Her mind swirled. Rage, disbelief and bone-deep sorrow threatened to steal her breath. Tavrien stared at her console, red rimmed eyes causing the screen to blur. She didn’t know how long she had been crying, or when she had begun. She only knew that one of her best friends had needed her, and she had left her to the wolves.

She gulped her cold coffee grasping at words to voice her feelings. How did one go about telling a mom her child had died? The Williams family had to know just how important and vital their daughter, sister, loved one was but she had nothing. Obviously they knew how special she was, but what could she say to them that could possibly make amends? They would rather have Ash than her flowery words on a cold letter. A better leader would have brought the whole team back, not hollow words of condolences.

After the mission, Kirrahe had taken her aside and offered her words of comfort for her lost soldier. Things like, “she fought bravely,” and “she died a hero,” only made her furious. Now the Alliance expected her to send the same rubbish to a beautiful family--one that already lost a father in the line of duty. Shepard choked, “Oh god,” bile rising in her throat, “can I even do this?” Her chair scraped against the floor, sound grating. She grabbed her Blasto coffee mug, fleeing her quarters and the cursor blinking on the blank page.

The Normandy crew milled about, restless, speaking in muted whispers as she walked. The air heavy with grief and stifled tears. Tavrien knew she couldn't let the pain and utter despair she felt show. The crew looked to her for guidance, more so during the difficult times, and this was by far the worst the crew had experienced. Ashley was the soul of the ship, vibrant and energetic. She felt as though she had lost a sister, and she felt the sorrow wrapping around her, making the tears harder to fight. Inattention lead her wandering feet back to the one place she knew she had to return to, but had been avoiding.

Kaidan would want to talk about the decision she made. However difficult, she knew it had to be done. With a shuddering sigh, she walked through the door into the darkened room. The lowered temperature caused her to shiver. Her eyes adjusted to the dark as she quietly made her way to the bed he occupied. He was sleeping, brows creased ever so slightly, a grimace set on his lips. Her hand reached for his hair, but she snatched it back before she touched him as if shocked. The desire to sweep hair away from his forehead had been so strong.

Instead she turned and grabbed a blanket off a nearby cot; wrapping it around her shoulders as she settled into a chair. She refused to wake him because he needed sleep. The guilt gnawing at her heart was too much, and seeing the emotion reflected at her through Kaidan's eyes would be torture. Tavrien forced herself to practice her breathing, mentally tuck these feelings in a box, and shove it away.

She glanced at Alenko, and for what had to be the millionth time, marveled at him. In battle, she couldn’t help being impressed with his calm demeanor. He was everything she wished she could be. Analytical, intelligent, he never did a thing without processing and seeing the situation from every angle. She knew what he had endured, all of the weight he carried to become the man he was. She often wondered if she could pay that price and remain half as decent.

Yes, she was hailed as the Hero of Elysium, but she certainly hadn't been the only one fighting. Desperate civilians answered the call for help, countless died fighting for their homes. The battle had been nothing short of a bloody disaster. She willingly sacrificed lives for the textbook definition of the “greater good.” She felt like a fraud when someone admired her with eyes full, glowing with hero worship. Tavrien forced herself to look the other way when the smoke cleared and blood washed away. The Alliance decided to market her as the perfect poster-child. Suited for the limelight. Hell, she had been groomed for itl her whole life. Hannah Shepard surrounded her daughter with the best tutors and military strategists the moment she had expressed interest in following her mother’s footsteps.

Tavrien continued her watch over Kaidan through the long hours of the sleep cycle. Any chance to rest was elusive and her thoughts strayed to the man lying on the cot nearby. Would he hate her when he woke? Blame her for the death of a comrade-in-arms and dear friend. Would he ask to be transferred off the Normandy? She wouldn’t fight him if he decided he couldn’t stay. It would destroy her to let him go, but she had no hold on him. Minutes or hours passed, Shepard didn’t know how long she sat wrapped in the rough blanket. Awareness crept across her skin and she knew for some time he had been watching her. Gritty eyes dragged to him, afraid of what she would find.

“Why?” HIs voice cracked, whether from disuse or emotion, she could not tell, “Why did you do it? You should have left me, Shepard.”

Tavrien spoke softly, wondering who she was trying to convince, “No. Our primary objective was the destruction of that facility. You were arming the nuke. You were with that bomb because you have the skills required.”

“That’s not fair.”

Shepard silenced him with a dark look and continued, “You are a very capable Biotic. The strongest I’ve ever worked with. You were higher ranking and the most damned logical choice by all the books ever written. Any commander would have chosen you!” her voice echoed through the med bay. She hated feeling defensive, she knew she had let her feelings get in the way.

“So, I was rescued because I was the most logical choice? What about Ash, she was your friend! Don’t you care at all? She looked up to you, and I am sure she didn’t expect you to leave her behind like some grunt nobody!” His chest heaved, biotics barely checked in his rage.

Shepard stood, shocked at the accusation in his tone. She wanted to cry, to run and hide. Whatever she had imagined, this was infinitely worse. In a hoarse whisper attempting to hide the hurt, she replied, “I made a decision, Kaidan. Me.” Suddenly she was tired of being questioned, and she took a step closer to him. She stabbed her finger into his t-shirt clad chest, and angrily moved on. “There was nobody else to ask. I was on the fly. I didn’t have time to decide which soldier was most valuable to my operation, I was leaving one of my friends to die with an armed bomb counting down the seconds!”

“No, Shepard,” Kaidan sat up, legs swinging over the side of the bed, and rubbed his temples, “If I had just done my damn job, you wouldn’t have had to make that choice. Ash would still be with us.” His shoulders drooped, and his head fell in defeat.

The sight of him slumped over taking more of the blame than he had a right to pissed Shepard off. How dare he try to diminish her role in the way things played out! She glared at him, a furious fire glinting in her blue eyes. “That is enough!” she roared. “Ashley’s death is on Saren’s hands. He is hell bent on destroying everything we know and love along with these Reapers. He is a mad man, and there is no way to convince him to give us a chance. To fight. We didn’t kill Ashley, he did.” Her palm slapped against the mattress near his leg and gripped the stiff blanket in her fist.

The silence stretched; growing a life of it’s own. She cursed the tears finding their way down her cheeks. She felt weak, and betrayed by her own body. She was more upset that when his warm hand settled over hers, she would have given anything to throw herself in his arms. She would sacrifice a lot more than her career to have him hold her, and tell her that everything would be ok. How selfish and undeserving she felt, her friend was dead, and here she was taking advantage of Kaidan’s grief. “Don’t,” broken and bitter, she pulled her hand away from the comfort he gave.

“Shepard, I’m gr...grateful that I am here. I know it doesn’t seem that way, but I am. You chose to save me, and because of that decision I can fight another day. Still, I have to know…” He paused, rubbed his neck where his implant rested, took a breath and slowly let it out, “Did Ash die because of me? Because of us?”

There it was, out in the open, and Shepard didn’t know whether she should be glad or vomit on the shining med bay floor. How could she be so stupid? Of course Kaidan knew of her feelings for him. He was perceptive, and she wasn’t exactly at her best when it came to him. Her mother had taught her young how to conceal emotions, how to put on the face of a leader when necessary. Somehow Kaidan broke down all the barriers she had crafted to keep others at a distance. He reached out to touch her after she took too long answering. The light caress from shoulder to elbow and back up startled her. How could so little contact from him shake her like no other touch?

“Kaidan, please. I… What do you want me to say? That I don’t mean to ever leave you behind. That it would be like leaving a piece of myself! I couldn’t ever make that decision. You mean too much, I lo..” She slapped her hand to her mouth, eyes wild and sparkling scared she said too much.

“Do you mean it? Shepard, could you possibly?” Kaidan looked at her with apprehension and wonder. He grabbed her hand again, rough callouses scraping over her the soft skin of her wrists. She shivered, as he pulled her closer to him so her hips settled between his legs. One hand at her elbow, the other lifted her chin so he could look her in the eyes. “Tavrien, please,” he croaked, “tell me I am not imagining this.”

Clutching his shirt, she pulled his face toward hers. Lips inches from hers she looked into his eyes, and licked her lips. She was waiting, giving him an out. Understanding he needed a chance to be the voice of reason, to stop them both before they crossed the line. She knew the regs, but couldn’t seem to make herself care. She had almost lost him, as well as Ash, and sticking to the rules meant that he would never have known. If he let her go, she would back off. Never pursue him again, but oh how she wished with all she had that he would take the leap with her.

She looked up from his lips only to find him watching her own. Kaidan groaned and his mouth slanted across hers. All of the tension built up over the months of the mission was poured into the kiss. Capturing her bottom lip between his teeth alternating between gentle and rough bites, tongue following, soothing away the pain. She hummed her appreciation, and matched his need with her own. She couldn’t fight her body pressing against his. Breaking the kiss with a gasp for air, she clung to him. He held her gently, hand sliding up and down her spine. “Shepard, you have to know how hopelessly lost I am over you. I have been dreaming about this moment since that first mission.” He sighed and rested his head against hers. His fingers tangled in her hair. “But where do we go from here? I can’t let you risk your career for me.”

With a quick intake of breath she moved her hand to his cheek and rubbed her thumb across his cheekbone. She sighed, eyes closed as she rasped, “I think I”m in love with you, and if you are willing to chance it, I am sure we can figure this out.”

“I’m not sure this is real, Shepard. I’ll be livid if I wake up and this has all been a drug induced dream.” Kaidan whispered huskily in her ear. He placed a gentle kiss to her neck and let out a breath.

Untangling herself from his arms to look into his eyes, she swore, “I’ll be here when you wake up, and if you need a pinch, I’ll be happy to help.” His laugh was carefree and so unlike any she had heard from him. So much had happened since they had begun searching for Saren. For the first time in months, she was ready to take the world by storm. Declaring her love for Kaidan didn’t make her weak, but made her feel empowered. With Kaidan and the rest of the Normandy crew by her side, nothing could stop her.

#mass effect fic #kaidan alenko #female shepard #shenko #fshenko #me:fic #tavrien shepard #tavrien shepard x kaidan alenko #tavrien x kaidan #i don't mean to #part 2 #my fic #steph did a thing #mass effect

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thunderheadfred · 7 years

Text

Red Streak [3.2]

Chapter 03: One of Those Faces [Part 2 of 3. Revised August 2017]

Read the complete fic on AO3

Albacus Shanxi 2157 CE

Albacus passed the omni-tool hardware from hand to hand, worrying a circle around the projection ring with idle thumbs. He was too tired to be nervous, and too well-trained besides, but he allowed himself to indulge in a momentary feeling of dread as he left the main body of his torini in the square and made his way alone to the industrial quarter.

Hannah Shepard’s supply hub was crammed into a rough, riverside area to the west of the city proper, and it was a desolate mess. The entire block looked as though it had been ramshackle to begin with, and the ambiance had been little improved by the orbital debris that he himself had dropped down from above, smashing half of the structures to rubble. A lopsided, impoverished collection of useful but ugly buildings: metal refineries, lumber mills, and several smaller food processing facilities, all of them gaping and silent now.

General Arterius would never approve of Albacus handing any meager scrap of technology to the humans, even this first-tier Elkoss Combine plaything with no melee capability. The General rarely approved of much, as far as diplomatic approaches was concerned, but Albacus had yet to find anything in this situation that was worth compromising several centuries of inherited ideals. Spending a year in his youth as political aide to an asari Matriarch had taught him a thing or two about the importance of negotiation and compromise. The General could take his ambitious, self-serving warmongering and hang with it.

Their hands had already been bloodied; a soiling so deep it would never be cleansed. It made no difference if the Citadel Council appeared in person and ordered the Tenefalx to exterminate civilians and children. The only reason Albacus would knowingly allow his ship to continue to risking innocent lives was if he himself were dead.

An omni-tool was the easiest way to help a solitary human manage the enormous logistical task of supplying the colony, and there were other benefits that had nothing to do with the possibility of mutinous assault. For one, the rudimentary communications app would allow him to contact her in case of emergency, and emergencies were inevitable. It was hard to say which side was more likely to crack first, but it was certain to happen sooner rather than later. He refused to be responsible for catching Shepard’s child in the crossfire. Overloads, sabotage, even an underpowered shield might help the two of them survive a few extra minutes if the storm broke without warning. He owed her that much after dragging her into this: a chance.

He had no concerns about the human female’s ability to handle the tech; she was surprisingly adaptable. So far, most of the humans seemed to be. The human general - Williams - had adjusted to several galaxy-broad political concepts in the span of minutes, and his willingness to cooperate with the surrender had filled Albacus with shaky respect. It was never easy to relent to a superior enemy force with minimal bloodshed - Albacus understood that all too well from his own forced cooperation with Arterius.

As he approached the depot entrance, he nodded to Obren Ilmek, taking note of the tired ashen patina of the lieutenant’s plates. He would require a relief soon; the torin looked liable to die on his feet if he was forced to stand much longer. Albacus had personally posted his own sub-lieutenant to Shepard’s guard detail - he trusted Ilmek not to mindlessly open fire over a translator glitch. He was a just and reasonable torin with two decades of service on his record, nearly half of those aboard the Tenefalx. Albacus would have trusted him to guard his own blessed matrem, had she still been living.

For now, General Arterius was allowing Albacus his attempt at cooperation. Nonetheless, Albacus had made every attempt to keep Shepard and her child surrounded by his own trusted hands, in case Arterius’ feelings suddenly changed. Albacus knew the Tenefalx crew like the back of his own hand, and was likewise familiar with the sister crews of the Miriton and the Bexitani, but the rest of the shakedown fleet was a mishmash of junior officers fresh out of the recruitment hall, with General Arterius’ own hot-headed brother among them. None of them were ready to be considered real falxi of the Blackwatch, and Albacus would have loved nothing more than to send them all home to their compulsory service colleges. The juniors were far too inexperienced, far too headstrong and eager for blood, to be trusted alone with human prisoners.

Especially not Shepard, he thought. She was unpredictable in her own right.

“All quiet here, Regidonis.” Ilmek reported, shuffling his armor around a stiff neck. “Tulubri is inside. She said the human started working as soon as the sun came up.”

“Has the mother given you any trouble?”

“No, not as long as the child is in her sight.”

“I suppose at this stage, we can count that as progress.”

Albacus shoved open the stiff, un-powered door and stepped into the cavernous darkness beyond.

As his eyes adjusted, he could see Sergeant Tulubri standing at attention, thankfully without a weapon drawn. Ris Tulubri was his best hand-to-hand practitioner; she could disarm a charging krogan just by looking at him. If Shepard started trouble, he knew this was the tarin who could end it swift and clean, without an untimely death on either side.

For a moment, Albacus thought he might be imagining things in the dark, but after a few seconds of squinting, he realized that the shadowy blur near Tulubri’s right side was in fact the human child, and she was holding the sergeant’s hand like it was made of precious salarian spunweb. Not merely holding Tulubri’s hand, she seemed to be studying it, pulling the fingers right down to her tiny face, and as Albacus approached, he saw why. The tarin had removed her glove to show off the long, smooth lines of her talons. Surprisingly intimate for the sergeant - he had never known her to be sentimental before. Then again, he reflected, he had never seen her around a puer, much less an alien one.

“Getting friendly, I see.”

Tulubri gave him a polite nod, then looked down at the little one, her mandibles flickering in an embarrassed grin.

“She’s very curious, and kind of cute, for a monkey. She reminds me of my fratliae, back on the Citadel.”

“Still,” he teased, allowing a welcome bit of warmth into his sub-vocals for once. “Never thought I would see you barehanded and petting a puer.”

“Is it still a puer if it’s a monkey?” she asked, rubbing one talon curiously along the soft and fleshy side of the little human’s face.

“She’s not a monkey,” said a voice. Albacus dimly recognized Shepard’s drawl, though she was calling down from high above him, somewhere near the ceiling. Like some kind of spirit. “She’s a great ape.”

He peered deeper into the shadows and spotted Shepard dangling from a large steel shelf as if she were climbing a tree, apparently doing her utmost to remain true to her family’s distinguished primate origins. When she prised open a sealed bin and then poked her head inside, she wretched. Reeling away from the stench, she barely kept her grip on the scaffold.

“No, it’s all bad. Once we lost the air conditioning it was a fool’s hope anyway. Damn.”

So far, Shepard had been economical with her words in front of him - this felt like her longest sentence so far.

“What do you have left?” He asked, watching Shepard scrambling back down to solid ground.

“Almost nothing.” She said with finality.

He palmed the omni-tool and begged the spirits for a damned reprieve.

Shepard jumped the last few meters to the floor, and when she stood at her full height, Albacus was once again surprised by her stature. She seemed taller by half than the rest of the humans in the colony, with arms and legs almost as long as a full-grown tarin’s. Nor did she seem intimidated by much, with the exception of any threats to her child’s well being.

Whenever she spoke to him, she looked him square in the eyes; something that her own general had been too dwarfed to attempt.

After measuring Albacus’ intentions with another one of her perceptive once-overs, she wiped her hands on an immaculate white cloth that was wound around her torso and sighed.

“The computer has been down since day three of the bombardment,” she said, looking as if she were trying to internally calculate several large figures all at once. “This morning, I’ve been trying to take an inventory of this storehouse, but it’s slow going… damn near impossible.”

“I have something that may help with that,” he said. He held out the small hand attachment of the Elkoss Cipher Mini. “I smuggled you an omni-tool.”

“Is that one of those…” She floated her right hand around her opposite forearm, mimicking the familiar haptic interface.

“It is. I pre-loaded it with all the data we could mine from your storage media; one of my engineers was up all night cobbling this together. A few things were lost or corrupted, but it should be usable for the most part.” He tossed it to her, indicated how to fasten it to her wrist and power it on. “I apologize, but this model does not transform into anything lethal.”

“Figures.” She said, as the omni-tool flared to life on her arm.

As soon as the omni-tool was illuminated, Shepard’s child let go of Tulubri and rushed to her mother’s side with a reverent ooooooh. Shining, bug-like eyes stared into the glowing orange hologram with unabashed wonder.

“Yes, Jane. Definitely ‘oooooh.’”

The child reached out to touch it. Shepard looked to Albacus, her expression rock-hard.

“Is it safe?”

“Completely.”

She prodded it a few more times with a bare fingertip, just to be sure, and then lowered her arm within reach of the little one.

“Ooooooooh” the child said again, squeezing the orange hologram between her many chubby fingers. “Orange!”

“Jane, I need to talk to Captain Regidonis now. It’s important.” She withdrew her arm, but was well prepared to redirect the child’s frustrated whine. “Hey, where’s Lionel? You should show him to Sergeant Tulubri.”

“Okay! Tulu-bee, come find Lionel. It’s important!”

With the child and the deadly hand-to-hand tactician sufficiently distracted, Shepard approached and held out her left arm.

“Show me,” she said.

He slowly walked her through the menus that would pull up the relevant documentation; shipping receipts, inventory records, maps of her suppliers. She caught on quickly.

“There are some viable crops in the southern quadrant, soybeans maybe.” In an unconscious, droning voice, she explained the contents of her ledgers. Endless financial figures and budget estimates whizzed by, which Albacus’ translator could process, but he himself could not. “The corn might be ready in a few weeks, if it’s still standing. I have no idea what sort of yield we could expect, but someone should be assigned to comb the farms, in case there’s anything we can salvage.”

“I can have a junior detail supervise a small group of cooperative human workers - how many do you need?”

“Can’t your men drive a tractor?” She paused to look into his face, and her soft, foreign expression was similar to one he’d witnessed on more than one asari: sarcasm. Was she joking with him? In the middle of a crisis? He blinked.

“Nevermind,” she amended, voice flattening out. “A dozen farmhands should do, if you allow them to use a transport.”

Slowly, clumsily, she pulled up a map, then pointed to several areas of interest.

“I have some storehouses in the north. Dried goods: rice, flour, beans. Some of the apples and root vegetables are probably still edible. Cans and boxes too, we can use all of it. I’ll need a full shipment as soon as possible. Send a convoy. And this time, don’t blow it up.”

“Anything else?”

She stared at the omni-tool and tried swiping through a few screens, but quickly got lost in a sub-menu, unable to find the return command.

“Here, like this.” He reached over her shoulder and tapped her back to the correct area. Despite his proximity, his armor, his visible weaponry, Shepard didn’t flinch, or even blink, when he got too close. Her fortitude continued to impress.

She studied the omni-tool again, frowning. “Looks like… a mess. In the best case, we’ve got enough supplies in remote storage to last a few weeks. We lost too much in the bombardment. Half the farmland is as good as salted now, and we don’t have time to turn it over. If your people are planning to hold this colony for any length of time, additional supplies will have to come from off-world.”

“The General will never allow your ships through his blockade. Aid will come through us or not at all.”

“Do you have spare rations?”

She might have been kidding, but he took the question seriously.

“Unfortunately no. We have different protein structures - our food would be useless to you, possibly deadly - never mind that we barely have enough for ourselves. I might have some levo relief stocks available, but it would be asari, salarian… completely foreign. Chemically sound, but you might have a difficult time convincing your people to take it.”

“If you can get it to me, I can cram it down their throats.”

“Maybe I could--” he cut himself off. It would be a huge risk, trying to slide a message under the General’s watch. Benezia would help, Albacus had no doubt about that, but the General would be a problem. Once an asari Matriarch saw what was going on down here, Arterius’ grandiose theatre of war unearned would be as good as curtained.

“What?” Shepard asked, turning to face him more directly.

He buried the hope for now. See if his restless torini would settle into a work detail. See if some semblance of cohesion could be maintained for more than an hour. Then he could worry about sending smoke signals to Benezia. The Matriarch had taught him that, after all: always walk the longest roads one step at a time.

“Preparations to secure your supplies from the north and south will start within the hour.” he said, willfully refocusing on problems that were immediately solvable. “If you like, I could assign a supervised work detail to help you clear away this mess, maybe restore some power. I understand that since you agreed to assist me, there have been some tensions between you and the other colonists--”

“Nothing fixes tension like sharing a work load. Yeah. Send them over. I’ll give a few sad sacks something to do. Keep ‘em busy, and show them I’m not feeding you all of humanity’s secrets.”

Firmly, suddenly, she grabbed hold of him, enclosing his gloved palm between her many strong fingers.

“Thank you,” she said. “For taking this on.”

Her hand squeezed his. Once, strong and certain. Then she disappeared into the shadows, calling for the little one named Jane.

#this didn't require many changes #just one or two extra details and a few minor dialogue tweaks #yay!#Red Streak #Fred writes #RS chp

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