Feet hit the ground with a loud thud. Shepard looked over to Garrus, nodded once and the two began to slide across the battlefield. Kaidan felt a little out of place, but that was only natural. He was the newest member of their ground team and hadn't reintegrated yet. He followed quietly, ears constantly trained for the sound of soldiers. At her quick wave, he ran to meet them behind cover.

"I'll run out and distract them; Garrus, you take out the ass up top. Kaidan, sneak around to the side and work on overloading that turret." They both nodded and went to execute their orders.

He ran into a nearby prefab, finding a good vantage point: within range of his omnitool but far away enough that hopefully Cerberus wouldn't notice him until the turret had already blown up in their stupid faces. Fingers tapped carefully, working around the security systems. In short order the turret had stopped firing. A few small adjustments later, it exploded. The electricity arced to the engineer manning it, frying his shields immediately. The second that happened, the sound of a sniper rifle echoed through the streets. Its victim fell from the above pod, landing with a sickening crunch. Shepard leapt into action, quite literally, weaving in and out of melee, shooting the remaining troops at point blank range and slashing them with her omni-blade.

She would never cease to amaze him in combat. It was a bit gruesome, but there was something graceful, effortlessly beautiful about how she moved: with pure skill, training, and deadly elegance. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion as her blade glanced off the shield of a Cerberus troop and the bastard moved to ram her with it as she spun. Kaidan's arm flew out and a wave of biotic energy ripped toward the soldier, knocking him off balance and ripping away his shield. The energy continued to sap away at him, rendering the man still. With no mercy, she took advantage and stabbed him in the chest. The last of the group fell with a groan.

Garrus walked over and Kaidan followed. "Nice work with the turret there, Alenko. Good to see you haven't gotten slow."

"Me? I was waiting for you to line up that shot, Vakarian." The turian gave him a hearty thump on the shoulder and both looked to her for further orders. She was quite ready to give them.

A gloved finger pointed to the lower area. "Okay. Let's scout out the lower level. I'll go out first, Kaidan will follow. Garrus, you stay above and do what you do best."

"Win wars?"

A wide, friendly grin was tossed his way. "Take rockets to the face." The joke was met with a loud chuckle and Garrus headed off to sneak through the upper buildings. She gave Kaidan a professional nod and weak half-smile before spinning to lead him through the next area. He followed without comment.

An hour or so later, the two of them ducked behind a large crate, peering out. She leaned close to him to whisper. If they weren't wearing armor, he'd have been able to feel the heat of her skin at this distance. "Think you can do that trick again?"

His eyes flickered over to hers for a short, wonderful second before moving back to inspect their prey. "Yeah, I'm not drained yet." She nodded shortly in response and immediately jumped from her crouch into a vault over the crate. A quick roll later, she and her blade were already in the back of one of the Cerberus soldiers.

Garrus's sniper rifle rang true and one of the men carrying physical shields was no longer in possession of a head. He fell over. Kaidan tapped away on his omni-tool, overloading the shields of another guy – looked like maybe an engineer from the equipment on his back. She shot him point blank in the chest once his shields fizzed out. Garrus scored another clean shot and a trooper fell down the stairs in the middle of the fray.

Immediately Kaidan began to glow and summoned another wave of biotic power. He unleashed it a moment later toward the second shield-bearer. They jerked and dropped it as they fought against the hold. She grabbed the shield as it fell and threw it up the stairs, knocking a few more men over. A grenade flew in from above, making short work of that lot.

A woman – civilian, maybe a cook from her clothes – ran through a prefab to the south. She was gunned down from behind and fell to the ground in a heap. Kaidan's eyes flicked up to the doorway, gun aimed right at it. Sharp, sudden pain laced through his right side as one of the stealthier Cerberus troops managed to sneak up behind him in the chaos of battle. That was definitely an omni-blade pressing into his side. Shit. He stumbled to the left and tried to backhand them with his pistol, but they were too fast.

"Kaidan!" Shepard's voice rang across the field, far more scared than he thought she'd ever let herself sound. He was probably imagining it. She ran toward him, arm reaching back. Was she going to throw a grenade at him? Before he knew what had happened, her body was enveloped in a bright blue glow and a ball of energy – biotic energy? – swung around him and knocked his attacker away. The sniper rifle above finished the job before they could get up. Everything fell silent.

He stared at her in shock. Did she just throw biotics? The woman he knew never had…biotic abilities. She didn't meet his eyes, guiltily looking to the ground. Cortez interrupted any questions Kaidan would have asked her.

Commander, I'm detecting no more bodies in the area. We have all the civilians we're going to find.

Green eyes avoided brown as she swept off toward the LZ. "Copy that, Lieutenant. Moving out for extraction."

The shuttle was full of refugees; he certainly wasn't going to ask her here. That didn't mean he couldn't watch her with wary confusion, though. She pointedly avoided his gaze every chance she could. Every time their eyes did meet, she looked almost scared. Something was definitely wrong here.

The sooner they talked the better.

Gravity shifted as the dampeners kicked in. They were now safely in FTL and would arrive to rendezvous with Hackett's people in a few hours. For now, the civilians were quietly comforting each other in the shuttle bay: it was the largest open area and Cortez was only too happy to have more than just Vega down there with him.

Shepard nodded to Joker and turned to retreat when Kaidan stepped in front of her. "When?"

She stopped short and looked up to him. "After I…came back." Her face was a neutral mask; only he would recognize the clenched jaw, the slight shine to her eyes.

"You didn't tell me sooner?"

Shoulders stood straight as she pushed up to nearly his height. Her voice was low, angry. Maybe even a little hurt. "And when would have been the opportune time to tell you somethi–"

"–Uh, as much as I love to watch a good fight between you two, this probably isn't the best place."

"I would recommend the captain's cabin. It is unoccupied."

Joker and EDI cut them off. Frustrated, Shepard glared at Kaidan for a moment before pushing past him. He reached to grasp at her upper arm. "Hey, wait."

She spun to stare at him.

"We should…talk."

Her only response was to nod once, then stalk toward the elevator. He could but follow quietly.

The elevator ride was mercifully quick, awkward as it was. When they were safely locked in her quarters, she rounded on him again, this time with tears in her eyes.

"When would have been the right time to tell you? After I was detained, when everyone knew I was a mass murderer? Or maybe on Mars, where you spent the entire time trying to convince yourself I'm not really me?"

"I don't know, maybe all that time we spent talking in the hospital? Better yet, earlier! God forbid that you'd have written me any messages when you came back. First time I heard from you was on Horizon."

Tears coursed down her cheeks as she blinked. "I didn't even know then! And I did. I did send messages. Maybe they were blocked or…something, but I did. All I could think of every minute was you. When I first woke up, I thought of you. Every night I went to sleep wishing you were there. Went into every battle wishing you were there. When I heard you were on Horizon, all I could think of was getting to you and making sure you were safe. If you don't believe that, get the hell off my ship and out of my life." Her finger jabbed toward the door.

His mouth opened to speak, but Kaidan just couldn't think of a response that wouldn't make it worse.

She continued, fists balling up in anger. "Better yet, how about I tell you when I found out? How does that sound?"

Quiet anger slowly began to rise. She had been through a lot, but he had to deal with her death, too. "Did you expect me not to be shocked? You were never biotic before! What happened?"

"Cerberus happened. I never asked for biotic powers! I never asked for any of this. I'm…" She tore herself away, stomping to stare at the fish tank. Her voice was suddenly low, full of pain. "I'm still Lia. You said you'd never doubt me again."

All his irrational anger immediately disappeared the second she quietly spoke the name he hadn't uttered in almost three years. Private, long-suppressed memories associated with that name flashed through his mind. All he could do was wipe a hand over his face. Damn it. "I'm not doubting you. I'm…I mean, come on. Imagine if you suddenly found out that I wasn't a biotic anymore. That's a life changing event."

"So is being brought back from the dead." She hugged herself, armor clinking.

Guilt flooded through him. Sure, he had mourned her for two years, but she died. Here he was, selfishly expecting her to comfort him. "I…" He walked over slowly and set a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry."

Red hair fell down as her chin clunked against the chest piece. Shoulders rose and fell slowly, her way of hiding tears. He pulled his gloves off and let them fall to the floor.

"Listen, I'm…things just…they're a little crazy right now. I'm sorry." His hand reached to smooth down her hair. "I'm sorry, Lia."

Shepard's back stiffened at the name before shaking his hand off. "Back from the dead, and no one cares."

That surprised him a little. "You mean no one ever talked to you about it?"

"No. We were too busy taking care of the Collectors, and then I was too busy being grilled by the brass."

He frowned and pushed her to face him. "Do you want to talk about it?"

A quick moment of thought later, she shook her head and latched her arms around him, cheek pressed against his chest plate. Tears streaked down Alliance blue as sobs wracked the woman. Kaidan's arms went around her as best as their armor allowed, fingers lacing through her hair.

To everyone else, she was the most revered, put together Commander in the galaxy, but to him, she was a woman. One who still trusted him enough to finally break down in his arms after more than half a year holding it in, even if he didn't deserve her trust at this point. Tears slowly built and fell down his face as the reality truly hit: she was here, and she was the same woman. She was his Lia.

Things weren't good between them yet, but maybe they could begin mending. Together.