Time slowed down for Shepard when there were bullets in the air. Always had. As soon as her instincts pinged danger and her senses started pouring in data, she would sink into a sort of honey-colored haze. A slow sweet spot where she could parse out every little thing that was happening. It was a unique talent that had popped up during live fire drills in basic training, and Cerberus's tinkering with her adrenal glands had only enhanced the effect.

So when she stumbled over a thought and a bullet split the air inches behind her head, she had the space between one heartbeat and the next to react. All the time in the world.

The familiar honey-haze rose, and she welcomed it like a long lost friend. Her left ear caught the meaty impact of a high velocity bullet into flesh; the tall Marine at her side had taken the hit. Her right ear caught the crack of a rifle, almost like the tinny cough of an M-98 Widow but not quite. Her mind measured the delay between impact and rifle report, numbers pouring through sniper calculations that bore the rumbling signature of Thane's voice. Her eyes found cover positions: a pair of benches about twenty meters away, or a clump of trees immediately to the side of the path.

Decision made, she began to turn. Her right ear picked up the sub-audible whistle of more bullets incoming. Two more rifle cracks. In sequence, not overlapping. One shooter. Hmm. In that split second within a split second, her decision changed from getting herself to cover to getting the man next to her out of the line of fire.

Right boot planted on the path, tendons in the knee complaining as she forced the forward momentum of her stumble to become a sidelong tackle into the wounded Marine. He was tall, she was short; her shoulder took him in the gut and bent him in half as she bore him to the ground. Above them, she could hear the angry buzz of projectiles finding air instead of flesh.

The honey-haze receded, and she let it go with a pang. She hit the ground at normal speed with a length of bloodied man under her. The world caught up as she grimly calculated the time it took to reload a sniper rifle versus the time it would take her to drag a grown man across the brief distance to the trees. It was going to be awfully close.

She was just rising to a crouch when a shadow fell over her. There was barely time to recognize Vega's growl of "Sorry, Commander" before she found herself flung over his massive shoulder like a sack of pissed-off potatoes and bounced mercilessly as he bolted for cover. Shepard knew better than to bury her elbow in the back of a man's skull when he was just trying to get her to safety, but that didn't keep her from wanting to do it.

Vega dropped her boots-first behind the trees, then planted a shovel-sized hand on her shoulder and pushed her down into a crouch. Pistol in hand and broad back braced against a tree trunk, he stood over her. Shepard knew this posture: classic protect-the-noncombatant stuff. It was all suddenly funny; honestly, when was the last time that she had been considered a noncombatant? Probably right around the same time that she had last brought fists to a gunfight. Damn, she hated being unarmed.

The thing about opening fire on an Alliance facility is: nobody panics. There was none of the screaming and chaos that might come from a civilian scene. All across the idyllic city park they had been jogging through, she could see folks dropping footballs and abandoning picnics, diving into cover. Nobody pulled sidearms, though. Seemed Vega's squad had the only guns in the vicinity.

One heartbeat of silence. Two. It was long past the time that she would have started barking orders, but this was not her squad. She didn't even have a comm link. James was in charge of this detail, but he hadn't said a word since manhandling her. Something had frozen the big Lieutenant.

"James," she tapped his knee, "get your wounded over here. I'll check him while you call for medics." No response. She frowned, her voice filling with the sharp punch of command, "Lieutenant Vega!"

That seemed to get through. A tremor ran through James, sending goosebumps down his arms and freeing him from whatever had held him silent. He tapped into comms, his words calm and authoritative, "Finch, get Montgomery to my position. Lee and Buckley, cover him." Tapped again, "Vega to Command, we have sniper fire on the Commons. Package is secure. One wounded so far. I need a medic out here, ASAP. Recommend sweeps at twelve-and-fifteen-hundred meters north-northwest of my nav-point to locate the shooter."

Shepard grunted, half annoyed and half impressed. Annoyed, because the "package" was almost certainly her. Impressed, because the distance that he called out matched the result of her own mental calculations. If he was operating on par with the equations taught to her by a master assassin, then Vega was good. He would be excellent someday if he could get over whatever had made him freeze up.

The other beefcake Marine (the improbably-named Finch) hauled the wounded man across the grass and dropped him at Shepard's feet. He took up a position mirroring James, and Shepard found herself suddenly under the vigilant protection of a quarter-ton of muscled manflesh. She felt ridiculous.

At least there was a good distraction. She tuned out Vega's comm-chatter with his other squad members and got to work on the one that was bleeding. Hands deft and firm, she took quick stock of his wounds. The bullet had pierced his biceps completely, then kept on travelling to bore cleanly through his ribs and punch a hole the size of her fist out through his back. Shepard growled under her breath. That hole had been intended for her skull.

"James, got any medi-gel on you?" She was no doctor, but she was pretty sure there shouldn't be bubbles in the blood coming out of his back.

"Just a first-aid pack," he answered, never taking his eyes off of their surroundings, "Left thigh pocket."

Blood-slicked fingers left livid streaks on the dull grey fabric of his fatigues as she dug into the pocket for the medi-gel. Little first-aid packs like this one weren't intended for massive repairs, but it might hold him over till med-evac could find them. Popping the seal on the cannister, she applied it directly to the bubbling back wound and held her breath. If the hole didn't close up, odds were good that his lung would fill with blood before the medics arrived. Shepard made a face as the flesh at the center of the wound started oozing together like wet red clay being molded by invisible hands. As many times as she had used the stuff herself, it was always a little unsettling to watch medi-gel in action. At least the bubbling stopped.

Not so for the bleeding, however. "Vega, Finch, give me your shirts."

James blinked. "Ma'am?"

"Medi-gel took care of the worst of it, but he's still bleeding from four places. I need bandages. Either give me your shirts, or I'll have to use my own."

The threat of Commander Shepard going topless was motivating; Vega and his doppelganger took turns stripping out of their shirts and staying on armed lookout. In short order, she had a makeshift bandage on the man's arm and both hands pressing pads into the wounds on the torso. Blood was soaking the white fabric, but at least it was doing it slowly.

Shepard took stock of her situation. No gun, no armor. Shot at, but not shot. Arms half wrapped around one Marine while two more stood protectively over her like the galaxy's most muscular, barechested mother hens. Garrus was going to laugh his ass off when he heard about this.

Garrus. She shook her head, felt a hum rise in her throat that echoed the discordant tones of his voice on that last night. Longing. What wouldn't she give to have him at her back right at the moment? Returning sniper fire, anticipating her thoughts so well that she never had to order him. Memory tried to sweep her into its thrall, but she squashed it ruthlessly. There was a time and place for that, and this was neither

With a quiet sigh, she settled in to wait. Might as well make small talk, keep the injured guy conscious.

Tipping her head, she chatted up the man whose blood was drying on her hands. "Hey kid. What's your name?"

He looked up at her with blue eyes gone dilated with pain, unclenched his jaw and answered with admirable stoicism, "Montgomery, ma'am."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Shepard." For some reason, he laughed a little at that. Shepard let out a relieved huff; if he could laugh, his lungs were probably clear. "You're gonna be fine. Looks like a through-and-through. And through, again. One bullet, four holes. You're a damn overachiever, Montgomery."

"Hoo-rah, ma'am." His gaze slipped past her to the two shirtless giants looming over them. A weak smile stretched over gritted teeth. "At least the view is nice."

Finch blushed so intensely that the red covered him from brow to bellybutton, but he held his position in silence. Vega, however, didn't have an ounce of blush in him as he put on an offended air, "Hey, now. I'm feeling downright objectified, here."

Shepard snorted, and was gratified to see a smirk curve Vega's cheek even before she spoke. Chipping away at that mask. "Can you blame him, LT? The man's injured, not dead."

Montgomery chuckled, then groaned against the pain. "Think my ribs are broken."

"Probably," Shepard eased the pressure slightly on the wound over his ribcage. No sense in causing more pain than he was already in. "That bullet was moving awfully fast."

Vega glanced down at her, "Think the shooter's done?"

She looked up to answer him, and they both saw it at the same time. There in the trunk of the tree that Shepard was hunkered behind, bright with the splintered interior of living wood, were two fresh bullet holes. One was slightly higher than the other. In unison, Vega and Shepard turned the follow the trajectory from the tree trunk to two fresh gouges in the dirt several meters away. Having missed their intended target, those last two bullets had just kept flying till they found another one. Vega let out a low, impressed whistle.

"Sure hope so," Shepard drawled, "otherwise, we're gonna need to find bigger trees to hide behind."