Holy crap, I've actually returned! IT'S A MIRACLE!

Chapter 4: Loyalist, Pt. 1

It had all gone horribly wrong.

The Reapers had been prepared. The Alliance's ships had been decimated, their troops annihilated, and the Crucible, the last hope for the galaxy, was personally torn apart by Harbinger.

And one by one, they began to fall.

Zaeed was mortally wounded by a Brute, but he made sure to take the monstrosity with him thanks to a dozen inferno grenades strapped to his chest.

Kasumi drowned in a swarm of husks, her dying screams louder and more horrifying than a thousand Banshees.

Samara was shot to death by a group of Marauders, her barriers unable to stand up to the sustained fire.

Jack had engaged a cluster of Banshees after a Reaper Destroyer single-handedly wiped out her students. She didn't last long.

Grunt had managed to fend off a large number of Ravagers, but even he couldn't survive a skyscraper crumbling on top of him.

EDI was killed twice, first by an abomination detonating next to her body, then Harbinger destroying the Normandy.

James had his head torn off by a Banshee.

Javik ended up killing himself, using his biotics without limit until his body simply burned out.

Jacob was devoured by Cannibals.

Kaidan sacrificed himself to evacuate a family onto a shuttle. The last thing he ever saw was that shuttle being shot down.

Wrex destroyed everything in his path until a Reaper swooped in and disintegrated him.

Garrus and Tali decided to die on their own terms by detonating a Thanix missile. They held each other close up to the moment the timer reached zero.

Liara had her arm torn off by a Brute, and she bled to death.

After holding the love of his life while she died, Commander Shepard attempted a suicide run on Harbinger using a Mako and his M-920 Cain. He was unsuccessful.

Miranda felt like crying as she fought off wave after wave of enemy, using her guns and Omni-tool, then eventually her biotics, and finally her arms and legs.

As she felt the last of her energy fade away, the genetically perfect woman watched as the Reaper forces actually held back, gazing at her with dead, empty eyes as if waiting for her to do something.

"Miranda," came a voice that was familiar, yet oh so horrifyingly not.

She turned, shaking the whole time, as her eyes fell on an image that had haunted her nightmares. An image that she had always thought of as beyond a worst case scenario.

Standing a few meters away was Benjamin Kirby Tennyson. The Wielder of the Omnitrix. The Savior of the Universe. The Vanquisher of Vilgax. And the man she loved with all her heart.

And yet, it wasn't him. The warm emerald eyes, the familiar green jacket, that smile that always made her feel as if all was right with the universe, they were gone.

Instead, what stood before her was a cybernetic monstrosity, grafted with the malevolent Reaper technology that broke spirits and enslaved the mind. His skin appeared to be decaying, his eyes were an empty glowing blue, and his voice...

"Is submission not preferable to extinction?"

It was the voice of hope being extinguished. A voice of absolute, unrelenting evil.

"Join us, Miranda," the construct said.

And with those words, the Reaper army surged forward, and Miranda Lawson screamed.

It was 4:43 in the morning, and Miranda Tennyson woke up screaming.

The reaction was immediate. A pair of strong yet tender hands reached over and wrapped around her body, pulling her into a warm body. The perfect woman's remarkably intelligent mind rapidly began assessing her situation.

I'm in a bedroom. It was just a nightmare. We destroyed the Reapers. My friends are alive. Ben...

Miranda looked up at the concerned face of Ben Tennyson, at the loving eyes and scruffy beard that she had originally protested but now considered so invariably him that she never wanted him to lose it.

She felt her eyes water as she wrapped her arms around his chest and hugged him close, allowing his heartbeat to calm her down. Proof that he was here, with her. The man who had melted the ice queen and claimed her heart.

The man who had put a ring on her finger, taking away the surname her bastard father had bestowed upon her and replacing it with one she adored.

They sat in silence for a few minutes before Miranda pulled back and wiped at her eyes, feeling a hint of shame for what she perceived as weakness.

"Bad dream?" Ben asked gently.

"How could you tell?" she returned, a hint of a smile on her features. It was truly remarkable how that man always managed to make her feel better just by being in the same room.

"Wanna talk about it?" he suggested.

"Not right now," Miranda sighed as she slipped out of bed in her pitch-black nightie. "I need to do something first."

As she tied the sash on her robe, Ben spoke up again. "That 'something' wouldn't be waking up our son just to make sure he's okay, would it?" he teased.

She playfully rolled her eyes. "If my scream didn't wake him up, nothing will."

"True," he snorted. "That kid could sleep through a nuclear explosion."

Miranda laughed at that as she walked to the door and twisted the handle, though she paused before stepping out into the hallway of the house. She turned to look at her husband, a warmth blossoming in her chest. "I love you," she said, the words more for her benefit than for his.

Ben smiled at her. "I love you, too, Miri."

More than anything, that was what she needed to hear.

The raven-haired woman walked down the hall without making a sound, her many years of training with Cerberus actually managing to come in handy in a non-combat situation.

Before long, she came across the door she was looking for. Again, as quiet as the grave, Miranda opened the door, allowing the light to shine down on a six year old boy lying in bed, his limbs spread out wide as if he were attempting to claim the whole mattress for himself.

She approached the bed and sat down in the chair that was always positioned next to it, where one of the two parents would sit in order to tell the boy stories to help him sleep. Some were fictional, others were very much real, but nothing made Kenneth Maxwell Tennyson fall asleep like a good bed time story.

Miranda sat down in the chair and gazed down at her son, the life she had brought into the world and would give her dying breath to protect.

She used to think that love was an insipid idea used for terrible romance films and to sell Valentine's Day cards. Yes, she loved Oriana, but that was family. Something completely different.

Then Ben came along, and she thought she knew everything there was to know about love.

But then Ken was born, and Miranda discovered that she had only scratched the surface of that emotion. She loved the child so much it actually hurt, and to this day that fact was something she struggled to fathom.

She remembered when she had found out she was pregnant. It had been a powerful surprise, mostly due to the fact that her genetic makeup had made it impossible for her to conceive a child. Later on, a little research indicated that the Omnitrix acted as a genetic bridge, allowing Ben to essentially bypass Miranda's sterility.

While the former Cerberus officer had always wanted to be a mother, she couldn't possibly understand what it meant to be one until she held that baby in her arms for the first time. That weight of responsibility, of molding a life into a success or failure.

And even though she had felt extreme concern over the idea that she, a former member of a terrorist organization, would end up being terrible at motherhood, Ben's trust and support had eased her into the role.

While diaper-changing hadn't been fun, Ken had turned out to be a relatively easy baby to deal with. He very rarely cried, and those legendary scenarios where the baby wakes up the parents multiple times during the night were few and far between. Hell, teething, supposedly one of the worst things a baby had to deal with, had happened practically overnight.

It didn't take long before Ben and Miranda realized that their son was quite intelligent. He picked up walking, talking, and potty training long before the children of their friends. While other kids Ken's age watched things like "Captain Cosmic", he preferred reading and solving puzzles, which he had no doubt gotten from Miranda. Though Ben had thrown a few quirks in there as well, including a love of smoothies and a laid back attitude.

The mother reached out and gently brushed a strand of hair away from her son's face. She had seen pictures of Ben when he was this young, so she was well aware of the striking resemblance Ken shared with his father. However, his hair was pitch-black, much like hers, and she knew that if he opened his eyes, they would be the same sapphire ones she shared with Oriana.

In her heart, she knew she'd burn the entire galaxy to the ground to keep Ken safe. The thought both pleased and terrified her.

She bent over and pressed her lips to his forehead, simply happy that her life had gone the way it had, and nothing like the nightmare she had just experienced.

With that, she stood and left the room, closing the door behind her.

When she returned to her room, she found the lamp on Ben's side of the bed was on, and he glanced up as she walked in. He must have been more worried about her mental state than he was tired.

God, she loved that man.

"So, was he drooling?" he teased.

"Of course not," Miranda scoffed as she slipped off her robe and tossed it onto a nearby chair. "My son is not a bulldog."

"Our son," Ben corrected. "And have you seen him eat?"

Yes, Ken did have a tendency to consume food like a starving villager when he was only mildly hungry. Then again, he was a biotic. Had to keep that calorie intake up.

"He had to get something from your side of the family," she fired back before climbing into bed.

"Oh, ouch," her husband commented, clutching a hand over his heart as if her had been wounded. "I'll have to tell everyone how low your opinion is of us. Shame, too, Gwen has a lot of respect for you."

"You ass," Miranda sighed, though she couldn't seem to stop smiling. The banter, the man next to her, the fact that all was right with the galaxy. It meant more to her than she'd like to admit.

Ben's face then became serious. "But you are alright?"

She nodded. "Considering all we've been through, a bad dream now and then is a small price to pay." She held up her hand, the ring around her finger shining in the light.

"Yeah, but now we're both awake," Ben pointed out, glad that his wife was feeling better. "Maybe we should start breakfast?"

Miranda glanced at her bedside clock. 5:02 AM.

"We could do that," she admitted before smiling coquettishly. "Or we can find other ways to pass the time."

If Ben was too dense to pick up on her meaning, the fact that she slipped her nightie off and tossed it in the corner was probably all the confirmation he needed on her intentions.

The bearded man decided to play around a bit first. "But you left the door open," he pointed out.

His wife then waved her hand, which was now glowing blue. Using her biotics, Miranda closed the door.

"We might wake up Ken," Ben added.

"He could sleep through a nuclear explosion, right?" came the response, Miranda using her husband's words against him.

"Maybe I'm not in the mood," the Savior of the Universe teased, though they both knew that was a lie. Ben could be blind, deaf, brain-damaged and comatose, and Miranda would still be able to arouse him.

But she would play along. "Let me worry about that," she said as she leaned forward and captured his lips with hers.

The next hour was energetic and wildly passionate, and once the sun peeked over the horizon and shined light into their bedroom, Miranda warmly smiled, content that the two men most important to her were safe.

Her life had truly turned out perfect.

So yeah, I'm not dead! I'm just as surprised as you guys are!

Anyway, I have no excuse for the long-ass absence (A YEAR AND A HALF SINCE MY LAST UPDATE, WTF?), just the fact that I had to deal with school, a psycho-bitch ex-girlfriend, and a cluster of other problems.

Long story short, I've returned, and the writing bug has infested me to an absurd degree.

Now, I know this chapter is a bit different than the last three, but since my primary Ben 10/Mass Effect story is Ben/Miranda, I decided to write a chapter on how that could eventually turn out, with a little inspiration from The Incredible Muffin's "Unlimited Justice" series. Let me know what you think.

Next chapter is looking to be Liara or Tali. I also have an idea for a FemShep/Ben/Liara chapter, just for kicks.