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Mass Effect 10 Part 1

Chapter 14

The Tales of The Shepard

Tales of a Sole Survivor Colonist - Dock 422

Shortly after dismissing her crew for shore leave and giving Rear Admiral Mikhailovich a quick rundown of the Normandy, Shepard made to leave for her own bit of R&R, only to be pinged on her omnitool the moment she exited the elevator off the docks.

"Commander Shepard? Sorry to bother you." The caller addressed her in a slightly thick French accent. "This is Lieutenant Girard down in the docking bay."

'I just left there.' Shepard thought to herself irately, taking deep breaths to steady her already tense nerves. 'This had better be good.'

"There's a woman here, uh..." The lieutenant paused hesitantly. "She was rescued from Batarian slavers a few weeks ago. She's from Mindoir." That got Shepard's attention, flashbacks of a life not entirely her own, but not entirely distant shooting through her mind at the mention of that old colony. "I guess she was taken. In the raid on your town."

"When my parents died..." Shepard whispered to herself, even as conflicting images of 13 years dead parents, and still living parents she spoke with just weeks ago flickered through her gestalt of a mind. She forced her mental fatigue down and immediately went back the way she came to address this much more important issue. "What went wrong with her? You wouldn't be calling me about this for my health."

"Well...she's a little...messed up." Girard remarked uncomfortably. "She got free somehow, grabbed a gun from one of my guys. Now she's holed up here in the docking bay...she, uh...she says she wants to die."

"Say no more, I started heading your way the moment you mentioned Mindoir." Shepard responded as she tapped her foot irritably, cursing how slow the elevators on the Citadel were with every passing nanosecond. "Shepard, out." She said as she cut the feed, the elevator doors mercifully opening shortly after she did.

"Commander. Glad to see you." Girard saluted Shepard the moment she arrived.

"Wish it were under better circumstances." Shepard nodded in response. "Where is she?"

"Behind those shipping containers." Girard answered. "I've got a sniper positioned, but I don't think we'll need him. She's only a danger to herself." He explained, jumping into a metaphorical fire before immediately jumping back out. "We've got a sedative to calm her down, but we can't get close to her. Every step we take gets her more wound up."

"I don't need a sedative, and I certainly don't need a sniper." Shepard insisted stalwartly. "If I'm not able to save even a single life by myself, then I don't deserve my job or any of my awards."

"If you say so." Girard replied hesitantly. "Don't push her too hard. If she seems liable to pull the trigger-"

"With all due respect, Lieutenant, I think I know what I'm doing." Shepard assured him before walking up the ramp towards the girl's hiding place.

"Good luck, Commander." Girard saluted behind her.

In mere seconds, Shepard arrived at the containers, not even flinching as she used her biotics to delicately pry open the girl's fingers and pull the gun into her hand in one swift motion. 'Have I always been a biotic?' Shepard wondered idly as the girl before her - a scared, shivering, buzz-cut, clear wreck of a woman - looked two seconds away from jumping over the ledge. 'Eh, must just be one of the alternate timelines.' She shrugged mentally as she biotically pulled the girl into her arms.

"S-stop!" The girl panicked as she tried to force Shepard away, even as Shepard gently stroked her head and down her back to comfort her. "What do you-? What are you-?"

"My name is Jane Shepard." She whispered softly to the poor girl. "I'm going to help you, help make things better. What's your name?"

"Animals don't get names." The girl whispered shakily. "The master puts their symbols on her. Hot metal all over her back. She screams when they do it."

"For every single time they hurt you, I promise you I'll kill a hundred Batarians." Shepard assured her gently. "You are not an animal." She insisted a bit more fiercely. "Think back. Think of your parents. What name did they give you? That's who you are, not some number or product those four-eyed bastards can buy and sell. Remember."

"She remembers a lot of things." The girl answered shakily, but perhaps a bit more confident as he resistance got weaker. "Talitha." She murmured fondly. "They call her that. Sh-she doesn't remember the rest." She began resisting much more fiercely. "Leave her alone!"

"Never!" Shepard hissed protectively, hundreds of visions of Batarians flashing through her memory. Some were of their arrogance, hatefulness and violence on full display during her childhood on Mindoir, or the early stages of the attack on Elysium, while at least as many were of their cowardice, backstabbing and pain as she slaughtered them by the hundreds in the later stages of the attack on Elysium, and later on Torfan, taking care to violently gouge out all four of their eyes with every kill she made, reveling in the sacrilege she was committing against their religion with every stab, and proudly cutting off their heads to display her grisly trophies mounted on pikes as a warning to all Batarians. "Not until I know you're safe." She continued as she forced down those images for later. "Remember. What happened to your parents?"

"There's...She sees them." Talitha whispers. "They're yelling. Run! Hide!" Her voice hikes in volume and panic. "They hit the masters. But the masters, they have lights and hoses. Daddy's...he's melting!" She cried in sorrow as she clenched her head. "Sh-she doesn't want to see that! Don't make her look. Don't look! Stupid, stupid!"

"Be strong, Talitha!" Shepard squeezed her tightly, trying to assure herself almost as much as she was trying to assure Talitha. "I know it hurts, but you have to face what happened. Acknowledge it, but don't let it consume you. Overcome, because that's the only way to win against the masters."

"She's not strong, she's weak. The masters say so!" Talitha shook her head in denial. "When she thinks, water comes out of her eyes." She shakes fearfully, tears forming in the corner of her eyes. "The masters beat her when she wastes water, so she doesn't think anymore." Her trembling intensifies. "She sees them. Mommy and Daddy. Burning in the white light. Melting. Going to pieces. They can't even say anything to her!" She wept openly. "They're dead Shepard. They try to save her, and the masters burn them. Can we stop remembering now? Please?"

"I was on Mindoir." Shepard told Talitha gently, trying to find some common ground. "My parents died in the raid."

"Lying!" Talitha shouted as she tried to force Shepard away again. "You get hit for lying! Get buzz or the burning. Can't be there." She denied, then began growling in anger. "Why are you alive?! Why are you-why aren't you like her?! Broken." She turned back to whimpering. "Only fit to dig and carry."

"It was hard." Shepard confessed as she called upon flickering half-memories. "I fell pretty far, losing my whole family like that. My friends, my childhood." As she spoke, memories - or maybe time itself, Shepard had no way of knowing for sure - began settling into place. "But the Batarians didn't break me. I broke them instead." She grinned as the mangled fusion of the past itself solidified. "I may have just been a teenager, but I was fierce. When one zapped me and went to grab me, I powered my way through and rammed a knife through his eye into his brain. I grabbed his gun, hunkered down behind his corpse, and shot his friend to death when he came after me too. The recoil nearly dislocated my shoulder, and every shot felt like it might tear my damn arm off, but I kept going." She grinned as she savagely got into the story. "When more of them came, I hid under the bodies of their buddies to catch them by surprise, and chucked some grenades I stole from them when their backs were turned. Honestly, everything after that was a total blur, and by the time the Alliance arrived to investigate..." She stopped to chuckle mirthfully. "When I woke up, I was in an Alliance medical bay. I had more than thirty broken bones, a dozen dislocated joints, massive blood loss, severe exhaustion, bits of shrapnel and Batarian bones all over and inside of me, my sixteen year old body barely held together and kept going until my rescue by raw adrenaline, but I was alive, and about two dozen Batarians that had come for me weren't."

"You lose your mommy and daddy. But you don't dig. You don't carry." Talitha whispered in awe and admiration. "You stand up. You fight. She wishes she could stand up and fight."

"You want to stand up?" Shepard asked softly. "I'll teach you a trick if you answer me one thing. What's the last thing you remember from Mindoir?"

"Fires." Talitha responds immediately, her tone sounding miles away. "Smells of smoke and burning meat. Animals screaming as the masters cage them." Shepard gave her a gentle squeeze and brushed her back. "As they put the metals to their backs. Put the wires in their brains." Shepard moves one hand to Talitha's back, and the other to her head, the gentle touches having the desired effect as she briefly stiffens, then relaxes a bit. "She pretends to be dead. If she's dead, she can't work. But they know!" Her voice hitched into a whine, almost as if she were a child complaining about chores and not a grown woman talking about PTSD and attempted suicide. "She hopes they'll leave, but they put her in the pen." Her head shook weakly. "She didn't fight. She was already broken when they put the wires in."

"Not everyone can be me, Talitha." Shepard assured her sadly, while simultaneously checking how many seconds had passed since her time with this poor broken girl had begun, and silently vowing to kill a Batarian for every single second she had to be here. For both Shepard's and Talitha's sake, she was hoping to be here for a very long time. "You were what, six years old? No one but the Batarians blame you for staying quiet and hoping they'd go away, and their opinions don't mean jack shit here. The only person blaming you is you. That's my secret." Shepard backed up a bit to look Talitha in her eyes. "Hate the Batarians, love yourself, and never stop moving forward."

"She wants to believe that." Talitha looked down quietly. "She wants to believe nothing would change." She shook her head. "She doesn't want to be there anymore. In the pen. In the cages. Lying quiet while they do things to her." Shepard's mind screeched to a crashing halt the moment she heard those words, before furiously contemplating the logistics of strapping a massive propulsion unit to an asteroid and launching it onto the Batarian homeworld. "She wants to be strong like you, but she doesn't know if she can."

"You don't need to be strong like me, Talitha." Shepard pat her sadly on the shoulder before squeezing her tightly again, only this time it was to comfort both of them. "Just...just tell me how you escaped them, and I promise you'll never see another Batarian ever again...because I'm going to wipe out their entire species just for you."

"She can't escape." Talitha shook her head as if the mere thought were some cruel, sick joke. "They have chains, wires, needles! You go too far, they take your brains away!" Despite the utter tragedy of what this poor girl had been through, a tiny part of Shepard's mind that she made a mental note to have lobotomized later thought that the way she said that last sentence was meme-worthy. "Animals like her come. Animals with guns. They make the masters explode." Shepard added another mental note to the growing list to find out whoever led that mission against her slavers, and personally making sure that they got a medal for their work. "She tries to fix the masters so they won't be mad at her. She puts all the reds and purples back in, but they don't move. The other animals take her."

"You were afraid." Shepard sighed sadly as she picked Talitha up bridal style, again ignoring her protests and struggling as she held her close and made her way back to Girard. "All you'd known for 13 years was the master's abuse, so you tried to heal them."

"No!" She desperately tried to push Shepard away. "She doesn't want to see other animals. They're not real. They can't be real. They can't see her!" She grabbed the sides of her head and shook it. "If the animals can see her, then this is real, but it can't be! The wires, the chains, the hitting." Her arms moved to her sides, holding herself tightly. "This doesn't happen to her. It's another girl, a dirty girl, a stupid girl! She deserves it!" She said with violent certainty, which just made Shepard even sadder. "It... it happens to her. Doesn't it?" She sobbed weakly. "They see her, so it's real. She doesn't want it to be real!"

"I really wish I could do more to help you, Talitha." Shepard shook her head tiredly as she set the girl back on her feet, right next to Girard, though she immediately jumped behind Shepard, obviously having come to see her as something safe. "But I have other things I need to take care of right now, other people I need to help. If I don't act to help them as soon as I possibly can...a lot more people might end up suffering just as badly as you. Do you want that to happen?"

"No!" Talitha shouted as she tried to yank away one of Shepard's guns, only for Shepard to immediately snatch it back and put it back in the holster. "Give that back! She has to help! She doesn't want others to be like her! Dirty and broken! Not good, not good! Have to help. Have to work. Have to fix!"

"That's the kind of attitude I like to see!" Shepard grinned as she proudly clapped Talitha on the shoulder. "Make the galaxy a better, safer place for everyone who deserves it, while making life hell for those who make it worse. Now which one do you want to be?"

"She...she gets a choice?" Talitha uttered uncertainly. "But...but she never gets to...she doesn't want to...she doesn't...she wants to fix things. Make things better."

"Say that again." Shepard softly rapped her knuckles on Talitha's shoulder.

"She wants to fix things. Make things better." Talitha repeated with a little more confidence.

"Again."

"She wants to fix things. Make things better!" She declared as she stood up straight.

"Louder!"

"I want to fix things!" Talitha shouted at the top of her sore, long underused lungs, causing Girard as his men to jump back in shock. "I want to make things better! She doesn't...I don't want there to be more people like me!" She began cracking up again, her voice quavering back to a sad and sore croak. "I remember me... It's hard to remember me...but I have to, I want to. Don't want others like me."

Smiling at Talitha's first step on a no doubt long road to recovery, Shepard gave her a friendly pat on the back. "I know." She assured her as she gently nudged Talitha over to Girard. "These nice people...they'll take care of you. Help you get better, so I can help more people. Understand?" She said as she turned Talitha's gaze to her own for one last time. "I help people. You can help me help others, by getting help for yourself. Okay?"

"...So many people...all helping others." Talitha muttered in confusion. "All so much...why so much help?"

"Because it's a lot better than the other thing." Shepard assured her as she went over to Girard. "You take good care of Talitha. Got that soldier?"

"Yes sir!" Girard saluted Shepard proudly, more inspired and proud to be an Alliance soldier than he'd ever been before in his entire career.

"At ease, gentlemen." She nodded back before moving on with her shore leave, suddenly much more relaxed and invigorated than she'd felt since just before Eden Prime.

Tales of a War Hero Spacer - Zakera Ward

Having given the grand tour of her ship to Rear Admiral Mikhailovich and somewhat justifying it to him in the process, and having saved the traumatized Talitha from suicide, Jane Shepard felt pretty good about how the day was shaping up thus far. With some time to kill before her scheduled meet up with Ben, Liara, Tali & Shiala, she decided to check out how the shopping was at the Zakera Ward. Just before she could get there however, someone that gave her a slight headache and sense of dejavu just to look at him called her aside. Recognizing the sensation as being familiar to every other chronal manipulation based migraine she'd ever had she decided it would be best to find out who he was and what he wanted.

"Hey. Been a long time, huh?" The man who she may or may not remember addressed her when she stopped in front of him.

"I'm sorry, do we know each other?" Shepard asked the man even as she shifted through her chronologically overlapping memories.

"I guess you don't remember me." The man remarked with a nervous stutter. "Lieutenant Zabaleta? I worked with your mother." The man paused wistfully as he thought back, with Shepard still struggling to put the pieces together. She remembered that her mother - at least one version of her mother, anyway - had been, and still was, an Alliance soldier like herself, but without any direct prompts it was difficult at the best of times to remember much of anything beyond a certain point. "We served on the carrier Einstein." The Lieutenant continued. "That was 12...13 years back. You were just a kid them." He brushed it off as unimportant.

"I guess you're not in the service anymore, huh?" Shepard remarked casually as she noted that the man was clearly worn down both physically and mentally.

"'Retired', yeah." Zabaleta remarked jokingly. "You know how it is. Times are tough for vets. They always are." He said tiredly.

"I didn't see her much that tour. The ship was on patrol most of the time." Shepard remarked, as much to help prompt her memory to dig up those old recollections as it was to explain her lack of recollection to Zabaleta.

"Hey, call your mom up and ask." The man urged her a little too eagerly. "She'd remember old Zabaleta. She'd vouch for me." Pausing to wipe away the sweat forming on his brow, he continued. "Look, I need a favor. I'm kinda short on money these days. I hate hitting you up for money, but a man's gotta eat, right?" He chuckled awkwardly. "So, uh, could you spare something? Maybe 20 credits?" He practically begged.

"20 isn't enough to get you back on your feet, is it?" Shepard sighed in tired disappointment at the man, easily pegging him for a drunk or addict out for his next fix.

"Nah, nah!" He denied hastily. "I'll just get a...a meal! You know?" He tried to bargain.

"Yeah, it's not a problem." Jane remarked, taking pity on the poor man as she handed him the requested credits.

"Hey, you're a good kid, you know that?" Zabaleta remarked with a woozy glaze in his eyes. "Thanks." He fidgeted with the credits in his hands for a few seconds before continuing. "You ever want to come by and talk, I'll be here. Hehehe...Can't afford a ticket home, right?"

"Yeah." Jane nodded as she turned away. "Be seeing you, Zabaleta."

Normandy - Comms Room

Immediately after talking with Zabaleta, Jane knew she had to do something to help. She sometimes cursed her better nature, but it never lasted, especially in cases like this one, where she already knew exactly what to do. Dredging up a specific set of highly conflicting memories took some serious focus, but that was one thing Shepards were known to have in abundance. "Computer, give me a real-time connection to the dreadnaught Kilimanjaro. I want to speak to my mother, XO Shepard." Parts of her felt weird saying that, as in addition to a high ranking Alliance soldier, she also knew her mother to be a deadbeat who abandoned her as a child, and a casualty of Batarian slavers. She quickly shoved that thought aside though, as it was mere seconds before her call got a reply.

"Shepard spe...oh, hi." The voice of Hannah Shepard came over the comms. "I don't have time for a personal call right now. I'm on duty."

"I know what that's like." Jane remarked tiredly. 'More than you could ever imagine, mom.' She tagged on mentally, keeping that little detail to herself for right now. "Do you remember a Lieutenant Zabaleta from the Einstein?"

"Ernesto? Have you heard from him?" Hannah inquired with concern. "He was one of the marines who guarded the CIC. We shared a watch. I lost track of him after...there was an incident." She trailed off sadly.

"I've seen him here on the Citadel." Jane informed her mother sadly. "Looks like he's had some hard times."

"I don't doubt it." Hannah noted tiredly. "You remember the Batarian raid on Mindoir, in 2070? You were in high school."

'More than you will ever know, mom.'Jane thought grimly as she got flashbacks to the part of her that was there that awful day.

"The Einstein's task group responded to the mayday." Hannah continued, unaware of the mental trauma her daughter was shoving back in a tiny and unimportant portion of her mind. "The Batarians were still pulling out when the marines hit groundside. Zabaleta was one of the first down." Hannah paused hesitantly. "He...he was never quite the same after."

"I had to talk down a rescued slave from that raid less than an hour ago." Jane admitted sadly. "The PTSD was so bad she was trying to kill herself."

"Then you know how bad it was." Hannah replied sadly. "He tried to keep working, but it rode him. He showed up drunk on duty more and more. We couldn't always cover for him." She paused again, and Jane could almost imagine her mother shaking her head in regret. "The Alliance discharged him. Everyone knew he drank because of what he'd seen down there. Even if he never talked about it...Especially because he never talked about it."

"For it to have affected him that deeply, he must have been a very sensitive man." Jane noted.

"He was." Hannah recollected wistfully. "Always in laughter and tears." She paused to take a deep breath. "If you see him, tell him we still worry about him. Tell him to go to the Veteran's Affairs Office. I have to go. But take care of yourself. You're making us proud. Kilimanjaro out." With that, she cut the line, leaving Jane with a new directive.

A Short While Later - Zakera Ward

Shepard wasted no time making a beeline for Zabaleta. She was a woman on a mission, and she wasn't going to waste any time sitting around.

"Hey, back again, eh?" Ernesto Zabaleta grinned awkwardly the moment he saw her, not the least bit suspecting. "Don't suppose you've got any credits to spare."

"I spoke to my mother." Jane informed him with all the sympathy she could muster. "She told me about what happened on Mindoir."

"Did she?" Ernesto remarked with bitter sarcasm. "I wonder. People tied like prize hogs. Locked in cages, clawing and screaming as they're loaded into cargo pods." His voice rose in tone, pitch and panic. "And we couldn't reach them. The Batarians defenses had us pinned. Dozens died trying to advance. All we could do was watch as they hauled people away." His voice took on a tone of silent dread. "I've been looking for 13 years for something to make that sight go away. What have you got, huh?!" He inquired sarcastically.

"I'm not going to give you money to drink yourself to death." Jane said firmly. "You need to stop this."

"If you don't have a better option, just give me 20 credits!" Ernesto spat hotly. "A good bottle of whiskey. Enough to stop the dreams." He sighed tiredly.

"I already set you up with an account at a nearby grocery store, for food only. No alcohol." Shepard said firmly. "And my mother said to go to the Veteran's Affairs Office. You're not the only one who's seen that brand of hell. They can help."

"The VAO...God!" Ernesto spat in frustration and paced for a few seconds. "If she wants me to go talk to someone fine, I'll do it. For her. She always stuck up for me." He shook his head with a joyless chuckle. "She always was naive. All the VAO does is pump you full of chemicals. If she wants to talk, tell her she can reach me through the Citadel VAO."

"I'll be sure to let her know." Jane nodded contentedly as he walked off. "And I'm sure she'll be happy to hear it too."

Tales of a Ruthless Earthborn - Chora's Den

After having saved Talitha and Ernesto from themselves, on top of the earlier surprise inspection, Shepard needed a drink badly. Not that helping people get over trauma was a bad thing, it was just mentally and emotionally taxing, and she was giving the entire crew the day off to get them to unwind, not work them up the walls even further. Unfortunately for Jane Shepard, the universe had apparently decided to give her one more middle finger before the day was out.

"They told me it was you, but I didn't believe it." A shady looking guy just outside of Chora's Den smirked at her with a devious glint in his eye. "Shepard grew up and turned into a soldier."

"An impatient soldier." Shepard glared back even as she immediately began tracing her memories back from the timeline where she was known as the Butcher of Torfan, thinking that was the most likely timeline where she'd associate with such an obvious scumbag without either putting them in a cell, or a bullet in their skull. "Who are you, and why are you in my way?"

"Name's Finch." The man replied curtly. "You probably don't remember me, but we ran together in the Tenth Street Reds." He paused only briefly to shake his head sarcastically. "You probably don't remember it yourself, running in a gang. None of the vids mention it when they're talking about you."

'Probably because three histories have been tied up into one knot.' Shepard thought sarcastically as pieces began falling into place, despite her not wanting them to, before directing her focus to a response. "The vids never tell the whole story. So what can I do for the Reds?"

"One of the Reds, Curt Weisman, got picked up by the Turians." Finch explained. "We'd like you to talk to the Turian guard in the bar and get Kurt out."

"What was this guy arrested for?" Shepard asked, even as the more devious part of her mind began cranking through the information she had on her old gang buddies, trying to figure out what she could get out of this without paying too big a price.

"Some stupid minor offense." Finch replied evasively, a red flag if Shepard had ever seen one. "Maybe he had a little red sand. You know how the Turians are." He shook his head in arrogant judgement. "They declared him a problem, and they're shipping him back for a trial."

'You're goddamn right I know how the Turians are.' Shepard saw through his lie in an instant. 'Certainly more than you, that's for sure. Both culturally and legally, Turians have no problems with recreational drug use, unless it's done to excess or becomes a problem to others.' Rather than call out the lie however, she decided to probe for more information. "You're not asking me to break Weisman out of jail, are you?"

"Of course not." Finch replied in a tone that clearly indicated the opposite. "But word has it you've got some pull with the aliens. All we're asking you to do is pull a little for us."

"What was one of the Tenth Street Reds doing in Turian space, anyway?" Shepard addressed the final issue she had with all of this nonsense she was being forced to put up with.

"Since your days, the Reds have expanded." Finch replied, as if that were something to be proud of. "We do some salvage, a little shipping here and there, that kind of thing."

'I very much doubt that's the extent of it, but I should probably see where this goes anyway.' Shepard thought as she began brainstorming all sorts of uses the modern day Reds could have preparing for and participating in a galactic scale war against the Reapers, most of it very high risk. "I'll talk to the Turian and see what I can do."

"Thanks, Shepard." Finch grinned as he and Shepard shook hands. "I knew you're remember your old friends. The guard's over in Chora's Den." He explained as he stifled a chuckle. "Take care of this, and you'll never see me again."

Her task set, Shepard quickly went into the bar, which she idly noted had fully repaired the hole left by Ben's lava shotgun. Spotting the Turian officer, she quietly asked the bartender to get a drink ready for her when she got back, preferably something strong, as she had a feeling she would need it.

"Can I help you?" The Turian asked once he noticed Shepard approaching him.

"A human named Finch wanted me to use my authority as a SPECTRE to free Curt Weisman." Shepard warned the Turian.

"The xenophobe?" The Turian responded in mild shock. "I should have known he'd have friends." He nodded his head gratefully. "Thank you for the information. We'll increase the guard on his cell."

"I knew you'd rat us out, Shepard!" Finch growled at her angrily as he approached, getting the attention of both her and the Turian officer. "Now it's payback time!" He said menacingly...or at least menacing from his perspective. Personally, Shepard had seen so much crazy shit in just the past few weeks that his tone barely registered as a slight itch. "When we're through telling our story, the aliens will all know what the first Human SPECTRE really is."

'I barely know who I am.' Shepard thought in an odd mixture of scathing and humorous. "My bio is public record." She responded smoothly. "Everyone knows that I ran with gangs as a kid." That reflexive response set off warning sirens in her head. 'Shit! All three of my histories are public record, aren't they?!' She mentally panicked, even though visibly she remained cool and collected.

"They don't know that the Reds target aliens specifically." Finch gave a predatory smirk, leaving Shepard nervous for reasons that had almost nothing to do with him. "We've got the backers to handle offworld missions. Your alien friends won't like you so much when they hear what your gang did."

"What do you want, Finch?" Shepard asked, a bit more fiercely than she meant to. "What gets you out of my life?" She narrowed the focus. 'I have way more important things than some xenophobe with an irrational grudge to deal with right now.'

"What do I want?" Finch replied sarcastically. "I want aliens off of Earth. I want the Council to stay out of Humanity's business."

"The Tenth Street Reds was a gang, not an Earth-First movement." Shepard retorted as she managed to reign her calm back in. 'Public records can be forged, and misinformation is more common than not. With any luck, most people who don't know me personally from those days will just think the conflicting backstories are cover-ups or rumors, not evidence of an inter-timeline conspiracy.'

"They're a Human movement now." Finch rebutted, as if there was a distinction between the two. "You think the vids will make that distinction." He threatened, not realizing the irony of that statement. "I can find a dozen Reds who'll swear they saw you kill aliens for fun. Who's going to believe you then?"

'Why am I wasting time on this bullshit? I have a war to prepare for, and a drink waiting to help me buzz this irritating moment out of my head.' Shepard thought as she quickly thought up a response that would get her what she needed. "If you want Humanity to be strong, a smear attack on the first Human SPECTRE is a bad idea."

"The SPECTRE is right." The officer seconded the motion. "This is Humanity's chance to prove itself. There is even talk of earning a Council seat."

"Of course you'd side with Shepard!" Finch spat with vicious spite. "You want someone who's in bed with your kind!"

"I'm in bed with a Quarian, two Asari, and an extra-galactic shapeshifter. Haven't found a Turian I like that way just yet. I'd go for Garrus, but I think he's already spoken for." Shepard retorted sarcastically, drawing befuddled looks from both parties. "...Yes, I mean that literally. Who are either of you to judge?" She shot cold looks at them, both of them raising their hands in placating surrender. "And as for you." She grabbed Finch roughly by his shirt and pulled him in close enough to see the whites of his eyes. "I'm a SPECTRE now. I could systematically hunt down and kill you, your gang, your entire family, and legally get away with all of it. I'm not going to do that though. Do you know why?" She asked with a casually danger to her tone, Finch quickly shaking his head nervously in response. "It's because I'm generous to my friends. And you're gonna be a good friend to me by being my rat on the inside. From now on, any little schemes the Reds try to pull, any other groups they work with, any time they so much as twitch their nose, you're gonna report everything to our new best friend here." She explained in a hissing tone as she jerked her thumb in the direction of the Turian officer, causing him to double take in response. "Do I make myself clear, Finch?"

"Crystal." Finch nodded fearfully, as did the officer, though Shepard couldn't see him do so.

"Good." Shepard nodded as she walked off to the bar. "Now if you'll both excuse me..." She stopped and chugged the drink she'd ordered earlier, slamming the empty mug down with a satisfied sigh. "I needed that." She smiled as she casually strolled away to meet up with Ben and the others.

"...That human just downed a whole pint of ryncol." The bartender remarked in shock and awe, striking fear into the hearts of the officer and Finch, both of whom made a silent vow to never do anything that might make Shepard angry.

Later - Citadel Embassy Lounge

"I hate my life." Shepard sighed in exhaustion as she collapsed onto her chair.

"Whoa, what's got you feeling like how my grandpa's cooking smells?" Ben asked sarcastically, earning odd looks from everyone else. "...Trust me, you don't want to know."

"Being equal parts of three contradictory backstories from a massive fold in space-time, that's what." Jane replied tiredly as she pressed a glass of ice water to the side of her face. "Seeing and feeling everything come clashing together in my brain gave me some massive new PTSD. How the hell do you deal with this kind of thing, Ben? Working with Paradox, I mean."

"Honestly?" Ben replied dully. "I don't know if I've ever had it quite as bad as you do. Don't get me wrong, teaming-up with Paradox is always a headache and a half, especially that time I teamed-up with alternate versions of myself to fight alternate, evil versions of myself." He paused to let that sink in, eliciting tired groans and a few chuckles from everyone else. "...My life is a goddamn comic book, isn't it?"

"You're just realizing this now?" Kaidan chuckled as he munched on some cookies he'd bought earlier. "Also, nobody's called them 'comics' since forced diversity, the abusive working conditions and higher-ups, and a metric truckload of SJW bullshit utterly destroyed the industry in the mid 2020s. It's either graphic novels or manga now, with shared universes being the exception rather than the norm." He noted conversationally, only noticing the odd looks everyone was giving him after several seconds of silence. "...What? It's not like Joker and Ben have a monopoly on pop-culture references and sarcastic criticism and humor."

"Yeah, but it's a really weird thing to bring up out of nowhere." Ashley noted awkwardly before taking a long, drawn out sip of her protein shake.

"Also, we're just a lot better at it than you are." Ben added smugly before chugging half of his third smoothie, happily taking the wind out of Kaidan's already flimsy sails. "We just make quick one-liners, yours was practically a speech."

"...Speaking of weird things out of nowhere." Tali began nervously as she rose from her seat and waved over a male Quarian that had just entered. "Everyone...I'd like to introduce you all to Admiral Rael'Zorah...my father." She said with a salute.

"At ease, Tali." Rael let out a soft hum of a chuckle, gently pushing down her arm before suddenly pulling her into a surprise embrace. "...I'm so proud of you."

"Father!" Tali squirmed at the sudden display of affection from her long estranged parent. "What in the name of Rannoch are you doing?! You're embarrassing me in front of all my friends!" She hissed as everyone let out a few playful chuckles at the adorable sight of the father embracing his daughter.

"I can't help it." Rael sighed happily as he finally released his daughter. "I just...what you've given to us...to all Quarians...it's just..." He choked up, holding up a pausing hand and shaking his head in disbelief. "Words do not exist that can describe how...overjoyed our people are."

"Really?" Tali tilted her head questioningly. "All I did was provide evidence of what most young Quarians already suspected might be the case. Honestly, I'd thought that there'd be a lot more controversy surrounding the whole thing, considering our history with the Geth."

"I'm not going to lie, there was a lot of push-back." Rael sighed in mental exhaustion. "Even I doubted it at first...Still, between your message, the evidence, and going to Zaal'Koris of all people for advice..." He chuckled mirthfully in recollection. "It finally won me over. Then we both managed to convince Shala'Raan, and with a majority vote, we managed to force through at least an attempt to meet the so-called 'True' Geth on neutral grounds."

"That's wonderful!" This time it was Tali's turn to hug her father, an embrace he eagerly returned. "When's the meeting? Where is it? What about Garrel and Xen? I can't imagine those two bosh'tets are too happy about this turn of events."

"Settle down there, Tali." Rael chuckled at his daughter's enthusiasm, glad to finally be able to act like that father he should have been for so many years. "The details of the meeting are being kept on a strict need-to-know basis, and despite having been the one to find the data..."

"I get it." Tali nodded understandingly as they parted again. "Do what you have to do for the benefit of our people, despite any personal cost. That's all any Quarian can hope to do."

"It shouldn't have to be." Rael said as he looked down at his hands in frustration. "I should have been..." He shook his head. "That's all in the past though. What matters now is that we take this chance you've given us, and focus on building a better future where no Quarian will be forced to make such sacrifices ever again. As for the other two admirals..." He shook his head and clenched his hands in frustration. "Garrel and I aren't on speaking terms anymore, and I doubt we ever will be again." He huffed angrily.

"What?!" Tali remarked in shock. "But you two have been practically brothers since you saved one of our freighters from a Batarian raid before you were both shoved out on your early Pilgrimage together!"

"And because of that I expected him to at least try and look at the potential this data presents with an open mind." Rael shook his head in frustration as he began to pace. "But that stubborn old warship pulled out every dirty trick in the book to try and stonewall this decision. Slandering Koris as a suit-wetting coward to any captains that would listen, and having the nerve to say that Raan and I were 'emotionally compromised' due my being your father and Raan being a longtime friend of the family, conveniently forgetting all the years he and I spent frustrating those pompous Turians every chance we got...No offence to your teammate, of course." He quickly apologized when he noticed Garrus.

"None taken." Garrus shrugged before chugging some Turian beer. "Trust me, I know how difficult my people can be at the best of times. Why do you think I joined a team without any other Turians on it to begin with?"

"To annoy the crap out of the rest of us?" Wrex verbally jabbed the ex-C-Sec officer.

"So how did you finally manage to force the decision to make peace-talks with the Geth through?" Shepard inquired stoically. "As any human who knows their history can tell you, there's nothing more dangerous to the survival of a species than when a hypocrite digs in their heels."

"You must be Commander Shepard." Rael saluted the redhead, getting a casually salute back. "Tali has spoken of you often in her letters, and I did some independent investigations of my own the moment I heard my daughter would be working under you." He nodded in approval, obviously liking what he'd heard, and even more obviously not knowing the innuendo he'd just made, if Tali's embarrassment, Shepard's smirk, and Ben's subdued chuckle were anything to go by. "To answer your question, it was actually Admiral Daro'Xen who was the voice of reason that forced the decision through in the end."

"Admiral Xen?!" Tali repeated in shock and disbelief. "The same Admiral Xen that performed surgery on her childhood toys? Who talks of reprogramming the Geth back into their original state as our servants and lording the largest synthetic army in the galaxy over the heads of the Citadel Council? She was the voice of reason?!"

"I was as shocked as you are when she voted in favor of the decision." Rael admitted without hesitation. "Obviously, she's trying to work some kind of angle to take control of the Geth, but with the Reapers on the way..." He stopped short, realizing he shouldn't be discussing such things too publicly. "The point is, I'll take her support now to try and avert a disaster later. Our science team and military tacticians say that, depending on the methods used, we have five years at most before...real trouble shows up..." He shuddered at the thought of the scale of disaster the Reapers could cause. "And even that's considered an enormously generous and conservative estimate. With those timetables and the options we're considering, I feel confident that we can divert her attention to other vital tasks long enough to defuse her...less savory projects."

"We'll take whatever we can get." Ben gave a grateful nod as he walked up and wrapped an arm over Tali's shoulder, prompting her to fidget nervously against his torso. "With two-thirds of the Citadel Council being the stubborn blowhards they are, maybe an alliance between the Quarians, Geth and Humans could finally make them take the word of outsiders like us seriously."

"...You must be Ambassador Tennyson, from Andromeda." Rael remarked as he noted the uncomfortable closeness between his daughter and the shapeshifter, and how Tali seemed all too happy to have Ben's arm around her. "My daughter has spoken much of you in our communications, how your insight has helped shape her viewpoint of the conflict between Quarian and Geth for the better, but it seems she has neglected to inform me of...certain other insights she's developed with you..."

"OH no!" Tali wagged her finger angrily at her father. "Don't you dare go there, Father! I understand your position as an Admiral and the pressure that comes with it, and despite everything in our past I'm willing to give you a chance to finally act like a real father, but you do NOT, under any circumstances, get to be the overprotective father! You gave up the right to that long ago!"

"I'm just concerned." Rael defended himself from his daughter's verbal assault. "He's from another galaxy. Who knows what sort of...I mean, I know his DNA was supposedly based off of a human template, but even they don't have the same amino acids as-"

"Not hearing this! La-la-la, not hearing this!" Tali trilled as she covered the sides of her helmet.

"I assure you, there's no cause for alarm, Admiral." Liara interjected to try and set his mind at ease. "Dr. Chakwas, our ship's medic, has done extensive tests, and she assures me that Ben's polymorphic DNA can immediately adapt and bond to any potential sentient host parent, so there are no biochemical barriers to-"

"It can do what now?!" Ben panicked as everyone involved looked at the young Asari in alarm.

"You mean...you didn't know?" Liara blinked sheepishly.

"What makes you think we would know?" Tali asked her tensely. "You know we haven't exactly been using protection!" She hissed.

"You haven't been WHAT?!" Rael looked at his daughter in alarm. "And why would she know that?" He pointed at Liara accusingly.

"I already said you don't get to be the over-protective father!" Tali pointed back at her father as the conversation continued to spiral into madness.

"I am way too old and way too sober for this shit." Wrex shook his head tiredly before turning himself in the direction of the bar. "Hey, could I get another four or five mugs of ryncol over here?"

Next Day - Horse Head Nebula - Pax System

"I. Am going. To die." Tali groaned as she shook her head in shame, hiding in the corner of the Normandy's cargo hold.

"Still thinking about our little spat with your dad yesterday?" Ben asked as he cautiously rubbed his lover's shoulders, earning a barely noticeable nod in response. "I'm surprised. Honestly, I thought everyone more or less forgot about that after that scuffle with those privateers a few hours ago on Xawin."

"Please, that sort of thing is barely a blip on the radar at this point." Tali huffed mockingly. "Why were we even there in the first place, anyway?"

Ben paused for several seconds, having to struggle to recall the reason for their involvement despite his normally photographic memory. "I think it was something about a missing mining ship?" He answered uncertainly. "My memory's been a bit spottier than usual ever since we got those anti-indoctrination injections from ExoGeni."

"A temporary side-effect." Liara noted as she pulled up a seat next to them. "Dr. Chakwas has some vitamin supplements that can help counteract it if you're interested."

"No thanks." Ben declined politely. "I don't know why, but for some reason just being near Dr. Chakwas freaks me out. I mean, I'm not normally afraid of doctors, but something about Karin just makes me want to keep a wide distance from her."

"To be fair, you have consented to a number of rather invasive tests with her." Liara noted clinically. "Perhaps it is creating a subconscious association with your fight-or-flight instinct."

"I beat the crap out of mad scientists after my DNA on a regular basis." Ben reminded her of his prior adventures. "I haven't been afraid of any of them since I was ten years old, so why would she freak me out?"

"It is called fight-or-flight for a reason, beloved." Shiala remarked as she entered the conversation, her build and the use of the word 'beloved' making Ben wonder how Looma and the other girls were doing with his genetic source. "You trust Dr. Chakwas enough to do these tests on you, but you are conditioned to view doctors studying your DNA with suspicion. You don't allow yourself to harm her, so you are left with an impulse to stay away instead."

"...She makes a good point, you know." Tali commented nonchalantly.

"I guess I'll try looking at it that way and being more open-minded in the future." Ben sighed as he leaned up against the wall.

"Glad I could be of service, Ben." Shiala nodded as she sat down with the rest of them. "Now that we have put this issue to rest, there is one other topic I wished to bring up."

"And that would be what exactly?" Liara inquired inquisitively.

...

Omake 3: Tales of Another Ben

"It concerns the goings on of another Ben Tennyson." Shiala began. "I know we agreed to discuss these matters with the whole ground team, but I recently witnessed something that...has me concerned for the future, both the immediate and the distant."

"What about him...me...whatever?" Ben shook his head as he struggled to find the right pronouns.

"During our first melding, I saw that Paradox had briefly brought you all to a universe of darkness known as Varelsi Space." Shiala reminded them. "You will also recall that another version of Ben was involved in that area as well, albeit only briefly."

"I...think he might have said something like that back then?" Tali remarked uncertainly. "It was a while ago, and we didn't actually get to see this other Ben."

"Yes, well, that Ben is made from a composite of three different strands of DNA." Shiala explained as she held her hands up, using her biotics to conjure a glowing helix in each. "The right half of your body is made from Swampfire, while the left half is made from Upgrade." She then moved the two helices together into a double helix symbolic of DNA. "Binding these two radically different genetic codes together is the DNA of Lodestar, which visibly forms a pair of extended shoulder blades and your head." The double helix shifted into a form that looked vaguely like what she had just described, albeit entirely in blue.

"Fascinating." Liara whispered in awe. "Organic and Synthetic DNA, bound together by microscopic magnetic forces. It's not my field of expertise, but I'd love a chance to study him nonetheless."

"You just might get that chance." Shiala uttered with dread. "You see, this Ben was sent to a dying universe, with only one star and a handful of habitable planets and moons left in existence." That remark sank like a weight in the pit of everyone's stomach. Heat death was a terrifying thing to think about even at the best of times, let alone while you were actually forced to live it. "The entropy of this universe has been artificially accelerated by the Varelsi that inhabit that universe of darkness you briefly visited. They use unknown technology to steal entire stars and planets, whisking them away to their own universe for equally unknown reasons. They first began their horrific campaign against that universe 20,000 years ago, and were on the brink of total victory before your counterpart arrived."

"...And here I thought the Reapers were terrifying." Ben shuddered after a long silence. "These Varelsi though...there are no words...what is this other me even supposed to do?!" He inquired sarcastically. "Even assuming he's able to stop them, what then? Can he steal back the planets and stars? Are they even still usable? And what about all the people that got stolen along with those worlds? This is all just..." He sighed as he placed his face in his hands.

"You understand my concern, then." Shiala nodded morosely. "These Varelsi...they can cross the borders between universes, and steal stars and planets with seemingly no end in sight other than the end of the universe they are plundering. While the other Ben and the comrades he has found in a group of powerful warriors calling themselves Battleborn have managed to avert disaster for now, and even inflicted sizable damage to the Varelsi themselves, victory still seems but a distant dream for now. I worry that...if they manage to capture the other Ben, they may trace the quantum entanglement that binds you to our universe, and who knows how many others." The silence hung stagnant in the recycled air for a long time. Seconds passed, then minutes, each moment feeling simultaneously longer and shorter than it actually was.

"...I've never had a drop of alcohol in my life." Ben finally broke the silence as he stood up and stretched out the kinks that had formed in his back. "Let's go change that, shall we?"

Surprised I'm finally posting something again, aren't you? Well, so am I! I make no promises for the future, but here's hoping it doesn't take me another 9 MONTHS to get the next chapter out!

Next time: Noveria and Liara's MILF Benezia!