A/N: I could not help but to think that Yeoman Chambers needed a little more character development. And as a woman with an obvious alien kink, who better to ask for inter-species mating advice?

I stared absently at the drink in my hand and swirled it slightly, the ice cubes clinking rhythmically against the glass with a comforting familiarity I had been greatly lacking as of late. Yeoman Kelly Chambers, Psychologist, scientist and genuine Xenos-enthusiast, sat quietly across from me; the coy smile she was trying politely to hide merely distorting itself into carnival mirror proportions behind the amber liquid of her brandy snifter. It was only after the silence continued to dredge on that she began to scrutinize me openly, her head tilting askew as she considered me.

Asking her to come to my private quarters had seemed, at the time, like the easiest way to speak to her in confidence. But I was strongly unaccustomed to hosting such soirees outside of rank and file, and female bonding, in and around itself, was not a particular strong suit of mine. Sometimes, it really is easier just to shoot some one than it is to talk to them

"Look," I said with a sigh, finally setting the drink down on the small coffee table so that I would stop using it as a clever distraction. "I know that your free time is valuable. Everyone is being pushed to the limit right now. Things are tense. Stress is running high. I understand that this may even be outside of your professional capacity. But, I was hoping that I could talk to you about something personal. Something...mildly delicate."

"Mildly delicate?" Chambers held her glass stem expertly in-between two fingers before balancing it steadily on the top of her knee. She nodded respectfully at my obvious hesitation but her face held a glimmer of female intuition that frankly pissed me off. Still, when it came down to it, my options were either this-my awkward humbling attempt at casual female banter-or going to subject myself to the clinical ramblings of Mordin. And this was not a subject that I deeply wanted to broach with the neurotic salarian geneticist. I could already hear his words in the back of my mind, rapid and disjointed as he explained to me the finer points of inter-species intercourse. At least as far as it pertained to a very specific turian male and my own very willing, but daunted, homosapien self. "Mating difficult. Should be avoided. Find strong human specimen. No chaffing."

When I moaned out loud, Chambers downed the rest of her glass and set it down next to mine, a thin well sculpted eyebrow arching upward in question. " Is this about, Garrus?"

Sighing, I rubbed my face with both hands. I supposed this conversation would go far easier if I simply committed to it. "Garrus. Yes. Right. Him. "

She had the decency to laugh. "I thought as much. I am the ship counselor, Commander. I was beginning to wonder if you knew what I did here."

The girl had a spunky side. This was far from the polite unassuming persona I had come to expect. And yet, somehow, I should have known. There is very rarely such a thing as a quiet retiring red head. "I am aware, Kelly. And I am grateful that there is someone else on board this ship that cares about the crews' needs almost as much as I do. Someone that will let me know if there is something that I have missed. Something that might need my attention."

"I know, Commander." Kelly poured herself another two fingers of sweet asarian cordial before returning the ornate blue bottle back to the table. From an angle, it looked cunningly like the figure of a posing maiden, her head turned slightly over her right shoulder as if to lure you into tasting her. Distractedly, I also noticed that she seemed to have tired of her typical roll of alcoholic indulgent and had recently accepted a new position as bodyguard for my new Illium made lowball bar glass. It was good to know that there were still career advancement opportunities available for off-world specialty decanters.

Chambers coughed suggestively and waited for me to notice her. When I returned eye contact, I suddenly wondered how long she had been waiting for me to rejoin the conversation.

"Commander, may I speak candidly?"

I nodded and decided to take the coquettish asarian bottle back up on her offer. "Of course, Kelly."

"Why have you never requested to speak to me before?"

That, unfortunately, was a fair question. A fair question that I did not know how to answer.

"Shepard," She leaned forward and balled her hands into her lap,her tone gentle as she reproached me,"-you died. They were able to bring you back but you lost two years in the process. Two years! You returned to find nothing familiar, nothing but a new battle to fight and another chance to die. Your old crew had moved on, scattered across the universe. And you? You were forced to move forward alone. You had no choice. No other options. That is not an easy accomplishment."

Chambers pushed herself up from the couch and crossed aimlessly to the embedded floor to ceiling fish tank taking up the greater expanse of the far wall. She watched the Sun Fish dart spastically for a few quiet moments before sighing."The Illusive Man placed me here among your crew for their benefit, yes, but I am also here to evaluate you. I was part of the Lazarus Cell, Commander. I saw what it took to bring you back. Miranda may have been in charge of your physical reconstruction, but your sanity is my responsibility.

I've been trying to give you time to adjust and to come to terms with working with Cerberus. I haven't wanted to interrogate to you." She paused to look at me poignantly. "-Not that you would have allowed it. But I do want to know that you are OK. Not many have been asked to save the galaxy from eminent demise. You are the only woman I know that has been asked to do it twice."

I narrowed my eyes and lifted my chin slightly."Are you worried about me or Cerberus' investment? I guess there is always the possibility that I could snap under the stress of it all and just start pissing on things, indiscriminately. I didn't ask for any of this, Kelly. "

In the six months we had been serving together I had never once seen a negative emotion come from the Yeoman. The look she gave me now politely suggested that I go fuck myself.

"Commander Shepard, you asked for me to come here. Inquiring how you are handling your own death doesn't seem like too much to ask."

Point taken.

"Kelly," I gestured hopelessly and gave up. "I am sorry. I know you are just trying to do your job, but I am not ready to talk about it yet. There's a chance that I may never be. I lost everything. My ship...my crew...Kaidan. I'm not looking for empathy here. All I want is some semblance of normalcy back. Dwelling on it isn't going to make that happen any sooner. I'm fine. I am just adapting."

"Kaidan? Commander Alenko?"

This is not what I had wanted to talk to her about. Kaidan was quite content in his belief that I had forced him to evacuate the crew of the Normandy just so that I could jump eagerly from the burning ship and disintegrate gracefully in to the waiting hands of Cerberus. I would sooner enjoy offering cosmetic tips to a charging krogan than delve through that emotional baggage, again. Still, I could not help but to wonder idly if EDI would be willing to find me a vid on how to tell your ex-lover that you did not die just to tick him off.

When at last I spoke, my voice sounded begrudging even to me."Yes, but he was just a Lieutenant, then."

"I remember. He was in your case file," she grabbed the chair in front of my desk and rolled it to sit directly in front of my spot on the couch."You two were involved?"

"I know it is against protocol. Some might say I abused my position for a few fleeting moments of passion by the light of an Omni tool but - "

"No, I just think it was very human. But Cerberus is not the Alliance. We do not have the same stipulations."

I was really beginning to like her. Then again, it might have just been the cordial. It had a tendency to make you want to reach out and make new friends, even if you did not really want any. "Perhaps," I offered doubtfully. "But it still did not end well."

"Well, no-" She said matter of factly."But that wasn't your fault. As I recall, you took enemy fire and your ship was none-so-delicately and irreversibly blown up. For all case and purposes, you ended up doing an unceremonious swan dive into the outer atmosphere of a relatively unknown ice giant while attempting to evacuate your pilot. There doesn't seem to be anything premeditated about that. Unless suffocating in the vacuum of space was really your ideal path to the other side?"

I frowned back at her.

"Yes, somehow I had strongly doubted that. But does that not relatively sum it up?"

"More or less," I agreed. "but Kaidan still hasn't forgiven me."

"I do not think that that was the problem, Commander."

"No?" I shrugged casually." Maybe you are right. He was too busy judging my new motives to really use all of his vocabulary words. Apparently coming back from a crispy critter status has a unique way of putting people off."

Kelly snorted."Or maybe your dying just traumatized him slightly, did you ever even stop to consider that? Isn't it possible that he may have just been in love with you? It is not unfathomable, Shepard. He has spent the last several months trying to forgive himself for inadvertently leaving you there to die. And just as he is slowly beginning to come to terms with it, you stroll up like you are barely late for supper."

"He caught me off guard." I laid my head against the back of the couch and closed my eyes. "I received a report that he had been sent to Horizon after the Alliance discovered the human colony there might be the next target. He was following the same leads we were. And even though our Intel was correct, we arrived too late to intervene. Following the aftermath, I wasn't sure if he was one of the few we had forced the Collectors to leave behind. I was afraid to hope. But when he found me-"

I swallowed past a lump in my throat. Galactic saviors were not allowed to become overwhelmed by matters of the heart. That had to be a rule, somewhere. And chances were it was probably a drell that wrote it.

"Kaidan had set up defense towers on Horizon as a cover for his investigation in to Cerberus," I continued. "He had initially thought that you were involved in the original colony disappearances. When the rumor surfaced that I had survived and was now working for you, he was beside himself. Even when he discovered first hand the true source of the abductions he could not fully reconcile himself to who he thought I had become." I smiled then, but there was not any humor in it. " He doesn't trust me and I can not say that I blame him. He is not entirely sure that I am even the same person. For all the proof he has, I may as well just be some elaborate AI to give name recognition and credibility to the current Cerberus cause. I know that I owe the Lazarus Cell and the Illusive Man for my continued existence, and for that you have my full cooperation, but Cerberus does not control me. Kaidan does not see that."

The Yeoman's lips settled into a single straight line. It was decidedly not a good look for her. "I was aware of our mission there. I was on board this ship, after all, but I did not realize Kaidan's full involvement. Still, I can not say that I am surprised. We are a privately funded paramilitary group, that alone does not usually inspire thoughts of warmth and good cheer from the outside world. Hell, most still think that we are little more than rebels and crackpot extremists. But that isn't what bothers you. You feel like Kaidan walked away from you. You feel betrayed." She hesitated before confirming her thoughts out loud."You loved him."

I would have expected it to sound more like an accusation, but this was far too close to sympathy and I did not know what the hell to do with sympathy. Realizing that she had not made it an open question just gave me an excuse not to answer.

"Give him time," she said, finally. "He'll contact you when he can face everything that that entails."

I nodded but pretended to become distracted by the chittering of the space hamster running happy circles in his tank on the far corner of my desk. He seemed quite content in his space hamsterness. He was living in an area five million times smaller than his natural habitat, but for a handful of pellets, and an occasional ruffage ration, he was more than content that this was all a very fantastic arrangement. I was slightly envious of Lieutenant Squeak-Squeaker for a moment. I was also beginning to remember why I often chose not to fraternize with the other female folk.

"So," Kelly nudged my foot with hers in a friendly attempt to get my attention, again. "I'm willing to bet the credit chit hidden in my underwear drawer that you didn't ask me here to talk about, Kaidan."

"You could say that, but I don't think telling me the secret hiding place of your credit stash was such a grand idea. Hamster bedding isn't cheap, Chambers."

She grinned, showing the top row of her teeth."You're changing the subject."

"You Psychologists are all so damn observant."

"It is a hazard of the trade." She leaned forward as if there would be a need for conspiratory whispering and raised an eyebrow in question. "Now, tell me about, Garrus."

I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. Perhaps I had not thought this out as well as I should have. Perhaps I could still end this and walk away. There had to be other resources at my disposal. I did not necessarily need to admit my new-found carnal leanings to the only onboard resident therapist. There were options. I had an Artificial Intelligence.

"Garrus-" I found myself mapping out his general size and form with the use of my hands."The tall turian whose ass I saved because he decided to dispense his own form of vigilante justice by taking pock shots at the slavers and drug traffickers on Omega? I still don't know why he couldn't have just taken up a nice quiet hobby, or just hung out in bars and picked up half naked asarian dancers like a nice normal member of society."

"I know who he is, Shepard." She shook her head like she was being forced to deal with a small obstinate Duct Rat. Perhaps the only real difference between the two, at the moment, was that those Citadel ne'er-do-wells could be paid to delve out private information and I was trying really hard to hold on to mine.

"It all makes sense, you know?" She said, mildly." He's a link to your past. Something familiar. Something that you can trust. You need that right now. This isn't the first time that two species have stared at each other from across the killing field, sweating from the heat of battle, and realized that there just might be a few parts that fit."

"That's very poetic, Kelly. Speaking from experience?"

"Maybe, but I'm not a fighter, Commander. The battlefields I roam are all here." She tapped her temple with her index finger and winked. "But I may have, on occasion, matched wits with a turian or two. They can be very opinionated and very... passionate. They seem to enjoy sparring no matter what the venue."

She seemed to be reminiscing slightly. I was not sure that I would ever want to be preview to the barrage of images currently flashing behind those clear intelligent green eyes. When she caught my expression she straightened involuntarily. "You asked me once if I was attracted to aliens. I told you then that intimacy was one of the best possible ways to understand someone on a Psychological level. Psychology has always been one part book smarts and three parts voyeurism. I like to think of it as field research."

"Research is it? Well, cheers to that." I ignored my fingerprint smudged glass on the table and took a shot straight from the bottle. Suddenly holding on to it seemed like a solid idea, just for good measure. Savoring the smooth after burn I clutched it to my chest and made furtive eye contact with the most un-xenophobic woman I had ever had the pleasure to meet. "So, it is possible?"

"Yes. Of course it is." She sounded like I had just asked her something so asinine she could not completely wrap her head around it. " There are precautions you should take, but otherwise..."

"Precautions?"

I passed her the bottle slowly and she took a shot of her own. We seemed to be running out far more quickly than I would have anticipated.

"They are heavily scaled and built to last; very durable. It's rather like mounting a Mako."

The visual was already locked and loaded before I could do anything to stop it. "Did you just say, Mako? "

"Yes," her expression was quite sincere. "an all terrain M35 Mako infantry fighting vehicle."

" I obviously know what they are."

"Just checking." With a little support from the couch and desk, she made it successfully to the hamster cage and slipped Squeak-Squeaker out of his ball pose. When he vibrated slightly, she jumped. "Are they supposed to do that?"

"You scared him."

"Ah..." She sat back in the rolly chair and threw her feet ungracefully on to my coffee table. She seemed very comfortable, even with the rodent making its way up her arm to hide behind the hair at the nape of her neck."Where was I? Oh. Yes."

It was back to business for the good doctor...

"Other than chaffing you shouldn't be too uncomfortable. There are some positions that will make it less of a problem than others but I'll forward them to you," she shrugged. "For the most part standard procedures will apply. Some things remain consistent no matter what flavor of alien you are dealing with. Unless they are hanar or some other non-bipedal race, of course. That would involve a great deal of creativity." As she freed the hamster from her hair it seemed to remind her of something."You should really try stroking the crest horns. It is an intense erogenous zone for turian males. It helps them to loosen up all of that pent up warrior aggression. It's actually rather fun to watch." The look on my face made her smile suddenly."Is this too much?"

"No, this is very useful. I just...thank you. It is just a great deal to absorb."

"Yes, It can be intimidating the first time. I'm actually surprised Garrus is willing to try it. He doesn't seem like the experimental type. He's cautious. I would have expected him to map out the terrain before volunteering to send troops."

The mental image of Garrus watching vids on human mating techniques made me wince visibly. "This is definitely outside of his comfort zone. I do not think this is something he would generally subscribe to."

"No, not lightly." She grabbed Squeaker by the tail as he made a break for it and got up to put him back in his cage. "Commander, Garrus is very aware of you. He is covert about it but he follows your every move. I believe the only reason that things have not progressed before now is because it did not occur to him that you would be open to it. He never would have initiated it. It never would have even crossed his mind. But trust and loyalty can transition into something much more and very easily. It may not have been coherently premeditated on his part, but I assure you he is welcome to it."

She dropped the rodent in to a bed of shavings with a light thud, then fastened the lid back on to his tank. Wiping her hands together, she considered me for a moment.

"Shepard, he respects you. That is no easy task. Kaidan might have been more forthcoming about it, but I think Garrus has had an attachment to you since long before you ever even knew how to phonetically pronounce his last name."

When she joined me on the couch her face was all hard lines and wrinkled forehead. Whatever else she had to say, she did not plan on sugar coating it.

"Listen," she crossed her legs and appeared to search her lap thoughtfully. "With all do respect, Commander, if you are just looking to relieve tension, Garrus isn't the way to go. You're not the only one that has been betrayed, recently. He may seem frightfully resilient but his range of emotions is not so very different from your own. It will not go well. "

"You are honestly concerned that I am going to knowingly take advantage of a fully grown turian combatant?"

"No. What I am saying is that you are lost and prepared to die, right now. Those are both acting factors in all of your current motivations. They might not be the only factors, but they are a powerful stimuli either way. He needs you as much as you need him. Just let that be enough. If you are not comfortable with the plausibility that this may actually manifest itself in to something much more complicated than a single passing liaison, then I wouldn't take a chance on it. Just walk away, Shepard."

As I stared back at her in muted silence, Chambers maintained eye contact. I could not help but to think that there was still a great deal that she was not telling me.

"You sound as though you speak to him quite often."

Catching my tone she reproached me cautiously, the lines around her mouth deepening at the corners. " Yes, but only when he wills it. He is not what I would refer to as a communicator."

"But the two of you are...close?"

I watched her as she became more guarded,her arms crossing as if shielding herself from my new sudden line of questioning. When she looked away the set of her jawline was defiant. "I would like to believe that he trusts in my professional capacities but I've never crossed that line if that is what you are asking. Is that what you are asking?"

"No, Kelly. I'm asking if you are attracted to him."

"Ah," she blinked slowly." You are worried that we may both be after the same thing. If we were, I would not be having this conversation."

"I was not questioning your code of ethics."

"No, you were questioning the source of my intent. But my concern for him is not based on any deep seeded emotional attachment. I will leave that all to you."

I tried not to look relieved. The thought of us competing for the affections of the same crew member tasted way too much like an old Earth melodrama. One that undoubtedly would have ended with one of us being released through the airlock.

"Does that answer suffice or would you like to ask me if I have designs on Thane, as well? I think Jacob smells nice."

I shook my head. Now she was just being catty. When I glanced back at her, I could almost feel her change the subject.

"Good. Have you ever done any research on turian body language?"

I suddenly felt like I had skipped through several pages of major integral battle schematics. Her countenance agreed.

"You really would have been lost without me,"she sighed. "It would have been the worst turian/human encounter since the Relay 314 Incident."

Unfortunately, I could not argue with her.

"Well, here is one for the road, then. Putting your back to a turian during love play shows trust and in some more subtle nuisances a varying degree of subservience. As his Commander it would serve to indicate that you consider him as an equal when you are alone. I think that you would like where that goes."

"I'll keep that in mind. Is there anything else that I should be aware of?"

"Yes," as she stood to stretch, she smiled broadly. "Be careful not to make contact with any of his bodily fluids. At least at first. There have been a wide range of reactions reported. Though I'll admit the lack of need for birth control is nice, it doesn't overcompensate for the possibility of balding if it gets in your hair."

"Balding?"

"Just...aim away. You'll be fine."

I was beginning to think I would have been better off talking to Mordin. At least he wouldn't seem giddy as he explained the hazards of our adverse biochemistry.

"And how different are they physically?"

"As far as reproduction goes, it is all very recognizable. It is just that male turian genitalia is quite proportionately larger and pronged. But really, Sheppard, just follow his lead. That is if you can actually get him to lead. Nature has a way of working these things out. We may not be able to help them continue along their gene pool, but if we were not meant to pleasure each other we would not have been given the means to do it. And Garrus-he may not know what to do with you, but he wants to find out. Trial and error. Research and discovery. Divide and conquer. If you haven't realized it yet, you are both already invested. I've just been waiting for one of you to do something about it. And I know that it is hard for you to read his facial expressions on even the best of days, but believe me. He is miserable. Take one for the team, would you?"

Well, this was certainly a nice change of pace. One moment she was asking me not to hurt him and in the next simply requesting that I saddle him up. The empty cordial bottle on the table reminded me of why that may be.

"Thanks, Chambers. I appreciate this. I really do. "

She nodded, taking the hint." I know that it wasn't easy coming to me. Thank you for trusting me with this, Commander. I'll see you on deck come next rotation."

I felt something very akin to female camaraderie as she walked through the door to leave. Or maybe it really was just the cordial. Yes, I preferred to keep it at that. Intoxication did not mean future conversations like this.

"And Commander? Don't forget to aim away."

As I watched her disappear into the elevator I contemplated why my self-imposed celibacy had been such a bad thing.