A Lot in Common

By: Light-Eco-Sage

Rated: Mature for sexual content (FemShep/Garrus), language, and violence.

Summary: During the hunt for Saren, the crew of the Normandy runs across an unexpected person: the younger sister of Commander John Shepard! How will another Shepard affect the course of the series?

Disclaimer: Mass Effect is owned by Bioware.

LES: Yes, a sibling story. But I've never read one that was finished before. Hopefully I'll be able to do it, because I have it planned to the ending. Commander John Shepard is a paragon, through and through. Athena Shepard is a paragade. Yes, Athena is the name of my renegon Shepard, but I switched the names. My paragade Shepard was named after me… Ashley… before I knew that there was a squad mate named Ashley in the game. So the name is getting switched over.

PART I: SOVEREIGN

Chapter I: Feros

"Officer Vakarian and Tali'Zorah, report to the air lock." The voice of Commander John Shepard came over the intercom, drawing Garrus Vakarian away from his repairs of the Mako ground vehicle. The Mako was as sturdy as vehicles came, but the Commander always seemed to bring it back in less-than-stellar condition. Most of his days were spent crawling around underneath the carriage of the vehicle, finding new and creative ways to repair the underside after the Commander had taken the vehicle up a mountain and off a cliff without using the thrusters… again.

Garrus pulled himself out from under the vehicle with a sort of grace that should not have been possible for anyone who was fully armored, let alone a turian who carried natural plating on their bodies. But Garrus practically lived in his armor, like most turians, and was more than used to moving in it.

He caught sight of the young quarian, Tali'Zorah, and walked over to join her as they made their way to the elevator to take them up to the main level of the Normandy. Garrus did his best to ignore the sour look that they got from Ashley as they left. Garrus was not the only one who had noticed that the two Alliance soldiers on their squad, Kaidan Alenko and Ashley Williams, were going out on missions less and less since the Commander had picked up himself, Tali, and Wrex on the Citadel.

Not that it was Garrus' or anyone's place to make judgments. The Commander had the right as the C.O. of this mission to take whoever he wanted groundside.

"We're in orbit around Feros, right?" Tali asked.

Garrus nodded, mentally reviewing the information that had been given to them by the former Captain Anderson. "There is a very small colony on Feros, but most of the colony is made up of ExoGeni researchers. As far as the reports say, the geth are attacking there in force."

"Do you think that we'll find Saren there?" Tali asked.

Garrus shrugged. "I don't know. But I damn sure hope so."

Saren. The whole reason for this mission. Saren was a turian Spectre, one of the best of the militant hand of the Council. Spectres typically did the Council's bidding, elite operatives with the power to get away with pretty much anything. Some were violent and some were diplomatic, but all got the job done. Saren was one of the violent ones, but did his job well. But even with his violent tendencies, the Council never suspected that he would turn against them: gunning another Spectre down from behind and using the synthetic geth to attack a human colony.

Garrus had been a member of Citadel Security, or C-Sec, at the time and assigned the task of finding any evidence of Saren's wrong-doings. But Saren's rank as a Spectre had made this absolutely impossible. Everything that Saren touched automatically became Spectre-level classified. And C-Sec? Well, there was only so much that a cop could do against special agent authorization.

That was how Garrus had met Commander Shepard the first time, the human having walked in on him arguing with his boss, begging for more time to complete his investigation. It had been mostly Commander Shepard's word regarding Saren's wrong-doings, and Garrus had studied his file during his investigation.

Commander John Shepard had been born about three years before what the humans called the First Contact War, which Garrus knew as the Relay 314 Incident. He had been born into a military family and had spent most of his childhood growing up on different Alliance ships. Following his family's footsteps, he had joined the military as soon as he attained the proper age and quickly rose in respect among his peers and superiors. It was during his first posting, on Elysium, that he truly distinguished himself. Batarian pirates had attacked in force, and his unit had been completely wiped out. But John Shepard had rallied the civilians and held off the batarian forces off single-handedly. For this, he was awarded the Star of Terra, the highest honor that the Alliance bestowed on its soldiers and admittance into the Alliance's 'N' training. The N Academy was a special Alliance facility built for the training of Alliance Special Forces. The ranks went from N1, the lowest but still filled with prestige; to N7, the highest and most respected rank. Commander John Shepard achieved the fabled N7 ranking.

The mission to Eden Prime, as far as he could tell from the files, was both a test run for the Normandy, the advanced Alliance warship that had been a joint project between humans and turians, but also a Spectre evaluation mission. The Human Alliance wanted a human Spectre, and were pushing heavily for Commander John Shepard to represent their race in the elite special forces. It had ended in failure. The Prothean Beacon that they were sent to pick up was destroyed, and the Spectre Nihlus was killed by Saren.

Garrus knew the rest of the story, because he witnessed it himself. He and Commander Shepard had met up again following a lead through a small medical clinic on the Citadel, and Garrus had joined up with him to find a quarian who might have proof that Saren brought the geth to Eden Prime.

They picked up the krogan bounty-hunter, Urdnot Wrex, much to Garrus' disappointment, and then went after the quarian. They had reached Tali in time and she did, indeed, have proof of Saren's treason and more. The Council dismissed all talk of Reapers, but Garrus was just glad to see that they did accept the important part: that Saren was responsible for Eden Prime. They had stripped Saren of his Spectre rank and made Commander Shepard a Spectre, giving him the charge to hunt down Saren and bring him to justice.

Commander Shepard had accepted the mission, but Garrus knew that he was still very concerned about the Reapers from the recording. In truth, Garrus was still very skeptical about the Reapers, and sided with the Council in this matter. But he was wise enough, and turian enough, to not voice such thoughts out loud. Making Saren a priority or the Reapers… both led to Saren, and that's who he wanted to put a bullet through.

The elevator made its way up to the middle of the ship, and Garrus and Tali stepped off, took a flight of stairs to the CIC of the Normandy, and from there found their way toward the forward airlock.

They found Commander John Shepard waiting for them. "Tali, Garrus, are you ready for this? We know that the geth are here in force, so we need to be prepared for plenty of fighting.

"Ready, Commander." Both Garrus and Tali replied.

"Get ready to hack, Tali, and Garrus… just do what you do best." The Commander said with a small smirk. Garrus nodded. They both knew that Garrus was a sniper, and a very good one at that. In fact, on several occasions he had called Garrus the second best sniper that he'd ever seen. When questioned, he refused to reveal who the best sniper he knew was.

Garrus pulled out his trusty rifle, giving the gun a quick double-check to make sure that it was in perfect condition even though he had cleaned and assembled it that very morning. As usual, it was in perfect working order. Tali, likewise, checked her shotgun and her omnitool.

"Everyone set? Let's go." Commander Shepard said as he pressed the button that would open the outer air lock and allow them to disembark.

As Garrus expected, Feros started out as the sort of typical mission that he'd come to expect from working with Commander Shepard. The geth really were there in force and, while there was no sign that Saren was there personally, it became clear that there was something with this colony that he wanted. Garrus just couldn't imagine what a nearly failed colony would have of interest to him. The leader of the Zhu's Hope colony told Commander Shepard that the rest of their colony was still at the ExoGeni building that was some ways away. He had asked the Commander to go see if there were any survivors who might know the reason for the attack and to save as many people as possible.

Commander Shepard had immediately agreed and then asked for directions to the building in question. Garrus knew that Spectres usually came in two varieties: ruthless and diplomatic, and Commander Shepard fell squarely into the second category. He did the job and saved as many lives as possible doing it.

To Garrus' fear and relief, they were to take an unused Mako across the Prothean Skyway, but at least it was their Mako, so Garrus wouldn't be stuck repairing it after Commander Shepard was done with it. The Commander took the wheel and Garrus took the guns, while Tali kept an eye on the vehicle's shields and armor integrity.

As the Zhu's Hope colonists promised, it was a straight shot to the ExoGeni building, albeit a straight shot through dozens of geth troops. They pulled into the building, and the Commander jumped out of the Mako, followed closely by Garrus and Tali. They were about to go into a small underground bunker that had been highlighted on their map as a prime place for the researchers to set up a defensible position when they suddenly found themselves under gun fire.

Shepard, Tali, and Garrus jumped for the cover provided by the door, and the Commander peeked around the corner, his hand held up behind him in the universal military signal of 'stop'. "Friendlies." He whispered to the others. And then, louder, so that the people in the room could hear, he called. "My name is Commander John Shepard! I'm here to get you out of here!"

And then, from within the room, a female voice called out in surprise. "John?"

When the Commander heard the voice he froze for a second and then walked out of cover. Garrus gasped in shock and tried to pull him back. Friendlies or not, there were clearly scared civilians in there who would shoot at anything that moved. But he walked into the bunker without fear, and no shots were fired. Garrus and Tali glanced at each other and then followed their commander down into the bunker.

There was nothing blocking the door, but that was okay because it was the only point of entry into the room and could be used to bottleneck the enemy, setting up a clear kill zone. There was a clear line drawn between researchers and security personnel. The researchers held their hand guns and pistols like they'd never touched a gun before in their lives. But the security teams all carried sub-machine guns and rifles. A young woman, clearly working beneath her station, judging from the N5 marking on her armor, and clearly the leader of the security teams, collapsed her rifle and holstered it on her back.

She had vibrant red hair that was cut short compared to most of the human females that he had seem before and green eyes. "John? What the hell are you doing here?" She asked again.

Garrus and Tali stared at each other in shock. They'd never heard anyone call the Commander by his first name before. On missions, it was always 'Commander', and on the Normandy, sometimes, it was 'Shepard', but never John.

"I think I'm the one who should be asking you that, Athena." The Commander walked over to her and pulled her into a hug.

Maybe she's his mate. Garrus thought to himself. His reports said nothing about the Commander having a mate, or a wife, as humans called it. But, then again, it had been lacking in the personal details.

They pulled apart. "The Alliance sent me here about a week ago." Athena said. "The ship I was on was pretty close when we heard that this planet was being attacked by geth, so we got diverted here. But they are here in force, and I've got a lot of civilians to protect… too many to get them safely back to the colony. Then the Alliance called and said that they were sending back up. So… I guess that you are it, huh?" She turned her attention to the turian and quarian behind him. "By the way, I heard about you being made a Spectre. Congratulations. You know, of course, that if it were not the for the Blitz, it could have just as easily been me."

"I don't doubt it." The Commander laughed, and then he turned his attention to his team. "Oh, sorry… introductions. Athena, this is Officer Garrus Vakarian and Tali'Zorah nar Rayya."

"Hello." Athena said with crisp politeness.

"Nice to meet you." Tali said.

"Commander Shepard, you've never told any of us that you had a mate." Garrus said.

To Garrus' shock, both of the humans suddenly turned bright red. At first, he thought that they had suddenly fallen ill, but then he remembered the human tendency to blush when embarrassed. He had seen it before, but never this pronounced.

"Well, uh… that's because she's not my 'mate'." The Commander said.

"Oh! I apologize, Commander! I didn't mean to assume…" Garrus began hurriedly.

"Well, you did… and now that's going to be in my nightmares for weeks." Athena sighed. "Well, since you are obviously so interested, I'm not John's mate and don't ever plan to be his mate. Not just because it's against Alliance law…"

"Not to mention highly disturbing." The Commander commented.

Athena nodded. "I'm the Commander's sister, Athena Shepard. Nice to meet you."

"Sister?!" Both Garrus and Tali gasped in shock.

Commander Shepard nodded. "Yes, Athena is my younger sister. She joined the Alliance as well, right after I did. I guess you could say that the only reason she's not as well known as I am is because I had the 'luck' of being sent to Elysium and she didn't."

"Not to mention that I'm an Infiltrator by training." Athena commented. "It's damned hard to gain renown when people don't even see you coming."

"A sniper?" Garrus asked. Now he suddenly felt like he knew who the best sniper was in the Commander's opinion.

"Good lord… snipers." Commander Shepard sighed. "You two can compare the size of your rifles later. For now, we need to take care of this geth problem." Garrus couldn't blush the same way that a human could, but the signs were there for those who knew how to read them: the slight blue tone to the flesh of his neck, and his mandibles held tight to his face.

"It might be a tough fight, even for a Spectre." Athena said. "I'd go with you to help, but these people really need me more here."

"I understand." John said. "Just give me as much information as you can about the building."

Athena quickly gave her brother all the information she knew about the building and what it was doing. She didn't know everything, because the representative of ExoGeni refused to answer any of her questions. She hinted heavily that he could put a little Spectre authority pressure on him, and he promised to have a talk to the representative.

As the Commander and his ground team turned away to make their way into the building above, Athena Shepard called out. "Oh, and Officer Vakarian, right?"

"Yes, ma'am?" Garrus snapped around. He wasn't sure about her rank, but it couldn't hurt to be polite to the Commander's sister.

"Don't forget that we've got to compare our rifles later." She said with a bit of a smile.

Garrus stared at her for a few seconds and then turned away, his mind racing. There was no way that a human could know that those were the sort of words that a turian female would say to a male when she wanted to instigate sex. There was just no way she could know. Perhaps she just really wanted to compare the size of their guns.

Yeah, that had to be it…

LES: As of this point, Garrus is right. Athena Shepard doesn't know about the turian-related innuendo regarding guns. She just has a professional interest in him as another sniper. I'm trying to keep this relationship as close as possible to the actual Garrus/FemShep relationship: friends, friends with benefits, and lovers.