The apartment was nice. Twice the size of her old cabin on the Normandy, with cheap government-issue furniture and narrow windows that could be opened to let in actual breezes of real Earth air. That had been a surprising luxury, likely allowed because the drop below the windows was a sheer plummet of twenty stories or more with no ledges or handholds of any kind. Not that she had been looking for escape routes; she just happened to observe this fact while admiring her fabulous view of the city.

The bed stubbornly refused to hum with the steady pulse of FTL drives, a fact which had led to a bout of insomnia that could only be defeated through rigorous application of single-malt scotch, but it was just the right size for one person and covered in fresh sheets every other day by a bustling little service mech with no vocalization module. A small kitchenette came furnished with a table and four chairs, seeming to imply that maybe she would have visitors. The size of her bed further implied that those visitors would not be the friendly sleep-over kind. She had ended up stacking three of the chairs and using them to stow her boots. It had never been a problem, because her only visitors were the service mech and her guards. Alliance Marines who were half in awe of their prisoner made for interesting jailers. They always offered to pass her requests for things like extranet access up the chain of command, and when they delivered the refusal they did it with a salute.

As incarcerations went, it was very polite. Damn near negligent. And terminally frustrating. She was a compulsive do-er with nothing to do but spend a lot of time alone with her thoughts.

"I cannot explain the how of it, Siha," the rasp of his voice was like stones tumbling, "Perfect recall is not something that is done, it is something that simply is. Can you describe to me the exact process of human dreaming?"

In the darkness of her cabin, the cool light of the aquarium (occupied only by water and plants since she couldn't bring herself to forget another fish to death) made her hand glow like some deep sea creature as it traced idle fingertips along the ridge of his collarbone. Where her skin reflected the light, the fine scales of his seemed to absorb it, making him a creature of shadows and hush. "Sure I can. We fall asleep, then some time later the REM cycle kicks on and we dream."

He waited. So silent that only her ear against his chest told her that his heart still beat, his lungs still breathed … steady and clear, particularly since she'd asked EDI to filter her cabin's enviro-controls for minimum humidity. He waited, knowing she wouldn't be able to tolerate the inadequacy of her own answer for long. And he was right; she heard herself trying to explain, "REM cycle, as in Rapid Eye Movement." His smile was a smug shadow that earned him a poke in the ribs. "It's when our brains slip into … some kind of an active subconscious state that … makes our eyes move a lot? Okay fine, I have no idea how dreaming works."

Semi-fused fingers gently caressed her hair as he sagely intoned, "Admission of ignorance is the first step to enlightenment."

"I'm beginning to think you make up these little fortune cookie sayings just to mock me."

"Do not be ridiculous, Siha. I have no idea what a fortune cookie is." Nobody could do deadpan like an assassin.

"Alright then, oh mysterious one," she flung the tangled sheet aside, sliding bare legs over his to sit astride his hips, "if you can't explain it, then maybe we can reverse engineer it."

"How do you propose we - " his words trailed off on a purring rumble as a flex of muscled thighs and a sway of spine brought their bodies deeply together.

"Tell me, Thane," a gasp threaded her words, hips arching in time to the subtle urgings of strong hands, "How exactly will you remember … this?"

A sharp knock at her door could only be one particular guard. Nobody else bothered to knock on a door that could only be opened from the outside by an omni-tool with the right security clearance. And nobody else ever seemed to interrupt her more, ah, private reveries.

"C'mon in, James," she called from where she leaned against her kitchen counter, holding a cup of coffee. She took a sip and sighed inwardly; it had gone cold at some point.

The door slid open to reveal Lieutenant James Vega. Well, most of him. The man was so big that he had to turn slightly sideways and duck his head a little to step through the door. He had a face like a boxer's fist, all scars and knobby bones designed to hurt people. Some guys had to put on their war face; for James, it was his default facial expression. If it was a mask, it was a good one. A hard one. For the past too-many weeks, she had amused herself by poking at that mask, trying to find out if there was anyone behind it but the pile of mean muscle he looked to be.

He stepped to the center of the room, boots surprisingly light on the tile floor, and snapped a salute. She returned it by lifting her mug. "You're not supposed to salute me, James. Remember?"

"Yes, Commander." He settled to standing at attention.

A long sip of (sigh, cold) coffee and an arched eyebrow let her play out the kind of silence that had been known to reduce enlisted hardasses to sweating schoolboys. James weathered it like a champ.

For about ninety seconds.

When she added a tiny slurp to her second sip of coffee, he broke. "Permission to ask a question, Commander?"

"James, I couldn't give you permission to submit to the force of gravity right now. You don't have to ask if you can ask. You can just ask."

One corner of his mouth twitched. She mentally chalked a point on her side of the imaginary scoreboard. The other side was for Cerberus, the Geth, the Reapers, and dumb bad luck. They had a lot more chalk marks on their side of the board than she did on hers, so every little victory counted. James cracked his neck to the left, flashing the slim outlines of an incomplete tattoo on his neck peeking out over the top of his uniform collar. His vertebrae sounded off like little gunshots, and the sound seemed to release him to stand at-ease.

"How d'you always know it's me at the door, ma'am?" His steady baritone was still as professionally cool as ever, but she didn't miss the relaxing of his syntax.

"I have contraband surveillance equipment placed at key points throughout this facility," she deadpanned, "The data feeds to various sub-dermal implants on my body."

He blinked. Frowned. "Security scans would've picked up anything like that."

She shrugged. "Only if they know where to look. I have to take off my left boot to check audio feeds."

James glanced down at the foot in question. His dark-eyed gaze was as frankly suspicious as his tone. "The left boot? … Ma'am."

Her nod was solemn, "You wouldn't believe what it takes to check video. I have to get two mirrors, go in the bathroom, and drop my -"

"Commander!" His hands were up in surrender, or to stop whatever she'd been about to say. Eyes wide, the big Marine looked downright scandalized, "You're shi- .. uh, kiddin' me, right?"

Tip of a wink, "Gotcha, Vega." He shook his head in disbelief, broad shoulders rolling like boulders as he braced hands on hips. She gave herself five more points on the scoreboard. Joker would've been proud. Pouring the coffee out into the sink helped cover the sudden pang of missing her mouthy helmsman. "Now. Surely there was some official reason for coming to see me today."

"Right," James didn't quite snap to attention, but it was close. "The Tribunal's convening, and they're requesting your presence."

Wry humor twisted her brow, "Again? It's nice when they say 'request'. Makes it sound like I can say no if I want to."

"Well, you can say no, ma'am," James pointed out.

"But then you'd be obligated to change my mind."

"Ma'am."

They had one of those moments, where two people who know they're good take the measure of one another. James was huge, like a brick wall had become a person, but she hadn't missed how lightly he moved. He'd be quicker than he looked. Slabs of muscle along his back and across his waist spoke of someone who had trained mostly in heavy weapons, the kind that seemed hellbent on punishing you for pulling the trigger. Punches could rain down on that torso all day and he wouldn't feel a thing. In a hand-to-hand confrontation, she would have to move fast to incapacitate him and hope that he hadn't been briefed on the extent of the cybernetic upgrades added since her resurrection. Either that, or outlast him in the hopes that his endurance would give out before her heavy bone weave did.

A fight between herself and Lieutenant Vega would be nasty, brutish, and probably very short. Realistically, she gave herself even odds. Being locked up in this very nice apartment had her almost bored enough to want to pick that fight, if only for something new to think about. Ruthlessly, she squashed the impulse. Her crew were in the wind out there in a galaxy that was woefully, desperately unprepared for the war that was coming. The last thing she needed to do was give the Alliance any more excuses to distrust her.

Jaw set at a grim angle, she nodded to the door. "Lead on, James."

Whatever conclusions he had come to in his assessment of her were hidden behind the meathead Marine mask, firmly back in place. "Aye, Commander."