I've faced ghosts all of my life, but sometimes the oldest ones can offer comfort. I sat on the porch of the small farm house. The wind smelled like the field of corn sprouting up from the fields a little ways away. Mindoir is where I returned. No one in the Alliance nor on the small colony would recognize me now that my previously dark, curly, brown hair was now dyed blond. And besides, who would think the lone survivor of Mindoir would come back to where her world first began to crumble? I lived in solitude for most days. No electronics, just old fashioned tools for the farm, and of course my guns were stashed in the basement. The small colony embraced me with open arms, thinking that I was just a small time farmer from Earth, looking for a new start.

The house was constructed near where the old family house was burned down during the Bartarian raid. It was nearly an exact replica with the yellow siding, the white windows, and the wrap around porch with rocking chairs. Sitting on the porch always seemed to clear my head. The sun dropped, and the night rolled up onto the sky, with stars blanketed across it. The stars are what plagued me the most. My hands itched to know if the Normandy was still trapped amongst the stars, or if they miraculously made their way home. The likelihood that the crew was still alive on the Normandy was slim to none. I knew not to get my hopes up. It was foolish to wish anymore. Everything I fought for was taken away, there was no one left for me to live for, but I kept moving with the same daily routine. Every morning I would rise early, unable to shake my military early starts to the day, and I would do work on the farm for most of the day until I was too bone tired for anything else. The fatigue was what helped keep the nightmares at bay. No matter how many days passed by, the dead called to me, and my decision plagued my very soul. Waking up screaming and half the room torn apart was just another part of every day.

I got up from watching the stars on the porch and headed inside, if the war didn't kill me, I'd be damned if I let the chill of the night finish me off. I leaned my head against the door as I put in place the three locks on the door, and set the alarm. Trudging my way up the stairs and to the bathroom, I washed my face. I stared in the mirror at the wetted face before me. The curly blond hair hung past my shoulders, darkened bags sat under my eyes from the few hours of sleep I attained every night, and the scars that hugged my face. I always did my best to cover them up when I went into the town for supplies, people tended to whisper when they saw them. I was the anomaly in town. My spitfire demeanor had all but simmered down to nothing, and my eyes just carried the souls of all those who've died. I left the people around my alone, and they honored me in the same way. I dried off my face and prepared for the worst part of the day, sleep. Closing my eyes I drifted off into restlessness.

I'm not sure what woke me first. The fact that I was being burned alive in my nightmare, or the rustling that I heard coming from downstairs. Adrenaline shot through my veins, and all my muscles fired on reflex. I reached under the bed, pulling out my shotgun, and snaked my way to the top of the stairs behind the wall. Glancing down the stairwell, I could make out shadows dancing outside the glass of the window next to the door. I made my way stealthily down the stairs, waiting out of sight of the door, preparing for the intruder to make his way inside. I watched as the light on the security system turned green as the intruder bypassed their way right through it. A soft, almost inaudible click of the lock sounded, with two more following. They went through all my security in less than two minutes. These were not petty thief's, these were professionals. My breathe quickened and I pumped my shotgun, loading it for the right moment. The intruder walked into the house, the light from the moon and stars outlining his silhouette in the hallway. As they took a few more steps into the house, I stepped behind them placing the double barrel to their head. Just as the gun touched the nape of the intruder's neck, they spun around, knocking the gun out of hand, and barrel rushing me into the wall. I gasped from the sudden loss of air, and while a strong forearm was holding me to the wall, everything came crashing down on me. I felt the fire work its way through my stomach and into my legs as I thrust my leg up into the assailant's abdomen, causing them to stumble back, giving me my opening to throw a right hook, and pin them to the floor. I breathed heavily, forgetting how much raw power it took to fight again.

The small lapse of concentration presented the opportunity for the assailant to flip positions, securing down my arms and rendering my legs useless by straddling my hips. I felt the grip change as he tied both my arms behind my head, and a coldness touched my neck. A knife, I knew instinctively. More fear should have been pumping through my body, should have been prompting me to fight for my life, but I was just so tired.

"Go ahead, kill me. I've got nothing to lose," I spat out with a bored, agitated tone. The sudden removal of the cold object from my neck didn't surprise me as I awaited the final blow, but the sound of the object clattering to the floor caused my confusion to rise. A hoarse whisper came from the person above me.

"Arizona? Ari?" the voice said. The voice was so familiar, but I couldn't place it, the hands that were previously holding a knife to my neck were now untying the rope binding my hands. At the first chance I let the punches fly. A string of curses followed.

"Goddammit Ari, would you quit the damn flailing!" the accent now more distinct. Everything in my body ran cold. My body seemed to drop unceremoniously to the floor.

"No, no, no, this isn't real. I'm having another fucking nightmare," I said out loud, trying to get myself to awake from the madness. I felt myself being lifted up, but I didn't care to fight it. I lay limply in the arms of the person carrying me. I was set down on the couch of the living room, and I felt a blanket that was set off to the side be wrapped around me. Footsteps wandered a few feet away, and a click sounded as the lights in the room flickered on. My gaze was fixed firmly on the floor. I've faced too many monsters, and ghosts, I couldn't bring myself to look at the dead face of the one ghost who mattered the most.

"Well I'll be damned," a gruff whisper came out from a short ways away. The foot steps approached her, and boots appeared in her field of vision as she stared at the wood floor.

"Look at me Ari," the man said. As stubborn as ever I clenched my fists over my eyes and shook my head. I felt like my heart was constricting with every breathe I took. Calloused hands wrapped around my smaller ones, gently pushing my hands away from my eyes. The hands moved to my face, caressing the sides of my cheeks and hesitated. It was only mere seconds until the fire shot through my lips. It was those familiar lips that had crossed my mind oh so many times as I paced the Normandy as I fought the collectors, and it was those hands that had held me through the night. The dam behind my eyes broke and I opened my eyes, I refused to let the tears spill.

"Not the waterworks, you know I'm goddam awful with them," Zaeed joked and he watched her and waited for my reaction. I jumped up off the couch, wrapping my arms around his waist, kissing him to the point that I was sure my lips were bruised. His arms wrapped easily around me and held me to him.

"This is going to suck when I wake up," I said, thinking out loud.

"This is no dream sweetheart. I was working a bounty, but I never dreamed in a billion years it would be you." Zaeed said.

"But when did the Normandy get back?" Panic shot through her. "Did the rest of the crew make it? Is everyone okay?"

"Calm down. Everyone is fine. The Normandy got back a week ago, and everyone on the goddamn ship has been looking for you, but all we go was that Commander Shepard had gone missing, and there was no trace of where she was. They put out nation wide transmissions looking for you, but the look in Hacketts' eyes when I talked to him, well, with the way he was looking, I thought you were dead." Zaeed said, his arms constricting tighter around her.

Zaeed pulled back to look at my face and frowned. I could feel my face turn scarlet as I realized he must of notice the scars that now marked my face. I'd never been concerned with vanity before, but I knew I looked far from pretty.

"I know how the scars look, they are pretty gruesome, and the third degree burns to my neck don't help my complexion much either, but-…" Zaeed cut her off.

"I don't care about some fucking battle wounds princess. Those just mark how you fought like hell to live another day. What worries me more is that you look like you haven't slept in months." I hung my head, unwilling to explain what haunted me every day. Wordlessly, Zaeed headed to the stairs, navigating to the bedroom. He set me on the edge of the bed as he toed off his loosened boots and stripped down to his boxers. He then pulled my into his side as he wrapped the blankets over the two of them. I placed my hand on the blue suns tattoo on his neck after noticing a new piece of black ink that ran over his skin above his heart. It read:

"For Those I Love, I Will Sacrifice."

I traced the letters with my fingers until I got the end where there was a small inscription of letters.

"What?" Zaeed asked when he noticed her hesitation.

"That's my alliance tag number," I said in awe.

"I love you, so I thought, why not tattoo a piece of her on my body? It didn't help that I thought you were dead. You know logic isn't my strong suit." Zaeed said with a low chuckle.

I smiled, knowing that everything in this moment was perfect, yet there still was something nagging at me from the back of my head. I pushed it away, soaking in the musk of whiskey and cigars rolling of the body of the man lying beside me. And that night, I didn't dream about my demons.