Chapter Text
"Okay, you grab her legs I'll get her arms"
"Oh shit, oh fuck, I've killed Shepard"
Lieutenant Alenko covers his face with his hands for a second as he paces back and forth. Gunnery Chief Williams watches the man who is somehow her superior officer in this scenario freak out for a minute. And then another. She only barely switches focus to glance at the beacon, or whatever was left of it. Shepard seemed to have done the equivalent of sticking her tongue in the thing's electrics and fried it. And her.
"Alenko! Shut up and help me with this...sir"
"I am a Sentinel, I should be able to fix this?"
"Is that a question, sir?"
Kaiden doesn't reply, preferring to crouch down and face the 'dead' Commander and flail his... orange thing. Biotic Amp? Omni-tool? Ash's job was to shoot things not do magic, she didn't need to know the magic brand names. She watches with a certain degree of amusement as the Lieutenant curses his past self for cheating on the 'First Aid' exam back in... did he say brain camp? Everything she learnt about this man only made him seem weirder. She found she couldn't look away, in the same twisted way car crashes are so engaging to watch.
The Lieutenant continued like this for a moment or two, glowing, cursing and pacing. Ash wasn't sure exactly how long had passed, as she had zoned out, scanning the sky for whatever ship these lunatics came in on. Alenko stands to face her.
"What do we do, chief?"
Ash stares for a moment, wondering if the lack of oxygen made those serving on frigates forget the chain of command. He was supposed to be telling her. She doesn't get time to quip as she is interrupted by an alliance navy warship swooping low overhead. Whoever was piloting that thing must have a lot of confidence in themself.
"Joker!" the Lieutenant recognises, because of course he does, and taps into the ship's comms. The lieutenant still holds his palm to his ear like it's 2100. The same way the Commander does... or did, given how she's looking right now.
"They're here for pickup" Alenko announces, hand back by his side and notably not helping Ash lift Shepard.
"Can you pick up her legs??" Ash finally gets to quip. Alenko seems to get the gist this time.
Shepard's body is limp and heavy, which is a good sign that she's not dead. This fact, despite being shared with him, does nothing to calm the Lieutenant, who keeps repeating "oh god" and "I can't have killed Shepard on our first mission" like it's a prayer.
As soon as the three, or two and a half, board the ship they are greeted with a crew of people all too eager to take the Commander off their hands and onto a stretcher. Their level of readiness reveals how optimistic they must have been about their mission's odds, anyway. Alenko rushes after the stretcher like an expectant dad in the old hospital drama vids Ash would never admit to loving. She didn't have to worry about being alone for too long, though, as she was approached by a man in uniform pretty much the moment the ship's hatch closed.
She stands to attention before she even sees his captain stripes. Oh man.
"Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams reporting, sir" she barks, hand flying up to salute.
"At ease," Ashley allows herself to breathe, it had been a while since she had to engage with such a high ranking officer, Eden Prime had barely qualified for a second lieutenant. "Captain Anderson, 63rd Scout flotilla. I want to thank you for your work down there chief, and for helping bring back the Commander"
"Just doing my job, sir."
"Were you assigned to Eden Prime?" the question almost sounded stupid until you remember the 212 had sent out a distress call to literally every Alliance fleet. She could have been anyone.
"Yes sir, the 212 brigade of the 2nd frontier division, sir... the only one left"
"You should come with me to my office, we'll try to contact your superiors, see what can be done. You have done commendable work today Williams, I'll see to it that you are recognised"
"Thank you, sir"
"Does he always talk like that?" Joker asks Pressley as half the CIC crew crowd around his terminal trying to get a gauge on what had happened down there that leads to the XO being exploded and Corporal Jenkins being bagged for burial.
"I'll be honest this is my first mission with the Captain and I can already say with full certainty, yes," Pressley responds, so deathly serious Joker can't help but laugh and ruin the tension.
-
"She got exploded!" Kaidan panics
"So you've said" Doctor Chakwas tries to humour him, but it's been 15 hours and she has heard this story one hundred times. The curse of serving with high ranking strangers means you can't tell them to fuck off and have them actually do it. She takes a sip of her coffee and doesn't look up from her console. He is not put off in any way.
"And it's because of me! I was the one who got too close to the beacon"
Chakwas hums, not listening enough to try to refute and save Kaidan's feelings. Plus, she'd already tried that six times in this same conversation, and look how successful that was.
"and she's dead and she'll never forgive me for killing her and she'll never give me her autograph and I swear to god Kaidan you screw up every opportunity first brain camp now this oh god"
"Lieutenant!" Chakwas awoke suddenly,
"and when I go home my dad will be like "so did you get your poster signed" and I'm gonna have to be like 'dad this poster is suddenly worth A LOT MORE I MADE IT LIMITED EDITION' OH GOD"
"Alenko! Snap out of it!!"
"WH-what? Sorry, Doctor. I didn't notice you here"
Chakwas stared at Kaidan, privately wondering how they installed L2 implants into him when there was no brain in there to latch them onto.
"The Commander is waking up!"
-
Shepard was a person of principle. Maybe.
If she were to look back, which she was lucky to have barely any time to do, you would find the majority of her decisions were actually made by her gut instinct.
Batarian slavers? Bad. Should shoot them.
Alenko glowing and floating in the air? Bad. Stop that happening, even if you get a little exploded in the process.
Recruiting aliens like you're building an Ark and facing down a Council Spectre with links to the suffering you see every time you close your eyes? Sounds more interesting than shore leave at her grandmother's place.
A lot of the time, more complicated issues were either handled by her superiors or when it came down to it the solution was immediately clear to whatever part of her neural system handled those sorts of things. Her brain was for figuring out which gun has a lower heat sink and where to aim said gun. She had gotten pretty far with that state of mind, and she had yet to regret anything, not a single scar. Apparently women find them attractive, she'd heard an alien say something like that once. (She kinda regretted the one on her finger she got from trying to pet a pyjack on her first tour of duty. Who knew those things had razor teeth? What do they need razor teeth for!!? Bananas are SOFT!)
Shepard was a collection of gut feelings and instincts stacked into N7 armor, essentially.
It was these gut feelings that told her something was off when she landed onto the active volcano. She felt unusually nervous. It wasn't the geth turrets on the ride up, or the armature in the doorway, or even the fact this was an active, rumbling, actual volcano. It must have been something about meeting an evil Matriarch's daughter stressing her out. This was her first real mission as a Spectre, her first step towards finding Saren. She shoots down a surveillance drone and shakes her gun to cool it, wanting to make sure she was in the best position possible for what she might find waiting for her.
Shepard had training, she knew what Asari were and what they were capable of. She'd even spoken to one once on an earlier deployment. Shepard knew what to expect. Asari were blue, with tentacles and biotics powerful enough to assist a rogue Spectre with his Geth Invasion. She had been hoping not to ever need to see Benezia's daughter's biotics, and that the two would do something diplomatic and it would be fine. Her gut was less optimistic, so was the Krogan she brought, who kept talking about how good his shotgun is at blowing up Asari the whole trip.
"Hello? Is somebody out there?"
Shepard was... Not a good psychic, it turns out.
-
Being appointed the first human Spectre meant people looked to her to make proper decisions now. Ones that had to be justified in front of the entire galaxy. Or, rather, justified to three aliens and any poor kids on school field trips to the presidium that day. It felt like people were always looking at her to be a perfect poster child for her entire species. Constantly watching her at every spaceport, biotic fanatics base, or active volcano she visited. She couldn't catch a break. Even the ship's doctor was staring, although, in Doctor Chakwas's defense, she was also saying something. Shepard just wasn't listening.
"...two times in two missions! I mean seriously Commander are you looking to fill up your loyalty card?"
"hey! this last one wasn't even my fault!... we are talking about me right?"
Chakwas huffs, "YES! and how you managed to get bitten by a husk and wound up in my medbay again! What is up with you people and not listening to me?"
"It was a Stalker and it wasn't even my fault! The geth put an armature outside the ruins, blame the Mako for being too big to fit in; I didn't want to be fighting it on foot!"
"You're right Commander, I will go down and give the tank an earful. Hold still!" Chakwas stings the scrape along Shepard's arm with something poignant and antiseptic. It's barely a flesh wound, just because it was given to her by a space zombie doesn't mean anything. Stupid Council safety protocols, Stupid Spectres, Stupid Saren.
---
"What did Saren want with you anyway? Do you know something about the Conduit?" Kaidan probes from across the briefing room, tearing Liara's eyes away from Shepard for a moment. Shepard wasn't kidding when she said the staring was endless. She was too busy feeling grateful for not being the centre of attention for a moment that she didn't fully process how uncharacteristically hostile he was being and scold him for it.
"I have no idea. I know the Conduit had something to do with the Prothean extinction. Pardon my language, but I fucking love the Protheans, Commander. I have spent 50 years trying to figure out what happened to them" Liara responds, voice too level for her to have picked up on the hostility. That, or she was so eager to talk about the Protheans she didn't care.
"I have a theory on what happened" Shepard chips in, glaring at Alenko. As she turns back to Liara, her entire face has changed. Her eyes are wide and shining
"I would love to hear it!"
"Uhh, yeah I'm pretty sure they were wiped out by the Reapers"
"The Reapers? But they don't exist! I mean, there are some theories but they are largely-"
"Yeah, I saw it in a dream once." Liara's head tilts slightly, so she elaborates "I accidentally hugged a beacon earlier and it exploded me and uploaded some form of ancient PTSD flashbacks into my brain. They say the Reapers did it and AH!"
Shepard jumps back away from Liara who had somehow managed to get within a few inches of her face without making a noise. Liara is grinning as wide as she can go, and is completely unfazed at the Commander's new position on the floor.
"That is so interesting! I had read theses on that in the past but I never saw anything convincing enough to do any serious research, it takes so long to get proper approval for a new digsite and I wouldn't even know where to sta- are you okay, Commander? Do you need a hand?"
Shepard blinked up at her from her spot on the floor. Liara stared down at her, punctuating the sentence by stopping the little giddy bounce she was doing as she spoke; looking more confused than anything. Asari's were so intense. Shepard had to admit that her experience of saying " my CO is over there " and " you can't bring weapons into the base, sorry" that one time did not prepare her for every facet of the species. She wonders if it was because they were around so long, in the same way that old wines get more intense.
Shepard finds her way to her feet and manages to push away a blush that was creeping onto her cheeks. She did not need an audience for this. Can't she have some privacy in the centre of a room with chairs all facing her?? It wasn't her fault the Turians who built this thing didn't think their CO's needed to sit.
"I'm fine, it's okay. Alenko, sit down." Kaidan backs off slowly, as if he was expecting her to collapse again and didn't wanna make the whole trek across the room this time. "Yeah, I- I saw them, Doctor. You should sit bac-"
"Can I see?" Liara asks, holding the Commander's gaze for an exceptionally long minute. Her eyes were really blue, and Shepard would have preferred they were a little further away from her right now. "Forgive me for being a little forward, but this is literally my life's work"
"See- see what?"
"Oh, sorry. I don't have much experience with humans, can I please see the vision you received from the Beacon?" Shepard stares, her way of speaking is so stilted. She would have to get her translator checked the next time they docked, maybe it was an issue with Thessian grammar. Liara took this silence as an invitation to fill it, like this was a job interview and she was afraid no response meant she had said something wrong "I am asking if you will let me meld minds, uh, with you. Please"
Garrus, the turian, wolf whistles and looks around like it wasn't him who did it. It's honestly so impressive that he managed it without lips that Shepard didn't even get to think about telling him off. As if opening the floodgates, Williams makes a comment about how they should leave the two alone and Shepard loses control of the room.
Liara, unfazed by the crew's noise, takes Shepard's hand gently in her own. It's nice, but from the room's reaction, definitely more than it looks. Shepard doesn't know what it is but she can guess this is going somewhere she doesn't want it to. That's bad. She met this person like thirty seconds ago. She was standing so close. Shepard knows the more suggestive rumours about Asari aren't true, but she doesn't need to test out that theory right that second, in front of everyone.
"Uh, I think-"
"Sorry to interrupt Commander" Joker buts in, saving Shepard's entire life. "But I have the council on comm-link, and Tevos keeps sending the request again and again like I didn't see it. It covers the whole control panel every time and it's really annoying can you please deal with them?"
There's a groan in complaint, and laugh at the groan, and chatter as the group file out of the room. Liara is the last to leave, dropping the Commander's hand and running her own through hair she didn't have. She meets Shepard's gaze briefly but looks away when she sees how red the human had gone. That was a bad sign, even she knew that. Humans go red when they're really emotional about something, she only hoped she hadn't managed to piss her off with her suggestion.
"I am sorry, Commander, I should. I should go lie down." she laughs, short and fake. "it's been a long day."
Shepard watches the Asari near run out of the room and rush in the opposite direction of the Medbay. She goes to say something, when the Council pop up behind her with a "Shepard" in their signature derogatory tone, and she jumps a mile in the air.