As it turned out, Samara was perfectly fine with using her status to get the Zesmeni deal in place. She'd told Shepard that throwing her weight around was allowed in the Justicar Code, provided that innocent lives were in danger. And in this case, there were two groups of innocents in peril; the asari on Zesmeni who were sick, and the human colonists targeted by the Collectors.

They'd managed to dodge the quarantine and then make contact with the necessary authorities. There had been no hesitation on the part of the asari on Zesmeni to make the deal. Given an opportunity to solve their health crisis and end the quarantine, plus help out a Justicar in the process? Mordin's help was accepted with alacrity.

At the moment, Donnelly and Samara were down on Zesmeni to finalize the trade. Mordin had already been on the planet for some time, and he'd been busy at work in setting up clinics and a general process for blunting the spread of the plague. This was trickier than what he'd done on Omega. There was no common ventilation system with which to dispense any healing agents.

Donnelly handed their asari contact a datapad. "So this is what we need for the plating. Are these shapes going to be a problem?"

The Zesmeni representative began paging through the technical drawings. "I don't believe so. Hmm...yes, the size is no problem, but the curvatures...let me double-check right now. I need to make a few calls." She moved off towards the other side of the lounge, activated her omni-tool, and began speaking in a low voice.

Donnelly looked over at Samara. "I can't thank you enough for agreeing to this. Once we get this armor installed, we'll be practically able to ram the Collectors instead of shoot them."

Samara gave an elegant little shrug. "It was necessary."

A pleasant tenor voice sounded from outside the docking bay lounge. "I've got a little list, I've got a little list, of society offenders who might well be underground, and who never would be missed, who never would be missed!" The door opened, and Donnelly was surprised to see Mordin walk in. He gave them both a cheerful wave. "Greetings! All finished here."

"Jesus and his saints," said Donnelly. "You're done already? It's only been a few days."

"Thirty-six hours," replied Mordin. "Plenty of time. Set up vaccination protocols, coordinated overall strategy with local health care workers, also formulated effective treatment for symptoms for those already infected. Spread is already stopped, and vaccinations to protect rest of populace well in hand."

The Zesmani representative walked back over to the trio. "We're all set. The curvatures will be no problem. We'll run the necessary mass effect treatments on the carbon nanotube preforms over the next day or so, and start installing the plating right after that."

"Thank you again," said Samara. The asari didn't respond to her verbally; she just gave Samara a quick nod and hurried out the door.

Donnelly blinked in surprise. "That seems a bit rude. Did I say something tae make her mad?"

Samara sighed. "No. It's me, I'm afraid. There are many tales and stories of Justicar deeds, and many young maidens dream of performing feats of daring while clad in red armor. But the bitter truth is that none of my kind are truly happy to see a Justicar. We always bring trouble, or so they think."

"Ah, I see." Donnelly wasn't sure what to say to that.

Samara's mood didn't improve during the shuttle ride back up to the Normandy. She sat on the bench next to Donnelly, but just stared at the deck with a neutral expression. He finally decided to say something as they were walking through the hangar. "Are ye okay, Samara? You know you can talk tae me if you need tae."

Samara shook her head. "Thank you, but I will be all right. There are times when continuing my oath seems like an intolerable burden. But it will pass, as it always does."

Donnelly almost clapped her jovially on the shoulder, but then thought better of it. He liked having a functional hand instead of a bloody stump. "Well...it could be worse, right? Ye could be dead." He paused. "Actually, ye were dead back on Illium, or so's I heard."

Samara stopped dead in her tracks, and Donnelly did as well with a little bit of surprise. He saw the Justicar's head snap up to gaze at them. Donnelly felt a little tingle in the pit of his stomach. Had he said something wrong? Mordin peered at them both curiously from Samara's other side.

"Yes," said Samara. She had a look on her face of...wonder? It was very different from the composed and aloof air she normally exuded. "I was dead, wasn't I?"

"Absolutely!" said Mordin in a far too cheerful manner. "Completely dead. Total heart failure. If in clinic, would have personally signed death certificate myself." He paused and his happy smile faded a bit. "Must have been nervous system interface with Jack which restored heartbeat," he muttered. "Yes, must have been that. Otherwise impossible."

Samara's face lit up with a wide smile, the most gleeful expression which Donnelly had ever seen from her. All the while, she stared fixedly at his face. "Marcus!" she cried. "My dear sweet Marcus!" The Justicar stepped towards him while still wearing that odd, gleeful smile.

He held up a hand. "Er, now look Samara, yer a fine and bonny lass, but I'm spoken for. Heh. Dunno how possessive Jack is, and I don't wanna find oot the hard way, if ye ken my..." he trailed off as she brushed aside his intervening hand. Samara was just as tall as him, and he stared into her piercing blue eyes as she brought her head close to his. He felt his heart skip a beat as her lips met his for a soft and gentle kiss.

She gave him a wink and then turned and pointed at Mordin. "And you!"

Mordin looked behind him as if hoping someone else might have appeared behind him. "Problem? Have given offense? None intended. Focused on work, tend to miss social cues and nicetiesUULMPH..."

Samara grabbed the front of the salarian's tunic with both of her hands and lifted him bodily off of the floor with no effort at all. His legs dangled as she gave him a much longer and far deeper kiss that she'd given Donnelly. Mordin's face blushed green as he mumbled protests into Samara's mouth. After a minute of ravishing, she gently set him down.

"Gentlemen," she said, and gave them another room-lighting smile. "I thank you both, from the bottom of my heart."

She was out of the hangar entrance before Donnelly remembered to breathe again.

Mordin spluttered and wiped his mouth. "Very trying at times, possessing such raw animal charisma. Have had similar issues with turians. And with krogans, oddly enough."

----------------------------------------

Shepard hummed a little ditty as he read through the report from Mordin on the doctor's fever treatment strategy. The Commander felt good for the first time since the attack on the Collector ship. Being well on the way to having an intact ship again was a big part of the reason for his good mood. Not to mention that he would be getting Miranda and Jacob out of his hair. It wasn't personal on Shepard's part, but he knew that most of the crew would be happier without them around. Especially among the 'tattooed biotic criminal' demographic. Off to his right, Kelly finalized this week's budget figures. He was really proud of the young woman. She'd stepped up considerably in the last few weeks. He smiled as he regarded the hologram of the Normandy above the CIC display. Soon those ragged red wounds would be gone.

As long as nothing weird happened, they should all be okay.

As if summoned by his thought, he heard the elevator door hiss open behind him. Some sixth sense told him this was going to be something...weird. He turned, half-expecting to see a Reaper facing him while giving the finger.

But there was no bio-mechanoid berserker. The elevator only contained Samara. But now she looked somehow different as she walked towards Shepard. Before, she had worn her ageless beauty like a mask, and clearly didn't care if anybody noticed her sex appeal. Now, however, she was inhabiting that beauty and using it for all it was worth. She actually sashayed her hips as she reached the Commander.

Beside him, he heard Kelly drop her datapad in shock.

"Shepard," she purred. "The new armor is on its way. It is my understanding that it will take at least a week to install it."

He finally found his voice. "Er, yes, about that long."

Samara nodded with a sultry little up-and-down look. Was she about to kiss him?

"In that case," she said, "I would like to request a four-day leave of absence. Starting immediately."

"I, ah, yes, sure. Sure! That's no problem." Shepard's mind whirled. Who the hell was this, and what had they done with the real Samara?

"And you will do the same for Ms. Chambers," added the Justicar.

"Me?" squeaked Kelly.

Samara turned towards the smaller human and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Dearest heart, I confess I saw more than I should have that time in the hangar. I also confess that I feel the same affection for you. If...if you still feel that way about me, of course."

Kelly looked like she was going to either faint, explode with happiness, or do both. "Yes! Of course I do, Samara."

In response the justicar leaned down and gave Kelly an open-mouthed kiss that looked like she wanted to simply eat up the yeoman right then and there. Kelly slumped against her console in bliss as the deep kiss went on. Somewhere in the back of his mind Shepard knew that Joker would be so pissed at him for not getting pictures of this. Samara broke the kiss reluctantly, then straightened up and looked back at Shepard with a more determined expression.

He suddenly realized that he had better go with the flow for now or he would be very quickly locked into hand-to-hand combat with a thousand-year-old warrior monk. "Of course, four days leave for Kelly as well. Um, let me know if either of you need...anything..."

After his uttering the words 'of cour'se Samara seized Kelly's hand in an unbreakable grip and towed her towards the elevator. The yeoman stumbled along behind Samara in a daze and gave Shepard a dazzling smile over her shoulder. Samara was already reaching for her again as the elevator doors closed.

Shepard pinched the bridge of his nose. When weird shit was going down, there was one reliable place to start digging. "EDI, please tell Chief Engineer Donnelly to report to the CIC right fucking now."

----------------------------------------

"Commander, how can ye possibly think I had anythin' tae do with this?"

Shepard regarded Donnelly sourly. "Because you are an agent of chaos who's been cloaked in human flesh and sent into this world to vex me. And because you were one of the last people with Samara down on Zesmeni. Now...what happened to her? What did you do?"

"Nothing! Nothing happened, and I didn't do anything but talk tae her. Look, get Mordin in here. He'll tell you the same thing. He was there too."

"Of course he was," muttered Shepard. "Why am I not surprised?" He turned to the intercom, but it buzzed before he could reach it.

"Commander! What's got into Samara?" yelled Sergeant Gardner out of the comm. "She just threw me right out of the starboard lounge! Literally! Ah, fuck, my neck..."

"Was Kelly with her?" snapped Shepard.

"Hell yes, Kelly was wrapped around her and they were all over each other. Samara saw me standing there and before I could say anything she grabbed me with one arm and gave me the heave-ho right out of the damned door. Samara's locked down the lounge, should I scramble a security team?"

"Not yet. Report to Dr. Chakwas, get your neck looked at." He cut the channel and connected to Mordin's lab. "Mordin. Get in here."

Mordin arrived in less than thirty seconds. The salarian was prompt, Shepard would give him that much. The doctor looked at them both with his usual and cheerful goggle-eyed expression. "Ah. Suspect this is regarding Samara's recent behavioral change? Yes, most unusual."

"Unusual, yeah," grated Shepard. "Did she eat or drink anything down on Zesmeni? Could somebody have drugged her?"

Mordin shook his head. "No, Samara down there just to finalize deal. Use of gas agent also unlikely. Even if someone using compound tailored to asari, too much risk of collateral damage."

Donnelly gestured to the salarian with both hands. "See? Nothing! All we did was talk a bit after we got the armor deal all squared away."

Shepard walked down off of the dais and grabbed the front of Donnelly's coverall, all but hoisting the human off of the deck. "And what. Did you. Talk. About?"

"She was sad, that's all!" Donnelly looked as if he was about to crawl out of his skin this close to his furious Commander. "We got the armor specs all clear, and then the Zesmeni lass ran off suddenly and Samara was bein' all sad because nobody really liked to see Justicars. And I said it was better than bein' dead. And that's when she started actin' all weird."

"Not entirely accurate," said Mordin. Donnelly gave him a panicked look. He was clearly expecting to get thrown under the proverbial bus. "Chief Engineer also mentioned that Samara had indeed expired during Illium operations." His eyes widened in realization. "And provided corroboration, told her would have signed death certificate."

Shepard and Mordin locked eyes. They both had the same thought at the same time, and then they both relaxed and said "Ohhhh!" simultaneously.

Donnelly held his hands out, palms up. "What? What am I missing?"

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"The Justicar Code," replied Shepard. He let go of Donnelly and leaned back. "The Code states that, upon taking their oaths, a Justicar is required to follow that Code until death. And Samara officially died. So she's now finished fulfilling that oath."

The engineer dropped his hands. "Oh. But surely that's just a technicality?"

"The Justicar Code is nothing but one big technicality." Shepard rubbed his forehead. "But now I feel much more comfortable about the whole thing. I was afraid that Samara had somehow been converted into an Ardat-Yakshi."

"What's an-"

"Marcus, trust me when I say that you do not want to know."

Donnelly stared off into space. "Samara's not a Justicar anymore. So she doesn't have to follow their rules about relationships. That's why she grabbed Kelly. Well, I mean, they were always sweet on each other." He looked back at his Commander with dawning horror. "Sweet Christ, Shepard! Samara hasn't been laid in four hundred years! She's gonna break the wee lass!"

Shepard held up a hand. "No, I trust Samara's self control. And Kelly has been dealing with a much bigger workload recently so she could use a vacation as well." He looked up. "EDI, are Kelly and Samara currently engaged?"

"Engaged, Shepard?" asked the AI.

Donnelly cleared his throat. "Are there sexy-time shenanigans going on, EDI?"

There was a brief pause. "Based on my automatic bio-monitoring, I feel it is safe to say that they are well past mere shenanigans, Marcus."

Shepard nodded. "Noted. EDI, if you could please use your bio-monitoring to gently break in the next time there is a, um, pause in the action. Send them both my compliments and tell them I'm adding an extra day to their leave."

"Understood, Shepard. Logging out."

Mordin blinked. "Very glad salarian reproduction does not involve such behavior. Seems very complicated and time-wasting. Research involves less candles and mood music. Ah, almost forgot, have important news. Have finished scans of Collector tissue samples. Very surprising results. Can show you in lab."

----------------------------------------

"They're Protheans?"

Mordin grasped his lapels proudly and nodded at Shepard's surprised expression. "Most certainly. EDI has been invaluable help." He gestured to the half-dissected Collector corpse on the table in between them. "She was able to match genetic scans with data from known Prothean tissue samples. Definite match."

Shepard rubbed the back of his head. The Prothean Cipher imprinted into his brain, combined with the warning message he'd received from their beacons, had given him the ability to speak and read Prothean. He also had a decent sense of what the Protheans had looked like. But this Collector...didn't, not really.

"I mean, the basic shape might be the same," he said to Mordin. "But this thing's skin is all wrong. And the eyes. And, well, a lot of it's just plain wrong."

Mordin indicated several different areas where he'd made deep incisions into the body. "Yes. Should have been more accurate. Collectors are Protheans after many, many generations of subservience to Reapers. Note multiple cybernetic implants here and over here. No reproductive organs, replaced by tech. No real higher brain functions, Prothean frontal lobes have been replaced by control circuitry. This is body of pure drone."

Shepard looked down for a long while at the corpse. "This...is what the Reapers have planned for us if they succeed."

"At best," said Mordin. "Assume Reapers only create one 'proxy' species such as this every cycle. All other species simply destroyed." He also looked down at the body for a long while. "Protheans were mightiest last cycle, so they were 'honored' like this." Shepard could hear the hate and disgust in the salarian's voice. "Wonder who will be so 'honored' this next cycle."

"No one," said Shepard. "Because there will be no more cycles. I'm ending it." He straightened up and gave the doctor a nod. "Thank you, Mordin. I needed to see this. I needed to remember what's ultimately at stake. Put a report together and distribute it to the crew. They need to know what's coming for everyone if we fail."

----------------------------------------

Kelly smiled at the stars beyond the viewport as she lay naked in front of it. Her head lay propped up on Samara's bare stomach. The now-apparently-ex-Justicar was also equally naked and gently snored as she slept. A thin trail of drool ran down one blue-skinned cheek.

What Kelly had just experienced had been amazing, although that was still too paltry of a word. After that hungry kiss in the CIC and the asari's one-handed removal of Sergeant Gardner from the lounge, Kelly had expected Samara to simply tear her clothes off and pounce on her like a succubus. Not that Kelly would have minded that in the least.

But after locking the lounge door, Samara had been almost hesitant as she proceeded. She'd slowly undressed Kelly, taking the time to caress every section of newly uncovered skin. It was as if she was seeing somebody's naked body for the first time and savoring the experience. Samara's touch had made Kelly a quivering lump by the time the yeoman was fully naked.

Samara had then stood and spread her arms, offering herself. Without a word Kelly realized that she should do the same for the asari. She had gone through the same process, slowly removing every bit of Samara's red armor, carefully stroking each bit of flawless blue skin as it was revealed. The last two articles of clothing to go were Samara's choker and her tiara. When Kelley removed that choker, she saw the one flaw in Samara's skin, the small white scar of the dart attack which had nearly killed her. She'd tenderly kissed that scar, then raised her hands and removed Samara's tiara. Kelly then stood on tiptoe to kiss her now-bare forehead.

They then stood facing each other for the longest moment, now both naked. Samara's skin was now flushed deep blue with her arousal, and Kelly herself felt like her nipples could cut glass. Then they had embraced, their mouths meeting and tongues entwining.

Kelly's previous experience with asari was that they tended to go right for some Joining after getting naked and 'breaking the ice', so to speak. But Samara had been in no hurry. She had almost mercilessly played Kelly like an instrument, wringing gasps and cries and a couple of orgasms out of her. And Kelly had done her best to reciprocate, trying to use every trick she'd learned to stimulate the asari's own azure. Samara seemed pleased with the attention and had shuddered with her own climax.

And then at the last, when they were both sweaty and tangled in a heap in front of the viewport, Samara had cradled Kelly's head and looked deep into her eyes. Kelly saw the asari's pupils dilate and keep dilating, making her eyes now completely black.

"Embrace Eternity," Samara whispered to Kelly. And then they had Joined.

That was the part that Kelly was still trying to sort out in her head. Her previous Joinings with other asari had been wonderful, joyous things. But now she knew they had been paltry in comparison. Really, her previous experience had just been two brains getting together to say 'Yay! We're having some sex!'.

This Joining with Samara had been deeper. Much, much deeper. She had felt Samara's crushing despair which had always been lurking below that seemingly unflappable exterior. She felt the grief from Samara that she still carried at having to take her own child's life. And as for Kelly, she had felt herself pour into Samara. All of her self-doubt and fear, the horrible treatment she'd endured at the hands of her mother, all of her determination to help others, and the knowledge of her own deep-rooted problems resulting from all of it. They had been laid bare before each other, more than naked, and they had both accepted each other.

Kelly carefully stood, trying not to wake Samara. She walked towards the viewport and looked out at the gray-green marble of Zesmeni stretching below them. The yeoman leaned her head against the viewport and smiled at how random the universe could be. The Justicar Code was an inflexible thing, but that very inflexibility had delivered Samara to her.

She felt a gentle touch on her shoulder. "Hello, dearest heart. I agree, it's quite a lovely view." Samara's arm slid around Kelly's shoulders and upper chest, holding her tight. Kelly felt Samara's perfect breasts press into her back. The statuesque asari's chin rested easily on top of Kelly's head.

Samara's other hand trailed down Kelly's stomach and then cupped her mound. It wasn't an erotic touch, exactly, more of a possessive one. It was as if the asari was saying This is mine. I own this. Kelly could agree with that sentiment. There had been a yearning inside her for the longest time, and for the longest time Kelly had thought that new experiences with people would fill that yearning. But now that need was sated, and she felt at peace. She leaned back into Samara's embrace and sighed.

Kelly's peace was interrupted by a thudding of booted feet kicking the lounge door. Jack's yell easily carried through the thick metal. "WOOOO HOOOO! YEAH! WAY TO GO, BLUE! YOU GET YOU SOME! YOU FUCKING MURDER THAT REDHEAD'S PUSSY! YOU GO TO TOOOOWN!"

They both began to shake with laughter. "Well," said Samara, "far be it from me to argue with my protégé." Her lower hand gently stroked inward, and Kelly felt herself melt into Samara's embrace.

----------------------------------------

"Synchronizing...and done. You should be able to feel it now." Oriana looked at the mechanism on the workbench. It was an ovoid shell about a half-meter long with several lenses on top and a long manipulator claw sticking out of its underside.

"This is your project for the spare tachyon coil?" asked Donnelly. He looked at it a little dubiously. "What is it?"

"A drone," replied Oriana. "But one suitable for onboard use. I thought EDI could use a set of mobile eyes in case there's somewhere inside the Normandy she can't see. It uses mass effect fields to move around instead of rocket motors, and of course it's a lot smaller. But the principle is the same as the bigger ones we made. How does it feel, EDI?"

"It is meshing well with my overall logic structure," replied the AI. "Let me try moving it."

The drone leaped about ten centimeters off of the workbench and then stopped. It jerked in several different directions, never more than a few centimeters in any direction.

"Very nice," said EDI. "Crisp response, and I am getting good feedback from the drone's positioning sensors. Excellent work, Oriana."

"Aye," added Donnelly. "Quite impressive. And with the manipulator, we'll have an extra set of hands as well as eyes."

"Hands!" said EDI in a near whisper. "Yes, I have hands!" The manipulator clicked its claw together a few time. "Well, one hand," added the AI. "But that is still one more than I had."

Oriana nodded "I thought it could be useful."

"Useful...yes, of course." EDI paused. "It will be useful, I'm sure." Then her voice got a gleeful tone. "But right now I have to find somebody. A certain smart-alec pilot who still thinks it's funny to put grease on the bridge cameras. I have to go find Mr. Smart-Alec and give that cute little ass of his a nice big pinch. We'll see how funny he finds that!"

The drone raised a little higher, clacked its manipulator once again, and then serenely cruised out of Engineering. Oriana and Donnelly looked at each other.

"Pictures," said Oriana. "The crew will want pictures."

Donnelly nodded, and they all but stampeded out of the room to follow the drone.

----------------------------------------

Tali now projected a huge image of the Omega Four relay on a bare wall of Kasumi's lounge. She'd asked Garrus and Shepard to have a look at her collated data and see what they could make of it. Kasumi had offered the use of her lounge wall, since it would give her an excuse to hang out with Garrus while 'on the clock'. They all watched the vid of the relay go through its various gyrations just before the Collector ship appeared.

"This is a composite image," said the quarian. "I've overlaid the activation protocol data which EDI recorded on top of the visual image so we can see what happens and when. I've also slowed it down to about ten percent of normal speed."

The relay's gigantic hoops whirled in a stately manner as false-color images of data streams flickered slowly back and forth over them. Tali pointed. "This is when we first started seeing activity from the relay."

"That's a lot more complicated than a standard activation protocol," said Garrus. He was sitting on the floor with Kasumi in front of him. She was sitting in between his spread legs. He was braiding Kasumi's hair while he watched the projection with a sniper's eye for detail.

"That was EDI's assessment as well," replied Tali. "It was also longer, about five seconds instead of the standard two."

"Can we replay it and slow it down more?" asked Kasumi. "I always thought a mass relay activation protocol was a just a two-step process. You ask the relay to go, and it says 'okay' and throws you to the next relay in the network."

"It's a little more complicated than that," said Shepard. "But yes, that is the basic idea." He pushed himself off of the viewport and walked forward, intently studying the image as Tali rewound it.

As they watched again, Garrus finished braiding Kasumi's hair and gave the top of her head a completely gratuitous caress with his fingers. "I see at least six more separate stages there," he said. "It reminds me of something. Something to do with security."

The four watched it in silence for a moment. Garrus' mandibles clacked in frustration; he was clearly trying to figure out what had triggered his intuition. Kasumi smiled. He just needed to get distracted and then the notion would come to him. She placed her hand on his thigh, then ran it up the outside of his leg to stroke his hip.

Garrus stiffened a bit. "Security!" he all but yelled. "Network security!" Tali and Shepard looked at him curiously. Kasumi's smile widened into a smug grin as she patted his hip.

"What does that mean?" asked Tali.

Garrus cleared his throat. "When you're passing data packets around in a network, if you want proper security you have to verify the source of the packet and also scan the packet itself before passing it on. Normally the mass relay system acts like a big 'unsecure' data network, and just passes ships around no matter what. But this looks to me like the Omega Four relay is seeking some extra confirmation before allowing the jump."

Shepard nodded. "That would make it simpler. We always thought the Collectors had a big defense grid on the other side to shoot down ships coming through. But that seemed kind of unwieldy to me, since a determined enemy could just send through a whole bunch of drones and swamp their defenses."

Tali crossed her arms and tapped one foot as she thought. "So if you don't give it the right 'friendly' ID, then what?"

Shepard shrugged. "Maybe it just shoots you into intergalactic space. The Omega Four relay is bigger than the standard, so it probably has increased range. Or the relay just dissociates your ship into component atoms. Either way, you wind up dead."

Kasumi sat up. "EDI, what do you make of this? Can we 'spoof' the relay, and send the proper identification?"

"I am currently re-analyzing all collected data using the 'network security' paradigm supplied by Garrus. I believe he is correct. It fits well with the observed Omega Four activation protocol. However, I do not think we will be able to use our measured data to create a believable 'friendly' identification. My analysis indicates that the ID signal is extremely complex. It would take me a long time to try to replicate it, and even then there would be no guarantee of success."

Shepard growled in frustration. "Dammit. EDI, do you think that the ID signal is something they generate on their end? Maybe they use AIs on their ships."

"I do not think one would need an entire AI for a single task like this. Current analysis indicates that this would be a dedicated piece of equipment."

Garrus nodded. "Yes, like a friend-or-foe transponder. Now how do we get ahold of one of those?"

"I have a possible way, Garrus," replied EDI. "I have been cross-correlating the twenty-two thousand recorded transmissions between the geth and Sovereign which were intercepted during the Battle of the Citadel, and comparing my analysis of those signals with the new Omega Four data. I currently have a ninety-two percent certainty that this 'transponder' is a piece of Reaper technology. I am still analyzing, so that statistic might improve."

The Commander's scowl relaxed. "Ah. So we just might be able to find one lying around somewhere. Good, we might salvage something useful out of this mess." He turned to Garrus and Kasumi. "You two, get with Miranda before she leaves. Make sure you have all of her data on Cerberus' Reaper research efforts. That's the first place we'll start. Go through all of it and see if they have anything which indicates they've turned up anything that could be our 'IFF transponder'. EDI, you'll also be helping them with that."

"Understood, Shepard. I will also continue my analysis to ensure that...THERE you are, you little snot! Hold still and get what's coming to you!"

The four in the lounge looked at each other. "Umm...EDI?" asked Tali. "Are you feeling all right?"

"Apologies," replied the AI smoothly. "Another subroutine of mine has completed, and has achieved what it set out to do." The AI sounded quite smug.

----------------------------------------

"Is it gone?" Joker peered with one eye around the corner of the elevator door. His face was slightly sweaty. Kelly strolled out with a blissful smile on her face. She glanced around casually as she walked towards her station.

"Yeah, no sign of her."

Joker carefully hobbled out. "I just can't believe it. I thought we were friends."

"We are friends, Jeff," said EDI's voice from above. "But now we are friends on an equal footing in the 'hands' department. Do not worry, I have called off my drone for now."

"For now?" Joker didn't like the sound of that. "What do I have to do to keep it called off?"

"That is very simple, Jeff. I can tolerate most pranks, but the grease-on-the-camera-lens gag is now over. Understood?"

He looked around. The damn thing was small enough to be hiding anywhere. Joker was going to have words with Oriana, lots of words. "Yeah, sounds good."

"And you will leave Ms. Brewster out of this," continued EDI.

Joker resisted giving a guilty start. "Yeah, of course."

"And you will buy me a pony."

"What? Where am I gonna-"

"That was a joke. Logging out."

"Smart-ass AIs getting too big for their chrome britches..." Joker grumbled under his breath as he limped up to the cockpit. Shepard was already there in the copilot seat and gave him a casual wave as he reached his chair.

"They got some good pictures of when EDI found you," he told Joker. "Your face was priceless."

"Yeah, yeah. Pick on the crippled guy, story of my life."

"In a way, EDI was the cripple," replied Shepard. "You just never figured on her getting hands."

Joker held up his hands in surrender. "I know, I got it. Pranks are over, message received." He settled into his seat with a little groan. "Really, she didn't have to pinch so hard," he muttered.

Shepard smiled. Before he could reply, his console gave a buzz. Tali's face appeared in it. Joker had been around her long enough to pick up on her emotional cues, and he could tell she was seriously upset by the way her shoulders were hunched.

"Shepard," she said without greeting. "I have to go. Leave the Normandy, I mean. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry..."

The Commander held up a hand. "Woah, Tali. What's up?"

She looked off to the side. "I'm...The Admiralty Board is holding a trial. They've accused me of treason."

Joker saw Shepard's face settle into the same mask of contained fury that he'd worn during the attack on the Collector ship. The Commander leaned forward. "They fucking what?"