After the mission on the Purgatory, the Normandy crew didn’t really have much to do at the moment.

Cerberus was still looking for signs of Collector activity and had nothing solid as of yet, so Shepard was left to her own devices.

Without a solid mission or goal pushing her forward, the human Commander was taking the time to get to know her team in a more relaxed setting than rushing to a mission or in the middle of a firefight.

Well, she tried to anyway.

Even with nothing pressing going on, running a ship was still a very involved job so she only had a few minutes to talk to everyone. Still, the general crew were easy enough to get along with even if she didn’t get to know them very well yet.

Jacob continued to live up to her first impression of being a through-and-through marine, jock attitude and all, although to his credit he didn’t seem particularly xenophobic. Rather it was the politics the Alliance had played and their inaction after Eden Prime that had driven the young man to join Cerberus. Short-sighted in Shepard’s opinion. Especially since Cerberus usually had so many ‘rogue’ cells that went against human interests, but she knew just how hard it was to do nothing when you saw something wrong and you were ordered to do nothing so she didn’t judge him too harshly. If anything Shepard hoped Jacob’s attitude rubbed off onto more Cerberus operatives.

Mordin was… interesting to talk to. The Salarian had basically moved into the Science Lab and greatly enjoyed playing with the various state-of-the-art equipment found inside. He did have a habit of going into great detail on what he was doing though, and while Shepard wasn’t an idiot, advanced biochemistry and gene sequencing was not something she could talk about other than just smiling politely and nodding along.

She hadn’t had much luck talking with Jack or Miranda either. The convict had been dismissive and hostile during the brief conversation they had, but she had appreciated getting access to the Cerberus databases so there was at least some progress getting Jack to open up. In contrast to that Miranda had gone back to being professionally distant. Evidently she had not appreciated Shepard handing out access to restricted files. A part of Shepard fully understood why Miranda was bothered as she would probably feel the same if it were Alliance databases, but on the other hand it was still Cerberus files...so fuck them.

The whole situation would probably give her a better read on her XO anyway. Since Miranda was determined to track exactly what Jack was looking through, it meant she was also reading those files. If Jack found anything damning, then the black-haired officer would know it too. What that ended up doing for her allegiances to Cerberus was up in the air, but Shepard was willing to find out.

The newest addition to her crew, the tank-bred Krogan that had named himself Grunt, was similarly hard to talk to but that was mostly because he simply lacked any real experiences of his own for now and was uninterested in the implanted memories, claiming they felt ‘hollow’. Besides securing his allegiance for the time being there really hadn’t been much else to discuss with the young Krogan. Although the rather sudden release of the tank-bred might be another reason Miranda was upset with her.

She mentally shrugged.

Miranda would get over it.

Shepard dismissed her thoughts on her team for now. Garrus was busy trying to dig up some old contacts about a potential upgrade to the Normandy’s main battery so she was taking the opportunity to meet with Revan again. The meditation lessons with the Sith had been a great help in calming the Spectre’s mind after her death, resurrection, and dealings with Cerberus. She was actually a little scared imagining what trying to deal with her current situation without the Elven woman helping her deal with it. When not instructing Shepard, Revan had begun to share some of her experiences during the Mandalorian Wars.

Although if she was being honest, Shepard had a hard time imagining the scale of the conflict Revan fought in. She had a hard enough time with a single ship, nevermind multiple fleets. Hearing what Revan was capable of could be pretty humbling at times.

Shepard entered Revan’s quarters for their next session and was surprised to see the Sith Lord in something other than her normal black robes. Ever since Revan had taken up residence in the cargo bay she had always worn either her robes or armor, but now the Elf was wearing some loose workout pants and a fitted tank top. It was such a change in appearance that Shepard wasn’t sure she was in the right place for a second.

“Revan, that's a new style.” She couldn’t help but say after recovering from her shock.

The Sith opened her eyes from her meditative position and looked placidly at the human commander.

“Is it that surprising? Even I need my clothes washed from time to time.”

“Ah, ehm, right, that makes sense.” It was easy to forget that despite the billions of credits worth of technology laying around the cargo bay, Revan herself only had her armor and the clothes she was wearing when she crashed.

“It’s a good look for you.” Shepard said, trying to recover from that slip up. And she wasn’t lying, under the armor and loose flowing robes Revan had the build of someone who spent years forging their body to perfection. She had the grace and smoothness of motion of a gymnast and the restrained power of a martial artist mixed into one, and Shepard needed to stop right now before she ended up thinking just like a certain Yeoman.

“It’s fine for now, but I prefer my own style of clothing.” Revan replied, idly pulling at the straps of her shirt and giving Shepard a glimpse down her shirt. Shepard felt her face heating up at Revan’s flawless skin before she remembered the state of her own and her feelings took a darker turn. Revan paused and looked up at her. “What’s wrong? My clothes aren’t that upsetting are they?”

It was a strange comment, but then Shepard remembered for the tenth time that Revan was an empath. Of course she felt the Commander’s shift in emotion.

“Sorry, it’s nothing.” Shepard deflected. “You were going to try teaching me moving meditation this time, right? Where do we start?”

Revan simply stared at her, one eyebrow raised as violet eyes bored into green. “For someone who was supposed to be the equivalent of a Jedi Shadow, you are remarkably bad at lying, Commander. So care to tell me why simply looking at me makes you feel such a way?”

“I don’t suppose you’ll leave it alone if I say it’s private?”

Revan smiled, but it was a cold expression. “Forgive me, but the last time I trusted a student when they said their feelings were private he betrayed me and everything I had created.”

Shepard had to give her that one. Revan’s tale about her betrayal by her friend and apprentice Malek had revealed how deeply that experience still affected the woman. Revan had straight up told Shepard that as long as she was teaching the Commander she would likely act like this as well. But Shepard was so determined to stop her own mind from fighting against her that she swore to put up with it.

“It’s your skin.”

Revan said nothing.

Shepard huffed. Damn the Sith for patiently waiting for her to continue.

“Look, I’m not one to get all bent out of shape over a little scar okay? Hell, I’m an N7 and half the ground team is littered with them. But I look in the mirror and see underneath the scars is freaking glowing machinery and it just keeps reminding me that the scars I have are because I’m a fucking science experiment...”

Shepard took a moment to collect herself, following the breathing techniques Revan had shown her. Collecting the negative thoughts, acknowledging them, accepting them, and letting them go with every breath out

“...so when I saw you,” She gestured at Revan’s unmarked skin. “didn’t have a scratch on you despite all the battles you were in hit me hard.”

The Sith remained silent for a while.

“...I had wondered about the scars. You seemed to avoid reflective surfaces but since you didn’t seem to mind the others on the crew I wasn’t sure.” She eventually said slowly. “But surely you have the medical technology to deal with a few scars if you didn’t want them?”

“Not on a frigate.” Shepard said dismissively, running her fingers over the crags in her skin. “And I can’t exactly justify taking us off mission for a few weeks just to get it taken care of at a civilian hospital or the cost of installing the hardware here.”

It was actually incredibly frustrating. Sure, Miranda said the surgical scars would heal on their own as long as she kept her epinephrine levels low, but that was hard to do when she was running combat missions and when looking at a mirror stressed her out. And all of it could be solved as long as Shepard was selfish enough to ignore entire colonies in trouble to get treatment or rely on Cerberus to install the needed hardware and not hold a debt over her.

She would rather chew glass than owe TIM anything. He might’ve brought her back to life, but she refused to owe him for that. She didn’t ask him to and he certainly hadn’t asked her.

“I sense you have strong feelings about those options.”

Shepard shrugged. She wasn’t exactly hiding that.

Revan looked at her for a bit, then sighed and motioned for her to sit on the floor directly in front of the Sith.

“I had planned on getting you into a more dynamic form of meditation since that's obviously where your preference lies,” Shepard cringed a bit at the not so subtle dig about how hard it was for her to sit still for any appreciable amount of time. “But considering this latest conversation, it seems that will have to wait until I correct something first.”

That had Shepard cringing harder. The last thing she needed was her meditation teacher playing at being a therapist. She was already trying to avoid being alone with Chambers for any appreciable amount of time because she didn’t want TIM knowing what made her tick anymore than he already did. And if she was being honest, she didn’t want to wind up being seen as some broken soldier needing to be fixed to Revan.

After seeing the Elf handle being tossed into arguably worse circumstances than herself, Shepard’s natural competitiveness refused to let her become dependent on the Sith. Would she do her best to learn the skills Revan had to offer? Hell yes.

Rely on her to sort out all her problems? Not a chance.

“Look, I appreciate the offer but I’m not looking for a shrink. If you’re worried about me going postal on you just because I can’t look in a mirror, don’t. I’d probably go after Miranda first.” Shepard tried to smile at the end to show she was joking. Too bad Revans serious mein refused to soften any.

“Good, because I have better things to do with my time and yours than attempt to mimic a mind healer.” Revan said shortly. “If I was, I would tell you that ensuring you are healthy mind, body, and soul requires time and effort before you see results.” Shepard opened her mouth but before she could say anything the Sith Lord talked over her. “But seeing as we do not have that kind of time, I am simply going to brute force some of it. So unless you are dead set against it, I will attempt to accelerate healing your scars.”

Shepard’s protests died on her lips. Revan was going to heal her? She knew Revan had kept Garrus alive after he was hit by a missile, but once he made it to the medbay she never offered her abilities again. Shepard had thought it was because she could only affect recent wounds but maybe she was wrong.

“You aren’t wrong, healing old injuries is magnitudes more difficult than fresh ones.” Revan explained after she asked. “But surface level stuff is easier than most. I won’t lie though, I don’t know how to make this comfortable for you.”

“Do it.” Shepard said immediately. Anything to be able to look at herself and not see an abomination looking back in the mirror.

Revan nodded and placed her hands on either side of Shepard’s head. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before her face smoothed out into what Shepard had started to learn was a meditative trance. Then she started to feel some slight prickles on her face. Prickles that quickly escalated until it reminded her of the time she accidentally tried sleeping on top of a colony of fire ants during basic.

But she grit her teeth and refused to make a sound.

She’d felt worse.

A small eternity later the feeling stopped and Revan pulled her hands away. Shepard was a little surprised to see the Sith lean forward, sweat running down her face and breath coming in pants.

“Th-There. Not a bad effort for the first session.” the elven woman eventually managed.

“Are you okay?” Shepard had to ask. The only time she had ever seen Revan this drained was after she had crashed into a planet and fought through a few squads of Batarian slavers.

“F-fine, healing just takes a lot out of me.” Revan replied. “Like I said, I’m not a healer. Battlefield medic I can do, but that much concentration isn’t something I can do for long.”

She motioned to a nearby table and a canteen of water telekinetically jumped into her hand.

While Revan was drinking, Shepard got an alert on her omnitool. A message had come in from her old CO, Captain Anderson. Councillor now technically, but he would always be Captain to her. And he was asking her to come to the Citadel.

Shepard made her excuses and left Revan’s quarters in a hurry. She was so focused on getting to the CIC deck that she didn’t even think about looking at the results of Revan’s work until the elevator doors closed and she caught a glimpse of herself in the metal doors.

The deep crevices in her face where just yesterday glowing orange implants could be seen had been sealed and replaced by rough scar tissue. It wasn’t pretty, but the lack of light showing through made Shepard feel like even if Revan never attempted healing her again she would still owe the Sith several favors.

The elevator doors quietly hissed open, and Commander Shepard stepped through them feeling lighter than she had in weeks.

-o-

As it turned out, the fight Shepard was half expecting to break out when Miranda learned about their destination failed to materialize.

Coincidentally enough, there was another person of interest Cerberus had marked for recruitment that had just signed on and was waiting for pickup at the Citadel. How a marked Cerberus frigate was allowed to freely operate in Citadel Space wasn’t something Shepard was very keen on learning. It suggested either a dismissal of how dangerous the terrorist organisation was to the wider galaxy or politicking and backroom deals that meant Cerberus’s crimes were mostly ignored outside of the Systems Alliance.

Knowing the council, Shepard wouldn’t be surprised if it was a combination of both those and even some other factors.

They hadn’t exactly cracked down on Batarian slavers despite them withdrawing from Citadel space and still launching raids on member races.

Whatever the reason, the Normandy was able to dock at the Citadel with no issues and only the usual traffic that had Joker complaining about half blind pilots with the spacial awareness of a Hanar and several pointed remarks about their possible ancestry with farm animals.

Miranda had assured her that despite her own reservations with the situation, no one would be waiting outside to arrest them all. So once the ship was docked and C-Sec didn’t immediately storm the airlock, Shepard allowed for limited shore leave for her crew. Hopefully not enough to cause issues, but plenty to ensure everyone had a chance to destress after their missions.

From there it was a simple ten minute ride from the local transit station to where she was supposed to meet with their potential new recruit. Oddly enough, she made it to her destination without being ambushed, or assaulted, or finding her target in the middle of a fight. In fact, things were so normal Shepard did three perimeter checks just to make sure she hadn’t missed anything.

“You’re being paranoid.” the amusement in Revan’s slightly distorted voice was clear. Shepard sent a mild glare at the thin black visor where the other woman’s eyes were sure to be.

“I haven’t met a single recruit for the ground team without everything going to hell. It’s pattern recognition, not paranoia.” she replied.

“Even Jacob and Miranda?”

“Met them shooting my way out of a Cerberus medical facility minutes after I woke up. Jacob when we were taking down the security mechs. Miranda when she killed the person who sent them after us.” And hadn’t that been a fun thing to wake up to…

Revan shook her head, that same mild amusement practically radiating off her body language. “I still say it’s paranoia, but we can debate that later. Our new friend seems to be getting impatient.” she pointed at the advertisement holo that had been hacked to show the image of a hooded woman. Shepard idly wondered if hoods were starting to become a fashion statement. Between Tali, Revan, and now this woman that was three people already.

“Commander Shepard. We have the finest companions waiting for you. Perhaps something petite, smart, and Japanese would be your style?”

Shepard snorted.

You could tell a lot about a person by how they chose to introduce themselves. And she was learning quite a bit about their recruit with this little display. Talented, obviously, if she was able to hack a mid-level security platform on the Citadel just to make contact. Cautious, since she was still making contact remotely. And despite the carefree tone, Shepard recognised the hooded woman was probing for reactions. If she didn’t like what she saw, she would likely call the whole thing off.

“Well, this is cute.” She said as she and Revan approached the projector.

The woman’s lips quirked in amusement at Shepard’s comment so this was a live feed at least. “Please tell me your password, Commander Shepard.”

“What, that’s it? No custom tailored hook to draw me in? Or what about a little flattery to butter me up?” Shepard sighed theatrically. “Just straight to the password. I’m hurt Kasumi.”

The huff from Revan showed exactly how believable that last part was, but Shepard was having fun while nothing was shooting at her.

“You’re more fun than I thought you’d be, Shep, but I figured you’d be up for some intrigue. If I knew you’d play along I’d have made more of an effort.” the woman crooned. “Kasumi Goto at your service...but you apparently already knew that.”

Shepard smiled. “I like knowing who I’m talking to.” she replied easily. “So why the secrecy? You in trouble or something?” she wouldn’t judge Kasumi too badly even if she was. She didn’t exactly have the right to, considering the people she was working with at the moment.

“I’m the best thief in the business, not the most famous. Need to watch my step to keep it that way.” Kasumi explained. “I also needed to make sure this was legit. And I have no doubts now, you’re the real Commander Shepard.”

That made sense, but the last bit made Shepard raise an eyebrow. “Just like that? How did you know I’m the real one?”

“Like I said, I’m the best in the business. That means being able to recognise important people at a glance. After doing this sort of thing for a while you get almost a sixth sense for it. Each person gives off their own ‘aura’ which is unique. After I met you the first time I was never going to forget yours, you give off this feeling, like you’ve seen things that no one else ever has.”

“You met me before?” Shepard couldn’t remember meeting anyone like Kasumi, but that didn’t mean the thief couldn’t have been in disguise.

“Well ‘met’ might be a strong word for it. I was in the Citadel for a job a couple years ago and was in Chora’s Den when your team went after Fisk. Hard to forget you after that.”

The fifteen minute reminder buzzed on Shepard’s Omnitool. She had to wrap this up or they’d be late to their meeting with Anderson.

“Well, glad to actually meet you then. You’ve been briefed on the mission?” she asked.

“I have. And I’m a little surprised it took Cerberus this long to reach out to me, my fault for being hard to find I suppose.” Kasumi said a little arrogantly, but if she was as good as she was suggesting then she might have earned the right to be. “Plus the hiring bonus of you helping me out was too good to pass up. You know about that right?”

And then Shepard was suddenly on the back foot. Cerberus made a deal on her behalf without her knowledge.

“I guess it slipped their minds.” Kasumi continued, the shock on Shepard’s face must have been enough of a clue. I’m looking for my partner’s old greybox. A man named Donovan Hock took it, and I’m planning to get it back.”

Shepard crossed her arms. “Can’t say I recognise the name.”

“A well-respected ‘businessman’. Arms dealer, murderer, and generally not a great guy.”

That was better than what Shepard had been expecting. Going after an arms dealer was way better than some of the other options out there. Although hearing a greybox was involved was a surprise. Those were insanely regulated hardware, usually only available to top level researchers and spies. Even then, the ability to playback memories like video files was rarely worth the side-effects.

The alarm on her Omnitool pinged again. She needed to wrap this up. She could get the details from Kasumi later and she had a basic read on the thief. The rest could wait till later.

“I can live with that for now, if that’s what you were promised we’ll get it done.”

“It’ll be fun. If we’re lucky, you won’t even need to draw your gun.” Kasumi smiled lightly and the ad-holo cut out and sank down. “We should probably wrap this up now though,” Kasumi’s voice filtered down from the platform above them. “You look pretty silly standing there talking to an advertisement.”

Kasumi was going to be an experience on the Normandy, Shepard could already tell.

“See you on the ship, Shepard.”

With that final parting word the asian woman turned and walked off, presumably to gather her things, leaving Shepard and Revan behind.

“So what did you think of her?” Shepard asked the Sith.

“A skilled infiltrator at the very least. And a good addition if you can keep her in line.” Revan replied. “I imagine she will keep probing exactly how far she can push things if you don’t keep an eye on her.”

Shepard groaned. That’s what she thought. Was it too much to ask that just one recruit be normal?

Then another thought hit her and she groaned harder.

“Something wrong?”

“I just realised nothing went terribly wrong during this meeting.” She almost whined at Revan. “That means this meeting with the Council is going to suck.”

Revan shrugged and started moving towards the gate leading out of the terminal area.

“I find that’s how meetings with politicians disconnected with the state of things around them tend to be normally. The best way to deal with it is make them as uncomfortable as possible in return. Or threaten to replace them, that works sometimes.”

Shepard was reminded that the woman walking next to her had basically been the Empress of her own creation at one point. And she was taking her to meet with the three people that refused to acknowledge anything was wrong until it was undeniably shoved into their faces.

Suck was too tame a word for it. This meeting was going to be a disaster.