Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Commander Shepard has often been lauded as an exceptional leader. Her superiors commended her for her effective fire squads, the special touch she had with civilians, and her laser focus. They didn’t realize that she was just following the threads.

Shepard could always see the threads that connected people. They came in different colors. Green for family, blue for love, and yellow for friendship were the most common. Sometimes she saw people with a shimmering white thread stretched between them; she thought they might be soul mates. Then there were the red threads. She saw those most often in battle. She couldn’t quite figure out what they were.

She would watch sometimes as threads were formed between two people, see the color and make guesses about the people being tied into each other’s webs. She always followed the threads. It’s what kept her sane as her parents transferred from one posting to the next. Friends are easy to find when you can already see the bonds. The threads kept her alive after thresher maws slaughtered her unit. A scarlet thread brought her to Anderson.

Shepard had dozens of threads shooting out from her. She was the center of a crimson web with one ethereal white strand that reached throughout space. Her soul mate was out there somewhere. She didn’t have time to find them. The universe was a big place. They’d find each other eventually.

For now, Shepard had to focus on the connections she could see. Kaidan. Joker. Jenkins. Nihlus. When Nihlus boarded the Normandy, Shepard felt all of the threads in her web quiver. Something was about to change and all of her threads felt tenuous, ready to snap as the knife of fate sawed away at them. Her white thread was always steady, though. Immovable, unchanging.

She thought about who could be at the other end. What were they like? They’d have to be pretty damn unique to put up with everything Shepard did to survive. The constant travel and talking, so much talking. Her terrible driving, her model ships. What would she have to put up with?

Eden Prime
As her ground team landed on Eden Prime, Shepard felt uneasy. The threads connecting her to Jenkins and Nihlus were thinner than usual, almost transparent. Shepard shook the threads from her sight and drew her pistol. Something was about to change.

Alenko and Jenkins followed her hand signs, but she wasn't fast enough to signal as a geth drone appeared and shot Jenkins down as he moved from cover to cover. She felt the thread between them snap, mirrored by a sharp pang in her heart. Feeling a thread break never got easier.

She forced her anguish down into the depths of her stomach. Grieve later. Survive now. Alenko needed her to push forward. As she pulled him away from their young teammate, Shepard saw a new thread shoot out from her. It stretched ahead, constantly moving. It connected to someone on the planet.

Shepard kept an eye on her pistol barrel and signaled Alenko to follow her as she followed the thread. It was a red connection, red as Jenkins’ blood. She trusted her web.

Rounding a corner, they entered combat with more Geth machines. Shepard saw the soldier at the end of her thread, a young woman in pink and white armor. She smiled—most women refused to wear the Phoenix line of armors. It was nice to see someone who just didn’t care. Shepard brought her along. She’d fight to have her transferred to her ship if she had to. The threads didn’t lie.

It wasn’t long before Shepard felt that terrible pain in her heart again.

Nihlus. Shepard drove her team on, aware that it was too late. Their thread snapped and he was dead. She tried to ignore the new thread forming. Instead of a new red thread like the one that affirmed her faith in Ashley, this thread made Shepard feel cold with dread. It was thicker than her other threads, thick and black like a snake come to wind itself around her. It stretched away from her, toward Nihlus. She pushed forward, lobbing her biotics at Geth along the way. Following the threads never failed her.

She saw a network of yellow threads leading into a bunker. Inside she found citizens of Eden Prime—farmers. Innocents. Well, almost innocent. Shepard shamed them into turning over the goods from their smuggling ring and convinced them to share the name of their contact. She could be very convincing.

Together, her squad ripped through the Geth guarding the space port. Shepard knew that Nihlus was dead; she knew it when his thread snapped, but seeing him on the floor was still a shock.

“Something’s moving, over behind those crates.” Shepard’s gun went up before Ashley could finish her sentence.

“Wait! Don’t—Don’t shoot! I’m one of you! I’m human!”

Shepard noted a yellow thread leading back to the farmer’s they had found earlier. This must be Cole’s contact. He had fallen asleep before the attack. Saved by his laziness, he was in the perfect spot to watch as Nihlus was shot in the back by another Turian. The sound of the shooter’s name made that new black thread quiver.

“He called him Saren. I think they knew each other.”

Now that Nihlus was dead, there were no threads leading away from his body. Shepard checked the black thread that formed after Nihlus’ thread snapped. It pointed her toward a tram. If Shepard followed the threads, she’d find what she needed.
It was a brief fight to the port but Shepard wanted to scream. Every Geth, every bomb, was another obstacle. By the time they cleared the port, there was no sign of the mysterious Saren. Only the beacon. Shepard kept her calm, but her heart was anything but. Nihlus believed in her and now he was gone before she could prove him right. This was a disaster.

Captain Anderson had questions. All Shepard had was the beacon. Suddenly, one of Shepard’s threads tugged at her sharply. She turned and saw Kaidan, drawn in by the Prothean artifact and clutching his head in agony. Shepard pushed past Ashley, yanked Kaidan away from the beacon, but in doing so got caught in the field.

Her mind was flooded with violent imagery. So much death. A tapestry torn apart by careless claws. A single white thread drifting off into space.

Chapter Text

Shepard followed the threads on the Citadel. She was connected to so many people here. Ash and Kaidan were at her side, marveling at the sheer size of the station. There were so many webs. Shepard could spend years deciphering each bond. She followed her own threads through the citadel, meeting Sha’ira the consort, Barla Von the information broker, and Emily Wong the journalist. They were weak bonds, but important. She carefully ignored the white thread that seemed more taut than usual. She didn’t have time for soul mates.

She noticed a couple of new red threads, their sources close by but still out of reach. She would have to wait until after she spoke with the council. Then she could explore the rest of the station. She would find a way to sever the sticky black thread that taunted her.

She watched with increasing anxiety as her white thread tensed, as if the person at the end of it were close. Not now, she thought. I can’t do this now. The elevator doors slid open and she had to hide her surprise over her white thread leading straight to a Turian arguing fiercely with Executor Pallin. She listened to their conversation, the officer’s conviction that Saren was dirty, Pallin’s refusal to give the officer more time.

Maybe she was wrong. Maybe the white thread wasn’t meant for soul mates. How could her soul mate be a Turian? She shoved the thought out of her head as she spoke to the officer. Garrus. The name burned across her mind. He was important, soul mate or not. She would remember him.

Following the threads brought her back to Garrus, to Wrex, and fortunately to Tali. Together, they were able to bring forward the evidence needed to confirm Saren’s actions and launch a hunt. Shepard felt things click into place as the three new bonds made it clear they would be going with her no matter what. She tucked away thoughts of the white thread as the thread between her and Kaidan started to turn blue.

Soul mates. Ridiculous.

Chapter Text

“What are you doing?”

Garrus’ voice shattered Shepard’s hypnotic rhythm of double-crochet stitches. She gasped and dropped her hook and yarn, hand reaching to her hip for the gun that she had stored in her locker. She shook her head to clear the remnants of her crochet daze and then glared at the interloper.

“I was working on some gloves. The Normandy gets cold.” Shepard picked up her work and set it down on the table. Her fingers ached—it was time for a break anyway.

“But why? Can’t you buy them?” Garrus pulled a chair out across from Shepard and sat down. He wasn’t looking at her, but at the navy blue yarn that matched her Alliance uniform. He reached out a hand to touch the metal hook she’d been using, but pulled it back, unsure.

“I could, but I can also easily make them. And when I make them, I know no one else has them. They’re unique. They’re mine.” She picked up her basket of crafting supplies and arranged her work in progress so that it wouldn’t unravel. Foot locker regulations were strict, but she managed to make room for skeins of yarn in her favorite colors—emerald green, dark gold, different shades of blue, scarlet, snowy white. Shepard rested her hand on the white yarn as she unfocused her eyes to better see the threads surrounding her.

It was still there. A dazzling white thread connected her to Garrus and she still didn’t know what it meant. The threads connecting her to Kaidan and Liara stretched, turning blue as she got to know them both outside of missions. She’d have to deal with that sooner or later.

“It’s just so… domestic.”

She raised an eyebrow at him. Nearby, Kaidan sputtered, choking on his coffee. “You’re in for it now,” he said.

“What?”

“Is there a problem with being domestic, Vakarian?” Shepard’s voice dropped several degrees, icicles forming on her words.

“I mean, no, of course not, it’s just, I—”

“There are more skills than just fighting. It doesn’t hurt to know how to do something peaceful.”

Shepard clutched a skein of yarn, overtaken by a memory.

Her mother, humming an old song. Gentle hands winding yarn into a ball. The insistent click of knitting needles. A green thread stretching between her and her father, out in the galaxy somewhere, fighting. It snaps. A little girl cries for no reason.

“Do you think I could learn?” Garrus asked. Shepard looked at his hands, incredibly different from hers.

“I don’t think Turians are made for crocheting,” Kaidan said, voicing Shepard’s thoughts. She shoved that aside and took out two looms from her crafting kit.

“Probably not, but anyone can loom-knit.” She set the rectangular loom in front of Garrus and passed him a hook. “Pick two colors. I’m going to show you how to make a side buttoned cowl.”

“A side what what?” Garrus poked through the rainbow of yarn and settled on green and gold.

“You know that short scarf I wore on Noveria?” She asked as she picked her own colors to work on. She liked the way blue and silver combined. It made her feel calm.

“You made that?” Kaidan asked, surprised.

“I did.”

“I thought that was something they added to the N7 gear and us regular soldiers had to do without,” he joked. Shepard smiled. Maybe she’d make one for Kaidan, too.

“Alright, I have my yarn. What do I do?”

Shepard walked Garrus through the steps, showing him how to wrap the yarn around the loom’s pegs and how to pull the loops up and over. Once he had the pattern, he moved slowly but deliberately. Kaidan watched for a while, but grew bored and wandered off. Wrex came through the mess hall and shared anecdotes about Krogan artisans—what few there were remaining—and the stories they told in fabric, similar to tapestries Shepard had seen on Earth.

“When I make something, I try to focus on who it’s for. It might sound silly but I try to put some goodness into it. Hopes for warmth,” Shepard murmured as she felt the pattern in her hands and heart.

“That sounds like superstition, Commander.” Garrus had made good progress. Shepard admired the way the green and gold wrapped around each other.

“It might be, but it’s a superstition that doesn’t harm anyone.”

They worked in silence as the Normandy flew them toward Feros. Shepard knew they’d have to stop soon, but she was enjoying having someone to work alongside without needing a lot of chatter.

“Who are you making yours for?” Garrus asked.

She thought about it. She picked the colors because she liked them together and because she needed something in order to show him how it worked. Being able to look over at how her hands moved helped him to keep the pattern going.

“For my best friend,” she said. She meant it. He deserved something nice. “How about you? Are you going to keep your first loom-knit or are you going to give it to someone?”

“I think I’ll give it to my best friend,” he said after a moment.

“I’m sure they’ll love it.”

Joker’s voice broke through the silent calm. “Commander, we’ll be at Feros shortly.”

“Thank you, Joker.” To Garrus, she said “You can hang on to that until you finish. If you have any questions just let me know.” She tucked her project away in her crafting kit and got up from the table.

“Thank you, Commander.”

Maybe the white thread was for best friends. That was kind of like a soul mate, wasn’t it? Shepard took a moment in her cabin to study her web. One green thread tied her to her mother. It was good to know she was still out there. She didn’t have any yellow threads anymore, but it didn’t make her sad. The red threads did tie her to friends, but those bonds were even more important than friendship, somehow. She felt that they were all on a precipice. The sticky black thread leading to Saren was likely to pull her off the edge if she didn’t sever it first.

Chapter Text

Commander Shepard hid near the storage lockers on the lowest deck of the Normandy. Normally half of her crew had run of the place, but it was late enough that everyone had retired to their sleep pods. Shepard had a lot on her mind and the only way to work it through was to lose herself in a craft.

They were on their way to Virmire and Shepard had some very tricky threads to untangle. Liara and Kaidan’s threads were both bright blue and she had no idea what to do about it. She cared deeply for them both. Kaidan was soft and gentle. Liara was curious and earnest. It didn’t matter that Saren loomed over them like a boogey man from nightmares, Shepard’s heart demanded to be heard.

The elevator door slid open causing Shepard to freeze in the middle of her stitch. A white thread connected her to the figure getting off of the elevator—Garrus. Shepard relaxed. Garrus wouldn’t ask her awkward questions about why she was sitting on the floor across from the Mako while everyone else slept.

Garrus said nothing as he stood next to where Shepard sat and removed the loom she loaned him from his locker. He settled down next to her and resumed knitting while she sewed small x’s into a piece of fabric. He alternated from working on his own project and watching hers, always quiet. Shepard appreciated that.

“I have to make a hard decision,” she said finally.

“On which gun you’ll use to shoot Saren? I know you favor your pistol but I think you should give the sniper rifle a try.”

Shepard laughed softly. “I’ll keep my pistol, thank you.” She focused on pulling her needle through the fabric before continuing her original thought. “It’s about Liara and Kaidan.”

“Ah, so that’s reached a head?” Garrus held his scarf up to show Shepard.

“It needs ten more inches,” she said. “Is nothing private on this ship?”

Garrus shook his head. “They’re very obvious people, Commander. Lower deck rumors aside, they have terrible poker faces.”

“I don’t really know how I feel,” Shepard said after a moment’s thought.

“If you think they won’t wait for you to figure it out, then you don’t know them very well, Shepard.” Garrus rolled up his scarf and put it back in his locker. He held a hand out to his commander and helped her to stand. “We’ll be at Virmire in a few hours. You should rest.”

Shepard muttered an agreement and retreated back to her room. Her threads were still tangled, but she didn’t feel so bad about it.

Virmire was a disaster. Garrus and Tali stood beside Shepard as she was faced with an impossible choice. Ashley fought for her life at the AA tower, urging her commander to rescue Kaidan, who was busy arming a bomb and fighting off Geth.

They argued with her, each determined to sacrifice their lives for this mad mission she dragged them on. Kaidan, who was soft and kind and dying at the end of a blue thread. Ashley who was hard and young and so important to her whole family. Shepard got a flash of the young woman flying across space just to walk her sister to school.

“Ashley, I’m on my way.”

Kaidan understood. He was too understanding. Shepard ran along the length of the red thread that connected her to Ashley Williams. She tried not to think about the blue thread behind her getting thinner and thinner.

She was already on her way off planet when the bomb ignited and the thread snapped. Now she didn’t have to choose between a gentle man and a curious asari. It didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered now was that Udina grounded her whole team.

Shepard sat across from the mess hall where Kaidan used to spend most of his time. They’d chat in that god awful glow and she learned about the boy he used to be and the man he grew into. No one has asked her about that choice. Ashley was torturing herself with guilt, but no one has asked Shepard how she felt. Not even Liara. Garrus left the loom he borrowed in her room while she was out. She didn’t know what that meant. She’d have to ask him later.

Liara found Shepard on the floor, lost in thought. The thread between them still shone blue, but Shepard wasn’t sure anymore. There was a moment, but it was too brief before Joker interrupted. Shepard lost it. Now wasn’t the time. First she would honor Kaidan’s memory and destroy Saren.

Chapter Text

There wasn’t a body to bury. It was just a box with nothing but dust inside. Hannah Shepard barely registered the Alliance soldiers that whispered their condolences. Anderson stood at her elbow, ready to guide her away when the grief got to be too much. There was nothing left of Hannah’s brave, stupid daughter.

She hated the sight of the Citadel, a place her daughter died for. She loathed the Council that spoke so proudly of the Hero of the Citadel. Their neglect killed her. They should be tried for her murder.

Hannah swallowed against the burning in her throat of sobs locked away. She didn’t care about the medals or the flags, only the basket she clutched in white knuckled hands. It was the only thing left of her child—a side of Jane Shepard that no one would ever care about.

“Captain Anderson,” a layered voice interrupted Hannah’s thoughts. A Turian stood close to her and David. She tensed in his shadow, years of prejudice rising up unbidden. She slammed it back down and kept her face impassive as she watched David and this alien clasp forearms. He held a green and gold scarf in his other hand.

He looked sadly at Hannah, his mouth opening and closing without a sound. Hannah reached out to touch his arm. It was okay. No one who cared for Jane needed to speak. She knew.

“Commander Shepard changed my life,” he said in a low voice. Hannah smirked.

“She changed mine, too.”

He laughed at that and Hannah relaxed even further.

“You know, she taught me to knit on a loom. I never got to show her.” He looked down at the scarf he held and offered it, a tribute that spoke to Jane’s spirit so much more than anything said or done at the farce of a funeral they were forced to attend. Hannah’s breath hitched and the missing hit her hard in the chest.

“What’s your name?” Hannah asked.

“Officer Vakarian.”

“Garrus,” she whispered. Hannah reached into her daughter’s craft basket—miraculously returned to her by an Asari who never left a name— and pulled out a lumpy package with a sloppily written gift tag. Hannah held it out to him. “This is for you.”

Garrus accepted the package and read the tag. “For Garrus, my best friend.” He slid a talon under the plain wrapping to reveal a scarf like the one he already held in blue and silver. The scarf she started to teach him in the first place.

Hannah couldn’t read his face, but she felt something profound pass between them. She held the basket out to him.

“Jane would want you to have this.”

Garrus took a step back and started stammering. “I can’t, you should—“

“I have plenty to remember her by. She shared this with you. Please.”

Hannah took the scarves from Garrus and tucked them into the basket before making him grip the handle.

“Create things and remember her. Remember Jane.”

Garrus pulled the basket close and nodded. When he left, Hannah felt lighter.

Chapter Text

Shepard wished she could say that dying wasn’t so bad. She wished that there was comfort in watching all of the threads binding her to the universe stretching and stretching thinner and thinner until one by one they snap, snap, snapped away from her. She was disconnected and suffocating. It was agony. The shining white thread that stretched across space back to a Turian on the citadel was the last to cling to her. She blacked out before she could see it snap. She hoped there would be a new thread for Garrus soon.

Shepard thought that death would be dark, that she’d finally be able to rest. She’d been hunting out pockets of Geth for months with no reprieve. She just wanted to get on with it, hit the Reapers where it hurts. No one would take her seriously so they had her running around—too busy to hunt for the real threat. Death would at least take all of that off her shoulders. Someone else would have to save the universe. It wouldn’t be her, not today.

But instead, death was painful. Her entire body burned and ached. She had been shattered and each individual piece of her still felt nothing but pain. There were so many lights but none of them were there to guide her. Instead it seemed they watched her and whispered. They whispered about her heart rate, her stats, her cells. They said her name over and over again. She couldn’t answer.

“Shepard—don’t try to move.” One of the voices urged her back to sleep, to calm, but the pain was too much. Air burned straight down to her lungs. Where were the threads? Shepard couldn’t see the threads. She reached out for the voice but was gently pushed back down to the darkness. All she could do was wait.

She didn’t have to wait there, burning in the darkness, for very long. The voice called her back to the watching lights. “Wake up, Commander.” Would it kill the voices to call her something other than Commander or Shepard? She had a name. No one ever seemed to care.

“Shepard, do you hear me? Get out of that bed now – this facility is under attack.”

That was something Shepard could grasp. Attack was something she understood deep in her bones, no matter how much they ached. Shepard sat up from the table, her head still filled with cotton. The voice overhead said something about scars. Shepard could feel them on her face and ribs. She wondered what kind of web they made across her body. She checked for her threads out of habit, but the web wouldn’t spring to life. No red threads, no green, and definitely no white.

Panic rose in Shepard’s chest. Where were they? How could she lose them?

The building shook and gun fire lit up the windows outside of the lab. With a pistol in hand and armor that looked familiar clicked into place, Shepard felt closer to her old life. She followed the voice’s directions and pressed forward, constant and unstoppable. Not even the new weapons tech could stop her. (Thermal clips? Really? Alright then.)

The mechs kept coming. They spilled through doorways with an endless hail of bullets. Shepard fired until she ran out of bullets and almost threw her pistol in her fury. Seriously. THERMAL CLIPS? A mech got too close and she let loose a biotic punch that snapped the head off the machine’s body. A mysterious voice that was slowly getting on Shepard’s nerves cleared her to continue.

Shepard fought her way to a man crouched in cover. He seemed distressed to see her up and about. His name was Jacob. The voice that’d been guiding her was Miranda. Shepard took a deep breath and tried to see her threads again. She almost cried with joy when she saw her network, faint in her vision but still there. A red thread connected her to this man. She could trust him. For now.

It was nice to be on a team again. Jacob was an effective soldier with Alliance experience. He helped Shepard put together the pieces, to understand what happened to her and her team. It seemed impossible but who was she to say? She knew there were powers in the world that made no sense.

According to Jacob, Project Lazarus brought her back from death and it took two years. Who knew how her threads had changed, or if they were even the same? Shepard still saw a glittering white thread stretching off into the distance. Was it Garrus? Or did she have a new soul mate now?

A new voice chimed in over the frequency to guide Shepard along. This time it was Wilson. He guided them into rooms thick with gunfire and smoke. Mechs woke when they entered a room, ready to attack. Shepard and Jacob pushed forward, but Shepard was already exhausted from the fighting. When would she get to sit down?

Wilson was shot, they had to hurry. Shepard ran up the stairs, searching rooms until she found Wilson on the floor, clutching his leg. Shepard didn’t want to go near him. There was a thread connecting him to Jacob, to others somewhere on the station, but no thread connecting him to her. He brought her back to life and they weren’t connected in any way? How could that be? Miranda was supposed to bring her back exactly as she was. What if she failed?

“Shepard, if I tell you who we work for, will you trust me?” Jacob stopped Shepard before she could keep going to fight more mechs. Shepard studied him. The tension between Jacob and Wilson surged. The symbol on Jacob’s uniform, on Wilson’s shirt, the fog in her head was finally clearing and she knew what it was. As soon as Jacob said “Cerberus,” Shepard had her pistol aimed at his head. She remembered. The experiments, the deaths, the torments. Cerberus was behind so many terrorist acts while she was hunting Saren.

“We have to work together,” Jacob said with impressive calm. He knew that Shepard wouldn’t kill him. Wilson didn’t seem so sure as he nervously stepped back.

Shepard put her gun down with a promise to meet the Illusive Man once they escaped the station. Her threads said she could trust Jacob, but she wasn’t sure she could trust the threads anymore.

Before Shepard could put too much thought into it, Wilson was opening the door to the shuttle bay. A dark haired woman Shepard remembered from a dream stood there, gun in hand. Wilson hit the floor. Shepard watched the threads that connected him to Jacob and who Shepard guessed to be Miranda snap out of existence. Was that why they weren’t connected? He was just passing through her web, barely touching it.

There was no use arguing over a deed that was already done. Shepard wasn't sure if the threads meant anything anymore, but she and Miranda were connected by a red thread, just as Shepard and Jacob were connected. Red was for fate. Red was for blood. Shepard didn’t like Miranda’s methods but she needed to be free of the station. She needed open sky and an expanse of stars—even if that was what killed her in the first place.

As Miranda assaulted her with questions about her previous life, Shepard studied her reflection. The scars on her face glowed, as if she was on fire beneath her skin. She touched the scars lightly, afraid that she would fall apart if they were disturbed. Once Miranda was satisfied, they landed at a new station. Shepard perked up when she saw her threads brighten. A new connection waited for her.

Shepard saw a thread leading off somewhere in the station, but it wasn’t in the room Miranda was pointing her to. Instead, there was a projection in that room that showed her a shadowy man smoking a cigarette. She couldn’t see his threads. She hated communicating with people this way; there was no way to see their bonds. The Illusive man could be anything to her. His thread could be sickly black like the one that connected her to Saren. She couldn’t tell.

He gave her something, though. A mission. A purpose. Something to do with this new life they forced on her. They also gave her Joker. She suddenly recognized his thread, that he was close—he was the connection she saw on the station as the shuttle drifted in. There was also the Normandy. With her pilot and her ship, things might be okay. There might even be a turian out there somewhere waiting to hear that she’s alive.

Chapter Text

It was hard to focus on anything Aria said when a white thread shone in the corner of Shepard’s eye. She couldn’t control when she saw the threads as easily as she used to. Sometimes they would suddenly crowd her vision, distracting her in the middle of a conversation. Now, this white thread was persistent. The person at the end of it was close. She wouldn’t let herself hope about their identity. Things could have changed.

Shepard hesitated in front of the door where mercs were recruiting to take out Archangel. Miranda walked right by her. She didn’t get far before Jacob called for her to stop.

“Shepard, what are you doing? We need to get the Professor out of the quarantine zone.” Miranda propped her hand on her hip, a scowl on her pretty face.

“He’s not going anywhere,” Shepard said. “Did you hear what Aria said? Archangel has three merc groups converging on him right now—he might not survive.”

“He’s been holding his own for this long, I’m sure he can hold on a little longer.”

Shepard outmatched Miranda’s scowl with her fiery glare and refused to budge. “Your professor is in a clinic in the middle of a quarantine zone. He’s fine. We’re going after Archangel first and that is my final word on the matter.” She ignored the rest of Miranda’s protests and opened the door. She heard Miranda and Jacob argue quietly behind her, but nothing Miranda said could deter Shepard from her path.

A Batarian representative from the Blue Suns stood in front of a ledger. He leered at Shepard and Miranda, directing them to the Stripper’s quarters instead. Shepard drew her gun. She remembered when men would say things like this to her and she would scoff at them. She would take the high road. Now, she felt her blood boil as anger raced along her veins. The merc backed down.

Shepard balked when she saw their next recruit. He was just a boy with a 50 credit pistol—willing to throw his life away for a gang. Shepard darted in to snatch the pistol away. In the past she would have lectured him. She would have talked about how there were better things he could do with his life. She got the feeling talking wouldn’t get her very far on Omega. So she broke it.

She was a different person, and it was showing all over the place. Miranda insisted that they needed the old Shepard, but maybe the old Shepard was a relic. Maybe she needed to die so that a new Shepard could be born.

Shepard ignored the white thread that ran parallel to her path. She wouldn’t theorize, she wouldn’t speculate. She would do the job. Even if the job took her increasingly closer to the person at the end of her white thread—the person who might be her soul mate.

They hit the walkway and Shepard saw that thread stretch straight up to a masked sniper in the building. Archangel. She wanted to run, to cut through the cannon fodder of mercenaries and find out for herself who he was. But that wasn’t the plan. She unleashed a biotic charge and took down the merc in front of her, distracting them all from their target. She let Archangel pick them off while she distracted them, dancing around them with more biotic charges, throwing people through the air and like clay pigeons to be fired upon from the ground.

Shepard fought her way up the stairs, eliminating enemies trying to hack their way through to her target. Shepard hesitated at the door, no longer locked. The white thread connected her to the person on the other side. A turian. A sniper. She took a deep breath and opened the door.

“Archangel?”

He didn’t speak. He held up a hand and resumed his focus. He waited for a breath then squeezed the trigger, taking out the last merc below as he came out from hiding. He set down his rifle and removed his helmet. Shepard could have sworn she died again in that moment. Her heart no longer beat, her throat closed and she couldn’t breathe.

“Shepard. I thought you were dead.” His voice jolted her back to life. The white thread that connected them flared with a brilliant light. She couldn’t believe that it was really him.

“Garrus Vakarian?”

Chapter Text

With the Professor and Archangel secured, Shepard had Miranda’s voice in her ear urging her to leave Omega. There were other dossiers to complete, other squadmates to collect. It was time to move on. Shepard wasn’t ready, yet. She had reclaimed a small piece of her old life with Garrus returning to her, but something still wasn’t right. She didn’t want to get sucked back into a war she had already died fighting once only to die again without having done something for herself.

She roamed the levels of Omega with Mordin and Garrus trailing her. She liked having them with her. Garrus knew her well enough to let her be and Mordin was too distracted to ask uncomfortable questions. Shepard switched off her comms to get away from Miranda’s voice while she searched for something that could make her feel normal, if only for a little while.

She eventually found it in a lower deck bar. It was a bit cleaner than Afterlife and full of life. A hundred out of tune voices from across all alien species singing along to an old earth song, arms slung over each other’s shoulders—Shepard saw a massive web of yellow threads like sunlight connecting everyone in the bar. Some threads were blue and some were white, but it was mostly yellow. A sea of yellow and the only red threads to be found were the ones Shepard carried with her.

Shepard sat down at a table and uploaded the song catalog to her omni-tool. Garrus wandered over to the bar while Mordin scrolled through the catalog, expression unreadable. Shepard was impressed with the sheer volume of songs—if she could name it, she found it. The catalog had a section for each alien species plus a separate one for showtunes. She submitted her song and name and waited, terrified. When had she ever sang in front of people? It was bad enough that her friends made fun of her dancing.

Garrus returned with drinks for the table, but Mordin passed on his. Garrus shrugged and handed off to another Salarian who wandered by their table. Shepard sipped at her drink, relieved to find that it was whiskey. She waited for Garrus to ask her why they were here, what the point was, but he just sipped from his glass and clapped for the Batarian on stage.

“He just sang a Quarian dirge from Fleet and the Flotilla, that took guts.” Shepard grinned. This is why she wanted to be here.

“Ooh, The Pirates of Penzance!” Mordin said. Before Shepard could ask why Mordin was excited about a human musical from well before any of their time, the Krogan running the show called out her name. Not Shepard, her real name.

“Jane? Is there a Jane here?”

She stood up and raised her hand. “That’s me! Sorry.” She picked her way through the tables to stand on the stage. She was suddenly aware that she still wore her combat armor. Who sings in combat armor? She took the microphone with a quiet thanks as everyone stared at her. She felt her hands begin to shake and her heart rate spike. EDI’s voice was suddenly in her ear, asking if she was okay. The music began and she found Garrus’ eyes in the sea of strangers. He nodded slowly and she smiled. Everything would be okay.

“It’s a twenty-three four-to-one that you can fall in love by the end of this song.”

It was a silly song from a hundred and seventy years ago, but singing it made her feel better. The karaoke regulars cheered for her when she was finished, their confusion over a dead woman come back to life just to sing karaoke forgotten. She returned to Garrus and Mordin. Garrus didn’t say anything, but clinked his glass against hers.

Mordin leaned forward and said, “Shepard that song didn’t make any sense. Twenty-three four-to-one doesn’t even mean anything. The odds of falling in love—”

“Mordin,” Shepard interrupted. “Never tell me the odds.”

Mordin blinked at her. “I’m returning to the Normandy. To do work. Real work.” He pushed away from the table and left them alone in the bar. Shepard rolled her eyes and knocked back her whiskey. At least it wasn’t poisoned this time. She got up to get another but Garrus grabbed her wrist.

“You’ve been drinking a lot lately,” he said. His eyes, which hard comforted her before, bore into her now. They were asking questions he would not voice aloud. Shepard jerked her arm out of his grip.

“How was I supposed to know that bartender was going to poison me,” she snapped.

“You could have just not ordered anything. Seriously, this isn’t like you.” Garrus tried to block Shepard’s way to the bar but she dodged around him to ask for another whiskey. The Salarian behind the bar poured her a drink but Garrus’ hand covered it.

“She’s actually had enough, thanks.”

“I had one drink—that you bought.” She gripped her glass and slid it out from under his hand.

“That’s not counting the several drinks you had at Afterlife—so many that you blacked out. Shepard—Jane!”

Shepard knocked back her whiskey and left the glass behind on the bar before rushing off into the crowd of dancers. She lost herself in their yellow light, unable to see the people connected to the threads. She let herself forget about everything around her and focused on the threads, how they fit into the tapestry of the universe. She danced and danced, unashamed and unafraid.

She felt someone touch her arm, guiding her off the dance floor. She let them. Her body needed a rest. “Jane, we need to talk—”

“About what? How I died? How even in death I can’t rest?” Shepard took a deep breath. This was supposed to be fun. When did it stop being fun?

Shepard opened her mouth, ready to return to the Normandy, but the Krogan running karaoke interrupted by calling out, “Garrus Vakarian! Are you here?”

Garrus left Shepard standing there, shell-shocked.

He took the microphone—it seemed so small in his hands.

“I’d walk through hell for you, let it burn right through my shoes. These soles are useless without you.”

Shepard laughed. Of all things for him to sing. She clapped along with everyone else as he left the stage.

“I didn’t peg you for human post-punk,” she said. “I thought you were more of a military anthem, club remix kind of guy.”

Garrus shrugged. “What can I say. I’m full of surprises. So are you.” Shepard grinned up at him. “Come on, let’s get back to the Normandy. EDI’s been in my ear for an hour since you refuse to acknowledge her.”

Shepard blushed. “Whoops. Sorry EDI.”

“Are you well, Commander?” EDI’s synthetic voice popped back into her ears.

“I’m great. Thanks.”

Chapter Text

Shepard exploded into her quarters, looking for something to throw. Horizon was a disaster. She didn’t expect Ashley to be there, but it was such a relief to see a friendly face. She’d been watching her emails, hoping for the chance to let Ashley know she was alive and to ask how her sisters were doing. When she saw Ashley emerge, she thought that the years she lost wouldn’t matter, that the gunnery chief who loved that pink and white phoenix armor would smile at her and ask if there was room for one more.

Two years might as well have been two hundred because Ashley didn’t know her anymore. Like so many others, Ashley acted as if Shepard could control the fact that she died, control who brought her back, just abandon the colonists that were disappearing under the Alliance’s guard. As if she could let people disappear without a trace and not do something.

And the Illusive Man. She wanted to rip him apart. He’d deny it but he knew Ashley would be there. It was his fault. He leaked Shepard’s connection to Cerberus and isolated her from the people who mattered, who would support her if she got to be the one to tell them. If the Illusive Man knew who Archangel really was, would that dossier had been included? Shepard wanted to scream. She was tired of being corralled and controlled.

Something on her coffee table caught her attention, freezing her mid-tirade. It was a basket, filled with yarn, crochet hooks, knitting needles, and a loom. It was her basket, the one she lost on the Normandy. How did it get here?

Shepard released her anguish—she’d find it again soon enough—and sat down in front of the basket. There was a package next to it with a card. For my best friend. She opened it to find a green and gold scarf. She remembered teaching Garrus to knit on a loom, watching his careful fingers mimic hers. She buried her face in the scarf. It was soft and smelled like gunfire and smoke.

Shepard touched the basket. Her cabin had everything they thought she’d need, but it didn’t have a single thing that actually mattered to her. There was a picture of Liara on her desk, as if that romance went anywhere despite Liara’s willingness to stay, but no pictures of Kaidan who she mourned regularly. It felt like ages since she made something good with her own hands. She could have had this the whole time. Why did he keep it from her?

Shepard gripped the handle of the basket in one hand and her new scarf in the other and stormed to the elevator. It was a slow ride down. The elevator stopped once on the CIC deck for a Cerberus crew member heading down. One look at Shepard sent them backpedaling.

“I’ll just, uh, wait for it to come back.”

The doors to the elevator closed and Shepard was finally on the right deck. She marched through the mess, ignoring calls from Mass Sergeant Gardner and Dr. Chakwas. The doors to the forward battery slid open. Garrus didn’t even turn to look at her.

“Hey Shepard, can this wait? I’m in the middle of some—”

“Stuff your fucking calibrations.”

Garrus froze. “Well that’s new.” He faced her, hesitant. His eyes traveled from her face down to the basket in her hand. “Ah. Didn’t like the scarf, then?”

“How long?” Shepard demanded.

Garrus shook his head, hands held up in a gesture of peace.

“How long have you had this without telling me?”

He reached out to her, slowly. She flinched but didn’t stop him from taking the basket and scarf from her hands and placing them on the control panel behind him. Garrus sighed as he tucked the scarf inside the basket, his hands lingering over the soft yarn.

“Liara saved it from the SR1. Your mother gave it to me at your funeral and I kept it. I don’t really know why. You only ever taught me to use the loom and there wasn’t anyone on Omega who could teach me anything else. But it was nice. Having this piece of you.” His shoulders slumped. “I wasn’t sure you’d want it back. You’ve been… different.” Garrus reached out for her but his hand fell before he could make contact. “Seeing Ashley on Horizon seemed to unravel you. I wanted to give you back this piece of yourself. Remind you that you’re still you. No matter what Ashley or the Alliance says.”

Garrus picked the basket up and handed it back to Shepard. “You owe it to yourself to reclaim some peace.”

Shepard took the basket back. “What would I do without you?” she whispered.

“Probably something stupid.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s Tali who keeps me from doing stupid things.”

“Oh, yeah. I’m the one charging into the stupid thing with you.”

Shepard laughed. It felt good. It felt like home.

Chapter Text

Shepard threw her needles and yarn across the room, crying out in frustration. No matter how carefully she counted the stitches out, they disappeared under her fingers and reappeared after she adjusted for their disappearance, making her feel like she was losing her mind. Her hands couldn’t do it anymore. She was just trying to knit something simple, keep her hands busy while freeing up her mind to strategize. Her hands never failed her before. If they couldn’t knit, were they even her hands? She took off for Miranda’s office. Miranda did this and Miranda would fix it.

The door slid open at her approach and Miranda sat behind her desk, busy as usual. “Shepard, what can I do for you?” she asked, barely glancing up.

Shepard stood in front of her. Her hands shook and her throat burned. The threads that bound this crew to her crowded her vision. She tried to blink it all away, focus on the red thread that connected her to Miranda, but it was all too much. Too many threads pulled at her, threatening to rip her apart.

Miranda stood from behind her desk, reaching out for the commander. “Shepard, what’s wrong?”

“My hands,” Shepard whispered. “They won’t work like they used to.” She held her hands out to Miranda. “I can hold a gun, I can throw a punch, but I can’t knit anymore, I can’t—”

“Knit? Who cares if you can knit?”

“I do!” Shepard shouted. “I care! I need to be able to do more than destroy.”

Shepard could no longer see Miranda, only the threads that spread away from her to connect her with others and the threads that spread away from them, further and further out beyond the Normandy. She could follow these threads all the way to the edge of the galaxy, see out into dark space where the Reapers waited—but a beacon called her back. A white thread that belonged to her glittered among a web of scarlet. She touched the thread with her mind and felt Garrus at the other end look up from his work.

“Shepard, I think you should go rest. Do you need help back to your cabin?”

Shepard’s consciousness returned to Miranda’s office. Her perfect face was pinched with worry and Shepard couldn’t find the words to smooth the wrinkles from her friend’s brow.

“I’ll take care of her.” Garrus’ voice shouldn’t have surprised her. She knew he was coming, knew that he felt that she needed him somehow. She let him lead her to the elevator and back to her cabin. She stood in the doorway and watched as he collected her discarded knitting and rearranged her basket. He pulled out an extra pair of needles and gestured to the couch. She sat down but didn’t pick up the knitting that broke her earlier.

“Do you remember how long it took me to get the hang of that loom?” he asked. Shepard smiled a little and nodded.

“You’d never done anything like it before.”

“But I eventually got it. Sometimes the yarn would completely unfurl from the pegs, but I managed. I didn’t touch the loom again for a while. After you died, it felt like I’d be disturbing your spirit. I bought new yarn and thread when I could—it was hard to come by on Omega—but I didn’t make anything.” Garrus poked through the limited yarn choices in Shepard’s basket. “I’ll have to bring up that footlocker, the basket couldn’t hold it all.” He selected a ball of red, orange, and yellow. It reminded Shepard of campfires, phoenix wings, everything burning.

“Anyway, there was this kid on Omega. Daphne. Smart kid. She wouldn’t do jobs for any of the merc groups because she didn’t trust them, but she scouted for us. We fed her and took turns giving her a place to stay. Her birthday was approaching which meant the team wanted to do something for her and then suddenly, I heard your voice. It doesn’t hurt to know how to do something peaceful. It was like your spirit was with me. So, I took out that loom and I picked some of that yarn I bought and I got to work.

“It was really hard because I hadn’t touched the thing in over a year. I thought I didn’t know how to do it anymore, that I’d lost that gift from you. But it gave me a reason to remember you, so I kept working at it. Soon enough, it was back. I never lost it. I just misplaced it for a while.”

Shepard felt his story like a blanket around her shoulders. It protected her from her fears.

“Did she like it?” she asked.

“She did. She wore it every day until—well. At least I gave her something nice before Omega took everything away from her.” Garrus sighed. He handed Shepard her failed project. “Sometimes we mess up. But you know better than anyone that you have to keep going if you want to get it right.”

Shepard took the project and started unraveling it so that she can start from the beginning. “I hate it when you’re wise and all knowing.”

“I know you do.” Garrus held up the knitting needles he took from the basket. “Now, how do I use these?”