#Shaeed

[clericofshadows]

REGIS SHEPARD AND ZAEED MASSANI CITADEL DLC DATE MEET UP

[dairsmuids]

— and i could love you violently, if i let myself

summary: when shepard visits the citadel to investigate volus ambassador din korlack and his possible ties to cerberus, she doesn't expect to find herself confronted with a ghost from her recent past in the process.

pairings: zaeed x femshep, garrus x femshep (mention only)

word count: 2.8k

a/n: for reference: my canon shepard is lucrezia "ezi" shepard, a mostly-renegade vanguard with a spacer background and ruthless service history. ezi had an ongoing fling with zaeed during the events of me2, but as a pair of grumpy idiots who'd rather shoot first than share feelings, they never fully expressed how they felt about each other. so their romance fizzled out, and ezi ended up getting involved with garrus.

ezi is a fury-driven mess of a human, and i adore her.

dedication: my two best friends, anli & lya, who aren't even in this fandom but always make time to listen to my ramblings & encourage me to be more vocal about whatever is on my mind. thank you both for always letting me annoy the shit out of you. i love you ♡

also on ao3 here.

Zaeed Massani emits a rough exhale, shifting his grip on his rifle as he glances down at the pile of mercenary corpses cooling on the apartment’s tiled vinyl floor. Din Korlack, the volus he's spent the last few weeks chasing, cowers in the corner, wheezing anxiously into his breather mask. Not that Zaeed gives two shits about him anymore. His focus has now shifted to the woman walking in through the apartment doorway.

She looks beautiful as ever, he thinks to himself before immediately internally brushing off the too-soft thought. Though he can't deny it's true, she does look good. Lucrezia Shepard — Ezi to her friends — is the stunning yet dangerous force of nature she always was. And yet Zaeed can clearly see there's something else in her stance now. Something heavier. The weight of war, perhaps. The same war that's currently burning half the goddamn galaxy down.

"Shepard," Zaeed greets, the mercenary’s voice tinged with its usual sandpaper quality as he rests his gun casually over his shoulder. "Took your damn time getting here. Glad I wasn't just making an ass out of myself over a hunch."

"Been a while, Zaeed," Shepard murmurs, a surprising level of amity to her tone as the apartment door hisses closed behind her. Bright blue eyes flick over the dead mercs before landing on Zaeed again. A part of her still can't believe that Massani of all people is involved in this. She'd, of course, wondered where he'd gone after she'd returned to Earth, but allying with Cerberus again was not what she expected. "Where's Korlack?"

Zaeed jerks his head towards the volus huddled in the corner, not taking his eyes off Shepard. Goddamn sentimentality, he thinks to himself as his mind betrays him with a flash of a memory: his body covering hers in her bed on the Normandy. "Lucky for our little friend here, he's alive. Guess you could say I had a change of heart." He expels a short grunt sound that's almost a chuckle, as his eyes find the corpses of his fellow mercs once again, giving one of them a slight nudge with his boot. "Undisciplined bastards. That's what I get for signing up at the last minute."

Shepard strides over to Korlack, her black boots splashing in merc blood as she closes the distance. She grabs the volus by the collar of his envirosuit, hauling him to his feet with a sharp tug.

"You should've gone to C-Sec if your life was in danger," the Commander growls firmly, her light blue eyes flashing with a level of unbridled irritation that's pretty much business as usual for her. "I've got questions, and you're going to answer them. And don't even think about lying to me." She shakes him slightly, her grip tightening. "What intel did you give Cerberus?"

Zaeed watches almost nonchalantly as Shepard manhandles the volus, a small smirk playing at the corner of his scarred mouth. Her fire stirs something in him he's struggling to ignore, even if it's hardly the first time he's seen her act in such a manner.

Korlack lets out a surprised wheeze as he's dragged upright. "Information o-on a turian planet's defense system," he explains with a stammer, his small eyes darting nervously between Shepard and Zaeed, "B-but if I tell you which planet they're attacking, Cerberus will know I turned t-t-traitor."

Zaeed rolls his one good eye, crossing his arms over his chest. "You already betrayed your own people, you dumb bastard," he says, his voice a low growl. "Talk, before Shepard starts pulling bits off you to feed to her varren."

Shepard's grip on Korlack's collar immediately tightens, knuckles turning white as she does so. She can feel her practically-nonexistent patience begin to wear thin. She leans in close, her breath hot against the mask of his envirosuit. "We just saved your life," she mutters, her voice low and menacing. "Tell us what planet you've put in danger, or I swear to God, I'll make what Zaeed did to those mercs look like a picnic."

Cool metal meets warm flesh for a brief moment as Shepard’s free hand drifts to the pistol at her hip, the touch a silent but meaningful threat at the volus diplomat. And at that Korlack swallows hard, the combination of the Commander’s iron grip and her threats enough to finally wear him down. "Aethus," he immediately blurts out as he takes in another hiss of a breath. "It's Aethus. Cerberus will attack a colony called Aethus for its shipyards."

Shepard's eyes narrow as the volus spits out the name of the targeted colony, finally giving up the necessary information. At least I can pass this on to Victus and get the colony evacuated, she thinks, mildly relieved, That oughta save a lot of Turian lives.

"That wasn't so hard now, was it," Shepard mutters, releasing Korlack roughly. He crumples to the floor, making another hissing sound as he gasps for air. She watches as the volus stands, readjusting and fixing himself. "Now get out of here. Before I change my mind about sparing you."

Zaeed watches Korlack scramble to his feet and hurry towards the door with mumbled thanks, and the mercenary can't help but feel a twinge of disappointment that it's already all over. A small part of him wanted to see Shepard unleash a bit more of that infamous temper of hers.

As he turns back to Shepard he lowers his rifle, letting the weapon hang loosely at his side. "Took him long enough to spit that out," he remarks, his voice a low rumble. He takes a step closer to her, his heavy boots thudding against the blood-stained floor.

Shepard turns to face Zaeed, her light blue eyes flashing with a mix of relief and lingering anger. She rests her pale hands on her hips, her stance wide and authoritative as she regards him, letting out a small hum of confirmation. "I'll make sure the Primarch gets the information and evacuates the colony. We can't let Cerberus destroy any more innocent lives."

Her eyes flick over towards the mercs’ cooling bodies in the opposite corner of the room, eyebrow quirking upward ever so slightly before her gaze finds Zaeed's once more, the obvious question burning a hole in her brain. "Zaeed, what are you even doing here?" she asks, her tone betraying a combination of confusion and disappointment. Another lingering flicker of a glance toward the corpses. "Who were those people you were with?"

Zaeed's gaze lingers on Shepard's face, taking in the fierce determination practically carved into the sharp lines of her jaw. "Bunch of mercs from Omega," he explains. "Signed on with them when I heard they were making a hit on Cerberus. Didn't realise until it was too late that they were actually making a hit for Cerberus." A short exhale escapes his parted rough lips, a sound that's almost a regretful sigh, though Zaeed typically makes it a point not to harbour too many regrets. "Should've studied the job longer."

Shepard allows a single thin dark eyebrow to lift upward once again, though she doesn't give a verbal response. The alteration of her body language — the folding of her arms across her N7 hoodie-clad chest, the way she shifts her weight from one foot to another as she stares him down — is more than enough to relay her disappointment in his stupidity.

Zaeed can't help but let his gaze drift over her, taking in the changes since he last saw her. The most noticeable difference is her hair, once shoulder-length and now cut in a short cropped style, different from how he remembers her during their time together on the Normandy almost a year ago. If he concentrates hard enough he can almost remember the softness of the strands of her dark locks against his fingertips.

"Fuckin' hell, Ez," he says, his voice a low rumble as he gestures at her head with a quiet huff. "Y’know, I almost didn't recognise you when you first walked in." He smirks, his cheek scar pulling tight.

Shepard's gaze sharpens at Zaeed's comment, but a flicker of amusement sparks in her light blue eyes as the prior disappointment finally starts to dissipate. She reaches up to touch her cropped hair, a small smirk playing at the corner of her mouth. "Can it, you geriatric bastard," she retorts, her voice sharp and dry as her smirk remains firmly plastered on her face. "The upkeep was driving me nuts. Besides, I used to have my hair short like this long before you knew me.”

Zaeed chuckles roughly at her geriatric bastard comment, a sound that rumbles deep in his chest. Hurling insults always was their way of showing familiarity and affection, and he's grateful that hasn't changed, at least. "Reckon I've got more hair on my balls than you've got on your head, you cheeky bitch." He takes another step closer to her, until he's standing just a foot away, close enough to smell the faint scent of her shampoo.

"Relax, sweetheart," he continues as he meets Shepard's expression of amused indignance, his voice lowering to a rumbling murmur between them. "Never said it didn't suit ya." He almost wants to reach out, brush his calloused fingers against the short bristly hairs at the back of her neck, but he thinks better of it.

There's a brief silence between the pair, and Shepard tries to pointedly ignore the knot she suddenly feels in her chest at Zaeed's oh-so-typical bumbling attempt at a compliment. He can smoothly put a bullet between a set of batarian eyes from a few hundred yards, yet handles any kind of flirtation like he's trying to juggle a hot potato. It's ridiculous, and endearing.

"For what it's worth, you look like hell," she remarks as she takes half a step back, her arms still crossed across her chest, the zip of her hoodie digging a little into the side of her arm. It's supposed to be an attempt at humour, but there's also a hint of a bite to it, and Shepard realises then that she hasn't quite shaken off her disappointment in him just yet.

Zaeed gives a huff of amusement, showing himself unfazed by her words. "You always knew how to flatter a man."

Shepard allows the veiled facade of humour to completely drop, then — a mixture of irritation and something like concern flickering in her expression as she regards him. "And you always knew not to get played," she reminds him, "Not like this. Not by a bunch of pisspoor third-rate Cerberus goons who couldn't hit a target if Harbinger himself was hovering right in front of them."

She hadn't heard a word from or about Zaeed in months, and suddenly he shows up tacked onto a Cerberus job, even if he's admittedly not actually with Cerberus. Shepard's sure she could laugh at the irony. Suddenly Kaidan’s reaction to seeing her on Horizon last year makes more sense to her than it ever did before.

To her words Zaeed gives a shrug, but it's a stiff, awkward movement. Truth is, he had been off his game, and he knows that. Knows he's fucked up. But admitting it would be a level of emotional vulnerability that the mercenary veteran doesn't have in him.

"Didn't realise you cared so goddamn much," he manages, his voice a gruff grumble that gives nothing of his inner turmoil away.

His response would probably make Shepard recoil if she was a lesser creature, but she's been too hardened by the past to allow this frustration to seep too deeply into her war-weary bones. She's experienced enough horror to last multiple lifetimes. She's watched friends die in her arms. She's executed enemies without batting an eye, unflinching at their blood splattering across her face. Hell, she's even experienced the touch of death herself. Deliberate apathy from a man she once believed she could love? It pales in comparison. It's a dull ache that barely leaves a mark in the smoking crater of her life story.

She's about to turn on her heel and leave, about to mumble something about having to contact the Primarch — but Zaeed gets the jump on her, slipping his rifle onto his back before he starts to walk away toward the apartment door.

"C-Sec’ll be on their way soon enough," he mutters in his low, gravelly tone, "Won't be too pleased with the mess we've left ‘em, I imagine." The apartment door hisses as it slides open to allow the mercenary to depart.

Shepard stares blankly at Zaeed's back as the distance between them grows. She watches expectantly for him to turn the corner and head out into the hallway — but, in the open doorway, he does something she doesn't expect. He stops. And stands there, for a brief moment that feels like a lifetime.

He doesn't bother to look back, but he wants to. God, does he want to. A slow, measured breath escapes his cracked lips. Once again he doesn't think before he acts, though this time Zaeed's foolish act comes in the form of a question he wishes he'd thought better of. "Vakarian treating you well?"

That very nearly catches Shepard off guard.

Her thoughts momentarily drift to Garrus. Just a few hours ago she'd been standing at the top of the Presidium with the turian, confessing her love for him. Are you ready to be a one-turian kind of woman?, he had asked, his nervousness obvious even as he tried his best to mask it behind his trademark sultry purr.

And she does want that. God knows she does.

But as her eyes travel down the length of Zaeed's armour-clad back, a small part of her can't help but still wonder about the road less travelled.

"He is," comes her straightforward reply. Her response is much less complicated than the mental gymnastics it took her to arrive at it. Her jaw clenches, almost as though the admittance pains her.

Zaeed simply nods, as if that's all he needs to hear. Maybe it is. Maybe it has to be.

He leaves his questioning at that.

"Talk more later, Shepard," he mutters finally, a pathetic attempt to cling onto some sort of nonchalance — a nonchalance that isn't there and that hasn't ever been there when it comes to her, if he's truly honest with himself. "Catch up near the docks, if you like."

Without another word he finally offers mercy on them both by turning the corner and walking away, the apartment door sliding shut behind him. Once it's fully shut, leaving Zaeed standing out in the quiet hallway alone, he lets out a breath he hadn’t realised he was holding, running a hand down his battle-worn face.

It’s better this way, Shepard tells herself once he’s out of sight.

But her body betrays her, as it so often does: shoulders locked tight, fists clenched at her sides, jaw so tight she half-expects her teeth to crack. A slight glow of blue permeates around her as her biotics flare.

And then out of nowhere the memories come fast, almost as though someone has pressed play on a vid in her mind. Some things are so vivid, so painfully clear, they could put Thane’s eidetic memory to shame. Meeting Zaeed on Omega, that first flicker of attraction that gave her pause for the first time in years. Countless missions she fought through with him by her side. Saving his life with a reach of her hand as they'd slid down those toppling platforms in the Collector base. Him saving her life with a reach of his hand as she leapt to the Normandy upon their escape and almost missed the jump. The nights spent tangled together, in her cabin, in his cot on the engineering deck, desperate touches and hushed words neither of them would ever dare repeat in daylight.

And now all she’s left with is his goddamn indifference.

She exhales sharply, but before she can let that frustration settle, another thought strikes her. Garrus.

The difference is staggering. Like night and day, even despite how similar the three of them are in so many ways. From the start, there was no guesswork with Garrus, no hesitation. Even in the early days of their friendship, she'd felt a kinship with him she hadn't felt with another since her Alliance training days.

With Garrus, there’s never been an unknown. No doubt. No question. "You realise this plan has me walking into hell too," he'd joked when he'd joined her on the Collector mission a year ago. And yet he stayed. His loyalty has been absolute, unmatched. And that has always been enough. More than enough.

She can't deny that Zaeed challenges her, makes her feel alive. Garrus does, too. But the difference between the two men is that Garrus also soothes her, grounds her when she feels like she's back floating over Alchera again, tethers her when she feels like she's sinking beneath the weight of the galaxy's expectations. And at a time like this that's not just what she wants: it's what she needs.

She drags in a single deep breath, and the blue glow dissipates as quickly as it came.

It's better this way.

[charlatron]

Once again, @schoute made my dreams come true. Thanks so much, lovely. You are a treasure ❤️

[ferindencadash]

"BUNNY"

And

Sadist Jack (warm feelings) blood play

Pleeeeeeeeeeeasssssse

So I realized after you asked that I actually do have something written for the "bunny" one. 😅So you win the wip prize! There's not much yet, but it's under the cut! (along with Jack thoughts)

From his table in the darkest corner of the room, Zaeed Massani watched as Commander Fucking Shepard herself entered the shittiest bar on Omega. Sure, she was in her civvies, a plain black hoodie covering her trademark red hair, jeans so tight they could have been painted on, but the merc had spent enough time with her on the battlefield that he could recognize her by her walk alone. He briefly considered that the polite thing to do would be to alert her to his presence, give her the option of joining him but he had never been known for his manners. Besides, people didn’t come to this shithole looking for a nice conversation, they came here to drink, fight, or fuck. While Zaeed would never have expected the Hero of the Citadel to show up in a place like this, he supposed it wasn’t that strange. Everybody needed a stiff drink alone once in a while.

So when some dumb young kid in Blue Suns getup made his way across the room and leaned on the bar next to her, lecherous intentions clear in his leering gaze, Zaeed chuckled to himself, waiting for Shepard to toss the little shit on his ass.

Instead, he saw Shepard toss back the contents of her glass, slide off her barstool, and head toward the bathrooms with the man in tow.

Zaeed shook his head hard, like he was trying to clear the image from brain. He had to be imagining things. He wasn’t that far in the bag yet, but maybe his bad eye was playing tricks on him and that wasn’t actually Shepard he had seen. No, he was sure it had been. This must be part of some mission. The guy could be some kind of informant or something. Or maybe she’s just looking for a quick fuck, his brain helpfully supplied. He growled under his breath. It wasn’t that he had her on some kind of fucking pedestal. She was a red-blooded marine and he was sure she enjoyed a good tumble as much as the rest of them. But surely she had better taste than this?

That's as far as I've gotten with that one, sadly. After this, it switches to Shep's pov in the bathroom. The "Bunny" part is the random bar guy asking her name, and she just stares at him and deadpans "Bunny", because she's obviously not here to make any real connections. 😅

Then Zaeed busts into the stall, tosses the poor guy on his ass (pants around his ankles) and tells Shepard there are better options if she's that hard up for a fuck. You can probably figure out where it goes from there. ;)

(I legitimately cannot remember how I was planning to work the "daddy issues" line into it.)

As for the Jack idea, there's really not much. I was just thinking about the line in her loyalty mission about "getting warm feelings during a fight". We know she likes things a bit rough in bed, and it just makes sense to me that, with her conditioning, she would be a sexual sadist.

I'm also really interested in trying to get into the mindset of a sadistic character. I'm very much a masochist myself, but I'd like to examine the flip side of the coin and try to work out what makes them tick.

I also just really like blood play, and there aren't enough fics with it. 😅

Thanks for the challenge and the ask! ❤️This really is encouraging me to get writing. :)

[misseffect]

✨WIP Whenever✨

Tagged by @otemporanerys - thank you!

Tagging @angry-jager and @diaphanouso

Flashpoints is a shakarian AU but I'm allowing myself a little ill-advised shaeed fling. as a treat 😌😌

Zaeed almost looks surprised when he finds her at the door. Like he didn't really expect her to show.

“Drink?” he says, as she follows him in.

The room is smaller than she expected, though maybe that’s the trade-off for the balcony; Shepard can see a door handle and a slice of midnight peeking through long, half-drawn curtains on the far wall.

The surfaces are messy in patches: an open carry-on spilling sleeves and trouser legs onto the floor, discarded packets and open water bottles by the bed, a near-empty glass of whiskey on the end table by a dark green chesterfield sofa. The only light is two bedside lamps, sending long, soft shadows up the walls.

“Skip the preamble,” Shepard sets her bag on the vanity. “I know why I’m here.”

“Suit yourself.”

Zaeed crosses to the end table and slings back the last finger of whiskey. Shepard watches his shoulders through the movement, his dark blockwork tattoos just barely showing through his shirt, coiling above his collar and below his shirtsleeve. Whatever he says about smoking and drinking, he hasn’t let himself go.

He turns, one hand in his pocket, and beckons her with a finger. Shepard walks despite the indignity of being summoned, gratified by the way his eyes slide from her thighs to her tits, and when he kisses her it’s slow and dirty and tastes like whiskey.

It all feels refreshingly simple: he's rough in a careless, practised sort of way, curling one hand into her hair and mapping her out with the other – tits, arse, hips, back, in that order – while Shepard hangs on his collar. He smells equal parts better and worse up close; a soupy blend of stale cigarettes and faded cologne, both expensive, both differently intoxicating.

This is a bad idea. Maybe her best bad idea yet.

[thessiansunfish]

The scream I scrumpt…

i like having them share things and do things for each other because they are both selfish assholes

[rohitgautamphotography]

Shaheed Diwas | भगत सिंह का पैतृक गांव-पंजाब | Bhagat Singh Ancestral Ho...

[inmyworldblr]

Balraj Sahni and Nutan in a still from Sone Ki Chidiya (1958)

| dir. Shaheed Latif

[chaiaurchaandni]

via aljazeera

[kaidanalenkosprmanager]

My great friend @clericofshadows was beyond super kind enough to give me a blend file with her Shep, Regis, in it and give me permission to make a render and a poster of him to add to the mix with all the others, since he is also a part of Soph's canon! :) Regis is Soph’s Butcher of Torfan, an instructor at the Villa, and he’s also married to Zaeed in her canon. Since I usually give little nods to him in the rants I do with Zaeed posts, I thought I'd repost them back next to each other! ;)

MEET THE CREW OF THE NORMANDY SR-2 (2185)

Overseen by Admiral Steven Hackett, the undercover operations undertaken by the Normandy crew in 2185 are sponsored by the Alliance Shade program following Sophie Oliveira-Shepard's coup from Cerberus after her resurrection. The mission? Traverse the Terminus Systems. Collect intelligence on the thing that killed her in 2184. Save the galaxy by any means necessary. The only issue? The darker secrets lurking under the surface. Like the machinations and strings being pulled by someone behind the scenes that seem to keep dragging old crew members into new dangers. And the old enemies... wearing familiar faces. MIRA'S MORE CANON MASS EFFECT 2 AKA: The actual, canon crew of the Normandy SR-2. ;) Mass Effect 2: Legendary Edition (2021) Rendered: Blender Eevee

[clericofshadows]

CLERIC'S MODEL SWAPS REGIS SHEPARD/ZAEED MASSANI WHAT IF: Zaeed had a fling...?

[dairsmuids]

— all i did was speak normally; somehow i still struck a nerve

summary: still reeling from her encounter with the leviathans on despoina, shepard receives an unexpected but not entirely unwelcome call.

pairings: zaeed x femshep, garrus x femshep (teeny tiny mention only)

word count: 1.6k

a/n: as always, for reference: my canon shepard is lucrezia "ezi" shepard, a mostly-renegade vanguard with a spacer background and ruthless service history. ezi had an ongoing fling with zaeed during the events of me2, but as a pair of grumpy idiots who'd rather shoot first than share feelings, they never fully expressed how they felt about each other. so their romance fizzled out, and ezi ended up getting involved with garrus.

also on ao3 here.

The soft blue of the fish tank emanates across the room, bathing the Normandy's captain’s cabin in its usual comforting glow. Shepard sits draped across the leather corner couch, a datapad clutched between her pale, battle-scarred hands as she tries to get her latest report finished. She's been at it for god knows how long — hours at this point, probably — but the words just aren't coming.

She knows she's fine. Chakwas confirmed it, after a thorough medical checkup and a few almost-stern words from the usually-unflappable doctor.

Though despite knowing the mission on Despoina hadn't done her any permanent damage, and had actually been something of a success, Shepard can't seem to shake that uneasy feeling. The memory of climbing into that squeaky old Triton and sinking into the ocean abyss still clings to her, gnaws at her, like some insistent wound that'll never fully heal. Not too different from Alchera, really. That almost blinding panic of suddenly not knowing where your next breath of oxygen is coming from, if it's even coming at all.

She reaches for the half-empty whiskey glass on the table and knocks the contents back in one shot, willing it to dull her dark thoughts. Don't go there, idiot. Not now.

The sudden incessant beep of an incoming vid call snaps Shepard out of her reverie, and she's grateful for the distraction but also irritated by the interruption. She tosses the datapad aside before rising to walk the few steps around to her private terminal, bright blue eyes flicking toward the screen to see the caller's name. Zaeed Massani.

With a slight crease of her brow, she reaches down to press a button, answering the call. 

The moment the vid call feed connects, Zaeed’s scarred face fills the screen — and while he usually always has the expression of someone who could tear a krogan in two with his bare hands, there's something different this time. A deeper scowl than usual. A flicker of something in his expression that she sees rarely, if at all.

“Wanna tell me what the fuck were you thinking?” 

Shepard gives a surprised blink, scoffing as she folds her arms. His tone immediately makes her temper flare up, the familiar feeling of a white-hot flame blooming in her chest, but she makes a conscious effort to hold it back — a sliver of patience that's rarely seen and only ever exercised towards those she truly cares about. “Well, hello to you too, Massani.”

“Cut the shit, Shepard,” comes Zaeed's short response, his sandpaper-voice grittier than usual. “Went down to the bottom of the ocean in some tin can and almost didn’t make it back is what I heard.”

Shepard's eyelids flutter slightly as she suppresses the urge to give an indignant roll of her eyes. “Who told you?” she asks, though she has a feeling she already knows the answer.

“Who d'ya fucking think? Vakarian,” Zaeed looms closer on the screen, blazing fury obvious in his good eye. “You scared the shit out of him, and that bastard's not easy to scare.” 

“I handled it,” Shepard says sharply, the line of her jaw giving a flicker of a twitch. She can feel her N7 hoodie clinging to her sweat-dampened spine, a sudden sensory annoyance. It almost tempts her into barking out an excuse to end the call and hanging up in favour of a shower. Yet she remains. Her affection for him wins out. Again.

“S'not what I heard. Heard you nearly drowned then almost got stomped by one of them Brutes.”

Shepard makes a mental note to go down to the main battery and chastise Garrus for being a bigger gossip than Daniels and Donnelly. “I handled it,” she repeats, deliberately slower this time. 

The sound of a harsh, incredulous laugh suddenly escapes Zaeed's lips, his good eye burning hotter than the Tuchanka sun as he stares at her. “Unbelievable. Galaxy's going to hell and you want to get yourself killed going for a swim. You’re a goddamn nightmare, Lucrezia.”

Shepard's eyes immediately narrow at his impudent use of her full first name. He knows she hates it. He only dares to use it when he wants to rile her enough to make a point. And then it becomes glaringly obvious to her what point he's trying to make, in his typical bumbling way. He was worried about me. 

The thought softens and amuses her in equal measure.

“Starting to sound like you care about me, Massani. Getting soft in your advanced age.”

Zaeed scoffs, folding his armor-clad arms in a manner that's almost petulant, though Shepard catches the shift in his expression like a sniper spotting movement. Caught you, she thinks.

“Don't give a shit what you do, Shepard,” he insists, though there's no real bite to his words, and almost certainly no truth to them either. “Long as you live to tell about it. Can't imagine Vakarian'd be too pleased if you got yourself killed and broke the poor bastard's heart like that.”

“I see,” Shepard says, a teasing lilt to her voice now. “Well, I'll be sure to let Garrus know how concerned you are for him and his heart. Such selflessness.”

Shepard's gentle teasing earns her a death glare and a quiet muttering of “Cheeky bitch” in response. She brings her hand up to her face, pressing a hooked finger over her lips in an attempt to hide the triumphant grin threatening to manifest, though the creases at the corners of her eyes give her amusement away.

If there's one thing she's learned in the time she's known Zaeed, it's that he's never the kind of man to shy away from admitting anything to Shepard — except when there's emotions involved. And in those instances, where possible, he'll duck behind Garrus like the turian’s a piece of convenient cover. Some days, Shepard finds it infuriating. In this moment, however, she can't help but find it endearing.

A brief silence stretches between them, and Shepard watches as Zaeed lights up a cigarette, idly blowing his first puff of smoke in the direction of the camera, temporarily blurring him from her sight. Once the smoke dissipates he's still there, almost frozen in place, glaring at her profile almost like it's a battlefield he can't quite conquer.

“You know you don't have to worry about me,” she tells him, seizing the opportunity to coax some real emotion out of him, like carefully tugging on a loose thread. “For once, it feels like we actually have a chance at winning this damned war. And I'm sure as hell gonna live to talk about it.”

She stubbornly ignores the gnawing inner voice that tries to tell her otherwise.

“Yeah, well, be an embarrassment if you don't,” Zaeed mutters gruffly, taking another drag from his cigarette. “Proof you can't do anything unless I'm there to save your arse.”

At that, Shepard doesn't bother to hide her eye roll, returning her arms back into a folded position across her chest. “That so? You wanna put your money where your mouth is, Massani? Come back onto the Normandy?”

Zaeed's remaining eye narrows slightly, the scarred lid twitching as he studies her face. “And have the goddamn Alliance breathing down my neck each time I so much as take a piss? No thanks, sweetheart,” he replies, turning his head briefly to the side to blow out another cloud of smoke.

Shepard lets out a low chuckle, eyes meeting the floor beneath her feet briefly before she glances back up at him again. Even on the flickering holoscreen she can tell he looks more exhausted than usual. He looks how she feels. She wonders if maybe, to him, she looks the exact same way.

Suddenly she feels that longing, one she's had often since returning to active duty on the Normandy: a longing for how things used to be. Obviously not for the days of being on the Cerberus payroll or being surrounded by a crew of Cerberus minions who smiled at her just a little too enthusiastically. Rather, for those times when she could pad down the hallway of the Engineering deck, stumble into the starboard cargo hold, and revel in Zaeed's chaotic, comforting company. The now-renovated space no longer feels the same. Memories of sharing war stories and dirty jokes, heated sparring and even more heated intimacy — some of the best times of Shepard's life, now suffocated beneath the bleak sterility of Alliance interior design and even bleaker drone of Diana Allers’ reports.

“Ez,” comes Zaeed's voice, breaking the silence to wrest her from her thoughts, snapping her back into the present.

The way he calls her Ez, the way the nickname rolls off his tongue with that low, gravelly timbre: it only serves to exacerbate her yearning. The sheer sentimentality of it lands square in her chest, such an immaculately-placed shot that she's half-expecting to hear the familiar click of her armor's shields going down.

He takes one last drag of the cigarette, putting it out with a scrape against the wall behind him as he blows out the smoke to one side. His mouth remains open for a full second before he actually speaks again, hesitance in his stare, almost as though he's battling an internal war of his own. “Just goddamn watch yourself, alright?”

Five simple words. A broken old mercenary's clumsy approximation of tenderness.

And just like that, before she can say or do anything else, he abruptly cuts the call.

She stares at the blank screen for a long moment before exhaling, a tired smile tugging at her lips as she saunters back towards the couch. Love you too, you miserable bastard.

[aishabellasbigblogofeverything]

Hello dears👋! I am asking you👈 to support my campaign to help me🙏 reach my goal. I am now in dire need of your support to help me survive👇Gaza is a very dangerous place both in terms of living and lives. I need your financial support to enable me to get the basic needs for my family until the Rafah crossing is reopened to transport my family to safety and peace. Please help a family survive through your donations or through your shares to others. Thank you very much for standing by the oppressed🇵🇸

Shaeed, and there’s no need to thank me, but you’re welcome!

[arts-butthound]

Shaeed fluff? Coming from you?

15. Trembling hands

🖤🖤🖤

Okay, I had a lot of feelings today and I managed to twist them into something I think. Also I got a little carried away.

Also here's this song that put me in my feelings this afternoon:

Her Hands Were Shaking

Her hands were shaking.

Well, all of her was shaking, trembling. Somewhere in the utter dark, halfway off the mortal coil, she laid beneath the rubble, dying very slowly. She drifted in and out of consciousness, the moments she was awake were hardly lucid, visited as she was by hallucinations in the dark. But then the wreckage started to move, and the shot of adrenaline that sent through her heart set all of her muscles on fire.

It wasn't until familiar, armored hands wrapped around her and hoisted her out of the rubble and broken glass that she'd resigned herself to becoming a part of for what little remained of her life. But the one person more stubborn that she was found and dragged her carcass out of the rubble.

She hated him for it then. Jane tried to tell him to fuck off and let the dead get some goddamn rest. She'd done what she had been brought back to do, was it so much to ask that she get a permanent vacation?

But all that came out was a pitiful whimper, a cry of pain and desolation. She lost consciousness again before she could curse at him and whoever else refused to just let her go in peace.

Her hands were shaking.

Panting, the world came into focus slowly, machines screamed and beeped. Hands were on her, panicked voices spoke words she couldn't understand yet. Jane had a creeping sense of deja vu, like she'd done exactly this before, but the memory was too far away for her to really understand.

Raw fear built and she tried to sit up, she needed to leave. She didn't know where she was, she didn't even know who she was but she knew everything was wrong.

A different hand squeezed hers. “Go back to sleep, Shepard,” he broke through the panic in the room and in her brain. The world grew bleary and unfocused again, and she forgot it even happened.

When she woke up again, still connected to so many machines the electric buzzing from the power supplies threatened to overwhelm her, he was still there. Sitting in a shitty foldout chair in what little room there was in between all of the medical equipment. Shepard groaned, “I must be in hell if I'm in a hospital and you're here.” She tried to smile but every part of her felt like it was on fire, a pained grimace curled at her lips instead.

He rolled his eyes, leaning forward with one arm propped on his knee, “Hell'd be more entertaining. Think this must be goddamn purgatory. Watching you take a weeks-long nap was about to bore me to tears, some of us have work to do, you know?”

“What are you doing here, Zaeed?” Her voice was changed, raspy, dry, and weakened. She felt small, listless. Shifting her head took a gargantuan effort, like a newborn baby unable to hold up its own head.

“Someone had to keep the vultures and boot-lickers away,” he said quietly and looked down at his feet.

Shepard closed her eyes. “Sure,” she said just before dripping off to sleep again.

Her hands trembled, covered in pine needles and bile, as she tried to push herself back up. Tears streaked down her cheeks, and she wretched again. She didn't know where she was. Jane had been running towards the beam desperate to end the invasion, when she'd tripped and fell, hitting her head. There were trees all around her now. Blood was in her eyes.

Intentional footsteps snapped twigs, and crunched through dried leaves. “Coming up behind you, Janey,” he warned her just above a whisper. He crouched next to her, examining her face without touching her, concern knitted in his brow. “Do you know where you are?”

“No,” she cried pitifully. Her hand slipped out from under her weight, his were there to catch her before she ate dirt again.

Zaeed wiped the grime off on his pants before brushing hair off of her face so he could look at the cut above her eye. “Middle of nowhere, West Virginia so you can get some peace. Reapers are dead, you fucking dropped them out of the sky.”

Her head hurt so bad, but after a few quiet minutes of trying to pace her breathing with his, she was able to put the pieces back together. It had been months since the hospital. They'd never even really talked about whatever … this was, but in the aftermath of the near end of the world, they hadn't been able to part ways. “From you, that sounds like hero worship,” she said trying to crack a joke. She couldn't mask the trembling in her voice, the anxiety in wide, panicked eyes.

“If I wanted to kiss your ass, Shepard, I'd just pucker up and do it,” he shook his head and helped her up. “Let's get you cleaned up, Jane. I've seen enough of your blood to last a lifetime.”

Her hands were shaking, but they found their home held in ones that were steady.

[ferindencadash]

I have finally completed my first multi-chapter fic!! \o/

It's a Mass Effect, pre-ME1, Zaeed/FemShep pairing.

It was both super fun and utterly exhausting, and I think I will stick with one-shots for a while. 😅 It's far from perfect, but I'm damn proud of myself for finishing it!

If you want to check it out, you can find a link below, but please note it comes with a HEFTY dose of content warnings. Please heed appropriately.

[beardedmrbean]

Mexican troops on patrol killed 12 gunmen in a clash near the U.S. border in Tamaulipas, according to the government of the northeastern state, which has been rocked by violence linked to organized crime. The slain attackers were alleged members of a drug cartel, government sources told AFP.

The shootout occurred when soldiers were patrolling Miguel Aleman municipality on the border with the United States, the office of Tamaulipas's spokesperson for security said on social media.

It said members of the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena) "were attacked by armed civilians who were hiding in the bush" at around 2 pm local time.

The clash left a dozen assailants dead and soldiers seized "12 long weapons, cartridges and magazines of various calibers," it added.

State government sources confirmed to AFP that the 12 attackers, alleged members of a drug cartel, were killed in the incident, during which the military also used drones and a helicopter.

Situated on the U.S. border, Tamaulipas is one of the states hardest hit by violence linked to organized crime.

It is the site of constant clashes between gangs fighting over lucrative drug trafficking routes.

Four U.S. citizens, two of whom later died, were kidnapped at gunpoint after crossing the border into Tamaulipas state in a minivan in March last year. Americans Zindell Brown and Shaeed Woodard died in the attack; Eric Williams and Latavia McGee survived. A Mexican woman, Areli Pablo Servando, 33, was also killed, apparently by a stray bullet.

The Gulf drug cartel turned over five men to police soon after the abduction. A letter claiming to be from the Scorpions faction of the Gulf cartel condemned the violence and said the gang had turned over to authorities its own members who were responsible. 

Last month, Mexican marines detained one of the top leaders of the Gulf cartel. Mexico's Navy Department said in a statement that marines had detained a suspect it called "one of the key leaders of one of the most powerful criminal organizations in Tamaulipas," adding he was "one of the main targets of the Drug Enforcement Administration," but did not provide his name.

Mexico has registered more than 420,000 murders and 110,000 disappearances -- most attributed to criminal groups -- since the launch of a controversial military anti-drug offensive in 2006.