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He caught himself as he staggered into being, biotic shield flaring and gun lifted instinctively. His mind immediately began tumbling through contingencies, explanations, reorientation--he'd been trained to think on his feet, both by a life on the street and later by the assjakes at brain camp.

Not a threat. Wherever he was, he was safe for now.

Slowly, as his eyes swept the room, he lowered the gun. He was in a CIC of some sort, though it looked nothing like any human CIC he'd ever seen. Turian, surely, and yet...that wasn't quite right either.

Whatever it was, it was beautiful.

Shepard reached out to run his hand over the sleek hull as he moved around to the head of what looked to be a star map. It was like one of the model ships he used to steal from rich hobby shops and painstakingly build up piece by piece in the quiet of early morning. It was like his dreams, and for a moment, he could almost imagine himself standing before the glittering star map and giving orders, racing across the stars with a wild sort of joy.

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Getting pulled through an Eluvian was absolute up-pissing shite. Sera'd had enough of that once in her life, and then landing in the weird bloody Fade Skyhold, and then one day she just walking through it when she'd been trying to get to get back to the tavern, and stumbled into what turned out to be... space.

Still wasn't sure she had her mind around that word. A big metal ship in the middle of nothing, full of good people who were pirates. She thought. Some bollocks about Cerberus and the Systems Alliance and she was sure it didn't fecking matter. She got to shoot guns and then there'd been Jack, all long, taut lines and the tattoos! Almost like a vitaar, but unlike with those Qunari, it wasn't poison.

Which worked out well enough because Sera had licked every single sodding inch of them.

So when she opened the door to the hold and stepped through and all of a sudden everything was different, all the hair on her neck stood up and she went running back up to the main deck. Silent, empty.

Bloody voiding bollocks. This was the grounded Normandy and she was back in the shiting Fade. She came around the corner into the CIC and paused, eyes narrowing at the unfamiliar boy staring around.

"What, you a... a Shepard then?" She'd started to track on how there were certain people, the ones who were really-real important, those were the ones that changed the most. And for people in space-wear holding space-guns that meant Shepards.

Shepard turned with an ease Sera could easily recognize, though not many others could. It was the careful, overly casual air of a street kid who would fight or fuck or bite or bullshit or do whatever he had to at a moment's notice. There was a sharp brightness to his eyes and a quick curl of his lip.

Not to mention the way his hand stayed relaxed on the gun, but his finger slid subtly closer to the trigger. He seemed relaxed enough, and anyone who didn't know what to look for would take that crooked smile for face value. But Shepard? Was ready to fucking destroy her if she proved to be a threat.

And then probably steal her boots.

"I'm a Shepard, then," he said easily, studying her. "What are you?"

Sera had seen dogs that bit without barking, most dangerous kind, the ones who didn't warn. This Shepard looked like he could smile while he was doing it. The smiles were lies, but he was good. Really good. He should think about becoming a Jenny.

For Sera's part she hopped up to sit on the console thingy down away from the weird step bit that had the... map parts. It was shiny and looked like magic when it was on, anyway. She didn't understand it. But she understood street rats, was one. A Rat King, her.

"I'm Sera. Also a Jenny. Also an elf, like that means anything other than pointy ears and people spitting on you in the street." Her lip curled a little, and she tipped her head a little forward, looking up from under her brows. "You're new, right? Just popped in? Your ears stop ringing yet?"

Elves are fairy stories.

He didn't say that, though. Shepard hadn't survived as long as he had by denying the things that were happening to him, no matter how crazy they seemed. He'd long ago learned that the best way to keep going was to roll with the punches and reevaluate later.

"Is it that obvious?" A question with a question. He recognized her kind, however, and was immediately inclined to like her, if not trust her. A kid like Kaidan...so good, so fucking pure that the shine just wouldn't come off no matter what kind of shit the world threw at him, all locked up in his head as he overthought everything...had been difficult to grok. At first, he'd hated the other boy, just because he'd been rich and beautiful and different.

Now he was all bared teeth if anyone tried to mess with his best friend, but it had been some time before he'd come to understand some part of him. He still didn't understand him all.

Sera? Sera he already understood. He let his hand drop from his gun, knowing she'd understand that too.

Sera tipped her head a little to the side in acknowledgement at the question. "Yeah, this place, it's got a way of collecting people and dropping them right on their arses in the shite-pit. You got that look, like you're still wondering what that bloody smell is."

She pushed off the console, and nodded toward the hatch. "Come on, then. I'll show you." Best to just point out the weird sky and the castle and hey maybe there'd be some stupid new nug piss that had appeared or happened while she'd been space-pirating.

"Okay," he said, falling in step easily. They even moved the same, like birds about ready to take flight at the slighted provocation. It made his lips twitch slightly.

"This isn't your ship." That much was obvious. "Whose is it?" He wanted it. Badly.

This was usually where Kaidan dropped a hand on his arm and gave him a look. A 'we are not stealing an Alliance cruiser' look.

Wasn't hers, but Sera knew her way around it just enough to find the hatch that had been left ajar. "Well, when it crashed, some bloke with serious eyebrows was maybe in charge? Kaidan something. Foreign rubbish, don't know him from spit."

She slipped out, onto the emergency ramp, and waved a hand at the orchard and the castle and the sky. "So, this is Skyhold, only not really. It's in the Fade. Sort of. Which is kind of where magic happens, so that's a lot of demony piss."

She gave him some room because if he had some kind of fit she wasn't going to get that gun in her face. Out here she'd be able to drop off the ramp, roll under it and he'd never bloody see her again if she didn't want him too.

His sharp gaze swept the castle, the sky, the weirdness of it all and quickly catalogued the lay of the land. Yeah, it wasn't anything like what he'd expected, but he'd deal with that later. He nodded once, accepting and moving on.

"Right," he said, then focused on the important part. "Kaidan Alenko is here? Do you know where?"

"No idea. I just got back from being sucked through an evil demon mirror, to another version of this big stupid space boat, where the Shepard who captained it was a lady, and had gone pirate, right?" Sera shook her head vigorously. "But you could check the book. You got a book, yeah?"

"I got a book." He tipped his head, lips quirking. "So there's a Shepard who owns this thing?"

"There's a couple, last I saw. I mean, I don't know who owns it. It's crashed. Who'd want a boat that doesn't go anywhere?" Sera shrugged. "Maybe the crew's still staying on it?"

"Crashed ships can be fixed," Shepard said. He was already making mental plans to take over.

He really, really wanted a pirate ship.

Shepard tilted his head toward her. "You want to steal it with me?"

"What, you serious?" The question made her eyes dance though, because being a space pirate had been pretty bloody fantastic. Sera grinned lopsidedly. "That'd be alright, yeah? So long as we weren't hurting like... little people."

Shepard's ship, the Shepard she'd just met had been a good sort, flipping the bird at her commanding officers and going rogue. Helping people. Killing slavers. It'd been grand.

"I prefer to hurt the big people who like hurting little people," Shepard said, grinning sudden and wide.

Oh yeah, he liked her.

Sera grinned back. "That's all good then, innit?" She cocked her head toward the castle. "I need my bow, arrows, that shite. You want a tour? See the sights. Meet the big hats if they haven't all gotten eaten by something drippy?" She tripped down the ramp, not waiting for Shepard to agree, or looking back to see if he'd follow.