I'd like to take a moment and thank everyone who has read the previous chapters of this story and in particular those of you who were kind enough to leave a review. I appreciate your support very much.

"So…." John Shepard grimaced in concentration and then with a well-practiced movement, he leveled and aimed a M-6 with a still hand. He squeezed the trigger gently and a fraction second later there was a vibrant explosion of blood and bone thirty yards away. It made a wet popping noise that echoed back to him.

He turned to his old friend Wrex. "…Peace, huh?"

Shepard was answered with a deep noncommittal grunt. He watched as the Krogan similarly lined up a shot, though perhaps more half-heartedly, and then heard the familiar return of death wash over them.

"This is it now. Killing wild Varren." Wrex growled disgustedly, as he looked out at the brown-gray wastes of Tuchanka. The planet's continuous cycle of catastrophe, which began with a nuclear holocaust and recently ended with the last in a series of civil wars sixty years ago, had permanently twisted the land into a near lifeless horror. The perpetually hazy sky darkened only barren rock and rubble from past battles, with the exception of the odd feral animal that scurried about in a desperate search for food. Occasionally, the monotony of the place was broken by small eddies of wind, which would whip along the waste and twirl dirt and debris aimlessly. Ultimately, however, even they would lose energy and succumb to the death that surrounded them.

"And with pistols." Wrex continued dejectedly.

They sat atop an old modified M29 Grizzly together, nearly 200 miles outside Urdnot, with only a few unmanned drones circling them overhead to thwart any potential danger. Next to each was a bottle, Ryncol for Wrex, and some sort of expensive looking Scotch for Shepard that Tali had given to him as a present on Rannoch. In companionable silence they each drank and took potshots at the wildlife.

Shepard licked his alcohol stung lips and said, "I know it's not what you would have ever wanted a hundred years ago, but this…this is good, Wrex."

Wrex grunted again, but this time replied. "So you keep telling me. But I wasn't raised to be a….diplomat" he spat the last word, as if the syllables were rotten.

Shepard looked over at him. "Neither was I, and I never wanted to be. But…" he paused and turned his head towards the dull heavy clouds that reached to the horizon."…It's one thing to fight the Rachni or the Reapers…it's another to fight the Citadel. I…" He stopped abruptly, not wanting to go any further. Any mention or allusion to the Rebellions and the genophage was always a risky proposition, and Shepard knew from experience that it was best to avoid them as much as possible.

"They're soft and we are becoming soft like them." Wrex said simply in response.

The words were part of a well-worn argument that Shepard had heard from Wrex for decades. He knew that they represented his friend's knee-jerk response to the Krogan's increasing diplomatic entanglements and not a considered opinion of the situation. Accordingly, he played the role that he knew so well, the rational counter-balance to Wrex's impatient and frustrated hostility.

"There's nothing soft about being intelligent Wrex." He began, the familiarity of the words made it feel like an echo from the past. "You didn't defeat the other clans and unite your people just because you were the angriest or the most aggressive. And there's no honor in fighting a war that doesn't need to be fought." Shepard chose his words carefully, but he knew that they would still appear to be pacifist and conciliatory to Wrex.

Consequently, he continued the argument, and attempted to give his words a bit more steel. "Anyway…the Krogan deserve to be seen and treated like something more than mercs and thugs. I mean, haven't you seen what political power for your people can accomplish?" Shepard again tip-toed around the central conceit of his words, which was that the Krogan should care about the larger political framework of the galaxy, and work within it, instead of simply butting their heads against it constantly.

"Asking permission about what planets we can colonize…being told yes and no by someone who wouldn't know what end of a gun to point at a Batarian? It wasn't what I ever saw for my people." Wrex said grimly, his words a low growl.

Shepard was again undeterred by the words, because he knew that they were his friend's pride talking and not his head. "And you've been able to colonize. You've even settled on planets that had been designated for Turian economic development…" At this reminder Shepard finally saw a small smile on Wrex's face, and so he continued with an encouraged energy. "…You've spread throughout the DMZ and beyond, become much richer…and maybe it's a change…but isn't it nice to see your sons and daughters born with a purpose beyond dying?"

Shepard knew that to convince a Krogan, and in particular someone who was under incredible political pressure like Wrex, that the success and power of their people could be independent of body counts, was always a difficult matter. In the years that followed the civil wars' conclusion he'd considered it impossible many times. Not because he believed that the Krogan were simple minded warmongers, but rather that the concept of warfare was so engrained in their culture and individual worth that any change would be seen as a fundamental betrayal of tradition.

Nevertheless, after failing to gain political recognition and consideration for the Quarians, and watching as they withdrew into themselves with increasingly vitriolic contempt for other races, Shepard had been determined to not let the Krogan suffer a similar fate. Fortunately, the Krogan possessed a key difference from the Quarians. They had an organized and viciously effective military, and a willingness to use it. Even more importantly, the unification of the clans under Urdnot and the forthcoming population explosion as a result of the eradication of the genophage, meant that Krogan power was strongly on the ascendant. It was clear to everyone, even the most ardent opponents of Krogan political representation, that they could not simply be ignored. The only question was whether or not another war was inevitable.

"I know that money and territory are important." Wrex begrudgingly acknowledged, interrupting Shepard's line of thought. "But just sitting here. Shooting Varren…" he waved his pistol dismissively at the waste, and then roughly grabbed his bottle of Ryncol.

"I understand Wrex." Shepard said sympathetically. "But the Krogan are stronger now than they ever have been because of you." He noted matter-of-factly, taking a sip of Scotch himself.

"Mmm. The colonies are doing well. Ha!" Wrex abruptly laughed to himself, a deep timbre that rolled without obstacle around them. "Last week, Grunt sent me a vid of some creature his team killed on Rothla. Big damn thing. Made the Asari engineers shit themselves." He laughed again, this time even louder.

Shepard chuckled, both at Wrex's amusement and his choice in employees. "You're still using Asari engineers?"

Wrex smiled knowingly at Shepard. "Good for morale. Also keeps the females on edge. You should see the birth rates on the colonies where we use them."

Shepard wryly nodded in understanding. In his youth he'd spent many a shore leave at bars, hopelessly hitting on the beautiful Asari dancers. Those memories seemed oddly uncomfortable now, as they lingered in fractured and blurred pieces. It was like there was some uncertainty in his mind that the young man was indeed him, and not a friend or character in a book he'd once read. The notion of having ever been that cocky, carefree and energetic seemed entirely foreign to him now. Decades upon decades of war and politics had punished him mercilessly, not only physically but mentally as well, leaving him unsure that life could genuinely be led without constant pain and loss.

As his mind staggered through memories of the past, it branched beyond tales of a failed lascivious youth, and through a hundred other thoughts and associations. Fighting on Thessia against the Reapers, the exact shade of pale blue that pooled in Samara's wide eyes, the cocksure grin of Aria T'Loak, the happiness on Liara's face when she'd told him about how Miranda had kissed her when she finally admitted her feelings. Liara. How had he forgotten until now?

"I just remembered Wrex, I saw Liara a while ago and she said to say hello…" Redirected towards his recent trip to Thessia, he recalled fully now how they'd left the park and gone back to her penthouse, where they'd started planning his visits to other old friends. Wrex and Tuchanka were an obvious choice, as both seemed as immovable and immortal as stone.

"How does she look these days?" Wrex inquired sharply, as he took a particularly large gulp of Ryncol.

Shepard grinned and took a sip that burned his throat and moisten his eyes. "Still too young for you. Also, she's with Miranda."

Wrex nodded. "Can't compete with that."

"Yeah, that was the only thing keeping you two apart too." Shepard noted dryly.

"Always did better with their commandos anyway. Little blue machines, could go forever." Wrex remembered wistfully as he pawed at his bottle's label.

"Thanks for that." Shepard shook the accompanying imagery away with wide eyes. "Anyway, what I was going to say was that Liara is giving a series of lectures at the Citadel on the Protheans and the Reaper War later this year. And when I mentioned how often you visit there on business, she also wanted me to tell you to come see one of them."

"Hmm. Maybe. It would better than what I normally do. Meetings and conferences." The familiar snarl of contempt at politics returned in Wrex's words.

The tone stirred old anxieties and feelings within Shepard, and he shifted uncomfortably. He knew that the fight to get the Krogan into those meetings and conferences had been a protracted and brutally frustrating one, during which he'd burned through considerable political goodwill and public popularity. He was told, then warned, and finally threatened that pursuing a place for the Krogan on the Citadel would end disastrously. Person after person made it clear to him that for all his impassioned speeches, challenges, and pleas, the Krogan would always be viewed as a militaristically minded race, incapable of the intellectual acumen necessary to participate in the larger political arena. That, ultimately, he would fail just as he had with the Quarians.

Shepard had rejected all of these biases and threats because he firmly believed that the Krogan legitimately deserved a place at the table, and that to deny them it would mean another war and millions of deaths. However, the fight with those who opposed his beliefs was only half the battle, because before he was able to lobby on behalf of the Krogan he had needed their support to pursue such a goal. He'd always understood that such consent was not a formality, but he never supposed that it would be such a struggle to achieve.

As he watched Wrex blast another Varren into a spray of blood that the cracked and dry ground eagerly drank up, Shepard was pushed back into a past of confrontation and despair. After the war the Citadel and its races were in a greatly weakened state both militarily and economically, and many Krogan viewed the situation as an opportunity for them to rise to a dominant position within the galaxy. Unsurprisingly then, rumors immediately began to swirl in Council Space about the Krogan's intent and plans in the post-war power vacuum. Due to his relationship with the leader of the most prominent clan, Shepard was asked to establish a diplomatic relationship with the Krogan and detail the possible threat they posed to the galaxy.

As it turned out, however, in the post-war period the Krogan were a greater threat to themselves than anyone else. Wrex's unwillingness to immediately seize the opportunities presented within the galaxy for rapid expansion, and strike against the old enemies of his people, precipitated a civil war on Tuchanka. Over the course of several years, anger and resentment at Wrex's perceived inaction precariously boiled until it ultimately congealed into a loose confederation of smaller clans who supported an archly conservative and militarily aggressive position. When they struck against Clan Urdnot in a coordinated effort on land and in orbit, they staggered its defenses.

In his firmly established position of influence and power Shepard had convinced the few remaining Human military leaders to officially recognize Clan Urdnot as the legitimate rulers of Tuchanka, and to begin the shipment of munitions for aid in the war after several years. The Krogan Civil Wars lasted a total of almost thirty years, though battles were increasingly sporadic in the final decade. In the end the vanquished clans, who had been largely destroyed, capitulated to Wrex and were made to suffer the ultimate humiliation of surrendering their arms.

Shepard had viewed the unification of the Krogan as an opportunity for them to become a member of the galaxy's larger political system and to finally end their cycle of war and destruction. Wrex saw things differently, however. He wished to forge an alliance with Humanity as an acknowledgment of his friendship with Shepard and aid in the war, but Wrex steadfastly refused any other alliance. The notion of answering to a Council that included Turians and Salarians was a completely ridiculous notion in his opinion, and one that he believed would ignite massive political unrest.

Accordingly, Shepard and Wrex remained mired in a stalemate throughout years of sporadic discussion. Things ultimately climaxed when Shepard visited Tuchanka after a meeting at the Citadel, during which statistics of Krogan birth rates had been discussed with worrying tones and close minds. Between hoarse yelling and flared biotics, he had exasperatedly proffered the notion of the Krogan gaining not just a position on the Citadel but on the Council itself. Shepard remembered now, sitting atop the Grizzly over half a century later, the booming laughter that had shaken the room in response.

Nonetheless, Shepard's idea proved to be a turning point, not just for the Krogan but also for the entire galaxy. In less than a year, he'd convinced Wrex that a Krogan position on the Council meant equality with his enemies and could prevent another war with the Citadel, which would undoubtedly devastate the Krogan just when they were regaining their strength.

Finally of one mind and resolve, Shepard and Wrex had then traveled to the Citadel, and in their respective positions of Admiral and Clan Leader, begun the process of garnering support for the expansion of the Council. They were immediately met with cold shoulders and incredulous looks. Shepard remembered watching the goodwill that had surrounded him since the war slowly but surely fade away. Allies and friends awkwardly distanced themselves from him and his ideas of Krogan political representation.

The crux of the problem was that the Council was the arbiter of its own expansion, and required a majority to admit any new race. The Human Councilor voiced his support for the inclusion of more races, albeit somewhat reluctantly, but the Salarians, Asari, and Turians remained immovable in their unwillingness to expand the Council.

For six long and torturous years Shepard worked to build support for the Krogan, and plead his case to the Council with only the smallest successes. The drawn out process eroded Wrex's patience with politics, as he saw the continued rejection of any possibility of Krogan representation as a direct insult to his people and a reaffirmation of his dislike of the Council races. Wrex's anger finally boiled over in an address to the Council, during which he strongly intimated that the Krogan were ready and willing to go to war to defend their interests and continued expansion in the galaxy. Shepard could only watch as his friend not only threatened the Councilors to their faces, but also began naming specific military weaknesses each possessed. After a short shouting match with the Turian Councilor, they were both escorted out of the Citadel Tower under armed guard.

Shepard's memory of their walk back to the shuttle was entirely one of emotion. Many things from the past had fallen away in his old age, battles blurred together in a cacophony of screams, barked orders, and weapons fire, and the details of people's faces became more and more hazy with each passing year. However, the intensity of his anger and hopelessness on that walk remained burned within his mind, a moment of pain that stood defiantly against the feebleness of his deteriorating self.

With each step away from the Tower, the fire of his anger had tightened his muscles, causing his jaw to clench and teeth to grind together. Years of negotiation and hard work had all been for naught, and now there would be war. Maybe not in his own lifetime but at least in Sylvia's, and that thought alone filled him with enough anger to want to attack the armed guard and run back to the Tower demanding another audience.

It was then that everything changed. Four steps away from the shuttle that would take them back to the Marathon, an Asari had called their names and delivered their salvation. She was an assistant to the Councilor, and informed them in a hushed tone and beckoning gesture that her lady wished to have a word with them in her chambers.

"You alright Shepard? I killed your Varren." Wrex asked him, the rough words bringing him back to the present.

"Oh, sorry. Yeah…I was just thinking about that time when you threatened the Council." Shepard said with a reassuring smile.

"Which one?" Wrex answered.

"Right before we met the Asari Councilor." He smiled crookedly at how rapidly things had been changed. "I remember warning you the entire time we were walking there not to threaten her again."

Wrex nodded. "And I told you if you didn't stop talking I'd eat you. Still can't believe that worked. Just had to put our boot on their throats."

Shepard hesitated at his friend's choice in words for a moment before responding. "I'm not sure it was that exactly. But…I guess in retrospect it makes sense that the only Citadel race who lives close to as long as you would take the long view. Another war, even centuries away, would be an immediate concern for them."

"It sure didn't make that Salarian bastard flinch. What was his name? Meh…" Wrex waved his hand dismissively at the waste. "That's the good thing about them. They don't live long enough to make remembering anything about them important." Wrex laughed and sagged backwards on the Grizzly. The now nearly empty bottle of Ryncol almost toppled over with the movement.

"If only it had made him change his mind…then we wouldn't have had to go through all that shit." Shepard sighed and reached for his own bottle. He took another sip, which burned with a dull warm pain that coaxed his shoulders to slump under the weary weight of the memories.

That goddamn third Council vote.

After meeting with the Asari Councilor and obtaining tentative support for Council expansion, he and Wrex had immediately agreed that the best chance to obtain the third vote lay with the Salarians. Shepard surmised that despite the fact that the Salarians had engineered the genophage, and thereby earned the hatred of every Krogan alive, their political outlook was ultimately a coldly analytical one that sought only to maintain their own security and prosperity. In contrast, the Turian Primarchs' hatred of the Krogan had been bred in the intense warfare of their ancestors. The shattering of family lines, the creation of millions of orphans, and reports of mass graves that still continued to the present, made the Turians' hatred of the Krogan an immovable force.

Nonetheless, after six years of stalled negotiations and now nearly open threats of war, it was clear to Shepard and Wrex that the Salarians would never be moved by diplomacy. As a result, Shepard decided to abandon discussion and instead move into the morally grayer area of political manipulation of the Salarian Union and its numerous Dalatrasses. The decision did not come easily, and Shepard had anguished over his turn to deceit and underhandedness, but he now saw the situation as a war. Moreover, he felt with absolute conviction that Krogan political equality and the subsequent prevention of war were ends that justified questionable means.

Despite the plan's simple goal, it possessed a byzantine complexity that tested the patience of several of Wrex's Battlemasters. Through an intricate year-long campaign of misinformation, feigned troop movement, and one spectacular incident of corporate espionage masterminded by Kasumi at his behest, Shepard and Wrex managed to convince the Salarian intelligence agencies that the Krogan's forces were not only significantly larger than they appeared, but also that they were moving into a position to strike against the Council races. At the time Shepard had foolishly believed that the Salarian Union would recognize the clear and immediate threat to the galaxy, and as they were unable to utilize biological weapons to give themselves any sort of chance militarily, they would attempt to avert war with an agreement to expand the Council.

The Salarians decided on a much different path. During a meeting with Wrex on Tuchanka regarding the movement of troops outside the DMZ, they were interrupted by a bright flash of light and then a voice. Wrex had instinctually drawn his weapon, but only to point it at a hologram of Feron, the Shadow Broker. Without preamble or explanation of how he was able to bypass security, Feron had informed them that a STG assassination team was to land on Tuchanka within the hour and eliminate Wrex.

The Marathon's equipment was only just able to detect the ship in orbit, and then only because it was specifically looking for it. However, once they established a lock on the ship's signature, they were able to track it to its LZ and watch the three Salarian assassins slowly creep towards the capital from orbit. After two days of waiting, the STG team finally made their move against Wrex during a tour of the outer settlements that ringed Urdnot. It was the time and place that Shepard had expected them to attempt to assassinate Wrex, as he surmised that his friend's schedule had been stolen and analyzed for obvious vulnerabilities. With knowledge of their location and intention, the assassins were unable to even fire a single shot, as a specially formed team of Battlemasters sprang on the Salarians and disarmed them violently.

"I liked it. Dictating terms to the Salarians was a nice change." Wrex finally responded. "Would have been more satisfying to kill them but it worked out fine."

"The plan wasn't to blackmail the Salarian Councilor, but you're right. At least the Union decided to negotiate their return instead of just sending another team." Shepard noted.

"Mmm. Dragging them into the Tower and demanding that the Salarians be thrown off the Council would have been fun too." Wrex paused a moment and then concluded with a growled, "politics."

"You know Wrex…" Shepard sighed into the breeze, which had suddenly come up from behind them. "I won't always be here to stop you from killing things. Pretty soon its just going to be you on your own." He meant the words sarcastically, but to his own ears they came out hoarse and flat.

"I'm more worried about what comes after me. Even after joining the Council diplomacy still isn't popular." Wrex stopped and then turned to his friend. "And it sounds like this is more than a visit for you. It's a Maklahon."

"Maklahon?" Shepard echoed back in confusion.

"At the end of a Krogan's life, when he still has the strength, he goes on his Maklahon. It is a return to his first battlefield, the place where he truly became a warrior. He…" Wrex motioned towards the sky, "…talks to the Void, the thing that comes next. Then he returns to the clan and dies." He finished matter-of-factly.

"This isn't my first battlefield Wrex." Shepard said in an attempt to brush off the accusation, as it felt too close to the truth.

"You're not a Krogan. Visiting Liara, Tali, and now me? Maklahon. Just with human feelings." Wrex turned away from him and back to the wastes.

A silence filled with understanding fell between them. Each was a warrior who understood that their time was near the end, and that the best days were long in the past. That the success created by the battles they'd won seemed distant and transitory when compared to the unraveling of their own minds and bodies.

Shepard drew back from those thoughts, and instead focused on the present. "Feelings? Don't worry Wrex I'm not going to try and hug you."

Wrex laughed. "Good, because I can't drive this drunk and you can't do it dead."

Shepard joined him in laughter. It was a hoarse and raspy noise, but genuine as it surrounded them and then sped away along the wastes of Tuchanka.

I've marked this as completed for now, because while I have several ideas for additional chapters that would show Shepard catching up with other characters, I have not written them and I think it would be unfair to promise them at this time.