This piece works as a standalone, but you might enjoy it more accompanying the others in this series - Observation & Engineering, John, The Sound of Silence, Oblivious, Solace, Loved & Lost and Belonging.
In the game, Tali's convinced Shepard won't fall for her because she's quarian - what if he thinks the same, because he's human? Also, I've magically invented quarters for all the squadmates. I guess it isn't canon, but...
Once More, With Feeling
It is... odd to be on a human - no, a Cerberus - ship again after so long. Tali has to get used again to the size of it and the stares she receives; she tries her best to ignore the Cerberus logo painted on every available inch of wall.
She sighs, remembering the briefing; Taylor had been friendly, she supposes, and she'd wanted to believe he was sincere, but both she and John know too much these days to think that Cerberus can be trusted.
This "EDI" just confirms her suspicions. An A.I? She knows how that will end - she knows how it always ends. She would have thought humanity would have learned from their experiences with the geth. Even discounting that, it will be constantly reporting back to Cerberus, be bugging the ship. Why has Shepard kept it on board? Unless it's wired in so well he can't get any engineers to take it out.
This is all strange, slightly unreal, even Shepard himself. Even after he invited her back on, taking her hand as she stepped onto the ship and giving her one of his trademark smiles - she had nearly tripped at that point, and she blushes recalling it, thankful for her mask - she was hit by this ridiculous fear that he'd... disappear, or that she'd wake up, alone. Just like those nights on the fleet.
She tried to tell herself it meant nothing that she turns back, somewhere inside her, to the stammering Tali on her pilgrimage, not the leader of a squad (her heart sinks remembering them) with a ship, when she is around him, but it was a lie. She's known since Freedom's Progress. Two years has changed nothing.
She looks up, out of habit, hearing those footsteps behind her. She shakes her head - she is being foolish. Then she remembers that she is with him, and he is alive, and if her smile were visible, it would light up the room.
Shepard notices the stares (and Joker's raised eyebrows) as he walks through the CIC. Wondering what's up with them, he realizes he's slipped into a habit he used to have on the old Normandy: whistling. The old crew got used to it; he'd done it even when Anderson was in charge, but it was pretty rare back then.
It hits him abruptly that he hasn't done it since he... woke up. Then he remembers the reason why he's doing it now, and walks on, trying very hard not to grin like a lunatic. She's back on his ship, just like old times.
Kelly stops him on his way to the elevator. "You seem cheery, commander." She has that shrewd look she seems to think he can't recognise, when she's trying to read something into what he's saying. They usually get on pretty well, but he wishes she'd stop trying to analyse his behavioural patterns when he has conversations with her. It's a little... disconcerting.
He shrugs, smiling. "It's a good day." Stepping past her, he presses the button in the elevator for Engineering.
The smile drops from his face as he walks. He hates to admit it, but he's nervous. It's been two years since they talked properly, and, as he opens his mouth, he wonders what to say. When he reaches her, he eventually manages, "Seen Garrus?"
"Oh... yes." She turns to him. "He was - "
"Calibrating?"
"How did you...?"
He shakes his head - that turian really needs to get out more. "It doesn't matter."
There's a moment of silence. How is he meant to tell her what he couldn't for two years, that he can't now? That he's a cyborg zombie. That he's only just starting to know the crew on his own ship. That he doesn't think he can do this without her.
Then there's what he found on Alchera, what Ken spent days on, at his request...
"I've missed you, y'know." She looks up in surprise from what she's doing with the console. "Who else can I go to when I break things that will laugh at me?"
Her shoulders slump slightly, he thinks, as if she was expecting him to say something else. "I didn't - " She looks at her feet, and, he notices with fondness and a surge of memory that makes his throat go dry, wrings her hands. Many things have changed in two years, but not everything. "Well, maybe a little," she confesses, her voice growing smaller in a way that he's only recently begun to find incredibly sweet.
His grin is back. "No-one here does. They're all afraid I'll report them to the Illusive Man... or throw them out the airlock."
"Hey!" Ken's voice rings across Engineering.
He takes a look at the clock, and realizes he's been hanging around so long trying to figure out what to say that he's wasted valuable time. "I should go. There are preparations to make." He throws her a look over his shoulder as he leaves. "I'd take a look at your quarters. I think you'll like them."
She gazes after him in bewilderment, until Ken says, loudly, "He's just excused you from your work. Stop ninnying around."
She is still wondering what "ninnying around" means when she reaches her quarters. Approaching her desk, she notices a small package on it.
She picks it up in amazement, unwrapping it to find the usual protein paste and... Mesh'ka? She holds it carefully, making sure not to let the sweet treat crumble. Her mother used to make it - she'd thought it was only available on the Fleet. Then she remembers: there are shops that stock quarian food on the Citadel, but they're so hard to find...
She wonders how she will eat it, since it is solid, when she notices the air filtering system that someone has carefully fitted into the wall. She can take off her suit in here, she realizes.
There are other things on there, too: a datapad containing blueprints and diagrams of the drive core, and something else.
It takes a moment for her to believe her eyes.
She smiles, ignoring her tears, as she picks up her mother's omni-tool, her omni-tool. There are burn marks on it, but it's been meticulously repaired. She remembers not being able to find it in the escape pod, her grief at leaving it in Engineering...
She fits it onto her wrist, the orange glove flaring up as she does so; as she fires up the command menu, she sees that there is a message waiting for her. She opens it, expecting to find a video link, orders, something, but instead there are simply two words:
Welcome back.