A human and a turian sitting together sharing drinks after a not-so-simple mission. Give Joker five minutes and he would have over half a dozen wisecracks about the scene ready and waiting. As it was the two of them were relaxing and enjoying each other's company, Garrus with bottle of dextro fruit liquor while Shepard had a bottle of spirit-knows-what that humans seemed to favour.
Her laughter was something to be cherished, he realized as she shook her head at him, crossing her arms loosely and leaning back in her chair. While it was certainly something she did often, each little chuckle made something stir in him that he'd thought buried deep down for longer than he cared to remember.
The moment he saw the human woman for the first time heading towards a meeting with the council regarding Saren's crimes, he knew she was different from the other humans he had seen on the citadel. Most he had seen were like the Ambassador Udina, overly ambitious and demanding respect and position they hadn't earned. She walked with her head held high, an air of confidence that would make even all but the largest of Krogan think twice about dealing with her. She was strong and gentle at the same time, everything about her traits he recognized coming from a lifetime of military training.
At the time, he was too angry with Executor Pallin abruptly ending his investigation to really get a good look at her face, and while he did notice the cybernetics running along the left side of her jaw, he couldn't help finding her quite striking for a human. She was younger than he expected for the war hero that held the line all by herself during the Skyllian Blitz, probably his age or slightly younger. The one eye he saw was a deep blue, her cheekbones sharp and pronounced, with long red hair flowing just past her shoulders. When she spoke she was all business, more than capable of handling herself. At first, he'd thought the cybernetics were simply to enhance what was naturally there. But when they met again a few hours later, in a hostage situation with Dr. Michele of all things, she turned toward him as he made his way over and he realized he was sorely mistaken.
Almost the entire left side of her face and neck was marred by burn scars, a glaring dark red in complete contrast to her pale skin, and there was several sets of cybernetics running over most of it, the majority of it focused above and around her eye, with several larger sets connecting it to the bottom of her lower jaw. As she spoke, he realized that the muscles around that side of her face were completely dead, and it was likely that, unless the eye itself was also cybernetic, she was sightless in that eye as well. It was then that he realized the mechanics were there to repair, not enhance, and it was the first indication that she'd gone through hell during the Blitz, and that it had made her into the tough, hard working soldier that she was today.
"Garrus? Hello, Citadel to Vakarian, do you hear me?" She said, her voice cutting in as he blinked the memory away. She was staring at him with her only live eyebrow cocked half-way up her forehead, and a smirk pulling her mouth to the side. Her left arm, which was also a mechanical prosthetic that connected to the flesh at her shoulder, was tapping the table expectantly.
"Er... pardon?" He replied, shaking his head, mandibles twitching in embarrassed confusion.
"You were on another planet for a minute there."
"Sorry, Commander. What were you saying?"
Her smile only grew wider, "I didn't say anything. It just got real quiet in here real fast, that's all."
"Oh."
"Y'know, Garrus." She said, shrugging, "You don't have to call me Commander if we're sharing drinks in the mess hall."
"I'm a turian. Military training and protocol runs deep."
She sighed, shaking her head, "Your not on a turian ship anymore. You're on an Alliance vessel now, so you don't have to be so by-the-book with me. Neither do you have to call me Commander all the time."
"I, uh, don't want to offend, Comm-, er... Should I call you Shepard, then?"
He was surprised by the sorrow that flashed across her face then, and again when it vanished just as quickly to be replaced by her familiar smirk, "Just call me Natalya. No family name."
He was uncertain if that meant the family name wasn't necessary, or if she didn't like people using her family name, but he didn't press the issue. He hated when assumptions were made about him, so he had no right to subject her to his own assumptions. However, that meant that the only way he was going to learn anything about her was to ask. She was constantly asking him about his life with C-sec, how he hated all the red tape that got in the way of his duty—it was only fair for him to return the favour.
"So, Commander," –he realized too late that he'd slipped, but she let it go with a knowing grin—"It occurs to me that you know practically everything there is to know about me."
She shrugged, "You're part of the crew, aren't you? I like to know the people I work with. I need to know who I can trust. Otherwise I'll end up working for more arrogant bastards like Udina."
"Well," he shrugged, leaning on the table beside her, "what about you? You know everything there is to know about me, but I know next to nothing about you. Apart from what everyone knows about you and your part in the Blitz, I mean."
She considered this for a moment, her brow furrowing the way it did when a human considered their options, before she nodded, "I guess that's fair. What do you want to know?"
He shrugged again, "I guess... Well, let's start with your history. What did you do before enlisting?"
Her head shook lightly, and she gave him a wry grin, "Would you believe I've been military all my life?"
"... Wouldn't surprise me."
She chuckled, "Well, I am. My parents have always been in the Alliance military. In fact they first met when he was operating on her shoulder to remove some shrapnel. I always thought that was rather romantic in a strange sort of way."
"We got on well as a family. Of course my Father always had to work late and mother could be away on duty for weeks at a time. But they did the very best they could to find time for me. Even if he was tired from a long day at the surgery, Father would always help me with my homework. And Mother, she loved to play games with me and would read me a bedtime story every single night she was home. And when I was older, we all went camping together in whatever system we were stationed at. Thinking back, they did everything they could to give me the best childhood I could have had. Eventually, once I was old enough, I enlisted as a soldier... But it's not something I tend to advertise."
"Why not?"
"It's... not a time that I have a lot of fond memories of." She responded after a moment.
"Do you... still keep in touch with family?"
"My mother whenever I'm able." She explained, "Not as easy as it sounds, since we both command separate ships. I haven't seen her since my N7 training started. Letters and messages are the only real way we talk now."
"What about your father?" Garrus asked, "You didn't mention him."
"I don't have the chance anymore." She considered this for a moment, before amending with, "He was part of one of the medical teams sent to Elysium..."
"During the Blitz?"
Silence fell for a moment, and he began to regret his prodding into her past. It didn't seem like she'd had it easy. But then, he had already known that, hadn't he? Not only from her visible scars, but he could tell by the way she carried herself with a sort-of wounded confidence, and unbreakable strength borne out of adversity. But that still didn't make it any easier.
"He was... caught in the chaos of a batarian surprise attack during the Blitz. I didn't find out he was dead until nearly three months afterwards."
"Commander, I..." Yep. Spirits damn him, he definitely regretted it now, "I'm sorry."
"It's the reason I applied to the N7 program." She continued with an appreciative nod, "Not just to honour my family history, but so I could be strong enough to help everyone in need. It hurt knowing that he was there, wounded and dying and there was nothing I could do to help. We did everything right, everything played out near perfectly and we still couldn't save everyone."
A solemn silence fell over them again, and he apologized a second time, shaking his head, "I shouldn't have brought it up."
"Hey, no, it's okay." She protested, "You were right. It is only fair for me to tell you about myself after everything you've told me."
She smiled at him, and he felt a renewed vigour, so he asked her to continue, "What about you? What happened to you after after the Blitz?"
She caught his eyes when they flicked briefly to her cybernetics, and her lips pulled into a smirk, "In other words, what in the void happened to my face, right?"
"No! That's not what I—W-well, I am curious, but you... – That is to say, uh..."
"Relax, Vakarian." She responded, laughing, "It also happened during the Blitz, and I know it's not exactly inconspicuous. You think you're the first person to ask? You think I haven't gone through life prepared to tell the story? I've long since come to terms with it. I mean sure, I've lied about it more often than not. There are roughly eight different stories circulating about how this happened, and those are just the ones I made up." She said with a cheeky grin, "But you? You deserve the truth."
She crossed her arms, and leaned back as she began, "I was just a corporal when the Skyllian Blitz started. Our mission was simple: drop down, hand out some much needed supplies, in and out in three, four days tops. Everything quickly went to hell once the batarians showed up."
"Reinforcements weren't able for at least a week. Our forces were roughly two to three hundred soldiers, mostly civilians defending their homes against what was believed at the time to be over 10,000 batarians. Outgunned, outmaneuvered and outmanned by an impossible margin and with no hope of escape, our orders were to hold the line for as long as possible. It quickly broke down into us seeing how many of those bastards we could send to hell with us."
"On the fourth day I was leading a group of roughly sixteen, we settled ourselves in the trenches, four snipers and the rest using whatever weapons we could find. It quickly became obvious to me the others weren't soldiers. They panicked, some fled while others were shot down. After an hour or so holding the line there were only four of us left. One of them, his name was Cole I remember, took a shot to the leg that would bleed out if we didn't do something quickly."
Garrus could feel from her tone that this was going somewhere bad, fast, but when he opened his mouth to object, she held up her prosthetic hand, giving him a pained, yet reassuring smile. So, he quieted, and allowed her to continue.
"I provided cover fire while the others attempted to get him out of there. At first it looked like he was in the clear, but then I saw one of the batarians arming a grenade. I hit him right between all four eyes, but he had already thrown it. I tried to grab the grenade and throw it right back to his buddies before it went off..." She paused for a moment, her mouth turning down at the edges and her prosthetic hand opened and closed several times before she continued, "Turns out batarian fragmentation grenades have more power and a much shorter fuse then I thought. Blew my whole arm off. Broke my jaw and tore several chunks out of my face as well."
"I thought I was a dead man walking after that. What happened next is too blurry for me to remember anything, and I have no idea how I managed to hold the line afterwards without an arm and half my face, I just know that I did. I followed my orders to hold the line and kept fighting, refusing to give up until there was no more fight left in me. Anderson later told me that I made it all the way to the medical bay completely under my own power. I didn't pass out until they started the surgery to save my life. To say everyone was surprised I had survived at all would be a major understatement."
"The therapies and procedures needed to recover and get used to my new cybernetics were estimated to be about two years, and the doctors said I'd likely never head back into the field again. Chances of a full recovery were scarce, they said, and there were other factors they wanted me consider. I told them exactly where they could shove their reasons to keep me from being a soldier, and was back as a newly promoted Commander in just over six months. Apart from the new face and coughing up blood the first few missions back, it felt like I never left. If anything, it was my new reputation as a war hero that I had the hardest time adjusting to.
"And they just let you come back? I can understand the promotion and everything—I mean, you saved an entire planet nearly all by yourself—but everything else? They just gave you command over a new crew?"
Her mouth pulled into a fond smile when she responded, "My mother had to pull some stings of course. I served on her ship, the Dauntless, for just over a year until she stopped worrying I couldn't look after myself. She never told me how she convinced the higher-ups to allow it, but... well, let's just say I got my temper from my mother, and she can be very... "persuasive" when angry."
Garrus laughed at that. "And then you were transferred to Captain Anderson and the Normandy... and Eden Prime."
"Eden Prime, Saren and the Geth, becoming the first human spectre and gathering a crew to take down the Reapers before they come to destroy us all. Kinda sounds like a story you tell the children before bedtime, doesn't it?"
"Maybe, but I don't know many stories where the hero has a grenade go off in their face."
She smacked him on the shoulder, smiling. "You ass." He just laughed again.
Silence again intruded on their conversation, but this time it was welcome, allowing him to contemplate everything he heard. Natalya Shepard... she truly was nothing short of amazing. Even when life gave her the worst kind of hell to fight, she always came out stronger. Lost an arm, yet gained so much more as a result of her iron will.
He doubted he would ever find another woman... make that ever find another human like her in his lifetime. Yeah, he definitely had no doubt about that.
Natalya stared at her arm for a moment, and then got up leave, "Thanks for listening to my story, Garrus. I haven't had the chance to do that since... well, ever. I enjoyed it." She stopped for a moment, and when she spoke again, her voice was uncharacteristically soft, "You're a great... friend, Garrus. Thanks for sticking around."
"Commander," He said, noting her hesitation with a knowing grin, and tossing her a salute, "I can't imagine anywhere else I'd rather be."
Author's Note: Originally a oneshot I had difficulty deciding whether to post or not, I've decided to expand on this even further and combine it with my Mass Effect play throughs. I hope you enjoyed the first of many chapters. Please read and review.