No one, she was certain, had more eagerly stepped aboard a tram and approached its nav menu.
Sara Ryder wasn't one for dramatic gestures, and even though this button press was the culmination of a dozen repeats of the same question ("Can I leave yet?"), she lacked both the energy and the patience to come up with one.
She settled for a simple tap on "Docking Bay 5B" and sighed. "Freedom at last."
"I wouldn't call a dark tunnel 'freedom.'"
His hair was a shade of brown darker than hers, as always, though both their eyes carried the same gray-blue that defied Mom and Dad. Her brother, the Pathfinder: a phrase she had to go over a few hundred times in her head to make stick.
"You didn't spend a week staring up at the cryo bay's ceiling," she said. "The gaps between the panels are burned into my brain forever."
Minuscule progress was better than nothing. Though compared to where she was two weeks ago, boarding a tram was a gigantic leap forward. Adrift in a hazy void with nothing but her thoughts for company, Sara felt the seconds stretch into centuries. And when her brother's voice pierced the shroud, those thoughts turned to Habitat 7… and Dad.
Her brother put his hand on the metal of a seat back, only to yank it back with a small hiss. That was the third time since they left the cryo bay.
"Rubbing a lot of carpet?" Sara asked.
"Paying the price for stopping bullets with my mind."
She raised an eyebrow. "Since when?"
"Since SAM."
"Both of you possess latent biotic abilities," SAM chimed, "but my connection to your brother allows me to amplify his. I can act as both biotic implant and biotic amp."
She expected her brother to waggle his fingers, or to sign a mnemonic like Serviceman Luna did back in Sara's Alliance days. On Mako drives to and from Prothean dig sites, Luna would amuse herself by levitating a spare ammo block an inch over her palm. If anyone made a joke at her expense, she'd throw the block at their face, only to yank it away half an inch before impact. Nobody failed to flinch. Luna never failed to pull back.
Instead her brother shrugged with a guilty smile. "The best part is getting to eat more without anyone judging me."
"So now you might stand a chance against me at an all-you-can-eat?"
"I wouldn't go that far yet."
"SAM can't boost your metabolism to FTL speeds?"
"Maybe, but I'm not gonna let myself spontaneously combust to beat you at our birthday contest."
Biotics, for Sara, were once the subject of action vids and news reports… and Mom's research, the mysterious new field that caused her illness. Luna and other biotics made that arcane space magic seem normal, something they just did. Mom's research, even with what it caused her, did that for people like Luna. Mom gave them a purpose. A place. Someone to be.
But she helped design the SAM implants, too. And after Dad disabled all the safeguards from her brother's... Her brother, the Pathfinder, suddenly a biotic. Probably a stronger one than five Lunas at that.
Jealous? No. Events far beyond their control had dropped them both into wild, unforeseen circumstances. No point in dwelling on where he landed.
Sara shifted her feet on the floor as the tram halted and its door slid aside.
She never saw the Citadel's Presidium in person, but the vista from Docking Bay 5B was a dead ringer for the news footage and extranet stills. As Sara and her brother stepped into the lively bustle, she took a deep breath of the closest thing to fresh air on the Nexus.
Beneath the artificial afternoon sky and the dim shade of trees, meanwhile, a pale blue angara scratched his chin at Avina's perky gesticulations. A group of asari commandos, still wearing their hardsuits, made their way towards Vortex's bright neon yellow signs. Before the Hyperion's arrival, Sara was told, the Nexus was on its last legs, consumed by desperation and fear.
"Pathfinder," a human woman called.
Her brother slowed down, waving. "Mira, hey. Thanks for the message. Glad to see my tip's working out."
"More than 'working out.' I've been invited to a joint-species diplomatic conference. Guess I made an impression on our angaran friends."
"Wow, congrats," her brother said with that genuine smile.
"All thanks to you." Mira looked past him. "You're Sara Ryder, right? Mira Hayashi, an honor."
Sara shook Mira's outstretched hand. "Likewise."
"I hope you being out and about means you're rejoining the Pathfinder team soon."
"Once the doctor gives me the OK."
No less than four similar conversations cropped up as the Ryders navigated the crowd, but that was expected. Dad inspired a near-fanatical loyalty to his dream of Andromeda in people he barely knew. Sara prided herself on finding the best route through a sticky situation, and on seeing the big picture and picking out its linchpin. Her brother? He knew basically everyone. At least that hasn't changed.
Finally, they reached the edge overlooking the landing pad. Sara leaned forward on the glass panel railing.
There she was, sitting pretty. Work crews wiped away the dirt so her hull could glow pink and gold in the artificial sunset. She boasted graceful curves and clean lines, but Sara watched the briefing and knew all about the sophisticated tech within. The Tempest and her sister ships were supposed to be the tip of the Nexus's spear. Now she was the only one, a single point of light to illuminate Heleus.
A cart full of red crates rolled up the boarding ramp. Sara half-expected Dad to emerge from the belly of the ship and spare the fresh supplies a single, all-seeing glance.
"The griffin's wings," she said, smiling.
"Ha-ha."
"Too easy." She'd inherited Dad's skill with humor, unfortunately, so she took the low-hanging fruit where she could find them. "Think you could smuggle me aboard? I could fit in one of those crates."
"Then I'd get lectures from two angry doctors."
"Two?"
"Oh. You were still, well, you know, when Lexi was on the Hyperion."
Harry mentioned trading places with a Doctor Lexi on the Pathfinder team, though he framed it as a huge relief.
"Hey. You all right?" her brother asked, leaning sideways on the rail.
"Shouldn't I be asking you that? You're the one running all over the cluster fixing everything."
"And you're the one stuck here because of some really bad luck. I mean, you look like you're about to vault over the railing."
Her grip on the metal had tightened, she realized. Sara flexed and relaxed her fingers. "You first."
"I asked first."
She tried that piercing Dad stare she liked using to resolve their minor disagreements.
After a few seconds, her brother sighed. "Fine."
Still a hundred-percent success rate.
"You know those action vids where there's a badass, competent lady but the protagonist role goes to the bumbling idiot dude instead? I think we might be living that, Sara."
"Who said you're the protagonist? Everyone's the star of their own story." Mine's just taking too long to start.
"But you know what I'm saying. Sometimes I think you should be Pathfinder. Or I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop and for someone to tell me that this is all just some horrible mistake."
"Make sure you and Dad don't charge too far ahead," her brother said six hundred years ago, on the shuttle ride to the Hyperion. "I can't cover you from a click away."
From the rearguard to the vanguard. Sara thought back to Mira Hayashi. And still trying to shoulder all the problems in the universe.
Oh. The linchpin. She took a moment to collect her words.
"Look at what's around you." She gestured to a group of angara. "Andromeda natives visiting our station because you made a good impression in first contact." Then to an asari walking hand-in-hand with a salarian. "The asari and salarian arks in dock because you rescued them." Then to the spot where they encountered Mira. "That lady who thanked you personally in a crowd of people.
"Everyone here thinks you're doing fine. More than fine. Judging from what I'm seeing, I can say I'm one of them."
Her brother's gaze had followed her hand attentively. "Yeah. I know you're right. It's just… a lot." He smiled. "You sure you don't wanna trade places for a day?"
"Let me lead your team? Pathfinders aren't exactly drag-and-drop."
"You'd do fine."
"Tell them that."
She wasn't a people person like her brother, winning friends in an instant with an easy smile and neverending jokes. She'd introduced herself to Liam Kosta and Cora Harper before the long voyage, and by all accounts they remained on the team. But the news reports mentioned an asari, a turian, a krogan, even an angara. All of them had weeks to gel together, weeks Sara had spent pondering Dad's death in a coma.
They were a team, her brother's team. Sara glanced at the Tempest. Its armor, minimal as it was, seemed impenetrable.
Or maybe not. Her brother packed new biotic powers and an intrinsic connection to SAM, but from everything she'd seen, he remained that damned selfless goofball.
"Okay," he brother said. "So I went and spilled my guts."
"You always do that."
"Sure, but now it's your turn."
Again, Sara paused. "When Harry lets me go, there's still a spare bunk in the crew quarters, right?"
Her brother scratched his chin. "Drack, he's a krogan, doesn't fit in a bunk. Peebee lives in one of the escape pods."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously. So yeah, I'd say so. Why, planning your triumphant return?"
"You know it." One down. "And your team?"
His expression turned thoughtful for a second. "I think I know what this is about." He shifted on the railing. "Honestly, there's way too much sass on that ship. And I don't help. So you'd be the perfect balance."
"I'd have a ton of catch up to get through."
"And while you're at it, you'd give them plenty of ammo to fire shots at me. They'd love you."
Two down, I think. Bonding with new people was work for her, not effortless as it was for her brother. But now wasn't the time to shy away from dirty hands. A landing zone wasn't always just a destination, Sara realized. Sometimes it marked a beginning.
Soon, she hoped, though that meant hanging on Harry Carlyle's medical judgment for who knew how long. Let him do his job.
"I can't wait to be back," she said.
Her brother took a deep breath. "Well. Suddenly the air's a lot clearer."
"Can we move on to less serious stuff? Unless what I'm about to ask is actually serious."
"Huh?"
Sara leaned in towards him. "Who's Gil, and why did I have to hear about him from some random engineer who wandered into the cryo bay?" That encounter was a horrible mess of awkwardness from both sides.
Her brother fell silent, if only for a moment. "Right. That guy. He asked me if the Tempest's chief engineer was single, I told him 'no,' because Gil's my boy."
"Do I have to interrogate Gil?"
"No. Definitely not. He's great. Now, this guy I met on Kadara? Lying was his favorite hobby, but at least I got fancy booze out of it."
"Your first mistake was dating someone from Kadara."
"He had a nice accent. Also, fancy. Booze."
Some dashing rogue had swept her brother off his feet amidst romantically lit but grimy streets. The image had no appeal to Sara. At least her brother seemed okay with it. The last time he dealt with heartbreak, the mere sound of Sara's voice left the guy on his knees, begging her to let him apologize.
"You should meet him," her brother said. "Gil, I mean. He's really funny. Just don't play poker with him. He'll take all your money."
"Smuggle me in a crate…"
"Two angry doctors…"
Sara laughed. "All right, fine. How 'bout a tour? Harry said I couldn't join the Tempest-yet-not that I couldn't look at her. And if I fall over, Doctor Lexi will be there, right?"
"Two great points."
"Just Ryder stubbornness. That's branded into us for life." Hard work, Sara reminded herself, not to be shied from. Might as well get started today. She started off towards the landing pad. "Come on, let's check out those wings, Griff."
Her brother's groan was her shit-eating grin.