Fathers
By: Light-Eco-Sage
Rated: Teen for romance (FemShep and Garrus)
Summary: Garrus is rather indifferent when it comes to his relationship with his father. Not just indifferent, really, but full-blown Daddy Issues. Athena Shepard just can't understand.
Disclaimer: Mass Effect is owned by Bioware.
LES: If you are one of my long-time fans, then you'll know that I don't have a relationship with my father. To be frank, I've got daddy issues. My father emotionally abandoned me and I, in turn, disowned him. But I also can get pretty emotional when it comes to other people's relationships with their fathers. Such as giving up on a good relationship. So I figured that I'd write something for Father's Day since I don't celebrate it in the usual sense. Based on one of my Fem!Shepards: Renegade on the battlefield, Paragon to friends, Spacer, Sole Survivor, black hair, green eyes, infiltrator, romanced Garrus (as usual for my Fem!Shepards). Named after the Greek Goddess of battle and wisdom, and jokes that it only half fits her. Based on a head-canon regarding this Shepard because the Spacer background is more of a 'paragon' background than a Renegade one. Takes place after the perfect ending of Mass Effect 3: Reapers destroyed, Shepard lives.
Now this was a sight that many people thought that they would never see. It was no secret that the great Commander Shepard was absolutely ruthless on the battlefield. A professional to the end, she would complete her mission no matter what it took. Of course, if her mission was a rescue mission or she had to save lives, she would do her damn best to save every life. But she also knew that sacrifice was a part of war. She would, and had, sacrificed during the course of the Reaper War. And people were, naturally, a little scared of her. Like she would come unhinged and attack at the slightest provocation. How little they knew the Commander.
While she would lash out against jerks and assholes without question, she was also quite the opposite with those that she cared about. Become friends with the Commander, and you would begin to see a different side of her: a line drawn in the sand due to her experience on Akuze. She cared about her squad and would not leave any of them behind if there was a choice.
The crew of the Normandy would not think anything of the sight before them, but the average person on the newly rebuilt Citadel didn't know what to think. Commander Athena Shepard, recently released from the hospital, was limping slowly down the street. At her side, supporting her weight with gentle hands was her lover, Garrus Vakarian.
People stared because they could not imagine the famous and ruthless Spectre acting so… tender. They imagined that she'd be more likely to judo-flip anyone touching her like that rather than allowing such contact. But Athena Shepard not only allowed it, but actually thanked him with a smile every time he caught her from losing her balance.
"Athena, are you sure you don't want to sit down?" Garrus asked, after a few times catching her from falling on her face. She had, after all, been in the hospital for quite some time and, despite strong-arming her way out, she would need more time to recover from her ordeal at the end of the war.
"I'm not that weak." Athena grumbled, but he could hear the playfulness in her tone. Turian females often reacted the same way to male over-protectiveness, and it made Garrus laugh to think that maybe their species wasn't that different after all.
"Of course you're not weak." Garrus conceded with a turian grin, his mandibles wide and open. "You're absolutely ready to kick the ass of the next big alien monsters that show up."
"You know it." Athena replied. But he noticed that she had changed course for a small bench. Garrus followed her lead without question. He had followed her without question from day one, and it had been everything he dreamed it would be. Unlike C-Sec, Shepard knew what it took to get the job done, and did it. She and Garrus had clicked right away due to their similar feelings on justice. Ruthless on the battlefield, and a good person to sit and talk to between missions. She was perfect, and looking back, Garrus was not surprised that he had fallen in love with her so deeply.
Yes, love. It had taken him a long time to say that word out loud, but he had been feeling it for the Commander for a long time, all the way back to the original Normandy. He remembered so badly wanting to approach her about how he was feeling for her, but after witnessing her turn down the advances of both Liara and Kaidan… well, he'd lost his nerve. Only to discover two years later that she had the same exact feelings for him.
The time he spent with Athena Shepard were some of the most wonderful times of his life, and he wouldn't trade that time for anything. Despite their differing species, they'd made it work and were now totally committed to each other.
He helped Athena to the bench and sat down next to her. "Well… maybe I'm not ready to fight huge alien monsters like the Reapers just yet." She admitted with a soft groan. "Give me a few days, though, and I'll be back into ass-kicking shape."
Garrus made no reply besides leaning down and pressing his forehead against hers in a turian sign of affection. Athena smiled at him, pressing her lips against his mouth plates only briefly. Turians could not kiss as humans were used to, but the practice was still enjoyable to her, especially when he used his tongue.
"You're selling yourself short, love of my life." Garrus whispered to her. "I'll bet you could take on another Reaper now."
"Shut up." Athena replied playfully, going to kiss him again when Garrus suddenly froze and pulled away from her, staring over her head with the turian equivalent of the expression 'abject horror'.
Athena turned to see what had spooked her lover like that. At first, she couldn't see anything. Despite the rarity of turian-human couples, no one was paying attention to them. Everyone else had their own things to take care of. She scanned the crowd of humans and aliens, trying to see what Garrus saw. And then she saw who it was.
She had never met the man, but the older turian's resemblance to Garrus was unmistakable, and not just from the matching colony markings. That, combined with Garrus' reaction meant that this turian could only be his father.
The elder Vakarian had not seemed to notice them, but Athena was willing to bet that they would not have more than a few more minutes before he did notice his son sitting on the bench in rather close proximity to a human female.
Athena's eyes fell back on Garrus as he turned away from his father. "We should go." He said.
Athena could do little besides stare at her lover in shock. Was he expecting that she would pretend to forget how worried he was about his father during the war? He knew that she had listened in on the frantic call that he had with his father, begging him to get off Palaven before it was too late. She had heard the desperation in his voice, and she knew that he knew it too. She ignored his suggestion and turned her attention back to Garrus' father. "That's your father, right?" She asked.
"Yeah, that's him." He sighed. He could all ready tell that she wasn't going to leave. He may have been a bad turian who was dating his commander (and a human one at that), but even he wasn't bad enough to go against her. He had joined her to be free of red tape, but if she had ended up being one of those 'by the book' sort of people, he still would have stuck it out. That sort of turian instinct was hard-wired.
"He looks good." Athena commented. "I know that you were worried about him with the war going on."
Garrus gave a little snort. "I knew it would take a lot more than Reapers to bring that tough old bastard down. I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to handcuff one."
Athena laughed a little. And then her eyes grew more serious and Garrus felt his heart sink. "You should go talk to him, Garrus. I'm sure that he's been worried about you."
"He knows that I'm alive." Garrus replied. "And I know that's good enough for his disappointment of a son. You know that my father and I never got along, and it's just… well… he thinks that you are a bad influence on me."
"Oh? Am I?" Athena asked.
"From his point of view? Definitely." Garrus nodded, a distinctly human gesture that he'd picked up during his time on the Normandy. "He doesn't approve of how much gunning outside the lines we've done."
Athena sighed. She'd had this talk with Garrus before. On the one hand, she understood that regulations were there to keep civilians safe. But it's not like criminals operated inside the bounds of the law. In order to bring the worst of the criminals in, you needed to work outside the law as well. It was like when she first met Garrus. A C-Sec officer bound by the law and red tape trying to find incriminating evidence on a Spectre where even the contents of his morning breakfast was classified and a free pass to do whatever the fuck he wanted? It wouldn't take a genius to realize why Garrus' investigation had failed.
"But you are still his son." Athena said. "He should be proud of you."
Garrus turned to look at her. He'd rarely heard her speak like this. In fact, he'd never really seen her push people into meeting those that they didn't want to talk to. During the fight with the Collectors, she'd let Miranda walk away from talking to her sister. And then she accepted when Liara didn't want to talk to her father. So why was she pushing for Garrus to talk to his father? "Why are you pushing this?" He asked.
Shepard sighed, and leaned forward on her elbows. Then she winced and pulled back. Garrus watched with concern, afraid that she had really hurt herself, but she shook her head. "I'm fine, really, Garrus. Stop worrying."
"I'll stop worrying when you're healed." Garrus said. "Now stop changing the subject. I know what you are doing."
She sighed again. "Have I ever told you about my father?"
Garrus stared at her for a moment thoughtfully. They'd spoken about her mother before, but Garrus was sure that he'd never heard a word about her father. He knew that Shepard had a good relationship with her mother, who was an Admiral with the Alliance. He'd even met Hannah Shepard once, and he'd thought that she was a good person. She'd hardly blinked when she learned that her daughter was dating a turian, just asked if she was happy with him. "No, I don't think I've ever heard about your father… at all." Now that Garrus thought about it, he'd never heard anything about Athena Shepard's father. Not even in the files of her that he studied during his investigation of Saren.
"Well, there's a bit of a reason for that. I know who my father is, but I've never met him and I don't have plans on ever meeting him."
"What? Why not?" Garrus asked.
"Because he's in a prison on Earth." Athena replied.
Garrus stared. Of course, this news didn't change his opinion about his lover. He didn't care if her father was a criminal, because he knew Athena Shepard. "If I may ask… what did he do?"
She sighed. "My mother had just recently been accepted into the Alliance when my father started making passes at her. My mother wasn't interested, so she kept refusing." Garrus stared in confusion. Her mother wasn't interested in the man that would become the father of her child? That didn't make sense. "One day, he followed my mother to a bar that she liked and slipped a date-rape drug into her drink."
Garrus blinked. "I'm sorry, Shepard, but I think that my translator glitched. I didn't catch the meaning of that one word. 'Rape'?" His pronunciation of the word was awful, given his differently shaped mouth, the 'p' sound becoming a click of his mandibles because of his lack of lips.
Athena stared. "Turians don't have an equivalent to the word 'rape'?" She asked in shock.
"It means nothing to me." Garrus replied.
"Well, rape refers to a crime where you force a person to have a sexual encounter without their consent." Athena explained. "A date-rape drug like the one that my father used knocks the person out so that they are unable to fight back."
Garrus listened to her explanation in shock and horror. Humans would force other humans to have sex against their will? It certainly was unheard of for turians. First of all, it was physically impossible to force a turian into a sexual encounter if they were not aroused due to the plating that protected the genital areas of both males and females. Secondly, male turians rarely heard the word 'no' anyway. A female usually only refused if she was in heat and didn't want a child, or if she was all ready bonded. And if a male did get told no, there were always 'other fish in the sea', as it were. Trying to force a lost cause when, odds were, there were other females who would have sex with you was considered foolish.
"He got caught and punished very severely." Athena said. "The fact that he was an Alliance officer and that he used a drug on my mother was bad enough, but law enforcement discovered after my mother filed her report that she was not the first to have been raped by him. My mother soon learned that she was pregnant."
"Humans can get pregnant from a forced sexual encounter?" Garrus asked.
Athena nodded. "Some animals on Earth have developed measures to protect them from rape, or from conceiving from a rape. But humans never did. Our race became largely monogamous as we became civilized, but as animals we are polygamous."
Garrus had almost forgotten that monogamy was not a fact of life for humans. Sure, turians slept around plenty during their younger years, but once they met their mate, that was it for them. Humans simply choose monogamy.
"I'm really sorry that your father was such an awful man, Athena, but I still fail to see what this has to do with my father."
"Garrus, I don't give a fuck about my father and, odds are, he doesn't give a fuck about me. He probably doesn't even know about me. My mother was a strong woman who raised me to the best of her ability even though my birth was not planned. So, yeah, I've got Daddy Issues too. But it also kills me inside when I see someone throw away something good." Athena placed her hand over his and gave his fingers a reassuring squeeze. "Your father loves you, I'm sure of it."
"You've never even met him." Garrus replied.
"Okay, you want to know how I know that he loves you?" Athena asked. "Because he hasn't given up on you. If you were really that big of a disappointment, and if he really didn't care about you, then he still wouldn't be trying. Just go try, Garrus." She turned to look. Vakarian Senior was getting closer and would spot them soon.
Garrus glanced between Athena and his father, before he stood up with a sigh. "At least wait here for a bit." He began to walk towards his father, who noticed his son's approach right away.
Athena Shepard didn't have to be an expert on turian body language to know that her instincts had been right. Papa Vakarian did still care for his son, even if he didn't agree with his son's life choices.
Maybe the elder Vakarian would freak out when he learned that his son had chosen a human as a mate, but she knew that a true father's love would prevail.
LES: If I admitted the real inspiration behind this story, I would have to go ahead and die of embarrassment.