Excerpt:
"Wait!" He called helplessly from his spot on the floor. "Wait! Come back!" Panic gripped his heart like a vice as he watched his answer-source slip away from him. "I don't know who I am! I don't know who I am!"
His voice fell on deaf ears, swallowed up in a chorus of moans and wails from the room's other occupants. His voice was just another drop in a sea of outcry for both help and answers.
Disclaimers:
1) I own nothing.
2) Cover art was commissioned by Beth Ad Astra. To view full image, you can find Raking Over The Ashes under my username: Some_Writer. To view more of Beth Ad Astra's work, you can find her at bethadastra on Tumblr.
A/N:
If you're reading this without having read my other story, The Primarch's Order, you won't get the full context for chapters four and five.
This was originally intended to be a simple oneshot to satisfy my muse. Then my muse ran away with me and I ended up with this. :)
The Presidium 2190
8:22 am
Two turians and a human paraded down a long corridor located inside the impressive Citadel Tower. Plush, red carpet muffled the sounds of their footfalls as they walked, though few were around to hear them anyway.
At the head of the pack, the human and one of the turians walked side by side, heads held high for they had walked their current path times beyond counting by that point. Trailing behind them, his gaze locked on his mismatched feet, was the second turian, whom was still coming to terms with his new name.
'No,' he mentally admonished. "My old one"
"We're almost there." He looked up upon hearing the other turian's voice. Blue eyes, one behind an ever-present visor, regarded him with a mixture of equal parts curiosity and pity. He looked away from the other turian to cast his gaze further down the hallway. "When we get there, I want you to wait outside and let me do all the talking."
"Is that really necessary? He's my father," he countered without heat.
"Oh, it's necessary." Garrus Vakarian exchanged a look with his mate, the redheaded woman that just so happened to be the Hero of the Galaxy. "Trust me. A lot has changed since you've been gone."
He never imagined he'd be escorted to a Councilor's chambers by two Spectres.
Nerves began to twist his gut into tight knots so he chose to remain silent for the rest of the walk. He didn't trust his sub-harmonics not to betray his unease.
Once they arrived outside an extremely secure door, true to his word, Vakarian raised his omni-tool and began the process of removing the security from the locking mechanism. As the program ran, he took a moment to reach for Commander Shepard's elbow, just a fleeting touch accompanied by the exchange of two brief smiles before the door opened and he separated himself from the trio.
The second he moved inside a voice, almost as recognizable to him as his own, thundered through the doorway.
"You're late, Vakarian."
It didn't sound happy.
"Nice to see you too, Councilor." He heard Garrus' sarcastic retort just a second before the metal door closed between them, leaving him alone with the very stoic Commander Shepard.
She leaned casually against the wall with one leg bent to brace her boot against the bulkhead. Her eyes were trained on the wall opposite from him, refusing to look at him. That's how she had been the moment he met up with her and Vakarian that morning. She hardly uttered three words to him, which served to further tighten the knots in his belly.
Had he done something wrong?
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible as he watched her watch the wall. Then her eyes darted to meet his gaze and he was too late to stop himself from looking away. He pretended to find something truly fascinating about the very wall she'd been staring at.
She exhaled loudly; a sign that it was safe to look at her again.
She said nothing, but the direction of her stare had moved to the floor.
Feeling both brave and desperate to abate the awkward silence, he tried for conversation. "Aren't you going in too?"
She didn't look up right away, and for a horrible second he thought she would deign not to answer him at all. Thankfully, her lips pulled back into a clearly forced smile and she told him, "It's Spectre business they're talking about, first and foremost."
Confused by her answer, he asked, "But aren't you...?"
"Technically yes, but I only just got full use of my legs back." Her smile seemed to grow more generous when she added, "All that sitting around hasn't left me in the shape I used to be. So until I fix that, I'm off duty."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"Are you not allowed to...?" He wasn't quite sure how to finish his question, but she apparently picked up on his meaning, evidenced by the humorous snort she gave.
"Nothing like that. Your dad doesn't mind me joining in for the mission reports. He probably figures Garrus will just tell me everything anyway." Their gazes locked again and her smile faded from her face as quickly as it appeared. "Honestly, I just wanted to stay out here with you."
He felt his mandible pinch to his jaw, insulted at her insinuation. "I'm not running away."
"And I wouldn't try to stop you if you did," she told him with a voice like stone. "You don't have to do this. You have a new life now. A new identity. No one else knows you're alive and it can stay that way if you want." There was a hollowness in the way she spoke... Envy perhaps.
He spared the metal door beside him a thoughtful glance as he contemplated his next words. He could admit the temptation her offer held. However, he had grown tired of being a victim of circumstance. This was his choice to make, a decision all his own. Resolved, he looked back at the human and caught her watching him intently.
"No," he answered. He then added, simply, "He's my father."
"Okay." Her tone was quiet and she nodded her head.
The silence between them grew less awkward and more companionable, though she still seemed reproachful in her demeanor. At least he felt confident in deducing that she wasn't angry with him, judging the conversation they just shared.
Feeling emboldened, he asked, "Is... there something wrong, Commander?"
At his question, her eyes darted to the ceiling and she bit down on the inside of her bottom lip. She remained that way, but he would wait for his answer. Whatever it was, it troubled the human greatly. Finally, she tore her eyes from the ceiling and rooted him in place with her stare.
She looked... guilty.
"Yes. What's wrong is that you're alive."
He endeavored to ignore the sting brought on from her comment. Perhaps he read her wrong after all.
"I see."
"What's wrong is that you were alive when I thought for sure you were dead. You were alive and I left you behind in that desert. That's what's wrong." Her eyes bore into his face before they disappeared under her hand as she rested her palm against her brow, fingernails biting into her scalp. "What's wrong is that I fucked up horribly."
Definitely guilt.
Out of habit, he emitted a comforting hum, forgetting the futility of it on a non-turian.
"Commander, I saw the footage last night. You had no reason to think I survived that."
"It doesn't matter. I'm wondering what your father will think of me when he learns the truth."
"My father is turian. You had a war to attend to, alliances to form. It would have been a waste of time to go back for me. In your position he would have done the same."
She looked like she wanted to argue further, but ultimately decided against it. Instead, she pressed her back against the wall and slid down to the floor. Their height difference was considerable before, but as he looked down on her now, sitting on the floor, she was almost child-like.
"I want to know what happened to you," she confessed without looking at him.
"It's a long-"
"Please." She looked up at him then, a ghost of a smile playing on her lips. "We got time. They haven't even started the mission report yet."
That confused him.
"But Vakarian's been in there a while now."
Shepard grimaced. "It's a thing your dad does. He sits you down at his desk while he ignores you for a while and continues working in absolute silence. It's a power-play thing."
He shot her a look that conveyed his disbelief. "That... doesn't sound like my dad."
The look of pity returned to her eyes and her frown deepened. "I'm not so sure that is your dad anymore."
He was forced to clamp down on his second larynx to stifle the sad warble that nearly escaped him. It hurt to think of his father, the proud and decorated general, well-loved by all that served under him, reduced to a barefaced politician. The very thing he had hated most.
A memory of watching a turian soldier be forcibly converted into a reaper husk came unbidden to his mind. Then the soldier wore his father's face and he was unable to smother his solemn warble then.
"Hey," she soothed, having picked up on his slip-up. Her time with Vakarian seemed to leave her well-versed in the nuances of turian expression. "If anyone can get through to Adrien Victus, it's Garrus."
"Are they close?"
"They were for a time."
That caused his curiosity to overpower his former distress. "I wasn't aware my dad-"
He was swiftly caught off by a ring of laughter.
"It wasn't like that." Her grin broadened. "Though you'd think so by the way they bicker like an old married couple." She shook her head, her smile slowly fading, but not completely. "No. Victus just values Garrus' opinion and he holds him in high regard... That, at least, hasn't changed."
Resigned to leaving his fate in Vakarian's -hopefully- capable hands, he gave her a slow nod.
Commander Shepard patted her hand against the space of floor beside her and she looked up at him expectantly. "Now, will you please tell me your story?"
He eyed the square of carpet she'd invited him to for several heartbeats before he slowly lowered himself to the floor, pressing his cowl against the wall. He took a breath to settle his nerves and looked at the woman sitting beside him.
"Alright, Commander."
Tuchanka 2186
[Time unknown]
'Victory at any cost.'
The words flitted through his mind like a swarm of crawling insects, but he couldn't pinpoint the location of the hive. His whole right side was alight with agonizing pain and he wanted to scream, to call for help but found it impossible. He could hardly draw breath let alone emote any kind of sound. Besides, he didn't know who he would call out to even if he could. His lungs burned as hot as the rest of his body under the crushing weight of what felt like a large, metal plate.
Every part of him hurt and the allure to succumb to the pain, to close his eyes and rest for just a minute was almost overwhelming. However, another part of him screamed, 'Get out! Survive!'
If he allowed himself to rest, he would die.
He opened his eyes- eye... his right one hurt too much and was too clotted with dirt, and what could only be blood, to force it open. All around him, rock and soil pressed in on his large body. A logical part of his mind deduced that he somehow ended up in a ditch just deep enough to accommodate him, and the metal plate across his body kept him pinned within the oppressive walls. Panic began to worm its way into the crevasses of his brain as he became increasingly aware of how much the claustrophobic space restricted his movement.
A vestigial part of himself scolded him for even allowing room for the panic to sink in. He had to school his mind to remain calm and figure out what resources he had at his disposal.
Could he still move his extremities?
He drew breath through his nose -as much as he could, anyway- and tried to wiggle his fingers on his left hand. All three responded. He tried his right- the side that hurt- and rejoiced when they too responded. Now his furthest extremities. He felt the sensation of the toes in his left boot reacting, not so much his other one. It would seem his entire right side took the brunt of the plate's impact against his body.
Two functioning arms and one leg; He could work with that.
Another hard-fought breath of air later and he lifted his hands to push up and against the weight of the metal slab above him. He quickly grasped the difficulty of the task when he discovered how heavy his arms felt coupled with having no leverage from his position on his back. The metal groaned as it settled back over him.
Another breath and he tried again, closing his eye against the dirt and rocks that started raining down on him as the metal plate began to shift against the walls of dirt.
'Spirits, it's hot!'
Had that heat been resting against his right side while he was unconscious?
"Fuck!" He cursed at both the strain and the pain he earned for his effort.
To his great chagrin, the slab of metal stopped giving when he sensed he had pressed it up against an even larger object nearly on top of him. He couldn't see it, but he could feel more heat radiating off of it, finally burning through the gauntlets on his hands.
'What the fuck happened?'
Exhausted, he gave up his struggle against the inanimate object and his body went limp in the dirt. He was tired and the temptation to die was becoming severe, but the thought that it would undoubtedly be a slow death in this tight space was unappealing. That, and the thought that his body would likely never be found.
Who would mourn him?
Amber eyes and a tattooed face.
He would, but who was...?
A sudden wave of pain washed the question away and he recoiled the best he could from the lid on his heated cage. Tapped out, he laid on his back, shoulders pressing into the walls of soil. He had to come to terms with the fact that he was unable to push the plate off him and he was too wide to shimmy up the trench to escape underneath it...
Or was he?
Slowly, gingerly, he rolled further onto his left side, finding that what little he succeeded in pushing against the plate created enough space for himself to move his leg and shoulders. He managed to free his left arm from beneath him and used it to begin clawing his way out from his prison. Though he did his best to avoid contact with the plate, he still felt the hot metal further sear the right side of his face and shoulder.
He reached out, kicking with his good leg to grab a handful of clay and used it to pull himself along. Over and over he did this, ignoring the pain that shot down the entire length of his right side with each and every twitch of his muscles.
Kick. Reach. Pull.
Kick. Reach. Pull.
The trench began to climb vertically, which made his rhythm even harder to keep, but when he looked up he could make out light shining down on him. He was almost there.
Wherever there was.
Kick. Reach. Pull.
Kick. Reach. Pull.
'Just a little further.'
He was tempted to shut his eye against the invasive light when it hit his face, but he didn't. It served as a nice distraction from the pain.
At last, like a baby sprouting from a birth canal, his head came out the other side of the crevasse and he could finally see the source of the hot temperature that nearly cooked him. He wasn't initially sure what it was, but a voice in his mind supplied the word, 'Bomb.'
Needing no further incentive to distance himself, he braced his hands on the metal plate that trapped him -'Protected me?'- and he began to pull himself up until he was sprawled on his back out in the open. He gave himself a moment to gulp down lungfuls of sweet air like he'd been suffocating for hours. He probably had been.
Once his heart rate had settled he slowly climbed to his feet.
The first thing he noticed was the smell of burning flesh that permeated the air around him, replacing the smell of soil. He couldn't be sure how much originated from his own flesh and how much was from his surroundings.
Upon looking around, he discovered that his task was incomplete. He had been buried inside some sort of quarry, it's tall walls stretched up high above him. Thankfully, there was a stone staircase nearby that hadn't retained too much damage from the blast. He could still scale what steps remained. So he did, the already arduous task made more difficult by both the leg that refused to work for him and the tightness of his burned hide with each pull of his overexerted muscles.
When he eventually reached the top, the scene he took in did little to relieve him.
Bodies, and lots of them. Bodies of both turians and humans littered the ground. The humans wore white, heavy-plated armor with a black and orange symbol he knew he should recognize, but the name wouldn't come to him.
The turians though...
He slowly approached one that was sprawled out on a metal platform near a console. The smell of decay should have been his first clue of the man's state without having to see the blue and gray matter spilling from the bullet hole in his head. He didn't look like he'd been dead long, but bodies don't last long in sweltering temperatures. His eye traveled down from the ruin of the man's head to examine the black and red armor he was dressed in. On his chest was an emblem that read: The Ninth Platoon.
Glancing down at his own charred armor revealed similarities between himself and the dead man, but if he had an emblem on his chest, it had been burned away.
"It's too risky. We'll lose more of us in a head-on assault!" He remembered saying to the dead turian. "We skirt the enemy."
"D-did I do this to you?" He asked the unresponsive body, trying hard to ignore the horror that took hold of his heart and failed. "Did I do this?"
He looked around, taking in every pair of black, sightless eyes that appeared to stare back him. Accusing him.
"Spirits!" He cried, feeling his breath grow heavy. "Did I do this?!"
"Over here! I heard something!"
He snapped around to the source of the loud, unmistakably krogan voice. Horror had yet to let up its oppressive grip over his heart. If anything, it squeezed tighter. Of its own accord, his hand followed a familiar destination to the gun at his hip, but closed around empty air.
Did it fall off in the trench?
He scrambled for a hiding spot, but his damaged limb made him too slow and he heard, "There! I think it's one of those marauder bastards!"
'A what?'
A bullet flew past him and he instinctively dove for the ground. Desperate for a shield, he dragged himself along on his belly, his muscles screaming in protest as his hands clawed for the nearest cover; A large hunk of twisted metal.
'For all the good it'll do me,' he bitterly thought to himself.
"Naash, wait!" A second low voice boomed.
"What?" The first voice snapped.
"Marauders don't move like that! Put your gun down. I think it's a turian."
"I'm not seeing the problem, Toxx."
"Naash!" The second voice thundered, angry now and the first krogan fell silent.
The sound of footsteps grew louder and louder as the source approached his place of cover, but it was impossible to tell which footsteps they belonged to; the first voice or the second. One wanted to kill him but the other didn't.
"Remember. A turian is never completely unarmed," a wise man once told him. Though he couldn't place the name.
Amber eyes and a tattooed face.
He flexed his talons and steeled himself for either a fight or getting immediately shot in the face. In either case, he struggled to his feet and moved out from behind his shitty barricade, attempting to hide his limp as he did so.
He couldn't appear weak.
"Easy there," the owner of the second voice soothed as the krogan continued to slowly advance on him. Large hands were held up in a mollifying gesture like the krogan was nearing an injured animal and he watched him with a pair of gray eyes that looked out from beneath the blue-green plating that armored his wide head. "You look like you need some help."
The krogan seemed friendly enough, but the turian was unable to abate the wariness he felt at his presence. His posture remained rigid, talons flexed, ready to tear into him the second he charged. He imagined it will be no different from the perceaclops he used to hunt on Palaven.
'The eyes are the most vulnerable part of a krogan. That's where you should aim and always remember to never let one grab you. If one does, you've lost.'
He blinked hard at the unbidden thoughts.
"I'm Toxx." The krogan holstered his shotgun, apparently not threatened by the show of talons. "That idiot up there is Naash." He gestured with his thumb to said idiot. The other krogan stared down from atop a large ridge. "Got a name?"
The turian blinked again at the question, unsure of how to answer.
After a moment of waiting, the krogan- Toxx sighed. "Look, kid. I'm probably the friendliest krogan you're going to meet here. We're all pretty pissed at your Primarch. If you tell me your name, I'll make sure you get home."
"Leave him!" The rust-colored krogan called down from his perch. "He'll be dead soon enough out here anyway!"
Toxx ignored his companion and continued to wait for an answer.
"I... I don't know," he replied.
Toxx stared at him for several heartbeats, obviously waiting for him to elaborate, before he emitted a frustrated sigh. "He's right, you know. You won't last out here and I guarantee no one's comin' for you. So unless you tell me your name-"
"I don't know!" He repeated. "I don't remember. I'm a soldier... I think. But that's it."
The krogan blinked at him and he could almost see the gears working behind the gray eyes. "I see. I guess the best I can do for you then is to get you on a shuttle to the Citadel."
"The Citadel?"
"They got refugee camps there with dextro food and medicine, which we don't have. And if you don't mind me saying-" Toxx shot him a sideways glance "-I'd say that's something you sorely need. Pretty sure you turians are supposed to have two eyes and two of those mandibles."
Unsure of the offer, the turian took another look at his surroundings, his eye landing on each and every still form crumpled in the yellow sand. A well of guilt bubbled inside him, but he couldn't put a name or reason behind him. The carnage elicited a hatred that refused to be stifled. A hatred towards himself that made him want to lie down near the closest turian corpse and die alongside him.
"What about...?" He gestured to the death that surrounded them, knowing exactly how young and naive he sounded. It didn't matter. He didn't want to leave them to rot more than they already had. For some reason, he couldn't shake the suspicion that he was responsible.
"What about 'em? They'll probably be collected later. Right now it's you or them."
Stranded in a hostile wasteland, he realized he had little choice but to reluctantly trust the krogan. The abatement of the adrenaline that had been coursing through him had been made abundantly clear the second he took a tentative step forward. He cringed at the pain that shot up his all but useless leg the instant it was forced to accept the smallest amount of his weight. The flinch did not go unnoticed by his new companion, but instead of mockery he was surprised to receive an almost sympathetic look.
"Here- uh... Let me give you a hand."
"I'm fine!" The young turian snapped without really meaning to. Guilt was quick to punish him for his rash reaction when the krogan rolled his eyes before he turned and kneeled on one knee, presenting his back.
"What are you doing?" He asked, hearing the question echoed, albeit significantly louder, from the other krogan. He knew the question was unnecessary because the intention was very clear. He was forced to ignore the bullet to his pride.
"What's it look like? You're gonna slow us down on that bum leg o' yours, boy. I meant it when I said you won't last out here. Neither will we, especially if Kalros heard all the commotion out here."
"Kalros?"
"Mother of all thresher maws," he answered, aiming a toothy grin over his shoulder. "Now get on. Don't got all day."
He eyed the expanse of the krogan's back skeptically. "Are you certain carrying me won't slow us down more?"
Toxx scoffed. "Please, kid. I'm pretty sure I've got a good-oh... five-hundred pounds on you. What're you, two-hundred something?"
"Something like that." At least he thought so.
"We don't got all day, kid," Toxx repeated. "You comin' or not?"
The turian took a brief moment to weigh his options, each bleaker than the last. By the end, he saw little choice but to acquiesce. Reluctantly, and slowly, he climbed onto the krogan's back. At first he wasn't sure where to place his hands, but after some extremely awkward experimentation he sufficed by gripping onto the rim of his hump. He felt Toxx's arms curl around the backs of his legs to support him and he had to fight the panic that swelled instantly in his chest.
However, Toxx was correct in his ability to carry him. He did so damned near effortlessly. With his head lowered and back hunched, he charged up the embankment where his -comparatively large- companion waited for him. Once at the top, the other krogan sneered at the turian before swiveling his head and marched off ahead of them, setting a brisk pace that Toxx easily kept up with.
He wasn't sure how far their destination was or even where it was. Spirits, he was hardly confident of its existence at all. Perhaps it was all a rues orchestrated by two psychotic krogan so that they could have their fun with a vulnerable turian plaything. Though something in the, dare he thought it, tender way Toxx supported his weight made him doubt the presence of any ill intent. He was surprised at how conscientious of his injuries the krogan appeared to be as he seemed to make an effort not to jostle him.
After what seemed like a few hours had past and his adrenaline further declined, he started to feel a sense of drowsiness descend upon him. The rocking, back-and-forth motion under the hot sun was having an almost hypnotic effect on him. In addition, the pain in his leg had practically dulled completely. He had to wonder whether or not that was a good thing.
Toxx must have felt the weight shift when he came close to nodding off for the umpteenth time. "Comfortable?" He heard him rumble. The turian forced his working eye open to find a gray, slitted eye peering up at him from over his shoulder in a fabulous example of the monocular vision of krogan.
"Sorry," he said, feeling slightly embarrassed at the slur in his speech.
"S'fine. More concerned about you dying on me."
"If he does, get him off quick. I ain't gonna help you scrub turian excrement from your back," the other krogan- Naash, chimed in.
"Pleasant," Toxx retorted. His gray eye swiveled back to regard his passenger again. "Don't listen to Naash. He's all bark."
"He did shoot at me," the turian dryly reminded him.
"And missed," Toxx countered with a glib smile.
"On purpose!" Naash defended, his voice indignant.
"Sure," Toxx jabbed.
The two went on like that for some time. Bickering appeared to be common practice for them, but it appeared to be good-natured. Playful even.
"So what do we call you?" Toxx asked some time later. The young turian had long since tuned out the squabbling between the two krogan so he was caught off guard by the voice suddenly directed at him. He had been nodding off again.
"You're not keeping it!" Naash warned.
Toxx rolled his eyes. "What're you talking about, now?"
"You're naming it!"
"He's not an 'it,' Naash. And I'm not naming him!"
"Sure sounds like it."
"He has a name, he just doesn't remember."
"How about Pipsqueak?"
"Stop it."
"Pyjack?"
"You're not helping."
"Felix."
"You're being ridic-" Toxx trailed off, blinking at his companion's back. "What?"
"Felix. It's a turian name. I-uh... knew a turian bounty hunter once. That's what he changed his name to after a few close calls in his career." Without looking back to regard the krogan-turian duo, Naash deadpanned. "That was over two-hundred years ago so he's dead now. Not even his name could save him from time." He added the last part with a chuckle. Krogan always seemed to find humor regarding the passage of time.
"What does it mean?" Toxx asked, sounding rather intrigued.
"It means 'lucky'," Felix informed him gloomily. With only a single eye and mandible left, a crippled leg, a missing life shrouded in murky memory, and a whole legion of dead soldiers in his wake he felt anything but.
After what seemed like hours, the trio at last arrived at what Felix supposed could pass as civilization. For krogan, at any rate. Crumbled streets, shelled buildings, ceilings patched with tarps, twisted wire and rebar as far as the eye could see, and temperature still forecast as hot-as-fuck.
'Yup, krogan society. Ah, and here come the upstanding citizens now,' Felix thought to himself as he peered over the top of Toxx's head with his good eye. They appeared to be heading straight for his mount in particular, a snarl on each of their faces, but they were cut off by Naash's massive bulk as he stepped between them and Toxx.
"What's wrong, Jorgal," one of the opposing krogan spat the name at Naash like an insult. "Don't want to share your little turian with us?"
Naash didn't respond, verbally anyway. Instead he sent his brow crashing into the other krogan's face. As the other krogan reeled, he growled, "Say my clan's name like that again, Weyrloc and I'll use your skull as my personal ryncol flask."
"With a fucked up face like that, he's too ugly anyway." The other growled as he picked his friend up and they stomped away.
'I just got called ugly by a krogan. Ouch.'
He couldn't even remember what his face looked like.
Toxx took the time to carry him to a ramshackle building that could only be the krogan's home. He tried to carefully set him down on a large cot, but Felix had become so delirious that he crashed to the bed in a heap, groaning at the pain that shot through his hide like a thousand hot needles.
The krogan frowned. "You don't look good, kid. I wish I had some food to give you, but everything I've got won't do you any favors."
Felix slumped on the bed, thankful that he was just able to twist his face so his healthy side took the fall. He felt too tired and too sick to answer. His eye slid shut, no longer concerned if the krogan decided to kill him.
Just before he drifted off, he heard heavy footsteps stomp out of the room. He couldn't be sure how long he laid there, but just before sleep fully claimed him, he felt the sting of a damp cloth against the exposed ruin of his face. At the contact, he had to bite back the hiss of pain that threatened to leave him.
"Next shuttle for the Citadel isn't leaving until tomorrow morning." He heard Toxx rumble as he dipped the sullied cloth into a soapy bucket of water only to return it to his face a heartbeat later. "Think you'll live through the night?"
No. He felt sick and delirious and he couldn't shake the bitter resentment he felt for himself. It was all enough to make him open his mouth, intent on requesting to be taken back, to be allowed to die with the men he left behind, but no sound left him when he tried. Instead, he utilized a slow blink as his answer.
Toxx frowned before he dropped the rag in the bucket, the water now colored an inky blue. He then dipped his hand in his pocket and withdrew a tube of medigel. "Yeah... didn't think so. This medigel should help though." With a gentleness Felix never thought possible from a krogan, Toxx began to smear some of the gel on the burned portions of his face.
The relief was both instant and unwelcome. He didn't deserve this kindness when so many were dead.
Once he was satisfied with what little he could do with his face, Toxx turned his attention to the armor. "This has to come off, you know." He didn't wait for his consent before his fingers went to the clasps.
Felix didn't want to look at the state of his body as the plate was peeled away so he chanced a glance at the krogan's face. He regretted it instantly when he was met with a deep, troubled grimace.
"You're gonna need something to bite down on," was all the warning he got before a questionably clean cloth was shoved into his mouth. Toxx then reached down and ripped the armor from his hide. The cloth did little to stifle his scream.
"I know it hurts, kid. I'm sorry." The krogan rumbled before going to work on the next part of his armor- his torso, particularly the part located around his sensitive waist. Felix found the nerve to reach for the krogan's wrist, pleading with him to stop. He had no words, but when the krogan looked up at the contact, Felix shook his head.
Did Toxx not understand how sensitive a turian's waist was?
Felix received nothing except a sympathetic look for his effort, insinuating that he did understand, before he repeated, "It's got to come off, kid," and he tore the armor free.
Mercifully, Felix lost conscientiousness soon after.
He wasn't sure how long he was out, but when he next opened his eye the room had darkened significantly. If he focused hard enough on the wall across from him he could see little stars shining through the bullet holes. Night had fallen.
He then noticed a large, krogan-shaped form slumped on the floor, large head resting back against the wall. Panic rose in him, a knee-jerk reaction, until he reminded himself that if Toxx was going to kill him, he probably would have done so already. However, he was too late to stop the surprised gasp that left him, causing the krogan to glance over at him at the sound.
"Well look at that, you've made it halfway through the night," he commented from his spot on the floor. "I bandaged your face best I could. Never had to doctor a turian before so they're a little sloppy."
Felix tentatively reached up to touch the bandages that had been fastened to his face. His fingers trailed up the fabric, up and up until they came to rest on the patch secured over his right eye.
"Sorry. That's gone," Toxx informed him. "Your leg isn't looking good either, but I'll leave that to the docs on the Citadel to make that call. Hopefully it won't kill you before then."
Great. One eye, one mandible, and one leg. The irony of his new name was becoming painfully apparent.
"Brought you a water bottle," Toxx pointed to the bedside table. Felix glanced over, feeling just how thirsty he was upon seeing it and he reached for his prize greedily. Then he realized the difficulty of drinking from a bottle with half his face immobilized by bandages so he forced himself to slow down.
"I checked your wrists for an omni-tool, thinking I could get some information about you from it, but it was fried," Toxx explained as if he hadn't overstepped a very private boundary while Felix was incapacitated. "You must have a pretty high-tech translator embedded in that skull of yours if it's able to operate independently from your omni-tool."
Felix chose not to comment, too focused on the task of transporting the water from the plastic bottle into his dry maw. After he succeeded in his task enough times to feel relatively satisfied, he made an attempt to break the silence.
"Thanks," he rasped. "For... this."
"Ah," Toxx smiled and waved a dismissive hand. "I couldn't leave you out there. Not all krogan are heartless brutes- well... Most of us are, but not all."
"Is this your home?"
"Yeah."
"It's nice," he endeavored to sound convincingly polite.
"No it's not. It's a shit hole."
'So much for that.'
"I take it you got your medical degree here?" He tried for a joke.
Toxx snorted. "No. Naash gets in a lot of fights so eventually I learned how to patch him up."
"Does he live here too?"
"You ask a lot of questions. No. Why would he?"
"Oh. You two just seem- er... close. I could hear it in your voices when you were talking to each other." Toxx stared at him. "It's a turian thing. We're sensitive to different vocal inflections."
"I can't imagine turians excel much at lying, then."
"So people think. Believe it or not, it's quite the opposite. If you can get away with lying to a turian, you can lie to anyone."
"Interesting," Toxx drawled, making his loaded response clear as he shot Felix a pointed look.
"I never said I was one of those good liars," Felix defended.
"How would you know if you can't remember?"
Felix opened his mouth, ready with a retort, but after a pause he shut it again. The krogan had him there. After a moment of thought, he asked, "Why would I lie about my memory loss?"
Toxx shrugged. "I don't know. Could be you're someone important or maybe the son of someone important and you're afraid we'd ransom you off."
"Would you?"
"Before this mess with the Reapers? Probably. Now that Wrex and the female shaman are trying to negotiate with the Primarch we're all on our best behavior."
"Sorry. Reapers?"
Toxx looked at him as if he'd sprouted a second head. "Shit... you really don't remember, do you." Frustrated at his own limitations, Felix looked away from the krogan to scowl down at the sheets over his lap. "Look, this might come as a surprise to you, but-"
And Toxx launched into the story of the apparent invasion of the entire galaxy, happening as they spoke. He told him of giant, horrific metal creatures with the ability to indoctrinate individuals and control thralls. He told him of husks and brutes and marauders; turned humans, turians, and krogans to be used as shock troops under the sentient machines.
"That's what we thought you were, at first," Toxx explained. "The staggered way you were movin', your damaged face. There's been a lot of 'em around here lately."
Soldiers impaled on giant spikes. Their screams of pain and terror filled the air around him. They knew their fate. They had seen it countless times before their turn.
Soon, his turn would come.
He too would become one of those abominations, gunning down the people he loved.
Amber eyes and a tattooed face.
"Fuck." His hand came up to clutch at his brow, talons digging into what little plate was exposed. "I was fighting those things," he confessed, voice still trembling at the memory. "I remember."
"And you'll fight more of them soon enough, I'm sure," the krogan told him, his voice grave. Felix had nothing to say in response. All he could do was tremble as his mind dredged up accusations and scornful comments.
After several minutes of silence, Toxx said, "How much do they teach you about krogan society at your fancy school? Other than how best to kill us, I mean."
Still caught up on the horrific scraps of memory his mind had begun ripping and pulling to the surface, he remained silent so Toxx continued on without prompt. "Naash doesn't live with me because, according to our culture, our relationship is wrong. He's my mate in all but name, but as long as we're here on Tuchanka, we can never acknowledge it. That's the way we've lived for the last... century, I guess."
The sorrow he heard in Toxx's tone dragged Felix's attention from the nightmares his mind supplied him with and brought it back to the krogan. He didn't know what else to say except, "I'm sorry."
Toxx shrugged. The shadows that flitted across him painted an ancient look on his visage. "Yeah. Me too, kid."
The rest of the night past them by slowly with Felix slipping in and out of conscientiousness. Each time his eyes opened to find his guardian keeping watch on his behalf, he felt less and less afraid. By the time morning finally came and he was loaded up on the cargo ship, he felt a twinge of disappointment at having to leave such a good and gentle man behind in the Tuchanka wastes. He deserved better.
"This is where I leave you, kid," Toxx began as he lowered him down into a makeshift nest he'd set up out of packaging crates and bubble wrap. It was a cargo ship, after all, and the krogan crew were not keen on giving up a precious bunk to a turian. "All you have to do is survive the trip."
"What's stopping them from spacing me?" He asked.
He was without a pair of spare clothes and he couldn't well wear his battered armor against his charred and tender hide, so Toxx pinned an old sheet on him to cover his body. Its purpose was to help keep him warm more than anything else.
"Nothing. They don't know you're here. Keep quiet and that won't change."
Alarmed, but with the effort to keep his voice down, Felix asked, "What? How can they not know?"
"Don't worry, the ship is auto set for the Citadel. The krogan aboard are nothing more than heavy laborers for after the ship arrives. There's nothing down here they'll want- I checked."
Felix wasn't convinced and the look he gave Toxx told him as much. Toxx went on. "Look, all the alcohol is upstairs. They'll be so desperate to get through the three days of spaceflight that they'll have no reason to come down here. I know it's a risk, but it's literally your only option if you're gonna survive. You'll starve here if that leg doesn't kill you first."
Toxx dipped his hand into his pocket and withdrew a small piece of plastic. He handed it to Felix and explained, "It's a clicker. We use 'em to train our varrens. If you're too weak to talk by the time you land, use this to draw attention to yourself. Not a whole lot they can do about a stowaway once C-Sec starts sniffing around for contraband. I would've given you a whistle, but I figured you turians can't really use 'em even with a non-fucked up face."
Felix tried not to react to the unintended sting of his comment. Instead, he reached for Toxx's shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze. "Thank you for everything, Toxx. Good luck to you."
A small smile tugged at the corner of Toxx's mouth. The first, Felix realized, he'd seen on the krogan.
"You too, Felix. You're gonna need it."
Toxx was correct in his assessment that Felix would remain undisturbed in the cargo hold. No one came down for the entire duration of the trip, which was good because they would have likely heard the way his stomach growled angrily.
He was so hungry.
He had no idea when his last meal had been, or even how long he had been buried beneath the metal plate. Not long, he thought. He wouldn't have been able to survive more than a day or so in that heat with his injuries.
As he laid there on the floor, dim bulbs lining the deck as his only light source, he had no way of keeping track of the time as it passed. According to Toxx, it was a three day trip between the Krogan DMZ and the Widow system.
Equipped with only a twelve pack of water to stave off the hunger pains and a putrid bucket to -with great difficulty- relieve himself in, Felix settled in for what he anticipated to be the longest three days of his life... Not that he could remember much of his life.
Slowly, he began to feel his strength leave him with the slow passing of each hour. He tried to spend them asleep, which became easier and easier the weaker his body became.
All feeling in his injured leg ceased right around the time his stomach stopped growling as he felt the sickness spread within him. Despite Toxx's attempts at halting infection from setting in, he had only delayed it for a short while. That was made abundantly clear to him when the foul smell of his leg and other parts of his body began to overpower the putrid smell of his waste bucket.
By the time the hatch to the cargo hold groaned and shuttered as it was lowered, his head felt too heavy to lift off the metal floor. He barely winced at the invasive, artificial light that streaked across the deck and managed an impressive head-shot right through his eye. He had only a second to muse at how odd it felt to see light with only one eye despite the fact that it shown across both of them before he heard footsteps. Lots of them. Different weights and gaits of different species.
Slowly, he willed the hand attached to his healthy arm along the metal floor, feeling for the clicker. Once he found it, he positioned his thumb over the metal piece and applied pressure to it.
Click-clock
"Did you hear that?" He heard a male turian voice ask.
"Hear what?" The second voice sounded asari.
He squeezed it again.
Click-clock.
"That!" The turian exclaimed. "Listen."
Click-clock.
"Wait. I heard it that time."
Click-clock.
"It sounds like it's coming from over there!"
Encouraged, he squeezed the clicker again and again. Each click made him feel more desperate to be found. More desperate to survive.
"Spirits," the approaching turian cursed. "What stinks? Did something die in here?"
'No. Not yet. Not dead yet.'
Click-clock.
Then a blue face peered around a nearby crate. Confused, the asari's eyes traveled up the tangled web of bubble wrap and old sheets. Once her eyes locked onto his own, it took a second for her to comprehend what she was looking at. She exhaled sharply and recoiled out of his line of sight.
"Nellus!" She called out. "Goddess, Nellus get over here!"
His thumb continued to mindlessly squeeze the clicker, over and over as his brain latched on to what had become his lifeline. More footsteps, more faces as additional C-sec officers hurried to the scene and surrounded the ruined turian in the cargo hold.