AUTHOR'S NOTE: This will be a series of vignettes building the relationship between my femshep, Khalia Col Shepard, and Garrus Vakarian. It's an exercise to help me illustrate the moments that I feel would be important toward putting their courtship into context without having to write a complete story. It starts in ME1 somewhere before Virmire. Khalia is Earthborn, the Butcher of Torfan, and a Vanguard. From a strategic standpoint, Garrus and Kaidan are the best compliments for her skill sets with Wrex and Tali being a favorable second (balanced Biotic, Tech and Military abilities). Just to give you some sense of the reasoning behind her squad choices.
Very rarely did they stop at the Citadel without the Commander being whisked away to the Citadel Tower for some conference or other with the Council.
Whenever her business with the diplomats was completed, Shepard would run to and fro, completing various and tedious errands. Garrus was often amazed by the magnitude of people who were allowed to drop their dirty laundry in the Commander's lap. At first, he was mystified by her patience, until he began to see the beneficial outcomes that often followed. Every little tidbit and reward she received, usually brought them a small part of the way closer toward their goal.
This time, however, Shepard and her two followers found themselves with a spare chunk of free time on their hands. Garrus could see by her fidgeting that Shepard wasn't entirely comfortable with the idleness.
Ashley, it seemed, was content to stare out at the massive arms of the Citadel and track the motion of passing ships. He felt relatively comfortable in the silence of his companions, waiting the six hours until the routine maintenance on the Normandy was completed. He supposed he would rather be in the shuttle bay, cleaning his weapons for the hundredth time. But, the maintenance team from the Alliance had been very specific that they needed the full space of the interior of the ship.
Garrus suspected that this "routine maintenance", suspiciously mandated by Captain Anderson, was a clever ruse to foist the Commander off the ship and force her to get a smidgen of "R&R", as he had heard Kaidan put it.
They had reached a minor lull in their investigation of Saren and so, Shepard had decided to stop by the Citadel to wrap up a few loose ends with her many side projects. Ashley mentioned a desire to visit the Markets and look for new heavy armor. She felt she was ready for the upgrade, and had nearly begged the Commander to let her tag along and use their Alliance requisition funds to buy her a new set.
Shepard really didn't need convincing. They had found out very early on that Shepard seemed to enjoy spending money on her crew. Their odd band of misfits suddenly found new weapons and armor in their individual lockers on a regular basis.
Garrus, as had frequently begun to happen, found himself at the Commander's right hand. No one really contested his position as the second in her customary three-man team. He hardly even thought about it.
Two hours later, their errands quickly concluded, the small team returned to the ship to rest up and prepare for their scheduled departure in a few hours. However, they found themselves turned away at the airlock by a pair of Alliance marines. Shepard had nearly pitched a fit, until one of the Majors on scene had dropped Anderson's name. The Commander clammed up after that, but even Garrus could see the hard edge in her eyes as they left.
Now, he cleared his throat uncertainly as he watched the Commander scratch a deep groove into the metal railing in front of them.
She glanced at him briefly, then paused, when she realized he was staring at her. He tried his best to make his smile as obvious as possible. In his experience, humans were often unable to recognize Turian facial expressions.
"What?"
"I was just thinking," he said slowly, "why don't we go up to Flux and grab a few drinks?"
He gestured behind him, to the staircase that led up to the dance club.
Shepard made a face.
"And what? Spend 20 credits on a drink? I don't think so," she said, returning to her scratching.
"There's always Chora's Den, Commander," Ashley said, smirking.
The Commander straightened for a moment and stared out at the interstellar traffic beyond. Then, she slapped her palm against the railing, startling them both.
"All right, let's go get drunk," she said resolutely.
Garrus followed her toward the staircase without hesitation, laughing. Ashley trailed behind, a protest half-formed on her lips. The Gunnery Chief put her hand over her face and sighed.
"Why do I ever speak?"
They made it to Chora's Den in record time, with Garrus almost trotting to keep up with the Commander's stride. It seemed that, now she had a definitive directive, she intended to carry it out with expedient precision.
"Commander should we really-?"
"Calm down, Chief. It's just a little after-hours, downtime," Shepard interjected blithely. "He wants to see me relax, I'll show him how friggin' relaxed I am," she added, under her breath.
Garrus and Ashley exchanged troubled looks. Both of them had followed Shepard as she power walked all the way from the Docking Bay to the Embassies. They had been firmly denied entrance into the Human Embassy office, but both of them had been able to hear Shepard's voice through the automatic door. They weren't sure what Anderson had said in reply, but the Commander had exited the office seeming calmer, but no less angry. Garrus suspected that the phrase "That's an order," had probably been thrown into the conversation. Shepard was many things, but she was an Alliance Officer first.
He liked that about her.
Four shots of brandy later, and he was worried that the Commander was taking the Captain's orders a little too seriously. She seemed capable of handling her liquor fairly well, but he was beginning to worry about Ashley. Shepard had challenged the Gunnery Chief to keep up with her or she would return the armor they had just bought. Williams, it seemed, was not a heavy drinker by nature.
Shepard ordered a round of beers as an act of mercy, but the Gunnery Chief had already put her head on the table and fallen asleep.
"She passed out fast," Shepard said, pouting. "I kind of expected her to put up more of a fight, being an enlisted girl."
"Some people just aren't cut out for it," Garrus said, smiling, and finished his drink. "Body mass, and all," he concluded.
"Excuse me, are you calling me fat?" Shepard looked outraged, but her eyes were grinning.
"No, no," he said smirking, "Just you know...bulky."
"I'll have you know that under all this armor, I am very slender and I look fantastic naked."
Garrus stared at her.
Round one, Shepard, he thought absently.
The Commander suddenly seemed distraught and sighed.
"They couldn't even let us change first?"
He shrugged.
"I prefer my armor," he said, rolling his shoulders. "I always feel exposed in civilian clothes."
"I can relate to that," she said, nodding. "Still, sitting in a booth in heavy armor isn't exactly comfortable."
He laughed as she shifted around in her seat, rearranging herself into more and more exaggerated positions. By the time she settled back into her seat, they were both laughing loud enough to be heard over the deep drum of the music. Ashley stirred in her sleep, and the pair of them put their fingers to their lips and chided one another for being too noisy. However, their synchronized shushing only made them laugh harder.
"You should be ashamed of yourself!"
They both turned toward the loud voice, caught off-guard.
Standing over their booth was an old man. He seemed drunk, which, Garrus supposed, you'd have to be in order to come over and yell at Commander Shepard.
Shepard, regaining a smooth veneer of military bearing, chose to be diplomatic.
"I apologize if we disturbed you sir," she responded calmly. "Won't happen again."
She tipped her drink his way and took a sip.
"I don't give a shit about your hollering," he growled, loud enough to be heard over the bass, "I mean you're sitting here cavorting with one of them raptors...in public!"
Shepard glanced quickly at Garrus, and he could tell that she was reading his face for a reaction to the old man's slur. Garrus shrugged in reply. He was a C-Sec Officer. Racial tensions with humans, particularly those old enough to remember the "First Contact War" as they knew it, was an every day hazard of the workplace. He had heard it all.
He saw Shepard's eyes narrow, ever so slightly, and braced himself.
"Sir," she said, turning her attention back to the man beside her. By now the old codger had launched into a diatribe that spanned the entirety of Garrus's lineage and denounced them all as baby eaters and criminals.
"Sir," she said again, and this time the heavy tone of her voice stopped the man mid-sentence.
"Who I keep company with is no concern of yours," she said simply.
"It damn well is when you're a member of the human Alliance. If people see you galavanting with one of these buzzard-beaked, shit-eaters, they'll start getting ideas-"
He stopped, because Shepard had stood as soon as the words left his mouth. She was nose to nose with the old veteran, and Garrus knew that very few people in the galaxy could bear the weight of that particular gaze. The old man swallowed, hard.
"That's twice now that you've insulted a member of my crew. When you insult my crew you insult me, and I don't take kindly to being insulted. Do you know who I am?"
The man seemed to rally some of his temper.
"Shepard," he spat, "the first human Spectre. A Council puppet."
"Think about that for a second. What do you think it would cost me to have your attitude...adjusted?"
She waited for the old man's expression to soften with the dawning realization that this woman could have him ejected in space without any fear of consequence.
"That's right, now you've got it," she said, smiling kindly. "Now I think, as a Spectre, that when I tell you you've had enough to drink and it's time to go home, that you would agree with me. Don't you?"
He nodded, adam's apple bobbing nervously in his throat, and made a beeline for the front door.
By now, the immediate area around them had gone a bit quieter. The other side of the bar still throbbed with conversation, and the music still thumped in their heads, but everyone around them was surreptitiously focused on the Commander. She sat back down without a word and finished her beer.
"I would give anything for a good larger that hasn't been transported several light years through space, first," she said miserably.
Garrus dropped his head toward the table, laughing hysterically.
"What?" She said, genuinely confused. "Do I amuse you?"
"Immensely," he said fondly.
They fell into a companionable silence, as Garrus found himself dwelling on something unusual.
Finally, he said, "Do you feel that way about Turians?"
She glanced up at him, her finger tracing patterns in the condensation on the table.
"Feel what way?"
He shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. He and the Commander had had several conversations aboard the Normandy thus far. He enjoyed her company, and she seemed to be the only person who fully trusted his judgement and capabilities. More than that, she trusted his instincts. But they had never really done any serious digging into their...unique camaraderie.
"A lot of humans dislike Turians because of the war. I used to see it all the time when I was working at C-Sec. Sure, on paper everything is nice and civil. But that old man was right, you don't see a lot of turians and humans having a nice time over a couple of drinks."
Shepard gave it some thought.
"I grew up on Earth," she said simply. "I didn't see my first alien until I was almost twenty. Sometimes they freak me out, but all I see is people. Doesn't matter what they look like, deep down they're all just people."
Garrus realized then, that he probably hadn't even needed to ask.
Shepard was always asking questions. He had noticed that she seemed relatively ignorant of the many different species that populated the galaxy, but she never settled for ignorance. She was always trying to learn, to discover more about the aliens she encountered. She accepted everything they taught her with an open mind. In a way, he understood what she meant. Shepard's diplomacy and her accepting nature was almost Asari, but her loyalty to her crew and her tactical mind made her seem a little Turian, too. Then again, maybe humans were the only species who were capable of being so mercurial.
"So being friends with a Turian isn't strange to you?"
She glanced at him, her green eyes suddenly penetrating.
"No, it isn't strange," she said, leaning forward on the table. "And yes, we are friends."
He smiled, and hoped she couldn't see it.
But when she grinned at him in reply, he felt for sure that she could.
"Who knows? Maybe after you help me take down Saren, the public opinion will change. We could even see turian and human relationships."
Garrus made a derisive noise in reply.
"Please, we can't even eat the same food."
She smiled at him.
"Stranger things have happened."
XXX