Two

When he woke, Garrus didn't remember much, but the few mangled scraps of memories were probably best forgotten anyway. Lots of painful jostling, narrow, dank walkways, views of his own limbs dangling uselessly and... Shepard. Her boots smeared with his own blue blood, stumbling over metal grates, grunting with effort. Then swearing at him not to die, because he owed her big time for schlepping him through a smelly sewer. Oh, yeah. Good times.

He sat up slowly, almost instantly regretting it. Feels like I got in a headbutting contest with a krogan.

"Take it easy, there," a guy told him, the one he saw with Shepard before. "You survived a direct hit from a missile. You'll need more than just a couple of hours of down time." They were in a med bay that gave him an eerie sense of de ja vu. Garrus reached up to touch his neck. He wondered where Shepard was, and why she wasn't there when he woke up.

"No kidding," Garrus said. He didn't want to make small talk with tight-pants Cerberus man. He needed to see Shepard, needed the truth from her. He got to his feet, taking a moment to steady himself.

"Whoa," Cerberus man said, holding his hands up, like he was trying to stop traffic. Garrus waved him off and started making his way to the door, legs wobbling. Keeping one hand on the wall, he ignored the Cerberus man's protests and proceeded to the exit. Just as he reached the door, he came face to face with someone Garrus was sure he'd never see again.

"Good timing, Dr. Chakwas. Vakarian here was trying to make a break for it."

"Thank you for waiting, Jacob." Calm eyes, neat gray hair still in its same short cut. Funny accent is intact, too. The familiarity was comforting yet almost too much to bear. He opened his mouth to greet her, but words failed him. "Well, look at you, Garrus!" Throaty laugh. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say we were on the old Normandy chasing down Saren."

"Hi, Doc," he said. A slight nod was the best he could do by way of greeting. "What do you mean, 'old Normandy'?"

Dr. Chakwas sighed, suddenly seeming ancient and weary. "Oh, I'll let the Commander explain. I've had enough excitement for one day." She went to her desk on the opposite side of the med bay and rummaged around in its drawers, drinking heartily from a silver flask.

"Commander Shepard will be down in a minute," Jacob, the Cerberus man, informed him, sensing his befuddlement. Garrus shrugged, then sat down, wondering what was keeping her.

He was about to get up and search for her when the woman herself came through the door, dressed in a Cerberus uniform.

"If you two wouldn't mind..." she began, glancing between Dr. Chakwas and Jacob.

"Of course, Commander," Jacob said, snapping off a crisp salute. Kiss-ass. Dr. Chakwas followed him out, a little more slowly. Garrus noticed they both seated themselves in the mess hall, within sight of the medical bay.

"Please, sit," Shepard said, wheeling over the doctor's chair for herself as Garrus sat down on the bed he'd woken up on. "Hell of a reunion, huh?" Avoiding the fly in the lotion. Or whatever that ridiculous human saying is. He didn't care about what she was hiding as much as why.

"How about we skip the bull and get right to what the hell happened?" Garrus said, fighting to keep his tone even.

Shepard gave in to him quickly. "Fair enough." She waited for him to ask.

"Why did you leave m-" he stopped. He wasn't there to shout at her or make accusations. "Were you really dead?"

"Yes."

"Then how did you do it?" It went unsaid that he meant coming back to life.

Shepard rubbed her temples, tousling her hair. She took a second to smooth it back. She locked her eyes with his. "The Collectors, Garrus. They're abducting entire human colonies... for the Reapers."

"But what about you?" he pressed. The fate of the galaxy rested on their shoulders, again – no surprise there. That still didn't explain how she cheated death.

A strange smile flashed briefly across her face. She settled back in her chair. "Cerberus funded the project to collect my remains and reconstruct me. From what they told me, it took two years. When I, for lack of a better term, woke up, they told me the situation and let me investigate it for myself." She moved a little closer, wheeling herself in the doctor's luxurious swivel chair. "It's real, Garrus. Everything we uncovered about Sovereign and Saren hasn't gone away, even though I did. The Reapers are still out there, as much as the Council and the Alliance wish they weren't."

"And that's were you come in."

"Where we come in. I've been assembling an elite team to take the fight to the Collectors. I need you for this, Garrus," Shepard said, giving him a soft kick in the leg.

He returned the gesture fondly. "Well, whatever they spent on bringing you back was well worth it. If stopping the Reapers is even possible, you're the only one for the job." He straightened a little. "Besides, I may have missed your, uhhh, very fine leadership skills."

"By the looks of it, you kept yourself busy," she replied, smoothly seguing into what Garrus was up to.

"Right." The sharp sting of betrayal was still too fresh, the images of his dead teammates engrained on his eyeballs. "Let's just say I trusted someone I shouldn't have." He stared at his hands, absently wondering where his gloves were. He looked up, startled, when Shepard took hold of his bare digits.

"Hey," she said, in that soft tone that she never used around the crew. "You okay?"

He dipped his head slightly. He'd tell her about it sometime. Just not right away. Unloading that burden on her could wait. "I will be."

In another unprecedented event, Shepard got to her feet and put her arms around Garrus, pressing her face close to his. "I'm here for you," she said simply. Then they remained silent for a while, committing the moment to memory, before she pulled back.

"Enough of that for now. We've got a galaxy to save, remember?" Garrus nodded, standing upright and giving her a professional nod. "C'mon, I'll show you the Normandy two point oh." He followed her out of the med-bay, the pain in his body completely dulled.

Something had changed between them. The days of coexisting as professionals under a common cause were gone. Every day for two years, he'd thought of her, try to move on, and fail. Now that she was back, neither of them could pretend like they were still just soldiers on a mission together. Shepard had become Garrus's best and only friend in that wide, lonely galaxy. And, undoubtedly, she was the best and only hope for civilization in that wide, lonely galaxy.