"Listen, Hannah," Shepard said, voice raised a hair louder than her normal speaking volume in an attempt to cut through the four year old's incessant chatter on the other end of the comm link. Hannah had already gone through all the emotions in only a few minutes: first and foremost, happiness at hearing her mother's voice; then frustrated anger—or whatever passed for it in a child so small—when Shepard delivered the news that it would be yet another day before she could come home; dramatic tears in a desperate attempt at hoping it could sway her mother and the fates; and finally, distracted babbling, mindless and half not making any kind of sense since her mouth didn't work quite as fast as her head.
"Hannah, baby—" She tried again, but sometimes talking to her daughter was like talking to a wall. Hannah heard what she wanted to hear, when she wanted to hear it, and god have mercy on the soul of anyone else who thought they could convince her otherwise. "Put Daddy back on—okay? Shouldn't you be asleep?" That was it, diversion. Bring up a topic Hannah liked even less than ending the calls with her mother, and maybe she'd give in to the lesser of two evils.
She had other ideas and kept talking anyway. Something about her cat—that fucking nuisance of a cat that never failed to find something new to shred every night—and a television program and even yesterday's lunch. Sometimes Shepard really had no idea how her daughter kept all those thoughts organized in her head. "Garrus?" Another tactic, calling for the reinforcements on the other end. Judging by the faint rumble of laughter in the background, she had an idea he was still listening in close by, more than likely taking enjoyment out of her helpless struggle. "Damn it, Garrus!"
"Hey, hey, hey now," he finally said, and Shepard could hear the switch from speaker to his personal comm by the fading out of her daughter's voice and the clarity of his. "I may have to call Jack and see if she's still got that swear jar for you to borrow."
"Very funny."
"I thought so. Now," his voice purred, "I'm not sure six minutes on the phone with Hannah was enough of a punishment. I think you should let her talk to Victus since he's the reason you're stuck there an extra day. Don't be a martyr, he deserves to share the pain."
Billions of miles away, communications routed through beacons and mass relays, and Shepard's cheeks pulled into a smile at his words. It was almost like being home with him—with them—on Earth. Almost. "I take it she's been driving you crazy."
"Mostly I've been playing interference, keeping her and Alice apart."
"Don't tell me," she spoke, voice straining in the back of her throat, "that Alice started crawling in the few days I've been gone?"
"Not yet, Shepard, don't worry," Garrus said with gentle reassurance. "I think she's kind of stalled out at the rocking on her knees routine."
"Well just don't put her down between tonight and tomorrow. Sabotage her if you have to, I don't want to miss it."
Together, they shared a moment of laughter over the connection before it dissipated down into quiet.
Garrus was the first to bend. "I miss you."
"I miss you, too. It's just one more day, I swear."
"This isn't going to turn into you calling me tomorrow morning and saying the same thing, is it?"
He couldn't see her, only hear her voice, but Shepard shook her head animatedly regardless. "I'll be home before dinner."
"Is it even anything interesting that they're keeping you for?"
"I'll—" Shepard glanced out the doorway of the office kept in Victus' apartment. There was no movement, at least that she could see, and only deafening silence since they'd arrived from the docks, the Turian infant having tired himself out and fallen into sleep. "I'll tell you about it tomorrow. I've got to go."
"Tell Victus he's on my shit list."
"I will. Love you."
"I love you."
Her words rushed out, before he could get a chance to disconnect. "Wait—Garrus?"
"Hmm?"
"Is it too much? Taking care of the two of them?"
"Why, you finally found a place with a good return policy?"
She could almost imagine the expression on his face. There would be a slight squint to his eyes as the plates of his face shifted, the ones on his cheeks upward while his brow plates leveled out in the kind of softness he'd only ever shown her. Maybe his mandibles would have spread and contracted once or twice too, an unconscious habit of his that seemed to be tied to some of his more sarcastic comments.
"Just… wanted to make sure. Goodnight, give the girls a kiss for me."
"I'll see you tomorrow."
Shepard touched the screen of her omni-tool, severing the temporary connection it made when networked through Victus' line. She didn't move to leave, not right away, just slumped into the chair at the Councilor's desk, shutting her eyes as her head leaned back to rest against the high-backed seat.
Garrus' words filled her head, try as she might to think about anything else. He hadn't answered her directly, and though she suspected he would never admit to being overwhelmed in any situation—least of all by the idea of being father to two young human daughters—she didn't doubt him, either. She'd just needed to hear the sureness in his voice, even if it had come with smug sarcasm.
From the hallway, footsteps approached. "Shepard," Adrien said, rapping his knuckles against the doorframe. "Everything alright?"
Letting her eyes open, she smoothed a hand over the front of her shirt to force out the wrinkles, an old habit she hadn't been able to shake that stemmed from years of uniform wearing. "Garrus says you're on his shit list."
Adrien let out a huff of hair, though his mouth widened in amusement. "Surprised I wasn't already on it."
"It's a growing list," she said, standing and crossing the room. Shepard passed him on the way out of the office, following the hallway down to the main living quarters where both her belongings and the small sack of the newborn's necessities laid abandoned beside the sofa. On one of the couch's cushions with pillows packed around him, the baby rested, bundled tightly together in a swaddle more like a human child would have preferred. Truth be told, she didn't know if Turian infants even liked that cocooned feeling, but Victus hadn't indicated otherwise, and it seemed like the most logical next step in helping the boy preserve the heat he'd been rapidly losing.
Shepard sat down on the edge of the couch, stroked the back of her fingers over his brow and cheek, the plates tougher than her skin but still fairly pliable and without all the distinct definition like that of a grown Turian's. The sections of his nose crinkled as he slept, sensing her presence without waking.
"I want you to tell me I'm crazy and this is wrong," Shepard said aloud, feeling Victus a few feet off.
"You've always been crazy, but I can't say it's wrong."
"Why aren't you listing every reason against this? Why aren't you telling me he should be raised on Palaven, that he should have a mother who actually knows anything about what it means to be Turian herself?"
"Because…" Victus took up his place on the arm of the couch, overlooking the two of them. "…You're a good mother. Ten years ago you protected my son for me while you could." He paused. "And because tonight I made it my duty to make sure you met this boy before you left Eden Prime."
Shepard's hand stilled, stroking ceasing against the baby's flesh. He stirred slightly, wriggling within the confines of his bindings at the sudden loss of her careful and constant reassurance. The last time Victus had kept something from her, he'd lost a son as a result of it. Times had changed though, and the idea that he'd orchestrated a few events of the night wasn't exactly the same as lying by omission about the knowledge of a bomb buried deep under Tuchanka's craggy surface. Ten years ago, she'd yelled and nearly hit the man for keeping a secret like that from her. This time, Shepard didn't know what to say.
"If you and Vakarian can't, that's one thing. I know it isn't the ideal time with two young daughters already. But I don't agree with the policy back home, especially not when it means this one's likely to spend the next few months or years without parents to call his own while you and Vakarian would do a better job than anyone else they could place him with."
The baby turned his head and let out a high pitched yawn, eyes blinking slowly open. He gave up after a second, letting them shut again as the rest of his body once more tested the tightness of the blanket before going still. Sleep called back to him and Shepard allowed it, despite how hungry she imagined his stomach must've been. If the ache for nourishment didn't wake him fully soon, she'd have to do it for him, cries and screeching be damned.
"You're going to get hell for sticking your neck out for me, Victus."
"It's not a council law, even if most other races have enacted similar clauses. Spirits, it's not even in perpetuity in Palaven's constitution. It was an emergency amendment called for by panicked bureaucrats that desperately wanted to try to sustain the population numbers however they could. Besides," he said, voice lighter, "you know how much I hate bureaucrats. That part of me hasn't changed."
Shepard cracked a smile. Most of the details from those weeks and months during the Reaper's assault on the galaxy were fuzzy, buried under a haze of stress and age, but she could still recall how ardently he'd refused to leave his men behind, and when he'd been informed he was Primarch of Palaven… he hadn't exactly gone into it with open arms either. That was when she knew he would be what not only his people, but hers, needed him to be. Someone who, just like her, didn't play by everyone else's rules—even if the last decade had drained most of that impetuousness from them both.
"Even without my support—you're still technically a Spectre after all this time," Victus reminded her.
Her head shook at what he was implying. "I'm pretty sure Spectre status isn't meant to be used to acquire an orphan for yourself."
"You think you'd be the first one to use it for a selfish reason? And you and I could both debate all night about whether this would actually constitute selfish at all."
When she looked up, Victus had his omni-tool out, fingers typing at the holographic keys. "This is going to come back to bite us in the ass, isn't it?"
Victus paused, setting his focus on her rather than the omni-tool's screen. She'd seen that expression before, jaw slightly slack, sharp teeth bared, his particularly long and large mandibles spread wide. "Wouldn't be worth it if it didn't."
Deep in her muscle and bones, Shepard could feel that nagging part of herself, heavy with the weight of apprehension. It wasn't a question of if someone found out, it was more a question of when. He was putting himself at risk for her, and despite the closeness they'd forged on the battlefield, in the war room, and in the Council's chambers, Shepard, for the life of her, couldn't understand why. It wasn't something he'd lose his spot on the Council over since the other Councilors seemed to strictly adhere to a policy of I'll leave your questionable business alone if you don't bother mine, but it would ruffle some feathers back on Palaven at the very least.
Then again, wasn't this what she and Garrus had been waiting for over the last few years? If someone had ventured to give them the chance, to make an exception for the savior of the galaxy and her right hand man, they more than likely would have been content to raise their own adopted Turian child, parents to only one. But Shepard couldn't say she regretted how life had turned out, because although children—especially the process of carrying them and giving birth to them—had never been something she had ever thought she would accomplish, as cliche as it was, she couldn't imagine it all having happened any other way. What would her life with Garrus have been like raising a Turian daughter or son, without Hannah and Alice? There was nothing in the galaxy worth of trade for the memory of his expression when he'd seen either of his daughters for the first time.
And here it was, presented practically on a plate for her. A chance to have it all. Opportunities like this, they rarely came twice.
Shepard swallowed hard at the final considerations she had to make. Maybe she had been wrong, should have told Garrus the real reason she'd stayed on Eden Prime and let him play a role in the decision making process. It was his life too, and they'd made the choice together to have the others, to become parents the first and second time.
The truth was she hadn't told him because she'd already made up her mind since she'd first held the child. If there was any possibility in the galaxy, consequences be damned, she was taking him home. For all the apprehension she presented with, Shepard didn't actually want someone to give her a real reason to back out.
Her palm came to rest over the boy's stomach and chest, layers of blanket between their skin though she felt the rise and fall of his chest as he slept. As she did so, Shepard could almost see the picture in her head: Garrus nuzzling the son she knew he always wished he had, finding joy in being a father to just one more. "Does he have a name?" she asked, without taking her eyes off the baby.
"It's Caius."