After taking down Sidonis, Garrus wanted to go and check on Shepard. He wasn't blind, and though she was a fair distance away she could see her struggling on the ground. But he was smarter than that. As much as he might have been worried about her physical state he knew that going to the scene of the crime was not a smart thing to do. Folding his sniper rifle and holstering it on his back, he made his way back to the shuttle to make his hasty retreat to the Normandy. He knew Shepard would make her way back eventually; if she didn't, he could pick her up in the med-bay. He winced at the thought, though. She's strong… she couldn't be that badly hurt.
As he sat down in the shuttle, a confused multi-toned voice sounded from behind him. "Officer Vakarian, where is the Commander?"
Garrus felt his throat dry instantly as he saw who was sitting in the back seat through the rear-view mirror. He had completely forgotten Thane had accompanied the two of them to watch the shuttle and be ready to potentially book it out of the Citadel If things went badly. But now that Shepard wasn't there, he was eyeing Garrus curiously, and that wasn't what Garrus needed at all right now, especially after what had happened. "She, ah, said she needed to go meet with someone..." Garrus nervously replied. "Something personal, wouldn't tell me what."
Though Thane still seemed a bit skeptical, he nodded and leaned back, allowing Garrus to pilot the shuttle back to the Zakera Ward where the Normandy was docked. Aside from general mission banter with key points left out, the ride and subsequent walk to the Normandy's docking area was a quiet one. It didn't stop him from thinking about Shepard, though, and how pissed she would be the next time they saw one another.
Really, though, why should she be? He could feel his temperature rising as anger built up in his chest. She knew what Sidonis had done, and Garrus told her this was the only way to get justice for the lives lost under his control. To him, it didn't matter if she understood why Sidonis needed to die; all that mattered was that the job was done. As he stepped into the airlock Garrus considered if he would apologize for what had happened. A part of him instantly jumped to support an apology, but something else told him he should think twice before giving Shepard what she probably wanted. Either way, he wasn't quite sure what he would do.
Garrus shook his head, dismissing his thoughts as he hear the signal to exit the decontamination/compression chamber and entered the Normandy, welcomed onto the ship by a multitude of computerized tones and coolly glowing stations.
Thane walked right through the cockpit and towards the elevator, but Garrus could only hope to be so lucky. "Welcome back, Mr. Vakarian." Shit, Garrus spun to look at the pilot's terminal, seeing the AI EDI's large purple eyeball (was it an eyeball?) projecting and seemingly "looking" at him. "Your mission has gone as planned. According to the reports on the galactic extranet C-Sec is currently investigating Sidonis' death but has no leads."
"Thanks EDI," Garrus mumbled, trying to turn on heel and leave only to be stopped by another, more male voice. "Ah, so you tore that guy a new asshole, didn't you?" Garrus closed his eyes, inhaling sharply before turning around and seeing Joker looking at him with a grin on his face. The grin only lasted a moment, though, as Joker seemed to lean forward in his chair for a moment, looking beyond where Garrus was standing. "I thought Shepard was with you?"
Garrus' stomach dropped and he shifted his weight, rubbing his neck as he procured a reason for Shepard's absence yet again. "She, ah, had to talk to someone down in the Lower Wards... Some sort of personal business, she didn't tell me what."
Joker's grin resurfaced. "Ahh, I'll bet the Commander's going to go and find some more 'illegal extranet bookmarks.'"
EDI seemed less than pleased about the comment. "Mr. Moreu, it is hardly professional or of accordance to rank to speak of Commander Shepard in this way."
Joker rolled his eyes, shrugging his shoulders. "Same way it's not funny when you spin me in my cha-aye aye aye, stop it EDI!" As Joker had been speaking, the AI had begun to playfully move the pilot's chair in a circle. Garrus sighed, not in the mood for such playful interaction. "I'll leave you to... whatever it is you two do up here." Before either could respond, Garrus finally turned on his heel and headed down to the Main Battery Room. He figured he could do some calibrations (which always needed to be done anyways) to keep his mind off the subject at hand.
Shepard could hardly keep herself from prying open the doors to the Normandy as she stood in the decontamination/compression chamber. It had taken her the longest time to get back to the Normandy after desperately circumventing where Sidonis had been killed to avoid being picked up by C-Sec. The whole time, too, Shepard had been assessing what had just occurred. At first she had been starting to worry about Garrus' mental well being but at this point she was angry that the turian had gone so far as to endanger her in order to finish off Sidonis. Maybe she had been out of line, trying to talk to Sidonis rather than flat out kill him, but any respectable person would do that, Shepard thought.
The matter of the fact was that Garrus, a turian and person who she respected and trusted, broke her trust by shooting her on a mission she was going out of her way to help him with. And the best part was her back was still killing her, which wasn't making her any happier.
The doors finally hissed, sliding to the side to reveal the interior of the CIC. She barely noticed any of her surroundings, though, as she quickly moved to Joker's terminal.
"Hello, Commander Shepard. You've arrived later than anticipated, and-"
"Not now, EDI," Shepard snarled at the ship's AI, and it quickly became unresponsive. Shepard grabbed Joker's chair and swung it around to reveal a very stunned looking Joker. "Damn, Shepard, I know I'm special, but I can turn my chair around myself..."
"This is not the time Joker," Shepard stepped back, crossing her arms and to her left side as she spoke. "Did Vakarian enter the ship?"
Joker raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, about an hour or so ago. We expected you to be with him but he said you were out on personal business down in the lower hey, where are you going?" Shepard turned sharply and stormed away towards the elevator as soon as Joker began describing what Garrus had said she was doing. He was lying to cover his ass! She completely ignored the Yeoman's attempt to get her to look at her message terminal for the tenth time today, and by the time she reached the elevator Shepard had become so angry she practically punched the elevator buttons. Her ride was no better; she angrily paced the small space until the doors slid open, to which her response was to launch herself from the elevator and to set her path directly to the Main Battery.
To her dislike, the status indicator on the door's face was glowing red, meaning that the door was locked. Shepard didn't care, though, as she went up to the door and banged on it ruthlessly with her fist. "Garrus, open the damn door right now!" She persisted to slam her closed fist into the large metallic door, ignoring the fact that it was fairly uncomfortable to be doing so.
"Vakarian, open the fucking door!" She was losing her temper quickly, her yell crackling mid-sentence and her pounding becoming more fueled by her rage. She could hear murmurs from the cafeteria, which she could only presume were about how the commander had lost her mind, but she could have cared less. She needed to speak with Garrus, and she wasn't going to wait.
Garrus was startled as he heard the pounding start, though he could not tell what part of the ship it was coming from. He was in the hangar when he first heard it, as he had been doing some maintenance work on the Kodiak shuttle after having run some calibrations but his curiosity got the better of him. He took the stairs up to the fourth deck, and after seeing that the banging was not coming from there he made his way up to the third.
He was immediately greeted by the sight of some of the crew standing by the crews' quarters, huddled and murmuring about something that Garrus assumed had to be about the banging. He looked to the small group. "Where's the noise coming from?"
An uncomfortable-looking, light-framed brunette woman answered him. "It's the Commander, Officer Vakarian. She's been at the door to the Battery for the past few minutes yelling for you to open the door."
Garrus felt his mandibles flutter and his entire body felt like a void. He nodded to the woman, moving himself cautiously towards the battery, and as he grew closer he watched the strongly built commander, who still donned her mission armor, pounded intensely on his door and yelled. It had been easy to be angry at Shepard when she wasn't standing in front of the battery trying to break down the automated door with her fists, but now Garrus considered running again to try and save his skin.
Garrus swallowed, though his mouth had already become very dry. iBe a man, Vakarian. He finally brought himself to be about 5 metres away from her when he finally spoke. "Uh, Commander?"
Instantly Shepard spun around, her eyes burning with what Garrus could only assume was rage. "You. Follow me." She walked past him, almost making sure to push him with her shoulder and cause his balance to be thrown off for a second or so before heading towards the elevator. Garrus was worried on the inside, but kept his composure as he walked through the small crowd of crew members the commander had amassed and followed the commander. This is not going to be good...