Hitch
Why did I wait so long to check on the state of things? How could I have been so careless?

It wasn't until they had reached the food court near Embassy Row that Ms. Sussman had taken another head count. When she'd come up one child short, her heart had skipped a beat. Twice more, she counted the children under her care, and twice more, one little blue face was missing from the group. Doing her best not to panic, Janie urged her administrative counterpart, Celindra Salameh, to organize an impromptu roll call. No one reported having an extra youngster, and her stomach dropped through the floor.

Thoughts racing, the redhead tamped down on the terror rising inside her. Panic wouldn't help her find Kayla. On the other hand, a missing child was a situation not to be taken lightly. The longer you waited to file a missing persons report, the less likely anyone, especially a child, would be found alive. That might seem a little histrionic to some, but facts were facts. Without further hesitation, Janie quickly shot off messages to her supervisor, her contact at C-Sec, and Kayla's grandmother outlining what had happened. Her career might end sooner than planned due to this mistake, but she couldn't care less. What mattered was that if anything happened to Kayla, she would never forgive herself.
The young woman felt that way about all of her students, but she'd be lying if she said she didn't share a special bond with her youngest charge. Kayla had been transferred to her care as a last-ditch effort to keep the child under control. The girl was barely out of infancy by asari standards, so while she physically looked to be about seven years old, due to the longevity of her race she was just about three-quarters that in terms of mental development. A lot of teachers, even ones of the same species, weren't well versed at handling kids that young, and as a result had tried to "reach" Kayla using tactics better suited for older children.

It also didn't help that the girl seemed to be downright terrified of members of her own species, a fact that was peculiar and remained inexplicable.

To anyone who wasn't Janie, anyway.

Ms. Sussman's specialty was working with "difficult" kids, so when the headmistress and her staff had thrown their collective hands up over what to do about the little handful, the redheaded teacher had personally requested she be transferred to her class. Janie had a gentler approach than most of her colleagues, and that seemed to be exactly what Kayla needed. They'd rapidly formed a close relationship, and the little girl had finally begun to settle down under the human woman's kind, but firm, tutelage.

Of course, that had done nothing to temper the child's mischievous streak. The current situation was testament to that. It had just never caused this big of a problem until now, and for the first time, Janie wished that Kayla was just a little less defiant.

Shaking herself, the teacher tried to think of places her student might have gone. The fact the asari child felt safest on the school grounds permeated the haze of fear that had settled across Janie's mind. Hoping Kayla would have returned to familiar ground, she made the decision to retrace their steps back to the Conservatory.

As she corralled her students back in the direction from whence they'd come, all Janie could do was hope that her instincts were right.

*/*/*/*/*

Of all the damn luck.

Garrus couldn't believe it. Not only was he responding to a call made by someone he hadn't expected to ever see again, but a very familiar blue bundle of trouble was involved. And she happened to be a diplomatic VIP.

Wonderful.

It wasn't that the officer necessarily disliked the lieutenant; after all, he really didn't know the man. And he wasn't one of those guys who hated children on principle, or anything like that. When it came to his job, how he felt about a person was almost directly proportional to how much paperwork they generated. Anything involving this diminutive asari was good for a week's worth of forms filled out in triplicate, which annoyed Garrus to no end. Unfortunately for the human, this made him a target of the turian's irritation, too. Guilt by association.

Once again cursing the karmic gods of comedy (as his human colleague Eddie Lang often put it), he went to work.

"Start from when I last saw you, Lieutenant, and work your way forward from there. Please."

*/*/*/*/*

"Let's go over it one more time, if you don't mind."

Lieutenant Alenko wasn't sure what he was expecting when he put in the call to Citadel Security concerning his current predicament, but he certainly hadn't expected to cross paths with Garrus Vakarian twice in less than six hours.

As he once again relayed the events of the afternoon to the officer standing in front of him, Kaidan glanced down toward his feet. He found it was hard to concentrate with a child hiding behind his knees. She'd retreated there as soon as the other man had arrived on the scene, which made the human sentinel more than a little suspicious. He wasn't sure how to broach the subject, though, so figuring out the connection between the detective and this frightened little girl would have to wait.

As requested, he started his story again.

*/*/*/*/*

The detective listened intently as Alenko explained to him, for the third time, what had transpired from the time he left Citadel Tower to the moment Garrus had shown up in the alleyway. Had this been about any other child, Garrus would have chalked things up to coincidence and left it at that. The fact that the youngling in question happened to be the member of a very prominent family changed everything.

"So, let me make sure I have this right. You were on your way to Barla Von's office, and you heard someone crying?" Garrus had a hard time believing that, since he was pretty sure human hearing wasn't as good as that of his own species, and he wasn't certain he would have been able to hear anything out on the sidewalk. It was quieter here on the Presidium than if they'd been in the Wards, sure, but it still would have been pretty difficult. On the other hand, human body language was something he'd become pretty well versed in during his time at C-Sec, and he was willing to bet credits to kilaka fruit the human man was telling the truth.

The dark-eyed man answered tersely, "That's correct."

Garrus almost missed on the near-imperceptible change in tone. He's growing impatient, the turian thought. Might be able to use that to my advantage. "And why were you going to meet with him, exactly?"

The lieutenant seemed to mull the question over for a moment, and instantaneously, Garrus was livid. I swear, if he says 'That's classified' I might just punch him in the face. . . No sooner had the thought completed itself when the man said matter-of-factly, "Commander Shepard had it on good authority that this guy might be able to give us a lead on Saren."

The candidness of the answer stunned him. He was certain the human was going to stonewall him, just like everyone else had been lately. Alenko's body language indicated he had nothing to hide, which made Garrus feel a little guilty over his previous line of thought.

"Well, then," the officer said, stalling as he gathered his thoughts together. "Lucky for Councilor Tevos and her granddaughter that you have such good hearing." This bit of name-dropping was the last trick the turian had up his sleeve to see if he could trip the other man up. Not his favorite thing to do, resorting to deception, but in his line of work, you had to be as crafty as the suspects you were up against.

The human man's face went slack from shock. "Wait. . .are you saying she," Kaidan waved his hand in the direction of the little girl behind him, "is related to the Asari Councilor? As in, one of the most powerful women in all of Citadel space, who was standing ten feet away from me less than two hours ago?"

That solidified things: Lieutenant Alenko had no idea who, exactly, he'd been rescuing when he'd come across this wayward child, and that implied he had no ulterior motive in doing so. Garrus was both relieved and disappointed by the revelation. It wouldn't make the load of paperwork any lighter, but it would certainly mean fewer meetings with angry superiors and outraged politicians. Oh, and one pissed off asari matriarch.

Coming back to the matter at hand, Officer Vakarian answered. "That's the way of it, yes." Looking down at the aforementioned Tevos heir, he continued, "Speaking of said matriarch, I need to inform her of what's happened and return her granddaughter to her as quickly as possible."

*/*/*/*/*

Kaidan nodded mutely, still mulling over the news that he'd stumbled into what could have been a diplomatic disaster. His mind only distantly registered that the detective was still talking. "And that means little Kayla and I need to take a walk down to headquarters."

"NO!"

The lieutenant came back to himself when he heard her shriek. The little girl, Kayla, had somehow managed to maneuver herself in such a way that she now had her arms wrapped around his legs, and her little face buried in his knees. As gently as he could, Kaidan extricated himself from her grasp and knelt down in front of her. "Hey," he said with concern. "What's the matter?"

Kayla looked at him, her blue eyes wide with terror, and said, "I don't want to go with him."
"Why not?"

A single tear ran down her cheek as she exclaimed, "He's big and scary!" With that, she threw her arms around Kaidan's neck and whimpered into his chest, "Please don't make me go!"

Kaidan Alenko was a pretty tough guy, if he could say so himself. He'd survived biotic acclimation as a child, excelled during basic training with the Alliance, and was a formidable force on the battlefield. Yet, when it came to this tiny asari hugging his neck, he'd been reduced to a pushover.

He found himself hugging her back as he said, "Shhh, it's okay. If you really don't want to, I won't make you go."

*/*/*/*/*

Unbeknownst to the lieutenant, a very annoyed turian was now glaring daggers at him from two feet away. So much for respecting my authority.