Chapter Four

Kindness on Kadara

Out of all the things Sasha could've expected to see when she arrived home, four challyrions and and an adhi cuddled up against a pissed off turian was not one of them.

"Oh my god," she said, trying not to laugh and nearly dropping the satchels she had slung over her shoulder, "this is the best thing I've ever seen."

"Get them off," Kaetus demanded impatiently.

Sasha then could not hold back and laughed so hard she nearly fell over.

"Please get them off," Kaetus growled.

After a moment of feeling Kaetus's angry glare, her laughter simmered and she said, "Oh, alright." Then let out a sharp whistle.

All at once, the four challyrions and the adhi sprung up and bounded towards Sasha as if they hadn't seen her in years. Kaetus watched curiously, but still quite irritated.

"Yes, yes," she said to them, "I have your treats."

All of the creatures stood in front of her like a squad of faithful troops and she was their commander. She reached into a large satchel that hung on her hip. "Fuff, you're first." She pulled out a hunk of meat from the bag and tossed it to the larger challyrion. It caught the meat in its dangerous jaws and then ran out with it resembling a child with a new toy. "Kira, you're next." Kira took her meat a little more gingerly than Fuff and followed the larger one. "Sprocket, here's yours." One of the other challyrions, Kaetus noticed it had a dusting of white spots on its rear, took its meat and followed the others. "Apollo, here's yours." The last challyrion repeated the pattern. "Flynn, last but not least, here's your treat." The adhi then completed this ritual as it headed out, meat in mouth.

"This is absolute madness," Kaetus murmured. His voice was very weak, but still held a tone of surprise. "How the hell did you get five bloodthirsty beasts to follow your every command?"

Sasha removed her armor and placed it at the end of her bed as she spoke. "I will tell you…" she paused as she reached into another bag she'd set down with the armor, "if you drink this."

She pulled out a sealed metallic bottle and moved towards Kaetus. "What is it?" He asked.

"It is a drink made for turians that has all sorts of nutrients that helps when you're sick or dehydrated."

She set the bottle down next to him. He glanced at it, back at her and said, "Fine," as he began to hoist himself up. His weakness hit him hard as his head began to spin and his arms shook under his weight. He grunted as they nearly gave out.

"Hey, hey, hold on a sec," Sasha said as she rushed over to help him.

She grabbed his good arm and Kaetus tensed. For a moment, their eyes locked onto each other and Kaetus wasn't sure what to feel. He never really had anyone be so kind to him, especially when he didn't even understand why. And he didn't even know her name.

She helped him up into a sitting position and then pushed over an empty storage crate for him to lean against. He snatched up the bottle and as he opened the lid, he said, "So tell me about your animals, uh…"

One corner of her lips pulled up. "My name is Sasha." She watched him take a gulp of the drink, then continued. "I found Fuff, well his full name is Kerfuffle because, well, that's what he is. Anyway, I found him caught in a trap. He tried to attack me, but I was able to keep him restrained as I nursed him back to health. I had all the intention of releasing him back into the wild, but he began following me and soon began obeying my commands. Sometimes he tried to challenge me, but I asserted my dominance and became his alpha. Not too long after that I found Kira, Sprocket and Apollo. They were a litter of pups whose mother was killed. They were easy to tame, being pups. They're still young, but they're very sweet. And Flynn I found in an abandoned outlaw camp locked in a cage, nearly starved to death. He kind of just went along with the others."

"So they were all injured and you nursed them back to health… like me."

Sasha chuckled, "Well you are a little more difficult and stubborn than them and it wasn't as simple as just nursing them back to health. I got a lot of bites and scratches, I had to learn to respect them and they had to learn to respect me. I had to educate myself on their behavior habits, but luckily, that is my field of expertise."

Kaetus raised his good brow plate. "You study animals?"

"Back home I was a veterinarian and an animal behaviorist. I was recruited by the Initiative to study the new animals we would be encountering on these planets."

"Yet here you are hiding in a cave on Kadara."

Sasha shrugged. "We all have done something that landed us here." Before Kaetus had the chance to ask about her reason for being exiled, she changed the subject. "Your swelling has gone down quite a bit you know."

He touched his face gingerly. "Yeah, I guess."

"Oh, speaking of which, I guess I should change out your bandages."

Kaetus didn't respond. He wasn't sure how to. He had suffered through medic visits before, but being a medic was their job. Sasha was a stranger. She had no reason to help him and it made him extremely uncomfortable, but he knew he wasn't in any shape to refuse medical assistance. As Sasha retrieved the bandages, he wondered what Sloane would say to him if she saw him like this. She wasn't the type to dote on him, or anyone for that matter. She'd probably tell him to get off his ass and get back to work. She wasn't the most caring individual, but he was loyal to her. He vowed to protect her and he failed.

Kaetus watched as Sasha undid the bandages on his leg. Once they were off, he noticed the large crack in his shin plates and the gash in his calf. He also noticed his spur was broken.

As Sasha tossed the old bloodied bandages aside, she looked up at him and asked, "Are you thinking about Sloane?"

His good eye met hers with a threatening gaze.

"It's okay if you don't want to talk about her. I know you two were close, but sometimes it helps to talk about the people you care about after their gone."

Kaetus looked away as she began rewrapping his leg. He didn't want to think of Sloane as 'gone', as truthful as it was. He sighed and tried to take her advice, hoping it would help. Something had to help ease the constant ache in his chest. "Yes… we were… close."

"Did you love her?"

His jaw tensed and his mandibles jerked. Then he scoffed. "There's no such thing as love. There's loyalty and survival."

Sasha wasn't sure what to say to that. It was obvious Kaetus had feelings for Sloane, but he would never admit it. Plus, the rigid turian seemed to have bitter thoughts on the idea of love, so Sasha decided it was best to leave the subject alone.

When she finished his leg, she moved onto his chest. She knelt at his side with clean bandages in hand. He leaned forward slightly to allow her access, but when he did, the urge to ask Sasha of her intentions struck him.

"Sasha," he felt a little strange saying her name for the first time after being around her for days. "Why are you helping me? I mean, what's your motive, your end game here? You're obviously not with the Outcasts or the Collective, so why go through all this trouble?"

Her fingers grazed his carapace delicately as she undid the bandages and she looked up at him with a playful smirk. "I'm going to recruit you into my team, the Crazy Beasts!" Kaetus's expression was clearly unimpressed with her joke, but she laughed at it. His grouchiness didn't take away from her enjoying her own joke. "But seriously, I helped you because you needed help."

He raised a brow as she tossed the old bandages. "So you have no ulterior motives?"

"Is that so hard for you to believe?"

"Yes," he answered bluntly. "Kindness doesn't go far on Kadara."

"Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I have no ulterior motives." She touched the broken pieces of his carapace gingerly and he flinched. "Still looks tender."

"No shit," he muttered.

She ignored him and let her fingers travel down his wound, which was healing, but was still a maze of cracks and gashes across the front of his carapace.

Kaetus tried his best to be nice, but damn he was uncomfortable. No one, not even Sloane had ever touched him like this. He kept telling himself she was only inspecting his injuries, like a medic would, but it was still difficult to sit and allow it.

"Looks like it's healing nicely, though I'll admit I don't know too much about turian anatomy. I'm not going to worry about your hand for a while. It needs to stay splinted."

She replaced the bandages on his chest with clean ones and then disposed of old ones in a bag by her cooking equipment. She returned with something in a package that fit in the palm of her hand.

"Oh, I also got you this. It's some kind of turian nutrient bar if you're hungry." He took the package as she continued. "It's actually pretty late, so I'm going to bed. Do you need help lying back down?"

"No," he replied. He wanted to do something on his own. He hated feeling helpless.

"Okay, well, I'll be just over there. Don't hesitate to wake me up if you need me."

Kaetus nodded as Sasha dimmed some of the lamps and cleared the equipment off of her bed on the other side of the cave. She removed her body suit, wearing some kind of knee-length breeches and a V-neck shirt. It wasn't the most revealing sleepwear, but Kaetus still averted his gaze. He waited a while, noticed Sasha toss underneath her blanket a few times, then when she was still, he opened the nutrient bar.

As he took a bite, favoring his broken tooth, his thoughts dwelled on Sloane and Sasha's questions. Everyone knew they were close, but no one knew the extent. She depended on him as much as he depended on her. He had faith in her. She was a strong leader, but she was also ruthless and even Kaetus could admit, mean sometimes. Hell, she was even mean to him, but that was Sloane.

His mind ventured to when Sloane would call him into her quarters on the nights she was lonely. She would command him to strip out of his armor and body suit and fuck her. Some nights were different than others. Sometimes she would tell him to use his mouth. He got used to female human anatomy by following her demands. He would delve his tongue into her and lap at her most sensitive parts while she writhed in pleasure. Sometimes she would just tell him to fuck her. Only ever from behind or him on top and there was never any kissing, even though Kaetus knew it to be a form of human affection, but Sloane didn't want it. He enjoyed the fact he was there to pleasure her, even though most times he didn't finish himself, he was fulfilling her desires and that was all that mattered.

Kaetus finished his nutrient bar, took a swig of his drink and sighed, trying to ignore the ache in his groin that crept up on him while picturing his private moments with Sloane, but most of all he tried ignoring the empty feeling in his gut when he realized those moments would never happen again. Even though Sasha's lecture about revenge made sense, he still had to avenge Sloane. Those Collectives took everything from him and no matter what Sasha said to him, he would claim his revenge.

He glanced over at Sasha's sleeping form. She was curled up on the edge. Though he couldn't see her all that well, he did see some of her fire red hair that spilled over the edge of the bed like a flaming waterfall. He did admit to himself that she was a curiosity. A human, exile, scavenger, beast tamer with a kind heart. She was a rarity in Andromeda and he wondered how she wasn't dead yet.

As Kaetus finished off his drink, he figured he should get some sleep. He glanced down at his mat and noticed a folded blanket at the end of it. He hadn't noticed it until now. He picked it up and spread it out over him as he painfully readjusted himself back onto the mat and laid down, hoping sleep would come quick so his mind wouldn't remember any more.

To be continued...