In the End of the World
Chapter 4: Dumb and Drunk
Though Shepard didn't know how the Turian drinks were, she found the human wine to be quite excellent. To be fair, the high quality of it was probably wasted on her; Shepard drank infrequently. Her career simply did not allow her the time.
Even had she been a wine connoisseur , she would not have given the drink much of a thought other than "more" after finding her most loyal friend and the ship's best soldier stripped down to his skivvies just inside the door of her cabin.
Jane was a smarter woman than most. When Garrus' almost sensual reply, "How long is that, Jane?" drifted to her from across the cabin, she knew something was wrong. He never called her by her first name. Then to find him half-undressed? She put the pieces together while he stared at her, dumb-founded, as he saw the bottles in her arms. She had started to panic.
Just as she was about to address the situation, Garrus had sort of frozen in place. She'd started to say, "Garrus, I really don't -" but stopped at the look on his face. He was miles away. She'd blinked a few times, then waved her hand in front of his face.
"Vakarian. Hello? Palaven to Garrus."
Just as she became aware of his warm breath touching her lips in their close proximity, her eyes began to travel downward from his face to the rest of his form, covered only by a thin layer of cloth. At that moment, he came to with a look of shock and perhaps disappointment.
"What's going on?" she'd asked, trying to sound neutral as she withdrew from the warmth of his body heat. "You're acting as if you've already had a few too many, and I haven't even opened the bottles yet."
She watched him glance down at his discarded attire anxiously as he made some sort of bullshit excuse that she wasn't listening to. She suggested cancelling their evening together, and started to walk away so he could put his clothes on, but he didn't do it. How could he possibly have known that Jane had seen the vids, and that she knew exactly how Turian undergarments differed from casual-wear? He was trying to save himself embarrassment.
So she turned back to him and smiled a response. Fine. If he wanted to play chicken, she wasn't going to back down and spare him the humiliation of admitting what he had assumed she wanted to do with him.
This is how Garrus Vakarian came to be half-naked and holding a glass of fine Turian brandy in his commander's private cabin.
"Why don't you take a seat?" she suggested from the comfort of the couch.
Garrus hesitated before joining her. He was not normally self-conscious; he knew he was an attractive Turian. For some strange reason, he still felt his heart begin to race and his muscles tense up. He suddenly realized that if Shepard were to find out he was in his underwear, she might be extremely offended. Oh, well. He was in too deep now to make her suspicious by bailing out. Besides, he really did want to be there. With her.
So, with great effort, he forced his feet to transport him to the couch, fervently reminding himself that Jane Shepard was just one woman. Unfortunately, Garrus had no idea what he was in for.
"So," she smiled as he sat a few feet from her, "How is life? We haven't really had the chance to talk for a long time."
He nodded. "Probably not since -"
"Since I died?"
He nodded again, looking down. "Shep, you have no idea what it was like."
She stared at him. "Dying?"
"No, watching you die. It was like losing a family member." He sounded pained, and it made her uneasy.
"The ugly, miniature-sized cousin?" she supposed jokingly, trying to relieve the tension.
"Why would you call yourself ugly?" he demanded.
She shrugged. "By Turian standards, I meant."
He wanted to tell her that she was beautiful by any standards. Instead, he settled with, "Turians don't really find humans so unattractive as you might think."
She let it go. "Speaking of family, you've never mentioned yours. Do you have one?"
"Everyone has some kind of family, don't they?" he snorted.
"I don't," she murmured.
He didn't know what to say. "I'm sorry, Shepard. That was an asinine thing to say."
"It's alright."
They were quiet for a few moments, during which they both drank deeply.
"What happened?"
Jane sighed. "My mom was in Alliance. She went MIA when I was about ten years old. I hardly remember her. And my father," she almost growled the word, "didn't really give a shit. He died when I was eighteen. That's when I joined Alliance." She downed the rest of her drink, and stared absently into the pattern of the wood grain on her coffee table.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Anything," she replied sincerely.
"What was it like being dead?"
She pursed her lips. "Quiet, I guess. All I remember is floating away from the wreckage of the Normandy, realizing my air tank was punctured. I was thanking the deities that my end would be quick, rather than hours of floating in the void, helpless, before I inevitably reached the same fate. Then I held my breath until my vision went dark... And suddenly I was waking up in Cerberus labs."
He shook his head in amazement. "I don't know how or why they did it, but I'm glad they brought you back."
"Why's that? So you can pretend to snipe from twenty yards back while I do all the grunt work?" she smirked.
"Excuse me? If you went charging into battle like usual but without me covering your ass, you wouldn't last five minutes.
"Not true," she protested, shoving him as he laughed. "When's the last time you head-butted a Krogan?"
"You are pretty tough for such a tiny little thing," he grinned at her, mandibles pulling back to expose rows of long, sharp teeth. It was a little creepy.
"Garrus?"
"Yes, Shepard?"
"I don't think I've ever seen you out of your armor before."
He choked on the brandy. "Uh, yeah. I just didn't want to risk spilling alcohol on it. Might warp the paint."
"Are regular Turian clothes always made so thin?" she asked, a gleam forming in her eye that he didn't notice.
If he were capable of it, he'd have blushed. "Um, yeah. Palaven is hot."
"So is that why you always wear so much armor around the ship? Because it's hot? I just think it's weird that you clearly have some casual clothes on board with you, but you always wore them with armor over them until now."
That did it. Her questioning had become too obvious, and she saw his eyes widen slightly as he realized that she knew he was in only his underwear. Drat. She'd wanted to string him along for a while longer.
He was quick on his feet. "Well, to be honest, these are underclothes. The armor was just feeling uncomfortable, and I knew you probably wouldn't mind," he lied, knowing all the while that she probably saw through him. "Are we good enough friends for that?"
She had a new idea. "Garrus, turn around."
"Why?"
"I said turn around, dammit."
He complied, looking confused.
Jane watched him for a moment to ensure that he really intended to obey, then got up and dipped into her wardrobe. She quickly slipped off her commander garb and replaced it with a T-shirt and a pair of underwear.
"Okay, you can turn back."
He pivoted to face her again. He met her gaze at first, then she watched as his eyes dropped to take in the rest of her body. She felt a heat creep up into her cheeks as he stared at her.
"Is that human underwear?"
She nodded, not trusting her words.
"I like it."
Suddenly the game had flipped, and she was the one feeling awkward and exposed. She blamed the alcohol for this poorly thought-out plan.
It was true; her head was beginning to swim. She headed back to the couch, stumbling slightly along the way, and accidentally fell into him.
He caught her, laughing, and helped her sit next to him. "Maybe you've had too much to drink."
"Maybe I haven't had enough," she muttered, shooting a glare at him.
He shrugged and poured himself another glass. "What is it humans call someone who can't hold their liquor again? Oh, that's right. You're a lightweight."
It was lucky that he had set his glass down.
"Buddy, I will tear off those stupid mandibles," she threatened, lunging at him.
Garrus grabbed his attacker by both wrists, and she struggled with him, trying to force her fist toward him. It didn't work.
She gave up, signaling her defeat by allowing her body to go slack, and he dropped her wrists in surprise; she was now slumped against his chest.
He didn't dare move. She was half on him, and half dangling off the couch. It seemed like a very uncomfortable position for her to be in, but he'd never really touched Shepard before today, and this seemed like something called 'hugging' that he'd seen humans do before. He wasn't sure what to do with it.
For a whole minute neither of them spoke or moved, before he realized that her breathing had become deep and that she had fallen asleep against him.
He sighed and stood, scooping her into his arms. He walked to the bed somewhat haphazardly, realizing that the alcohol had affected him more than he'd known. He laid Jane onto her bed carefully, then gently pulled one of the blankets on top of her.
She mumbled something too quiet for him to hear.
"What?" he asked softly, but she had already drifted off again.
He began to make his way to the door, swaying, before deciding that he'd rather sleep off his intoxication on the couch than pass out on the unreasonably long elevator ride down to deck three.
Garrus altered his course of direction, and instead headed toward the couch. He was asleep the moment his head touched the fabric.
(A/N): See? We finally got to the Shakarian fluff. This was an unusual chapter, and far more goofy than it was intended to be. Hopefully the humor is appreciated, although the next chapter should be a bit more serious.
