We sat and talked about weddings for another hour before we went to sleep. Tali promised she'd hold my hand until I fell asleep, then she'd crawl back onto the couch. When I woke up in the morning, she was there, so I believed her. I wonder how long she stayed after I fell asleep, though.
I got a few visits from the crew, along with the crazy teammates that couldn't join me on the Normandy. Wrex and Grunt damn near broke my arm with the hand shakes and hugs, Zaeed didn't go three sentences without saying "God-damned," and Kasumi still insisted on calling me Shep. But the talk with Tali had been the deepest talk I had the entire time.
Most of it had been "Good to see you're ok, get better, and we'll talk when you're up for it." Still nice to have someone come in every hour or so. It kept things moving along.
Against the doctor's orders, I made anybody I knew with high ranks send me casualty reports. He said I shouldn't be under stress, but I had to know...
I got most of the reports just after I got out of surgery for the skin grafts. Victus said the Turian fleet lost three-quarters of their fleet and over half of their land forces inside of the day of fighting for Earth. Almost seven hundred thousand men and women lost their lives... And that was just that their casualties.
Every fleet involved in the invasion gave up numbers similar. Asari lost just over five hundred thousand. Salarians, even with the diminished fleet they sent me because they were pissed about the genophage, lost three hundred thousand. Geth lost four hundred thousand bodies and six hundred thousand "identities" as the report described it. Quarians finally listened to me, at least, and kept the civilians out of the invasion fleet. They were medevacs and supply runners. Still lost just over two hundred thousand people, even without the land war involved.
Hackett wouldn't send me the human casualty list, but I went around him and had Traynor get into his comms and forward me some... Biggest mistake I've made in a long time...
Over four million Alliance marines were KIA. And that was just the invasion force. At least twenty million soldiers in North America died from Earth being taken to the Crucible being fired. The global soldier loss is well over a hundred million... and the civilian death count is simply listed as "too high to count."
Doc was right. I shouldn't have seen that list, all those people we lost... I didn't get a whole lot of sleep for four nights afterward. I spent most of it up, talking to Tali. She had seen most of the numbers herself, and was still trying to cope with her own loses... She lost just as many friends as I did. The fleet always called her, and she'd give her advice or speech to the troops over a vid-call. She said that... as much as her people needed her, I needed her more.
When she told me that, I would've given anything to go back to the Normandy, crawl into bed with her, and stay there for a few days. It didn't matter if we made love or not: I just wanted to forget the the world was wrong and focus on the best thing in it. She got me through it, though. She let me talk though everything for a while, let me vent... Gave me a shoulder to cry on... I had the same job for her the next night. We got through it somehow. I have a feeling I wouldn't have been able to without her...
Three days before I started physical therapy, I was cleared for visitors, meaning they could be in for more than five minutes at a time. I made a list on my omni-tool, who to see in which order the moment the doc cleared me.. All of the crew got first priority, then anyone who's either been in the crew or anyone who gave a lot of help. Reporters and usual fans get to wait for the press conference I'm planning. Hackett's the first after the crew. With the bomb I plan on dropping, and everything he's done, he deserves a little heads up.
So, all and all, the first up is... Ash.
She walks into the post surgery room at about noon, wearing Navy blues and her hair in a pony tail. I sit up from the bed with a clear head for the first time since I got to the hospital. They got me still hooked up to a few wireless vital monitors and some bandages under my hoody and sweats, but I have free reign to wheel around the hospital and walk around my room. Walking is slow, and the chair has to be electric (Doc's orders), but it's nice to get out of the bed. And in clothes that are mine.
"What's up with the dress blues, Lieutenant?" I chuckle lightly.
"The entire team's been interviewed hourly since the end of the war, Skipper. Garrus, Vega Joker, even all the crew who couldn't be with us for Earth. I wanted to look good for the camera, which is something you've never been terribly good at."
"I had some good interviews over the years."
"But you always looked like Hell. You can talk, but you can't look good while doing it," she chuckles.
"Well I'm sorry a flat top and goatee aren't exactly photogenic. I guess knocking out al-Jilani didn't help matters," I joke.
We both laugh for a few seconds before Ash gets serious again.
"I know you didn't invite me here to joke about our looks, Aaron. What's this about?"
I walk over to the windows and roll down the blinds so no one can see in. "I uh... I just wanted to talk for a minute or two."
"I'm listening," she says, a little nervously, a little curiously.
"I wanted to set the record straight. About us..."
I sigh a little, trying to think of the right words to say. The plan I had just disappeared and flew out the window. "I'm not asking you to take me back, and I'm not leaving Tali. It's just... I want to figure out where we stand, Ash. You were a hell of a friend on the SSV, still a damn good one during the war, and a lover I don't regret for a second. I... What do you want to do?"
She has the same look of confusion and thought I had when I was trying to think of what to say. She runs her hand through her hair while looking at the ground. After a little bit, she looks up and starts talking.
"I don't regret what happened between us either, Skipper. I still remember our talks and our night before Ilos. I was happy with that, and I'm still happy when I think about it. What I told you on Horizon all those years ago, I did mean that. Not the being angry at you, but that I loved you on the Normandy. I still care a lot about you."
She sighs/smirks before she keeps going.
"When I heard about you and Tali, I was ready to kill you both. I had my rifle ready and my armor on. I was one trigger pull from drilling you between the eyes and then her in the next heartbeat. I know you were torn on the Citadel when I was at the hospital, but it wasn't helping me being angry with you...
"You know what finally got me to stop wanting to kill you? I saw the you guys together. I mean, the moment I saw the two of you, I reached for my rifle, but when I didn't get it... I looked at the two of you while you ate lunch in the mess. You sat next to her with your food finished while she kept working on hers. You talked to her for over half an hour while she ate. Then you talked there for almost an hour... I saw how you looked at her, that look in your eye... Then her body language while you talked to her and held her hand and...
"I knew you loved her. It was obvious to everybody, but especially me. And after I listened to her talk about you, I knew she did too. That... I hated that just as much but... I remembered the way you used to look at me and how you acted and... You never were in love with me like you are with her...
"As much as I hated losing you Aaron, and as much as I like Tali, to an alien... You were and still are happier with her than you can ever be with me. So... I decided to let you go."
She sighs and turns away from me.
"I'll miss those days with you. I will for a while and probably read some more poetry like I did when you died. But before I fell in love with you, you were my friend, Skipper. And if we can, I still want to be..."
I lay a hand on her shoulder and walk around to in front of her. She's not on the verge of tears, but her depression is almost an aura around her...
"Hey..." I say softly, finally getting her to look up at me."Think we can still be friends, Ash? I'll need somebody to have a few drinks with and get some relationship advice from when I screw something up."
It earns me a bit of a chuckle and a smile.
"Sure... I'd like that."
She moves her arms under mine and gives me a hug. I give her a hug back. Not as closely as I have when we were together or like I do to Tali, but still a hug.
"Thanks..." I mutter. "For the record, Ash, there are two things I'm sorry about. I'm sorry things didn't work out between us, and I'm sorry I had to choose someone besides you. But... I don't regret choosing Tali... Is that fair?"
"I know, Aaron..." she sighs. "Thank you for being honest with me..."
"I have a deal in mind. Just to set the record straight, get everything squared away."
"What deal?"
"We have one last hug and we start over as friends. Just like we did before we started the whole flirting thing on the Normandy. And we keep in touch from there. That sound reasonable?"
She chuckles a little again and pulls her head back from mine.
"That sounds more than reasonable, O Captain, my Captain."
"Good. Means I don't have to pull rank on you."
We hug for just a few seconds. It's not a hug like "I love you." It's more like... "Thanks for everything." It feels good to finally get this thing sorted out between us.
We let go of each other when we're done.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Lieutenant Williams. I'm Commander Shepard," I joke.
Ash laughs, batting a little bit of hair out of her eyes.
"It will be an honor to serve under you, Commander."
She offers a hand shake that I take, then we salute each other. It takes all of our will power not to bust up laughing again.
"Thanks," she says. "I'll see you later, Skipper."
She starts walking out the door.
"See you later, hellcat," I joke. That's the last time I'll ever be able to call her something like that. Come to think of it, it's also the first.
She gives one more chuckle as she leaves.
The moment she gets out the door, she draws a pistol I didn't know she had and points it at the scream of some woman in the hallway. I rush out the door and, somehow without falling over myself, get a view of what all the commotion's about.
There's a rachni worker standing in the middle of the waiting room. His/her tendrils are wandering the air aimlessly, pointing at people for a second before resuming their search. When they point at me, though, they stay locked on as it slowly walks towards me. Ash keeps her weapon trained on the bug. I just stand there like a moron. Hackett said they were being nice and cooperative, and I let the queen live, so it should be friendly... I hope.
It stops just in front of me and bows it front legs, like a horse at a circus. It doesn't say anything, but I don't think they're capable of talking in the first place. But what the hell is going on?
"I don't suppose we have a coma patient within grabbing distance, is there?" I question to all the nurses in the room, who are pressed against the walls in fear.
A new scream sounds behind me, followed by the thunk of a body hitting the ground. The same nurse who's been checking on me for the last three weeks just passed out when she saw the car-sized cockroach in the middle of the room. If she saw the thing spit acid like it did on Noveria, she'd have passed out faster.
Her body stands up slowly, now under control of the rachni. Ash trains the pistol on the bug's head, but I make her lower it.
"We offer no hostilities," the nurse's disembodied voice says, the same voice that's spoken to me three times over the last four years. "We merely wish to speak to you, Commander."
"You might want to rethink how you do that next time," I say sarcastically. "Since when have the workers been able to control people?"
"They can not. If you will follow, we shall explain." It waves one tendril towards the stairs.
"Give me a second. I need to take my chair," I surrender. Why do I have a bad feeling about this?
I walk back into my room, sit in my electric wheel chair, and slowly roll out to the waiting room.
"Which floor?"
"Go to the front door," the nurse says before collapsing to the ground.
I take the elevator and arrive to the ground floor in a minute. The rachni decided on taking the stairs. Judging by the screams, it was keeping pace with the elevator. At least it didn't just crawl out the window and down the wall. It meets me at the front door, standing there patiently.
"Ok, what's next?" I ask.
It simply waves a tendril towards the door, like a person signaling with their hand.
It crawls out the door, and I follow to the pressure sealed garden. There's some kind of weird dome around the hospital, like the emergency barriers on a ship during a breach, that keeps the air in. It lets solid objects in, though, so sandstorms can come in...
Along with the queen rachni standing in the middle of a grass patch. Holy shit, it got even bigger from last time. It couldn't even fit in the damn shuttle bay on the Normandy. There's an obviously controlled doctor standing next to her, ready to talk.
"What in the HELL are you doing here?!" I ask/shout. "How'd you even get here?"
"We had our own ship," she answers immediately. "Your soldiers gave us protection on our trip, but would not leave their ships. We believe they are afraid of us."
"I can't say I blame them."
"You wish to know why we came."
"That'd be nice to know, yeah," I nod. "Any reason besides scaring the living hell out of everyone on Mars?"
"We wished to thank you for sparing us, Commander," she says, herself bowing like the worker did earlier. "Few organics would have done the same in your position. And we wish to thank you for defeating the machines. We knew it would be you to end the sour note that stole our children from us."
"Thanks for helping with the Crucible. We needed it, and I hear your workers were perfect for the job."
"We were happy to aid you. As a way of thanking you, and a way of defeating the machines. We learned a great deal, even about other species. Your kind do not communicate as much as we."
"I'm pretty sure that was more everyone scared out of their mind than anything else."
She stands up and returns to her usual stance: taller than everything else in the room.
"We believe so. But thank you, Commander. Your kindness will never be forgotten, and we will not risk violence again. We wish to be a part of your community."
"You mean join the Council? Whenever we rebuild it and get some semblance of order in the galaxy again?"
"If that is how we join, yes. We do not want to tempt fate again. We wish to rebuild to what we once were, and to coexist in a harmony with your kind."
"That's... not a bad idea. It will take some work to get everyone to trust you guys again, but I think there's a decent chance. What do you plan on doing now?"
"We will go back to our home, burrow deep into the rock and ground to raise more children. We will leave some to keep our presence known and sing with the other races. We will not make the mistakes our mothers made."
"Good for you. I think the rachni deserve a second chance."
"Thank you, Commander. We wish to return home now. We fear the other humans may panic if we stay."
I turn around and see all of hospital security pointing rifles at the queen while still hiding behind the doors, walls, and anything else they can find.
"Yeah... That's probably a good idea. Stay safe on your trip. And try not to aggravate any krogan on the way."
It laughs a little, I think. Some weird sound comes from the queen itself instead of the host.
"As you wish. Thank you again. We will see you again."
"Just warn me next time so I can have everyone relatively calm."
Both the queen and the worker turn away, walking out of the dome to what I assume is a rachni ship. It doesn't look like any other ship I've seen, and it's guarded by three Alliance fighters and a frigate. Kinda hoped she was kidding about that.
The possessed doctor falls to the ground when the queen reaches her ship, and the staff rush to check him.