A/N: I apologize for the delay, and I'd like to promise that the next chapter will be here within a week, but this is the absolute worst time of the year for me in terms of free time, so I can't guarantee speedy updates for the next month or so. I am working on the chapters, but not as often or for as long at a time as I would like. This should resolve itself soon enough, and in the mean time I'll try my best to keep updates at least slightly on time.
Chapter Six
The universe doesn't get smaller.
It can be hard to remember that at times. When man first raised his eyes to the stars and thought of sailing upon their celestial seas, even the clouds above his head were unreachable, an infinity away. Centuries ago, in the year 1969 AD, man's boot sunk into the dust on Earth's moon, and in the light of this tremendous leap crawling from point to point on the earth became inconsequential, juvenile. Years later man's primitive engines took him further into the stars, and they were faster than anything anyone had ever built. The distance between the Terra and her pale sister Luna suddenly seemed so much smaller.
Later still man learned to fill his ships' bellies with shiny blue rocks, rendering them weightless and capable of impossible speeds. Just as the speed of human travel grew from a few miles per hour to something that did not fit on the page and had an E in it, the distances men crossed seemed to dwindle away to almost nothing. Mass Effect turned distance into a footnote, but mass effect jumps are deceiving. Gaps unfathomable miles across can be bridged in the briefest of moments, but once crossed, they do not disappear. Light-years care nothing for man's illusions, and when one jumps a thousand of them in a second the impossibility of what has just been done challenges the mind.
Legion sits at the end of its jump, perfectly motionless in the AI core save for its arms, which steadily work the wire brush in and out of the barrel of its rifle. I, it thinks to itself. I, I, I, I, I.
…
Commander Shepard leans over the back of his pilot's chair. "We're coming up on Catreus now," explains Joker from under the brim of his cap. "But we're not the only ones." His hands fly across the keyboard and a picture opens on the display, a faint red band looping around to the other side of the planet before them.
"What am I looking at, Joker?" asks Shepard, irritation slipping into his voice.
"It's an emission trail," says Joker in a tone that suggests that it should have been obvious. "Someone's vented heat sinks here recently. It's faint, but it wouldn't be here at all if there wasn't a ship here recently."
"A ship, Joker? A ship orbiting a planet we know is inhabited."
"Not just any ship. A ship with the same stealth systems as the Normandy. They built up heat during FTL flight, and when they red-shifted they blew it off so it wouldn't melt the heat sink. They didn't come far, though. Either that or it's a few days old."
Shepard shakes his head. "How they have our systems? That's classified Alliance tech, and if there was another spectre here Hackett would have told me."
Joker shrugs. "I dunno, commander. The Alliance isn't the only one with the plans, though."
Shepard opens his mouth, then stops. Cerberus. He closes his mouth, his lips tightening into a thin line. "Take us in," he says. "As quietly as you can."
"Roger that, commander. Haven't vented the heat sinks yet, so we're running dark."
Shepard squints at the magnified image of Catreus. "Where's the facility?" he asks.
"It's on the other side," Joker replies. "I'll take us in under the clouds, and with luck we'll land without them knowing."
"Good," says Shepard, straightening up. "I'd like to avoid dealing with Cerberus today. I don't care what Solaris is up to, so we're doing this one by the book. Knock on the door, see what's wrong, leave. That's it."
"You got it, commander. Hey EDI, baby, check this out."
"I am not a human infant, Mr. Moreau," answers the synthesized tones of the copilot. "And referring to me as such is inappropriate."
"Ah, forget it," mutters Joker. "You probably wouldn't care anyways. Hold on, commander," he says to Shepard. "This is gonna get a little bumpy."
Shepard folds his arms on the back of Joker's chair, watching as the Catreus grows gradually larger in the view screen.
"Disengaging artificial gravity," announces Joker, speaking into the shipwide inter-comm. A moment later Shepard's boots lift themselves gently up from the deck and he is left hanging awkwardly from the pilot's seat. "Here comes the exosphere," says Joker. "Gonna get warm."
The view screen flashes light orange, flickering as if a flame is blowing against the ship's electronic eyes. Joker's hands perform an intricate dance, darting this way and that across his control array. "Thrust capacitors good … shield integrity at ninety-eight percent … EDI, can you bump me up to ninety-nine?"
"Affirmative. Redirecting non-critical resources."
Whiteness is visible now, a solid field of pure, featureless white stretching below them. It is getting closer alarmingly quickly. "Joker," says Shepard, his voice strained as he tries to pull himself into an upright position. "Please tell me we're not about to crash."
"Clouds!" crows Joker, grinning manically. The ship begins shaking from left to right, nearly dislodging Shepard's grip on the chair. "EDI, check our G-diffusers!"
They field of clouds comes up to meet them, and then they are in the midst of swirling, milky white. There's a lurch, and Shepard's stomach feels like it's being dragged out of him. "What are you doing?" he asks through gritted teeth. This is the last time I do re entry without being strapped in, he thinks, the vibration threatening to shake his arms out of their sockets.
"It's called a split-S maneuver," replies Joker. "Generating drag to slow us down. That and the thrusters," he says, making a gesture over the keyboard that causes a sudden blast of force, propelling Shepard back and into the wall of the cockpit.
Shepard makes a weak attempt to leave the wall, is pushed back, and decides he likes it better there. "This is slowed down?" he asks incredulously.
"This is nothing," calls Joker from his seat. "We're down to Mach twenty-five, smooth sailing."
Shepard opens his mouth, then closes it again as the smoothness of the Normandy's sailing bashes the back of his skull against the wall again. He grimaces, tasting blood.
Just as suddenly as they had appeared, the clouds around the Normandy vanish in a flash of gold and orange and they are soaring beneath them, the planet's surface spread out in vibrant green as it speeds by below. Joker flips a few switches and the pressure eases off, the vibration slowing to a more tolerable swaying. Shepard rises shakily, retaking his place behind the pilot's chair. Below the Normandy the tops of dense forests rush by at blurring speed, fading and melting into a landscape of unbroken green. Mountains rise in the distance, their gray-brown humps rising out of the verdant sea like the humped back of a great beast beneath waves. The sun glints ahead of them, its setting rays sweeping across the forested expanse to meet them.
Joker grins, and with a subtle twist of his arm he guides the Normandy's right wing up, trailing it through the clouds hanging like inverted ground above them, wisps trailing curling around and dissolving in the ship's superheated wake. He turns his gleeful face up to Shepard, and the commander can't help but match his exuberance. "Pretty nice, huh, commander?"
"Not bad, Joker," Shepard concedes. He leans forward, as if it will help him to see better. "That looks like a temple down there."
"According to my databases," chimes EDI. "The planet Catreus was once a salarian garden world. During the rachni wars it was evacuated, and has not since been repopulated. Infrastructure from salarian settlements remains however. It is likely that the facility we seek has been built in the ruins of just such a settlement."
"Makes sense," grunts Shepard. "A nice clean planet outside council jurisdiction, and they don't even have to set up their own buildings."
"There's more," continues the AI. "The Normandy's sensors have picked up geth signals."
"Coming from the planet's surface?" asks Shepard, alarmed.
"Yes. The signal is weak, but it matches known geth signatures."
"Heretic signal patterns?" Legion has appeared suddenly at Shepard's elbow. It poses the question the EDI. "Play back the transmission for … play back the transmission."
EDI complies, and a stream of unintelligible, heavily distorted crackling and buzzing plays from a speaker somewhere.
Legion nods slightly, its face plates tilting in affirmation. "Yes. I recognize the transmission. It is Heretic in origin, meant to signify distress. An SOS, except it is malfunctioning."
"How so?" asks Shepard.
"It lists its location as an area of space several light-years from this planet," replies Legion.
"Is it the only signal?"
"It is the only signal our sensors were able to pick up," answers EDI. "And I think Legion will agree it is not as strong as it should be, certainly not if it was meant to work across light-years of space. It is unlikely it has the strength to make it as far as the nearest comm buoy."
"Geth signals coming from a planet where an alliance facility just went dark," muses Shepard. He scratches the stubble beginning to form on his cheek. "It seems awfully straightforward. All the more reason to stay silent. If this is a trap, I'm not in the mood to fly into it. Where's the base, EDI?"
"The Solaris facility is located on the other side of the planet, commander," replies the AI. "ETA is four hours."
"Come on," begins Joker, but EDI cuts him off.
"The commander has expressed his wishes to remain undetected, mister Moreau. This means no dangerously high speeds, and no 'daredevil' behavior."
"Yes, mother," grumbles the pilot, slouching down in his chair a little.
Shepard leaves them, taking the elevator back up to his cabin. After a little while Legion joins him.
…
The Mass Effect jump is something Garrus has become so accustomed to that he barely even notices the unfathomable distances he crosses. Now, though, it is as if the distance has opened within himself, spreading two halves of his own being to opposite sides of the galaxy. How can it be possible to be so far apart, he wonders. He holds his finger up to the glass, one talon tracing patterns across the cool surface. His eyes gaze out through the window, the vibrant collage of city lights blending together in his vision. How can two people be this far apart and still be connected? How is it possible? How can I know I will see her again when I do not even know where she is, not even within a margin of a hundred million miles? It makes his heart ache to think about it, a slow throb as if with each pulse it pulls at a freshly healed wound.
"I just got off the phone with Harken," says a voice behind him, dry like rustling leaves.
Garrus turns away slowly from the window of the room the two men share, his eyes lingering on the city outside. "What did you find?" he asks.
"He can't help us," says Thane. "And he seems exceedingly fatigued by the little help he's provided. He did however point me to someone who knows a little more about Jacobson than he does."
"And who might that be?"
"A Craig Harris, an ex-coworker. A drunk, too, so he should have little holding him back from giving us an honest account of her."
"Did Harken tell you where to find him?"
"Yes. He said to look in a place called 'Chora's den.'"
"Oh, no," groans Garrus, passing a palm over his face. "Not Chora's Den."
"Yes," says Thane, the corners of his mouth twitching. "I have heard about your and Shepard's history there. I imagine they have scoured the blood and scorch marks off of the walls by now, though."
"Alright," sighs Garrus. "But I'm not looking forward to this."
…
He still isn't looking forward to it when the two are striding down the narrow, dimly-lit hallways to the less-than-salubrious bar. Shadows flicker around them in the dim streetlights; it's clear that maintenance of this area is low on C-Sec's to-do list. "We'll just sit next to him," he's explaining to Thane, still wondering if he's going to be thrown out on sight. "Buy him a drink or two. I doubt he-"
Thane stops suddenly, holding a finger to his lips. Garrus tenses, his hand dropping to his side and curling into a fist when it doesn't find a gun there. Shit! The drell shakes his head though, taking a funny, hop-skipping step forward, like a bird. He cocks his head, seeming to listen, then his hand flies out, so fast that Garrus barely sees it move, and into the shadows where it meets with a thump and a surprised cry. Thane shifts his grip and yanks back, pulling a startled-looking man out by his collar. The man is clutching his throat where the drell's punch connected, and his eyes dart over Garrus's shoulder.
The turian needs no second warning. He spins on his heel, ducking instinctively even as the knife blade hisses over his head. He reaches up, grabbing the arm as it comes back to slash at him again, and smashes the fist holding the weapon into the wall. The man at the end of the arm makes a stifled noise of pain, and Garrus slams the hand against the wall again, breaking the fingers' hold. The knife clatters to the floor, and Garrus nearly pulls away in time. A meaty fist collides with the side of his face, sending him stumbling backward, his head ringing. As he regains his balance he looks up to see his assailant now holding his other hand, cut and broken from its liaison with Garrus's face plates. Garrus smiles viciously, taking hold of the man behind his neck and delivering first a knee to his gut, which bends him over, wheezing, and then a hard elbow to his temple, which drops him straight to the ground. "That's why you don't punch a turian," Garrus says, then he suddenly remembers the other human.
He looks up to see Thane watching him with an expression like amusement on his face, his arms wrapped in a painful-looking hold around the other would-be mugger. "Are you done?" he asks Garrus, the corners of his mouth doing their funny, twitchy smile again. Garrus looks at Thane blankly. Then he turns to the fallen man and gives him a hefty kick for good measure. The man groans and shows no signs of stirring.
"Yeah," he mutters, and when he turns back to Thane, the drell's man is already unconscious on the ground. "I would suggest we take their weapons," he grumbles. "But it doesn't seem like you need any."
Thane shrugs, falling back into step beside Garrus as they continue on down the shadowy alley. "Weapons are a convenient way of dealing with an inconvenient business. It is so easy to pull a trigger that one can forget about all the difficult things to be done afterward. How many assassins failed because they thought a bullet in the back of their target's skull would suffice to kill them?"
"It doesn't?" grunts Garrus.
"No. There is more to a successful assassination than the physical ending of the target's life. There is always a trail to wipe, loose ends to clear up. You must know your target, know where they were to be that day, what appointments they had. Who will call their office and receive no answer. Who will find their body, and what they will do when they find it. If they will call the police or pursue the killer on their own. If they have powerful connections that have power to make such a search effective. All of these things must be considered, because any one of them might lead to capture, excruciating torture, and death. Convenience is not part of an assassin's work. It is the same as laziness, and laziness is deadly."
Garrus absorbs this for a few moments. "So, no guns?" he asks after a time.
"Guns are necessary. My personal dislike of them doesn't change the facts, and the facts are that my personal philosophies regarding violence have little place on a large-scale battlefield. In general though, I prefer to avoid anything that makes death and killing seem clean and simple."
Garrus nods, although he can't tell if he agrees with the drell's opinion. The times his finger has found the trigger in the past few years it has usually been to blow another chip out of the never-ending mass of crime and filth hanging over Omega, and hopefully letting a little light in through the cracks.
"You don't agree with me," says Thane, reading his mind.
"I'm not sure," replies Garrus. "Using guns doesn't make killing easier for me. Every death is a decision I have to make, someone I know I want gone from the world and away from the innocent people they prey on. It's a decision, and my weapons don't make it easier for me. They just help me execute it."
Thane nods, the sad look on his face obscured by shadows. "We are from different worlds, you and I," he says.
"The assassin and the policeman."
"No, I do not think you are a policeman. Policemen are men of the law. They enforce the law to the best of their abilities, because they have chosen to view it as a guide to right and wrong. You are a man of justice, and you seek to enforce justice as you see it. The assassin and the vigilante. I kill because I am paid to do it, and so I seek to justify my deeds with a moral code. You kill because of your morals, so you need no justification."
Garrus trudges along next to the drell in silence for a minute or two, eyes on the steel street under his feet. Then he looks up at his companion, a wry smile raising his mandibles. "What a fine pair of cynical bastards we are," he says.
Thane laughs.
…
Commander Shepard returns to his room with the intent of completing his pre-battle meditation. It is not something he shares with the rest of the crew; only a few of them, those he's known the longest, know about it, and they give him his distance before missions. Shepard doesn't know when he started the practice, but it has become tradition now.
He sits cross-legged on the floor of his cabin, pulling off his slightly uncomfortable command shirt and letting the cool air touch his bare skin. He sits motionless in the quiet for a while, listening to the sound of his own breathing and feeling the rise and fall of his own chest. In and out and as he breathes out he empties himself with the air he exhales until he is empty and still inside, like a calmed pond. When he is entirely empty and he looses his sense of position he closes his eyes and looks inside himself.
John searches out the energy of war, the power that he calls on to slow time and strengthen his arm during battle. He finds it quickly, a glowing red-orange presence hovering in a space between his head and neck, winding down his shoulders and arms. Its light is gentle, like a sleeping beast waiting to be awoken. He knows it will respond to his call. He sends feelers out to the rest of his body, feeling the calmer, passive energy flowing within him. Blue gentle flowing it flows around the charged battle-energy and he coaxes it to expand, fill him with its gentle light and stop just outside his skin, painting him with gently glowing blue in his mind's eye. He breathes out and feels a calmness overtake him, spreading with the imaginary blue light. This is the rationality this is where you return to.
Slowly he begins pulling at the red-gold heat that lingers just out of reach behind his skull. He draws it down in tendrils, weaving it in with the gentler blue. To kill to destroy to burn he feels the strings of red in his mind, like leads attached to the beast, ready to summon it with a sharp yank when the time comes. He lets the mental image of the colors fade, returning to his emptiness. You will kill because you have to. To save yourself. To save others. Destroy those who seek to hurt others. Make safety by eradicating danger. Do not kill for revenge. Do not kill for gain. Do not kill for pleasure. Do not cause unnecessary pain. Do not let others suffer because of your inaction.
He repeats the words to himself, forcing himself to think about each command, evaluating them. He will not let himself fire a gun when the can no longer abide by every one of them. It is like religion, or the closest John has to one. The more distance men put between themselves and the earth, the less likely it has begun to seem that their existence is owed to a God or Gods, and even if it is so Shepard wonders if men would not have left them behind with their home planet. It is not a question that troubles him much, but he cannot deny that there are things in the universe that beg a greater explanation, or at least an attempt at understanding. This is part of the reason for his meditation. If someone with this much power over the fates of others doesn't think about how he uses it … Shepard doesn't know what would happen, but he can recognize the road to ruin at the end of that unfinished sentence. He stands stiffly, stretching with a gentle yawn. Then he strides over to the dresser set in the wall of the room and opens it, retrieving his father's guitar from its secured stand. The wood is good quality. Sapele, John remembers, from trees back on earth.
He sits back down on the cabin floor, cradling the guitar and dropping the paper envelope from the shelf onto the deck beside him. He lays the guitar flat across his lap, twisting the first tuning key until the lowest string hangs loose and comes out of its peg. He pulls the bottom of the string out of the bridge and reaches into the envelope, selecting a new, shinier one, threads it back up to to the peg and begins tightening it. His mind strays, traveling back almost thirty years and millions of light-years to a small house in a small town in a small, rainy country where a small boy sat on his father's lap and reached his hands out for the very same instrument. John looks down at his hands now and they seem so big, so unlike the ones that he had touched the guitar with for the first time. He smiles, the back of his throat tightening, and remembers.
…
The door to Chora's Den opens and Garrus's eyes dart to the barkeep, who he is relieved to see is a different man. True to Thane's prediction, the scorch marks and blood are nowhere to be seen, and with a sudden lurching feeling Garrus remembers that the day Shepard and Wrex and he had first come in here looking for Harken was over two years ago. Spirits, it feels like yesterday!
Thane leans closer to Garrus's ear."Now we just have to locate our man," he whispers.
Garrus is already scanning the bar, and he instantly rules out the two comatose turians at the booth in the corner, as well as the krogan downing shot after shot of something toxic-looking, in a battle with his own personal demons. Garrus's gaze settles on the lone human patron, a man with dark skin and close-cropped hair sitting slumped over at the bar. "That's him," says Garrus, keeping his voice low. "The one at the bar. Everything about him screams 'ex-cop.'"
Thane nods, and he and Garrus approach, taking seats at the counter to either side of the man. Garrus decides to test the situation. He waves the bartender away and leans forward on his elbows, peering at the sullen face of the man. "Harris?" he inquires in a neutral tone.
"Eh?" The man in question raises his head slightly, squinting at Garrus. "Do I owe you money or something?"
From the man's speech Garrus can tell he's already a few drinks over par. He smiles at the man, and then, realizing the human might not be able to pick up on this, he changes his tone to a much warmer, friendlier one. "Come on, Harris. Don't you remember me? You aren't that drunk. Well," he says, throwing in a chuckle. "Not yet, anyway. Hey," he calls to the barkeep. "Another drink for my friend. I'll pay."
Harris sits up a little more, bewilderment mixing with distrust on his face. Garrus can tell he's scanning his own foggy memory for any memory of the turian. "Do … Do I know you?"
Garrus chuckles again, clapping Harris on the back gently. "Good one. Hey, really though, I just came by to make sure you weren't taking it too hard," he says, on the basis that any man drowning himself in liquor, alone, at a place like Chora's Den must have something to take hard.
Harris looks at him searchingly for another moment, then he turns away, his expression clouding over. "Bastard lawyer," he mutters.
"Aren't they all," agrees Garrus, sliding Harris his new drink as it arrives.
"It's not even that," says Harris morosely. He looks down at the stained countertop. "I don't even mind losing the flat. Shitty little place, never liked it, and the neighbors were assholes. I just … I just wish she didn't have to go." He seems on the verge of tears. Garrus claps him on the back again, and Harris drains half his glass in one go.
"She just wouldn't listen," he continues, his voice plaintive. "I kept telling her it would be alright, that I'd find more work, told her I'd make everything okay. But she said she couldn't take it. I really loved her, you know that? I really loved her." His face crumples, and Garrus wraps his arm around the man's shoulders.
Garrus imagines he's Shepard. What would he say right now? He'd have something, some magic words to make everything seem alright for this poor fuck. "Look, Craig, have you told her that?"
"Yes-"
"Have you really told her that? Not just when you leave and when you go to sleep at night, not when you're stressed or angry or trying to make a point. When was the last time you looked her in the eyes, and told her, just for the hell of it, 'I love you?'"
"I … "
"You gotta do it, Craig. People are apart for too long. You can't let her forget."
"She … I … but she left me, though. She went … and the lawyer, they took my house and my things and I have no job …"
"Listen. You have her number?"
"Yes, of course. I was going to call it, just working up the-"
"Forget it. Throw it away. Go home, get some sleep, for spirits' sake take a shower. Then tomorrow morning dress yourself up nice, buy some flowers and go and fucking tell her yourself. Tell her you're sorry this happened, and you're going to make things right. Tell her you found a job and take her out to goddamn breakfast."
"But … but I don't have a j-"
"Go down to customs and excise. Find Yvonne Daecher, head of shipment tracking. Tell her Garrus Vakarian sent you. She'll hook you up."
"Who's Garrus Vakarian?"
"Friend of mine. She'll know who you mean."
Harris blinks at him, his bloodshot eyes moist. "I … I will. I'll do what you said. Thank you. I … I love you, man. I don't even know who you are." And with that he rises clumsily from his stool, embracing Garrus tearfully. Garrus stumbles back a step, recoiling a bit from the strong perfume of brandy surrounding the man. Nevertheless, he puts another reluctant arm around Harris, breaking away from the embrace as soon as he can. Harris doesn't seem to notice. "I'm gonna get her back," he says, wiping his nose on the back of a sleeve that has seen better days. "I'm gonna make things right. Thanks, man. I don't know what I'd—hic-do without you." He turns to leave and Garrus, suddenly recalling their mission, calls out to him.
"Hey, Craig, there's one thing you can do for me, though."
Harris turns around, still smiling happily. "Sure, sure. Anything I can do."
"You know anyone by the name of Emelia Jacobson?" asks Garrus, contriving to sound only vaguely interested.
"Yeah, yeah, I know her. She's the hardass bitch sergeant."
Garrus smiles briefly. "The very same. You know where I could find her outside of work? I think there's a better side to her, but you know how uptight she is on the job … " He lets the sentence hang suggestively.
"Oh," says Harris slowly, going to tap the side of his nose in a knowing manner and missing entirely. "You'll be wanting to look for her at the C-Sec midyear ball. Big fling, never been myself. Too expensive. She'll be there, all the officers are."
"Thanks," says Garrus, nodding. "Good luck with your wife."
"Good luck to you, too, with the, you know," says Harris, making suggestive motions with his hands. "In fact, you might just be in luck. I heard she likes aliens. They say she's afraid to look at a normal-colored cock!" And he staggers away, laughing as if it's the funniest thing he's ever heard.
Garrus turns back to Thane, who's looking at him with admiration. "That was a job well done, Garrus."
Garrus makes a neutral noise, sliding onto his stool again. "Yeah, it should be a lot easier to approach her at the ball. We're sure not getting anything done in her office."
Thane shakes his head. "I meant with Harris. You did a good thing, and something that I would not have been able to do."
Garrus shakes his head in amusement, thinking back to the comical Harris and his tragic plight. "I didn't think I would, either. I'm not sure why I did, but it felt … right."
"That man will make a good father some day. I wonder if he will tell stories about this day, years from now."
Garrus snorts. "He'll probably go to bed and forget all about it."
"But maybe not. You touched his life, Garrus, and you may have pushed him away from the brink of ruin. Your mate would be proud of you."
Garrus looks away. "You think so?"
"Yes."
The turian is quiet for a while. Then he turns back to Thane, a glint in his eye. "Well, good. And speaking of mating, I hope you brought some cologne, because you have a ball to attend."
…
Legion steps into the cabin uninvited, but feeling as if an invitation is unnecessary somehow, or as if perhaps one has already been extended. He finds Shepard sitting on the floor, replacing the strings in a musical instrument. His shirt is somewhere else, and Legion finds itself irrationally excited to trace over the twisting contours of the man's muscle with its eye. Scars stand out against the smooth skin here and there, like comets against a night sky. It steps down to the main floor section and sits facing Shepard, imitating his cross-legged pose. Shepard continues stringing the instrument, a guitar Legion's mind tells it, semi-hollow body with six steel strings. It watches Shepard thread the skinny wires in and up the neck to the pegs at the very top, fastening them and tightening the key slowly until the string is in tune. Eventually he says, "Do you know about guitars, Legion?"
"I know it is a musical instrument," says Legion. Then, after a pause, it asks, "What is music, Shepard?" It knows the dictionary definition, countless numbers of them, and it knows what the geth think it is, but it wishes to hear Shepard tell it. Maybe Shepard knows things that dictionaries and the geth do not.
"It's like sound," Shepard says after thinking for a bit. "But alive. Living sound."
Can sound be alive? Thinks Legion. It looks down at its hands. Can metal be alive? Shepard has finished tuning the guitar. He picks himself up and Legion's eye follows him as he makes a half circle and sits down again next to the geth.
"Here," he says, and he gently, almost lovingly passes the instrument into the geth's arms. Legion holds the thing awkwardly, unsure what to do. "Like this," says Shepard, and he's suddenly behind Legion, leaning forward and placing a two hands on the guitar, his arms reaching around Legion's body. They are very warm.
"One hand up here on the neck," Shepard explains. "And one down here by the strings." Legion moves its hands next to Shepard's, trying to copy their position. Shepard moves his hands over Legion's, repositioning the geth's long, thin fingers. It can feel him smiling behind it. "Not so stiff. Like this," and he eases Legion's fingers up so that they arch over the fretboard instead of laying down flat on it. "And your thumb here, for support, but not too tight." He shows Legion how to press down on te strings, changing the length of the strings to make different notes. "Go ahead," he says, and Legion can feel the warmth of his body against its own. The fingers on Legion's right hand rise, poised over the strings, and it is suddenly afraid. Afraid that it will pluck them and nothing will come out. Afraid that it will have no life to give the sound. Afraid that something that is not alive cannot create something that is, that it will be unable to make music because it has no soul. Does this unit have does this does Could it be possible that it is alive? Could metal really be alive? Can sound be alive? Legion doesn't know, and the fear is eating at it. It begins to lower its finger, waiting with dread for nothing but flat, lifeless sound to come out, for this wonderful dream to be over.
It plucks the string. A note sounds, clear and undulating, echoing and vibrating through Legion's body. Behind him Shepard cries out in wonder. "The pickups! The signal from the pickups is going through you. You're the amplifier, Legion!"
The last echoes of the note die away, and Legion feels its courage building. Its fingers return to the strings, working together with its left hand now, pulling more notes out of the air. Behind it Shepard laughs happily, and Legion's eye dims a bit. It forgets just a little of where it is and what it is, the programs in its head shutting up for just a minute to listen to the sound it has created. Its hands begin to move faster, this time pulling the notes not from thin air, but from a place within itself that it did not know existed. Actually, it is the same place it feels the spark for Shepard, the same unfindable inner heat. The sound flows smoothly from its fingertips, resonating through it, up and down, high and low blending together like light, like a waterfall, like dancing flames. It could lose itself in the sound forever, never come back to the world of logic and reasoning. But it does, because it has to. After unmarked time Legion plucks the final, long note and sits back, resting some of its weight against Shepard and suddenly very conscious of what it has done.
"Was that music, Shepard?" it asks tentatively.
Legion can feel the smile behind it again. "Yes, Legion," answers John. "It was beautiful." Then he leans forward and kisses Legion gently on the side of its face. Legion is happier than it has ever been before.