With Shepard in his arms, he found himself remembering the first time he'd seen her on the Citadel. Most humans seemed small to turians—the females especially so—and his first impression of her had been no different. She'd been relatively slight even in her armor, and Garrus had made the same mistake he'd witnessed so many others make in the time since: he'd underestimated her. He'd seen only her slim human limbs, her large human eyes with their fringe of dark lashes, the soft features that gave her the appearance of being younger than her years, and he'd believed her weak. Once he saw her in action—on the battlefield and off—her charisma and skill had all but erased the initial judgement. By the time she'd welcomed him aboard the Normandy, he'd almost forgotten his initial misguided assessment. Well. He remembered enough to be ashamed of that assessment, anyway. He hadn't been able to meet her eyes for the first week.
Shepard was tall for a human woman, strong enough to handle her Black Widow—and him, for that matter—with deceptive ease, but the war hadn't been kind, and she was thinner now than she'd been even when he first saw her silhouetted in the entrance to the Citadel Tower. Better than anyone, perhaps, he knew she'd been relying too heavily on her Cerberus upgrades to keep her going in lieu of proper sleep and sustenance since Earth. Perhaps even before. When he'd seen her on Menae he hadn't made the mistake of thinking her frail, but he'd noticed a new gauntness in her cheeks to match the new ghosts in her eyes. Even in armor she felt too light, and he found himself wondering how depleted her resources truly were, and why he was only noticing now.
He knew the answer to the latter: because she hadn't let on. Sometimes he thought even she didn't realize how hard she was pushing herself. As vulnerable as she was with him—more vulnerable than she was with anyone—she couldn't reveal what she herself was unaware of. He'd seen her weary, and he'd seen her strained, but he hadn't seen the slow erosion of her health for what it was because she was Commander Shepard, with the fate of the galaxy on her shoulders. When a single woman was tasked with the impossible—brokering peace treaties and curing genophages and ending wars hundreds of years running—a proper dinner tended to get lost in the shuffle, no matter how carefully her resident turian was watching, or how willing he was to help shoulder the load.
And it was his damned fault she'd missed breakfast. ("Sure you don't have another round of… sparring in you, Shepard?" She'd laughed, stretching her long, pale limbs enticingly against the sheets of her bed. "If you think you've got the reach, Vakarian, my flexibility's more than up to the task.") Hell, it was his fault she hadn't choked down the rations aboard the Kodiak, too. Twelve hours that would have bought her. Twelve damned hours.
Even now she revealed little of her suffering, though she couldn't be comfortable. He was being careful, and as gentle as he could, but he couldn't entirely stop her legs from jostling, and splints could only give so much support when they were fighting gravity. In the brighter light of the hallway he couldn't pretend her agony was just exaggeration borne of shadows and dimness. The damage was more evident, and so was her struggle to overcome it. He'd never seen her quite so wan, and the bruising against that paleness was downright alarming. Battles with Collectors and entire gangs of mercs and damned Reapers, and she'd never suffered so much as a black eye. Helmet or no helmet. Still, her eyes were sharp and steady above the bruises, scanning the hallway with their usual precision, and the pistol she held one-handed didn't waver.
"I hate not having things to shoot."
He snorted, startled out of his grim reverie not just by the words, but by how longingly she spoke them. "Only you, Shepard."
She nudged him gently with the side of her head, eyes never leaving the hallway. "You know what I mean. All these flickering lights and disembodied threats? I get enough of that from Harbinger. Give me a target. Preferably one that'll go down with one clean shot to the head. That's the kind of assuming control I can live with."
"If it's all the same, I could live without the sudden appearance of the kinds of targets around us lately. I never liked husks, but brutes? Those damned Cerberus Phantoms? Banshees?"
"I don't know, the turian-Reaper hybrid ship is making me nostalgic for a run-of-the-mill shrieking asari death-bitch."
"Bullshit. You scream every time one of those things appears, and don't think I don't hear it."
He glanced down at her in time to see her smile. Her full bottom lip was cracked, beading with a droplet of fresh blood. It took a great deal of resolve not to immediately put her down and start cleaning her up. A moment later her tongue darted out and though she scowled at the taste, she didn't comment on it. A second drop of blood welled up almost immediately. "Couldn't you go for a nice YMIR mech or something, though? Maybe with some of little LOKI and FENRIS buddies just for kicks?"
"Why not ask for an armature, while you're at it?"
Shepard wrinkled her nose in a patented don't be stupid, Garrus look. "Without the Mako? It would feel like cheating on the old girl. Remember that time I ran one over? To death?"
"In the kind of exquisite detail that regularly haunts my dreams."
"It wasn't that ba—"
"It really was. I think you made Wrex cry. Or as close as krogans get."
He didn't like how he could feel the pain in her body as she chuckled. He didn't hold her closer though it was his instinct to do so; her ribs would hate him for it. He couldn't protect her from the kind of agony she was suffering. "Wrex was always a baby about being in the Mako." She sighed, a little wistfully. "I should have made Cerberus buy me a new one when I had the chance."
"What, in place of your beloved Hammerhead?"
She left off her surveillance long enough to shoot him a horrified glare. "I hated the Hammerhead, Garrus. I'd've blown it up if the opportunity had ever arisen. Gladly. And then I'd've thrown a party around its smoking corpse."
"Don't hold back. Tell me how you really feel."
"I almost wept tears of joy when Cortez told me the damned thing was still out for retrofit when the Reapers hit."
"That's my Shepard. Always finding the bright side."
She rolled her eyes at him before turning her gaze toward the hallway again. "You have a destination in mind, smart-ass?"
"Far away from that elevator as possible?"
She nodded. He felt the subtle shift of her body as she tried to make herself more comfortable. He felt the less subtle spasm when the attempt failed.
"…Are we there yet?"
They weren't quite as far as Garrus would have liked, but the undercurrent of strain in her voice couldn't be masked by her attempt at humor, and that was enough to make it far enough. He had to put her down to open the door, and when he picked her up again, she gasped and turned an inhuman shade of green. "I'm okay," she said, voice high and thin.
"You're not."
A little of the color returned to her cheeks as she squeezed her eyes shut and inhaled sharply through her nose. "Don't argue with me, Garrus."
"Don't lie to me, Shepard."
Her bloody lips parted, but instead of giving voice to whatever she'd been about to say, she only nodded. "I need to rest for a bit. I think this particular set of injuries has thrown the old cybernetics for a loop. Too much to fix, can't do it all at once, but they want to."
He almost regretted the request for honesty, then.
The room was small, bland, turian. He found himself glad of the anonymity. He didn't want to see holos or personal effects. He didn't want to think of what had become of the room's previous occupant.
She sent him a grateful smile as he settled her on the bunk. "We need supplies. You up for a recon mission?"
He didn't like leaving her. He'd only left the elevator the once, and then because he needed medical supplies. But she was right, of course.
"Have fun," she said, head tilted back against the wall, eyes already closed. "I'll be here when you get back. Bring me a present. Water, maybe. Or tools."
"You and your tools."
"Those who calibrate in glass houses shouldn't cast stones."
He hesitated in the doorway, giving her a skeptical look even though she wasn't looking at him to see it. "That's not a real one."
She opened one eye and grinned. "Sure it is." Then she lifted the hand still holding the pistol and waved him away. Her tone was not nearly as nonchalant as the gesture. "Be careful out there, Garrus. No unnecessary risks."
"Right," he said. "Only calculated ones."
She didn't have to say anything. He was well-versed in the many meanings of her eyebrow gestures and this one all but shouted don't push your luck, wise-ass.
So he did as she bade, locking the door as he left.
As long as it'd been since his C-Sec days, the cop instinct still ran strong, and the first place Garrus went was the mess hall where they'd left Tali and Cortez and the Kodiak. Where was the victim last seen? He chastised himself for the word-choice, but kept his finger ready on the Mattock's trigger. Comb the crime-scene for clues. No piece of evidence is too small.
The shuttle was gone, of course. That he'd been expecting. But he wasn't prepared for the new scorch marks along the inner wall, or the broader gash in the dreadnought's hull, or how the console Tali had used was no longer part of the wall because of said gash. He wasn't prepared for the bits of metal floating aimlessly through the mess. They didn't all belong to either hull or console. He recognized the paint job and wished he hadn't. Denying the evidence doesn't make the outcome better. For anyone. Stick to the facts.
There wasn't enough debris to account for an entirely destroyed Kodiak, he told himself, aiming for a little of Shepard's optimism. A glancing blow could've sheared a panel loose. A couple, even. Maybe even knock the comms for a loop. The little ship could take a beating—he knew that. He had evidence of that. And maybe Cortez wasn't Joker, but he was good. Damned good.
Gun still readied, Garrus crept along the wall until he could peer out into the void beyond. The planet below shone, a deceptively beautiful jewel against the star-speckled velvet blackness of space. A beautiful jewel that screwed with communications and seemed likely to pose a problem if the ship drifted too close to orbit. He sent out a burst of frustrated gunfire and then regretted it. In his mind's eye, he saw Shepard scowling at him. Keep it together, Vakarian. They'll come for us soon.
Nothing happened. Evidently it wasn't flare enough to alert either friend or foe. And if the Normandy was in range, she didn't answer any of Garrus' hails. Neither did the Kodiak.
"Fine," he muttered into the deafening silence of his own helmet. "At least I can do water and tools."
Ignoring those haunting, fresh signs of a firefight, Garrus turned his back on the darkness of space and began rooting through cupboards and what containers still remained bolted to the floor. One after another produced dextro-amino stores. Food. So much damned food. And not a single bit of it any use to her.
With a wordless cry of rage, he dashed a container of individually-wrapped packets to the floor. Or he would have, if gravity had been on his side. Instead, the silvery rectangles floated, mocking him.
Sinking down into a crouch, mag-boots heavy against the mess hall floor, Garrus lowered his head into his hands. Denying the evidence doesn't change the outcome, either. He breathed deeply, released a shuddering exhale, and inhaled slow and steady once again. Water. And tools.
They'll come for us soon.
When he was back in the safe gravity of the hallway, he swallowed a packet of rations without tasting them, and tried not to feel like he was betraying her by eating when she couldn't.
She'd give him that don't be stupid, Garrus look if she knew, but he still felt unaccountably guilty anyway.
