A sudden movement jarred her awake, and she realized she was holding onto his arm, leaning her forehead against him. She looked up at the monitors. Everything looked like it did before. Dr. Chakwas was asleep in her bed in the back. If the alarms went off, she'd be up to attend to him.
Shepard looked back at Garrus and lightly stroked the undamaged side of his face, smiling to herself. She finally felt at home on the Normandy for the first time since she was back. She couldn't wait until he was awake and they could really talk. She leaned against him and went back to sleep.
Her omni-tool woke her up the next morning and she rubbed her eyes, looking over at Garrus. He was still peacefully out. Dr. Chakwas was sitting at her desk.
"How's he doing this morning?"
She smiled, "Well. As expected. You really should get something to eat, or you'll be in here too, connected to machines."
"If you've got something in here to snack on, I'll take it, but I'm not leaving."
Dr. Chakwas sighed and rummaged around in her cabinet, pulling out an energy bar and bringing her a drink of water.
"Thanks." Shepard sat and ate, periodically patting Garrus' arm.
"Commander, we need to debrief and plan for the next mission." Miranda's voice came over her omni-tool.
"Not until Garrus is up and better. Unless it's a ship emergency, I'm not leaving." She answered.
"Understood, Commander." Miranda was irritated, but she knew there was no arguing with her.
Shepard stood up and stretched and used the bathroom in medbay. Coming out, she stood over his bed and looked down at him.
"Good to have him back, isn't it?" Dr. Chakwas smiled.
"It's like an answer to a prayer."
She sat back down in her chair, and started looking over messages on her omni-tool. Suddenly an alarm went off and she shot up. Dr. Chakwas ran over and looked at the screen.
"He has a fever, he's rejecting the graft. I've got to go back in there."
"Okay, I'll clean up," Shepard started.
"No – this will be microsurgery, I don't need your help. You need to go, I've got to re-start the sterilization of medbay so his wound doesn't get infected."
"But – "
Dr. Chakwas looked at her sternly, "You're still covered in dirt and blood. I don't have time, you need to leave, NOW."
Shepard nodded and left medbay, standing outside the door feeling completely helpless. "Not sterilized," she repeated looking down at her dirty clothes and hair, and immediately went up to her quarters to shower.
Even after that, Dr. Chakwas wouldn't let her re-enter or give her an update. Not wanting to distract her from her work, Shepard had no recourse but to get something to eat and do the work she'd been putting off.
Figuring no news was better than bad news, Shepard reassured the crew he was recuperating and tried to convince herself as well. She was working on a report on her quarters when she was pinged by Jacob.
"Could you meet me in the conference room, Commander?"
Puzzled, she answered, "Sure, I'll be right down."
Standing across the table from him, Shepard tried to read him. He wouldn't meet her gaze. What the fuck is going on?
Finally he spoke, "Commander. We've done what we could for Garrus, but he's taken a bad hit."
She felt her heart clutch in her throat. She looked down.
"The doc's corrected with surgical procedures and some cybernetics. Best we can tell, he'll have full functionality, but…"
Suddenly the door opened, and just like that Garrus walked in the doorway, "Shepard."
"Tough son of a bitch. Didn't think he'd be up yet," Jacob said.
Shepard was speechless.
Garrus walked in the room, "Nobody would give me a mirror, how bad is it?"
She wanted to tell him everything, tell him how he was the best thing he'd ever seen in her life.
Her voice caught in her throat and she cleared it, "Hell Garrus, slap some face paint on there and no one will even notice." She was so excited, so nervous, aware that Jacob was in the room, she didn't know what she was saying.
To her relief, Garrus laughed, "Uh, don't make me laugh. My face is barely holding together as it is. Some women find facial scars attractive. Mind you, most of those women are Krogan."
It was her turn to laugh, "Well, I find facial scars very attractive."
They stared at each other for a moment. Feeling the tension in the air, Jacob silently saluted and left. As the door closed, Garrus turned to face her.
"Garrus, I'm so glad –" she started to walk towards him.
He stopped her, "Frankly, I'm more worried about you. Cerberus, Shepard?"
"Well, I, it's a long story." She shook her head.
"You remember those sick experiments they were doing?"
"I haven't forgotten. It's an uneasy alliance at best. That's why I'm glad you're here. I need people I can trust."
Garrus nodded, "I'm fit for duty whenever you need me, Shepard. I'll settle in and see what I can do at the forward batteries."
Shepard stared open-mouthed as he turned and left. That was it. She shook her head in disbelief. She'd been expecting an emotional reunion, a confession of feelings, and there was – nothing. She put her hand on the side of the conference table and looked down at the floor trying to put together what had just happened. He sounded pretty upset about Cerberus, but he was here, was on the Normandy with her, so that counted for something. She decided to give him some "settling-in" time and then go talk to him later a bit more in depth.
Garrus walked down to the forward battery. He put his hand up to his face. It ached, but based on the damage that had been done to him, he thought Dr. Chakwas was a miracle worker. It had been a relief to wake up and see a familiar face. She gave him a short update, but told him he needed to talk to Shepard to get a full account of what had happened. He entered the battery and looked around, taking a cursory look at the computer and checking out the systems.
"Damn, good thing I'm here. This thing's going to need a lot of work." He turned and leaned against the console, thinking about his conversation with Shepard. It still wasn't real to him that she was alive. She didn't seem the same, her voice was the same, but she looked different, acted different. What the hell was she doing with Cerberus anyway? He didn't like it, but he was willing to see how the mission went and find out for himself. He knew the Reapers were the real threat, and Dr. Chakwas said they were going after the Collectors and the Reapers.
Shepard met with Miranda and planned out the next mission. They needed to go to Haestrom and recruit Tali. After their meeting, Shepard went straight to Garrus.
She was surprised to see him working already. He turned, "Shepard, need me for something?"
She frowned, he was so formal, this was weird. "Have you got a minute?"
He shrugged, "Sure, just checking the weapons systems. You can never be too careful."
She walked over past him and leaned against the railing, trying to think about what to say next.
"You know, I thought I'd seen every weapon available in our fight against Saren, but mercenary work showed me otherwise." He mused.
She couldn't even really look up at him, afraid her face would betray her anguish at the ordinariness of their conversation.
"Maybe Cerberus isn't so bad after all. This rebuilt Normandy is amazing." He gestured around.
"You were doing mercenary work, is that when you left the Spectre program?"
He nodded, "Yea. I just couldn't do it. Not after, well. I wanted to make a difference in a bigger way." He snorted, "Not much of a leader, though. I got my whole squad killed."
He told her about his team, how he'd recruited them and how Sidonis had lured him away and gotten them all killed. He slammed his fist on the console, "I'm still looking for him, hunting him down," he looked at Shepard, "He'll get his someday, and I'll be the one to give it to him."
Shepard saw the emptiness in his eyes that had bothered her on Omega. She could only think she'd feel the same way if someone had murdered her entire team.
Shepard nodded. She cleared her throat, "I tried to find you, when I woke up. You had disappeared pretty good. I'm – I'm sorry I didn't get to you on Omega sooner. I didn't know it was you, didn't know you were in such dire straits."
Garrus waived her off, "You actually got there at a good time. If you hadn't helped to take out the gun ship, we wouldn't have made out of there anyway. Don't sweat it."
There was an awkward silence. She wanted him to ask her more, she wanted to tell him more, but didn't know how to do it.
"Um, tomorrow we're going to get Tali. She's on Haestrom, and we're going to try and recruit her. Would you be able to go?"
"Sure. Dr. Chakwas declared me fit for duty. I'll be ready."
She brightened, "Great. I missed you a lot, Garrus, it's been tough."
He cut her off, "All in the past. The mission now is what's important. Thanks for coming by, Shepard. I've got some things to take care of." And he turned back to his console.
Realizing she'd been dismissed, she reluctantly got up and walked past him, stopping to put her hand on his arm as she did, "I'm glad you're okay," she said softly and walked out the door.
He swallowed hard, but didn't move. He heard his door close. He looked up at the ceiling and let out a long breath.
On the other side of the door, Shepard stood in place, thinking over the conversation. He was so business-like, so stand-offish. When she'd started talking about her feelings and what happened, he cut her off. She looked up and started towards the kitchen to get something to eat. Maybe as the days went on, he would warm up a little. He's probably still recuperating from his experience on Omega, she thought hopefully.
