Something struck her face. Not hard, but enough to wake her up.
"Cat, wake up," a voice said loudly. "You have to wake up."
Her eyes opened but she couldn't see anything. Or rather she could but it was blurred and spinning.
"She's awake," the voice said. Catherine thought it was James, but she couldn't be sure. The voice seemed to reverberate and resound between her ears.
Her back and neck ached. Sharp pains shot up and down her spine and her hands and feet tingled with a million pins and needles. She tried to roll on her side, tried to turn her head, do something to undo the knots in her body, but she felt like she was underwater.
There was a smell in the room, like stale beer and lilies, and it made Catherine want to throw up again. She gaged, her whole body flexing. Her chest burned with every reflex of her body. Hands were on her again, turning her on to her side just in time for her to heave again and spew vomit everywhere.
There was a moaning sound and Catherine realized it was coming from her. The fabric surface under her face was wet with tears as she sobbed in agony. There seemed to be voices all around her. One of them was furious, on the brink of yelling. The other was a flanged voice, deep and calm, and Catherine vaguely remembered seeing a turian.
"Garrus?" she tried to say, but she bit her tongue and blood flowed, its metallic taste making her gag again.
The voices came closer and a cool hand came down on her forehead.
"She's burning up. Is there a shower or a tub in here?"
"Through that door," the turian voice said. "Clean her up. I'll take care of this room. We'll send someone for her wrist too."
"Thanks."
Strong arms lifted her off her bed and her world spun as she was carried away from the sweet and sour stink. Bright light burned her eyes and she had a brief image of tiled walls before something cool and wet was put over her eyes and forehead.
The floor came up to meet her and the sound of falling water began. There was a loud rip and she felt her shirt coming away. She tried to lift her arm to help and pain flared in her wrist again.
"It's okay, Catnip. Don't move."
A shiver of shock and cold rippled through her setting her teeth chattering. The tears began again and her throat constricted until it became difficult to draw breath.
"C'mon. Let's get you cleaned up."
Limp and unable to make her body do anything she wanted, Catherine could only go along with it as James picked her up and carried her under the steady flow of warm water.
He lowered them both to the ground and sat against the wall letting Catherine sit between his legs and lean back against his chest. Tipping her head back he told her to open her eyes and let the water wash them out.
She did as she was told and the water sluiced down her face, cooling her stinging eyes. James' hand stroked at her hair, scraping the clumped sand out of it.
After a few minutes of this her vision slowly returned and she could see that they were in a large shower stall with tiled walls and floor and clear sliding glass doors. The only light in the space came from a strip of glowing blue above that cast no shadows and didn't hurt her eyes.
"Drink some water."
Catherine opened her mouth and let some of the water sprinkle down on her tongue. Her teeth were gritty and the taste of vomit, metal and chemical made her gag again. Tipping over James' thigh she vomited again but this time there was only the water she had just swallowed.
She continued to dry heave, her whole body convulsing while James rubbed her back. When the heaving stopped he pulled her back upright and she sagged back against him crying again.
He told her to keep drinking and though she didn't want to she did and this time managed to keep it down. Her throat felt less raw and she tried to speak but it came out like a raspy hiss.
"I'm sorry, James."
"Listen to you," he said gently. "Crap beaten out of you, dusted all to hell, and apologising to me. You got nothin' to be sorry for, Catnip."
"I threw up on you," she moaned.
"Worse things have happened," he responded simply. "Are you warm enough?"
She nodded.
"We gotta this crap off you," James said. "Can you stand up?"
"Not on my own."
James hands went under her arm pits and he pushed himself up with his powerful legs and turn her around to face him. She slouched into him and he supported her with one arm around her waist while the other used a cloth to wipe down her back and shoulders.
"Why is this happening?" she said with a little sob. "What was that stuff?"
"Red sand," James said with clipped words. "Fucker who attacked you was probably a dealer."
"This is a drug? Why would anyone do this to themselves?"
"Nobody would do this intentionally," James said as he stood back to run the cloth down her front, under each breast and into her belly button. "You were pretty damn close to an overdose."
Her knees buckled and he caught her before she toppled, holding her to him again. His movements were methodical but tender as he continued to wipe away all traces of the drug on her skin.
"What happened, Cat?" he asked.
"I think they blocked the path," she slurred. "They cornered me. He was going to rape me. I punched him and this red stuff went everywhere."
"That explains it. It got right into your blood," James said. He sounded calm, but under it there was a vein of fury that made Catherine quiver. "Let's get you dry and warm."
He shut the water off and slid the door open. Catherine tried to step with him but her leg wobbled and her picked her up again and set her down on a bench against the opposite wall. Wrapping a huge white towel around his own waist, he grabbed another and began to pat her dry.
He started at her feet and worked his way up, dabbing carefully at her broken wrist and rubbing her hair only gently. Lifting her again he got the towel most of the way around her and carried her out of the bathroom.
The adjacent room no longer stank. Catherine could see now that it was a small, windowless apartment. There was a holoscreen against one wall and a large bed opposite it. In the far wall was another door and a couch beside it where a turian sat watching them, one leg resting casually on the other.
"We're good," James said to him.
The turian nodded and rose. "Doctor's outside when you're ready."
James thanked him and the turian left. The bed was freshly made and James tucked a foot under the edge of the covers and flipped them back. He lay Catherine down as carefully as he could and then eased the towel out from under her.
He knelt beside the bed and Catherine rolled her head to the side to look at him. She was crying again as the pain in her back intensified.
"Why does everything hurt?" she begged to know.
"Red sand stimulates the nervous system," he told her. "Your spinal cord is taking the brunt of it. You ready for a doctor?"
She nodded and he reached out the brush his thumb under her eyes, wiping away the wetness there. He gave her a kiss on the forehead and stood. He tapped the security panel on the door and a pale grey salarian bustled into the room.
Without a word to James the salarian came to her side and picked up her arm, thankfully her left, and gripped her wrist between two fingers.
"Pulse is very fast. Too rapid. No temperature, but likely going into shock."
"You're just like Mordin," Catherine said, bursting into fresh tears.
The salarian lowered her arm and looked at her face for the first time. "Professor Mordin Solus? You knew him?"
Catherine was too choked up to answer so James stepped in. "He was on our ship for a while. They got along pretty well."
"Assumed you were just another junkie," the salarian said with a frown. "Knew Professor Solus well. Worked in his clinic on Omega."
Now the salarian knelt down beside her and took her hand in both of his. "Don't worry. I will take good care of you."
Catherine could only nod and the salarian put her hand down softly on the bed. He gingerly lifted her other arm and probed the injury carefully. Catherine whimpered but didn't cry out despite the pain. He followed with a quick scan of his omnitool and then sat down on the edge of the bed.
"Definitely broken," he said. "But not severely. Should heal quickly with an injection of a growth hormone. Otherwise, will have to give you a cast for up to three weeks."
Catherine's mind was beginning to drift. She looked to James and he said hormone and she nodded. The salarian reached down to the bag he'd carried in and pulled out a syringe and a clear glass bottle.
"This will hurt," he said sympathetically, looking at her with his big black eyes and then back up at James. "It would be best if you could hold her still."
James crawled over her to the other side of the bed and lay down beside her, putting one leg over hers and his arm over her chest.
The salarian picked up her arm again and sterilize the skin in the centre of the top of her wrist. He then took up the needle and held it over the spot and looked to James. Catherine was barely aware of what was happening.
"Do it," James said.
The salarian didn't hesitate. The needle came down and drove into her skin. Awareness flooded back into Catherine and it hadn't been for James's arm pinning her down she would have pulled away from the needle.
"Ow ow ow," she said over and over as the doctor pushed down on the plunger, forcing the solution of medigel and growth hormone into the flesh around the broken bone.
It seemed to take forever but finally he pulled the needle out and let her hand fall back to her chest. Reaching into his bag he pulled out a coiled bandage and began wrapping it tightly around her wrist, forearm and hand until she was unable to bend it.
"Keep the bandage in place for at least forty eight hours," he told her. "Should be fine after that, but be careful with it for a week."
"She's got a pretty nasty bump on the back of her head," James said. "Can you check for a concussion."
The salarian pulled out a small penlight from a pocket and shone it in her eyes. She flinched away, but he held her chin and forced her to look at him.
"Pupils massively dilated. Likely side effect of the drug. I assume exposure was... accidental?"
"Yeah," James replied. "She was attacked."
"Concussion possible, but little to be done. Sleep best thing for her now."
James and the salarian talked for a while more, but Catherine was beginning to drift off as the pain in her back lessen as the medigel began to take effect. Her entire body ached still. A fog was creeping over her mind and when the bed shifted slightly under her she realized she had been asleep.
The salarian was gone and James was climbing under the blankets with her. Her was wearing his boxers and nothing else. He lay on his side with one arm under the pillow beneath her head and the other resting over her protectively.
"Thank you, James," she mumbled, her voice barely audible.
"No worries, Catnip," he rumbled. "Go to sleep."
"Don't tell anyone about this," she tried to say, but her lips were sticking together.
"I won't, but the bruise and cut on your face are going to be tough to hide," he said, shifting a little to get comfortable. "We'll tell people about the attack. That'll explain all the injuries."
Catherine mumbled that she didn't even want the rest of the crew to know about that.
"There's no shame in any of this, Cat," James said. "They're going to want to know what happened to you."
She wanted to argue more. She wanted to tell James that she would come up with her own story. But her body was succumbing to exhaustion and shock and she was passing out.
"Just sleep," James was saying. "You'll feel a helluva lot better when you wake up."
Catherine woke to the sound of voices again. She listened for a moment and realized that the Commander was in the room. Mortified, she kept her eyes shut and pretended to be asleep still.
"Vega, what happened?" Shepard asked. Her voice came from across the room and Catherine thought she must be sitting on the couch by the door. "Aria said something about red sand. You know the Alliance has a zero tolerance policy for drug abuse."
"It wasn't like that, Commander," James said in her defence. "She was jumped on one of the detours. She fought back and from how she tells it she must have broken the bag of sand the guy had on him. It spilled out on her and she ingested most of it. She's lucky she'd not dead."
"Aria's guy said she gave a pretty spectacular biotic display," Shepard said.
"What?" James exclaimed. "Aria had someone there and the bastard didn't step in when he saw someone was about to get raped?"
Catherine flinched away from the wrath in James' voice.
"Aria's had eyes on us every time we set foot on the station," Shepard explained. "But she had a no contact policy. The guy was out of line already by sending you a message to let you know she was being followed. I don't blame him for limiting himself to that considering who his boss is."
"So how did you find out then?" James asked.
"She sent me a private note with an address," Shepard said. "Her guy on the door told me the rest."
There was a long pause and Catherine couldn't tell what was going on. Then Shepard spoke again.
"She going to be okay?"
"Yeah," James said with a heavy sigh. "She'll be fine when she wakes up. Might have a bit of a head ache, but red sand clears the system pretty quick."
"And the wrist? She fit for duty?"
"Another thirty-six hours and she can take the bandage off," James explained. "The doctor Aria sent knew Mordin. He dipped into his high end stuff to fix her up."
"It pays to have friends," Shepard said. "You're a good man, James. For taking care of her like this. Are you two..."
"Not anymore," James said and Catherine heard the regret in his voice.
"Sounds like you'd like to be," Shepard said, picking up on the same thing.
"Can't say I haven't thought about it." The bed shifted and Catherine realized James was sitting against the wall beside her. "But we're better as friends."
"Yeah, I get that," Shepard said, and Catherine heard the crunch of her boots as she stood. "We're undocking within six hours. Stay here until then."
The bed rocked and Catherine let her head bounce naturally as James got off the bed.
"Hey, Commander. Listen, she really doesn't want anyone to know what happened. She's pretty ashamed of the drugs, and I doubt she wants anyone to know about the attempted rape."
Catherine had to stop to a smile from growing on her face as she listened to James.
"And no one else knows that she's a biotic and I know she doesn't like to share that."
"Don't worry, Lieutenant," Shepard said. "We'll keep it under wraps. The crew already knows something's up so we'll tell them about the attack, but none of the details. By the way, the asari died from her injuries. I'll let you decide if you want to tell her that."
The door hissed open and shut and when Catherine was sure she was alone with James she cracked open her eyes. They were gummy and sore and she lifted a hand to rub at them.
"Hey," James said, sitting on the bed beside her. "How ya feelin'?"
"Like a bag of smashed assholes," she said. Her sounded and felt like a bucket of gravel.
"Heh. That good, eh?" James laughed. "Sit up if you can. There's some food here for you."
"Are there any clothes for me to put on?" she asked, remembering that she was naked under the sheets.
"Shepard brought some stuff for you." He got up and tossed a blue t-shirt across the room at her.
It was one of her own. Shepard must have pulled it out of her locker for her. She wondered if Morgan knew she was alright. She would have expected to find her on the ship when she returned from the club.
Using one hand to lever herself up, Catherine sat against the wall and tugged the shirt over her head. James, who was wearing only his pants, came back to the bed carrying a tray of food for her. He set it down on her lap and then threw himself across the bed at her feet, leaning on one elbow.
Catherine looked down at the scrambled eggs and strips of crispy bacon and then looked back up at James.
"Eat it, Catnip," he said firmly. "Trust me. Nothing cures what ails you like eggs for breakfast."
"I'm less than thrilled, but since I barfed on you twice last night, I figure I better do what I'm told."
"Three times," James said with a little smirk.
"No." She tipped her head back and closed her eyes, hiding her face with her hands.
"'Fraid so," he said, chuckling. "On my best boots too. Lucky for you they're made to withstand plasma."
"I am so sorry, Jimmy," she said.
"Enough apologizing," he said. "It's starting to piss me off. And don't apologize for apologizing!"
"Okay, okay." She raised her hands defensively.
She picked up for fork and ate a tiny mouthful of eggs. Her stomach recoiled at first, but soon she was shovelling it away like it was the last thing she would ever eat.
"How long was I out for? And where are we?" she asked between bites of bacon.
"About twelve hours," James said. "We're in one of the back rooms at Purgatory. So, uh, that biotic explosion you set off..."
"I don't know how I did that," Catherine said.
"It was the sand," James said. "It can enhance biotics as well. Guess you would have been a pretty powerful adept if you'd kept the implant."
"Probably," she said, stuffing the last piece of bacon into her mouth. "I remember they were really pissed when my doctor insisted that it come out. The L2 was a rough piece of work."
"That asari," James started to say.
"I heard," Catherine said. "I was awake. Just wasn't ready to face Shepard yet."
"And you're okay with that," he asked, frowning at her.
"She got what was coming to her," Catherine said with a shrug. "Besides, it was their fault that it happened at all. I didn't asked to be attacked or drugged. And I had no idea what would happen when I defended myself. I was never trained how to focus my power."
"Glad you aren't too torn up about it." James sat up and crawled up the bed to sit beside her. "So you heard the whole conversation?"
"Most of it." Catherine leaned into him and let him put his arm around her shoulder. She put her good hand on his stomach and ran a finger along the lines of his abs. "You really think about us being something more?"
"I have," he admitted. "Not sure how serious a thought it was."
"I won't lie," she said. "I've thought about it too."
"And?"
"And I think I came to the same conclusion you did. We're better as friends. Best friends even."
"What about Morgan?" James asked.
"Different weapons, Jimmy," she used his own line to try to explain it.
"I want more than that," he said.
"Okay, best example... comfort. I can't sit like this with her. Half naked and using her as a pillow."
"Think I have a shot with your feisty little friend?" he asked shyly.
Catherine slapped him on the stomach and shouted, "I knew it! I knew you liked her."
"Yeah, I like her," he admitted. "I wanted to be sure that we were off the table before I said anything though. So? What are my chances?"
"It would not take much convincing," Catherine said with a warm smile. "She likes you. She can bully you."
"I should go for it then?"
"You should," Catherine told him. "Thought you didn't plan to retire?"
"She seems like she'd make a good soldier's wife."
"Whoa, the 'w' word! Must be more than a crush."
"Maybe a little," James said and then changed the subject. "We should get you up and moving."
Catherine was a little shaky, but managed to get on her feet and dress herself. Shepard had brought her track pants and running shoes as well as a bra and underwear. Luckily, James had thought to pick up her credit chit the night before and so as they walked back to the docks she stopped and bought a jacket.
It was the first chance she had to look in a mirror and she was appalled by what she saw. The left side of her face was covered in one livid purple and red bruise and her eye was ringed in black.
Her lip was indeed cut, but not as badly as it had felt like at the time. It was scabbed over and hurt whenever she tried to smile, but would not likely leave a scar. Her left ear was also torn. Three of her fives hoops had been pulled out and though they were designed to unclip with only a little pressure, they had still left marks.
While James used her credit chit to pay, she took out three little hoops from her other ear to even things out and tossed them away as a reminder of her horrible ordeal.
When they arrived back at the ship, Joker and EDI were on the bridge and immediately got up to see her. EDI seemed to sense that something more had happened but thankfully said nothing. Joker was simply impressed that she had taken the two assailants on and held her own until James arrived.
"Guess those sparring lessons down in the shuttle bay really paid off," he said shaking his head in a combination of anger and disbelief. "Can't believe this kind of crap is happening on the Persidium. Makes you wonder how bad it's getting down on the Wards."
They were interrupted by Morgan running full tilt through the CIC and wrapping Catherine in a huge hug.
"Fucking hell, Cat," she cried. "I was so worried. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, Morgan," Catherine said, hugging her friend in return. "My wrist is broken though. Be careful with me."
"They broke your wrist?" Morgan shouted. "That's it. From now on we don't go anywhere alone. Do you think Shepard would let us carry pistols?"
"If you're licensed for one, she'd probably be fine with it," James said. "But you won't be allowed to carry it on the station so no point really."
Morgan linked arms with Catherine and lead her off through the CIC and down to the crew deck. James followed but continued down to the shuttle bay, leaving the two women to talk. Once in the lounge, Morgan began to pummel Catherine with questions.
"You pretty much know the whole story, Morgan," Catherine said. "They jumped me. I defended myself. James found me and finished the job."
"But where did you spend the night?" she pressed. "Why didn't you come back to the ship and see Doctor Chakwas?"
"Aria's been keeping an eye on us all apparently," Catherine said. "I must have made a good impression because she got us a room at Purgatory and brought in a doctor."
Morgan frowned at her. "A room? I thought you and James weren't sleeping together anymore?"
Catherine sighed in annoyance. Her head hurt and she was struggling to answer all the questions without revealing the heart of the story.
"We're not," she said. "But we were closer to the club than we were to the Normandy and the doctor gave me some pretty heavy pain killers. They knocked me out and James just stood guard."
This seemed to satisfy Morgan. She and Catherine stayed in the lounge for the rest of the day. Several people came to see Catherine, including Diana Allers, who wanted to do a story on her to leave with the news network on the Citadel to hopefully incite more people to sign up for the militia.
Catherine consented and when they were done with their short interview Diana apologized again for what she had done week before. Feeling generous, Catherine forgave her and against her will found herself liking the woman just a little bit.
When they undocked Catherine insisted on resuming her post thought Shepard told her it would be fine if she wanted to wait. They were on their way to Thessia and the transit time would be short. Stepping down would only raise more questions about what had happened to her that she couldn't perform her duties.
Shepard couldn't tell the crew exactly what they were doing, but from the tone of her voice they knew it was something big. Tensions were high on the ship as they hit the relay, and everyone felt that whatever it was they were going for, it could very well finish the war. Catherine hoped beyond hope that they were nearing the end.