Apologies for being a day late. Got caught up. (Ao3 is having problems too).

A few lines lifted from A Bullet for your Sins, the chapter of the Mass Effect comic book series based on Garrus's time in Omega.

Chapter 37

He shot one stim, felt it go through his system at FTL speed. He only had four out of the twelve pods he left in HQ. They probably won't last him another two days.

The wrapped bodies of his comrades surrounded him—only three were missing. He wasn't sure where Mel or Erash were—but alive, hopefully.

Giving up was in the back of his mind and a simple truth, simpler than all the other ones he thought up as every bullet made it to its target and every clip, clanked and sang—empty against the asphalt. Only he couldn't give up because—

He remembered green colored eyes. While she slept, he remembered her soft hair under his hand. He recalled his mother's kind voice as she reassured him that she would watch over her while he was gone.

He lifted his gun and looked through his scope, his finger on the trigger.


Maybe he should have known that one time.

Both he and Shepard were sharing a drink, a legitimate drink in Archangel HQ. It had been a long day for her and he saw it in her face, in her complexion. She was running herself ragged, as if the concept of rest was so foreign or so stupid it baffled her.

But still she made time for him, bored as he was while Sidonis did all the Intel work—insisted that he be that part of the team that provided all the datapads and files, the guy who knew all the sensitive information. Garrus had trusted him implicitly; he was the lieutenant, second-in-command. If Garrus were to be taken down in battle he trusted Sidonis to pick up the slack and move forward.

Just as Alenko had trusted Garrus to move forward, to do the right thing even when he pulled the trigger on Dr. Saleon and had never been so disappointed in Garrus since. Understanding be damned, Alenko still thought it was wrong. Garrus knew that.

But with a dextro glass of liquor and her own levo one, a red wine she had described as "New World, Stag's Leap: pricey and powerful. A far cry from the shit in Afterlife and a drink for the weary." She had picked it up before heading back to her temporary safe house. She had swirled the red contents from a glass of crystal and drank it with the true mettle and decorum a good wine deserved.

"You trust your Sidonis with a lot of things." She said offhandedly to fill the silence.

He sighed. "Why do I feel we've had this conversation before?"

She pushed, however. "You ever dip your hands in the Intel work?"

"Every once in a while. I look at everything he shows me. And I show him everything you've given us so far."

"So, he knows everything you know." She sipped the wine and put the glass down. "And he might not share everything he knows."

His eyes narrowed at the insinuation. He knew Erash was listening in and that this sort of bomb, planted in the head of even the most logical person could end up bursting into a huge mess. "I trust Sidonis. He helped me make Archangel what it is today." He sighed. "I realize this must sound naïve to you but there are people I can definitely lay my life down for and can trust with my life."

She poured herself another round of the red wine. The smell was woody and aromatic. He always thought levo alcohol would repel him like the food but the smell had reminded him of the old haunts in Cipritine, the trees there and the soil. He was tempted to ask for a sip if he wasn't sure that it would send him to the hospital.

"Did you reach this idiom in the book yet?" She smiled—a lazy sort of, oddly, sultry smile. Maybe she was a little drunk, maybe he was. He couldn't remember any recent time but this one where he had seen her smile like that. "It goes: pick your poison. It means to choose between horrible options. In this case: to trust a man who may not return the same trust or to distrust him and breed animosity."

"Oh, that sounds like the relationship I have with a certain other person with a love for wine."

"Hah, don't be dumb, turian." She still had that smile on her face. It was doing weird things to his insides, but then, so was his drink. "I never once said you should give me any of your trust."

A bullet whizzed past and overhead. Wake up, Garrus. He told himself, his sharp teeth grating the walls of his mouth. Wake up or you'll never get to kill the one responsible.

"Boss," Nalah's voice in the recording rasped. "It was Sidonis. He—" An explosion cut her off. Garrus found her body near the entrance when he entered, scorched and barely recognizable.

But now, he looked over the bridge, gun snug between his hands—every pull of the trigger he chanted a name—each bullet met their mark, dead on.


With the incoming YMIR mech he could see behind their barricade, Garrus knew he didn't have enough clips to take it down and defend himself from both the heavy mech and the fodder support. He felt his heart rate pick up and his eyes sharpen from the stims but he probably didn't have much power to stand and run. Two days without sleep would do that to a man, days without proper food too. Not to mention wave and wave of armed men coming towards him.

Another round of stims and Garrus found that his life could be summed up in three hard truths.

The first truth made his head ache, even as his eyes looked into the scope and took one merc down after another. The first truth was that if had reunited with the "newly made" Commander Alenko, Garrus wouldn't have hesitated to inform his commander of some of things they could have done better. For example the incident with Robinson might have gone better had Alenko not let his heart speak for his head. Scuttlebutt had a way with putting the crosshairs on a good relationship. If anything had put a strain in that short love affair, it was that Williams would never know if Alenko had saved her because he loved her or because Robinson had made sure that the bomb would go off. He would have advised Alenko to be more confident in his choices, to not be so easily swayed by the people he was trying to convince.

At the same time, he would have liked to have learned more from the Commander. What had he thought when he stood defending himself against the Blitz? What had N-school been like for a biotic or for one as young as him? And maybe some non-military things as well, like how he was able to hold his drink so well and yet still be able to drag Wrex back to the ship with his biotics? Or, how painful were the headaches caused by both the nightmares from the Beacon and the L2 implants?

The second hard truth hit him and it took his breath away. He felt it still after he had loaded himself with the last of his stims and changed the clip of his Mantis. Counting what he had left, he knew it was appropriate that his breath was coming short now.

The second truth was that he longed to speak to Shepard, to finish that talk that they had promised. Resisting the urge to reach over to the pendant hanging on his neck—he didn't want a reminder that he didn't have it anymore. He opted instead for the Indra he had at ready and shot down the large mech, doing a pattern of shooting and Overloading before it could move out of his line of sight. The combination of precision and speed took it down quick enough that he reached back for his Mantis and aimed at the fodder—they were growing cockier lately. Not that he had given them any reason to be.

He wished that the moment he thought Allison and Shepard were one and the same, that he had pushed for answers. Remembering Shepard now made him feel stupid and young, when he always thought he was neither— how patient she had been with him as they discussed tactics. How equal they were when they had discussed weapons and armors. And all other conversations in between, all the jokes and drinks they both enjoyed together.

The last regret, and the most painful, was that it took him more than enough time to realize that his father had been right all along. The nagging voice he made up in his head, the conscience of his conscience. He should have spent more time in Palaven—making it up to his sister, spending more time with his mother.

His father had warned him about everything. If he had listened, no one would have had suffered his ineptitude—no one would have been tortured or killed.

There was nothing he could do about the other two truths. But that last one—if he was going to go then he could at least be a good son if not a good turian.

"Dad." He said through his omni-tool as soon as his father picked up the other line.

"Garrus? Have you landed safely? What's all that noise?"

Garrus smiled as he looked past his scope. The mercs were gathering for another rally and they were moving a little better than before. "Just a little target practice."

"Then call me back later."

"I don't think I can do that later." He fired a few rounds of his own and each bullet dropped a man down. "Too many targets."

His father figured it out, like he always did. "I see."

"I just wanted to hear your voice. Is—is mom all right? Solana?"

"Yes, she's fine, son. They both are."

"How about you? You good?"

"I'm fine. Forget about that."

Garrus turned back, just a moment while the mercs tried to reassemble and descramble their troops. "I just wanted you to know that you were right about everything. I should have listened to you, when I could. I—I'm sorry."

"I said forget about that. Listen, are these targets of yours moving fast?"

Garrus looked through his scope. "So far, not fast enough. But they're learning."

His father paused before speaking again. "How are your thermal clips?"

"Oh you know how it is. You could always use a little more."

"Work with what you got, then. You don't stop pulling that trigger until it clicks, son." Garrus knew he was about to say something especially important when his father paused again. "No matter how things are falling apart around you, as long as you have at least one bullet left, you can still get the job done. Understand?"

Garrus looked through his scope. Maybe he was hoping someone he knew would be on his or her way to him now, save his ass in the nick of time. Looking at the grim determined faces of the fodder the mercs were sending his way, not one of them was familiar. He always knew, Garrus thought. He always knew Omega was the end of the road for most people.

"Yeah, dad." He replied, he kept his subvocals as soft as possible. "Thanks."

He did fathom the click of his father's mandibles, the bare hum from his subharmonics on the other line that knew he was lying and that his son wasn't going to come home—not in the way a father would want a son to return. And that this late conversation was the only time the two of them would ever sort anything out. It was so half-assed, so much varren shit. Spirits.

Only one last thing to ask. "Is she—is she alright?"

There was a strange silence but they both knew who Garrus was referring to. "She is. She woke up a few days ago. She's making her way to you."

"Spirits," Garrus laughed. "About time." He exhaled heavily. "But she won't make it in time now. I'm not that lucky."

"Garrus," His father's powerful voice was clear even light years away. "You finish up what you have to do there, and then you come on home to Palaven again. There are a lot of things we have to sort out."

Get the job done, Vakarian. Get it done and go home.

"I have to go now, dad."

"I know." His father whispered in the other line. He didn't try to stop the call. "I know."

Garrus didn't try to drop the comm either. As he looked out at the bottleneck, welcoming his end—he caught sight of three distinct figures and—the N7 insignia.

"Dad," He didn't think his smile was a nice one. Not when he imagined he could get out of this one alive. Not when he imagined Shepard and him meeting again. Not when imagined the bullet and the traitorous head it was meant for. "It seems my situation just got a whole lot better."