Note: Sorry for the break, there has been a LOT going on and I just didn't have a chance to work on this or anything else except my school work. I did go back and add a new scene just after scene 8, I think. Hopefully, I can get back and catch up now. I really appreciate all the lovely reviews and nice PMs
"Oh for… DAMMIT…!" Shepard shook her head; she was not amused with the current information from Hackett, the lack of news from Anderson and the bad news from Victus. The only good news was from Wrex; they were slowly pushing back the Reaper's organic waves on Palavan and Menae. On the other hand, there was some interesting news; the quarians had finally decided to make contact and now the Normandy was heading merrily on its way to meet up with the Migrant Fleet.
On one hand, Shepard was looking forward to seeing Tali again; on the other, she had a bad feeling that the Admirals of the Migrant Fleet were going to cause a shit load of problems. She knew the bad blood between the quarians and the geth, but just like the issues with the krogan and… well, everyone else; people just had to freaking stop and think. The Reapers were HERE! There is no time for petty internal squabbles. If they didn't join forces and work together, every single one of them would die. Then what would it matter if the krogans and salarians didn't like each other or the quarians hated the geth. The only thing that mattered was that if the reapers won, then every sentient, space faring race would be extinct. Sometimes she thought that she and her crew were the only bloody ones who got that.
"Uhm… Commander?"
"Yeah, Joker… what's up?"
"Err…there's an incoming communication for you… want me to put it through to the war room?"
Frowning, Shepard asked, "Who is the communication from, Joker?"
Joker hesitated, and then said, "Miranda."
Shepard smiled, she and the ex-Cerberus agent would never agree on everything, but they were both on the same page about a lot of things. "Put her through to the War Room, Joker; I'm on my way now."
The dark haired, "genetically perfect" woman smiled when she appeared on the screen and Shepard smiled back at her, "Miranda… good to hear from you."
"You too, Shepard… I've got some news, about a few things, actually. But I need to come onboard and talk to you about it…."
Shepard pursed her lips, "Sure, but we're on our way to meet the quarians; I don't know if we can swing by wherever you are and pick you up…"
Miranda smiled again, "Not to worry, Shepard… I've got a ride. I'll meet you, let me make a few arrangements and I'll send the coordinates to Mr. Moreau, I promise, I won't hold you up."
Shepard chuckled, "Good to know… ok, send the coordinates and we'll swing by and get you. Anything you need me to start working on ahead of time?"
Miranda looked hesitant, and then shook her head, "No, I really think speaking in person is the best idea. I'll see you soon."
Shepard frowned as Miranda ended the communication; whatever she was on about, you could bet it wouldn't be good.
CHAPTER BREAK
"Amica… what is this?" Garrus stood, carefully holding the offending object up by one claw. Looking up from the data pad she was reading, Shepard's eyes widened when she saw the object that Garrus was holding up. The look of disgust and irritation on her turian mate's face made her giggle, which made her slap her hand over her mouth. Garrus eyes widened and he tossed the object to the side and stalked toward his mate. Shepard sat at the desk in their quarters, her hand over her mouth, eyes widening as her mate stalked her. Taking a deep breath, Shepard spoke with forced calm, removing her hands from her face and attempting to be calmly commanding, "What are you doing, Garrus?"
Garrus stalked his mate, his sharp eyes narrowing as he said, "That sound… I don't think I've ever heard you make it before…."
Shepard frowned, "You've heard me laugh before…."
Garrus nodded, and paused next to her, cocking his head and looking down at her, "I've heard you laugh, but never make that sound…" She smiled up at him, and chuckled,
"Guess I'm not really a giggly person…."
Garrus gazed down at her, raising a hand and using one talon to caress her face, he said, "Guess not… but it's really an amazing sound, amica." Shepard stood up, not even trying to push Garrus back, so when she stood, it was into his arms. He wrapped his arms around her, leaning down to nuzzle her face affectionately. He began to purr at her and she sighed, leaning into his embrace.
Shepard smiled, relaxing into the embrace, "I love that sound… just so you know…."
Widening his mandibles, Garrus purred as he held his mate close and said, his cheek resting against the top of her head, "I know, amica… I know."
CHAPTER BREAK
The door to her private quarters, or rather, she and her mate's private quarters, opened and Shepard strode into them. Without looking around, she made her way to the bed, and dropped down on it, face first. Right now, the only thing she wanted was to bury her face in her mate's chest and sleep until everything seemed like a bad dream.
The situation with the quarians and the geth was… rectified. There was peace, albeit, not as uneventful as she'd hoped. Legion, brave, honest, FRIEND Legion was gone, having given his "life" to bring the geth back to the light. Shepard felt her eyes fill with tears as she remembered the way the geth had referred to himself in the singular for the first time just before he died. In theory, she understood his actions; she even respected them, was willing to do the same herself. But her heart ached at the loss of yet another friend.
She heard the door opened an a few second later, her mate's arms slid around her as he lay down on her bed. Drawing her close, he pulled her face to his chest, and she felt the rumble of approval as she buried her face in his chest and snuggled as close as possible to him.
Nuzzling his nose against her temple, Garrus whispered, his sub harmonics vibrating with love and sorrow, "I know it hurts, Lia… and I'm not going to give you any old platitudes."
Shepard smirked in spite of herself, her memory replaying the conversation Garrus just alluded too.
"But I know, and you know, that what Legion did will help. Over and over, you've proven you can do things that most people can't even dream of doing. You defeated Saren, Sovereign, destroyed the collector base… and now have brought peace between the quarians and geth. Oh, and one other thing… what was it? Hmmmm." She heard the note in Garrus' sub harmonics that told her he was being playful, but there was a note of seriousness in there too…
"Oh yes… defeated ANOTHER Reaper…. You not only gave the quarian's back their home world, but allied them with the geth and brought BOTH on board for this fight." Garrus smirked at her, using his hand to tip her head back so he could look into her eyes, he murmured, "You're a miracle, Shepard… to everyone in the galaxy."
Shepard sighed, she hated that thought. But just as she was about to correct him, Garrus placed a finger on her lips and said, "But to me… you're my mate. As wonderful as you are, the most wonderful, special, important thing to me is that you're my mate. I love you Lia Shepard… and I always will."
Shepard swallowed hard wondering how Garrus always knew just what to say, just the words she needed to get her back up and moving. Sometimes the only thing that kept her going was Garrus and his magic ability to know what to say and when to say it.
Chapter Break
"Are you sure it's real? After all, we've had signals from turian ships before that were traps…."
Traynor nodded, her cheeks red as she stammered a little, "I… err… I double and triple checked it, Commander. I know what's happened before, so I wanted to make sure this was on the up and up… the Talia is stranded…. It's a small turian military frigate. Everything checks out."
Shepard sighed, "Ok… let's go check it out. We can't leave allies out here hurting and stuck… Joker, set a course and get us there, but keep a weather eye on the horizon…"
A moment of silence, as Samantha Traynor stared at her and said, "Errr, what Commander?"
But Joker just quipped, "Aye Aye Cap'in."
Shaking her head, Shepard didn't try to explain to the confused woman, instead she turned and headed to the elevator and pushed the button for the crew level.
Entering the Main Battery, she paused to watch her mate moving quietly between the long access rows and the console. After a moment, he spoke, his voice humming with amusement, "Something you need, Shepard?"
Grinning, Shepard said, "Naw, I'm just window shopping…" Garrus cast her an odd but amused look and then turned, leaning against the console, arms crossed across his chest and said,
"What's going on, Shepard?"
Sighing, Shepard shook her head, "We got a distress call from a turian vessel… the Talia. You know anything about her?"
Garrus frowned, thinking then shook his head, "Not familiar… what kind of ship?"
"Small frigate… turian military."
"Is the signal confirmed? We've had issue with fake turian distress beacons before, remember?"
Shepard grinned, that was one of the reasons she loved her mate; their minds thought a lot alike. "Edi and Traynor both say they checked it three times…."
Garrus grinned at her, "Want me to check it too, just to be sure?" Shepard grinned back at him, chuckling,
"Yeah… just take a quick look. If it checks out, we'll see what we can do. If it doesn't, we'll see who we can beat…."
Garrus shook his head as he pulled up the signal and ran it through his own checks; nodding as he turned and said,
"It looks legit…."
Shepard nodded, "Joker… eta to the distress call?"
Joker's voice came over the intercom, "About 2 hours, Commander."
Sighing, Shepard said, "Ok… we've got 2 hours. We'll meet at the shuttle in an hour and forty five minutes. Any suggestions for a third?"
"Tali," Garrus never even hesitated and Shepard nodded, grinning,
"MY thoughts exactly!"
Chapter Break
The shuttle dropped the three old friends off at the shuttle bay. To their surprise, the shuttle bay lacked gravity and air, though no damage was shown. As a matter of fact, the entire ship seemed fine; no damage, no breeches, nothing to indicate why the ship was literally dead in space. As they disembarked the shuttle, they formed into a familiar marching pattern and explored the shuttle bay. The shuttle sat in their berths: nothing seemed out of the ordinary, except for the lack of air and gravity. Shaking her head, Shepard said, "It's like the ship just shut down… for no reason at all."
Garrus glanced around, his gizzard was clenched and his fringe was tight against his head as he said, "I don't like it, Shepard… it's… wrong."
Tali nodded, "I agree… this is just not the way it's supposed to be. Where are the turians?"
Neither Shepard nor Garrus had an answer for her, so they just headed up to the next level, which was engineering. All the way to the CIC, the ship was the same; no air, no gravity, no bodies. Just empty, almost haunted space. As they entered the area that would be the CIC on the Normandy, Garrus heard something; but his warning came too late as a shot fired directly at them. Tali was still in the access hall and just fell back, nearly hitting Garrus. Shepard, unfortunately was through the doorway into the bridge and had very little place to go. As the shot hit the wall where she'd been standing a few moments before, she launched herself off the wall into a combat roll to put herself behind a panel, calling out,
"Cease Fire… I'm Commander Shepard of the Normandy SR2, we're here answering a distress call." Utter silence answered her and she glanced up to see Garrus raise a hand and say, his double flanging voice carrying a sub-harmonic of non-threat,
"Cease fire before you blow us all into space…."
A voice came from across the room, by the echoing effect of the voice; Shepard figured it was turian which, since they were on a turian vessel, was really no surprise.
"Hold fire… who are you?"
Garrus shot Shepard a look and she nodded, so he replied, "I'm Praefectus Garrus Vakarian… formerly of C-Sec, now serving on the Normandy SR2. We're here to answer a distress call from this vessel…"
Shepard started; she knew that the Generals on Menae had saluted him, but she had never heard a rank associated with her lover.
"Vakarian?" a higher pitched voice spoke, and with a start Shepard realized it was a female turian. "Sorry… we thought you were Cerberus."
Shepard glanced at Garrus, who gave her an almost imperceptible nod, and rose. Taking her place in front of Garrus as Tali moved to stand behind him, Shepard said,
"You've had some issues with Cerberus, I take it?"
The turians, seven figures in all, stood up and walked toward them. The one who had spoken, a slighter figure in heavy turian armor said,
"Yes… they're the reason we're in this shape. Commander Shepard? I'm sorry we shot at you."
Shepard nodded, "No problem, I'm used to it. What happened here?"
"Cerberus attacked us… we managed to get away and hide in the asteroid belt, but they really screwed the ship. Engineering is down, weapons are offline, and hull breeches are all over the place… that distress signal was about the only thing we could do…. By the way, my name is Shala Scorpio, I'm… I was the gunner on the Talia."
Nodding, Shepard glanced at Garrus and saw that he was checking out the console to their left, as he glanced over the turian's. Shaking his head, Garrus said, "No power at all, Shepard…"
Shepard nodded, "Ok… then I think it's for the best to get everyone over to the Normandy and go from there."
Shala hesitated, then sighed, her sub-harmonics reverberating distress and acceptance, "I understand… I think we've salvaged everything we can, Commander…."
Shepard nodded, "How many of you are there?"
Straightening up, the female replied, her voice and sub-harmonics falling into a subordinate to officer tone, "Six others and myself, Commander. All of us are here…."
Nodding, Shepard said, "Ok… we have a shuttle attached to the landing bay, let's head down and get you off this ship."
As the turians headed out following Tali, she couldn't help by notice how Shala fell into step with Garrus and exchanged a few words with him. Her sub-harmonics made a sound Shepard hadn't heard before and she frowned. To her relief, however, Garrus nodded and then fell back to walk beside his mate, saying,
"You ok, Shepard?"
Shepard touched his arm, carefully as she said, "Yeah, no harm done… we'll have to see about getting them somewhere safe…."
Garrus shrugged, "Safest place I can think of is the Normandy, Shepard… and another unit couldn't go wrong…."
Shepard frowned, glancing at her mate and then said, "We'll talk about it after we get back to the Normandy… I want to hear everyone's opinions… and we're due to meet Miranda soon too."
Garrus gave her a strange look, but clicked his mandibles and nodded, "Ok, Shepard… let's get us back home."
