Wakefulness came upon Shepard very gently. His eyes slid open easily, and his mind was clear and light. None of the brain fog or bleariness he usually felt in the first moments of each day.
He supposed it made sense. His heart was full, his soul was utterly without burden.
Never before had he slept so soundly, never before had he felt such content tranquility, such a sense that he could live in this moment forever and never want for anything else.
The woman he loved; who he could now truly say that about, and who had said the same to him, lay at his side, just in front of him, still asleep if her light, pleased purr of a snore was any indication, the sound of it warming his heart just as her body warmed his skin where his arm was thrown clumsily across her stomach.
Apart from which he had no particular duty to occupy him just then, and there were hours yet until they returned to the Citadel for resupply, so he could afford to savor it all for as long as he pleased.
It could not always be this way, he knew, but the desire for moments like this one to come again would be a powerful motivator. The quiet bliss he felt just now, relaxed and warm and at peace, Tali beside him and with no bloodshed on the immediate horizon, would justify all the pain and fighting that tomorrow would bring.
Damn the galaxy, he thought with a wry smile.
This is what I'm fighting for now.
He took a deep contented breath, focusing on how nice the cool cabin air felt in his lungs, on the subtle clean scent of the silky hair his face was still buried in.
This was what it meant to be alive. Usually it took a particularly intense fight to get him to truly feel that way, a moment of harrowing chaos when his heart pounded in his chest so hard and his adrenaline ran so high that he could not help but be made aware of the fact, but this…
Quiet and soft and so much more pleasant than the blood and bullet storms of his day-to-day, but no less effective at giving him that sense that he was truly alive. Probably more so, now that he thought about it.
He was brought out of his reverie by the slumbering quarian stirring at his side, some odd noise coming from low in her throat as she twitched minutely in his embrace.
He rose an eyebrow a little at it, wondering what could have her acting this way.
Her small twitches eventually gave way to a full shift of position, and her body turned until she was looking up at the ceiling.
Shepard propped himself up on one arm to get a better look at her, and had his breath stolen from him a moment as he took in the masterpiece which was her face once more. Eventually, he imagined he might grow used to the sight of it, but so soon after first viewing it was as incredible as it was last night, the sweeping, graceful brushstrokes of her facial markings utterly dominating his senses as they had before.
The soft lines of Tali's face were rendered yet softer by her sleep, purple-painted lips parted lightly. Her brow was unfurrowed, cheek and jaw muscles relaxed, and he imagined she had slept just as soundly as he had.
But then it shifted a little, grew tenser, and the small twitches he had noticed became more pronounced. Her lips pursed lightly in response to something unknown, and her eyes seemed to flit about beneath their milky lilac lids, as human eyes often do when in the midst of a dream.
A few more noises of light distress came forth from her throat, and Shepard's face softened slightly in concern. Her behavior just now reminded him of the nightmares she sometimes had, that they both had.
He did not want Tali to be caught trapped within her own mind, did not want this moment or the night before to be sullied by a bad dream, so he gently pulled his hand from across her stomach to bring it up to her face, cupping its side and brushing a cheekbone with his thumb, touch feather-light.
She did not stir from the dream she was stuck in, so he tried for words.
"Tali…"
Her face seemed to shift a little as though she had heard him, but she did not respond.
"Tali." He pressed, a little louder.
"Nuuh…" she slurred, though whether it was in response to him or the dream he could not say.
Her neck shot to the side, then, as though fighting some beast in her mind.
"Tali…wake up, it's just a dream." He said tenderly, bringing his hand down to squeeze at her shoulder.
Just when he was about to start shaking her awake, wanting more than anything to free her from her torment, one of her hands came up and, somehow knowing where he was, pushed lightly at his face, before she spoke in a husky drawl.
"Nng…Ken, you stupid bosh'tet, I said to get the five millimeter cable, not the…two millimmm-" she trailed off then, and her arm went limp to fall against her chest.
Shepard's face contorted as he tried to contain his laughter, managing to stifle it with a slight snort. He brought his hand up to cup his mouth so that he would not disturb her further, but he could not hold it back fully, exhaling a veritable gust of wind out his nose in the attempt.
The whole thing was just absurd. To think he had guessed she was doing something like facing off against a thresher maw in there, when really she was just having an argument with the sly and apparently deaf Scotsman about some mundane engineering matter.
But in the end his attempts at keeping his chuckles in his chest were all for nothing, as, seeming to reach the end of her simulated argument, Tali's body stilled in its twitching and her eyes slid open.
His breath was stolen from him for another moment as he beheld the luminous silvery pools. They looked even brighter and deeper than they had the night before, since her slit pupils were constricted considerably as they adjusted to the low light of their cabin.
She blinked daintily a few times and glanced around a little to get her bearings. After a moment, though, she looked over to where he sat, still looking down at her, and favored him with a crooked grin that drew his gaze to her lips.
A grin he matched, until he could not resist the temptation any longer and leaned down to capture them in his own.
She made a faint noise of surprise low in her throat, before it turned pleased and she reciprocated, resting a gloved hand on his face.
The kiss continued for a few seconds longer before he pulled back, and she gave an irritated, hungry growl in response, pushing herself up off the couch to continue it a moment more before slumping back down to the cushions with a thump.
Tali's eyes slid slowly up and down in a few more sleepy blinks, and she gave a contented sigh.
"G'morning, beautiful." He managed eventually with a goofy waggle of his eyebrows.
She giggled huskily, sleep still hanging in her voice.
"Mm, it certainly is. I don't think I've ever slept so well. And that wake-up…"
"Did you really expect me not to?" he chuckled.
"I expected you to give me five seconds of being awake before kissing me." She quipped back, a light flush rising to her features.
"Well, you harbored an unrealistic expectation."
"So it's all my fault, huh?" she asked with mock incredulity.
"I would never accuse you of that. There's blame on both sides." He said with a smirk. "Sure, I was the one that kissed you, but you were the one that looked kissable enough to make me."
She let slip another giggle.
"You're insufferable."
"And yet you suffer me." He gloated.
"Only because you're so warm, and I need you to sleep." She retorted with a bit of put-on dryness, turning back away from the couch and sidling back closer to him to return to that warmth.
Shepard got the hint and slid his arm back around her waist, earning a contented hum from the engineer.
"What time is it?" she inquired after getting settled again.
"You do realize you have an omni-tool, right, love?" He said with a good deal of his own dryness, but he also remained attentive to her reaction to his new name for her. It felt right on his tongue, but it was far more important for it to feel right in her ears.
"Oh, shut up, you…w-what did you just call me?" she asked, voice wavering just a touch.
"I called you 'love,' love. Is…that okay with you?" he replied with some genuine worry, not knowing if she'd be comfortable with it.
"Yes!" she exclaimed, a little louder than she had intended. "I-I mean…yes, it's okay with me. B-better than okay, really, it's just…to be reminded of what we said last night…"
"I get it. Last night was…a lot."
Tali gave a hum in ascent before turning back around to face him, eyes shimmering, and set a hand gingerly on his face once more, brushing lightly against his bristly brown stubble.
She continued, voice tender.
"I've…told you before that I…saw you as more than my commander, o-or as my friend for a long time before I ever said anything to you about it. That I cared for you. And all that time…I never imagined you'd look at me that way. But when you said you did, that you had for as long as I had…it was the best I'd ever felt." She confessed, thumb drawing patterns on his cheek.
He just looked down at her, but kept his mouth closed, sensing that there was more.
"Even then…well, you know me. I worry, I doubt…I wasn't sure that 'you and me' would go anywhere. Wasn't sure if it would develop into anything more than what it was. I-it was stupid, I know, and you never gave me any sign that you didn't think I was…enough. I-I tried my hardest to stop myself from thinking that way, but…it was always there, under the surface."
Tali's eyes glistened with restrained tears, then, only seeming to make their silver sheen more brilliant, but he did not allow himself to focus on that, much more intent on her words and the deep emotion behind them.
"B-but after last night…I laid myself out for you, showed myself to you in a way I've never shown anyone. And…e-even in spite of all we've been through…I was afraid, afraid of being vulnerable, afraid that you would judge me, o-or look down on me. But you didn't. You understood me, you supported me, you helped me to work through and get over how I felt about Mother…a-and then you said you loved me…It was all just so…oh, John, I've never been so happy. Didn't even know it was possible to feel such joy. But I did. And I do. And…I know I will. Always."
As she finished, the tears she had kept pooled in her eyes at last escaped, streaking wetly down her pale skin. Her shoulders did not shake, and she did not sob. It merely seemed that there was too much emotion within her to restrict it to just her words.
Shepard felt his own eyes moisten to see it, and allowed a small smile to come to his lips as he reached out with a hand to brush the tears away.
Once the fingers of his emotion stopped clutching at his throat so tight, he spoke but a single word.
"Always."
He promised her simply, voice thick and unsteady, but he hoped it contained all the conviction he wanted it to.
And he did mean it. Perhaps he could not promise her that every day in the coming years would be like this one, would possess such storybook sublimity, but he could promise his presence, his effort in seeing that they both felt this way in spite of the trials they both knew tomorrow would bring.
But also, beyond that, he was promising to her that, some day, things would be like this all the time. Once the wars that needed winning were won, there would be time for more of this: more lazy mornings, more pillow talk, more soft intimacy, more easy bliss. All of it.
It was as he had told himself earlier. This was what he fought for now, just as Tali had urged him to those six months ago.
I'll give everything I have to see that this moment has its sequel. He thought with a small hopeful smile.
He leaned down, then, to press the lightest of pecks against her purple lips, before pulling back to rest his forehead against hers, gazing down and losing himself in her eyes. From the impassioned, mesmerized look he saw in them, he guessed she was doing the same in his. She always claimed that it happened all the time if she wasn't careful.
After a long silence, her face took on an uncertain look, and her eyes fell from his.
"John…what I said…a-about not being sure if 'you and me' would go anywhere…I just want you to know that-" she began.
"I do know."
He assured her firmly, but she ignored it.
"I want-no, I need you to know. I know you meant what you said last night. I'm sure of it, I was sure of it the moment you said those words to me. You've shown it to me enough times that the words were...just a formality. And I need to know that you're sure of what I said, too. What I feel." Her voice dripped with even more of that earnestness and honesty than it normally did.
"I'm sure." He echoed her. "I never doubted it for a moment, either, because of all the times you've shown me."
Tali seemed calmed by his words, and gave a little nod to tell him so.
Relieved that she harbored no further doubts, he felt compelled to leave one last barb.
"You really shouldn't worry about me not believing you. If you were trying to lead me on, I'd know. You couldn't tell a good lie to save your life." He said with a smirk.
Tali pulled back from his forehead a little, a peeved look on her face.
"T-that's a good thing!" she defended herself. "It means I'm honest!"
He could not resist the low chuckle that poured from his lips.
"It is, it is. You know I'm only messing with you." He assured her with a cheeky smirk. "You are honest; you don't try to be anyone other than who you are. And I adore that about you, love. Please believe that."
He felt a shiver run through her body, then, and he crooked an eyebrow at her in questioning.
"S-sorry…I just…really like when you call me that." She confessed, a little sheepishly.
Shepard's smirk widened.
"Glad to hear it. Because I really like calling you that. So it seems we've got a win-win situation here."
"We do." She agreed happily.
A thought came to his mind, then.
"While we're talking about this, I guess you may as well take your pick as to what I call you besides your name. 'Love' was just my first choice, but I'd gladly call you by another if you have a preference. And trust me, you'd be surprised by the variety. We humans are exceptionally creative when it comes to names for our, uh…mates."
Tali cocked her head at him a little, a question in her eyes, and her lips twitched into a small bemused smile.
"Well, what are my options?" she asked like a customer picking out a new hovercar at a dealership.
"Better question is what your options aren't. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a word in human languages that someone hasn't called their lover at one point or another. Depending on the people involved, they could call each other anything." He explained.
"Really?"
"Really. Gimme your best shot." He urged her.
Her expression grew pensive for a moment.
"Socket wrench."
Shepard gave her an exasperated look.
"Be reasonable, Tali."
She brought a hand up to wag a finger disapprovingly in his face.
"You said anything." She reminded him sharply.
"I was just exaggerating! You know…for effect."
"For effect." She replied dryly, entirely unconvinced.
"For effect!" He insisted. "To show I was serious about the variety. Like, as an example, there's a whole category of names like that where humans call each other by the names of food. Honey, pumpkin, sugar-"
"Nutrient paste?" she cut him off with a decidedly impish smirk he decided he liked, in spite of how he was most definitely losing this exchange.
He gave her a look that carried even more exasperation than the last had.
"You are vicious, woman. My people haven't even known what nutrient paste is for a hundred years!"
"You should have chosen your words more carefully." She said smugly.
Seeing his moment to turn the tide, he fought back.
"You know what, I agree. You're completely right. Deliberate diction is something whose importance I did not appreciate until now, which is why I think I've settled on the perfect name for you."
A little uncertainty colored the snide overconfidence on her face, then.
"What's that?"
He let a devilish smirk of his own come to his lips.
"Skunkspray."
She blinked dimly at him, all of that confidence now having fled her features.
"O-only half of that translated. What's a skahnk?" she tried.
"Nope, not gonna tell you; it's better that way. Besides, a little mystery never hurt anyone." He said absently, looking casually away from her.
With a little uncharacteristic boldness, she reached out to grab his grizzled chin and pull him back to face her.
"Maybe not before now. But this little mystery definitely will." She threatened by bringing her other hand to rest on his abdomen where they both knew the massive bruise he had sustained yesterday lay. She tapped at it with a finger with the implication that she could press a good deal harder if her ire was provoked further.
"You wouldn't." he said in mock horror, knowing full well that she, indeed, wouldn't.
"I would." She insisted, before her resolve failed her almost instantly. "O-okay, I wouldn't. We both know that."
"Yes, we do." He agreed cheekily.
She gave a groan of exasperation.
"Damn it, John, just tell me what a skahnk is!" she exclaimed, slapping at his arm instead like she often did when indignation seized hold of her.
And while he found such indignation unfailingly adorable, he acquiesced to her wishes.
"A skunk," he corrected her by bringing up a finger to boop at her dainty dotted nose, "is a kind of animal back on Earth. Small, furry…pretty cute, actually."
He noticed Tali's eyes grow a touch hopeful, apparently thinking that maybe this name was not so bad after all.
A hope he was eager to dash.
"And they spray a fluid that stinks so bad you'd retch the moment it touched your nostrils." He ended deviously.
Her eyes and mouth both shot open in surprise.
"You little bosh'tet!" she cried. "I-I don't smell bad…do I?" she asked, a little genuine concern in her voice.
"Tali, you know I was only messing with you. You happen to smell very nice. Clean. Not at all like a skunk, I promise." He assured her.
"Well…good." She managed, moving her head forward and down to nestle against his chest. "As long as you say that I have nothing in common with these…skunks, I'm alright." She finished slowly, precisely, now pronouncing the word much better.
Shepard could not help but smirk. He had not intended for his choice in disparaging animal comparison to line up so closely with last night's flattering animal comparison, but it did, and who was he if not adaptable to new opportunities, intentional or otherwise?
"Well…you might not smell like a skunk, but that doesn't mean there are no similarities at all between you two." He said pointedly.
She pulled her head back from its favorite place to look up at his face inquisitively.
Tali did not actually ask the question, apparently in the fear of what other negative quality he had in mind for her.
"You see, besides being small, and fluffy, and rather cute once you look past the stench they give off…skunks also have stripes." He ended amusedly, bringing up a hand to the side of her head to run his fingers through the silky smoothness of her hair, and to run his eyes over the facial markings he had already come to love so well.
Markings which were instantly swallowed up in the heated purple flush that spread across her face in a wave. Her eyes fell sheepishly from his.
"You're lying." She tried to convince herself.
"I am many things, but I am not a liar." He insisted ponderously.
"Is every animal on Earth striped?"
He decided the ribbing had gone on long enough, even if it had been her to start it.
"Only the prettiest ones." He said warmly, guessing from prior experience that she would appreciate the goofy compliment.
His prediction proved true when her exasperated look softened into another crooked smile, before she leaned in again to steal another kiss from him, lips melding with his in an easy dance they both were already getting quite good at.
Just as it had the other two times, he felt his mind slip into a cloudy haze, felt his surroundings fall away, like there was nothing else in the world but the sensation of her lips on his, nothing but that warm fog of closeness.
A haze that was pulled out from under him as he felt her sharp teeth nip at his lower lip. When she had done it last night, during their first kiss, he had been so caught up in the moment that the sting had been shrugged off, but just now he had to admit. It really hurt.
He broke the kiss with a small grunt of pain, pulling back and looking annoyedly down at her.
She looked up at him, eyes a little unfocused, and appearing far too innocent for that to have been an accident.
"Something wrong, John?" she asked in a sweet voice.
More like saccharine, he thought wryly.
"Oh, no, there's nothing wrong. I've only been stabbed in the lip by a set of razor-sharp dagger teeth. It's no big deal." He said pointedly, reaching a finger up to rub gingerly at the spot where she'd bit him.
"Sooo sooorry." She quipped in a tone which implied the exact opposite feeling. "I'm still learning. This is all so new to me. You can't expect me to be perfect at kissing you so soon after doing it the first time."
Somewhat uncharacteristically of him, he allowed her the last word so that he could get back to what he really wanted.
"So why don't we get you a little more practice?" he proposed, and her eyes flared with new light, though whether its source was in what he was asking her or in her triumph in this little exchange he could not be sure.
"Good idea." She said smugly, and leaned back in, returning his mind to the pleasant heated haze it had been under earlier.
They lay there, lips locked in their lovely dance, for an amount of time he could not be sure of, before he felt her face tense up minutely, then pull back entirely.
He gave a quizzical look at her crinkled nose, before she turned away from him to let out a loud sneeze into her forearm.
Just as it had last night, before sleep had taken them, the sneeze reminded him of the danger she was still in, as happy as he had been to ignore it earlier.
"Can't believe I forgot. You've been out of your suit a whole night, love. But it doesn't seem like your reaction has been too bad." He said, eyes voicing a question.
Her own eyes fell away from his, and her lips curled down in disappointment to be reminded of her restrictions once again.
"No, it hasn't been…but the drugs have probably worn off by now. I have my own antibiotics I could use, but still, I…I should probably put my visor back on." He could hear the sheer sadness in her voice, the longing for what she felt now to last forever, and the anger in knowing that it could not, in the unfairness of it.
"Yeah…" he agreed weakly, wanting this to last as much as she did but allowing rationality to take back over and think of what made sense, not what he happened to desire at this particular moment in time.
He tried to put a bit more spirit into his next quip, but it did not quite work as well as he wanted it to.
"And I should probably hit the shower, before I risk you getting any funny ideas about calling me skunkspray."
He regretted the joke as soon as he said it. It would help neither of them feel better about bidding farewell to what had been such a blissful moment, and he had said the words mostly for his sake, not hers.
She did at least give him a weak smile, but only to be polite or to allay his fear, so far as he could tell.
She then rose up from where she lay to sit at the edge of the couch instead, and he joined her, extending an arm over to rub lightly at the small of her back.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't be making jokes right now. But I want you to know that it's alright. There will be more times like this. I promise." He tried to assure her.
She merely looked down at the floor, pensive, for a long while, before a strange look came over her features and her eyes came back to meet his.
"There will be." She agreed resolvedly, and though he kept it from his face, he wondered just what was going on inside her head.
The words he had spoken were mostly platitudes, and he had said them because they needed saying, but he didn't actually expect them to make some great change in her emotional state.
There was something else going on in there, he could tell.
It was after a moment more that he realized the silence between had grown uncomfortable.
"Do, ah…do you need any help putting your helmet back on?" he offered weakly, mostly just because he felt he should say something. He wouldn't actually know what to do with the pieces of her helmet, where they connected, how they interfaced with the suit's controls.
But in spite of this, Tali treated it like a serious question.
"No!" she exclaimed, overly loud like earlier, before catching herself. "I-I mean, no, thank you. It's…kind of you to offer, but it's a…matter of privacy. O-our suits, I mean. Very private." She excused herself, but again, he could tell that something was up. What he had said earlier, despite it being said so jokingly, was true. Tali could not lie to save her life.
"Alright. Well, I'll be in the shower if you change your mind about needing help." He said, leaving her with one last pat to her back before pushing himself to his feet and giving a languid stretch, feeling the muscles of his back and legs pop satisfyingly.
Shepard stopped briefly to unzip his prized N7 hooded jacket, tossing the thick black-and-red garment across the room to land on the bed so that he would not have to place it on the floor of the bathroom, as he often did with his other clothing.
He heard Tali tinkering with her helmet's pieces behind him as he strode across the cabin toward the restroom, shutting the door behind him.
After taking a brief moment to throw some frigid water in his face and relieve himself, as was typical of his morning routine, Shepard stepped over to the shower, feeling the soft fabric of the mat tickle his toes.
Sliding open the thick glass door, luxurious for any standard military vessel, he reached in to the metal shower handle, turning it to nearly its hottest setting. He knew from past experience that it took quite a while for the water to get to where he wanted it.
As a man fond of his showers, he sometimes imagined how much time he wasted in a week just in waiting for his water to get sufficiently scalding for his tastes.
As he waited for it to warm, he began the somewhat slow and painful process of stripping from his remaining clothing,
Unflattering and reductive a comparison as it was, Tali was apparently a remarkable opiate, and he had all but ignored the pain of the day's previous wounds, both while awake and asleep, with her at his side.
But now that he was alone again, he felt them all acutely, in an awful medley of deep, throbbing aches, sharp, wince-inducing pinpoints, and even raw itchiness in a few places.
Once he had managed to strip all the way naked, he approached the room's mirror to get a sense of how the healing process was progressing. What he saw surprised him.
A good number of the smaller cuts and bruises had simply disappeared, not even leaving behind any scar tissue as mementoes. The larger ones remained, however. The massive abdominal bruise still marred his skin, and had not gotten any smaller that he could see. He could almost hear Chakwas's chastisement in his ears already, he thought bemusedly as he remembered the salve he was supposed to have put on.
Pulling its canister from the cabinet, he unscrewed and coated his fingers in the stuff to rub them across his bruise, providing a pleasant numbness to dull the ache of it after the few seconds it took to kick in.
Feeling a strange absence of pain in his injured shoulder, he gave it a few twists in testing, before eventually unwinding the tightly bound bandage around it, finding to his pleasant surprise that it had actually healed entirely, a plug of tender pinkish flesh now overlaying the gaping hole that had been there yesterday.
Well, if Cerberus's modifications did nothing else, they at least enabled my recklessness to be as cost-free as possible. He thought with a wry smile.
Stepping under the hot water, he winced lightly as it nearly scalded his skin before giving a low groan of pleasure at how it relaxed him once he adjusted. The events of last night had been effective enough in doing that for the most part, but the day before had been hard, and there was nothing better for tense muscles than a good hot shower.
He placed his head under it, little droplets collecting in his close-cropped hair and beard, and he let out another satisfied sigh.
Shepard continued his shower for a few minutes more, lathering himself up in lavender soap and basking in the heat of the water as he stopped to wonder briefly about the strange behavior Tali had exhibited just before he had left.
He was good at reading her body language, but being able to read her facial expressions was not even a day old to him.
Apart from which the look she had worn on her face was quite strange, full of many things he did not understand.
As he pondered, he applied a touch of shampoo to his short mop of hair, keeping his eyes shut to prevent it stinging them.
Over the heavy beating of the water on the checkered ceramic tile of the shower floor, he almost didn't hear the door to the restroom slide quietly open, but his sensitive soldier's ears managed it.
Scrubbing at an itchy spot on his scalp, he spoke without opening his eyes.
"Changed your mind about needing some help? Be out in just a moment, love." He assured her, sticking his head back under the water to wash away the sudsy foam atop it.
The door did not slide back closed, and she did not answer him. His brow furrowed in confusion.
"Tali?" he asked the air, eyes still shut.
Again, Shepard did not hear a response.
But he did feel a hand touch at his shoulder from behind him.
A gentle, warm hand.
And the texture…Not leather, not plastic, not cloth…but skin, soft and smooth.
His eyes shot open, and a shiver ran up his spine in spite of the heat of the water still beating down on him.
For a moment he could not really believe this was about to happen, and so it took him longer to gather the courage to turn around than it perhaps should've. Eventually, though, he managed it, pivoting slowly on his heels to face her.
Tali stood just a step in front of him, as naked as he was.
Her arms dangled limply at her sides, and she met his gaze with an expression that conveyed an odd mix of tender longing and impassioned pleading, wanting him and wanting to be wanted by him.
In spite of himself, Shepard abandoned what he saw in her expression to run his gaze along her body.
As it had been with her face, he was shocked at just how similar she was to a human woman. Besides the extra bend of her digitigrade legs, the missing fingers and toes, she looked like she could have jumped straight out of some classy Renaissance painting.
He ran his eyes over her supple, pert breasts, along the graceful, flowing curve of hip and shoulder.
He beheld the firm flatness of her belly, took in the corded muscles of her thighs and arms, tensed in mild expectation beneath her pale purple skin, which was flushed slightly from the heat and the steam of the shower.
And to his great delight, there were yet more of the darker markings he had first seen on her face to feast his gaze upon, as they extended across every part of her body that he could see.
He corrected his earlier comparison. She didn't look like she came from a Renaissance painting. She was a Renaissance painting, at least insofar as she stole his breath from his lungs, stole everything from him but his ability to behold her beauty, to stand there awestruck and dumb.
It took him far too long to realize that he had been staring for far too long, so, with some reluctance, he dragged his eyes back up to her face.
But it seemed he hadn't been the only one doing some staring, as he found Tali's silvery eyes running hungrily along his own form, tracing every defined muscle in his chest, arms, and abdomen, as well as casting a few skittish glances further down.
She caught herself after a few seconds, bringing them up to meet his gaze. But while she normally might have been embarrassed to be caught staring, and set blushing profusely as a result, now she only flashed him a crooked, coquettish smile which he matched.
They both just looked at each other, then, neither quite sure of what to say, only sure that whatever they could say would likely be insufficient, entirely inequal to the moment and what it actually meant.
Eventually, though, he broke the expectant silence with the only words he could muster.
"God, you're beautiful." He choked out, voice low and thick.
Tali's smile widened slightly, giving him a glimpse of the tips of her pointy teeth.
"I-I was just thinking the same thing," she replied softly, unable to keep her voice form wavering, if only a bit.
Shepard exhaled a light half-laugh out his nostrils, and his eyes flitted away from hers slightly.
"What?" she asked him, hands meeting at her waist to fiddle with each other.
"It's nothing." He assured her warmly. "It's just that usually, among my people, men aren't often called beautiful. More likely to use the word 'handsome' or, uh…'dashing.'"
Tali closed the slight distance that separated them, bringing her arms up to encircle his neck while he mirrored the move at her waist on instinct.
"W-well, I would use those words to describe you, too." She said sweetly. "And I will…right now. You're handsome…and dashing…and beautiful, too. Why can't you be all three?"
He chuckled low in his chest.
"Aren't you a sweet-talker? And as to your question, have you seen this bruise?" he joked, pulling a hand free of her waist to gesture at the massive, mottled purple and yellow splotch marring his skin.
She flitted her eyes down to take another look at it, and the smile she wore grew more cheeky.
"Okay…maybe I was wrong…only most of you is beautiful." She quipped.
"And the scars?" he asked her, lightly but with a mild serious undertone.
Beneath the banter, some part of his mind actually did want to know what she thought of him, of the countless old wounds that crisscrossed his whole body, punctures and lacerations and burns long-healed that Cerberus had kept him with to ensure himself and others of his authenticity, to ensure he was as he had been.
This time, a blush actually did come over her features.
"Especially the scars." She confessed playfully, before her tone grew more serious to match his own.
"I do like them, John. They give you a very…rugged look. Strong. But also…I know every one of those scars has a story behind it…a story of someone you saved, a story of you putting your life on the line. Every scar is just more proof of what I already know…that you're the bravest and most heroic man I know."
He felt his smile widen, felt his heart rise into his throat, as he answered her heartfelt words.
"You know…" he managed. "For someone who stammers and stutters so much, you really do have a way with words when you want to."
She favored him with a slight giggle, and he continued.
"But enough about me. Probably only called me that to stop me from gushing about you. I mean, I always thought you were beautiful in the suit, and you know that, but this…" he trailed off.
"-is me." She finished, her grin widening.
"Is you." He echoed. "And you really are stunning."
Tali pulled back from him a little, a playful glint in her wide eyes.
"Is that what you think? What makes you say so?"
He met her with a small smirk. If she wanted to fish for compliments, he'd gladly take the bait.
"Well, let me think..the flawless skin, the toned muscle, the perfect proportions…oh, and an absolutely killer set of hips." He finished with a wink and a shift of his hands to rest lightly upon them.
She gave a noise which was half a giggle and half a pleased purr at his words and his touch.
Shepard knew from the pamphlet Mordin had sent him a while back, about human-quarian cross-species pairings and the finer details of quarian sexual anatomy, that there was a mild erogenous zone, a small nerve bundle, centered in the hips, and he silently thanked the salarian for it in his mind, as he adored the sound that his touch elicited.
When he had first gone through its few dozen pages, cheeks hot even though he had been alone, he hadn't even been sure the knowledge would be of any use. What now seemed just moments away was necessarily of much greater importance to Tali than it was to him.
Not only was the full removal of one's suit for another both dangerous and deeply meaningful for quarians, but this was her first time, he knew from what she had told him. It had been seven years since Shepard had last known another woman, and he was sure that he was exceptionally 'rusty,' but he had at least done it before.
And while he could not say that the thought had never appealed to him before, or that the set of hips he had just quipped about had not drawn his gaze their way every time he saw her, he had made a pledge to himself not to ask her for this, not only to preserve her health, but also to prevent her from feeling as though she needed to, as though this was something that he expected of her.
In the early days of their still-young relationship, she had expressed some small doubts to him, doubts about herself, about how she could not be with him whenever he wanted, not like another human or an asari could. He had immediately told her what those doubts were: stupid and unimportant, though in kinder terms than those.
She had seemed to believe him, then, but he had not wanted there to be any chance for those doubts' resurgence, so he had generally strayed from the topic of physical intimacy.
But, as with yesterday, when she had taken the already-monumental step of showing him her face, it was her choice to take this next great leap, as well.
And who was he to deny her something he wanted, too?
Apparently Shepard had been in his own head a while, his only action being to rub lightly at the curves of her hips, so Tali pulled him out of it.
"I-is something wrong, John?" she asked him, a little concerned.
"No, nothing, just…thinking." He assured her, voice still a tad distant.
"Thinking about my hips?" she teased him.
"Don't need to. I have them right in front of me." He countered, brushing his thumbs along the skin of them and earning another pleased hum from the quarian.
"So…they're your favorite part of me, hm?" she asked him playfully, though he guessed part of her was genuinely curious, as he had been about what she thought of his scars.
"More like a close second. They're great, believe me, but they don't hold a candle to your, uh…markings?" He finished uncertainly, bringing up a finger to brush at one of them on her arm, realizing that the word he had chosen for them probably wasn't fully accurate.
"Teel'rah." She supplied helpfully, eyes following where his finger traced one of them. "All quarian females have them on their skin to some extent, but there is a lot of variation in how many and what kinds. The women of Clan Zorah have…a lot of them. M-more than most." She murmured sheepishly, as though a little insecure about them, a feeling he could absolutely not abide.
"They're amazing, love." He assured her warmly. "Really, they are. They accent everything perfectly. It's like…like your body was a canvas for some master artist." He was a little sheepish, too, as he said the last, to speak so candidly.
She gave a goofy crooked smile at his warm honesty.
"And you said I had a way with words." She said huskily, bringing a hand up to rest against his face, supernaturally soft.
"I call 'em like I see 'em." He retorted.
He pulled one of his hands from her hips to trace a marking that stretched from her shoulder down to her abdomen.
"I mean, just look at them, they're magnifi-" he cut himself off as he realized what he had not earlier.
It had taken his finger brushing against her toned, flat stomach for him to realize that it literally was just flat.
She seemed to notice his hesitancy immediately.
"W-what's wrong?" she stammered.
Shepard let a bemused smirk come to his lips.
"There's nothing wrong, it's just…where's your bellybutton?"
She both crooked an eyebrow and cocked her head at him in a doubly inquisitve gesture.
"My what?" she asked blankly. Though they both still wore their stripped-down omni-tool bracelets for communication, it seemed that the word had not translated into khelish very well, for obvious reasons.
"Y'know…" he pressed, pulling back and bringing a hand down to point at his own. "your belly button."
"A button?" she asked him again, looking down at where he was indicating, before her sheer curiosity overcame her.
"W-well, what happens if I press it?" she wondered aloud, and reached down with her finger to poke into it gently.
Shepard chuckled lightly before pulling her explorative finger out of it.
"I'm not a machine, Tali." He said wryly. "Doesn't do anything if you press it. I'm sure you know that my species bears live young, like yours does. And when humans are gestating, they're attached to their mothers via something called the umbilical cord. For transferring nutrients and oxygen. After they're born, that cord gets cut and tied off, and the bellybutton is what's left of that." He explained.
"Oh." She said simply, flushing lightly in embarrassment. "S-so it just never heals?"
"Pff, no." he scoffed. "It's not a wound, love."
"Maybe not." She conceded, now smirking, seeing an angle to tease him from. "But for it not to ever go away…seems like a design flaw."
Her tone was condescending and devilish, like she was judging some piece of shoddy tech and not an entire species. His entire species.
"You can't look at humanity like we're a drive core or something, you…you engineer! It's not my fault quarians are so weird…" He grumbled defensively, feeling some strange compulsion to stand up for his people against such an insult, playful though it may have been.
Tali looked unconvinced, cocking her head at him again.
"Oh, so quarians are weird because we don't have a hole in our stomachs?" she asked exasperatedly.
"Yes. Yes, they are." he replied, though he realized that it didn't really make sense.
But from how a smug smirk came to her lips, it was clear she had yet more ammunition. He had a bad feeling about his chances of coming out on top in this little verbal contest.
"Fine, John. I'll give you that one. You can say that's normal. But how do you explain these?" she finished playfully, a long finger coming up to poke lightly at one of his nipples.
He could not help but laugh at her boldness. It seemed that the prospect of winning this latest banter-battle, or perhaps whatever courage she had mustered to come in here and show herself to him like this in the first place, had done much to loosen her usual hesitancy for touching.
"Yeah, what about them?" he shot back, slapping her hand away, but by then he already knew where she was going with it, his quick tactical mind planning ahead on how he could get the upper hand back.
Just gotta let her think she's winning.
"What about them? Human males can't nurse young! So their nipples are useless!" she exclaimed in triumph. "It doesn't even take an engineer to see that's a design flaw!"
He let her have her moment, not wanting to rain on her parade quite so soon.
But he did, eventually.
"You sure seem to know a lot about human anatomy, Tali." He said pointedly, voice low and throaty.
All of that snide smugness immediately vacated her features in a rush, and her bright eyes widened a little.
Trap set, trap strung.
"The…the physiology classes! O-on the flotilla! I told you about them!" she tried after a moment's consideration, but there was no conviction in her demeanor.
"Sure, you told me about them. But that's not where you learned it." He deflected knowingly.
"W-well, I already told you that I…thought of you that way before you…a-and there were these vids…o-on the extranet…humans and quarians…s-so I.." she stammered out, and Shepard could not help but fall into a deep laughing fit at the absurdity of her being so bashful now, of all times.
He felt her hand connect sharply with his bicep.
"D-don't laugh at me!" she whined.
In spite of his best efforts, he still took a few more moments to let his chuckling subside, biting at the inside of his cheek to speed the process along.
Even then, he could not keep the bemused mirth from his voice as he replied.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't, it's just…Tali, you being so embarrassed about this doesn't make any sense! You do remember that you're the one that came in here naked, right? Unless you're just here for the shower and I've somehow…misinterpreted?" he ended bemusedly, but with an earnest undercurrent.
Tali's expression shifted from one of peeved indignation to another one which he could not fully describe. Embarrassed at being embarrassed, yet also sobered by his words, reminded of why she had come in here to start.
Her expressive eyes took on a longing sort of light as she stepped in close to him, resting both her hands on his pectorals and leaning in until she was right up in his face. Her lips were a mere inch from his own, and he could feel her heated breath wash over the lower half of his face like a caress all its own.
"I'm…not here for the shower." Her voice was quiet, and still a little unsure, but also with a sort of mild, muted sultriness he'd never heard in it, as though she herself was testing to see how it suited her.
"Yeah…I didn't think so." Shepard answered lowly, before wrapping an arm about her waist to pull her quickly the rest of the way toward him.
Tali gave a small squeak of surprise at the movement, at the sensation of his skin on hers, then another as her eyes shot down to see his manhood pressed lightly against one of her thighs, beginning to stiffen in anticipation.
She looked down at it for a long moment, then up at him, a distant, glazed look in her eyes, before it shifted to one of a deep animal hunger, and she leaned quickly in to smash her lips against his in a desperate snog of a kiss.
He was put momentarily on the backfoot at the enthusiasm, the aggression, Tali was displaying. Any semblance of hesitation, of her standard shyness, was entirely absent as she mashed her lips against his with an almost feral need, the same need with which her tongue wrestled his.
There was none of that sweet softness, that hesitant sense of discovery and exploration that their other kisses had possessed: this was desire, raw and unfiltered.
The arm he had around her waist tightened yet further in his drive to match it, and she made a pleased growl low in her chest that he could feel as well as hear for how close they were. She didn't quite seem to know what to do with her hands, and they roamed feverishly across the expanse of his chest and broad shoulders, never staying in one spot for more than a moment.
Until her mind eventually caught up with what her eyes had seen a minute ago, and she trailed a hand down his body to lightly grip him between his legs, eliciting a similar groan from deep within his own chest as she gave him a few testing strokes.
Somehow, from within the heady warmth that had enveloped his mind, part of him thought back to what Tali had told him before, about what they were doing now, and then he wanted to bring it up to her.
He guessed it wasn't strictly necessary. These were not the actions of a woman who felt pressured into it, but even so he felt compelled to ask.
With some reluctance, he made an inquisitve noise in his throat, hoping it would get her to ease up a bit.
It had the opposite effect, as it seemed she was unable to differentiate between the sorts of noises he made in her ravenous state.
He tried again, louder this time, but still she did not let up.
Bringing up the hand which was not around her waist, he set it firmly on the side of her face, pushing her away from him.
The kiss broke with a loud smack, and the respondent look he saw on her face was so confused and annoyed it might have been genuine anger.
"What?!" she implored him hoarsely, sucking in a few deep breaths before the animal hunger in her eyes fell away somewhat to a slight concern.
"W-what is it? Did I do something wrong?"
"No." he assured her. "Not a thing. I just wanted to-"
"Then what?!" she pleaded him again, bouncing up a little on antsy toes.
"I want to be sure this is what you want." He explained concisely so that she would not interrupt him again.
A good deal of that annoyance returned to her features.
"You pulled me away from you to ask me that? What do you think?!" she hissed harshly before she once again switched back to her usual demeanor in the blink of an eye.
"I-I'm sorry. I shouldn't yell at you. And I know why you're asking, but, trust me, you don't need to."
Tali's other hand came up to rest on the side of his neck.
"I want this, John…" she growled, low and husky. "I want you."
She took another deep breath that set her nostrils flaring out before speaking again.
"Now."
That was all the encouragement Shepard needed. The low, sultry tone of her voice flipped a switch in his mind, and suddenly he felt as eager as she had, leaning back down to recapture her lips in a passionate kiss of his own.
Tali seemed surprised for a moment at his sudden spike in initiative, but she adapted and met it in kind.
One hand came up to tangle in her thick mop of raven locks, while the other drifted lower to feel at the plush flesh of one of her thighs, drawing a pleased whine from the quarian, air pouring out from her nose to tickle his face.
They continued in this way for some time, feeling, exploring, lips locked together with a desperate need, until eventually Shepard could not hold himself back any longer.
Bringing both his hands down to cradle her thighs, he hefted her slim form up into his arms with a low grunt while Tali let out a pleased, surprised squeak, before immediately adapting to her new circumstances, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck.
Though he could not see anything, he managed not to slip and fall as he took a few steps towards the far wall, pressing her back gently against the cool ceramic tile and squaring his stance so that he would not drop her.
At last pulling away from her lips, he instead brought his head down to bury it in the crook of her neck, mouthing kisses at a nerve bundle he knew sat there, just beneath the supple skin. His prior research again proved itself useful, as it earned him a high, sweet moan, right in his ear.
Unfortunately, it also earned him a bit of sharp pain where her clawed fingers dug into the back of his neck by accident, but he decided it was well worth the trade-off.
"S-sorry." She murmured once she realized it.
"S'fine.." was all he could say back.
Not willing to wait anymore, and sensing a similar impatience from Tali, Shepard removed one hand from her thigh, bringing it down between his own legs. He pulled his face out of her neck to instead rest it against her forehead, casting his eyes down between them so that he could adjust his position and line himself up with her entrance. Moving his hips forward until he met the slick heat, he brought his eyes up to meet hers, voicing a silent question which she immediately answered with a quick, eager nod.
Bracing himself for the sensation, he eased his hips forward slowly. Tali's hold on his neck tightened into a vice grip as he slid inside, and she let out a breathy gasp, while he let out a throaty groan to match it at how she squeezed down on him, wet and tight.
His hips continued their slow, careful advance, not wanting to take any chances at hurting her, as he knew the quarian vaginal canal was comparably narrower than in humans.
A moment later, his fear seemed to be fulfilled as she made another hoarse gasping noise that came out as more of a wince.
Immediately, he tensed, and placed a hand against the wall in order to pull himself back and out, but before he could, her strong, lithe legs tightened at the small of his back, keeping him situated firmly where he was.
"No!" she gasped, eyes shimmering up at him. "I-it feels good…Keelah, you feel good…just not used to it."
His heart jumped at her words, but even so he spoke.
"I just…don't wanna hurt you."
Tali brought one of her hands back from his neck to cup his cheek.
"You didn't." she assured him softly. "And you won't, I know you won't…I trust you."
His throat closed up too much for him to respond, overwhelmed by the moment as he was, so he contented himself with leaning back in to kiss her tenderly, now a good deal less hungry, less animal than the last had been.
As the kiss deepened, his hips continued moving forward, cautious and slow, until at last he bottomed out, and they were fully joined.
Tali broke their kiss, then, sucking in a breath, flitting her eyes down between them before looking back up, pleading.
"J-just…give me a moment…need to catch my breath." She murmured, shoulders rising and falling as she adjusted to the new sensation.
"Yeah…me too." He replied, doing some panting of his own and pressing his forehead against hers.
They rested there for a moment, waiting on their second wind, gulping down the steamy air of the shower greedily.
Eventually, Tali's shiny eyes shifted from the distant, dreamy look they had had into one of some flustered amusement.
"Against the wall like this…Keelah, John, how did you know…how did you know that I…" she trailed off into more panting breaths, but her meaning was obvious.
Shepard gave a throaty chuckle that came out as more of a cough for how short his breath still was.
"This a fantasy the vids taught you?" he asked lowly, hefting her up a bit where his hand still held her thigh.
A light flush colored her features, but her impish smirk showed she would not be bashful about it right now.
"No…this one's mine." She admitted with a small giggle.
Another chuckle poured from his lips in response.
"Well…I was the one who put us here…and if this was my first choice…then I think you can see you might not be alone in having thought about it before." He admitted, just a little sheepishly.
Tali's eyes flared in delight and her smirk widened before she pulled his head in to press a series of light pecks to his lips.
Though they had both caught their breath by then, he could not resist saying one thing more in a teasing, low growl.
"So…you have a lot of fantasies about me?"
That lovely flush deepened on her cheeks.
"Y-yeah…" she squeaked out after a moment.
Seeing her so flustered was an intoxicant all its own.
"We have a few hours…" he said playfully with a kiss to the tip of her nose. "I wanna help you live them all out."
A shiver ran through her body at his seductive tone, but then a smirk returned to her lips.
"I'll hold you to that…but I don't think you can."
"Why? Too many?" he quipped.
"Maybe…" she replied flirtatiously, "but there's another reason, too."
"Yeah? What's that?"
"Well, we'd…have to go back to the Rayya for one of them."
Shepard scoffed in a disbelieving laugh, watching as she playfully waggled her eyebrows at him in spite of the embarrassed blush that still graced her cheeks.
"You're kidding." He managed, but she only shook her head.
"Okay, this one you've got to tell me about." He urged her, but something shifted in her then.
Tali's eyes took on a little of that raw desire from earlier, and her legs tightened on his back again to remind him of just where he was.
"I will. But later." She purred.
Shepard matched the hunger that had once again settled between them.
"Later."
He echoed her, capturing her lips in another deep kiss while he pulled his hips back, marvelling at how the tight heat fought to keep him in.
Tali gave a little whine, then a gasp as he pushed them back forward.
She broke their kiss to suck in another breath as Shepard buried his head back in her neck and built up a slow, back-and-forth rhythm, still cautious about hurting her as he had been earlier.
The pleasure of it was intense, and exquisite for the both of them, but again her impatience shone through as she shifted her head to rest on his shoulder, lips against his ear.
"M-more."
Her begging sent a shiver down his spine, but his caution remained.
"Tali, I don't want to-"
"More."
To hear such want, such need in her voice, he could not help but to grant it to her.
Shepard lost himself in instinct, then, the rhythm of his hips growing faster, harder as his mind went blank, focusing only on the wet heat around him, the softness of her skin against his, the hands gripping at the back of his neck, the pointy teeth occasionally nipping at the flesh of his ear.
And the sounds she made, those he lost himself in most of all, the breathy gasps and tiny squeaks, the throaty moans and pleading cries, all of it coming together into a sweeter symphony than any he'd heard.
He lost himself in her until he may as well have not existed, and never had such oblivion felt so good, so right.
By the time they were done, the shower had long since gone cold.
The cool air of the cabin was frigid upon Shepard's sweaty skin, but the bed's covers atop him and the warmth of Tali's body meant he could tolerate it.
He looked down at where she lay beside him, head nestled into his chest, arm across his stomach, one leg entangled with his, and sighed fondly, though with a bit of exhaustion, as well.
It had been two hours since he had carried her out of that shower and tossed her lightly onto the mattress of their bed. Or was it three? Keeping track of time had not exactly been at the forefront of his mind, not with her in front of him. And so eager, too. It seemed that years of being trapped in a suit made one exceptionally hungry for sensation, any sensation, even more so when that sensation was pleasurable.
Despite her complete lack of experience, Tali had apparently not been lying about her earlier statement. She certainly had plenty of ideas for how it should go, some from before they'd meant anything more to each other and some after, and he had done his very best to keep up with her enthusiasm, but even now he was not sure he had.
She had just seemed so indefatigable, and it been only a few minutes ago that they had at last stopped, collapsing into the cushions in a sweaty, panting heap.
Good thing, too. I was about to ask for a break. He thought to himself with a smirk.
But they had stopped, and now they lay entwined, basking in the afterglow, the pleasant heat of their exertion, soothed by each other's deep, even breathing.
There was a little pain, too, however. Shepard's every muscle ached, his mouth was dry, his lips and neck were probably bruised, and for a moment there he had been afraid she'd bitten his ear off. The quarian had proven herself especially fond of marking him with her teeth. He wasn't sure if Tali actually meant anything by all the love bites she left all over him, if they were instinctual as part of the quarian bonding process or not, but either way he'd probably have a hard time explaining away most of them.
But he didn't mind any of that. This had been all he had wanted it to be and more, more than he could've expected, and he hoped that she felt the same way.
As he thought this, he felt her stir somewhat in his embrace, brushing her head against his chest and letting out a contented hum.
He pulled her a little closer to him at where he held her waist, earning another one from low in her chest, and he settled his head deeper in the pillows, closing his eyes. It was still another two hours until they reached the Citadel. He could take a little nap. After hours of trying to keep up with his insatiable quarian minx, he could certainly use one.
Which was why he almost tensed up when he felt her shift beneath him, bringing her head up to plant a soft kiss on his lips, but he kept it under wraps, feigning sleep.
Tali tried kissing him a few more times, but he did not offer her even a twitch of his own lips in reciprocation. A low noise of annoyance sounded from her throat, and he imagined the irritated look she wore as she pulled back to look down on him.
"I know you're not asleep, John." She drawled.
Shepard stifled a smirk at her perceptiveness, only mostly successfully.
"I saw you! Your lips moved!" she cried, bringing a hand down to shake at his shoulder.
Still he maintained the façade.
"Little bosh'tet…" he heard her murmur, before that hand slid down over his chest and down to just below his ribs, twitching her fingers there a few times in a way which made his abs spasm.
He could not keep his face from contorting at the tickling. Tali had learned all of his spots very quickly, those that made him groan in pleasure, those that made him shiver in delight, but only one that made him laugh. She had stopped him in their passion to ask him about it, and insisted it was another "design flaw" once he explained the phenomenon of humans being ticklish.
Now it seemed she would exploit that knowledge however she could.
It only took him a few seconds more to lose the battle, and he spat out a reluctant snort of laughter, bringing down his hand to smack away at the one still tickling him.
"There you are." She gloated smugly, pressing another peck to his lips.
"You are insatiable, woman!" he chuckled. "I don't have another one in me."
"Not one more?" she teased.
"Not one more." He insisted exasperatedly. "I'm only a man, love. I can't give you anymore then what I've got."
"Oh, you gave me more than enough, believe me. I just wanted to kiss you again." She purred, bringing her head back down to nestle it beneath his chin.
He gave a throaty chuckle, still in some disbelief at her blatant flirtatiousness. While normally shy and restrained, when she felt truly comfortable, Tali really could loosen up, express what she felt more freely.
His heart warmed to know that she felt this way around him, and it really had been amazing to see this other side of her.
Had been.
The words stuck out in his mind, reminding him of what he already knew. That this was temporary, that it would not last, that soon she'd return to her suit and they'd both return to their duties.
And while he was content with that, while he did not need this moment to last forever for it to be beautiful, he wondered a moment whether or not she would feel that way, whether or not she would dwell on this moment and be conflicted about leaving it behind, setting aside the freedom and the bliss of it to return to the confinement and the sanctuary of her purple glass prison.
As though in accordance with his thoughts, the stripped-down omni-tool bracelet at Shepard's wrist beeped faintly, and, with a measure of reluctance, he brought it up so that his eyes could read the display.
A faint sigh of resignation rumbled from his chest, and she brought her head up off his chest to look up at him, a question flashing in her luminous eyes.
"Miranda wants to meet with me to discuss some of the components we plan to purchase at the Citadel…And Gabby sent word that she wants your input on a few issues that have cropped up down in Engineering." He informed her.
The easy bliss that had hung in her face fell away, her lips twitching down into the slightest of frowns as her brow furrowed. And while he wasn't sure if he had just imagined it, he thought he saw her eyes go darker, the brilliant glimmer fading into a soft glow.
"Oh." She whispered weakly. Her small lips seemed to quiver for a second as her eyes fell away.
Shepard reached out to place a finger under her chin.
"Hey..."
Tali's eyes returned to his.
"it's like I said earlier. There will be more of this. I promise." He assured her warmly.
She searched his face, then, and was silent for a long moment. She did not seem to believe him, though, and whatever doubt she was harboring still lay beneath the surface.
"Okay, John…if you say so." She responded weakly.
Slowly, she disentangled herself from him, arms and legs pulling away until she sat at the edge of the bed. He went to the opposite side, grabbing some fresh clothes from his footlocker and pulling them on, looking back to see that she was watching, no doubt acutely reminded of just how easy it was for him to do such a thing.
She pushed herself to her feet and padded over to the table where the components of her suit were folded and piled neatly, grabbing it up and placing it on the bed.
"Can I help you with your suit at all?" he asked her, sitting at the edge of it.
After another long look, she gave him a nod.
Given that he didn't really have any idea how the pieces connected, his "help" amounted mostly to handing her pieces when she asked for them, watching a little entranced as she slid on the boots and gloves, activating seals and connecting various gadgets together underneath the leathery padding. She waited until the end to replace her helmet, snapping the parts together and reconnecting them to the main body of the suit before unfolding her veil and beginning the process of donning it, hands moving dexterously to wrap it about her body various times until there was just enough of it at the top to serve as a hood.
Understandably, she got to the visor last, and hesitated, looking down sadly at the pane of violet glass cradled in her now-gloved hands.
Sensing that inner conflict springing back up, he spoke to try and allay her concern.
"I know what you're thinking. And I understand it as much as I can from where I sit. But try not to. Please?" he begged her.
Her gaze shifted from the last piece of her prison to his eyes.
"How can I not think that way?" she spoke softly. "Y-you've always said that this didn't matter, that you didn't ever need to be close to me this way in order for you to love me. That you cared for me because of who I was, in spite of the suit. And I believed you, but now…now that it's actually happened…" she trailed off, before gathering herself and continuing, voice wavering from held-in tears.
"Now that it's happened, what if everything changes? What if this is how you think of me now? I-I can't be this all the time. I can't kiss you all the time, I can't join with you all the time…What if this was a mistake? What if I've shown you a person you love more than what I am most of the time? I…I'm worried we won't be able to go back to the way things were." she rambled, all her worry pouring out of her in a torrent.
Shepard stood, reaching out to cup her cheek, and she leaned into it in spite of her anguished state.
"You're right. We can't go back to the way things were. But that's because nothing's changed. There's no 'way things were' to go back to. Today, what we did…getting to see this side of you, and to share myself with you this way, it's been amazing, I can't even begin to tell you…but what I can tell you is that it hasn't done a thing to affect how I feel about you. Not a damn thing. Nothing's changed between us."
Tali still did not look convinced.
"B-but you-" she tried, before he leaned in to place a soft kiss on her lips, pulling back after a moment and offering his hands.
She looked down at them, then at the visor in her hands.
"Do you trust me?" he murmured.
She searched his face a while again before giving a small, shaky nod, pressing the glass into his hands.
Gingerly, he took the visor from her, shifted it around in his hands until it was the right direction, then brought it up until it was in front of her face, pressing it slowly forward until it met the metal frame of her helmet, making a faint hissing sound as the seals connected and her face was once again concealed from his sight, and all he could see was the little silver stars of her eyes shining back at him.
"Now you kiss me." He said simply.
Her head tilted a little in confusion.
"John, I can't-"
"Kiss me." He urged her, firmer this time.
And she did, bringing a hand up to the back of his head and pulling him forward until his forehead met the cool violet glass.
He stared through it, deep into her eyes, hoping they told her all he wished her to understand.
Eventually, he spoke, voice earnest and thick with emotion.
"Now…how do you think that one felt, compared to the first?" he asked her.
She paused for a long moment as she considered his words.
"T-the same?" she whispered hopefully.
"The same." He assured her. "And it always will feel the same. Just like how I feel about you will always be the same."
He pressed his lips lightly against her visor, leaving behind a small smudge in roughly their shape.
"Always." He promised her.
Her eyes fell away to bore into the floor, and he heard her breathing quicken a little, the indicator light of her voice box flickering slightly.
"I…I'm sorry." She said at last, voice shaky and unsure.
"You don't have to be."
"I do have to." She argued. "I-I shouldn't have doubted you, shouldn't have doubted what you feel for me…I should've just trusted you."
Shepard's hands came down to take both of her own in a tight squeeze.
"It's a perfectly reasonable doubt to hold, and there's nothing wrong with feeling it…so long as you realize it's not true now."
"I do." She promised him.
A warm smile came to his lips, and his hands fell to encircle her waist.
"Good. Now go, love. If you wait any longer, you know Ken'll start making rude jokes about us."
She gave a giggle, now brought back to her previous playful mood.
"I'm sure he already has. Poor Gabby, being all alone to suffer them." She grumbled, turning to walk away, toward the cabin door.
Shepard could not resist leaving her with one last jab.
"Oh, and you'll probably want to stop by the mess, too." He said casually.
She turned to look over her shoulder, head cocked lightly.
"Why? I'm not hungry."
"You sure? The way you kept gnawing at me, I assumed you must be starving." He said with a smirk, pointing up at one of the red marks on his neck her teeth had left.
Tali's eyes immediately shot to the floor, and her hands met at their waist to fiddle nervously with one another.
"I couldn't help it! I-it was instinctual, how I show affection!" she defended herself. "Y-you never said anything about it!"
Once he recovered from the little chuckling fit her words brought out of him, Shepard was able to respond.
"I didn't say anything about it because I liked it, love. It's like you said, you were 'showing affection.' I could probably ask Miranda for some of her concealer…if she uses any. But I don't think I will. Don't feel like hiding them." He finished with another sly smirk.
She turned around fully to face him, a hand at her hip and a smirk of her own on her lips, he guessed.
"To show you're mine?" she teased him.
"To show I'm yours." He agreed.
"Well, you're not the only one. I've got one, too." She said sweetly, finger coming up to tap at where his lips had smudged the glass of her visor.
His smirk widened.
"Yeah, but that one's so clearly a mark my lips made. At least with mine, I could make the excuse of being savaged by a wild animal or something."
Tali huffed in irritation.
"Oh, shut up." Was all she said, before pivoting on her heel to begin walking out once more.
Shepard did not, in fact, shut up.
"As you command…my little thresher maw."
She froze where she stood, but kept facing forward, apparently not confident she could not stop herself from slapping him if she got a look at his shit-eating grin.
"You…you…are so lucky I have work to do." She surrendered.
He chuckled smugly.
"Guess I am. You can slap me for that one later…see you then?" he offered her.
She turned to face him, then, and reached out to the access panel for the door, speaking softly as she gave her reply.
"Mmhm, see you later…love."