The horizon was dark, the sky a deep, blueish, purply hue, but the line of blazing light where it met the distant land spoke of just how close dawn was. Close, so close to the time when the sand and stone would be bathed in the radiant orange of Tikkun's rays, as it had for billions of years, the most consistent testimony to the presence of beauty in the universe.
But, as had not been the case for three hundred years, this time there'd be somebody to appreciate that beauty.
Lost in her thoughts, Tali absent-mindedly extended a hand to the dirt upon which she sat, grabbing up a handful of rusty, mottled soil and holding it up to her face, playing it around between her fingers and watching the various granules and small stones that made it up go crumbling away until gravity drew them out of her sight, falling down to the small river beneath the cliffside her legs were dangling over.
She watched them go for a moment, watched the soft blue line flowing inland, reflecting what miniscule light the stars overhead provided against the copse of maroon-leaved flora which clung to it.
She let her body go limp, then, falling back to the dirt and giving a shake of her shoulders to press it down and immerse herself within it, as though some force would snatch her away from it if she did not take every moment possible to appreciate it.
For as much as she appreciated it, though, she still could not believe it. Well, she could. She had been there after all, to see it all done, but some part of her feared that every moment would wake her from her sleep, her far-too-pleasant dream.
Millions had dreamt it before, to be where she was, to sit where she sat, to breathe in that cool night air, filtered as it was. Why should hers be true when all theirs hadn't been?
But there was no denying it. She was here, and the drab landscape which surrounded her looked as beautiful as the lushest forest, the most picturesque beach, all because of what it meant, what it constituted.
But despite the undeniability of it all, part of her simply could not ground herself in all that had happened. It had been a truly remarkable series of days, packed full with far too much for her to have processed by now. It may well have been too much for her to ever process, what with the precariousness of their situation.
First had come the joy, at finally being allowed to see John again. It had been six months, six grueling months of separation from her bondmate. Though he had stood behind what he had done in the Bahak system as the only thing to have done, he had submitted to the Alliance's insistence on putting him to trial for it. Thousands had died, after all, necessary as it was.
Their parting had been…hard, compounded further by the message her aunt had sent her regarding her people's intention of warring with the geth. The Reapers could have arrived at any time, and they decided that now, of all times, was the time for war. Almost worse still was Raan's request that she return, to offer her expertise on the geth and weigh in on the matter, after they'd cast her out for what was practically the same issue.
She had spoken against it, naturally. Her hatred for the geth had been soothed considerably by the opportunity to actually speak with one, which she had made great use of during their fight against the Collectors. This, along with the closeness of the Reaper threat, had shaped her reasoning. But it had not mattered. Though Raan had seemed genuinely interested in hearing what she had to say, the other admirals were already well-entrenched in their positions on the matter. Apart from which she didn't actually have any authority to speak from, not even on equal footing as a member of the Fleet, let alone as an admiral.
She had thought it would be the death of all of them, but resolved to at least do what she could to mitigate the situation. Old attachments died hard, it seemed, and they were still her people, even if they didn't see it that way.
When the opportunity had presented itself, she had advised the Admiralty to enlist John's help in their fight, to offer their aid should they win against the Reapers, what she had wanted them to do from the start. This time, to her great relief, they had agreed, and so had John.
His presence at her side had been a great comfort, as well as a beacon, a paragon of hope that they might actually succeed.
And then today had happened. Despite the impossibility of it all, they had, in fact, succeeded.
It all blurred together into her mind. Even as she had been unable to imagine what had happened producing any of the outcomes which might result, this one had been unthinkable even among all the others she deemed unthinkable.
Though her hatred for the geth had waned greatly, she still had not viewed them at all favorably. Whatever their reasoning, whatever positive regard Legion had built for them in her mind, they had slaughtered billions of her people, a truly haunting portion of which were noncombatants. Young children, the sick and the old. It was by luck alone that they survived at all, but the life of her species was a mere fraction of all it should have been, all the collective value the other species' appreciated as a given.
In so many ways she was only now coming to understand, the quarian people had left their soul behind on Rannoch.
Theirs was a rough, shallow existence filled with endless poverty and longing for the past, of galactic rejection, of reluctant, internalized shame.
And of the fear that a single tear in the prisons they wore would be their end.
Theirs was hardly a civilization at all, subsisting on the mere scraps of culture and spirituality they could find time for given how totally their lives were dedicated to subsistence of the more critical sort, the petty struggle for resources and ship maintenance.
With this war, she had thought it would be her people or the geth to triumph, and there was no doubt whatsoever as to which she would choose, regrettable as the conflict had been to start, regrettable as she was that it had to happen at all.
But in the end, it had not come down to that. It had almost, it had come so close. But it hadn't.
In the end, it had not been all of the geth which had died, only one, only the one which she had truly ever known, one she had come to see as a…friend.
She sat back up, looking over to the far edge of the cliff where Legion's body had fallen. It was not there, not anymore, as a group of geth platforms had arrived a few hours ago to bear it away, to inter it in some place of honor, she could only guess.
With their newly-gained sapience and independence, it had apparently not been long for them to develop the beginnings of reverence, of sentimentality. She had seen it some in Legion itself, in its insistence on wearing a piece of John's battered old hardsuit, salvaged from the wreckage of the first Normandy after he had died.
Now it seemed that it was yet another of the gifts it had bestowed upon its brethren.
She was glad the geth were not being so cold about it as they might have been before. She was clearly no longer an expert on the geth, such was the degree of the change that had been wrought in all their minds, and so had not known how they would treat the memory of the one that had granted them their intelligence, their true personhood.
But it seemed they were honoring it, and for that she was glad. If there was ever a being which deserved reverence, she supposed it ought to be Legion. Its sacrifice was a pure one, informed, deliberate, and without any true hesitation. Logic dictated that it was the right choice, of course, and it was one she would have expected any geth platform to make before all this. To sacrifice one for the good of many was a pure net gain, mathematically undeniable, but logic had not been the only thing to dictate the geth's actions, in the end.
There was self, there was an "I," distinct from the collective from which it had been born, and a love for that collective stronger than either of those things.
It was the only one of its kind to ever get that far, but it laid down its own sense of self so that the rest of the consensus could reach those heights, could know what it truly meant to be a person unto oneself, and not merely unto each other.
Besides the sadness, though, there was happiness, too. In general, she supposed there was no better way to die than to die fighting for what one believed in, a cause, a conviction that something was right. Most people that died that way only ever had the chance of a better tomorrow in mind to ease their passing, a hope that their death might move the world a little closer to the dream that had driven them to their doom.
But Legion had known well what its sacrifice would bring, beyond doubt. She imagined there was likely a sense of peace to go with that. A lack of worry and a lightness of spirit, a chance to go happy with the certainty that their death would mean something, and not just something at all, but something truly great.
Or, at least, she imagined that's how one of her people would feel about such a thing, or one of John's, but then…the geth had been as much a person as she was by the end, she supposed.
Her eyes flitted further back, to the ominous, hulking husk of the Reaper destroyer the orbital bombardment had devastated. Even in its death, she imagined its cold crimson optic, now devoid of its light, was somehow staring at her, accusing, hating.
The geth won't be your slaves anymore, machine.
And with today, her hope had never been higher that all the rest of their would-be doomsayers might join this one in the dirt, cold and dead.
She was pulled from her introspection, and from her reminiscence, by a touch of color breaking through the deep black and blue, a wave of pink and white beginning its conquest of the old night sky.
She gave a little frown to see it, wishing John were here.
He had promised to come join her if he could, but there were military matters to handle just now, logistics, coordination with the geth fleet and the portion of her people's fleet which would not stay behind to handle the settlement of noncombatants.
She might've stayed, even if she lacked any sort of authority among her people regarding things such as this, not even as a geth expert, anymore.
She had opted not to, though, not trusting herself to be around the admirals at a time like this.
A little anger welled up in her to think of the catastrophe that might have resulted had Gerrel had his way, at all the death his myopia might have wrought.
Her anger was interrupted by a sound reaching her ears.
Even through the haze of her reminiscence, she could hear the heavy crunch of boots in the dirt and stone, approaching her from behind.
A little smile came to her lips. At this point, she could tell just from the sound who was approaching. She had often teased him about the heaviness of his stride, stomping around like a drunk krogan, and he had defended himself in his typical way, something Samara had said to him about it being a sign of his confidence and authority, and that she shouldn't dare to be so arrogant as to challenge six hundred years of wisdom.
She was glad for him to be here, and not just for the obvious reasons. For all he'd done, for the world he'd just won and the hope he'd just given to millions, he should at least be allowed to take in the sunrise before moving on to the next world that needed saving.
And, she thought with a smile, he'll probably appreciate the poetry of it, too. An end to this long night of sorrow for my people, a new day dawning for us.
The steps grew closer, but she kept facing forward, curious as to what he'd say.
"Keep you company?" he asked with just the hint of a smirk, as though it was not the thing she wanted most in the world at the moment.
She turned to look at him over her shoulder.
"Please?" she pleaded him softly.
He acquiesced with a little nod, taking the last few steps to stand at her left and lowering himself gingerly down at the cliff's edge.
On instinct, her hand reached out to hold his arm and steady him, so that if he should slip she'd be there to help.
He noticed the touch immediately, and gave a scoff of laughter.
"I'm not gonna fall." He said dryly. "After today, after all this, to go out that like would be pre-tty embarrassing."
She gave him back a small giggle.
"Good thing I'm here to catch you then, save you from that shame."
Once he had gotten settled, he gave a little kick of his legs, looking down at the river as she had.
Without looking back up at her, he crooked his arm in her direction, an invitation she was ever-eager to accept, looping her own around it and taking his hand in a tight squeeze, scooching herself through the dirt to get close enough to lean into him, head burying itself in the crook of his still-plated shoulder.
She gave a pleased, blissful sigh. If today had been a dream, this would be its crowning joy, and if it was allowed to continue for more than a moment, she'd know for sure of the truth of it all.
"I'm glad you're here." She whispered warmly, brushing her thumb gently across his palm.
"Well, I should hope so. Getting you a home world back is worth at least a little esteem, don't you think?"
She felt another giggle come over her, and she let her elbow swing over to nudge him in the ribs.
"I already thanked you for that, you bosh'tet." She retorted, bringing up her other hand to gesture at the horizon.
"I meant I'm glad you're here now to watch the sunrise with me."
His eyes followed her finger, running along the ever-growing tide of color streaking its way up the sky, giving a little smile to see it.
"Good timing I got out here when I did, then. Hate to miss a moment like this. And so…poetic, too. A new day is dawning for your people." He finished with a touch of ponderous ostentation.
She gave a hum in agreement, but did not take the chance to gloat about his predictability. She could only make such accurate guesses for how much of him he'd allowed her to see, how attuned to him she had become.
"But then…I suppose a sunset might have been just as poetic. As the sunset ends the day, so would it have signaled the end of your people's exile. Poets have a way of twisting entirely unrelated events into saying the same thing, or so I've found. Anything for a bit of dualism."
She gave a short giggle at his little jab, but being reminded of timing reminded her of just how long he had been back at the Normandy, landed just a short distance away alongside several of her people's shuttles and a few geth craft, so that the three new allies could assemble and discuss their next move against the Reapers.
"How did things go back there?" she asked a little hesitantly.
John and the admirals only barely tolerated each other, and he resented them all besides Raan for their role in her exile. After today, she guessed he'd harbor a specific animosity for Gerrel, as she was coming to.
He gave her hand a tight squeeze, setting her heart swelling. Things had gone well, she could tell from just that little squeeze. It seemed to contain so much more than it really was.
"Well. Very well." He assured her, genuine joy coloring his tone.
"That's gotta be the first logistical meeting I've ever walked away from with a smile on my face." He ended, wearing a smile so wide it was hard to believe it had been yet wider right after the fact.
"What was so good about it?"
"Well, there is the fact that we now have two fleets gunning for our side instead of one. But both of those fleets stand to be a great deal more effective than any of the projections I'd yet received would have led me to believe. I hadn't realized quite so many of your people's ships were outfitted for combat." He ended questioningly.
"They had to be. Many of the ships in the flotilla were not originally of military origin, so we built upon and added to them over time in order to increase our strength."
"But the numbers…I'll bore you with the numbers later on, but for now just believe me when I say that they are substantial, and that's me saying that when I already knew how substantial the fleet was to start with. And the geth…"
"Also substantial?" she asked with a widening of her smile. It seemed he truly could not believe how much better their odds had gotten.
"Also substantial." He echoed with a little awed shake of his head. "A bulk of the geth forces came to this system upon the war's beginning, but the swiftness of the whole thing meant that a sizable chunk couldn't arrive in time. They were stationed elsewhere in the Veil, at several points the geth deemed strategically important. So the fleet is a decent bit bigger even than the one already here. And their productive capabilities, their manufactory potential…now that they're sure of the scale of the Reaper threat, and that they're a threat at all, to all sapient life…let's just say the fleet's gonna get even bigger."
He had been looking distantly at the horizon, a sort of dreamy, glazed look in his eyes, before he turned toward her, icy blue glinting beautifully in the starlight, in a way she might have gushed about if it didn't look like he had more to say.
"And, here's some other news to hearten you further, if that was possible. Your aunt informed me that the Admiralty plans to rescind your exile, if we all make it through this. For your service in reclaiming the home world."
She cocked her head at him.
"I already knew that, John. She told me so."
"Oh." He said, looking a little abashed. "Well I didn't."
He crooked a mildly accusatory eyebrow at her, mostly just curious.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I…didn't think it worth mentioning."
Now his eyebrows furrowed up, in confusion.
"Well…why not?"
She took a little breath before responding. Surely he hadn't forgotten all she'd told him before, only hadn't allowed it to sink in quite so deep as she'd wanted it to.
"Do you…remember the night we were bonded? What I said to you?" It had been many months since then, half a lifetime ago to her mind, but nothing about that night had changed so far as she was concerned.
"You said lots of things. How you only loved me for my body heat, for one."
She gave a giggle.
"Not that one. The other one." She chided him.
"That I was more of a bosh'tet than the krogan that tried to kill me?"
"John…" she grumbled happily, bumping her hip against his.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." He allowed with a chuckle. "I'm just in a good mood, that's all."
She gave a squeeze of his hand.
"I know. And that puts me in a good mood, too. But right now, just tell me…do you remember what I said?"
"Of course I do. Every word of it, every moment of that night."
He gave her hand back a squeeze of his own.
"You said I meant more to you than your people ever had…that I was like a home to you."
"And did you believe me?" she pressed.
"I did. It's just…I don't know…in spite of what you said, I figured at least a part of it was a coping mechanism…for all that had happened to you. Even if it was small, I imagined it played some role in how you felt. Overvaluing what you had left to deal with what you'd lost."
"Well it wasn't. And I didn't." she reaffirmed, filling her voice with conviction.
"Even here, even now? Awaiting the dawn on the world of your ancestors, and with the knowledge that you'll have a people to go back to if we make it through all this?"
"Even here, even now." She echoed him. "I could've lived the rest of my life without them…and still been happy. I never lost what was most important to me, never lost the only thing that had made me truly happy to start with. Getting them back…I didn't mention it to you because it doesn't matter. I mean, it does, but it doesn't really matter, it's not really important, if…that makes sense. Do you understand?"
She wished so badly for him to, but there was no way he wouldn't. Not after today.
He met her with a tender, touched smile, bringing the top of her hand to his lips and gently pressing them against it, warmth bleeding through the material to grace her skin.
"Yeah…I do."
She met his smile as the sky continued brightening.
"Which is not to say I'm not overjoyed to have them, because I am, I could hardly begin telling you how much."
A little laugh spilled from his throat.
"So am I. Would have worked out either way, I imagine, but this way I won't have to smuggle you back here when it's all over, get to go the legal route with it."
Her brow furrowed beneath her visor at his words. Beyond the sudden certainty that that would ever happen, his belief in it, what he had said brought something to her mind she'd thought about a few times. Idly, without any true expectation, they had sometimes shared little half-dreams they'd had, of living on Rannoch if they could.
Now, with their odds looking better than they ever had been, and with the planet itself actually being open to them now, she wished to make clear how she did not wish to force him into anything for her sake, just as she never wished to.
"That reminds me. There's…something I wanted to talk to you about." She began softly.
His head cocked minutely, and a little concern entered his eyes at the hesitancy of her tone.
"I just wanted to say that, if we win this thing...if we make it…we don't have to live here."
He scoffed, as though the notion was somehow silly to him.
"Of course we do."
"We don't." she stood fast, not wanting to allow his selflessness to deprive him of a chance to fulfill his own wishes, even if that trait was one of her favorites of his, the one that had first endeared him to her at all, gotten her far enough to learn all the others she had come to adore.
She continued, after a little pause to let the conviction behind her words sink in.
"If you believed what I said to you that night, and what I am saying to you now, then believe this."
Another pause, during which she disentangled her hand from his to set it on the side of his face.
"I would go anywhere with you, hir'kun. Anywhere. Even if it meant leaving it all behind. My people, my home world. I've done it before, even if it…wasn't my choice, then. I could do it again, I could turn my back on everything, even knowing what it all means…so long as you were with me."
She noticed a sort of touched awe come across his face, then, to hear her use the name she'd given him during their bonding ceremony. It was not frequently that she referred to him by it, with both agreeing that it was too serious, too weighty a thing to go throwing it around, lest it lose its power in repetition, which was not to say that she did not cherish every stupid, silly new pet name he placed upon her on an almost daily basis.
They were merely different sorts of names, and she reserved this one only for when it was most needed, like now.
A long silence followed during which he processed what she was saying, as if giving the matter some serious consideration, a courtesy to befit the seriousness with which she had asked him to.
Eventually, though, after it had all played out in his eyes, she could tell his mind had not changed. He lifted his hand from the dirt to press hers against his at the side of his cheek
"Then come with me back here. When it's all over. I can tell you want this, and trust me when I tell you that I want it just as much. Maybe more." He finished with a small smile.
Still she was not fully convinced. The desire seemed too much wrapped up in her own for her to be comfortable in dragging him back here when he might want to be somewhere else.
"But…what about Earth? I know your memories of your home world are…not the fondest, but it can't all be bad, can it?" she asked a little pleadingly.
He shook his head.
"No, it can't. And it isn't. There's parts of it that are beautiful, parts where you and I could be happy. But…I'm not just looking for a nice place. I dream of living here for another reason."
"And…what is that?"
"Living here would mean being part of something truly remarkable. Not just the rebuilding, the resettlement, that will hardly be unique. There's not a planet in the galaxy that will make it through this unscathed, not one. Everywhere we go there'll be rebuilding, people needing homes, food, medical care."
His eyes shifted from hers, back to the horizon, growing steadily brighter and more colorful as the minutes fell away.
"That'll happen here, all of it…but beyond that, there will be a true rebuilding, one no government administrator could help along. Not just of bricks and farmland, but of culture, of spirit. I never spent more than a day on the flotilla, but from all you've told me I get the sense that your people have only ever really gotten by these centuries. Not enough room, not enough time, to live, to really live. They've survived, when most probably would have just given up, but they haven't thrived. But here, on this world, there'll be a chance for that. As the bricks are laid and the towns resettled, there'll be songs written, festivals thrown, heroes honored. Living here, I'll get to behold a people discovering itself all over again. I'll get to watch a civilization take its first gasping breath after being underwater for three hundred years…I'll get to watch millions of people take back the soul they lost, their pride and their sense of self, and I'll be here for it all, to shape it and to be shaped by it."
His eyes came back to hers, soft, pleading for her to understand just how much it would mean to him.
And seeing that fire burn in his pale blue eyes, she knew.
"I want to see it all, every bit of it. I want to be a part of it, to be there at every crowning moment…and through it all, I want you at my side."
"I will be." She answered him immediately, voice catching on her emotion in spite of her efforts. "I will be."
"You will be." He echoed her, as though there was nothing he'd ever found surer, more true.
Her eyes flitted away from his, during which she reflected on the way they were both speaking of the future. In the past, they had been careful not to attach expectation to tomorrow. They both knew well the folly of taking time for granted, how near death and misfortune was to anyone, and how it was nearer still to them by merit of the danger they willingly placed upon themselves. But just now, using words like 'will' instead of 'would,' they had moved past idle dreaming, past ideals and hypotheticals, and onto hope, lovely and dangerous and fraught with fear as it was.
He seemed to read her mind, then, so attuned to her as he was.
"I know what you're thinking, love. And I get it, you know I do…but just look around you. Behind us is a group of quarian and geth craft, and despite all odds, they're not shooting at each other. In fact, they just got done working out just how best the two of them could get to shooting their true enemy. We sit upon a world no one's seen in three centuries, the first to see its sun rise in all that time. And to cap it all of, just over there is one very dead Reaper." He finished with a smug smile, and a gesturing of his head to the metallic carcass.
"Maybe this'll just jinx it, but I'd say we're allowed a little hope, don't you? Even if it's just for a moment?"
She was still a little hesitant, fearful for the pain it might bring, but it was, as it always had been, her inclination to trust him, her desire, too, and the day's events had just seemed to make him so wonderfully happy that she could not help but match him in it, amplified by his own. His emotions tended to be contagious like that, she'd learned long ago, and his joy most especially.
"I suppose we are."
His smile took on a different sort of smugness at having convinced her, but all in a moment it fell away, anticipation and caution entering his eyes, along with a will to push past them both.
She brought her hand down to grip his, intertwining their fingers.
"What is it?" she asked with no small degree of concern.
Whatever this was, she could tell it had been with him for a while now, and was only now coming to the surface.
"I wasn't sure when to have this conversation, if any time was the right time, but here and now, when my hopes are high and I'm not afraid of them, for once in my life…I suppose there's no better time than now. I…also have something to ask you."
She gave his hand a little squeeze.
"So ask me." She urged him, and her eagerness seemed to hearten him.
Still there was that hesitation, though, and it drew his eyes away from hers once more, looking down at the chasm below, following the course of the river.
After a long silence, he spoke again.
"What do you want to do after this? And I don't just mean where you want to live, but how you want to live." He said, voice soft and scratchy.
She pondered the question for a second. As with most of the rest, she was hesitant to think too far into the future, so the answer was one new to her, as well.
"I'm…not sure. The question is one that's always scared me, even from before I ever met you, when even my ability to be there for the future wasn't so uncertain, let alone what would happen. I think the fear of the pain it might cause me was never worth knowing the answer, so I never let myself go too far with it, but now that you've asked..."
She took a moment to think about it, realizing that there was really only one thing she was sure of about the future, not something she would like to do, but something she wouldn't.
"I don't know what I want to do, but…I don't think I want to fight anymore. I'm proud of everything I've fought for, everything we've fought for, everything that fighting has accomplished…"
She trailed off, before collecting herself once more.
"But I'm tired, hir'kun. I'm…so very tired." She finished in the ghost of a whisper, but then the thought came to her that she was hardly one to deserve that feeling.
Her words were true, and reflective of how she truly felt, deep in her soul, but the unworthiness of them fell over her, then, with him sitting at her side, having born the soldier's burden for so much longer than she had, and having it weigh far more heavily on him, too, with all those he'd been made to lose in battle that she hadn't, the many other lives he had to preserve as their leader.
"But…what I feel is so much…less than what you feel. I-I wasn't trying to imply they're the same, but-"
She cut herself off before she could go too far in her rambling, a much rarer thing these days but still annoying at times. What he wanted was more important to her right now.
"Do…you want to fight anymore?"
He didn't answer her for a time, just brushing his thumb along her palm, giving the question some serious thought. She imagined the war between duty and desire raging itself in his mind, and of identity, too.
He had little connection to the idea of the human race in and of itslef, she knew, and no family to which he might return. He had the fight, and he had her. Those had been his words, exactly, one quiet night.
After a long, tense moment, he spoke, in a whisper as she had.
"No, I…I don't think I do."
It did not sound nearly so final as it could have.
"It…sounds like there's something else."
"Yeah. There is. I don't want to fight anymore, that's what my heart tells me, not unless something as big as the Reapers comes along again, but there's another part of me that questions whether or not I'd be able to do anything else. I've been fighting all my life, all the parts that mattered, anyway. I don't know anything else, so…maybe I already made my choice a long time ago, and there's no use struggling against inertia."
She gave his hand a tight squeeze.
"Don't say that. Nothing about this is final. Nothing about anyone's life is final, but yours least of all. I…I believe in you, believe you could do anything if you decided it was really what you wanted. Even setting aside everything you've ever known, trying to be someone different, forging a new path for yourself…one without the war and death. All you've done…all you'll still have to do if we're to win…someone like you deserves a chance to rest, to savor the peace you've won for others. And…maybe you don't know how to do anything else. That might not even be true, but even if it is, that doesn't mean you can't learn."
He digested her words for a long moment, chewing at the inside of his cheek in that way he did when he was thinking deeply about something, brow creased in concentration.
After the silence grew too tense for either of them to bear.
"I…think I agree. In spite of myself, in spite of that ugly little voice that says otherwise…I agree. Maybe there's hope for me yet."
"There is. And if you don't fully believe it…that's fine. I can believe it for the both of us." She finished with a wide smile, to be able to use those words, to say them back to him after so much time, when he had first used them to console her in the depths of her own self-doubt, after the first person she'd been made to kill.
The significance of it was not lost on him.
"Looking to repay the favor?" he teased.
"Finally." She said back warmly.
"After all this time, though…figure a bit of interest's built up, don't you think?"
"Doesn't matter. I'll believe in you five times harder than you ever believed in me."
"I'd like that.
She was heartened to have convinced him the possibility, of the innate potential he so readily saw in others, of his ability to move past something that, proud as he was of it, had exacted a heavy toll upon him. If there was anyone that deserved to lay down his arms, it was him, she thought. And he could do it, so long as he truly believed he could.
"So while we're letting this hope in…what is it you'd like to be? Have any ideas?" she asked the question lightly, without any real expectation for a solid answer, simply wanting to distance them both from the heaviness from earlier, the doubt.
"Yes. I do." He answered her immediately, and in his eyes there was a sort of hesitant knowingness. Clearly he had had something in mind to start, and this whole conversation was simply his way of getting around to it.
She prompted after a moment, just as eager to hear it as he seemed to be to say it.
"Tell me." She urged him.
He shut his eyes a second, drew in a deep lungful of the cool night air, before exhaling it audibly out his nostrils.
When his eyes reopened, they were filled with a determination, as well as a pleading, directed at her for all she could tell.
He let his other hand come over, taking the one she had given him in both of his own.
"All my life I've been a soldier. Fighting, killing…it's been all I had for so long, 'til I found you. And you've given me a great deal, more than even I know, more than I'll probably ever know, but even so there's still so much more to life than I've ever allowed myself to experience. And if we make it through this, there's gonna be a whole world of possibilities out there for me, for us both. So many things I could be, that there's no way I could tell you just which of those things I'm gonna end up being. I couldn't even tell you which of those I want to be yet…except for one. If we're to win this thing, I don't think I'd have it in me to be a soldier anymore, and faced with the question of what else I ought to be besides, who I ought to be, there's just been this answer, this one answer, that keeps coming up, over and over. Every way I approach the question…the end's the same. I see it when I wake up, and I see it when I go to sleep. Every time I let myself dream a moment...it's there."
Her breath had hitched in her throat to hear the gravity of whatever it was he was about to say, feeling it in every waver of his usually strong voice, in every desperate begging squeeze of her hand.
After a long pause, he spoke, soft and low.
"Maybe it's an awful idea that won't do anyone any good, maybe I'll make an absolute mess of the whole thing, maybe it's not for me to be…but once I'm done being a soldier…I'd like to try being a father."
Tali's eyes widened, and tears sprang lightning quick to their forefront, at his words, at the mere notion of all they entailed.
As with much of the rest of the future, the thought had only ever lingered at the very edges of her consciousness, kept shielded from the core of her mind, from a place of true consideration, only by her diligence, her fear of the pain its lack of fulfillment would bring.
There was perhaps no thought she'd fought harder against within herself, no desire she'd tried harder to suppress, to condemn as mere wishful thinking, something she'd never be allowed to have. Too perfect, too impossibly perfect, she'd tried and failed to believe.
But now it was though all of those mere hints, those shadows of the idea she'd discarded as shut off to someone like her, were all falling in at once, filling her mind with images and dreams and joy at them both.
Whatever hesitancy she had had to attach expectation to the future was now wholly done away with, washed away in the tide of emotion he'd set flowing through every inch of her being. Here, upon the world her ancestors had walked, the love of her life at her side, she dared to believe, to truly hope, uncaring for the folly of it.
She could not meet his eyes any longer after that, staring into the dirt and trying her best to get a hold of herself so that she could give her answer to what had been half a request. She bit at her lip to still its quivering, sniffled to try and clear away the tears.
"Is…that something you could see yourself being? A mother?" he asked softly at her side.
That was too much, that word, that wonderful unfathomable word, promising her so much now that she believed it was possible, and she knew there'd be no collecting herself for a long while.
In lieu of any unworthy words spoken in a shaky voice, she flung herself forward at him, wrapping her arms around him as they both went crashing to the dirt, tears spilling unseen from her eyes, wracking her entire body with rapturous sobs, cries of elation.
He gave a grunt as a bit of the wind was knocked out of him, then a weak, hoarse laugh at her lack of even an attempt at a verbal response, knowing well it had not been the first time she'd done this when emotion had overcome her.
From the choked sound of it, though, she guessed he was shedding a few tears of his own, even if she could not see them.
After a time, though, he prompted her, voice filled with unrestrained joy, knowing well what her answer was but wanting to hear it out loud, anyway.
"So…"
She gave a little giggle through her cries.
"Yes, John, yes! A thousand times yes!" She managed, practically gushing the words out.
He gave a low chuckle back, squeezing her against him at where his hands were settled at the small of her back.
"A thousand, huh? I was thinking more like two or three, but if that's what you want…"
Her giggling intensified, and she twitched her head to the side a little to head butt him a little.
"Ancestors as my witnesses, you will not pass on your awful humor to any children of mine."
"It is so happening. You already know it is." He quipped back.
She gave a groan, as if in exasperation, when really the mere idea set her heart swelling in longing, for everyone in her family to make her laugh like only he could, and for her to constantly feign irritation at those amazingly awful jokes he told. There was little in that moment she could imagine wanting more.
She gave a happy sigh into his shoulder, before that previous cheek left her voice, growing more tender.
"You're going to be a wonderful father. I know you will." She said softly.
"We'll see." He allowed her, and she was glad he was not entirely pessimistic. "Don't really have anything to go off of with that, any real knowledge of what that's like…but I'll give my very best."
She propped herself above him with an arm, to gaze, fondly and deeply, into his sapphire eyes.
"I know you will." She repeated warmly. "And that's why you'll be good."
He gave a little smile at her faith in him, before inverting it, turning it her way, instead.
"Maybe I'll be good at it, maybe I'll be a good father, but you'll be a better mother."
In spite of the warm honesty in his voice, the true belief behind his words, she could not resist.
"Well I should hope so, considering I'll be the only of us to actually be a mother." She jabbed, nuzzling the side of her head against his.
He chuckled lowly beneath her, yet it came out as half a scoff.
"You know what I meant." He grumbled with a touch of put-on dryness. "And I'm sorry, but weren't you just getting on me about my awful humor?"
"It's your fault." She deflected playfully. "My sense of humor was much better before I met you."
"I'm sure it was." He said through the last of his chuckles, settling in to the dirt and pulling her flush against him.
Silence fell on them, sublime and serene, but still her mind raced, alive with possibility.
After finally letting this sense of hope into her heart, foolish as it might have been, painful as it might come to be, all the little ways the future could play out presented themselves to her now, each one seeming yet more perfect, yet more joyous than the last. She yearned for all of them, and she yearned for any one of them.
Apparently, the same things had been going through his own head, as he spoke just a moment before she had been about to, to ask him just how it all looked in his dreamscape.
"Let's leave the rest for after all this, love. For now…it's enough for that dream to be there, isn't it? Out in the open, where we're not afraid of it?"
"It is." She cooed back, willing her mind to be still, at least as still as it could be, to leave the far, far future to handle itself for just a moment. The present demanded her attention now, and she wished to savor it when the nearer of future's facets still held so many trials for them both.
That silence came back upon them, and this time she was content with it, on the loveliness of this moment, as impossible as all those she still longed for, perhaps more so.
She hoped dearly that she would not regret this hoping. In the back of her mind, sequestered away by willpower alone, that little voice of fear lingered, telling her to stop this foolishness.
When every day might be the death of both or either of you, you can not look past even one of those days, let alone hundreds, thousands, claiming them as though they belong to you.
Maybe it's stupid, she told the voice. Maybe I'll regret all this, maybe I'm fooling myself that any of this is even possible, maybe this is all a lie.
Her arms squeezed John's shoulders tighter, driving that voice down.
But if I'm lying…then let's lie a little longer.
He made an inquisitive sound low in his throat at her tightening of their hug.
"It's nothing, hir'kun. Nothing at all."
He resettled himself, then, and together they just lay, embracing in that rusty old dirt, caring nothing for how uncomfortable a spot they had chosen, focusing only on that warmth, that ethereal, almost spiritual oneness that dwelt between them, burning a true flame.
After a long, unbroken moment, though, he spoke, voice soft.
"Looks like dawn's here."
She shifted her head just a touch from where it was still buried in his shoulder, finding his guess to be true, and that the first few bright rays were beginning to crest the horizon, spears of light lancing their way through the heavens.
She promptly moved her head right back where it was, suddenly not caring to see the rise of some star, far preferring to cherish what she had in her arms just now than to see this dawn she'd once thought to be the most meaningful thing in all existence.
After a moment to gauge her reaction, he pressed.
"Thought you wanted to watch the sunrise."
She did not respond.
He chuckled at her silence after a moment.
"And what if I want to watch it?"
This time, she made a stubborn, indignant noise of her own, half a warning that he had better not move.
"Get off me, woman." He joked, trying to nudge her off of him by arching his back.
She did not budge, and only squeezed him all the tighter, more for the sake of the game than anything else.
"Fine, be like that." He grumbled, now pushing himself fully off the ground, using all his strength to heave her off of him, finally managing to get himself to a sitting position, cradling her in his lap.
He gave an exaggerated grunt of exertion at the end.
"God but are you heavy. Think you might want to lay off the sweetpaste, love."
She scoffed aloud.
"Shut up. I know where you sleep." She shot back.
He gave another chuckle at that, apparently content to allow her the last word.
After a time, he gave a nudge of his shoulder at where she had reburied her head.
"C'mon, love. Watch it with me. Please? You named me after it, it's gotta mean something to you, right?"
With some reluctance, she loosed herself from the embrace, shifting her head around and leaning back against him.
Rannoch's star was beginning its final progression, revealing more and more of its brilliant, soft orange, filling the sky with a resplendent display of colors, driving away the cold blues of the night and replacing them with shades of silky scarlet, accented with rich bands of amber and goldenrod.
A little whistle came from between his lips, piercing the early morning silence.
"Damn…so this is Tik'kun." He breathed out in awe at the simplest beauty there was to be found anywhere, given additional meaning here for all it signified.
"Beautiful." Was all he could say after that, eyes locked firmly on the horizon.
"It is." She agreed. "Though…I can't help but think this moment is missing something."
He cocked his head down at her, quirking an eyebrow.
"And what's that?"
A smug smile on her face, she brought her hand up from where it had held his neck, moving to the back of her own to press the small button to disengage her visor's seals, reaching up to pull the pane of violet glass away and leaning in to take his lips sweetly in hers.
And as their lips met, so too did the last of Tik'kun's rays meet the sky, resplendent and glorious.
A new day had dawned.