"I told you everything already." Shepard shrugged the blue shock blanket off her shoulders. "And get this thing off me."

Garrus put it back on her as he walked by.

"You took down seven armed terrorists on your own, with no backup or weapons." The C-Sec officer was looking at her with one eyebrow raised in an expression of doubt. "Yes, you've said that already."

"What, do you think I'm lying?!" Shepard stared at the asari as if she were, well, an alien. "I'm the victim! What could I possibly gain by lying to you?"

"I'm not saying you're lying, ma'am. I'm just saying that you're very emotional and you might be misremembering…"

"What? No!" Shepard shook her head. "Look into my files if you don't believe me, I've done crazier stuff. You have to believe me!"

The asari sighed. "Vakarian?"

Garrus clicked his mandibles. "Look, I don't know. They were already down when I found her."

Shepard stared at him.

"You too, Brutus?"

"My name is Garrus…" He scratched his forehead. "Do you have a concussion?"

"What? No! I just…" She angrily shook the blanket off herself. "How can you be against me?"

"I'm not against you, I'm just trying to be objective. You know I believe you. I mean, I've seen the stuff you can do first hand." He turned to his asari colleague. "She's more than capable of taking down a turian unarmed, I can vouch for that."

"We're gym partners," Shepard explained.

"Yeah, I'm not asking for details." The asari wrinkled her nose in mild disgust. "What you do on your own time is none of my business."

Garrus put the shock blanket over Shepard's shoulders.

"I'm sure she's telling the truth, Valena." He crossed his arms, leaning against the wall behind him. "But that's not even important. What's important here is this is the third time in the last month someone's attacked a human politician - and the second time it was Shepard. Someone out there's clearly out to get you."

"Actually, I don't think they knew who I was…" Shepard stared at her hands. She closed a fist. "They didn't seem to care about me personally."

Valena raised an eyebrow, unconvinced. "This was a kidnapping, not a random attack. These things take planning, time. You had to be the target."

"Except I really don't think that's the case. I think… I think maybe it was a coincidence. The assassin from before was after me, but those guys didn't seem to have a plan or… They weren't all that well-organized, either. It's almost as if someone wanted them to fail."

Garrus dropped his eyelids. "Shepard, that's insane."

"Thank you for believing me, by the way," she snarled sarcastically.

"Okay, not insane." He held up his hands. "Just… Can you please listen to what you're saying first? Please? It's just a little bit improbable.

"Hold on." The asari furrowed her brows. "Garrus, do you know this human?"

Garrus opened his mouth, staring at her and completely speechless.

"Yes," he groaned, exasperated. "That's not a new information! It came up like three times in this conversation!"

Shepard shook the shock blanket off herself.

"I don't want to keep you any longer than I have to. If you're done taking my statement, I'll just…"

Garrus sighed. He slowly put the blanket on her shoulders, his hand lingering on her arm. His nose twitched completely subconsciously.

"Oh, Shepard..." He shook his head. "What do we do with you?" He brushed her hair off her forehead, his subharmonics rumbling softly. "What do I do with you…"

"Are you okay?" Valena looked at him with some concern.

"Yeah." Garrus cleared his throat. "Yeah, she's okay. So... I'm alright."

"What now?"

"Well, one thing's for sure." He nodded at Shepard. "You are not going anywhere alone anytime soon."

Shepard was irritated, but she sent a glance at Valena.

"Do we have to do this now?"

"Well, when else do you want me to do this? I'm not going to just sit back and leave you be when there's people out there who want to hurt you! I…" He shut his eyes. "I know you can handle yourself. I'm not doubting your skills. But I care about you too much to put all my trust into one person - even if that person is Commander Shepard."

Shepard sighed.

"Fine," she said through gritted teeth. "But only because you were right and I don't want you to say you told me so later. So fine. You can go back to bodyguarding me."

Garrus flared his mandibles.

"I'm not… I'm not going to do that."

"What— What do you mean you're not gonna do it?"

"I think I might be too close to this."

"You were my bodyguard before."

"That was different. We didn't know each other as well back then, and you weren't really in danger. It's one thing to look scary to ward off troublemakers from the girl you just started dating, and a completely different one to protect the person you love in real danger. I just… Like I said, I can't trust one person with this. And especially not myself."

Shepard put her hand on his mandible. She gently stroked his cheek with her thumb until he started quietly purring.

"You're really mature now, you know that?" She furrowed her brows. "Were you always like this or is this new?"

"New." Garrus leaned down to press his mouth plates against her forehead. "Watch and see what happens when I have something to lose." He shook his head. "You did this to me. All your fault."

She chuckled. "Did I now? I'm sorry."

"Yeah, I think I was better off as a renegade." Garrus looked down, no longer joking. "Love… changes you. It's not all fun and games now. Now, I…" He shook his head. "I never thought it could be possible to care for another person this much." He looked up and Shepard was surprised at the amount of passion in his eyes. "You better believe I'm gonna do my best. We'll bring these people to justice."

Shepard nodded.

"I'll be waiting."

So she waited.

She waited for a month - and then another one, to no avail. Garrus got more and more on edge as time passed with no results. An Alliance council liaison was poisoned, but the culprit was never caught. Shepard waited, but Garrus didn't come home that night. She found out the following day that he'd spent all night working. She didn't say anything about it. Eventually, it was labeled as a cold case, with no leads or suspects.

Time passed and slowly, she managed to get back to her usual routine. Garrus gradually stopped staying at the precinct for overtime, too, with time. Other things had priority, new responsibilities that had to be seen to. For a while, Shepard threw herself into her work, trying to escape from her bodyguard. No other human diplomat was assigned one anymore. Eventually, even she was deemed no longer at-risk. She eventually gathered some courage and gave a few speeches and made public appearances. She wasn't attacked during any of them.

She even managed to get Garrus to go out for dinner. They'd had enough stress lately and she felt that they both deserved a break. Going out for a date only reminded her that racism was still a thing, and even though they weren't assaulted physically, she spent the next few days thinking about all the unmentionable words she'd been called by that young human man who saw them together. Garrus spent all night making sure she felt better, that she felt loved and cherished. Maybe he was as touched by that as her.

She threw herself into work afterward, more determined than ever, and eventually, some of her hard work was paid off when she managed to finally get the turian government to pay the war reparations she'd been struggling to get for nearly a year.

That made her feel better for a while.

Shepard pushed the door, stumbling into their apartment with little grace. She shut it behind herself just a bit too hard, but she couldn't be bothered to care.

"Hey." Garrus only took one look at her and immediately made that face she knew was solicitude. "You okay?"

"I had the worst day at work," she groaned as she kicked off her shoes. "Did you know that someone decided to include human characters in some online game and apparently it had some racist undertones? I spent half my day dealing with complaints about that one thing. I'm exhausted. God. I'm just glad to be here with you now." She threw her jacket onto a chair. "If anyone calls for me, you may as well tell them I'm dead, because I am done for today."

Garrus didn't say anything, only watching her rambling with a fond smile.

"What are you smiling at?"

"Maybe your day can still get better."

"Yeah, right. How would that go?"

He took her hand and led her to the living room.

Shepard sucked in a breath, completely taken by surprise by the dozens of candles that had been lit around the room, creating a soft and romantic atmosphere.

"Surprise," Garrus said uncertainly.

"What's all this about?" She laughed, looking around. He'd really pulled out all the stops. He'd even managed to get actual Earth flowers. Roses. Not her favourite, but the gesture still meant a lot.

"I don't expect you to keep count, but…" Garrus nervously tapped his foot on the floor. "Okay. Here it is. Here goes." He cleared his throat. "A year ago today, I found a wounded human soldier on the battlefield. I didn't want her to die, so I did my best to keep her alive… Even though the human soldier terrified me to the bone. And if you told me then that in that human, I'd find companionship and love and my soulmate, I would have laughed in your face. But that's exactly what happened. She changed my life in ways I never thought possible, and she gave me more happiness than I thought I could deserve. I… owe her everything." He wiggled his nose. "Which is why I'm so glad she's let me be part of her life. I… Shepard, this has been the best year of my life. Thank you for letting me share it with you."

Shepard blinked, surprised that her eyes had started watering. She wasn't one to cry and it was a point of pride with her, but as always, Garrus managed to elude the reactions she considered normal.

"Damn it, Garrus, you could have told me you were going to do all this." She laughed nervously, trying to mask the shaking in her voice. "I'd have at least worn something better, I'm straight from work." She looked up at him. Not the time for jokes. She put her hand on his cheek. "It's been wonderful for me, too, Garrus. I've been shot, stabbed, discriminated against, hated, and kidnapped, and I still wouldn't trade those last fourteen months for anything."

"Stabbed?" Garrus repeated. "I don't…" He shook his head. "Doesn't matter. I just… You did keep count?"

Shepard laughed.

"Yeah, at some point I figured out Palaven years must be longer. Because you didn't do anything for our one-year anniversary and there's no way in hell you wouldn't do anything." She raised an eyebrow. "I know you, Garrus Vakarian."

He put his hands on her waist, purring gently. "You sure do. And I'm not complaining."

"What about the mortifying ordeal of being known?"

"I think I'll manage. Being known by you isn't that bad."

Garrus hummed in appreciation when her soft lips found his mouth plates in a kiss that was more chaste and steady than the burning passion they used to share. Maybe that passion had been starting to fade away, a bit. But it didn't matter. What they had now was stronger and more intimate than even the most passionate of flames.

Shepard eventually stopped kissing him, but only to nuzzle up to his neck.

"Nice speech, by the way," she giggled. I don't even want to know how long he's been preparing it. "Almost thought you were gonna propose there for a while."

Garrus pulled back.

"And if I had…" His voice faltered slightly. "What would you have said to that?"

There was a long silence as Shepard thought.

"I… don't know," she realized. "I guess it's one of those things where you don't know until it happens." She looked down. "I know I love you. But I don't know if we're ready for… that."

"It's okay, it was just a what-if question… We couldn't actually get married, so… You know. I didn't mean it to get serious. Besides, you're the one who brought it up."

Shepard hummed some vaguely dismissive noise, resting her head on his chest. Garrus had to keep himself from stroking her head, aware that his unclipped talons would get caught in her hair if he did. He knew from experience it would have killed the mood.

Standing in the candlelight, she seemed to glisten with her own light and maybe he was crazy, but he thought she'd never looked more beautiful.

"Is it crazy that so much can change in just one year?" Shepard whispered.

"It is crazy. It's absolutely insane. Damn, Shepard, it's mad. I don't even want to imagine what it's like for you ."

"We only met a year ago, but I feel like I've known you for so long… I can't imagine my life without you in it." She motioned at everything around them. "Not to mention all of this. " She smiled. "But it's all worth it. Crazy or not, I'm happier than ever. And a big part of that is because of you. I... I just..."

"Hey." Garrus smiled. "I love you, Shepard."

"That's what I meant," she laughed. "I love you too."

"So…" He cleared his throat. "You were stabbed?"