Garrus fluttered his eyes open, slightly shying away from the light that fell on his face. A rare occurrence: he'd woken up without an alarm.

Once his eyes adjusted to the brightness of the day, he smiled. Shepard's huge green eyes were zeroed in on him, only centimeters away from his face.

"Hey there," he whispered.

"Hi." She put an arm around him, her hand eventually resting on his nape and gently stroking the plates on his neck.

Despite his best attempts to keep at least some of his dignity, Garrus soon found himself purring and leaning into her touch. That only made Shepard smile wider.

"You're in a good mood today," she giggled while Garrus left a trail of soft kisses up her neck, eventually finding his mouth plates on her lips, and at that point she did kiss him back, letting out a satisfied hum when they connected. When she pulled away, she was smiling. "Any reason for that?"

Garrus pretended to think.

"Let's see: I wake up next to a beautiful woman who looks at me like I mean the world to her. Sun's shining, birds are singing, life is perfect. Kind of hard to be in a bad mood when that's what my morning looks like."

Shepard shook her head at him. "Flatterer."

She rolled over and jumped off the bed. Garrus watched in silence as she stretched out, as always fascinated by the way her well-defined muscles tightened and shifted just under her skin. How one so strong could look so fragile was something he could never understand.

She ran a hand through her hair. Garrus had braided it when he couldn't fall asleep last night, so now it was wavier than usual, but she didn't seem to care.

"I'm going to make coffee. Do you want some?"

Coffee was the one dextro food he trusted Shepard with making. And even that only because she seemed to consume almost unhealthy amounts of the levo counterpart and therefore had practice.

He nodded. "Yeah. Thanks."

Garrus watched her walk away, his eyes lingering on her waist and hips. He let out a content sigh.

How did I ever manage to get a girl like that? He curled up his legs, sitting at the edge of the bed, on the blanket, where it was still warm. Shepard must have changed the thermostat again. Sure seemed like this was a battle he wasn't going to win. In an open admission of his defeat, he grabbed one of his shirts and quickly pulled it on.

He rolled off the bed and lazily walked to the kitchen. On his way, he made sure to check what time it was and with some dismay realized he would soon have to go to work.

He yawned. As soon as he saw the wide smile breaking across Shepard's face, he felt a growl build up in his throat.

"Say I'm cute and I will murder," he warned her.

She laughed. "I'm not saying anything."

"You're thinking it."

She handed him a cup of coffee. "Well. Nothing you can do about that."

Garrus accepted it without a word, pretending he didn't notice her smirk.

He drank his coffee in silence while Shepard went on about some salarian filing system she'd been learning. He couldn't care less about it, but he liked listening to her talk with such passion. Shepard managed to be genuinely passionate about even the most trivial of things, and he had to admit that sometimes, her enthusiasm rubbed off on him too. It had taken him a long time to realize how empty his life had been before he'd met her - it hadn't been until she came along that he'd started really enjoying living.

He let out a heavy sigh when he realized he had to actually go to work. With a low groan, he got up.

"I have to get going."

"Oh, wait!" Shepard grabbed his forearm just as he was about to leave the apartment.

Garrus stopped. "What?"

She stood on her toes and kissed him on the cheek.

"Have a nice day."

Garrus stroked her cheek with the back of his hand.

"You too," he purred.

Once he was on the other side of the door, he leaned on the wall, letting out a high-pitched moan. He covered his face.

Great. Now I'm going to have to go to work grinning like an idiot.

Garrus absently flashed his keycard at the door to his office. A young human officer passed by and nodded at him.

"Sergeant."

People actually greeted him first now. It was absolutely crazy.

Had it not been for Shepard's support and encouragement, he probably wouldn't have accepted a management position. As it were, he was finally starting to believe that he not only could do this job but that he could do it well. Maybe he hadn't been giving himself enough credit. And now he was respected among his peers.

If only Dad could see this. Garrus fell back onto the chair. The holoscreen flickered to life when he turned on the terminal. He'd give me the whole lecture about responsibility and maturity, and I wouldn't hear the end of his smugness.

Garrus tapped his talons on the desk. He had no idea why he'd been thinking about his father so much lately. Was it simply because he was at C-Sec now or did it go deeper than that? He'd been dodging calls from his father ever since he'd started that job. That probably had something to do with it.

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me."

Garrus glowered at the screen as if his angry glare could change what he was looking at.

For a few hours now, he'd been redigitasing some old case files to update them into the new system that also included humans. Of course this one case file in particular had come up almost as if some malevolent spirit was watching him and had a twisted sense of humor.

The case was clear and shut, actually; a double homicide of an asari-turian couple. All evidence perfectly immaculately labeled, all leads followed-up on, even the most dead-end ones. The perp was caught within 24 hours of the crime being first reported. All thorough, exemplary police work. The name of the arresting officer was, of course, Castis Vakarian.

"Fuck you," Garrus growled at his computer. This was crossing the line into personal torment.

He filed the document with grim satisfaction of not having to look at it anymore.

"Hard day?"

Garrus looked up.

"Hi," he said as he got up, pretending he hadn't been caught in a moment of exasperation at the universe.

"Hey, Garrus." Chellick looked around, pretending to be impressed. "Well, would you look at this; big man in the fancy office. Guess the apple doesn't fall so far from the tree after all, huh?"

Garrus did all he could not to roll his eyes.

"What do you want?" he asked flatly.

"Nothing, nothing." Chellick nodded at the young turian accompanying him. "A bunch of us are going out for a drink after this. Do you wanna come?"

"Thanks, but not today." Garrus turned off his work terminal. "I'll have to take a rain check."

"Rain…?" The turian instinctively looked up even though weather didn't exist on the Citadel.

"Oh. It's, ah…" Garrus flared his mandibles. "It's a human expression."

"Right, because you have the— Right." Chellick nodded quickly.

"The what?" The younger turian tilted his head.

Garrus got up.

"It's nothing," he said. "You guys go on without me."

"His mate is human," Garrus managed to hear the hushed explanation even as he walked away. He didn't turn back, pretending he didn't hear it.

In all fairness, he didn't really care. So people were talking; they always had been. If anything bad were to happen to them, it already had happened as far as he was aware.

He was still slightly bitter that his investigation into Ordo Veris hadn't gone anywhere, but it was officially out of his hands. Normally he would have argued with his superiors about it, but he'd had other things on his mind at the time - like an at-risk girlfriend who for some reason insisted on putting herself in even more risk whenever she could. In the end, he'd let it go. The C-Sec investigation was over, or at least put on the back burner, and Palaven command were in charge of the case now. His father among others, because of course he would be involved. It made ghosting him that much more difficult.

"Garrus!"

It was around this time that he realized someone had called out his name - a few times by now.

"Huh?" He shook his head, suddenly realizing he'd been completely spaced out.

"Hello? Earth to Garrus." The human was waving her hand in front of his face.

"Oh. Shepard..." He flared his mandibles, flustered. "Hey. Wow, I, uh... didn't know you were getting off work early today."

"Yeah, there's a…" The muscles of her face twitched seemingly involuntarily. "Something came up. I'll tell you when we get home."

"Something bad?" He carefully watched her face, searching for any clues about her feelings.

She pursed her lips.

"Not bad, no." She put her hand on his cowl as if she instinctively felt his fears and how to quell them. "Don't worry."

Garrus could almost melt into her touch, finding an unreasonable amount of comfort in her reassuring presence. He purred softly, earning a very surprised look from a turian woman nearby.

Shepard took his hand.

"Come on," she said, gently pulling him along with her. "There's no use standing around like that."

"Yeah..." Garrus followed her without question.

"Are you alright? You looked pretty spaced out back there."

He glanced at her, but soon turned his gaze back toward his feet.

"Yeah, I'm just… I'm still thinking about…" He wrinkled his nose. "You know."

"Oh."

Shepard looked down, too, and they didn't exchange another word until they'd made it home.

Garrus slipped off his shoes. Annoyingly, Shepard had made him get a carpet for the living room and he wasn't yet used to the feeling of something so soft under his feet when he walked. He fell onto the chair, not bothering to keep up any appearances of having dignity.

"Tea?" Shepard called out from the kitchen.

"Yeah. Sure." Out of all the strange human things she'd brought with herself into his life, boiling leaves in hot water wasn't one Garrus would have expected he'd come to like so much. Tea was probably the only levo drink he thought was worth the hassle of taking all the pills just to digest it safely. Shepard found it funny for some reason. Said he didn't seem like a tea drinker - whatever that meant.

"Thanks," he said when she handed him a hot cup of tea.

She eventually sat down on the sofa, across the table from him.

Garrus looked at her in silence. She didn't speak, so he decided it was appropriate to implore her a bit.

"So?"

Shepard sighed, staring into the steaming cup of tea in her hands.

"It's not a bad thing," she said softly. "There's a work thing I've been trying to decide and I'm having a bit of a hard time."

Garrus tilted his head at her. "I don't understand how I would be able to help with that."

"Oh, you're about to understand." Shepard slowly breathed in and then out. "There's this diplomatic mission funded by the Hierarchy."

Garrus's mandible twitched. He leaned closer.

"Go on."

"A human delegate visits Palaven, a turian delegate visits Earth, a sort of good intentions exchange. To show we're all at peace with each other. I'm supposed to choose the human delegate, actually." Shepard raised an eyebrow. "But here's the kicker: normally these things take two, maybe three days, right? Well, for some reason, the human delegation is estimated at two weeks." She wrinkled her forehead. "Something's afoot on Palaven and the Hierarchy clearly wants a human to be there. No one's saying it explicitly, but it has to do with those attacks on human diplomats on the Citadel."

"Oh." Garrus tightened his grip on the armrest, the wood squeaking in protest. "It's personal, then."

"Garrus."

"Well, it is. You can't say it's not!"

"Garrus."

"The fuckers almost killed you twice already. I'm just saying—"

"Garrus."

"Ah, sorry!" He shook his head, snapping out of it. He took his hands back. With some dismay, he noticed he'd left deep talon marks in the wooden armrest. "Fuck. Sorry. I just…"

Shepard touched his hand. "I get it," she said softly. "Look, I… I don't envy you. I can't imagine what it'd be like for me if I knew there's people out there who want to hurt you. It can't be easy."

"Still. I'm pretty sure I got the lower end of the bar."

Shepard furrowed her brows. "What bar?"

"It's an expression, you…" He tilted his head. "It's just… I have it easier than you. That's what I meant to say."

She sighed. "Neither one of us has it easy. Those last few months have been kind of taxing. Sometimes I wish I could just take a break from all of this."

Garrus looked at her.

"You should go."

Shepard blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

"No, I'm serious." Garrus stood up. "You should go! You haven't taken a vacation once since I've known you, and you said it yourself that you'd like to see a different planet. You should really take this job. It's probably going to take a few weeks at best, so it's not like you'll be abandoning your duties here, and you'll be advancing your interspecies relations policy. It's perfect."

"No, I can't… I couldn't."

"Why not? You don't stand to lose anything and besides, you've earned this."

"No, I don't think… I was actually thinking of giving this to that Jon Grissom kid. You know, that young officer from Shanxi? We met with him once. He's the closest thing humanity has to a hero right now."

"You mean aside from you?"

Shepard opened her mouth.

"That's different," she mumbled. "He's still an active soldier. I retired."

"If you're worried about your work, it can wait a few weeks. If you're worried about me, don't worry."

"Now why would I be worried about you?" Shepard leaned back in her chair. "I don't think you're so incapable that you won't survive a few weeks on your own."

"You'd be surprised," Garrus chuckled. "When I was thirteen, I set our living room on fire."

Shepard burst into laughter.

"You did what?"

"Yeah. Part of why we had to move to the Citadel, actually." He flared his mandibles. "Oh, Dad was mad."

"I'm sorry. You set the living room on fire? How did that happen?"

"Well, you know how adults always tell kids never to play with ignition fluid?"

"They tell us not to play with matches, yeah."

"Well, being the rebel I was, I decided I could afford to ignore what adults say. I mean, I knew better, right? Stupid kid. But I thought I had all the answers. Especially after my sister showed me this extranet article about how to make your own flamethrower at home." He flared his mandibles when he saw Shepard's expression - not one of amusement like he'd been expecting, but a more content one. "What are you smiling at?"

"Nothing," Shepard smiled innocently. "Just really considering taking that trip to Palaven now."

That he had not been expecting to be the outcome of his story.

"Really? What made you change your mind?"

"Just the idea of possibly getting to see baby pictures of little Garrus running around with a flamethrower. Baby turians are cute enough as it is. You're cute now. The math is clear: you must have been the most adorable little thing as a kid."

"How…" Garrus tilted his head. "How do you know what turian babies look like?"

Shepard blushed. "You get curious sometimes, okay? You can't tell me you haven't looked up the same thing."

"Well… Fine," Garrus admitted reluctantly. "But baby humans are kind of gross. And what's with the self-destruct button on their head? I'm surprised your species has survived this long."

Shepard stood up. Slowly, she walked to the kitchen.

"Well. Seems like we're going, then."

Garrus followed her hesitantly.

"We?"

Shepard put the empty cup in the sink.

"Well, yeah," she said as she turned around to face him. "It's an open invitation. Me plus one person of my choosing."

"So you'd take me?" Garrus laughed nervously. "Shepard, believe it or not, I've actually been to Palaven before. This is a huge opportunity for your species. I'm sure you have plenty of human friends who'd kill to be on that ship with you."

"Maybe so," she agreed, "but the neat thing is I get to choose this person. I'm not stuck with some boring diplomat; I can actually have it be someone I like."

"And you think that I'm the best choice? If you're so intent on going with someone you're close to, wouldn't it be better for that someone to be human? I am so happy that I'm your first choice, but I don't think you're thinking this through." Garrus looked down. "Would you really rather have me there than someone who's more… like you? A human friend - or someone like Commander Anderson, or…" He drifted off, suddenly aware that he'd said just a few words too many.

He clicked his mandibles, taking a nervous step back.

Shepard covered her mouth.

"What?!" Instead of the anger Garrus had been expecting, she erupted into laughter. "You're jealous of David?" She shook her head, still laughing. "Garrus. You stupid, stupid boy." She stroked his cheek, seeming incredibly amused. "How do I…" She took a deep breath. "Okay, here's how it is: I love David Anderson."

"You…" Garrus wrinkled his nose, nervously looking away. "I… see."

"But he's not in any way competition for you." She chuckled as she playfully elbowed him. "Come on. You're my guy. You know that."

"Yeah. I just…" Garrus nervously massaged his nape. He didn't fully understand what was going on. "You clearly care about each other very much."

Shepard jumped up onto the kitchen counter.

"Of course we do. David's been like a brother to me. We were in the Academy together, so he knew me before the Battle of Houston Bay, before the N7 program, before we all even went to space. You know. Before I…"

"Got well-known and scared of initiating interpersonal relationships?" Garrus leaned back, his arms folded across his chest.

"I deserve that." Shepard took the punch with a sour smile. "Besides, you broke the curse, didn't you? I trust again."

Garrus tilted his head.

"I have no idea if you're joking or not."

Shepard smiled knowingly, but she didn't give him an answer.

"We're going to Palaven," she said firmly. "Get used to that idea. Besides, you're the one who made me apply for this position anyway."

"Yeah… By the way, how dangerous is this diplomatic mission, really? Just asking. Because adding up my bad luck and your ability to attract trouble, I think we make a great hotspot for something to go wrong."

Shepard laughed. "Ever the pessimist, huh, Garrus?" She shook her head. "You know, I actually think it will be a great opportunity to see where this all started." She gestured to roughly all of him.

"Yeah. That's not offensive at all." He let himself add some sarcasm to the conversation.

"Oh, come on. It is your home. There's gotta be a reason you're like that down there."

"Like what."

He wasn't really expecting an answer, so he was that much less disappointed when he didn't receive one.

He twitched his nose, thinking. Shepard seemed rather set on taking him now that he'd convinced her to go. It wasn't maybe ideal, but she deserved a break and he had no idea how else to convince her to take one. She wouldn't go on vacation otherwise. This opportunity was simply too good to pass up on.

Then again, of all the planets in the galaxy…

"Are you okay with this?"

Garrus nodded. "Yeah. I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know. It can be hard coming back, sometimes."

He managed to bite his tongue before he asked about her attitude towards Earth. If she wanted to talk about it, she would. He wasn't going to push; she deserved to have her privacy if it was something unpleasant to talk about.

"It's fine," was all he said aloud. "It's just been a long time, that's all." He nervously tapped his foot on the floor. "Well. Now that you mention it… There is one thing on Palaven that I didn't get to see as much on the Citadel."

"And what's that?"

Garrus flared his mandibles.

"Turians."

Shepard furrowed her brows.

"And you're worried you might not fit in with your own?"

"What? Ha! Nice one." He shook his head. "No, I never did fit in. Come on. Think back. When have I ever been a good turian? I met a human and after a week, I already felt a deeper connection with her than any turian I'd ever known. I was under orders to shoot to kill. Didn't follow that. Turians, we're expected to be team players; I fail miserably at that. No, I never fit in. Besides, our society puts a lot of pressure on respect... And I always was something of a rebel."

"You're actually a pretty law-abiding person from what I've seen."

"Then I look forward to you meeting other turians. If you think me rule-obedient, you might be in for a culture shock soon."