Notes: I can only apologise to anyone active following this story for the lateness of this instalment! Life and work are busy so weekly updates are becoming tricky. I will update as often as I can though and have no intention of a hiatus any time soon. :)

Ryder wondered if she would go blind from the sheer amount of times Lexi had shone that damned light in her eyes.

"Lexi, I feel fine!" she protested, attempting to bat the other woman's arm away but failing as she scooched gracefully out of Ryder's reach. "Other than, you know, the complete annihilation of my retinas!"

"Sara, it is part of a standard physical exam, the less you bitch about it the sooner it will be over," Lexi replied coolly.

Ryder sighed, kicking her dangling legs like a petulant child, but allowed the doctor to finish her examination, "Until you repeat it again in three hours time? How many times do you need to re-examine me to establish that I'm alright?"

Lexi leant away from her, the cold intelligence in her eyes giving way to a gentler expression, "Alright, I suppose I may have been a little… overzealous. You can hardly blame me, you do have a propensity for dying or sustaining life-threatening injuries."

"Why does everyone think I'm doing it on purpose?" Ryder exclaimed, huffily.

"Because you throw yourself headfirst into any and all trouble you encounter?" Lexi suggested as she packed away the medical equipment she had been using to check over Ryder, before moving towards her desk to update the Pathfinder's records.

Ryder sat in silence and allowed her to concentrate for a moment. Clothed in a vest and sweatpants, the bandages which were wrapped from the tip of her shoulder blade to her lower bicep were visible. Gingerly, Ryder rolled her shoulder and was unsurprised when this motion was accompanied by a familiar jolt of pain that made her breath catch. Although it was hardly surprising, she couldn't help but feel dismayed at the frailty of her body. It had only been two days and already she yearned to have her feet sink into real earth, or even sand, even snow, again. To breathe in the still new air of one of the planets they had discovered. What she would really like would be to hurl a kett Chosen into a wall, to feel the wild power of her biotics crackling at her will. However, she doubted that right now she had the energy to move a cup she still felt so frustratingly, impossibly tired.

"If you think I'm bad, you should wait until Scott joins us. He's horrendously accident prone, he's broken more bones than the average human has in their body," Ryder mused, rubbing at the bandages, trying to ease an itch beneath them.

"Stop."

Ryder switched her gaze back to the asari and dropped her hand from her arm sheepishly.

Lexi turned in her chair so that she could cast Ryder a disconcerted look, "What am I going to do when there are two of you?"

"Cry?" Ryder laughed slipping slowly from the bed, voice hopeful, "So… does this mean I can go?"

Lexi rubbed her temples, Ryder wasn't sure whether this was from the stress of imagining having twin Ryders to look after, or frustration at her current charge, "Out of this room? Yes. Off the Tempest? Not yet. You still need to give your body time to rest, otherwise, you risk reopening the wound."

"Okay, now you do literally sound like my mother, grounding me," Ryder teased, leaning back against the bed with a grin.

Lexi exhaled, "Don't mistake me Ryder, I am fond of you, but I am also thoroughly, thoroughly relieved that I no longer have to spend all day caring for you and enduring your incessant, misguided attempts at humour."

Ryder held a hand to her heart, "Are you trying to imply I'm not funny, Lexi? I think I need to lie down again, I've been grievously injured. It's true that there are worse things than death, a more agonising pain I have never-"

"Ryder, Sara, just go," Lexi ordered, though there was no hardness in her words and Ryder thought she looked as though she was trying not to smile. "Besides, it's been two days and you haven't had a shower."

"So, I stink and I'm not funny? Lexi, you need to work on your bedside manner," Ryder shook her head as she stepped across the med bay, towards the door.

"Just don't get your bandages wet!" Lexi called after her as the doors to the med bay were sliding shut, "And take it easy!"

An hour later, Ryder had to admit, albeit begrudgingly, that Lexi had been right to confine her to the Tempest. The exertion of showering and getting dressed had been completely draining, not to mention the strain of trying to fend off various team members with assertions that she was alright. Thankfully, due to the rotation of sleeping hours many of them had retired to their bunks for the night, so she was able to go about her business with only some interruption. Jaal had caught her in the hallway on the way back from her shower, wet hair sopping into her shirt, legs already aching beneath the weight of her body. He had only let her go after what felt like a thousand apologies for not spotting the sniper, another few hundred more for not insisting he remain at her side, and an attempt to hug her that caused a tremor to pass through her body as he haphazardly knocked her arm. Then, when trying to sneak an extra pillow from an empty bunk (the only way she had been able to sleep comfortably the night previous was with an extra one wedged against her spine, keeping her shoulder elevated), Vetra had awoken, talking at a hundred miles a minute, offering to press her contacts for the identity of the sniper, or to requisition a tub of ice cream for the Tempest. She then went on to explain ice cream was something she had not tried herself, as it would likely make her throw up her own organs, but understood it was a human delicacy that was not only a favourite of children but actually had medicinal properties, healing not only pain but also negative emotions. Ryder didn't have the heart to tell her the truth. Ryder was relieved she hadn't bumped into Liam or Peebee, who had visited her in the med bay the most frequently and had bickered any time they were there at the same time. That was until she finally slid into her quarters and found a mug of steaming tea on her desk and the original Blasto vid loaded up on her display. Only Liam could have left it, as the only crew member who understood her great love of both the beverage (having taken to it when she had visited her English grandmother) and the cheesy exploits of the hanar spectre. As overwhelmingly touched she was that they worried over her, Ryder had never enjoyed being mothered, didn't like being fussed over like she was some delicate, breakable thing. Liam's gesture was perfect, it was just like him to know what would make her feel better. As her fingers curled around the handle of the cup, she felt disquieted for a moment, and a small part of her felt sore. She sank into her desk chair, drawing her bare knees up to her chin, blanket pulled over her shoulders.

"Liam, thanks," she murmured over the comm, via private channel.

"Don't mention it." She could almost see his smile, warming like the glow of the low sun in winter. "How are you feeling?"

"I've felt better, but then I felt worse after Habitat 7."

She wove her fingers in and out of the blanket, creating frills between them.

"Yeah, that was rough." There was understanding, not pity, in his voice. "Let me know if you want any company, Ryder. It's been ages since I watched Blasto."

It had not been an uncommon arrangement, they'd had a fair few movie nights now, with and without the other members of the crew. How easy it would be to say yes. To stretch out on her couch with her back to his steady heat, to listen to his running commentary on how the fight scenes were choreographed while they laughed at the unnecessarily long sex scenes, and tried to tally up the number of times the titular character shouted, "Enkindle this!"

Everything about Liam had always been so easy; easygoing, easy to laugh with, easy on the eyes… Even after what had happened between them, maintaining a friendship had been easy enough. But things were different now. The ugliness between Liam and Reyes had altered their relationship, made it difficult where it had never been before. She knew how she felt about Reyes, as if she wasn't made keenly aware whenever she saw him, her body betraying her with the way her skin prickled at just the thought of his touch, whenever those wicked eyes met hers. Although she didn't feel the way about Liam that she did about Reyes, that didn't mean she didn't care about him. She was aware, now more than ever, it had hurt him when she had started dating Reyes, no matter how he tried to pretend otherwise.

"I can barely keep my eyes open," she yawned, not having to lie.

"Well, I'll say goodnight then. Get some sleep, Sara."

Despite herself, the affection in his words was an all too tangible reminder of what could have been, and the soreness in her chest ached once more.

"Night, Liam."

Ryder sat staring into space for a moment, hands still curved around her mug. Shaking herself, she took a sip and felt renewed as the warmth spread through her body.

"Pathfinder, you have 103 unread emails," SAM announced, nearly making her flinch his voice was so sudden.

She sighed, "But of course. Are there any that are urgent?"

"There are several from Tann…"

"Transfer them to the junk folder. I'll rephrase that, are they any I'll actually care about?"

"One from Scott on the Hyperion."

Sara rubbed her forehead, feeling very worn, "He'll flip when he hears about this."

"August Bradley has sent you an update on Prodromos."

"Okay, I'll respond in the morning… or whatever time it is when I wake up," Ryder was already switching off, turning away from her computer, ready to sink into the soft solace of her bedsheets.

"And there's one from Reyes Vidal, sent yesterday."

"What?" her body twisted back urgently. Ryder asked suspiciously, "You deliberately left that one until last, didn't you?"

"I don't know what you mean, Pathfinder."

Ryder made a noise that suggested she didn't altogether believe SAM as she opened her emails, scrolling, searching for a certain name.

How are you?

To: Ryder
From: Reyes Vidal

There are rumours spreading on Kadara that I killed the Pathfinder after our display at Tartarus. I would be grateful if you could show your face soon and prove otherwise. I would be grateful if you showed your face anyway, for purely selfish reasons.

Get in touch when you are well enough, I can think of several ways I could make you feel better.

Thinking of you always,
Reyes

The more she read, the more the pink heat spread across her cheeks. As she read the last line, which he had signed the same as his last email, a smile crept across her lips. She began to type a reply, smile turning to a grin as a sudden idea struck her.

Ryder stretched her hands above her head again, for what felt like the fiftieth time, doing her best to mask the severity of the tremor this sent through her body from her doctor.

"So?"

"So, Ryder. You are still not well enough for the field, however well you try to convince me otherwise," Lexi responded, typing the results of Ryder's physiotherapy session into her omni-tool.

"But Lexi-"

"It has been four days Sara. For the last time. Give. It. Time," Lexi looked at her beseechingly, "please."

"Meridian can't wait any more days Lexi, it couldn't even wait four!" Ryder replied testily.

"Sara," Liam rested his hand on her shoulder, but the reassuring pressure of his hand was not quite steady enough to quell her nerves, her fears of what could befall the galaxy if she remained convalescing any longer.

Knowing she would regret it later, Ryder shrugged off his hand and stalked from the room without another word. She knew it wasn't Lexi's fault, or Liam's, it wasn't them she was angry with. Fists clenched, she stalked down the hallway, passing Cora whose head tilted as she passed, cat-like eyes following her perceptively.

"Ryder?"

"I'm fine," she replied, curtly, without turning her head in response, without pausing.

Ryder entered her quarters letting out a long, indignant groan, pulling off her jacket and throwing it angrily into her desk chair.

"Sara?"

She flinched, eyes flicking towards the source of the noise. And there he was. Reyes Vidal in her quarters, on her bed, wearing that smile. He was dressed more casually than usual, a t-shirt tossed over combats, the brown skin of his arms so exposed, so available to the touch. He'd sat up straight as she entered, eyes flicking from the omni-tool at his wrist to her face. The grin on his lips dying in response to the troubled expression on her face, the walking thundercloud that had just exploded into the room.

It felt surreal, seeing her in her quarters, seeing her so angry. As she muttered his name in surprise, the furrowed lines on her forehead smoothed out, the spark at her fingertips she appeared not to have noticed dissipating at once. He rose to his feet and she stepped towards him so assuredly it was hard to believe she had been shot mere days before.

"Sara, you should not take your sexual frustration out on the chair," he said, shaking his head in mock disapproval.

Her eyes found his, their familiar blue full of warmth, "Why? You here to fix that?"

"Depends, how are you feeling?"

He reached for her, the motion more tentative than usual, grin faltering slightly. It felt strange seeing her here, so animated, when the last time he had seen her she had been so out of it. His eyes darted to the bandage at her shoulder that wound a couple of inches below the sleeve of her shirt, as if to remind himself their eventful encounter on Kadara had even happened at all. All else was the same, the smile etched on her lips as though it had never left them, as though she hadn't been bristling with anger a few moments before. The deceptively delicate features alight with the same amiability that seemed to emanate from her pores, the same draw that pulled so many disparate strangers to her cause. Sara slotted her fingers through his in the way he'd grown used to, drawing close and enveloping him in her smell, a scent that reminded him of sweet peas and summer rain.

"Better now you're here."

The look in her eyes was coquettish, and he would have almost believed it was sincerely demure if he didn't know any better. This together with the matching smile weakened his composure and made his stomach feel as though tight knots were uncoiling, as he remembered what it felt like to steal away her grin with a press of his lips.

"Did anyone see you?" she added.

"No, SAM was very helpful," he chuckled at the memory, "as was your pilot's singing."

"Kallo? Singing?"

"Do you have any other salarian pilots tucked away in here?" he lifted a dark eyebrow.

She shook her head, "Not that I'm aware of."

The loose curl of red hair escaped from behind her ear and she tucked it away again reflexively, a habit that she repeated often without realising it. It was both reassuringly, attractively familiar and, at the same time, off. After what had happened it simply didn't seem normal to be this composed, particularly when taking into consideration what Kosta had said. That she had died. She had died, and he didn't know. Hadn't been told. And now she was achingly, beautifully normal and it set his teeth on edge. Hadn't she been the one teasing him for being so closed off?

Sara must have sensed his hesitancy as she looked at him searchingly, "Are you alright?"

"Sara, I wasn't the one who had my arm nearly blown off."

This came out far more tensely than he had intended, and the smile faded from her lips. She tilted her chin upwards to look at him. On closer inspection she looked paler than usual, usually faint freckles pronounced against her skin.

"I get shot at a lot, Reyes. I'm fine."

"So you say," he slipped his fingers from hers and wound them gently around her wrists, "and yet you were assaulting an inanimate object mere moments ago."

"I'm…" her eyes flicked away from his, the action more telling than any of her words, "I'm frustrated that I'm not fit enough for the field. That's all."

As he had feared, he was going to have to be direct.

Reyes sighed, "Sara. Look, I know something happened when you boarded the archon's ship, I just don't know what. I know it stopped you contacting me. I know it's bothering you."

One eyebrow arched dangerously but she allowed him to finish.

"I could pretend I don't know about your mission, but you're an intelligent woman, you must know I have contacts everywhere," he finished, cautiously.

His chest squeezed as he finished his sentence, very aware of the tightening of her shoulders, the shadowy flicker in her eyes. For a moment she looked as though she were about to shout at him, about to push him away, violently. Beneath his fingers, her skin hummed as though her biotics were ready to be dispelled at any moment. Instead, she breathed a heavy sigh. Sara slid herself away from him and moved towards her bed. She sat down, her eyes still on him, reflecting the low light emanating from the lamp at her desk, her irises cast a midnight blue in the gloom.

"I didn't tell you because I didn't want you to act like the others, like I'm made out of glass," she frowned, fingers squeezing the bedsheets into balls in her fists.

"Oh, I don't think the comparison is completely undeserving… Glass is also sharp and cutting?" he responded, sitting down next to her, knee sliding next to hers.

"Ha ha."

She cast her eyes down towards her knees, a melancholy in her countenance he had never seen in her before. Reyes found himself wishing for the first time in a long time that he was better equipped at comforting people. It was something he had little practice in.

"What happened?" he murmured.

She turned to look at him, knee sliding onto the bed, hand resting on her thigh, "We were caught in a containment field in the Archon's chambers, trying to find the map to Meridian," she continued as though much of this wasn't news to Reyes, which of course it wasn't, "but it only holds living material."

Reyes stared at her, momentarily, uncharacteristically speechless as the implications of this set in.

"So, the only way out was for one of us to die and it just so happens that SAM has the ability to stop my heart," her eyes slowly drifted away from his as she spoke, settling somewhere over his shoulder, "and he did. And for a minute I was just… gone."

For a moment it was as though the whole ship was quieter, the hum of the engines dulled, the intermittent sounds of voices, the footsteps on the ladders, stopped. He placed his hand over hers. Her fingers felt cold but not as cold as his insides suddenly felt.

"Sara, that's… shit, that's… you should have told me."

"How could I?" Sara stood up suddenly. "And tell you what? That I'd failed? That I got myself captured?"

Reyes frowned, "What?"

She began pacing back and forth at the foot of the bed whilst Reyes stared at her, an incredulous expression etched on his face.

"So much is at stake, thousands upon hundred thousands of lives and I keep making such stupid, idiotic mistakes," the same anger as before flared in her eyes, "I strode in there like I was infallible. I was so reckless, such a fool."

He rose to his feet, "Sara-"

"My dad did not die just so I would follow him," she continued as though she could not hear him, "if he was here things would be different. He wouldn't have been so fucking naive."

As he stared at her a thought struck him, hard. Harder than it should have. Deep down Sara Ryder was just as vulnerable as everyone else. Whilst she might be special, might have some greater purpose the ordinary civilian could only marvel at, that did not make her any less human. Reyes had accused Kosta of putting her on a pedestal, but he was in danger of doing the same himself.

"I did the same the other day with the architect. I let my guard down, I should have been ready. My injuries have put the search for Meridian on hold, they could have killed me," she turned and looked at him, "and… they could have killed you."

Her eyes were round and wide and impossibly lost, lost in an infinite cosmos of the terrible implications of her perceived past failures.

Reyes used this opportunity to interrupt her, stepping towards her and brushing her loose hair aside, holding her face with one hand, "Sara. Stop."

She looked at him, shrunken pupils dilating as her eyes focused on his, "I have to hold myself accountable, there is too much at stake."

"You have escaped death twice, only to continue killing kett, and raiders, and sort out all the other shit that the Nexus sends your way. You're walking around as though you weren't just grievously injured… and now you're worried you've failed?" Reyes reasoned, speaking slowly, eyebrows knitted into a frown.

"I… Well, when you put it like that…"

Her lips pursed as though she was going to continue but she did not. Reyes slid his hands over her shoulders, his fingers trailing delicately as they reached bandages. Her body relaxed at his touch, the far-off look in her eyes fading. Sara looped her arms around his waist and he pulled her securely into his chest, fingers meeting at the small of her back. She sighed into his neck as Reyes curled his hand into her hair, the soft strands silky beneath his fingers. She pressed herself against him tightly, her arms tucked securely beneath his, as though drawn to the warmth of his his skin still bristled excitedly at the contact, her embrace evoked a feeling of consolation that ran deeper than desire.

"I may have been wrong before, you can't be all that that intelligent if you blame yourself for such things," Reyes added, mockingly.

She laughed against his neck, expelling a puff of air that tickled his skin, "I hate how self-satisfied you get when you're right."

"So, you always hate me?"

"Well, you do love the smell of your own shit."

He laughed. As he held her, allowing his eyes to drift closed, he felt the rise and fall of her breathing steadily synchronise with his own. Relief from a tension he didn't know he still had emanated through his body, the twist of anger and pain that had knotted in his side since she had been shot, that he had tried to avert his attention from, subsiding at the soft brush of her cheek against his neck.

As she shifted a hand further up his back, tightening her hold, Reyes wheezed slightly, his ribs throbbing as though he'd been winded.

"What's wrong?" Sara asked sharply, face upturning to his.

"I may have… cracked a few ribs," he responded in an offhand way. The barely withheld grimace gave him away, however.

"How?" her uncertain gaze bored relentlessly into his.

"It's nothing."

"Reyes."

The way she said his name, keen eyes firm yet brimming with concern had the truth spilling from him like blood from a wound.

He sighed, "I also may have gone after your assassin. I was reckless, he used biotics and threw me into a cliffside… I lost him."

Sara stared at him for a few seconds, a mix of emotions swirled in her eyes like a thunderstorm at sea, "I told you not to go after them."

"Yes, you did."

"I do not need protecting," her words were resolute.

"Trust me I am well aware." He remembered how she had summoned a ball of biotic energy that had pulled in and obliterated three Roekaar, how she had dispatched another with a single shot to the skull. He wound his fingers through to the ends of her hair, "I was angry, and I was not thinking. I also felt responsible, this could well have been an Outcast reprisal."

"Reyes," her eyes flicked away from his, "I would hate for anything to happen to you because of me."

"And yet you expect me to bear it when you are shot, or killed?"

The words came out reflexively, indignant and uncomfortably honest. As soon as he said them his body tensed, heart pounding roughly in his chest, ripping his breaths away in a sudden moment of panic at his earnest, unguarded words. Sara didn't say anything. Her eyebrows furrowed, eyes impossibly deep.

"It-it was my own doing, I could have let my agents deal with it," he continued hesitantly, "I let it become personal. Because they targeted you."

A mix of emotions pooled in her eyes, troubled yet taken aback, cautious yet affectionate, "Please don't go looking for him again."

"Relax, I'm sure the Pathfinder has more pressing things to worry about than the scrapes a smuggler from Kadara gets himself into," he replied, deflecting, "even if he is the Charlatan."

"Reyes," she smoothed her hands over his chest, gazing at her fingers intently and biting on her bottom lip, "you're more than just some smuggler from Kadara."

As her eyes flicked upwards he could see the sincerity in her expression and it was exhilarating, yet terrifying, in a way that battles and shady business deals never could be. Without conscious thought his mouth was on hers, driving a surprised yet amenable gasp from her parted lips. Then tension of days of waiting and wondering, of hurried conversations via omni-tool, of scouring the port, of putting pressure on every source he had ebbed away into the kiss. He pulled her face against his, the other hand yanking her hips toward him so he could enfold her supple body inside his. Every stroke of his thumb on her cheek, every feverish brush of their tongues drove the image of her lying lifeless on the floor of some far-off ship further from his mind. Instead, she was there beneath his fingertips, beautifully soft and alive and his. Sara was sucking, tugging at his lip with her teeth with the same restless desire, tongue pushing back against his, pushing him to drive his deeper into her mouth. He obliged her, and he felt a shiver pass over her skin, his own body thrumming in response, heart convulsing in his chest. A delicious moan escaped her throat that caused his hips to rock forwards, leaving them both breathless, as her lips, her tongue was interrupted in their usual rhythm as she let out another low sound. Her palms moved to his hips, on which she applied gentle pressure until he was backed onto to bed. Accommodating, he sat as Sara pressed forwards possessively until he was forced onto this back, the soft weight of her body resting over his, her thighs warm and inviting and enticingly close. Although he was used to taking the lead, he allowed himself to bask in the thrill of her command for a moment, as the soft contours of her curves pressed arousingly against him. His breath shuddered out as her hair licked at the skin of his neck, as her fingers travelled the lines of his body as though charting her course on a map. She broke their kiss for a moment and looked down at him, lips reddened from their contact with his, waves of scarlet hair gliding over her shoulders and falling on his chest. But it was her eyes he sought out, their infinite blue narrowly framed by thick, sable eyelashes. He thought me may never tire of the look held within, a look of unflinching desire, of affection, that said he was definitely someone, even if to no one but her.

"You are beautiful, you know."

The tender, nearly but not quite shy smile he received in return only confirmed this was so.

Perhaps Reyes Vidal did do bashful, half stuttered compliments, after all.