Screams in the Dark

The Crucible shook. Shadows danced, cast by the flickering inferno that raged among the stars. Explosions and fire crept across the Citadel and all manner of Reapers were swarming from every side. She couldn't breathe: blood and smoke were choking her lungs, her vision swimming from the rising heat - or lack of oxygen, she couldn't be sure which. A Husk ran screeching for her and she threw herself behind some rubble. A weapon. She needed a weapon. In the flash of yet another explosion a wink of reflected light caught her eye. She squinted. A tube of metal, the barrel of a-

She threw herself forward, tearing at the mound of rubble, wincing as their jagged edges and burning metal cut into her hands. She finally freed the sniper rifle and set about checking it was functional. There were some scratches on the blue metal, she'd better make sure…

She knew this gun. Knew its weight, the way the light bounced off it. Knew the scars etched into the metal and the turian that bore their twin. His rifle... Why was it here? It was rarely far from his side. If it was here, then he was here. But if he was here - he would be using it - and if he wasn't….

She gazed around, squinting through the choking smog and debris. Searching...

"GARRUS!" she cried out, answered only by the roar of the inferno.

"Shepard." She could barely make out EDI's voice through her comm, "Have… get to… beam… establish… link..."

The link. She had never felt heavier. With a grieving heart she tore herself away from gazing at the rubble around her for any sign of a blue armored form and began to make her way towards the ribbon of light in the distance.

Madly, she moved from the few shadows of cover made available by the debris, thinning the Husks in the distance with the too-heavy sniper rifle in her hands and eliminating the ones that slipped closer with biotic blasts and her omni-blade. She was fading fast. A Marauder made it within striking distance and landed a blow with one of its three-fingered hands to her chest. She felt a sickening crack within her and flew backwards, landing hard upon the crumbling ground. Before she could regain her footing it was on her - its twisted maw roaring as it brought down the killing blow. She pulled her arm in front of her just before the blow landed. Her omni blade sprung into existence, stabbing straight through the Marauder's torso. It let out a garbled shriek and grew still.

Panting, drenched in its fluids and her own blood, Shepard hauled the carcass off herself and struggled to her feet. Her side burned. She looked down. Something white and slender, covered in thin streams of blood, protruded from her armor. From beneath her armor. She drew a gargled breath and, in agony, continued towards the beam.

That dancing light - she could make out EDI's silhouette rippling before its brilliance. She was almost there. She picked up her pace, begging her ravaged mortal coil to carry her a little further, just a little further and she would ask no more of it. Nearly there - she could make out the light from EDI's eyes now, see the AI's outstretched hand. Shepard extended her own, and then a bloodcurdling, too familiar roar rent the air. A Brute lumbered towards her. Directly in the path between her and EDI and the beam. Between her and an end to this hell.

She threw herself behind a protruding slab of concrete - if she could just get around - she'd never have the strength to take it down, but if she could just get past-

The concrete behind her exploded, throwing her to the ground. She cried out in pain as she landed upon her exposed rib, gasping for breath, choking on the smoke that instead rushed to fill her lungs. Shadows fell upon her as the hulking bulk of the Brute eclipsed the radiance of the beam. In the distance, EDI shrieked her name.

In desperation, Shepard raised the sniper rifle in her arms, squinting through the blood and smoke that choked her vision, training the crosshairs on the Brute mere feet from her now. The shot would have to be perfect. Her breath was ragged; she readied to fire. Snaking forward on that grotesquely elongated neck, the Brute's horned head emerged from the veil of twisting smoke. She fired just as the last tendrils of smoke cleared from its howling, blue-tattooed face - and screamed.

"MORIA!" Her name cut through the echoing of explosions in her ears. Somewhere someone was screaming. Something heavy lay across her. She needed to move, to find cover. It's heat smothering her, she couldn't breathe. She pushed the heavy material away, twisting, falling- something caught her arm, another Husk? She fought against it, but it caught her face, drawing it towards- she beat against its chest, trying to get leverage. "MORIA!"

Her eyes flew open. The Brute was here, its face before her, horned head against the dark sky - holding - but the fires were gone. She was in a dark space lit by dancing starlight out the window, the air cool against her sweat-drenched, burning skin. The face before her - the blue tattoos - Garrus. Her heart leapt - wonderfully whole, turian Garrus. She could see his mouth moving, saying something - but she couldn't make it out over the screaming- her screaming.

The room quieted as her scream faded into broken sobs.

"It's ok, Moria. I'm here. It's ok. You're safe," he crooned, gently brushing matted hair back from her sweat-and-tear-drenched face. She was back. He could see it in her eyes; had seen the moment when the terrors of her dream had finally faded enough that she could take in the cabin around her. "It's ok," he murmured, "you're safe. You did it. We're all safe." Her chest was still heaving. He could smell the fear, its sharp scent cutting through the lilac and citrus. His heart broke. "It's ok," he whispered, his eyes boring into hers, "it's over, Moria. It's all over, Moria, I swear" and folded her into his ams.

It was the fourth night she'd awoken from nightmares on their trip from the Salarian hospital back to Palaven. This time, at least, she hadn't caught him in the face as she struggled against the unknown horrors in her mind. He'd assured her that the bruise would fade and that he could barely see it behind the blue of his clan tattoos. But he knew she'd seen the shock on the others' faces in the mess the next morning. He only hoped by some miracle his cursedly sharp Commander had missed the silencing looks he'd given each person they encountered and his and Liara's panicked, whispered conversations.

He held her at the edge of her - well, their bed, emitting a soft, rumbling vibration from his chest and rocking her gently back and forth. He stroked her matted hair as the sobs gently subsided.

He'd tried to wake her as her sleep became restless. When he smelled that bite of fear on her sleeping form- tried to wake her before the screaming started. Tried to spare her voice, now constantly hoarse, and the pride he knew was beginning to strain. But he couldn't. She wouldn't wake of any but her own accord. Liara and Tali's only guess was that her new synthesized brain was perhaps treating dreams as programs… where, without the necessary command, there was no option but to let it play out. He had turned down Liara's offer to alter Shepard's sleep with her biotics. He knew Moria wouldn't be ready for that yet, and that the dependence would scare her as much as the dreams had.

He had no idea what she saw in the dark, in the shadows, and to his horror, sometimes in his own face. She wouldn't talk about it. And he couldn't bring himself to push her to open up. His dreams were bad enough, full of walls of light he couldn't follow her through, ice cold five-finger hands, a still chest, and that sickening crack he couldn't escape. If he, who had seen so many fewer horrors, could barely sleep... he couldn't fathom how she could when she had endured so much more.

She was still shaking, her breathing falling into the staccato panic that sometimes followed. He felt her racing heart begin to sprint against his chest. He stood swiftly, carrying her gently in his arms. He felt her cling to his bare chest, holding tight as if she could somehow escape the world and bury herself forever in his arms. He crossed to the door, it swishing open before him and set off down the dark hall, thanking the spirits he'd fallen asleep still wearing pants.

He moved as quickly and quietly as he could along the corridor, praying for distracted crew as he passed the entryways to the mess and engineering. That was the damn problem with space flight. Some part of the crew was awake at all times. You couldn't really get a damn moment's privacy. And a crew that was so heavily staffed with curious humans with no sense to shut the hell up and mind their own-

"Garrus!" Exclaimed a gunnery sergeant who had just rounded the corner, nearly running into him and the barely clothed Commander of the whole damn ship. "I- what - is," the sergeant stuttered.

Garrus leaned forward and, with his most threatening "I ate your people before they had evolved to use tools" voice (something he had picked up from too much time around Javik), growed "Out of my way now. And this never happened - you never saw this or we will throw you off the ship before reaching Palaven."

He could hear the sergeant's heart skip a beat and barreled past to the engine room at the end of the hall. With an elbow, he nudged the panel to open the doors and stepped inside.

"Out. Now." he hissed at the few techs on duty, who after a long, intimidating talk the other day, knew the drill. He walked to the end of the platform as they scuttled away. He heard the door sigh closed behind him and released an echoing exhalation of his own.

He stopped at the end of the walkway, leaning slightly against the command panel. "It's ok," he breathed into her hair, "It's ok. You're on the Normandy. You're safe." He could still feel her trembling, but he told himself not to panic, and wait. He heard her take a slightly deeper breath, her heartbeat slow by a fraction. Good. For some reason… he didn't understand why yet, this, the engine room, the one place in the whole ship that was never quiet, was the only place she could sleep. He'd found her curled against the wall by the door two days ago. Fast asleep where she must have been sitting for a time. He'd sat there for three hours… just watching her… entranced by the calmest sleep he'd seen since she woke from her coma in the hospital two weeks ago. He had no idea what had driven her here. A routine task in running the warship? A haunting memory or moment of fatigue? He felt her sigh and loosen a little in his arms. It didn't matter. He just thanked the stars it worked. "It's ok, Moria," he whispered over the steady thrumming of the engines. "Listen… it's ok… you're home."