So, I was in the hospital, as one does to get her appendix taken out. I didn't have access to my laptop and I was bored and I had story in my head, so I had to write the first half of this chapter with a pencil on paper like a cavewoman! Twentyseven pages, over 4800 words, written by hand. Can you believe it? I think the last time I wrote so much by hand was sometime in the eighties. Because we didn't have computers, kids!

()()()

The annoying beeping of his omni-tool woke Garrus from a deep sleep. His bedroom was bright, the windows transparent and the omnipresent light of the Widow-Nebula streaming in.

After a few seconds he registered the beeping and realized that someone was ringing his door. He called up the picture and saw Nihlus waving at the door-camera. Garrus hesitated shortly but eventually issued the command for opening the door. Nihlus strode in, his subharmonics singing a cheerful greeting. Garrus answered with a more quiet tune. Beside him, wrapped up in her blanket, Shepard stirred.

Garrus pushed his blanket away. Having his own blanket had proven to be necessary, Shepard always wrapped herself completely in her blanket like in a cocoon. He moved over to her, raking his talons through her hair. He whispered in her ear, "Hey, sunshine, we have to get up." Her eyes sprung open, her body suddenly tense. But then she relaxed, recognizing the situation as not dangerous. She groaned roughly and pulled the blanket over her head.

In this moment Nihlus stormed into the room, still singing while he loudly called out, "Good morning, my little lovebirds!"

Shepard groaned annoyed and Garrus chuckled. "Unless you have brought coffee, I would advise you to be more quiet."

Nihlus just laughed, "But of course I brought coffee, I would not dare to meet the human krogan otherwise."

Shepard made a short grunt, "Alright, I'm getting up."

Garrus climbed out of bed with her but Nihlus put a hand on his arm to hold him back while Shepard left the room. He turned to Nihlus with a questioning trill and was taken aback by the anger Nihlus sounded at him.

With an angry hiss, Nihlus pushed Garrus back on the bed and loomed over him. "You stercus eating paedor, what were you thinking?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb with me, you hurt her, bit her, scratched her, you unplated piece of..."

Garrus raised his hands. "She wanted me to..."

"She wanted you to hurt her? Don't tell me such futuo! You unworthy..."

A commanding voice came from the door. "Stop it, Nihlus."

Shepard stepped over to them, white toothpaste on her lips. "Garrus didn't do anything I didn't want. He never would, I know that." She placed her hand on the cowl of his armor and pushed him away from Garrus. "I wanted him to be rough, I wanted him to be a turian with me." Nihlus stared at her, his subharmonics confused and astonished. "Look, it's just a few scratches, we put medi-gel on them last night, they will be healed in no time. Now, can you please let my man live?" She grinned at him and with a warm smile to Garrus, left for the bathroom again.

Nihlus took a deep breath and turned to Garrus to offer his hand, to pull him up again. He trilled an apology that Garrus acknowledged with a hum of his own.

Nihlus grabbed his lower arm and looked him in the eyes. "I hope you know how lucky you are."

Garrus nodded, "I know, sometimes I can't really believe it."

Nihlus sang another apology. "I shouldn't have assumed... you are not that kind of person." They both heard the shower start in the next room.

"Don't be so fast in your dismissal." Garrus said with a sigh. "We had a fight last night and things didn't look so good for a while. I yelled at her..."

"Oh, futuo, she really doesn't like that!" Nihlus called out. "What did you fight about?"

"My parents are coming to the Citadel to see me and somehow we had different ideas of how to deal with that."

"Different?"

"She didn't want to face my father with me. She thought there is no point because he wouldn't change his opinion anyway."

Nihlus nodded. "And you thought she would leave you alone with him out of cowardice."

Garrus felt ashamed. "Yes, I felt betrayed. She is normally so fearless, why would she shy away from this confrontation?"

A thoughtful hum came from Nihlus. "Humans have a different view of fights. They will enter a hopeless fight to save someone but they will always question if there is a good reason for it. If they feel like there is nothing to gain, they will mostly avoid it. Human commanders have a lot of troubles with soldiers who refuse to follow an order without some proper explanation."

A surprised trill left Garrus, to not follow an order, what an astonishing idea.

He pulled on a tunic and sighed. "We talked about it, she did some research and I think she got the idea that I couldn't be like a real turian with her. She got really wild last night, she bit me first." He leaned his head to the side to show Nihlus where she had bitten him and Nihlus made a surprised tone.

"You should put some medi-gel on that, it looks kind of nasty."

Garrus nodded, carefully feeling around the bite. He stepped over to a small mirror to look at the mark himself and cringed. A big, black bruise had formed around the bite. He dug out some medi-gel from his closet and spread it on. With relief he saw the bruise slowly fading.

He turned to Nihlus, calling him back from the door. "Does a bite mean something in human culture?"

Nihlus hummed thoughtfully. "I don't think so but shouldn't you ask Shepard about that?"

Garrus stretched his throat. "You're right. This whole communicating thing turns out to be really important."

Nihlus made a sound that congratulated him on his wisdom with a hint of sarcasm, as he left for the living room.

Garrus followed him. He saw Shepard on the couch in a shirt and pants, her hair still slightly wet, glistening. She held a cup of coffee in her hands and turned to him with a smile.

Spirits, that smile.

Nihlus placed a few bags on the coffee table and sat down in the armchair. Garrus got himself and Nihlus a cup of cava and refilled Shepard's coffee. As he sat down beside her, she raised her face towards him and placed a kiss on his mandible. He nuzzled her hair in return.

Each of them picked some breakfast pastries from the colorcoded bags. Some lighthearted smalltalk was exchanged between them about current events on the Citadel. The turian teacher Atika Birdan and one of Anderson's staff were organizing another turian/human festival and Shepard's face lit up in excitement.

"I hope we can visit the festival together this time." She said.

Garrus hummed his reassurance at that. The last festival was overshadowed in his memory by the attack on Elysium and his fear that Shepard had been killed.

After they had eaten, a silence began to stretch between them. Nobody wanted to start the uncomfortable conversation about Saren Arterius. Shepard finally ran out of patience.

"Nihlus, we have found some things about Saren that are... disturbing or at least confusing. We need some information from you."

Nihlus trilled uncomfortably. "Some events and assignments are classified, classified by the Council, not even an ANIS investigation gives you access to that."

Shepard nodded, "We know that. But we have some dates we want to check with you." She transferred the list of dates that Garrus and her had written down from memory after their session. "Please check if you accompanied Saren on any of these missions."

Nihlus pulled up his own notes and began to compare. Garrus watched him carefully. Turian faces were not as expressive as human faces, but even turians had certain tells. A twitch of a mandible, a subconscious hum of the subharmonics, those were the tells of turians. Garrus saw that Nihlus was very uncomfortable.

Suddenly a change was visible. Nihlus looked confused and his subharmonics sang out in annoyance. He turned the datapad around so that they all could look on it.

"I was present on most of these official missions. I remember Saren leaving me occasionally and doing things on his own. He was sometimes gone for days. We've stopped at Feros and Noveria but I never left the ship there. He said that he just needed to take care of some things."

Nihlus now enlarged the section of the timeline that involved the Katanga, the ghost ship. "I wasn't with Saren anymore then but I had received a message from him about the dig site."

Garrus trilled his surprise. "He still messaged you? I wouldn't have thought that he still kept contact with you."

Nihlus sounded out that he understood Garrus's confusion. "While Saren is clearly an asshole, as Shepard always puts it, I am probably the closest he has to a friend." Nihlus said with a sad hum. "Even after I became a Spectre, I have received a few messages from him."

Nihlus suddenly looked extremely uncomfortable and Garrus held his breath. He was sure that Nihlus was about to tell them something significant.

"He had invited me on his new ship." Nihlus said. "It's not a ship from the Council and he never answered my questions where he had gotten it. He kept asking me about prothean artifacts. I have never been interested in prothean things, I don't know why he asked me about that." He stretched his throat, showing how uncomfortable this conversation made him. "I got the feeling that he wanted to recruit me for something, but I kept asking questions he never answered. The closer we came to the ship, the more removed he became, distracted. He had new biotic implants, they gave off a strange glow. At some point, when the ship had just come into view, he sent me away. I managed to get a picture from afar."

He projected a slightly fuzzy image on the big screen in front of the window. The ship didn't really look like a ship, Garrus thought.

Shepard was just as surprised as him. "That's a ship? Is something like this in any of the databases?"

Nihlus shook his head. "No, I checked everything, no ship like that has ever been registered."

Garrus zoomed in and tried to improve the picture. He let an algorithm analyze the reflection of the outer materials. It came back with a lot of unknowns, organic/metallic alloys and non-organic structures. He couldn't make sense of it.

Nihlus leaned over to see the results on Garrus's omni-tool. "Don't think I didn't try that. The materials match nothing we know, at least as far as we can tell from the reflections."

Shepard was busily typing on her omni-tool, searching for clues. She tapped one entry and put it on the big screen, next to Nihlus's picture.

"This is an entry about aliens, who have uploaded their minds into virtuality, I don't even understand how that works. But they left their organic bodies behind and transferred themselves." She scratched the corner of her mouth with a fingernail. Something she always did, when she was deep in thought, Garrus had noticed. Sometimes she would catch a fingernail between her teeth, not chewing it, just holding it.

She took the finger from her mouth and pointed it to the screen. "What if they found a way of uploading themselves to machinery? And then, if you merged machinery with organic material, you'd come up with something like this."

Nihlus shook his head, "I think that seems to be a little far fetched. As far as we know, those virtual aliens are peaceful and they only transfer themselves to voluntary organics or pure virtual environments. Something like the scale of this - unheard of."

Shepard looked at Nihlus and then turned to Garrus, her face showing a helpless plea. He realized that she was uncomfortable to ask Nihlus more questions, just like she had been when they were looking up information in the Council's database.

He spoke up. "Nihlus, what is going on with Saren? We have witness reports that he blew up an archeological dig site. He hired a merc ship to raid freighters. That ship has since turned up at the Citadel a few days ago and everyone on board is dead. Even for a Spectre, that is in no way right."

Nihlus's subharmonics broke out in a cacophony of anger, sadness and foreboding. "Honestly, I don't know." He called out. "Saren was always ruthless but he wasn't plain cruel. Hiring a merc ship for raids, that is not his usual manner. He may not have much regard for lives if they interfere with the mission, but sending out mercs to raid freighters... are you sure? Is that witness of yours reliable?"

Shepard answered that question with confidence. "Yes, he's reliable in my opinion."

Nihlus hummed angrily. "Probably one of your damn krogan friends."

Shepard shrugged. "Doesn't change the facts. The ship turned up, full of dead mercs and Saren's DNA was found there. Add the witness account to that and it makes way too much sense to ignore."

Nihlus let out a tune of despair. "He has changed in the last half year, you know? For a while it looked like we were almost friends, he kind of opened up to me. But then we went back to Palaven for a short break between missions." Nihlus got up and stepped over to the window. He stared out to the ward, light reflecting on his face. "He went back to the Arterius estate. It's mostly in ruins after whatever his brother Desolas did there and the place is fenced up. He could have sold it or rebuilt it but he never did. One day he left me and went to the estate. I didn't see him for two days. Then he was back, not a word, nothing about what he had done there. We left shortly afterwards and he was different, more removed. I heard him talking to himself when he thought I was sleeping and he'd never done that before."

Shepard looked thoughtfully at Nihlus and then to Garrus. "I think we can say that Saren is not a madman but something happened on the Arterius estate that changed him." She got up and placed a hand on Nihlus's shoulder. "You said he asked you about prothean things. What did you talk about?"

Nihlus let out a short laugh. "You know, I never cared about the protheans, I'm not interested in their history. They lived 50,000 years ago, I have more pressing concerns today. But they left us the relays and the Citadel so I can't deny that they still have an influence on us. I'm no archeologist, so whenever I find something on a mission, or when Saren and me found something, I called in the scientists. The Council has a group of asari scientists on call for things like that, so I would just relay the message to Council administrations and they would deal with it. But..." Nihlus suddenly looked thoughtful and his second voice called out in surprise. "I've forgotten but now I remember - there was a site on Therum, I think, where he asked me to delay my message to the Council."

"Why were you there originally?" Garrus asked.

"We received a distress call from a mining team that they were getting attacked by pirates. We were in the area so we went to their aid. By the time we arrived at the mining facility, it was almost too late. The whole place was raided and the remaining miners had locked themselves up in the mine. We killed most of the pirates and the rest took off. We managed to secure some of the equipment and called in the mining company, I forgot who it was. When we freed the miners, they showed us some markings and devices they had uncovered. Saren wanted to look at them and asked me to delay the call to the Council. I hadn't even realized that the things looked prothean."

"Did Saren say anything about it later?" Shepard asked.

"No, he didn't talk about it at all. That was shortly after we had been to Palaven and about three months before I became a Spectre." Shepard looked at him thoughtfully and Garrus could see in her face that she still had many questions. But apparently she wanted Nihlus to tell her on his own accord, so she didn't ask him any more.

Nihlus straightened his back and turned away from the window. "Well, my little lovebirds, I have to go. I may have time later, I'll let you know." He said, spreading his mandibles in a smile.

They said their goodbyes and watched him walk out.

Garrus turned to Shepard. "Tell me what you think."

She smiled at him and let her finger drop from the corner of her mouth. Then her expression turned serious again. "I think, he isn't telling us everything. There is something more." She sighed. "He doesn't want to tell me - us, and that disturbs me more than it should." She sat back down beside him and leaned her head on his shoulder.

"I know he doesn't have to tell me everything, I mean us, but he is my friend, our friend, he should trust us."

Garrus hummed for her and felt her relax against him. "Maybe there are some things he isn't clear about himself. I'm sure he will let us know if he thinks something is important." He tried to sound confident about this but he really wasn't. He didn't know Nihlus well enough that he could read his subharmonics in every nuance.

Shepard turned towards him and in one fluid motion crawled up on him until she straddled him. Her hands were on his face, her thumbs rubbing circles on his mandibles. She placed her lips on his mouth and kissed him. Those soft lips, that adventurous tongue, he loved this so much. The world was slipping away, only the two of them in the light from the Citadel remained, kissing, stroking, moving against each other.

One of her hands was moving along the side of his fringe to the back of his neck as they continued to kiss. Her lips gently sucking on his mouthplates, his tongue dipping in and out of her mouth, a little shock running through them whenever their tongues touched. Her tongue moved along his outer gums, touching, stroking and a deep moan left him. His hands found her hair and the skin on her neck.

She moved like fluid over him, her many fingers igniting every nerve on his skin. His hands crawled under her shirt and he carefully, very lightly let his talons scratch over her back. She arched her back with a joyous sigh. When she leaned forward again, her mouth landed on his neck, planting little kisses there.

Close to his ear she whispered, "We should get going."

He hummed loudly, sounding out his arousal. "Then you should probably stop doing that."

Shepard hummed a low grunt that sounded very much like his own. "I can't, too much beautiful, sexy turian in my hands."

He moved his head back to look at her. "I'm beautiful to you?"

"Yes you are! So beautiful, all hard edges and strong, and that metallic shine... beautiful." Her gaze was travelling over him with awe.

He sang out his love for her with his subharmonics. "That's good because I think you are so beautiful, so soft and rounded, strong and flexible." He was still a bit surprised by that himself, but he truly thought of her as beautiful. He resisted the urge to scent her, so that she wouldn't have to take a shower again.

Her brilliant smile lit up her face and she kissed him again.

He felt his plates loosen and groaned. "Shepard, you need to stop doing that, or we won't be leaving this place for another hour."

She grinned. "Hmm, tempting." With a last peck on his mandible she slid off his lap and went looking for her shoes.

Garrus went into the bathroom for a quick shower to wash off her scent. He also needed some cold water to get his plates to close again. Before they had gone to bed last night, he had had the sense to put his armor into the disinfect closet. As he took the pieces out to snap them on, he looked over to what Shepard was wearing.

Her pants were made of some flexible, thick material, sort of like what her vest was made of. She wore a thin, long sleeved, white shirt with red stripes on the sleeves. She was putting on black boots, snapping them closed and he noticed her hiding a small knife in the shaft.

"Why do you never wear armor?" He asked, snapping on his gauntlets.

She laughed. "Why do youalways wear armor?"

"Turians always wear armor, it's normal for us. It means that you are always ready to fight, always prepared."

She snickered, "As if you guys aren't already naturally armored and protected against attacks. Hell, you are even armed, if your talons aren't blunted. Of all species beside the krogan, you could run around naked and never be in real danger."

"And you of all species should be in armor all the time, soft and squishy as you are." Garrus said.

She looked at him thoughtfully. "I guess you're right. But so far, no one has developed armor that can be worn all day without getting uncomfortably hot all the time." She raised her hand to touch the skin on his throat. "Turians don't sweat, right?"

"Sweat? What do you mean?"

"Humans regulate their temperature by sweating. Our skin excretes salty water to cool off. You must have noticed that whenever I was, ehem, worked up." She grinned sheepishly and Garrus grinned back the same way.

"I've noticed that you tasted salty." Now that he thought about it, he remembered the beads of water on her face and on her back when they had sex. He had not really paid attention, it was just one of the alien things about her.

"How do turians regulate their temperature?" She asked with her childlike curiosity.

"We can easily deal with heat by raising blood circulation. Our plates shield us from heat radiation and by circulation we cool off the areas that are unplated. That works up to a certain point of course, too much heat can cause us to overstress our circulation, causing heart problems." He had his talons stroke through her hair. "We don't do so well in the cold."

"Yeah, humans neither. Freezing can kill us pretty fast." She ghosted her hand over his fringe, as if she was copying his movements. "Anyway, humans sweat and that makes wearing armor all day a sticky, uncomfortable mess. There is actually some new armor in development by Ariake Technologies that promises a new ventilations system. If that works as promised, I might wear that all day." She raised herself on her toes and gave him a kiss on his mandible. "Let's get going. I want that datapad back to do some more research."

Garrus nodded. He snapped on his weapons as he saw Shepard snap on her heavy pistol to her belt. They left the apartment, walking side by side.

In the back of his mind, Garrus counted down how much time they had left until his parents arrived.

He certainly didn't look forward to that confrontation.

At the ANIS office, they found their datapads on Garrus's desk. They checked the data on it and found some of their entries wiped. It looked rather arbitrary, in some cases, only names were erased, in other cases names were left intact and dates had been deleted.

They looked at each other and laughed, the information in their own heads was much more valuable than what was left on their datapads.

They sat down in front of their terminals and spent the next two hours with research. Shepard looked into Saren's investments while Garrus looked into the locations they had learned from the session the day before.

They worked in silence, only occasionally sharing a look and a smile. The other team was not there. Garrus had not really realized until one of the strangest human females he had ever seen walked, or rather danced into the office. She wore high laced black boots, a white labcoat and a slim top with strange markings. Her black hair was separated into two braids. All over her clothing, decorative jewellery was jingling and she had a friendly, almost childish smile on her face.

She hopped over to him and extended her hand. "Hi! I'm Pauline."

Garrus took her hand and smiled at her, hoping she would recognize it on his face. "Hi. I'm Garrus."

Her smile never faltered, so she probably recognized his smile. Shepard waved over from her desk. "Hi, Pauly."

Pauline turned around in a pirouette. "Where is everybody?"

Shepard shrugged. "We don't know. Nobody was here when we got here."

The woman turned around again, her braids flinging around. "Well, if you have anything to check over, give it to me. I will find all the secrets, no matter where they are hidden."

Garrus nodded at her. "We will keep that in mind."

The strange woman danced towards the elevator and waved towards them before she disappeared. Garrus gaped after her until he was woken from his trance by Shepard's laughter. "Close your mouth, Garrus!" She grinned at him.

Garrus flustered. "I wasn't... I didn't..."

Shepard almost fell out of her chair laughing. "Relax big guy. Nothing wrong with looking, Pauline is quite the sight."

He let out a breath. "That was the strangest human I have ever seen. Human diversity is quite astounding."

Shepard grinned. "Oh, you have seen nothing yet."

"She is the forensics expert?" Garrus asked.

"Yes, and she is the best."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Shepard let the datapad drop on the desk. "I think I've done all I can. How about you?"

Garrus skimmed over his list. "Give me another twenty minutes."

"Alright."

They kept on working, each concentrating on their task. Garrus was looking over police reports, hospital files and sometimes local news posts from places where Saren had filed reports about. There were some discrepancies between his mission reports and the local reports. While it was clear that Saren always got the job done, his methods often left a trail of destruction behind. He would always catch or kill the criminals, hired mercs or pirates but without regard for civilian casualties. Local authorities were rather cautious in their praise of his actions. Garrus had made a simple list that put the numbers from Saren's reports next to the reports from local sources. The discrepancies were obvious.

Garrus sensed Shepard's presence behind him before her arms snaked inside the cowl of his armor. She looked over his columns with interest. "Can you put dates next to the rows?" She asked, pointing at the columns.

Garrus nodded and added the dates. Shepard looked critically over the list. "Around that time, Nihlus became Spectre, right?"

Garrus checked for the date, "Yes, after that, he was alone." After that date, the list became noticeably thinner.

"He didn't do much for the Council anymore." Shepard said. "In fact, he has not taken a Council mission or brought in a report for three weeks now."

"That could be just a lull in activity." Garrus didn't really believe that himself. Shepard wordlessly pulled up a report about pirate activity in Council space. There was no lull visible, and a search of local news posts showed plenty of Spectre activity.

"So it looks like Saren is avoiding Council work." Shepard murmured.

Garrus hummed thoughtfully. "Wouldn't the Council notice when their top Spectre is not working for them anymore?"

Shepard had her arms still around his cowl. Her breath on his neck made him shiver a little but it was also soothing. Her being with him, working together, it felt so natural.

She made an approving hum to his question. "He must have a real fan on the Council, someone who covers for him." She said. "You know, it may be just my prejudice, but the turian Councillor would be the first to come to my mind."

Garrus nodded. "Let me just check something." He searched for recent connections between the Sparatus family and the Arterius, respectively the Serpentin clan but he didn't find any.

Shepard shook her head. "Go further back. Like back to the time when his brother lived."

Garrus broadened the search, enjoying the soft feeling of her skin against his neck. The search algorithm returned no entries concerning Saren but it brought up a connection between Sparatus and Desolas, Saren's brother. There was a short report about the attendees of a high profile military academy. The accompanying picture showed young, serious turians in academy uniforms. Most of them had colorful colony markings, only two turians were barefaced.

One barefaced turian, long, fleeting plates on his forehead and extended Valluvian horns on his mandibles, stood next to a dark plated turian with extensive white markings. Garrus recognized him as the young version of Councillor Sparatus. "So it looks like Sparatus knew Desolas Arterius from his academy days. Maybe he feels obligated to cover Saren out of some promise or old friendship to his brother."

Shepard nodded. "Yeah, that would explain why he can operate like that without ever getting questioned by the Council." She raked through her hair. "The longer I look at all this, the less I'm liking it. A ruthless Spectre is already dangerous, if he has the Councillor covering for him - that's a terrifying thought. There is nothing that will stop him, no matter what he does."

"Agreed." Garrus nodded. Thinking about this situation, he could actually understand why his father was so against Spectres. That he didn't want his own son to join them had probably as much to do with their dangerous lifestyle as it had to do with them being unruled and uncontrollable. Still, he would have been a different kind of Spectre.

Shepard pushed herself upwards and stretched her back with her arms above her head. "I think my head is stuffed now. We know a lot of things, we have a feeling for Saren now and we can't proof shit. I need a break."

Garrus logged out of the terminal and stood up. They were alone in the office, so he took her in his arms, relishing the feeling of her turning soft in his embrace. A small sigh came from her and she pressed her cheek against his mandible. Garrus cursed his armor, preventing him from feeling her softness against his body. He nuzzled her neck before letting her go.

She smiled up to him. "Let's take a walk, I got so many things in my head, I need to turn them over for a while."

"Yes, I'd like that. And we can also make a little detour to our volus friend Expat, ask him what he knows." Garrus said as they walked to the door.

She nodded, already deep in thoughts. They walked silently next to each other, both of them thinking over what they knew.

The volus Expat was unfortunately not quite as forward as he had been before. His behaviour had turned into fearful, he seemed deathly afraid especially after Garrus had mentioned the Shadow Broker.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Palaven-clan." He wheezed and began to hurriedly pack up his merchandise. Shepard stepped forward and lowered herself into a crouch to face him.

"Don't worry, we don't want to cause you any trouble. It's just that you mentioned the colonies Feros and Noveria and we would like to know what you heard about them."

The volus wheezed a few times, before he answered. "I haven't heard anything directly, Earth-clan," wheeze, "but I know a merchant who deals in real estate. He told me that he got many new customers," wheeze, "Earth-clan like you, coming from those colonies."

"Could I talk to him?" Shepard asked. "Here is my contact, please ask him to call me."

The volus merchant was fidgeting from one foot to another. Finally he wheezed out an affirmation.

"But I can't promise that he will call you." He said with his helmeted head hung low.

"I understand." Shepard nodded and raised herself up again. They left with a short farewell.

They walked back towards the Presidium. Shepard abruptly spoke up. "Sometimes I wish I had my own ship. I would fly to those colonies and look at this myself. All this investigating on second hand information drives me nuts, I want to go out out there and really see what's going on."

Garrus grinned. "We would need a Spectre for that. Maybe you should apply for that."

She laughed, "Oh hell no! First human Spectre, I can do without that pressure, thank you very much!"

They went to a café for a quick lunch. Shepard had something she called 'Noodle Soup' while Garrus treated himself to some small fishes, promised to be fresh from Palaven, according to the waiter. The fish was raw, as it was custom for turian food and lathered with a spicy cream. He picked one up with a two pronged fork and slid it in his mouth, enjoying the crunch of it's bones and the blood mixing with the spices. When he opened his eyes again he caught Shepard staring at him, her spoon frozen halfway towards her mouth.

He tilted his head in question, "What?"

She lowered her spoon back to the bowl. "I'm trying to decide whether that way of eating looks frightening or erotic." She tilted her head to the side, mirroring his movements. "I guess, I just have to get used to it." She returned to her soup, carefully blowing on the spoon with pursed lips. Garrus found that fascinating, such conduct being impossible for turian mouthplates.

They kept eating in silence, both of them looking fascinated at the others way of eating. At some point, they both broke out in laughter at the situation.

Their omni-tools lit up, indicating a call from Nihlus to both of them. Shepard got up and moved a chair next to Garrus, to look on his omni-tool with him. Nihlus greeted them from the translucent screen with a huge grin.

"Hello my lovebirds!" He called out, his mandibles spread wide. "Do I have a surprise for you. Meet me at Docking Bay 23."

"Why?" Shepard asked.

"Ah, no telling, just be there!" Nihlus twitched his mandible in a grin and ended the call.

Shepard looked like she was about to burst from excitement. "Oh, I think I know... You're gonna love it! Come on!" Their food forgotten, she ran to a transit hub with him and ordered a skycar to take them to the docking ring.

"What is it?" Garrus asked, feeling left out of the excitement.

"Shh, in a minute, you'll see." She jumped out of the skycar and ran through the security station, only stopping to say her name at the terminal. Garrus followed her, saying his name as well, hearing the faint 'voice match confirmed' behind him as they entered the dock.

On the dock he almost ran into Shepard who had stopped still. They stood in front of a ship unlike any Garrus had ever seen. The hull of the ship had a sleek, curved design with the wings angled downwards to the side like it was custom on turian frigates. The design looked familiar and alien at the same time. The ship was painted in black and white, a red stripe on it's side under the name. In human writing, big bold letters spelled out the name, NORMANDY.

Shepard stared at the ship in awe, one of her hands over her mouth. "Oh my god, she is beautiful!"

"She?" Garrus wondered.

"Yes, ships are female and she is a beauty." Shepard said, taking his arm and pulling him along with her. "Look at the guns, it's a brand new GARDIAN system and she has a mass accelerator gun as well. She has a new kind of drive core, huge, twice the size you would normally fit into a frigate. Does she look familiar to you?"

Garrus tilted his head. "Yes, in a way, the design reminds me of turian fighters."

She grinned at him triumphantly. "Exactly. The ship has been designed by human and turian engineers cooperatively. It's a brand-new ship type, designed for covert solo missions. If she is successful, they will build many more of her. This is the ship I couldn't tell you about." Her enthusiasm was infectious, Garrus found himself feeling just as excited as her.

"And you think we can both serve on this ship?" Garrus asked, cautiously hoping for it. To serve on a ship like that would be a great honor.

"Yes, I think we can get you on there. You see, Captain Anderson is getting command of the Normandy from Captain Zander very soon. I have spoken with Anderson about multiple species on the crew before and he is at least not against it. The Council has sponsored the construction of this ship so it should be natural to have members of all Council species on board." She put her hand on his mandible for a second. "I can't promise anything of course, but I will move hell and water to get you on board."

There was a tiny knot of fear in his gizzard, it had felt so good, so right, to work together during the past few days. He didn't want to miss that. And he definitely didn't want to go back to C-Sec.

The airlock door opened and Nihlus waved at them with a big smile. "Hello my friends. Would you like a tour of this pretty little ship?"

"Who are you calling little?" Shepard asked, running into the airlock. She could obviously not wait to get on the ship. Garrus followed her just as eagerly. The disinfection cycle ended and they could finally enter the inside of the ship. To the left was the cockpit, filled with holographic controls glowing orange, a pilot seat and a co-pilot seat. While it did look fairly normal for all that Garrus knew about cockpits, he took note of the fact that the seats were clearly made for humans.

They turned to the right and entered the command deck. Garrus noticed that the CIC was placed towards the back of the ship and had a raised platform, as it was custom on turian ships. As far as he knew, that was a uniquely turian design and he wondered how well it worked for human command style.

As Nihlus approached the platform, the holographic display in the middle changed to a galaxy map. Shepard stepped up on the platform beside Nihlus. She tested the display and started moving through the database, making herself familiar with it. When she looked up, she caught Garrus looking at her and made a shy smile.

Nihlus motioned to them to follow him as he led them further towards the back into a large room with chairs and a holographic communications port. Nihlus pointed towards it. "The Council had requested this, it has a direct connection to them."

Shepard looked confused. "On an Alliance ship? Why would they need a direct connection to the Council?"

Nihlus looked slightly embarrassed and Garrus could tell from his subharmonics that he had let something slip that he wasn't supposed to. "I will explain later. Let's look at the rest of the ship." He ushered them out and down a set of stairs to the second deck.

Nihlus gave them a tour through the mess, showed them the location of the captain's cabin and the medical bay. Garrus wanted to look into the main battery but the door was locked and Nihlus trilled apologetically that he was unable to open it. They made their way down with an elevator to the lowest deck, the cargo hold.

Garrus found his interest suddenly piqued, not only was there a well equipped weapons repair bench on one side, but there was also a Mako parked alongside the hull of the ship. Garrus had heard about these vehicles, armored and well armed like a tank, but much more maneuverable and agile than that. He was itching to take a closer look at it, this thing even had thrusters and atmospheric shielding. It could be dropped from atmospheric flight onto a planets surface and manage short flights with it's thrusters. The only problem usually was to get the thing back on board, it needed to jump towards the ship in atmospheric flight, close enough for the mass effect cables to latch on and pull it back in. That kind of exercise needed a good pilot and a good driver.

He realized that he stood lost in thought when Shepard called back to him from a door next to the elevator.

"Hey, drag yourself away from that thing, we are getting to the heart of this baby."

Garrus hurried after her and descended down a short ramp to the engineering level. He found Shepard standing in the middle of the room, staring in awe at an insanely huge drive core. The thing looked massive, like it was supposed to go into a much larger ship.

"How did they even fit this thing into this ship?" Garrus wondered aloud. Shepard seemed to be unable to form words, her mouth stood open but didn't move. He suppressed a chuckle, she looked like she had just been given the nicest present ever.

Nihlus stepped up to them. "This is the Tantalus drive core. It makes this ship one of the fastest spaceships ever, extremely maneuverable in the hands of a skilled pilot. But it also powers one of the best features of this ship - a stealth drive."

Shepard's eyes went wide. "A stealth drive? For real?"

Nihlus nodded with a grin. "Zero emissions for up to three hours in operation or even days while drifting. Of course, the ship will still be visible but it will not show up on any scanners."

"That is so awesome." Shepard sighed. She looked like she wanted to hug the drive core. "Isn't it awesome?" She asked, turning to him. Garrus chuckled.

He whispered quietly, "Yes, sunshine, the way you look at it I wonder if I should be jealous."

Shepard giggled quietly. "Don't worry, he won't replace you."

Her omni-tool pinged with a message and Nihlus twitched his mandibles in a grin. "That should be your order for the Normandy's shakedown run in two weeks." He said.

"XO under Captain Anderson." She whispered in awe. Garrus was proud of her and fearful at the same time. If she went on the Normandy, where would that leave him?

She looked up to him and he recognized the same thoughts in her face. "What about Garrus? I want him on board too, and Anderson knows that."

Nihlus trilled, embarrassed. "There is a slight problem with Garrus's current status. The Normandy will operate as an Alliance ship with Council sponsoring. For Garrus to join, he would either have to be hired as a mercenary or ordered on board by the turian Hierarchy. Unfortunately, Garrus isn't military at the moment, he's still C-Sec."

Garrus hummed angrily, of course C-Sec would cause him problems.

Nihlus continued. "The best way for Garrus and his future would be, that he rejoined the military and joined the Normandy as an official representative for the turian Hierarchy. That way, he will have a rank and will continue to fulfill his duty as a turian."

Shepard looked at Nihlus with a frown. "Let me guess, it will take a while to get that sorted, and he can't join right away?"

Nihlus made a tone of uncertainty. "With luck it could work. We still have two weeks." He trilled at Garrus. "I already put a request forward and the Hierarchy is willing to accept you. But the transfer to the Alliance takes a bit longer to work it's way through the bureaucracy."

Garrus sang out his hope with his subharmonics and there was a bit of triumph in there too. Leaving C-Sec and rejoining the military, and then transferring to the Alliance, it was a perfect list of things to annoy his father. It felt like a coup for independence.

He looked towards his girlfriend and caught her looking at him in worry. He knew what she thought about, she would go on the Normandy, with or without him. Not only was it an order, it was also a great career chance, one he would never ask her to miss. Even if he couldn't go with her.

She took his hand in hers, her thumb stroking the skin between his thumb and second finger. "We will find a way, just give it some time." She said with a hopeful smile that warmed him from the inside. "We will be together, no matter what."

Nihlus made a rude sub-noise that made Garrus involuntarily flinch. "The sweetness between you two is sickening." Nihlus said with a grin. "I will personally see to it that Garrus get's this transfer, if only to prevent Shepard from kidnapping him. She would probably start a war between humans and turians just to get you."

"Yes, I would. Not even a question." She purred, sliding up to him and placing a kiss on his throat.

Nihlus made an amused trill. "Please don't make a mess on the drive core, you strange kids. I'm going up to the mess hall and I expect you two there in five minutes. After that, I send the engineers back down and you better not give them a show that could scar them for life."

Shepard giggled quietly as Nihlus left, the door sliding shut behind him. The blue light of the drive core reflected on her black hair and the blue streak was shining even brighter. She pushed him against a station on the side, ignoring the angry beep from it. His codpiece suddenly felt very tight.

She pulled his head down and kissed him hungrily. He was really glad that she didn't wear armor as he chucked his gloves to the ground and let his hands roam under her shirt, stroking her waist and letting her hair slide through his fingers. They still kissed, desperately, their tongues touching and stroking, her oh so soft lips nibbling and sucking on his harder mouthplates. She climbed up on him, her kisses moving to the sides of his mandibles, her hands stroking under and over his fringe.

An amused trill left him. "Is it the drive core? Does that turn you on?" He murmured, his breath blowing over the skin of her throat. He noticed the fine hairs on her skin standing up.

"Yes. No. Yes, the drive core... the light, the hum, so hot... but it's you." She kissed along his mandible. "Only you."

She suddenly stopped and pressed her forehead against his, breathing hard. They stayed like that until they heard steps coming down the ramp to the door. In a fluid motion she slid down and stepped away from him, straightening her hair with a quick move of her hand. She walked towards the other door, Garrus picking up his gloves and following her, just as the door opened. Three humans, all of them carrying tools and reading datapads, entered as they left the room.

Shepard snickered quietly. "I can't believe he really sent down the engineers. He's going to pay for that. One day..."

Garrus watched her, his heart beating fast. That mischievous grin was another favorite of his.

()()()

The expression Valluvian horns is supposed to describe the striking long extensions on the mandibles that Saren has. I got that expression from Velasa and her great Sidonis story 'Love is a Wicked Creature'. She says she has it from Smehur and the MissfireAnon's works. It always comes back to Smehur when it is about Saren.

I had this idea of Shepard getting turned on by the drive core and then... somehow I wrote a story about Tali and the drive core. If you're interested, check my profile.

Anyway, next up, Vakarian senior should show up, don't you think? That's going to be... interesting.