Perir - (Peririn plural) Turian male under the age of 15.
18 Days ASR
Garrus stepped out of the cab and looked around the Presidium. It felt as though cycles had gone by since he last stood amidst the gleaming white structures and pristine lakes. Everything registered too bright, the light harsh and glaring, the gardens painfully garish. He shifted in his armour, feeling exposed and unshielded, like standing too close to the sun.
He glanced over at Martin, seeing that the kid felt as uneasy and out of place as he did. "Never thought Omega would seem like home," he said, letting out a long breath. Stretching his shoulders, he tried to ease the tension that twisted his muscles into steel bands. Instead of releasing, it just made everything ache a little more. Damn, he really needed to start sleeping without waking up every hour on the hour, panicked and breathless. Sometimes it took almost a full minute before his surroundings registered, dispelling Haestrom's cold, stone tomb and pool of blood.
"Still think we should have brought a protection detail," Martin grumbled, breaking through the clammy frost of Garrus's thoughts. The kid scanned the crowd, his hand resting on his sidearm. "I know you think Daro'Xen was just blowing hot air, but after Haestrom … ." He cracked his neck then nodded toward Barla Von's office. "Let's get this meeting over with and get the hell out of here."
Garrus couldn't argue with that. The press of people sank icy talons into the base of his spine, every nerve ending screaming a warning. As much as he wanted to dismiss it all as paranoia and a touch of PTSD from Haestrom, he couldn't manage it.
"So, why are we here?" Martin asked. Eyes in constant motion, he swept the area, muttering to himself about the area being too exposed. He detoured a few paces to stare into a car parked next to the cab stand. Two figures sat within, barely visible through the tinted windows. The kid's hand tightened on his sidearm, and he backed the rest of the way to the door. "Don't you normally just meet with Von over the QEC?"
Garrus paused, hand raised to hit the intercom. "I do, but apparently a group of batarian art collectors sent a buyer who is worried that the artifacts and art are stolen." He shrugged. "Anyway, the buyer wanted to meet me personally before negotiating to purchase any of it, and we need these funds right now. Badly." He hit the comm. "So we're here, appeasing some art collectors so our people can eat and our ships can fly, instead of saving Wrex's clan." He clenched his teeth and forced the frustration aside. They'd be on their way in a few hours.
"Come in, General," Barla Von's breathy rasp said through the speaker.
The door opened to reveal the normally spartan office crowded with some of the larger sculptures from Hock's Beckenstein home. Four massive krogan guards glowered in the corners of the room, looking enough like statues to blend in. Garrus weaved his way through, spotting Von and the buyer at the far end by the desk.
"What I want to know, Mr. Von, is why these artifacts aren't in museums somewhere," a strident female voice called. Garrus frowned a little at the lilting accent, the way the sentence went up at the end almost like song. "Why are they being auctioned off instead of being turned over to the appropriate governments?"
"At Captain Shepard's insistence," Von replied, pausing for breath, "the entire collection …" Breath. "... was offered directly …" Breath. "... to museums and galleries before …" Breath. "... being offered for sale."
Garrus plastered on his diplomat smile as he stepped around a huge krogan statue and saw a small woman in a smartly tailored suit looming over the squat broker.
"Captain Shepard was very adamant," Garrus broke in, not willing to listen to Von wheeze his way through the entire spiel, "that only state treasures be made available to governments. She was worried that they'd disappear into private collections or be used to broker back room deals instead of being returned to the people. These pieces were all offered to public venues, but not claimed." He moved to shake her hand and introduce himself, but she turned to face him.
"You're telling me that a Picasso went unclaimed?" she demanded, her entire being crackling with an all too familiar fire. "Sweet Jesus, and you expect me to believe that?"
The woman strode toward him, all flashing green eyes, red hair, and … Garrus staggered back, a hand buttressing against the statue to help hold him on his feet as a heady rush of dizziness washed over him … and a riot of freckles stampeding across her nose and cheekbones.
Garrus's knees buckled, his entire body suddenly ice cold, but for the fiery sting that burned through his hands and feet. He caught himself before he went down. "Dear spirits."
"General?" Martin stepped up beside Garrus, reaching out to grip the general's arm. "Are you okay? Wha—" The kid froze as still as death except for his fingers on Garrus's arm, which tightened painfully, squeezing the edge of the general's armour into his flesh.
The pain barely registered as Garrus stared into the eyes of a ghost.
"Shepard?" Martin whispered, his voice just a soft moan of sound.
A faint keen spooled from Garrus's second larynx as the question broke the spell that locked his brain down tight. He blinked, his eyes suddenly able to pick out the differences between the woman preserved in his memory and the one standing before him. Face thicker through the cheekbones and jaw, her skin not drawn as tightly ... deep lines of age and care carved around her nose and mouth … body taller and stockier but not as straight and sharp, the edges ground down … . Nonetheless, he found himself staring—mouth and mandibles hanging slack—at the very image of the woman he would have called bond-mate in forty cycles time.
The buyer lurched to a halt, her scowl deepening as her eyes took on a wary, haunted cast. "Are you all right?"
Martin released Garrus's arm and rushed forward, startling the frown off the woman's face. "You've got to be Lucille—"
Regaining his senses, Garrus stepped forward, grabbing Martin's arm to pull him back. They didn't want to scare the woman out of her mind. "Sorry about that," he said, struggling to keep his voice soft even as his emotions rampaged, slamming back and forth between joy, longing, and anger. "Please forgive my eager young friend. It's been a long trip."
He offered his hand. "General Garrus Vakarian," he said, then nodded toward Martin. "And this is Martin Weaver. I apologize that our awkward entrance didn't allow Barla Von to make proper introductions." He took a step forward.
Ignoring his hand, the woman edged toward the door, the haunted look turning to that of a drellak having caught a predator's scent. "My name is Seiben Krellid."
A soft growl rumbled from Garrus's throat before he could choke it off. The name … her slave name ... burned like bile in his throat. Seiben … seiben translated to forty-nine in batarian. No way in hell he'd call her that.
Suddenly, the car outside registered, and he cursed his idiocy. Of course she was scared. She was a slave, her handlers were parked right outside the door, and two morons staggered in acting like … well morons, using her proper name and asking questions.
She circled around the other side of the statue, heading for the door. "I'm sorry, I've made a mistake. I'm sure these artifacts are all being offered legally. I'll recommend that my employers—"
Garrus ducked between her and the threshold, heart racing, his hands trembling as they leapt up, pleading with her not to run. "No, please … I'm the one who should be sorry," he said, backtracking. "We reacted badly to a simple case of mistaken identity." He smiled and gestured toward the art. "Please, allow us to give you whatever information and assurances your employers need."
Martin stepped forward, but Garrus shook his head, silencing him even as the kid opened his mouth. They'd been far too ham-fisted already. They needed to back off and give everyone a couple of moments to process.
"Are those your people outside in the car?" Garrus asked, stepping off to the side to allow her an escape route, his training finally overriding his emotions. "Would you feel better if we invited them inside?"
Backing up a step, she shook her head, the fear in her eyes telling Garrus that as much freedom as she appeared to have, she remained closely monitored and under extreme duress. He stepped further to the side, trying to check for any sign of a control device without being obvious. He didn't see anything, but her high collar and the tight bun of hair at the nape of her neck could easily hide a subtle interface.
His gut twisted as he faced what must be one of the universe's cruelest jokes. The resemblance … . Why did Shepard have to be the very image of her mother? No. He shoved aside the anchor of longing that lodged behind his keel. Time for damage control.
He gestured toward a painting, throwing the subject into a 180 degree turn. "I've never really understood this sort of painting." That simply stated truth threw up a wall, and he let out a thin sigh of relief. And it was true; the blocky, warped shapes made no sense to him. "It's human in origin, though, isn't it?"
The rigid planes of her face relaxed slightly, and two hesitant steps eased her away from the door. "Yes. I'm surprised none of the galleries you approached took it. It's called Guernica. It's a very famous work by an artist called Picasso."
"I find it a little unsettling, if I'm honest," he said, twisting his head around to look at the painting sideways.
A thin smile broke through the panic, the expression only lifting one corner of her mouth. He gawked, the crooked smile and the glint in her eye so familiar that a hand wrapped around his throat, cutting off his air.
She took a step forward and ran reverent fingers along the edge of the frame as she replied, "Picasso certainly isn't to everyone's taste."
Garrus glanced toward the door, then opened his omnitool, sending a message to Martin to get a datapad from Von. He needed to communicate with Lucy without terrifying her half to death or alerting her keepers. If anything he said or did made them suspicious, they'd rush in and spirit her away. He'd never find her again. More importantly, he knew deep in his bones that she'd suffer for his mistakes. "It's certainly not turian," he replied.
"All of this art came from the collection of one man?" Lucy asked. She turned a slow circle, but her eyes returned to lock onto Garrus, her breathing fast and shallow.
"This is just a few pieces," Garrus replied. "Captain Shepard …" He leaned down a little as he held the woman's gaze. " … said that he possessed the head from a statue called Lady Liberty." He shrugged. "That one was returned to the Systems Alliance."
"The Statue of Liberty?" Her words hissed slightly as she forced them through a clenched jaw. "Who was this man? He must have been a very good thief or insanely wealthy."
Martin passed Garrus a datapad, into which the general typed, "Are you Lucille Marie Shepard? How are they monitoring you? Are you wired with a control device?" before passing it over.
"Here is a manifest of the items," he said, in case the handlers had eyes in the room. "As for the previous collector … he was a bit of both along with a healthy dose of old world gangster." Garrus watched her for any sign of flight as she read his message. He let out a breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding when she replied instead of tossing the datapad at him and running for the door.
"I like this one," Martin said, seeming to clue in. He walked over to a statue of a rachni queen. He folded his arms as he leaned on one hip to regard it. "Looks just like Amalair."
Lucy glanced toward the threshold before she passed back the datapad. She turned to follow Martin, putting the massive stone krogan between her and the door.
"That's an extraordinarily interesting piece," she said. "I ran radiometric dating on it, and it predates the Prothean Empire by over a hundred thousand years. It's composed of an alloy I've never experienced before. The implications of its existence are staggering, and to think it was sitting in someone's vault."
Garrus winced, wondering how Von's expert had missed that vital piece of information. "Okay, this one goes back into our vault until we know what to do with it." He looked around, wondering how many priceless artifacts had slipped through their hands. He nodded for Martin to keep up the conversation while he focused on Lucy's text.
"I am no one."
A sigh greeted that simple sentence, the four words dragging more weariness from his bones than he could ever recall feeling, even after Shepard died. How could Garrus face his love on the day of their reunion only to tell her that he'd failed her, leaving her mother in captivity? He needed to convince Lucy to trust him, to take a chance.
He watched her, looking for the signs he'd seen in long held slaves … signs of being broken. She was clearly nervous, but held herself straight and strong, her head not hanging from her shoulders. Of course, if she behaved that way, they'd never be able to send her out into the galaxy. She'd be useless as a broker, unwilling to stand up in negotiations, fighting down to the last for the best deal. No, either because of her gift or some extraordinary act of will, he didn't believe her broken, just understandably terrified.
He turned back to the datapad. "If you are Lucille Shepard, Cpt. Jane Shepard, the woman who acquired all this art, was your daughter. Just before she died, she asked me to find Bunny. She believed you were dead." He hesitated, staring at the pad without seeing it as he debated the wisdom of showing his entire hand, Deciding that he didn't have time to play coy, he added, "I know this is sudden, and that you're scared. Jane was important to me. Please, I made a her a promise, one I can't keep if you don't trust me."
Garrus looked up as Martin spoke. "So this one is illegal?" The kid let out a merry cackle. "Elcor pornography! Nice." He turned to Garrus, stabbing a thumb toward a sculpture that Garrus didn't feel the need to examine too closely all of the sudden. "Elcor porn. Illegal on Dekunna and all elcor colonies." Martin bent over to look at it upside down. "Oh yeah! I see it now. Wow, who would have thought they could get into that position?"
Barla Von waddled over, twisting to look at the sculpture from every angle his squat form could manage. "We are not asking enough for this piece." He sucked in a long breath. "Vol-clan knows a diplomat who will pay three times the catalogue price."
Garrus hoped Lucy's employers weren't interested in any of the pieces that were headed back to vaults or had steadily increasing price tags. He passed her the datapad, turning himself so that he wouldn't be tempted to try to make sense out of the twisted forms and tangled appendages. Somethings he did not need to know about the elcor. "We could take it back to base just to irritate Melanis. She could complain about it, maybe take some of the heat off Zaeed."
Martin cackled. "You know that he just keeps hanging Winter Garden up to piss her off."
"Winter Garden?" Lucy asked, stepping toward them. Although she kept her voice tightly controlled, and her fascination and excitement for the art had outweighed her flight response, a sheen of sweat across her brow and the back of her neck betrayed the toll his pushing was taking on her.
She talked and typed, doing a far better job of keeping both conversations going than he was. Of course, he supposed that she had far more to lose. "You have Winter Garden in your possession?" she asked. "It's the most notorious painting in the history of galactic civilization." She returned the datapad in a casual handoff as she stepped past Garrus. "A string of more than seventeen people have died while in possession of that painting."
Martin groaned and slumped against Von's desk. "Oh great. Another one of Zaeed's sole survivor stories in the making."
Garrus opened his mouth to answer, but Von stepped in, the financier explaining that the asari relic was stored for safekeeping, and not for sale. Leaving it to Von and Martin to keep Lucy talking, he looked down at what she'd written.
"I saw a young woman on the news years ago," Garrus read. "I couldn't take my eyes off her … that beautiful woman my dead child could've grown into. I charged into the master's study demanding to know if Janey had survived. He shoved my face into a holo of my husband's corpse embracing my dead child and whipped me bloody. I did not ask again."
Garrus looked up, blinded by rage and sorrow until he saw his tears reflected back in her eyes. But then Lucy straightened, drawing herself up behind a clenched jaw. She swiped at her eyes, the gesture as fierce as it was familiar. He let out a sharp exhalation as Lucille Shepard vanished behind the memory of her daughter. How could the universe be considered just or kind when it pulled shit like this? An indignant fury flared at the base of his spine, scorching its way up through his nervous system. He'd bleed those fuckers for every last drop of suffering owed to Kahri ... her mother … her siblings … all of them.
Snapping straight and rigid, he choked the anger and pain down, returning to Lucy's words.
"I am a slave, General," she wrote. "When I leave, I'll be hurried into a car, then shoved into a box at the dock. That box won't open until I'm inside my master's compound where I'll be stripped, hosed down, and then whipped because I've spoken outside my script. That life does not leave room for speculation or daydreaming over dead children."
Vomit burned its way up his throat, but before he could do anything more than let out a strangled moan, Lucy stepped into his space and gripped his hand. He tried to return her stare, but couldn't manage to get past her neck. A vivid red scar peeked out from beneath her collar.
"And Captain Shepard?" Lucy asked, her voice tight and nasal, losing some of its music in her battle against her emotions. "You said she's dead?"
The question smashed through his last hope of control, silent tears burning their way from the corners of this eyes. Swallowing what felt like a grenade, he nodded, then raised the pad to type a reply. If her handlers had orders to keep her away from any mention of her children, they wouldn't let that conversation go unchallenged.
Instead, she took it from his hands, and with a single glance toward the door, entered, "You loved my daughter, didn't you?"
He read it through the back of the small screen, but just took the pad back, frantic talons tapping the interface. "We need to get you away from these bastards. Come with us. There are only two of them out there. We can protect you."
"She was shot," Martin replied to Lucy's question. "The day the council made her the first human—"
"Do you have any other questions about the authenticity of the art?" Garrus asked over the rest of the kid's reply as he handed Lucy the datapad once again.
"I'm satisfied with your explanation of how they came into your organization's possession," she said even as she entered text, "and if they have already been offered to museums, I have no qualms about them finding a place in my employers' private collections." She looked up and smiled, the same tight press of lips and softening around her eyes. "They'll be pleased to know there won't be any title issues. They're very excited about several of the pieces you're offering." She closed her hand around his talons for a moment before relinquishing the pad.
"Excellent." He lifted the datapad, but kept his eyes focused on Lucy. So close. This imperfect avatar held his love so close, but still beyond his grasp. A fierce, aching hunger welled up, clawing its way out of the ground, frantic, grasping fingers clambering up his body. It dug through the seams and gaps in his armour only to burrow through his hide and take root in his bones. So damned close. For the space of three, impossibly arduous breaths he almost turned and strode out the door. Too much … it was all too much to ask of him.
Instead, he sucked in a fourth, ragged breath and took refuge behind the mask of diplomat/salesman as he said, "Our organization is expanding rapidly at the moment and can certainly use the influx of funds." He closed his eyes, shoring up the walls before he looked down at what Lucy had written.
"I have seven children. As long as I behave and bury him in credits, he keeps them out of the mines and the brothels." Beneath that she'd entered a series of coordinates. "The bastard operates five facilities that I know of. You'll need to hit them all simultaneously." Garrus took his first deep, clean breath since entering the office and looked up, admiration for her courage burning warm and deep, setting loose all the knots tied in his gut. Painful or not, he'd do what he needed to do.
There's no doubt where you came from, Kahri.
After he was done on Tuchanka, he'd get Nihlus and Anderson together with his contacts in the sapient trafficking division of C-Sec. Maybe Nihlus could bring in a few Spectres as well. Regardless, they'd make sure that Lucy Shepard and her children were free citizens within the month. He wouldn't rest until he saw it done.
He glanced back down at the last line. "Is Bunny alive?" The depth of hope and fear expressed in the three simple words dragged a soft, trilling keen along the underside of his breath.
Holding Lucy's stare, Garrus nodded. "As far as I know," he answered out loud, allowing her courage to fill him … to defy their cruelty … their stranglehold of terror. He knew where to find her, and when he rolled into their home, the slaving bastards would learn what it meant to be afraid.
The door opened, and two massive batarians in expensive armour lumbered through, intractable walls of muscle and arrogance. As much as he accepted the inevitability of their entry, as much as he knew he needed to let her leave with them, it took every ounce of Garrus's self-control to keep his hand off his sidearm. He clamped his jaw down on his fury … his disgust, both at the horror of what Lucy and her children had lived through for more than a decade ...
… and at his inability to just pull her into his arms, to throw himself between her and harm … to protect her as he'd been unable to protect Shepard.
"Have you concluded your business?" one of the batarians demanded, shoving his bulk between Lucy and the rest of them.
Lucy lowered her head. "Yes. It's good news. The buyers will be pleased." She bowed slightly to Barla Von and then Martin. "It has been a pleasure, gentlemen." Stepping around the batarian, she took Garrus's hand again, squeezing his talons in a way that told him not to worry, that she'd happily take what awaited her if it meant freedom for her and her children. "I'm very glad to have met you, General. Thank you for the information. I feel much better about recommending these purchases."
He gripped her fingers when she pulled them back, unable to let go. How could he just let her leave knowing what would happen to her? She yanked her hand free. He sucked in a long breath and met her stare with a resolute nod. If she was brave enough to go back, he could find the courage to let her go. "I look forward to doing business with your employers. Take care." He stepped back, watching after her as the thugs surrounded her, escorting her out.
"Well," Martin said after the door closed, "guess that explains how Shepard knew so much about art, huh?"
Garrus felt the starved longing return, burning through him like a wildfire. He let it flare, trusting it to settle as he held himself back from running out the door. Two bullets. It would only take two bullets. Gripping that knowledge, that certainty, he tucked the bullets away, saving them for when they wouldn't cost Lucy what little she still held dear.
'Less than a month,' he promised, the oath more rather than less sincere for its silence.
He turned and passed Martin the datapad. "It does at that, kid." As the longing, the loneliness prompted by the glimpse into Shepard's stolen future, began to ebb, weaving into thick cables of connection, he laughed, sharp and clear as glass. Of all the things he could have expected to happen that day, finding his Kahri's mother would never have occurred to him.
Barla Von looked back and forth between them, his round body pivoting along with his head. "Vol-clan appears to have missed important context."
Garrus patted the volus on the back, the action reasserting reality. He still had a great deal to get done. "It's okay, let's get to the rest of our business. I need to send my family on their way home, and then get to Tuchanka and stop a friend from doing something stupid." He sat at the desk, but caught Martin by the arm before the young man could join them. "Head out and see if you can reach my father … get a sitrep."
As casual as he tried to appear, he felt his heartbeat like the timer on that bomb ticking down.
"I want to come to Tuchanka with you, Garrus." Solana stopped so suddenly at the threshold of the boarding lounge that Garrus ran up her heels. She whirled around to face him, giving him a shove when she smacked into his armour. "I can help."
Garrus staggered back a step, a broad grin meeting his sister's petulance. Her fire set off a nostalgic ache behind his keel. His strong, stubborn, impossible Sol. He swallowed an apology for having left her behind so completely, and embraced her, gripping her shoulders tight. The time for apologies had long passed. Time to step up and do better.
"I know, and I fully expect you to be involved in Archangel now that you've had a taste of it, but first you need to get Mari home." Releasing her, he stepped back, regarding her with a combination of awe and astonishment. When had his baby sister stopped playing warrior and turned into one? "When Pari gets home, come out to Omega, and I'll put you to work, but for now … ." He ducked his head in a shrug consisting mostly of guilt. "It seems as though the entire galaxy is gunning for me, Sol, and I have to make sure that Mari is protected if they try to come at me through the family."
"I'm standing right here, Garrus," his mother said, fisted talons planting firmly on her hips. "And rumour has it that I was a soldier and a cop long before I became your pathetic, infirm, little old mother. I can take care of myself."
"Forget that my poor old mari could hand me my backside or my head sixteen different ways?" He chuckled and backed up a step, his hands lifting to ward off an attack. "Spirits forbid such a thing happen." The hard core of truth behind his teasing set like steel in his spine. He came from a long line of honour and battle-hardened warriors, male and female alike. Sadness trickled through him as he wished that the three fierce warrior-women in his life had been granted a chance to meet.
As if able to read his thoughts, his mari stepped forward and held out her arms. A wide smile, and a quick snap of her mandibles answered his teasing. "I'm tempted to remind you and send Sol to Tuchanka, but I'll indulge you this once. Mostly because I don't want my daughter anywhere near the combination of enraged krogan and giant explosive devices." She gripped Garrus's shoulders when he stepped into her arms. "Be careful, and send your pari home when it's over. I've gotten used to having him around." Her mandibles flicked. "I sort of enjoy it."
"Just sort of?" Garrus chuckled as he leaned in to touch his brow to hers. "I'll do my best." He pulled away and reached over to give Sol a playful shove. "Safe trip home, and I'll see you later."
Sol arched her neck a little and turned away, the very picture of haughty. "You can count on it." Tossing a grin over her shoulder, she held out her arm to usher their mother into the security line.
"We have clearance for the relay in twenty-three minutes," Martin said from behind Garrus's left shoulder.
The general just nodded, watching after his family, savouring the gift he'd taken for granted far too long. He'd be glad to have Sol join him out on Omega. He missed her.
They turned to wave at the gate, then disappeared down the docking arm. Letting out a sharp breath, he spun on his talons and strode for the elevator. "Twenty-three minutes? Guess we'd better get moving." He gave Martin a hearty slap on the back as he passed, joy and purpose lifting him higher than he'd felt since Shepard died. She might be gone, but she'd left him a hell of a lot to live for. Shame it took him nearly two cycles to see it.
"Been a hell of a day, hasn't it, kid?"
Martin grinned. "That it has, General."
When they reached the Passch, Garrus paused at the bottom of the stairs to the bridge while Martin turned toward the elevator.
"I'm headed to the galley and then to take a nap. I'm a slave to a cruel overlord who refuses to feed me," the kid hollered down the length of the CIC. "Captain L'Tsai, I want to lodge a formal complaint. Seven hours! Seven long, starving hours since I was last allowed to eat."
The asari captain turned from her console next to the galaxy map to watch the young man approach. "I will lodge a complaint … on behalf of the general … accompanied by a request that he be assigned a left hand smart enough to pack a couple of dried fruit bars and a bottle of water when going on a mission."
Martin just sputtered, prompting a grin wide enough that Garrus could make it out from across the deck. He turned away from the confrontation even as Martin bristled, revving up a full dose of smartass.
Even after travelling from Omega to the Citadel with a skeleton crew—most of his people had been reassigned to the vessels in drydock—Garrus still felt as though the ship had been deserted. He climbed the stairs into the bridge, the ghost ship feeling gnawing away at his bright spirits. Only Mi'khal Tref, the batarian beta-shift pilot, sat at his station.
"Come to watch the magic happen?" Mi'khal asked. The easy-going, affable pilot tossed a toothy grin over his shoulder.
"You know it." Garrus rested a hand on the back of the empty co-pilot chair and let out a long breath. "I just thought the ship might feel less empty up here."
Mi'khal shuddered. "It doesn't though, does it?" The batarian glanced around even as his fingers tapped the interface, entering the data needed for their jump. A veteran smuggler, he'd logged twice as many hours as most Alliance pilots, taking the helm of a dozen different classes of ships before Archangel took down the smuggling ring he worked for. Grateful for a second chance, he'd campaigned heavily for one of the six coveted spots piloting the Passchendaele.
"So many empty stations is creeping me out." A shudder rocketed up the batarian's spine, violent enough to make his chair rattle. "I've got one of those feelings," he continued. "One of those … smuggling a container that I'm pretty sure is full of something horrible, but I'm too afraid to look … feelings." He shuddered again. "I'll be happy to leave Tuchanka behind and get our asses back to Omega. I'm hoping it's just the creeps, but I keep coming back to something being off, General. Keep sharp."
The pilot turned his attention to the relay as they began their run. Garrus watched, a familiar thrill tingling down his arms as they flew toward the gigantic structure. Awe riveted him to the deck plating. The sheer primal force needed to bend time and space stole the breath from his lungs as it had ever since his father held him on one hip and explained how the relay would arc out to grab the ship and fling it across space. Garrus had been so afraid that first time, the relay so huge compared to their ship, the forces so monstrous and incomprehensible to his six-cycle-old mind. But then his father had held him tight, the sheer wonder in his pari's voice soothing away the terror, replacing it with awe. Smiling, he closed his eyes as the familiar fist wrapped around him and yanked him through space.
They exited the mass effect corridor facing the brilliant yellow-white sphere of Aralakh. The star's light shone through his eyelids, as harsh and unrelenting as everything else in krogan territory. The brightness dimmed, Mi'khal must have polarized the ports, and the general opened his eyes.
"Drift just under 1100 klicks, stealth systems operational," Mi'khal reported, a not insignificant or unwarranted amount of pride bleeding through his tone. "Good clean run."
"Good work." Garrus grinned. "Don't let Joker hear that number. He'll make it his life's mission to beat it." He turned toward the stairs down to the main level of the CIC. "ETA to Tuchanka?"
"Four hours, thirty eight minutes, General." The batarian laughed. "I think I'll send Joker a message right now with that jump data."
Garrus just shook his head. "On your head be the consequences." Four and a half hours ... enough time for a quick shower and a nap. The adrenaline had begun to wear off, reminding him that he hadn't slept more than a couple of hours a night in weeks. "I'll be in my quarters if I'm needed." He jogged down the stairs, long strides carrying him the length of the CIC.
Halfway down the narrow corridor between the ranks of system monitoring stations, he passed the alpha-shift pilot. He smiled and nodded. "Lt. Pirelli."
"Good evening, General," the young woman said, greeting him with a bright grin. "A lovely evening to be headed for sunny Tuchanka, land of everything in the galaxy that wants to kill you." She brushed past without stopping, whistling as she ran up the stairs, her boots ringing against the metal grating.
Garrus nodded. An accurate enough description of the krogan homeworld. "That it is, Lieutenant."
L'Tsai had returned to her work and looked up at him as he stopped beside her terminal. "Sitrep from Tuchanka, sir." She activated her monitor, bringing up a orbital scan. "Hierarch Vakarian reports that General Victus sent a platoon to take control of the bomb site, but they are having difficulty reaching it." She pointed to several markers. "These are Victus's men here. A combination of the terrain … the bomb is in the center of a ruined industrial area … and heavy resistance is slowing them down. The lieutenant leading the force estimates at least another four to six hours to reach and pacify the objective." A slightly apologetic shrug accompanied that information, as if somehow the delays were her fault, or she expected him to shoot the messenger.
He nodded and leaned a hip against the point defense console, affecting nonchalance. "They can only do what they can, Captain. I'm sure they're doing their best. What about the evacuation of the Urdnot camp?" His arms settled across his chest, locking away his impatience.
L'Tsai mirrored his stance for a moment before one hand broke free and cut toward the scan. "One more thing about the bomb, sir. According to the general, his people are fighting Blue Suns."
Garrus snapped straight, his one hand falling to rest on his sidearm. "Blue Suns?" That didn't make any sense. What did the Suns gain by blowing up krogan? The answer was simple: nothing. They were a smokescreen for the real enemy … disposable guns to provide a hefty dose of anonymity.
"The hierarch reports that the evacuation is also going slowly despite the cooperation of the krogan religious leaders and the female clan chief. Urdnot Wrex is encouraging his people to remain and defy what he says is just turian intimidation." She answered his soft curse with a nod and an empathetic wince. "However, most of the females and all of the children have been evacuated outside the blast zone."
He nodded, one sharp jerk of his head. "Very well, stay on top of the situation. I'm going to take a shower and try to get a little sleep. Let me know if anything on the surface changes."
The asari's salute betrayed her origins as one of the Destiny Ascension's junior flag officers. He returned it with a turian one, then headed for the elevator. Inside, he turned to face her, then reached out to hit the hold button.
"Please tell me that we didn't give away all our ground pounders, and it won't be just Martin and I trying to fight our way through to Wrex and the giant bomb."
She grinned. "We managed to hang on to six. They'll be coming off their sleep shift in two hours."
He released the door. "Excellent."
After a quick shower, he burrowed under his blankets. His stomach growled, protesting his priorities, but exhaustion pressed at him harder than hunger. He yawned, telling his belly to shut up until he woke, then closed his eyes.
"I hope you know that I found your mother, Kahri," he said to the dark. "She's okay, and you have a pile of brothers and sisters. I'll get her out of there as soon as I can. I promise you that." He let out a long breath and relaxed into the mattress. "Then we'll find Bunny."
Within moments, he fell asleep.
19 Days ASR
Bodies surged through the door, an alien tide of bizarre shapes, slicing blades, and frenzied limbs in the fading light from his armour. Silent, trapped inside his head, he prayed and cursed and cried as his body fought, seeming immune to injury and the passage of time. He screamed, wrestling back a measure of control over his own vocal chords, his own limbs, but his rage and fear went unheard over the droning of the enemy's wings and the drumbeat of their bodies slamming into the half-open door. The horrible wet crunch of shell breaking against metal dragged him back to his childhood. On one of his explorations, he stumbled upon a group of teenagers beating a carincrus with metal pipes … the giant crustacean screamed and snapped its claws, trying to fight back as the peririn pulverized its shell, and finally the meat and organs beneath.
He dragged his scattered thoughts back to the present as the room tipped and swayed around him. Spirits, his head ached … buzzing … electric jolts of agony ripped through his skull. Shoving that aside, he focused on Roger, the gun bucking into his hands in a steady rhythm. One … two … three … pause. Over and over as he fought to keep the rifle from overheating. If it did, he'd be overwhelmed and crushed just as surely as that poor sad animal on the beach.
One of the creatures made it inside the door, an arm hanging half off, whipping about uselessly even as it raced toward him, it's double sided blade carving the air ahead of its charge. Bullets tore into its shell, the force knocking it around like a ragdoll, but still it charged, its blank, white eyes glowing in the faint light.
It slammed into him, the blade clutched in its hand never stopping. The pain registered only as a hard tugging as the blade carving through his armour, plate, and hide. The organic weapon lodged in his hip bone, tearing loose when he staggered, his leg collapsing as the tendons sliced through. Swinging Roger in a wide arc even as he fell, he slammed the rifle into the creature's head, the chitinous shell cracking open with a sickening crunch.
As he lay there, firing into the bodies that flailed over the mass of their fallen comrades, the hollow gong sound of the their bodies slamming into metal echoed inside his head. Constant ringing, banging … hollow thumping against the metal … .
Garrus bolted upright in bed, heart slamming into the base of his throat as he flailed, tangled in his blankets. Over several seconds, the softness of the blankets against his hide eased him back into his bed despite the hollow, thumping ring of bodies striking metal that continued to echo in his head. It stopped with the whisper of voices, banging, then a crash.
He jumped up, landing on his feet next to the bed, his blankets still wrapped around and between his legs. A dark shape dropped from the ceiling and ran to his door, the orange glow of an omnitool illuminating Martin's face.
"Weaver?" His alarm fading a little, Garrus bent over to wrestle himself free. "What the hell are you doing, kid?" He looked up at a darker spot against the ceiling, a icy trickle of alarm snaking through his guts and setting off the alarm at the back of his skull. "Why are you crawling around in the ducts?"
The dark spot gave birth to a shadow, the form unfolding from above to drop, landing agile and light on taloned feet. The trickle surged into a flood. His hands leapt in front of his face, and he sank into a defensive stance.
"Get dressed," the invader growled, amusement rolling through her subvocals. When he didn't move, too busy trying to figure out what was going on, she stepped close enough for him to make out her features, and his arms fell limp to his sides.
"Kandros? What the hell are you doing on my ship?"
(A-N: Holy cow, Chapter 90, and I think you can see that we're diving into the thick of things now. Events will start to snowball from here. All the loves to my readers and reviewers. Your support helps keep me going. Well, your support and Sassy haranguing me to get back to her chapters. :D She's so pushy! See you in a couple of days.)