Tali scanned the pages of the human textbook in her hands. Each page had a glossy sheen, indicating a near mint condition. This made her take extra care with the thin pages.
Her glowing eyes hungrily took in each picture and thirsted for each word. Despite the rather boring language used, her imagination ran wild as she dreamed up the historical scenarios and placing herself in the shoes of each famous person, imagining what each faced and thinking about what she would have done if it were her. Sometimes it concerned her that the textbook mainly contained wars and bloody conflicts, so she occasionally picked up a different one that mainly focused on cultures. It amazed her how humans were living the way they did in the books only several decades ago.
Human culture was absolutely fascinating for her. She never knew there could be so many differences in between one species. It was almost as if a whole another galaxy was held inside the planet Earth. She spent hours pouring over each detail of the textbook, changing reading positions so frequently that she would be in a different one each time someone would return to the observation deck.
It was an enjoyable way to pass the time since Shepard was out everyday looking over the construction of their new house that was being built. Each time he left, she would beg him to take her along to see it, and each time he would refuse with the same answer, "It would spoil the surprise!"
Tali hated hearing it sometimes, but she strove to be patient. Shepard must be really hard at work for making the house special, since sometimes she wouldn't see him at all during the night. That she hated more.
Even though she knew that she would see him everyday, she would miss him so much during his absent hours that it ached. Sometimes she felt like it was probably because she was acting too pushy to see the house, so she decided to take it down a notch whenever he returned.
Still, she was excited. Her young girl dream was almost complete. Soon she would be bonded to Shepard and live out the rest of her life in her dream home. It was almost too much to handle! She gave a fervent prayer of thanks to the ancestors, and reminded herself to do so every day for the rest of her life.
"How's my sister?" Came an eerily close, familiar voice. Tali turned her head slightly and met Kasumi's face right up against her mask. She jumped...and screamed, too.
"AH!" Tali's scream rang throughout the deck and she toppled off the couch, landing straight on her rear end. Her small, sneaky Japanese friend burst out laughing.
"Kasumi! What in the name of...?" Her tongue ran off angrily, followed by a string of Khelish and it's more mild curses. She rubbed her behind tenderly. "That wasn't funny!"
Kasumi attempted to collect herself in between her bouts of laughter, and it took awhile before she could finally form a coherent sentence.
"Aw, man," she gasped and chuckled, "It's been awhile since I've done that."
Tali only gave a dirty glare, which Kasumi responded with a roll of her head in substitution of her eyes. "Don't give me that look. It's more cute than threatening," she said as she walked around to help her up.
"Wait until I get my shotgun," Tali groaned with effort as she pulled on Kasumi's arm.
"Har har," Kasumi fake laughed. She noticed the textbook on the floor, "How're you enjoying your book?"
"It's very good! But...you guys have a lot of violence. You all fight like a bunch of..." She stopped herself before she said too much.
Kasumi answered for her anyway, "Animals?"
Tali nodded.
"Don't worry about it too much. I mean we are a relatively new space-faring race. I can see why we might seem like that."
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have that point of view. I'm sure all the wars on your homeworld has a meaning to exist-"
"Human greed for resources," Kasumi interrupted suddenly. "That's about almost every war. If there was anything that we should have learned from the thousands upon thousands of wars that we had...it's that we should be content with what we have."
Tali raised an eyebrow, "If that was the case, then why are you a thief?"
Kasumi opened her mouth, but no words came out. She stood there dumbstruck like that for a couple seconds before closing her mouth again.
"So?" Tali asked smugly.
"I have nothing to argue," Kasumi admitted. "At least I don't think I start full on wars over what I steal. In fact I actually stopped one by stealing something...except it already belonged to me. So I stole it back, I guess." Tali smiled brightly for her minor victory over her friend.
"I guess that's because nobody has anyone to blame when it happens because they don't know it was me...unless I did that rose thing," Kasumi added. "You kind of need two people to start a war." Tali nodded in agreement. She bent over to pick up the textbook and place it on the couch. "So!" Kasumi changed conversation suddenly, "Got any plans other than reading? I'm dying of boredom."
Tali shook her head irritably, she couldn't find anything interesting to do, which was why she resulted to reading her textbook. "Sorry, Kas. I've got hardly any ideas, myself."
The thief gave a disappointed look, but soon asked a hopeful question, "Have you finished planning your wedding?"
The word was still fairly foreign to Tali, but even if she didn't know what it was, the context sufficed, and her eyes widened in disbelief at herself.
"No! I haven't finished planning! Keelah, I am so stupid!" She exclaimed. She then bolted off to fetch for a data pad.
"Tal! Wait for me!" Tali heard as she turned the corner of the door.
Her data pad, along with her omni-tool, held all the information on how she wanted her bonding ceremony to go. Normally it wouldn't take much planning considering quarians had few resources and lived three hundred years being nomads. But she was bonding with a human, and on her homeworld instead of a fleet of ships. She didn't want it to be dull, and from what she had found out about human bonding ceremonies, they are anything but that.
Keelah, probably too much excitement for my tastes.
She wanted to incorporate some of the human traditions into the ceremony. Not just because they were interesting, but because it would make Shepard a little more comfortable. She didn't want him to feel like he was too out of place.
She retrieved her data pad out of Shepard's cabin. It was one of the few things she kept in there since she visited and stayed often. Kasumi managed to reach her when she came back out of the door. "Ya know, you're a lot faster than you seem," she said, a little out of breath.
Tali laughed. "I think you have been out of training for awhile."
"What, and you haven't?"
"Fair point."
Kasumi took a few deep breaths, "So, where to?" Tali curled her fingers under her neck with her head bent forward thoughtfully. She remembered that it was another action Shepard found, "cute," for whatever reason.
"I mean I don't have to grab anything else, we can go outside. It's a nice day."
Kasumi rubbed her neck, "Oh."
"Oh? Don't like the light?" Tali laughed.
"No. It's just that this world is a little hot, don't ya think? And I just chased you up here, so...yeah."
Tali laughed once more. "We'll sit in the shade. Come on, it won't be that bad." Tali walked passed her to take the elevator down, and she thought the thief most likely rolled her eyes.
They first made a stop at the mess hall to grab some refreshments. Kasumi grabbed some lemonade, while Tali just grabbed a water bottle and a..."straw." They also had a run in with EDI, Joker, and Liara before leaving the ship. EDI and Joker were returning from the medbay, with Joker having a cast around one of his fingers, something about button diagnostics.
Liara, however, simply had her eyes glued to a data pad. "Hey Liara, Tali and I are just gonna go outside to plan her bonding ceremony. Thought we should let someone know."
Liara only replied simply, almost robot-like. "I'm helping your friend, Silon." She seemed very tight lipped.
Oh yeah! Silont! I wonder where he ran off to? "I hope he's not too much trouble to work with. Have fun with him, though!" Then they were off.
It wasn't as easy to find shade and privacy as Tali first hoped. There was still a fairly large crowd of people just outside of the circle of space that was now taped off. It's only been about less than a week since they first landed, yet the crowd, the paparazzi, and the news reporters still kept coming. A few pointed at her, most likely thinking about the factual rumors of her relationship with Shepard.
If they could only see my data pad.
"Come on! It's been several months since the final battle!" Kasumi said exasperated.
Tali herself sighed in annoyance, "Yeah, well, they didn't know until a couple months ago."
The women started to walk around the ship, looking for any direction to slip away from the small crowd unnoticed.
"Still," Kasumi added, "You would think that it would have ended by now."
"People are people."
They found a gap as a pathway away from the ship towards a small range of hills, but due to the sparse amount of trees, there was still plenty of people able to see them. They shared a glance, both knowing. "I think we might be stuck here," Tali assumed, ready to give up.
"Not necessarily," Kasumi argued as she revealed a package of cloth attached to her waist. "Come here, get close to me," she ordered.
"Oh? What is it?"
"I've been tweaking that little something something I got from that armory back on Earth...Ugh, quit fidgeting!"
"Oops! Sorry!"
Tali stood still as Kasumi loosely wrapped the cloth around both of their waists, connecting each end together.
"Alright...let's hope this works," Kasumi whispered nervously as she summoned her omni-tool. With a few taps on the holographic display, the cloth hummed and started fading away into the desert background, taking the two occupants with it.
"Ooh, this is weird," Tali said with a touch of excitement. She bent over low and saw that her whole body disappeared, as well as Kasumi's.
"Be quiet, we're going to sneak out now, and keep close to me!"
"I get it, already!"
Tali stood back up straight, and her and Kasumi's body returned to her sight. Clearly anything outside of the stealth cloth could not see them. She silently praised Kasumi for her idea.
The two women then started walking out from the ship towards the hills, the only thing indicating their position was the pair of footprints they left behind on the dusty desert floor. Tali kept her head on a swivel, making sure nobody could see them. She could feel the soft sand under her boots as she carefully placed her feet so she wouldn't trip, and she kept a hand on Kasumi so she wouldn't fall.
Once they reached behind the hills, Kasumi uncloaked them both and started folding up her piece of tech. Tali released a sigh of breath she didn't know she was holding in.
"We should be good now," Kasumi whispered slightly. "Should we go a little ways or stay behind here?" She motioned the the small hill of dirt and sand between them and the ship.
"Let's go a little farther, I'd like a bit more breathing room."
Later, being more comfortable with the distance, Tali sat down underneath a thin tree and pulled out a water tube and some nutrient paste from her pockets. She's completely forgotten about breakfast and it was almost noon, good thing she packed for lunch. Taking a small swig from the water tube, she positioned her back against the tree and her data pad on her lap.
It was difficult to find a good shady area for Kasumi. The sun was at it's peak and the scrawney trees that grew around the area didn't have very good coverage. But thankfully, one hill had an overhead rock formation to cast a nice amount of shade for the little thief.
"Why don't you come over here?" Kasumi asked, "There's plenty of room left."
Tali shook her head and looked up the tree and it's branches, a new breeze rustling the few lime colored leaves. "No, it's quite nice over here, and I just sat down."
"Fine, so what do you have planned so far?"
"Not much, I have the time and the place, and I have an incomplete list of people I'd like to see there. I feel like it would be best if it was a bit more private, with just us and a couple friends."
"True, but we have a lot of friends. But when and where do you want it?"
"At the beachfront, Shepard and I shared a moment there," Tali paused to show her a map on her data pad. "Also within three months, near the end of the day." She could feel her excitement grow more and more as she kept talking about it.
"That's fairly soon, are you sure you don't want to wait a couple months after? It'll be pretty difficult to set up everything by then. We have to complete the guest list, set up the ceremony, a whole lot more, even a dress!"
"That shouldn't be too difficult to set up in three months?" Tali responded.
"But that's the thing!" Kasumi near yelled, "You have to take time! It's your special day and it can't be anything less than flawless and perfect!"
Tali scoffed, "That's a bit of unnecessary pressure, don't you think?"
"Absolutely not! You're getting bonded!"
"I really don't think Shepard and I care that much. I don't think either of us want it to be extreme."
"I know you're excited, Tali, but you want it special! Four months is even considered a short amount of time for planning. Can we just push it back until then?"
"Again, Kasumi, we don't want anything extreme. The ceremony is for Shepard and I, and that's special enough for us."
Kasumi sighed in defeat. She instead tried to compromise. "How about this, we set the time for the month after, and if you manage to set up everything before your time, then you can do whatever you want. But if not, then we do it my way."
Tali rolled her eyes, "Yeah, sure. Whatever."
Kasumi gave a semi-satisfied sigh, stretched her back, and sat back down. "Now that that's settled. Any ideas for what you want for a dress?"
Tali's eyes glowed a little brighter as she excitedly started searching through her data pad.
Garrus picked up a chair and settled it closer to the table near the window where Joker and EDI sat in the corner building. The building itself didn't have anything going on. It's function was to be a quick stop for food and miscellaneous supplies, but it wasn't filled with anything yet and was open to the public as just a place to sit. It gave off a diner feel to it as there was a counter off to the side and the multiple tables and chairs filled the bigger spaces.
EDI carressed Joker's damaged hand and gave Garrus a glance as he sat down. "Is Shepard coming?" She asked.
"He should be. I don't see what the guy could possibly be busy with."
"There's his house," Joker chimed in.
"Yeah, but the Geth are taking care of all that. He shouldn't have to lift a finger on it."
"Perhaps he wants to give it a few, 'personal touches,' as people call it," EDI continued.
"Perhaps."
It was quiet a few moments. The late afternoon sun broke easily through the perfectly translucent glass. It was difficult to tell that there was glass there at all. It was relaxing. Although it's been many months, Garrus was appreciative that he could relax in clean gear and not in blood, sweat, muck, and grime.
Tikkun was warm as always, and its rays kept the streets almost boiling hot. Garrus was happy to be in the building and not outside. He yawned as Joker broke the silence.
"Man, it's been so boring lately. These past few days have been dragging on and on for me. I think I might go crazy if I don't have anything to do. The only thing keeping me awake right now is the sound of construction."
"Yeah, me, too," Garrus agreed.
"Any idea when the Captain can get out of that wheelchair?"
EDI answered for him. "It'll most likely be another month or so. Stomach wounds are not exactly the easiest to heal. At this point it's whenever he feels no pain when he walks."
"Poor bastard can't ever get a break, can he?"
"Guess not," Garrus said. "I don't like it."
Garrus had an uneasy feeling ever since the attack at the Citadel. He didn't know whether it was guilt or anger, most likely both. He knew that quarian, Silont, was on its case but he didn't feel comfortable doing nothing. He just had to do what he's best at where it's best at, and that was making sure Shepard and his crew were safe.
As if his arrival was on cue with his thoughts, a bell rang over the door and in came Shepard in his wheelchair. "Sorry, I'm late guys."
"Spirits, Shepard, what the hell have you been up to?" Garrus asked.
He seemed uneasy. Shepard scratched his neck armor, "Uh, not much, really. Just looking at the house. Helping here and there." Garrus looked at him in a suspicious manner, but bought it anyway. If Shepard was actually doing something different, he was sure that he would tell him sooner or later.
"So, what did I miss?"
"Not much, Cap'n. We're all just kind of chilling out. We haven't had much time to do that since we've landed since you've been busy with the house and all," Joker said.
"You could've joined me, Silont, Tali, Dyad, and Garrus in the observation deck that one night."
"I could, but EDI and I were busy maintaining the Normandy. Y'know, since practically everyone was out."
Garrus realized his mistake, and became somewhat flustered because of it. "Sorry, Joker. I should've asked some people to stay behind to help you out."
Joker laughed, "Nothing against you. It was actually quite enjoyable being alone on the bridge for once." He noticeably tightened his grip on EDI. Garrus couldn't help but snicker. "What, bird brain?" Joker chuckled.
"Oh, nothing," Garrus replied, "Just wondering if you came up with any new robo moves for, 'getting down.'"
Garrus was met with a plastic holder to the face and a Joker's flustered laughing, "No, you dumbass!" The rest of the group chuckled, and a mild silence ensued. For some reason, nobody could keep the quip train going. It was almost too peaceful for that.
Shepard and Tali are home, we don't need to joke to cope with stress. We're done...we're practically free. Garrus smiled. Sure it was boring, but it was appreciated.
Joker groaned again. "I need to fly again."
"Maybe we could ask the quarian people if you could help out in any way. There's still work to do up there with all those old ships," Shepard suggested.
Joker's eyes lit up, "That'd be great, Shepard!"
Garrus cringed somewhat. He was the new Commander of the Normandy, and he couldn't of thought of something simple as that.
Shepard noticed, "What's up, Garrus?"
He shook his head, "I don't know, this position I have...you're giving me, 'big shoes to fill.' I still have so much to learn."
Shepard gripped his shoulder, "You'll do great, believe me. Half the missions we have done were off the rails, but we pulled through it all. Together. I'm sure you'll be fine."
"Thanks, Shepard."
After more moments of silence, the group silently decided to go get a look at the sights of the city in the works.
It was beautiful, the world. The sky was in perpetual sunset lighting and it was littered with overhanging spaceships waiting to land. Construction noises were heard as buildings with a mix of ancient quarian and modern geth styled architecture were built. Sandstone buildings with beautiful engravings and markings stood at corners and the bases for skyscrapers that gleamed in the sunlight were seen more inwards of the streets. The streets were made of paved desert sand, stone, and dirt. No fancy asphalt to make the city seem misplaced. Sure there was dust that flowed with the wind, but there was hardly any worry, considering the people wore masks everywhere they went.
"Perhaps we could go to a gun range?" Shepard suggested.
Garrus and Joker laughed. "I have a broken finger, captain, I'm not risking it," Joker said.
"And you're in a wheelchair, Shepard," Garrus continued, "Something tells me that you wouldn't be able to do much."
"I don't need legs to kick your ass, Vakarian," Shepard mildly threatened. "Come on, I haven't shot anything in awhile and my trigger finger is getting bored."
Garrus gave a frustrated chuckle and followed Shepard as he wheeled off to find a gun range of any sort. The turian quipped something about their last competition on the Citadel shooting bottles, in which the human-quarian hybrid made some excuse and a more determined statement to win.
"Maybe we could call some of the guys and see if any of them are around to hang out," Joker suggested. They agreed. EDI gave the call.
Garrus stretched and yawned. The leisure hours were getting to him. Training himself at the gun range would help keep his senses sharp. And besides, a little crew bonding never hurt.
Things were looking up and getting better.