Shepard
They unhooked from the weird space machine they were attached to and Nihlus started them in what she hoped was the direction of the transmission signal. She left him in the cockpit to go put her armor on, locking the pieces into place like he showed her. She finished right as he passed her room to go down to the cargo bay and get his guns. "Nihlus," she called and caught up to him.
He looked at her, looking her up and down at her armor and his mandibles flared. "Stay." he said and pointed to her room.
"I'm going," she growled and held her ground. "That is my crew, they trust me, they are my responsibility." she said and stomped her foot on the ground. "And I am going to be damned if I sit here while one of them is in danger."
Nihlus was tense as he took in her tone and posture. He sighed through his nose and ran an armored hand down his faceplates. He clicked something at her and motioned for her to follow him into the cargo bay.
Nihlus
Nihlus was pretty sure this was a bad idea, but he still gave Shepard a pistol, a sniper rifle, and an assault rifle. He was giving guns to someone he couldn't talk to and going into a hostile situation, but he trusted her.
They set the ship down far enough away that it wouldn't be seen in the blizzard going on around them. He helped Shepard lock her helmet into place before attending to his own. "Just be careful." he said before he opened the airlock and they stepped out into the storm. The first thing that he noticed was the cold, even under the padded armor and helmet he felt it chill him to the bone. "I hate the cold." he muttered and lead the way through the snow. His sensor kept going in and out from the storm, but the base should be directly northeast of the ship and that is the way he kept them going. Until there was a cry in his com and he turned around to see Shepard chest deep in the snow. She must have stepped on a soft part. He chuckled and went back to pull her out, sinking down to the waist in the snow beside her instead.
He could almost feel the face she was making under her mask, and if she could talk she would say something like "Really? How was that supposed to help?"
"Oh shut up, you fell in first." he said and started wiggling around, managing to make his way to her. Their armor gave a clung as it bumped against each other, barely auditable over the sound of the storm. He took his time widening the space around them, secretly enjoying her against him, even if it was through two sets of heavy armor. He moved his arms around her and locked them under her butt, making her jerk away from him and said something into the com. "Calm down." he said and lifted her up. She clung to him at first, and he took the short second to enjoy it, before she climbed over the edge of the hole they were in. 'I'm in trouble,' he thought as he eyed her hips while she wormed her way over the side.
Once she was safe he pulled himself up, digging his feet into the snow to help pull himself out. He got to his feet and took her hand, walking into the snow connected in case one of them fell in again.
It was a funny thing about the cold that after a while you stop noticing it as much. Despite the stiffness in his fingers as he tapped away on his omni-tool, hacking into a side door of the base, he didn't feel the chill as much as he initially did. And then the door opened with a wave of warmth and the chill bit down on his bones just as bad as when they had first left the ship. He quickly rushed Shepard in and shut the door behind them.
They were in a narrow stairwell with the only way to go being up. He pulled out his assault rifle and checked the clip, watching Shepard do the same. He held a talon up over his lips and she nodded. Be quiet. Quickly they started climbing, passing the first few floors as data from the bases computers flashed across him omni-tool. It was a prototype hacking software that found a terminal wirelessly, hacked it, and sent him back any useful data, and it was extremely helpful when looking for something.
They just passed the third floor's door when it busted open and several mercs stormed through, one grabbing Shepard who was the closest. Nihlus raised his gun, trying to get a clear shot, to no avail.
Shepard slammed her head back into the batarian merc's face. He cried out and loosened his grip and she spun, swiping his feet out from under him. The other mercs moved in, but Shepard did a backflip and clocked a turian in the head with her foot, sending him flying into a wall. Then she dropped flat on her stomach and Nihlus took the cue and fired, ripping into the mercs. His heatsink popped, giving her the cue to get up and they continued up the stairs, fighting mercs as they pooled out the doors. Usually Nihlus worked alone, normally other people bugged him to have along, but there was something about fighting with Shepard… It was like she knew what he was going to do before he did it, always one step ahead of him and five ahead of the enemy. She was so gracefully and brutally efficient that several times he caught himself staring at her more than fighting. The part that really caught his attention was how flexible she was, she could flip over obstacles, run along the wall, and just… contort her body in ways that made his own body hurt just watching.
They were out of the stairwell now on the ninth floor, the one that the hacking system told him had the holding cells. He knocked over a filing cabinet and they ducked behind it to avoid the shower of fire from above. He panted hard and looked over at her, observing her heavy breathing too. They were both starting to wear out, but that didn't mean they were done yet. He put a fresh heat sink into his assault rifle and pulled out two rounds of cryo ammo, attaching the first to his gun and the second to Shepard's. He didn't have a way to tell her what it did, so he would just have to show her. He poked his head out of cover in a lull of fire and shot the nearest merc in the arm, making him cry out as his armor froze stiff. Shepard poked her head out and looked at it before giving a nod. Together they moved out of the cover and fired down on the mercs, killing a few, but mainly incapacitating them, freezing their legs or their arms so they couldn't run or fire.
Slowly they made their way to the door with the holding cells and each took a side. After a glance at each other Nihlus hit the lock in the center and the door slid open. They both turned to fire, but there was no one to fire at. In the center of the room was a large bomb. "Oh shit," he said and grabbed Shepard, tossing her on his shoulder, and ran back the other way. He didn't even make it to the end of the hall before the bomb went off, flinging them hard into the far wall.
Shepard
Her chest felt tight and everything was ringing around them. She sat up a bit and held back vomit as everything spun and shook around her. She closed her eyes for several seconds to try and brush off the nausea, but the ringing wouldn't stop and kept making everything spin even behind her eyelids. She opened them again and looked to her side where Nihlus lay, out cold by the looks of it. Blue liquid pooled around his head coming from a cut. "Why is your blood blue?" she said, still dazed and unaware of the danger around her. There was a large shake around them and the tile she was sitting on cracked. "Oh shit," she said and tried to get off of it, trying to pull Nihlus with her, but it was too late. The floor crumbled beneath them and they fell to the one below.
"Ow…" she said and sought Nihlus out with her fingers through the dusty air. Her fingers found his shoulder and she went to move towards him, stopping when her left leg didn't move. She touched it and pulled her hand back when she felt something wet. Her eyes finally adjusted and she could see a bar going through her shin a few inches below her kneecap. Her body went into shock and the adrenaline kicked in. With steady hands she took her chest armor off and ripped the bottom half of her under armor shirt. She tied it to the end of the bar and with a quick breath she jerked her leg off, the cloth taking its place and helping her not to bleed out. She took off the heavy armor on that leg to get a better view of the wound. With a sigh, she ripped off more of her shirt and bound the wound up, then set to work dragging Nihlus through the rubble. There were a few more explosions, but nothing else too major, and the building crumbled in places around them, some missing them by inches.
The progress was slow, but she managed to get them to a stable corner on the first floor. She laid him down and collapsed beside him, the pain in her leg and everything they had just went through taking the last of her strength.
When she woke up Nihlus was still unconscious and it was cold. She dragged herself to her feet and limped through the remains of the building, clutching her right side with her left hand. It wasn't bleeding and it wasn't swelling as if she had internal bleeding, so she figured it was just sore, something to worry about if it didn't get better but right now she had work to do.
First off she didn't know how long Nihlus was going to be out and there wasn't a way she could get him back to the ship, she also couldn't fly the ship back to him because she didn't know what any of the buttons did. That left her with one option, bunker down and wait it out. Mentally, she counted off the things she would need—food, water, a shelter that would block the cold bit of the wind, anything that would burn to get a fire going, blankets if she could find any. Like any trained survivalist she sought shelter first. They were in a pretty good spot in the corner and it blocked wind from two sides, so instead of moving them she got every filing cabinet, every blown off door, every slab of rubble small enough for her to drag, and built up a wall on their two exposed sides. It helped, but it was still drafty so she went out of the building with half a door and into the snow. It took several trips, but she got the sides packed with snow, plugging up any holes in the rubble walls.
She sat down beside Nihlus, panting hard and shaking from the cold. "Well it seemed like a good idea at the time to rip apart my shirt for bandages." she said to his unmoving form and looked down at what was left of her shirt. It only went down to her bellybutton, leaving her midsection exposed and cold. "And unfortunately it's about the only option I have right now." she added with a sigh and ripped off another few inches. "It'll only be temporary until I can get a fire going and sear our wounds shut, but it'll help stop the cold from getting in your blood." she told him as she folded the fabric up, pressed it to the cut on his head, and held it there by tying a bit of wire around his head.
After a thorough inspection of her work to make sure it would stay on she got up again. "Alright, you stay here, I'm going to get us a roof." She pushed herself back to her feet and continued her scavenging for anything she could lay on the top of their makeshift shelter.
It was nearly dark with heavy snow clouds blotching out the sky above them when she finally gave up, cold, tired, and hungry. So she turned around and headed back towards the shelter, dragging a tarp that carried what she had been able to find. It was merger, a few blankets and a half empty filing cabinet she filled with any books or folders she could find for kindling. It wouldn't stop the snow from falling down on top of them. It wouldn't fill their empty stomachs. It wouldn't be enough to keep a fire going through the night. And as she pushed her body back towards the shelter she knew that she had failed. Her feet numb and barely responsive, she fell to her knees, half open eyes watching the darkness fall on the world around her.
Nihlus
It was cold and there was a sharp pain in his head, but sleep refused to draw him back under, away from it. "Shepard…" he muttered and his fingers slid along the tiled floor under him, searching for her, but came up empty. The memory of what happened came back to him in ripples, they were in a merc base, they had been fighting, there was a trap, a bomb. He opened his eyes and looked up to the snow clouds that were blotching out the grey sky above them. He had grabbed Shepard and tried to run away from it, and then he couldn't remember anything else. He sat up and looked around, finding himself in a small square surrounded by four feet high rubble on two side, walls on the other two. It was clear that whoever had stacked the rubble was trying to make a shelter, but the maker was gone and that worried him. "Shepard?" he called out and stood up, a hand going to his head as it throbbed in pain, finding a wire around his head with a bit of fabric against a cut on his head. "Shepard." he called again, even more worried. Her chest armor was still in the shelter, and he was pretty sure the fabric had come from her under armor.
He stepped out of the shelter and went to find her, fighting the pounding in his head, and ignoring the ache in his chest. She had to be okay, just out looking for supplies. She was tough, a soldier, she wouldn't just fall to the cold. He turned a corner and the blood pumping in his ears skipped a few rhythmic beats. On the cold floor laid Shepard, unmoving and pale. He went to her, checking for a pulse, which she did have. Then he grabbed a blanket off the tarp and wrapped her tight in it, covering her half exposed body. He picked her up, carrying her bridal style back to the shelter, setting her down just as the snow started to fall. He brushed her hair out of her face tenderly before going back out to get the things she had gathered. Once he got it back he took stock of it, another blanket and a filing cabinet full of books and paper, but nothing to help block the snow. She must have blacked out before she could find anything.
"Don't worry, Shepard, it's my turn to take care of you." he said and started going through the maze of rubble and skeleton walls the explosion had left. It was clear the mercs had meant to collapse the whole thing in around them, but it had failed and left a good portion of it standing. The area they were in was a small attachment of the base that only had gone up a few floors, allowing more of the first floor to remain intact. "You're definitely a soldier, Shep." he said, taking pride in her ability to find this spot and start building them a shelter. Even some of the signs on the wall were still readable and, with the aid of his omni-tool to read the batarian, writing he found his way to a cafeteria. Inside he found two promising looking tables that would work for a roof and several ration packets of both levo and dextro food.
He lunged it back to the shelter and propped the two tables on one of the walls of rubble Shepard had made and the opposite building wall at an angle to give them more room inside and to let the snow slide off rather than add up and collapse it on top of them. Then he got the tarp and wedged it tight on both ends of the second table above the other wall of rubble, blocking it off and giving them a door. "It'll keep the snow out at least." he thought to himself and slid inside, crawling over to Shepard.
Shepard
She groaned as someone shook her awake and looked up at Nihlus. His mandibles slacked in relief when he saw her move and backed away to the other side of the shelter to a pile of books that where feeding a low fire. She sat up and took in her surrounding, the shelter was finished and had a roof and she was wrapped in a blanket. "Teamwork, eh?" she said and moved to sit beside him by the low fire.
He pulled out a hot metal rod about a foot long, its tip glowing red and said something to her, her omni picking up a few words and translating them. Cold. Gel. Bad. "Your medicine stuff froze, didn't it." she said and stuck her leg out of the blanket for him. He undid the fabric bandage she had around the wound and pulled out the fabric she had pulled through it with one quick movement, making her cry out in pain. "I'm fine," she said in response to the apologetic look he had on his face.
With a nod he looked back down at the bleeding wound and pressed the tip of the metal bar to her skin, searing the front of the wound shut, before he did the backside of her leg. She held in the scream this time, not wanting Nihlus to feel any worse than she knew he already did. He was too kind for this type of work.
Once he pulled the metal rod away she took it from him and pointed up to the wound on his head and he nodded, undoing the bandage and holding still as she stood on her knees in front of him and pressed the hot metal to the cut. His hands went to her hips and his gloved fingers dug into her skin, his own reaction to the pain. And then it was over, the metal discarded. "There, all done." she said and put her arms on his shoulders, her forehead falling against his. He looked up at her with his green eyes as she stayed there for several long seconds, his breath warm on her face. "You're warm." she said, her body shivering.
He noticed that, probably felt it through his hands still on her hips, and moved them, wrapping her in the blankets. "What about you?" she asked and tried to hand him the outer blanket, but he stilled her hands, signaling her to stop. She did as he asked and watched as he undid his armor, stacking it off to the side. She understood and blushed as she remembered an old survivor trick. Body heat was shared better the less you had on. With a breath to steady her shaking hands, both from the cold and embarrassment, she undid the locks to the rest of her armor, kicking it out from under the blanket. She was done before Nihlus, having less armor on than him. He looked at her for a moment before he took the top half of his under armor off, gauging if she was going to react badly to that, but she stayed calm, silently looking over his plates for the second time since they met. Now that she wasn't so distracted with the mere fact that aliens existed she could note several things about him that she had missed the first time. He was very muscular, his dark plates laying over his lighter skin, and that he looked kind of human, granted a plated, disproportionate human, but it wasn't unappealing, in fact she would wager that to his species he was attractive.
He slipped inside the blankets with her and she snuggled close to him, his warm body a nice change from how cold everything else was. He felt really muscular too, his plates digging into her a few places as she shifted to get comfortable, eventually finding a nice position that molded her body to his. "You're warm." she said again, sleep thick in her voice as she drifted off into slumber.
Nihlus
He was glad it was so cold out; it helped him from getting aroused as she continuously shifted against him, trying to get comfortable against his plated body. Finally she found a position she liked with her butt on the ground beside him, her legs draped over his lap, head resting on his upper arm, and her right arm wrapped around his chest. He watched her fall asleep and once she was completely out he sighed and shifted under her, trying to quiet his instincts that told him there was a beautiful woman half naked against him and he should be taking advantage of this. There was enough space in the shelter for him to stand up at the highest part of the table-ceiling. He could pin her against the wall, hook her legs over his hips, and have what he came to crave more and more every day. The thought made his plates shift despite the cold and he looked away from the wall, trying to avoid those thoughts. But Shepard laid on his other side, so it was merely turning away from the situation and to his addiction. He took a deep breath through his nose, taking in her scent and let out a slight groan. The sex would also help keep them warm, and she was so close, wearing so little. He tried to put some space in between them, but she clung fast and he put a hand over his face. He had thought he had enough will power to do this, but he was wrong. If he couldn't get away from her he was going to jump her, and it would definitely freak her out and break the trust she had in him, it would ruin everything, she'd probably run off into the blizzard to die in the cold rather than be near him.
And even as he thought of all the reasons why it was wrong, all the reason why he shouldn't he couldn't stop his mouth from going to her neck and nipping the flesh there, his tongue rolling over the assaulted flesh. He groaned at the taste of her skin and his legs shifted closer to him, body crying out for more. He put one hand on the small of her back and the other on her hip, pulling her tight against him, and his mouth moved lower, licking up from where her pants started up to the remains of her shirt right below her breasts. "Why can't you be a turian." he breathed against her skin as he nipped and licked at it. He pulled back after a bit and laid against the wall, keeping her close, doing everything in his power to leave her be and let her sleep. He loved her sleeping face, how peaceful she looked, hell he loved her. He was in love with this strong little creature he couldn't even talk to, whose love he could never hope to have in return. He laid there with her in his arms, sub-harmonics letting out a constant whine from the fact that he could never have her.
A/N: Alright, there you go guys. Sorry it took so long, I got really bad writer's block. But here it is. Thanks for reading and review, tell me what you think.
Also no I did not forget about Joker, we are going to get an updated about him later.