Notes: So I had like three ideas for this prompt, this was just the one that was finished first.

Stargazing

For what felt like the hundredth time that night, Shepard rolled over again. She hadn't had a decent night of sleep since they took her off the sedatives. No matter how much whatever therapy was on her schedule exhausted her, no matter how much she tried to exhaust herself, it was never enough. Even so, she almost always eventually fell asleep.

But not tonight. And she knew better than to hope for things that would never happen.

She gripped the nightstand, the skin stretched too tight against her knuckles, and heaved herself out of bed. She gave a sharp hiss when her foot hit the ground, her remaining leg still bone sore. She wasn't supposed to do this, but she hated asking for permission and didn't want to waste time trying to put on her leg in the dark.

Making her way to the chair was mind-numbingly slow. Then again, most things were now. A pained hop, then reach for the next thing for balance. She could follow the route in her sleep. Night stand, then one hand back on the bed, sit a moment, then get back up, left hand on the table, then reach with the right for the chair. She'd stand as long as she could, then lean against the arm a little longer before settling into the seat.

If she fell, she could take comfort in a private hospital room being one of the few luxuries afforded to her for a too slow recovery.

She took a moment to watch the too dim city lights below. Earth wasn't like she remembered it. It was still a polluted, overpopulated, stifling cesspit. Even more so now with ruined cities and stranded soldiers. But it was hurting differently now, tired and war weary.

Kaidan told her that if they got through this, he wanted to help her make some happier memories of earth. At the time, she thought she had nothing to offer him but a handful of good memories, but the thought was nice. Even if it was sentimental and pointless, she felt she owed it to him to give the planet a second chance.

But with the dark outside, she could see more stars than she ever had as a child. Vast swaths, just like the window in the port lounge. And before she could stop herself, she started searching.

She wasn't alone. Far from it. She didn't have a day without company. Grunt was here almost every day, helping her get around and keeping her in check when she was angry at herself for needing help. Jack came by when she could, sharing stories about her students and an endless supply of pictures of Eezo. Solona visited a few times, wanting to meet Garrus' human sister. Hackett occasionally brought information and she kept bugging him to give her something to do, if only to stop her from feeling so restless. Meeting Kaidan's mother was bittersweet, but every day she found herself waiting for her to visit.

Tonight though, she was so damn lonely.

The distress signal didn't change anything. It was too corrupted to determine a location or even discern a message. Only that at some point in the last few weeks, someone on board the Normandy was alive and tried to call for help.

She shouldn't read too much into it. It wasn't a real lead. Just an anomaly.

Knowing that it was foolish didn't stop her from orienting herself in the constellations and honing in on the rendezvous point.

When she called in the medevac, she didn't expect to ever see Kaidan or Garrus ever again. She already said her goodbyes to Tali, Miranda, Joker, EDI, and all the rest of the crew. She went to the crucible at peace with what would happen because it meant that they had a chance. Everything she did after speaking to the Leviathan, it was to give them a galaxy worth saving. Even if it meant she wouldn't be in it.

She was still overjoyed about surviving, but for the first time, she thought she understood people who thought they shouldn't have.

She should stop herself from projecting the bridge and the galaxy map into her mind. She should stop herself from plotting courses from the Sol relay. Trying to determine where a dying relay would dump a floundering ship. Where Joker would set them down. She should stop herself from worrying if Kaidan survived his injuries.

She should put them behind her. It was easier before she met everyone. No matter what happened, she could just leave it behind and move on with her life. She'd been doing alright with that before the latest news. With it, she'd always wonder.

And maybe in the morning this would all pass, but tonight, her bed felt too big to sleep alone. And for the first time in weeks, she had some proof that maybe, maybe, her friends would come home.

As much as she tried to tell herself that the distress signal changed nothing, all she could do was watch the stars and try to hope.