On Both Sides of the Glass
Chapter Three
Dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We're both of us beneath our love, we're both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
- Leonard Cohen, Dance Me To The End of Love
For once, Rose found herself not worrying about the five hundred and fifty billion lives that depended on her. Relaxing was something that she didn't allow herself to do that often, because she hadn't had time to relax. There had always been one more planet to save, one more battle to fight, relaxation becoming so low in her priorities list that it had vanished right off it. Today was an exceptionally good day, she realised, glancing down at the soft white fabric that covered her arms. The sleeves ended at the wrist, tight and buttoned, hiding the scars that she had accumulated over years and years of heavy combat.
It wasn't that she wasn't proud of the scars, it just seemed inappropriate to showcase them on this beautiful spring morning. The trees outside the apartment on the Citadel were heavy with blossom, a scent of hope in the air. They had been threatening to blossom for the past two days, and now, with the joyousness of spring and new beginnings, they had finally blossomed into a canopy thick with colours and scents. Light flooded in through the massive windows, bathing everything in a rosy glow. Rose picked up the tiny nosegay and pinned it to her veil, taking care that she didn't undo all the work the girls had done. They were her closest friends, and Rose cherished them all. She turned to face them, and smiled beatifically, taking the next bunch of flowers Nellie handed her.
The women in her bridal party were close friends—good friends. They had stuck by her through the worst of times, and the best. They were as diverse, and each woman who was in her bridal party had been selected because they had served with her during two horrendous experiences, the first being the trip through the Omega Relay, the second during the Reaper War. They had been her friends for so long now that Rose had forgotten the exact length of their friendships—combined as they were. There were Asari matriarchs amongst those Rose counted as friends, and admirals of the Quarian liveships. There were humans, too, amongst those in her bridal party—Miranda, Jack, Nellie, just to name a few.
Rose's hens night had been fun. The Silversun Strip was a great place for a night out with the girls. They'd hit the Armax Arena at Jack's insistence, and, within hours of getting there, Rose, Jack, Liara, Samantha, Nellie, Miranda, Tali and Samara had beaten Aria and Bray's top scores. That had been fun. Next they had gone bar-hopping, getting completely plastered and eventually thrown out of every bar on the Citadel.
"I'm Commander Shepard, the first human spectre," Rose insisted at one point, "You can't just throw me out!"
"I can, and I will," the Krogan bouncer also insisted, "I don't care who you are."
Rose crossed her arms, twitching as though she had a bad case of the chills. "You mean to say that the saviour of the bloody galaxy is being thrown out?" She pointed to her left boob, where the badge flashed bride to be on it. The Krogan bouncer looked nonplussed, and snorted.
"You're still not welcome. Get out of here before I call C-Sec." The Krogan waved his hand threateningly.
"Urdnot Wrex and Urdnot Bakara are great friends of mine!" Rose insisted, hoping that the Krogan bouncer wasn't from a rival clan. "How would they react if they heard that the person responsible for the Genophage being cured was being thrown out of a bar?"
"I don't care. Hey Smash," the bouncer waved over another Krogan bouncer, "Get these pyjaks out of here."
Again, Rose's arm twitched with the urge to throw the bouncer in the air using her biotics. Nellie and Samantha, this time, grabbed both arms and physically restrained her. "That's it! I'm calling C-Sec!" The aptly-named Smash grabbed Rose, and threw her out—and Rose was sure she felt her arm break as Smash roughly manhandled them out of the bar.
Rose hissed in pain as she stood up, unsteady on her feet. "We'll go somewhere else, where the bouncers are more reasonable," she declared, swaying from side to side. It felt like the world was spinning around as though she was in the skycar, racing to keep up with Tela Vasir. She could still hear Liara's admonitions that it was a skycar, not a shuttle.
"It's a taxi, it has a fare meter." The words were clear as day.
Still, Rose was sure the Krogans had thrown her out because she was human—not because she was drunk. Stupid racist Krogans. Like they didn't have her to thank for curing the Genophage. This was the thanks she got.
"I was responsible for curing the Genophage!" Rose shouted at the Krogan, "That was me! And Urdnot Wrex made me an honorary Krogan in thanks. "
"I. Don't. Care." The Krogan was really, really starting to piss Rose off. She didn't seem to be getting through to the Krogan, and her hand twitched, reaching for the non-existent gun, ready to shoot him if she had to. Rose realised in that moment that she didn't have a gun on her.
"Rose, no!" A horrified Nellie knew exactly what her sister was thinking, and grabbed her hands. "No."
Her friends converged on Rose, and grabbed her before she could do anything stupid—like punching a Krogan bouncer. Frog marching Commander Shepard, hero of the citadel, conqueror of the collectors made the girls giggle. Rose was giggling too, as they collapsed onto a large bench. Rose slapped some medigel on her arm, hoping it wasn't actually broken, and looked around at her friends.
"I love you guys," she said warmly. Then she winced in pain as her arm moved in a way that it shouldn't have. The medigel seemed to be working slowly. Too slowly, for her liking. "Ouch. My arm."
Nellie immediately activated her omnitool's medical scanner, and took a quick snapshot of the offending limb. It was a bad break, the humerus completely shattered. "You need more than medigel, sis," she told Rose, examining it further with a gentle hand. "It's shattered. You need to go to the hospital."
"Why?" Rose asked pitifully, "Why hospital when you're the best damn surgeon in the navy? Can't you just fix it? I'm really sure they're sick of me at Huerta." She gave Nellie a pitiful, pathetic look, as though someone had just told her that her hamster was dead.
"Do I have to get Nana and Dede involved?" Nellie fixed her sister with a look. "Nana's just gotten home from being debriefed, and Dede's just exhausted from the war you were winning." She looked more like Rose than she ever had at that moment—the same stubborn look in the eyes and the mouth that was just a tiny bit too wide to be considered attractive. Their mouths were set in the same shape, each of them biting their lips and raising an eyebrow. They stared at one another, daring the other to blink. Goading, even.
"No. Hospital." Rose bit out through clenched teeth. "You're the best surgeon I know after Mordin."
"Shepard, please." Samara's voice broke in, "Listen to your sister." Rose and Nellie broke their stares to look at the Asari matriarch. "Do you want your arm to be in a sling for your wedding day?"
"Fine." The stubborn, obstinate tone in her voice meant she was only doing this grudgingly. She supposed it could've been worse—like when the Collectors had spaced her on the old Normandy. Rose didn't like to think about that. Pushed it to the furthest recesses of her mind. "But only if you do the medigel stuff."
"Alright." Nellie couldn't keep the smarmy swarm of pride that burst up inside her out of her voice. For once, her stupid, stubborn, reckless, annoying, and a whole lot of other adjectives sister had actually listened to her. "Let's get a skycar, then."
They made their way to the taxi stand, Nellie and Samantha supporting Rose between them. Rose wasn't an easy patient at the best of times, and drunk Rose was something of a nightmare, always jumping from one topic to the other to the point where she sounded as manic as a Salarian. The drunken rambling and constant squirming forced Liara to put Rose in a stasis hold, if only to contain her. That, at least, had the effect of making the ride to the hospital so much easier.
"I don't need a doctor, or scans," Rose said stubbornly, about thirty minutes later as they waited to be triaged. "There's heaps of people worse off than me. I feel fine."
"Commander Shepard? The doctor will see you now." An Asari medic wearing the familiar form-fitting scrubs with the hospital logo on them called out to Rose.
Rose glanced at her sister with a wounded look. Somehow, every bit of shore leave she ever got ended with those words.
The small chapel was crowded. The two crews of the Normandy, both Cerberus and Alliance sat in pews surrounded on all sides by stained glass windows. Outside, the media stood in attendance, vying for the best position to get shots when the chapel finally opened its doors to reveal the newlyweds.
Inside, the altar was decorated simply, driftwood candelabrum with lit candles—stained glass glowing softly behind it. It was a small, old chapel, that had seen so many weddings and funerals in its life. The wedding it bore witness to now was one that had seemed an impossibility three years ago. Rose had died, and this chapel had been where they had held her memorial, and like some Messianic figure, she had died and returned from death. It was a chapel that was as old as the Citadel itself—reaching back aeons, having seen so many cultures and races born and die. It was a chapel that over time had transformed itself, turning into whatever the current cycle's cultures demanded it to be. Even the Keepers weren't quite sure how that happened, Asari historians and archaeologists had never been able to pinpoint its exact age or origins.
It truly was beautiful today. Not only the outside, but the inside, too. White garlands sat on the edges of the altar, on the ends of the rows of pews. A few men and women sat in the front row, and all eyes turned as the strains of the processional song signalled the arrival of the bride. The women, wearing long peach coloured dresses with floral headdresses stepped forwards. A diverse group of women, from Tali'Zorah vas Normandy to Nellie Nevell and Jack, some looking more out of place than others in their human garb, they had been chosen to escort their friend and sometime commanding officer down the aisle on this beautiful spring morning.
Then Rose came, wearing a long dress that flared at the waist into a ball-gown, with sleeves and a beautiful and unusual strawberry pattern embossed into the fabric. It was soft and made Rose feel like she was the most beautiful woman in all the galaxy. Her hair was pinned up behind her veil, and her bouquet was made from an old romance novel.
When she reached Kaidan, finally, she smiled up at him. "It's finally here," she whispered to him as he gently brushed her veil back, and kissed her cheek.
The ceremony itself was brief, the simple exchange of vows, the assurances of love and fidelity ad infinitum, the signing of the registry. In the twenty second century, not much had changed when it came to the paperwork—the dull and humdrum bureaucracy still existed. Unlike Salarians, who only exchanged breeding contracts, Rose was glad that romance still had its place.
She could remember the proposal.
Ten months ago, before Rannoch.
The soft illumination from the data pads flung carelessly on the table was enough light for Rose to see her way through the dark—stumbling and tripping over her combat boots to the steps, and then up them to the bathroom. She had woken from another nightmare about Akuze. It seemed like Akuze and the horrors of Akuze were never far from her mind—she was tired of the war, tired of being held hostage to her past. Rose stood in front of the mirror and didn't recognise the woman standing there. She saw the tired eyes, the permanent shadows underneath them—she could never sleep for long without the nightmares claiming her. Five, ten minutes, sometimes twenty or thirty. But a full night's sleep was impossible.
Rose turned the tap for the shower and shed her clothes, standing under the water, letting it cascade down her back. She stood there like that, just letting the water wash over her. When the water grew cold, she reached for the towel and wrapped it around her. It had helped, but only just. She hated that she could never find peace, that it was a constant struggle to keep herself from letting the darkness overshadow everything—even the happiest moments were tinged with sadness.
She wished she could believe that she was fighting for the good in the world that was worth fighting for. Rose wished that the war would end, wished she could run away and become a hermit on an uninhabited planet, far, far away from everything and everyone—a hermit living with just her memories. It would be easier to cope with life then. She wanted to live like Yoda, or Obi-Wan Kenobi, a devotee of an ancient and powerful order, cut off from the turmoil of the galaxy. Yet her mind kept pushing a different way of being a hermit: her brain always had Kaidan by her side in these wishes of running away. He was the reason she had kept fighting, kept trying to make the galaxy better. Her breathing slowed down, as she realised she was safe. Safe from the demons that lurked in her mind, at least for the time being.
She went back to bed, back to the warmth of Kaidan's embrace. When she woke the second time, she turned to him, and smiled. "I love you," she said.
It was a rare day that they were both free to do whatever they pleased. They flew to the Citadel, and wound up at a favourite café. It was a small café that they had discovered in the early years of their relationship. Zakera Ward had a vast selection of them, and this place was like an opal: its beauty hidden until the light flashed and showed beautiful colours. Kaidan was excited—he had something special planned for her.
When they settled down on the couch in The Rattling Bog Café, with glasses of sparkling water in front of them, Kaidan kissed Rose.
"I have something for you," he said, coughing to disguise his nervousness. They had discussed marriage, and it was all but official that they would get married, but Kaidan wanted to do this the proper way. The simple rose gold ring with the teardrop shaped pearl sat in his pocket. He drew it out, and took her hand. "Rose Elinor Shepard, will you marry me?" he asked.
"Yes." Rose kissed him. It was all that needed saying.
"Dance me to the children who are asking to be born," the wedding singer crooned, as Rose and Kaidan twirled on the dance floor, oblivious and happily so, to the rest of the world. "Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn…" It was a song they both loved. Old though it was, it spoke to them in a way few new songs did.
The wedding reception passed by in a blur—morphing from the first dance, through to speeches and cake cutting, to the finale where Rose tossed her bouquet, and Kaidan tossed Rose's garter. To their surprise, Nellie and James were the recipients of both. Then they were off in the skycar, empty ammo crates tied to the back with the words just married painted with a Krogan sensibility.
For once, Rose felt happy and peaceful. She leaned her head on Kaidan's shoulder as they were taxied to the apartment.
It was their first night together as man and wife, and both were excited. No sooner had they gotten in the door than Rose's dress came off, and the veil with the fifteen thousand hairpins. Their clothes were strewn in all directions, and they made love that night.
When they woke the next morning, Rose turned to her husband, and kissed him. She felt happy and optimistic for the first time in a long time. She was content.
A/N: Because it's important to the chapter, this is the song.
watch?v=IEVow6kr5nI
