Two more days.

Kaidan Alenko had two more days in Piccadilly Memorial Field Hospital as a downgraded inpatient.

'You've done well, Major,' his new Salarian doctor said. 'You've done incredibly well.'

Kaidan closed his eyes.

The bruised flesh surrounding them had faded in the past few weeks, visible progress Steve brought a mirror to help him track. The first time Kaidan saw his own reflection, swollen lips cracked and dark, eyes unexpectedly bright in the middle of so much jacked up flesh, he didn't drop the mirror. The glass didn't break. There were no seven years of bad luck because all Kaidan did was hold onto the thing tighter and say, 'I knew you were just trying to be polite about how I looked, Cortez.'

'Steve,' he said. 'You know, Vega's got this nickname system—maybe he's smarter than he looks, at least about that. Figuring out what to call people without having to worry if you're being too friendly or not friendly enough… Sounds to me like he's onto something.'

'You're not being too friendly,' Kaidan said. '…Steve.' His mouth moved with the words. He watched them come out in a backward shape and listened to them as they sounded all right. 'All the nicknames I've had… Well, they weren't always ones I wanted to have, ones I was proud to call mine.'

'Biotic stuff?' Steve asked.

'No,' Kaidan replied. 'Vancouver stuff. Didn't you hear? We're too nice to be soldiers that side of the old border.'

He managed a chuckle. Steve put the mirror away. Then it was time for a checkup so Steve left, and Kaidan looked forward to that with a headache that started right behind his eyes. Anxiety caused them. Stress headaches. When situations were tough or when he was anticipating something unpleasant they always started up again. The inside of him was more predictable than anything going on outside.

Too bad it had to be so unpleasant.

Kaidan was just waiting for the day they came for him. Old soldiers who'd worked their way up in the ranks always talked with the same kind of voice, and even when it pitched itself loud to be heard over chaos or quiet to be shared as classified intelligence, it was still the same kind of voice. He'd asked himself once, would he sound like that someday when he was older?

Would Shepard…

But they were going to want to know what Kaidan knew. They were going to have to debrief him. They had to know about him already and they were coming to catch up, to keep tabs, to touch base; they'd be there with matching shoulders and mended uniforms, probably after a routine checkup, when Kaidan was finally cleared. When they knew he wouldn't stall out like the Mako or just plain fold like a house of cards.

Major Alenko.

You're going to have to forgive me if I don't salute, Kaidan practiced by thinking, lips moving, as Salarian fingers rolled up the back of his gown and checked in with his broken ribs, the lacerations and the swellings and the edema. My saluting arm's still feeling a little stiff, but other than that, I hear I'm doing pretty good.

Two more days. He wasn't even in intensive anymore. If they were coming for answers, they were taking their time.

Or they weren't coming at all.

Or they already knew there was nothing to come for.

…Or somebody was keeping them off Kaidan's back.

'Heart rate elevated,' the Salarian said. 'Major Alenko, are you experiencing any acute physical discomfort at the present time?'

'No,' Kaidan said. 'I'm good. I'm doing pretty good.'

He didn't need a mirror to know how ridiculous that looked coming out of his face the way it looked, even now, what took its sweet time to heal. When he rested his head against the pillow it didn't ever really stop hurting, a thrum between his ears and under his cheekbones, and if he ever drifted off without realizing, shifting always woke him up again, the bruises aching down to the bones beneath. It wasn't in his blood anymore. It was somewhere a whole lot deeper.

But that was pain you couldn't quantify, nothing a Salarian volunteer could mark down on his charts with a tut and a hm that sounded melodic, even it was only almost.

'Cough now,' the Salarian said.

Kaidan obliged.

His ribs didn't hurt as much anymore; neither did his lungs. He could take breaths that actually meant something without feeling like bone was piercing muscle and other vital tissues; the Salarian seemed to think it was an improvement, anyway. Doctors and nurses got the same look when they were marking down something like progress, good and also when they weren't.

Kaidan didn't roll the gown back down. The Salarian did that for him. He thought about exercises, PT, atrophy, the walks he took around the Field Hospital with Steve, and everybody who wasn't coming to visit him.

'Major Alenko.' The Asari nurse—James Vega's Asari nurse, apparently—took the clipboard from her Salarian friend. 'There's somebody here to visit you.'

Kaidan blinked. He thought he could hear a humming in his ears, but in the end, it was just ambient noise, an old memory, everything narrowing to focus on the present, and an echo he hadn't expected. It sounded familiar, like déjà-vu.

Or like déjà-vu all over again.

He'd been here before. He'd done it already. He'd grieved and moved on and moved up and then, everything…

It still mattered, but he couldn't let it matter right now.

'Sure,' Kaidan said. 'I mean, thanks. Send them in.'

Major Alenko. He braced himself. He could guess what the Salarian would have to say about his heartrate now, but it wasn't physical pain that brought on the sudden shift.

'Her, actually.' Kaidan squinted but he didn't have to; it was Diana Allers, that reporter from the Normandy, and she was looking good. Even back then, in the final hours, she still looked good—composed, like somebody broadcasting should, sending a message to everyone who was still watching. I've got the time to comb my hair, so we're gonna be okay. 'I heard you were here. Had to see it for myself, though. That's just how reporters are, you know?'

'If you say so.' Kaidan watched her track her way to the stand next to his cot, working her angle. She had to be after something specific. 'It's not my thing—not personally, anyway.'

'You soldiers. You're pretty much all alike,' Allers said, then sighed. 'You always think I'm not talking business when I am, or that I am talking business when I'm not. And don't get me started on the flirting. Look—you don't have to worry, all right? I'm not here for the big scoop. There aren't any broadcasts going out right now, anyway. I've got a show, and we do this daily printing… Just to keep everybody informed. Lots of leg-work, mostly. I'm surprised I still have feet and I swear, I've never been in such great shape in my life. Don't look so eager to agree with me about that, by the way.'

'I can tell,' Kaidan said, delayed but still mostly on cue. 'It's really working for you.'

'Thanks.' Allers glanced up and grinned, tight but real. 'You can tell I'm not here for an interview or the inside scoop because I'm the one doing all the talking. Breaking the first rule of reporting and everything.'

'Right,' Kaidan said.

'Honestly, I'm trying to be a good person. I…just thought maybe you wouldn't mind asking a so-called 'objective' source any questions you had.' Allers had sharp eyes; Kaidan hadn't noticed them before because honestly, he hadn't been looking. He squinted again, not at anything in front of him now, mostly at what wasn't there anymore. He wasn't surprised when nothing seemed real, then blinked dizzy white stars out of his eyes. 'So… Any questions?'

'Nothing I can think of at the moment,' Kaidan said.

Allers shook her head and shrugged. 'Somehow, I figured you'd say that. Well, it's free of charge no matter what, OK? And the offer still stands. I was just passing through. Besides…' Allers licked her lower lip, sucked it in, folded her arms, easy action on top of sore muscles. Kaidan knew. He lived it; he could tell. '…I don't know. I guess I have to see things for myself or else I figure somebody's trying to sell me something that isn't real. You take care of yourself, all right?'

'Not exactly something I've been good at in the past,' Kaidan said. '…But I'll see what I can do.'

'Since I asked so nicely,' Allers replied. 'Honestly, if you don't, I can think of way too many people who wouldn't be able to handle it. The big, tough guys especially.'

She meant Vega. 'I know a couple of those,' Kaidan said.

'They need all the help they can get.' Allers dropped a pamphlet on Kaidan's bed. 'Check it out. It's got some good stuff in it—and I'm not just saying that because I wrote most of it myself.'

'Thanks,' Kaidan said.

'For what?' Allers asked.

She didn't ask for anything else; she was already long gone, only passing through. Kaidan stared down at the articles in front of him, narrow print columns about natural resources running low and local refugee experiences and some breaking news about riots and looting in New York, the hopeful folded into the despairing. There wasn't anything about Canada; Kaidan didn't know why he'd thought about it in the first place. Vancouver. Home, kind of. A big picture window and a deck and a breeze and a young kid who had no idea what he was in for.

It passed through too—like that breeze or like Allers or like all the information he still wasn't processing. And he never learned the end of pretty much all the items in the bulletin. His eyes kept stopping whenever they mentioned two words, a rank and a name, a whole lot more important than Major Alenko. Whenever Kaidan got to that while he was reading, he skipped to the next article, until finally he'd run out of words to skim and words to ignore and there was nothing left but a piece of paper in his lap.

Two days later, he was released. Steve was there and Vega too, only the second time he'd shown up.

Kaidan took his first few steps out of Piccadilly, leaving old news behind.