"Oh eat my entire ass, Tuchanka!" it was hard to tell which was louder: Shepard's bellowing or Grunt's ridiculous cackling at the sight of a massive, angry, thresher maw.

"Just like old times, Shepard!" Garrus couldn't help himself but laugh at the situation they were in: a krogan going through puberty by completing some ridiculous rite of passage. And somehow he was lucky enough to be a part of this whole shit show.

"Are you kidding me? We had a Mako then! With CANONS!" she barely yelled the last bit out before she had to roll around one of the structurally unsound pillars within their small fighting arena. The maw spewed a blast of toxic their way, smashing into a crate and disintegrating it with acid.

Garrus motioned to the crate, "Your driving was more dangerous than this mess, trust me!" he yelled over his shoulder before lining the maw up in his crosshairs, firing a shot between what he guessed to be its eyes. A shrieking squirm, and the damn thing was underground again, the whole area shuddering as it moved beneath them.

"Great, now you just made it mad!" she yelled out, still behind cover, as flaming screeching creatures came at them from both sides. "Grunt and I will finish these bastards off, you keep the heat on Big Bertha up there!" and with that, she was off in a whirlwind of blue biotics, Grunt's victorious laughing carrying even over the screeching of the dying creatures. But no matter how accurately Garrus lined up his shots-eyes, head, mouth- the massive maw kept diving back under the earth only to re submerge itself, spitting acid and disintegrating their cover. He knew if this kept up much longer, their cover growing thin, there was very little hope of leaving this place.

"Screw this," Shepard pulled out her new missile launcher from its place on her back, and rolled out of cover as Garrus yelled her name in protest. He felt the hum of her biotics ignite as she barrolled herself towards the thresher maw in the even thinking twice, Garrus was running after her, intent on not repeating their last battle.

Just as she got into a good range and pulled the trigger, the maw reared back to spit out one last blast before succumbing to the final, fatal wound. The missile found its target easily, but Garrus tackled Shepard out of the way before the ball of acid spit made its way to her.

He looked down awkwardly as he saw that he was completely on top of her, arms on either side of her shoulders, his back shielding her from whatever fuckery was being unleashed on this forsaken planet. He was close enough to smell her red hair through her helmet, mint with...well, something was obviously burnt.

"I'm flattered, Vakarian, but this seems hardly the place," Shepard teased as she laughed up at him, but made no room to move out until she smelled the burning as followed her nose, sniffing conspicuously as she arrived at the culprit: she couldn't stop herself from falling to her knees, rolling into a ball, and laughing until tears streamed.

"What is so funn-" he was cut short as a squad of krogan arrived at the arena, threatening to end Grunt's rite a bit early. The situation seemed serious enough to him, but for Spirits only know why, Shepard and Grunt thought it was a great time to make jokes.

"Well I'd hate for us to get burned from this later.." she sneered, turning to Grunt as they stood before the squad.

A deep rolling laughter escaped Grunt, "That'd be a real pain in the ass!"

They both would have doubled over in their laughing had the other krogan not taken it all as an insult and began the attack. Garrus dashed into cover, making his way a bit further back to line up a better shot. It was when he was running when he noticed it: the acid from the maw burned away his armor. Right over his ass.

"Next time I'm letting you get burned!" he bellowed after Shepard, laughing as she charged through an unsuspecting krogan.

When they returned to the disaster of the Urdnot encampment, Wrex nearly fell off his throne when he saw them. "Grunt, you are now of clan Urdnot. May your new clan cause you less shame than these clowns!" he barked at them, slapping his knee.

"'Oh Garrus, you saved me from that giant thresher maw, how can I ever repay you? You were so brave, I wouldn't be here without you!'" he mocked Shepard in his most feminine voice he could muster, only making the rest of them double over even more.

"Let's get back to the ship before Raincloud catches a cold," she said as she motioned back towards it. She assured Wrex they would be back soon, as Mordin had important business on Tuchanka as well.

She had to follow him all the way to the medbay to make sure he actually went, knowing that if he didn't get it looked at that the pain would soon become unbearable. Dr. Chakwas took one glance at the situation and gave a look of you've got to be kidding me before she turned to get some medi gel and bandages, effectively leaving Shepard and Garrus alone, him lying with his chest against the table.

"So...enjoying the view?" he tilted his head in time to see her shake her head, rolling her eyes.

"You know we usually end up in a buttload of trouble but this...this takes the cake," she patted his arm in mock sympathy.

"I don't think I can do any better than that one unfortunately," he turned his head back, looking at the pillow under his mandibles. A show of defeat. "I'm going to have to sit the next one out, aren't I?"

"I'm not sure you'll be doing much sitting anytime soon, but...yeah. I need you at your best. I can't worry about you seducing all the krogans on this planet while I'm trying to get a job done," she winked, so he knew she was teasing but it still hurt knowing he wouldn't be there.

"So then who is going to save your ass?"

"Don't you worry your pretty little head," she stood up, placing a kiss on his forehead.

What the hell did I just do?

She turned and left without a word.

What the hell was that?

Despite his obvious pain in his lower regions, Garrus couldn't stop the heat that was left burning on his brow plates. Did she just...kiss me? He looked at his hands and flexed them to make sure he wasn't dreaming. They seemed real enough...maybe this was real. Maybe she actually shared what he had been feeling well up inside him since seeing her again on Omega. He'd seen vids of this curious human show of affection, this is how they showed affection, right? The way her hair smelled of mint when he wrapped her up in his arms, the way it felt when he ran his fingers through it back on the SR-1. The way he thought of her as his world went black after the missile hit him, wishing for just one more chance with her.

The flirting escalated after that. Soon the dirty jokes lingered in the air a bit longer, sideways glances were caught more often, casual brushes became lingering touches. Inseparable as they were before, now their feelings were unstoppable.