"Well, that's really lovely, Commander."
Chakwas took a brief glance at her bared arm and then went to scrub up.
"Yeah, I got it done just for you." Shepard responded with as much dry humor as she could wrangle. For a bullet wound that was only a graze, the spot on her arm was killing her.
"Well, that's got to be a one-in-a-million shot." The doctor continued speaking as she casually gathered a surgery kit and a syringe, dressings and gauze. "No major damage, and still through the one soft spot in the arm of your hardsuit. Very lucky, Commander."
"Then why does it hurt so bad?" Chakwas set down her supplies at the small table next to Shepard's exam table and picked up her arm again.
"See this lovely little bit of green plastic sticking out? As I said, one-in-a-million. That's your birth control implant."
"I thought it was in the other arm." Shepard muttered.
"Mmmm. I'm definitely looking at a standard implant here." Chakwas felt her other arm and nodded again. "I don't feel anything on your right side. Implants on the left. We'll want to make sure you get a fresh one while I have you numbed up."
"Alright."
"Now lay down. This will be easier to get to with your arm over your head." Shepard obeyed, and then felt the sting of the syringe loaded with the numbing agent.
"You've got some shrapnel that I can see too, so I'll be extra nice today, and let you finish numbing up before I start pulling it out." Shepard laughed slightly.
"It feels better already, actually." She sat back up and started unlatching the bottom half of her armor suit, peeling herself out of it and laying it over a chair at the end of the room. The black bodysuit underneath had been peeled down to her waist to access the bullet wound on her arm, and she left it where it was.
"The damaged implant is probably making it hurt more than it would otherwise. Looks like its splintered." The doctor stepped back over. "Ready?"
Shepard couldn't feel a thing as her doctor pulled several pieces of metal and plastic out of the gash in her arm. The light tinkling sounds as the shrapnel landed in a small dish one after the other brought her out of a light trance. The day anyone got hurt on her team she took it as personally as possible—reviewing the mission in as many ways as possible, reevaluating her strategies, the training and regular drills she insisted on to keep everyone sharp—but she couldn't get the look in Garrus' eyes out of her head as she was shot.
He had drug her into cover, trying to check her over again, but she had adamantly shoved him away. She had felt the recoil of the bullet, but no pain, and assumed it had simply bounced off the kinetic plating over her arm. She had pushed on, slightly annoyed at how he then stayed glued to her ass, taking out the mercs ahead of her before she could even get a bead on them. Of course, once her arm had started aching, she had fallen back to his side and let him take every headshot he could manage. She provided as much cover fire as she could but had relied on her omni-tool and its overload and sabotage. She couldn't lift her left arm, because every time she did it felt less like a graze and more like a bullet to the bone as the hardsuit panel drug over the wound.
When they cleared the base, Garrus had radioed Joker, and advised that they needed extraction, and that Shepard was wounded. She had looked at him with incredulity.
"You know, my omni-tool is working fine." She fixed him with the harshest stare she could manage and he frowned back down at her, blue eyes flicking between hers and where she held her wounded left arm close to her chest. His mandibles kept twitching outward and as she glanced at the points of his teeth she had wondered if it was some display of dominance… or what, until Wrex had laughed.
"Get a room." He had dismissed them and stalked off to the Normandy's landing point. Garrus seemed to take a breath, and almost deflate. His head dropped and his face and arms relaxed.
"Let me help." He said quietly. "You brought me to help you, let me help."
She shook her head. She didn't know how to respond. This was too... close.
"I guess you already did." She said as quietly back. She wasn't happy about it. She didn't like the way he was making himself personally responsible for her. She didn't need it, she'd never needed it before, and things with him suddenly seemed complicated. She didn't know how to ask him to just crack jokes with her when everything was okay, or maybe shoot the shit together over beers when neither of them could sleep.
But the hum of Joker bringing her ship down through the sky broke her thoughts, and she grabbed him by the arm and followed after Wrex.
"Come on." When she realized that she had taken him by the hand as they walked up towards the medbay, she stood in the elevator staring at their hands—they fit together oddly.
He had bullied her into the elevator and up to Chakwas' medbay and she had protested only verbally until the doc had eyed the blood dripping down her side.
"I think she's dying, Doc." He said dryly. Shepard lightly shoved him. That was more along the lines of what she was comfortable with. That frustrated concern in his eyes before made her feel guilty for something she couldn't... didn't want to think about.
"Thank you for being a mother hen, Garrus." She knew he wouldn't quite catch the veiled barb at him, but said it mainly for Chakwas' benefit, and the doctor chuckled quietly as she reached for the clasps to the top of her armor suit and began peeling away to find where the blood was coming from.
"A what?" He asked.
"Later, Mr. Vakarian." Chakwas had said.
Now, the doctor was wrapping her arm up with a roll of white gauze and humming quietly to herself.
"Done already?"
"I thought you were asleep." She said quietly. "You're going to have some bruising, I had to add a few stitches to the wound, but you should be fine with some minor scarring. Let me redress it tomorrow and I'll check the wound for infection. Oh, and the new implant is about four centimeters away from the old one. Since we got this one in the same day there shouldn't be any problems with your coverage." Shepard laughed.
"Not like it gets much use anyways." She said.
"Oh?" Chakwas turned away from where she was stowing her tools in a small autoclave. "I had assumed at least one of your admirers was successful."
"My what?" Shepard shook her head and stood up. "No, no, Alenko seems to be… hoping for more than I can reciprocate."
"Fair enough, but what about your teammate? I've never seen you go anywhere without him."
"Wrex?" Shepard asked, hoping to deflect. She wished she had a shirt on so she could just duck out of the medbay.
"Commander, coy does not suit you." Chakwas' tone was accusing.
"Are you counseling now, too, Doctor?" Shepard said, searching for a shirt, hospital robe, anything. She heard the doctor sigh and watched the older woman turn around, an Alliance issue sweatshirt in hand. She came over and provided some assistance in pulling it over her bandage.
"When I have to, yes. He likes you, very much. And I can tell you like him too. Why not give each other a chance for more?" The good doctor's face was close, her gaze steady.
"Because…" when I think about what could go wrong, I'm too scared… "People are so much safer when you keep them at arm's length."
"Oh, absolutely!" The doctor agreed. "But so much less gratifying."
The door hissed open, and the Chakwas' face flipped into a grin.
"Well, speak of the devil!" Oh no. "Mr. Vakarian, why don't you make sure our good Commander gets something to eat tonight?"
"I… Okay." He responded slowly, eyeing the doctor suspiciously. Then he turned to Shepard. "There's actually a message that came in for you. Joker asked me to grab you."
"Excellent! Now go, get out of my medbay." She walked Shepard to the door, and she couldn't hold back a laugh.
"What am I missing?" Garrus asked Shepard quietly.
"Oh, just the cat eating the canary." She responded, jabbing a thumb in the doctor's direction.
"Well that explains it." He said dryly, shaking his head.
"Think about what I said!" Chakwas called through the closing door.
"You know," Garrus said slowly, his voice purring suddenly with the light hearted tone she was used to hearing from him, "Someday you're going to have to explain all of these things you humans say."
"Okay, someday, Garrus."
"Good. I'm holding you to that." He led her around the stairs. "Joker said the message was coded urgent, so that first, and then food." She nodded. "Since I'm under orders."
"Yes sir." She smiled and beat him to the stairs.
After hearing Kahoku's message, however, her nerves were on edge, and she directed Joker to immediately set a course for Binthu. She would clean out those Cerberus bases, and with any luck, the Admiral would still be there, alive.
She turned away from the galaxy map as it flickered back into view. Garrus stood behind her. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he leaned against the CIC railing, conspicuously casual. He reminded her of a cat when he did that.
"So… Cerberus." He obviously wanted her opinions.
"They're terrorists." She spat.
"But they're for humanity." He was prodding. Why was he prodding?
"They take advantage of people. Humans, the weak, everyone. They're ruthless and misguided. They're just well trained mercenaries."
"The turian government would denounce them, too. They're too divisive. Too radical. Sometimes diplomacy and cooperation work better."
"Catch more flies with honey than vinegar." She agreed. She suddenly felt very tired. She needed some food. He nodded.
"Your human sayings again… but I guess I'm glad we agree on that." They both smiled at each other. She realized she was staring at him when her stomach grumbled again.
"Yeah." She turned back to the stairs to the crew deck. The mess was calling her name. "Come on. I need a beer. And I want a cheeseburger, but I'll settle for rations packets. You in?" She asked.
"As if you really need to ask anymore." He responded.