Garrus

Shepard had reached her limit for the conversation; I had already been planning to leave before I smelled blood in the air, and that was the only thing that kept those red marks from haunting me for the rest of the day. The "yes means yes" concept had served me well my entire life, so even though Shepard never specifically asked me to leave, I could read ambivalence in the movement of her hands and the quirk of her mouth.

She wanted this, wanted me. She just wasn't sure of me. Easy enough to resolve, given enough time.

Of course, in war, there was never enough time. We'd already wasted so much.

I took the elevator down to the CIC. As a rule, I'd never spent much time there. I knew where I was useful and the CIC generally wasn't one of those places. It was the best place to find the Primarch, though, and I wanted an update on Palaven.

It was easier to think of the ruin of my entire world than it was to narrow my perspective to just my family. No news meant I could hope a little longer.

Traynor passed me on her way to the elevator, head bent over a pile of datapads, murmuring to herself. Her focus was so singular that she barely noticed when her shoulder collided with mine.

"Excuse me - oh, Officer Vakarian, my apologies!" She seemed to see me for the first time. "Is there anything you need, sir?"

"No. As you were."

Traynor flicked a glance at the ceiling and half-smiled before she could catch herself.

"I, uh, hope you're having a pleasant morning, sir," she said, in a bad attempt to cover herself. "I." She swallowed, throat bobbing, and backed into the elevator. "Thank you, sir." The doors slid shut, though I wouldn't have put it past EDI's new humor subroutines to keep the door open a little longer than necessary.

The Primarch wasn't in the War Room. I hoped he was sleeping, rather than fighting with Wrex, and the lack of shouting from the the makeshift conference room seemed to bear that out. Only a few techs were around, which meant I could check for news on Palaven without anyone hovering.

It also meant that no one noticed the way I doubled over for one brief moment when I read the latest casualty reports. When I was a child, I couldn't fathom a universe with a million people in it. Now I lived in a galaxy where millions died every hour. It was enough to turn your bones to ash, if you let it.

There's an old human vid, from back before First Contact, where one old warrior asks another, What can men do against such reckless hate? It was a question I still struggled with. It was a question I wanted to ask as I watched the flames of Palaven.

The warrior's companion said, Ride out with me.

It was still early in the morning shift, so I stayed in the War Room. My old team was still on Menae, gathering intel on the Reapers' movements and funneling it back to me for dissemination to the turian fleets. Paralus Kovalan, my executive officer, was reporting that the Reapers were massing to hit Scoriae - one of the last cities with a working spaceport. Civilian evacs had to be rerouted, and now I had to coordinate with the krogan - exhausting, meticulous work that required more diplomacy in one message than I thought I'd ever use in my entire life. Every message meant lives saved - and if the krogan were willing to lay down as fodder for the Reapers, then I owed them a little politeness.

A few hours passed, and the War Room gradually filled. The Primarch didn't appear, but I heard rumblings that sounded distinctly like Wrex, coming from the conference room. I kept my head down and kept typing.

A little before the mid-morning shift change, Kaidan came in from the bridge, grumbling to himself. He looked rumpled and sleepless, but he straightened when he saw me.

"Garrus. I didn't think I'd see you here."

I waited for the inevitable joke, but Kaidan, mercifully, avoided it.

"I thought the Commander had taken you with her planetside." My mandibles tightened on reflex, a possessive gesture I tried to control. I didn't like it when Shepard went out without me. No judgment on her abilities - but she took me so often I was used to it. I almost felt entitled - we worked so well together, tech and sniper, strategist and biotic - that even when the situation called for someone else's skills, I didn't feel right if I wasn't there.

No one else was quite so prepared to catch her.

Kaidan was still talking.

"I guess it's just a milk run - some of Tali's buddies in the quarian marines passed on the location of some Prothean tech that might come in useful. And with the our resident Prothean expert being another biotic, there wasn't much chance I'd get to tag along. Tali's the third - I'm surprised she didn't take you along, though."

My brow plates constricted in surprise. Kaidan never struck me as the cagey type, but the sideways grin he threw my way had me rethinking that assumption.

"Hmm, well." I searched for something to say - Kaidan was the last person I wanted to discuss Shepard with - and then something he said came to the surface.

"Wait - you said quarian marines?" Kaidan nodded.

"Why? That important?"

I laughed. "For Tali, very. Did she ever tell you about when we picked her up on Haestrom?"

"Haestrom? Sounds familiar, but -" Kaidan paused, then snickered. "Oh, man. Kal'Reegar wouldn't be one of these marines, would he?"

"I think," I said, as solemnly as I could, "that you could lay money on it, as you humans say."

"No wonder the Commander didn't ask you. Tali would have electrocuted her."

"Or hacked her comms to play nothing but volus mating ballads."

"Oh God." Kaidan shuddered. "Those exist? Remind me to bleach my brain later."

I was already checked out of the conversation. No offense to Kaidan, but as soon as I said the word comms, an idea - a wicked, terrible idea, one that would probably have Shepard peeling off my plates one by one - started to form.

"So xenophobic," I sighed at him, already pulling up the ground squad comm channel. Liara and Tali would overhear - but so much the better.

It took a minute to connect, and then Shepard's voice crackled over the comm.

"Garrus. Miss me?" She sounded bored; Spirits only knew how long Liara would spend running her hands over whatever tech the marines had discovered before she started actually assessing what had been found, and I could imagine all too clearly Tali and Kal trying very hard not to flirt with each other. It was a wonder Shepard hadn't started shooting things just for something to do.

"Oh, terribly." I let a purr into my voice, just enough to be heard over the comms. "No one to barge in on half-naked up here." Kaidan made a strangled sound and tried to look very interested in a blank datapad. "Well, except for Kaidan, but I don't think he'll be quite as receptive as you were."

Shepard laughed, a little hesitantly. "Well, we can't all have my poise and adaptability."

"Adaptability I'll agree with, but your poise is arguable."

"Vakarian, do you really want to start this old argument again?"

"You mocked my calibrations, Shepard. Your dancing is fair game."

"If you can call it dancing," chimed in Tali. "Most species call it a seizure."

"This is mutiny. If I spaced all of you," said Shepard, "no court in the galaxy would convict me."

"I'm trembling with terror, Shepard."

She growled at me. "I will make you pay for this, Garrus."

"Promise?" This time, I let the purr drop to a rumble. There was a pause on the other end of the comms, like Liara and Tali were holding their breath. Shepard didn't respond, but with the safety of distance, I knew I could push her farther than I had this morning.

"So, Shepard."

"So, Garrus."

"What are you wearing?"

I heard a gasp, and a startled cough that could only have come from Liara.

"My armor, big guy," crackled Shepard's voice, bright and husky. "Any other smart questions?"

I grinned. "Yeah, a few. What about underneath?"

Shepard

Garrus may have lost his mind.

What the hell is he thinking? Does he know people are listening? Did he hit his head recently?

Wherever Garrus' mind had gotten off to, mine wasn't far behind, because I was staring up at the sky with what felt like an all-galaxy champion stupid grin on my face.

Meanwhile, twelve quarian marines and one quarian tech were trying not to look at me. Liara fussed with her omni-tool and did a bad job of hiding a smile. A very familiar smile.

"You know what's under my armor, Garrus," I said, trying to school my face back into normal lines. Liara went very still, and Tali suddenly had to show the marines something on the other side of the dig site. My friends were all assholes.

"I've made several educated guesses, but I don't want to base my hypothesis on shoddy methodology. Humor me." That flanging note was back, tinny as his voice was over the comms.

Goddamn him. Goddamn him to hell, was this flirting?

If it wasn't flirting, I was about to make myself look like an idiot. But after six months of what-if'ing myself to sleep, looking like an idiot wasn't much to risk.

"Well, if it's for science, Garrus, I think I can present you with my findings."

"I'm breathless with anticipation."

Coming from anyone else, that line would have sounded like a hideously overwrought come-on. From Garrus - and God, I hoped this was flirting - it was like honey, warm and sunbrowned and almost too sweet on the tongue.

I waited, long enough to hear his impatient huff. "Don't keep science waiting, Shepard."

Not smiling now was impossible. "Sorry, fact-checking. Sad news: just a plain old black undersuit."

A gusty sigh filtered over the comms. "How old? It might have some archaeological appeal."

"Old enough to have started to wear out in...places." Jesus Christ, I needed to shut my mouth. "I'll switch it out for a new one next mission."

"Don't get rid of it," Garrus rumbled. His voice sounded like it was right in my ear - I half-expected to feel his breath against my skin. "It's an artifact. It's significant."

Oh God. Oh God. I must have hit my head in the past twenty minutes, because that was the only possible explanation for letting this conversation go on as long as it had. Garrus didn't flirt. Not with me.

"Well, posterity will have to survive without it. It's been cute, Garrus, but don't you have work to do?"

There was a pause on Garrus' end, and another gusty sigh. "Right. Because I'm in a great place to optimize firing algorithms right now."

"Saying goodbye now, Garrus." I closed the channel before I could embarrass myself more, only to look up and see Liara gaping at me, thunderstruck.

"Almost finished?" I asked, in my best say-anything-and-I-will-drown-you-in-acid voice. She shut her mouth and nodded.

"I've been finished for five minutes," she said. "We can head back to the Normandy whenever Tali is ready."

"You've been finished? Why didn't you say so?" Liara gave me a supremely unimpressed look.

"Why do you insist on asking stupid questions?" she asked.

Garrus

I was still smiling stupidly at the comm, even after Shepard disconnected.

"You know," said the Primarch from behind me, "as amusing as this is to watch, I have to wonder. If she put half as much effort into the war as she is into being willfully ignorant, would we have already won?"

"Primarch," I said, without turning. Kaidan echoed me.

"It's an honest query, Garrus."

"But not a serious one."

"Oh, far be it from me to have a frivolous query. I forgot there was a war on."