Disclaimer: Chapter one.
"Shepard," Kasumi's voice chimed over the comm. Garrus almost shot up in surprise, suddenly hearing the familiar tone from nowhere, but managed to reign it in.
She continued, "The auction hall has opened. Bids are starting on the first half of the show, but our item isn't until the second half. I need you to get in there and give me a run-down of events while I work. There are people coming in and out of here and I need to know when they're going back into here while I crack this."
The commander made a soft hum in acknowledgement and rose to leave, taking Garrus with her. The party crooned a little, displeased that they seemed to be leaving so soon, but one of them saw the time and squawked out that they needed to find some seats for themselves. She collected a displeased-looking Grunt and, with a little nudging by Garrus, Shepard was able to find an empty balcony seat above the auction stage.
"Grunt, you go ahead and look imposing at the entrance of the balcony. Garrus and I will keep watch over the event for now." When she strode out, they found that even though they were alone in this particular balcony, they didn't get much additional of a feeling of privacy. There were various occupied ones nearby, including one populated by many of the people from the table earlier. They recognized Alison and waved at her. She made a wave back and walked towards the back again.
"Kasumi, I'm about to go into silence right now; I'm too conspicuous to keep you up to date by voice, but I can send you updates via omni-tool."
"No good," Kasumi said back, "I can't pull up my omni-tool while I'm sneaking, Shepard. A bright, orange interface is going to get noticed immediately."
"You don't even have a simple text-to-voice VI?"
"I didn't exactly think I needed one, and its not like I can download one right now. Look, I'm sure it won't blow your cover if your talking to your slave while you look at the stage."
"Actually," Garrus broke in lowly, "once we walk back out into the open, it's likely Alison will be watched, out of curiosity if nothing else. Our covers are still too conspicuous, Kasumi; if Shepard goes out there and starts reporting events, someone will eventually notice the behavior and we very well might find ourselves in a fight before we intended one."
"Oh, well... Ah! Can't you talk without looking like you're talking, Shepard?"
"Huh?
"Well, I've been to a couple underground auctions, and ones like these sometimes have people having a little too much fun with their human trafficking products until the good stuff comes out. That'll let you be as vocal as you want and still keep an eye on things, right?"
Shepard's face turned white, and Garrus felt like how she looked. "Uh..."
"I don't mean anything big. You could have Garrus pretend he's going down on you; that's easy enough to fake. Then, instead of abusing your adorable turian officer, you're could keep me up to date."
Shepard groaned and strode out again with Garrus. "How the hell do you get such insane ideas?"
"I might have had some interesting casings with Keiji. Besides, you two would be cute together."
What does that mean? he thought, but didn't dare say a thing as he followed his commander out. She turned to him, frowning.
"You don't have to do anything you don't want to," she reminded him. "You already got drugged more-or-less against your will."
He shook his head. "I told you you don't have to worry about making me uncomfortable. Besides, this is much better than making believe I hate you. How about you, though? I mean, your about to have some strange man's face centimeters from your privates for a mission."
"You're not a 'strange man', Garrus. But I would understand it if you didn't want to be sniffing at a human's genitals for an indeterminate period of time."
"Did you forget I've been in the turian military for several years? There's no way that could be any worse than sleeping in the barracks with the other young soldiers. It stank of stale sex and the sewage was always breaking."
She laughed, taking the hint, and took a moment to figure out how to best situate herself to look over the area. The decision settled on leaning over the ledge just slightly, oh-so causually, with her ass hitched enough to give her spine a curve. When she widened her legs a little to give him room to scoot in, he thought he'd faint.
As soon as he slid into position behind her, she started talking, "Okay, Kasumi. We're in position. They're showcasing a Phalanx with some illegal mods on it right now, but haven't started betting yet."
"Good. Let me know when the betting starts, when it ends, when they go off stage to get another item, and when they come back. I'll be silent until I'm done, here."
"Understood," Shepard said in her usual commander's voice. Garrus almost wanted to laugh. She was still the absolute professional even with a turian looking up her skirt.
And what a sight it was up her skirt. Her smooth, soft flesh begged to be touched, and he allowed himself to indulge that just a little bit, because why wouldn't he be gripping her hips a little as he worked? She jerked a bit, but continued with that same even voice as she continued noting details about the auction, the people, and the room itself. Grunt was also on the line, Garrus realized, and Shepard most likely figured that the most amount of information available to everyone about the situation, the better.
But it was a little difficult to focus on that for him when she smelled so... delicious. Not like a turian woman, to be sure, but did all humans smell this appealing? Or was it just Shepard? Her panties looked a little damp, and he remembered hearing about wetness for human women being a sign of arousal. Spirits, if she honestly was aroused by him...
He kept focused on her voice. If he can keep track of what she's saying, he's not distracted. "Another group has just come in from the lobby and they're going towards the front," she said, "They look pretty sloshed. No wonder there's so much substance thrown around; I bet the people running this show love it when the bidders are too drunk to realize how much money they're slapping each other with."
Shepard sounded pretty on top of it. He leaned his neck froward just slightly and nuzzled into the flesh of her thigh before he could stop himself. Her voice hitched a little and her legs jerked, but she kept on, so—hell—so did he.
He kept nuzzling the backs of her legs and slowly dipped between them, taking care to avoid that center that was so barred off from him with wet fabric. Her scent was fantastic, her legs felt like silk and muscle underneath his plates, and her words as she spoke were getting this lower drawl to them that lit him on fire. Some of her words ended a little too slowly, a little too seductively, but she was still going, and, damnit, he wanted to hear more. Could anyone deny how much of a fucking turn on it was to have Commander Shepard like this?
His tongue slipped out and tasted her thighs experimentally. Salty. Musky. She made a tiny gasp and that was all his control could bear. He laid into the flesh of her thigh, nuzzling, licking, nibbling, slowly moving closer and closer to her center before he'd switch to the other to do the same. Every time, he got a little nearer.
Shepard's voice was all over the place. Details of the auction were spat out through gritted teeth and sung through these beautiful whines he wanted to hear more of. Her thighs quaked about his head in need. Her scent deepened and the cloth above her private place was almost translucent with wetness. And slowly he inched towards his goal. He was almost there, about to scratch the fabric with his teeth, when she kicked away to get control of herself.
Almost against his own will, he responded with a vicious growl and grabbed her hips roughly, pulling her back into him. A hand pulled the underwear to the side with enough force that his gloved talons still tore a hole in them, and his tongue plunged into her.
"Ah! Fuck!" There was a strange bang in front of Shepard, and a creak as her hands gripped the side of the balcony too hard.
"Shepard!" Grunt's voice came over the comm. "Is there an attack?"
"No, there isn't an attack. I just, ah, slipped. Stay in your position," she hissed out between her own little growls and whimpers. She tried to get herself out of Garrus's grasp again, but he gripped harder and kept ruthlessly fucking her with his thick tongue like she was his first meal in weeks. After that, he'd admit he wasn't even keeping track of the report, anymore.
Until her hips wrenched out of his hands and her fist connected with his jaw. He flew back from her with as much shock as force.
In a second, she was on him, her face in his and pulling his cowl in a threatening manner, and he focused immediately on the large, red welt where she hit her head on the rails. "Kasumi is on the move, so we need to get to it as well. She left our equipment in a maintenance closet on this level." Her voice was all business. That shouldn't scare him, but it did.
He nodded, because there was no way he was going to be able to speak. As they exited the balcony, he heard a few cat-calls from the other balconies. Apparently, they had gained a little bit of an audience.
"Aw, she's going to give his punishment in private. Too bad!" one of them cried out.
Garrus shook his head. They didn't know the half of it.
Shepard collected Grunt and silently dragged Garrus to said maintenance closet. She gained entrance quickly; apparently the janitor's employer did these sorts of parties often enough to know the need of taking one's slave away from the general public when they beat them. Shepard nearly shoved him in and closed the door behind them.
He started apologizing immediately. "Shepard, I'm sorry, I don't know what-"
"I almost couldn't talk when someone went back towards Kasumi's position. She almost got caught because of what happened out there." She nearly ripped off the dress, but Garrus felt so mortified that he couldn't even pay attention to her lacy undergarments or her exposed waist. She sighed and ran a hand through her hair before she started to pulling on her underarmor. "I shouldn't have let you get drugged."
He didn't know what to say to that. He couldn't say anything to that. He jeopardized the mission because of what he did. If Shepard hadn't been more professional than he was, the whole thing would have fallen through and one of their squad would be in a compromised situation. Drug or no drug, he didn't have an excuse. He put on his visor and checked over his guns, but what she said next made his blood run cold.
"Maybe I shouldn't bring you on the next few missions."
His head shot up, and he realized that his heart broke before he knew it could even happen. "It won't happen again," he pleaded, but she was turned away as she snapped on her ceramic plate "I'll report for latrine duty and whatever else once we return to the ship." Anything.
"Better safe than sorry," her voice sounded like a death toll. That was that.
In a different universe, he might have looked at her hips as she bent over to secure her greaves and tell her how much he'd like to take her in this godforsaken closet if it weren't for the press in time. Maybe she would have blushed and told him that if he could wait a bit, her cabin would be more accommodating once they get back. But in there here and now, all it did was remind him of his humiliation, and he looked away. Or maybe I would have jumped on her like a fucking animal.
She was enjoying it! a part of his brain pointed out, and he put that voice down like it was a traitor. Shepard had to punch him to get him off. He endangered Kasumi and was grounded from combat missions as a result. If Shepard wanted to throw him off the Normandy after this mission was over, he wouldn't be in a position to complain.
He wanted to say something, to make this right, but his mind was a blank. He merely followed her and Grunt as Kasumi prattled on her current coordinates. Everything was moving quickly, now. They hardly were in the hallway before barreling through and into a new area that looked to be a cargo hold of sorts. There was plenty of cover, plenty of hiding places, and every chance for an ambush.
The man running the whole show outside was there, and though he didn't recognize her when she was Alison Gunn, he knew Commander Shepard, dead or not, from the armor. "Well, well, well, a dead Spectre and a dangerous mercenary that nearly took Omega to it's knees. Why am I not surprised that the two of you joined up?"
"Just give up the prothean artifact, and you get to walk out of this alive," Shepard said, and for her, that was a very kind ultimatum.
"I don't think so," he said, then started to retreat, "You should have kept with your little exhibition outside! Kill them all!"
"They never take the easy route," Grunt said, and probably with a little too much krogan glee to it. They all rolled into cover and Shepard started yelling out orders.
The combat was typical. He watched Shepard's six. He would snipe a few and switched to assault when Shepard needed more press for a flank. Adrenaline was pumping, marks were falling with each raise of his scope, and he was feeling good. He could have forgotten the entire fiasco before.
Shepard's shields failed and a slug snagged her shoulder. She went into cover while her upgrades worked on it, then ran in the crouch to get to the shooter. Turns out that the owner had a pistol of his own... That Phalanx that Shepard had described earlier from the auction.
"Too bad you left to fuck your little Archangel before you saw my new guard dogs." Garrus heard a bulkhead slide open somewhere, and the growls of varren jumped to his ears. Shepard cursed and some crates banged around.
"Damnit," he flung his sniper back and pulled out his assault again. She nor the animals were in sight of him.
"If you give up, I'll call them off!" The enemy called over the carnage. "The way you scream, I bet vids of you would go for a few creds!"
Garrus's head shot back towards him. His eyes focused on the man's gleaming teeth in his smile.
He blacked out.
His eyes focused on Shepard's face as she applied medigel to something that really stung his abdomen.
"What..." he tried to get up, but her hands pushed him back. He could see a varren corpse with its head lolled in an unnatural angle behind her.
"Let it seal, first. It's not..." Burning pain shot through him and he was out again.
