The blow to her face made Shepard's senses reel. She didn't feel any one area of discomfort by this point—though if she had to think about it, the kidney shot was probably the worst one. It was all a diffuse haze of pain that seemed to penetrate to her very cells.
And for every blow she landed, she rubbed her knuckles or elbow against Garrus' carapace. It might not be 'natural armor' but it was rough; rough enough to make her wonder how turians and 'soft' species ever…
Another blow to the face broke off her vague curiosity about cross-species relations. She hadn't taken a beating this bad since the days when Iron Mike Yamada, in all his martial supremacy, ruled his green recruits with a duarasteel fist and kept them under his mild-mannered steel-toed boot.
She blocked Garrus' next blow, took one to the chest, almost under her breastbone. It knocked the wind out of her, and the next instance she found herself on the floor, unsure of what kind of strike Garrus had used but completely convinced of its effectiveness.
He'd put her on the floor. Things weren't going well.
Dodging him hadn't worked. Ducking around him hadn't worked. Irritation and frustration both slowly receded, exposing the blankness of soul that had persisted since Aratoht.
Punches didn't seem to faze him, and by this point she was hitting him as hard as she could. He was never in range when she tried to kick at him; turian speed and a nimbleness she hadn't expected put him out of reach before she could do more than plant her anchor foot and take the weight off her kicking foot.
He had a way of positioning his arm (or, on occasion, turning his head) as she struck out open-palmed that ended with her skin sliding the wrong way against his carapace. By now her right hand had two or three patches that seeped blood.
He hadn't been lying when he said he was good at hand-to-hand. She simply hadn't appreciated what that meant in comparison with how an N was trained. She had not expected unrivalled superiority (in fact, she tried to avoid fistfights where possible), but she had not expected him to be so…effective.
She took another blow to the face which sent her back to the ground. It was harder to get up this time. Her arms shook as she put her weight on them, the muscles in her midriff began to protest. Her head ached, ringing like a bell, her senses rattled.
As soon as she was up, he caught her in a flurry of blows. For every one she managed to block, another landed elsewhere—and Garrus was not holding back in how hard he applied the blows, either.
She was on the ground again, muscles shaking. There was something happening in her mind—or maybe in her psyche—a kind of tremor like an ocean receding before a tsunami struck.
She got up again, but this time he let her have a moment to get her footing, to assemble some sort of balance before he put her back on the ground again. It was so frustrating, to be allowed to get up and then be put down as if it were nothing at all…
Down.
She got up.
She was back on the floor. The metal was cold beneath her cheek, soothing even. She found her throat constricting, her whole body trembling. She tried to get up, managed to get to her elbows before a turian foot descended, putting her flat on the floor. She shouted—it might have been 'get off' but it might have been more profane—but it did her no good.
The kick that followed, a kick that stopped just short of breaking her ribs, did it.
She broke, flew apart in all directions.
She lost track of herself, didn't realize that the grating, anguished screams came from her own mouth, torn from her own throat, born of remorse, grief, and guilt. She couldn't understand that her inability to breathe properly came from wracking sobs that shook her from head to foot. She couldn't explain why she felt drenched in water, when it was, in fact, sweat and tears—tears that gushed from a reservoir that might seem to an outsider to be without bottom. It disgorged its accumulated contents freely, with abandon, venting as much of the unshed poison as possible in this one moment of weakness, brought on by physical exertion and a pain of body that echoed the pain within.
She could have spent hours or days in that suspended state of disconnection, where she was and yet was not, where she existed in a form that was all body and no soul or all soul and no body.
Slowly though, she seemed to coalesce. She couldn't stop the sobs, couldn't staunch the tears, couldn't still the tremors as grief tore itself loose. She didn't feel 'better', didn't feel 'peace' seeping into her being…but she felt human again, and that was something.
There was a hand, slowly rubbing her back, a large, three-fingered hand with talons that snagged every so often on the material of her shirt. The comforting gesture assured her that no hostility remained, that she could rise and go if she chose.
Or could.
It was recognition of not being alone that made her force herself into a sitting position.
Garrus, looking worried, sat beside her. His expression held apology for having hurt her, but for nothing else.
Shepard nodded, still unable to stop her own hysterics. Finally though, she scooted over to him with difficulty and let her forehead drop against his shoulder. It was, she recognized on some level, a very human reaction to want proximity of one's own kind—or those close to one—in times of great stress or adversity.
Garrus stiffened for a moment, then looped an arm around her, waiting in silence for the breakage to begin to heal.