Silence.
James took a shaky breath and blinked forcing himself to look away.
It was really her.
He had never felt relief...or was it relief? Whatever it was, he had never felt anything like it so acutely before. It almost felt like something stabbed him in the chest. His fingers were turning cold and despite looking calm on the outside, there was all sorts of chaos inside.
Another breath.
James let his eyes return to Shepard and he stared trying to make sense of the situation. Yeah, he was a soldier, he was supposed to be able to take anything in stride and keep a cool head., but he was failing a little too miserably right now.
He took a step towards her, their gazes locked. She had changed. It wasn't just the chair she seemed to be confined to. No, it was the look in her eyes and the expression on her face.
A coldness was there where it had never been and there was a darkness in her eyes that put a reaper to shame,. There was a different kind of hardness in the lines of her face and the curve of her lips, something that separated her from regular soldiers. Different from when she was resurrected from Cerberus, different from when she reminisced about the deceased, different from when James watched her pull away from him and run towards the transport beam back when the reapers were still alive. She was different.
But it was stupid to think that anyone would be the same.
James stopped in front of Shepard and bent down to pick up the dropped data pad before she could. The hard metal of the object reminded him that this was really happening. Stupid..to be told by some object that this was reality. He set it down on the table beside him and then looked at Lola. Her expression was unreadable.
Her hair that he was so used to seeing in a bun was down and longer than he remembered, her face was paler than before and she was thinner than he thought was possible for someone like her. It almost felt like he was looking at a shadow of what she once was.
"I'm guessing you have a lot of questions." Shepard finally broke the silence, there was a wicked glint in her eyes but the little grin on her face told him that she could guess what he was thinking. Shepard had always been able to read him so easily for some reason.
James pulled out a chair and took a seat in front of Shepard. There were no hugs or tears and there weren't going to be any, "You can say that." James replied. They couldn't stop staring at each other though, "I'm sure you have your questions too Lola."
Shepard's grin transformed into a smile at the nickname and her head tilted to the side slightly, "Ohh still using that nickname?" she asked, her eyes sparkled a little and James was reminded of the Shepard before her disappearance, "In any case, I need to know what the hell is going on before we start catching up on our lives." she waved her right hand in the air as if telling someone to go away.
"Right." James cleared his throat and began to tell her everything, starting from when Joker had told him about the cult group. It didn't take as long as he thought it would, but when he was finished there was a sour look on Shepard's face and a crease between her brows that he knew all too well the meaning of, "...but that thief chick is pretty good." James finished and tapped away at his omni-tool, "She found you and brought you here with almost half a day to spare." then he frowned as he thought to himself. He should have contacted her a long time ago, he had wasted too much time being pathetic...it was almost too embarrassing for him.
Shepard sighed and then settled back into her chair that hovered silently beside him, "There's really nothing to do but wait." she looked at him, "Is the Alliance not handling this?" from the tone of her voice, she wasn't expecting much of an answer. In any case, it was obvious that there should have been exchanges of information, meetings to figure out what to do, people sent out to handle the cult. Was the Alliance still not recovered enough to decently do their job?
Well...it was to be expected, with the mass relays shot, AIs destroyed, refugees everywhere, not to mention the reaper bodies still lying around. There was a lot going on and even more to do. The body count was still rising as corpses were still being discovered and identified and with the recent chaos that had happened, there was a big problem of looting and mercenary activity. Businesses in the underworld were rapidly expanding and the slave business was picking up faster than ever because of the issue of countless orphans just waiting to be taken care of and the fact that people had nowhere to go. Obviously it was worse in politics but it wasn't something that James had paid attention to.
"They're not handling it very well." James grumbled and leaned back in his own chair as he sighed heavily, "They didn't think of it seriously as a threat. I mean come on...rebuilding a reaper and trying to bring it back to life?" he looked at her, "It sounds impossible. So the Alliance put it back on the back burner and was dealing with other stuff like the slave trading and gang turf wars." he rolled his eyes, "They didn't even tell a few people to keep an eye on them just in case. It was a complete 'hands off' situation." He only just managed to find out why the Alliance had let the cult activities to continue without doing anything and it was thanks to Scars. According to the Turian, well...it was just as he had said out loud to Shepard earlier.
"Clean up must be a pain." Shepard muttered as she thought about the situation the Alliance was in. It still wasn't an excuse for them to make a mistake like this though, "Has the Alliance figured out anything so far? I'm pretty sure they're doing what they can now." it was worth asking even though she knew the answer.
"They know as much as we do at this point." he shrugged his shoulders, "This group of pendejos really know what they're doing despite their large group. Alliance can't get past their security no matter what they do." It was a little scary to him how good they were and it was even scarier how familiar this all seemed. He just couldn't put his finger on it right now.
"Is it too much to ask to be able to retire peacefully?" Shepard grumbled, "I guess we have no choice but to wait for them to come at us." there was a frown on her face at the unfavorable choice.
"You know how it is Lola, they can't do anything without you." James grinned at her and stretched out his arms with a little groan, he hadn't gone through his reps in a while and his body was beginning to protest. He almost missed going out onto the field. Almost.
Shepard snorted, "At this rate I'll have no choice but to go on a conquest for the galaxy and run things myself."
"I'm down." James laughed and looked at her, "I'm sure that the pilot would be down too, in fact I'm sure that he'd even make banners and shit."
They exchanged looks and then shared a laugh.
Silence once more.
James couldn't help but to steal little glances at Shepard. Now that he was somewhat used to the situation, he was beginning to become hyper aware of Lola's physical condition. She had not used her left arm once and although her legs and feet moved, she had not made a move to get up. It also seemed like she was purposely not moving her head around too much, like she was suffering from a chronic headache or dizziness...or maybe he was just thinking too much.
Suddenly Shepard laughed, "You could be a bit less obvious about staring at me you know." she teased him lightly and she smiled at him as if it was alright with her. In truth, she was self-conscious and awkward but she didn't want to let him know. After all, she had her pride if nothing else.
"Sorry." James looked down at his hands a bit sheepishly.
He almost didn't know what to do with himself right now.
In his mind, he knew the Shepard...the Lola before being separated from her. There was no doubt they had both changed, even if the time apart was relatively shorter than they had each anticipated.
Neither of them were the same person they had been at the moment they separated and no one could know exactly how and in what ways they had changed.
They had each gone through something that no one could come back from, and they were left scarred and damaged in more ways than one. How were they supposed to interact with this unfamiliar person? The Lola right in front of him was no doubt different from the Lola that had existed before.
It was awkward.
Shepard absently traced a pattern on her chair's armchair with her right hand. It still felt strange being in the same room as James. This wasn't how she wanted to meet him again...that is, if she ever decided to willingly reveal her existence to him. In retrospect, she wouldn't have told anyone that she survived, but her situation didn't allow it and she was dragged out into the open. Seriously...was it too much to ask to retire quietly?
And then there was her...'condition' to talk about...she knew that no one would press her for an answer and that was the wonderful thing about her friends. She didn't owe anyone an explanation and everyone knew that, but the discrete glances and the silent moment that occurred whenever someone laid eyes on her would be loud enough for her.
A sigh escaped her and she prepared herself as she looked up slowly at James, who sensed that she was about to talk sat up and waited for her to begin. He didn't know what she was going to say but he could tell that it was important.
"After the Citadel...exploded." she managed a small smile after her hesitant beginning, "The Salarians found me half buried and half dead." Shepard blinked slowly as she remembered the past events, "They said it was practically a miracle that I survived."
James snorted at that, if there was anything more amazing about Shepard than her skills as a commander, it was her luck when it came to surviving.
"There was a buildup of toxins and I suffered moderate brain damage." she gauged James' reaction carefully, "I can't...I'm not like I used to be." her voice was quiet but she didn't look away from James, "I can't do the things that I used to." she almost dared him to pity her, almost dared him to say the words she hated the most 'I'm sorry', but she bit her tongue and swallowed the harsh words, "I'm only breathing properly because of an implant, my balance is jacked up, and I can't use my left arm." she willed herself to raise it up and show him the uncontrollable tremors that plagued it and then let the limb drop to her side.
His face was unreadable...no, it was more like expressionless. This one time Shepard had no idea what he could possibly be thinking and it gave her an uncomfortable feeling, not because she didn't know what he was thinking, but because it reminded her of how much he had changed. When she had first laid eyes on him, she had noticed how defeated he looked. His eyes held shadows that would never go away and his body seemed to be protesting with every movement he made. It was more than that though, his countenance had changed and instead of the confident soldier she first met when she had been grounded, there was now just an outline of the person he had been. He had the look of a man who had lived too long and had seen too much.
Shepard was about to look away when she felt a rough hand cup the side of her face forcing her to keep her gaze on James, "Lola." his voice was hoarse and full of emotion.
It was all he said but she knew what he meant. It was as if the earth had suddenly moved around James and Shepard to close the rift they had imagined to be between them.
She reached up and let her own hand rest atop James' hand and held it there, "Yeah." her voice came out as a whisper and wavered slightly. Her eyes burned with sudden unshed tears but she smiled at him despite the strain in her throat.
They could hardly take a breath. They could hardly move. It felt like they were stuck in that moment and wandering around in each others' presence. Unwilling to come out of it.
"Me too." Shepard's voice cracked this time but the tears never came.
-.-.-.
***reviews are welcomeeeeeee and thank you so much for those of you who have left reviews previously. I do appreciate each and every one of them. 3
I also suspect that there will be around 2 or 3 more chapters left depending on how things go, just an FYI for anyone who wanted to know.
(any grammar/spelling mistakes will be corrected at a later date when this whole story is finished).