Like all spacers, Shepard had a strange relationship with gravity.
From an evolutionary standpoint, there were few things the human body was less suited for than weightlessness, save the hard vacuum of space itself. Before the advent of artificial gravity, long-term human habitation in space had been a complicated prospect—gravity was, simply put, too foundational to human physiology to do without. In its absence, muscles atrophied, bones grew brittle, and the mind struggled to orient itself. There was, simply put, no place for the body in microgravity.
And yet, as a child Jane had always relished the rare chances to play in the zero gravity training enclosures aboard the stations and warships where her mother was stationed. There, she could fly effortlessly and clamber smoothly across the walls and ceiling as naturally as if she'd been born to do it. The idea of growing up on a planet with her feet anchored to the ground had been almost incomprehensible, and she'd been unable to imagine an existence without the incredible sense of freedom of soaring weightlessly.
However, microgravity felt a lot less freeing when she unexpectedly found herself floating through the hangar of her own ship.
Joker's warning had given Shepard and the marines just enough time to look up from their drills in confusion before the ship's artificial gravity had failed, leaving the hangar a mess of floating bodies and sparring equipment.
Most of the squad was in the process of rescuing themselves from midair, with Williams carefully kicking off of Amy, sending both towards opposite walls where they could find handholds and the others using the narrow grooves in the deck to painstakingly pick their way toward their lockers on the far side of the bay.
Unfortunately, in the initial confusion as the ship's gravity failed, Shepard had started towards the elevator and inadvertently kicked off of the deck, leaving her hanging in midair as she slowly drifted farther away from the group and towards the bay's high ceiling.
"A little help here?" Shepard called, swiping her floating hair out of her face as her feet kicked uselessly at the open air. A few of the marines glanced her way apologetically but could only look on, unable to help until they had donned thier hardsuits.
Granted, Jane wasn't entirely helpless—every Navy servicemember was proficient in zero-g, self-rescue maneuvers to get out of situations like this, but they were slow and looked absolutely ridiculous.
"Doesn't seem so pointless now, wearing armor all the time, eh Shepard?" Wrex rumbled in amusement as he stomped across the deck in her direction, his feet anchored firmly to the deck by his armored boots.
By now floating several feet above the floor, the commander had the unusual experience of being slightly "taller" than the krogan. "Touche." she replied, unable to cease her gradual, midair spin. She pointed towards the door to the right of the elevator. "Push me towards Engineering?"
Wrex seemed to consider her request for a moment before shrugging his enormous shoulders. Grabbing the spectre by the boot and plucking her out of the air, Jane gave a surprised yelp as she found herself pointed head-first at the door a fair distance away, one of the krogan's hands grabbing the back of her belt and the other holding her by the collar. The warlord chuckled. "Quit squirming, you humans are hard enough to get a good grip on to begin with."
With a slight heave, Shepard found herself hurtling weightlessly across the hangar, suddenly feeling more like athletic equipment than the ship's commanding officer. Fortunately, Wrex's aim was true and the door opened as she approached, allowing the spectre to redirect herself off the doorway and sail neatly into engineering.
Engineering, usually filled with the reverberating hum of the Normandy's propulsion system, was eerily silent as she entered save for the chirping of alarms sounding on several consoles, and Jane noted with a pang of alarm that the ship's drive core had lost much of its typical glow. The massive armature was no longer spinning and the core itself was currently little more than a faintly reflective silver sphere hanging in the center. It seemed the ship had bigger problems than merely a loss of artificial gravity.
"I told you, Adams! There was something wrong from the moment we broke atmosphere, I could feel it!" Joker insisted over the open intercom channel, the sound of chirping alarms in the cockpit audible in the background.
"If you can divine that we've got a heat concentration building on the number three thruster pylon, feel free to share next time, Joker, but I can't swing a wrench at a gut feeling." Adams replied tightly, his tone uncharacteristically terse. The ship's chief engineer and his team stood firmly planted to the deck as they worked furiously at various consoles, benefiting from the magnetic anchoring system built into their engineer's boots.
"Adams, Joker." Shepard greeted with a tone of mixed amusement and concern, catching hold of the railing next to the chief engineer's station and bring herself to a halt. "What's our status?"
"We're dead in the water, Commander." Joker answered, sounding dismayed. "We were halfway through our prograde burn to the relay when the drive went offline. I've got nothing but auxiliary sublight thrusters and comms up here."
"A power surge kicked the drive core into emergency shutdown and we lost a few systems, ma'am." Adams explained, seeming somewhat irked by the helmsman's dramatics. Despite the situation, the engineer seemed as unflappable as ever. "We're working on getting it back online."
"What happened? How bad is damage?"
"Nothing serious, Commander." Adams assured, swiping at the holographic panel in front of him to pull up a holographic representation of the Normandy. In addition to various alerts and rapidly scrolling readings, a portion of the hull near the inner starboard engine flashed an alarming red. "The number three engine detected a heat spike and automatically shut down. The resulting power spike tripped a protection protocol in the drive core and created a cascading failure that knocked a lot of systems offline. It'll take a while to bring everything back online, but the actual damage is minimal."
Shepard gave a slow nod, scrutinizing the holographic image. "What knocked the engines offline in the first place?"
"A heat concentration near the engine pylon." Joker interjected. "We cut it pretty close to that eruption on Therum—seems like we scratched the paint as we were clearing atmosphere."
"The heat concentration is probably due to some minor damage to a radiator panel from a debris strike—of no real consequence it itself, but it tripped a fault in the drive protocols." Adams said. "An engine shutdown while under power with the internal heat sinks running hot is an edge case. Onboard any other frigate, a power surge of that size would indicate that the core containment field was about to fail catastrophically and an emergency shutdown would be the proper response in that scenario, but the Normandy's threshold for a containment failure is an order of magnitude higher due to the size of her drive system." The engineer explained with an apologetic shrug. "We'll alter the drive protocols to make sure it doesn't happen again, but this is the kind of issue usually ironed-out during a proper shakedown run."
Jane huffed unhappily. Here they were, on a dangerous mission in isolated frontier space, dead in the water because of a design oversight. Adams gave a weary smile. "Welcome to engineering aboard a lead ship, ma'am."
"Adams," Tali spoke up from her station, "I've located the damage the pylon. Looks like its number six radiator panel took a hit from something." The quarian tapped a few buttons and an image of the Normandy's hull appeared on Adams' station, centered on an ugly black scar mark near the base of one of the ship's engines.
"Can you repair it or will we need to dock somewhere?" Shepard asked with a wince, mustering a serious tone. The nearest friendly starports with repair facilities that she could think of were Arcturus and the Citadel and if word got back to Anderson that she'd put a ding in his brand-new ship, she suspected the old captain would never let her live it down.
"Definitely fixable." Tali chimed in confidently. "An EVA job to replace the whole panel would take less than an hour." She looked to the chief engineer, continuing a bit more meekly. "If that would be alright, Adams?"
The man nodded, chuckling as the quarian immediately started for her gear locker.
"Actually," Jane stopped her, "If you don't mind some company, there's someone I'd like you to take along..."
...
"I'm still not sure how I got volunteered for this." Nick remarked unhappily, a note of wary uncertainty in his voice. He shifted from foot to foot, checking the seals on his gauntlets for what must have been the sixth time. "I've gotta be the only person on the ship who's never done this before."
"Actually, Joker's not fully zero-G certified either, but he has a medical waiver." Shepard observed, receiving an unimpressed look from the medic and returning a wide smile. The commander was entirely too cheerful about shoving him out the airlock. "Nervous?"
"Yes." Nick stated bluntly, adjusting his helmet. "And feeling a little underdressed."
Needless to say, tagging along on a spacewalk hadn't been his idea. While he'd gone through a module on operating in zero gravity as part of his training with Williams that covered the principles of fighting in microgravity and reacting to simulated equipment hardsuit malfunctions, the lessons had all been conducted in the hangar with his feet planted firmly on the ground. Now, suddenly faced with an actual lack of gravity, Nick found himself rather disoriented.
Shepard had discovered him floating in the elevator amidst a cloud of coffee droplets and said that she had a job for him in that gleeful, smiling tone of hers that always meant some kind of trouble. Twenty minutes later, his armor had been stripped of all its usual chest rigging and he was standing in an auxiliary airlock with a bulky equipment belt around his waist, waiting to step into the empty void on the other side of the doors. Granted, he wasn't sure how a pen flare launcher or pad and paper were going to help him during a spacewalk, but the tangible absence of his usual loadout definitely contributed to a sense of nakedness.
"Ready?" A new voice inquired from the entrance to the airlock.
Shepard made a quick exit as Tali carefully entered the airlock, guiding a large silver panel as it floated through the air and with a heavy black toolbelt strung across her wide hips. Nick would be in good company, at least.
"As I can be." He admitted with a shrug, eyeing the panel. "Is this a pretty routine fix?"
"It should be." Tali confirmed, hitting a button that closed the airlock's inner door with a heavy thunk. She scrutinized the medic for a moment, seeming to notice his nervousness. "Have you ever done this before?"
"First time. You?"
"I've lost track." The quarian replied cheerfully as she squeezed past him, pulling the panel along behind her. If being saddled with a greenhorn bothered her at all, it didn't show. "It's nothing to worry about, though. Just follow my lead and take your time. You'll get the hang of weightlessness pretty quickly."
Taking hold of one of the electromagnetic tethers that hung from her belt, she attached the end of to the panel before punching a few commands into the panel next to the outer door and keying up her radio. "Bridge, this is Tali'Zorah. Two personnel exiting auxiliary airlock four for repair work on the number the number one engine starboard pylon."
"Understood, specialist, stand by." The calm voice of one of the ship's communications techs replied. There was a brief pause before the voice returned. "You are all clear to begin service on number one starboard engine pylon. Enjoy your walk."
An amber warning light began to whirl and the hiss of air being pumped out of the chamber gradually faded away into the muted nothingness of vacuum. The airlock doors opened silently as the final seal released, and Vandas felt his breath catch as it opened to reveal the dotted void of empty space beyond.
Tali led the way, the heavy, uneven fall of her mag-boots registering as a dull vibration through the deck. Reaching the end of the airlock's short walkway, the quarian pulled another magnetic tether from her belt and anchored the cable to circular feature on the wall next to her before grabbing a handhold and swinging herself deftly out of sight, the replacement plate following after her as she gave the line a tug.
Nickeli slowly followed, freezing in place where the airlocked ended and left nothing but empty space ahead of him. Standing there with the knowledge that he was about to step out of the lovely metal box full of oxygen and all the other things he needed to stay alive felt a great deal like how Nick imagined jumping out of a plane would feel like—his stomach was in knots, there was an alarm chirping in his ear telling him that he needed to slow his breathing, and all of the coaching he'd received from Williams was running together in a blur.
The lack of an appreciable "ground" below him as he peered over the side was the most concerning part. Heights he could deal with, but this was... something else entirely. The rational part of him understood perfectly well that he was in microgravity, but there was a part of Nick's brain that looked "down" at the infinite expanse below him and promptly began running in little circles and shouting in panic.
Even so, the feeling of alarm that was beginning to become overwhelming wasn't an entirely alien sensation. It reminded him of the first time he'd been shot at—the frantic and disoriented indecision that found him frozen in place as gunfire crackled over his head. That time, he'd just thrown himself to the ground like his more seasoned platoonmates had already done. The solution here wasn't quite so straightforward, unfortunately.
"Nick?" Tali's disembodied voice spoke into his ear as she realized he wasn't following behind her.
The medic tried to reply that he was fine and that he'd be right behind her but ended up saying both simultaneously, producing an unintelligible but vaguely distressed noise.
"Nick?" The engineering called again, more urgently this time.
"I'm fine." Vandas stammered quickly, finally willing his feet to move. He mimicked what he'd seen Tali do, attaching his tether to the attachment point on his left and beginning to clamber upon onto the hull. "Just a little... uh..."
He found the quarian's extended hand waiting for him and accepted it, letting her gently guide him forward and waiting until both of his boots were firmly clamped onto the hull.
"Are you alright?" Tali asked searchingly.
Nick couldn't muster the words to respond and simply nodded vigorously, as if trying to convince himself as much as her. The vertigo he'd felt earlier had returned and that damned respiration alarm was still screaming in his ear.
"Sorry. It's a lot to process." He said, offering a sheepish smile before belated realizing that his helmet's sun visor hid his face.
"It's alright," She assured. Her hand ran up the inside of his right forearm, her fingers finding the gap just below his elbow and giving a firm, reassuring squeeze that he could feel through the padded layers of his undersuit. Her eyes, glowing just enough to be visible through her dark visor, were fixed upon him intently. "Just put one foot in front of the other and stay right behind me."
Vandas took a long, slow breathe, the alarm in his ear finally falling silent. "Lead the way."
With some further coaching Tali, Nick eventually settled into a workable rhythm as they as walked out onto the Normandy's wing, eventually locating the damaged panel and setting to work. Gradually, his movements became a little more fluid and discovered he wasn't fighting the effects of weightlessness quite so much, but he was still surprised by how strenuous working in microgravity was and how clumsy it made him feel.
Every movement down to the smallest shift or turn had to be carefully considered to avoid mistakes, and he found himself having to constantly stop and readjust his anchor when reached the limit of his tether. Placing a hand against the hull to steady himself as he removed one of the bolts from the damaged panel inadvertently pushed him away and he had to reel himself back in with his safety line. Brushing aside a tool bag to get a better look at something sent the satchel drifting off in the direction of empty space, and he only realized what he'd done when Tali quickly darted after it.
The quarian was, fortunately, incredibly patient throughout the entire ordeal, politely offering tips and providing timely reminders when she noticed a mistake he was about make. It was the same sort of patience one might use when teaching an elderly relative how to use a piece of unfamiliar technology, and it was obvious that the repair was exactly as trivial to the engineer as she'd made it sound in the airlock.
All the while, she maneuvered herself in zero gravity with a practiced and easy kind of grace that Nick thought resembled a kind of dance, as naturally as if she'd been born to do it. She moved acrobatically at the end of her tether line, propelling herself through an effortless series of spins and pirouettes with only the lightest of touches against the hull.
All told, it the repair took a little over an hour and a half—mostly on Nick's account—and once it was complete, the pair located a comfortable spot on the Normandy's wing and "sat" down, magnetizing their boots and securing their anchors to the hull while they waited for Engineering to complete diagnostics. While Nick suspected Adams wasn't about to ask him to join the engineering team, he still considered himself to have done an adequate job for someone more familiar with bandages than bolts.
As he settled into an odd sort of squat that was the closest he could come to sitting without floating off into space, the medic greedily gulped water from the small drinking tube inside his helmet, genuinely surprised by how exhausting working in zero gravity was.
With a low groan, Nick stiffly took a quick account of the various aches and cramps he was feeling. His shoulders and back were cramping up something fierce, and there was a layer of sweat trapped between the inner layer of his undersuit and his skin that shifted and flowed every time he moved. It created a sensation that felt unnervingly like there was something else moving around in the bodysuit with him and he was trying very hard not to dwell on it.
He needed a nap and a long, hot shower, but suspected he'd have to settle for a quick wash-up and a fistful of aspirin.
Spending a few minutes quietly surveying the strange patch of stars laid out across the sky, Nick scoffed, realizing he'd been searching in vain for the familiar line of Orion's Belt. He was so utterly far from home that even something as enduring as the constellations were nowhere to be found, and the realization was accompanied by a peculiar kind of homesickness. With two tours overseas already under his belt, he'd been acclimating quickly to life aboard the Normandy, but a part of him still longed for the simple feeling of familiarity. It would come in time, he supposed, but in the meantime, he found himself missing the sight of a night sky that he recognized.
During his deployments, stargazing had been a kind of meditation—it provided a peaceful sense of distance and smallness to escape the clutches of reality for a while.
He'd spent countless sleepless nights laying on the mudbrick roof of their outpost during his first tour, still covered in Helmand's invasive, impossibly fine dust from a day on patrol and wrapped up in his field jacket to fend off the chilly night air. Bone-tired but still unable to sleep, he'd lay up there and search for constellations until dawn. Without the haze of light pollution to wash it out, the night sky in Afghanistan was a canvas of countless pinprick stars and the flowing, colorful brushstrokes of the Milky Way. It may have been the only thing about Afghanistan he genuinely missed.
"Quite the view out here."
"Hmm?" Tali murmured, glancing up from her omni-tool. The quarian followed his gaze in the direction of the star field and, to his surprise, gave a slight shrug. "I guess. It gets kind of old when it's all you ever see when you look out a window."
"Well, I think there'll be plenty else to see chasing Saren all over the place." The corpsman noted. "That's what your pilgrimage is about, right? Experiencing new things? Or is it more of a religious thing?" He gestured vaguely towards the expanse of space. "A 'roam the galaxy and find yourself' kind of deal?"
Tali chuckled. "A bit of both, I think. The idea of a transformative journey is an old tradition among my people—long before we lost our homeworld, it was a rite of passage for a young quarian to leave their home and spend a period of time traveling among the different clans. They'd work to earn their keep, and when they left would receive gifts to help them on the next part of their journey. It's similar today—a young quarian will go out into the galaxy and bring back something of value to offer a ship captain to prove themselves worthy of joining their crew and if the captain accepts, they're recognized as a full adult. For many, it's the only time they leave the Fleet to see the wider galaxy. A few decide to go their own way and don't return, but that's rare." She shook her head. "The galaxy isn't very kind to lone quarians."
"I'm sure it's not." Nick agreed quietly, recalling their encounter on the Citadel. "Still, I'm sure you'll bring back something worthwhile to offer a captain. Plus, you'll have some wild stories to tell at the next family party."
Tali laughed musically. "Quarian families are typically very small and so our get togethers are terribly dull—I'm sure they would enjoy hearing about it."
The young engineer hugged her knees to her chest, her tone turning wistful. "Though my father would probably say... I don't know." A weak shrug. "When I left, it was ' don't let the Fleet down, make it proud." She mimicked a gruff male voice. "He used to be different, but now no matter what I do, I can never seem to please him. The more I think about it, the more I think I should just tell him to go to hell."
"Family is... it's important. Don't give up on it too quickly." Nick sighed, a weight to his words as his gaze remained fixed on the stars. "I know it can be tempting, but it's too easy to walk away from a big part of yourself without realizing it."
There was a long silence as the medic's words hung in the empty space between them. Out of the corner of his eye, Nick saw Tali's head turn in his direction as if she might say something, but after a moment her gaze fell and eventually turned back to the starscape. Whether she'd thought better of her words or simply couldn't find them in the first place, he couldn't say.
After a minute, the medic gave the slightest of nods, as if agreeing with himself on something. "I like the idea of a Pilgrimage—going out and changing and everyone back home expecting you to come back different. That's a good thing, I think. Saves everyone a lot of misunderstanding."
"My people have a saying, keelah se'li." Tali explained softly. "It has a lot of different meanings, but most importantly it's a reminder to keep looking ahead to the potential of what the future might hold. The galaxy is constantly changing and if we let ourselves get stranded in the past, we can forget to look up and see what we might make of the future."
"Keelah se'li." Nick repeated to himself, as if testing the words. After a moment more, he looked to Tali and offered a wan smile. "Thanks."
"Anytime." She replied, her omni-tool flashing on her wrist. Glancing at it, she began to rise. "Come on, it's time we got back inside."
...
An hour and a hurried shower later, Nickeli found himself navigating the ship's bustling mess hall, a happy look on his face as he carried a dinner tray bearing the Normandy's surf and turf special—a sizable chunk of steak that was slightly overdone on one side, a somewhat rubbery-looking lobster tail, and a messy dollop of what was probably supposed to be collard greens. It was, by an infantryman's standards, a feast fit for a king.
Distracted by the assortment of enticing smells coming from his meal, the medic failed to notice that everyone else in the aisle seemed to be trying desperately get out of his way, only realizing his mistake when the sound of heavy footfalls behind him sent him reflexively darting to the side. A moment later, Wrex stomped past, seemingly indifferent to the obvious stares he was getting from the crew.
"Wrex, not going to try the lobster?" Nick called after the krogan, eyeing the flimsy plastic tray he clutched in one massive hand. The medic couldn't say whether he had made some arrangement with the mess hall or if none of the cooks were either brave or foolhardy enough to insist upon standard portion sizes, but the lumbering warrior's tray was visibly bending under the weight of a tall stack of steaks.
"Nah, I swore off insects a long time ago—make me gassy. "He answered casually as he passed, continuing towards the elevator. With a quiet laugh, Vandas slid into the team's usual booth, where Amy was already eating.
"Hey." The medic greeted.
Scarpasky glanced up and looked over the haggard medic with an appraising eye, her neutral expression shifting to one of amusement. "Hey. You, uh... kind look like shit."
"Oh, Amy—knowing I can always rely upon your honestly is what gets me through these uncertain times." Vandas sighed dramatically, at which the stocky Ukrainian rolled her eyes. He offered a shrug. "Space sucks. I think I prefer marching."
"Zero-G is peaceful. I like it."
"You would. Weren't you boarding infantry or something before this?"
"Orbital Assault." She corrected with relish, flashing a toothy grin. "I just didn't realize you expeditionary force guys were such pussies."
"Is that why you like me so much?"
Amy failed to conceal her smirk. "Fuck yourself."
Digging into his meal with a grin, Nick surveyed the rest of the crowded dining hall and was surprised to see the usual lighthearted bantering among the crew had disappeared in favor of hushed conversation. A frown drew itself across his lips, a mix of worry and curiosity replacing amusement. "What's everyone so antsy about?"
Amy followed his gaze around the room before speaking in a low voice. "Word is we are re-routing. No idea where to."
"What're the guys from Navigation saying?"
"Nothing, but you know Tucks in Engineering?" The sapper asked. Nick paused to think before nodding, the name vaguely familiar to him. "Well, he said Shepard called down, wanting to know how soon the Normandy would be ready for a jump once the drive core was back online. Said it sounded important. Apparently, the supper menu changed after that."
"You don't s'pose she's got a dinner reservation on the Citadel she doesn't want to miss?" Nick quipped. "Besides, what's the menu got to do with it?"
"Surf 'n turf means bad news." Scarpasky stated firmly, stabbing her fork into a chunk of steak for emphasis. "The commander is kissing up before she bends us over and shafts us. Didn't you learn that when you were riding with fleet forces?"
"No, the food there was awful regardless of the occasion."
Amy gave a snort, forking a chunk of steak into her mouth. "Enjoy your steak, because—mark my words—our hopes of slipping into port for repairs and shore leave have done down the drain."
"Don't talk with your mouth full." Nick admonished sarcastically before jerking his head to the empty spot beside her, nothing the absence of fireteam Cossak's third member. "Where's Tolo?"
Amy rolled her eyes and swallowed before answering. "Cleaning up all the cargo that shifted when we lost gravity. One of the gearheads found an unfinished still in one of the engineering spaces."
"And he confessed that it was his?"
She shook her head, poking idly at a bit of gristle sitting on her plate. "Of course not, but Detective Vakarian found his fingerprints all over it. Now, the sergeant major is pissed at me for 'not keeping an eye' on the little shit." Amy growled as she stuffed another bite of steak into her mouth, jabbing her fork in the medic's direction. "Which is bullshit, because I was."
"Then how did he managed to partially assemble a still with you, 'keeping an eye on him'?" Nick asked, deciding to overlook her poor table manners.
Scarpasky seemed to chew over the question along with her steak, a guilty smirk gradually forming before throwing her shoulders back in a cartoonish shrug. "Well, what can I say? Nobody is perfect."
Nick could only shake his head with a laugh, taking a bite of his dinner.
"Scarpasky, Doc."Ouder appeared as if on command, glancing between the two of them. "How's the surf 'n turf?"
"Passable, but everyone is wondering what the occasion is." The sapper said enigmatically, watching him with a careful eye. "Scuttlebutt says we are headed to the Terminus."
"Scuttlebutt should shut her mouth and eat her fuckin' steak." Ouder retorted pointedly. If the sergeant major knew anything about their sudden change of course, he wasn't sharing. He glanced at Vandas, seemingly expecting a comment, but the medic merely raised his eyebrows and took another bite of his greens. "When the commander wants everyone to know, word will come down."
With a chime, the ship's public address system sprung to life.
"Attention crew, this is the commander speaking." Shepard announced. Ouder hissed irritably, and Nick once again marveled at the spectre's incredible sense of timing. "We are re-routing to the Kepler Verge."
"The geth have attacked another human colony."
A/N: I kind of wrestled with this chapter for quite a bit-and even considered scrapping it all together-before I got it to a point where I was happy with it. It's another quiet chapter for the focus on different characters and interactions, but hopefully it still kept your interest. You'll have to let me know how I did.