Ryder woke up to SAM drilling her brain out, he was forcing her to wake up. "Pathfinder," he sternly says for the fifth time. Ryder's eyes struggle to open, she looks over, Reyes is still sleeping.
"What SAM?" she asks in agitation. She sits up, Reyes wakes up as well, feeling the bed shift. He scoots across the bed to hold her.
"Cora is trying to contact you, she says it's urgent. I tried to prevent her from contacting you, but the word no was not enough," he explains through her omni-tool. She and Reyes look at each other, she groans but calls Cora.
"Ryder?!" Cora shouts through the vid call. "Where are you? We have been worrying all night." Cora seems to pause, she could see Reyes' arm around Ryder. "Who's that?"
"A friend," Ryder lazily replies, rubbing her eyes. Reyes chuckled from behind her, he trails kisses up her arm. "Can this wait? I have stuff to do today."
"No, you're the Pathfinder, you can't just disappear all night. Are you sneaking off to sleep with some outlaw?" Reyes felt Ryder tense up, she scrunched her face up.
"Cora, shut the fuck up. I'm the Pathfinder, yes. Meaning I can do whatever the fuck I want. Who I sleep with is my business, don't question my personal life. Now go back to doing whatever plant growing shit you were doing and leave me alone," Ryder shouts over the vid before hanging up. She drops her head into her hands.
Reyes sits up, pulling her to lay into him. "Is she always like this?" he asks. Sara nods against his chest, letting the tears fall down her cheeks.
"She was meant to be Pathfinder, my dad chose me as it was a life or death situation." Reyes pulls her back, lifting her chin and whipping the tears away.
"What exactly happened on Habitat-7?" Reyes had only heard rumours about that mission, but hearing they lost the only known Pathfinder alive was a big hit for the Initiative and their plans of finding a new home.
Ryder sighs, closing her eyes for a moment. Reyes rubs her back. "So we got to the planet, and it turned into a massive shit show where me and Liam's shuttle broke completely in half and I fell from the sky. SAM was able to get my jumpsuit working before I lost contact with him, it was a damn hard landing. I cracked my helmet, luckily I was able to fix it with my omni-tool. I found Liam and we went scooting ahead, one of our crew members got shot by the Kett, so we got into a massive firefight." She remembers how horrible the planet was, they either had to hide from Kett or dodged the shield killing lightning.
"The Kett was the same as when we all got to Heleus, tried attacking the station more than once," Reyes says. He went from being a shuttle pilot for the Initiative to being a soldier. He knew how to use a gun, but he rarely had to use it during his times with the Alliance.
"Well, we found my dad. He ended up finding the base and SAM determined that bringing down the shield and getting to the monolith would stop the storm and get our the last remaining shuttle back to the Ark." Sara wished they could have just left, but the shuttle wouldn't have been able to handle those storms. "It was so bad the mountains were floating."
Reyes chuckles, he'd not seen anything that odd since coming to Andromeda. "Did fixing the monolith sort the storms?" Ryder nods.
"Yes, vaults do a final sweep where once reset a powerful organic killing cloud will destroy anything in its path. Only the remnant are safe from it." Reyes moves his head back in confusion.
"You have outrun a big cloud with every vault you activate?" Ryder nods, to her it was a normal day's work. Reyes didn't like the sound of it, he hated to think Sara was putting her life on the line every day just to save everyone else.
"But anyway, it happened at the monolith. It blew me and dad off the platform and whilst my dad landed with just a bad leg. My whole helmet caved in, I wasn't breathing anything in. My lungs instantly closed up and I started to choke, the only thing I could do was sit up, looking at my dad as I started to full-on panic." Reyes felt squeamish, he'd hate to know what type of feeling that was. "My dad took his helmet off, telling SAM to transfer Pathfinder codes and then... nothing. I fainted. I woke up at random times, remembering everyone grabbing me, my implant was fried when SAM was taking control and I almost died." She looks at the floor, "well, I did actually die."
"What?!" Reyes almost shouts. Her omni-tool lights up.
"Ryder was clinically dead for twenty-two seconds before I was able to restart her heart," SAM answers in a calm tone. Reyes places his hand on Ryders, squeezing it as she looks physically upset just remembering it.
"What a shit start to Andromeda," he comments. Ryder nods.
"Anyway, here I am now. In bed with a smuggler and guy I just met," she laughs. Reyes chuckles, he did however feel bad asking Ryder about her family and past when she didn't know anything about him.
"Well, since I know so much about you. I'll let you in on some things about me," he says sitting up properly. "My full name is Reyes Nicholas Vidal. I was born in Chile. Before the Initiative, I served in the Alliance for nine years as a shuttle mechanic and pilot." Ryder smiles, placing her hand on his knee.
"I already know your service record," she says. Reyes narrows his eyes at her, but how? Then it clicks.
"I can have no secrets from you, right, SAM?" Ryder's omni-tool lit up.
"I apologise Mr Vidal. Ryder somewhat forced me to tell her about you. I pointed out it would be a good bonding exercise for her to find out from you herself," the AI says defending herself.
"Wow, Ryder. You forced poor SAM into telling you about me. Too shy to ask yourself?" Ryder goes warm to the cheeks, shaking her head.
"No!" she says way too loudly. "Maybe..." she adds. Reyes laughs. "Your middle name Nicholas... it's not very Latininnan?"
Reyes bobbed his head. "It was my father's name. He passed before I was born, and died in a shuttle accident. My mother gave me his middle name in honour of the great man he was. She almost had a heart attack when I told her I wanted to be a pilot one day," he chuckles lightly. It was a fond memory. He probably would have never come to Andromeda if his mother was still alive.
"My parents hated me travelling all over the galaxy to find Prothean ruins, but it was my passion." She loved spending long hours trying to find trinkets and lost items, it was such a frill to her.
"I never pegged you as someone to dig up ruins for a living. I expected more Krogan charging and biotic punching," he jokes. Ryder slaps his arm, though she could see his point.
"Maybe here, I was a good girl in the Milkyway," she says with a headshake.
"Your work fell through with Alec's research right?" Reyes remembered seeing all the news reports about it. It was a lot to take in, but he could somewhat see Alec's argument about how SAM could be different to the Geth. Sara was at least proving that.
"Sure did, the news caught on and my supervisor kicked me and Scott out. My dad was branded a traitor by the Alliance and his rank was stripped. He only didn't lose his N7 rank because only death can strip someone from it." Sara remembered the arguments, Alec and Ellen, her mother had when she and Scott came home jobless. Ellen blamed both SAM and Alec for it.
"I heard that human Spectre agreed with Alec and his true intentions. But then she died," Reyes says. He couldn't remember who it was.
"Commander Shepard?" Ryder asks. Reyes nods, "I actually met her once. She came to my college on the Citadel, gave a speech about her time with the Alliance and the recruitment side of things for if anyone wanted to join."
"I wonder what the Milky Way is like now," Reyes says leaning into Ryder. They both let their foreheads touch, Ryder accidentally let her biotics travel through to Reyes, and he shook slightly.
"Sorry, it can happen," she says smiling. Reye's didn't mind, it was warm and soothing. "What was this business you needed help with then?" He stood up, heading to his drawers to grab some clothes.
"Not here, we will talk on the way to Kralla's. It's a problem that's caused me to lose money and men," he says heading to the bathroom. Ryder only grunts in reply and gets up, wanting to change as well. She didn't mind helping Reyes, it gained her more favour in Kadara port, but she was worried Tann would find out and become angry with her.
Then again, she didn't really give a shit.
A/N: I tried doing research into Reyes and his background. There is barely anything out there but fan theories. I put some together, making it up is kind of fun in a way. Give him a character to who he is and her personality.