6. PAUSE
She slept like the living dead.
"Shepard," EDI's cool, synthetic voice murmured. "Shepard. Wake up."
"Wha—" She almost slapped herself in the face as she tried to simultaneously grab her sidearm and hurl herself out of bed. "Jesus. What is it?"
"There is a situation that requires your attention."
Shepard stilled. Cerberus betrayal. Collector attack. Alliance subpoena. Garrus. "...Specify."
Joker's voice crackled over the ship's intercom. "A sexy situation. Or terrifying, depending on your perspective. Jack and Miranda are having a little chat in the XO's office. You may want to get down there before they kill each other."
Shepard let out her breath. "Wonderful," she mumbled, and began yanking on her clothes.
"The perks of command," Joker said cheerfully. "...Hey, question. Could a biotic cage match actually do serious damage to the ship? 'Cause I like my Normandy the way she is. You know. Intact."
She wiggled her feet into her boots, ran a hand ineffectually through her wild hair. "I recommend you review some of the old footage from Solcrum. Namely, the part where Liara and I used our mind powers to crush a Geth Colossus into a tiny pile of scrap."
"Yikes. Um, Commander, in that case, can you hurry?"
"Yeah, yikes," she affirmed. "I'm hurrying. Consider this the next time you feel like sassing your commanding officer: you'd be a lot easier to crush than a Colossus."
"You're in a delightful mood this morning," he muttered. "Don't gotta take it out on me."
"Perks of command." She punched the call button for the elevator.
"I expect better from both of you," Shepard said wearily, rubbing at her eyes. "Jack, is there anything Miranda could say that would actually make you feel any better about what Cerberus did to you? You were spoiling for a fight and you know it. If you need to beat something up, come to me. I'll point you in the right direction."
She turned to face her XO. "And Miranda, what were you thinking, baiting her like that? You should have nothing to prove. Why did you let her get under your skin?"
Both women folded their arms, shifted their gaze away. Jack looked sullen. Miranda looked like an icicle.
"Listen. I don't expect you to shake hands and make friends. I do expect you to stay sharp, stay focused, and do your fucking jobs. You're here because you're the best at what you do, and that's what it's going to take for us to win."
Shepard stood directly in front of them, back straight, expression fierce.
"If you don't think you can go out there and stand side by side and kill the shit out of the Collectors, you need to get your heads on straight right fucking now, because our people are out there suffering while you waste everyone's time with this." She jabbed a finger into her palm. "We are a team. We have each others' backs. Put this aside. Are we clear?"
"Yes, Commander," said Miranda.
Shepard nodded at her. "Good."
Silence. She raised an eyebrow at Jack.
"Crystal," muttered Jack.
"Then it's settled. This doesn't happen again. Miranda," she said with an acknowledging nod, and gestured Jack out the doors ahead of her.
In the hallway, the little biotic fidgeted, jammed her hands into her pockets. "Hey, uh."
"Yeah?" Shepard said warily. Were they going to have a problem?
"I never talked to you after the whole deal with Teltin." Jack glanced up at her. "So... thanks."
Shepard fought to keep the astonishment off her face. "You're welcome, Jack. Did it help?"
Jack pursed her lips. "You know, I thought after what I heard about Aeia and Illium that I'd get to see you pull some badass shit down there." She cocked her head to one side. "But all I got was a girl scout speech."
Shepard gave her a flat look. "It takes more than a few krogan to get me excited. Next time, tell your friends to bring a gunship."
Jack snorted. "Yeah right." She rubbed a hand over her head, glanced away. "But... yeah, it helped. Girl scout speech and all. See you around, Shepard."
She slouched off to the elevator. Shepard watched her go, bemused.
The mess was deserted. Everyone on morning shift had long since cleared out, and Gardner was presumably off cleaning a toilet or fixing a busted pipe somewhere. She banged around in the cabinets, searching for caffeine. Found a box of expensive-looking tea, undoubtedly from a crew member's own personal supply. Sure. Why not.
"Joker," she called out at the ceiling. "How long until we reach the Citadel?"
"Three hours and change, Commander. Plenty of time to solve everyone else's problems."
Maybe. If she was really efficient about it. She made a second cup of tea, and went to go talk to Krios.
By the time they docked, the caffeine had worn off, but she was feeling pretty good about herself and her ragtag bunch of rebels, thugs and misfits.
Rebel and misfit number one met her in front of the airlock. "You dressed up," Garrus said, dry as dust.
"So did you," she replied. They were both wearing full armor, guns strapped to their backs. Of course.
They fell into step with each other as they pushed through the crowded docking bay. It was easy, instinctive, just like it had always been. He shortened his long, rangy stride for her benefit, and stuck to her left, knowing she tended to fire right. She walked slightly ahead, he slightly behind, so she could head off enemies at the front and buy him time to get into position.
It was so easy it swung all the way back around into really fucking uncomfortable. Being here, on the Citadel, with him, was turning her head inside out.
Everything had warped beyond recognition.
Everything was exactly the same.
"Shepard," he murmured, as they stood in line for security clearance. "What are we doing?"
"Hitting Rodam and everywhere else that's halfway decent for mods, armor and guns," she said. "Speak up if you see anything you like."
His jaw clicked. "I mean what are we doing."
She closed her eyes. Not yet. "...Not here. Let's just— pretend to be normal, for a little bit."
He didn't respond for a long moment. The line shuffled forward.
Finally she braved a glance up at him. His brow was furrowed, his good mandible flexing angrily in and out as he stared ahead.
What the hell was he pissed off about now? Goddamnit. "Okay, this was a bad idea," she said, rubbing her forehead. "Forget it. You can do what you want. I'll go."
"Where, exactly?" Garrus made a sharp gesture at the line stretching ahead of them. "Unless you were planning on pulling the Spectre card, and leaving me here to rot."
"I wouldn't leave you. But if you hate being around me so much, I'm not going to make you stay." She glared up at him. "And I'm not pulling the card. You know I feel like an asshole when I do that. I'm hanging on to the title by a thread as it is."
"Of course," he said blandly. "Wouldn't want to make you uncomfortable, Spectre."
She looked away, fuming, and didn't say anything. There was absolutely nothing she could say, not with EDI in her ear. Unless she used her fists to say it.
He stood bristling and silent at her side.
A pair of salarians waiting in line behind them eyed him, then her, and slowly edged backwards.
He let out a long breath, and unfolded his arms. Tipped his head down to look at her. "...Shepard, I—"
"—Shepard?"
She turned to look. "Bailey," she said with relief.
The C-Sec captain was holding a bottle of Tupari, and something in a paper wrapper that looked vaguely like a hot dog. He nodded a greeting at Garrus. "Lucky I spotted you two. Always busy as hell this time of day."
"Haron! We're coming through," he barked up at the main gate. "We've got a goddamn Spectre paying us a visit."
They talked shop with Bailey for a few surprisingly pleasant minutes. Then they were spat out into the wards and she had to figure out all over again what to do with her hands, where to look.
Fuck all of this. Fuck the two years. She wished she could put a bullet through her skull and rewind back to fucking Horizon. That would be good enough. If only she'd been better at covering her ass in the beginning, everything now would be—
Well. Not okay. But at least tolerable.
If she'd kept her head together better, maybe she could even have talked Kaidan into joining her.
"Shepard," Garrus rumbled.
"What," she said, resigned to her solitary hell.
"I'll be good. Let's go."
She lifted her head cautiously. "...Yeah?"
"Yeah. Wherever you like."
She managed a faint half-grin. "You may live to regret saying that."
He blinked at her slowly, his turian version of an eye roll. "I'm not scared of you."
Yet. Shepard led them in a slow, meandering path through the markets, stopping to look at whatever caught her eye.
A hack assist module. Omni-tool games. Tiny ships. Fish. The galaxy really was full of useless crap.
"Where are the fucking guns," she hissed, a fruitless half-hour later.
Behind her, Garrus let out a startled laugh. "I thought you were just trying to punish me. You're lost?"
"Hell no! I was just hoping there'd be more. Is Rodam Expeditions really the only place that's worth a damn around here?"
"Ah," he said, looking smug all of a sudden.
"What," she said warily.
He flared a mandible in a sharp grin. "It's a good thing you brought along a local. Follow me."
She actually began to enjoy herself, after the second or third shop they poked their heads into. He was giving her an up-close and personal experience of a side of the Wards she'd never seen before. They wandered through narrow alleys spiderwebbed with power cables, picked their way between ramshackle apartment buildings and gleaming skyscrapers, dodged around colorfully dressed members of every major species. For the first time, she could see how people actually lived on the Citadel.
And with his home field advantage, Garrus had even lightened up enough to start being an ass to her again. Win-win.
She was still going to tell him and ruin all of it forever, just... not yet. Hanging out like this, trading jabs, cracking wise, acting like they were hot shit and the galaxy couldn't handle it— even though they were still both furious and fed up with each other, it was the most fun she'd had all week.
He led her through the dark and crowded subterranean shopping district to a little hole-in-the-wall of a shop, surprisingly well-stocked, where they inspected the merchandise with expert eyes and argued happily over every little damn thing.
The customer service representative, a fresh-faced asari, gave up on trying to help them after the first two minutes. Shepard didn't blame her. Shepard and Vakarian made for an absolutely impossible pair of customers.
"Really, Shepard? You're about the last person that should ever get a targeting visor. You shouldn't even be legally allowed to make that purchase."
"Why the hell not? It says it makes your shots ten percent more accurate. Actually ten, not 'up to ten.' You have one. Why am I not allowed?"
"Because you can't wear it under your helmet."
"Obviously." She put her hands on her hips. "So?"
He leaned back against the shop counter and folded his arms. "So, you use your SMG the majority of the time. Accuracy is pretty much irrelevant with that thing. ...I can't believe you actually like that gun."
"Feel free to arrive at your point, Vakarian."
"My point is that your enemies are going to headshot you a lot faster and better than you can headshot them, so don't bother. You're better off with a helmet. And why is every single thing you've bought today an offensive upgrade? You haven't gotten a damn thing that might actually help protect you."
Because it'd be a waste of credits. She glanced up at him, then away. "Christ, fine. I won't get the visor." She dropped the box back onto the counter. "Hey, do you want a new rifle? This one seems nice."
He shot her a look that said I know what you're doing. "No, I'm good. Thanks."
"C'mon." She nudged his shoulder. "Your Mantis looks like it predates the First Contact War. Don't you want something a little sexier?"
He looked righteously offended. Shepard fought down a grin.
"Absolutely not," he clipped out. "The Mantis may be simple, but it's a damn classic. Streamlined, lightweight, packs one hell of a punch." He poked a scornful finger at the display model on the counter in front of them. "The Viper is fussy by comparison. Overdesigned."
The customer service rep poked her head out from behind the counter, a hopeful expression on her face. "Actually, in the newest iteration Rosenkov streamlined the feature set considerably, and reduced the weight to—"
Garrus waved her away with a flick of his hand. The asari sunk back below the counter, resentment in her eyes.
He gestured at the model. "If you're a sniper working alone and you need extra bells and whistles, sure, a gun like this could come in handy," he said to Shepard. "But if you have a team, it's much more effective to send in a tech to deal with shields and armor. Then you can do what you do best, with the best tool for the job. Quick and clean."
He hefted the display model and pressed it to his shoulder in a fluid, weightless movement, his eye up against the scope.
"One shot. One kill. Reload."
He gently placed the gun back on its display stand, then turned to look at her. "...What?"
Shepard couldn't contain her smile any longer. "Nothing."
He clicked his jaw at her, irritated. "I forgot I was talking to a biotic. You all think you're too good for real guns. Let's head out, Shepard, we've done enough damage here."
The neon orange glow of the underground market washed over them, reflecting off his silvery skin, turning the bold strokes of his face paint midnight black. He gestured for her to follow him, and began pushing his way through the crowds with lanky grace.
"I have real guns," she said, matching his stride. "I shoot things just fine."
He glanced down at her. "With a pistol and an SMG? Krogan would laugh in your face. I'm pretty sure those krogan back on Pragia were laughing."
"Sure, up until they died in agony," Shepard said mildly.
"From my headshots."
"Which would have bounced right off their skulls, if I hadn't already gone in and killed them ninety percent dead for you."
His eyes narrowed. "I think your math might be a little off. Didn't you get my present last night?"
She fired up his calculator app on her omni-tool, punched randomly at a few buttons. "Nope, the math's good," she said, looking up at him with wide eyes. "I've got the numbers right here. Ten percent Vakarian, ninety percent Shepard."
"Like hell. Let me see that." He leaned over and swiped at her arm. She skipped out of his reach, laughing. "You better run those figures again, Shepard."
"Denial isn't an attractive quality, Vakarian." But she poked at the interface. "...Oh. Hmm. That's odd."
"What," he drawled.
"Now it's saying eighty percent Shepard, twenty percent Vakarian."
"Imagine that."
"It's also saying that's the best you're gonna get, so don't push it."
He flicked a mandible at her. "It's saying an awful lot, for a basic calculator app."
"You only got me the basic version?" Shepard frowned up at him. "Cheapskate."
He reached over and patted her gently on the head. "Well, I thought we should start off slow. For your sake."
She scowled at him, but her traitorous lips kept trying to twist up into a grin. She'd really missed this.
"Where are we going, anyway," she said, after she'd wrestled her face back into something resembling detached professionalism. "Another manufacturer outlet? I think I'm good."
"A bar," he said. "You owe me a drink for all the hell you've put me through today."
"Just one?" she said, surprised.
"No. But I'm letting you pay me off in installments. Even Cerberus's pockets aren't that deep."
Shepard brought the beers back to their table, color-coded labels peeking out from between her fingers, and slid the blue one across to him. "Here. Debt discharged."
She'd expected some sarcastic crap about compound interest or something, but he just said "Thanks," and took a long drink. He gazed out the sunlit window, his sharp chin propped on one hand.
She looked too, squinting against the brightness. The chaotic, irregular sprawl of the wards stretched out as far as she could see. The long starfish arm of the Citadel curved gently upwards in the distance, shimmering inside its envelope of pale blue atmosphere.
"So," Garrus murmured. "You did your shopping."
"I did," she agreed.
"Is this the part where you tell me not to bother coming back to the ship?"
"What?" Her beer bottle thunked against the table. "No. Of course not."
"Oh." He closed his eyes briefly, let out a long breath. "Good."
Shepard pressed her palm to her forehead, squeezed her eyes shut. Goddamnit. She'd been so wrapped up in her own fucking head trying to keep her secrets safe. She'd barely paid any attention to what she'd been saying, how she'd been acting.
Of course he'd thought she was a heartbeat away from cutting him loose. She was the only one who knew it was really the other way around.
This whole time she'd been walking around with him as if things were normal, and he'd been pretending just as fiercely as she had.
"Garrus," she said, her voice rough.
He looked at her. His eyes were pale, piercing blue in the stark sunlight.
She reached over the table and touched the back of his hand. "I've been a shitty friend."
"Yes," he agreed. "But you were dead. That's a pretty good excuse."
Shepard took a sip of her beer, contemplated the bottle in her hands. "We haven't talked very much about the important stuff, have we?" she said. "Tell me about Omega."
"Tell me what's going on with you," he countered.
She grimaced, looked away. "You go first."
He folded his arms. "How old are you, again, in turian years? Eight?"
"You're deflecting," she said, with a honeyed smile.
He sighed, and rubbed at his forehead under the visor. "I... yeah. Can we talk about you instead? I'm not ready."
Shepard looked down at her hands, took a deep breath.
All right. Why the hell not. If the conversation went really badly, she could always find a ledge somewhere and walk off it.
"Okay," she said. She drained her beer in a long gulp. "But not here. Let's pay another visit to Bailey. We need a change of uniform, and I bet C-Sec has some spares."
Bailey just waved a hand and told his assistant to get Shepard whatever the hell she needed. Bailey was fantastic. If only the Council could be more like him.
In the women's bathroom at C-Sec HQ, Shepard contemplated her underwear, and weighed probabilities.
Her armor and helmet were bugged. Obviously. EDI had a direct link to her comm, camera and medical software.
Her undersuit was most likely also bugged. At the very least it would have some kind of tracer implanted in the fabric.
Her underwear, though... How far would Cerberus really go to keep an eye on her?
Fuck it. She couldn't even be sure about her brain. She definitely wasn't sure about her bra. She peeled it all off and kicked it aside, then shimmied into the black-and-blue C-Sec one-piece, zipped herself up.
She gathered up the pieces of her armor and stepped out into the hallway, and nearly bounced off of Garrus's shoulder.
"There you are," he said.
She just nodded mutely, trying not to stare. C-Sec Officer Vakarian had risen from the grave.
She dumped their armor in a storage box in Bailey's office. "The visor, too, Vakarian."
"What? No. Why?" His hand flew up to his face.
She just looked at him. Tapped her ear, pointed at her eyes.
"Shepard, there's a point at which healthy paranoia becomes actual paranoia." But he unhooked it, dropped it into the box. His skin underneath was pale, more suede than silver.
She unfastened her omni-tool as well, and made sure he did the same.
Bailey watched them with wary interest. "Don't think I wanna know why all this is necessary. Just try to stay out of trouble while you're wearing our duds, all right Shepard? Don't make us look bad."
She grinned her shark's grin at him as they walked out the door, borrowed pistols clipped to their sides. "C'mon, Bailey. It's me."
Newly minted C-Sec Officers Shepard and Vakarian stood in the atrium in front of the rapid transit terminal.
"Now what," he said, looking down at her.
"I'm not sure," she admitted. "We need to go somewhere where there's absolutely no chance of spies, or bugs, or being overheard." She glanced up at him. "If we were back in my city on Earth, I'd have a million places, but the Citadel... I don't know. A hotel?"
"Spirits, no," he said. "Everyone has bugs in the hotels."
"Then where?"
His eyes sharpened, grew cold and distant. "I have an idea."
She stood guard in the silent, half-lit hallway while he hacked the door.
"You're sure?" she murmured.
"Very sure," he rumbled back. "Mierin didn't have any relatives, and he moved into this apartment complex after he quit C-Sec. I think I was the only person who knew he ever lived here." His face darkened. "At least, the only person who's still alive."
Shepard glanced down at him, her forehead creased in worry.
"Ah—" he made a small noise of satisfaction as the door lock disengaged. "We're in."
They stepped over the threshold into an inch-deep layer of dust.
Any doubts she'd had about their security were instantly erased.
The air was dead still, and had been filtered and recycled so many times it smelled of nothing at all. The large window in the opposite wall was set to one-quarter brightness. Wan sunlight slanted over a low couch, a coffee table, a stack of datapads, all of it covered in a pristine shroud of pale grey.
No one had set foot in this space, drawn breath from its air, in over a year. It was a tomb as silent and still as Alchera.
Garrus stood motionless at the door, his face tipped down.
She pressed her hand to his shoulder. "...Garrus. I don't want to disturb any ghosts. We can find another place."
He shook his head and stepped forward, leaving a pair of dark two-toed footprints behind. "It's all right," he said. "Mierin... he would approve of this. He was always the most pragmatic out of all of us."
"Well, in that case." Shepard's lips curled in a tiny smile. "Do you suppose he left us any booze?"
He let out a startled huff of laughter. "If he did, it's dextro."
"Not a problem for me," she said, shrugging. "I'd rather be pleasantly drunk for this conversation. I think you would be, too."
"Fair enough." He went and rattled in the cupboards, produced two glasses and a bottle of grass-green liquid with elegant, unreadable script on the label.
She contemplated the long, low couch and its perfect blanket of grey. A ghost's seat. She moved over to the big window instead and sat down cross-legged on the dusty floor, stirring up a miniature nuclear cloud around her.
Quiet footsteps approached her back. A glass dropped into her uplifted hand.
"Thanks," she murmured.
He stepped around her and sat down, stretching his long legs out in front of him.
They gazed out the window for a moment, in companionable silence. They were up high enough to see the great curving ring of the Presidium in the distance; high enough that the the fragile cocoon of atmosphere cradling the wards disappeared abruptly into starry blackness.
"To Mierin," Shepard said quietly, raising her glass.
"And everyone else," Garrus murmured. "Monteague. Erash. Melanis. Vortash."
"Pressly," she said.
"Butler. Ripper. Sensat. Weaver. Krul."
"Ashley," she said.
"Williams," he said. "...And you."
She met his eyes. "And you."
Their glasses clinked gently.
The liquor was warm and sweet, with a strange earthy, metallic flavor. Somewhere in between honey and dirt.
"This is kind of okay," Shepard said, surprised.
"I'm glad to hear it. You don't want to know how much this stuff costs." Garrus cradled the glass between his hands, long fingers wrapping easily around its circumference. "So," he said, looking at her with sharp eyes. "Why are we breaking into my dead friend's apartment in borrowed clothes? Cerberus?"
"Cerberus," she confirmed. "We may not be safe here either. But it's the best I can do without scooping out my eyeballs."
"What?" He coughed, and had to wipe a bit of liquor off his chin.
"They're synthetic now," she explained, blinking deliberately. "It's possible EDI could have a direct feed from my brain. Miranda said otherwise, but, well. I'm not sure about Miranda."
"Spirits," he said, looking away.
Shepard took a long swallow of her drink. "If EDI's in my brain, we're so fucked anyway that it doesn't even matter."
He grimaced. "You were right about needing liquor for this conversation."
Shepard smiled wryly. "Drink fast. I'll give you the bad news now."
She leaned forward, looking directly into his eyes. "Listen. Cerberus is waging psychological warfare on all of us. They are trying to make us relaxed, complacent. Do not relax. Not even for a second. They are using us to go after the Collectors, and the instant that's done, they will stab us in the back."
He flicked his good mandible out in a fierce, sharp-toothed smile. "Not if we stab them first. I'm relieved, Shepard. I was starting to wonder if you'd gone soft on those bastards. What do you need me to do?"
"Watch my six. Keep your eyes and ears open. Look for opportunities. We need to do everything possible to win over Miranda and Jacob, and get the rest of the Cerberus crew on our side." She firmed her jaw. "Even if it doesn't work— even if all we can do is get them to hesitate before they open fire on us— it still gives us a better chance."
He nodded. "We won't be able to talk about any of this on the ship."
"No. If you need to tell me something, you'll have to get creative." Her fingers tightened around her glass. "We may be in their pockets for now, but we don't have to go along quietly forever. Our moment will come."
"Just let me know when you're ready. I'll be there." His eyes were alight with cold intent. "They have a lot of dead bodies to answer for."
Shepard swirled the green fluid around, watching it glide over the surface of the glass, and shook her head. "Can you believe that bullshit they pulled on Pragia?"
Garrus sank back against the side of the couch. "That was vile. Even for them."
"All those conveniently placed vidlogs, all saying the same thing. 'Splinter group.' 'No direct involvement.' The Illusive Man must think I'm a complete fucking idiot."
He gave her a sharp look. "I thought you were talking about what they did to Jack."
"Oh." She took a sip of her drink, glanced away. "Well. That too."
"Shepard," he said. "...I think you're losing perspective."
"I'm not going to pretend to be surprised every time Cerberus finds a new way to fuck somebody over," she snapped. She looked down at the floor, and let out a long breath. "But you may be right."
Garrus made a low, discontented rumble. "If you're agreeing with me, things must be even more screwed up inside your head than I thought."
"Listen, you ass. We're in a crazy situation. I'm allowed to be a little bit crazy."
The rumble deepened. "Only if you come out of it alive."
"Actually, the plan is to get us all out of this alive."
She drained her glass and contemplated the slow, impassive rotation of the stars outside the window.
He was alive. So was she, if you used a slightly generous definition of the word. It was quiet and still, and no one knew where they were. No cameras. No computers. No spies.
She could feel her nerves gently, finally beginning to uncurl.
"It's really nice, sitting up here," she murmured. "Let's talk about something else for a while."
"The Praetorian," Garrus said immediately.
"Jesus, Vakarian." Shepard grimaced and pushed herself up to find the bottle. Little puffs of dust kicked up behind her heels. "I need about twice as much of this stuff in me before I can do that."
She folded herself back down next to him, splashed a generous amount into her own glass, and topped his off when he raised it in wordless request.
"I have a better idea," she said. "Why don't you tell me more about your opinions on big guns?"
"I'm in favor of them," he said, and clinked his glass against hers.
"Cheers to that." She drank deeply.
The woodsy liquor blazed a path down her throat and pooled inside her, spreading a comfortable warmth out to her fingers. Her shoulders slowly relaxed, and she settled back against the side of the couch.
Beside her, Garrus tipped his head back, and propped one long arm up on his knee. The glass dangled loosely from his hand.
"That was a long list of names you drank to," Shepard murmured into the stillness.
"I worry about you all the fucking time," he murmured back, looking up at the ceiling.
She glanced over at him. "...I'm worried about you, too."
"At the very least you could pick up an assault rifle." He gestured with his hands, nearly sloshing his drink over the edge of the glass. "It's easy. Just point and shoot."
"No way. Assault rifles are heavy. If I'm loaded down, it's a lot harder to use biotics effectively." She smiled and took a long, slow sip, rolling the liquor over her tongue. "And killing bad guys with my mind is fun."
He let out a deep, purring chuckle. "Not as fun as when you line up a shot, factor in wind speed and air density, breathe out, pull your trigger... and then two kilometers away, at the top of a very tall apartment tower, a merc's head explodes like a squishy fruit." He held up his forefinger and thumb in front of her face, then pinched them shut.
"Two kilometers? Bullshit."
"Nope," he said smugly. "Benak Had'derah. Red sand distribution manager for the Blue Suns."
"You are so full of crap, Vakarian."
"I understand your resentment. Not everyone can be this gifted." He patted her on the head.
Even through the glove, his hand was unbelievably warm. Shepard struggled not to close her tired eyes and sigh with appreciation.
"Did I ever tell you how I survived Akuze?" she murmured.
He straightened up abruptly, his hand dropping to the floor. "No. No, you didn't."
"I had a sniper rifle."
She savored the expression of slack-jawed surprise on his face.
"You? A sniper rifle?"
"Yep. Shitty old Avenger model. Hahne-Kedar never could make guns worth a damn. It would overheat if you breathed on it."
He squinted at her. "...The thresher maws must have been laughing too hard to kill you."
She grinned down at her glass, unspeakably grateful that he wasn't going to try to coddle her.
"Yeah, well." She swirled her drink. "With a target that big, you don't need to have good aim. Just fast legs. So next time you feel like sassing me about how I'm better at running than shooting, keep in mind it kept me alive."
He gave her an odd look. "I won't deny that you're a lousy shot, but I've never sassed you about running."
"Yes you did, on Aeia. The—" Oh right. She'd died that time. Of course he didn't remember. "—Nevermind. Must have gotten mixed up."
"Hmm," he said, eyes sharp. Crap. He was mentally filing that one away.
But he let it lie for now. "Alenko mentioned that you wouldn't talk to him about Akuze. Back on the SR1, I mean, when you two were— having your thing. He was worried you might be haunted."
Shepard raised an eyebrow. "Haunted?"
Garrus looked up at the ceiling as his translator burbled into his ear. "When you say it back to me, it translates differently. I meant that the memory was draining your spirit. He thought that was why you couldn't talk about it. It was too painful."
"It was," she said.
"And now?"
Shepard rested her chin on her knees. "...I guess I gained perspective."
He splashed a bit more of the liquor into her glass before topping off his own. "What happened with the thresher maws?"
She smiled. "What do you think? I ran, and fired, and ran some more." She reached over and clinked her glass against his. "Every shot that went wide meant I had to sprint for my fucking life for an extra forty seconds. Couldn't use my biotics, because I wasn't sure when I'd get to eat again. Turned out to be a good call. It was a day and a half before the Alliance sent in air support."
She glanced up at the ceiling, trying to remember. "I managed to kill the first one with the rifle. The next few stayed behind for a while to eat the body, so that earned me a breather. Then I found a cache of bombs. All in all, I think I got about five or six of them, but it's hard to be sure. The memories are kind of shaky." She took a long drink, and leaned back against the couch next to him. "Thank fucking god threshers are so territorial. If they'd all swarmed at once, you'd be talking to a puddle of human goo right now."
He looked at her intently. "And the others from your unit?"
"All dead within the first thirty minutes."
Garrus leaned back and tipped his head back against the armrest, rolled over onto his cheek to look at her. "So why did you live?" he murmured.
"...I'm not sure," she replied slowly. "Even now. The ground started shaking during shift change. Worst possible time. Chain of command fell to pieces. Some of the others were trying to go back inside the shelters for guns, some were trying to get out to the vehicles. I tried to get everyone around me to shut up and just stop for a second, but— either no one could hear me, or they weren't paying attention.
"So I just... stood still, and waited, and watched."
She gazed down into the bottom of her glass. "When I saw that I needed to run, I ran. I grabbed as many as I could and made them run with me. But one by one, everyone else died. And I didn't."
"Hmm," he said, watching her through heavy-lidded eyes.
"Although," she murmured as a thought occurred to her. She held her hand up to the light of the window, looking at the faint traces of surgical scars running down the insides of her fingers. "Maybe I did die. Like everyone else down there. But I just... came back."
"Shepard," he said sharply.
She reined herself in. "Anyway. That's the other reason I tend to steer clear of big guns." She took a long, slow sip of her drink. "Big guns are for certain death situations. If I don't pull out the rifle, or the grenade launcher, it's like... it means that everything's actually not that bad. It's going to be okay."
Silence. She glanced up at him.
"That's a ridiculous superstition," he said unmercifully.
She scooted closer to him and slung her arm over his shoulders, with some difficulty. "You know I love it when you're horrible to me, right? Never stop."
Garrus turned his head to look at her, a little awkwardly since her elbow was in the way of his fringe. "Your 'big gun'—"
She thumped her glass down on the floor. "Are you air quoting at me, you turian motherfucker?"
He gave her an unimpressed look. "As I was saying. Your 'big gun' back then was an underpowered and inaccurate model that was obsolete before it even hit the shelves." He flicked his good mandible out and up in a malevolent grin. "Now, you have a miniature nuke launcher."
"If only we had a thresher maw to fire it at," she said.
"The spirits help the pious to grant their own prayers," he said, and reached around her shoulder to rest his hand on top of her head again. She laughed and leaned back against him.
"You're the only person I talk to like this," she said.
Garrus made a low rumble in his throat. "After how much we've been screaming at each other, I'm amazed you're continuing."
"...Yeah. I should really stop." Shepard straightened her back, and let out a long breath.
"You were a total mess down on Pragia," she said. His fingers tensed against her scalp. "Insubordinate. Unreliable. If we'd been up against worse than a few krogan, it could have gone to complete hell. Distraction gets you killed, along with anyone else who's relying on you. You know that."
"I know," he replied. "You're right. I'm sorry. That won't happen again."
She turned to look at him, astonished. His fingers slid through her hair with the movement. "You what? You're agreeing with me?"
He sighed and pulled his arm back, leaving a cold, empty space behind. "I am a soldier, Shepard. You're in charge of this thing, and like you said, you're kicking ass. It's your job to make the calls, and my job to listen. Regardless of personal feelings."
Shepard fell back against the couch, giddy with relief. "Keep on talking like that, Vakarian, and I'm gonna have to petition the Hierarchy for a marriage certificate."
"Besides," he said, undeterred. "Your call was tactically sound. They had armor and biotic barriers. I couldn't do a lot to help. You needed to take care of it."
"And then stand back and let you steal all the credit for my kills," she agreed. He flicked the back of her hand. "Ow!"
"I'm trying to be serious, here," he growled.
"Sorry." She took a sip of her drink, gathering her thoughts. "I'm just... glad to hear it. After I found out you went to Miranda—" The memory rose up and throttled the words in her throat. Flat on her back in a prefab on Illium, staring up at the ceiling. Her eyes burning from dust, her heart choked with fury.
She shook her head. "I trusted you, completely. And you went around my back to Operative Lawson. She reports directly to the Illusive Man every single night. And then there was all that crap on Pragia, and..." Shepard drew her knees up to her chest. "I thought you were going to leave me. For good."
"You told me to leave you," he said, annoyed. "I thought you were bringing me out today to give me the 'thanks for the memories' speech."
She glared at him. "I was hoping you'd fall in line if I pulled out the heavy artillery. I should have remembered that you're a stubborn ass."
She tipped her face down, pressed her forehead against her knees. "...Why did you go to Lawson," she said to the floor.
"I told you."
"Tell me again in a way that I'll understand. Because I don't get it. Before I left for Illium, I thought we were all good. Then the next thing I know, Lawson's up in my face saying you think I'm jeopardizing the mission."
She thumped her glass against the ground, and bared her teeth at him. "If you doubted my ability to command, you should have at least had the decency to take me on yourself. Not brought a vote of no confidence to fucking Cerberus."
A low rumble came from his throat. "I never doubted your ability to command," he growled. "I never said anything about jeopardizing the mission. That is not what Lawson and I talked about."
"Then what."
"I said you didn't seem to care about your own life anymore. I called her various names for her role in creating this situation. And I asked her to keep you safe."
She glanced up at him. "You called Lawson names for me?"
Garrus clicked his jaw at her. "Somehow I knew that would be the only part that got your attention."
Shepard sighed. "I do care about my life."
"You care about the mission," he said. "That's different. Are you even happy to be here, Shepard?"
"Those colonists aren't going to save themselves, are they?" she retorted. "The Collectors are inhaling every last inhabitable world we've got, the Reapers are dicking around in deep space with impunity, and for some reason I drew the only short straw in the entire galaxy. So if Cerberus hadn't found me and turned me into their undead indentured servant, our odds would look even worse than they do right now. And you'd still be lying facedown in a puddle of blue fucking blood on Omega."
"You're not answering my question." He tilted his head. "But I'm pretty sure I just figured out what I needed to know."
"You are such a cop," Shepard said, pressing her hands to her face.
"I'm even wearing the uniform," he replied.
They sat in silence for a long moment. She uncapped the bottle and poured a thin stream of liquor into her glass, then his, watching the droplets pearl up and splatter against the surface.
"You're the last person I have left, Shepard," he said into the stillness. "Don't die."
"You're not allowed either," she said fiercely. "I won't die."
Garrus picked up his drink, and gave her a long look. "I'm not going to take your word for it anymore. Enough stalling. Tell me what's really been going on."
Her brain screamed No No No but her mouth said "All right." Fuck! Shepard glared down at her glass.
"It sounds completely insane," she warned him.
"I already think you're completely insane. You can't make it any worse."
Oh goddamnit. She'd done this all fucking backwards. She should have told him everything when they were still yelling at each other. It would have been easy. Get the words out, throw them in his face.
Now she cared again, way too much, and her resolve was shot to hell.
They hadn't talked about Omega— but she could see it. Losing his squad like that had cracked his hard heart to splinters.
If she told him the truth—
And here it was:
She'd lied to him through her teeth every single time. She'd died not just once, but over and over again, and she wasn't planning on stopping anytime soon. She'd been given a sickening kind of superpower and instead of being the better woman and pretending it didn't exist, she was exploiting it for fun and relying on it to rescue her from her own shitty decisions and lack of focus. On Pragia she'd seriously considered killing herself just to spite him.
If she told him the truth, he would find her choices utterly repulsive. He would never allow her to continue. And he would never, ever forgive her. He would walk away, and they would both be left without a single friend in the galaxy when the Reapers came screaming in.
And if she lied to him now, she was betraying him all over again. What kind of friend was she, to keep him blind and shackled to her side? And what kind of friend could he be to her? Not the sharp eye and right hand that she needed in this insane new universe. He wouldn't know enough to help. He wouldn't be able to watch her and make sure she didn't lose perspective. Go too far. Or not far enough.
There was a third option: pick one, see how it worked out, and then shoot herself in the head. They could repeat this whole conversation without him knowing any better, and she could work the angles and figure out how best to play him. Like a puppet in her hands.
What had she turned into? She was a fucking monster.
But she couldn't stop. The colonists were still out there. The Collectors were still out there. The Reapers were still coming, and it just might take a monster to kill them.
It wasn't even a choice. She would just have to screw her head on a little bit tighter, and figure out how to be her own damn right hand. She wouldn't stop until every last Reaper lay in pieces.
"You know that psychic Cerberus brain chip theory of yours," she began.
His eyes widened. "...I may need to retract my previous statement."
"Garrus," she said, putting her hand to her forehead.
He reached out and touched her shoulder. "Sorry. Keep going. I'm listening."
She shrugged uncomfortably. "There's not much to say. I just... see things. Future things. Things that haven't happened yet. It's only sometimes, and only when I'm fighting. I haven't really figured it out."
She pushed her glass around on the dusty floor. "You asked how I knew what the Praetorian would do. That's how."
"And how you knew about the YMIR? And those hunters?"
She nodded.
"And the red dust on Illium?" he asked, his voice low and dangerous.
"I knew it wouldn't kill me," she said. Not permanently.
"It was still irresponsible," he said.
She rolled her neck back and forth and looked away, feeling itchy. "Possibly."
He exhaled. "So. You died a human, and came back a prophet."
Shepard chewed on her lip, and said nothing.
"Did Cerberus do this to you?"
Good question. "Somehow, I don't think so. If they did, they're not taking credit for it," she replied. "But I've been trying to keep it under wraps. For obvious reasons."
"...Yeah."
They sat together in silence for a long moment. Shepard rested her chin against her arm, and traced circles in the dust with her fingertips.
"You believe me?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said. "I do."
She exhaled.
Garrus looked up at the ceiling. "You had EDI lock me out of your cabin over this," he said. "Seriously, Shepard?"
"Yeah, well." She put her hand flat against the floor. Lifted it back up to see the impression of her palm in the dust. "It seemed like the prudent call at the time. I couldn't say anything I didn't want Cerberus to hear. And I was about two seconds from decking you."
"Hah," he rumbled. "You could have tried."
Shepard snorted. "Fine. Come up to harass me whenever you feel like it. Next time, I won't let the AI protect you."
He tilted his head to one side. "If you hadn't been protecting me, all of this would have been a lot easier."
She huffed out a short, harsh laugh. She was a coward and a liar and a horrible person. It had never been about protecting him. It had always been about protecting herself.
Shepard looked at him, her lips curved in a sad smile. "...I know."
It was well past time. They drained their glasses, picked themselves up, swaying slightly. Garrus looked down at the dust blanketing the floor, and chuckled. Footprints and finger marks and some indecipherable swooshes from their legs. Smooth round indentations from their glasses. And two remarkably clear impressions of a turian and a human butt.
"Our masterpiece," Shepard said, laughing a little.
"Let's come back here sometime," he said, and draped an arm over her shoulder. "We can make it bigger."
Her brain supplied her with several images of how that might be accomplished. She stiffened under his arm, stared up at him, eyes wide.
"What?" He looked down at her blankly.
"Nothing," she managed, fighting down a scandalized grin. It was just her. Booze always turned her into a pervert. Turian brains probably didn't even think that way.
Garrus made a skeptical noise, but mercifully chose to ignore her. He bent down, pulling her with him, and placed their empty glasses carefully into the dust covering the low coffee table.
"Thanks, Mierin," he murmured.
"Thank you," Shepard echoed quietly. A dead turian she had never met. His sanctuary had given her a few precious hours out from underneath Cerberus's thumb.
It would be better if she hadn't used his gift to lie to her only friend.
But, well. This was the galaxy she lived in now.
Bailey's assistant kept an impressively straight face as Shepard handed her the uniforms— wrinkled, caked in dust, and smelling of expensive turian liquor.
"Official Spectre business," Shepard said, conscious of the fumes on her breath.
"Uh-huh," the assistant said. "By the way, you received some communications while you were out. Your ship tried to reach you over the link in your hardsuit."
Garrus tensed at her side.
"What did you tell them?" Shepard said, her voice even.
"Official Spectre business," the assistant replied.
Shepard smiled. "Whatever Bailey's paying you, it's not enough."
"Tell him that, ma'am."
"C-Sec really has changed," Garrus said, looking over his shoulder as they exited the security gate.
"Miss it?" Shepard asked.
"Absolutely not." He flicked a mandible out in a small smile. "I'm right where I need to be. Don't you think?"
They walked side-by-side back to the Normandy.
"...Ah, damn," he sighed, as she palmed the control for the airlock. "I forgot. You were going to buy me dinner."
Shepard snorted. "No I wasn't." The doors hissed open. "Maybe I'll consider it next time. If you're really, really nice to me."
He patted her on the head again. "Keep dreaming, Shepard."