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Victoria ignores the door chime, for the fourth time. She's nearly run out of pillows to throw at the door, as if that would get them to leave. She has one pillow left, but she's hiding in it.
"Ryder, Liam and Jaal are outside your quarters. They appear to not be dissuaded by your silence."
An image comes to mind, of the two men sitting on the deck, setting up camp in front of her door. She wonders whether they'd break out the salarian opera to wear her down, and then decides she'd rather not find out. "Let them in," she says, voice muffled in her pillow.
The door swishes open and shut, and then the lock activation chirps. Footsteps, a pause, and then footsteps again. The bed shifts slightly as they sit on either side of her, and she hears them set the thrown pillows back where they belong.
She doesn't move. She needs a few more minutes with her face shoved into a pillow. Jaal's hand settles on her lower back, warm and soft and comforting, while Liam gently, soothingly, rubs her shoulders.
She feels a lot like just giving in and crying.
"You," Liam says quietly after a few minutes, "are not fine."
Of course she isn't - she only said that so she could get out of the briefing room as quickly as possible. She'd made a bee-line for her shower, scrubbed herself nearly raw, and then sat on the floor with her knees to her chest while three days' worth of her hot water rations beat down upon her shoulders. She'd put her favorite lotion on afterward - something she found in Aya's markets that smells remarkably like lemonade - but the attempt to make herself feel even the tiniest bit better only served to steal what little remained of her energy. She smells good, but her hair's still wet, though it's mostly stopped dripping now.
"Nope," Victoria says, not even bothering to put up a fight about it. She takes a deep breath and pushes herself up, sitting. Even the smallest motion causes her head to spin, and she blinks away the vertigo, wishing she'd thought to grab at least some toast before collapsing. Rubbing at her eyes - she probably has pillow lines creased into her cheeks - she tucks her bare legs underneath her and shrinks into her sweatshirt. She'd managed underwear and a sports bra, plus the Initiative sweatshirt, but, like drying or even braiding her hair, pants were just too much work.
Jaal shifts closer, settling his arm around her waist, but she pulls away. As much as she wants a hug right now - as much as she needs a hug right now - she isn't sure she can take one. Not without completely falling apart. She's certainly earned a bit of falling apart, but she isn't quite ready; she isn't sure how far she'd fall.
"They tore them apart," she whispers, voice shaky, unsteady. Staring out the window at the stars, she avoids looking at either of them. The screams of the salarians echo inside her mind, loud and tortured and sad. Desperate. They left behind everything and everyone they loved, traveled all the way here for the innocent promise of a new future, only to be violently ripped apart by a madman the moment they woke up. She sniffles and wipes at her eyes.
"And you died," Liam says, when she doesn't say any more. Jaal murmurs his assent. Pain threads its way through their voices - those three words hurt to say, hurt to think about. They heard the same logs she did, saw the same things she did, and yet unlike her, neither the logs nor the mangled dead bodies will keep them up tonight. SAM needing three tries to restart her heart will.
Victoria draws her knees to her chest. "Oddly," she says, "that isn't bothering me too much." She suspects if she hadn't played those logs, if Raeka hadn't called her, if she hadn't fought a half-exalted krogan, if, if, if - rising from the dead, again, would affect her more. She feels badly that they had to see that, she does, but dying falls outside the realm of things she can process right now.
Jaal reaches out again, and this time she lets him settle his hand on her knee. "Ryder," he starts.
She shakes her head. Suddenly, it doesn't matter how far she's going to fall, only that she is, and she can't stop it. "No," she breathes, staring down at her lap. She tugs her sweatshirt over her hands. "No. I can't…I can't be Ryder tonight." Can't be Ryder, can't be Pathfinder, can't be anything other than Victoria.
Jaal nods. "Victoria," he begins again. Her name sounds like a comfort - a promise - from his lips. "You do not have to be anyone other than yourself." He gently strokes her bare knee with his thumb - also bare, his gloves left somewhere else. "What can we do?"
Victoria takes a very shaky breath and her vision blurs as tears fill her eyes. She finally turns and looks at the two of them. She blinks, bringing her partners into focus, and the tears tumble down her cheeks. Crying sounds like a good plan now - the only plan - and they're both here, looking for all the world like they're ready and willing to hold her up while she falls. "I really need a hug," she whispers.
They move carefully, but swiftly, and the words have hardly left her mouth before they've surrounded her - Liam at her back, arms around her waist, and Jaal at her front, tucking her into his arms. They're strong and steady and caring, and as Jaal presses a kiss to her forehead and Liam presses a kiss to her shoulder and they both whisper I love you, she lets herself fall.
***
Liam slips back into her quarters after acquiring toast and giving Lexi an update - and getting a refill on Victoria's anxiety medication and, after Lexi heard what they saw on the Archon's ship, a small bottle of sleeping pills as well - and locks the door behind him. Jaal's still on the bed, curled protectively around their girlfriend as she drifts in and out of a fitful sleep.
He fills a glass of water and carries it, the toast, and her meds over to the bed. Gently, he sits down beside her and brushes her hair out of her face. She looks up at him, eyes red and puffy, and gives him a weak smile. He bends down and kisses the top of her head. "Do you want meds?"
Slowly, she nods. With Jaal's assistance, she sits up. She was already spent, and crying took even more out of her; she leans heavily on Jaal to stay upright.
"Anxiety or sleep? Doc says you can't have both."
Victoria sniffles, and manages a quiet laugh. "Did that once in med school," she says, voice thick and hoarse, "don't recommend it. Sleep, please."
He twists the cap off the silver bottle, taps out one white pill, and hands it to her, followed by the glass of water. She swallows the pill and drinks half the glass in one go. Leaning her back against Jaal's chest, she gestures for the toast. It's nothing fancy, just toasted formerly-frozen protein bread with some angaran fruit jam spread on it, but she looks at it, and then up at Liam, like he's just cooked her the most amazing five-course meal. She slowly nibbles at it, careful to keep crumbs from falling into the bed.
Silently, she finishes her toast and her water and reaches forward to set the plate and glass down on the nightstand. Liam takes both from her with a kiss on her cheek. Her eyes go a little out of focus - her meds have kicked in. Liam sighs to himself; at least one of them will get some decent sleep tonight.
Jaal helps her remove her sweatshirt; skin contact seems important tonight, for all of them. Jaal's already shirtless, and Liam discards his onto the floor. She looks up at him, and Liam can tell there's the beginnings of a bad pickup line on her lips - probably along the lines of if you wanted me naked, you guys could've just asked - but she doesn't say anything. He's glad she doesn’t.
They shift around and pull back the covers so they can sleep under the blankets. Jaal slips his arms around her again as she lies down, holding her close to his chest. Liam kicks off his shoes and then slides in beside them. He catches Victoria's hands with his and kisses her knuckles. She's had this breakdown coming for a long time - he's not even sure she cried after her father's death; sure, they weren't close, but he was family, and died right in front of her.
And now she died. Again. And the Archon jammed that thing in her neck, and she saw that he was torturing the salarians, and had to choose between Raeka and the krogan, and, and, and. Victoria has an incredible ability to pack things away, to ignore shit in the heat of the moment, but he's yet to see her unpack things, to process the shit she ignores. So it builds.
Until it breaks.
"Sleep," he whispers, cupping her cheek with his palm. He gently brushes his thumb across her cheek. "We're here."
***
When he feels Victoria drift off into a sound, dreamless slumber, Jaal finally allows himself to relax. Fractionally. He no longer needs to be on full alert, but he will stand guard over her as long as she needs. He kisses the top of her head and shifts just slightly so his arm won't fall asleep with her lying on it.
He looks over her shoulder at Liam. They were both on that ship with her, heard and saw everything she heard and saw - although, and Jaal is imminently glad for this, neither of them had to die - and he'd be lying if he pretended not to be shaken by everything they found. "Are you alright?" he quietly asks his partner.
Liam shakes his head. "No. You?"
"No," he says, clasping Liam's hand with his.
Liam closes his eyes and rests his forehead against Victoria's for a moment. "I don't know what I'm more upset about. What they were doing to the salarians - what they are doing to all of us - or her."
Jaal makes a strained noise in the back of his throat. "It is not a contest," he says gently. One thing does not have to be worse than another.
"I know," Liam says, squeezing his hand. "But if I don't rank them, it's just all terrible and I don't know what to do with all terrible."
Victoria huffs quietly in her sleep. They both look down at her. Victoria certainly knows what to do with all terrible - she's somehow able to shut everything off, to not feel anything…at least until it becomes too much. Jaal suspects that, whatever it is that lets her do this, it wasn't intended as a permanent measure; she was supposed to let the pressure and emotions out long before they overloaded, long before she broke down sobbing in his arms for an hour.
"I understand," he says. Angara are not shy with their emotions the way he's discovered humans can be; his mothers taught him the value of emotional honesty, both with himself and others, and he's long learned how to process all terrible. It is not an enjoyable task, but he does not need to make one thing worse than another, nor hold everything in: there is meditation, and breathing, and reflection, and talking. Eventually, all terrible passes. He should teach his partners, perhaps it would help them. But not tonight.
Liam reaches out and strokes his fingers down Jaal's unscarred cheek.
He smiles and turns to kiss Liam's palm. "She is alive," he says, because that truly is all that matters from that. She died, and it caused a horrible, sickly knot in his stomach, but she did not stay dead. "We found the salarian ark, and rescued them from the Archon. Pathfinder Raeka is alive. And we now have a map to Meridian."
Jaal is not an optimist by human standards, nor does he want to diminish everything else that occurred today. But in the midst of tragedy and hurt and heartache, reminding them of the good that was accomplished today - and there was much - is important.
Something else he should try to teach his partners: acknowledging the good that happened does not negate nor erase the bad. Neither does acknowledging the bad negate nor erase the good. He loves Liam and Victoria, but humans are strange, difficult creatures. They are also wonderful and kind, but their approach to mental adversity seems to be the equivalent of beating it with a stick and demanding that it go away because they said so.
Liam's shoulders relax slightly. He slides his hand away from Jaal's cheek to rest on his hip, holding Victoria between them.
"SAM, lights out," Liam says quietly. "Wake us when we get to the Nexus."
"Of course," the AI says softly. The lights fade and the window filters darken, keeping out much of the starlight.
"Sleep well," Liam whispers.
"Sleep well," Jaal says, settling his own hand on Liam's hip. Victoria sighs and tucks herself closer to them. He brushes a kiss to her bare shoulder.
He doubts either of them will be sleeping soon, but they can pretend, and keep watch over Victoria, and each other.