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Chapter Text

2183.07.10

Regarding the geth, no, Shepard, I don't think they'd be interested in having it out over a friendly game of poker. I had to look that up, by the way—are you sure the information listed in the Encyclopedia Galactica is accurate? Turian games have a lot more rules.

To answer your other questions: yes, I am already sick of C-Sec; no, I haven't quit and stowed away on the Normandy—your ship isn't that large, surely someone would notice an extra face aboard; and no, I have not talked to my father since your last message. I'll send you his address. You can contact him yourself if you're that interested.

Glad to hear you and Chief Williams had such a fun-filled time at the photo op on Arcturus Station, although I'm a little concerned to hear that you had to prop each other up on your way back. Take someone responsible with you next time, all right? Maybe Moreau...although I would pay to hear Al-Jilani's take on your fondness for fluorescent liquors.

Pass along a hello to Tali and the crew, and keep me updated on what you find out there. The only action I've seen lately was a pushy volus trying to talk his way into requisitions.

G.

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2183.07.12
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2183.07.13
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2183.07.14
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-

 

Garrus still talked to Shepard even though she was dead. He knew it wasn't healthy, in the same way he knew that Palaven was an M-class planet and that his father would be angry when (if) he found out what Garrus was doing on Omega; he knew, but he didn't particularly care.

You're pulling to the left, Shepard said.

Garrus lined up his sights and pulled the trigger again.

Better, Shepard said. Anyway, a dead merc's a dead merc, who cares if you hit his right eye instead of his forehead?

She was teasing him, he knew.

"You care," Garrus said. He sighted and shot a third (a thousandth) time and dropped a turian in Blue Suns armor with one slug. Seven-point-eight million people on Omega, and sometimes it seemed like all of them had signed on with one mercenary group or another. He was starting to run out of heat sinks.

Hey, Garrus, she said. What are you doing out here, anyway?

"Working," he grunted. "What does it look like?"

He pictured her tucking a piece of her funny human hair behind her ear; it seemed to be in constant danger of falling in front of her eyes.

Looks like you're trying to get yourself killed to me. What, you have a death wish or something?

"Don't be an idiot, Shepard. Neither of us are that kind of crazy."

You say that, but it doesn't seem true from where I'm standing. I'm dead and you're still rambling on like some FNG with a crush.

"Whatever," Garrus said. He'd heard stories before—men, good men, sane men, who spent too much time in isolation or were spaced a little too long or waded through one too many bloodbaths, and then started to lose the distinction between dreams and reality. Haunted by spirits until they started believing their ghosts were real.

He wasn't pining for Shepard. He wasn't Dr. T'Soni, who wept through Shepard's memorial and still refused to accept that the commander was gone, or Moreau, who changed the subject every time Shepard was mentioned. He wasn't broken or out of his mind—

Sure you aren't.

"Shut up, Shepard. You're screwing with my concentration."

Geez, Garrus, learn to take a joke. You need to watch more comedies, that's your problem. Those shitty telenovelas don't do your sense of humor any favors—there are only so many times they can remake 'Gone with the Wind' with asari.

"Haven't seen that one," he muttered, and then promptly wanted to kick himself. "Didn't I tell you to go away?"

Come on, you're not fooling me or that dumbass you just shot. You don't really want me to go away.

He seemed to have hit a break in the waves of fodder who thought they could stick their heads out of cover with impunity; it was well into Omega's night cycle, or what passed for night on a station that seemed to be an endless maze of back alleys. Garrus paused to appreciate the contrast with the Citadel, although 'appreciate' might have been too strong a word. If he made it off this rock, he was buying an apartment planetside—somewhere nice, with a day and a night and maybe a view of the sunrise. There were a couple of farming colonies not too far from Palaven that offered decent incentives for settlers—

Hey, Vakarian. You awake under that brain bucket?

"Yes, I do," he said reflexively, and Shepard cackled at him.

No, you don't.

"Believe me, I really, really do."

Nope, Shepard said. And I can prove it.

"Do tell." Garrus let himself close his eyes for five seconds. It was all the rest he could afford, knowing that every shot he didn't take might mean the death of one of his men tomorrow.

You've got my dogtags tucked up in your hard suit, for one thing.

His hand clamped automatically over his side, where the chain was safe in a pocket under his armor. He did have a set of Shepard's tags, although he hadn't done anything as indulgent as actually wear them; Joker had passed them along in private after the funeral. He'd been drunk enough that Garrus wasn't sure he remembered what he'd done with them, but Garrus wasn't about to surrender them now. His own serial number was branded on a fragment from the ammo block of his first rifle and looped around his ankle, as was customary, and if he died, he expected his sister would carry it with her. It was what you did for family, and Shepard was family.

"Go haunt Tali or Williams if you're going to be a pedantic ass."

Yeah? Maybe I will. Maybe I'll stroll out of your life right now. He imagined her turning, hair (longer now than he'd ever seen it) falling down the back of her fatigues, a slight hitch in her step from a slug she'd taken to the kneecap on some long-ago campaign; and he couldn't stop the refusal that shuddered down his spine.

Ha! You flinched.

"You know, traditionally spirits are supposed to pass along wisdom or comfort. Something wholesome. Maybe you could at least try not to laugh at me."

Tough, Shepard said. Now here's some advice: eat something. You look like you're about to fall over, which is going to put the fear of Archangel in exactly no one.

"Thanks, Shepard," Garrus said, more sincerely than he'd intended; and then he set to work again.

 

-

 

2185.10.19

Garrus—

Hey, it's me. This is probably coming as a shock, but I swear I'm back and that I had a good reason for not—it's a long story. I don't know if I can explain everything, but contact me and we can figure out a way to talk. I'm in a clusterfuck that puts the situation with Saren to shame.

Remember the time we took Tali to that firing range on the Citadel and she outshot your old boss?

I'd really like to hear from you.

J.

##

2185.10.20
MESSAGE RECEIPT

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-

 

That was the last conversation he had with her. Garrus couldn't decide if she'd made good on her promise or if he was finally too worn out to hallucinate; those waking dreams, or delusions, or whatever they'd been, were one of his last comforts in an increasingly desperate situation, although he was well aware they could be early symptoms of a traumatic anxiety disorder.

One night when he was too exhausted to sleep he looked up Gone with the Wind on the extranet. His team was audible through the floor—they were drinking and telling lies, no doubt—but Garrus kept a measured distance from them. He wasn't so removed that their commander was a complete unknown, but he did stay far enough away that they learned to turn to each other for support and to him only for direction. It wove them together like the interlocking pieces of a rifle; Garrus had only to aim and pull the trigger.

The images he pulled up on his display were quaint: women dressed in impractical clothing made of meters too much fabric, elaborate houses almost as large as the women's clothing. He tried to imagine Shepard in a dress like that and failed. The handful of times he'd seen her out of uniform, she'd donned a pair of coveralls—and then only to clean her armor.

The history of the story was much more interesting; it was set in the midst of an old Earth nation's civil conflict that reminded him of the Unification War. He read a little more and was troubled to discover that the conflict had been about not only sovereignty but slavery. Sometimes he forgot how young Shepard's species was. When his people were razing krogan colonies and salting krogan soil, humans had yet to discover the combustion engine.

Gone with the Wind. He'd probably overhead someone talking about it during his C-Sec days and filed the name in his subconscious. It didn't seem like the kind of thing Shepard would appreciate, at any rate, even if he believed he was truly being haunted instead of going nuts. He didn't know what kind of dramas Shepard liked, but he doubted her tastes ran to anything like that.

Downstairs Erash laughed, and Garrus jumped at the sound. Before he went to bed he meticulously disassembled his rifle, cleaned it, and put it back together. Then he sorted the crate of heatsinks he'd bought earlier into smaller packs to be distributed tomorrow. And then he went to bed. His dreams were oversaturated. He met Shepard in the middle of a field under a gray sky, and she didn't speak; but she smiled.

 

-

 

2185.10.24
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2185.10.27
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2185.10.30
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2185.10.30

Vakarian—

CHECK YOUR DAMN MAIL.

##

2185.10.31
MESSAGE RECEIPT

Your message to [ VAKARIAN, GARRUS ] dated [ 2185.10.30 ] has not been read.

 

-

 

Maybe if he checked his messages more often he wouldn't have been so stunned to see Shepard storming his two-story coffin. Early in his career as Archangel he'd taken the time to wade through his inbox every couple of days—not as often as he should have, maybe, but his letters from home were filled with bad news and nagging, and hearing from the handful of friends and colleagues who still bothered to keep in touch with him served only to intensify the feeling of remoteness from his old life.

If he'd bothered to log into his personal address or his C-Sec account, he would've seen the string of increasingly curt notes from eight different fake personas and two authentic ones, all controlled by the mistress and commander of the Normandy. He read over her messages as he rehabilitated; thirty minutes after he'd escaped the medbay Chakwas had run him to the ground, and he'd been confined to bed ever since.

It was somehow easier to read Shepard's messages than it was to look her in the face. Most of her more recent letters had been filtered into his archives alongside the long strings of exchanges from the time after Sovereign's attack. In contrast to those early letters, the first few she'd sent after her resurrection were stilted and formal, explaining her new association with Cerberus and asking where he was. After that she'd tried to contact him almost daily, usually with one or two terse lines instructing him to respond.

Better to read the messages from Shepard than the ones from Mierin or Weaver. Shepard had come back; good as her reappearance was, he doubted the universe would extend the courtesy to the team he'd lost.

His face hurt.

"Officer Vakarian, if you look any more concerned I'm going to drug you again," Dr. Chakwas said. "I'm letting the Commander know you're awake for visitors."

"Doctor—" Garrus said, but she was already paging Shepard.

He sighed. "I wish you hadn't done that."

"Nonsense," Chakwas said. "I had to bar the door to keep her away when we were performing surgery, and later drag you away from her before the anesthetics had worn off. It will be good for you to do something other than stare holes in your omnitool. I'll be in the crew quarters if either of you need me."

He wasn't trying to avoid Shepard, he was just—it was just—

"Garrus," Shepard said, ducking through the hatch just before Chakwas sealed it on her way out. "How you holding together?"

"Fine," he muttered.

"What was that?"

He cleared his throat. "I said I'm fine, Shepard."

"Good. Good to hear." She crossed her arms and cocked her hip with classic Shepard confidence, but to Garrus the pose seemed forced. Out of nowhere his vision swam and he went dumb—literally speechless with rage—not at Shepard, but at the whole ass-backwards situation, at Cerberus, at Garm and the Blood Pack—and a little at Shepard, for dying, for arriving when she did and not one day earlier, or one day later—

He tamped it down. He set aside his anger, and he set aside his personal failings, and he let himself feel the relief that had tinted even his guilt and grief since Shepard stormed back into his life.

"The Doc said you're lucky to be alive yourself," he said. "Sounds like you have more robot parts than I do."

Something went out of Shepard, and she relaxed against the bulkhead, looking less defensive and more like a person, like a soldier and his commander and the woman who had been his comrade.

"Please. I was always a cyborg—you think this good an aim could be anything but mechanically perfect?"

"Whereas my flair for witty repartee can't be duplicated by any VI." As always, Garrus's mouth ran itself automatically. "We're a lucky couple of bastards, Shepard."

She grinned crookedly, which was a better reaction than he got from anyone else when his jaw flapped without his permission. "Thought you didn't believe in luck."

"Yeah, well, I've been rethinking a lot of my life choices lately."

"You're tellin' me." She hopped up at the foot of his bed; he shifted his feet out of the way to give her room to breathe. "This ship is so damn big I could park the old Normandy in the mess hall. They gave me my own deck." She looked so hilariously offended at this display of civilian opulence he had to chuckle, and the outrage caging his lungs loosened just a little more.

"You'll be wearing armor plated in platinum next."

"Wouldn't surprise me. I've got a fish tank. Biggest waste of water this side of the Presidium."

"Come on, I always thought those lakes were—"

"Pretty?"

"Scenic," Garrus said, dryer than wine.

"You would," she accused. "When's the Doc letting you out of here?"

"Officially, not until tomorrow. Unofficially..."

"You've already given yourself the grand tour?"

"Well, of the forward battery and engineering. Who's your XO? That's her office across the way, right?"

"Miranda Lawson. She's Cerberus right down to the tips of her pretty pointed toes, but she knows what she's doing. Wish I knew what she's doing—it's tough to run an operation like this when I'm not sure where my authority ends and hers begins. For all I know, she's got the whole crew leashed to her boots."

"Is there anyone else you can trust on this boat?"

"You. Chakwas. Joker's up on the bridge—"

"Yeah," he said, "I heard." He couldn't say he was thrilled at the news; he respected Moreau, but they'd always been wary of each other, circling around Shepard like varren.

"The engineers seem like good people, they're ex-Alliance, but who can tell how they'll behave under fire. Same goes for Taylor, the armory officer, although he's a little more seasoned."

"Great. You, me, the doctor, and your crazy pilot against a shipful of human imperialists. You know I hate it when we aren't outnumbered."

"Laugh it up, Vakarian. At least I'm not taking on every major criminal organization on Omega at the same time."

He must have—flinched, or Shepard read something in what was left of his face, because she backpedaled immediately. "Shit, sorry. Way too soon."

"No, Shepard, your timing is impeccable." He leaned on the last word, and she rolled her eyes even as she patted him awkwardly on the ankle; Shepard wasn't one for physical comfort.

"I get it. That was dumb of me. Aw, fuck." Shepard's language always took a dive off a tall cliff when she was under fire. Not like Garrus—he slipped up sometimes, as would anyone who'd been a soldier and then a cop, but he heard an echo of his father's reprimands whenever he resorted to vulgarity.

"Shepard. It's fine."

"Yeah, okay. Hey, get this, I might have a fifth ranger for our insurrection."

"Taylor?" he said doubtfully.

"No, Tali. Ran into her on a colony called Freedom's Progress. You haven't kept in touch with her, have you?"

"Not for the past...ah, let's just say it's been a while." Since Shepard's funeral, in fact, but he wasn't about to bring that up.

"She's running errands for the admiralty board now, believe it or not. Tried to convince her to tag along, but she had some top-secret assignment she had to finish. Now that I know exactly how one-way this trip could be I'm glad she didn't, but she might still turn up sooner rather than later."

"I'm flattered I don't get an exemption from suicide missions," Garrus joked, but instead of huffing a laugh, Shepard frowned.

"You don't have to come along. No, I mean—it isn't that I don't want you, and god knows I could use you, but—"

"Shepard, shut up," Garrus said. "Or I'm paging the doctor to check your head for lesions."

"Oh, whatever." He had the impression she wanted to slug him companionably in the shoulder; since he was still 'technically' hospitalized, she settled for patting him on the ankle again.

His crew was dead, largely through his own actions; his family's long collapse was speeding to an end; his head looked like it'd been minced and grated; he was signed onto a one-way death run; but Shepard was in front of him, flesh and blood and bone and intent. The scales were tipping in his favor.

Chapter Text

Shepard disliked the Citadel. Made the back of her neck itch. It hadn't always; in the old days it had seemed urban and expansive, a tangible symbol of her long-ago dream to see the stars. Now she couldn't shake the feeling that she was going to be arrested.

The last time they'd made port here had been to meet with Anderson, and then Garrus had mirrored her vague discomfort. Now he hummed at her side like a livewire, like six thousand volts of electricity wrapped in skin and shoved into a cab. In the backseat, Tali kept her face turned to the window; Shepard couldn't blame her. She briefly wished she had the luxury, because the worst—the absofuckinglutely worst—part of this mess was that she didn't know where Garrus's head was at.

He'd always been a firebrand, but Shepard was previously willing to excuse his behavior because he held himself to the same high moral standard as he'd held the rest of the universe. She'd admired that about him, that sureness and magnanimity, but this Garrus was slipping. Shepard didn't admire it, but she understood it; she'd slipped once. Now they had a name for her that nothing to do with saving the Council.

Garrus had her six, a duty in which he'd faltered only once, and then through no fault of his own. It was the highest praise she could imagine. If he took that shot—if he executed his former comrade, in full light, in full view of civilians—he'd be climbing out of a pit every day for the rest of his damn life.

Some days that climb seemed interminable. Death, Shepard was learning, had very little to do with atonement. Hell, she scared the living daylights out of dying, when it should've been the other way around.

She thought about that, when she placed herself between the business end of Garrus's rifle and a man with a target tattooed on his forehead; she thought about that, and trust, and about Mindoir, which was never far from her conscious mind. If Garrus chose to fire, there was a chance—however slight, in spite of his skill—there was a very real possibility he would clip her. At this range and with a high-powered rifle, a shot that even winged her head would make her gush like a popped grape.

It wasn't about Sidonis. She would've shot the turncoat herself in a different situation, if it'd been some stranger he'd thrown to the wolves. Loyalty was not a word novel to Shepard's vocabulary; it was the faith borne of loyalty that had carried her here, and something else entirely that compelled her to step in front of Sidonis.

Guilt, maybe. Hope. Some damn thing that had wormed its way under her skull, the same damn thing that made her laugh at Garrus's dumb jokes.

"He isn't worth it, Vakarian. Back off," she said.

"That an order, Commander?"

She paused. "No. Just a request. But look at him—he's as good as dead already. Trust me, I would know."

He was silent in her ear except for the soft hiss of breath.

"Garrus?"

"Yeah, fine. Tell him to get out of here."

Sidonis was gone from her thoughts before he was out of her sight; she picked out the shadowed perch where Garrus was hiding easily, almost believing she could see the glint from his rifle even though she knew he was invisible to the naked eye. She'd made a bad call, a call that went against every instinct she had and every belief she had dear, and now she had to deal with the fallout. Garrus should've been allowed to make his own decisions, but this—it was just as personal for her as it was for him.

"Garrus—" she started, as she swung into the cab.

"Don't want to talk about it, Shepard."

"Look, I know—"

"I mean it, Commander."

"Yeah, okay. Fine."

Tali hadn't even hauled herself out of the backseat. Smart girl. The drive back to their docking bay was more fraught with tension than the three minutes Garrus had a gun aimed at the back of Shepard’s skull, and all at once Shepard knew why. It was for the same reason she'd stepped in front of Sidonis without hesitation: trust, and how it broke.

 

-

 

"What are you doing here?"

He kept his back turned to her, although she knew the hiss of the security lock had to have announced her presence. That alone spoke volumes; Garrus might not stand for military formality these days, but he always treated Shepard with the respect he so clearly felt she deserved. Her resolve hardened.

"I'm here to talk," she said, "whether you like it or not."

"Whether I like it or not?" He rounded on her then, eyes glittering fiercely in their deep sockets. "Sounds like that's your new policy, Commander."

"And what, you'd rather I condone you murdering in broad daylight? I didn't think you were that kind of man, Vakarian."

"Don't give me that crap," he snapped. "I've seen you put down too many criminals to believe you care about due process. He deserved to die, we both know that."

"I'm a Spectre. I don't need official sanction." After the words were out of her mouth she realized with excruciating awareness how low that dig was; he'd take it as comment on his capability—

But instead he crowded into her space and drew himself up as if he thought he could intimidate her. "The hell that's your reason. You think I can't run my own life?"

She pushed back, got right up in his face, uncowed by the six inches she had to look up to return his glare. "No, I think that I need your head on straight!"

"Then you should've let me kill him!"

"Maybe I should have," Shepard said, "but I didn't. It was beneath you. You fall down that hole and you'll spend the rest of your life regretting it."

He broke off his hard stare, hopped the guard rail, and paced down the length of the Thanix cannon. Shepard wasn't holding her breath that he'd understand her reasons, much less agree with them, when she wasn't sure she agreed herself. She had pull over him, if she was honest, and she might have used that unscrupulously, but Garrus angry was an entirely different person from Garrus the cool, level-headed security officer.

"This isn't about the mission, Shepard. It's Torfan, isn't it."

She scrubbed at her face with her hands. Never let it be said that Garrus didn't have pull over her, too.

"Maybe it is about Torfan. I've been there. You think those batarian slavers deserved to die? Let me tell you something: I've seen the kind of atrocities they can inflict firsthand. They were scum, Garrus, and maybe they deserved to die, but I shouldn't have made that call."

"It was a military action—"

"It was revenge and you know it! That kind of thing eats you up inside, Vakarian, and I've learned from it, maybe become a better woman and a better leader because of it, but there's no reason for you to repeat my mistake when I'm here to knock some sense into you."

He took a long breath; she could see the anger drain out of him, and then he sighed and sagged sideways into the bulkhead, looking as weary as she felt.

"You are here, Shepard."

"What?"

"Nothing. Nothing. Just thinking...this is going to be a long war, isn't it?"

"Maybe we'll get lucky enough to die before the real fighting starts."

He snorted at that and faced her again, bracing his hands against the rail. Now he had to look up at her. "Careful. You're supposed to be the relentless font of optimism and hope."

"Then why do I keep you around?"

"I thought it was obvious that I'm here to make the place look nice."

"Yeah, you really beautify that giant gun," she said, and he chuckled. "I should go. I've been tinkering with the gerbil launcher, trying to get it to load sticky grenades."

"And you have reports to file, and requisition forms to sign, and campaigns to plan, I'm sure. But Shepard, for what it's worth..."

She crossed her arms and waited.

"If I'd been with you at Torfan, I would've stopped you, too."

"I—thanks. That's worth a lot, actually."

"Good." He hauled himself back up and over with an easy display of strength and ducked to pull out his cleaning kit. "Now, don't you have somewhere to be?"

"God, I have everywhere to be. What shift are you on tomorrow?"

"Second."

"Catch some sleep before tonight. We should be to Tuchanka by 0600 and I need you watching my back bright and early."

"I'm all yours, Shepard."

Maybe he should have that stained across his forehead as a warning. Better that than seeing him in Cerberus gear, at least.

 

-

 

Tali found her later that cycle in the mess. Shepard wasn't eating, although the ever-present mug of coffee sat steaming at her elbow. Her rifle was disassembled and spread out on the table in front of her; she'd shaved a hair off the firing pin, which of course necessitated a thorough cleaning. Constant tinkering wasn't a nervous habit so much as a life-saving one.

"Don't you usually do that sort of thing in your cabin? Or the armory?"

"Quarters were getting a little too close," Shepard said, and shook a couple of drops of oil onto a scrap of rag. "How about you?"

"Still too quiet," Tali said, and took a seat across from her. The mechanic was cradling a mug of her own. Shepard had asked about that habit, back on the SR-1, and Tali had said she enjoyed the heat and aroma, even if she didn't drink levo coffee. Cerberus didn't stock much dextro stuff beyond bare basics, and Shepard had been too preoccupied to think of it.

"Maybe you should start sleeping during the busier shifts," Shepard said.

"Maybe you should start sleeping at all," Tali said, far more shrewd than Shepard had been at her age.

"Who needs it?" Shepard tossed back. Not her. She could get by on two, maybe three hours a night; the last time she'd slept more than six hours in a thirty-hour period had been before N-school. For a while she'd leaned too heavily on stims, but she'd weaned herself away from tabs and was careful to avoid forming another habit. Of course, since Cerberus brought her back, it was possible she'd lost that weakened resistance to addiction.

Tali drummed her fingers against the table. "That's the new Rosenkov line, isn't it?"

"The M-97 Viper. I'm still not sure if I like it; it holds more ammo than most long-range rifles, but it doesn't have the stopping power I'm used to. It does dispense heat more efficiently, but—" Shepard looked up to see Tali drop her chin on her hand. "Sorry. You didn't come here to discuss arms manufacturers."

"Not really, no," Tali said, her voice filter somehow amplifying the wryness in her tone. "I thought that was why you kept Garrus around."

"That, and to make the place look nice. Or so he tells me." It was hard to tell what was Garrus's usual brand of self-deprecating humor, what was a deep well of confidence that bordered on arrogance, and what was a defense mechanism. She suspected he was genuinely bothered by his recent disfigurement, but she couldn't ask him about it; they didn't have that kind of friendship. Fighting back to back in trenches across the galaxy, sure. Pondering the philosophical implications of synthetic life, anytime. Revelations about family, loss, and scars...well, they told war stories sometimes.

Tali dipped her head. "How is he doing? He seemed so...angry."

"He's fine. We talked it out." Shepard ran her thumb over the edge of her ammunition block, checking for fractures and inconsistencies.

"You mean you snapped at each other and then one of you made a stupid joke," Tali said, and Shepard glanced up, startled.

"You don't have the battery wired, do you?"

Tali laughed. "No, Shepard, I just know the two of you. I'm not sure what happened after you told me to go loiter outside the Department of Tourism, but when you came back Garrus seemed...it's just, I've never seen him mad at you."

"Yeah, well, I may have encouraged him to make a choice that didn't end with his former teammate's brains smeared across the ground."

"Weren't you supposed to help him hunt down Sidonis, or whatever his name was?"

"Why does everyone think my call was wrong?" Shepard said. "Garrus made the final decision, first of all, and I wasn't about to watch him execute the guy in the middle of a crowd. C-Sec would've been all over us."

"It isn't like you to argue against killing a criminal. You don't have any problem with death, Shepard."

"As a last resort. And Garrus...he's better than that, okay," she muttered. She took up her barrel, closing one eye and squinting down the length of it.

Tali studied her silently, hands still wrapped around her cooling cup and head tilted at an inquisitive angle. Shepard let her; part of what she liked about this ritual was how it cleared her mind. The task was just intricate enough to distract her from tomorrow without being complex enough to require real focus.

Finally, Tali sighed. "Have you ever thought about your relationship with—"

"Hey hey, what're you guys doing up?" Joker stuck his head out from behind the aft bulkhead, his ballcap askew. "Time for all the good little zombies to be resting in their cushy captain's beds."

"An undead joke. Great. Never heard that one before."

"I saved it for you, Commander," he said, and winked at her. "Hey, Tali."

"You were sleeping in medical bay again, weren't you," Tali said.

"Guilty as charged. It's better than sleeping with twenty Cerberus clowns all packed together like sardines. They smell like racism."

Shepard pushed out a chair with her foot. "Play nice, Joker. Those sardines keep your ship in the sky."

"Don't remind me. No, seriously, don't bring that up, or I'll have to talk about how glad I am to see that your obsessive-compulsive disorder is continuing to manifest itself as a fixation with firearm cleanliness."

"Ash never thought it was a fixation," Shepard said.

"Ash showed up with triplicate forms to legally change your name to 'Benedict,'" Joker said. "Tali, are you drinking that? Because if you aren't, I will."

"Go ahead," she said, and pushed it over. "I didn't catch that last reference."

"Benedict Arnold," Joker said, and slurped at her (now his) coffee. "He was a traitor back in some big battle. American Civil War, maybe?"

"American Revolution," Shepard corrected. "Back before the UNAS existed—old Canada in the UNAS is the nation my family was from before they moved to Mindoir, Tali. Benedict Arnold was a general who defected from colonial forces."

"Charming," Tali said.

"Humanity is a class-act, all right," Joker agreed. "So how's Officer Stickass?"

"You know what," Shepard said, and snapped her rifle back together in eighteen seconds—not a personal record, but fast enough that Joker inched away from her.

"Uh, Commander?"

"I'm tired," she said. "Think I'll hit the sack."

"Shepard?" Tali said.

"Yeah?"

"Make sure you actually sleep. You seem like you need it."

Joker opened his mouth; Shepard narrowed her eyes, and he shut it with a clack.

"Night, Joker!" she said sunnily, and went to the elevator with her gun over one shoulder. Tali's trilling chuckle followed her out.

 

-

 

The next day she found herself telling a krogan adolescent that thresher maws weren't half as frightening as they sounded.

"We'll tear this thing apart, Grunt, don't worry!" She had to shout to make herself heard over the wind. "Right, Garrus?"

"Age shouldn't be a barrier to excellence," Garrus agreed. "Unless you're trying for excellence in suicidal charges. Then we're screwed."

"If this maw isn't strong enough to be worthy, we'll find another to kill!" Grunt shouted back.

What was her life, Shepard thought. What the hell.

"What the hell are we doing, Shepard?" Garrus said.

"You know what?" she said. "I have no idea. I swear this seemed like a good idea at one point." She popped the heat sink out of her SMG and, holding the weapon as gingerly as possible, stuck it out from cover. The top half dissolved in acid in before she could yank it to safety.

She looked at Garrus. Garrus looked back.

"I vote we let the krogan deal with this one," he said.

"Suck it up, Vakarian."

"He's probably leading that suicidal charge down its throat right now. I told you you shouldn't let him out of your sight."

"What?" Shepard squawked. "You wanted to buy him a lapdance!"

"I would be appalled at how sleazy I am if I weren't so busy trying not to die from chemical burns and terror."

"Can you stop bitching long enough to cover me?"

In answer, Garrus rose, sighted, and fired in one fluid motion. Shepard would've appreciated the sight, had she still been tucked next to him behind the mound of rubble, but she wasn't—as soon as he moved she'd followed, flicking out of sight only to reappear eight meters ahead and upwind of Tuchanka's very own commentary on the sandworm.

Garrus shouted something after her, but his instructions were lost to the maw's screams and Grunt's roars, she'd taken her helmet off to judge the wind on her face, and her subdermal radio link wouldn't be much help with all the interference. She switched to hand signals: Down?

Clear, he answered. Your left, thirty— He shook his head. Forty meters. Aim high.

Shepard was an extraordinary soldier for dozens of reasons; Cerberus's cybernetics didn't even rank in the top twenty. Her willingness to ask questions first and then shoot, her understanding of the mechanics of warfare, an empathy that granted her an uncanny insight into both enemies and allies—those made her remarkable. Her will, her aim, and her visual memory were what made her dangerous.

Her next round took the thresher maw right down the gullet. She loaded a new heat sink, aimed, caught her breath, squeezed the trigger; her second round took the beast in the soft underbelly. She was peripherally aware of Grunt closing fast, of a spray of acid that would have burned her face clean away if she weren't partially hidden behind a stone pillar; those fell away as she exhaled, caught her breath, squeezed the trigger—

Her third round caught the thing in the upper palate of its mouth. Clean shot to the brain, if thresher maws kept their brains in their heads.

"Commander," Garrus said, almost low enough to be lost to the wind. Shepard checked herself before she could take the fourth shot. Her heart was beating out a tattoo in her ears, but it was worth letting that rhythm go unresolved to see Grunt empty his shotgun into a monster ten times his size but only half as ferocious.

Garrus came up behind her. He had her helmet dangling from one claw.

"So," he said.

"Yeah," Shepard answered.

They stood shoulder to shoulder, watching as Grunt wiped a stringy chunk of maw tissue off his face.

"You're sitting next to him on the ride back," Shepard said.

Garrus turned to her with a wounded expression. "Me? I'm the one who picked up your helmet."

"I could've picked up my own helmet."

"But you didn't," Garrus pointed out.

"Maybe I was going to. Maybe you stole the opportunity from me."

He scratched the side of his face, clearly bracing himself to shift gears; Shepard crossed her arms and prepared to be amused. "Look, Shepard, not that I'm desperate, but I know military secrets."

"Your collector's set of asari telenovelas isn't a military secret, Vakarian."

He pointed a finger at her and opened his mouth, but before he could counter with a defense of his god-awful taste in entertainment, his expression shifted to something far less playful.

"Incoming on your six," he bit out.

"Great," Shepard said, and reached for her rifle.

 

-

 

Later, after Grunt had thundered off to brag to his new clan, Shepard finally took the opportunity to roll her shoulders and sigh. Her left side kept going all stiff; could be that she still wasn't entirely recovered from the ordeal of dying, but it might also be her new hardsuit sitting funny. Wrex settled back in his throne like he'd never suffered an ache from hauling around twelve kilos of armor, although she noticed that Garrus had his hands hooked over his collar and was stretching his neck from side to side.

"You two heading back to the Normandy for the night?"

"Is that an invitation, Wrex?" Garrus said. "Because I love what you've done with the place. I always heard that fixer-uppers were a bad investment, but the throne rubble really contributes to the shabby-chic feel."

"That what you were going for with your face, or were you just trying to imitate me? Because it isn't the scars that make me a hit with the females."

Shepard rolled her eyes, but she couldn't quite hide the shit-eating grin that tugged at her mouth. This was good. A waste of time, but good.

"Up to you, Shepard. There's a campfire with your name on it if you want it," Wrex added.

"Let's see, do I want to camp out behind the krogan DMZ, or do I want to return to a Cerberus-operated ship with more bugs than Grunt has dinosaur models? Garrus, what do you think?"

"I think whatever you want me to think. Battlemaster," he said placidly.

"Camping it is. We'll pick up the Professor in the morning."

"I'll have someone haul rations from your shuttle," Wrex said. "And now I have a duty to go get shitfaced with the newest member of Clan Urdnot. Garrus, Shepard."

"Wrex," Shepard said, and watched as he took the short way down from his throne rubble, dropping four meters and lumbering off without a hitch.

"I don't know how he makes me feel old," Shepard said. "But he does."

"Whatever you say, Battlemaster."

"Aw, hell, you're not going to drop that, are you."

"Not unless you make it a direct order."

"Consider it—"

"Battlemaster."

"Laugh it up, Garrus."

"Oh, I will," he said. "So. Fire?"

"Fire," Shepard agreed. "That wreck back there looks like a safe enough bet."

"Can't imagine anyone picking a fight under Wrex's nose," Garrus said, but he followed her as she picked her way down and started for the blown-out building to the northeast. The temperature was already starting to drop, as Shepard suspected it would throughout the night—not enough to be dangerous, but certainly enough to be uncomfortable, especially to her turian comrade.

They found a room on the ground floor that seemed structurally sound; it had most of its ceiling, at least, although the floor was little more than dirt. About half of the outer wall had crumbled away, leaving a meter of packed debris before the ground sloped away into a deep ravine.

Shepard stripped down to her utility suit and left Garrus to sort out the pieces as she gathered tinder and lit a fire. By the time she was finished, he was poking through a pair of rucksacks, which had been delivered as promised. He too had removed his hardsuit, and was outfitted in boots and a close-fitting shirt and pants not dissimilar from what she wore, although his were a charcoal gray where hers were black.

"You know," she said, poking at the fire with a stick of rebar, "we could've slept on the shuttle."

"No fun in that. Do you have any idea how long it's been since I've taken a vacation?"

"Have you ever taken a vacation?"

His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Maybe when I was a kid."

"Better make the most of the next eight hours, then," she said, settling back against a slab of concrete and stretching her feet towards the fire. From her position she had a straight shot outside; the view was...well, it was something. Not too radioactive, hopefully.

Garrus dropped a couple of MREs next to her and set his M-15 within easy reach before dropping down to join her. "Going to tell me about all your tropical getaways?"

She knocked her elbow against his companionably. "You know I spend most of my leave time in a bar. Let's see, the last time I had to build a fire, though..."

"Before you enlisted?"

"Probably," she said. "I remember one night in the Skyllian Verge when I would've traded my left eyeball for a chemical heating pad, though."

Garrus used his teeth to tear open one of the MREs in purple packaging. "What that before or after the Blitz?"

"Couple of months before. I'd just earned N1 at the Villa and my CO wanted to test me. He was an ass. The batarians were digging in on Rayingri and setting up oil rigs, although nobody could figure out why. We didn't have any interest in it, but the higher-ups didn't want the batarians having a stronghold in the Armstrong Nebula. We did try sending in a ground unit, but they'd rigged the whole platform to explode once our boys and girls were close enough."

"So they sent you to take care of the problem."

"Something like that," Shepard said. "There was a ranking officer named Garik who was coordinating the operation. I spent three days in a ghillie suit crawling over rock to line up that shot. Never been more miserable in my life."

Garrus made a sound. Shepard twisted to look at him, and caught him scrupulously applying a fragrant sauce to his packet of food. "What?"

"Nothing," he said.

"Come on, you can beat that?"

"Sure, you were physically uncomfortable," he said. "But I think the real test is the ability to operate under psychological duress."

Shepard peeled open an MRE of her own and settled in for a story. "Was this during your time with the 43rd?"

"It was while I was with C-Sec, actually. I'd finally been promoted to Investigations, but every so often they loaned me out to Special Response. Bomb threats, hostage situations, that kind of thing." He paused and made a face. "I know this stuff isn't supposed to go bad, but it tastes like it's been marinating in krogan sweat."

Ah, it was going to be like that. For all that Shepard tended to be a talker and Garrus a doer, he could milk a story like nobody she'd ever met. "Get on with it, Vakarian."

"Don't rush me, Battlemaster. Anyway, I'd just made detective when we got word that there was a problem in the financial district. Some salarian separatist nutjob had wired himself up and walked into a bank. One of the managers stalled him long enough for most of the customers to get to safety, but there happened to be a class of kids taking a field trip that day..."

"You're kidding."

"I wish. Our first response squad was off dealing with a pirate raid a couple of klicks away, so the captain decided to call me in. I was new to the position, remember, and—you have certain rituals you do before you take a shot, right?"

"Sure," Shepard said. She'd never met a sniper worth his weight in salt who wasn't superstitious to some extent.

"Well," Garrus said, drawing out the word, "I never go after a target without this." He tapped his visor.

"That's a lot more practical than—"

"Then what?"

"Nothing," she said.

"Right. Like I said, I was doing my best to adhere to all the regulations, and part of that was not wearing military-grade gear while walking around the Citadel."

"So no visor?"

"No visor," he said. "I was called down the the financial district, but nobody told me why. When I got there they handed me some piece of crap Elanus rifle and told me I'd be setting up opposite the front entrance. I told them that if they were going to pull me off my current investigation, the least they could do was bring me my visor from my desk."

Shepard edged closer, uncaring that she was tucked up against his side. "And then what?"

"Pallin was doing a spot-check of our station that day."

"So?"

Garrus chewed and swallowed. "So he was the only one at the station other than the clerk when the captain called."

"Now I know you're kidding."

"Oh, I'm serious," he said. "The next thing I know, Pallin comes hauling up to us, waving my visor in one hand. He was angry enough to break teeth. He followed me all the way up to my hide, too, cursing in my ear the whole time. Our techs managed to take the kinetic barrier down, which flushed out the bomber. Only problem was, he came out behind a shield of kids, and he had an accomplice. Somehow that had slipped our notice completely."

"What happened?"

"Pallin told me that if I couldn't take them both down without collateral, he'd hang me himself."

"And?"

He looked down at her, and his mouth and mandibles rearranged themselves into a smirk. "Two headshots."

"Ha!" Shepard said. "Showed him. You know, I never liked Pallin."

"You don't like anyone who disagrees with you."

"I like you," she said, and looked at him sideways, "and you don't do anything but argue."

"That's not true," Garrus said automatically.

She smirked right back at him. "Sure it is."

"You sing," he said.

"What?"

"You hum under your breath," Garrus explained. "Before you shoot."

Shepard looked away to hide her flush. "I can't believe you noticed that."

"I doubt anyone else has. What is it, anyway?"

"It's an old folk song," she said.

"And?"

"And eat your food, soldier," she said.

"Yes, Battlemaster."

Shepard took her own advice and shoved a piece of what was supposed to be ham in her mouth. Perversely enough, she felt as close to relaxed as she'd been since she woke up in a Cerberus bunker. Tuchanka might have amounted to a global war zone, but Garrus was here, warming her right side, and Wrex was outside, keeping the wolves at bay. Somewhere above, Tali and Joker and the Normandy were in orbit, and while the soul of her ship might be stained an ugly yellow that wouldn't go away until her girl was flying Alliance colors again, the heart of the Normandy was intact. Shepard was intact. It was enough.

As soon as that thought formed, there was a scuffling from outside the ring of firelight. Shepard tensed and went for her sidearm when a varren nose edged into the circle, then a varren head and two varren paws, shortly pursued by a varren body.

"That thing's going to follow you all the way back to the ship," Garrus said, and put down his rifle for his fork.

"Hey, Urz, hey boy." Shepard waved her maybe-ham at him. "Who's a good boy?"

Urz sat back on his haunches and whined at her. She chuckled, rolled to her feet, and threw the ham like a frisbee into the darkness. Urz followed at a fraction of the speed of light, howling all the while.

When she turned around, Garrus was watching her with a strange expression on his face. "What's up?" she asked.

He shook his head. "Just thinking."

"Don't strain yourself," she said; but later, in the moments before she dropped off to sleep, she had the strangest idea that he'd been looking at her legs.

She remembered nothing of it in the morning.

Chapter Text

Garrus wasn't sure how he'd ended up in close quarters with Jeff Moreau, but he knew it hadn't been his idea. When Shepard had said—

"Man, how long is this gonna take? What, is she trying to piece it back together herself?"

"You didn't have to come, you know."

Through the open hatch, Garrus saw Moreau shift. "Yeah, well. I'm not going to make her look at some Cerberus goon after this. She'll be all stiff-upper-lip about it, you know how she is, but it can't be easy to visit your own grave."

Garrus paused. "Actually, our regular pilot keeps the hatch shut. And never talks, except to confirm orders. I wouldn't say it's an improvement, but—"

"That's funny because you're such a model of silent restraint yourself, right?"

"Do you really need me to explain it to you?"

Moreau didn't answer, but from the way his head bobbed Garrus suspected he'd rolled his eyes. There'd always been something prickly between them—nothing serious enough to impede their working relationship, of course, because Garrus was a professional and Moreau could at least pretend to be one—and he was aware it had everything to do with Shepard. Not that there was anything romantic between Shepard and her pilot, but they were close, had known each other since long before Eden Prime, and shared a similarly dark sense of humor.

—And certainly not that there was anything romantic between Shepard and Garrus. That thought was the height of absurdity. No, the tension between Garrus and Moreau was less that of two rivals vying for her attention and more that of...two specialists who had different ideas of how to keep their commander safe. Professional concerns, to manufacture a phrase.

He wished he'd brought something to do with his hands.

Garrus was in full gear, of course, the magnetic rig with his rifles on the seat beside him, but short of ripping panels out of the Kodiak and poking through the wiring, there was nothing tangible he could do. He wasn't great with shuttles, anyway; ground vehicles, sure, and given enough time he could probably mount a couple of small-caliber cannons to the vehicle's undercarriage, but although he hated to admit it, his technical prowess ended the moment a transport broke atmosphere.

The interminable wait wasn't made easier by the repeated tone that went with Moreau checking his messages. Every couple of minutes, off went the same damn alert.

"Do you really need the audio on that thing?" Garrus grumbled.

Moreau shut off his omnitool fast enough that if Garrus hadn't known better, he would've thought the human was watching pornography. "Uh, no. Sorry."

But thirty seconds later he was at it again—without the chime, spirits be thanked, but the glow of his omnitool lit up the cockpit like a flare. "What the hell's so important you have to check your mail every other breath?"

Moreau twisted around in his seat. "Nothing, okay? Geez, you're like my dad."

"It isn't nothing if you're so anxious about it."

The pilot scowled. "I'm waiting for a letter from my sister, happy? She usually writes me around this time. She's a couple of hours late."

"Oh," Garrus said.

"Yeah, 'oh.' Thanks for the consideration, big guy. Now if it's all right with you, I'm gonna run some diagnostics on our thrusters. Do I need permission for that, too?"

"Only if you decide to ram us into the planet," Garrus said. "On second thought, scratch that—at least panicking would give me something to do."

Moreau snorted. "Seriously. How long does she need down there? I know the Commander's still getting her head on straight after her Cerberus retrofit, but come on, it's like negative twenty down there. There isn't even anything for her to shoot."

"I don't know about that," Garrus said, ducking through the hatch and dropping into the co-pilot's seat so he could better glare at Alchera's mottled surface. "This is Shepard we're talking about."

"She'd comm us if she needed help."

"Probably."

"...Yeah, maybe not so much," Joker said. He massaged the bridge of his nose, something Garrus had seen Shepard do when fighting off a headache.

Garrus settled back in his seat and crossed his arms; there wasn't enough room in the cramped space, but as always, he made do, stretching his legs out as far as the cockpit would allow. "I, uh. Didn't realize you had a sister."

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Her name's Hilary, she's on Tiptree with my folks. Wants to be a pilot, if you can believe that."

Younger sister idolizing her older brother; Garrus had no trouble imagining it. "Mine wanted to join C-Sec when she was a kid," he said.

"No kidding? What's her name?"

"Sol. Solana. She used to beg me to play cops and criminals with her. She's outgrown it now, would probably shoot herself in the foot before she'd join C-Sec."

"Aw, don't tell me that. The last thing I need is a kick in the ego if Hils tells me she hates flying."

"She's planning on joining the Alliance navy?"

Joker shrugged and resettled his cap. "Maybe. Our mom's a contractor on Arcturus Station, but it isn't in our blood like it is with some people. Like Shepard—you can look at her and tell it's driving her nuts to be running an operation this big without Alliance oversight. Me, I'm just happy the seats are real leather."

"Mmm. I can understand Shepard's point, though."

Joker laughed. "You would. Her mom was navy, you know."

"Was she?"

"Oh yeah. She served with Hackett. Fleet officer, went to Naval Academy and everything. Not like Shepard, who had to crawl her way up from E1."

"They've should've promoted her to captain," Garrus said. It was an old complaint, one Joker had heard before—one Joker had made before, as had nearly every member of Shepard's old crew.

"Probably. I don't think she finished college until after she enlisted, though, and then she shot straight up to commander in six or seven years. Maybe they thought they'd better put the brakes on before she was running the whole fleet by thirty-five."

"We'd be in a lot better position to fight off the Reapers if she were."

"Buddy, you don't know how right you are. Hackett's not so bad, though. At least he listens, but it isn't like he can pull funding out of his ass."

"Funny. And here I thought that was where politicians stashed their wallets."

"Nah, then they wouldn't have room to shove their heads up there."

"True enough."

Joker pulled up his inbox on the main screen and closed it almost as fast, but not before Garrus caught sight of a handful of messages from EDI—not the typical briefings she sent out to everyone, but shorter letters, several recent. He opened his mouth...

"You know, Garrus," Joker said, "for an ex-cop with a grudge against the whole damn galaxy, you aren't so bad."

"Thanks. I think."

"And now we have to hug and kiss as a sign of our newfound respect."

"Let's not do that part," Garrus suggested.

Joker smirked. "Your call. We're still buying matching friendship bracelets next time we're at the Citadel, right?"

"Matching bottles of beer?"

"Ooh, I like beer. You're on. We'll make the Commander pick up the tab. And speaking of..." He tapped at the controls. "Commander, is that you?"

"Ready for pick-up, Joker. Hope you boys were able to stay out of trouble."

"If I tell you we found a platinum deposit on the fifth planet, do I get a cookie?"

"Ignore him, Shepard"—Joker made a face; Garrus took his own advice—"we're on our way."

"Sounds good, Garrus. Shepard out."

Garrus stood up to roll his shoulders. Even under Shepard, military life was more of the same: hurry up and wait.

"She likes me better than you," Joker said.

"Shepard wouldn't want her crew fighting," Garrus said, although he couldn't resist adding, "And she does not."

They started the curve of their downward trajectory; Garrus popped the hatch as soon as they hit breathable atmosphere and hung out the side, staring down at the untouched snow. Pieces of debris started showing up about four klicks from the main crash site—here scattered parts of sleeper pods, there a tread from the Mako. Garrus felt sick, but stayed at his post, eyes searching for Shepard on the horizon.

"My poor, poor baby," he heard Joker murmur.

He spotted the flame-colored shock of Shepard's hair first. As they drew closer he saw that she had something tucked under her arm; he couldn't make out what it was, but it was about the size of her helmet—

Oh. Oh, fuck.

"Shepard—" he said.

"Not now," she interrupted, brushing past him. "Joker, get us out of here."

"Aye-aye, Commander."

Garrus turned away and took his time closing the shuttle and locking it tight. He reminded himself that however difficult this was for him, it had to be twice as difficult for her; and then he went to her side, sat down beside her, and waited.

She was gripping her old helmet with both hands, staring into the fractured visor as if she could see more than her own face in the reflection. Garrus tried not to dwell on the cracks in that helmet, but the image of Shepard struggling in hard space, clawing and writhing as her equipment failed, had never entirely left his dreams. He'd be revisiting it tonight, guaranteed.

Shepard sucked in a long breath, and another one, and then sagged sideways against him. She was upright again almost immediately, but for that one still fraction of time, he had supported her. He could only hope that he'd helped.

 

-

 

After they'd safely docked on the Normandy and Shepard had disappeared in the elevator—taking her helmet and a collection of dogtags with her—Garrus's knees started to give out. He leaned heavily against the Kodiak, staring at his feet.

"Yeah," Joker said. "Me too."

"It was just—"

"Creepy as fuck?"

"Among other things."

"Let's never talk about this again."

"Deal," Garrus said.

Joker made to leave, probably back to Normandy's cockpit, but before too many steps he turned around and squinted at Garrus. "Hey, do me a favor? Go check on her later."

"Planning on it," Garrus said. Just as soon as his legs worked again. He hadn't been so shaken since—he couldn't even remember the last time. Even Sidonis' betrayal hadn't provoked this level of comedown; the days when something as simple as a firefight made his vision fade out around the edges and his stomach churn had passed far beyond his ability to recall.

He fixed his eyes on the opposite hull interior and counted to twelve, then sixty, and finally three-hundred. After that he picked himself up and went to wash away the sweat, taking advantage of the full five minutes allotted for his shower—another Cerberus luxury, one that had seemed wasteful yesterday. Today Garrus was simply thankful for the opportunity to stick his head under the hot water and let the rush drown out his mind.

When he was clean and dry and his heart had stopped hammering, he went to the mess and made himself a cup of kava and Shepard a mug of the strong, bitter coffee she liked best. He carried both up to her cabin. She took a long time to answer her door, and when the hatch eventually opened, she wasn't standing inside to greet him but sitting on her couch with her legs drawn up.

She was also barefoot. He'd never seen her barefoot before.

"Shepard. Thought you might like some coffee."

Shepard looked at him without seeming to see him. "Is it hot?"

"Hot as I could make it," he promised, setting it on the low table and twisting the handle so it faced her. "Mind if I sit?"

"Sure," she said, already reaching for her drink. She cradled it between her knees; Garrus got the impression she'd have been just as happy with a heating pad. He took the seat opposite and let her have her silence a little longer.

This was only the second time he'd been in her cabin, although it felt more like Shepard's living space now than it did when he first came aboard. The fish tanks were still empty, as was the model display case, but she had papers and datapads spread across both desks, a utility uniform folded on the chair, a row of books behind her bed—

Her bed, he couldn't help but note with a spark of envy, was rather large. He wondered if she kept to one side, or if she sprawled across the whole thing.

"You know I didn't come up here just to study your water tanks," he said.

"I kind of figured," Shepard said.

"Then I guess I should ask...how do you feel?"

"Cold. Just cold," she said, and sighed. He gave her time to collect herself. "I thought it would provide closure, you know, but it only seemed..."

"Cold," Garrus finished.

"Yeah."

The fine scars on her face stood out in sharper relief than usual, and her posture showed nothing of the restrained passion that carried her in battle or the warm jocularity that won her crew's trust. Her eyes held every day of her thirty-one years and lifetimes besides.

"Do you ever think about why the Reapers kill us?" she asked suddenly.

"I...of course I have, Shepard. But I'm not sure we'll ever know the answer to that. Maybe they do it because they can, because we're playthings to creatures of their scale."

She nodded and then shook her head. "I don't like that answer. I don't believe that we're so small, not even to them."

"You don't believe there are things we can't understand?"

"Well," she said; he was relieved to see her lips twitch. "I don't know about that. When I was a kid I used to read a lot of pulp sci-fi. There was a writer named H.P. Lovecraft I didn't much like, but now I wonder if he wasn't indoctrinated. He wrote about ancient horrors, waiting for us between the stars."

"Morbid," Garrus said. "Although there are similar tales on Palaven."

"'In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming,'" Shepard quoted. "Nasty stuff. He was never my favorite. Not my point. My point is—how are we supposed to fight an entire army of beings that powerful? How are we supposed to survive?"

It was a question that had occupied Garrus for nearly three years.

"We do the best we can," he said. "We hope the Council pays attention, and that we're fast enough and strong enough to win."

"Or we blow up the relays," Shepard said.

Garrus choked. "Or that. You don't pull your punches, do you?"

She shot him a look and uncurled her legs. "You can't tell me it hasn't crossed your mind. No relays, no Reapers."

"No relays, no communication," he countered. "And we don't know that the Reapers rely solely on the relays for travel. Say we do blow them up—if the Reapers come anyway, we'd really be done for."

"You always have to make sense, Garrus," she said, wry. Somehow they'd migrated together; her feet were nestled against his thigh. It felt...friendly. Shepard's old, largely female ground squad aside, he didn't have many women as friends, but Solana tended to be more tactile with him, too.

"Somebody has to be the voice of reason on this ship," he said. "Joker misses that description by the width of a planet, and you'd join Clan Urdnot if left to your own devices."

"Like you wouldn't," she said. "Garrus Vakarian and his krogan women."

"Oh, now it's women?"

"What can I say, Garrus. You're too much man for just one krogan."

Garrus hid his face behind his cup of kava.

"What is that stuff, anyway?" Shepard asked.

"You haven't heard of kava?"

Now it was Shepard's turn to hide behind a sip. "That's what it is? We always called it turian coffee."

"Close enough," he said. "It smells a little richer and a lot sweeter than what you're drinking, but it's a natural stimulant and a lot of people drink it for social reasons."

"Turian coffee," she repeated.

"Then what you're having is human kava."

Shepard nudged him with her toes. "Do you always have to have the last word?"

"I think you're confusing us again, Shepard. One of us is a debonair, dangerous leader of scoundrels, and the other is the mouthy captain of the ship."

"Commander of the ship," she said.

"What, you mean you never made captain?"

She scowled at him, but then, grudgingly, started to laugh. "Jesus, if you make me snort coffee out my nose again, I'm throwing you in the brig."

"I live to serve," Garrus said.

"Couldn't do this without you," Shepard said. "I mean that, you know. Even what you did for me now. Some days it's harder than others to keep the doubt at bay."

"Shepard," Garrus said, as gently as possible. "You're allowed to be fallible."

"Not in front of most people," she said. "But hey. Thanks."

"Anytime," he said, and found suddenly that he no longer felt a need to hide how important she was in his life. For years Garrus had forced aside the things that had mattered most to him, but now it was as though the transformation that had begun when he'd left the Citadel for Omega had finally come to an end. He wondered what his father would think of him now, and decided that he didn't care if he found the answer.

 

-

 

Then came Project Overlord.

Shepard, figuring it would be a short ride, crammed too many personnel into the Hammerhead and had Joker drop them as close to the signal source as possible. Garrus was grateful that the ride lasted only a handful of minutes; in a space designed to fit three, he and Grunt were shoulder to shoulder while Tali and Lawson crowded onto a seat designed for a single human.

He was even more grateful to be out of the Hammerhead...until they found the first body.

"He went fast," Shepard said. The man wore a Cerberus uniform and had died slumped against the acrylic glass guardrail. Shepard ran her first two fingers through the blood smeared on the glass and sat back on her haunches, considering.

"I don't know of any VI that can lift a pistol," Garrus said.

Tali came over, already tapping away at her omnitool. "Has to be mechs. Or geth, although that seems improbable."

"Cerberus outposts like this one have a full complement of YMIR and LOKI mechs," Lawson said. "For defensive purposes, of course."

"Defense. Sure," Shepard said. She shared a look with Garrus over Tali's helmet and jerked her head; scout ahead, that signal meant. Shepard hated taking Tali into the field, not because their resident engineer wasn't capable, but because every suit breach could be Tali's last.

Personally, Garrus thought as he scouted ahead, he'd far rather have Tali along than Normandy's current XO. He didn't exactly have a grudge against Lawson, who had after all returned Shepard to him, but he didn't exactly trust her, either. Her devotion to her master passed worshipful and verged instead on fanatic. She rarely joined them on ground missions, anyway—because, Shepard maintained, one officer had to stay behind to run the ship—but for this they needed somebody familiar with Cerberus operating procedures.

He scanned the next room, saw the one of the last things he wanted to see, and called out, "Look sharp, Shepard, we've got geth!"

Tali cursed and ducked out of sight; Grunt charged ahead, down the stairs that opened into an atrium. The fight was over before Garrus had an opportunity to do much more than lay down covering fire. He scavenged a couple of heatsinks from the upper balcony and came back to find Shepard rooting through what had to be the cafe's terminal.

"The register?" he said. "Really?"

"Really," she said.

He knew why, they'd talked before about the day that they'd no longer have Cerberus's deep pockets funding the Normandy, but Garrus couldn't see how stopping to crack an account worth maybe five hundred creds was going to keep them in the sky for long.

"What?" Shepard said. "I sent Grunt and Miranda ahead to clear a path to the tram."

Garrus held up his hands in surrender. "Didn't say anything. Although—if you were on the Citadel, I'd be arresting you for burglary."

"Keep the cuffs in your pants, Vakarian."

"Must've left them in my other armor," he deadpanned.

She pointed at him with one hand, still working the keyboard with her other. "Hey, maybe my petty theft will pay for a hardsuit that doesn't look like my pet varren chewed on the collar."

Garrus dropped the subject after that. Shepard could harp about his armor all damn day.

"I don't like this, Shepard," Tali said. "Why are there geth here? We're a long way from the Perseus Veil, and these aren't behaving like any geth I've met. What was Cerberus trying to do?"

"I wouldn't mind an answer to that question myself," Shepard muttered.

Conveniently, Gavin Archer didn't appear until after they'd retracted the dish. Garrus busied himself with the scientists' bodies while Shepard interrogated the man, but when he heard her raise her voice, he was back in the access center before his brain caught up with his feet.

"Control?" Shepard said. "No, you don't control anyone. I don't care if they tear you limb from limb—that crosses the line."

"They're geth, Commander, not human beings," Archer said. If he'd felt more charitably inclined, Garrus would've pulled the man aside and explained that that tactic was unlikely to work on Shepard, who was a stained-from-birth unification supporter if ever there was one.

"I am not having this argument with you, Doctor. You took a risk and it blew up in your face. I don't know how you can look at the bodies of your staff and tell me you still made the right choice, and I'm not interested in your excuses. We're leaving."

She turned her back on Archer, as precise as a cadet on parade. "Tali, can you work from here?"

"I...yes, I think so. I'll do my best to keep the VI off your back."

"Good," Shepard said. "Keep an eye on the doctor. Grunt, you're with her. Garrus, you and Miranda are in the Hammerhead with me."

"Copy that," Garrus said, and stayed only long enough to see Tali settled behind a heavy security door before he went to collect Lawson. Shepard was waiting at the M-44's controls when they boarded. Garrus took the seat beside her without asking for an opinion, leaving Lawson the back bench.

Shepard's jaw was tight as she drove.

"Beautiful planet," Garrus said, watching a succession of waterfalls speed by. "Wouldn't mind retiring someplace like this."

"What, no beaches?" Shepard bit out.

"I don't have anything against beaches. Now, give me a comfortable chair, maybe a bottle of brandy...then I downright love them."

"CLIFF, SHEPARD," Miranda yelled.

Shepard fired the vertical thrusters and hopped down the rock face. "No clubs around here."

"Plenty of targets, though."

Shepard snorted and hit the accelerator.

"Next time," Miranda said, "and Shepard, I don't mean to impose on your position, but next time, I'm driving."

The next six hours were a slow grind through more of the same: more banks of equipment lockers, more mechs, more of that frightening gentle music being played to corpses, more more more and the whole time the static howl of the VI led and followed them both.

"It's herding us," Shepard said, through gritted teeth.

"It's herding us through a geth ship," Garrus added, just in case someone (Lawson) had missed the gut-numbing significance of that detail. Oh, wait, Lawson belonged to an organization that thought it was a good idea to attempt to control the geth.

"It's eerie how silent it is," Lawson said. "To think that the ship could come alive at any moment..."

Shepard shot him a sideways look over her raised arm. He lifted a shoulder; let Lawson come to her own conclusions about the Illusive Man's involvement.

"You know this is gonna go to hell as soon as we find the override," Shepard said.

"What, it isn't bad enough for you already?"

"Oh, I don't know," she said, and ducked under a damaged pylon. "Nobody's shooting at us, nobody has a concussion..."

"No brain lesions, at least not yet," Garrus said, and they both snorted. Lawson frowned at them, eyes curious as they flicked to Shepard.

"Remember the VI on Luna?" Garrus said, drawing Shepard's attention back before she could explain the joke. "And I thought that thing was insane. Is there some kind of unwritten code that every virtual intelligence has to go crazy on their seventh birthday or relinquish their membership in the club?"

"You're upbeat and heartwarming enough to write kids' books," Shepard said. "Here we go. Watch the door."

Instead Garrus watched her cross to the computer banks at the far side of the loading bay. She'd been clipped earlier, a knock to the arm she'd shrugged off, but he'd had basic medic training for all Citadel associate races, and he suspected she'd have one hell of a bruise forming already. He saw her wince as she worked the override and made a note to tell Dr. Chakwas.

"And now?" Lawson said.

"Now," Shepard answered, "we haul ass. Move! Tali, you read me?"

"Loud and clear, Shepard. There's activity ahead of you. Making sure all the locks work this time."

"We have cloaked targets!" Garrus said.

"Keep moving," Shepard said. "We're not here to rack up our kill count!"

Garrus didn't say it, but during the brief flashes of thought he had time for between shooting and reloading and shooting and making sure Shepard's arm wasn't slowing her down, he was reminded of a scene from Fleet and Flotilla. Plenty of dramas—the older ones, at least—used the geth as a faceless antagonist for sheer convenience, but Flotilla had been produced by a major studio and had spared no expense in creating the interior of the geth prison ship that had been the main setting of the vid's middle third. Garrus, stupidly, could only think about how completely inaccurate that much-lauded set had been.

(He did tell Shepard later, when they were back on Normandy and Shepard's arm had been bandaged and she looked like she needed to think about anything but the battered savant sleeping under heavy sedation in the medbay.

"That was what bothered you most about that ship?"

"All I'm saying is I could make a fortune as a vid consultant," Garrus said.)

Virtual intelligences were strange, tricky creations—not true beings like their younger siblings, like EDI and the other artificial intelligences that were widely distrusted. Most VIs were designed to be servants, with so many limits and failsafes written into their code that breakouts were supposed to be impossible. In practice, Garrus had never had known a true AI to go rogue; there was, simply, no reason for it. AIs didn't have to compete with organic species for resources, their wants beyond materials for hardware so removed from the physical world that, geth aside, there was rarely a conflict of interest.

Shepard was fuming as they drove to Atlas Station. She was as professional as always, but she hadn't so much as glanced at Lawson since relaying their position to Tali. The stone set to her face remained until they found the first of Archer's log entries to reference his brother, and then Garrus could read the tightly-controlled horror in her set jaw and blazing eyes.

"What does it mean?" Lawson asked.

"Nothing good," Shepard said.

"Shepard, you have to know that this is not how Cerberus operates. The Illusive Man couldn't have known how radical Dr. Archer's solution—"

"Couldn't have known?" Shepard said, slicing her hand through the air. Garrus turned his back and pried the panel off the elevator controls to expose the wiring; the damned thing kept jumping between floors, from the second to the fourth to the sixth before crashing back down.

"Couldn't have known?" Shepard repeated. "Tell me, Miranda, just what else the Illusive Man doesn't know. Did he not know about Akuze? Did he not know about Admiral Kahoku? You can only make so many excuses, Miranda. I don't know what the hell this is, but between the geth ship and what's looking like an attempt to plug Archer's brother into the entire collective, I'm beginning to wonder if Cerberus ever considers the goddamn consequences. No, he damn well knows—he damn well planned this."

"Shepard..." Miranda said.

"Don't answer. Just—think long and hard about who you're working for. Garrus, how's that elevator?"

"Interfacing with every other piece of tech in the room," he said. "Give me a minute."

"Fine. Tali, how's everything looking on your end?"

"Ah," Tali said. "Not to be the bearer of bad news, but Shepard, Dr. Archer has disappeared."

"Great," Shepard sighed. "Know where he's headed?"

"Tracking his bio-signature. Looks as though he's taking a ground vehicle to Atlas Station. Should I send Grunt after him?"

"Stay where you are. I'll let you know if I need you. Shepard out."

"Got it," Garrus grunted.

"Take cover," Shepard said. Garrus scrambled for the nearest table, overturning it and ducking down just as the elevator discharged more geth than he was in the mood to deal with. After that they had to contend with actually riding the crazy elevator, and then with a room of deactivated geth troopers that managed to be more disturbing than their live counterparts. He put a bullet through the center mass of each platform; Shepard followed him, tearing out the wire clusters that led to the units' ocular lenses. Better to take the time now than be caught from the rear later.

"That's gotta be the server room," Shepard said. The VI roared its disapproval. "And if I never hear that sound again, it'll still be too soon."

"Seconded," Garrus said, and was forced to add, "Or not," because when Shepard tried to open the door, the lock raced around the corner and turned what had looked like a wall into a hatch.

Shepard looked up, as though she could see whatever virtual ghost was haunting them, and then strode towards the server console. "Get ready," she said, "and don't be surprised if this summons a Reaper."

Garrus took up a position at her right, rifle aimed at the doorway; Lawson was to her left, leaning over Shepard's shoulder to study the override. Shepard met his eyes, gave him a nod, hit the switch—

—lit up from the inside—

He reached for her as she spasmed and staggered across the room. Her omnitool had activated itself, but worse were the thin lines of light that cut across her face and rippled down her throat, the sharp glow of her eyes, like she was about to fracture and break apart from the sheer force of what was contained within.

"Don't touch her!" Lawson snapped. "It's her implants!"

Doubt at his own knowledge of human physiology caused him to hesitate; panic made him pound at the door as it closed and locked with Shepard on the wrong side.

"Get this thing open!"

Lawson shook her head. "It's useless, I can't overload it. The VI must have shut off auxiliary security access."

"Tali?"

"Not now, Garrus."

Garrus snarled and slammed his fist against the door hard enough to open the skin where his armor bit into his knuckles. When it came down to the line he was completely worthless to Shepard, who was now trapped, probably infected, and definitely headed for a deadly confrontation of some sort because she was Shepard.

He gave himself to the count of six to tamp down the anger and self-recrimination, opened his eyes, and said to Lawson, "If she dies, I'm killing you. What are our options?"

"We have none," Lawson said. "The VI has full control of anything that can receive a signal."

"All right," Garrus said, and thought. "Can we break the windows?"

In answer Lawson pulled out her gun and fired two rounds. A blue kinetic barrier flared to life over the surface of the glass. "No such luck."

"EDI?"

"Nothing from the ship. In point of fact, we had better be careful ourselves—our omnitools and that visor of yours could be turned against us."

"I don't think it's interested in anyone but Shepard," Garrus said, "but noted. Tali will get back to me as soon as she can."

"And until then?"

"We wait," he said.

Lawson's mouth made a moue of displeasure, but she leaned back against the console and set her pistol within easy reach. "I don't like this."

"I'm sure you can tell how thrilled I am," Garrus said, and dropped to his heels. He could see the open elevator doors through the bank of windows, giving him a decent position if anyone came through the sealed door and a better one if any geth managed to rappel down the elevator shaft.

He'd always hated waiting. Waiting meant you had time to second-guess yourself, to come up with all the worst-case scenarios you didn't have the time to imagine during a firefight. Unfortunately, soldiering was two-thirds waiting, and life in the private sector had been even worse, although at least in C-Sec he'd had paperwork to fill in the gaps.

"You know," Lawson said, "I've always wondered what you were doing on Omega. It seemed...serendipitous that Shepard would stumble across you just as you needed her most."

"You know," Garrus said, and let the words hang in the air until Lawson shifted uncomfortably. "I always wondered why 'Cerberus,'" he finished.

"The name? It's a reference to Earth mythology."

"It may surprise you, but turians can work the extranet," he drawled. "Still doesn't explain the connection between a giant, three-headed dog and an organization dedicated to human supremacy."

"We're guardians," she said. "The guardians of Earth, of the colonies, of humanity's best interests...or we're supposed to be, at any rate."

"Not so sure?"

"Not anymore," Lawson said.

 

-

 

When Tali was finally able to remotely access Atlas Station's security overrides via Cerberus's intranet, Garrus was through the door before Lawson was on her feet. "Tali? Where the hell is she?"

"Shepard's fine, Garrus. Let me just..." There was a series of pops as Tali opened a path. "There."

The hallway fed into the large central room he'd seen from the station's upper levels, an atrium with the ceiling so far above that the place felt like some vast, underground cavern. Shepard, who at very least didn't smell of blood, was studying the network of cables that led to one central point—a man, hanging suspending, his body obscured behind machinery and his eyes forced open with clamps.

"Shepard," he said.

"Garrus. You okay?"

"We're fine," Lawson cut in. "What is this? Is that Dr. Archer's..."

"Yeah, that's his brother. Archer hauled out of here a couple of seconds ago." Shepard shook her head when Garrus reached for his sidearm. "No, let him go. We need to figure out how to get David down from there. Joker's putting a call through to Grissom Academy."

"On it," Lawson said. "We'll have to shut down all this equipment first or risk neurological damage. I'll call in a team of trauma experts."

"Pull from the ship only," Shepard said. "No more Cerberus. Get the Doc down here on the combat cockroach, too. We're getting this kid out of here safe and sound."

"Understood, Commander," Lawson said, and stepped to the side to begin giving orders. Shepard's eyes drifted back to David Archer; the man had wet trails down his face, and an odor that made Garrus think of his mother and his squad drifted through the air. He was startled to realize that the scent came not from David but from Shepard.

"What are the odds he's ever going to be the same again?" she said.

"I don't know," he admitted, "although I'd say you raised them considerably. Sure you don't want me to hunt down his brother?"

"Wouldn't say I'm sure, but today...today we'll let him go. I had a chance. Didn't take it."

"Why not?"

He had to cock his head to catch her lowered voice in his good ear. "There's been enough destruction on this rock," she said.

"We could still haul him in for questioning. Turn him over to the Alliance, maybe even C-Sec."

"He'd be dead in his cell before they processed his admittance paperwork. God, this day."

"It's been a long day," Garrus agreed.

"The worst day," she said. "When this is over with, I'm going to do something completely Cerberus-free. Go to the beach, maybe."

"See a vid," Garrus said.

"Yeah. Hit the bar."

"Go on a date."

She laughed tiredly at that. "Not sure I've ever been on a real date. I've always been more of the 'my bunk's empty and you'd look nice in it' type."

"Can't say I could see you in anything formal that isn't a dress uniform, anyway."

"Yeah, well. After this is all over, who knows. Stranger things, right?"

"Every damn day," he said.

Her posture straightened, and she tucked her pistol back in its place on her hip. "That's Chakwas. Talk to Joker and see if he's gotten through, will you?"

"Whatever you need," Garrus promised. "Even if it means talking to your crazy pet pilot."

"Don't think I don't know you're friendly now," she said, smirking.

And then they were back to business.

 

-

 

Shepard ordered the ship to dock at the Citadel to refuel and refit before they headed out to Mnemosyne. Garrus had the afternoon off, since Shepard was allowing all but a skeletal shift crew to take a couple of hours to relax. He planned to meet Tali, Chakwas, and Shepard herself at Purgatory later for drinks, but in the meantime he'd booked himself a public access terminal at the archives in Kithoi Ward.

He could've taken care of his correspondence aboard Normandy, of course, but that required either more time or more credits than he had. He'd have to upload his outgoing messages to EDI's servers, then wait for her to send out a databurst to the nearest comm outpost, which would send his letters on to Palaven. By the time Solana's reply had made it to an incoming packet and downloaded to his inbox, he'd be on the other side of the Omega-4 relay. Hubs like the Citadel employed round-the-clock public beaming—much faster, although frequently less secure, and much cheaper than paying for a databurst of his own.

Sol talked mostly about home, about their parents and how the neighborhood was looking. She did her best to hide the resentment that underscored the more negative bits of news, but he could tell that being forced into a role as caretaker grated on her. Garrus could relate, although he felt guilty that he had enough reason to justify his absence at the family home to himself. Sol, on the other hand, had put a promising career with the air group on hold to play nursemaid.

He had another letter, this one unexpected, from an old friend back home. Vel Phaeton had served with Garrus in the 43rd Marine Division before Garrus had mustered out of his mandatory service early to join the civil sector. Vel had apparently been transferred to a new unit—more he couldn't say, although Garrus suspected he'd been picked up by Blackwatch. In their younger days, both his and Vel's files had been flagged as notable by a number of SOF heads, although Blackwatch required a minimum of ten years' field experience before they would even consider a candidate.

Neither his mother nor his father had written him. Garrus couldn't say he was surprised.

Business completed, he picked up a couple of pieces of daquali fruit to eat while he strolled back to Zakera. The years after Sovereign's defeat had been kind to the richest parts of the Citadel and hell for the poorer sectors, as the elite seized the opportunity to rebuild the Presidium to even grander specifications and the impoverished turned to crime. Tourism was as popular as ever, though, going by the sheer number of families who clustered at every viewport to gape at the skyline.

Garrus couldn't say why Citadel Souvenirs caught his attention. He popped his last slice of daquali in his mouth and wandered inside, ignoring the shopkeeper's inviting smile in favor of the automated catalog. There was a mixed-race couple nattering beside the terminal, but they shuffled out of his way without breaking their conversation.

Illium Skald Fish. Model: Destiny Ascension. Model: Sovereign—complete with a nice little note about how this was ST&R agent Saren's flagship. Model: SSV Normandy—that description Garrus pulled up and read with less disgust. It was funny to realize that the SR-1 was famous enough to be a toy even though the time from when she'd been commissioned to when she'd been destroyed had been only a smattering of years.

He punched in an order on a whim and waited while the manager disappeared in the back room to retrieve his purchase. Maybe Shepard would get a laugh out of it; maybe she'd stick it in that display case and her cabin would look less empty. If nothing else, he could give it to Joker as a prank gift.

Shepard was already at Purgatory when he arrived with the model's box under his arm; she waved him over to her dark corner.

"Hey, Garrus. Having a good time?"

"Better now," he said. "I, uh. Got you something."

"Yeah?" she said. She was wearing a grey a-shirt with her fatigue pants, one that displayed the scars and ink that crossed her upper arms; at his inquisitive expression she said, "Couldn't stand to wear the Cerberus stamps tonight. What's this about a present?"

He shrugged and tossed her the package. "Model ship. I saw the case in your cabin after Alchera and thought you might like something to put on display."

"You didn't have to, but thanks all the—oh." She'd ripped open the box enough to see exactly which model he'd gotten for her, and her expression of stunned delight made every credit of the five hundred he'd spent worthwhile.

"It's the Normandy," she said.

"Well, it was either that or Sovereign," Garrus said, "and I had a hunch you'd like this one better."

"With investigative skills like that, you should be a cop."

"I'm going to assume that among your people, you thank someone by taking the piss out of them."

"Thank you," Shepard repeated dutifully. "Now come on." She gathered up the box scraps littering her seat and took off for the exit. Garrus followed, confused but willing to see where she led him.

"Shepard?" he said.

"Come on, come on!" she called over her shoulder. "Back to the ship, soldier."

"Can I ask why?"

"Have something to put in my display case!"

Garrus was almost flattered enough to allow the interruption of his evening. "But I haven't had anything to drink yet!"

"We'll raid the Doc's store," Shepard said. "She has three kinds of brandy and at least one of them is dual-chiral. Acceptable?"

"More than," Garrus said.

 

-

 

In retrospect, he shouldn't have been so surprised when she propositioned him, but some things...well, some things you never saw coming.

Chapter Text

Shepard found the wine bottle in the back of her armor locker. There was no way in hell it should've been able to migrate there, but Normandy had taken a lot of damage hitting the Collector base, and not all of it visible.

It wasn't until she heard Liara's voice that she realized she'd left her cabin hatch open—it jammed now, unless she hit the manual overrides.

"Shepard?"

"Hey, Liara. Just doing some cleaning," she said, and fished the bottle out from behind her spare pair of boots.

"I shouldn't be surprised that it's taken you this long to attend to your cabin. The mess below is..."

"Overwhelming?" Shepard suggested.

Liara made a face. "We could get a crew up here, you know. I'm certainly not financing Normandy's repairs for Cerberus's sake."

"Don't worry about it. I don't have a lot to my name, anyway. Mostly the books and the model ships."

"Yes, when did you take up that collection?"

Shepard shrugged and bent to pick up the intact model of the SR-1 that had made its way under her desk. She thought first about keeping both the model and the wine bottle and then nearly pitched both in the trash canister out of shock. Liara's brows were doing a complicated dance on her face as she watched her former commander linger over the momentos.

"Oh, you know," Shepard said, aware that she'd taken too long to answer the question. Liara's expression clearly said she didn't, but Shepard plowed ahead and tossed the bottle out. The model went in her closet. She was aware that she tended to be an emotional desert, but even deserts had a spot of rain now and then.

"...Of course," Liara said.

"Quiet," Shepard said, in her best master-and-commander voice. "No way you came up here just to ridicule me for being a soft touch."

"Actually, I thought I'd see if you wanted to join us for dinner. Tali and I thought we'd have a night out to celebrate your safe return."

At the invitation, Shepard's stomach grumbled; she'd slept for eighteen hours straight and then started working beside Liara's crews almost immediately, with only a handful of whatever processed rations were close at hand. While it went against her principles to break before the job was finished, Shepard felt an exception could be made after surviving a suicide mission.

"Yeah. Sounds good, actually. Give me a minute to shower?"

"I hate to ask, Shepard, but does your shower even work?"

"Point," Shepard said. "Somewhere casual?"

"I'll be sure to pick a restaurant where the smell of unwashed human won't get us thrown out," Liara promised. "There's a sampler bar not far from the dock that I think Tali would like."

"Now?"

"Unless it's too soon?"

"It's fine, Liara," Shepard said. "Let me check in with my XO before we go." She slipped into her officer's jacket but left it open, and as they waited for the elevator she ran her grubby hands through her hair.

"It has to frustrate you to not have a stairwell," Liara said, and Shepard groaned.

"You have no idea. I have an emergency access tunnel and that's it."

"How awful," Liara said, but she was smiling as she said it. Shepard grinned back. Something in her eased at Liara's presence; whether it was her youth, her lack of pretense, or her genuine concern Shepard didn't know, but there was a quality about Dr. T'Soni that was damn near soothing.

Shepard stepped out of the elevator and neatly into Garrus, who hauled up short of running her down but only just.

"Garrus!" Liara said.

"Liara," he said, and then, "Shepard." He was stripped to the waist and had smears of grease all up and down his bare arms. Shepard kept her eyes glued to a point six inches above his head.

"We're shipping out for dinner," she said. "Care to come along?"

"'We'?" he said, and then halfway looked like he regretted asking. Or maybe like he wanted to bolt in the opposite direction—it was hard to tell when she could only see him in her periphery.

"Shepard, Tali, and myself," Liara said.

"I have some things I should..."

"I know we would be delighted if you joined us." Shepard spared a second to be impressed at how far Liara had come; the young scientist she'd picked up on Therum would never have stooped to outright manipulation, but the information broker was clearly made of sterner stuff.

"All right," Garrus said. "I'll just grab a shirt and—"

"Don't," Shepard blurted.

Garrus stopped. "What?"

"Don't...forget you said you'd let me borrow your M-5," Shepard said. Which was what she'd intended to say all along. Clearly.

"I thought you said laser sights were for the—I believe your exact words were 'the elderly, the infirm, and Conrad Verner.'"

"Do you always give this much lip to your superior officers?"

Garrus smirked, infuriating man, but Shepard would take smug over terrified any day. "I don't know," he said. "I've never had a superior officer who was so unreasonable before."

"Go put on a shirt, Vakarian."

"Is that an order?"

"Do you want it to be?"

He took his time sauntering away, but after he disappeared behind the forward battery airlock Shepard replayed the past thirty seconds in her mind and went cold. Simple pleasure at seeing his face faded at the realization of exactly how unprofessional—exactly how flirty—they'd been. She turned to Liara...

And found that her friend had one hand over her mouth, hiding a shit-eating grin.

Fine. One slip in front of Liara was acceptable; in the future, Shepard would just make sure that her stress relief stayed where it belonged—in private.

"Shepard," Liara said. "It's fine. I honestly can't even say I'm surprised."

"About that," Shepard said.

"Who else knows?"

"You. Mordin."

"I'll be discreet," Liara said, and that was all—no questions. Shepard thanked the lucky star that had put the other woman in her path.

Garrus came back, his features schooled into an expression that was merely friendly; she wouldn't be surprised if he'd experienced the same flash of panic she had. His shirt was a ragged old thing with the C-Sec emblem on the front and lettering in a turian script below; it hung loose at his waist and pulled taut across his cowl and shoulders. Unsurprising, since Garrus packed a hell of a lot more muscle than most turians.

He didn't register Liara's floor-length dress until he'd reached them, and then he twitched sheepishly. "Uh, this isn't going to be a formal event, is it?"

Shepard rolled her eyes and pulled apart the flaps of her jacket to display a shirt almost as stained as his. "You're safe, Vakarian."

"Now that's a novel experience. Where's Tali?"

"Waiting," Liara said firmly, and herded them towards the elevator.

The restaurant Liara had picked overlooked the commercial docking bays. Volus merchants rubbed elbows with elchor explorers and turian requisitions officers, with human executives and salarian suppliers, and in the corner two quarians huddled together, their body language screaming discomfort. And the asari dominated all: bartering, networking, coaxing or commanding as the situation demanded.

Tali was sitting at a round table with twice as many seats as their party needed. She waved to them from across the room; Liara noticed her first, but Shepard and Garrus started towards her at the same time. There was a silent, furious, and ultimately brief jostle for dominance as they both tried to shove their way between the crowded tables, but when Shepard managed to land a kick on one of Garrus's spurs hard enough to make him wince, she yielded and let him lead.

"Shepard!" Tali said. "You made it! I was so happy when Liara said she'd made reservations, but then I thought you might be too busy to go out—"

"Nice to know where I stand in your esteem," Garrus said. "Sure, the Commander gets all the enthusiasm, but what about her trusted munitions officer?"

Tali crossed her arms. "I will shoot you."

"You'll try," Garrus said, with the supreme nonchalance that made Shepard want to shoot him herself.

"We're three dozen people short to make this a real reunion, anyway," Shepard said, and took her seat.

"It would be nice to have all of the ground squad in one place again, though. Shepard, didn't you say you'd seen Wrex on Tuchanka?" Liara said.

"Saw Wrex. Saw Ashley, too."

"Oh?" Liara said. "I was under the impression that the Gunnery Chief was on a classified assignment in the Terminus Systems."

"She is. She's..." Shepard hesitated. "...Working through some problems."

Garrus snorted.

"I suspect that's uncharacteristic understatement, Shepard, but I hope you're able to sort out your disagreements."

"Ash always sees reason. Eventually," Shepard said, and buried herself in her menu. The platters were color-coded, as was the custom at most dual-chiral establishments; Shepard punched in an order at random from the levo selection, ravenous with hunger and not caring what she ate to sate herself. She hadn't put in so many hours of straight physical labor since she'd graduated from N-school.

Liara ordered a sandwich sampler that she offered to share with Shepard. Tali's food came on a purple platter just like Garrus's, as pointed a demonstration of Ilium's prejudices as any Shepard had seen. If the place was really as committed to universal service as its banners claimed, it would've served any quarian his or her food in a sealed container fitted with the universal connector that fit any face mask—food in a tube. As the situation stood, Tali would have to trust that the airlock that sat underneath her suit's vocal unit could decontaminate her meal.

Garrus had ordered twice as much as the rest of them—a platter of sliced fruits and another bearing something that resembled a crawfish but smelled far sweeter. "What's that?" Shepard asked.

"Trimen," Garrus said. He didn't seem to need to break it out of its shell the way a human would and was in fact relishing the sounds the tail made when he bit into it. "We used to eat it every year at my grandfather's."

"It's a delicacy, isn't it?" Liara said.

Garrus shrugged. "I guess, but I ate so much of it as a kid that I didn't realize how rare it is."

"Your father's father?" Liara asked.

"My mother's."

"I haven't heard you speak of her," Liara said, and wiped her fingers on a napkin. "What does she do?"

"She's a linguistics professor with a background in programming. Did a lot of work on the translators. Her dad's a fisherman, which scared my dad sh—uh, scared the life out of my dad."

"Why's that?" Shepard said.

Garrus pried a claw off his trimen and bit into it with a crack. Shepard was forced to wait until he was finished chewing for an answer.

"I don't know if you've noticed—"

Shepard rolled her eyes.

"Turians weren't exactly designed with swimming in mind," Garrus said. "Only crazy people want to fish."

"So you're saying it's genetic."

"You want to talk about that Best of Stellar Fantasy anthology that came in the mail bag yesterday?"

"You want to talk about Gone with the Wind in Space or whatever the hell that holodrama you love is called?"

"...Will that be all, Commander Shepard?"

"That will be all, Officer Vakarian," Shepard said.

Tali was trying unsuccessfully to stifle her laughter.

"I hadn't realized your tastes in literature were so..." Liara interposed.

"It's fine, you can say it," Shepard said.

"Trashy?" Garrus offered.

"Look." Shepard leveled her utensil at him. "The galactic community as a whole may have had spaceflight long enough that pulp stellar novels are considered quaint and old-fashioned, but most of humanity's better ideas were written up in fiction long before our scientists caught on."

"Which ideas?" Tali said. "Buffets?"

"Hula hoops?" Liara suggested.

"Wait, I've got one," Garrus said. "Socks."

"I've never understood that," Tali said. "Why not manufacture your shoes with linings?"

"While I'm glad to know that my species has left its mark on the universe, I was thinking more of organic computing, bionic limbs, artificial gravity, FTL communications..."

Liara blinked. "You aren't joking."

"Nope," Shepard said.

"Quantum entanglement?"

"Well, something like it," Shepard said. "Humans aren't all meathead soldiers or scientists scrambling to catch up to the rest of the worlds, you know. We have our creative types."

"I'm certain of it," Liara said. "But still, how romantic of you, Shepard. Ashley once shared with me that you said you'd joined the Alliance to see the stars, but at the time I'm afraid I thought she was exaggerating."

"Come on, don't turn me into some bleeding heart," Shepard said. "If we have to pick on someone, pick on Tali. She's been getting letters."

"You aren't supposed to know about that, Shepard. If you've managed to break through my privacy protocols..."

"I haven't. EDI has," Shepard said.

Garrus popped his last slice of fruit into his mouth and swallowed. "Kal'Reegar?"

"The one and only," Shepard said.

"Garrus, shut up," Tali said.

"Did I say anything?"

"You were going to," Tali said. "Consider it a preemptive strike. And my aunt thinks I don't know anything about battlefield tactics."

"He asked if he could see her the next time we took a turn near the Flotilla," Shepard told Garrus.

"Why are you terrible to me?" Tali said. "See if I ever touch Normandy's engines again."

"Like you could—" Shepard started to say, but her communicator buzzed before she could finish. She touched the first and second fingers of her right hand to her ear to activate her subdermal implant. "Shepard here."

"Shepard, it's Miranda. I have some information that might interest you."

"Yeah?" Shepard said.

"Bring Dr. T'Soni,"" Miranda said. "It's about the Shadow Broker."

"The information's good?"

"I've verified it in every way I know."

"ETA in five," Shepard said. "Have Joker prep the engines. Garrus?"

"Go. We'll be behind you."

"Roger that," Shepard said, and wiped her face one last time with her napkin, pushed back her chair, and left.

Although life quickly descended back into its usual contentious mix of tedious negotiations and harrowing shoot-outs, she carried the glow of that meal with her. Shepard was not a sentimental woman, whatever Liara thought, was in fact above all things a marine and a pragmatist. Still, she carried her own memories to shore her up against the dark. This one she tucked alongside the night before, so she could take it out and examine it when she wished, and the rest of the time leave it to gather dust while she went about her business.

 

-

 

Garrus didn't go with her to the Shadow Broker's base, nor did he join the Shadow Broker when she visited Shepard's cabin. Shepard was...satisfied with Liara's decision, but she couldn't prevent a thread of worry from spinning around her thoughts when Liara cavalierly handed over a stack of digital paper that turned out to be very thorough, very complete dossiers on the Normandy's fire team. Shepard drained the last of her glass of wine as she sat before them, elbows on her knees, hands folded; ultimately, there was no decision. Eleven of the files she wiped clean and then tossed in the trash chute for good measure; the twelfth she took with her to the forward battery.

The Normandy was in better shape than she'd been since long before their run through the Omega relay, but there were still telltale signs of disarray hidden beneath the sleek design and state-of-the-art technology. Gardner's mess had never been quite set to right, in memory of the man himself; the far bench at the first table no longer squeaked if someone sat on it; the door to Miranda's office was still lacking the layers of locks that had made it a veritable fortress before. Shepard had no doubt, though, that the Thanix cannon was as precise as the manual allowed, and possibly more than.

"Shepard," Garrus said, without looking up from his station. "Need me for something?"

"Not really," she said. "Nothing exciting, at any rate. How's she firing?"

He shrugged and finished tapping something into the terminal before lifting his head to look at her. "Steady enough. EDI and I ran some simulations this shift, but you know, that's no real substitute for in-the-field experience..."

"Officer Vakarian, that sounds suspiciously like you want to waste Cerberus resources by taking this big fucking gun and using it to shoot at some big fucking asteroids."

"Commander Shepard, that is exactly fucking correct."

"Noted and logged," Shepard said, and hopped up to balance on the safety rail. "We'll put it on the schedule."

"Are we planning on shipping out anytime soon?"

"Don't have an answer for you." She sighed, went to run her fingers through her overlong hair, caught a tangle, and scowled. "Strictly off-the-record..."

"EDI, that means you," Garrus said.

"Turning off external sensors in the forward battery. Will that be all?"

"That'll be all, EDI," said Shepard. "Off-the-record, I have no goddamn idea what to do next. Working with Cerberus hardly engendered trust, but right now they're the only organization willing to acknowledge that the Reapers exist. On the other hand, we've cut our ties with the Illusive Man, and we can hardly expect to win a galactic war without some kind of military support. We need money, we need ships, and we need warm bodies."

Garrus bent over and braced his elbows against his station, so that their faces were only centimeters apart. She didn't mind the intrusion. "How long is the Shadow Broker's credit line?" he asked.

"Not that long."

"Pre-emptive strike's off the game field," he said. "Let's assume that when the Reapers attack, the galaxy at large accepts their existence and prepares a counterattack. Who do we need most?"

"The salarians," Shepard said immediately. "What? We need innovation to win this thing, not just battlefield prowess."

"All right, given. But they're not going to attack the salarians first—we both know they're going after Earth. Then where?"

"Palaven," she said. "They'd be idiots to not corral the Citadel races as quickly as possible, but the Hierarchy are the most immediate and most dangerous threat to Reaper dominance, especially as long is Tuchanka walled off behind the DMZ."

"Yeah, I was afraid you'd say that. They're not going to be easy to convince, you know."

"Who is?" Shepard said, and leaned forward to bump her forehead against his. "At least we've got Wrex, he might be able to pull together some krogan merc squads for us. Hey, uh, not to change the subject from our impending demise, but Liara dropped off some data before she left."

"Please tell me this doesn't have anything to do with archeology."

"No, you're safe on that front." She pulled the folded file out of her back pocket and slid it in front of him. His brows rose when he saw the label and climbed even higher as he flicked through the information.

"This is...frighteningly thorough."

"I didn't read it," Shepard said. "Actually, I deleted everyone else's, but I thought since you and I are..."

"Friends with benefits is the human expression," Garrus said mildly.

"Right. Well, since you're sleeping with the commander, you get all the perks, so there you go—thought you might want to see that."

He was silent as he read; Shepard hopped off the rail when her ass started to hurt and walked over to his workbench, where at least three firearms were laid out in various stages of disassembly. She'd have to see about getting him hooked up with a Valiant—he'd like that. Good rifle. Certainly better than any the Alliance would ever waste on her again.

"Here," Garrus said, reaching over her shoulder and dropping the file in front of her. "All yours." She tilted her head back to stare at him, and he shrugged at her. "Nothing in there you don't know," he added, "and if there is, well, it's something I've been meaning to tell you anyway."

"The shearing mechanism on that hand cannon is busted," Shepard said.

"It is—oh," he said. "Huh." He never did care about his sidearms as much as his rifles.

"Can I..."

"If you've got time," he said.

"Chakwas' orders. I have to spend at least thirty minutes a day engaged in some activity unrelated to warfare or she'll ground me." Shepard's mouth twisted. "I think she's worried about my sanity."

"Aren't we all?"

"Laugh it up, Vakarian," Shepard groused, and then settled herself against the bulkhead with her legs splayed apart and her reading material propped against a knee.

It was wrenching stuff, and initially she thought that the blackest parts were the Shadow Broker's notes on how Shepard overshadowed Garrus's potential for leadership. He would make—had made, did make—a hell of a fine commander, but this was first her fight and her ship, and they both knew it. The logs on his mother were painful, but nothing unexpected; he'd hinted that she wouldn't be in his life for much longer. Shepard was scrolling through the list of shitty music he kept on his visor, a combination of cheap synth-pop and soundtracks from telenovelas and porn flicks, when he came over and nudged her with his boot.

"Shepard. Did you fall asleep down there?"

"I feel like I owe you five free questions after this," she said. "Liara didn't turn up a dossier on me, but christ, Garrus, it's yours when she does."

"I'd rather have the five questions," he said, dropping down on his haunches to study her face. How he balanced so adroitly in ten tons of heavy armor was beyond her.

"Shoot," Shepard said.

Garrus's mandibles flattened into a frown, and then with one hand he reached out and caught a tendril of her hair between his covered thumb and near-finger.

"Why's it so long?" he asked. "You never wore it this long before."

"That's your question?"

He shrugged, immoveable.

"Yeah, okay, fine. That was Cerberus's call—they accelerated the growth. Humans treat their hair sometimes for cosmetic purposes, and Cerberus thought I'd look prettier with longer hair."

"Thought your mother wore hers long," Garrus said. A piece of her hair caught in the armored joint of his off-finger and broke; Shepard didn't flinch.

"She did."

He hummed, in the bottom register of his lower voice box, and withdrew his hand back to where it belonged.

"That's my thirty minutes," Shepard said, heaving herself to her feet, suddenly angry with no identifiable cause.

"Shepard."

"What?"

"Liara gambled her life on the hunch that you'd pick up a picture of the SR-1."

"So?"

He tilted his head to study her, and with that familiar and usually endearing gesture Shepard started to rein herself in. Anger, like all emotion, could be useful, could be fuel, could be a tool if she remembered how to use it, but this anger had been dogging her steps since she woke up with her insides rebuilt; it was anger born more of confusion than any healthier source, and in the night it gnawed at her until she stared, sleepless, through the transparent viewport Cerberus had installed over her bed, wondering which parts of her were real and which weren't. She would touch her arm and wonder, is this real, touch her thighs and wonder, is this flesh, wiggle her toes and crack her jaw and think, was I born with these parts, am I still me.

Garrus's nearness may have soothed those thoughts, but it did nothing to alleviate her confusion.

"Nothing," he said finally. "Taylor rigged a bag up in the shuttle bay, though. Nobody's down there right now; you'd have the place to yourself."

"I can take a hint," she said.

"Don't hurt yourself."

"Please," Shepard said. "Worry about the ship if you're going to worry about anyone." She thought fleetingly about inviting him down with her, but with the way she was feeling it wouldn't do either of them good, especially because he was more sensitive to her moods than she herself was. "Look, Vakarian, you know it's nothing personal—"

"Shepard, I can tolerate ninety-nine percent of the sentient beings in the galaxy for less than three minutes a day. Take some time alone. I'll keep the crew off your back for an hour."

"Thanks," Shepard said. She didn't have a smile, a quip, or any more intimate farewell in her, but she held up her fist and he caught her intent almost immediately, rapping the back of his knuckles against the back of hers. It was their old firefight gesture, the one that meant, Got your six.

She went up to her cabin first, to collect the gear that had been gathering dust for too long in the bottom of her locker, and then wound tape around her hands as the elevator rumbled its way down to the shuttle bay. Sure enough, there was a Cerberus-issue bag hanging from a chain next to the all-species weight bench Jack had hauled on-board from Zakera Ward. She'd made them all pay her before letting them use it, but her fee wasn't outrageous—for Shepard, at least. Shepard suspected she'd charged Miranda triple the going price.

First Shepard stretched and did a couple of rounds of light calisthenics to get her muscles warmed up; only then did she start to work her hands. Her punches were light at first, little more than taps, but then she started to find her rhythm and began to hit harder. She'd never boxed competitively, but it had been something to do, a way to fill her time on backwater postings. Not during training, at least not N-school, but most ships had at least one jarhead who would take her on for a couple of rounds.

And before that, there had been a time when she'd liked getting hit. There was a time when she thought she deserved to be hit. Hell, beneath all the hard-earned swagger that came with being very good at being very deadly, there was still a part of her that wondered if she deserved it. Killing had been far from her mind when she joined the Alliance; her mother had never let her forget that part of the military life was making other people dead, but as a dumb kid Shepard hadn't understood that. She'd left a lot of bodies in her wake.

She didn't let it bother her excessively, lest it interfere with her efficiency as a soldier and commander, but she couldn't entirely let go of that body count, either. It was good not to brood, but to remember. She remembered Mindoir, when she was fighting, and Torfan, and Eden Prime, and Horizon, and the Citadel, and to her those were not places but great lists of names and sacrifices.

Her fingers and wrists started to ache about ten minutes in, but she worked through the pain and kept at it. She hit faster than before—more powerfully, too. All the cybernetics had given her an edge that would earn her an automatic ban from any official ring.

What it came down to was—

Shepard hated owing anyone. No, that wasn't entirely accurate; she hated feeling beholden. She had her professional responsibilities, and those were a burden she was more than willing to shoulder; and she had friendships, the easy comraderies that grew out of a shared battlefield.

She'd never had a partner before, though.

That was increasingly what Garrus was becoming, and why he felt threatening when her friendship with Liara—which was, in its own platonic way, nearly as intimate—when her sisterhood with Tali—

Garrus Vakarian, Shepard thought to herself, you are a confusing son-of-a-gun.

There were far more important stakes than her sexual entanglements, though, and as always Shepard's mind soon snapped back to her private war. She had years, maybe years enough to win the Council or the Alliance to her cause. She had to start laying the groundwork now or the Reapers would tear the entire galaxy to pieces even before the politicians were desperate enough to admit what godless terror was upon them.

"Commander Shepard?"

Shepard stepped back and dragged a hand over the damp, sweaty tangle of her hair. "What is it, EDI?"

"Jeff requested I tell you that there is a high-priority encrypted call coming over your private line. Would you like to take it in the CIC?"

The rivulets of sweat running down Shepard's back told her just how long she'd been down there, beating the inert bag senseless when she should've been making her rounds; she sighed. "Give me a minute and I'll head up. Tell Joker he better not hang up even if he thinks it's the Illusive Man, got it?"

"I would not allow him to hang up, Shepard," EDI said. "I have told him that I find organic males who disobey orders unattractive." A beat. "That was a joke." Another beat. "I have not told Jeff that it is a joke."

"See that you don't," Shepard said.

When she saw that the call was from Hackett, she had it forwarded to her cabin. She wasn't Alliance; she had no commission, no colors, nothing that linked her beyond sweat and memories, and she had never been one for nostalgia, considering it one of the more useless emotions in god's green galaxy. When Hackett called, though, Shepard still asked how high.

She hadn't been on a mission like the one he requested of her in years, although back then she'd more often been sent to make a corpse than smuggle out a live body. The Bahak System wasn't exactly her first choice for a vacation, either, but she owed Hackett and they both knew it. The Fifth Fleet was still rebuilding itself from that suicidal rush at Sovereign two years ago.

Joker wanted to bitch her out when she told him the coordinates, of course.

"Why the hell are we heading into batarian space, Commander? We just put ourselves back together after Liara's little stunt, poor EDI's systems were scrambled for days, and now you want us to go off chasing slavers? This isn't some grudge match, is it? Because they put a nice statue up on Torfan for you. I took a picture. It's shiny."

"They put up a what—no, nevermind, tell me later. Punch it in, Joker, and stop whining. You're only playing delivery boy, anyway."

"Oh yeah? How'd that happen?"

"Need to know, Flight Lieutenant. You can note in the logs that I'm running a private, personal mission as a favor for an old friend, and that I'll be doing it alone." She folded her hands behind her back and lifted her chin, staring out at the rush of stars overhead and seeing nothing.

"Yes ma'am, Commander sir."

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."

"Hear what?" Joker said, but she heard him muttering to himself under his breath as she walked away. How he hadn't been court-martialed was one of the universe's constant mysteries; not many superiors were as willing to overlook insubordination in the face of loyalty as she was.

Garrus caught up to her in the armory, which was empty of all but, appropriately enough, arms. They were late into the third shift, when only a skeleton crew manned the ship—insomniacs like her pilot aside—but instead of crawling into bed for a solid hour or three of sleep, Shepard was digging out her hardsuit. The red blood-stripe up the right arm gave her brief pause, during which she wondered how much she really owed the Alliance, but the fact of the matter was that Shepard had a debt. She would do her best to repay in kind.

"Shepard," Garrus said. "What's our destination?"

"Classified," Shepard said, checking the seals on her helmet.

Garrus huffed. "You know I could—"

"But you won't," she said. "Get some rest, Garrus. Or go find Tali and ask her if she needs some help with Legion, god knows nobody sleeps on this damn ship. Stand down." When he didn't move except to grip one hand over the lip of her locker, she added, "I mean it, Vakarian."

His fingers tightened compulsively, and then he took a step back. "Fine."

"Garrus—"

"Jane," he said. "Watch your back." He waited for a sign, some signal of comprehension, and only at her nod did he turn and disappear through the cabin door. Shepard kept her eyes on the broad, sturdy line of his back until the lock sealed behind him.

 

-

 

Hackett had sent her hunting.

That was how it felt, anyway, and until Kenson had trapped her in a room with Object Rho, Shepard had felt as close to relief as she'd come in weeks. She'd travelled light, nothing more than her standard short-mission rig and a couple of energy bars tucked in a small magnetic case that clamped at the small of her back. Even the presence of the batarians wasn't enough to rattle her preternatural calm; she'd needed this, maybe more than she'd realized.

Here there were no Collectors. There were no Reapers. There was no Cerberus, no admiralty board, not even the welcome albatross of an advanced ship that required fuel and upgrades and supplies for the crew. There was Shepard, and there was the mission.

Of course, then Dr. Kenson revealed the nature of her project, and the whole thing went to hell. Shepard managed to hang on to her belief that there had to be a better way than blowing the relay for all of five minutes; her optimism that destroying the Bahak System would delay the Reapers significantly lasted until shortly before she passed out after fighting over half a dozen waves of indoctrinated troops. Her last thought before the world went black was, Did I remember to tell Joker to turn down the ambient lighting on the crew deck?

And then it was dark, and quiet. Shepard remembered the dark. It was broken by a spray of stars, little pinpricks of light against the vast emptiness of the cosmos; one of the stars fell, and Shepard tried to catch it...

She thought she was back in Miranda's lab when she woke up. For the first disorienting minute, she saw only the overbright lights and heard only the throbbing in her head; then the voice of a woman nattering about sedatives cut through the static, and Shepard realized that Kenson had knocked her out, had locked her up, had taken all of her equipment, and was likely about to doom the entire galaxy to a short war and a sudden extinction.

They'd dented her pistol. Funny thing, cheap, lightweight, not at all like the old Spectre-issue HMWSR she'd requisitioned prior to Alchera, but she'd reverse-engineered a couple of Cerberus's fancy upgrades, streamlined them, and then integrated them into the standard-issue grunt sidearm she'd lifted from a storage locker.

The pistol still fired. It fired a double-tap into Kenson's head, and another three rounds into the security guard who tried to stop her from reaching the comm station, and then—already low on heatsinks as she was—she tossed it away in favor of the security guard's hand cannon with the fancy laser sights. She shot three—four—twelve more men with that gun, discarded it, and reached for her rifle; killed three—six—another eleven with her rifle—and when Harbinger spoke to her, Shepard reacted without thinking and put four shots into the hologram.

She put six shots into the holographic projector.

She put three shots into the body of what had been the communication specialist before Harbinger's interference.

She put two shots into the face of the the man who pursued her in her desperate race to catch up with Normandy.

She put one shot into the center mass of the Bahak System.

That was her best shot of all. She didn't even have to pull a trigger, and yet she managed to take three hundred thousand lives anyway.

 

-

 

Jack and Mordin were waiting for her outside the medbay after Hackett left. Shepard hadn't expected the head of joint forces to board a vessel not long out of Cerberus's hands, but he had. "Face the music," the Admiral had said; she had a feeling it would be sooner rather than later.

Mordin had one arm folded against his chest and the fingers of the other hand curled against his lips. He was staring after Hacket with narrowed eyes, which made Shepard wonder exactly what he was thinking. If anyone would be sympathetic to her actions it would have to be the engineer of the genophage, if only because she wasn't sure she could bear his judgment.

But he only said, "Shepard. Talk later. Important matters to discuss, but—will wait. See me tomorrow."

"Yeah. Sure thing, Professor. Need anything, Jack?"

Jack waited until Mordin had bustled off to the elevator and presumably back to his lab before withdrawing a bottle from behind her back. "Here," she said. "Me and some of the guys got kinda worried when you didn't show up for a few days, and, uh, anyway. You look like to need it, Shepard."

The seal on the wine bottle was broken and more than a third of the wine was gone, but Shepard recognized it from the case Liara had sent to Normandy as a re-christening gift. "Thanks," she said, and tucked it under her arm.

"Well damn, don't read too much into it," Jack said. "Fuck if I'm going to go around giving presents or nothing, but hey." She punched Shepard companionably in the shoulder—Jack's version of 'companionable' could knock a krogan clean off his feet—and bobbed her head. "Glad you're alive or whatever."

"Thanks," Shepard said again, and, because she didn't cry, laughed.

She popped the stopper as soon as she was alone in her cabin, thought hard about drinking straight from the bottle, and instead went hunting for the glasses Liara had brought. All class flowed from the Shadow Broker, apparently, at least on this ship. She found them tucked up on her bookshelf, where someone—not her—had thoughtfully stored them stems-up. She drank two cups down straight, corked the bottle, and told herself to finish her damn mission report.

It was a lot easier to have a third glass of wine.

She was curled over her desk when Garrus let himself in; the lights were dimmed and she had the viewscreen pulled up over the display case. On the empty page a cursor was blinking in time with the throbbing of her too-loud heart.

"Shepard," Garrus said. "I can't go if you don't want—"

"No, stay." She ground the palms of her hands into her sockets. "I've got something to ask you about anyway."

"If I'm not interrupting you, I have a couple of questions myself. The Normandy's sensors picked up a hell of an explosion. At first, I wasn't sure you'd made it out alive."

"You can say it," she said. "I blew up Aratoht. Three hundred thousand batarians gone like that, and you want to know the worst part? The worst part isn't that I did it, or that I'd do it again—it's that, for that second before I hit the shit button, I thought about those slavers that killed my family, and I was glad."

Garrus didn't look half as startled as she'd expected, was, in fact, looking at her with far more gentleness and compassion than anyone that hardened had the right to hold. "I'd be surprised if you didn't," he said.

Shepard choked. "Sorry," she said. "What was that?"

"I talked with Hackett before he left. He said that you tried to send out a warning, probably at the risk of your own life. Thinking about revenge doesn't make you evil, Jane. It makes you—"

"Human?"

"Real, I was going to say. It makes you a person. You still lace up your boots one at a time, you know. You don't have to live up to your own legend."

"Don't I?" Shepard wondered. "I'd hoped they would put something other than 'Butcher' on my grave. So much for that."

Garrus looked at her with a grave expression, and then he said, "If I have to personally fight every member of the Council, I will make sure they put 'Battlemaster Shepard, Queen of the Girl Scouts' as your epitaph. I don't even know what a girl scout is," he added. He must have seen some tension in her ease, because he held out a hand. "Hey. Come here."

Shepard let herself be led down the steps and over to the sectional, where Garrus pulled her down next to him. "Hackett said something else before he left," Garrus said. "He, uh, led me to believe that you plan on turning yourself over to a tribunal to be charged for war crimes."

"I don't know if 'war crimes' is the right term."

"You're joking." Garrus's voice did something indescribable in human terms when he was angry; his upper register flattened while the lower became more emphatic.

Shepard hauled herself up on her knees to grab the bottle of wine from the edge of her desk; she had to reach for it and ended up bracing herself against Garrus's shoulder. "Here," she said, and offered it to him. "You have a lot of catching up to do. Take it, Vakarian, come on."

He took a swig to placate her. "Now I know you're joking," he said. "There's no way you're trying to soften me up for some terrible news."

"Look, Garrus—" She sighed. "I've done a hell of a thing, and we can't afford to fight a war on two fronts. If the batarians want retribution, it's better for me to take the fall than it is to tie up our forces in what would end up being a pretty damn vicious war."

"You're already in a pretty damn vicious war," he countered. "Who's going to fight that war, if not you?"

"You," she said. "Hackett. He'll do what needs to be done."

Garrus looked her in the eye and deliberately reached for the wine.

"Maybe I'm tired of fighting," she said.

"Never stopped you before."

"No. No, I guess not."

They sat side by side, staring in the same direction, for a long breath, before Garrus said, "You had something you wanted to ask me."

"Yeah. Here, pass that over." She stole the wine back for a mouthful and returned it to him, but her hand, stubborn thing, stayed caught around his wrist even after he'd set the bottle back on the table.

"I can be...difficult," she said. "I don't—I haven't had people in—oh, hell. I trust you, Garrus, so I need you to promise me something."

"Anything," he said.

"You might think twice about that after you hear what I have to say."

"Shepard," Garrus said. "Anything."

"Promise me that if I ever show signs of indoctrination—I mean even the slightest thing, I trust that you'll know if I'm not behaving like myself—if I ever act indoctrinated, you put a bullet through my head." She pressed her thumb to the center of her forehead. "Right here, you understand?"

"No," he said.

Shepard jerked her hand back from his arm. "You said 'anything'—"

"I'm capable of a lot of things, Jane. I'm not sure I'm capable of that."

"You'd rather see me turn into a puppet?" she demanded. "You'd rather see them pull my strings than you would give me a clean death—"

"You aren't the only one who has nightmares about indoctrination. I don't think anyone on this ship hasn't thought hard about what it must be like at least once, but you can't ask that of me."

"Why not?"

He hesitated and then, very softly, touched a finger to the line of the scar that ate across her cheek. "You'll be the first to know when I have an answer. Until then...you said you trust me. So—trust me."

"You drive a hard bargain, Garrus Vakarian."

"I have a lot to fight for," he said. "And if it makes you feel better, I promise that if you're indoctrinated and the situation is fucked up beyond all hope, then...then I'll do what you ask."

"Fair deal," Shepard said.

"Can we please talk about something else now?"

She slumped against him and let her eyes fall shut—just for a second. "Sure. How's your mom? Sorry, should've asked about that sooner—selfish of me. I'm sorry."

He groaned. "I'd almost rather have you ask me to shoot you again. She's fine. Improving. She isn't speaking to my father, not that I can blame her for that."

"Good. I'm glad to hear it." She couldn't imagine what it would be like to watch your mother—especially a mother as brilliant as Garrus's was—slowly slip into dementia. His relationship with his father was rocky, but he'd never spoken about his mother with anything other than utter respect.

"When are you leaving?" he asked.

"For...?"

"Earth," he said. "Somehow I doubt you're going to drag the process out."

"Tomorrow or the next day," Shepard admitted. "I have a few loose ends to tie up, and I'll have to leave enough time for the rest of the crew to make alternate arrangements, but you're right, no sense in waiting around. I thought I'd surrender the SR-2 at the same time. The Alliance needs her more than Cerberus, that's for sure. Have you thought about what you're going to do?"

"Wait for you," Garrus said, with a surety that was breathtaking.

"Not going back to C-Sec? Or Omega?"

He shrugged. "Too late for that. Someone has to keep the momentum going on this war of yours, Shepard. I'm going to go make some racket, lay some plans. Maybe I'll kill another Reaper and send it to you as a momento."

"That might be over the shipping limit."

"I like to think of limits more as suggestions," he said. "Speaking of mementos—" He patted at the sides of his torso, where turians put their pockets; he was wearing his under-armor suit rather than his nicer civies, which Shepard suspected were of a quality where the pockets were sewn shut. "Ah, here it is." He pulled out a chain and dangled it in front of her face.

"Those are my tags," she said, surprised.

"Moreau gave them to me after your, uh—" He coughed. "After your funeral. Liara took the spare set, but these are the ones they used to identify you. They're a little banged up, but I thought you might want them back."

She took them and held them up to the light. They were scratched all to hell, and when she wrapped her hand around them she could tell they wouldn't lay flat against her palm anymore, but they were hers, all right, her serial number and her blood type stamped under her name. Come to think of it, Liara's set was still in decent shape. Besides the battle wear these had taken, there was the matter of the small 'N7' etched amateurly on the back by a young marine who had known very little of what life would bring.

"I would. I mean, I do," she said. "Thank you."

Her fist was still closed over the tags, and he wrapped his hand around hers and squeezed. "You're welcome."

"If I don't see you again," Shepard started, because she felt she should give him some sort of closure, "you should know—"

"Don't be an idiot, Shepard. You aren't getting rid of me that easily."

"I can't make any promises," she said.

"No," Garrus said, and cleared his throat. "No promises." Something about the way he said it made her wonder if he was making the same kind of not-promise she was.

"Okay then," said Shepard.

Chapter Text

And at last, Garrus went home.

He disembarked the Normandy at the Citadel, where he and Shepard locked eyes one final time before she sealed the airlock behind herself. He was the last one off the ship; the humans still onboard were those who had decided to surrender themselves alongside Shepard. There weren't many, though—barely enough to man Normandy for her flight back to Earth.

From the Citadel he caught a civilian transport to Palaven, where he made arrangements to rent a one-room apartment on a week-by-week basis. Garrus had no intention of residing in his family's compound, where he would have had to sleep in his childhood bedroom. Unlike his sister, he hadn't stuck around long enough to move into his own suite.

He spent the first twenty-eight hours planetside taking stock of his resources and trying not to feel discouraged that they numbered zero. At one time, as a rising young star in the military and with the weight of the Vakarian name behind him, he'd been very well connected. Now he ranked somewhere below a merchant volus in terms of citizenship. Hell, he was lucky the Hierarchy hadn't officially declared him dead yet.

The next twenty-eight he spent putting together his argument. He'd have to be stupid to overlook his father as a potential source of support; much as Garrus disliked the old man, he couldn't afford to reject any possibility of aid this early in the campaign. Better to let his dad turn him away. Anyway, if Garrus was going to make trouble, there was no better place to start than with his family. He'd definitely had enough practice at it.

On the third day, he knocked at the Vakarian door.

He heard Sol bitching before he saw her. "Fuck this," she was muttering, "anyone who wakes me up this early deserves to be pushed in a river. I'll drown you, bastard—"

She'd gotten mouthy in the past three years. Good for her.

Garrus shifted his weight forward and tried not to tug at his clothes. He'd left his hardsuit back at his room; not even the most devoted soldier wore armor while off-duty on the homeworld, but it felt foreign to be without shield and plating. He half-expected someone to shoot him just to prove they could—his dad, maybe.

Solana keyed the gates open. "Yeah, what do you—" she said, and she stopped, and she stared. "Garrus?"

He got out, "Hey, Sol," before she punched him in the face.

In a fraction of a second, five things happened: he fought down the conditioning that had him tensing to hit her hard enough to debilitate her or worse; she pulled her arm back, probably to hit him again; he vowed to never introduce Shepard to his sister; he ducked; and Solana wrapped her arms around him.

"...What?" said Garrus.

"You dumbass," she said, and thumped her fist against his chest. "Where the hell have you been?"

"What?" Garrus said again, and he put an arm around her shoulders; one of them seemed to need it. She was more angular than he remembered. Stronger, too, although that stood to reason. In the years since he'd seen her last, she'd started a promising career as a fighter pilot, shot through the ranks at an unprecedented speed, and then sacrificed that same career to take care of an ailing parent. She'd grown up.

"Fuck." She pulled away and crossed her arms. "Dad's going to be thrilled to see you."

Garrus snorted. "I doubt that."

"I didn't say he won't break teeth," Sol warned.

"Where's Mom?"

One of Sol's elbows twitched outward, a sure sign of anxiety. "Offworld. Uh, Mom and Dad aren't...they aren't exactly…"

"I know they aren't speaking," Garrus said.

"It's worse than that. They're separated," said Sol. "The stress was too much. She hasn't lived here for a while."

"Too much? Too much?" Garrus was livid as he only could be under his father's roof. "What, that bastard's wife gets sick, and he throws her to the street because she's inconvenient?"

"Be quiet!" Sol hissed. "You weren't here, Garrus—Mom left because she wanted to leave, and Dad's pretty beat up about it, so don't rub it in his face."

"Fine," Garrus said, stung even though the accusation was perfectly true. "I won't say anything, provided he doesn't bring it up."

Sol got up in his face and stared at him hard; he did her a favor and let her look, knowing that his features were set, that his eyes gave away nothing. She looked away first.

"All right. He's in his office. Hey, moron, wait, you aren't going without me—Garrus! Wait!"

He was past the entrance and stalking through the courtyard by the time she caught up and rammed her elbow into his side. "I mean it," she said. "Don't you dare go in there just to piss him off, he's had a hard time, and no, I'm not apologizing for him, but the last thing any of us need is you two yelling at each other and then you disappearing again—Garrus? Are you even listening?"

Garrus hauled up short in front of the wide door that led to his father's office. For a lifetime that door had seemed as impenetrable as any fortress, the room behind it as distant and forbidden as the heart of a star. When he was growing up the door had been locked to everyone but his mother, and even she had entered only rarely during her husband's long stints away at the Citadel.

He knocked once and slid the door back without waiting for an answer.

His father looked up, startled but open. Garrus could pinpoint the exact process of hardening: the second when Naevius Vakarian registered intruder, the second when he recognized his son, the second when that open expression closed like a shutter. He had half-risen from his desk, and now he straightened, glanced at Sol, and...deliberately, obviously, swallowed his first remark.

"Garrus," he said. "Welcome home."

"I—thanks," Garrus said.

"You look like you've been through a lot," his dad said, and tapped a finger against his lower jaw. "That hurt?"

Sol circled around him, and Garrus realized she either hadn't seen or hadn't comprehended the size of the bandage on his face. "Oh, you know," he drawled, "just a scratch—ow! Sol, don't jab it!"

His little sister tugged his head down to better study the damage. "Shit, Garrus, what did you do, run into a fire face-first?"

"Something like that." He swatted her away. "Look, Dad, I have—move, Sol—there's something you need to hear. Both of you."

"Yeah, you might say we have a lot of catching up to do, unless you have another urgent appointment with a pleasure cruise—"

His dad quelled Sol's commentary with a sour look, and Garrus did his best not to bristle. He'd forgotten that he'd let Solana think he was off on vacation instead of fighting the Collectors. No wonder she thought he was a failure twice over—not only had he abandoned his filial duties, but in her eyes, he didn't even have anything to show for it.

"That's fine, Garrus," his father said. "We were just about to eat breakfast. Maybe you could share the reason for your disfig—ah, the reason for your return over a meal."

Garrus blinked. "Sure." He was stymied by his father's hospitality, and even more by how blatantly his dad was holding back on whatever cutting litany he wanted to unleash.

"It's nothing fancy," his father warned. "Sol's not much of a cook, and I've been busy."

"Chasing ghosts," Sol added.

"Solana—"

"Hey," she said, "if you want to turn yourself into a paranoid conspiracy nut as a hobby, I'm not going to judge. At least not on an empty stomach." She pushed past Garrus. He looked at his father—who only raised his brows—and followed.

Although the hearthfire in the kitchen still flickered away merrily in one corner, the room had diminished since Garrus had last seen it—or, maybe, the reality would never live up to his memories. His mother used to spread her work out at the long stone table, where she'd waited every day for her kids to come home from school. He could still recall how they'd fought for her attention, how offended they both were when she'd laughed at them, and how she would, with a little cajoling, teach them to write in alien alphabets so they could pretend they had a code…

"Your mother's offworld," his father said. "She's being treated at a salarian hospital near Sur'Kesh."

"It's fine, Dad, I told him," Sol said.

Garrus settled into a chair and let a hand fall against the cool tabletop. "She's better?"

Sol and his father had a wordless exchange, the kind of conversation Garrus could have effortlessly with Tali or Wrex or Jane but had never managed with his own family. "More or less," Sol finally said. "I was ready to leave with her, but she exploded at me—'there's not reason for you to waste your life, leave me alone,' crap like that." The bitter tone in her subharmonics was unmistakable, but she didn't stop slicing fruit. "Thanks for that. I don't know how you got that kind of pull with the Salarian Union, but it's all worked out just fantastic."

His father said something in an inaudible rumble as he delivered three glasses of water to the table.

"And where the hell have you been, by the way?" Sol slammed her knife down. "Not that I care, but you quit C-Sec, ran off with some human, earn a commendation from the Council, start Spectre training, stop Spectre training, vanish on 'contract work' for two years, and finally contact me to say you're going on a cruise?"

"That...does sum up a lot," Garrus said. It summed up what he'd told her, at least. Her simmering resentment was palpable, and as always, he was blindsided by the intricacies of relationships. He'd been so sure this attack would come from his father. If Shepard were here, she'd be laughing. Oh, she'd have his back—would probably go for Sol's throat—but she'd be laughing. At him.

"Spirits," Sol swore. "That's all you're going to say, isn't it? You arrogant bastard."

"What do you want me to say, Sol?" he shot back. "There was something I had to do. I did it. End of story. There are bigger things at stake than—"

"Than what? Than Mom? Than me? Than telling your family why you look like a thresher maw spit on your head?"

"Yes," he said.

She snarled and whirled on him. "And what's more important is a cruise? Or, no, don't tell me, this is about your fucking Reapers again. Were you so stressed out by the media blitz that you had to run away like some lazy-ass deserter? I can't believe you're still hung up on your dead commander's fucking myth—"

Garrus had her shoved against the counter, one hand planted on her chest to pin her in place, before she could draw another breath. She hissed at him and then, when she realized his rage, recoiled and twisted away, closing her eyes in anticipation of a blow.

"Sol," Garrus said. "Solana. Look at me."

He waited until her eyes slitted open, and when he was sure he had her attention, he said, "I won't hit you. I won't ever hit you. But if you say one more word against Shepard, I will walk out of here."

"Like you've never done that before—"

"I will walk out of here," Garrus repeated, "and I will renounce my family, and I will not come back."

He held her gaze until shock faded to comprehension, and then he let her go and walked past the hearthfire, past his father, past the table where his mother's presence lingered, and out into the courtyard. The purple jaina blossoms were in bloom all around the two great stones into which the house seals were set.

Garrus sat down on the rock bearing the Marinas crest and tried to steady his breathing. Maybe he could stay out here forever, soaking up the warmth. Maybe if he waited long enough, Sol would forgive him for abandoning her. Maybe Shepard would find him, too, and they could sit there together, under the clear sky, surrounded by the sweet high scent of the jaina flowers, and the galaxy would save itself.

He sat for a long time before his father came looking for him.

"You weren't on a cruise," Naevius said.

"How would you know?"

"You've managed to avoid picking a fight with me, for one," his dad pointed out, "which shows maturation. You probably don't realize how much muscle you've put on, or how that scarring makes you look, but you carry yourself like a veteran. You came home for a reason, and it's a serious one—and while you covered your tracks well enough that I have no idea what your 'contract work' involved, I do know that you fought off a Reaper vanguard on the Citadel two years ago."

Garrus jerked back. "How did you—"

"Garrus," his father said, and settled down on the rock carved with his own family's crest. "Do you know what the Vakarian words are?"

"'We repay in kind,'" Garrus quoted.

"'We repay in kind.' Sol's missed you. She'll come around."

"Should she, though?" Garrus leaned forward, bracing his forearms on his knees. "She's right. I abandoned you when you needed me."

"Whatever it was you were doing—was it good work? Necessary?"

Garrus thought about that, thought about Omega, thought about how ready he'd been to throw his life away until Shepard had walked back into his sights, thought about Harbinger. "Some of it was good, and some of it was...futile and really damn stupid."

"It's up to you to weigh the worth of that," his father said. "But I know Solana. She'll forgive you."

"And you?" said Garrus.

Then came the second surprise of the day. "Garrus," his dad said, "there's nothing to forgive."

Garrus looked away. His visor spit out reading after reading—ambient temperature, scientific classification of the surrounding flora, biometric readings on his father, windspeed and forecasted weather. In the corner, a blinking alert let him know he had unread messages.

He had no idea what to say to a benediction he'd been waiting half his life to hear. Eventually he settled on, "Thanks."

"I've recently had it brought to my attention that I've been, ah, a 'stubborn ass' when it comes to you. Consider it overdue." His dad shifted. "Now. I've been tracking reports from the Terminus regions. Your sister may think I'm chasing ghosts, but there are too many strange things going on for it to be a coincidence. There's something coming, isn't there?"

"You have no idea." Garrus chuckled dryly. "If we're all still kicking around when the dust settles, remind me to buy you a drink."

"That bad?"

"Worse," Garrus said. "Let me tell you about it."

 

-

 

The next week went something like this:

"You'll have to let me do the lobbying," Naevius said. "To put it delicately, your standing in the meritocracy is…"

"Shot all to hell?" Garrus suggested.

("I wonder why that is!" Solana shouted from another room.)

And this:

"It could be three years before they arrive, but it could be three months," Garrus said. "We need to start laying supply lines now."

His dad scoffed. "And I supposed you can take care of that single-handedly?"

(Solana, playing a flight sim in the corner, said, "Apparently either one of you is capable of saving the galaxy without any help from anyone.")

And finally:

"If I have to decrypt one more batarian news report—"

"Quiet, Garrus," his father hissed, "I'm on the line."

"I'm going to see Vel," Garrus said, and slammed his way out of the office. Sol was lounging in the courtyard, watching the sky; she seemed to be treating their mother's absence as an excuse for an extended vacation.

"I'm going to see Vel," he said again. "Vel Phaeton. Not sure if you remember him—"

"You guys were in the 43rd together. Yeah, I remember." She rolled easily to her feet. Garrus was still startled when he stood next to her and realized how tall she was. She'd hadn't quite matched his height, but both of their parents were at the upper end of average, and she was beyond that. He still remembered when she was small enough that he could pick her up under his arm and haul her around like a sack of fruit.

He shook himself and started for the door. His armor was stashed in a locker back at his apartment, but his took his sidearm from the safe beside the entry before he left. Sol gave him a curious look, and that was when he realized that she intended to follow him.

"Sol. What are you doing?"

"Coming with you," she said. "Unless you have a problem with that, in which case, I can...oh wait, still come with you, because I don't care if you have a problem."

"Fine," said Garrus, who secretly didn't feel like arguing with her and even more secretly hoped she was coming around and extremely secretly still felt guilty that she'd been saddled with caring for their parents. Shepard liked to say he was a complex man. Garrus was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Vel was on leave half a continent away, about forty minutes by shuttle. They took a public transport. There was some trouble with security because of Garrus' low citizenship tier and his status as 'MISSING, PRESUMED DECEASED.' He'd expected Sol to sigh at the fuss, but to his surprise, she only glared at the security agent until clearance from the proper officials came through. Vakarian was a small house now, but it was still notable, or at least recognizable; the writings of Caelax Vakarian had been standard classroom fare for millennia.

It took a little more work to convince Vel to meet him at the hotel rather than a bar, but bars were tricky—they could be good cover, but they could also provide all kinds of eavesdroppers and other interested parties with exactly the opportunity they needed. Vel had presumably swept the hotel room where he was staying for surveillance, and if he hadn't, then he'd changed too much to be of any use.

When they found the appropriate room, Garrus rapped hard a couple of times with the back of his knuckles. Sol shifted when the door didn't open immediately, but Garrus merely leaned against the doorframe and waited.

A couple of minutes later, the locks clicked in succession and the door slid back. Vel was squinting and shirtless; they'd obviously woken him up.

"Garrus," he said.

"Vel. Good to see you." Garrus offered his hand, and without hesitation Vel reached out and clasped his forearm. His eyes, though, drifted past Garrus to fix on Sol.

"Solana Vakarian," Vel said. "Well now, look at you. Been a while."

"Phaeton," Sol muttered.

Vel stood aside, one hand across the side of the door to keep it from sliding shut. His hotel room was dark, the shutters closed, but even in the ambient lighting, Garrus could tell the room was bare. Even the blankets had been stripped from the bed.

"So, business?" Vel said. "Must be bad if you're dragging little sister into it." He switched on the lights and waved them into the hard plastic chairs beside the window. "I can't lie, Garrus—I'm surprised to see you here." Nothing about his tone or posture suggested a criticism. Vel was simply blunt until he could no longer afford to be.

Garrus draped an arm over the back of the chair and crossed a leg over the opposite knee. "And why's that?"

Vel dropped into the third chair. "Because the last time I heard from you, you told me you were shipping out on a suicide run, and that was after you'd fallen off the map for years. That kind of behavior, your involvement in the Sovereign incident—it raises a lot of red flags. The kind of red flags I'm paid to notice."

"Yeah? What did you find out?"

Vel answered by pulling up his omnitool and tapping in a combination. Every light, every device, even the aircon that kept the room cool kicked off in the same instant. The hotel's backup power supply cut in almost immediately, but that little display would have done a fairly thorough job of disrupting any kind of casual surveillance. It was a show, too, because someone in Vel's line of work would be habitually paranoid enough to take care of any high-end listening devices before now.

"That bad, huh," Garrus said. Solana's eyes looked like they were going to fall out of her head.

"You tell me," said Vel. "After your message, I went digging through your C-Sec records. There wasn't much that surprised me there, it was all the same old crap I'd heard officers shout at you in mandatory—gifted, but a hothead, needs to learn to play with others." His voice rolled into a smirk.

"And?"

"And then you got caught up in some human's holy war," Vel said. "There's a lot of inconsistencies in the official report. Your Shepard's spouting off about folk legends, the Council's offering her money and resources out the back door while they tell the reporters out front that she's delusional, the extranet's going wild, and you…" He shook his head. "Three weeks after Shepard's funeral, you vanish entirely."

Well. It was good to hear that he'd covered his tracks, at least.

"I can't say much about what I do," Vel said, "but trust me when I say I have considerable resources, and even I couldn't find anything concrete about where the hell you went." His tone was still mild, but something suggested that he hadn't been happy with the lack of results. "And now here you are, stirring up trouble on the homeworld."

"Come on, Vel," Garrus said. "What do you want me to say?"

"I want to know from you what the hell's going on," Vel said. "I would've written all this off as your signature firebrand insanity, but you apparently have your father's attention, and that has my attention."

"Trust me," Sol said, "we all want to know what the hell's going on. Unfortunately, my brother here is choosy about what he thinks is important enough to share."

"I have my reasons for that, Sol—"

"Yeah, well, how do I know you aren't lying again?"

Garrus looked at her, the sister who had once been his closest friend and was now a grown stranger, and at Vel, who had been his comrade-in-arms as surely as Ashley Williams or Wrex, if not Shepard herself, and then he spread his hands, off-finger and near-finger and thumb. "Ask," he said. "Whatever you want. If I can't or won't answer, I'll tell you. No lies, Sol."

"You are desperate," said Vel. "What's the story with—"

"Shepard," Sol interrupted. "They said she's dead, now she's all over the news."

"No," Garrus said. "I'm not talking about that."

"The Reapers, then," Vel said, as Solana subsided into frustrated silence. "You have to realize how ridiculous all of this sounds, but you apparently believe it."

Garrus laughed softly and without humor. "I believe it, all right," he said. "They're real, and they're here. We have no more than a few years until they're here in force, and if we aren't ready...ha. Even if we are, we don't have much of a chance."

"They can't be that powerful," Sol protested. "If they are, why haven't we run up against them before?"

"Because they haven't wanted us to. Look, Sol. I know this sounds ridiculous, but Vel said it himself—something's being covered up. The Council doesn't want to admit what's going on because their heads are shoved up their asses, but if we don't prepare now, we're dead. Not just us—the asari, the salarians. The humans. Everyone."

"What happened to your face?" Solana said. She had to be sick of listening to him talk Reapers with their dad the whole day long, but he wished she'd take him up on his offer with questions that were a little less personal.

"A rocket hit it," Garrus said.

They clearly couldn't decide if they should believe him, because Vel huffed and Solana said, "You're serious?"

"I thought it would make me look dangerous," Garrus offered, and that got a laugh from both of them, although Sol looked angry at herself for laughing.

"Garrus, I mean it," she said. "Where the fuck were you? Why were people shooting…rockets at you? Oh, fuck, you aren't a pirate, are you?"

"What? Uh...no, Sol, I"—wasn't committing any crimes, he was about to say, but that definitely wasn't true—"I was not a pirate. That's something else I don't want to talk about right now, but I'll tell you the whole story some other day."

"You swear?" she demanded.

"I swear."

"What about the suicide mission?" Vel said. "You mentioned something about the Collectors, but the only reports I've seen on Collector activity involve the Terminus Systems."

"Mmm. You know, maybe I should start at the beginning," Garrus said. "What do you know about...protheans?"

He talked long into the night. A lot of it involved retreading ground he'd already covered with his father, but where Naevius had interrupted him only to ask for clarifications, Vel wanted the broader context, and Solana wanted the personal. Garrus didn't tell them everything—he left out what he'd been doing on Omega, and if they noticed that he glossed over Shepard's death, neither mentioned it; nor did he share the more sensitive details, like Liara's new role as the Shadow Broker—but what information he gave them on the Reapers held them both riveted, even Solana, who already had pieces of the whole.

"That's quite a story," Vel said when Garrus had finished. "The question now, though, is what you want from me."

"Anything you can give," Garrus said bluntly. "Everything, as a matter of fact. You've got resources? I want those. You can convince your superiors to give you a new assignment? Even better. I need a sword, but right now I would settle for a scalpel."

"A scalpel," Vel said. "Who else do you have in mind?"

Garrus lifted a shoulder. "I already have a pilot," he said, and waited for that to sink in.

It didn't take Sol long. "The hell you do!" she snarled. "I never agreed—"

"But you're doing to do it anyway," Vel said.

"Fuck you, you don't know me," she spit.

"He doesn't. I do," said Garrus. "And...spirits, Sol, I know I don't have the right to ask anything of you, but I am asking."

She twisted. "I...fine."

"Just 'fine?'"

"It would be nice to fly again," she said, grudgingly, but her face loosened as she said it. "Yeah, okay."

"Dad's leaning on Fedorian pretty heavily," Garrus said. "He's agreed to commit some token resources, so we're going to have to be creative in figuring out how to use what we have. I'm...not actually sure how many people we're going to get, either."

"Which means," Solana said, "that you expect us to prepare the entire galaxy for a war against giant, mind-controlling robots with only four people?"

"Three," Garrus said. "We need Dad to stay here and talk to the politicians."

"Three people," Sol said. "Great. That's so much better."

Vel lifted a shoulder. "Look at it this way, Solana," he said. "At least it won't be boring."

 

-

 

In the end, the Primarch did give him a ship: a fast flitter, several generations out of date but in good repair, and he gave Garrus soldiers, if not enough of them—but Garrus had learned that lesson well. Six soldiers in the right place, used effectively by a commander who knew what he or she was doing, were worth as much as six legions.

They all reported to the ship on the same day. Garrus arrived in the morning, to acquaint himself with his new command, and Solana came with him. He'd been given a token civilian title of 'Specialist' to go along with his token resources, because he'd resisted having his commission reactivated. He had no interest in being beholden to the Hierarchy, and anyway, he'd served only half of the mandatory fifteen years before getting a release to work in C-Sec.

Vel arrived not long after, and then the others started to trickle through: Portia Kryik, fresh from rotation off a hastatim squad, was an hour early, while Cassia—make that "just Cass"—was exactly on time. Cass was a demolitions expert and career soldier with a quarter-century of experience behind her, and she reminded Garrus a little of Tali, or what Tali would be in another decade.

Hadrian Achenar was last. Garrus had been reluctant to take him on board, but his mother was connected to the right people, and her son had been on the verge of dishonorable discharge when she managed to land him this assignment. Achenar was young, close to Sol's age, but he already had a long history of insubordination. Garrus could tell the pattern was still in place when Achenar arrived two hours late.

"Nice of you to make an effort," Garrus said. He was looking out the forward viewport of the ship; Solana was beside him at the helm. Achenar, escorted by Vel, had approached from aft, but Garrus could see their faces in the reflection of the plexiglass.

Achenar huffed. "Sorry."

"Prompt and respectful," Garrus said to Sol.

"Sorry, Specialist," Achenar said.

"'Officer Vakarian' will be fine," Garrus corrected mildly. "Vel, give him the tour. We'll met in the CIC in half an hour to coordinate. If Private Achenar hasn't rid himself of his attitude by 1630, we'll return him to Palaven regardless of the ship's relative location."

"Look at that, Achenar," Vel said. "I don't think Officer Vakarian is kindly disposed to you."

"I don't care what he thinks," Achenar shot back. "I looked you up, you know," he added to Garrus' back. "Your citizenship tier is lower than most criminals'. Why the hell should I take orders from you?"

Garrus took a few steps closer to Sol's station—she was being suspiciously silent—and pulled up the ship's schematics on the display in front of her. The craft was unusual, more heavily armed than most vessels her size and more compact than the Normandy, although her sweeping, curved silhouette was evocative of the SR-1. The interior was a dim relief after the lighting Cerberus had installed on his previous posting—turian and human military vessels usually cut ambient lights, particularly when on high alert, and the SR-2 was so bright it had made him feel like he was on a surgical table.

"Maybe you shouldn't take orders from me," he finally said. Achenar made a noise of shock. "You're right," Garrus continued, "my rank in the Hierarchy is low, and I have no official military rank at all. You aren't required to obey orders you believe are unjust, anyway; in fact, I encourage you to refuse them."

To that point, Garrus had kept his face turned away from Achenar; the other man would have seen only the back of his head and the side of his visor. Now, though, he turned and looked dead-on, let Achenar look at him and at the character of his eyes. Garrus didn't know what Achenar saw there, but it was enough to make him take a step back.

"I am in command of this ship, however," Garrus said. "Which means unless I do issue an order you see as unjust, you'll do what I say or you'll be discharged, and then we'll see whose citizenship is lower. Have I given an unjust order, Private Achenar?"

"...No, sir," Achenar said. The venom was still there, but Garrus couldn't ask for more than a basic show of courtesy when he hadn't yet earned more.

"Good. Report to the CIC in twenty-six minutes. You're dismissed." He turned back to the schematic miniature, but his eyes were still trained on the reflection in the viewport. Vel had to bodily shove Achenar out of the cockpit.

"That's gonna be fun," Sol said.

"Yeah. Just what I needed—a rebel with no cause."

"When did you hold command, anyway?" Sol asked. "I didn't think you'd made it high enough in C-Sec."

"What makes you think I did?"

"Maybe that most new commanders would have flinched at a subordinate showing them that much tooth on day one."

"Still not talking about it, Sol," Garrus said.

She snorted at him, and their departure was rougher than he would have expected from a pilot who'd been called 'a prodigy' more than once. Sol told him she was "just out of practice, don't throw a fit." Out of practice. Right.

The crew assembled at 1630 as directed, and Garrus walked them through the mission basics without giving details; they needed to know what they were doing, but not why. To the knowledge of everyone save Vel, Solana, and Garrus himself, they were simply a task force assembled by the Primarch with the directive of 'preparing turian space in whatever way necessary' against an unspecified threat. None of them were stupid; Garrus was fairly sure they'd put his name together with federal records and news reports to arrive at their own conclusion, but he wasn't about to provide more fodder for the rumors.

At 1800 he released them and retired to the captain's cabin. It was a shock to have such an expansive space all to himself—talk about the perks of command. On the SR-2 he'd snatched sleep in the crew quarters or napped in the battery in short fits, but here he had a bed to himself.

He spent the next six hours shifting through the stack of priorities he'd begun compiling long before Primarch Fedorian had acquiesced enough to give him a task force. There hadn't been many threats to turian military supremacy in the past few decades; the Relay 314 Incident could have escalated if not for Citadel intervention, but by and large Garrus' people had gotten remarkably complacent.

Six soldiers. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough.

At the end of the evening, just before he took himself to the decadently large bed that definitely inspired images of his commander, he opened his extranet interface and spent a little time indulging himself. Research was always beneficial, and there was no reason not to learn more about humans, even if they did have the strange idea that they'd invented oral sex.

He wrote a message in his head. Dear Shepard, it went, if you were here, you'd probably be laughing at me. Her laughter was often soft, dry, dark: battlefield laughter. He had on occasion, however, seen her throw back her head and shout with delight; it was a breathtaking sight.

Before he went to bed, he laid his regret and his resolve before that memory like an altar; and that was how Garrus came to The Valiance.

 

-

 

And this was how he used his scalpel:

He stored caches of emergency shelters and supplies on every moon, every outpost, every settlement. He updated comm buoy clusters with better shield and stealth technology. He hit the pirates pushing past the Attican Traverse when he could and gave arms to local militias when he couldn't. He recorded everything he knew about the Reapers and migrated the data to local servers. He pushed for stronger alliances with the asari, for more contracts with krogan mercenaries, and for as much collaboration with salarian defense engineers as possible.

He did whatever was useful, unpopular, and possible.

He also spent a lot of time arguing with the Hierarchy, and the battles he did win were often only victories because of the weight his father could bring to bear. Primarch Fedorian and his office remained resistant to almost everything that went beyond standing policy. Nobody was going to argue if Garrus wanted to harden communication lines, but the minute he suggested practicing large-group tactics against a single target, say, or bolstering a colony with known separatist leanings, well…

The Valiance was drifting above Parthia when that message arrived. Garrus' crew was eating when he came in and announced the news, and, contrary to his own views, a few of them reacted with approval.

"You can't expect the Hierarchy to support known dissidents, Vakarian," Cass pointed out. "Parthia has sheltered Facinus sympathizers in the past."

Vel dropped his skewer and reached for another. "Had no idea you were so progressive, Garrus. It makes me wonder what else you're open-minded about." He waggled his brows; at some point over the past month, the respectful distance had dropped, and he'd started behaving like he and Garrus were once again a pair of adolescents in mandatory.

"Come on, drown it. Parthia deserves the same consideration as any other colony. If Palaven isn't willing to do that much, they shouldn't call Parthia a colony at all," Garrus said. He dropped into the seat between Vel and Achenar, who was hunched over with his fingers pressed to his crown.

Cass wiped her mouth and leaned back in her chair, all loose-limbed nonchalance. "Sounds like a house in an Invictus jungle," she said, meaning that the idea seemed like a good one only to the people who had thought it up.

"Their politics aren't my concern," Garrus said. "If the Hierarchy won't sanction funding—"

A month in Hadrian Achenar's company hadn't done anything to endear him to Garrus. The kid was foul-mouthed, insubordinate, and flat-out unpleasant company. Cass handled him well enough, and Vel and Portia Kryik mostly ignored him, but he reacted to Solana like she was the ignition to his fuel tank, and to Garrus like…

Actually, his reaction to Garrus was remarkably similar to the reaction Garrus had once had to Naevius Vakarian.

Which was why it didn't surprised Garrus when Achenar exploded. "Then do something!" he snarled. "Don't sit around moaning about the Hierarchy will or won't do for you, go do it yourself."

"'Do it myself,' huh?" Garrus crossed his arms and leaned back. "What am I supposed to do?"

Achenar looked surprised to be asked. "You...uh…"

"Give me an example," Garrus said. "Let's hear it." Vel and Cass both put down their skewers and looked at Achenar.

"...All right," Achenar said. "Fine. What do you know about Omega?"

Garrus went still.

"It's a space station, a big haven for criminals," Achenar continued. "Mercenaries, drug dealers, thieves, thugs, pimps—whatever you've heard about Omega, the reality's worse."

"And how would you know that?" Garrus said.

Achenar dipped his head like he was about to charge; his eyes were glittering. "I've been there," he said.

"Make your point."

"Last year somebody decided things needed to change, okay?" Achenar snapped. "One man, who thought he could make a difference, and you know what? In a few months, he did what Council forces hadn't been able to do for centuries—put every Omega gang on the run."

"Sounds like a vigilante to me," Cass said.

"Maybe," said Achenar, "but he acted, instead of sitting around and whining about how the Hierarchy wouldn't give him enough resources!"

"Archangel," Vel said. "I've heard of him."

"Then you know he got results." Achenar shoved away from the table. "Unlike us, with whatever the hell it is we're doing. Excuse me, sir." He stormed away without bothering to clear his tray, and Cass picked up his last uneaten kebab.

"You heard 'im, Vakarian," she said. "Vigilantism for all of us. Let's make something happen, yeah?" Still chuckling to herself, she stood up and carried her dishes off to the galley.

Garrus became aware that his hands were curled into fists. He opened them, forcing his fingers to relinquish their rictus.

Vel was staring in the direction Achenar had gone with a thoughtful expression on his face. "You need to watch that one," he said.

"Think he's dangerous?"

"Not intentionally, maybe," Vel said, "but he's...how do I put this? If he's hero-worshipping a figure like Archangel, something isn't right."

"Oh?"

"'Oh.' I bet I know more than Private Achenar does, even if there isn't much to know. Archangel killed a lot of vermin, all right, but there was nothing noble about the way he did it. He let the owner of a varren-fighting ring get eaten by his own animals, blew up a couple of car-bombers with their own explosives, poured red sand in a dealer's eyes so he died of overdose. Stuff like that. He did worse to slavers."

"What are you getting at?" Garrus said.

"Those deaths weren't random," said Vel. "They were planned, built—hell, they were crafted. Achenar's idolizing a killer."

"Maybe he is," Garrus said.

"You don't agree?"

"No." Garrus sighed. "I agree. I also think that killers might be what we need right now."

Vel looked at him. "If you're saying that, I know we're fucked."

"You really have no idea," said Garrus.

Chapter Text

As they fled Mars, there was one instinct plaguing Shepard, one overbearing compulsion that went against all her training, her intentions, and her better sense. After she checked on Ashley and consulted with Joker she gave in to it, retreating to the elevator and then to her cabin. Once that hatch had sealed shut behind her, she stripped off her clothes, turned on the shower, and overrode the protocol that kept the temperature lukewarm and the water duration limited to five minutes.

Then she put her back to the wall and slid to the ground, sitting with her legs drawn up, her arms stretched over her knees, and her chin bowed to her chest.

She did not sob. Shepard never cried unless she wanted to cry, or at least she was capable of putting off the urge until she could release the tension in private. She didn't often let her stress build to that point, but there were times—after the Torfan fallout, after seeing Ash on Horizon—that she'd had to track down a shower stall. This was worse in so many ways; the only thing that seemed to matter was the rasp of her own breathing.

The water's excessive heat no longer bothered her. At one point she would have found this temperature scalding, but in reconstructing her body Cerberus had done something to her skin, woven it with a carbon mesh that was better able to withstand her improved muscular and skeletal systems. She held up to extremes better and bruised less easily, although her skin still felt like skin and did still bruise.

Her hands closed into fists, and the muscles in her shoulders and back tensed automatically, but she had no tangible target to hit. There had once been monsters sleeping between the stars, and Shepard had seen them in a dream, and she had taken the dream for prophecy; but when she told her dream to others, they had received her vision as madness.

And now the monsters had woken; and now the monsters were here, on the ground, in force, chewing through her planet the same way they would chew through every other planet. What could she do against that kind of destructive power? Liara believe in the Crucible, but Liara had always believed in big ideas. Shepard understood hope, and how to balance it against pragmatism, and how hope itself could be pragmatic, but right now she was having trouble remembering what hope felt like.

EDI chimed an alert tailored to cut through the acoustics of the running water. "Shepard," she said. "We are twenty minutes from Citadel space."

Shepard grunted.

A pause, and then: "It is good to have you back, Shepard."

From deep in her throat, Shepard dredged up a reply. "Thanks, EDI." She let her head fall back against the wall and said, "Any messages for me?"

On Earth, during her house arrest, her messages had been heavily censored. The Alliance had allowed outgoing mail to certain addresses, but not her old crew. Short notes to Anderson had made it through, as had, of all things, her many letters to the Systems Alliance Veteran Memorial Association, which after her 'death' had erected a Shepard Memorial Flame on Torfan. It was one of the ugliest things Shepard had ever had done in her name, but her repeated requests to have the thing removed had fallen on deaf ears.

At any rate, the freedom to access her mail again was the one relief in this whole clusterfuck.

"Several, Shepard," EDI was saying. "There is nothing urgent that I have not already brought to your attention, but the backlog is considerable. Are you looking for anything in particular?"

"Anything from, uh. Garrus?"

"There are several messages from Officer Vakarian."

"Any recent?"

A beat as EDI scanned through her archives, and then she said, "No, Shepard. The last is dated from seven weeks ago."

"Damn it," Shepard said. "Flag those, EDI. Put a priority marker on anything from Cerberus, too. And figure out what the best hospital with an empty bed on the Citadel is—tell them to have a doctor waiting."

"I will do so, Shepard. Is there anything else?"

"No. No, thanks." She climbed to her feet, cranked the temperature back, and washed away her sweat. When she was clean, she toweled her cropped hair dry and went to dress. Anderson had planned ahead; her uniforms and armor had already been loaded onto the Normandy, as had her sidearms and rifles and the heavily modified M-98 she'd been tinkering with for the past year. Jack had taken to calling it Shepard's 'Black Widow,' half in jest, and the name had stuck.

Normandy was different now. Not in a way that changed the shape or soul of her, but Shepard knew this ship to her bones. That was another thing upgraded on Cerberus' dime—the SR-2 had carbon nanotube plating now, much like Shepard herself. The more recent retrofit looked like it was to bring the ship into compliance with Alliance regs, and Shepard sure as hell couldn't complain about that. Her girl was finally flying the right colors again.

 

-

 

And the ship was lovely.

Shepard had a romantic streak she did her best to hide. After conferring with the Council, she'd swung by Huerta Memorial to see Ash, and in the hospital's lobby she'd purchased a paper volume of Tennyson's poetry to leave at her former gunnery chief's bedside. Seeing Williams like that had been too much—too much pride, too much regret, too much anger. Shepard had said only a few words before leaving.

Looking at the Normandy was like that: pain and brightness all mingled together.

The SR-1 had been a marvel, but she'd never been more than a loaner. The turians said (or would have said) that the spirit of the ship had survived her ultimate fate, and Shepard agreed, but she was also proprietary about the SR-2 in a way she hadn't been about the SR-1. The SR-2 was built for Shepard and to Shepard; she was, plating and shields and stealth core and crew, alive in a way that only had a little to do with EDI.

From the docking bay, Shepard had her first static sight of Normandy in six long months. The Cerberus yellow was now Alliance blue, but the exterior still presented the same sweeping lines, the dorsal curve with its fan of engines on either side, the same clean silhouette. The most drastic changes were inside—hell, that QEC alone would've taken weeks to install.

Ha. Williams had once called Shepard a dreamer. Maybe Ash had been right.

Shepard shook herself and boarded. Her feet took her to the bridge to give Joker his orders and then to her cabin, where she climbed into bed without bothering to strip down to her skin. She slept badly, dreaming of the woods near her father's farm on Mindoir; when she woke, she felt like she was hungover. She pushed herself through a hundred push-ups and then a hundred more, until her implants could no longer avert the fatigue building in her arms, and then she rolled to her feet and went to meet the new specialist.

Sam Traynor gave Shepard a thorough overview of the retrofit, and EDI was there for Shepard to quiz about any changes Traynor might have overlooked. Shepard didn't look at the offered crew roster; she wanted her surprise and pleasure to be genuine the first time she went to walk the ship.

She started in the Normandy's bowels and worked her way up. The lowest decks were well stocked with extra ammunition and supplies, and in engineering, she was elated to find Adams. When he expressed his approval of the SR-2's stealth systems, Shepard felt a twinge akin to parental pride.

She finished up in the mess hall, where some of the off-duty crew had gathered to eat. Private Westmoreland was there, fresh from her security rotation in the War Room, as were Joker and Vega. It was pretty rare to see Vega without Cortez; Shepard liked that she knew that about him already.

"Commander, a tray?" That was Mess Sergeant Singh. She was young, upright, and professional—a far cry from Gardner.

"Sure. Thanks," Shepard said. "EDI? Remind Liara that she needs to eat."

A pause, and then EDI's warm voice: "I believe Dr. T'Soni has programmed Glyph to interrupt her should she become too engrossed in her work. However, I will pass the message along, Shepard."

"I appreciate it," Shepard. "Make that two trays, Mess Sergeant. Liara isn't picky." Singh had something hot served up within minutes; the main dish was actually asari, which Shepard appreciated. She didn't know if Sergeant Singh had taken the initiative herself or if the old hands had warned the newcomers about Shepard's culinary tastes, and honest to god, she didn't care. The seafood over some warm grain she didn't recognize smelled fantastic.

She slid into the seat beside Joker and pushed Liara's tray across the table. As if on cue, the hatch to the Shadow Broker's office popped open and the Shadow Broker herself emerged.

"Hey, Liara," Joker said. "Guess you decided you should eat before you faint again, huh?"

"For the goddess' sake, Joker, that was once," Liara said. She sat down primly opposite Shepard and bowed her head for a few seconds before picking up her fork.

"Yeah, well, all I'm saying is that the galaxy wouldn't be scared to death of the Shadow Broker if they knew she had the whole absent-minded professor thing going on."

Shepard planted her elbows on either side of her tray and rolled her eyes upward. "Damn it, Joker, you know that isn't common knowledge."

Joker looked exaggeratedly to his right, where Westmoreland's mouth was hanging open to display the partly-chewed contents. "Uhh…" he said. "Just...ignore that I said that, Private. Actually, why don't you just ignore everything I say. God knows everybody else does."

"Only because you flap your mouth so much," Shepard shot back.

"Really, Commander?" said Joker. "Because from what I hear, you like your men a little bit mouthy. Get it, Liara? Because—"

"Thank you, Joker, I don't believe I need it explained," said Liara, but she was struggling against a smile.

Westmoreland's tongue was going to roll out of her mouth if her jaw dropped any lower, and even James looked fascinated. They'd get used to it soon enough; Shepard didn't rely on formality with her crew unless she had no other options. Fear precluded any of them really knowing her, and it was familiarity and closeness that bound them into a single mind on the battlefield.

"Anyway," Joker said, "James here was mentioning some new cult out near the Pylos Nebula."

"Didn't say they were a cult." Vega shrugged. "I think indoctrination's more likely."

"I hate to break it to you, but plain old human beings are pretty good at indoctrinating themselves." Joker stuck his fork upright in his food and tossed back a couple of pills that had been hiding under a napkin. "I've run into plenty of cults before—"

"One cult, Joker. One."

"That you know about, Commander!"

"There's a saying on Thessia," said Liara, "that only an atheist sees religious fanaticism where there is none. Of course, that's a generalization and almost useless from an anthropological standpoint, but there is an interesting trend of paranoia in historically agnostic societies."

"I'm not—I never said I was an atheist, come on. Can't a guy have a conversation about brainwashing without someone turning it personal?" Joker said.

"I'm Catholic," said James. "Nothing personal there."

"You don't have to be religious to recognize the cultural influence, either," Liara said.

"Great, yeah, let's talk about you," said Joker. "You're, what, Siarist?"

"My mother followed the Athame Doctrine, actually, which I'm given to understand isn't terribly different from Catholicism." Liara leaned forward, warming to her topic. "There's less symbolic cannibalism, of course—"

"Hey!" said Vega.

"Oh, Lieutenant Vega, I apologize! I've clearly misunderstood some of the dogma."

"Yeah," Vega said. "Although, come to think of it, maybe not. My abuela would have washed your mouth out with soap, though."

"I...would not wish to offend your abuela. Or her soap," Liara said.

Shepard chuckled. "It's an idiom, Liara. He means that his grandmother wouldn't tolerate anyone talking shit. Kind of surprised you made it through childhood, James."

"Ouch. Nice, Lola," Vega said. "What about you? You a godless heathen like Joker here?"

Joker stopped chewing long enough to snort. "Please, the only trinity Shepard worships is Devlon, Rosenkov, and Armax."

"No atheists in a foxhole," said a glib Shepard, who in walking the ship had just finished her own kind of pilgrimage. She was glad they were all in decent spirits—that was the important thing, not the friendly quibbling over personal doctrines. They'd been hammered hard lately, some of them harder than others. Joker and Liara had been fighting the war for years already, Vega was still figuring out how to cope with his whole squad gone, and Westmoreland had lost a sister on Earth. Shepard made a mental note to keep a closer eye on her.

"So. Palaven, huh," said Joker.

"Palaven," Shepard agreed. "It'll be bad. The Reapers' main force might be massed at Earth, but we need to go into this expecting the worst. James, Liara, I want you with me on the ground. Cortez will drop us on Menae as close to central command as possible. Joker, you're on standby in case we have to bug out."

"Aw, c'mon, Shepard, can't a guy eat his almost-shrimp and kind-of-rice in peace?"

"Good luck with that," said Vega. "I have a feeling this one"—he jerked a thumb at Shepard—"would only let us eat MREs while we hump if she could."

"Man, you have no idea." Joker ate one of the almost-shrimp with his fingers, chewed, and swallowed. "It's twenty-four hours a day, twenty-eight or thirty if we're on a planet with a longer rotation. Work, work, work."

"Joker?" said Shepard.

"Uh, yeah?"

"If I recall correctly, you spent the last six months sitting on your ass in Vancouver."

"I also gave expert testimony and supervised the reupholstery of the crash seats," Joker said with a perfectly straight face. "Palaven's going to feel like a vacation after that kind of grueling labor."

"Shepard," Liara said, "about Palaven—"

"It'll be fine," said Shepard. "We drop, we find the Primarch, we get out of there as fast as we can."

"That wasn't what I—"

Shepard pushed away from the table. "I should go. Paperwork to finish," she said. "James, Liara, 0600 in the shuttle bay. Make sure Steve knows." She left her tray on the table; normally she wouldn't pull rank that rudely, but there were things—requisition forms to review, a whole terabyte of intel from the ST&R office—she needed to look at that Cerberus mech, she needed to—

"Whoa," she heard Vega say. "The commander was out of here fast."

"That's our Shepard," said Joker. "There and gone. You know, this shrimp thing's actually kind of good."

 

-

 

Hours after Menae, late into the third shift, she took the elevator down to deck five. Third shift was skeletal, bare bones, and even Joker was asleep; he'd probably snuck into the medical bay to steal a nap on one of Doctor Chakwas' berths again.

James had suspended a heavy bag on a stand near his workstation, and Shepard made a beeline there. She was in old sweatpants and an A-shirt that bared the tattoos on her upper arms. Shepard wasn't as heavily inked as Jack or even Vega, but like most marines, her skin carried its fair share of marks. The N7 stamp on her right bicep and the serial number on the bottom of a foot were practical enough, but she also had '2170' scored in small characters across her ribs as a private reminder, and after Cerberus had brought her back, she'd gotten a red and white phoenix punched into her left shoulder blade. It was a little on the nose, maybe, but she'd been eager to reclaim her body after its retrofit, and nobody had ever accused her of subtlety.

She didn't bother with gloves, but she did stop to wrap her knuckles before starting to work her hands. Heavy bags like this one were good for building power, but it'd be nice to have a speed bag; she'd have to talk to James about finding one.

After ten minutes, the fog in her head started to lift. After twenty, there was nothing left in her head at all but pure sensation. Her back and shoulders started to burn; sweat gathered at her hairline and began to trickle down her neck.

Through her concentration, she registered the grind of the elevator expelling someone into the shuttle bay. It was longer than she would've liked before the realization of that other presence broke through her haze; she finished up with an elbow strike that was more AMMAP than strict boxing, turned around, and found Garrus leaning against a stack of cargo crates as he watched her.

He was dressed only in his underarmor, which Shepard noted was of a lot higher quality than his old set. This was navy, with gold piping and a touch of cream at his throat. His new outer armor was a hell of a lot nicer than his old, too, although Shepard was primarily glad he'd stopped wearing the hardsuit with the rocket-induced structural damage.

"Want a turn?" she said.

"Mm, no thanks," said Garrus. "I just showered. Thought I would go to bed, try to switch over to the Normandy's schedule, but…" He lifted a shoulder.

"Time zone lag."

"Yeah," he said. "So listen, Shepard—before you ran off to call Hackett, we managed to talk about what I've been doing, but not about you. Joker said you were under house arrest?"

"Something like that." Shepard picked up a towel and wiped her face. "They didn't court-martial me, probably because Anderson was running interference. Restricted mail, restricted movement, restricted access to...everything."

His features did something that translated to a smirk, and Shepard grinned back and braced herself. "Sounds to me," he said, "like you were off having a vacation while the rest of us were trying to save the galaxy."

"Laugh it up, Vakarian. Not all of us can be expert Reaper advisors."

"I did always tell you I had purposes other than the decorative ones," he said, and then he turned and boosted himself up onto one of the lower stacks of crates. Shepard grabbed her water bottle; she wasn't surprised when he crouched down and offered her a hand. She braced against him and hauled herself up, and they sat down together, feet dangling into space, staring at the Kodiak.

"The ship's in decent condition," he said.

She nudged his side companionably. "Except for the cannon."

"Except for the cannon," Garrus agreed.

"The problem is the crew." He shot her a look, and Shepard shook her head and continued, "There's nothing wrong with them, but we had to get out of the solar system fast, which means the Normandy is now staffed with a full complement of engineers and technicians."

"No one combat capable?"

She started to tick people off on her fingers. "There's you, me, Vega, Liara—you know what I think of that—, whatever EDI's doing with the mech, and three green privates who were serving as security during the upgrades." She sighed. "I had the thought that you and I could form two squads and run double duty, but we barely have the soldiers to put one team on the ground."

"Make Hackett swap some personnel with you," Garrus said. He nudged her back. "He needs all the engineers he can get, and his marines would pay to serve under the famous Commander Shepard."

"Working on it, but with the navy in the shape it's in, god knows when the transfer will make it to us. And it's more like 'infamous.'"

"They're asking a lot of you, Jane—they've got to give you the resources you need."

She turned to look at him, and he let her look, studying her face as she studied his. The previous week suddenly felt like...like she'd been listening to a distorted signal that only now and with him became clear, like she only noticed the distortion for its sudden absence.

Shepard had thought herself stone all the way through, but something in her had gone cold and sharp when she'd seen Palaven burning. Fear and uncertainty had turned her harder yet—to iron, maybe, or steel. The Primarch might be in her CIC, but it was the extraction of the man sitting next to her that felt like the real triumph.

"I see right through you," she said.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. This is mutiny," she said, and smirked. "Too big to take orders from your old CO, Garrus?"

"I should've known I couldn't keep anything from you," he drawled. "Yes, Shepard. Great job, you've solved the case. The only thing I want more than the chance to follow you on suicide runs is the opportunity to command my own subsidiary team of traumatized humans."

Shepard tried to get him in a headlock. There was a short, seated scuffle for dominance that ended when neither of them proved willing to push the other off the side of the crates; his hand had somehow landed on her waist beneath the ribbed synthetic cotton of her shirt.

She raised an eyebrow, and Garrus cleared his throat so hard he sent himself into a coughing fit.

"Does this count as that date we talked about?" she asked.

"Uh. No. Unless you—do you?" The panic receded as his need to save face kicked in, and his voice dropped to that low register it usually only reached when he was exhausted or trying to flirt. "I mean—please, Shepard. When I take you on a date, you'll know it."

"Is that right?"

"Definitely." His thumb moved in small circles against her skin. "So, uh. What exactly would your ideal date involve, Shepard?"

"Thought you'd done your research, Vakarian," she said, and let herself relax into him. Garrus wasn't the only one who'd been reading up on interspecies partnerships, although she wasn't ready to admit how much of her house arrest had been spent scanning articles about the same. There was this one advice columnist…

"Yeah, well," he said, "humor me."

"Let's see—" Should she play with him? "We'd meet at a bar."

"At a bar, huh? That sounds like the Shepard I know."

"I'd be dressed in something slinky," Shepard added. "And he'd come over and introduce himself—"

"Now you're picking up strangers?"

"Quiet, you wanted to know. Anyway, he'd say something flattering, tell me he's heard of me, and then share something about himself. Maybe he'd drop a hint that he's an expert Reaper advisor."

"Mmm," said Garrus.

"And then we'd go dancing," she concluded.

"Dancing? Really? Sure you're not trying to scare him off?"

"Did I mention that the man in this scenario is a drell?"

"I don't buy it," Garrus said. "He sounds far too handsome to be a drell."

She laughed at that. It felt good, like stretching a muscle that had gone tight with disuse. "You know, I really can dance to certain kinds of music."

"Yeah?"

"A little. My...dad learned to dance to impress my mother. They used to put on music in the evening and show me steps out on our front porch."

Garrus was still; more than anyone else, he knew how rarely she talked about her family, but he was holding himself like she would shatter if he so much as breathed. "Which dances?" he said carefully.

"Formal human stuff." Shepard picked a loose thread from her pants, rolled it into a ball, and flicked it away with her thumb and forefinger. "Waltz, jive. Tango."

"I...wouldn't mind seeing that sometime, Shepard."

"Don't get your hopes up—Dad wasn't that great, and I was seven."

"Mmm. Dancing and drinks with a strange drell. I might have to learn to waltz to impress you, with expectations like that."

"You could dance as badly as I do and still impress me," Shepard said. "If we make it through this war, though, I'll go along with whatever you decide. Pick something you've always wanted to do, bring me along. That's my ideal date."

"Even if it means we watch the extended edition of 'Fleet and Flotilla' straight through?"

"As long as you give me bathroom breaks." Shepard considered the thought. "And don't mind if I try to distract you."

"Noted," he said.

The sweat was beginning to dry on Shepard's skin; EDI kept the shuttle bay a couple of degrees cooler than the rest of the ship, probably because it wasn't worth the extra energy expenditure to heat a large area that was regularly exposed to hard vacuum. Steve Cortez had been working on the shuttle earlier, Shepard noticed. His tools were neatly laid out on the workbench closest to the Kodiak, and there were a couple of burned-out couplings beside his spanner.

She liked it up here. It wasn't a good hide, but it gave her enough height to take in most of the bay, from the armory and requisition banks all the way to the ramp at the fore of the ship, snugged up against Normandy's belly.

Garrus' thumb stilled against her waist. After a moment he said, "Shepard?"

"Yeah?"

"You're not in this fight alone."

She'd been sixteen when batarian slavers had landed on Mindoir. They'd invaded Shepard's home and killed her family. From that day right up to this morning, when she'd fastened her boots and checked her rifle before landing in a war zone, her life had been an unceasing struggle. Between those two points had come basic, N-school, Torfan and the Blitz, a hundred independent actions, fights against pirates, fights against terrorists, fights to retain the memory of kindness in the face of the anger that drove her. She'd borne much of that weight alone, choosing to rely on herself rather than trust there were others capable of helping, until Sovereign had come—a threat so horrifyingly massive that even Shepard could not stand against it by herself.

And she said, "I know."

 

-

 

The war wore on.

Days turned to months, and with every hour that passed, the Reapers demonstrated the vast extent of their power. In her bleaker moments, Shepard could understand why Sovereign and Harbinger had looked at her with that superiority that was totally alien in its scope: one Reaper had, after all, been enough to bring the entire Fifth Fleet to its knees. The invasion was devastating on a galactic scale.

She brokered a cure for the genophage, she answered every distress call and followed every lead Hackett gave her as long as it was on the way to a higher-priority target; she slept fitfully and dreamed she was racing to save something just out of reach; and she felt, for maybe the first time, as if all of her considerable reserves were finally being tested.

Shepard was born for her job. As a child, she'd undergone the standard battery of intelligence tests, and she'd scored off the chart in more than one category—spatial reasoning and interpersonal relations, among others. The tester had told her parents that their daughter probably wouldn't be challenged academically until post-secondary school.

Beyond her aptitudes, Shepard demanded excellence of herself. She knew how to name her goal and work towards it with a rigor that bordered on ruthlessness. She had an empathy that was extreme—her creativity and emotional intelligence were no less acute than her logician's knack—and although that empathy had been damaged in the attack on Mindoir, it still leant her an uncanny insight both on the battlefield and in the diplomatic arena. And above all, she knew how to channel her drive and talent into split-second responses under extreme stress and into the longer-range planning that won wars. Shepard understood how to fight.

Battling the Reapers was killing her slowly, of exhaustion and heartache and a thousand small wounds, but it was also the first time in her life that she'd been pushed to her limits; the heartache was paired with a private, exhilarating sense that she was doing what she was made to do.

Of course, as Liara was likely to point out, that exhilaration was almost certainly no more than the overconfident sense of invulnerability that most soldiers demonstrated before a psychological break. Chakwas was always riding her about downtime, and Shepard shifted that concern to her crew; she was constantly badgering Cortez about taking some time for himself, nagging Liara to back away from her screens before she did any permanent damage to her eyesight.

Currently, the Normandy was docked at the Citadel on one of its mandatory off-duty rotations while Mordin poked and prodded Eve and Wrex. Normandy herself was being refueled while technicians made the dozen minor adjustments Joker demanded any time they made port; the ship had seen light engagement in the Vetus System, and now Joker was hovering over her engines like a worried husband at his wife's hospital bed. EDI seemed to find the whole display amusing. Shepard wasn't sure Joker knew what he had gotten himself into with that one.

She spent five hours with Udina in his embassy office before her voice started to go hoarse, and then she bowed out and swung by a barber to have her hair trimmed. She'd shaved it off before turning herself in to the Alliance, and now she kept it cropped fairly short. Shepard's mother had always worn her hair long, even during her years in the service, but Shepard had never mastered the trick of those neat, upswept buns her mother had favored, and it was not a concern for wartime.

Garrus had noticed; nobody else had cared.

She went to find him in the refugee camps after she finished her errands. When they were docked at the Citadel he spent a lot of time there, near the biggest cluster of turians, and Shepard found herself at his side more often than not, doing what she could to help the people within the reach of her hands.

There were a lot of batarians in the camps, too. Not so many humans. The losses on Palaven had been devastating—decimation beyond any comprehension. They were worse in human space; there had been no escape from Earth.

Garrus was talking to one of the dock officials, trying to negotiate space for another thirty arrivals, when Shepard reached him. She caught his eye, jerked her head towards one of the prefab shelters, and then went inside to roll bandages and pack medi-gel. He joined her a couple of minutes later; his face with tight with fatigue.

"Any luck?" she said.

"I wouldn't call it that, but they're making room. Serving under the infamous Commander Shepard does have its perks." He popped open another bulk crate of medi-gel and slid it over to her; Shepard started scooping it into smaller packages for distribution.

"Anyone you know?"

"I haven't seen the passenger manifesto. Let's hope I didn't just talk C-Sec into allowing a ship of mercenaries to land—that's what I call luck. How did the talk with Udina go?"

"He doesn't realize that the whole galaxy is putting their asses on the line out there. Earth needs as much help as it can get, but he's pushing the other councillors to help humanity at the cost of their own people."

"So business as usual," Garrus drawled. "I know you need Anderson with his boots on the ground, but life would be a hell of a lot easier if he were in Udina's shoes."

"No kidding," said Shepard.

"How's Williams?"

"Haven't seen her yet." Shepard kept her eyes down as she worked. Scoop, wipe, seal, repeat. She passed the packets down the table to a vorcha, who secured them in bundles of twelve and slapped a label on them. 'SAFE FOR ALL RACES,' read today's sticker.

"Listen," Garrus said. "I have to be at F-24 in a couple of minutes to meet the refugee ship. Come with me. You can go visit Ashley after that."

"Don't expect any rousing speeches," Shepard warned him. "I'm talked out from Udina."

"No speeches. All you have to do is stand around and look pretty."

"I do 'intimidating' better than 'pretty' these days."

"You manage both just fine in my opinion," Garrus said, which was one of the reasons Shepard loved him.

She wiped her hands on a rag and followed him past the C-Sec outpost to the elevator, where he punched up F-24 and leaned against the wall as the elevator slid into motion. Shepard appreciated that the Alliance was able to secure the Normandy a bay that was so centrally located, but sometimes she forgot how big the Citadel was; she hadn't been out to the wards in more than six months except to visit the crew's watering hole of choice.

Garrus hooked his hands over the cowl of his armor and stretched his neck while they waited. Sometimes she wondered how turians could carry around that much damn armor all the time—soldiers and security forces rarely went out of the house without their hardsuits, and even Shepard, for all her upgrades, would have trouble wearing that much extra weight every day.

The elevator opened before her tired brain could spit the question out, though, and Garrus stepped out ahead of her. They were just in time to watch a turian light frigate limp into port. Garrus traded a few words with the docking authority before returning to her side, and Shepard shifted her weight, letting her hip bump against his. She normally wouldn't be so forward in public, but little signs of affection like that were quickly becoming habitual enough to be forgettable.

When the decontamination finished cycling and the hatch opened, Shepard expected more of the same: another group of civilians, hunched in on themselves, carrying their wounded or dragging their dead behind. What she got was a shout of laughter.

"Boss!" she heard, and then a big female turian with bright red colony markings on her dark face trotted over to Garrus.

"Cass?" Garrus said. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Missed you that much, Officer," the woman said. "Kidding. I got an off-combat escort gig after busting my arm." She was wearing armor, of course, but there was presumably a cast or bandage underneath from the way she presented her forearm to them. "Just a few fractures. Why're you here? Thought you went after that commander of yours."

Shepard cleared her throat. "That'd be me."

"Oh, yeah?" The woman looked her over and grinned lazily. "Sure enough—I saw you on the news a couple of times. I'm Cassia Ionescu, call me Cass."

"Jane Shepard," Shepard said, offering her hand. "You're the demolitions expert from Garrus' task force?"

"Yeah, that's me. I am mighty good at blowing stuff up." She winked. "Not to brag."

"Not so good at Reapers," Garrus said dryly.

Cass shrugged. "It's a work in progress. You got a place lined up for these guys?"

"Depends," Garrus said. "What kind of shape are they in? We don't have that much hospital space, but there's a prefab shelter with your name on it."

"We'll take it," said Cass.

Shepard was amused by the woman's balance between brashness and deference and a little surprised that Ionescu hadn't tossed off a salute yet; Shepard had been mostly kidding when she'd joked a couple of months ago about Garrus rising to the primarchy, but she'd also quickly gotten used to the automatic, unthinking respect other turians showed him. God knew he'd earned it.

"I'll let you two catch up," she said. "Cass, it was a pleasure to meet you. Garrus, I'll see you back on the ship."

"Sure, Shepard. Give Williams my congratulations on becoming a Spectre."

"Yeah," Shepard said. "Yeah, I will."

Garrus must have caught something in that breath of hesitation, because he said, "Cass, give us a minute."

"Whatever you say, boss," said Cass. "Shepard, nice to finally meet you in person. This one"—she jerked her head at Garrus—"talked about you enough that I feel like I know you already." She tossed Garrus a salute that was just as lazy as her grin and ambled back to the clusters of families hauling luggage onto the dock. There were a couple of kids scattered among the adults; Shepard was glad to see them.

"Shepard," Garrus said, voice pitched low. "Is everything okay between you and Williams?"

"It's fine," Shepard said. "We smoothed things over after Mars. Glad she's on her feet."

"Are you going to invite her back to the Normandy?"

"I want to, but I don't know if that's a good idea or if she'd even accept."

"Want my advice?"

"Do I get a choice?"

"Ask her," Garrus said.

"...We could use another set of hands," Shepard admitted.

"It isn't about that, although yes, we could. We're too far into this war to let a stiff neck get in the way of reconciliation, and you and Ashley used to be glued together at the hip."

Shepard looked away and sighed. She was almost to the slow-burn point of exhaustion, when she could function at close to peak efficiency but at the price of feeling like a stranger was wearing her body. "I'm surprised to hear you, of all people, take that position."

"Trust me, I can still hold a grudge, but you've told me enough times that you don't blame her for being suspicious of Cerberus. You're the one saying you miss her—I'm just following your lead."

Shepard had the brief, anger-fueled thought that she should track down Tali instead; wherever Tali was, whatever responsibilities she'd taken on, she was still a lot more inclined to follow Shepard's lead than anyone else serving on the Normandy. But that thought was unkind, and untrue, and it wasn't fair to weigh Ashley's strength against her compassion. Shepard liked soldiers who talked back; no CO was infallible, and certainly not Shepard herself, who had made more than one bad decision out of rage. She stood at the center of a web woven of checks and balances and counterweights, and that was by design.

The anger that had lit her up dimmed just as quickly, like a star birthed and collapsed in some quick-time simulation of the universe. "You're right."

"Sorry, say again—"

"You know," Shepard hissed between her teeth, "I can always revoke your access key to my cabin."

"You can," Garrus agreed. "The question is, Shepard, will you?"

Shepard snorted at him, but she almost managed to summon the energy for a tired smile. "Thanks for listening. Let me know if you need any help."

"I've got it here. Go see Williams, and then take a nap."

"I wish. Damn, a nap sounds nice."

"So does a vacation."

"Or a date," Shepard teased. "See you soon."

"Always," Garrus said.

She hopped the elevator back to the rapid transit hub just outside of the Normandy's docking bay and then took a cab to the Presidium. There was a stand on the way to the hospital that sold some kind of taco fusion; the wrapping was a corn tortilla, but the filling was a sort of salarian stir-fry made with insect protein. Shepard had discovered the place a couple of years ago while tagging along with Anderson, and it remained a favorite.

She ate standing and was wiping the sauce from her fingers with a napkin when she first noticed someone staring at her. Her voyeur's interest was obvious, enough so that her subconscious assembly of cues and her conscious realization were almost simultaneous. Batarian, female, aggressive body language—Shepard's hand when for her hip before she could remember there wasn't a pistol there. She planted her feet and lowered her center of gravity instead, staying grounded but ready to move.

The staring didn't last long. "You," the batarian snarled, and then she was up in Shepard's face. "You. I know who you are. I know what you are. And they let you walk around unfettered!"

"Back off, lady—"

"No," the woman said. Shepard guessed they had about another ten, maybe fifteen seconds before they started attracting attention. "No, I will not back off. I lost two sons on Aratoht. They were miners! What role did they play in your vengeance?"

There were C-Sec officers coming up at ten and three o'clock, both big turian boys in blue uniforms. "Jardan and Ellak!" The woman's breath was hot against Shepard's cheek, her eyes red-rimmed and wild. "My sons! And you—they let you—"

The officers grabbed her by the arms and hauled her back; she was so singly focused on Shepard that she went easily, although her gaze remained fixed. "They may not know!" she roared. "They may not know what you are, Shepard, but I know!" She turned her head to the right and spat.

And then she said, "I know what you are, Butcher."

At that moment Shepard's brain might as well have been a computer running half a dozen parallel processes. She was noting the field around her, the third C-Sec agent coming up from behind, the batarian woman's unpracticed, untrained clawing; she was dismissing the woman as a threat and wondering how the press was going to spin this, if there would be legal ramifications, if recruitment numbers would fall because the public remembered that the famous Commander Shepard won her fame at Torfan; she was feeling the absence at her hip and on her back and remember the last time she'd gone into combat empty-handed.

It wasn't a matter of hubris or of some ruthless instinct for self-preservation. Shepard knew what she was, and what she wasn't; if she fell now, Earth might very well follow.

"Ma'am?" The third turian officer was at Shepard's flank; she had her omnitool pulled up and was inputting a report. "What's the situation?"

Shepard rolled back into herself. "Sorry, Officer. No problem. Just a disagreement that...got out of hand."

"We can arrest her for disturbing the peace—"

"No," Shepard said. "I'm just as much at fault as she is. Look, if I remove myself from the situation, will you let her go?"

The cop hesitated, and then she closed her omnitool. "Provided she doesn't cause any further problems, I don't have an issue with that."

"Good," Shepard said. "Thanks. I'll get out of your way." She turned around and walked back to the transit hub, her back exposed, the hairs on her neck pricking with tension.

Aratoht; Torfan. Mindoir—

The lobby at Huerta Memorial was packed. Shepard couldn't imagine how larger hospitals were faring; it was a stroke of luck that they'd managed to secure space for Ashley at all. The LC was, apparently, in the clear. She hadn't been approved for release yet, but she was working out of her hospital room, and by all counts it would be days and not weeks before she could return to light duty.

Still; Shepard was glad when the door peeled back and she saw Ashley standing at the window, back straight, face unbloodied.

"Good to see you up again," Shepard said.

Ash turned and blinked. "Did you get a haircut?"

Shepard had heard the cadence of that question a hundred times before: When do we make planetfall? Where did I leave my helmet? Is that pistol new? What did Joker do to piss Adams off? Have you ever played seven card stud?

She'd given her answer a hundred equal times: Twenty minutes. Check the shuttle. Yeah, want to try it? You know I don't get between those two. A few times. And now—

"Sure did," Shepard said. "Surprised you noticed."

"Shepard. I always notice," said Williams.

 

-

 

Tuchanka was a rat-nest, the cradle of brutes, a toxic stone of a planet. Shepard felt right at home in the blood-arena and among the rubble and deep in the winding tunnels of the Ancients, where only Kalros and her kind lived; and then the tunnel started to slope upward, black faded to gray, and they were in daylight.

She'd watched a lot of vids and read a lot of books where explorers stumbled across the ruins of some long-gone empire. Hell, she'd done it herself on Ilos, but that had been nothing like this. Looking at the slanting tiers of the buildings, the massive obelisks and beveled stairs that gave way suddenly to little pools of water, she registered for the first time her own alienness. Everywhere there was verdance: climbing up and carving through the rock, clinging to the sides of the complex, blanketing the bridges in mossy beds, and adorning the enormous granite statues of the heroes of Old Tuchanka.

Beside her, Liara sight breathily and said, "Oh." She clipped her SMG to her waist, touched her fingertips to the ivy winding around a column, closed her eyes, and said: "'There is no hope in the stars or in the people of the stars; the only hope remaining belongs to the ground and the green growing things,' she told them, and then she laid down her gun and her sword and went into the wastes; she tilled the earth there, and grew lath and lasshai and elae flowers, and she fought no more until her last struggle with death, three-hundred and seventy years after the war's end."

"What was that?" Shepard said.

Liara smiled. "It's part of a very old poem about an asari hero. She was a great warrior—supposedly. Of course, it's hard to verify her historical existence."

Shepard shook her head. "You and Ash."

"Still, Shepard," Garrus said, "you have to admit...it's a sight to see."

"Yeah," Shepard said. "Yeah, it is. I wonder if this is the krogans' future as much as their past."

"Not gonna be the krogans' anything unless we haul ass, Shepard," Vega said. "Sorry. Didn't mean to kill the moment."

"It's fine, James, you're right." Shepard slammed a new heat sink home. "Stay sharp, people!"

She thought about it, though, that green, in the breath between shots, when for a fraction of time she ceased being a soldier with steady hands and keen eyes and remembered being Jane Shepard. Eve had said—

"Draw it to the left!" Liara called. She was tucked behind an overhang, using her biotics to pressure the Reaper into turning its attention away from the remaining maw hammer. This was crazy, Shepard felt, completely fucking nuts, no leader in her right mind would condone a plan that hinged on a legendary sand worm. She dropped to one knee anyway, trained her sights at a biomechanical monstrosity that resembled a turian only because it hadn't been completely ravaged by nanotech, she trained her sights and she squeezed the trigger and she gave a shout that might have been a laugh or a sob or just a mindless cry from the battle thicket.

Something was wrong with her elbow. She could feel the bone and tendon grinding when she moved, even though her armor's squish skin had already sealed around the joint. Vega was down. Garrus was—where was Garrus?

"Hey!" she heard James say over the radio link. "Hey, you, big ugly! Over here!" He popped out from cover and fired right at the massive leg crashing down from overhead. At the last second he rolled hard out of the way; Shepard lost sight of him after that. She swore under her breath and, figuring a little additional idiocy wouldn't fuck up the situation any more at this point, hauled out her trump card.

Anti-materiel rifles weren't standard issue. They were most frequently used by teams, usually hidden in a blind, to take down armored vehicles from a distance. The particular rifle upon which this model was based hadn't been cleared for human use; it was geth ingenuity improving on a design that was probably krogan or turian in origin. Shepard didn't think an asari or a salarian could deal with the kickback any more than a baseline human.

She'd taken the firearm and, with a little help from that geth ingenuity, tinkered with it to fine-tune the shearing block mechanism and the shot capacity and make it a little more human-friendly. Although she'd never used it in the field, the last time the Normandy had been dry-docked she'd taken Garrus and a case of heat sinks to a firing range. The results had been...impressive. Shepard had passed the designs on to the Alliance, but the fact was that her 'Black Widow' wasn't built for mass production.

The Reaper roared.

She managed to back herself up into a decent position out of the range of its legs and lasers, and there she stretched out on her belly, the heavy stock of the gun tucked up against her shoulder as snug as any lover. If this worked, Garrus was going to throw a jealous fit.

"James," Shepard said.

"Kind of busy, Commander! Hey, pendejo, suck on this!"

"James," Shepard said, "get the hell down, or this bullet's going straight through you."

Through her scope she saw Vega hurl one last grenade as he hauled ass for cover. She inhaled; the clamor died away, her worry died, her self died. She exhaled; her reticle rose by nanometers, locking into place on the center mass of the lowest joint of the Reaper's closest leg.

She fired—

The bullet tore cleanly through the joint, and the Reaper let out a thundering scream and jerked away to leave the lower sixth of its leg behind.

"Holy shit!" Vega said.

Three seconds later, the second maw hammer sounded.

"So, Shepard." Garrus was winded in her ear. "Do I get a prize for ringing the bell?"

"Get the hell out of there!" she shouted. "James, Liara—MOVE." Shepard was already on her feet, kit packed up, slamming her way through the husks that were hot on her heels. There was a smell—biomechanical, oil and hot metal and ozone, gangrene and ash and rot—that she associated with the Reapers' ground troops; that odor was thick in her nose now despite the filter of her helmet, and she was caught between scrambling to keep out of their reach and staying on her feet while the ground shivered beneath her.

She thought the quaking was from the Reaper at first, but then the shuddering built on itself, and the ground erupted as the mother of thresher maws joined the battle. Shepard threw herself backwards, crawling until she got her feet under her, and even then it was hard to tear her eyes away from the gods fighting over her head.

"Holy shit," James, now close enough to touch, said again.

And she knew she would never forget that sight, never forget any of that day, not Kalros, not Wrex, not Urdnot Bakara, not—

 

-

 

Mordin. "Had to be me," he said. "Someone else might have gotten it wrong."

It was a good death. Shepard told herself that; it was a good death, a death that meant something. Was there such a thing?

 

-

 

Garrus asked her about it later. The Primarch had vacated the War Room, and Shepard was braced against the console, her head bowed.

"You know," Garrus said, "all in all, I'd say this was a win. Nobody's shocked that the Dalatrass tried to go behind Wrex's back, but because of what Mordin did—what you did—it's finally starting to look like we have a fighting chance."

"Do we?" she said. "Sometimes I wonder."

"I am a little surprised that you prioritized krogan support over the salarians. I seem to recall you saying that we needed them the most."

"How could I not? Sabotage, distrust—that's what will lose us this war. None of us stand a chance on our own." She was thinking, not about Mordin, but about Eve, who had said that to become a shaman, krogan females were buried in the dark. "We need not only diversity but unity to win."

"We've still got STG support, at least."

"Yeah." She swallowed. "Yeah."

Garrus was uncanny at deciphering her, no matter how foreign human nonverbal cues were to him; she never could decide if that was a function of his training as a cop or if he just knew her that well. He stepped closer, leaning against the console's guard, and said, "What is it?"

"Nothing. I...just wonder if I'm the best choice to serve as an example of interspecies cooperation."

He held off on the suggestive comment she would have welcomed at any other time. "There's none better," he said.

"Several hundred thousand batarians would argue with you."

"There's no one else," Garrus said, and that helped more than any platitude.

"No," she agreed. "It has to be me. Someone else might get it wrong."

"Shepard—" He lowered his voice. "Jane. Don't look for an excuse to martyr yourself."

She looked up, at the holographic blueprint of the Crucible, and didn't answer.

"I'll start managing turian support right away. You must be exhausted."

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," said Shepard.

He wore her down, of course. She was sleeping less every cycle, six hours out of every thirty, three out of every forty-five; her superiors would ground her soon if she didn't start getting more rest, but she couldn't sleep without dreaming—

When a krogan woman wanted to become a shaman, her sisters buried her alive in a dark cave with only enough food for seven days. On the eighth day, she had to dig herself out or starve.

Shepard went to bed. She closed her eyes. She dreamed of a forest, and of trees that whispered to her in the voices of the dead.

When she woke up, she was starving.

Chapter Text

The middle of a war was a terrible time to fall in love. It was the one disaster for which Garrus hadn't prepared a contingency plan. He had a dozen others in reserve, from 'What to Do If Mom Dies' to 'What to Do If Shepard Goes Down in the Field' to 'What to Do If the Reapers Arrive Early' to 'What to Do If the Reapers Arrive Late.' There were a lot of variations on 'What to Do If the Thanix Cannon Breaks.' There was not a plan labelled 'What to Do When You Fall in Love with Your Human Commanding Officer.'

No telling if Shepard felt the same way, of course. He was fairly sure of his own feelings; he'd spent a long time convinced they were just two buddies blowing off stress, and then a long time convinced he shouldn't overthink it, and now—well. Now he could barely look at Shepard without the force of his own want slamming into him. It wasn't merely sexual, and it wasn't always or even often in the forefront of his mind; but it was there, a starlight constant.

When he wasn't on the ground fighting Reaper forces, he was listening to politicians run their mouths; when he wasn't listening to politicians, he was working on the Normandy; when he wasn't working on the Normandy, he was holed up in front of a war chart, making more of those plans. Garrus was good at plans. He'd spend six hours working out what to do if the Reapers attacked here and the fleets responded like that, and then he'd write up a report and send it to the Primarch. More often than not, the Reapers would do what he'd predicted, and then Victus would assign the strategic priorities Garrus had listed to the units he'd suggested. They fought belaying actions in a war of attrition. They were buying time with lives.

Somehow, though—hell if he knew how—he still found the energy to hoard the affection Shepard could afford to spare. She was exhausted, the skin beneath her eyes permanently bruised, but in the back of the shuttle on the return flight from hitting some Reaper entrenchment, she would, if they were alone or had only Liara for company, take his hand; or she would find him in the War Room or battery in the middle of her rounds and stand next to him, not saying anything, before going on her way; or she would invite him along on the Citadel as she addressed the hundred small things that demanded her attention.

He did his best to help her bear her burdens, but the war demanded its toll.

That day they were dug in on Benning, trying to evacuate a handful of surviving civilians; the Cerberus response was slow and uncoordinated, but Cortez didn't have a clear window to land, and the targets kept coming.

Jane was next to him, back to a wall, both hands on her rifle, and a look he recognized as grimness on her face. They'd been waiting five or ten minutes for the next Cerberus drop; the civilians were tucked behind what passed for cover a couple of meters away. He could hear one of them sobbing.

"I don't like this," she said. The roar of the firefight had died enough that they could dispense with radio contact or hand signals. There was a human corpse on Shepard's other side, propped up with its legs splayed out. She shifted her rifle and laid out a row of grenades on the thigh closest to her. The man was mostly intact, although the right side of his face was caved in and the corresponding eye was hanging from its socket. Human blood was so red.

"Can't say I'm all that fond of it myself," Garrus said. "Taking time out of the real war to fight terrorists, now that's a waste."

It was hard to make out her face through her helmet, but he thought Shepard frowned. "Not that. Well, not only that. It doesn't always feel like we're in this war. The Normandy drops us, we fly away again. No commitment."

"You'd like prolonged assignments?"

"Not always. Yeah, maybe. It's disorienting, not being one of the grunts with boots on the ground. I'm used to more waiting."

"What, this isn't enough waiting for you, Shepard?" Garrus said. "Because if it isn't, we can arrange to spend more time in FTL jumps." He shook his head in mock disbelief. "Who knew the Reapers would care about every out-of-the-way backwater in the galaxy?"

"They've got a real appreciation for nature," Shepard drawled.

"Reaper environmentalists."

"Managing the wildlife population."

"Galactic conservation."

His radio clicked to life. "You guys trying to turn this into a park for Reapers?" Vega said. "'Cause I hate to say it, Lola, but I don't think the buggers are big on family picnics." Garrus detected Williams sniggering in the background.

"What," he said, "you're telling me the big grown-up husks don't take all the little baby husks out to play?"

"I got no clue what goes on in your head, Vakarian," Vega said.

"Who does?" Shepard said, and she smirked at him. At least the lines of her mouth no longer carried that grim tightness; Garrus' ego could take a couple of hits in the interest of lightening Shepard's load.

Small as the Normandy was, there were whole shifts, even whole shift cycles, when he wouldn't see her face-to-face. She spent a lot of time holed up in her cabin, reading reports and coordinating with various fleets, while he did the same in the battery. Sometimes they holed up together in the War Room, staring at the shifting schema of plans on the holographic display, but that tended to involve a lot of worrying about money, resources, large-scale tactics, and the efficacy of nuclear warheads on Reapers. Not so much relaxation. Very little flirting.

He sent her a message the next time they were decelerating en route to the Serpent Nebula; he hoped she saw it for what it was—an invitation—rather than one more item to add to her checklist. Shepard's emphasis on the welfare of her crew was one of the traits that won her inviolable loyalty, but it made him tread delicately when he asked her something as her...huh. He was her boyfriend, wasn't he?

Whatever the term, he was careful to phrase his boyfriend requests more lightly than those he sent in the mode of squadmate and unofficial 2IC. Of course, it didn't help that he still occasionally got nervous enough to trip over his own words around Shepard. He wasn't as jittery as he had been at the start of their liaison, but Garrus wasn't half as smooth off the battlefield as he was on it.

Shepard's response was in his inbox almost immediately, so fast he was reminded of the days just after Saren, when he'd been bouncing between C-Sec and Spectre training and she'd been touring in the SR-1. Back then they'd written to each other half a dozen times a day—nothing romantic, just two friends bullshitting each other. Those days seemed so long ago. Made him feel old.

He disembarked as soon as they docked at the Citadel, booked a cab, and waited for Shepard to make an appearance. As far as dates went, this one wasn't exactly dinner and dancing at an exclusive club, but he hadn't had a lot of time to plan—and Shepard had said she wanted to do something he wanted to do. As a young C-Sec officer fresh from the service, there'd been one idea he could never shake, even though he'd never had the guts to put it into action. Anyway, it had all the elements Shepard liked: guns, high places, isolation from politicians, and Garrus himself.

She was talking to Joker over her omnitool when she walked up to him. Garrus leaned against the cab while he waited for her to finish. She was dressed in fatigues—good; hadn't occurred to him to change out of his armor—and the gash stretching up from her left wrist was healing nicely.

"Hey," she said, and closed the link. "We goin' on that date, Vakarian?"

Garrus had been twenty-three the first time he'd killed. He'd been in his last year with the 43rd; his platoon had been in the middle of a joint exercise with the salarians when they'd been ordered to investigate a pirate attack in the Attican Traverse. By the time they'd gotten there, both ships had been dead in the black: drifting silently, no radio communications, no sign of life. They'd boarded the pirate vessel cautiously, found it empty; boarded the civilian vessel, found—

Garrus' specialization was in ballistics and long-range marksmanship. On a planet or a space station, with a decent line of sight, there was nobody, nobody, who could match him. Unfortunately, armor-piercing rifles were about as useless in the close quarters of a ship as the Council was in a war.

The pirates had laid a trap. They were waiting, concealed in the corridors, and when Garrus and the rest of the soldiers had spread through the ship, they'd opened fire. It was...messy. Close-range. Garrus had shot two people that day.

Once they'd retreated and contacted Command and washed the blood from their armor, he'd stiffly accepted a series of congratulatory backslaps until his endurance had run out, and then he'd fled to the ship's bowels, where he had crawled behind a provisions cupboard to shake. The tremors had taken an hour to wear off; that new, terrible knowledge of death was with him forever.

Hearing Shepard say she loved him hit Garrus the same way—like a punch, like a supernova, like realizing you weren't standing on the surface of a world but hanging from it, held only by the thin thread of gravity. It felt like drowning.

He didn't have a lot of time to savor the experience, though, nor the secondary pleasure of beating Shepard in their shooting contest. Even though he'd loaded the rifles with practice slugs, and even though the Presidium was protected by mass effect barriers, and even though C-Sec was overworked and understaffed after the recent Cerberus assault…

...Well, they were still breaking one-hundred and thirty-seven regulations.

"So," Shepard said. "How long before C-Sec shows up to arrest us?"

"About thirty seconds," Garrus said.

"Time to bail?"

"Yep."

"How's my cabin work for a rendezvous point?"

"I like the way you think," Garrus said. Her arm tightened around his back, and then she let him go, and they raced together to pitch all of their gear in the back of the cab. They tumbled into the front at the same time; Jane didn't bother buckling her restraint and spent the ride watching through the rear window for impending arrest.

She started stripping him of his armor before the hatch to her cabin had fully closed behind them. They had a short struggle when he tried to get her trousers off while she was working on his breastplate; it ended with Garrus on his knees, yanking off her socks, while Shepard hitched a leg over his shoulder to brace herself as she popped off his hardsuit.

Her legs were…fascinating. Talk about flexibility.

He finished about five seconds before she did—human boots had all kinds of fiddly little fastenings—slid his hand up her other leg, and hauled her up by her ass just as his greaves dropped to the floor. Shepard's arms went around his neck, and she smirked before applying her mouth to his in an, ah, impressively thorough fashion.

Garrus, who considered himself pretty damn good at multitasking, managed to lick a line up the underside of her throat as he staggered towards the bed. He dumped her backwards onto it; she bounced a couple of times, spread her long legs, looked up at him, and said, "Coming, Vakarian?"

"I think my line here is, 'My bunk's empty and you'd look nice on it,' but I'm...sensing that the time for lines has passed."

Shepard grinned crookedly; he loved that he could wring expressions that unguarded, that naked, out of her. "Oh, I don't know," she said. "I have no problem if you want to keep talking."

He joined her on the bed, taking up a place between those spread thighs and yielding easily when she pulled him down further still, although he was careful to avoid the healing welt on her arm. "Mmm, you want me to keep talking?" he said against her cheek. Her answering groan was low, almost subvocal; he wondered if human ears could have detected it. "You're going to have to work for it, Jane."

She smacked him on the shoulder, and, laughing, he rolled into her; and for that one schism of time, there was no war in their bed with them.

 

-

 

Some time later, with Shepard lazy and liquid beneath him and no energy to move himself, Garrus said, "You missed on purpose, didn't you."

"Maybe." Her voice was both muffled and resonant, probably because his face was planted against the side of her neck. "Did it work?"

"Oh yeah. I'm Garrus Vakarian, and this is my favorite spot on the Citadel."

"Haha. Oof." She worked a hand under his shoulder and pushed. "Gettin' heavy, hotshot."

Garrus rolled to his side and wadded one of her pillows up under his head. Shepard, meanwhile, squirmed around until she managed to hook a blanket with her toe, and in another of those distracting displays, lifted her leg straight up until she could grab the cover and pull it over them.

"That reminds me," she said. "I'm splitting our ground team. How do you feel about being in charge of B-squad?"

"No," Garrus said immediately.

"Garrus—"

"If I'm here to watch your back, then let me watch your back."

"You'll still be watching my back. Just...from a different angle. It won't be every time, but now that Ash is back on board, we have enough combat specialists for two three-person crews."

"Mmm." He had to admit, she'd chosen a good time to spring the idea on him; it was hard to get really worked up about anything now, with his nerves still singing and one of Shepard's fingers tracing patterns on the sensitive skin of his nape. "Who were you thinking?"

"A-squad would be me, Liara, and probably Ash, B would be you, James, and EDI." Which made sense; he and Vega had an understanding, and Williams had always gotten along better with Wrex than Garrus on the SR-1. Of course she had—they were people for whom frontal assault wasn't a tactic so much as a creed. "I wish we would've picked up a few more heavy-hitters by now," Shepard continued, "or at least Tali—"

Garrus snorted. "She'd be insulted to hear you don't consider her a heavy-hitter."

"I hate saying it, but we were a lot better staffed under Cerberus." Simply being a capable soldier wasn't enough for the kind of ops Shepard ran; keeping up with her required expertise in half a dozen fields, be they demolitions or combat hacking or offensive biotics. Garrus had met generals who wouldn't have cut it.

"If you think that's what we need, I'm...willing to give it a shot. Under protest."

"Noted. Any problems with the line-up?"

"Williams works best under you, and I'd rather you have Liara around if I'm not there."

"I figured you'd know how to use EDI best, too. Don't think I haven't noticed her hanging around the battery," Shepard said.

Garrus swallowed a cough. EDI—her mobile platform, to be precise—had helped him out a couple of times with a certain, ah, project. Definitely not something he was ready to reveal to Shepard, though, at least not yet.

"Ash will listen to you, if it comes down to that. She likes to bait Liara, but she'll knock it off if you call her on it. Vega needs to be pulled out of his own head. Get him around Cortez if you can, they're good for each other." Horror was beginning to dawn on Garrus as he realized exactly what kind of briefing this was; it cut through his bliss, cut the breath right out of him. He wondered if Shepard knew what she was doing. "I doubt you'll have a problem with Joker," she added. "He argues less if you give him your reasoning—"

"Shepard."

"You already have diplomatic authority from the Hierarchy, that'll help. Get Anderson or Hackett to grant you the same status with the Alliance—or get 'em to do the same thing with Ash, if they balk."

"Jane," he said, the edge there to pull her out of her head; he almost never snapped at her, and it made her bewildered.

"What?" she said. Behind the confusion was a kind of steadiness, the same constancy that had first drawn him to her. Shepard was a slow, deep burn, but even her light could be swallowed by the dark. He'd seen her go out once before; he wasn't about to see it again.

"You don't think you're going to live through this war, do you?" he said.

A beat, during which she looked at him. "You're effectively my 2IC," she said, all calm focus. "You never know when I'll be caught up in some diplomatic crisis when we're needed in the field."

Garrus pulled in a couple of slow, deep breaths, and thought hard. "After that mess with the yahg…"

"What about it?"

"You read the Broker's dossier on me."

"I did," Shepard said.

"And you said I could ask you five questions." Shepard hadn't liked the imbalance between them—reading through that profile gave her a decided advantage over him—or she'd been trying to make them even after dragging him into the assault on the Collectors. Probably both.

"Shit." She sat up, elbows on her knees, and dropped her head. "You've been sitting on that for the better part of a year, Garrus."

"Yeah, I have." He waited until she looked at him, just a glint as she turned her head sideways to glare over the top of her arm. "Four left. I'm using one now. Answer it."

"What question—"

"You know what question," he said.

She turned her face away again, ran her fingers through the ruffled red mess of her hair. At that moment, a Reaper knocking at the door couldn't have torn Garrus from her side.

"No," she said.

Garrus was a pessimist with a streak of stubborn refusal to view the world any way but the way he thought it should be. Shepard was an optimist with a ruthlessly pragmatic view of the way things were. It wasn't often that he was the one pushing her to consider the daylight side of a problem, but sometimes she forced his hand.

"That's crap, Shepard," he said. "You're telling me all those speeches, all those promises about what we're going to do after the war—"

"I can't save everyone," she shot back. "I thought you would realize that. Don't they teach you on Palaven that if even one turian is still standing at the end of a fight, it's a victory?"

"I'm not a good turian."

"The hell you aren't." Her shoulders and the line of her back had gone tight again. "Garrus—"

He sat up, mirroring her pose, and reached out a hand to turn her face to him. "You don't get to believe that," he said.

Shepard closed her eyes and touched her forehead to his. "It doesn't matter. I'm living on borrowed time, Vakarian, we both know that. The best I can hope for is that I take them out with me when I go." Her breath hitched. "I, uh...don't talk much about Mindoir."

"That's an understatement," Garrus muttered. He tilted his head, rubbed the side of his face against the side of hers, and she folded into him.

"When the batarians hit"—despite the hitch, her tone was dry and distant—"my mother...shit."

"You don't have to tell me this."

"No. No, this is important. My mother put herself between me and them. She gave me a chance to escape. There are a lot of bullshit reasons I signed on with the Alliance—see the stars, follow in Mom's footsteps—but the bottom line is that she gave me my life, and I figured I should do something with it."

Garrus slid his arm around her back. Her shoulders were narrow, but hard with muscle—the lean sort of strength that came from use, not vanity. He knew without asking that she hadn't told anyone this before, and that she'd probably never speak of it again.

"Cerberus brought me back to fight the Reapers. I've have my chance twice over. The odds say I won't get a third shot, and I'm...good, with that."

"I'm not," Garrus said. "Your mother will never know how grateful I am to her—hell, at this point I'm even grateful to Cerberus—but I'll be damned if your story ends that way."

Shepard twisted until she was straddling him, and Garrus leaned back on one hand and settled the other on her hip. "Hate to break it to you, Archangel," she said, "but you don't get to decide that one."

"Yeah? Then you'd better be prepared to admit that if you go out, I'm going out with you."

She frowned. "Fuck if that's going to happen—"

"You want truths, Shepard? Fine. You can't save everyone. You're buying time against the Reapers while Hackett races to put together a superweapon that might kill all of us, and you're buying that time with lives. We've already lost people we couldn't afford to lose. There's nothing that makes us more special than the protheans or the hundreds of other cycles that the Reapers have wiped out. But you know what else? On the other side of this fight, either we're both standing, or we're both in the ground. There's no third option."

She was quiet for a long time, eyes moving over his face, but Garrus kept still, letting her look until her crooked, cocky grin returned. "You watch too many vids, Vakarian."

"You're supposed to swoon and tell me I'm romantic," he retorted. "Laugh it up, Jane."

"I guess you're pretty romantic...for a cop."

"Kind of like how you're a pretty good shot, for an Alliance marine?"

She held up the arm with the N7 tattoo and flexed her bicep. "And now you're insulting my prowess? I might start making you call me 'Battlemaster' in bed."

"Mmm, Battlemaster. Now that's sexy." He slid his hands up her jaw and cradled her head; the levity dropped away, leaving behind the vulnerability neither one of them could seem to avoid.

"Hey," she whispered.

"Hey," he whispered back.

"You know how much that means to me, right?"

"I know," Garrus said, and he pressed his mouth to her eyelids, first the right, then the left, hoping she would carry the brand of his kiss with her—that it would keep her aim true, and that she would see what was coming for her always.

"Know what else?"

"What?"

"That was a damn good date," said Shepard.

 

-

 

What worried him were the times he couldn't read her.

He and Tali were waiting in the Normandy's airlock while Shepard passed through a damaged docking tube to the geth dreadnaught. Shepard was lively on the comm, making cracks at Joker and EDI, making light of the sheer luck required for safe passing. To listen to her, Garrus never would have suspected that a handful of hours ago, she'd received a message about the death of one she considered her own: Samara, the asari justicar, had killed herself on the steps of an Ardat-Yakshi monastery.

Shepard's laughter crackled over the radio link. 'Grave humor,' Garrus had heard it called; the phrase was a pun in at least three languages.

"Garrus?" Tali said.

He was flipping through optic modes on his scope. Flip, standard reticle. Flip, night optimization. Flip, thermal imaging. His visor provided even more accurate readings, although unlike a lot of marksmen, Garrus wore his visor over his left eye even though he shot right-handed.

"It's all right to be worried about her, Garrus," Tali said.

He lifted his face from the rifle. "She's the best person for the job."

"Shepard is almost always the best person for any job. That doesn't mean she's invincible."

"I'm not going to hover over her. It's wartime. If I am worried, it's pretty damn inconsequential."

Tali sighed. "Whatever you say." As always, she over-enunciated her dental sound. "I still can't believe we're sneaking onto a geth ship. The admiralty board is blind to what's going on in the rest of the galaxy. We don't have time for war with the geth."

"I was surprised to hear you support open war with the geth at all."

"I didn't!" she said. "The only thing I support is the survival of my people. If we are going to war, the most I can do is make sure the conflict is as bloodless as possible. Not that the geth are alive enough to have blood."

"You don't mean that."

"No," she said. "Not really. But how am I supposed to tell the Fleet that the geth are…what they are? Shepard may take a broad view of AI, but most quarians don't consider synthetic life anymore beyond how to kill it."

Garrus shut down his rifle and returned it to the mag-lock on his back. "I hadn't either, until we got wrapped up with Saren."

"You hadn't considered any species that wasn't from the Citadel," Tali retorted, poking his side.

"Well. Not beyond how to kill it, anyway," he said, and got a laugh out of her. "You know, Shepard pointed out to me once that provided the AI in question are built around the right altruism functions, it doesn't make sense for organics and synthetics to go to war. There's hardly a conflict in terms of territory or resources."

"What would you call Rannoch, then?"

"Self-defense," Garrus said.

She folded her arms over her torso. "Ha ha. Shepard is right, though. Well, sort of. Synthetics can live in environments we find too hostile, they don't need resources other than hardware...there's no more reason for them to fight us than there is for the quarians to fight the Turian Hierarchy."

"Not to say that there haven't been fights there."

"And plenty of them." She shook her head. "But in the end, I will stand with my people. And...I would like to see Rannoch."

Garrus thought about that, about never seeing Palaven again; he wondered if Shepard could understand. She had been born and raised on a colony world, and although she'd visited Earth a couple times as a kid and a couple more as an adult on Alliance business, it remained largely an abstract to her: the Homeworld, not home.

But then—Tali had never set foot on Rannoch, either, and her yearning was palpable. Shepard, too, existed without a home, a place that wasn't just steel and drive and bulwarks against the dark of space but fresh air and familiarity, dirt and salt and blood in the soil. History: the bones of your ancestors deep in the ground beneath your feet. Humans could settle on a hundred thousand planets, and probably would; but Garrus' race had been among the stars far longer, and still they hadn't found a place that shaped them like Palaven had. Earth was humanity's cradle, and it might soon be humanity's grave.

"You're set on seeing this through?" he asked. "Because Shepard could use you. Hell, we all could. Joker swears up and down that the Normandy doesn't run the same without you around."

"I...I'm really not thinking beyond the fight with the geth at this point," Tali said.

"You should be." He'd expected better of her; Tali could be rash, but he'd never known her to be shortsighted. "The Reapers aren't going to stop with Palaven and Earth—once we're used up, they're going to start chewing through the Migrant Fleet, too."

"I know that, Garrus! But I'm not like you—I can't drop everything to run after Shepard. Not all of us are so desperate to die for a cause!"

He stamped out the flare of anger and the corresponding impulse to retort, let what she'd said settle in the air. She was glaring hard at him, chin jutting out, eyes glittering behind the thick shield of her helmet, but after a moment she dropped her head and sighed.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean that. Shepard was wondering the same thing—if I would join her."

"Mmm. Did she ask?"

"Not so directly. But she's good at getting what she wants."

"Is she?" Garrus said. "That seems to be extrapolating a lot about Shepard from a small set of data."

"You don't think so? It's what makes her a good leader. She can see what people want, and what makes them afraid."

"Ohh," he drawled, "I'm not saying she can't be damn manipulative, but I'd hardly call it 'getting what she wants.' She's good at making sacrifices, that's all."

Tali tilted her head. "You are worried about her."

"She...hasn't been sleeping. You try dating the savior of the galaxy without a little anxiety."

"Point," said Tali. "It's just been on my mind a lot lately—what makes Shepard such an effective leader. Now that I'm an admiral, even an honorary one, I have to figure out how to lead, too, and it isn't something that comes easily to me. Shepard's skill at problem-solving is universal, but mine is…" She twisted her hands. "Mostly useful for fixing engines."

"She makes it look easy," Garrus acknowledged, "but I guarantee she had as hard a time learning how to be in charge as you." And he could see that—the way Shepard struggled, the way it wore on her. He'd admired her from the beginning, but his aversion to authority figures, bizarre as it was in a turian, had prevented him from seeing her as infallible, even when she was only a highly trained and decorated Spectre and not a legend.

"She understands people in a way that I find difficult. It isn't that—it's not as if I don't have good men and women around me. My team on Haestrom was incredible, but Shepard attracts people who—" Tali bit off and shook her head. "I'm not going to say this right."

"Go ahead," Garrus said. "Either you keep going, or I start talking crap about the new musical adaptation of 'Fleet and Flotilla.'"

"When you put it like that," Tali said. She settled back against the bulkhead and crossed her arms, wrapping her hands around her opposite elbows. "I think that...there are people who are moral, and people who are loyal. Not to say that you can't be both, but when it comes down to the line, some people will do what they think is right and some people will protect the ones they love."

"Not entirely sure I agree," Garrus said, "but go on."

"I used to think that what made Shepard unusual was that she attracted the second kind—people who were loyal above anything else. I had my doubts about some of her crew, but there were so many who responded to her, who were willing to follow her to the ends of the universe. It seemed strange, because I thought Shepard was the first kind of person, the kind who would turn a friend over to the authorities rather than be complicit."

"Huh. Who did you doubt?"

"Ashley," Tali said. "Although EDI told me what happened on the Citadel—with Councilor Udina? I was wrong about her. About you, too. And about Shepard."

"Me?" Garrus said.

"When we first met, I had a hard time imagining"—she cleared her throat—"imagining you could care about anyone that much, but you really would follow Shepard anywhere. She could tell you she'd decided to execute every non-combatant on sight, and you would offer to help her pull the trigger."

He didn't know what to do with that assessment and chose to ignore it. "And Shepard?"

"I was totally wrong about her. What made it apparent was that day with…" Tali hesitated. "...Sidonis."

That jolted Garrus; he'd almost forgotten Tali had been along with them on that little errand, but she'd kept an eye on the car while he and Shepard had done what they'd planned to do. Shepard had talked him out of killing Lantar, and although he'd expect his guilt and shame to double after letting that bastard walk out of his sights alive, he'd eventually been forced to conclude that Shepard had been right to curb his more zealous tendencies.

Still. "I don't see how that prioritizes loyalty over legality or morality," he said. "She talked me into letting him go, if you recall."

"But she didn't give a damn about Sidonis," Tali said. "It wasn't that—I don't think she cared if he lived or died. She cared about making sure you came away from Omega with your spirit intact. Shepard will always, always do whatever she can to shelter you, us, the Normandy. The galaxy. Her idea of loyalty is just...a little broader than most people's."

"Huh," Garrus said again.

"And she didn't really have that many people to be personally loyal to since she was sixteen," Tali added. "She'll serve the Alliance as long as it doesn't conflict with her own ethical code or what she feels needs to be done, but until—what did Grunt call us?—until her krantt came along, she didn't want to remember what it was like to have a family."

"Huh," said Garrus for a third time. "Well, if you're trying to reverse-engineer leadership, you're doing a damn good job."

"Thanks," Tali said.

"Do we hug now?"

"Oh, shut up," Tali said, and she punched him in the arm.

 

-

 

Grave humor. They could all die tomorrow. Might as well laugh about it.

 

-

 

When they finally set foot on Rannoch, it was with as little ceremony as possible. Some quarian admiral had crash-landed smack in the middle of the geth artillery, and Shepard apparently had plans that required the admiral's continued existence. Garrus was just glad to be anywhere that wasn't that damn geth dreadnaught.

It was a night op, strictly hush-hush; Shepard was somewhere below, winding her way through the canyon with Williams watching her six, while above Garrus crept toward the geth anti-aircraft base with Vega, who was acting as his spotter. They'd switched off all extraneous systems and equipment; even though the quarians had wiped out a lot of the geth orbital defenses, there was no telling what kind of creepy spy-drones were making fly-bys.

Vega bitched the whole way. "Come on," he hissed, "isn't this good enough?"

"No," Garrus said, and then made Vega crawl another thirty meters until they had better cover from a brush pile and a decent view of both the AA gun and the geth jamming tower. Not that Garrus planned on sitting still so long—by the time the AA security had been cleaned out, the units at the jamming tower would have easily spotted their position if they didn't relocate.

He counted sixteen geth platforms loitering by the AA gun's base, including a pair of what looked like hunters with full combat cloaking. "Confirmation?"

"Hang on, hang on," Vega whispered. "Three, eight, twelve—yeah, sixteen looks right."

"You hear that, Shepard?" Garrus said over the link. He couldn't see her, but he knew she was there, off to his right, stalking through the quiet. It was dark, not even much ambient light from the geth bases, but Shepard blazed in her proximity.

"Copy that," she said, "We're moving into position. Let's do this by the book."

"Understood," Garrus said, and settled himself a little more comfortably into the packed dirt. He was stretched full-length on his front, bumping elbows with Jimmy, who had his M-96 in the crook of his arm as he looked through his field glasses. After a couples of seconds Vega dropped the glasses and rolled onto his side to scan the plateau behind them.

"Think this is gonna take much longer?" James asked.

"Hard to say." Through his scope, Garrus watched a few of the geth congregate around a terminal. "Why?"

"Gettin' tired of waiting, that's all," Vega said. "Guess I'm not cut out for all this long-range crap."

"You get used to it," Garrus said. There were barely moving their mouths to speak.

"Yeah?"

"Definitely. Nobody signs on as a sniper because they like sitting perfectly still for three days while they wait for their target to pop up." What Garrus didn't add was that even on a shorter op like this one, he and his spotter would usually alternate positions—one shooting while the other kept watch.

Hard and fast, it hit him how much he wanted Shepard beside him. They'd be an unbeatable team. Vega was a powerhouse, capable, smart, great shot of course, you had to be to get an invitation to a special forces program like N-school, but next to Shepard or Garrus himself, Vega at range was merely competent. Although...by this point in their careers, Garrus and Shepard were both past the point of operating as snipers; they fought on the ground plenty, but in lightning actions as part of a fire team, working as designated marksmen rather than anything more independent or solitary.

Still. He could imagine heading out into the field with her, just the two of them on a recon mission against a fortified enemy that an air team couldn't touch, sharing the same rifle, the same telescope. He could imagine having her stretched at his side, his partner in every way that counted. Never could have happened, of course. Never would; if they both survived this war, and that was a long shot on a windy day, they would—they could—

Huh. Garrus' citizenship tier and reputation were both solid enough that he could have his pick of jobs, and Shepard would probably be booted up to admiral as soon as the Alliance had space to breathe again. 'After the war' had always been an abstract, but it crystallized right then with a startling ferocity. They could quit military life. They could quit fighting. Or not, Shepard could keep acting on the Council's behalf as a Spectre; they could help with the rebuilding effort, help put the galaxy back together.

He couldn't speak for Shepard, who was a lifer if ever there was one, but he wouldn't mind giving up soldiering entirely. Retire to the beachfront, have a few kids. They could adopt. Have a human baby using asari gene-mapping or a turian child with a surrogate. Maybe both. Did Shepard want kids? Garrus hadn't given it much thought, but right then, understanding came over him like a dawn. Marriage, a little house by the water. Family. Shepard had come from farmers. All he had to do was keep her alive—

"Yo, Garrus. You in there, buddy?"

"Yeah," Garrus said. "Sorry. Shepard ready?"

"Just about. You pumped to kill some flashlights?"

After the war. Who the hell did Garrus think he was kidding?

He shifted the butt of his stock against his shoulder, exhaled, inhaled. "Locked and loaded. Shepard, what's your position?"

"Ash is gettin' antsy to use her gerbil-launcher, if you boys are done daydreaming."

Williams clicked in. "Excuse you, I'm the definition of patience."

Shepard again. "Excuse you…?"

Williams sighed heavily. "Excuse you, ma'am."

"Hey," Vega said, "maybe we can actually finish this job and get back tonight? I got a poker game to win."

"Copy that, Mister Vega. Light 'em up," said Shepard.

Garrus looked down his long gun, breathed, stopped breathing—

And knew: after the war? No such thing.

 

-

 

The campaign on Rannoch seemed endless.

Down to the planet, back to the ship, steal a few hours of rest, clean your gun, head back to the shuttle to go back to the planet to hit a different target so you could go back to the ship—

Of course, in the middle of a firefight, Garrus' perspective tended to be a little more immediate.

They'd finally hit the Reaper base broadcasting the control signal to the geth fleet, clearing it of indoctrinated geth. Shepard was fiddling with the targeting laser linked up to the Normandy's weapons systems while Garrus and Tali leaned over the side of the platform, looking down into the well that held the Reaper construct. The sunset threw strange shadows on the sides of the well, and at the bottom—well, there was no bottom that Garrus could see. A glowing red light, like a Reaper's eye, winked from the center of the darkness.

"How's it going, Shepard?" he asked.

"Fine. Hang on—" The targeting display flaring to life atop the laser. "Got it." She took the steps up to the very edge of the platform and lined up her shot. Garrus could see the Normandy high and to their right, approaching at a speed that was a mere fraction of what she could really do but that was damn impressive in atmo nonetheless.

"Here goes nothing," Shepard said, and she set the laser against her shoulder and started to paint the target. There was a click as the system locked into place, and the Normandy blew past, flying low, dropping a bombardment that—

"Uh-oh," said Tali, and the platform shuddered and sent them all plummeting to the catwalk below.

Garrus landed hard on his shoulder and rolled fast to his feet, shaking off the disorientation and forcing himself to look for Shepard. At first he could only process the black shape in front of him as her form, and he squinted, trying to make sense of it, to pick out the contours of her armor.

And then he looked up.

Silhouetted against the sky, hanging for one infinite second against the Rannoch sunset, was a shape directly out of his nightmares. The black shape wasn't Shepard; it was a foot, attached to the dark bulk of a monster. Sound followed sight, the sub-bass vibrato that had to be the recorded noise of a dying world shearing apart, and then that was drowned by the throbbing of his heartbeat as it drummed out a war tattoo on the inside of his skull.

"Move!" Shepard shouted. "Move! Get to Legion!" She launched herself down the catwalk to their left, and Garrus bolted after her, twisted around only long enough to make sure Tali was following. A geth unit rolled out in front of them and he didn't even stop, knocking it down one-armed and letting Tali finish it with a shot to the head.

From behind them came that dying-world noise; the ground shuddered.

"Shit!" Shepard shouted, hauling up short as Legion's hovercraft swung out in front of her. She scrambled up the side to the mounted turret, and Garrus flung himself through the open hatch to the cargo compartment and hauled Tali in behind him.

"Go!" he said, and smacked the back of Legion's seat.

"Affirmative." Legion flipped them into drive so fast Garrus had to brace himself against the roof or risk crushing Tali. She was jammed up next to him, fingers flying over her omnitool, breath coming hard through her suit's respirator. Above them was Shepard; she was firing in staccato bursts, but she might as well have been throwing pebbles for all the good she was doing.

"You couldn't have found us anything other than a hovercraft?" Garrus bellowed.

"There were no locally available space vessels," Legion said, and then it broke into the comm chatter, where Shepard was snarling over her radio for an orbital strike. "We may escape before the Reaper recovers."

"No!" Shepard said. "Pull over!" Legion slowed, and the rat-a-tat of the mounted turret died. "This ends now. EDI, patch the quarians through to the Normandy's weapons system—I want the targeting laser synced up to the whole damn fleet."

"Understood," said EDI, and it was only then, when Legion flipped the HUD over to the external visual feed, that Garrus understood what was going on: Shepard was going to face a Reaper, on foot, by herself, because she was pissed.

"Let me out of here," he said, in the most reasonable tone of voice he could manage.

"Garrus, no!" Tali said. "Look at her—the last thing she needs is you breaking her concentration. One wrong move, and that Reaper will end up frying her."

"I don't care," he snarled, and Tali slammed an arm over his chest.

"—Allows your AI an unprecedented access to the Fleet's central operations," Admiral Daro'Xen was saying. "I will not allow this!"

"Yes, you will!" Tali said. "And if you don't link to EDI, I'll give her the overrides myself!"

"You—" A beat. "Fine. Fine. Normandy, we await your...convenience."

Tali had squirmed around so she was kneeling on the seat, keeping pressure on Garrus' chest like she thought she could hold him there by force. "Garrus?" she said. "Garrus! Don't you dare go out there, that will only end with both of you getting killed. Garrus, stop—fighting—me!"

He realized he was struggling against her, not like a skilled combatant but like an animal, twisting and shoving to get to the hatch and to Shepard, who was facing a Reaper alone, who was alone—

"Garrus!" Tali yelled. She was right up in his face, the translucent lavender of her mask close enough that he could pick out features. A modicum of sense returned, and he hit her fast in the chest and the wrists, knocking her arms away. There wasn't enough room for him to put real power in his strikes, she was in the way, he needed her out of the way.

Tali punched him in the face. On his good side, fast and hard—she put her body weight into it. He jerked back, and she started yelling at him again.

"Listen to me, you bosh'tet! Shepard gave you an order, and you said it yourself—she's the best person for the job, so let her do her job!"

Garrus froze. His limbs locked, his spine went rigid, his mind went dark; everything about him ceased except for the wild heave of his chest. Panic. He was panicking.

He took a breath.

He took another breath.

"Garrus?" Tali pulled her hand back and flexed her wrist.

"I…" He squeezed his eyes shut. "I'm...sorry. That wasn't—"

"Garrus, it's fine," she said. "Besides, it isn't every day that I get to hit a turian."

"Only every other day, right?" he offered, fighting to cover his weakness. The hovercraft shook as, outside, an orbital strike hit home; but this quake was longer, more intense, and even through the roar of bombardment, he could hear what sounded like a Reaper shrieking. The sound was penetrating, mechanical: a starscream that came as much from inside his head as outside it. Panic reared again and this time Garrus had only one thought, in all the universe there was only one thought, all of him was eaten up by one prayer. Let Shepard live.

The black mass on the screen in front of Legion fell; the world shuddered once more and was still.

"She...did it," Tali said. "I don't believe this, she really did it." She scrambled to the hatch, popped it open, and let in the dry Rannoch air before Garrus had time to process the red spot on the screen that might have been Shepard's hair. It was difficult to pick out dark armor against the background of the fallen Reaper.

He made himself follow Tali, staggered, and used the side of the geth hovercraft to haul himself up. Tali was far ahead, skidding down the embankment, but Garrus cared only for the figure beyond her. The red spot was not Shepard's hair; it was the Reaper's eye.

"WE ARE MANY," the Reaper said.

Shepard took a step forward, her hair an answering twin to the ruby flare of that massive eye, and then, defiant, she said, "We are more."

In that moment, she scared him, this woman who looked into the face of a dying god and made promises only she could keep. Or was he only scared for her? Garrus' knees started to buckle. Shepard was alive, she had lived to fight one more day. Against that, a little fear was nothing.

"Garrus?" Joker. "You guys okay down there? EDI's got you all on our sensors, but some of us, not naming any names, some of us would feel a lot better if one of you ANSWERED ME."

"Joker," Garrus said. "We're fine. Shepard...the Reaper's dead."

"You're shitting me. What the hell's going on? The geth stopped firing."

"Hold on." He dialed down the volume on his comm channel and cocked his head. Below, Tali was arguing with Shepard, pleading with her. Shepard cut her off and made a gesture of assent towards Legion, and Garrus understood they'd prevented one slaughter only to bear witness to another.

"Looks like Shepard's letting Legion upload the Reaper code to the Consensus," he said.

"WHAT?" Joker screeched. "Shit, there's no way the quarians can come back from that, I don't know what the fuck Shepard is thinking—"

Garrus wasn't sure how much Moreau knew about Shepard's roots. Everyone had heard the basics, she was as close to a celebrity as the Alliance had, and Joker knew plenty more than that, but there were things she'd told Garrus in confidence, and things he'd read from her silences and all that she didn't say.

He knew that she'd survived six weeks on Mindoir, living in the woods, creeping close enough to watch as the slavers implanted control chips in half her town and slaughtered the rest—six weeks before an Alliance patrol had broken through the batarian lines. He knew that Lawson had wanted to put a control ship in Shepard's head during Project Lazarus, and he knew that what Shepard herself feared was not death but indoctrination. He knew that the geth were now released from Reaper control, that they finally had the chance to be free—

Nothing he could say to Joker, in other words. "She's got a plan," he offered instead. "Shepard's always got a plan."

"It's possible her plan is going to get a fuckton of people killed today! Shit!"

And then Tali, on the open line: "Break off attack!" To Shepard: "I beg you, do not do this." In the sky above them, the flare of firing weapons arrays continued unabated—like fireworks, if you didn't know what was behind them; like inevitability, if you did.

Legion was manipulating a holographic representation of the upload, and Garrus understood where Shepard was coming from, but he didn't know how she could stand to watch Tali pleading for her people's lives, wasn't sure he wanted to see it himself. Shepard's expression was tight, nearly stoic, and her biometrics were solid, about what was expected for a fit human woman after heavy exertion.

"No," Shepard said. She looked up at him. "No. Nobody else dies today. All units, this is Commander Shepard—"

"This is nuts!" Joker said on the private channel. "How is convincing the geth and the quarians to be friends a plan? That's not a plan! It's not even close to a plan!"

"Quiet, Jeff," EDI said. "I would like to hear this."

Shepard was still arguing the geth's case, and Garrus wondered if it was shock that was making the admirals listen—who would go against the woman who'd personally killed a Reaper? Hell, he was in shock himself.

"You have a choice. Please," Shepard said. Her shoulders curled forward. "Keelah se'lai." By the homeworld I hope to see again: she said it like the quarians said it, not as an abstract but like the name of some bright secret.

Static crackled over the open line.

"...All units. Hold fire."

It was a victory, or something damn well like one. Whatever it was, Garrus would take it.

He thought he saw Shepard smile, but when he looked again, her face was set. Must've been a trick of the light.

 

-

 

Garrus found her hours later. He'd cleaned his rifles, something he still did himself despite his eventual grudging acceptance of Steve Cortez's competence, and had bolted through his dinner. He was too exhausted to sleep, and he wanted to see Shepard; he needed nothing other than her company.

EDI told him where Shepard was, and Garrus stopped in the galley on his way to her. A couple of security officers were eating at the smaller mess table; they stopped talking when he came in but resumed their conversation when he ignored them and started to boil a kettle of water.

Kava was most commonly made using a press, and Garrus had figured out the trick of making human coffee the same way. He dumped a couple of soluble protein packs in with the coffee, too, figuring Shepard wouldn't notice the addition; she'd been losing weight lately, too busy to eat enough to catch up on her caloric deficit.

When the beverages were finished brewing, he rinsed out the presses, stored his kava leaves in the dextro cabinet, and took the two mugs with him to Life Support. The coffee can he left out on the counter; someone else would be along for it soon enough. EDI swore she'd once seen Joker eating the grinds with a spoon, although it was hard to tell if she was kidding or not.

Shepard was sitting beside the water recovery system with a tablet in front of her, although she wasn't using it. Her elbows were planted on the table, and her fingers were fisted in her hair; with her head down, Garrus couldn't see her face, but she looked up when he set the cup of coffee in front of her.

"Anything urgent?" he asked, helping himself to the other seat.

Her expression stayed blank for a couple of seconds, and then she blinked and glanced at the tablet. "No. Hackett forwarded some information about a Project Aurora, but it doesn't look pressing enough to divert us."

"Haven't heard of that one."

"It's some task force he put together to investigate Reaper mythology. Not a bad idea, but it's too late to do any good." She picked up her cup and took a sip. "He'll let us know if they turn up anything useful."

Garrus hooked his arm over the back of this chair and studied her. She had the small spots of discoloration called 'freckles' peppered over her face, but other than that, her skin was the same stark white color that paler humans developed after too many hours in armor or too many years in space. The corners of her mouth were tight, and she was taking too long to blink.

"You know, Shepard," he said finally, "I should be mad at you."

"Say again?"

"Watching you take down that thing on foot…" He shook his head. "Tali had to knock me over the head to keep me from running out there and dragging you back inside. Good thing she did, too. What you did today was...'incredible' doesn't really cut it." He almost got hung up on himself before he told her what he wanted to say, but he forced the words out: "I'm proud of you."

"I… That means a lot."

"Good," he said. "Now we just have to hope the quarians and the geth figure out how to live as neighbors. Never thought I'd see Admiral Raan talking over farming conditions with a prime unit. Tali's worried because she doesn't know anything about crop rotation."

"I do," Shepard said, and then looked surprised at herself. "Been a long time since I thought about it, though. She'll figure it out."

"Provided we all live long enough."

"We've already failed on that front," said Shepard.

"You can't beat yourself up over Legion—"

"I'm not," she said. "But Legion isn't the only one. Pressly, Tanaka, Chambers, Crosby, Thane, Jenkins, Alenko, Mordin, Barret—Samara. Christ, Samara. There was no reason she had to die like that, no damn reason at all, and maybe if I'd been there I could have stopped her."

Garrus loved Shepard's voice—throaty, expressive, hard as flint and tough as talons, which made it all the more rewarding when he could wring softer sounds from her. Now, though, her voice was on the verge of cracking open; what would be left if it shattered, he didn't know.

"Jane," he said. "You can't do everything."

"I know that."

"Do you? Samara made a choice."

Shepard looked past him. "She died on her own terms, by her own rules."

There was no use glorifying Samara's death; she had killed herself, had probably died in regret, but her strict adherence to the code that trapped her was not solely pitiable. "She did," he said. "Sometimes that's all any of us can ask." His kava was getting cold. He wished he'd dumped more vitamins in Shepard's coffee.

"Her daughter's planning on living at the monastery by herself. That's a hell of a thing. She's got her mother's will."

Garrus, who had learned a thing or two about strong-willed women, could only agree. Asari monasteries were remote and austere, no matter what their purpose, and if Samara's daughter was determined to keep her lonely vigil, she would have hard centuries ahead of her.

He reached across the table and opened his fingers; after a long second, Shepard put her hand in his.

"You ended a three-hundred-year-old war," Garrus said. "The quarians and the geth have a home again. Shepard, today you won."

"We'll lose tomorrow," she said, and then admitted something he never thought he would hear her say, not on pain of death, not on brink of defeat: "Garrus, I'm afraid."

He gripped her hand a little tighter, even though the strength of her grasp was already verging on painful. There was nothing he could say; they were all afraid.

 

-

 

And then came Thessia, and the long fall towards Earth.

Chapter Text

Desperation clung to them like grime.

 

-

 

They were in the War Room. Traynor was glaring holes in the main holographic display as EDI threw up attack scenarios; Tali was beside Traynor, picking over a schematic of a Reaper state ship, looking for the weaknesses she already knew weren't there. Liara was sitting on the steps leading down to the circular console with Ashley standing over her. They were discussing something in lowered voices. Good. Ash had been the one to help Liara through Thessia, and while Shepard knew that pain hadn't healed or even dulled, Liara was keeping it together, staying focused.

Shepard thought only of their goal; every atom in her being was trained on that purpose, every waking or dreaming thought was only of how to beat the Reapers. No—Shepard didn't want to beat them. She wanted to annihilate them, she wanted to tear them apart, barehanded if necessary. She wanted to litter the empty space around Earth with Harbinger's constituent parts.

"Oh, I dunno, I always thought it'd be fun to see if I could make a real go of it as a chess player. My ELO ranking is decent, but that might be a little boring after serving here. What about you, Lieutenant Commander?"

She was hanging everything on a thread. Shepard had made a lot of gambles in her life, but this was the most desperate—the line between survival and extinction depended on Liara and the prothean blueprints Liara didn't herself entirely understand. But then, nobody understood the whole of the Crucible; they could only build the pieces, each team working on the small facet they could comprehend in isolation, and then join those pieces together. If they were lucky, the end result would be a superweapon. If they weren't...well, a massive detonation that wiped them all out might be preferable to decades or even centuries of slow indoctrination and slaughter.

It was up to Shepard to weigh the odds, to account for all the variables. The fleets were massing—

"Guess I'd like to spend some time with my sisters. After that, who knows? Maybe I'll go on an interplanetary bar crawl."

And what if it was already too late?

They would say the war was lost on Thessia. They would say the war was lost on Thessia and in the trenches of Menae, that hope had died at Earth. They would say the war was lost before it started, that it was lost on the other side of the Omega-4 relay, that it was lost at Alchera, that it was lost long before Sovereign and the Citadel. They would say it was lost at Eden Prime. They would say it was lost before memory started, before Torfan or the Skyllian Blitz, before the First Contact War, before the krogan rebellions or the advent of the rachni queens. They would say it was lost when Harbinger spoke its first words; they would say it was lost on Thessia.

"I believe I would like to contact the virtual aliens currently drifting in the Antilan System. Additionally, I would like to meet Jeff's family, and perhaps have racing stripes painted on either the Normandy or my mobile platform. What about you, Shepard?"

No. The fleets were massing, a force the size of which hadn't been seen in fifty thousand years or more. Hackett would tell her to pull it together; Anderson was counting on her. She wasn't alone.

"Skipper? Hello?"

Shepard blinked. "Ash?"

"We have been trying to catch your attention for some time, Shepard," EDI said. She wasn't physically present, but the display flickered a few times in what Shepard interpreted as an overture of concern. "Is everything all right?"

"Fine. Just thinking. Sorry, what's up?" Six hours of pouring over charts must have made her head fuzzy. Not good; their next jump would take them to Earth.

"We were...um, wondering if there's anything in particular you're planning on doing when the war is over, Commander," Traynor said. "Like taking a vacation or going back to Tuchanka or...anything, really."

"After the war?" Shepard said. There was that wall again, the block that stopped her from thinking past a terminal point. "I'm planning on celebrating our victory."

"Come on, Shepard, that's cheating," Williams said.

"Yes," said Liara, "you must have other things you'd like to do. Marry Garrus, perhaps?"

Shepard blinked again, startled. Marriage? She'd never thought of herself as the marrying type, or hadn't since she was a kid—although she'd expected to feel stifled in a committed relationship and had instead discovered that she appreciated the constancy. "If he'll have me," she finally said.

Tali and Ash snorted in unison; with the filtering effect of Tali's suit, it sounded oddly harmonious. "Please," Tali added.

"What?"

"You've got to be kidding, Shepard," said Tali. "'If he'll have you?' I'm surprised he hasn't proposed already."

Shepard dragged her tired mind away from the possibility of using the mass relays themselves as weapons and dredged up what willingness she could muster to play along. "I'm willing to admit that it's more than stress release, but—"

"He went crazy after you died!" Tali blurted, and then recoiled a little at her own bluntness. "Sorry, I didn't mean to bring up...but you really mean you didn't see this coming?"

"Excuse me?" Shepard said.

"Tali has a point, Shepard," said Liara. "I had access to your personal correspondence from the SR-1 in my early days as an information broker, and you and Garrus wrote one another frequently—sometimes several times a day—when you were away from each other."

"That doesn't mean anything. Hell, I write a lot of letters. He was pretty damn surprised when I suggested the idea, don't go making this into some big…" Shepard shook her head.

Tali and Liara exchanged a glance, and Ashley smirked. "Of course he'd act surprised," Tali said. "He's turian. You're human. There's bound to be some residual cultural taboo there."

Shepard was aware that in her personal life, boldness often substituted for emotional acuity, but this was going too far. "Can we please talk about something else?"

The smiles and laughter died away far too quickly. That worried her; it worried her as a commander who needed her personnel at peak operational efficiency, it worried her as the soldier who understood this small group of fighters to be the vanguard of an all-or-nothing offensive, and it worried her as the woman who had come to view and value the people of the Normandy as more than friends. Tali, Liara, Joker and Karin and EDI, Williams and, yes, even Traynor: they had become something like her family.

Shepard had shied away from that word for a long time, but she was aware that the ties that existed between them were rare and precious. The contrast of taking their candle-flicker bond of trust and determination and setting it against the darkness of the Reapers was daunting; if Shepard were a woman who prayed, she would pray that what was coming wouldn't snuff them out entirely.

Sadness came over her, sudden and overwhelming. She wouldn't hesitate to send any of them to probable death, and that was maybe her worst sin of all.

They were looking to her.

Shepard crossed her arms over her chest and rocked back. "Like Traynor. Anyone notice how much time she spends on the line with Diana Allers?"

"I—that isn't—she's interesting, that's all!" Traynor sputtered.

"Specialist Traynor spends approximately twenty-seven minutes a day talking to Ms. Allers," EDI said. "On an active-duty warship, that is an unusually high figure."

"You're making those numbers up," Traynor said. "You can't possibly have data on that! ...Can you?"

"I could run a comparison analysis against how much time Commander Shepard spends talking to Officer Vakarian, if you would like." The console produced a humming noise that Shepard associated with EDI letting the crew know she was processing, and then a slew of graphs popped up on the display.

"No!" said Traynor. "No, that's really, really not necessary, EDI."

"What's this one?" Ash had braced herself against the console's rim and was leaning over to stare at one of the charts. "'Hot Beverages as Affectional Expression?'"

"This is a portion of my relationship modeling portfolio," EDI said. "I have a limited number of firsthand sources to imitate in building my relationship with Jeff, which requires me to mine as much information as possible from that source." A beat. "Those sources."

Slowly, every head in the room turned towards Shepard. Her control was good enough that she didn't squirm, but the back of her neck went hot.

"Well," said Tali, "that certainly explains why EDI and Joker flirt through terrible humor."

And, because Shepard's luck always held, right at that damn moment the hatch popped open and Garrus walked in. "Finished my consultation with the Primarch, Shepard. What'd I miss? Oh, I brought you a cup of coffee."

"So, Shepard," Tali said. "About that wedding—"

 

-

 

She was on Mindoir again.

Her parents' farm was three hundred hectares: wheat and corn and soybeans, peanuts, alfalfa, and clover. Shepard knew every square meter of it blindfolded or in the dark, could walk from the old prefab her dad had lived in before he built the farmhouse to the creek that separated their land from the Singhs'. In a rainstorm she had once found her way from that creek to the big barn by nothing more than the feel of the ground under her feet.

The creek was north; home stood in the southwest corner, within sight and hearing of the forest. Shepard knew the forest as well as she knew the farm. She knew if she stood at the edge of the field within the forest's shade, she could hear a scream or a gunshot from the house without straining; she knew if she shimmied up the tall tree by the creek's far bank, she could count individual corpses stacked outside the house without having to squint.

She was in the forest on Mindoir again. There was the bench she'd built with her dad, there were the nests built by the mindadee birds, here was the bee block she'd set up for a school project: she was on Mindoir again.

There were shadows all around her. They spoke to her in the voices of the dead, and every whisper sparked against her heart like flint against stone. The sparks leapt from her and caught on the trees, and she watched as—

She watched—

She woke up—

She woke up with her pulse throbbing in her ears, a deep, frantic thrumming, and she waited until the beat of it receded. There was a song in her head; it was an old song, something her father had sung so often his family and his farmhands had known it by heart. Shepard knew the melody, but she could never remember the damn words. It came into her head at the oddest times.

She went down to the field, was how it started. Or was that how it ended? She could never remember.

Shepard rolled to her feet, pulled on her fatigues, and went to the head to splash water on her face. When she came out, still damp, she paused in front of her desk and touched the terminal. "EDI," she said.

"Is there something you need, Shepard?"

She hesitated; asking EDI to look up the song suddenly seemed frivolous. Shepard had gone years without knowing all the words, and it hardly mattered now. "How's the watch?" she asked instead.

"Are you offering to relieve me, Commander?" There was a shade of humor in EDI's voice.

"More wondering if you wanted some company."

"I believe I would like that." The amusement shifted to wonder; EDI had yet to take for granted the newfound freedom to express her own preferences. "Most of the crew is resting per your orders, Shepard. Lieutenant Commander Williams is talking with Doctor T'Soni in her office. Private Campbell is standing guard. Officer Vakarian is—"

"I'll find that one out myself, EDI, thanks."

"You are welcome."

Shepard dragged her fingers over the smooth fabricate of the desk and then up, to the plexiglass display case for her model ships. It was mostly empty space; in the very middle was a replica of the SR-1.

This was hers. Nobody could take it from her.

But she knew that wasn't true; 'home' wasn't place so much as idea, and one was just as fragile as the other. She had memories, but even memories could be taken. The reason she couldn't recall all the words to her father's song was not forgetfulness but self-defense; when the Alliance had found her on Mindoir, she'd been wandering in the middle of a field littered with bodies. She didn't remember that. She still didn't. Parts of her childhood, parts of the attack, were simply...gone. Her mind had hidden those experiences from her, and Shepard doubted she would ever be able to look beyond that shroud.

"Shepard?" EDI said.

Shepard drew back her hand. "It's nothing, EDI," she said, and then she went to walk the ship one last time.

 

-

 

Her mind might fail her, but she could imprint this in her bones. The first impressions were there already; blindfolded or in the dark, she could find her way from her cabin to the CIC by only the feel of the deck beneath her feet.

She passed the galaxy map and the station where, on the old Normandy, Pressly had stood to check their course. The ship's display showed all systems running green; just ahead of that holograph, someone had pulled up a countdown showing the time until they hit the fleet's staging point—three hours and running.

The forward hatch popped with its familiar hiss of air, and she passed the airlock and stood just in the umbra of the bridge proper. Joker was at his post, head propped on one arm as he flicked through displays.

"Hey, Commander." He didn't turn to face her. "How's it goin'?"

"Another day in paradise," Shepard said. "You ready for this, Joker?"

"Hell yeah, I'm ready. You think some big-ass space lobster is going to outfly me? No way that's gonna happen."

"That's what I like to hear." She came forward to stand behind his right shoulder, the same space she'd occupied on every op they'd run together since long before Sovereign.

Joker retracted the shutters to reveal the rainbow shift of FTL. The hum of the Normandy's engines was audible here, a subvocal emanation that Shepard had always considered a counterpoint to the equally invasive but far less welcome voices of the Reapers.

The song was still stuck in her head. Frankly, she was starting to feel a little pissed.

"Where's EDI?" she asked.

"Oh, you know. Here. Her body's down in the AI Core, though. She's messing with herself, can you believe that? There is so much material to work with there."

"Should I leave you and your right hand alone?"

"Aw, are you harassing me, Shepard? I think I might be proud of you."

"I'll see myself out," Shepard said, but she patted him once very lightly on the shoulder before she turned to go.

"Uh. Commander?" Joker said.

"...Yes?"

"Thanks. For everything you did for her." Shepard twisted around to look at him; he was tugging the brim of his cap lower over his face. "She's...still kind of figuring this personhood thing out, and I didn't want to, you know. Take advantage of that. Make her think I expected her to be a certain way. I'm glad she had you to answer her questions."

Shepard reached out to touch the bulkhead, knowing EDI couldn't feel it, knowing she would appreciate the gesture anyway. "It was my honor."

Joker cleared his throat. "Right. You can go now."

"Any other orders, Flight Lieutenant?"

"Oooh, yeah, would you mind bringing me a soda? And maybe one of those granola bars Chakwas hides in the dextro cabinet? Actually, I could really go for some of Vega's eggs—"

"Uh-huh. Good luck with that," Shepard said, and she left him there, still talking to himself and to EDI, whose attention was never far.

There were bright alarms scrolling on every screen Shepard passed, but most of her personnel were resting on the crew deck. The War Room was empty save one sentry, and Shepard stopped only to look at the QEC, quiet now. And then came the crew deck, the scratch on the memorial wall where Tali had dropped a spanner, the layered locks on Liara's office, the berth where Bakara had waited while Mordin created his miracle cure and sang his patter songs; and below that was engineering and the stealth core, the guts and garters of the ship, Adams' patient devotion and Tali's steady brilliance poured into machinery.

She finished in the armory. The shuttle bay was empty with one exception; even Cortez had abandoned his obsessive maintenance to snatch a few hours of shut-eye. The sole holdout was sitting on a low crate with disassembled rifle parts laying in neat rows at his feet. Shepard could smell gun oil the moment she stepped out of the elevator.

He cleared his throat. "Shouldn't you be in bed?"

"Hinting at something, Garrus?"

He moved over, and Shepard sat down next to him. Sometime between the Collectors and full-out invasion, he'd swapped his old M-15 for a turian-made rifle. The Phaeston was standard infantry issue among turian troops, but Garrus had tricked his out with a slick stability dampener and high-grade kinetic coils.

Shepard reached over and picked up the new ammo block he'd laid out next to the targeting compensator. A standard block was good for several thousand rounds; the slug sheared off and then propelled by mass effect fields was miniscule, but a couple of firefights could burn through those several thousand rounds pretty damn fast. Garrus passed her the assembly, and she slid the block into place and then started to rebuild the extractor around it.

Something was different about the shearing mechanism. She ended up struggling to fit it into place, and it slipped and gauged her thumb. "Dammit!"

Garrus reached over and slid the part into place one-handed. Cocky little shit.

"I could've done that," she said.

"Sure, but I thought sometime tonight would be nice."

"That's your problem, Vakarian. No patience."

"Oh, I don't know," he drawled, "I can be plenty patient under the right circumstances."

Shepard suddenly wished they had time to retire to her cabin, but no—they'd already upheld the private tradition they observed before suicide missions, and she valued this just as much; sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with him while they readied themselves was a ritual that long predated the less clothed kind of bonding, and it was in its own way just as intimate.

"I was talking with Vega earlier," he said.

"Yeah?"

"Well. More like I walked in on him praying. I'm always amazed at how many religions new arrivals have. After a couple thousand years of FTL capability, most races tend to be a little more homogenized."

"You took comparative religions in school, didn't you?"

"Two trimesters," Garrus said. "It was interesting. I don't know how much you know about traditional beliefs…"

"Not a hell of a lot," Shepard confessed. "My dad came from a devout background, but I've always taken more after my mom."

"No surprise there. Anyway, on Palaven our most widely-followed doctrine professes that there isn't really good or evil, only selfishness and selflessness."

Shepard borrowed the bottle of oil from between Garrus' feet and shook a couple of drops onto a scrap of rag. "I can see the wisdom in that," she finally said.

"I found it pretty repellant as a kid. The idea that there's no objective evil never sat well with me. Later I figured out that we were taught to equate selfishness with evil, but even that seems a little…"

"Careful there," Shepard said. "It almost sounds like you're embracing moral nuance."

He huffed, amused. "Galactic war has a way of making a person reexamine their worldview, that's for sure. I think that's why so many of your human religions appealed to me, though. Black and white, good and evil, all writ large…"

"Archangels?"

"Something like that." He picked up a brush and started to feed it down the length of the Phaeston's barrel. "Mind if I use one of my questions?"

"Garrus..." Shepard said. She cleared her throat and concentrated on wiping down the gun's stock. "You can ask me anything. You don't have to keep track."

He hummed in consideration. "That's...good to know. Call me curious—if you take after your mother, what do you believe?"

She had to work to clean the crevices on the stock's inner curve. "I don't know."

"No spirits, no afterlife?"

Shepard let the question breathe while she applied a few more drops of oil to her rag and started on the handguard. Garrus didn't press her; he knew that sometimes she needed to think, that she wasn't trying to dodge him but that sometimes her uncanny intuition faltered when it came to self-reflection.

"Bakara told me something once," Shepard managed. "She said that wisdom comes from pain."

"Do you think that's true?"

"I hope not," she said, and then she snorted. "Otherwise we'd all be damn wise."

He cocked his head. "If I ask you to come back to me, will you?"

Shepard cleared her throat again. "You might want to make that an order."

"Mouthing off to a superior officer? Please, Shepard, I'm the model of propriety."

"You're the model of something, all right." She was still smoothing oil into the gun's surface, and it surprised her when he reached out and took her chin between his thumb and near-finger to turn her face toward him.

"Jane," he said. "I love you. I respect you. I would follow you into hell."

Shepard's throat closed; her eloquence failed her. She reached up and put her hand on his.

"And this," he said, "all of this? It's because of you."

"It's because of Liara—"

"It's because you decided to trust a friend." He smirked. "Seems appropriate after all those times she trusted you to pull her ass out of the fire."

"Trust in me gets people killed. I don't deserve—"

"It doesn't matter what you deserve," Garrus said. "You have it anyway."

Then Shepard felt it: she'd reached this state before, going into a fight or in the midst of one, the rare moment when her anger and her focus, her deadly compassion and her anticipation and her drive, burned clean away, leaving only the most refined expression of her self—and what rested at the core of Shepard's self was pure, incandescent will.

"We're going to do this," she said. She felt bold and steady, firm on her feet, calm and confident and sure of her own lethality, bolstered by Garrus' faith.

"Damn right."

She was a professional, the only Reaper-killer there was, and she was ready to go about her business.

"We're going to do this," she said again. "We're going to win." She couldn't save Mindoir, but she could save Earth. She couldn't save Thessia, but she could save those who remained.

Garrus' jaws spread in a broad grin, and he went back to cleaning the Phaeston's barrel. "Good to see you've finally started listening to yourself. All those speeches, and now it finally kicks in."

"Garrus," she said.

"Yeah, Shepard?"

"You've changed me," she said. Garrus' head snapped up. "And you move me. And if I'm walking into hell, there's no one else I'd want watching my back."

He was staring at her with those lethal blue eyes of his, and then he opened his mouth and blurted, "We should get married."

"Yes," Shepard said.

"Uh, not—I don't mean—we haven't really talked about—wait. What?"

"Yes," she said. "When we come out of the other side of this, I agree. We should get married." She could see the clean vector of it, the sharp line of their future emerging from the tangled furor of the war. And why the hell not? "Unless you're trying to back out already, Vakarian—"

"No!" He coughed a couple of times. "No. Definitely not."

His hands started fitting rifle parts back together with a speed that would have impressed her under any other circumstances, although now it only made her smirk.

"Laugh it up, Jane," he grumbled.

"Believe me, Garrus, I will." She took the half-assembled gun from his hands and fit it back together with the stock and grip and trigger; when it was finished, she popped the extension button, raised it to her shoulder, and trained her eyes on the sights. It was heavy equipment, but sturdy and well-made, and it felt good in her hands.

"Shepard?"

"Yeah?"

"You're humming," Garrus said.

 

-

 

It wasn't such a bad way to die. Better than being spaced. Anderson was beside her; her job was done. And the view was…

 

-

 

There was a song stuck in her head.

 

-

 

It wasn't such a bad way to die.

 

-

 

Garrus was gone.

 

-

 

She ran through the killing fields towards that great pillar of light, and then she walked; and then she staggered, and then she crawled. There were blasts, more than one. She wasn't sure if the first or the second had killed her fire team—

 

-

 

The Illusive Man was dead, and Anderson was dying, but her job was done. The Crucible had docked with the Citadel. Something was wrong with her ribs; when she breathed, she could feel bone grinding.

"Shepard?"

Hell of a view, though. Funny, how even being spaced hadn't destroyed the thrill she got from a field of stars. Ash would've understood. Shepard hoped they put something nice on the LC's gravestone—a bit of poetry, or a line from a song. Shepard had known a song, once.

She went down to the field,
And her body there she laid;
She gave…

How did it end?

"Commander Shepard, come in!"

She remembered: it ended with Garrus gone. And Anderson—Anderson was gone, too. Shepard was the only one left.

Someone was calling her name. Hell of a view; Earth was hanging low overhead, a blue marble that ate up her vision.

"Shepard? Commander!"

Hackett?

"I—" She broke off, grunted. Her hands were tacky with blood. "What do you need me to do?"

"The Crucible's not firing."

Shepard rolled to her side, dragged herself forward. When she tried to climb to her feet, her legs gave out, and she fell hard. The control panel was there, a meter away, just out of reach—

"It's got to be something on your end."

She braced her elbows on the ground, sucked in a breath, and threw herself forward. The controls were—

"Commander Shepard!"

"I don't see—I'm. Not sure how to—" Her vision was starting to fade out around the edges. The pain was immense, so massive that she swam above it, unable to comprehend all the ways her body hurt.

"Commander?"

Hackett. She'd failed. Her vision was gone, and before the rest of her went, Shepard comprehended that she was dying.

 

-

 

On Mindoir they had a song:

She went down to the field,
And her body there she laid;
She gave the earth her blood and bone
That fruitful it might stay.

So break your bread, my darling heart,
But pray you don't forget:
The harvest comes at a cost, my love,
And that cost—

Everyone who remembered the song was ash.

 

-

 

She was rising.

She was...dreaming?

The boy from the forest, the boy from Earth, was in front of her. "Wake up," he said. He was glowing, like an angel, he was—sense sank back into her; she still floated on that tidal wave of pain—a hologram.

Not death or even a dream, then. Shepard had been dead before. It hadn't hurt like this.

Garrus was gone.

"Wake up," the boy said.

"Where...where am I?"

"The Citadel," said the boy. "This is my home."

"Who—" Her ribs scraped. She was probably bleeding internally. "Who are you?"

The boy looked at her. "I am the Catalyst. I control the Reapers; they are my solution."

Was she dreaming?

"The created," he said, "always rise up against their creators. Synthetics will always seek to destroy organics. I was designed to ensure the survival of organic life."

She had to force herself to assign meaning to his words. The control panel—she was so close. "So you slaughter us?"

"No," the boy said. "We harvest you."

(Garrus was gone, and there was a song stuck in her head.)

Population control. The Reapers managed the galaxy like a farmer managed his fields, culling in some places, encouraging growth in others; but their bounty was not grain but sentient lives. Shepard was chattel, she was one more lamb to their slaughter. Burn back the field at the advent of synthetic life, and organic races—however underdeveloped, however infantile—would continue to exist.

Shepard's secret was this: she had a star for a heart.

That star had burned itself past supernova. What remained should have been only a dense grain, a particle of sand in the void of her chest, but the fusion reaction that fueled her ignited, and she started to blaze one last time.

The Catalyst's solution was a violation that would keep them frozen, no future, past stolen: children forever. Oh, Shepard was angry. Shepard was damn well pissed.

What had it said? This is my home.

"You," Shepard said. "Who created you?"

The boy turned away. "You would not comprehend. It is sufficient to say that the ones who designed me recognized that there would always be war between synthetics and organics. Their own solutions were limited, but they understood the need for order."

Shepard stumbled after him. "Your presence here signifies that my solution is imperfect," the boy continued. "The Crucible provides us with an opportunity for revision. We have watched you, Shepard. You have come farther than any other who resisted us. It is interesting that a creature who is faithless has led others to such lengths on the basis of belief."

"No. No, you're…" She had to break off to cough; her voice scraped like glass against the inside of her throat when she spoke. "You're wrong. I have plenty of faith, I have faith my gun will fire if I take care of it—"

"A soldier's conditioning," the boy said. "Reflexive belief is a poor substitute. Still: I offer you a choice."

"A choice?"

"Yes." The boy spread its hands. There was something about its voice, something beneath… "Destroy us," the boy said. "But be warned. The Crucible will kill all synthetic life indiscriminately."

"Or?"

"Control us," the boy said. "Translate your consciousness into an intelligence like my own, and use the Reapers as you will."

"Or?"

"Join us," the boy said. "The union of synthetic and organic life is inevitable. We can bring about that change now by using the Crucible's energy to alter the basic matrix of all life."

"Or?"

"There are no further options."

"Or?"

"There are no further options."

"Or?"

"There are no—"

"Further options," Shepard finished. What had it said? This is my home. "Why are you telling me this? Why me?"

And then, more slowly: "Where are you from? Is this really your...nng. Your home?"

The Catalyst flared, washing out the world around it, and it answered her in Harbinger's voice. "WE HAVE OFFERED YOU AN OPPORTUNITY WE HAVE NOT OFFERED ANY OTHER"—and then the starscream faded to that high child's echo—"because even we cannot predict all outcomes. The choice is yours."

Shepard's first, wild thought was: Is this a trick? There were too many unknowns, too many black boxes, but she was on her own. She couldn't turn to Ash or Liara, couldn't ask Garrus for his perspective, and she was fading. Her legs were numb. The grinding in her chest was worse. She had minutes.

In the end, hadn't they chosen her because she did what needed to be done?

Combining organic and synthetic life—the idea itself, of one ultimate, inflicted change—was incomprehensible. It was an utter annihilation of diversity, of self-determination, and of autonomy. Controlling the Reapers—how could anyone be trusted with that kind of power? Could she?

And there was destruction. In the end, they had chosen her because she did what needed to be done…

Was genocide her fate? Was the epitaph of 'Butcher' simply foreshadowing that failed to encompass the scale of what she was about to do?

Shepard knew herself; call it a last gift. She was anger and rage, a fountain of white-hot fury, she was the sharp edge of a knife and the whipcrack repeat of a rifle. She was justice, and justice did not rest easily with mercy.

But she was more. She was compassion, and altruism, and she was an infinitesimal reflection of what the universe was: there was love there, and light, companionship, people who would walk into hell for you, people who loved you for what you were, people who loved you because you were fractured and proud and cocky, because you couldn't dance and because you loved pulp fantasy and strange foods, hamsters and boxing and the stars.

There were people who would save you because you were theirs, because for sixteen years they had sheltered you, because on hot days they had taken you to the forest to drink ginger ale with you at the foot of the trees, because they'd showed you how to dance and because their hair was red like yours. There were people who refused to save you because they knew you could save yourself, because they respected what you could do and trusted you to know your own limits. There were people who gave their lives in the service of great causes and in the service of small causes, people who wanted to set right all their wrongs, people who knew their right to live unshackled was inalienable, and people who believed, really believed, people for whom sacrifice and honor and duty were not abstracts but the reality they lived every day.

And there were people who fell, and people who picked themselves back up, and people who didn't. There were shades of nuance, cultural discrepancies in what was right and noble and what brought dishonor and disgrace. There was cold wine and hot coffee, sharing a cup with a friend or splitting a bottle with a lover, grief and pain and triumph, home and the black, a thousand sunrises on a thousand worlds, a thousand final sunsets if she faltered now.

What do you chose, Jane Shepard? she asked herself. Are you the butcher or the candle? Do you bring the dark, or are you the watcher who keeps it at bay?

Can you be both?

 

-

 

She chose, and the world swung around her.

"No," she said.

The Catalyst stepped back. "You refuse?"

"No," she said. Her fingers uncurled from the pistol she held in a rictus grip; it fell to the ground, forgotten. "No," she said. "Those are not the only options."

"We do not understand—"

"You sure as hell don't," Shepard said, and her head went up. "You want to know my faith? Fine. My faith is the people of Palaven and Thessia, because you may have left their homeworlds in ruin, but they will not go quietly. My faith is in the Normandy, in my commanding officers, and in the men and women under my command. My faith is in the quarians and the geth, in my pilot, in my ship, in my weapon and my shields. My faith is duty, altruism, sacrifice, and struggle. My faith is holding this line, and let me tell you something—like hell am I going to fail here when my people fought to their very last breath."

"I believe," Shepard said, "that if we fight for each other, we've already triumphed. You think synthetics and organics can't coexist? Look again. You think organics don't wage war on organics? Look twice. You think the created will always rise up against their creators? That's a damn fallacy."

There was a song in her head—

"This isn't about organics or synthetics," she said. "It's about this: if you try to enslave and eradicate a people, they will always rise up. That's it. That's all. And I don't care if you fly the Reapers into the damn sun—we have the right to determine our fate. We have the right to live free of you."

Her leg, the bad one; gave; she'd taken a slug to that knee in the Blitz and even Cerberus hadn't put it all the way right. Probably psychosomatic. Fuck.

"This is your choice?" the Catalyst said.

Shepard choked. Spit out blood. "Yes," she said, gasping, and then, firmer: "Yes."

"...So be it," the boy said.

It walked away.

It walked away, leaving her on the ground. She couldn't stand; she couldn't breathe through the bile and the terrible comprehension that she had failed. At the end, when nothing else counted, Shepard had failed.

There were worse ways to die, but not many. If he'd lived, Garrus would have been angry with her; she'd been so sure, so certain, and that faith had amounted to nothing.

Out of the corner of one eye, she could see past the rim of the Citadel. It almost looked like one of the Reapers was firing on another, but Shepard blinked, and the vision rolled out with her pain and her heartbeat.

She saw stars—

Chapter Text

He'd been working for fourteen hours straight, and he still had three dozen things to finish before bed. Food shipments, peace treaties, the aid Palaven sent to the colonies, the aid the colonies sent to Palaven, top-clearance meetings on how to address the debris of the Reapers, top-clearance meetings on what to do about the opportunists who were trying to take advantage of the post-war political environment, and an appointment with his doctor that had already been rescheduled twice all demanded his attention. At least he had someone else to help with the paperwork.

"Primarch?"

"What now, Corporal?"

"Doctor Stoica wants to know if she can bring in someone to do your psych eval when you stop by to have your grafts checked. Also, you have a priority message from Doctor T'Soni asking if you have time to meet her two days from now for…" Corporal Axilla glanced down at his datapad. "...For a light brunch, Primarch."

"No and no," Garrus said. "Tell Stoica I'm waiving the eval."

"Yes, sir. And Doctor T'Soni?"

"I'm busy," Garrus said.

Axilla shifted in front of Garrus' desk. Although his official appointment as Primarch was a formality—he'd held the position less than four months and would soon hand it over—he still got some of the perks. Of course, with Cipritine more rubble than city, that meant a desk in the new orbital station that had until recently been a troop carrier, a personal assistant, and reasonably large discretionary funds.

He'd kept the funding for himself instead of donating it to reconstruction. Just one more reason he made a bad turian. And speaking of…

"Did you find those listings I asked for?"

"Sir," Axilla said, "there aren't a lot of ships with all the specifications you wanted, but I did find a light corvette that the owner is willing to sell. It's asari-made, some stealth capability, loaded with a navigational VI that allows for a one-man crew. However, there's a...catch."

"A catch?"

"The FTL drive is completely shot."

"Put it up on the screen," said Garrus. "I have a conference call with the colonial primarchies in a few minutes, I'll get back to you."

"Very good. Anything else, sir?"

"That's all for now," Garrus said, and Axilla fired off a sharp salute and left the room. The ship specs appeared on Garrus' display a few seconds later; he leaned back in his chair and considered them, thinking about...just thinking.

It was a small ship, suitable for a crew of one to five, but state of the art despite the size. Her silhouette reminded Garrus of a hunting bird with its wings swept forward; the weapons arrays curved out and down on either side of the main body. Like most ships of asari design, her surface was sleek and minimal, a dark gray only a few shades off from charcoal that probably vanished against the background of a starfield. She was atmo-capable, equipped to land on all but the most hostile surfaces, large fuel tank, plenty of room for the supplies needed to support a lengthy journey through unmapped space.

Garrus cut his offer low by fifteen percent. If the ship's owner was serious about selling, she'd take the damaged engines into consideration and reduce the price accordingly. If not, well...he could wait another month or two to find better.

His consultation with the other primarchs mostly concerned the issue of Reaper technology and how to dispose of it. When the Reapers had started firing on each other during that last, desperate push over Earth, they'd destroyed most of their own fleet and ground force. There had been collateral damage, though, too much of it, and now there were all kinds of dangerous leftovers from the war—Dragon's Teeth and other nanotech, indoctrination hotspots, and even a couple of dead capital ships. Pieces of Harbinger were drifting in the gravity well of Earth's moon. The Council was tied up with other concerns—namely, its own expansion and the push for a binding document that explicitly outlined the legal powers held by Council representatives—so each government was tasked with coming up with its own methods for handling dangerous wartime remnants.

Garrus had spent a lot of time liaising with the Alliance. He'd wanted the Salarian Union's input, too, but the Union was pulling in on itself, closing its borders, shutting down ambassadorial outposts. Other than the few unofficial contacts he had in the STG, he couldn't get a word out of them. The asari republics were willing to talk, but their reach was so far-flung that they had little attention to spare from reconstruction. Palaven and Earth had borne the weight of Reaper regard the longest, and maybe that had created a sympathy—whatever tensions had lingered after the Relay 314 Incident were wiped away by the war, and now it was the humans to whom Garrus found himself turning.

Appropriate. Shepard would have been happy about it, at any rate. The first human-turian marriage had taken place a couple of days ago; Garrus had read the announcement privately, when no one was present to see how thin his control was wearing.

He wasn't pining for her. He wasn't broken or out of his mind. There were no hallucinations.

Although—using his position to place priority communication status on what was, essentially, a personal purchase probably counted as an abuse of power. Garrus couldn't bring himself to care. One more month. He could hang on for one more month.

The lower right of his display flashed an alert, overlaying the bottom of the asari ship's specs. Incoming call, origin unknown. He hit the 'IGNORE' button on his omnitool and wasn't at all surprised when the call went live instead of shutting off.

"Liara."

"Hello, Garrus." She must have been close; the feed was crisp. "I hope I haven't interrupted anything important?"

"That hasn't stopped you before," he said.

"I suppose you won't be surprised when I tell you that I'm waiting outside. Your Corporal Axilla is remarkably determined to deter visitors. Would you please tell him to let me through?"

She was right—he wasn't surprised. Apparently it was too much to ask that the Primarch be kept current on what was happening on his own station; Liara had become something like a force unto herself, krogan stubbornness all rolled up in the terrifying patience that marked her as her mother's daughter. He sighed and keyed her past the outer office.

His side hurt, and his shoulder. He rubbed at the latter idly while he waited. The skin grafts were healing well, his system had accepted the biomechanical implants that now bolstered his damaged nervous system, but there was a residual ache in the sockets of his joints and in his deep muscle tissue that would take time to heal.

Liara swept in a couple of second later, wearing a floor-length gown in the asari style and a subcompact pistol clipped to the ornate belt that slanted across her hips. She had a sharp weal that swept from her cheek down the side of her face and vanished beneath her neckline; it was a remnant of the same barrage that had left him with a new set of cybernetics, but while Garrus' growing collection of scars made him a mean-looking son-of-a-bitch, Liara's only enhanced the brutal ethereality she was growing into.

"Garrus," she said. "Thank you for seeing me."

He didn't bother lying to her. "I don't want to talk about it, Liara."

"Did I say I was here to talk about you?" She settled into the chair opposite his desk and crossed her legs. "Palaven seems to be recovering well."

"Yes," he bit out, and then, because Liara was still his friend, added, "The intel you passed along about Facinus was useful. I...appreciate it."

"It was my pleasure. You'd be surprised how many criminal organizations are taking advantage of the pandemonium—" She caught herself. "No, I suppose you wouldn't be surprised. I am, at times."

"You're still working with Lawson?"

"Yes, Miranda's proven invaluable. She's mostly focused on repurposing the remaining Cerberus resources for the reconstruction effort, but she's a capable woman, and I can provide her with the funding and information she needs to get the job done. Actually, she reminds me a great deal of Shepard."

Garrus didn't give a millimeter. "Oh?"

"Of course, the two of you served together—you probably know Miranda better than I do. Still, I can see why Shepard won her loyalty." Liara's gaze meandered away from Garrus, over the stacks of datapads and the monitors set into the wall behind him, past the viewport to her right that currently looked down on Palaven's dark side, and then to the security camera in the upper corner of the room.

"I know what you're doing, Garrus," she said.

"What"—he was aware of his voice dropping to a warning rumble—"am I doing?"

"You've virtually handed your office over to a successor already," Liara said. "You're cleaning out your personal accounts. You've been looking at listings for ships—I saw your corporal going through the sales net on my way through your reception. You aren't answering your messages, you're spending an exorbitant amount of money on maps of unknown sectors, and…" She hesitated. "And you refused to attend Shepard's memorial service."

"Make your point."

"This is Omega all over again!" She sat forward. "Garrus, you can't do this to yourself. Running off to get yourself killed is not the way to honor Shepard—"

"She's not dead," he said. Calm, level, presenting himself as everything he was not.

"The Alliance lists her as killed in action. I am not going to argue about this with you again."

"The Citadel vanished," Garrus said.

"We recovered debris—"

"Not enough."

Liara blinked. "I would be very angry with you," she said finally, "if I didn't realize that this is even more painful for you than the rest of us. Garrus...you need to accept that she's gone. Shepard is a hero; whatever happened after she went through the Conduit, she saved all of us. Let her rest. Please."

"Let her—" His hands clenched, and he lunged up and out of his chair; Liara's eyes widened, although she didn't move as Garrus stalked over to the viewport.

It was a very good view, transportant from the floor up to the seam of the ceiling. Palaven's night side showed bursts of light, some tightly clustered, some sprays scattered over the less populous or more decimated areas. The seas were marked by absolute darkness.

"You know," he said, "I thought you, out of everyone, would understand."

There was a soft rustle as Liara shifted behind him. "What I understand is that Shepard wouldn't want you tearing yourself apart chasing after ghosts. Garrus, it would break her heart."

There was no way he could explain it that would make Liara comprehend. Objectively, the evidence was scarce, but there was evidence: Hackett's last communication with Shepard; the Reapers firing on each other in that final unfathomable act; the disappearance of the Citadel; and the faint energy signature, obscured by garbage noise but present nonetheless, of something very large jumping to FTL.

And there was no body.

Liara sighed. "You'll do what you want regardless of what I say. But Garrus...for her sake, if not mine, don't kill yourself over this."

He examined his reflection in the glass—took in the dark suit, the hard stare; his visor was gone, lost in London—and then refocused, looking out past Palaven to the stars beyond.

"Before Rannoch," he said, "I told her there were only two ways for the war to end—with both of us standing, or with both of us in the ground."

Liara would try to be gentle with him, he knew. "I understand your devotion," she said, and her touch was as deft as he'd expected. "It's...beautiful, really. But in the end, we all make promises we can't keep."

"I don't," Garrus said. "Not to her."

 

-

 

Primarch Taryn Arcos was installed two weeks later. Garrus shook her hand, wished her success, and caught the next shuttle down to Palaven. He was once again a private citizen, free to look after only his own interests. Arcos would do a thorough job—she was far better suited to the position than he was, but she'd spent two weeks MIA and another six recovering in a hospital. She was a hardass who did what needed to be done, which he respected, and who was willing to cooperate with other races, which he respected even more.

He set up base at the family compound. It had survived the invasion more or less intact, thank the spirits. His dad and Solana were still off-planet, which meant he had the place to himself, although he didn't bother moving in beyond putting a couple of clean blankets on one of the beds and making sure the extranet hub was up and running. The kitchen had been looted, but that was no loss—he had enough MREs to last him.

The official offer from the Council arrived a few days later. He sent back his acceptance immediately.

In the mornings he went into the courtyard and sat on the steps that led from the wide inner ring of the porch to the grassy lawn. Wild plants had started to overtake what was once a carefully-tended garden, and weeds were springing up in the cracks through the cobblestone walk that bifurcated the courtyard proper. To the side, where the family crests sat, the jaina flowers were blooming again.

There was enough room for a dozen seal-stones, and in previous generations that many and more had occupied the lawn, but now there were only two. The Vakarian seal was set into a big, unpolished block of obsidian that had been in the same spot for...hell, probably millennia; the crest was recut and the obsidian restructured every couple of decades as needed. The Marinas seal was much newer, had only been present since a couple of years before Garrus' birth, and was carved into a block of striated sandstone.

He lugged the floor console out of his father's office and set it up on the porch, too, far enough under the cover of the overhang that the occasional rainstorm wouldn't hurt it, and he used that for his planning. His first priority was the ship; after the sales paperwork cleared, he hired a machinist to refit the engines. Even with the high-credit offer he'd make to push the work through as quickly as possible, it'd be another couple of weeks before the vessel would be spaceworthy. The machinist had agreed to deliver it, too, though, for another additional fee.

After the ship came supplies. He leased a docking bay, one of the few that was still intact in Cipritine, and had shipments delivered there. Medical supplies, including basics for humans and turians and some severe trauma stuff he'd routed through Karin Chakwas; provisions, dextro and levo, a good supply of coffee, and toiletries; clothes cut for a human female and a spare hardsuit; rifles, sidearms, the attendant gear to maintain them, and a few extra pieces, including a tactical shotgun and a couple of very new, very expensive weapons based on Reaper technology made up the bulk of his purchases.

There was the question of flying the ship. Garrus had been licensed to fly corvettes a long, long time ago, but managing her in combat was another matter entirely, and while he doubted he'd ever be able to match his sister's sheer artistry in the air, it couldn't hurt to know how to manage the craft in a shoot-out. He spent a lot of time in the simulator he downloaded. That was another couple of thousand creds, but he'd built up plenty of back-pay from Cerberus and from the Hierarchy.

There was the question of where to go, and how to go there. He talked to scientists and speculators over the internet, asked questions, got back answers he didn't understand, and had to ask more questions. His list of leads was long and frustratingly broad; he started by calculating possible trajectories for the Citadel, realized he didn't have a hell of an idea how the Citadel worked, and went back with more questions. Did it have engines? Was it a mass relay, or something else? Could mass relays propel themselves through the relay lanes?

He tried to work the problem in reverse, too. What had Shepard encountered up there? Had she spoken to Harbinger? A prothean VI? How had she turned the Reapers against each other? He was convinced the last was Shepard's work; when the Crucible had sent out its pulse not of destructive energy but of data, that message had jumped through relays and comm hubs and QECs, even, presumably, from Reaper to Reaper. That pulse had made them stop firing at the rest of the galaxy and start firing at whatever displayed their own signature: state ships, capital ships, husks, even the indoctrinated. There was a lot of collateral damage, a lot of confusion, but within hours there hadn't been an operational Reaper alive anywhere.

Where had the Reapers come from? Where did they go?

He read through Shepard's mail, through her reports, through whatever classified scraps the Alliance would throw him. It helped that Shepard had named him her legal heir, which meant he received all her personal access codes; between that, his new position under the Council, and the goodwill he'd built up with Hackett, he could get his hands on just about any piece of information out there. Sooner or later.

Reading through her private messages was hell, though.

He chuckled at some of the exchanges. She and Joker sent each other quick, acerbic notes or complaints; a couple of times they'd tried to troll each other into opening some porn site in a public place. Her replies to the Council had wavered between terse and angrily polite; with Lawson she'd been all business, with Tali all friendliness. With Liara she was more languid, more open and thoughtful, and they'd talked about everything from their childhoods to the nature of the war they were fighting.

And in her archive he found the letters he'd written her; her replies had shown him all those facets and more. Some of their responses to each other had been short notes, just quick plans to meet ("Docking 0230 Citadel time" from her tours in the SR-1, "I'll find you when I'm ready" from a much later layover for supplies and fuel on Ilium), while some were long, serious letters, usually the kind of thing one of them sent while drunk, or exhausted, or when the other was out in the field. Plenty—even the early exchanges, especially the early exchanges—were flirtatious or downright graphic. He wondered how he'd missed that.

He was deep into a message string they'd started on music and their shared taste in terrible synth-pop hits when someone settled down on the steps beside him. Garrus kept reading.

When he was finished, he closed his omnitool and leaned forward. "Vel," he said.

"Specialist Vakarian," said Vel Phaeton. "How's it going?"

"Coming to visit me? I'm flattered."

"I like to keep up with loose cannons and former Primarchs, you know me. Hear you're working for the Council now. Is that a demotion? I couldn't decide."

"To hear them talk, 'Spectre' definitely outranks 'Interim Primarch,'" Garrus agreed.

"How's your sister?"

"Fine," Garrus said. "She's off-planet flying supply shuttles. I'm surprised you haven't heard from her."

"She…" Vel hesitated. "...Probably wouldn't think of it," he finished. Garrus decided he didn't want to know what that pause meant. "Achenar's been loaned out to a squad of asari commandos," Vel continued. "Finally putting those biotics of his to good use. I also ran into Cass on Oma Ker—she's working with a bomb disposal unit."

"Bet she loves that."

"She is more into making explosions than preventing them," Vel said, and fell silent. The quiet was easy but expectant, threaded through with the certainty that this visit wasn't just one old friend dropping in on another. It was probably closer to that than Vel would have liked to admit, though—he gathered information habitually, but even Garrus had to admit that his own behavior over the past few months had been pretty damn unusual, certainly unusual enough to warrant concern from an outside perspective.

"Listen," he said. "I need you to do me a favor."

Vel hummed. "Vakarian, about that—I like you a lot, but you know you aren't my type—"

"From the scuttlebutt, that's because my sister is more your type," Garrus said mildly.

"Yeah, well." Vel looked away. "She doesn't know that."

"So, about that favor…"

"Let's hear it."

"I'm getting ready to ship out for a while," Garrus said. "Don't know how long I'll be gone. If you could keep an eye on my family—"

"Done," Vel said.

"Sol's got things pretty well in hand, and Dad's still in decent shape, but I don't know what he'll be like once Mom…" He shook his head. "It's only a matter of time."

"I'm sorry to hear that. It's not an easy way to lose a parent."

"No." Garrus looked out over the flowers to the sandstone block with the Marinas crest. "I shouldn't leave them, but I'm going anyway. What kind of a son does that make me?"

Vel didn't answer.

"Anyway," Garrus said. "Thanks. I appreciate it."

"Not a problem."

"Mmm. Now aren't you supposed to trick me into telling you what I'm doing?"

Vel chuckled. "Garrus, a varren could probably figure out what you're doing. You're going after your Commander Shepard."

"Not going to tell me I'm crazy?"

"You know that you'll probably be bringing back a coffin, and maybe an empty one at that. You don't need me to explain that to you." Vel threw a glance back at the console's display. "Some pretty impressive maps there. You got a starting point?"

"Yeah, actually," Garrus said. "There's an asteroid called Mahavid…"

 

-

 

His mother returned to Palaven. Sol took a break from work to accompany her from salarian space to her new home in Galata's extended care center. The family compound was about half an hour from Galata, itself part of the sprawling megalopolis that had developed around Palaven's capital; the Vakarians were an old enough family that their land sat outside the city itself, almost in the foothills of a mountain range.

Garrus hadn't seen Livia Vakarian in years. He avoided her even when Sol was getting her settled. There wasn't much of their mother left; her lucid periods were few and very, very far between, and even Helos Medical Group had no longer been able to do anything for her. Make her comfortable, they'd said, like that was any help.

And then, finally, he did go to see her.

He had to build himself up to it; taking on Harbinger was one thing, but looking into the eyes of a mother who no longer knew his name tested his courage to its limit. How Sol did it—hell, how his father managed—Garrus didn't know. His dad would be moving into an apartment near the facility in another few weeks, after he finished whatever the hell he was doing out in the Terminus regions.

The old euphemism was 'dying up top.' It was the worst fate Garrus could imagine, except maybe indoctrination.

After the first visit, he went back often, sitting beside her for hours every day. Sometimes he read to her, from his work or from her long-ago papers; the mathematics were far over his head, but he struggled through until he hit the parts that addressed purely linguistic concerns, which were equally dense but usually easier to pronounce. Sometimes they sat in silence together, looking out the window. Sometimes he shepherded her to meals or to the gardens outside, which were beautiful but sterile in a way their family courtyard wasn't. His parents had tended that courtyard together once, before any of them had heard of Corpalis Syndrome, before the arguments in the early stages of his mother's illness, before the Reapers had come.

She mistook him for his grandfather, her father, often. Not once did she call him by his own name.

After a few days, he stopped believing she would have a lucid period before his time ran out. A few more, and he no longer hoped she would be lucid ever again. In desperation he finally started talking about the war, pouring out every last bit of shame and grief and guilt and horror he'd carried with him since Menae or Omega or before; and then talking about the war became talking about Shepard.

He'd gotten used to his mother's vacant smiles and the distant, glassy stares. That made it easier. It wasn't really a confession, not when she didn't understand, but he wanted her to know everything anyway—all that he'd seen, all that he'd done or failed to do, everyone that he'd loved.

"She's a hell of a soldier," he started out. "Hell of a woman. You would like her, Mom, even though I'm not sure I would survive the two of you meeting. Uh, not to imply that you scare me." He huffed, rueful. "Well, maybe a little."

"She's human," he added, "did I mention that? I don't know how much news you've...seen, but she's with the Systems Alliance. First human Spectre. And she was damn proud of it, too—she should be, it's an honor. Tactically gifted, on the field or in diplomacy, and a great shot. Better than me, maybe, but don't tell her I said that."

His mother trilled in the back of her throat and reached for the glass of water beside her chair. Her hands trembled, and she knocked the water over. Garrus caught it before it spilled and helped her bring it to her mouth.

"There," he said. "Let me know if you want more. Where was I? Right, we kind of...fell into a relationship. Took me off guard, although in retrospect…" He hummed. "Maybe it shouldn't have. She's an easy woman to be friendly with, but a hard woman to know. Her parents died when she wasn't much more than a kid. She's handled it about as well as anyone could, but between you and me, I think it made her a little skittish to trust anyway. I'm not sure why she decided to trust me, although damn, I'm glad she did."

What else could he say? "We understand each other. It isn't some romance drama crap—don't give me that look, I know you think all I do is watch telenovelas. I don't know what it is. Shared purpose, maybe. Things are easy with her when they shouldn't be."

He snorted. "She likes all kinds of weird food, too. And she's into hand-to-hand. Boxing. She's an in-fighter, quick on her feet. I wish we'd gotten a chance to spar once or twice."

He said, "I learned how to dance for her."

He didn't tell his mother how hard, how ferociously Shepard loved. It wasn't the kind of thing he usually said.

He did say, "She's gone now." It ached to bring up. "Or at least that's what everyone believes. I'm...not so sure. Jane's record with death is more than a little irregular."

"You in formal dance instruction?" his mother said. "Now that's the one part of the whole story I have trouble believing."

Garrus froze.

"You've always had good instincts," Livia continued. "If you think she's out there, then go find her."

He exhaled, a little shakily. "Mom."

"Hello, Garrus." She looked carefully around the room and then out the window. "We're on Palaven?"

"Yeah. Galata, near home. Are you—how—"

"I'm…" She shook her head. "No. How's your father? Your sister?"

"Dad's good, he'll be here in a few days. Sol's off flying. She stops by when she has time."

"Mmm," his mother said. She tilted her head, studying his face, and then leaned forward to look more closely; the blanket he'd draped over her lap slid to the floor. "What's this?" She drew a near-finger over her face.

Ah. She'd noticed, although anyone who knew him well would be able to pick out the differences in the blue markings. Vakarian was still there in the pattern and the color, but now as the stain swept past his eyes, it broke on either side to leave three bare crosshatches. Vakarian, but also widower.

He was surprised she'd commented on that instead of the scarring.

"Your father," she said, when he failed to explain, "is fond of reminding everyone in a twenty-meter radius that the Vakarian motto is, 'We repay in kind.' That's well and good, but right now I think you need the Marinas words more. Do you remember what my family says?"

Garrus lifted his head.

"'We weather every storm,'" his mother said. "Remember that, and you'll persevere."

"Mom, what if I can't—" he started to say, but her gaze was wandering away already, over the room, out the window.

When she finished the circuit and her eyes fell on him again, she said, "Dad?"

"It's Garrus. I'm your son."

"Dad?"

"No," Garrus said. "Would you like to go to the garden?"

She hummed some song he didn't know and looked out the window again. When he took her by the arm and guided her outside, she went willingly, but she didn't recognize Garrus or Palaven or the jaina blossoms growing in the shade of the fountain.

Before he left, Garrus cut open a daquali fruit and arranged the slices on a plastic tray by her bedside. Then he gently touched his face to hers. And then he went. They would both have to weather their storms alone.

 

-

 

Liara figured out when he was leaving, although he hadn't taken any particular pains to hide his departure. He spent the morning loading the last of his supplies; the ship had been delivered to his docking bay on Palaven as scheduled, and the work on the engines had been done well. In the bay's lighting, the ship looked gunmetal gray, sleek and dangerous. Shepard would have liked her.

He stowed his last crate of foodstuffs in the hold and then went to check his fuel levels one last time, but when he reached the bridge, someone else was already there.

"EDI?"

"Hello, Garrus," EDI said. She was standing between the two crash seats with the fingers of her mobile platform resting on the flight controls. They were racing under her touch.

"Not to be rude, but, ah...where did you come from?"

"I came with the ship," she said, perfectly blank, but then her lips curved. "I am kidding. Jeff and I arrived a few minutes ago to see you off. The rest of me is still in orbit," she added. "Captain Williams is currently on leave to attend to the birth of her first niece, but she sends her best wishes."

Garrus blinked. "Damn."

"Yes," EDI agreed. "It can be troublesome to have friends." The rest of the cockpit lit up above and around them.

"What are you doing?"

EDI's smiled widened. "I am giving you a gift. This is a good ship; please make sure you take care of her."

"I'll do what I can," he promised. There was a clamor from outside; Garrus tipped his head, but he couldn't quite resolve the noise into words.

"Perhaps I should mention that Jeff and I are not the only ones here," EDI said.

Garrus went down the ladder like a shot and stuck his head out the cargo hatch. Joker was there, and James, and Tali with a quarian honor guard, and Liara…

"Hey, Garrus," James said, giving a little wave.

Garrus let go of the side of the hatch, went down the ramp, and cleared his throat. "Jimmy," he said. He offered his hand, fingers up, and James gripped it.

"You kill any bad guys lately?"

"Not in a few days," Garrus said. "Thought I'd leave you a few targets for practice. I know how much you need it."

James laughed. "Thanks, bud," he said, and stepped aside.

Tali was there next; she waved her guard back—no way that admiralty was a formality now—took one look at him, and punched him in the shoulder.

"Crap!"

"That's for being a bosh'tet," she said, and then she threw her arms around him. Garrus had to work to free himself enough to return her hug; he squeezed her around the shoulders and pretended not to notice the sniffling coming from beneath her mask.

Joker made the mistake of giving her a pat on the back, and Tali transferred her hug from Garrus to Joker without any warning. "Whoa," Joker said. "Uh, maybe not so hard? I kind of need those ribs."

"It's too sad," Tali muttered. "And you don't need your ribs that badly."

"I'm not gonna argue with you when you have a death grip on my torso," said Joker. "So, Garrus. When you find Shepard, make sure to tell her that her favorite person is waiting for her back on the Normandy."

"Give it up," Garrus said. "She never liked you better."

"Yeah, well...I've known her longer?" Joker said. "And maybe watch out for yourself, too. The Thanix cannon doesn't fire right anymore, and EDI keeps bitching about it. I was hoping you'd take a look at it someday." He guided Tali away, his steps stiff but steady; this was one of his better days.

Then Liara stepped forward.

"Garrus," she said.

"Liara."

"You know that I'm not here to dissuade you, don't you?"

He rocked back on his feet. "I figured you, out of everyone, would understand."

"Perhaps I do," she said. Her face softened. "Take care of yourself, won't you? And if you need anything at all, contact me. I find that I have very deep pockets and a weakness for lost causes."

"Thank you," Garrus said. It seemed inadequate.

She smiled at him. "What a beautiful ship," she said, threading her arm through his. He led her back a few steps and off to the side, which gave them a better angle to view his new acquisition. Tali came up on his other flank, her elbow knocking against him.

"I don't know," Joker said. "I mean, it's okay, sure, I guess those are some pretty fancy engines, but she's kind of…small."

"She's compact," Tali said.

"Tiny," said Joker. "And please, you think a ship can be state-of-the-art without some serious stealth capability? No way. I bet the seats aren't even real leather."

"What's her name?" asked Vega.

Garrus coughed a couple of times. "The, uh. Idenna."

Tali got it first. "...Idenna. Idenna. Are you serious, Garrus?"

"Isn't that the name of the ship from 'Fleet and Flotilla?'" Liara said.

"Actually," said Tali, "it's the 'Solar Wind.'"

"Come on!" Garrus said. He couldn't believe this. "Solar Wind is only in the musical. All that matters is the original, not some hack remake that ruins the entire second half of the story—"

"I like the musical!" Tali said.

"Wait," said Joker. "Garrus likes musicals? Does Shepard know that?"

"I think the point is that he kinda doesn't like musicals," James interrupted. "Hey, man, been meaning to ask—can turians sing?"

"No," said Garrus.

"Well, I think it's a...nice...homage," said Liara.

"Your tone conveys doubt," EDI said. "May I suggest an alternative? 'EDI' is an excellent name for a ship."

"Uh, hon, we've talked about this. You can't name every ship after yourself," said Joker.

"How else am I to feed my megalomania?" EDI wondered.

"That's what new recruits are for. Seriously, you guys should watch her screw with the ensigns, it brings tears to my eyes."

"I still like the musical," said Tali—

 

-

 

And then the only thing left was finding her.

He looked for a long time, even with Spectre access to speed his way. They relays were damaged and security was high; a fast ship could still only go so fast, and the empty places he was going warranted caution. The Idenna was quick and quiet, though, her navigation VI very good. Garrus could be patient.

He spent his time combing through extranet downloads and maps. When he was tired of those, he dry-fired his pistol and lifted weights and read the ink-and-paper stellar fantasy novels he'd scavenged from Shepard's locker. He wrote her letters, too, so she would have something to read when she came back, and he listened to the news as often as the ship could pick it up. The reports came in slowly, at first still with that undertone of grief and bewilderment, then with the scant slender threads of hope beneath the dry facts. Soon they came out of their shock enough to talk of the invasion.

They all called it something different: the Second Eden Prime War, the War of the Reapers, the Galactic Harvest. The historians had their own term, the press and politicians another. There was a name the rest used, though, the people who had lived through the Reapers and who had fought them. It spread from Earth to Palaven, from ship to ship and world to world. Already they were calling it Shepard's War.