Work Text:
Shepard couldn’t sleep.
Once, this would have been unusual. Like a lot of soldiers, during her military career she’d developed an almost preternatural ability to fall asleep nearly anywhere, no matter how uncomfortable. Sleep was as easy and natural as breathing.
But then she’d died and came back and nothing had really been the same since.
It was even worse since they’d been forced to leave Earth. Now when she did sleep, her dreams were filled with visions of children burning and the voices of all the people she’d failed, the ones she couldn’t save. It made sleep an unappealing proposition.
Next to her Garrus slumbered on, oblivious. For what felt like two or three hours at least, Shepard been lying in her darkened cabin with her sleeping boyfriend beside her, looking at the stars through the viewport above her bed and listening to Garrus breathing. Turians didn’t snore like humans, but one of the things Shepard had been surprised to discover early in her relationship with Garrus was that they produced a deep, rumbling vibration in their vocal chords when they slept which reminded her of a cat purring.
Normally she found it soothing—she always slept better when Garrus was beside her—but tonight not even her boyfriend’s cat-like purr or the comforting weight of the warm, heavy turian arm draped over her waist could lull her to sleep.
Fed up with lying there doing nothing while across the galaxy people were still fighting for their lives, Shepard carefully removed Garrus’s arm from around her middle and slipped out of bed. She moved quietly, not wanting to risk waking him up and triggering another ‘concerned boyfriend talk’ about her sleeping habits.
Tiptoeing across the cold metal floor of the cabin, she retrieved her datapad from the table and settled down in the middle of the couch with her feet tucked under her. She set the datapad’s brightness to the lowest setting, hoping the light wouldn’t disturb Garrus. Within a few minutes, she was completely absorbed in fleet updates and casualty reports. She was so focused on the numbers floating across the dimly glowing screen that she didn’t even notice Garrus wake up and get out of bed.
“Shepard? What are you doing? Come back to bed.”
She started in surprise and quickly tried to hide the datapad, but he plucked it out of her hands and turned it off.
“Hey!” she said, indignantly. “I was working on that.”
Garrus stared at her, unmoved.
“Come back to bed,” he repeated firmly. Shepard scowled and crossed her arms.
“I could report you for insubordinate behaviour, you know,” she told him.
“First, technically I’m here as the heirarchy’s representative and not an enlisted member of the Alliance so it’s not insubordination. And second, I’m not ordering you, I’m asking you as your boyfriend who cares about you and doesn’t want to see you get hurt because you were too tired to pay attention in the middle of a fight. Come back to bed. Please. For me.”
His eyes were soft and pleading and Shepard felt herself weakening. She’d never been able to resist a heartfelt request, especially not when it came from him, not even before she’d realised she was falling in love with him.
“Alright,” she conceded.
“Thank you,” he said, sounding relieved and a little surprised that she’d given in so easily. He’d obviously been expecting stronger opposition. Shepard let him pull her gently to her feet and lead her back to the bed.
“You know this is a waste of time, right?” she couldn’t resist pointing out. “There are a lot more important things I could be doing and I’m just going to end up lying here for hours again anyway, not sleeping.”
“No, you’re not,” he said confidently.
“Oh, really?” She raised her eyebrows, not trying to hide her skepticism. “And what makes you so sure of that?”
Garrus turned to face her, looking smug and also determined. He moved until he was standing in her personal space, forcing her to look up at him.
“Because I know a guaranteed way to help you relax,” he told her in a low voice, slipping his talons under the bottom of her tank top.
“Is that so?” She tilted her head, giving him a flirtatious look as his hands traveled higher under her shirt, fingers brushing her breasts. “Maybe you should show me then.”
“With pleasure.”