IC INBOX || Abraxas

[thearchangel]

INBOX text / audio / video / action Garrus here - leave a message. I'll get back to you in a minute. art credit code credit

Comments

[earthborn]

[Continued form here]

Seriously, though. Is it really that shocking to you?

[thearchangel]

Yes...?

It's not something I ever considered. We uh. Didn't really talk about that part.

[earthborn]

Look, haven't you ever had something you always wanted to do, but for about a hundred good reasons you just couldn't?

[The conflict between Turians and Humans was in the past, and very little to do with Shepard personally, but there were plenty of people on both sides who didn't see it that way. It was borderline disloyal, and a risk to your career, to admit to certain...fantasies. Fascinations. Whatever. Even if you found someone who genuinely didn't care about the political issues, rare enough, they had to be discreet besides being trustworthy in all the normal ways.

Time, means, motivation, access... She'd restricted herself to thinking about it and never so much as putting in an extranet search. Garrus had been her subordinate, and then her friend. A good friend, a close one, someone she could depend on, but on an Alliance Vessel on her first real Command assignment? Hell, she hadn't really known him back then, not until it was the end of the tour— and there had been a few other little issues pressing on her time, and her attention, after all.]

I know I talked big about it, but the Collector Base was the longest shot I've ever taken. We ought to have been looking at going to our deaths and I... I just didn't give a damn, anymore.

Besides, I trust you. With everything. I'm not gonna find a better Turian, or a better partner.

[thearchangel]

I could think of a few things...

[Not shockingly, most of them had been things Shepard either solved, or brought into his life just by existing. Part of him really, really wants to say something to the effect of "I got to see you again". After Alchera, there had been more than a hundred good reasons why he couldn't.]

[He'd wanted to reapply for Spectre training, he'd wanted to make a difference, he'd wanted to prove his worth. And... with her, it had all been possible. Sure, they're talking about things that aren't exactly related to those things. This is romantic-related.]

There's no one in this universe, ours, or any other I trust more than you, Shepard, that's been true for a long time. I... guess I just didn't think there was as big a... physical aspect.

As everything else.

[Trust, respect, etc.]

[earthborn]

Don't get me wrong, here. [This is embarrassing enough, as it is, and she's hardly accustomed to explaining her damn feelings.] If I just wanted to get laid, it's not a lot harder than finding the right bar.

But I didn't want that, clearly.

It's just that the thought occured to me a little sooner than our little uh, reach and flexibility conversation. I guess that makes me kind of a deviant. Go figure, Commander Shepard not such a paragon of virtue after all.

[Network - After the Escape from the Spore-Cult]

[earthborn]

Vakarian, Report!

i should really update this page

[thearchangel]

Reporting
From Noveria Lite

Condition
up to my knee spurs in snow
so
practically in hell

[He's funny. He's so very funny. He's so very funny it's a blatant cover for everything else.]

couldn't hurt lmao

[earthborn]

[Just seeing a response, knowing that she got through, is enough to force breath into her. Unclench. Alright. The Horizon is working again, at least enough to pass messages. And Garrus is alright— or, he's alive, at least.]

Suck it up, buttercup. At least we're alive.

The cultists got themselves together, made a push at the last minute. We've got a few hostages, and we're barricaded in the ritual room with all the corpses. There's fresh water, at least— we're working on opening an alternate exit. It'll do, for now.

The rescue team is on the island, but they still haven't found the entrance to the cave complex, so it's up to you and the others to figure it out. [She won't ask if he can handle it; she never does. Part of getting people to rise to the challenge is making it clear that you need them to do so, no if involved.] Get it done, Garrus. We're counting on you.

[Preferably before the biotic backlash drops her into a coma she won't be able to come out of without medical assistance, please.]

[thearchangel]

You know I don't know what that means

[He can guess, though. It doesn't take that much brainpower to figure it out. But it's the lighthearted, cavalier response probably wanted. Or, at least, that might be more assuring than bombarding her with his own questions.]

[Are you okay, how long can you hold out - things she doesn't need to deal with right now. Smothered and shoved aside. Report. Report and go forward. Put it in the box.]

Fresh water is better than before. Maybe you can get a shower while you're holding down the fort.

Understood.

Maybe we can get a signal fire going. Someone's bound to have firepower. Literal firepower.

[earthborn]

So...

[The message comes just as the sun is tipping towards the first touches of sunset. It isn't dark yet, not even dim, but there's a quality to the air— drowsy, sort-of golden. The day settling in for a last long sigh, before rest.]

I was promised a date, you know. Star-gazing, all my drinks comped, whole package deal. And here I stand, sober and unromanced.

[She is teasing you, Garrus.]

Story off my life: I gotta do everything myself. You wanna meet me at the gates?

[thearchangel]

[Crap. He knew he forgot something.]

[Be smooth. You've got this!!]

Maybe I was just making you wait to

anticipate the moment?

[He does not got this.]

I mean, yeah. Yeah, the gates sound good.

[earthborn]

A lot has been going on...

[Alright, maybe she's being a little mean, too. But nevermind that. Garrus arrives just as the light is getting properly rosy, the sky our past the western gate shifting subtly towards pink. The very first stars are starting to show, very dimly, almost invisible at sky's edge.]

Hey, Garrus. You got a minute? [There's a basket, with a couple of winebottles peeking out, conspicuously. She's clearly planned this.] I set up a camp. Thought you might want to get out of here for a night.

[Not a lot of privacy, in their normal accommodations, and the Horizon was... fine. But not the same as reality.]

[thearchangel]

Hey, there was the whole corpse wall decor thing going on.

[Okay, they're joking now. That's good. He's not in the doghouse - which he's learned can accommodate so many differently shaped animals, all called dogs.]

[And when he arrives, he snorts, amused - ] I don't know. I have some calibrations to pretend to finish. [Because they're in the Horizon. What a comedian.] But, yeah. Let's go. Now you've got me all curious.

[earthborn]

[Nights were the hardest. The summoned barracks filled and emptied with fair regularity; once every month or so, a few wide-eyed newcomers with wet hair would trickle in, looking for a pair of pants and an explanation. Some would stay the night, most would leave eventually... Shepard had colonized the far end, nearest the back window, for just this reason. She wanted both a clear exit, and not to be disturbed. It wasn't a private quarters, but it was something, and inspections for cleanliness were rare verging on nonexistent. They couldn't have broadcast more clearly that they didn't think much of the Summoned's discipline.

But nights were still the hardest.

It isn't long after everything had settled down, back into some form of routine, that Shepard had found them worse than usual. And tonight, she gives up; simply rolls out of bed and goes to stand in nothing more than an undershirt and sleeping pants, leaning on the window, hoping the night air will bring... something. Peace. Clarity.

She hopes she hasn't woken anyone, but she just can't lie there anymore.]

[thearchangel]

[She didn't wake anyone. Because there wasn't anyone there to wake.]

[It's been hard to sort memory from dream, sometimes. When the memories all smacked back into being, it was like reliving the horrors all over again. From Sovereign on Virmire, the Collectors' Base. Palaven invaded - seeing the fiery pit where his birthplace had been... hearing the news feeds. The constant stream of reports of the SR1's destruction. Alchera. Omega.]

[There's a courtyard in the barracks. For off-duty hours, with a few scattered desert plants, a little fountain. It's nice, actually.]

[Tonight... he's on the edge of the fountain. Looking down at grains of sand at his feet. One eye open, one eye closed. Back and forth. He knows by now others have retained aesthetic pieces - stars encased in their skin, different colored skin or other things like that. And here he is.]

[Sitting with crapped out cybernetics and a head full of crap memories, reliving them over and over.]

[earthborn]

[It takes her longer than she'll admit to notice him down there. Say one thing for Abraxas: the lack of electrical light pollution has a powerful effect on the view, and Shepard is never immune to it.

But she does look down eventually, and there he is.

It isn't nothing, deciding to go down and meet with him. After all, there's barely moon enough to see, and it is after curfew by more than far enough to get them in trouble— not that she expects anyone to call her out. Their fortunes rise and fall with regularity amongst the Free Cities authorities, but right now the appreciation for the Summoned is at a highpoint— who would bother them, if they need some air? On the other hand, he'd gone out alone, and not close-by; maybe he wanted the solitude, and the space. Maybe he needed time to himself. Maybe...

Shepard finds she's laced her trousers and tied her boots before she's seriously considered doing so. Ludicrous, of course Garrus will be happy to see her. Of course he needs company, after all this. Of course. It's what she would need, too, and she knows him well enough to know how alike they are in these matters.

She doesn't say hello, doesn't drop a joke, just makes sure he can see her coming, and settles beside him on the edge of the fountain. It's colder out tonight than she remembered it being, before: she runs hotter now, and the glow behind her scars shifts, subtly. For a long time, that's all there is; the quiet, and the press of shoulders. Sometimes all that's needed is to share the warmth.]

Y'know, when I was a kid, I used to fantasize about kicking my boss' ass. [Her voice is quiet. She might as well be talking to herself.] He made everything difficult for me. School, and homework, and making ends meet; it's damn hard work, being a kid in a street gang. Wasn't until I joined the Alliance that I realized how much of a gift it was, having to struggle every day. Everybody else was losing their minds just to keep their heads up, but for me... I already knew I could handle anything. I loved the pressure.

[She falls quiet again. Overhead, a silent streak crosses the sky: a shooting star. Shepard tilts her head back and sighs. Nothing for it but to address the issue directly, right? She's always been a head-on kind of person.]

I don't like who I turn into, when I don't have anything to push against. Whoever that woman was... will be— Whatever. I don't want to be like that. I don't ever want to be that.

[She wants a drink, or a smoke, or a stimulant. Something to keep her in her skin and out of her head. Eventually, Shepard leans against him a little harder, a subtle nudge. Your turn, Vakarian.]

[thearchangel]

[It takes him longer than he wants to process, to react to her approach. He knows it's her. He's not upset she's here. Nothing of the sort. He can just feel the sense of guilt crawling up the back of his spine. Wanting to stay in that world - debating saying anything at all. How could he? How could he have made that decision, for either of them?]

[What did he have to show for it, too?]

[If Shepard wants to sit in silence, that's fine with him. Silence is fine. It lets him turn the thoughts through his head. Debate how to broach the hundreds of subjects bouncing around in his brain. But it turns out, he doesn't have to. She's speaking. Taking the lead. Like always.]

[Slowly, he tears his gaze away from the ground. She's on his good side. The unscarred side. So he can look at her sidelong while she speaks, and see her in perfect clarity. All of that tracks, for her, absolutely. He almost laughs, and settles for a quiet huff of breath instead. A pause, in silence, before he speaks up, quietly, firmly:]

You won't. [Perfect surety. Perfect faith. Nothing about that insanity changed his mind.] We know better now. Besides... you'll still have my ass to yank back down to earth.

[More quiet. Companionable, this time. Chewing over the things he wants to say. Doesn't know how to say. Might as well start with admitting his own problems, before trying to broach the bigger ones.]

... But I don't know how much good I'll be in a firefight. They... whatever that was. It messed with what Chakwas did. After Omega.

[What the Normandy's doctor had to slap in place to keep him in one piece.]

Canon Update h/c

[earthborn]

It comes to her in the night.

The new quarters are nice, the bed much larger, the door one that locks. There's even a window, unshared; and if they've put her a bit farther away than most sergeants, then it's no hardship. She isn't ashamed to stack a second footlocker next to her own, and anyone who wants to report her for fraternization is welcome to be laughed at for their trouble. Once tolerated, the quiet flaunting of regs is practically a condoned measure. And anyways, she does what she wants. Even so, there's no such thing as safety, not from the magic of this place.

The visions that come to her aren't nightmares, they're memories. She wakes with them still playing out across her retinas; the vancouver skyline, in flames, Palaven smudged with splatters of fire, Mordin's final words, and Thane's gasping breath as he dies. She stumbles out of bed, gracelessly overturning the rudely-joined desk-chair, and falls onto hands and knees, then staggers back to her feet, visions of an impossible past, an unknown future, still parading before her eyes. Menae, Tuchanka, the Citadel half-ruined by Cerberus soldiers, Rannoch, Geth, and Earth.

"Fuck," She whispers, throat full of acid and hoarse with the horror, utterly caught in the whirl of it all, "God damn it."

Shepard has no idea how she manages the door, but it falls open under her hands and she goes down onto hands and knees again in the corridor, blind to anything but the Reapers bearing down on her, Garrus and Tali, Liara and Javik, James and Sam, and EDI, and... and a beam of light. She retches, empty, profoundly disoriented, and waits for it to clear, somehow, blind to all the world.

[thearchangel]

It is nice to have a door with a lock. Less like being a brand new recruit, and more like actually being a competent soldier. He'd worried a little, though, not for himself. Why would he be worried about his own status, after all? If his presence did something to hurt her career... even here...

But apparently that was just him overthinking as usual.

It's a perfectly normal night, he's draped all over the bed and, consequently, her, absolutely sacked out. At least until Shepard wakes up. Then he comes awake immediately, bolt upright and casting around for the problem, the wake-up call. Something. There's only the quiet room and -

"Shepard!"

Something's wrong. Something is deeply, horribly wrong. He's on his feet, he's in motion to try and help. Try and do something. A nightmare? They've never been this bad. She's never gotten fully up and staggered, never done anything like this. His hands are at her shoulders before she makes it into the hall.

It's a good thing, then, that they're a bit apart from the other rooms. Because he'd be damned if he let anyone else run into this. Again - for her sake. He's on his knees too, his hands hovering, to shake her shoulders, try to see her face. He can't check her vitals without his visor, it -

"Wake up!"

[earthborn]

Oh, but she is awake— or maybe it's just that her eyes are open. Her head tilts back, answering gravity and his urgency in a floppy, unfocused manner. She looks at him with a wide-eyed, crazed expression, pale and sweating. Her cybernetic scars are glowing with unusual vividness in the dark, almost visibly overheating with the overload of stress.

"Thane's dead," Shepard's voice is dull and distracted, trying to parse whatever she's seeing, the whole jumbled mess of the long months spent fighting the Reapers all dumped into her in one disorganized lump, "Leng. He's going after the... The temple. And Miranda."

Her expression crumples into a grimace that she fights to clear.

"Goddammit. Thessia. Fucking Leng," This time the name comes out with real malice, rage making it into a growl, "Cerberus morons. Don't they know... Oh shit. Shit. Earth. Oh god."

She puts a hand on his chest, the other around his wrist, and uses Garrus for leverage to stand. She has to lean on the doorjamb, and it's a wobbly lean, clutching her head. For a moment she just tries to breath, balanced there, leaning back and forth against the wood and his steadying hand, and then shoves past him towards the window. It's closed, barred, and insulated against the winter chill, but Shepard claws it open with little regard for the integrity of the shutters and—

—and for one wild, insane moment, considers simply jumping. It's far enough down, it'd probably work, and—

The impulse passes as abruptly as it had come and Shepard simply stands there letting the cold air wash over her, the sweat like ice, sharp, cold, and grounding. She breathes.

"I'm sorry," She says, in that same harried, scattered tone, "I... I can't keep doing this to you. I should've... I'm sorry Garrus. I can't keep any promises this time. Damn, there's even a bar!"

That's funny, and she laughs, but the leading edge of hysteria comes into it and she fights to lock it down, with limited success. Shepard can only imagine what this looks like.

"...I think. I think I remember all of it, now. The whole war. I know how it ends."

[thearchangel]

Some stupid part of his brain says "Yes, he is, and?" when she mentions Thane. It takes him a minute to recall. Remember her last events were on Earth. Before anything happened. Before the Reapers. And... now...

He puts his arm around her waist, stepping close to help her stand. Nothing else of what she says is familiar. He knows that "Leng" name. The bastard responsible for taking one of their own, the one who got away during that mess of a coup attempt. But the rest is just confusing. What about Thessia? What the hell happened to Thessia?

Granted, it's probably the same damn thing that happened to Palaven, Earth, and countless other worlds, but -

That thought doesn't get very far. She's pulled away, for the window, and for some heart-stopping moment, he thinks she might not stop moving. So he bolts after her. The fact he smacks into the wall when she actually stops, when she just stares out, is a minor inconvenience. "What - ? What are you apologizing for? What's happening!"

His own tone is equal parts frantic and scared. He can feel his mandible all but drumming against his jaw, rapid motion of uncertainty. There's no way to tone it down, and he doesn't even bother trying. Not right now.

I know how it ends

Apparently, he didn't need to try.

Everything goes still. Absolutely frozen. It feels like the ground just falls away under him, like the whole room has plunged into ice water. He's glad he smacked into the wall, because he doesn't think he'd stay upright, otherwise. He still reaches out. For her shoulder, to steady her, to hold onto someone, something.

"I... are you okay?" A lame, fumbling question, he knows. And he can't think of a better one. This is his priority. She's his priority.

Event | Solvunn Switcheroo

[restingstitchface]

I thought an adventure might do me good.

[But?]

I woke up this morning to the sight of a cow outside my window.

[thearchangel]

Dr. Crane? Good to hear from you. Someone mentioned you made your way here.

Holding up all right?

[restingstitchface]

Of course. I would complain about wanting to return home, but worry I would never endure the irony.

[Because this planet isn't home, is it?]

[thearchangel]

I'm sure you would.

But how about - "Man I wish I could go back to where the snow isn't up to my ass"?