Her hand squeezed his. He leaned in and pressed his forehead to hers. They were alone. Just the two of them and for the first time in a while, there was no immediate crisis. Perfect stillness, no injuries to nurse or bad news to chew on or plans to draw-up. Just two people resting after a workout. Like any other folks out in the Milky Way. It would be almost easy to get caught up in that thought and never look back. Pretend they weren’t the Galaxy’s first line of defense. But then, any immediate mental image he summoned of her involved Alliance red in some capacity. Casual sweats, polished N-7 armor, the patch on her jacket sleeve. He really had to focus to separate her from her work in his head. Someday, he hoped, he’d struggle to remember what her uniform looked like.
That was where he got the idea, in the first place.
Hello @sumomoblossom77! <3 <3 <3 You are such a gem; this is a cute one! I got a liiiiiittle carried away on the background bits, but here we go!
For the Angst/Fluff Prompt List!
Shopping
Officially, they were there to resupplyafter spending some time tracking down information for the Crucible.Officially.
Unofficially, Rae had received a comm fromJack, who happened to be in Citadel space on leave from training her babybiotics, and had immediately taken the lift down to the CIC and approachedJoker in her pajamas to tell him to turn the rig around. Apparently, the pilotwas more than happy to steer them towards shore leave instead of some far-flungrock in the middle of an asteroid field. Garrus leaned in the doorway as shebuilt her argument, having followed her thinking something might be wrong. Raedid not often stop to explain what she was doing or why. Either way, Jokerwasn’t going to argue and even EDI seemed on-board. By the time they went backto bed, they were on course, and when he rolled over in his sleep to feel hermissing, he woke up to Rae standing in the middle of her cabin in a towel,digging through her closet for a set of civvies.
(Continued under the cut!)
She bumped his hip with her own as theydisembarked and headed for the Silversun strip. Apparently, Jack had alreadymade plans for herself and Rae. They said goodbye outside one of thestorefronts and Rae took off, practically skipping. It wasn’t every day shetook some down time to see a friend. Nice to see her smile like that.
Garrus took the elevator to the refugeecamps set up on the docks. The Turian camp wasn’t holding up too poorly. Duringhis last visit, he had sent requisition lists to the Turian embassy, and itlooks like the supplies had made it. Mostly medigel and those modular temporaryhousing units, but it was better than nothing. His contact in the docks,Kyrdos, assured him that they were finding space for everyone. Still, in theshort time Garrus was there, the community on the docks accepted three newrefugees—two from Palaven and one from Epyrus.
He decided to give himself a littlebreather as well, since the camp was in good shape and Rae was still with Jack.Figured he’d earned it, given all the overtime he’d been putting in fighting Reaperson-foot and running back and forth across the Galaxy. Besides, he’d better takehis own advice, or he’d never convince Rae that running herself into the groundwas a bad idea.
The Zakera Ward was still half underconstruction, but it was in far better shape than anything on the Tayseri Ward,and at least the café he liked was still up and running. After the attack, itwas one of the few places that still had halfway decent Palaveni food. Not likeTurians were known for their cuisine, but sometimes it was just nice to get alittle taste of home.
He snagged lunch and took off for the Commonsto browse the shops. That was one of the things he’d forgotten he’d liked.Sometimes, it was just nice to browse the stores on the citadel and look at allthe newest mods and tech. Besides—practical applications. He wouldn’t buyanything he wouldn’t use, and tuning up his gear would be a nice way to winddown back aboard the Normandy. Alittle treat, since there was almost never time to tinker anymore.
Kassa Fabrications had the same crapinventory they’d had the last time he’d stopped by and checked, so that was abit of a bust. Nos Astra had a couple of Rosenkov armor mods that lookedpromising, but weighing out the specs, there really wasn’t a vast differencebetween the mod he was eyeing and the one already installed on his chestplatethat boosted his shields, so it wouldn’t be worth the price, especially notsince shortages had made supplies so damned expensive. He did pick up a littlesomething for his rifle at the Cipritine Armory, but they didn’t have anythingelse that really caught his eye. In fairness, Rae’s entire crew was routinelyoffered gear either before or right as it hit the market, so he was ahead on alot of the trends already. Afterall, everyone wanted the Shepard team to havethe latest tech; how else could she be expected to pull off the impossibleevery other week? He shouldn’t be disappointed, but still. Some part of himmissed the long hours spent building, repairing, and modding. Quiet, except forthe whir of the ship in the background. Rae had suggested that he take uppuzzles. Maybe he would.
He didn’t have high hopes for AegohrMunitions, but he stopped by anyways, just in case. Their catalogue had reallybeen hit by the shortages; it looked like most of their side-arms had beensold-out completely, and they only had one low-end scope in stock. He was aboutto walk away from the kiosk when he spotted it. The Kuwashii Visor. Fullycustomizable, average battery life of eighty hours (Palaven time, though hecould figure out the conversions to Earth time she asked), multi-window readoutwith enough memory to store a library of vids and presets to track heatsignatures, heartrates for up to twenty targets, environmental factors,radiation signatures…you name it, the Kuwashii can trace it. At least, that’swhat the advertisements said. The screen panel was a little big for his tastes,but Rae. Rae had been looking for one. She’d been eyeing it for weeks—saving upwhatever pay the Alliance sent whenever she could. With the lines ofcommunication all shot to hell, though, she hadn’t gotten much. The Normandy tended to get by becauseeveryone was willing to fund the Shepard crew now that they finally believedher, but that didn’t leave a lot of credits left over to buy herself thespecific gear she wanted. For now, they were getting by on donations half thetime.
The human model was a little more expensivethan the Turian model (figures), but still affordable. He wouldn’t have muchleft over after, but what else would he spend it on anyways? This was tooperfect to pass up.
He asked the Salarian behind the counter ifhe could have it gift-wrapped, but he wasn’t surprised the answer was “no.” Nota concern. He’d gotten good at making-do.
Garrus beat Rae back to the ship andscrounged around in her cabin, looking for something to wrap the box in. It wasan Earth custom, something Rae had showed him. Humans liked to cover theirgifts to each other in brightly-colored paper. All they did was tear the paperapart, but if it made her happy, he’d do it.
She didn’t have much. Paper was an Earthexport, and Earth wasn’t in a place to be exporting frivolous junk, so heimprovised and wadded the box up in a clean towel. Close enough.
It was late enough anyways where he decidedto stay on the ship and wait for her to return. Besides, that gave him some timeto tweak the barrel on his rifle with the newest mod he’d snagged. He spent afew peaceful hours by himself before she pinged his omni. Universal message tothe whole crew. Returning to ship. Departurein Tminus 1 hour. All aboard. Liara sent back affirmative. James messaged andif I’m running late? Shepard’s second message to the crew read Anyone running late can join the Keepers. Hearthey’re looking for people to clean the vents. James messaged back On my way.
At least everyone was in good spirits.
He waited patiently for her to make it upto her cabin, sitting way too stiffly on her couch. She probably made therounds first. Check to make sure everyone makes it back aboard safely, set acourse with Joker, check her messages with Traynor. Sure enough, right as theywere taking off again, the door to her cabin slid open and she stretched, yawningwidely as she kicked off her boots.
“Did you have a good time?”
She grinned at him softly when she droppedonto the couch.
“I did,” she said. Rae looked like she wascovered in at least eight new bruises, just based on what he could see of herarms. “Remind me to take you to Arimax at some point.”
“The arena?”
“Yeah. They let us go a few rounds forfree.” Rae slumped and exhaled at the same time and for a second, it lookedalmost like she was deflating. Still, even with her eyes half-closed, nothingcould have wiped that contented grin off her face.
“How’d you do?”
“High score! Jack used her biotics to breakoff a panel from the arena and use it as a shield while we were running. It wasbrilliant! Probably not a legal maneuver, but brilliant!”
Warmth spread through the pit of his gut asshe described it, grinning widely to show all of those blunt little teeth. Thrilled.Rae was absolutely thrilled. She detailed all eight bouts in a meticulousplay-by-play. Every step, every strike, every high-five. There was nothingbetter in the world than hearing her laugh hysterically through a descriptionof how she drop-kicked a broken turret into a mock Cerberus mech and blew it topieces.
Next to seeing Jack, his present was goingto fall a little flat, but regardless, once she settled a bit and after shetold him all about the match where they faced a team of computer-generated Shepards,he pulled out the little box from under the coffee table and set it on her lap.
For a second, she just stared. Then,realizing that there was a box under the mound of towel he’d given her, shelaughed hysterically. Not the reaction he’d expected, but still good.
“Is this my face cloth?”
“Well,” he sighed. “You said humans wrappresents, but I couldn’t find any paper.”
That sent her into another spiral ofgiggles, and she laughed so long he was a little concerned he’d done somethingwrong. When she finally calmed down and swiped the tears from the corners ofher eyes (a good sign, she assured him; a good cry, not a bad cry), she peeled thetowel back from the visor. It took her a minute to read, her eyes dartingback-and-forth as she skimmed all four paragraphs of text on the side of thebox. One she set it down, though, she pushed herself up into his arms andkissed his mandible.
“You got this for me?”
“This is the one you wanted, right?”
“Yes!” She turned the box over in herhands, grinning like her face would split in two. “This is the exact one I wanted.How did you remember?
“I’m a genius, clearly.”
“Garrus.” Her arms wrapped around his neck,pulling him down far enough where she could press her forehead to his. “Thankyou for thinking of me.”
“Well. No problem,” he said. Garrus brushedsome hair back from her face. The pad of his thumb brushed over her constellationof freckles—tiny splotches sprinkled over her cheeks and nose. “You’re alwayson my mind.”
