Three days leave
Alone.
Onboard a star-ship, being alone is a strange sensation. Where there should have been at least a crew of two hundred people, there was only me. I walked alone onboard my ship - overlooking the console and observing the beeping screens and walking through the high-backed leather chairs. A thin, tough carpet was underneath my feet, surprisingly comfortable as well as sturdy - and something that would put up with twenty or thirty years of wear and tear before showing even a scuff. A wonder of turian effort and care. It was functional and stylish - going well with the light blue of the ships main color theme. I liked blue.
Alone on the great ship Normandy, I walked slowly, singing under my breath an old song - something in one of the old tongues that were dying out in our history. A wonder of a universal translator was that any tongue could be translated. A shame was, that there was no longer as much variety with words and meanings. Everything was a little less mysterious - and a little more common every day. I would have been sad, but I didn't have much feeling either way on the matter. I had more important things on my mind.
I slid into a seat - and I was surprised at just how comfortable the leather and padding could feel. Against a sore body - in a uniform that wasn't too great to wear and chaffed a little from all the excitement that had been in it - a comfortable seat radiated its own sense of belonging, and was something very special for me. I sagged in deep - remembering the comfort a chair could bring. Captains rarely got to sit down on their ship - it made them look lazy, and get too used to being comfortable. That made them incompetent. I never sat on duty.
Thank God I'd let everyone have leave then, or they'd see me break one of my own rules.
"Computer, access holonet - news feeds - scan for anything interesting."
With a happy ding, the ships VI began to merrily search the feed-nets, and along all of the general news outlets, for anything that would be considered halfway interesting for me to read. It had taken a long while to break the VI into my definition of interesting - it definitely wasn't Elcor performing Macbeth, for that matter. No offense to the artists out there, but I didn't think it was a good idea.
As the VI worked and ran its merry little search, I laid back further in my chair and put my feet up on the console, and laid back, relaxing in the seat and even letting it tilt backwards a bit. My eyes closed, hair fell down into my face, and I sighed, blissfully. It was good to relax, even for just a few days. Everyone deserved the break - and they'd been given extra pay. God knew the local economy I'd picked could use the resources. A beach-planet, with many archipelagos, beautiful storms, and old ruins to take tours through. I liked it - they loved it - and I could get some much-needed shut-eye.
Not that I had pleasant dreams. Not since the colony of Akuze. Always the memories came as flashes of terrible feeling of dread, of foreboding. I'd volunteered, stupidly, to go with an assembled team that was meant to contact and see what was going on with the new colony. Sometimes, things broke, things didn't get put up - storms, asteroids, all sorts of things could go wrong on a colony world. Hell, I could remember.
But every time I let myself remember, the dreams came. A flash of metal and steel. Words that were lost in the haze of adrenaline. I always got an adrenaline high when dropping from a ship, I couldn't help that. And as soon as we set down, five-kilometers from the colony edge, it would begin. A rumble in the ground. A feeling of fear.
God, the fear. The sound was like a train and a howler monkey, and the rumble beneath the earth was like a small earthquake localized to drive your psyche into a primal panic. And then ground erupted, not less than three feet from me. A body caught and impaled by those giant teeth, chewing through armor, shattering shields, guns firing without a noticeable impact on the hard scale of the bastards. Acid burned - splashed near to me. The acidic smell had gagged me, nearly dissolved my sinuses. I had began to run - the ground rolled underneath and I dove to the side. Blood. The rake of rock across my throat - up and behind the ear - tearing flesh, scarring me. How did I live? I don't remember.
Running. Panting. Bleeding. Woozy. Sweat getting into the wound, dodging to the side the burn as metal dissolved around my arm - burning along the protective clothing. I still had the scar on my left arm - it'd only taken six months to get movement and feeling back. Thank god for the medical fields superior advancement and limb-augmentation.
I don't remember anything after that, except for waking up, screaming inside of a military hospital room on some planet I couldn't remember. I'd been in a coma for weeks - I'd been found, unconscious and nearly dead at the landing zone, covered in acid-burns. Why they hadn't finished me off was beyond my reasoning. The burns were on my chest, thighs, my left side. My neck ached from the massive cut - the skin turned to pucker up and heal over in a thin ridge that was very unattractive. I'd been unconscious and moaning about thresher-maws for weeks when I had awoken. It'd taken quite little time to calm me, but a lot before I could function again. But I'd made it. I'd made it, and fought to stay enlisted. If only to prove to myself I could do it.
I did, even if I paid the price for it.
I startled and fell backwards off of my seat - landing with a painful thud that sent the keypad into the air and my head bouncing off the carpet. Though it could handle even a Krogan stomping through - the cushioning wasn't enough for a hard head like I had. I winced, seeing stars - and slowly rose up to see a pair of black pupils staring down at me, like a hawk watching a curious little mouse. I wasn't prey for this bird - a bird with a face that was almost human, a face that made me smile just a bit. The blue marks along the well-armored face were comforting and familiar, as was the hand that reached down to help me up to my feet.
"Sheppard, are you alright?"
"Yeah, just seeing how comfortable the carpet is. You should try it." I replied, a touch on the sardonic side of things. He looked down, his face still but for the small, practically invisible twitches and constrictions around the eyes and positions of the beak and head, then gave me a shrug. He'd learned that from me, just as I'd learned how to keep a still face. It was a blast when playing at the casinos. No one could read me.
Except for the damn biotics.
"Mind if I join you?"
"Sure, plenty of carpet to go around." I used a foot to tip one of the nearby chairs over - and he gave me a most curious look - as though he had half expected me to do something like that. And, to my surprise, he laid down and back, his head near mine, as we both looked up at the slowly rotating star-field map. The thing was gorgeous, much like a living piece of artistry that cost as much as most colony ships. I watched it slowly swirl and turn, providing up-to-the-hour updates on everything that would be of importance to any half-bit commander going into the field.
He rested his tough-scaled head next to mind and I bumped heads with him - if only to get a little more comfortable. After a nightmare, it was good to search for a way to find calm and relax. If I let the nightmares control me, then I was giving into my fears. I was an ineffective soldier, I was a failure, and I was a coward if I let the fears control me to the point of irrationality. Not that I was exactly rational by most standards.
Who else would disobey orders, steal their own ship from dock, and fly off to an unknown world to battle a far-superior opponent? Then again, that was a uniquely human trait.
"What's on your mind, Garrus?"
"A lot of things, recently. Reconstruction of the citadel. C-sec. My father. What he'd think of me going into my training as a specter, after all this time. You."
"Me?" I asked, wiggling my feet in lazy circles in the air. It was good to work the ankles - let them stay limber when I had to do a long sprint across an open field - or between cover when blowing the shit out of the geth. Running was a life-saving technique. "Why me? I'm sure you've got something more important on your mind."
"Not as much as you'd think, commander. You are an important part of my--our lives - everyone's life. You are a hero. You stopped Saren, you saved a few colonies, you‘ve even helped foster a better human-turian relationship. You are something, someone, that everyone looks up to as a real hero. Not just as a member of a good species, but as a shining example of what anyone can be if they let themselves."
I looked away from the map - along the ceiling of the ship - and then over towards Garrus, his eyes half closed as though trying to reign in his words to avoid making a fool of himself. In truth, I'd never think of him as a fool. Maybe as a bit naive, maybe even a little young, but not a fool. I didn't say anything, I wanted to hear him talk. He had a nice voice, when he wasn't so self-conscious.
"I mean, look, Sheppard, even disobeying orders, even stealing a ship, even doing things that would get anyone else court-marshaled, and executed, you pull it off with such a finesse that you get rewarded for it. If any turian had done that, they'd face exile at the very least."
"Garrus." I said, very softly.
"Y-yes, commander?" Giving into an outburst wasn't like him, even if he was known to stand and argue for what he stood for when the time was right. To hear him talk passionately was good. Very good. He looked over at me as I turned onto my side, and leaned in a little closer to him.
"You really like me, don't you?"
He was quiet. He didn't answer right away, and just looked distantly, towards the hallway, the walkway - towards the freedom of a decontamination port and the warmth of a sunny, high-radiation day on the beach planet. He looked for a long moment, and let out a long, slow breath. He didn't face me, as he answered.
"I appreciate you, and everything you've done for me, for us. For the galaxy. You're a good person - you make sure things are done for the best of reasons. You..."
Maybe it was the two shots of tequila I'd had before returning to the ship. That was probably it. Maybe it was the fact there was no one else on the ship - that helped a lot, I think. Maybe it was the way he talked about me - appreciating me -t hat made me want to shut him up just a little bit. I think that did it too. But for whatever reason, I needed him to stop talking. Talk, he talked quite a bit when he had the chance. And god, I loved the softness of his voice - but I didn't want something soft, right now. Whatever the reason - maybe just the memory of how alone I'd been - I did something a little bit rash, a little bit dangerous, and something very unexpected.
I gave him a kiss.
His eyes closed tightly - as my lips met his, and my tongue brushed along the slender, smooth organ in his mouth. My breath and his met and was shared, as I suckled at his tongue, and his beak held and gaped open just a little, to work my lips against the hardness of his mouth. For as strong and durable the scale-plates were, they were only hiding a softness inside - a gentleness that I was able to savor. And really, his mouth had a musky flavor to it - it was a taste that lit my nerves on fire, and made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
He was a good kisser.
I don't know how long we kissed, how long we shared that moment together. Really, I don't think how long it was mattered - what mattered was that it was shared between two people who cared for one another - a comforting moment that wouldn't be dulled or turned away by anything. His mouth held mine and his hands cupped behind my head, the three fingered hands digging in carefully into my dyed hair. We shared the moment, and slowly broke apart - leaving him gasping, and me feeling like I'd ran a marathon.
God he was a good kisser.
"Sheppard." He whispered. "What...?"
I didn't let him get any further, as I pushed my body against his own, and curled my form over the heat of his body. He was warm - a byproduct of his strange biology. So very warm, it made me shiver and tremble through my flight suit, as my tongue again met his, and I ran my fingers along the side of his face, and down, throat, chest, over his sides to feel him through the thin clothing he himself wore. His body was hard, but strong - deceptively so as he held me to his body. I didn't know how long the feeling had brewed in him, but I'd wanted him since the first moment my eyes had seen him in action. And how he made me gasp - when he suckled at my lips, my tongue. A beak wasn't good for it, but oh he tried.
I held and curled against him for the longest of time, before slowly lifting my head up - dazed, panting, confused and loving every bit of it. He sat up with me and stared at me, a bit of my lipstick smeared against his mouth. He didn't seem to mind, or even notice, as he panted. A battle was shared between two lovers, who sought a refuge from reality in each others arms. I swallowed and leans in closer - and gave him a sultry look that could cross species barriers. I leaned in closer - affording a careful draw of my cheek against his own. Oh, he liked the sensation and returned the nuzzle with his own.
"Some of the crew might notice us, if we don't go to my quarters, Garrus." I shivered, his name was sending hot little electric shocks through my body. I liked it. And seeing him look at me with eyes that hungered, I wanted him more.
"Sheppard, if there is one thing you have taught me about human behavior, about being a hero - about being true to ones own self, it's this." He said, pushing his chest against mine. My nipples grew stiff from even this brief contact, and it made my belly grow tight. "Who gives a damn what other people think, any more?"
I'd like to say I gave him a witty reply. I'd love to say that I told him to get a hold of himself, and get to my quarters with me. I'd most definitely hate to say that he pulled my clothing open, and touched me here, there, everywhere. But truth be told - he used me, and I used him. He took from me, his body against mine, and I accepted him - and rode his body as he shoved himself into me. Our mouths met, as his mouth met mine. My cunny clenched and his heavy, full testes met my haunches again and again and again. We made love on the deck of the Normandy, over the chairs, against the console - we made love and tasted one another by lips and tongue as we fucked onboard my ship. And in every moment, every pulse of every one of his orgasms, I found the fiery release of ecstasy through my body. He played my body as I would use an instrument to make beautiful sound. He was a glorious lover - and every shot of fire that filled me, ran down my thighs, stained my tongue and lips was only a testament of his prowess.
We made it to my quarters. Eventually. And, when he finally let me get to sleep, I can say I slept wonderfully, fulfilled, with his hands holding my hips, his head on my shoulder, and his heat buried very deep inside of me. When I slept, I slept the sleep of contented exhaustion, and din either of us moved a muscle from where we collapsed together. Thankfully, it was upon my bed. I slept well, I slept contented, and awoke to his body still holding mine, and not leaving me alone for the rest of leave...
It was an exciting three days.