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“The Seaside Island Beach Pool & Spa is the only recreational swimming pool on the whole Citadel. Founded by legendary Volus visionary, Appo Sen, this palatial oasis is an engineering marvel and absolutely no expense was spared during its construction. The Seaside Island Beach Pool & Spa is open to all races and is dextro/levo friendly--”
“Joker, if you keep reading that stupid ad out loud, I’m going to make you eat the whole damn datapad,” Ashley threatened, glaring daggers over her cup of coffee. It was morning on the Normandy SR-1. Two full days of shore leave were ahead of the crew and spirits were riding high. Most spirits, anyway.
“Oh, come on, Ash. Don’t be such a spoilsport.” Joker lowered the datapad and waggled his eyebrows at her. He got an eye roll in return.
The mess area was noisy with most of the crew gathered and swapping big plans. Though Joker’s voice rang out over the din with ease.
“The Seaside Island Beach Pool and Spa is the relaxation destination on the whole station.”
“Tell us how big it is again, Joker, please,” Kaidan said in a child-like voice as he sat down next to Joker. He grinned at Ashley’s sour expression.
“Why over 113 thousand liters of the cleanest chlorinated water this side of Cincinnati.”
“What’s a cincinnati?” Garrus asked Tali. They sat further down the table from the group of very loud humans. She shrugged.
“You two want to come swimming with us?” Joker asked, leaning forward in his seat.
“Explain to me what that is again?” Tali rested her chin on her hand. “I don’t think I understood last time.”
“So you take a whole mess of water, right? And then you put yourself in it. That’s pretty much all there is,” Joke explained.
“And this is… fun?” she asked, not sound very convinced. Garrus chuckled.
“Hell yeah!”
“Hmm. I will pass. My suit may be water-tight, but it is still not submersible.” Tali turned back to her book.
“Boo.” Joker gave her a comically large frown.
Further discussion was stopped as Commander Shepard stepped into the room in an obvious hurry. The Alliance crew started to rise to their feet, but she waved them back down from attention.
“Hey, Commander, how about you?” Joker asked, turning in his seat to follow her.
She knelt down behind the counter. “How about me what?” She stood back up, one of the horrid breakfast bars in between her teeth and another in hand.
“You want to come to the best place on the Citadel?” Joker asked.
“You’ll have to be more specific,” she said around a mouthful.
“A bunch of us are going swimming at the new pool that opened. Want to come?” Kaidan stepped in.
Shepard nodded in understanding and swallowed. “Ah. Sorry, no. I’ve got meetings with the Council all day.”
“Oo. And what lucky few get to join you on that thrilling adventure?” Joker asked. Everyone suddenly found very interesting things to look at besides Shepard.
She smiled. “No one. I think I can handle a few debriefs without backup.” The entire table let out a collective breath. Shepard tossed the wrapper into the trash and started opening another bar as she headed for the stairs. “Stay out of trouble. I’m not bailing anyone out this time.”
“So Shepard’s out, Tali’s out, Liara’s busy.” Joker counted on his fingers.
“You’re too scared to ask Wrex,” Ashley commented.
“Oh, yes, definitely. So that just leaves…” Joker smiled and pointed down the table with a grin. “Come on, Vakarian. We could make it a fun guys outing.”
“Hey, I’m coming,” Ashley objected.
“Fine. A guys outing, plus Ashley.”
“Thank you, but no,” Garrus said.
“Suit yourself. To the Seaside Island Beach Pool!” Joker stood to leave the mess hall.
“And Spa,” Kaidan reminded.
“And Spa!” Joker cheered as he left.
“You grew up planetside. Did you ever swim?” Tali asked Garrus, watching the rest of the crew follow Joker and Kaidan.
Garrus shook his head. “Palaven is a desert climate. The water we do have isn’t for recreation.”
She nodded. “Same for the Flotilla. Though I still don’t understand what would make submerging yourself in an environment that you can’t survive in fun.”
This was Garrus’ favorite part of being on the Normandy. Sure the Mako was great and chasing after Saren had been exciting so far. But getting a front row seat to watch the interaction between completely disparate species never stopped being interesting. He’d known a little about humans from his studies in school. But that had hardly prepared him to work with the real thing.
There was always something new and weird about them. This morning it was swimming. Last week it was some animal called a pug. And a few weeks before, it was dressage. Even with the vids they’d shown him, Garrus still wasn’t convinced that horse dancing was a real thing. But Humanity always seemed so blissfully unaware of how odd they were in most every respect. Or at least Joker was.
“So since you’re not going to the Citadel’s premiere relaxation station—or whatever,” Tali started.
“Destination,” Garrus filled in.
“Yes, that. What are your plans for shore leave? I think there’s another group hitting the clubs.”
“We’ll see. I don’t really have any plans right now. Just see where the day may take me.”
The day, however, didn’t take him much of anywhere. He stopped by C-Sec to chat with the one or two of the people he actually liked. They had the usual problems, public drunkenness by the clubs, a new mysterious red sand distributor, smugglers at the docks. He could decide if it was disheartening or not that nothing much had changed there.
He checked in on his apartment, watered the already dead plant. He answered a few mails from his sister. But by the day’s end, he had to admit that it felt like he’d wasted the time. Which was a shame; shore leave was a rare commodity aboard the Normandy.
As he didn’t much feel like going to a club and sitting around his apartment was getting more depressing by the minute, he went on a walk. After an hour or so he realized that he was somehow on the same level as the heavily lauded pool. He stopped. Had Joker’s consistent badgering about this damned pool actually influenced him? Maybe Joker was in the wrong line of work.
Damn him if Garrus wasn’t curious what the actual place looked like now. It couldn’t hurt to take a peek. The place would be closed by now, but maybe he could look in the window. And no one would be the wiser. It was a pretty good plan, he thought. Till he rounded the corner and almost walked right into Commander Shepard. She was kneeling by the door to the pool, her omnitool glowing and a duffel bag at her feet.
“Garrus!” She hopped up, but her foot caught on the bag and she started to trip backwards. Garrus quickly reached out and caught her wrist, steadying her. “Thanks.”
“Commander.” He looked between her omnitool and the door. She quickly turned it off and looked a little sheepish. “Wha-- Never mind.”
She rubbed a hand on the back of her neck. “Is there any chance that I could just say I was tying my shoe by this door with my omnitool out and we can both walk away?”
Garrus laughed a little. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that you’re trying to break into this place.”
She crossed her arms and looked him up and down. “As a C-Sec officer on an extended leave of absence, do you have some sort of moral duty that would compel you to turn me in?”
“Absolutely not.”
A wide smile spread across her face, a hint of devious plans in her eyes. It was the first time he’d ever seen her smile like that. He almost wished he was physically capable of returning it.
“Perfect,” she said. “I am trying to break in, but the encryption is surprisingly complex. Can you give it a try?”
“Sure.” He knelt down and brought up his own omnitool. She walked a few steps away and abruptly flattened herself against the wall. “What are you doing?”
She looked back at him and frowned. “Look out, obviously. You think this is my first time breaking into a swimming pool?”
He looked at her for a moment, unable to tell if she was joking. He settled for nodding and starting up his decryption programs.
She was right. They’d broken into mercenary base camps with less encryption than this pool. A few minutes passed and he’d barely made a dent.
“How’s it coming?” Her voice startled him as it was right next to his ear. He glanced over. She was leaning down behind him so she could read his screen, her cheek just inches from his.
“Uh. Good. About 30% of the way there.”
She nodded and solidly patted his shoulder.
“Our 3 is clear. I’m going to check our 9. Send up a smoke signal if you run into trouble.”
She jogged down to the other end of the short hall. This time he was sure she was joking, or at least having fun by taking this ‘mission’ far too seriously. One of his mandibles twitched in a half-smile.
He turned back to the decryption program and focused. He made a decent amount of progress, but his stride was broken when Shepard came running back.
“Garrus, Garrus. We got incoming bogeys at 10 o’clock. How much longer?”
“I still need another minute.”
He could hear them approaching the corner. It sounded like a rowdy group of teenagers. She picked up her bag and stood between him and the youths.
“We don’t have a minute. They’re going to round that corner any second.”
“Almost…” He winced and took a wild guess on the last block. It was a fifty-fifty shot. But the door unlocked. “Got it!”
“In, in, in!” Shepard pushed him hastily through the door, following close behind. The door behind them closed. They both held their breath as the group of teenagers passed by.
They looked at each other and then both burst into laughter.
“Thank you for your help,” she said after finally catching her breath.
“My pleasure, Commander.”
Both of their smiles disappeared when they heard the door in front of them lock.
“What was that?” she asked.
He scanned the door and sighed.
“Dammit. I must have tripped a security measure. It’s locked out my decryption program.”
She stood beside him and tried to read the screen.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, if I was better with electronics this wouldn’t stop me. But for right now, I can’t even try to unlock the door for the next…” he paused and double checked the reading. “Four hours.”
“Damn,” Shepard chuckled. He looked over at her. “Oh, come on. You have to admit this is a little funny.”
“It is a little,” he finally admitted.
“That’s the spirit.” She turned and headed for a door at the far side of the shallow lobby. Garrus looked between her and the door and then followed after her. “Sorry if this derailed any fun shore leave plans.”
“I... I didn’t have any anyway.”
She stopped and looked back at him. “We need to get you a girlfriend.”
“I’m not sure that would be any more of a guarantee.”
“Well, it’d certainly be more exciting than hanging out in a dark pool with your boss.” Her voice echoed in the large room.
There was a strong chemical odor, emanating from the large rectangular body of water in the center of the room. Shepard took a deep breath.
“I love the smell of chlorine in the morning,” she said as she wandered over to a panel on the wall and pressed a few buttons.
Lights in the walls of the pool turned on, casting dancing shadows on the ceiling. She pressed another button and a walled off corner of the pool erupted into bubbles. There were many flat chairs on the deck and the far wall had a very intricate mosaic of what he guessed was a seaside. Or perhaps a beach. Maybe even an island.
“Huh,” Shepard said, frowning a little as she looked around.
“What?” Garrus asked.
“I just… I thought it’d be bigger.”
He looked between her and the glowing pool. “How much more water do you need?”
“On Earth, the pools can get five, six times this large. Sometimes they even have pumps in the back that make the water move like waves.”
“Isn’t that more difficult to swim in?”
“Yeah, but that’s part of the fun.” Ah, yes. Inviting more danger, much more fun.
He refrained from further comment and walked towards the edge to stick a hand in the water. He quickly pulled his hand out. As he suspected--ice cold. ‘Friendly for all races’ was rarely true.
He saw something flash out of the corner of his eye. Glancing over, he caught a glimpse of the pale skin of Shepard’s back as she pulled off her shirt. He quickly looked away but not before noticing that the same freckles as on her face dusted the tops of her shoulders too.
“What are you doing?” He asked, still not looking at her.
“I’m… going swimming?” She passed by him, dressed in the clothes she normally wore to work out: shorts and a form fitting tank top. She grabbed a towel off a stand in the corner.
“Now?”
She looked at him oddly. “Garrus, I know we don’t know each other well, but rarely do I break into a place of business without doing what I mean to accomplish.” She dropped her belongings unceremoniously on one of the chairs.
“I suppose that makes sense.”
She nodded resolutely. “Now, you may want to stand back.” She took four running steps before leaping off the edge and pulling her knees up to her chest. She crashed into the water with an impressive splash that sent Garrus diving to escape. He succeeded, partially.
Her head popped up out of the choppy water a moment later, her red hair darker now and flat against her scalp. “Ah,” she sighed, spreading her arms to float on her back. “That’s the stuff.”
Garrus had never seen a human swim before. The few Turians he’d seen in water as deep as this had sunk like rocks. It was odd to see his commander floating idly at the top of the water in no apparent danger at all. She seemed ...relaxed even. She cracked open an eye to look at him.
“Come on in. The water’s fine.” She flicked a few drops his direction.
“For a human, maybe.”
“Oh, right.” She turned and paddled nearer to his edge of the pool. “You run, what, four degrees warmer?”
“Six.”
“Six. Right.” She appeared to think for a minute. Small water droplets were caught on her eyelashes. “You should try the hot tub.”
“Hot tub?”
“Yeah, over there.” She pointed to the walled off bubbling corner. He did notice a bit of steam rising from the turbulent surface. “Come on.”
She dove back under the water, splashing him again, and kicked her way to the other side. Garrus slowly made his way around the pool, keeping an eye on Shepard. But she made it to the tub before he did with seemingly no trouble.
“Try this one.”
He looked at the choppy water. Instinct was telling him that this was dangerous, to stay far away from the glowing death trap.
“I’m not so sure,” he said slowly.
“Don’t you trust me?” she said with a knowing smile.
“I haven’t decided yet.” He looked back at her cheerful face and tentatively reached into the water, still expecting the worst. However, it was warm. Not as warm as he’d like it, but not uncomfortable. The bubbles rolled over his skin pleasingly.
“That is nice,” he admitted. She nodded, obviously satisfied, and turned to splash away again.
It took Garrus a while to roll up his pant legs enough to stick his feet in the water. It took a few minutes but he could feel his muscles start to relax. Alright, he could understand why humans found this enjoyable. In the meantime, Shepard began methodically swimming from edge to edge of the pool. He didn’t realize there were so many different ways to propel oneself through the water. Some facing upwards, some under the surface entirely, some of her passes were fast, others seemed unnecessarily complicated. But after a short while, she went back to simply floating on her back, a slight smile on her face.
“So is swimming something that all humans enjoy?” he asked when she drifted nearer to him. She turned over and slipped over to the edge of the hot tub, folding her arms on the lip.
“Mostly, I think. Humans like being by the water, certainly.” She gestured to the mosaic behind him. “But I’ve always loved swimming.”
“Why?”
“It’s good exercise and um.” She stopped to think for a moment. “When I was a kid, I was in a program for… well, for poor kids. And they’d take us to do ‘enrichment activities’. Museums, and camps, and so on. But in the summer, we went swimming almost everyday. And it was the best.” She chuckled. “We’d play Sharks and Minnows, breathing contests… Mermaids.”
“What’s a mermaid?” he asked, his head tilting a little.
“A mythical Earth creature. Half-woman, half-fish,” she explained quickly.
“That sounds terrifying.”
“In some stories they sing and lure sailors to their deaths.” She waved her fingers spookily. “But they aren’t real.”
He nodded slowly. “Right. Because the animals that actually exist on Earth aren’t scary enough as is, humanity had to invent more.”
“Hey, I’ve seen pictures of what you have on Palaven. If you want to talk about scary--”
“Have you actually seen a moose?” he interrupted her.
She scoffed. “They’re herbivores! They’re not gonna eat anybody.”
“They’re the size of the Mako with huge bones growing out of their heads.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed. “How do you know so much about Earth animals?”
He recoiled a little, feeling a little embarrassed. “I watched a... a vid series about scary animals from the Human planet when I was young.”
Now she tilted her head. “Wait, are you talking about Earth’s Scariest Creatures ?”
“How do you know about that?”
“How do you know about that?” she shot back.
“I watched it growing up on Palaven.”
“Seriously?” She laughed and pulled herself up on the lip between the pools. “Why would they show it? It’s just very thinly veiled propaganda.”
“What do you mean?”
She levelled him a look. “Earth’s Scariest Creatures? ‘Don’t mess with Earth, even the pigeons will kill you.’ They made it not long after First Contact.”
Garrus chuckled. “I’m not sure the propaganda side translated cross-species. It was very popular with children.”
She smiled at him slyly. “So what was your favorite episode?”
“Panthers.”
“Of course it was.”
“Yours?”
“Great white sharks.”
“Of course it was.”
They both laughed. Garrus realized that this was the longest conversation he’d ever had with Commander Shepard, especially about anything other than their mission. She’d always been cordial even with the striations of rank strictly observed. But this was different. She was different. She wasn’t Commander Shepard here, she was just Shepard. He hadn’t ever known any of his previous commanders as anything more than their titles. He wondered if it was a human habit, or a Shepard one.
She dipped her feet into the bubbling hot tub and frowned a little.
“This could be warmer.” She stood up, carefully balancing on the border between the bodies of water, and hopped to the deck. “It’s called a hot tub, not a tepid tub.” She pulled her hair over one shoulder and squeezed out some of the excess water as she walked over to a desk in the corner. “There’s usually a temperature control somewhere.” She lifted up a stack of brochures.
“So this really isn’t the first pool you’ve broken into?” Garrus asked, watching her methodically search the desk. She looked up and shook her head.
“Nope. Hell, this isn’t even the first time I’ve been locked in one either.” She opened a drawer and smiled. “Here we go.” She brandished a datapad and slowly made her way back towards the hot tub as she perused the pad. “Oh yeah. 35 degrees, who likes that? Let’s try… 40.” She tapped a few buttons on the pad. The bubbles under Garrus’ feet doubled in speed. He could feel warm water rushing from the jets. Oh, this was very nice.
“So when was the first time?” he asked as she sat back down on the perpendicular wall from him. She handed him the pad.
“If it gets too hot, you can turn that dial down.” She pointed to the screen and lowered herself into the tub fully with a sigh. “It was sort of a local tradition to break into the community pool on the last day of summer and stay all night. Watch the sunrise the next morning.” She ducked her head, suppressing a grin. “I had a ...wild youth. Rebellious teenage years, I’m sure you understand.”
Garrus frowned a little. “Not really. Between the Hierarchy and my father, I was kept on a pretty short lead. Too busy for rebellion.”
She looked at him for a moment then slowly nodded. “So that explains it,” she said softly.
“What?”
“You’re getting your rebellion out now.”
“I am… No, I’m not.”
“Come on, Garrus, I read your file. You have a spotless military record. You’re one of C-Sec’s best detectives. They’re obviously grooming you for big things. I read all that and thought, why the hell is this guy joining me, a human, to go chase after something that most people don’t even believe exists?”
“But… you’re a Spectre and we both know that Saren is up to something,” he insisted.
“Yeah, but you’re not following the plan. Whether it’s your plan, your dad’s plan, the Hierarchy’s. By joining me, you’re not playing their game anymore. You’re seeing what else it out there.”
He blinked a few times and looked away. How did she have him so thoroughly pegged? More importantly, how did he not realize this himself?
“Now, don’t get me wrong. I am very glad you chose to join me. I’d probably be dead by now without you. But… this is textbook rebellion.” She smiled a little at him. “Embrace it. It’s an exciting time.”
“I never really thought about it like that,” he said, slowly.
“If anything this is the better way to go about it. Much better than say… oh, I don’t know, breaking into your high school and releasing all the frogs in the biology lab.”
“Speaking from personal experience?”
“No, that was somebody else I knew,” she lied obviously.
He chuckled a little. “So as the rebel with years of experience, what does one typically do when locked in a swimming pool?”
She tapped a finger against her chin. “Well, there’s the obvious: vandalism, graffiti. But that seems a little below us.”
“Of course.”
She laughed. “Most of the times, we’d just make out. But I know Turians don’t really get down with the whole kissing thing. Plus, it may make things awkward during your next performance review.”
He laughed a little too. Yeah, that would be weird...
“So that just leaves us with the oldest standby in the book: Truth or Dare.” She grinned wickedly again.
He raised an eyebrow plate. “I’m almost scared to ask.”
“We take turns asking ‘truth or dare’ and the other person can either choose to answer truthfully to a question no matter what it is or do a dare that the other person chooses. And since you’re the rookie, I’ll go first. So ask me.” She waved at herself.
“Okay. Truth or dare?”
“Truth.” There was a pause for a moment. “Now you ask me--”
“I know. I’m thinking of a question.” He thought for a moment longer then decided on a good one. “Were you ever caught during one of your rebellious youth adventures?”
She smiled. “Got close a couple of times, but was only caught-caught once.”
“When?”
“Truth or dare,” she replied.
“Fine. I guess… truth?”
“Why did you join C-Sec?” She asked without hesitation.
He thought for a minute. “My father wanted me to.”
“Did you want to?”
“Truth or dare,” he replied with a smile. She groaned and rolled her eyes.
“I’ll do… truth.”
He wondered if it was polite to ask this, but she’d said any question and he was awfully curious. So he steeled his will and asked, “Why were you in that program? The one where you went swimming and to museums.”
“Oh. Um.” She hesitated for a moment.
“I’m sorry, you don’t have--”
“No, that’s not the rules. It’s okay.” She pulled herself back up out of the tub and sat on the edge again. “I was a ward of the state growing up. My parents couldn’t keep me or… didn’t want to, who knows.” She shrugged a little too casually for the serious truth she’d just delivered. But maybe it really didn’t bother her anymore. “So I grew up in foster homes until I aged out of the program. And then I joined the Alliance.” She smiled a little. “You’re good at this game.”
“Thank you.”
“So truth or dare.”
“Spirits.” He was suddenly very afraid what she’d ask him if he said truth. “Dare.”
She chuckled. “Interesting.” She looked around the pool. “I dare you… to stand in the pool for 1 minute.”
He paled a little and wished that he’d picked truth.
“Come on, I’ll time you.” She picked up the datapad and jogged over to the ladder. “You only have to get in to your waist ‘cause I’m not sure I could haul seven feet of soaking wet Turian out if you started drowning.”
“Your caution is appreciated,” he commented dryly, walking slowly over to where she stood. He looked down at the water and fought off a few pre-emptive shivers. Humans were idiots. Reckless, diabolical, persuasive idiots.
She was flicking through the datapad, obviously looking for a timer. He hovered at the top of the ladder.
“Give me a second,” she said, glancing quickly over the pad.
“No, please. Take your time.”
“Huh. That’s weird.” She frowned.
“What’s weird?”
“Take a look at this.”
He gratefully stepped away from the ladder and took the pad from her. A calendar was open. He looked over the schedule.
“Every two days the pool has a delivery scheduled at weird hours of the night.” She looked around the empty pool. “Why would they need that many regular deliveries? There’s no way they’d go through cleaning chemicals fast enough.”
“If someone’s getting deliveries in the middle of the night, it’s often less than legal.” Garrus passed the pad back to Shepard.
“Obviously. But what kind of illegal?”
“It really could be anything. If Joker is to be believed, this place is popular enough to cover any number of nefarious incomes.”
“Garrus, what time do you have?” she asked, looking at the pad.
“A little before 00:30. Why?”
“Because they’re scheduled to get another delivery right now.”
Garrus walked towards the door that led to the lobby and looked in carefully. It was quiet. But then the lock on the door turned yellow.
“Someone’s opening the door,” he said fiercely. Shepard tossed the pad across the pool to him. He caught it.
“Turn off the lights and get behind the desk,” she ordered. He quickly turned and flipped off the lights in the pools. The bubbles immediately stopped. She sprinted over to her bag and around the corner of the pool. She slipped and fell on her hip, but quickly recovered and joined Garrus behind the desk.
It was barely large enough to hide both of them. Garrus’ sleeve became damp from where it pressed against Shepard’s side. She rubbed at her sore hip.
“Do you have any weapons?” He whispered as he peeked over the edge of the desk.
“Garrus, I was going swimming. What would make you think I’d have guns?”
“Well, do you?”
“Yeah,” she sighed. She quickly unzipped her bag and pulled out a Stilleto II. She handed it over to him. He checked it over and ducked a little lower behind the desk as the front door opened.
They heard voices, must have been about three of them. One was definitely a volus.
“Put it -- in the back,” the volus wheezed.
“Obviously,” another voice snapped.
Shepard unfolded a compact from her bag and slowly raised the mirror to look over the desk. A volus, a batarian, and a human were methodically moving several large carts worth of unmarked boxes. The volus obviously was just supervising, and the other two obviously weren’t too happy about that.
“What do you think are in the boxes?” she asked quietly.
“Too small to be weapons.” He watched the batarian press a few tiles on the mosaic and a secret door opened in the wall.
“Illegal miniature figurines?” she asked. Garrus gave her a look. She’d arranged her face in the perfect expression of innocence. “Tiny nuclear bombs?” Her mask cracked a little as she smiled at her own joke. They started taking boxes into the secret room.
“Probably drugs,” he replied, a little too aware of the hairy situation they found themselves in to have as much fun as her.
“That’s boring.” She lowered her compact. She tucked her feet under her knees and lowered her head, obviously intending to just wait out their intruders. Trouble always did seem to follow them, well, her. It must have been difficult for her to find time to relax in between everything that happened to them. No wonder she broke into a pool… again.
“Truth or dare,” Garrus asked, his voice covered by the noise they were making. Shepard looked over at him in surprise but then smirked.
“Truth.”
“Why did you bring a gun to a swimming pool?” he asked.
“Force of habit. I got mugged once and they took everything because I couldn’t defend myself. So now I’m always packing.”
They both froze as the sound of one of the boxes hitting the tile floor echoed through the room.
“Be careful with that,” the volus snapped. “That box is worth -- more than you make -- in a month.”
“Red sand’s red sand. They won’t know if it got dropped,” the batarian shot back.
“The floor’s wet,” the human whined.
“It’s a pool.” The volus wheezed. “Of course -- it’s wet.”
“I banged my knee,” the human whined some more.
Shepard and Garrus both pressed hands against their faces to cover their silent laughter.
“Quit whining and start moving. -- There’s more boxes -- out in the lobby.”
“It’s been closed for hours, why would the floor be wet?” the human asked. The group was silent for a moment.
“Search the locker rooms,” the batarian growled to the human. Shepard and Garrus stopped laughing. Uh oh. The human groaned and they heard retreating footsteps.
“Must we? -- It’s not going to be -- anything. It never is.”
“Move, Sen.”
The batarian started looking around under deck chairs and behind the towel racks. There weren’t very many places to hide on the pool deck. They’d check the desk soon enough. Garrus started quickly grappling for some sort of plan or escape route. Something that didn’t involve the two of them dying in a damn pool. He was coming up empty.
“Truth or dare,” Shepard breathed, watching the batarian grow closer.
“Truth.”
“Do you trust me?” She looked at Garrus and he met her gaze.
“Yes.”
She quickly tucked the gun behind her and then tackled him. She rolled over and pulled him down on top of her, wrapping her arms about his cowl and hitching a leg over his waist.
“What’re you--” He tensed. Oh. He suddenly picked up on her plan.
“Trust me,” she whispered, her breath passing over the skin of his neck as she held him close. He lowered his head to the where her neck met her shoulder in an approximation of what he hoped looked like an amorous embrace. Did humans even do this? She smelled like chlorine and was curiously soft beneath him. He listened intently for where the batarian was.
Footsteps were drawing closer. His heart rate spiked. He was suddenly gripped by the fear that their tableau didn’t seem convincing enough. They needed something more. He let out a low deep-throated growl and Shepard beneath him tensed momentarily. Evolutionary instinct was difficult to fight, but then she seemed to understand what he was doing. She relaxed and released a breathy sigh. The footsteps stopped. Suddenly a flashlight shone down on them in their ‘compromised’ position.
Shepard gasped and started shoving at his shoulder. Garrus raised himself off of her and they both sat up. They blinked up at the bright light and the frowning batarian pointing a gun down at them.
“We have company,” he leered.
Shepard quickly tugged her other shirt back on, covering her gun and doing an excellent job of looking ashamed. The volus appeared beside the batarian.
“What -- Oh. Disgusting.”
Garrus wasn’t sure if that was in reference to the fact that they were a Turian-Human pair or that they were ostensibly about to have sex at a public pool. The second one he could understand. Shepard raised her hands and glanced at Garrus. He copied her motions.
“On your feet,” the batarian growled, taking the safety off the gun.
Garrus stood up and he helped Shepard stand. They raised their hands again.
“Who are you?” the volus wheezed.
“What does that matter?” the batarian growled.
“I want to know -- how they got in. -- That lock is -- state of the art.”
The batarian frowned and then turned back to look at them. “Who are you?”
“Come on, guys,” Shepard said with a slight smile. “Do you really think this is our first time breaking into a pool?”
They hadn't decided on a signal, but that was as good as anything. Garrus leapt forward, shoving the batarian’s gun towards the ceiling. He flipped him over his shoulder and wrenched the gun from his grasp. Garrus looked over and Shepard was pointing her gun at the volus, the situation thoroughly in hand.
“Please. -- I can pay you.”
“Appo Sen?” she asked.
“No. You have me -- confused with someone else.”
“Hey Appo.” The human walked back into the room. “There’s no one in the locker rooms, so I guess we’re...” He trailed off as he noticed the scene that was happening in the room.
“For fuck’s sake,” the batarian grumbled from where Garrus had him pinned with his knee.
“On your knees,” Shepard said simply.
“Yes, ma’am.” He did exactly as she said, putting his hands behind his head. Garrus grinned a little. Damn she was impressive.
“You know, Appo,” Shepard said, teasingly calm. “I’m pretty sure that red sand is a controlled substance on the Citadel. But I’m a little rusty. Detective?”
“Oh, definitely. I know several people down at C-Sec who would be very interested in the nighttime activities at this particular establishment.”
“Mother of.” And Appo said something that didn’t translate.
“Do you want to call them or shall I?” Garrus asked her.
“Oh, I’ll let you do the honors.” She smiled at him and he smiled back.
C-Sec arrived not long after and the trio were quickly dealt with. Garrus and Shepard were detained so their statements could be recorded.
“So let me get this straight,” Detective Chellick said glancing over the notes he’d been taking on his omnitool. He heaved a heavy sigh. “The two of you just happened to be walking past the pool and you noticed Sen and his accomplices carrying in carts of Red Sand into this pool. So you ...followed in after them and overpowered them with your wits?”
“And a pistol,” Shepard offered. Garrus nodded quickly. C-Sec had given her a blanket as she was still very damp.
“Right.” Chellick looked between the two of them. “Is that when you ended up in the pool, Commander?”
“Uh…” Shepard faltered. She looked to Garrus with a panicked look in her eye.
“Well, she… fell in obviously…” He stumbled through the sentence.
“And he couldn’t jump after me... because… you know, he’d… sink…” Shepard tried to pick up the thread.
“Yes.” Garrus emphatically nodded, knowing that Chellick was absolutely not buying a single word.
“Listen,” Chellick closed his omnitool. “It’s okay. I understand.” They both relaxed a little. “My sister married a human last year. And while I may not understand exactly what you see in this headstrong upstart of a detective, Commander, I’m not going to stand in your way.”
“Oh, wait, wait, wait. No, that’s not. No. We were just--” They both stammered over each other.
“I don’t care and I don’t want to know. You’ve both saved C-Sec a whole lot of work and gotten a major distributor off the streets. So thank you.”
They both nodded a little, deliberately avoiding looking at each other. Detective Chellick stepped away.
“Oh, and Vakarian?” He turned back around. Garrus braced for whatever was coming next. “The next time you decide to take a vacation from your leave of absence, try not to break into too many businesses, okay?”
Garrus relaxed. “What can I say? I’m a rebel.” Chellick gave him an odd look but walked away.
“Well, Chellick has some mortifying assumptions now,” Shepard said grimly but then chuckled.
“That’s nothing new,” Garrus replied, leaning against the wall next to her. “I have a question, how did you know that the volus was Appo Sen?”
“Joker’s voice carries when he reads that pamphlet.” She shrugged. “He’s going to be furious.”
“Do you think he’ll ever forgive us that we got his favorite place shut down?”
“He will if we don’t tell him it was us. It’ll be our secret.” She glanced up at him. “Oh, hey, good looking out catching my signal back there. I wasn’t sure you’d get it, but you had my back.”
He nodded. “Of course, Shepard. I’ll have your six as long as you need me.”
She looked up at him with an expression he couldn’t quite parse. Like she was regarding him very carefully, but seemed pleased about what she saw. “Yeah, you too,” she said, softly.
They shared a smile.
“So what do you want to do now?” she asked and started walking away. He looked surprised and fell into step beside her.
“You aren’t afraid I’m going to accidentally trap us in some other human recreation center?”
“I trust you.”