Chapter Text
When they found 'the kids', they were leaving hotel’s infirmary, Garrus clearly pleased with himself to be the one more responsible this time and Solana back on her feet, apologizing profusely. After getting some pick-me-up, she moved and talked much faster, close to the version Shepard got to know while overhearing Garrus’ vidcalls. Garrus himself was overjoyed to hear both Shepard and Castis saying the gallery tour was fine. Apparently, despite their differences, they shared a goal of not ending this day with Garrus completely defeated.
The restaurant floor was high up in the building, its giant glass windows replaced with screens. Instead of sun setting over Cipritine’s skyline, they got to admire fractals fluctuating in complicated patters, casting colorful shadows over elegant tables. There was also bar and further in, small stage where krogan singer was preparing to add charm to their extremely expensive meals.
It was just… so much. Shepard usually enjoyed mingling with the rich and the pretentious, always feeling out of place but… in a good way. Now there was something uncomfortable about it. Suffocating.
“Krogan,” Castis muttered to himself, taking his eyes off the singer beginning his performance.
“Yep,” Solana confirmed. “Singing krogan.”
The krogan, indeed, began to sing. He held the tune alright, jazz-like arrangement of his band was really cool and his voice was deep and powerful. Unfortunately, he picked such sad nostalgic songs, it was impossible not to find him a little funny.
And Castis and Solana did just that. They simply exchanged looks and burst into laughter, hiding behind datapads displaying restaurant’s menu. Garrus managed not to laugh out loud - but he was smiling, too.
Shepard looked at each of them, so similar to each other, so different, suddenly sharing a laugh over the same thing. Without speaking to each other, without resolving any issues they had before. Suddenly they were just… together. Like a family.
Shepard barely understood it. But she never had a family.
The waiter with two bottles of wine couldn’t have a better timing.
“Five stars by levo and dextro standards,” Castis noted innocently when the waiter left. “And no prices on the menu.”
“Give it a rest, dad,” Garrus cut his complaining short. But there was barely any warning in his tone now.
Shepard was not really sure about that shift. Suddenly, her allies were all friendly with her enemy. Because they were a family in the first place. Shepard never had any proper family. She was always alone.
That’s not true. She had Normandy once. But now… Normandy was gone. Everything was gone. Everyone was far away, their messages taking months to get from one comm buoy to another. Everything was different. Everything was scarred and broken and slowly rebuilding. And that scarred, broken family slowly rebuilding in front of her was not her family. Not entirely and undeniably. She was still alone.
She had no idea why she was thinking about it right now. She was just tired. It was a long day.
“Oh, they have a universal section,” Solana scrolled through the items made artificially digestible by both dextro and levo species. “‘Roasted potatoes, Earth delicacy’. Is it really a delicacy, Shepard?”
“In some way, I guess,” Shepard grinned. “But eating them in a restaurant seems wrong. It’s more of a campfire food.”
“Campfire food? How do you do camping back on Earth?”
“Well… When it comes to the potatoes, we put them on a stick and roast them over the fire, singing old songs, telling ghost stories. When I was just starting in the Alliance, me and my squad spent every shore leave camping.
“That sounds so cool. During our camping trips, we ate military rations and cried.”
Garrus chuckled at that one.
“We did a lot of camping when we were kids but it was nothing like that,” he explained to Shepard. “We walked, climbed, ran obstacle courses and then, as a reward – target practice. And for food – military rations. To get us prepared for boot camp, of course.”
Shepard nodded with slow understanding.
“That sounds… intense.”
“I hated it,” Solana added. “Me and Garrus ran away once.”
“Don’t even remind me,” Castis groaned. “Sometimes I still wake up in cold sweat.”
“Come on,” Garrus sipped his wine with a smile. “We told mom where we’re going.”
“Yeah, but she didn’t tell me.”
“Part of the ruse, sir,” Solana remarked with pride. “And let me tell you, Shepard, for all his detective experience from the Citadel, dad was absolute crap at tracking us in the wilderness.”
Before Castis managed to voice his defense, the waiter was back to get their orders. All of them got a side dish from the universal menu – except for Castis.
“And how did it end?” Shepard asked when the waiter was gone, swirling sour wine in her glass. “Your big camping escape?”
“We made it back home on our own,” Solana replied cheerfully. “Garrus had some important party to attend to. He was so pressed about it, he ended up dragging me more than dad usually did.”
“Dad never carried you when you complained,” Garrus protested.
“He also never made me actually unable to move my legs.”
“What party could be this important?” Shepard looked at Garrus, trying to imagine him as a teenager caring about things like parties.
Garrus’ eyes narrowed as he tried to remember.
“I can’t remember now but it was probably some school council thing.”
“You were in the school council?”
“Are you kidding?” Solana chuckled into her glass. “He was the school president.”
“Only for a year,” Garrus waved it off as if it was something to be embarrassed of.
“Yeah, because then they sent you off to boot camp.”
“School president?” Awe in Shepard’s voice was hard to hide. She never even bothered voting in her school elections. “You must have been pretty popular.”
“Not really, just-”
“He was,” Solana was quicker. “I was known only as Garrus Vakarian’s sister for the entirety of my school.”
“I was known only as Castis Vakarian’s son for the entirety of mine.”
“And I was known only as Castis,” Their dad said with the tone of voice suggesting there was a big lecture incoming. “My school was up in the mountains, the only one in my town. I had to climb for three hours every day-”
“And hungry nathak waited to ambush me at every corner,” Solana finished, mimicking his voice.
“Well… yeah. And there’s nothing to mock, I had only a stick to scare them off. You had a bus and security and everything. And one day you will appreciate it.”
“We already do, dad,” Garrus assured. “Your camping trips showed us what hell we were spared from.”
Solana laughed into her glass as their food arrived.
Tiberius Hotel’s head chef was a turian with an incredible touch for human food. Shepard knew any kind of pasta was a safe choice, and she had already tested out something that amounted to a dextro salad washed out of all the proteins. It tasted fake but tasted somehow and after years of military slop, Shepard deemed any somehow better than nothing.
Solana, on the other hand, really liked protein-free roasted potatoes and declared it more than a few times, extremely enthusiastically, staring at Shepard as if she was the one responsible for preparing the meal.
“I don’t believe you,” Castis said, looking at Solana’s side plate with disgust. “It can’t taste good.”
“Try it.”
“I’m not eating that.”
“Why? Because it’s alien? That’s xenophobic, dad.”
“You’re calling me xenophobic? I’m sitting at the table with an alien.”
Even Castis must have heard how it sounded since he cleared his throat ostentatiously, quickly taking a big sip of his wine as both Garrus and Solana glared at him with disapproval.
Shepard smiled into her glass. At least that one seemed like an accident. She would even find it funny if someone who didn’t hate her said that.
“Anyway, it’s really good,” Solana turned back to Shepard. “Wish they served it in some normal joints. That hotel is a bit above my poor student scholarship.”
“Then come here as often as you can, as long as we’re here,” Shepard said, realizing how much she would actually like that.
“Yeah, that would be great,” Garrus agreed eagerly. “We’re leaving in about two weeks. Hitting Thessia this time.”
There was sudden sadness in Solana’s eyes, even as she said:
“Wow. Thessia! You’ll send me something really nice this time, right?”
“What, you don’t like the postcards?”
“I would never give up the postcards. But send me some, I don’t know, asari diamonds or something. You know, to celebrate your new income bracket.”
Garrus chuckled as Solana tapped tips of her talons against her glass, smiling to herself.
“You were on Tuchanka before coming here, right?”
“Yeah,” Shepard said. “But it was more of a diplomatic mission than proper vacation. Had to clear up a few things with krogan leaders.”
“And you chose Palaven for proper vacation? I admire your spirit but this planet hates visitors.”
“It’s not that bad. Especially if you’re suddenly filthy rich and can afford all that.”
Shepard gestured towards the screens hiding the outside world from the restaurant’s guests.
“If I knew Alliance pays this well, I would sign up for their interspecies initiatives a long time ago.”
“Actually, Solana, it’s not a payment,” Castis cut in suddenly. “It’s retirement fund.”
He finished his glass of wine with satisfaction that hardly had anything to do with the taste.
“All money and no work,” Solana sighed and Shepard was either tipsy or paranoid - but she genuinely couldn’t tell if there was a jab hidden in that tone. And at whom it was directed. “A dream. I mean, it was hardly a dream getting to that point. Wouldn’t want to go through that.”
Shepard really didn’t want to think about it.
“It’s not exactly retirement,” she said, to her own surprise. “It’s more like a break. We still had this diplomatic mission on Tuchanka, we had a few meetings here and it will probably be the same on Thessia.”
“Ah. So you’re like an ambassador now?”
“No, not exactly. I am… no one, really, now. Just trying to get my life back on track. Or not really back, just on any track.”
“Right, right, I understand it. We’re all probably at the same point.”
“Right.”
It weighted heavy over the table. What they didn’t talk about. The thing they were shielded from in this hotel, thanks to the screens hiding Palaven’s landscape. The sound of Solana’s grim souvenir as she shifted her leg under the table. Shepard’s scarless arm that didn’t remember the time when it had scars all over.
“You can go to Thessia with us,” Garrus said, desperately trying to change the subject. “Both of you. We have priority clearance for the relays they managed to fix so far. Haven’t used it yet, but why not?”
“Thanks, but I have exams coming up,” Solana smiled charitably.
“And not really feeling like spending weeks aboard a ship anytime soon,” Castis added.
“Ah, right,” Garrus said, the dark shadow back over the table.
It was miserable, Shepard realised. They were all so miserable.
“We’ve been to the opera yesterday,” she said, not really caring it was completely out of nowhere. She just wanted to say something.
“I love opera,” Solana hurried with a warm smile. “What have you seen?”
“‘The Weight of Duty.’”
Castis laughed. He was not fast enough to stifle it with another sip of his wine. Shepard looked at him. She was really unsure now if she would be able to proceed or if it was the moment to abandon the battlefield.
But before she could decide, Garrus had his elbows on the table, clasping his hands together in the investigator mode.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Castis said. “I just remembered something.”
“Care to share it?”
Now Castis actually met his glare.
“Care not to speak to me like that?”
“Like what?”
“Disrespectfully. Commander, what have you thought about ‘The Weight of Duty’?”
“I liked it,” Shepard shrugged.
“You liked it? No deeper thoughts?”
“I-”
“I have some deeper thoughts,” Solana cut in. “‘The Weight of Duty’ is nice flashy piece of disgusting military propaganda.”
“Sol,” The warning note was back in Garrus’ voice.
“A classic’s still a classic,” Castis shrugged in return.
“So you don’t like it, sir?” Shepard inquired.
“‘The Weight of Duty’? I think it’s excellent.”
“Dad loves the weight, the duty, the service, all that lovely stuff,” Solana explained before anyone managed to get the conversation back on track. “He also loves the work, the workaholism, the excuses and the setting-your-life-the-way-he-wants-no-matter-if-you-asked-or-not.”
“Sol!”
“What, Garrus?! What?!”
But it was Castis who said:
“Can’t we seriously have one nice family dinner?”
Shepard quickly busied her lips with drinking before they had a chance to speak.
“I don’t know, dad, can we?" Solana took the opposite course of action. "Can you not be an asshole for one single day?”
“Me? An asshole? I didn’t slam the door in the middle of the night and showed up the next day reeking of horosk!”
“Dad-!”
But before Garrus managed to get his plea out, Solana pointed the talon at the middle of her father’s chest.
“Fuck you.”
“Sol!" And Garrus turned back to her. "Please, just shut up and-”
But Solana got up from the table, her chair almost falling and Garrus’ soul almost leaving his body.
“No, Sol, I beg you-”
“He knows why I slammed that door!”
“I warned you she’s in one of her moods,” Castis said grimly.
He definitely pushed his luck now. And he miscalculated terribly. Terribly for everyone involved.
Solana turned to Shepard with rage blazing in her blue eyes, glasses and plates clinking as she planted her fists on the table.
“Shepard, my dad is dead set on hating you. Because of you, Garrus had half of his face blown off. Because of you he is on vacation instead of working his ass off to make this world seem like the REAPERS never happened. Because of you he was not here when… we needed him. We both needed him. And to top it all off, you’re a human and a Spectre so, you know, no bonus points there. That’s why I slammed the door on him and fuck, I’m going to do it again!”
But Castis got up and there was silence. Solana glared up at him with a challenge as he towered over her, no distress on his face, even as his posture was all tense.
Then he just turned around and walked away, soon disappearing in the crowd gathered around krogan singer’s stage. Leaving the battlefield.
Their table was silent. Shepard vaguely knew they got some looks from the staff and other guests, but right now she couldn’t care less. It’s not like Solana said anything Shepard didn’t already know. But to hear such a loud and clear confirmation… It stung.
“Thanks a lot, Sol,” Garrus finally broke the silence.
“You’re welcome.”
“You really couldn’t hold it in just for an hour longer? You just couldn’t do it?”
“No!” she slammed her hand on the table, making tableware clink again. “I couldn’t take him dragging you both over living your lives even for a minute longer!”
“We spent the whole day with him acting like adults and you come here, late, hangover, just itching to cause trouble!”
“I told you it’s a bad idea! But you called me on a fucking emergency line and told me you need an ally!”
“An ally in making all of this go smoothly and nice!”
“Nice? Spirits, Garrus, in what world do you expect nice? From him?”
Garrus took a pause. As if he knew he shouldn't say that. But then he did.
“From you.”
All the fight seemed to leave Solana’s body.
“Yeah. Of course you do. I should hang my head low and let him berate all of us for the rest of the evening. So at least he would feel nice. I’m getting out of here. Have a nice trip to Thessia.”
“Sol, wait-”
She turned around, trying to storm off to the door leading out of the restaurant, her braces taking everything out of her momentum.
“This fucking leg!”
She stopped halfway there, trying to fix some screw on her thigh and then there was Shepard in front of her face.
Solana let out an exasperated sigh but at least didn’t rush right through her.
“I’m sorry,” Shepard said.
Solana left the screw alone, looking at her in confusion.
“For what?”
Shepard smiled awkwardly.
“For the Reapers.”
“…Rumor has it we don’t have the Reapers thanks to you.”
“It’s just a rumor,” Now her smile was back to bitter. “There was a lot of us doing the job.”
Solana sighed once again, this time speaking much quieter.
“And Garrus was one of them, I know that. Still. It was hard. On a lot of us. And he won’t make it nice in one day. Not like that.”
“I know. He probably does, too. Still. He really cares. He had a plan and everything.”
“Of course he did. But it had zero chance of succeeding the moment he invited this asshole-”
“But it was irrelevant. Family’s a family. And I’m under the impression you have enough to quarrel about without the subject of me added into the mix.”
“Well, yeah. But you’re part of that family now. You have to deal with that mix.”
That was the nicest thing Shepard heard all day. The kind of nice that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside.
“I’ll do my best.”
“You better,” Solana nodded, much calmer now. “Do we seem very crazy to you?”
Shepard thought about the way they all laughed at sad singing krogan.
“Yep.”
“Making a scene in the middle of the restaurant didn’t help?”
“Nope. You’re coming back though, right?”
Solana peeked over her shoulder as Garrus immediately tore his eyes away from them, the glass in his hand suddenly the most interesting sight in the entire flashy restaurant.
“I already made a big exit,” Solana turned back to Shepard. “How awkward would it be if I just… came back there?”
“Very.”
They both knew it did not change a thing.
“Okay. But there’s no way I’m apologizing to anyone for anything.”
“Deal.”
It took a while but all three of them convinced themselves to go search for Castis. They found him sitting alone by the table right next to the speakers, making him hear precisely all flavors of sorrow in the singer’s voice. They sat down by him without a word. Castis said nothing, too, preferring to stay facing the stage.
“This song,” The singer’s voice faltered with emotions. “is dedicated to the human soldier who saved my life when I was in London.”
There was immediate enthusiastic reaction, especially from tipsy human part of the audience, when the band started another mournful tune.
Why does the sun go on shining?
Why does the sea rush to shore?
Don't they know it's the end of the world
'Cause you don't love me anymore?
Why do the birds go on singing?
Why do the stars glow above?
Don't they know it's the end of the world?
It ended when I lost your love
There was a loud applause as the song ended and singer waved to the happily drunk crowd. All four of them applauded too, Vakarians raising their drinks high, Shepard doing her awkward human clap.
Castis finally turned back to them, his face all serious, his mandibles tense. Then his expression changed as he did something Shepard would best describe as a turian side-eye directed at this one-in-a-lifetime performance.
The three of them laughed at the same time, together, with no explanations, no apologies, no words, not resolving any single issue they had before. It was nice.