The side of his face was beginning to leave an indent in the covers, he was sure, a permanent creak coming to his spine with how he arched over from his chair, calloused hands neatly folded in his lap, sometimes with his arms crossed beneath his head. They didn’t have any extra beds for him, which was fine, understandable; he didn’t really need one as much as the other hundreds of thousands of people, but they at least let him stay overnight, past visiting hours.

                He didn’t think he would be able to sleep if he wasn’t there, anyway. It had been a few weeks, but he was patient – he would wait for as long as he needed to, watching stubble grow thicker on a scarred jaw, amber tears slowly sealing shut, buzzcut lengthening out longer than its 4mm protocol.

                The doctors were kind, sure of themselves, professional with what apparatuses they had left after the apex of destruction just didn’t happen to come. They could rebuild, so that was something, rebuild all the rubble of buildings that he had to dig through in the pouring rain and steaming smoke on a daily basis.

                He could still remember the heat that threatened to burn through his gauntlet as he finally placed a hand on Shepard’s cheek, his cybernetics blistering, overworking to keep him breathing under all the strain, the sizzle that rose from his skin as a few, scant tears landed on his neck.

                ‘Found you…’

                It was insane how much smaller Shepard was in his arms, with his armour melted down and burnt, singeing the battered, bruised, and split skin underneath, pale if not for the tech beneath the flesh keeping him glowing, like a beacon.

                Quickly, he’d been stabilized, and, while it was a little uncomfortable to watch the doctors slide needles into the inner creases of his elbows, his wrists, feeding tubes down his throat and sewing up his wounds with sutures and gel alike, he knew they were just doing their job, and he was thankful for it.

                Despite all the measures having to be taken, it was looking good, so he was told. Shepard just had to heal, from the inside out, and, now, he had all the time in the world to work through the years of hardships that he could never really take respite to deal with.

                All the bruises on him had shown up in full fervour after a few days, dark coloured petals bursting beneath the skin, with lighter edging, slowly fading inward. The cybernetics had some strong self-preservation properties, he had to give the Illusive Man that one as he thread his fingers with Shepard’s, lightly pressing the pads of his digits into his bony knuckles, thumb smoothing along the curve between the other’s and his index finger.

                The tubes had been taken from his throat instead to be injected into his belly; the forced feeding kept him alive but did nothing for his muscularity. Each day he could notice he was a little more skin and bone than he was the previous. Shepard might not be too happy, but he was alive. Actually alive, which was more than he could have hoped for, or ever asked for.

                   ‘You sure are taking your time, Shepard… But I… I guess it’s alright, I can give you this one, after all this time. I think you’d agree, too.’

                Never once did Kaidan think he wouldn’t wake up. Shepard was better than that; he wouldn’t let… whatever it was stop him from coming back. After all the shit he’d been through, even though it might be one of the best parts of his autobiography, even better than the Geth Consensus, this was still something pretty small compared to a guy like Shepard.

                At the beam, on the ramp of the Normandy, wasn’t going to be the last time he would look into his deep, azure eyes, and it wouldn’t be the last time he would tell him he loved him, either.

                This had to be, Kaidan guessed, the first time he’d ever seen him actually peaceful, no muscle tension holding his jaw tight and up, shoulders strong, bearing all the weight of a Galaxy upon them without even a crack. Even when he would be asleep, Shepard held a kind of invisible kinetic barrier about himself, always ready to wake up at the lightest sound or movement or shake.

                His bruised lips were parted, eyes lightly, but heavily shut, shoulders and back lax, the swathes of bandages wrapped about his chest slowly rising and falling with his deliberate breath like the jags of the heart rate monitor and the beats that let you know that he’s still alive, he’s still in there.

                Even as the days past, the hope didn’t pass with them, and he never got tired of sitting there in the same chair, in the same light that bled through the cracked walls and shattered windows, one elbow propped up on the chair’s arm, resting his jaw on his closed fist, other hand holding Shepard’s, just watching him.

                As the light would change shape, change tint and temperature, he would gradually lean over as he was, pressing his cheek into the covers that were beginning to smell like Shepard, and himself, too, then watch how his skin moved as he would touch over it, how it would pull slightly then fall back into place, how it would sometimes fleck with slight bumps.

                It had taken at least a week for the nurses and doctors to fall into routine around him. They wouldn’t ask him to move so they could work, they were just competent enough to check Shepard’s vitals as Kaidan laid over, as close as he could be without obstructing all the things needled into him.

                All it had taken to slow Shepard down, to make him relax, was finally saving the Galaxy as they knew it.

                It was so quiet, so still and rhythmic in the place, that he usually wouldn’t notice that he’d fallen asleep until he woke up with the morning light in his eyes, but, one time, it was different.

                His breath came out a little tersely as something roused him awake, something pressing into his cheek. Kaidan’s eyes fluttered for a moment, catching that it was still night, before squeezing them shut, blue energy crackling down his spine and along his nervous system as it woke up, too, furrowing his brow lightly.

                It took a moment for him to get his bearings, then he went stark still, breath freezing in his lungs and more slowly opening his eyes, turning his head.

                The thing that was poking into his cheek shakily moved to his jaw and his parted lips as he moved, staying in his arched over position. Grown out nails scathed the corner of his mouth, jerking, just like that twitching half-smile that looked down at him.

                “Hey,” It barely sounded like the guy’s voice, thick, scratchy, but it was definitely him saying the word, definitely his lips moving, that same soft mouth in a hard face.

                “H-… Hey…” The word came out in a breath, Kaidan’s head suddenly too stuffy to say anything smarter or more fitting.

                He stared at Shepard, and Shepard stared back, the sclera of his eyes yellowed with streaks of bloodshot, the half-shut lids lightly purpled. Even in his messed state, he was just as attractive, just as gorgeous, as the last time he had laid sight on him, if only because he was just as alive.

                Kind of like a jumpstart, his biotics kicking him into gear, another flush of cyan ran over him.

                “I-… You-… Shepard,” He dumbly tried again, lips moving as he attempted to form words that he just couldn’t.

                “…Y-Yeah, I—“ The sentence changed to a cough, Shepard groaning as he lurched over, a fine film of wet green sliding out between his lips – biofilm sprayed down his throat to line it, keep it clean and nourished. He sat back with a gravelly huff, joints creaking, blinking at the ceiling. “Well… that was attractive.”

                Kaidan watched him silently, squeezing the hand in his hard, before a small laugh came from him, growing into a throaty chuckle, rubbing a hand over his face, incredulous, almost, his shoulders shaking. Still the same, after all that time.

                “Damn it, Shepard,” He mumbled, getting up from his chair, careful of all the wires and tubes, and wrapped his arms around Shepard’s shoulders, faced buried into his neck.

                He felt a touch back, a trembling palm attached to a trembling arm pressing to his shoulder, warm breath against the side of his face.

                Though he would have waited a lifetime, he was more than glad it had finally come.

—

It was a long, tedious process of getting Shepard back to his proper self, getting him walking again, getting him using his hands again, fine motor movements out of synch. He’d broken more than a few glasses, either through holding them too firmly, or plain dropping them when he would try to take a drink.

                Shepard was a quick learner, though, determined, never let anything beat him. This was just another test, and he was good at tests, if only through his headstrong demeanour. There were a few stuff-ups, but he would just come back like his scar tissue, harder than it was before, better.

                Nothing was going to stop him, now. There were only so many times where you could be as lucky as he was, to rip death away and sink your nails into the light buried underneath, keep your breath and your pulse. And, because, honestly, therapy was nothing compared to anything else he’d done, compared to killing a Reaper, compared to stopping invasions and an invading, mutilated army, and then culling the threat at its beginning.

                ‘Think I could finally see English Bay, now?’ He’d asked, once, as he was getting his dressings changed before shakily pushing himself up off the bed, stumbling forward into arms that were all too ready to catch him.

                ‘…I’m gonna’ show you everything that we talked about, and then some,’

                He’d smiled into the crook of his neck, wrapped arms that weren’t so shaky anymore around his torso.

                The white, sterilized walls around him quickly became old, and he just wanted to get out there. Shepard was definitely overdue for a vacation, but it might be a bit harder than he anticipated getting out of his rut that had been ingrained over the years. Wherever whatever took him, it would be better, with an entirely different light with which he would see with, one not tainted with blood and gunpowder and screams he could still sometimes hear in his head when he closed his eyes.

                He was finally able to leave once he could sign his own name on the release papers, pen held stiffly between his fingers, taking it one letter at a time. It might not have been as clean as his signature used to be, straight forward, easy to read, but it was something. When he was done, he felt another weight lift off his shoulders, regulated hooks in his skin coming lose, walking unassisted from the place towards the entrance.

                The air outside had a different smell, a different taste, filling up his lungs, the slight chill of it already beginning to sink into his joints. That was something he could deal with, the aches and pains of the pins and plates which now held him together alongside the torn-but-still-working cybernetics.

                A small grin curved his lips, finding another at the base of the stairs, a somewhat hopeless expression on his face.

                “Damn… I thought I was gonna’ catch you before you got let out.” Kaidan told him, heading up the steps to meet him, taking two at a time, a white petal falling from the bouquet he held in one hand. Shepard squinted at it before softly laughing. He always was a romantic.

                “Your timing’s a little off, Major,”

                Kaidan shifted the weight between his feet, handing off the flowers and taking up the guy’s other hand.

                “Well… I guess we have all the time in the world to perfect it now,”