The Perk, Tuesday Morning

[not_a_whiner]

It'd been an... eventful two weeks. First they'd broken a bunch of ex-Cerberus scientists and their families out of the stalemate they'd been in with their former employers. Then Hackett had seen them flying around clearing Cerberus and Reaper hotspots, so tac teams could set up beachheads and recover research.

And it was... great. Exhilarating, yes, and necessary, but mostly it just felt good to be doing something again. Helping. It made the looming Reaper threat a little less paralyzing.

But that didn't mean Kaidan couldn't do with some downtime from time to time.

So when they hit the Citadel last night, he'd booked a portal - only barely getting through Portalocity's increasingly tight restrictions - and now he was sitting here, at the Perk, a cup of warm coffee in his hand and a single patch of medi-gel pasted against some scratches on his cheek. It felt nice, but also a little otherworldly: his own Earth had been like this just a year ago.

Now...

He took a sip of his coffee. He wasn't here to dwell, damn it.

... but he'd still dwell a little. He couldn't help it.

[[ open! ]]

Comments

[bitten_notshy]

"It really is you," Jack said, striding into the coffee shop and offering Kaidan a hug. "I wasn't going to believe you were really coming until I saw you. How are you?"

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan was more than happy to take the hug; he returned it firmly. "I'm okay," he said. "Happier when I'm keeping busy, these days, with everything going on. You still holding the fort here?"

[bitten_notshy]

"Trying to, anyhow," Jack nodded. "It's been quiet, at least for me. For all I know things are insane as usual up at the school. I'm glad to see you're still in one piece."

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan smiled wryly. "Not for lack of the enemy trying," he said, pulling away. "But yeah, I'm still more or less intact."

[bitten_notshy]

"Then the war's getting worse?"

There was real concern in Jack's eyes.

[not_a_whiner]

"It's definitely not getting beter. New fronts keep opening up, the Crucible's not even near done..." He shook his head. "It's gonna keep getting worse for a while."

[bitten_notshy]

"Crucible?" Jack said, shaking his head, and sighed. "Well, whatever's going on there, we'll need to show you a good tie while you're here. Anything on your must-do list before you leave Earth again?"

[not_a_whiner]

"Sleeping?" Kaidan said wryly. "I've got until 0300 tomorrow, then I need to book it back. Being in space for a couple of weeks mostly just has me aching for real coffee and a bed with a real mattress." Beat. "And, uh, hanging out with you guys, of course."

[bitten_notshy]

"I'm so glad to hear Emma and I are only in third place," Jack said, a smile tugging at his lips. "Any lower, and I'd start to think you didn't want to see us. Are you staying at the house?"

[goforthe_optics]

Tali didn't exactly have a habit of stopping by the Perk, not after that one incident with a dextro latte and a careless barista. She was only passing by after an early (and ultimately fruitless) morning trip to the warehouse district, to see if there were any bits of machinery lying around that she could scavenge.

She caught a glimpse at the edge of her peripheral vision that made her pause mid-stride and turn to look through the window. The man inside looked familiar, but there was no way it could possibly be him, could it?

[not_a_whiner]

As luck would have it, Kaidan had just finished his coffee. He caught a flicker of something metallic in the corner of his own eyes as he put the cup down. Instinctively, he glanced that way, and...

Was that a quarian helmet?

[goforthe_optics]

The only one (as far as she knew) on Fandom. And that was -- it had the cut of an Alliance uniform, though the design seemed a bit different.

"There's no way," Tali muttered, but now she had to push the door open and step inside for a closer look. "Kaidan?"

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan's face molded into a frown. "Tali...?"

...and then lit up.

"What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were busy, y'know, with... Fleet stuff."

Admiralling sounded like it involved being too busy to make island house calls, especially now.

[goforthe_optics]

It would be, because quarian politics were ridiculous, as the Tali that Kaidan knew was probably all too well aware by now.

"Fleet stuff?" Tali echoed, both her voice and posture reflecting some of her confusion, but she laughed a bit shakily. "I'd like to be, but not until I finish my Pilgrimage."

She was starting to put this together, but it still didn't make any sense; it was one thing to know academically that Fandom had a reputation for things like this, but another thing entirely to accept that it was happening.

[not_a_whiner]

"Your Pilgrimage? But you finished that years ago--"

Kaidan paused. Thought that over again. And look, that frown was crawling its way back onto his face.

"--What year is it where you're at?"

[goforthe_optics]

"It's 2183. Why --" Having a mask in the way didn't stop Tali from bringing one hand up to rub at the spot right about where the bridge of her nose would be, because all of a sudden she could swear she had a massive headache. "You're . . . from the future, then?"

That part was easy enough to process, what with her having come a century and a half into the past to be here. It was just the part where he was standing there telling her about something she hadn't done yet, when the last time she'd heard his voice, over the comm frequency back on Virmire, it was through a cacophony of gunfire and explosions before the signal cut out for good.

That was the tricky one.

[not_a_whiner]

"Couple of years out from you," Kaidan said, sighing. (He had... no idea about the Virmire part, which was probably a good thing, overall.) "Man. This island. First Liara, then Joker, now you..."

[icecoldfrost]

"I found you!" Emma, don't sound so surprised or delighted. You're a telepath. Of course you're going to find people you know when they show up on an island this small. "Have you eaten yet, or just trying to subsist on coffee alone?"

[not_a_whiner]

"It's still early days, Emma," Kaidan said. At this point, she'd earned that wry, slightly tired smile upon her arrival. "Coffee first, then I'll see if I can think about some grub."

[icecoldfrost]

"Don't think, you're on vacation. Thinking is not for vacation," Emma informed him, pulling out her phone and tapping at the screen. "I assume you still eat like a biotic."

Yes, Emma was ordering massive amounts of delivery to the house. Shush. She wanted steak anyway.

"Ugh, you should have shown up yesterday, then I wouldn't have had to teach. I could have just put you in front of the students to talk about how biotics work, and I could have read my book."

[not_a_whiner]

"You're teaching?" Kaidan asked, then regretted it; he should've said thanks, first. (He could hear his mom's lecture in the back of his head.) "Damn, now I feel out of the loop. When did that happen?"

Or had she already told him and had it just slipped his mind in the craziness these past couple of weeks? Now this was going to bug him.

[icecoldfrost]

"I came back for the second summer session to keep Jack out of trouble and teach Psionics at the Community Center," Emma said cheerfully. "Providing important adult education and socialization and all that, without any of the work of needing to be appropriate for high school students!"

Yes, because it was Jack that needed to be kept out of trouble, out of the two of them.

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan had to let out a little laugh. "Yeah, I'm sure everyone's really grateful about the way you keep reeling Jack in," he teased. "I'm not sure whether to be terrified by this class or intrigued."

Because it was Emma, after all.

[icecoldfrost]

"I haven't irreparably traumatized anyone yet!" Emma objected, but she was grinning at the friendly teasing. "I let them play with some of my tech toys and ask me questions about how different chemicals can affect powers this week, and next week we learn how to keep a telepath out of your head. I'd count this as my public service volunteering for the year, if anyone in New York would believe anything about this place whatsoever."

She took a sip of her latte and smiled at him. "What have you been up to, besides saving the future? Hopefully no more hospital stays."

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan pointed at the patch on his face. "This is the worst I've had it since I got out of the hospital," he said, "Scout's honor. Admiral Hackett's got us running all over the galaxy, helping the war effort-- trying to build a fleet and a weapon that can handle the Reapers."

Beat.

"Sorry, it's pretty much all 'saving the future' right now."