Squiggly Squid

No Love Is Wasted

(oh fuck it's finally happening)

Rating: Explicit Warning: Graphic descriptions of violence Relationship: Female Shepard/Garrus Vakarian Characters: Garrus Vakarian, Female Shepard, Castis Vakarian, Solana Vakarian, Donovan Hock, Normandy Crew, Original Human Character Tags: Alternate Universe - Western, Alternate Universe - 19th Century, POV Garrus Vakarian, POV Third Person Limited, Undercover, Eventual Romance, Explicit Sexual Content, Late 19th Century Misogyny and Racism, Character Death, gunfights, Hunting, Horseback Riding, Lots of Horse-Stuff, it's the wild wild west—what did you expect???, no beta—i said "yeehaw" and hoped for the best

Summary: Hired to infiltrate an outlaw gang, bounty hunter Garrus Vakarian soon discovers that some jobs are more complicated than they seem.

Ten thousand dollars is a hard offer to refuse.

And loyalty is a dangerous thing to gamble with.

"Shepard touched everything before we even had a sample. I constantly had to remind them that they were about to set off every alarm in the building. They thought a plant would get us Hock's DNA sample. A plant. Are they always like this????"

Playing around with different art styles :)

And sometimes fanfiction is, ‘Watch me do a fucking KICK FLIP off this cool sentence!! Also here's some sex'

Niccy is in Garrus’s secure hold, dangling over three inches of fresh snowfall, his mandibles wide, mouth tight.

“It’s ok buddy,” Garrus soothes. 

Niccy kicks and trills. He’s cocooned in four warm, thick layers. His scarf covers his mouth and nose, his beanie is pulled low. Two pairs of socks. But turians don’t like the cold.

Garrus inches him down, and as soon as Niccy’s tiny boot touches the powdery snow he tenses. “Shit!” he says with startled eyes. 

Jane laughs. 

Garrus gasps, then scowls. “He learned that from you.”

“Me? No he didn’t.”

“I don’t curse in English, mela.” 

Shepard and Garrus had scrambled out of the mansion as shots rang out all around them. Garrus practically threw her on Mako's back before he jumped up onto Mantis, and the two rode until the hills turned rosy under dawn's creeping light.

The dress Kasumi had put her in had torn at some point, and it seemed intent on fully dissolving by midmorning. Apparently the damn thing had been designed so that she couldn't wear any undergarments with it, and there were stripes of red scrapes where her skin had pressed against the saddle for hours. Her knees were exposed by the rapidly fraying hem and while it was pointless to perform modesty for a man who'd already been between her legs, she didn't care to let the sun char her already-chapped skin.

She let gravity pull her off the saddle. Garrus hopped down (the bastard had been able to wear pants for the ride), and began setting up camp as she finally slipped on the pair of buckskin trousers she'd stored away in her pack. A sigh escaped her lips as she felt the suede hug her hips; not nearly as soft against her ass as the silk, but much more familiar against her rough skin. The shirt slid over her shoulders and she rolled her shoulders back until she felt like a soldier again.

She nearly jumped out of her boots when she turned and walked straight into Garrus' now-very-familiar keel. The man's face was covered in red dust and left him looking as though his iron plates had rusted.

City slicker, didn't even pull up his bandana.

"Can a girl get one moment of peace, Vakarian?" Her voice came out creaky and she remembered that she hadn't had a bandana to cover her face, either. Shit.

"You nearly died back there." His eyes were wild and bloodshot. Three-fingered hands landed on her arms and he grasped her like he still wasn't sure she was in front of him.

She did dodge a bullet or two, she had to give him that. Still she shrugged. His hands moved with her shoulders. "Wouldn't be the first time, now, would it?"

He'd been running his eyes up and down her figure, no doubt to check if she was injured. Not one days ago he'd traced those same lines with his eyes, then hands, then tongue - she shivered at the memory.

"I need you," and oh, wasn't that a sentence to hear, but he kept talking, "to stay safe."

"I'm fine, ain't I? Don't I have a big, strong turian watching my back?"

He stepped closer, his voice approaching a growl. "Shepard."

For all that ferocity, Shepard felt his fingers trembling against her skin. It occurred to her that he might actually care, and that thought nearly scared her as much as the thought that she might care back. "Fine. I'll be more careful."

His hands slid down her sleeve, briefly holding her fingers as he made to slip away. There was that wildfire again. She grabbed his hand as it was just about to leave hers and she tugged. He nearly spun back into her arms, but stopped himself on the toes of his boots. Blue eyes met green.

Her lips moved. Shepard liked to think it was of their own accord, because she didn't care to take ownership of what they said. "Kiss me." She said in her hoarse, dusty voice.