fadewalk | RP: Kaidan (kaidanmod), Open (near Normandy)

When Kaidan blinked he could see leaves. Apple trees? Or cherries? That was weird. He raised his head stiffly, squinting.

Yeah, those were definitely trees.

For a moment his foggy brain tried to tell him he was home at the orchard, and that he hadn't left for Jump Zero yet, and he'd fallen asleep in the grass and was just now waking up, but the air tasted just as stale and metallic as it had in space, only worse. And the light was way wrong.

He sat up, clutching his spinning, splitting head, and then tried to squint past the stars and tracers, all the migraine halos and the spinning threads of darkness that signaled he was going to pass out again.

Why was the sky the worst color green he'd ever seen? He had to close his eyes to turn his head, and when he opened them he saw something that looked sort of like a turian cruiser, but way sleeker. And past that... was that a god damn castle?

He tried to stand, but ended up tipping forward onto his hands and knees, and the grass in front of his nose looked real as hell, and this was a really weird side effect of metabolic crash.

And none of it answered the question of where the hell was Shepard.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Leliana had just secured Certainty in a hidden vault in Skyhold and was now making her way to the mage tower through the Gardens, moving quietly in the darkness of the hallways.

First Meredith, now the Eluvian just summoning people back, randomly. She wasn't sure the guest wing was exactly in danger due the proximity with the Eluvian, but paying both Alistairs a visit to warn then seemed like the right thing to do.

She was just near the stairs when she caught up something on the corner of her eye, turning to see a young man falling in the grass. Another visitor? Unarmed, apparently still suffering the effects of the transportation, perhaps more.

The spymaster approached, quietly, offering him a hand.
"Need some help?"

Kaidan looked up at the sound of the woman's voice, squinting as he tried to focus. He shook his head at the hand, settled for sitting again. He was going to pass out of throw up if he tried to stand.

"Where am I?" His raspy voice was low, dry. "Do you have any water?"

(OOC: We can carry on. Other Kaidan might join eventually.)

"Here."

Leliana kneeled by his side, just like she recalled Mother Dorothea doing for her when they first met. She opened the water flask, holding it for the young man in case his hands betrayed him, ready to help. Her clothes didn't look Thedosian, but she was far from form an opinion yet.

"You are in Skyhold."

Kaidan needed the help. He drank two long swallows, shaking hand causing a little of the water to drip down onto the front of the jumpsuit he was wearing. It had his last name, his serial number, and a logo that included the letters BAaT. He wasn't wearing shoes.

"Thank you." He hiccoughed, trying to keep the water down. "Skyhold." He didn't know what that meant. "Is that a station, or a planet? Did Shepard get us off Jump Zero?"

If he'd been injured, maybe he could have lost his memory, but Shepard wouldn't leave him... just dump him. And if this was a hallucination he didn't know what the protocol was. Lie down until it went away? Pretend to play along? Isn't that how kids tripping on party drugs wound up jumping off of roofs? His heart rate was climbing with his adrenaline levels and the stab of pain that sent through his implant made him clutch his head, seething through his teeth.

"I believe the full story is slightly more complicated than you can understand now." she retrieved the flask and returned it to her bag before undressing her hood and folding it to place it under his head "But rest assured you are far away from Jump Zero. If your friend came here with you, he can't be far, but we should focus on you now, yes?"

Her voice was soft, gentle.
Last time Leliana had to tend to someone she didn't know have been a long, long time ago. She tried to show him he was safe, with her gestures. "Do you feel any pain? Would you let me check you for injuries?"

Kaidan let this mystery woman, with her soft voice, gentle hands ease him down and pillow his head. "Sorry. It's just my head." He was trying not to let the tears that were pooling behind his lids leak out.

He hadn't had a headache this bad since the implant was healed. He tried to take a steadying breath, let it out slowly. He needed to be calm so he could figure this out, but he was sick with hunger, and neither his body nor his brain was up to the task of getting his head right.

"Here, give me your hand. A friend taught me a pressure point to ease headaches." she removed her gloves to have a better grip on his hand, using the pads of her thumb and index fingers to massage the junction of his thumb with his palm, slow and constant circles. "I'm Sister Leliana, in case you're wondering."

(OOC: Sera and Shepard are going to join this thread, since they're just coming out of the Normandy. Gonna let them post in before I rep.)

((ooc: aye aye ^^))

Sera tripped lightly down the ramp of the Normandy and froze when they rounded the wing-thing. Her hands twitched for weapons that weren't bloody there but when she saw it was just Leliana and some body on the ground that she wasn't visibly murdering she relaxed. A little.

"You can't murder anybody with a hand rub can you?" Sera tilted her head inquisitively as she walked toward the Spymaster and the stranger.

Edited Date: 2015-09-07 02:12 am (UTC)

Shepard whipped out his gun and had it trained on Leliana's head between one breath and another. "Kaidan, are you safe?" he asked, voice losing all its light teasing and going deathly serious.

He was willing to give these people the benefit of the doubt, but she had Kaidan on the ground and he wasn't going to be okay with that until Kaidan reassured him he was fine.

The hand thing she was doing wasn't terrible, but the pain was so deep inside his skull there wasn't much that could be done for it.

Kaidan jerked when he suddenly heard Shepard's voice, and tried to push himself back up. He was seeing double - triple really and closed one eye, trying to get him in focus. "Migraine," was all he could grunt out, hand pressing against his temple.

"No Sera, I can't kill people like this. You probably fail to remember that I am a Chantry Sister, in addition to being the Left Hand." she kept her voice steady and calm despite the weapon pointed to her head "I would lower it if I were you, young man." and then, to the other "Ah, here, just found the right point. This may hurt a little, but it's flawless."

Shepard went all cold knife fast and Sera could appreciate that. She circled away from him because she wasn't going to get bloody shot with one of those again if she could help it.

"Right, but you're not all 'tend the sick' very often yeah? Usually just 'stab the baddies in the face'." She cast a wary glance at Shepard.

"As long as you're not going to stab him in the face," Shepard said, standing down immediately, posture relaxing back into something easy and loose-limbed. It was all a lie--he was still on red alert, with Kaidan hurting--but it a really, really good lie.

"We need to get some food into him," he added, voice low for Kaidan's benefit. He moved closer, though in a circuitous route just in case. "Hey, Kai. Feel like getting your blood sugar up and running again?"

The pressure point that Leliana found made Kaidan hiss with pain in his hand, but shockingly it held back the tide of red-hot-brain-poking that he was struggling to think through enough to roll his head toward Shepard and blink blearily at him. "Shepard." His raspy voice was low and relieved, almost breathy.

"Just no gummies," he groused. Hated the tacky-sweet texture of the energy cubes that some of the biotic kids lived on. The thought of trying to choke those down right now made his stomach clench and flip.

"I don't see many people here in need of a stabing in the face, do you Sera?" Leliana chuckled "We have proper healers in the Inquisition, an amateur like me can be relived from this sort of duty in order to dedicate time to ones true vocation, no?"

"Nope, no stabbing. S'just weird." Sera flicked her gaze from the boy on the ground to Shepard and back. "See, that's just weird. Because that's serious-eyebrows, but like... younger. A lot bloody younger."

With a dramatic shrug she cocked her head back toward the castle. "Gummies. He's one of those glowy types? Biologists?" She'd seen Jack eat those energy gummies, tried one once, couldn't blame anyone for grimacing at the thought.

"Nope, no one in their right mind would feel a need to stab Kaidan in the face. He's one of the good ones. Though 'serious eyebrows', I like that. Fits." He went to crouch by Kaidan, dragging an arm around his shoulders and helping him up. "Come one, then. We'll find you something not-gummies, right? Thank you," he added to the older woman. It didn't hurt to be polite sometimes.

"Biologist?" Kaidan's eyebrows furrowed and then he scowled harder when Shepard called him serious eyebrows as well. "That-- that is not going to be a thing."

He wasn't entirely dead weight, but he was shaky as hell as he got to his feet draped over Shepard's shoulder. "You okay?" he asked, dipping his head sideways to gently bump his temple against Shepard's head.

Leliana stood up and dressed her hood back, nodding to the young man who arrived with Sera as he thanked her.

"We have a madwoman at loose in the keep. It is unlikely she'll try to attack you, hurt as she is, but I would try to stay away from her. Blond, older, blue eyes, her name is Meredith." then she turned to Sera "Hence, someone in need of stabbing in the face. Alas, we can't."

Edited Date: 2015-09-07 04:00 am (UTC)

"Can't? Can't?!" Sera narrowed her eyes at Leliana, nose wrinkling across the bridge. "Oh that's some big-hat shite. Needs stabbing but can't." She turned around, back to the Spymaster and pointed at Shepard. "Watch out for crazy. I need to get my little bow and my little arrows and I'll be back around."

"We'll keep an eye out for blond, older, crazy," Shepard said. "Won't be the first time we've had to duck crazy old people. Hey," he added as Sera was heading away. "Don't forget you're going to help me steal that pirate ship."

"There's a pirate what?" Kaidan craned his neck and then looked at Shepard. "You're stealing a ship now?" He groaned and let his head hang, leaning more heavily into Shepard.

Leliana chuckled, shaking her head.

"Just try to stay in one piece, yes? All of you. Until we meet again."

And with a small curtsy, the spymaster went back to the main building.

((ooc: thanks for the scene guys ^^ always a pleasure))

Sera grinned widely at Shepard before nodding. "Oh, it'll be grand." She gave Leliana a wary glance and trotted off under the trees where the shadows seemed to clot around her and she slipped from sight.

(OOC: This one's out too. Thanks guys!)

"How's your head, Serious Eyebrows?" Shepard asked, leading Kaidan more slowly toward the castle. Hey, castles meant kitchens which meant food, right?

"That is so not going to be a thing, Shepard." Kaidan kept his head down, eyes narrowed against the weird light, which wasn't so bright it caused serious problems, but it was... twisty. Plus he trusted Shepard to get him wherever they were going.

He hummed a note, not agreeing, not disagreeing.

"Come on, inside. We can figure out more of what's going on once we get some food in you," he said, helping Kaidan into the castle. Shepard cast a glance around, then followed his instincts.

They didn't lead him wrong. Remarkably soon, they'd found the kitchen. "All right," he said, leaving Kaidan in one of the rough-hewn chairs, "you're lucky I actually know how to cook over an open flame."

Kaidan was used to following Shepard, so he didn't even question that he just found the kitchen. It was Shepard.

He plunked down in the chair, elbows on his knees and head down in his hands. "You know how to cook at all?" He raised his head far enough to squint over at him.

"Sure I do," Shepard said, already poking through, looking for something worthwhile. "If I didn't figure out how to roast food over a trash can fire, I'd never get fed." He looked over, one brow arched teasingly. "Not all of us grew up in a cushy Canadian mansion."

"Hey, I can cook over a fire just fine." Kaidan's grumble was owlish. He really felt like crap. "Shepard, what the hell happened?"

It was an open-ended question. Brain camp, the crashed ship on the lawn, the weird girl with the pointy ears Shepard was all chummy with, and the whole castle-thing inclusive.

"I don't know yet," he said, only hesitating a moment. He sliced up some fruit and set a plate of apple slices in front of Kaidan--then lightly gripped the back of his neck and pulled him in for a gentle kiss to the crown of his head. "We'll figure it out, though. Until then, adapt, play along, survive. Right?"

Kaidan's eyes closed when Shepard's lips brushed his hair. He nodded a little jerkily. "Right." Adapting and playing along weren't Kaidan's strongest suits. Shepard on the other hand... "Maybe once the migraine's gone you can explain how you adapt to this kind of stuff? Because I gotta say, kind of drawing a blank at the moment."

"I'll show you," he promised, letting go and heading back to fix them an actual meal. They both needed the calories after such heavy use of their biotics. "We're in this together."

"Right. Together."

Kaidan let his eyes stay closed as he listened to Shepard moving around the kitchen. He'd wanted to catch him before he drew away, ask him what the kiss on his head meant, but with the space that was between them the last week before everything went to hell, he wasn't sure he'd get an answer.

Or that he'd like the answer that he got.

So... it was Shepard screwing with him, gently, because he was still Kaidan's best friend. Like he was a little kid with a scraped knee, needing to be coddled. He could live with that, just like being needled for being rich and Canadian, it didn't much sting.

"Try it a little less dubiously next time," he said dryly, already beginning to chop and dice. "Also, eat your apple. You need the calories."

Kaidan would have rolled his eyes but he didn't want to open them. He groped on the table until he found the apple, the first bite a small one, the second larger as he was sure his stomach wasn't going to rebel. "Thanks, Shepard," he said quietly, before taking another bite.

With Kaidan's eyes closed, Shepard could watch him the way he didn't allow himself when he knew he could get caught.

"You're my crew," he said, as if that meant anything without a ship of their own. "...you're my best friend," as if that had ever meant anything before Kaidan.

Kaidan colored slightly where he sat munching on apple, looking like hell. He probably smelled not great after being in the brig. He opened his eyes, looked over at Shepard and managed a half-smile. "Yeah." He cleared his throat and looked down at the apple with a little frown.

He was starting to brood, eyebrows pulling together. He wasn't sure he should be out of the brig after what he'd done, and here he was sitting with Shepard having a damn picnic? He shook his head, huffing a little chuckle.

"What's funny?" he asked, transferring their food over to plates. Actual plates and silverware to boot. This was already a sight better than any meals he'd made back in the Reds. He slid Kaidan's plate over to him before sitting across from him, brows arched.

Kaidan looked down at the food for a moment, smile a little steadier, still crooked. He picked up the fork, turned it over and then shrugged.

It was a castle and it had weird forks. He'd live.

"Just this." He gestured around them. "Two hours ago I was in lock up. Because I killed somebody, Shepard." His voice dropped, low and raw. "I just didn't think this--" he gestured between them, "--was ever going to happen again."