[Note: Takes place in the Professional Silence storyline, somewhere before Virmire.]

"The electrical fields in the bodies of biotics mean they are also prone to small static discharges when they come into contact with metal..."

"... most forms of life on Palaven evolved some form of metallic 'exoskeleton' to protect themselves..."

The times on the Citadel are the better ones. On the Normandy, there's no privacy, no way to seek out the secrecy necessary for something like this. The ship is too small, everyone knows everyone's business, and it's too easy to be reminded of what they haven't managed yet to do. Saren is out there. The geth army is massing. And they still haven't managed to locate the Conduit. Aboard the ship, the weight of responsibility is as crushing as the narrow halls, constant interruptions and packed sleeping pods.

Here, on the ancient space station, drifting idly through the bright cloud of the nebula, they are all but anonymous. Even in the natural sterility of the Presidium, they're just faces. If they keep their heads down, keep to themselves, no one pays attention. No one is there to remind them, and look over their shoulders to weigh them down with lives on Feros they couldn't save, or the looming potential threat of some fifty-thousand year-old monstrosity they don't fully understand. In the Wards, it's even better. Masses of people make for easy hiding in plain sight, made all the easier by one's knowledge of the twisting, convoluted levels and walkways winding between spires and towers.

They've chosen the Presidium today. They need to breathe in what feels like clean air, and see the grass and trees, touch the pools. It's a living place, just as alive for all its stark structure as the teeming, bustling Wards. Things are quiet between them—they lean against a rail, staring down into a fountain Wrex once swore was full of fish before his latest return to the station. Overhead, the artificial sky is growing dark, the false white sunlight dimming into a feigned twilight. Lights are coming on in apartments and embassies, shops and bars. They stand so close, they're almost touching. One of them glances around, then reaches out to place a hand over the other's.

"Ow!"

Abruptly, the hand is jerked back, concern marring dark eyes. "What?"

A taloned hand flexes, three digits clacking against the metal rail. "You just... you shocked me."

Kaidan sighs, leaning his elbows on the rail, now a few inches further away from the other. His arms are folded. He does not touch any exposed flesh. "Sorry," he says, eyes looking decidedly away.

"It's all right," Garrus assures him, moving to reclaim the distance between them. "I should be used to it, by now." His tone is light, and his mandibles are flicking casually. "Maybe there's a reason biotics are so rare among my people..."

Now he's teasing, and Kaidan looks over at him, some of the tension gone out of his posture. "Why?" he asks, smiling slightly.

Garrus taps the back of his hand with a talon. Another dull clacking sound emanates from the scaled skin. "Very slightly metallic," he says. "I wonder that they don't manage to electrocute themselves every time they shake hands. Nothing would ever get done."

"I don't think it'd get that bad, Garrus," Kaidan answers. "I don't even notice it anymore. It's just something you get used to, like..."

He trails off, studying the darkening water in the pond below. Simulated wind picks up, blowing fountain spray back towards them. A soft rustle of scales and plates is Garrus shaking it off his face, grumbling at the cold of it. The words almost makes Kaidan grin.

"Like?" the turian prompts, also making an effort to keep his gaze riveted away. He leans a little closer, until their clothed shoulders are touching, and the electricity jumping through Kaidan has nothing to do with biotics. "What were you going to say?"

"Like... the extra rations," he says, knowing full well it's a terrible excuse.

Pale eyes drop all pretense of being interested in the lumbering elcor across the water. They're focused on Kaidan entirely now, studying him, raking over him like the hawks the turians supposedly resemble. He never saw it. Except for now, under the piercing stare. It isn't like the others, before the BaaT, and after every time he lifted a spinning drone high into the air for the rest to destroy. It's concerned. Even a little hurt. For a long moment, Kaidan tries to meet it, tries to put as much into it as he can. The asari embrace it. The krogan use it. The salarians secret it away. The turians distrust it, shove their own people into tiny groups that don't have to deal with the rest of their army. And humans have followed their fear.

Something like a gap seems to spring up, cracking metal tiles beneath their feet until it seems they're standing across the Presidium pond from each other. He swallows, wanting to move, to find a bridge over that gap. His feet are frozen, and he can't do a thing. Even if he did... what good would it do? He is standing alone, cut off with all others like him, with nothing to use to bring him back to that delicate normalcy on the other side.

"I thought most people liked the extra," Garrus says, turning his head. The words are carefully chosen. When he looks back, the only expression on his face is wry amusement. "If it's too much for you, you could always pass it off to Wrex..."

Kaidan snorts, and suddenly they're shoulder-to-shoulder again, with familiar electricity coursing warmth through him. "Only if I wanted to see him take my hand with it," he says, not at all serious. The smile on his face is real now.

"I think the Normandy mess goes to great lengths to make sure that doesn't happen."

Garrus ducks his head down. He rests it, just for a minute, against Kaidan's. Neither speaks. Around them, full dark has dropped down on the Presidium. The walks are empty. They are completely alone. Kaidan's hands find sharp turian hips, tracing sparking fingertips over the armor. If any of the jolts get through, Garrus does not say.

"We should get back."

A nod as they turn their backs on the dark waters, and arching bridges standing silent, sterile witness.