Chapter Text
by Crowthis
Purgatory wasn’t for everybody. Just the lucky ones.
Gastown didn’t have to be pretty. It didn’t have to have clean air or a view of the bay. It had plenty of bright lights in the darkness, a nebula hanging over the smoky streets; when Shepard leaned against the back wall of the club, the flashing signs formed their own kind of galaxy above him. It was like a private planetarium down there and even if it smelled like garbage, it didn’t always look like hell.
Only most of the time.
The back door opened, EXIT sign flickering. Music flooded out of the club like a sudden wind, blowing a couple of rich kids with nothing better to do than dust up and dance onto the street. The door slammed shut after them and, once their footsteps had faded, only the hum of the bass throbbing through the wall and pulsing into Shepard’s shoulders was left. For a whole lot of noise, it was still pretty damn quiet.
Shepard closed his eyes. He took the last drag on his cigarette, then crushed it under his heel and pushed free with his elbows.
‘Lift-off,’ he said.
It was time to ride.
Normandy purred between his thighs like an underground club pounding out music, only first of all, the bike had better taste in rhythm, and second of all, Shepard didn’t need to know how to dance to know how to fly. Gunning his engine, he heard the sharp echoes bouncing between warehouses, blasting through empty windows, ringing out loud and clear before the ignition guttered and steadied. He gunned the engine again, a third time, and then she was alive, ripping past a corner and over uneven streets, Shepard’s hair whipped, blinding and damp from a misty half-rain, against his face.
He had fifteen minutes to kill before he had to check in, tops. He drove clean over those fifteen minutes and one extra for good luck, and when he finally braked in front of the regular spot, the deal was already finished.
‘Nice wheels,’ he said, nodding after the car as it pulled away.
Finch stuffed his cut and the Councilor’s into his back pocket for forking over later. ‘Oh yeah? Had my eye on that beaut for a while, come to think of it. You wanna flank ‘em, see where they’re headed?’
‘Why ask when I don’t get a choice?’
‘Scope the damn joint out, Shep. Give me the coordinates. We’re gonna pick ourselves out a fancy new ride.’
Shepard snorted. Any other language it would’ve been an aye, aye. But that wasn’t the way they did things on the streets.
‘Riding a bike’s not just like riding a bike for you, huh, Finch? Gotta have four wheels instead of two?’
‘You keep it up with the small talk, you’re gonna lose ‘em,’ Finch said. ‘Then Councilor’s gonna be angry. You like Councilor when he’s angry?’
Shepard wrapped his fingers around the handlebars, swinging his leg over the seat. Easy; smooth. Some nights his hands cramped from riding so long, so hard, so fast, from midnight until morning finally showed up, cold and wet, leather creaking around his hunched shoulders. There wasn’t a single night he cared. The closer he bent over the metal, the more he could smell it and the less the rain mattered, slick streets and skidding wheels. He forgot about a dumb thing called breaks and just kept going, until the sun came up to meet him. Or at least until the clouds got a little brighter, depending on the weather.
Shepard left Finch and the rest of the guys behind in a belch of exhaust. Whatever their faces looked like, it was all covered up by smoke.
The SSV on the side of Shepard’s bike was the sweet spot, where the inside of his knee hit, where his legs pressed tight. He caught up with the flashy convertible, easy, then passed it so the driver wouldn’t get suspicious, tearing off down the street and doubling back once he was out of sight.
People with fancy things never deserved what they had—not when they couldn’t hold onto them in the first place. You didn’t drive your daddy’s best car to the worst part of town and think you were gonna be able to park it again like nothing ever happened, like it hadn’t seen the meanest side the city had to offer, right in front of the white picket fence. Shepard swung around a couple of back alleys; they were like the veins on the back of his hand, nothing special to anybody else, but he knew every twist and turn like they were a part of him.
No place like home.
Shepard followed the red flip-top all the way out of Gastown and toward Shaughnessy. The houses were fancy, the lights already off, neat little gardens out front and—what else—white picket fences around the front yards, sidewalks wide enough for two, trees and grass and flowers all over, not a single abandoned building or rusty fire escape.
It’d stopped raining. Shepard circled the block, keeping his distance. Normandy’s engine was just a quiet rumble, barely more than a whisper, keeping the secret they both knew—they weren’t supposed to be here. They didn’t belong in a nice place like this.
Finally, the car pulled into a driveway a block ahead and Shepard cut his engine to match. It was so damn quiet on the street that even Shepard’s breathing, the warm metal cooling along Normandy’s side panels, made too much noise. A light went on in a window ahead. Shepard needed a smoke; he was lighting the cigarette, cupping his hands around the flame, when he heard the footsteps.
He flicked his lighter shut. The footsteps paused, then started up again, and this kid appeared under one of the fancy, old-fashioned streetlamps. Fancy sweater, the button-up type, and fancy hair, kept all neat. Even his shoes were clean and Shepard dragged smoke into his lungs, the flare of the cigarette tip making the kid pause again. He sucked in a breath. He smelled smoke and his lips parted.
‘Being here’s not illegal, you know,’ Shepard said.
Somebody had to break the silence.
Just smashing into their walls, breaking their windows, pulling their fences up by the stakes, leaving nothing behind but a big, dirty mess. The trick to going fast was not being afraid of crashing—all that meant was a few broken bones, torn-up knees and ripped jeans and damages it wouldn’t be Shepard’s job to fix anyway. Shake their lives around a little bit. Give them some excitement. It’d be all they talked about for months, even years, much less days.
‘No,’ the kid said. ‘It isn’t, I guess. But following people around might be. And what you sold—back in Gastown?—that definitely is.’
‘So you’re a funny guy.’ Shepard took another pull. He didn’t need to be calmed so the smoke didn’t have that effect; all it did was make the air he was breathing easier to see. ‘You didn’t pay for the goods in laughs, did you? ‘Cause I hear that comes with interest now.’
The kid was getting all wet, standing there with a soggy sweater. Some people didn’t know when to get out of the rain.
‘I wasn’t buying. Just…going with a friend.’
‘Yeah. Sure.’ Shepard kept the ash away from falling on the bike’s fresh paint-job, after the last thrill ride. Being afraid of going up in flames would only slow him down. ‘That’s what they all say.’
‘Well, maybe,’ the kid said. ‘I don’t know about that. What they say and what I say don’t have to be related, either.’
Shepard’s cigarette was nothing but a stub. He let it fall and it glittered with the moonlight on the wet blacktop, only seconds later going black.
‘Hey,’ the kid added. ‘Why’d you follow us back, anyway?’
‘Gotta get a bead on where your loved ones are,’ Shepard said. Lies came easier than the truth and right now, the kid was too careless. Too brave, without anything that meant he could back that kind of attitude up. This wasn’t Encyclopedia Brown, Kid Detective. Shepard wasn’t the bad boy from down the block. Maybe he wouldn’t smoke a stranger just for having the wrong attitude and an honest face, but not everybody else would be so agreeable. ‘Just in case we need that information to take ‘em out.’
‘That’s crazy,’ the kid said.
Shepard shrugged. ‘You believed me, though.’
‘You don’t have any reason to lie.’
That was rich. ‘Might not wanna hang around that friend anymore. People like that get you into all kinds of trouble.’ Shepard gunned his engines, waiting for the kid to flinch. He blinked instead, but it was enough of a tell that Shepard knew he was rattled. Just not rattled enough. ‘Better blow before somebody arrests me for messing up the atmosphere.’
‘I don’t know your name,’ the kid said.
Shepard popped a quick move around him, gaining speed before skidding to a stop and U-ing back the way he came. ‘Never gave it to you,’ he replied.
by Crowthis
*
It was one of those nights. Long, but still—somehow—morning before he knew it. He gave Finch the address and told him it might not be an easy job, even if the hood of the convertible was down, and anyway he’d need somebody with fingers that were better at hotwiring than Finch’s hammer-hands. ‘You volunteering yourself for the job, Shep?’ Finch asked, and when Shepard finally turned in to catch some z’s, he reminded himself of something he always knew—something he could stand to live by just an inch or two harder.
Keeping his mouth shut. It might not be easy around guys like Finch and especially around guys like the Councilor, but it wasn’t as hard as Shepard could make it look, either.
Anyway, grand theft auto wasn’t the technical term if you didn’t keep the car. Shepard pushed back the shade, watching the sun come up over the city, then fell asleep with his back against the wall, framed in the windowsill, one knee hiked up and the other dangling out the window.
He dreamed he was running. Hard and fast but not fast enough. He wasn’t on his bike; it was just him, his shoes, and no headlights blowing through the darkness. Eventually he got this feeling like he was gonna fall, but he opened his eyes before that happened and braced himself on a yawn.
The sun was already high in the sky, already starting its way back down. Shepard rubbed the sleep out of his eye, an old bruise on the cheekbone from an argument with the pavement that was close to healing, close enough he kept forgetting it was there. When the heel of his palm hit it he cleared his throat and his body did the rest of the hard work, already distracted from the pain.
Hey, at least it wasn’t raining.
Lunch and dinner came at the same time: the early bird special at Apollo’s Diner, thick cut fries—and hold the ketchup. Shepard licked his fingers clean and washed his face in the men’s room, door braced shut with one foot, drying off the back of his neck and checking for blood stains on his jacket.
None this time. No tears, either. The current count was three weeks and two days he hadn’t set it on fire—or had it set on fire for him.
A new record.
Shepard shrugged his collar up and elbowed the jukebox on his way out, jostling it hard enough to shake the stuck nickel loose. He swept that into his pocket and headed out.
Autumn. Short days, long nights. Sunset came on early. Easy to feel like a creature of the night when you lost most of the day.
Then, it was back to Purgatory, leaving all the cars behind. They might’ve been bigger, but Shepard could scream faster than any of them.
‘Hey, Loco,’ James said, on his way inside as Shepard cut the engine in the lot. ‘What’s a cool cat like you doing in a dive like this?’
‘Gonna be late for your gig if you don’t beat it, James.’
‘Yeah, yeah. I hear you.’ James saluted, shouldering the back door open. ‘You know I’m never careful, Loco; that’s why I’m still around.’
With time to kill and the back door shut, Shepard headed out past the dumpsters, hopped the nearest fence into the used car lot, and set up in his favorite—a convertible that still had most of its red paint—putting his feet up to smoke, watching the stars, although mostly he was staring at dark, empty sky. One of the stray dogs knocked over a can nearby. Shepard fished the jukebox nickel out of his pocket and flipped it, caught it; flipped it, caught it. Around and around, the way the world was spinning, until the cold metal was warm.
The fence rattled. It could’ve been another one of the dogs or a cat getting too curious for its own good. Shepard turned.
It was the kid. The sweater with a face. Now he was trying his luck a second time in a place like this, hand against the fence—and not exactly the white picket ones he was used to, either. It was gonna leave an ugly metal smell on his fingers, something he’d have to wash off a few times over before it faded away.
‘Nothing better to do on a Friday night, huh, Nosebleed?’ Shepard asked.
‘I’m not the one breaking into car lots and hanging out in impounded vehicles,’ the kid replied.
‘When you put it like that, it sounds too damn clinical.’
‘You mean like the truth?’
‘I mean like what the hell’re you doing here?’ Shepard asked.
That seemed to stump him, at least for a few seconds of silence.
‘Any of the Reds see you sniffing around here,’ Shepard added, to drive the point home, ‘they’re gonna think you’re looking to join up and recruit you on the spot. You ever tell a Red no before?’ The kid shook his head. ‘And that’s if you’re lucky. Other option isn’t so nice.’ The kid didn’t raise his hand or anything, so Shepard continued. ‘They’ll figure you’re sticking your nose into something that’s none of your business, and they’re not gonna give you a slap on the wrist and a half-hour shaved off your curfew for punishment, either.’
‘No kidding.’
‘Yeah, ‘cause I’m not the funny guy. You are—remember?’
‘So how’d you get in there?’ The kid looked up, measuring the height of the fence and judging it against his own height, then focused on Shepard again through the diamond-shaped wires. The shadows on his face kept shifting when the lights over Purgatory switched colors, sign rotating overhead. Always turning and turning, never really getting anywhere. Like tires skidding, losing traction.
‘I knocked three times and gave the secret password,’ Shepard said.
‘You climbed it.’
‘No kidding.’
‘Well…’ The kid licked his bottom lip. Shepard didn’t know how he saw it so clearly from so far away; it meant he must’ve been looking. ‘It can’t be too hard, then.’
The fence rattled as he got his hands in place, swinging one foot into a diamond, then the other. Shepard sat up. He took out his cigarette long enough to lick his lips and shoot the kid a whistle.
‘Gonna have to call you Nosebleed after this,’ Shepard said. ‘When you break your face falling off of that thing.’
Halfway to the top was when you started getting cocky. After halfway, it didn’t just get twice as hard—because it got ten times harder, a hundred times, the final push taking every ounce of strength you had to make it without falling on your ass after. Nosebleed, meet gravity.
He was gonna tear his sweater and the color of blood wasn’t gonna match his shoes.
‘Alenko.’ His breath was coming quick and jerky now, but he was still climbing. The barbed-wire top wasn’t a leather jacket’s biggest enemy, but a sweater didn’t stand a chance against it. Not a snowball’s in hell. ‘…Kaidan. I’d, uh, shake your hand, too, only I’m a little busy right now.’
Shepard sucked smoke into his mouth and puffed it out again in a lopsided ring. The joke wasn’t funny; Alenko was breathless not from laughing at it, but from making it to the top of the fence.
‘I don’t remember inviting you in,’ Shepard said.
‘That’s ‘cause you didn’t,’ Alenko replied. His shoulder snagged on one of the sharp twists of wire and Shepard heard the sound the sweater made when it ripped.
And James called him loco.
There were plenty of people out there crazier than him.
The whole damn night was crazy, the kind of thing that happened in Blasto Vs. The Things From Outerspace. At any second, Alenko was gonna sprout antennae and hold out his laser-gun and try to convince Shepard he came in peace, that it was time to take him to earth’s leaders.
Joke’s on you, alien scum. We don’t have any leaders here. Only a bunch of rebels. Renegades on the streets and squares following orders ‘cause they don’t know how to make their own. You wanna conquer us? We won’t stand a chance ‘cause we don’t know how to stand together.
‘Uh,’ Kaidan said. Maybe it was oof. Whatever it was, Shepard watched him lose his balance while hoisting himself onto the other side, then catch it again right before he dropped the whole ten feet to the ground. He hung on, stubborn and weird, ripped sweater and all.
‘How’re you planning on telling your folks what happened to that sweater, anyway?’ Shepard asked.
‘I’ll think of something.’ Alenko’s feet, white sneakers still not scuffed, swung once over the ground, then back in the same direction. He felt around for some footing, sweater riding up at about the same time as Shepard realized he was watching it ride up.
Alenko’s toe pressed down on the blacktop. His weight shifted, gravity restored. Shepard looked away, finishing his cigarette. He heard Alenko’s shoes tap the ground and the silence that came after.
Well—almost silence. But just like a cigarette, it didn’t last long.
‘How often do you smoke those things, anyway?’ Alenko asked.
‘Why, you want one?’
Alenko’s nose wrinkled. ‘…Yeah, no thanks. I don’t smoke.’
Of course he didn’t.
Shepard lit up again, cheeks hollowing even though his mouth was full of smoke. He blew another smoke ring and Alenko watched it disappear in the foggy night air. ‘Here for your friend like last time, huh?’
‘Not this time.’ Alenko held his ground better than Finch, Shepard noticed, but whether that made him smarter or stupider, there was no way of knowing without testing it in the field. ‘You came after us last night because you were thinking about stealing his car, right?’
‘This isn’t the latest issue of Kaidan Alenko: Boy Detective, you know,’ Shepard said. ‘You’re not gonna solve the case and go home in time for dinner with the family and your lucky dog named Clue.’
‘Dinner’s long over, anyway.’ Alenko’s eyes lit up when Shepard’s cigarette glowed. ‘Feels like it ended forever ago.’
‘And I wouldn’t know about that ‘cause I don’t have dinner with the family, is that it?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘Sure you didn’t.’ Shepard settled back against the windshield. Chances were Alenko would get bored, would think he made his point, and, finally, decide to leave. If he was looking for trouble, he could find it past any door in Gastown. He didn’t have to bug Shepard while he was planning a car theft. ‘It was implied.’
‘If that’s what you wanna think,’ Alenko said. ‘If that’s what you’re gonna think. Maybe I’m not the guy to change your mind.’
‘You seem like the guy to keep trying, though.’ Shepard closed both eyes, then opened one. Alenko was still there. The stars were still covered up by the clouds. ‘Something I can do for you, Nosebleed? Other than babysitting.’
‘Very funny. You’re the clown here, not me.’
He was right about one thing—the whole place was a circus. Being a lion had its perks, but at the end of the day, the Ringmaster called the shots, and the lion headed back into its cage.
‘Anyway…’ Alenko made a sound like somebody’d popped three of his four tires. He was losing steam—realizing where he was an abandoned used car and car parts lot in the bad part of town, how far away from home and whatever his old man had set up for him, whatever his old lady was making for dinner. The wrong side of the fence. ‘…I came here to tell you to call it off. If you don’t, I’m gonna…’
Shepard opened both eyes. ‘Gonna what?’
Alenko swallowed. His throat, as clean-shaven as it was, bobbed once. ‘Then I’m gonna tell the police what I know. And, sure, maybe that makes me a real square in your book, but it’s the right thing to do.’
‘You sure are a piece of work, Nosebleed,’ Shepard said. He thought he saw Alenko’s mouth twist to one corner but it left in as much time it took Shepard to blink. It might’ve been nothing more than some dust in his eye, or the change of the colors on the sign over Purgatory from pink to red. Turning, turning. ‘You’ve gotta be pulling my leg.’
Alenko held up both hands. ‘No leg pulling over here.’
‘So out of the goodness of your heart and your dedication to…’ Shepard licked his bottom lip. It tasted like ash. There was a word he was looking for; he just had to pin it down. ‘…integrity,’ he decided finally, ‘you decided to come here first and warn me?’
‘When you’re taken in, you’ll be rehabilitated,’ Alenko said.
‘So I can look good in torn sweaters like you?’ Shepard’s leather jacket creaked. ‘Jeez, Nosebleed. You’re really something. You think you could teach me how to do your hair up nice and stiff like yours, too, or does that cost extra?’
‘I’m not kidding,’ Alenko said.
‘No kidding,’ Shepard replied.
The leather creaked. The blown out tires, nothing more than shredded black rubber, squeaked on the ground as Shepard shifted, crossing one leg over the other.
by Crowthis
‘You’d better scram before somebody takes you seriously,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about me; I’m gonna lie back and enjoy the drive-in. Good view from here of the show. It’s called Nosebleed Meets the Fence: Part Two. Can’t wait to see how it ends.’
‘You’d risk all that for somebody else’s car when you’ve already got a set of wheels?’
Like a fly buzzing around the place, there was no getting rid of him. Shepard swung his legs over the hood of the busted hot-rod and eased off, pushing his hand through his hair. It didn’t stay out of his eyes but the effect made Alenko swallow again while Shepard stared him down.
Still holding steady. He hadn’t buckled under the pressure yet.
‘You’re starting to rattle my cage, Nosebleed,’ Shepard said.
‘That was kind of the plan, I guess,’ Alenko replied. ‘Shake you up, so you could see the kind of mistake you’re making.’
‘You gonna rehabilitate me personally?’
‘Am I gonna have to climb another fence?’
Shepard snorted. Smoke puffed between them and Alenko coughed, politely, then held out his hand.
Shepard didn’t shake it.
He moved past Alenko to the gate and grabbed the chain, pulling it aside. ‘Squares like you make things way more complicated than they need to be,’ he said, pulling the gate open. ‘Could’ve saved your sweater and kept whatever excuse you’ve got up your sleeve for another rainy day.’
*