Chapter Text
Life at Brain Camp continued as normal, or as normally as it could for any of the members of Upsilon Unit who were still recovering from Ayaka’s death. Commander Vyrnnus still worked them to the point of exhaustion, and then some. Students kept burning out, although no more deaths occurred (or none that Vyrnnus thought they should be told about). The routine continued: eat, train, eat, train, eat, relax, sleep. The more they worked, the more they understood the importance of eating, and their daily-required calories increased as they got stronger. Soon, Kaidan felt like he was eating for two typical Alliance soldiers. But he needed it. If he didn’t finish a meal, he felt it at training. His body was changing, muscles forming that he never had before. It was a new experience.
He and Rahna also continued their trysts. Soon, their friend group learned about their relationship. Their friends didn’t mind too much, although it did require that their rec time be split between friend time and alone time. As long as their friends weren’t being completely ignored, they tolerated him and Rahna together.
Kaidan couldn’t help it. He was falling for her. Spending so much time alone with her was great for improving his kissing skills, yes, but he also got to learn so much about her as a person, which only made his feelings for her grow. He admitted to her that he didn’t know much about Turkish culture, and she didn’t know much about Asian culture (although he himself had never traveled to Singapore, his mother had told him stories about his family there, and those were the ones he relayed to Rahna).
He thought he was in love, though he didn’t really have any basis to compare it to. He wanted to spend all of his free time with her, and he didn’t even care what they were doing. Sometimes they’d just lie in bed together, reading or playing games, barely communicating with each other. But just being in her presence, absorbing her energy, made Kaidan happier than he had ever been in his life.
Not to mention she was insanely brilliant. Kaidan knew Shelby was smart when it came to tech, but Rahna was as much his equal. Between the two of them, Kaidan learned as much as he could about the biotic amp in his body, about omni-tools, mass effect fields, and mass effect engines and generators. Sometimes it made his head spin, but Rahna’s kindness and patience made learning about the tech worth it.
After a few months passed, Kaidan finally decided that what he felt was, indeed, love, and that he couldn’t stand not knowing if Rahna felt the same way about him. The halfway point of down time was coming up, and Kaidan was just about to ask Rahna if she wanted to leave for some privacy, when Shelby came bounding into the rec room.
“Guys!” he nearly shouted upon his arrival, causing Kaidan to jump in surprise.
“Jeez, Shelby, loud much?” he asked.
Shelby took in the occupants of the room and seemed to think better of what he was about to say. Instead, he made his way to where Kaidan and Rahna were sitting.
“Guys, do you mind if I come with you when you excuse yourselves today?” he asked, a lot quieter now.
“Yes,” Kaidan said immediately, nodding his head for added emphasis.
Rahna only giggled. “I don’t think we’ve reached that stage in our relationship yet, Shelby. But if we ever do get bored, I’m glad to know that you would be interested in joining.”
Kaidan shot his girlfriend an incredulous look, before noticing the sparkle in her eyes that always appeared when she was teasing.
Shelby’s own eyes widened before he realized the possible miscommunication that could have occurred.
“What? No!” he said, shaking his own head vehemently. “Ew, I would never —”
“You would never?” Rahna asked, mock-offended.
“Yeah, what’s wrong with my girlfriend?” Kaidan added.
“No, not that I would never, I mean, I would love to, anyone with a pulse would —”
“Watch it,” Kaidan warned. “You should probably stop speaking before you dig that hole any deeper.”
Shelby blushed a deep crimson, shifting his gaze between Kaidan and Rahna. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean, I mean —”
Rahna broke out into a fit of giggles, unable to keep the joke continuing. “We’re just having a little fun at your expense, Shelby, I’m sorry. That was unkind of us.”
“Perfectly fine by me,” Kaidan muttered, but smiled at his best friend all the same.
“You must admit, the way you asked to accompany us for our private time was a bit funny,” Rahna added, giving Shelby her brilliant smile. Kaidan’s heart melted at the sight of her.
Shelby opened his mouth to speak, but then seemed to think better of it. He paused, seemingly going over the events that led him to the present situation.
“I guess you’re right,” he conceded. “But guys, I need to talk to you.” He lowered his voice so both Kaidan and Rahna had to lean in closer to hear, “only you two. And I figured the best way to do that would be to go with you when you guys left here.”
Kaidan looked to Rahna, raising his eyebrows in a silent question.
She shrugged her shoulders back to him.
“Okay," Kaidan said to Shelby. “Let’s go.”
The three of them made their way to Kaidan and Shelby’s bunk. Once they were inside, Shelby locked the door.
Rahna giggled again. “Maybe he does want a threesome,” she joked, when she saw the lock whirl into place.
“Ha ha,” Shelby said, heading over to his footlocker.
“Okay, man, so if it’s not a threesome, what are we doing here?” Kaidan asked.
Shelby continued rummaging around in his footlocker until he finally found what he was looking for. With a triumphant flourish, he produced a small electronic device, waving it around excitedly.
“What is that?” Kaidan asked.
“Is that what I think it is?” Rahna asked at the same time.
“Take a look,” Shelby said, holding the piece of tech out to her. “Just, be careful with it, will you?”
Rahna closed the distance between the two of them in a few steps and took the tech in her hands. She began examining it from all angles, turning it this way and that. Finally, she examined the connections that protruded from the device.
“This is a transmitter,” she said, no question in her voice.
“It is,” Shelby said, somewhat proudly.
“A transmitter?” Kaidan asked, joining the other two at the piece of tech. “Does it work?”
“It does,” Shelby answered.
“How?” Rahna demanded.
“It took awhile for me to scrounge the necessary parts. Really, it was just taking apart some of the gaming rigs in the rec room. I also stole some components from Jump Zero’s internal communications systems. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter, is that I just tested it before I went to get you guys, and it works. We can send messages. Receiving them is a little more difficult, I think I’m still missing a component or two, but I should be able to figure that out soon enough, and any received messages will be stored in the data bank as code, just waiting for me to create the interface to retrieve them, so that’s not really a problem —”
“We can write home,” Rahna said softly, interrupting Shelby’s excited chatter.
“We can,” Shelby said, smiling. “More importantly, we can contact the Alliance and let them know what the hell is going on here. I don’t think they know students are dying. If they do…” Shelby trailed off, unwilling to finish that thought. “They just can’t. We need to tell them what Vyrnnus is doing to us. And when we do, they have to let us go home, or give us a new teacher, at least.”
Kaidan and Rahna exchanged glances, unsure about the viability of the transmitter. But they both knew they wanted to try contacting their families, regardless. It had been months without communication, the longest either of them had ever been away from home. They were, they were loath to admit, a bit homesick.
“Okay,” Kaidan said. “How long can the messages be?”
“As long as you want them to be,” Shelby said. “Go ahead and take the rest of the evening to draft something, and I’ll send them after lights out.”
“Thank you,” Rahna said, hugging Shelby tightly. “I know my family will be thrilled to hear from me.”
“Yeah, man, this is really cool,” Kaidan said, hugging his friend as well. “I’ll have something for you soon.”
“Me, too,” Rahna said. “Actually, Kaidan, if you don’t mind, I’m going to spend some time alone to gather my thoughts.”
“Of course,” he said, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her in for a hug. He kissed her forehead. “I’ll be here if you finish early.”
She smiled, kissing Kaidan quickly on the lips, before swinging her hair around and rushing out the door.
“Man, have you got it bad.” Shelby was grinning at Kaidan after the door closed.
Kaidan just remained silent, spending a few moments looking to the place where Rahna just was.
“Shut up,” Kaidan said, not giving his friend any attention. “Nah, man, really,” he said, finally turning toward where Shelby was sitting on his bed. “Thanks for this. I’m my parents’ only kid. It’ll make them really happy to hear from me.”
“One of the reasons I did this,” Shelby replied, smiling. “Now get to writing! I can’t wait around forever.”
Kaidan grinned back at his friend before grabbing a datapad and getting to work.
“Commander, something you need to see,” a deck officer spoke to Vyrnnus over the comm in his room. “We have an unauthorized data transmission off station.”
“Destination?” Vyrnnus grunted through his sleep-addled brain.
“Looks like it’s heading to Earth’s buoy sir. With multiple destinations on planet after that.”
“Can you find the source?” the commander asked, not as worried about a comm that was kept within the Sol system.
“Signal’s encrypted,” the deck officer informed him. “We can decrypt it, but it’ll take some time.”
“Let me know when it’s done,” Vyrnnus responded.
“Aye, sir.”
“Vyrnnus out.”
The turian turned over in his bed, trying to get settled so he could fall asleep quickly, maximizing the little time he knew he had before the decryption algorithm finished its work.
He sighed. “Which cadet was stupid enough to decide that calling home was more important than the classified nature of this program?” he thought, shaking his head. He’d find out soon enough, he supposed.
For his part, he hoped it was Alenko.
With the pleasant thoughts of every way he’d torture the idiot who sent the transmission coursing through his mind, he drifted back to sleep.