AN: If you haven't read Binary... then go do that. Or not. As you prefer.

Mirage

Tali'Zorah nar Rayya wasn't confronted with the magnitude of her mistake until she realized that it wasn't the radscorpion poison that was making her dizzy, but dehydration. But the poison certainly didn't help matters.

It was so hotout here. She really should have sprung for some kind of air-conditioning module for her suit, but the damned things were so expensive. And who could have known just how hard it was just to move across the sand?

And all the bugs! They everywhere! She'd been chased for the better part of an hour by a bunch of ants (the word still felt foreign in her mouth. All the human words did. But like so many others of her she liked saying them.) before the nasty creatures had given up, but her relief was short-lived because after those had come the radscorpions.

For something with such short legs and enormous pincers weighing them down the damned things could move like lightning. And they were resilient! There was military grade armour amongst her people that was less formidable than the arachnid's carapace. That damned things could take a shotgun blast to the face (did scorpions have faces?) and not be fazed! Eventually she'd had to throw her pack into its questing pincers to distract it long enough for her to get away. And even that hadn't been enough to save her completely, because she'd been stabbed right through her ankle.

The good thing about being stabbed all the way through the ankle by a poisonous stinger was that very little poison actually entered her bloodstream. If it had gotten somewhere with a bit more substance that might not have been the case. Which would mean she would either be subjected to a particularly nasty poison or suffer anaphylactic shock.

The bad thing about being stabbed all the way through the ankle was that she had been stabbed through her ankle. The pain that coursed up her leg was indescribable, and it only got worse with every step. She'd gasped and cursed and finally sat down beneath the dead branches of a blackened tree.

It was nice to just sit down in the shade for a moment. Or an hour. Maybe just a bit longer than that. It was difficult to say with her head spinning and her body feeling like it was made from lead and sponges. She would have to get moving soon, because there was an uncomfortable bubbling in her lungs that heralded the onset of a bad reaction to something in her suit and the day wasdragging on.

Still... it was pretty nice here. In the shade. Just breathing. Or trying to, anyway. Just a bit longer, then? Yeah.

Who knew the wasteland outside the Fallston's walls could be so harsh? Nobody had warned her about this!

Of course, she hadn't asked anyone about the dangers. That was the problem when one acted on impulse and wild ideas: no time to prepare. She'd merely acquired a shotgun and stocked up on as much food and water as she could. It hadn't been very much, but at the times she'd thought it would be enough. It looks like she'd never be able test that theory. Which might actually be a good thing, considering how well things had gone so far. The supplies would only have ensured that her venture would go on longer.

She squinted against the glaring sunlight, and caught a hint of movement that seized her attention.

She almost didn't spot him at first. It was difficult to pick out small movements in the distance when your head feels like its about to wobble off her neck if she moved too quickly.

He came walking out of a mirage, his movements masked by the heat of the air, but eventually she spotted the lone dot of green swaying gently in the distance. She couldn't tell much more than that, but any help was better than none.

She tried to raise a hand to wave at that distant movement, but found that they weren't cooperating. They were entirely too heavy to move, let alone lift above her head, and the effort of trying made her head swim even more. She clenched her eyes and hiss through her teeth as she put even more effort into it.

Something strange happened. She felt a strange sensation of falling, and then something hit her head. She snapped her eyes open immediately, and suddenly it was night. Time had passed, though it was difficult to say just how much.

She was laying down beside a small camp fire, above with a pair of skewered iguanas were being roasted. The pain in her ankle wasn't as bad anymore, and her head wasn't swimming either.

"You must be new," a masculine voice commented.

"Muhh?" she groaned unintelligibly. Her head was still swimming. She blinked her eyes, searching for the person who had spoken to her.

It was a human, sitting on the opposite side of the little fire.

She didn't recognize him from the colony, but that was hardly surprising. With more and more quarian colonists coming in as quickly as housing could be built for them, the few humans who were trusted enough to live amongst them had a tendency to vanish into the crowd. And despite the language barrier finally being overcome (though not yet quite conquered,) they remained an insular people. She'd been told that they hadn't always been such, but nobody liked talking about why that had changed.

This human wasn't like others she had seen. He wasn't thin or skinny, but there was a certain gauntness in his cheeks and around his eyes. He wasn't missing meals, but he wasn't wasting food either. His hair was closely cropped and bleached to an auburn tint of brown by the sun, and below them were tired blue eyes that watched her carefully. There were lines beneath them that belied many nights without enough sleep.

Curiously, he wore a bright green scarf with white swirls around his neck. It was looking a bit frayed around the edges, but here and there were small scars in the fabric where they had been carefully sewn back together with great care. It looked familiar, somehow.

And, though she only noticed it now, there wasn't a shred of fear in him. It was only now that she realized that all the humans she had ever met back at the colony had always had a certain amount of worry or anxiety in their features. As if they all shared a collective fear that something was about to happen. (Given her own streak of bad luck in just one day, she didn't want to rule out the possibility.)

He smiled at her.

"I said, you must be new," he repeated. "I don't recognize you."

It took her a moment to realize that he was speaking perfect Khellish.

"I... uhn..." she groaned, and tried to sit up. This turned out to be a poor decision, because the moment her head was ellevated the world wobbled and spun dangerously. Or felt to, rather.

"Careful," the human warned concernedly. "You had a bad allergic reaction. I did what I could to patch your suit up and gave you something to perk you up, but you're not going to feel good for a while."

That was an understatement. Something was twisting inside her stomach, and it felt like there was a fire in her muscles. Her head was better, but still a bit wobbly. And her ankle felt like someone was dragging a hard metal brush through the wound.

Still, it was a surprise that there was someone out here who could handle suit repairs at all, let alone carried medicine on the off chance they came a quarian as badly off as she had been.

"'nk you," she said gratefully in a small voice.

"It's no problem. I do what I can for the scouts," he made a sound of amusement. "I don't usually find them in as bad a state as I found you, though. You were lucky."

Behind her mask, Tali's eyes went wide.

He thought she was one of the scouts. That was... good? She didn't actually know how she was supposed to feel about that. The quarian scouts were well respected back at the colony, almost as much as the rangers. He might treat her better if he thought she was one of them rather than some silly girl who thought she'd be the first person in the colony to finish their Pilgrimage.

"I'm sorry, uhm... sir?" she said, turning appellation into a question. Her hesitation didn't go unnoticed.

His eyes widened, and his smile went wide.

"You arenew," he said with amusement. "Call me Shepard."

"I just- I've never seen you before," she admitted. "Are you from Fallston?"

For some reason the human found the question very funny.

"Very new," he said with a chuckle. The human threw a piece of wood on the fire, and embers rode the smoke up into the sky. "Yes, you could say that I'm from Fallston."

There was something about Khellish spoken through a human mouth that was strangely hypnotizing. His vocal cords and mouth didn't quite fit the language, and so there small differences. The words were spoken smoothly and quickly, flowing like water. It probably had more to do with him not speaking out of a microphone than it did with the actual way he spoke, but that didn't seem to matter.

Her temples throbbed and the world wobbled without warning. Shepard must have been watching for it, because he moved to her side in a flash, steadying her.

"Hey, take it easy. The meds must be wearing off," he cautioned her again. He reached over to a satchel she hadn't realized was next to her and retrieved a long metal capsule. "Here, drink this. You need to get some water in you."

"Thank you," she said gratefully as she accepted the capsule.

She fumbled with it for a few moments, her attempts to line it up with her helmet's induction port failing. It was a prospect doomed to fail, as her hands weren't nearly as agile as they might otherwise be due to whatever medicine he'd given her. Eventually the cannister fell from her clumsy fingers.

Shepard sighed, and with a dextrous hand (and those five fiddly fingers. She suppressed a shudder.) he fished it out of the folds of her mantle and connected it to her helmet himself. There was a small click and chime and then a quiet hiss as the connection was made and registered, and then

"There," he said softly. "Drink. You need to regain what you lost."

Tali gratefully did as she was advised, drinking down the distilled water with great satisfaction. The water felt like... well, like water in the desert. The throbbing in her head lessened almost immediately, and she sighed heavily as she swallowed the last drops.

"Thank you," she said again, less tired this time.

"Don't worry about it," the human said with a smile. "I'm sorry I can't do more for you."

"You've already done much more than I would have expected. I didn't think-" she stopped, embarrassed by her opinion. "The humans back at the colony, they aren't…" she trailed off uncertainly.

But Shepard seemed to understand all the same.

"They aren't exactly the most trusting lot," he agreed with her, shaking his head. "You shouldn't keep it against them. Life is hard outside the colony, even for us. They're just afraid."

"Afraid? Of what?"

"There are many things to be afraid of, but mostly it's you," he told her bluntly.

"Us?" Tali said indignantly. "But we've been trying to help! We keep them safe!"

"You do. But this is a bad place," Shepard said gravely. "I don't think the quarians back in Fallston really understand that. They're just happy to have a home. It doesn't hurt that the Migrant Fleet is in orbit in case something goes wrong."

Tali's eyes went wide in shock. He knew about the Migrant Fleet? He even knew it was here?! How could he know that? Nobody outside the fleet was supposed to know that!

Shepard didn't seem to notice her alarm, as he just kept on going.

"But you're a scout. You've seen the wasteland for yourself. What kind of person do you think could live down here without fear?"

Tali'Zorah put her worry aside for a moment to try to think of a response to the question.

A krogan could. Oh, they would have trouble at first. They would struggle. But that was where they excelled. They were born and bred to fight for survival. Harsh weather conditions wouldn't bother them. Radiation wouldn't kill them. Not even monstrous wildly would stop them. They would thrive in due time.

But humans… the only thing they had on quarians was that they didn't have an atrophied immune system, and five (shudder) fingers. They were vulnerable, even moreso than her own people, because of the actions of their forebears. She had only to think of her own experiences to know the truth. As bad off as she had been, she was lucky. She had survived long enough for someone with the knowledge and disposition to help her had come across her.

Not everyone could be as lucky as she. Not by a long by a long chalk.

She looked at him, watching her, calm as a mill pond.

"You aren't afraid," she pointed out.

"I'm a special case," Shepard shrugged in dismissal. "The others aren't. They were desperate, and now they're safe. They're either waiting for the other shoe to drop or they're afraid it will all be taken from them again."

That… made sense, actually.

"But let's not talk about that," the human said, and nodded towards her. "I forgot to ask earlier: what's your name?"

"Oh," Tali desperately hoped that human's knowledge of the admiralty board didn't extend beyond their names. "Uh, I am Tali'Zorah."

Shepard raised an eyebrow at her.

"... vas?" he said in question.

"Sorry," she said with a blush. Such a silly mistake! "Tali'Zorah vas Rayya."

"Well Tali'Zorah vas Rayya, in the morning I will guide you back to Fallston," he told her. "You should rest until then. I'll keep watch."

"Oh," there wasn't anything else she could say.

Back to Fallston… where she would probably be rushed back up to the Rayya and never be let back down in punishment. Where he father would scold her for doing something so foolish, so reckless… and failingin the process. What she had done was bad enough, but being injured and having to turn back was going to make it all the worse.

She couldn't bear to disappoint him like that. Not so soon after she started.

"Do you think I could stick with you for a little while longer, actually?" she asked him nervously. "I- this is my first excursion out here on my own, and I don't want to go back so soon."

Technically true, every word of it. But a lie all the same.

Shepard raised an eyebrow at her in question.

"You're wounded. You don't have any supplies," he pointed out critically.

"Only my ankle is hurt, and as for supplies, I think I know where to find where I left them," she countered in a rush. "I had to throw my pack at one of those radscorpions to get away, but it should still be there unless someone found it. I'll have more medical supplies too."

"Radscorpion, huh?" he mused, frowning a little. "Easy enough game. And Sae'Sorel would appreciate some venom samples."

"So it's okay?"

Shepard was quiet for a long time, watching her. Tali regretted not spending more time with any of the humans back at Fallston, because she had no idea what was going on inside his head.

"I suppose I'm the last person who should underestimate someone's resilience," he said eventually. "We'll see what we can find tomorrow. Until then, rest."

Tali couldn't help but smile at that.

Her pilgrimage wasn't done yet.

Two lone pilgrims walk into the wasteland.

It sounds like the beginning of a joke. The expectation is for them to encounter something interesting, something strange and bizarre. They are expected to comment upon it, and humour is to be found in their naivete. Everyone laughs.

But this is the wasteland. Nobody laughs when two lost souls enter, just as nobody mourns when they are buried beneath its sand. The wasteland will devour any and everyone it can, and spit their bones back out.

Two lone pilgrims walk into the wasteland.

One is wise to its treacherous ways, and walks warily between two worlds. The other is ignorant to the danger they are courting, but walks with hope and wonder and dreams of a home she has never seen.

The wasteland cares for no man, and it will destroy them both as it has so many others. With its myriad terrors, horrors and atrocities, the wasteland will consume them.

But the most perilous of all its dangers is not the monsters that stalk the dusty wastes. It is not the deadly radiation, not the scourging sun and not the poisoned earth. It is the mirage, a trick of light and heat that puts water where there is only sand. Always tempting with something so greatly desired, but never providing. It kills as surely as any claw, fang, bullet or blade.

The wasteland is made of mirages, but only a few of them tempt with something so mundane as water.

Two lone lone pilgrims walk into the wasteland. Who can say if they will walk back out?

Because war...

War never changes.

AN:Remember when I said I was a slave to public opinion? Well... surprise! Turns out I have all the stalwart will of a goldfish, because here we are. The idea also just wouldn't leave me alone. Stupid brain.

Anyways, like Binary this story will be short. Let me reiterate that so people will listen this time:

THIS STORY IS GOING TO BE SHORT.

I don't mean to sound mean, but I don't want people to get their hopes up. I expect this story to last a total of maybe 3-4 chapters long. This should not be a new experience.

Moving on...

So. Tali and Shepard have now met for the first time. Will he save her? Will they get along? Will he teach her his ways? Will they crush on each other? Will they have wild, life-affirming sex under the bright moonlight?! No. They won't. Because that's not allowed on this site, and I think I'd be rubbish at it in any case.

But nobody can stop you from thinking about hot xenophile action going down in the wasteland.

Remember: reviews, favs and mentions feed this beast. And you know you want to feed me. Because when I'm hungry I eat the souls of the innocent. Don't make me eat someone's soul.