"True. I guess Shep being out for 15 hours could be retold in shorthand and passing out on one day and waking up on the next, thus making the incident at most span a couple of days, but not "a few" (as was given in the comic)."
I don´t think there´s any way for them to justify the situation.
Shepard awakens less than 16 hours later and they´re nearly arriving at the citadel already. Lest be very generous and concede half the way.
Still, Saren and Benezia have time to escape, having their recording seized by Tali when she captures a geth that is separated from the group, so she runs to the citadel, remains there for a few days on the run for her life.
Things would work better if the normandy had to remain on eden prime, or had to go first to arturus or a nearby alliance station prior to going to the citadel.
The only way for it to work for me would be that (similar to DA2 when you need money to go on the expedition) the game demanded that you perform at least number X of side-missions while on the citadel, to work as if you had to wait for a few days for the audience, while at the same time C-Sec is investigating.
During my first play, a blind one, I caught this discrepancy, and treated Tali very badly because I thought she was lying to me the whole time. I was suspecting that behind the helmet there was a husk, or a geth (she looks like one) or saren´s daughter.
Something similar happened to me when I first saw the memento movie. The fact that the protagonist can describe his condition that prevents him from creating new memories after the incident is in fact a new memory, so I thought he was faking the whole time.