Chapter Text
“I’m telling you. Something’s up.”
Kaidan glanced up from his footlocker, having nearly finished packing away his meager belongings for the assignment ahead. He sighed to himself and turned his attention back to his mostly-standard-issue possessions. “I thought you were looking for some excitement, Jenkins. Change your mind?”
“Hell no,” the young corporal responded. He haphazardly tossed the few items he had left to fit into his footlocker and pressed it all down in an effort to get the container to close properly. “I’m ready. But really, if we have a turian Spectre on board and Commander Shepard… it just seems more than your standard shakedown run, doesn’t it?”
As Kaidan finished closing away his neatly pressed uniforms and orderly personal effects, he shrugged his shoulders. He chuckled at Jenkins, who was struggling with his footlocker, knowing that it would all fit if he’d simply organize it. “Or maybe you’re just overreacting. This ship was a human and turian initiative, after all.”
“Hmmph,” Jenkins responded, settling for the footlocker being mostly closed. “I guess we’ll see.”
The pair made their way to the bridge of the SSV Normandy, where other members of the crew were already hard at work preparing the fabled frigate for its voyage. Kaidan couldn’t help but cast Jenkins a questioning glance. Skilled though he was in the field, he wasn’t exactly the most stellar engineer, which was the primary sort of work that needed to be done in this particular region of the ship.
The corporal merely shrugged as the edge of his lips curled into a mischievous grin. “Just checking things out,” was the only explanation he offered for his relatively unusual presence on the bridge. He chuckled when a datapad was shoved into his hand and Kaidan pointed him at a console to check. If he was going to be here, he could at least make himself useful.
It was a sudden quiet among the busy crew that caught Kaidan’s attention to the fact that something was happening. He’d managed to wedge himself under a panel that needed some last minute adjustment and almost missed the smooth hiss of the vessel’s airlock opening. He could hear Captain Anderson’s voice, so he inched his way out of the cramped space and moved to stand. It was then that another voice caught his attention. It wasn’t familiar. It wasn’t human.
Spectre Nihlus strode forward with confidence, allowing his gaze to drift thoughtfully across the interior of the ship. Captain Anderson stopped just behind him, hands folded behind his back, clearly allowing the frigate and its crew to speak for itself. Kaidan stood at attention, unsure if there was supposed to be some sort of official announcement or introduction for the turian coming aboard. After a nod of acknowledgement from the captain, he quickly turned his focus back to the work at hand, like the others around him. All, except, of course, Jenkins, who was rather obviously staring at the turian with rapt attention.
It took a firm elbow to the side for Jenkins to snap out of his reverie. “You act like you’ve never seen a turian before,” Kaidan whispered.
The corporal muttered something then, though Kaidan couldn’t quite make out the words. Somewhat reluctantly, Jenkins tore his eyes away from the Spectre and fixed them back to the datapad in his hands. The staring hadn’t made much of an impact, fortunately, as Nihlus and Anderson both turned away to progress further into the vessel.
Kaidan watched Jenkins for a moment, though he simply stared at, or through, the datapad. Without a word, the lieutenant turned his attention back to the panel he’d been previously consumed with and left his companion to his thoughts. Kaidan wasn’t nearly as concerned with this entire situation as Jenkins appeared to be. His job was to work on the Normandy, answer to those in charge, and potentially throw things about a bit with the power of his mind. It all seemed pretty simple, really. He smiled to himself.
Just as he located a problematic connection and began to make the necessary adjustments, Kaidan received a light kick in the side. Whipping his head around, he saw many legs swathed in Alliance standard blue, all quickly rushing about and then coming to a stop at attention, much like when Nihlus and Captain Anderson had boarded. He rose to stand quickly, just in time to see a woman step into view. There was no mistaking her. He’d seen the vids and photos just like everyone else. She was young and already a hero. Commander Shepard.
He offered her a salute like any other soldier might, but stayed where he was and watched. Unlike Nihlus and Anderson, Commander Shepard took her time acknowledging the crew. She shook hands, exchanged a few words, smiled. It struck him as odd that she might show such interest in the people that manned this storied vessel. It was refreshing, actually.
“You act like you’ve never seen a woman before,” came the snarky observation of the corporal at his side.
“Very funny,” Kaidan flatly answered. Despite the ridiculousness of the comment, it caused the lieutenant to avert his gaze. He suddenly realized that his attentiveness could have been misconstrued as staring, and that was certainly not his intent.
“Commander,” Jenkins said a little too loudly as he stepped ahead of Kaidan. He offered her a proper salute before introducing himself. “Corporal Richard Jenkins.”
“Nice to meet you,” she responded, stepping confidently forward and shaking his hand. “Lia Shepard. Have you been with the Normandy long, Jenkins?”
“No, ma’am. Alenko and I were only recently assigned,” he answered, with a jerk of his head in Kaidan’s direction. The moment her dark eyes followed his gesture and landed on him, he felt incredibly small. She wasn’t an imposing person by any stretch of the imagination. Short brown hair, average height, athletic build… she appeared as any average marine, but there was some sort of intensity about her that he couldn’t quite identify.
“Kaidan Alenko,” he offered before clearing his throat and adding, “Lieutenant.”
“Hello, Lieutenant,” she rather cheerily replied. She shook his hand with a surprisingly solid grip. “I’ve heard some incredible things about this ship. Have you gotten a chance to look around? What do you think?”
“She’s something else, Commander. It’s an honor to be here for her first real test,” Kaidan answered as a little smile escaped his firmly professional facade.
“Glad to hear it,” she responded with a grin. There was some small hint of danger in that expression, against all logic. He wasn’t entirely sure what that little internal warning bell really meant.
“Shepard,” came a familiar voice. All of their heads snapped around to face the direction from which it had come. Few ignored the ship’s highly-decorated captain, after all.
“Gentlemen,” the commander offered, with a nod of her head. She turned and walked at a brisk pace to meet up with Anderson.
Once she was out of earshot, Jenkins set the datapad aside, clearly no longer interested in keeping up the illusion that he knew what he knew anything about engineering and calibration. “She seems nice enough,” he began. “With her reputation, I thought she was going to be a bigger hardass than Anderson.”
Kaidan merely shrugged his shoulders. He crouched down to finish his work. “We’ll see.”