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‘Hey Commander, do you have time to run through the route for our next few stops?’
Joker turned off his outgoing comms and waited for a response. She rarely kept him hanging very long when she was on the ship. Ground missions were another matter entirely - that had to be very, very bad for his blood pressure. Sure enough, her voice came through his earpiece after a handful of seconds.
‘Sure, can you come to my cabin?’
‘Uuuuh...yeah. Yeah, of course. Be right there.’
He had never been to her cabin. They always did this - did everything - in the cockpit. But they were docked on Bekenstein, which means he didn't need to be at the helm, and she might well be putting out multiple fires at once, so he stopped questioning it and limped his way to the elevator, his legs screaming after hours glued to his pilot's chair.
Whatever he expected to find when the cabin door slid open, it was not Shepard's bare back. Joker could feel his entire face heating up. ‘Shit, sorry. I can come back.’
‘No, no, come in,’ she said, throwing a smile his way through the mirror she was facing. ‘I need help with this stupid thing. Can you zip me up?’
The sudden lack of oxygen in his brain did not help with formulating a response. He settled on moving forward, one foot in front of the other, until he was standing behind her.
‘If I break a finger doing this, I'm telling Chakwas it was your fault.’
She gave a short laugh and shook her head. ‘It's a zipper, Moreau, not a hammer. You'll be fine.’
The thing did close pretty smoothly. Maybe too smoothly. Certainly too fast, even with his shaking hands and the extra care he took not to touch her skin.
‘There, all done.’ He took a step back.
‘Thanks.’ She smiled at his reflection, then grimaced. ‘I hate this dress. Do you hate this dress?’
The dress was black, elegant, and more close-fitting than anything he's ever seen her in. This wasn't the legendary soldier about to run into battle, or the tired woman who dropped onto the chair next to his after a mission. This was Shepard, yes, but Shepard with a waist, and hips, and freckled shoulders like cinnamon sprinkled on fresh cream, and -
‘I uh.... wouldn't say that.’
‘It's a sensory nightmare.’ She picked at the hem, and he fought not to follow the movement. ‘Kasumi could have picked anything. Did it have to be leather?’
‘I see how that could be a problem. Looks good though. You know. The dress.’
She turned and looked at him silently for a moment. It took all his strength to stop from squirming.
‘You don't use your crutches anymore.’
The change in topic was unexpected, but at this point, he would have talked about anything other than what was on his mind. ‘Not as much, no. I still have bad days, don’t get me wrong, but those Cerberus doctors aren’t messing around.’
‘You never told me.’
‘I didn’t think you’d notice.’
She raised an eyebrow.
‘I didn’t think it mattered.’
She crossed her arms.
‘Fine, I didn’t know what to say.’
Shepard rolled her eyes. ‘How about “hey, you know that organisation we work for that you won’t stop complaining about? They actually helped me with something pretty important."’
‘I’m not saying we should trust them.’
‘Neither am I. But now I know they’ve done at least one good thing.’
‘They brought you back to life,’ Joker said.
‘Okay, two good things. Doesn’t mean they’re not crooked, but it’s a start.’
‘Yeah,’ he let out something between a laugh and a sigh. ‘I guess it is.’
‘Now.’ She clapped her hands together. ‘How about those plans?’
Watching the landscape rush by from the hidden camera on Shepard’s collar was slightly nauseating, but he would take it any day over no news and no visuals. At least this time, he got to be involved, even if that involvement was limited to browsing the extranet and a few less-than-legal databases and feeding relevant information to Kasumi and Shepard if the need arose. Better than being left behind. When Kasumi spoke, however, he wasn’t so sure it was.
‘Looking good Ms Alison Gunn. Hock won't be able to take his eyes off you.’
The idea of a sleazy arms dealer thinking of Shepard that way, he could get past. She would never go for that. But the flirty lilt in Kasumi’s voice sent a tiny beast raging in his guts. Kasumi was skilled, charismatic, beautiful. That, Shepard could definitely go for.
‘You might want him to look elsewhere when you’re breaking into his vault,’ Joker piped up, just to remind them he was still here.
‘I’ll just flash him. Boom, instant blindness.’
Joker sat back and ran a hand over his face. That mental picture was not helping. ‘Can we just focus on the mission, please?’
‘Who are you, and what have you done with Joker Moreau?’
‘He’s right here, trying to make sure you don’t spend the rest of your second life as a feature in a creepy billionaire’s private collection.’
‘Is that not what I’m already doing?’
‘Fair point.’ He pulled up the tracking screen, eyeing the blinking dot of the shuttle. ‘You’re almost there. Get ready.’
‘When am I not?’ Kasumi quipped, adjusting the hood over her face.
‘All the talking?’ Shepard hissed into the comms. ‘I’m terrible at this. I was hoping Kasumi would do her thing and I would get to just stand there…’
‘Looking pretty?’ Kasumi offered from somewhere she couldn’t see.
‘Something like that.’
Joker leaned closer to the screen. ‘Breathe, Shepard. If you can be the Commander, you can be Alison Gunn.’
‘Right,’ she exhaled. ‘This is just another mask.’
‘Exactly.’
He watched her progress as she made her way through the ballroom, noting security measures and alternative exits. The amount of layers locking the vault was mind-boggling, but Kasumi seemed to know what she was doing. Annoyingly. Under her guidance, Shepard navigated the crowd, retrieved the password, voice recording and DNA sample before getting back to the vault door.
‘Sorry, Joker,’ she said as she unpinned the hidden camera from her collar and placed it on the ground. ‘You’re gonna have to stare at the wall for a minute while I get changed.’
‘Is Kasumi facing away too?’
‘She is,’ Kasumi’s impish voice piped up through the comms. ‘Sadly.’
‘Alright,’ Shepard said as she secured the camera back on her armour. ‘Let’s go steal from that asshole.’
‘Guy really likes to hear himself talk, doesn’t he? “You’ve fallen into my trap, Ms Gunn. Now let me monologue while you plan your escape.”’
Shepard threw her head back from her spot on the co-pilot chair. ‘What is that impression?’
Joker grinned. ‘You can’t tell me that’s not exactly what he sounds like. That accent is not from any planet I know.’
She morphed her expression into something approximating a scowl. ‘“Smuggling weapons is not evil, you know? I’m actually a philanthropist.”’
‘Wow,’ he barked out a laugh. ‘And you think I’m bad at impressions?’
‘You just don’t understand true artistry.’
Joker raised his hands in surrender and tried to get his face under control. ‘So, how’s Kasumi doing?’
Shepard’s smile fell, and he immediately regretted the change of topic.
‘Holding up okay. She’s had to make some really tough decisions today. I’m going over to her cabin tonight for some drinks. Toasting Keiji.’
‘Right.’ He did his best to ignore the tiny beast in his guts. ‘That’s good. She needs a friend.’
‘Yeah.’ Shepard forced a smile and gave his arm a hit so light he barely felt it. ‘We all need each other to get through this shitshow.’
Joker spent the evening touching the same spot on his arm, over and over again.