Summary: After the story Horizon: The Confrontation and Beyond, this is a series of short chapters on all the eligible romance candidates on the Normandy during their quest to eliminate the Collector Base, minus the chocolate syrup associate, Kaidan Alenko. (He was bashed to a pulp in Horizon: The Confrontation and Beyond already) Also in here, dear old Garrus, being one of the eligible candidate even the space hamster would love. Notes:
(See the end of the chapter))
Chapter One
Eligible Humanoid: Jacob Taylor
Jacob Taylor could be summed up to just one word for Shepard - infuriating. Whatever "good stuffs" he said he had, Shepard sure failed to see it. Shepard was so ready to put him in a tub of medi-gel and left him there on Freedom's Progress during their first mission together if she had found a bathroom with a tub. Unfortunately for her, and fortunately for him, Freedom's Progress inhabitants did not like taking baths and so, that chance was sadly, totally lost.
It was not that Jacob was not a nice guy. On the contrary, he was a very nice guy. Even Joker had said he was a nice guy, and Joker usually did not have much good things to say about people who were nice guys. Wait. Shepard narrowed her eyes. Joker did say something else about Jacob being way too nice for all the ways he knew how to kill people. And if Shepard were to go by Joker's standard, that would make Joker's words a very bad example of saying Jacob was a nice guy. Something was very off with that Jacob Taylor but Shepard could not put her finger on it. He just infuriated her. Maybe it was the way he spoke, like he was trying to ooze sex out of that voice of his... Or maybe it was the way he wiggled those eyebrows. Shepard swore someday, she might club the man to death with one of the guns in the armory if she had to see him do them again. She could literally feel her fingers curling into fists whenever she thought back on how she had walked into the armory to speak to Jacob and watched his eyebrows go where they were not supposed to only to not have shaved them off right there and then. It would be unfair of her to do that simply based on what could be an uncontrollable facial movement but it would sure as hell be extremely satisfying. What made it worse was that he was actually acting like a gentleman when his voice went to that place where all voices went when they tried to be naughty and his brows started doing their thing. And Shepard was almost always caught off guard and too confused to do anything until she walked out of the armory and then scratched her head and wondered why she felt extremely uncomfortable while she was in the room. Someday, Shepard told herself. Someday, she would catch that guy after she stopped being a confused bat she had been and totally put a stop to it.
Curses from Miranda from somewhere near her reminded Shepard that she was not the only one who felt like murdering Jacob Taylor. And believed it or not, at the moment, Shepard was the patient one.
"What the bloody hell were you doing pulling that thing for!" Miranda screamed from behind the cover. "We were concentrating fire on this one, you bloody halfwit!"
"I was trying to bring that one down so he won't add on the fire power," Jacob said calmly as he hid behind a crate and opened fire.
"He was freaking unconscious!" Miranda shouted back.
"He was waking up."
"He was not!"
"Will you two stop it!" Shepard shouted back right before a sniper bullet hit the back of the head of the biotic merc Miranda and herself was trying to bring down, instantly killing him.
So much for trying to make a good impression on the Archangel, Shepard thought. He saved them more times over the last five minutes than they did him. And with all these going on with her little team, he must thought they were all imbeciles by now.
"Move forward, kids," Shepard ordered. "And stop screaming like a girl when you start shooting or I swear, Jacob, I will boot you off the bridge myself!"
"That was my battle cry," Jacob answered as if that was the most natural thing in the universe.
Maybe "infuriating" was not the right word to use for Jacob. "Bipolar" might be. What was bipolar anyway, Shepard asked herself. Did suddenly screaming like a girl one moment and then going all calm the next considered bipolar? If it did, Jacob Taylor was definitely a Bioplar. Or maybe he was just "creepy". The way he would try so very hard to make his voice low and sexy...and those brows...and then ran into battle with that high pitch tone that could shatter glass only to turn about almost within seconds to sound like some jazz singing dude... Yes. Jacob Taylor was creepy.
"My nanny screamed more like a man than you!" Miranda shouted from across the other crate.
"Miranda, your nanny WAS a man," Jacob answered back.
"Precisely!"
Crossing the bridge, Shepard shot two mercs in the back while Archangel blew the head off of a third from his hiding place. Another two were taken care of by Miranda while Jacob finished off the last guy when they reached the stairs. Taking them two at a time, Shepard and the two Cerberus agents arrived on the second floor to see two mercs trying hard to get into the room.
Jacob screamed like a girl.
And Shepard jumped like the two mercs at the door. The pain in her head since she woke up did a double take and zapped her like a laser right through between her eyes.
"Shit! Jacob! I swear!"
One merc screamed also and dropped his gun while the other swung his around. Merc A must be the inexperienced one while Merc B must be the experienced one. Shepard trained her gun on Merc B . Apparently, Miranda must had thought the same because she sprayed bullets onto the man the same time Shepard opened fire. They did not stop at just shooting the experienced Merc B though.
"Guess you discovered a new biotic," Shepard said after both mercs were taken care off.
"But I swear if you Sonic Blast right next to me again," Shepard threw her discarded heat sink at Jacob. It landed square on his hard abs and he made a "ouff" sound. "I will stuff you head into a dead Krogan's ass!"
"You mean Sonic Screech," Miranda corrected.
The door opened to the Archangel's snipping quarters and they entered it. But then Archangel decided to play coil with her by hushing her when she started to speak. Great job, Shepard. She got up three mornings ago from the dead and found herself working with Moe and Larry. And now, she found Curly too.
Curly snipped the last inexperienced merc and got up. Oh, that was why he had hushed her. Shepard must really had been pulled out of the oven half baked. She thought he was just squatting there to look cool and playing it like he was some crime fighting super hero. She seriously had not expected that hidden merc. Shepard decided she really needed to get her game back. If not, she might have to call herself Curly instead. Anyway, what a show off. Could not have him going around being called Curly anymore. Not very Curly at all.
The no longer Curly looked exhausted when he sat on top of one of the crates in the room and took off his helmet.
"Shepard, I thought you were dead?"
"Garrus! What are you doing here?" Oh, thank the Spirits or whatever was in charge of the Turians, her Curly was Garrus! Shepard decided immediately Garrus would take back the name, Curly, because now that he was here, she would end up turning him into one anyway.
"Jacob," Shepard said from her place next to Garrus. "I want you to stay behind and make sure Garrus' safe."
"If you say so," Jacob said. "I'm not sure it's a good idea."
"It's the best idea I've since I came back from the dead," Shepard grinned at Garrus.
"Really, Shepard? You might need all the help you can get down there?" Garrus asked. When she just continued to grin, he bent down and said quietly, "Did you just find a new way to torture me without the Mako? I've heard the screaming too, you should know. It's how you scolded him for doing it that confirmed to me it was you and not some clone, actually."
"You're kidding me," Shepard smile grew larger. "Really?"
"Really. Only you could come up with such nonsensical creative ways of scolding. No clones can be cloned to say even that kind of nonsense."
"Really?" Shepard narrowed her eyes again, no longer smiling.
"Absolutely," this time it was the tired Garrus whose smile widened.
"Suck it up, Garrus. Been dead two years and now woke up half alive with the worst hang over of the galaxy. So you'll have to do what you did best."
"I watched your six, Shepard," Garrus said. "I don't remember babysitting for you."
"You always did," Shepard watched Garrus questioning eye. "Kaidan, remember?"
"No way," Garrus' eye widened. "Not going there again."
"Not negotiating."
Garrus sighed. "Not much time left, Shepard. Just go do your thing you do best or you"ll be hearing me screaming like a girl next. Just like old times, huh Shepard?"
"With me back, Turian, it's going to be better than old times!"
And with that, Shepard headed for the stairs down to lock up for Garrus with Miranda and grinning from ear to ear that she had left the screaming Jacob with her old friend.
"I still think I need a mirror," Garrus said thoughtfully after Jacob left the room. He carefully traced his Turian talons over the injury on his face after taking the rocket there.
"Vain pot," Shepard said.
"Dead Specter," Garrus retorted.
"Oh don't remind me," Shepard groaned. "The headache is so bad I feel like I need to drill a hole through my skull to get rid of it."
"Maybe you skull has had drilling done all over it, that's why you've a headache."
Shepard groaned louder.
"Frankly, I'm worry about you," Garrus said, pointing back where Jacob had exited. "Cerberus, Shepard? You remember those sick experiment they were doing?"
"Garrus, I am now one of those sick experiment they were doing, remember?"
"We both have been cybernetically enhanced by Cerberus," Garrus said. "So I'm going to let that one slide."
"Actually, I don't trust them," Shepard said closer to Garrus. "They are one big pot of strange brewing. And I've this feeling they are using everyone they gave me on this ship as bait. But no one else is stopping the Collectors from wiping out the human colonies. They gave me a ship and resources. I've to take what I've got. So I need you to be here with me to watch my six."
"Can't argue with that," Garrus said. "But just to have you know that means you're dragging me along back into hell again. Hah, just like old times."
"And just like old times," Shepard joked. "You're still such an ass of a complainer."
"Ouch," Garrus said. "My fragile heart."
"So, before you go do what you do best," Shepard said. "What do you think of that Jacob Taylor?"
"The screamer?"
"The screamer."
Garrus looked sideways at his Commander.
"Seriously, Shepard," he said. "I'm not interested in any romantic encounter of the gay kind, no matter how great their abs look. I'll rather take my chances with Korgan women."
"You're such an ass," Shepard said as Garrus lightly chuckled to avoid pain to the side of his face. "I'm saying don't you find him weird? There's something wrong with that guy and I intend to find out. I mean he went, "Commander, we've done what we could for Garrus?" just now on me! And I think he enjoyed that he was inflicting pain on me making me think you were gone. I think he's psychotic, or one in the making."
"He seemed nice," Garrus shrugged. "He was actually saying a lot of good things about you while you were down locking up the doors. I won't really think he's psychotic."
"Oh, Garrus, trust me. There's something weird about that guy, and I'm determined to find out."
"And while you're at it," Garrus said turning to the door. "I'll make myself nicely settle into the forward battery and hope to the Spirits my Commander won't rope me in on any form of spying on the Cerberus agent named Jacob Taylor."
"Not happening, Curly," Shepard said without turning. "If I'm going to hell, I'm dragging your Turian ass with me."
"I don't even know what a "Curly" is. And you're paying for some really slick sniper rifles if you're dragging my ass with you!" came his reply before the door slid close.
Notes: 04/23: This is more or less interjected with my last story "Horizon: The Confrontation and Beyond" so if you have not read that one, just know that some references might be coming from there when you read this. This is the same Shepard as in the other story. She is the only Shepard I actually know because that is how I imagined her to act like while she wasn't all serious about beating bad guys up. Not a personal Shepard though. I can't personally claim her as my own. :P