Disclaimer: I don't own Mass Effect, and I don't make any money off of being a fan.
A/N: This is a collection of drabbles - mostly very short ones - about Commander Shepard and her life with ADHD. Mostly fluffy, comedic scenes, but please know that any mental disorder has its drawbacks, and ADHD is no exception. I make it look fun, but don't assume I have no respect for those who struggle with and suffer for it. Anyway, enjoy this psychotic use of my time!
P.S.: This first chapter takes place in the ME2 timeline.
Joker had always hated it when the Commander would sneak up behind him and take his hat. But after going without her for 2 solid years, the sound of the automated doors sliding open behind him put a smile on his face before she ever reached him.
"You won't be able to sneak up on me anymore," he said, turning to face her.
Shepard pouted a little, then got a mischievous grin. "That just presents a new challenge."
When she first recruited Mordin and went to check on him in his lab, she stretched her hand out right above his eyes and stroked his forehead.
"Oh, it's soft," she said in tactile delight, while the confused salarian just blinked at her. "Kinda feels like my childhood pet python, but much warmer."
She retracted her hand and stared back at Mordin. "Anything else?"
Garrus had missed the way she would play with the spikes on the back of his head. He had even missed the way she would sometimes sing, "kitty, kitty, kitty," while she stroked them. But now when she traced her finger over his new scars and he saw the pain in her eyes, he realized that what he really had missed was her.
He clutched her fingers in his hand and held them before pressing her palm to his cheek - or whatever it qualified as now. Her lips pressed into a hard line, eyes misting as she stood before her best friend in the solitude of the medical bay.
"I'm going to be okay," he said to her, his voice as solid and enduring as it ever was.
She could only nod. Slipping her hand out of his, she leaned forward and pressed her forehead under his chin, hiding her eyes in his neck. His arms wrapped around her of their own accord, hers following suit, and they held each other.
It had not occurred to Dr. Chakwas how bad of an idea it would be to get Commander Shepard drunk. While she knew the Commander could cut loose with the best of them, she never considered that the woman might actually be competitive with the notion of relaxing.
"Shepard... as much as I appreciate you feeling comfortable around me... please put your clothes back on."
"But the rest of my muscles haven't melted yet," the younger woman protested.
Dr. Chakwas decided it wasn't worth arguing with her CO, and ultimately gave in to her own sleepiness on one of the patient cots.
Normally Yeoman Kelly wouldn't take a dare that made her break into a fellow crew member's cabin. But the Commander had always fascinated her, and she knew Shepard wouldn't be back from her meeting on the Citadel for at least another hour.
It therefore shocked her when the door opened to reveal Shepard reclining on her bed and reading comic books. The Commander looked up at her with wide eyes and put her finger to her lips. "You don't tell anyone I was here, and I won't tell Shepard you snuck into her cabin."
Kelly's poor eyebrow shot six feet in the air. "Huh?"
"Shh. Back out slowly, and no one will ever know."
"But aren't you supposed to be meeting with the Council on the Citadel?"
Shepard smiled. "I am. Just not in person. I sent a VI that looks like me with preprogrammed dialogue to respond to anything they might say or ask me."
Kelly tilted her head. "Will that work?"
"I'm, like, 97% sure I can predict exactly what they're going to say. They're rarely accommodating, and always critical. I'm certain the VI can handle it."
"Won't it be obvious that the VI is a hologram?"
Shepard gave a short, loud laugh. "They're holograms themselves! I doubt they'll even notice."
Just then, Shepard's comm badge beeped, and Garrus's voice projected forth. "Shepard, Anderson is not happy that you sent a virtual intelligence to speak in your place."
The blood drained from her face. "Oops."
"Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"
"Alright, who the hell brought these plastic tubes on board?" Miranda demanded.
The traitorous crew remained suspiciously quiet as Shepard continued to scuttle around the dining area flailing her newly-decorated limbs.
Omega was known for its debauchery and criminal intent. Aria T'Loak had seen much in her years of running the station. But no matter how long she lived, she doubted she would ever see another sight so bizarre as an N7 soldier running around Afterlife with flexible rippled tubes on her arms shouting, "Exterminate!" at the other patrons.
When they fought back the geth on Virmire, Shepard had been given a choice between her two human comrades, a choice of whom to save and whom to let die. But Shepard had looked straight into Garrus's eyes with that troubled expression and said, "Go defend the bomb. I'll join you once I've gotten Kaiden."
"Shepard, that's suicide!" he had yelled.
She'd shook her head. "No one gets left behind. I trust you to take point on this. Get Ashley on her feet. I'll be there as soon as I can." Then she'd turned and ran.
And she had trusted him. But if it weren't for the fact that Saren was more interested in killing the obnoxious human Spectre - and that Ashley was still a pretty good shot even with a concussion - her trust might have been misplaced. Her team was good, but they weren't gods.
When Saren had realized that Shepard wasn't among them at the bomb site, he'd angrily relocated to find her. At that moment, Garrus knew she was doomed. He had cursed her recklessness, cursed her motto of "I don't believe in no-win scenarios." She was going to die for that boy, and they would lose the best commander this galaxy had ever seen.
But somehow - through sheer luck, maybe - Shepard managed to rescue Alenko and fight off Saren before rendezvousing at the bomb site with the rest of the group. None of the salarians that had accompanied them survived the attack, and that weighed heavily on her shoulders in the months to come. But she'd saved her whole squad - a feat which anyone else would have deemed impossible.
After the battle, Garrus had come to visit Shepard in the med bay, where Alenko was passed out from his injuries. He'd walked in to find Shepard holding his hand, staring down at his bruised and disfigured face with tears running from her eyes. She'd wiped them off before speaking to him. "I thought sending him with the salarians was the safer option. If I had known - I mean, I didn't want Ashley to die either, but-"
"In war we make choices," Garrus had said, and she'd nodded, stroking the back of Alenko's hand with her thumb.
It hadn't been the first time the Commander had shown special affection to the biotic human, and it wouldn't be the last. There were rumors after the battle on the Citadel - after they'd defeated Sovereign and people were safe to gossip again - that Kaiden had visited her in her room for an hour before she'd left for that final mission. And Garrus believed them; he didn't have reason not to. He knew she cared for the boy, and he never brought it up to her to confirm or deny the accusations. And Alenko had cared for her too.
But as they stood there on Horizon, facing the Collectors and surviving colonists, it was clear that he had moved on. Two years was a long time to yearn after a dead woman, and although the turian had never gotten over his best friend, the matching rings on Kaiden and Ashley's fingers made it clear to everyone that they had.
Shepard hugged them both, congratulated them on their marriage, and asked the expected questions that seemed so trivial to Garrus. He could see in his best friend's eyes the heartbreak she was hiding. To her, it had only been a few months since she last saw them. It wasn't enough time for her to move on.
And then the couple attacked her when they found out that she was working with Cerberus. The fickle humans refused to hear her explanation. Garrus was so enraged that he almost stepped in and sorted them out himself - his way. But he refrained for Shepard's sake.
The experience cheapened their victory over the Collectors.
Cerberus had briefed the crew well on Shepard's service record. They had not, however, informed them of the intricacies of her personality. So when she rode into Engineering on the back of the new krogan recruit, Donnelly and Daniels were understandably concerned.
"I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts, diddly diddly. There they are standing in a row, bum bum bum. Big ones, small ones, some as big as your head!"
"Your tits are not that much bigger than mine!" Jack snarled.
Shepard clutched her chest. "My hands beg to differ!"
"Shiny!" Shepard shrieked as she rubbed the silvery scales on top of Grunt's head.
"Stop." The krogan grabbed her wrist.
"But they're so shiny!" Her other hand shot out to continue rubbing the scales.
Grunt snatched her other hand out of the air.
Shepard looked at each of their arms, taking in her situation, then deftly slipped off her shoes and proceeded to climb up the tank-bred's front.
Grunt growled in irritation that was quickly becoming anger.
The door to the cargo hold opened behind them, and Shepard paused to look at the new noise.
"For fuck sake, Shepard, can you not leave him alone long enough for me to take a nap?" Jack was already glowing blue around her arms and shoulders. "That damn AI woke me up to come stop you from fucking killing yourself."
"I wouldn't have killed her," Grunt growled back, though not thoroughly convincing.
"Only maimed or seriously injured," Shepard added like it was a joke.
The other two scowled at her. Grunt released her wrists, and she dropped to the floor like a flying catfish.
"Ow!" She rubbed her rump.
Jack pointed at the elevator. "Go upstairs before I call Vakarian to come get you."
Shepard crossed her arms and pouted, but obediently marched toward the elevator. When she had fully left their level, Jack turned to go back to her room.
"Thanks," Grunt said.
Jack looked back over her shoulder at him, then smiled. "I would have torn her fucking arm off."
"Believe me," he chuckled, "I almost did."
"Damn it, Shepard. Why do you keep doing this to yourself?" Garrus dutifully wrapped up yet another burn on the human's arm.
"How was I supposed to know making s'mores would be so dangerous?" she protested.
"Well when you heat them over a makeshift campfire in the middle of a salvage yard, you should expect the ground to be soaked with fuel in certain areas."
"But why did it explode so long after I started the fire?" She winced when he tied off the bandage.
Garrus only sighed, too tired to deal with his silly human at the moment. Luckily, Mordin was more than willing to give her a lecture in the combustible properties of all space-faring lubricants.
The door to Life Support opened behind Thane, carrying with it Commander Shepard's familiar scent. "Do you need something?"
Rather than say anything, Shepard leaned over Thane's shoulder and dragged her tongue from the bottom of his jaw to the top of the red frills on the side of his face.
Thane spun around, suddenly on his feet. "Commander?"
Her eyes squinted, mouth worked distastefully around the taste of his face. "Somehow I hadn't realized how unpleasant that would be."
The drell blinked in shock, flabbergasted. He wiped at the wetness on his face. "Why did you do that?"
"Sorry. I read somewhere that oral contact with a drell causes hallucinations."
Thane's jaw opened and closed a few times before he abruptly left the room. Shepard watched him go with even more surprise than he'd had from the ordeal. She frowned to herself. "Shit. I fucked up."
The next time Shepard came to visit Thane, she knocked first instead of barging in like usual. "Thane?" she called.
"Come in," he called back.
The Life Support doors opened into the oddly lit room. Timidly she rounded the corner. Contrary to his usual position, Thane had taken the chair facing the door today. Shepard's cheeks burned as she realized she was to blame for this newfound paranoia.
"I, um, came to apologize," she said, staring at her feet. "I brought you flowers and drell desserts. On my planet, that's how we say we're sorry and that we know we messed up." She put the peace offering on the table in front of him. "So anyway, I'm really sorry I licked your face without permission. I do a lot of stupid things, but that was probably the stupidest thing I've done in a while."
"I've seen you fight, Commander," Thane said at last, "You are often reckless."
She took a deep, shaky breath. "Yeah, I know. But it's okay when it's just me that I hurt. It's not okay when I do it to other people."
"You did not hurt me, Shepard."
Her eyes closed for a moment, too slow to stop the few tears that escaped. "But I hurt your trust in me. I hurt our friendship. I never considered how it might make you feel when a random person just came up behind you and licked your face. I treated you like an experiment, but you're not. You're my friend, and my comrade. You're supposed to be able to trust me, but I violated that trust. I'm sorry."
Thane quietly wrapped his arms around the sobbing girl. She jumped a little at his touch because she hadn't seen or heard him move, but she leaned into his embrace. "I'm sorry," she squeaked again.
"I forgive you, Shepard." The drell stroked her back, and subsequently her hair. It was longer than the standard military cut he had seen on other Alliance officers, but he supposed allying with Cerberus disqualified her for such arbitrations.
Shepard reclined on her bed, Garrus lying on his side between her legs with his head on a pillow in her lap. Her fingers massaged his scalp, pushed in beneath his natural armor that only the most skilled digits could maneuver through. The turian practically purred at her touches, cementing her chosen pet name of Kitty.
"Mmm, if you keep this up," Garrus rumbled softly, "you'll find yourself sharing the bed with me tonight."
"I can always take the couch if you want to sleep over," she offered softly.
"Who says I plan to sleep?"
Her heart fluttered at his words. Though they had flirted shamelessly for years, he'd never so openly implied a desire for physical intimacy before. Carefully, so as not to disturb him, she leaned down and pressed her lips to his forehead.
A grin spread across his face, the corners hiding beneath his mandibles. "That was nice."
"I have a few more if you want them," she offered, leaning further back against the bed.
"And what would you like in return?"
"Blood flow back into my legs, if you don't mind," she chuckled softly.
With a groan, Garrus rolled over her knee and onto the empty side of the bed. "Keep your legs and kisses. I'll take your bed."
Shepard picked up the pillow he'd been lying on and hit him with it. "You're a turd, Garrus Vakarian."
Turning suddenly, he grabbed her legs and pulled her down to be face-level with him. "And you're gullible if you think I would ever prefer to sleep over kissing you."
Her shocked expression was quickly replaced by a smile as he pulled her flush against him. Unable to suppress her urges, she poked him in the side. "I like you out of armor."
His mandibles clicked. "It's not the only layer I can strip away."
Shepard's cheeks blazed bright crimson. Garrus chuckled at her, pressing his forehead against hers. "But not tonight. Tonight, I'm content with kisses."
"Then kisses you shall have," she whispered, pressing her lips against his, savoring the air he breathed out as she breathed him in. Her fingers caressed the runes of his face, learning them by touch alone. His scars would also be hers, and there wasn't a damn thing anyone else could do about it.
Garrus traced a pattern of imaginary design over the black fabric smoothed down her abdomen. Shepard jerked and giggled but tried her best to remain still. "Garrus, I'm ticklish!"
"Of course you are, you silly soft human. You have no natural armor to protect you from my penetrating talons." He punctuated his words with light jabs to her belly, sending her into another fit of giggles.
"Stop, or I'll-"
"You'll what?" He trapped her under his arms, leaning bodily over her, pinning her to the bed.
She turned her face as a shiver ran up her spine, smiling despite herself. "I'll lick you, or something."
"Mmm, me first." Slowly extending his tongue, he dragged the muscle from her jaw straight up to her hair line. Then he pulled away and spat out the few hairs he had accidentally collected in the process.
Shepard laughed at him. "What about my natural defenses?"
"I hardly call that a defense."
"I don't know," she smirked at him, "Once the poison sets in, you might regret licking it off my face."
His face fell, momentarily concerned that she might be telling the truth for once. But after she wiped his saliva off her face, she licked his chin and said, "I was only joking. I hope."
Garrus growled lowly, causing her to shrink under him, her shoulders pulling up around her neck. When he saw this, he assured her, "That wasn't a menacing growl."
"I know," she whispered, "That wasn't a scared cringe."
He chuckled, distributing his weight among both legs evenly. He pressed harder against her, but instead of reciprocating his advances, Shepard pushed against his chest. "Maybe it's time you get off."
Garrus pulled back, off of her in a second. "Sorry. I thought-"
"Don't get me wrong," Shepard began, sitting up with him and putting her hand on his shoulder. "I want to. Believe me, I really really want to. But I can't."
"If it's about genetic differences, I've done the research-"
"It's not. It's... it's religious." Shepard pulled her legs into a criss-cross position and faced Garrus. "I'm Christian, Garrus. That means no sex before marriage. And while there are a lot of lines I've crossed and will cross, I've done a pretty good job of not breaking that one rule."
Garrus stared at her, fully serious. "But I thought you'd... with Kaiden."
Her mouth popped open in surprise. "Oh. No. I mean, I'd thought about it, but we never actually did. I didn't want to commit to him in case we never had the chance to marry after defeating Sovereign." She chuckled darkly. "I guess it's a good thing I didn't, since he's with Ashley now."
Garrus nodded. "I'm sorry I assumed."
She waved her hand dismissively. "It's alright. I know my carefree nature makes it hard to believe I would actually draw lines and stick to them."
Garrus chuckled, then kissed her temple. "I'm glad you did."
"Do," she corrected him. "You're not going to corrupt me, Garrus Vakarian."
"Mmm. Perhaps not as a Shepard." He smiled at her as her mouth popped open again. But before she could ruin the moment with her words, he hopped off her bed and returned to his calibrations.
If Joker had thought she was kidding when Commander Shepard said she would find a way to sneak up on him in the cockpit, he mustn't've truly known Shepard. He wouldn't have put it past her to try to crawl through an air vent or one of those big tubes to get into the cockpit without opening the doors, but there weren't any ducts large enough for the full-grown woman to crawl through, thankfully.
For some reason, however, Joker hadn't expected her to camp out in the cockpit all night while he was taking his sleep shift. An hour into his work and feeling blissfully alone, his hat suddenly flew off his head. He gave such a jolt that he actually thought he might have broken a bone. But Shepard's laughter and his vast experience with broken bones assured him that everything was just as it should be.
Samara had raised 3 children from infancy. Three children, two of them angels, one of them a devil. But even with Morinth's wild nature and the difference in the asari lifespan, Samara had never dealt with a child as old as Shepard. Asari matured quickly for their longevity, she supposed, if humans were any indication. But Shepard was an outlier, a revered commander who somehow still managed to need to be chastised by even the most subordinate of her crew.
Samara had spent centuries honing her reputation. Justicars were often seen as callous by those who lived outside the Code. But Shepard didn't see her that way. It was refreshing, surprisingly, to have someone so curious about her life story who was neither awestruck nor contemptuous. Shepard shared her Christian beliefs with Samara, and the Justicar found herself admiring the Spectre's dedication to her morality. She was nowhere near perfect, and she owned to that, but she kept trying despite her religion's lack of popularity.
The Illusive Man had thoroughly pissed off Commander Shepard, to the point that the crew began to doubt their continued affiliation with Cerberus, and thus their safety under this strained allegiance.
As the proxy voice of Cerberus, Miranda found herself fielding these concerns from the crew. Naturally, she had to bring them to Shepard to put an end to this unrest.
She found the Commander in the War Room discussing the matter with Jacob. Obviously he had gotten similar questions from crew members.
"Shepard," Miranda began, "Some of the crew have expressed concerns about our safety with you and the Illusive Man butting heads."
Shepard pressed her fingers to her forehead in a display of trying to ease a headache. "I know. But we've never seen eye-to-eye, so I don't know why this time has riled up so many people."
"I think the shouting match may have something to do with that," EDI chimed in.
"Thank you, EDI," Shepard sighed.
Jacob crossed his arms. "You should address the issue to the crew. You could put a lot of minds at ease if you were up front with everyone."
"I will. But I don't think we're in any more danger than we were before. The Illusive Man still needs me to defeat the Collectors, and he knows that I will. I think we can reasonably assume that he won't jeopardize us until we finish destroying them." Shepard turned a serious gaze on them. "I need to know that you trust me."
"I do," Jacob said, sounding almost hurt by the request.
"I do too," Miranda said, her words steady and sincere.
"Good," Shepard said, sounding just as serious. "Then by the power vested in me by the Alliance, and more recently by Cerberus, I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride."
The two officers' eyes opened wide in disbelief and terror. "No!" Miranda shouted, sounding utterly furious.
"That's not what I meant!" Jacob protested.
"It's too late!" Shepard laughed mockingly and fled the room before her two friends could ring her neck.
Down in Engineering, Gabby and Kenneth were having yet another argument about something entirely irrelevant to the war at hand. Shepard rarely paid attention to what they were saying because they either used a lot of technical terms, or Kenneth was playing the womanizer again. Kenneth was funny, and Shepard knew that he and Gabby would make a cute couple someday when they finally stopped pretending they were just friends.
Shepard usually made the rounds after each mission to check on every member of her team and her ship. When she came back upstairs after visiting Jack, she heard the two engineers bickering yet again. But it was a happy coincidence when their conversation led them to each say, "I do."
Shepard jumped on the chance, quickly shouting out, "I now pronounce you man and wife!"
Gabby whirled around to face the Commander. "What? No!"
Shepard giggled and bounded out of the room.
"Jeff," EDI began as Joker attended to his duties at the helm. "What does it mean when two people say, 'I do,'?"
"I'm gonna need more context than that," he said, mostly distracted.
"Commander Shepard has been preying on crew members, waiting for them to say, 'I do,' and then pronouncing them 'man and wife.'"
Joker chuckled. "She must be tired of the lack of romance and drama aboard the Normandy."
"But how does this change anything?"
"It's an old Earth custom," Joker explained. "Captains have the power to legally marry people when in international waters - or space, in this instance."
"It has been my observation that the crew to whom she has done this did not seek marriage."
"I don't think she can really marry people against their will. But I don't know the laws regarding that."
"I do," EDI said.
"Oh no. I'm not falling for that."
"Darn it!" Shepard's voice yelled from the opposite side of the door.
"Samara, can you levitate me?"
Samara took her time emerging from her meditation before turning her attention to the Commander. "I can. But my skills are not for your amusement, Shepard."
The woman shook her head, biting back a smile. "As much as I'm sure I will enjoy it, I actually need your help retrieving something from the ceiling of my cabin."
Samara stood and followed Shepard to the topmost deck. When they entered the room, it was immediately obvious what Shepard meant.
"Commander, why is there a model frigate stuck in the ceiling above your bed?"
Shepard blushed. "I was playing with it and wanted to see if it would fly if I threw it. But I got over zealous and threw it a little too hard. I'm actually more surprised that it didn't bust to pieces. These things are notoriously fragile."
Samara opened her mouth to ask more questions, then thought better of it. Raising her hands, she lifted the woman into the air and brought her in reach of the toy. "Wheeee!" Shepard cried, despite the limitedness of the flight. It was enough to convince Samara to glide her through the air over to her work desk on the upper level. Shepard laughed as she landed gently on her feet. "Thank you, Samara. You're pretty cool, you know."
"Thank you for saying so, Shepard."
"Shepard," Garrus began, "I've heard rumors of you marrying random crew members to each other."
"You heard correct," she smiled.
"I didn't know you had the authority to officiate a wedding."
"Oh yeah. All human captains do by nature of the job. I'm in command of this vessel, and therefore can legally bind two willing participants in holy matrimony. Of course, I'm pretty sure none of the people I've 'married' aboard the Normandy are actually legally married to each other. Heh, none of them consented."
Garrus held her shoulders delicately. "Could you theoretically perform the actual ceremony if two people did consent to being married aboard the ship?"
Shepard nodded enthusiastically. "Oh yeah, definitely. Why - do you know someone who wants to get married?"
Garrus grinned. "I do."
"Thane-doll, be a dear and grab a medi-gel canister from my pack," Shepard asked sweetly, bending on one knee next to an injured vorcha.
The drell did as asked and handed the spare pack to the woman, who took it and pressed it into the vorcha's hand. "Take care of yourself, then get your comrades on their feet. And find yourself something to eat, on me," she added, transferring a few thousand credits to him.
The vorcha nodded, pushing to his feet. He hurried down the hallway and out of sight.
Jacob sighed. "Shepard, why would you waste resources on a vermin like that?"
Shepard spun on her heel, fury in her eyes. "You listen, Jacob Taylor ," she said, stabbing a finger into his chest, "We are all God's creatures, regardless of how we look or act. Those vorcha are just as deserving of our help as every innocent we help during our travels."
"They're vorcha, Shepard! They're not innocent. You probably just aided a member if the Blood Pack."
Shepard raised her voice, pointing in the direction the vorcha had disappeared. "If he were in the Blood Pack, he wouldn't be starving in the slums of Omega. He'd be out with his buddies living it up, or smeared across a wall of some building we already cleared out."
Jacob crossed his arms, his jaw set defiantly. "You're so naive. You probably won't even step on a spider until it bites you."
"I would never harm an innocent spider! They eat mosquitos! We need them!"
The man just rolled his eyes. "You can't be reasoned with."
The trio made their way toward the marketplace of Omega, first stopping at the booth of a struggling quarian to whom Shepard gave a large amount of credits in order to help him get off the station. As they traveled the familiar tunnels up to the main market area, Thane noticed an unusual lack of beggars that were typically scattered across the floor.
As they entered the open market area, they spotted the vorcha Shepard had helped at a food stand handing out meals to several ragged-looking humans and vorcha.
Shepard looked at Jacob, a wry smile playing at her lips. Thane smirked inwardly at the defeated look on Jacob's face. He made a mental note to share the experience with Garrus once they returned to the Normandy.
"I didn't think I could love her any more than I already did," Garrus said after Thane finished his story. "But then she does something like this, and I fall even deeper in love."
Thane hummed. "Perhaps it is time."
Garrus remained silent, returning to his calibrations. The lack of verbal acknowledgement spoke volumes more than words would have. Thane excused himself from the room, returning to his own to reflect, as he was prone to do. One of these days, he thought to himself, his turian friend would have to stop postponing the inevitable.
Jack was perturbed by the fact that Shepard had decided to hide in her room, of all places. She knew the Commander had a thing for the turian, so why didn't she go and bother him?
"I know you think we're friends and all, but I'm not big on sharing my space," Jack said.
"That's probably the most diplomatic thing you've ever said," Shepard said, chewing on something as she sat in the corner.
"The hell it is," she replied with a smirk.
"There's Jack," Shepard grinned. "Anyway, I'll be out of your hair once I finish."
"Finish what?"
Shepard held up the bag and jostled it a bit in explanation. "They won't let me eat these if they catch me, and Grunt would make me share. That's why I'm hiding with you. They aren't going to risk angering you to take my food away."
Now Jack was curious. "What are they?"
"Fried pyjak balls," Shepard said matter-of-factly.
"What?!"
Shepard burst into a smile as she shoved another one in her mouth. "They're so effing tasty! It's like an organism in my mouth!" She held the bag out to her biotic companion and shook it. "You want to try one?"
Jack grimaced. "No thanks. The only balls I put in my mouth are ones attached to people."
Shepard shrugged and retracted her hand. "More for me."
Jack lay down on her bed and began to read something. At length, she said, "Hey Shepard, when are we going to blow up Pragia?"
Shepard loudly sucked the seasoning off of her fingers. "Whenever the hallucinations pass, I'll tell Joker to set a course for the Dakka system. From there we'll make our way to Pragia. But you'll probably need to remind me."
Jack put down her pad to look at Shepard. "What hallucinations?"
"The ones I get from eating pyjak balls. It's why the others won't let me eat them."
When Tali joined the squad, Shepard was thrilled. She went so far as to bake a cake for the occasion, and then to special order a quarian delight when she realized the cake would be more harmful than tasty to her friend.
The rest of the Normandy was rather satisfied with her cake, which had the words, "Welcome Home, Tali!" written messily across its expanse. She even received a compliment from Mess Sergeant Gardner, who she had come to appreciate for his tolerance of her quirky ways.
"Are you ready to retrieve the Reaper IFF, Commander?" EDI asked as Shepard poured over the star charts before her.
"Almost. There's just one little thing I need to get before running off into the great unknown." Shepard commed Joker. "Joker, set a course for Tuchanka."
"You know Garrus is gonna be pissed when he finds out you replenished your stash of teste treats," the man's voice replied.
"I'm not going back for those! I left a friend on the planet, and I'm not going to my death without him."
The varren that accompanied Shepard aboard the Normandy was enough to distract people from the wagon with several boxes of goodies she'd smuggled off Tuchanka.
"Holy shit!" Joker exclaimed, twisting to face the beast. "Why the hell would you bring that aboard?"
Shepard patted the striped canine and snidely said to Joker, "Urz is a sweet puppy. And he's mine, so tough titties, kitty." She continued into the ship with her creature in tow, dragging the little wagon behind her.
"Come on, Urzzy," she cooed to the varren, "Let's go stash your food in the meat locker, and then I'll show you your new home."
To say that the rest of the crew did not react well to their new cohabitant would be an understatement. First of all, just getting him to the elevator resulted in a mass panic and subsequent exodus of the flight deck. It didn't help that all of the soft, scurrying bodies got Urz's blood pumping to the point that he started chasing the slower humans.
"Urz, no! Bad dog!" Shepard yelled firmly. The varren promptly broke off his chase and returned to the Commander's side, head bowed in shame. She scratched his scalp affectionately. "I swear if I have to put a collar and leash on you, I will," she threatened him. He gave her a repentant look. It was enough to satisfy her.
She led him to the crew deck to ask Mess Sergeant Gardner where the meat locker was, since she had no reason to know. She planned to freeze most of the bags of pyjak meat she'd picked up from Tuchanka. The rest she'd keep in her mini fridge in her room to feed to him as needed.
As soon as the humans who always sat around that table in the middle of the room saw the varren, they jumped out of their chairs and scattered. Even Dr. Chakwas, safe in her medical bay, closed the blinds and locked the door to keep her rogue Commander out. Shepard patted Urz to keep him from pursuing the Cerberus crew.
"Quit running, people!" she hollered. Shepard crossed the room to where Gardner was standing petrified. "Hey, where do you store the frozen food?"
Gardner looked at her, then at the varren, then back at her, then back at the varren. With his eyes locked on the beast, he asked, "You gonna freeze that thing in there?"
Shepard snapped her fingers in the man's face, startling him. "Pay attention to me. I need to store Urz's food in there. Where do I go?"
Gardner swallowed, glanced at the varren before addressing the Commander. "The walk-in freezer is down in the port cargo hold."
Shepard smiled. "Thanks." She led Urz back to the elevator with her little Radio Flyer wagon in tow.
Urz didn't seem too fond of elevators, but he wasn't hopping all over or whining, so Shepard was pretty sure he would get used to it eventually. The wagon rattled a bit, which caused the varren unease, but they were at their stop shortly. The two made their way to the port cargo hold, where Grunt was standing around as he usually did.
When the krogan saw the loose varren next to his Commander, he was momentarily astonished. "Even feral beasts of war bend to your power, Shepard."
The woman patted her pet. "This is Urz. He's going to be a member of our crew. You want to pet him?"
Grunt eyed the panting pooch. He extended his hand, allowed Urz to sniff it, then scratched the animal's head and under its jaw. "He is a magnificent creature. We are keeping him?"
"Oh yes! In fact, that's why I'm down here - to store his food in the walk-in freezer. Gardner said it was down here." Shepard scanned the walls before locating it, then dragged her packages over to it and began to unload them into the unit.
When she had finished, she turned around with a single box left in her wagon. Grunt was on the floor laughing, Urz standing on his chest and licking his face. Shepard grinned and rolled around the two. As she opened the door to leave, Urz jumped off of Grunt of his own accord and trotted after Shepard. Grunt stood and called after them, "He can visit me any time he wants."
Shepard merely gave him a wave without turning to face him as the door slid shut behind her.
After depositing the wagon in the starboard cargo hold, single box in her arms, Shepard led her varren up to her private quarters to stow his food in her mini fridge. She pressed the button on the tank wall to feed her fish, then knelt down under the desk under her space hamster Meep and carefully unpacked the box into the mini fridge down there. She took out a slab of pyjak meat from one bag and dropped it into Urz's waiting mouth.
After washing her hands and cleaning the blood off of Urz's mouth, she decided to give him a proper tour of the ship and his new extended family. At her heels as always, Urz followed her out of the room and back into the elevator. He was quickly becoming used to it.
While no one could be as shocked that Shepard had actually brought a varren aboard as the civilian crew of the Normandy, Miranda did a pretty good job of looking like she was. Her face actually turned a little pink with anger as she yelled at Shepard about how irresponsible it was. "Where is it going to sleep? What if it gets restless while you're away on missions? What if it just decides to start attacking people because - oh, I don't know - it's a varren?! Why would you ever think this is okay?"
Shepard crossed her arms and frowned at Miranda. "That's an awful lot of hate for someone you don't know. Are you sure you're not misdirecting your anger? How are things with Jacob going? I know marriage can be hard."
Miranda gritted her teeth, slamming her fist down on her desk. "This is serious, Shepard!"
"Listen, I'm a big girl. I'm 29 - no, 31 - years old now. I can take care of a pet. I know how to care for an animal. I have all sorts of experience. You might not know this, but I had three pet pythons when I was younger, and one of them was a Burmese! I can handle a varren."
Miranda threw her arms in the air. "Fine. But you are cleaning up every pile of poo that creature leaves anywhere. And if it ever so much as sneezes at a crewmate wrong, I'm kicking it off this ship."
Shepard put her nose in the air and turned on her heel. Miranda may not appreciate her faithful friend, but certainly the others would.
She went next to the main battery, where Garrus usually resided. But when the door opened, the only thing to greet her was the hum of electronics. Puzzled, she decided instead to visit Thane.
The assassin had never made use of a varren in combat, but he had heard of others doing so. It seemed unorthodox to him, but the word fairly described Shepard, so he assumed that she had recruited the varren for such a task.
Shepard laughed when Thane presented this theory to her. She explained that Urz was just a good friend and that she wanted his companionship as long as she could have it. Given the morbid turn of the conversation, Thane made certain to give her enough of a pep talk that she forgot all about Miranda's harsh words.
From there, Shepard and the canine went to visit Samara, who had heard the commotion earlier and was prepared for the new creature that the Commander introduced. She stroked Urz briefly before saying that she needed to continue meditating, thus ending the visit.
Mordin handled the presence of the varren well, compared to the other squad members. However, he did request permission to experiment on Urz, which even most effectively ended the visit.
Jacob, naturally, scrambled up on a nearby table, immediately drawing his pistol and aiming it straight between Urz's eyes. Shepard stepped in front of him and yelled, "No! Bad Jacob! Don't shoot my puppy!" Jacob responded with loud swearing and threats, so they left.
Down in Engineering, Tali was not thrilled by the presence of the varren, but she trusted Shepard and thus cautiously allowed her to introduce Urz as the newest member of the family. The other couple of Engineers, however, immediately went on break and hastily disappeared.
Next, Shepard and Urz visited Jack, who frowned at him as she frowned at everything. But hidden beneath her frown was the heart of a child who had always wanted a pet, and she knew that she would come to love the bulky beast as they fought side-by-side. After all, the Commander surely wouldn't leave such an asset out of the fight.
After having searched the remainder of the ship and not located Garrus, Shepard returned to her bedroom with Urz only to discover that Garrus was waiting for her there.
"Oh," she said, rather shocked. Urz growled at Garrus before Shepard reassured him with a pat on the shoulder. "Garrus, I didn't expect you to be in here."
Garrus stood from the couch. "I finished my calibrations for the night and thought I'd stop by to see you. Is that Urz?" The turian held his three-prong hand out to the varren, who sniffed it before licking it. Garrus laughed and scratched the animal's head. "Good boy."
Shepard smiled and pulled Garrus into a kiss. "Did you want to get dinner, or maybe watch a vid for a couple of hours?"
Garrus put his hands on her shoulders. "Actually, I was thinking we could just talk for a while. Shepard, there's something I've been meaning to ask you."
Just then, EDI commed her room. "Shepard, Admiral Hackett is asking for you. He says it is urgent."
"Did he say what he wants?" Shepard asked, immediately in Commander mode again.
"You will have to ask him yourself."
Shepard turned on her heel and headed out the door, leaving Garrus standing alone in her room with the resting varren. He looked at the door through which she'd disappeared, frowning slightly. He sighed and clenched his fingers. "So close."
Tali was understandably furious with Shepard when she brought back an unexpected recruit from her expedition aboard the "dead" Reaper. She was even more appalled that the Commander opted to reactivate the fully-functional geth.
But as Shepard held the synthetic creature in her arms, cradling it like a massive cat she'd found during a walk, and looked up into Garrus's eyes with the most adorable, "Can we keep it?" the turian knew that somehow Tali would pin the blame for this on him.
"We are Legion," the geth said.
"We are Borg," Shepard mimicked the robotic quality of its voice.
"Shepard-Commander, we do not understand." Legion replied.
"You will be assimilated," Shepard continued, "Resistance is futile."