Joker heard her clipped, measured steps entering the cockpit. He heard her pain in the slow, controlled manner of her breathing. It tore at him, how she was blaming herself for every failure in this war. It wasn't her fault. Why couldn't Shepard see that?
"I bet the asari wish they had less dancers and more commandos right about now," Joker said as she settled herself to the right of his chair, shooting Shepard a glance over his shoulder. "Too soon?"
Instantly Shepard was mad. Joker could feel her go from zero to furious at the speed of light.
She jabbed a rough finger into the top of his shoulder, making him gasp and wince away. "You're a damn good pilot Joker and because of that I put up with a lot of shit from you, but this is not the time for cracks about asari strippers. Liara just lost her home and I just ensured it defeat. So I'd appreciate it if you'd lay off the jokes."
Joker turned his chair, forcing Shepard to take a step back. "Or what, Commander?" he challenged. "You need some levity in your life right now. EDI told me that according to your metabolic scans, you are under more stress now than during the Skyllian Blitz. Like more than on Elysium where it was pretty much you versus ten thousand batarians!" Joker leaned forward, looking like he was going to get out of his chair, but he thought better of it and continued:
"And the last time I had a briefing with Anderson, he told meto take care to you. The guy, leading the resistance on Earth, is worried about you!Jesus Shepard, do you have any idea how fucked up that is?!" Joker let out a frustrated huff and readjusted his cap. This emotional crap just wasn't for him. "I'm supposed to help, but the thing is, I don't know how. You're hell bent on solving this war on your own and hell if I can share that burden. So yeah, I make a few cracks about this universe. About the stuck up asari, or the rigid turians, or the angry krogans, because I know you could stand to laugh a little more."
Shepard's scowl didn't lessen one bit in the face of that little tirade and Joker realized he was in for one hell of a fight.
"I don't have the luxury of laughter right now, not while the galaxy burns around us. If I want a goddamn pep talk, Joker, I'll ask for one. In the meantime, your only concern is piloting this ship. Do I make myself clear?"
"No."
"What?" Shepard demanded in her low dangerous, 'I'm about to shoot you.' voice.
Joker had heard it enough times through the comm to know it was never a good sign when she resorted to that tone. He just hadn't realized until now how fucking scary it could be. He imagined the effect was ten times worse when she was armored up, covered in blood, and swinging that big ass shotgun of hers, but he knew he couldn't back down now.
"I said 'no', Commander."
"If I were you Moreau, I'd think carefully about what you're saying." Every word was punctuated with frightening clarity.
"I am. You're taking Thessia's loss as a personal loss, as if there was something else you could've done to prevent it. This isn't your fault. You warned them, Shepard, told them what was coming, and did they listen? No. The onus is on them. They lost their own damn planet.
"And you know what, it probably wouldn't have mattered if they had less strippers and more commandos because in the end it would have been the same. They ignored your warnings and they paid the price for it. Simple as that. As for that ass, Kai Leng, he needed a gunship to help him defeat the legendary Commander Shepard, that doesn't count as a win in my book."
Shepard advanced a few steps on Joker, her powerful frame looming over him. "Frankly, Flight Lieutenant what you think of the situation doesn't matter. Leng still got the VI, Cerberus is still one step closer to the Catalyst than we are, and I failed to stop him. Me. Not you, or Liara, or Javik, but me. The human who kills Reapers and some fucking idiot with a sword beat me."
Shepard turned away, fists clenched. "The ruthless calculus of war is starting show. It seems like every time I look in the mirror, my implants are more and more visible. Every time I look at that damn screen in the war room and see that another planet has fallen, another battle is lost, a part of me hardens. A part of me dies just a little so that I'll have the strength to get through this war. The whole galaxy is resting on my shoulders. They are counting on me to ensure the completion of the Crucible and I just gave our best lead to the enemy!"
She suddenly and violently, punched one of the steel bulkheads near the cockpit door, letting out a strangled sound of rage. After a moment she regarded her now bruised knuckles. Joker thought it must've hurt like a sonovabitch, but she hauled back and did it again. He scrambled out of his chair as fast as he could and hobbled over her. Shepard drew back to do it again, but Joker grabbed her wrist and she halted the action. He wouldn't have been able to hold her back if she really had meant to do it again.
"Stop," he said and shook her bruised hand. "Literally beating yourself up about this doesn't change anything. No one doubts that you'll get the VI back."
She yanked her wrist out of his grasp.
"And if we're too late? Then what? We just sit back and watch as our cycle ends?" Her voice took on a frantic, desperate edge.
Joker grabbed her wrist again.
"No. We fight. We fight until there isn't anyone left to fight."
"That isn't good enough!"
"Yes it is. It has to be."
"No!" Shepard wrestled out of his grasp again and hit the bulkhead with her fist, over and over. It was too quick and too forceful for Joker to even think about stopping.
Shepard just had to feel something, to hit something, anything. All the shit she had to put up with to get this idiotic galaxy to work together to stop its own destruction made her want to destroy something to vent her grief and frustration before it overwhelmed her, before it burned a hole in her chest and exposed her beating heart. Shepard wished she was out on the battlefield so she could kill something with her bare hands. But all there was right now was this bulkhead and her fist. So she just hit it -feeling her skin crack and bleed, feeling the knuckles bruise but not break- because she didn't know what else to do. Or how else to deal.
Joker knew that whatever it was Shepard was going to do, had to do, to fix this situation, it needed to start with her getting a grip.
Shepard wasn't prepared for the full-body check that Joker gave her (her stance had been sloppy and her attention was lacking -a testament to how troubled her mind was right now), but she did register his grunt of pain. She stumbled backwards with a sound of surprise and hit the wall just outside the cockpit, nearly falling to the ground as the slanted walls upset her footing, but Joker pressed himself against her, steadying her balance, grounding her, like he always had.
She'd barely found her footing before Joker was kissing her, harder than she thought was good for his health -none of the last few moments were good for his health, she thought wildly. The force of it slammed the brim of his hat against her forehead and knocked it askew. This was the only thing Joker could think of to make her understand that he cared about her wellbeing. That he didn't want to see her run herself into the ground over this ungrateful galaxy and regardless of what she felt, she wasn't alone in this fight.
Shepard knocked the hat the rest of the way off his head and distantly Joker heard it hit the ground. Then she threaded her sore fingers through his messy hat-hair as her other hand curled around his neck and crushed him against her. He made noises of discomfort and her grip lessened as she pulled back. Then she ran her hands over his chest and arms; it was clinical, she was for checking injury. He wanted to roll his eyes, he wasn't that delicate, not since Cerberus' gene therapy. Joker spoke low and against her lips.
"I'm fine."
She raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "You body-checked me."
"I'm not actually made of glass, you know."
"And Chakwas will kill me if you go to the Med-Bay injured because I had a temper tantrum."
"What about for a shattered pelvis?"
That finally managed to coax a reluctant smile from her and he answered in kind because finally, finally, he gotten through to her. He leaned back in to kiss her, but Shepard seemed to remember where she was because she withdrew slightly.
"I though you and EDI..."
"Yeah, me too," he replied, but it wasn't fair to EDI that he still spent more than half his time outside his shift thinking about Shepard. Then his tone turned playful. "But after that spectacular pass you made at me Shepard, how could I say no?"
She smirked, but he could see uneasiness in her eyes. "What happened to: 'I never even though about it.'?"
Joker chuckled. "Hell, Shepard, every sapient species has thought about it. I just didn't think you were interested, until you said so that is. With all the grace of a charging krogan, I might add."
Shepard let out a surprised burst of laughter. "Yep that's me, Battlemaster Shepard. Of course if you still aren't interested..." she started to play with the fastenings on his uniform, and for a moment Joker lost all coherent thought. "I could just go back to eyeing Hackett through the vid-comm."
"Shit, Shepard!" he blurted, half laughingly, half incredulous. "Tell me you're joking cause that may just give me nightmares. I'll never be able to look at him in the eye again without imagining that."
"What can I say? I've got daddy issues." Her grin was positively mischievous.
"Oh, ugh! Shepard! Where the hell is my xenoporn? I need something to burn that image out of my brain." He detached himself from her and hobbled back to his chair.
She laughed at his retreating back. Damn it was good to hear that again.
"Hackett is going to debrief me on the final mission in person, maybe we could make use of that built in shelf in the com-room."
Joker covered his ears. "Lalalalala! I can't hear you!"
"It looks like it's just the right height," Shepard teased, making sure to raise her voice just enough so he would hear that laughing statement through his hands. Suddenly a pair of warm, soft lips were on his cheek.
"Thanks, Joker. And I'm sorry for snapping at you like that."
Her quiet honesty made him grin stupidly. "I did say something about stress, didn't I? You're not the only one under stress, Shepard, but you've definitely got the lions share here. My-" He stopped. Joker didn't want to bother her with his own problems, she had enough without worrying about him. So he said instead, "Anytime, Shepard."
Her expression faltered a bit. She'd caught his hesitation and he knew she'd wring it out of him one way or another. Thankfully, she let it go for now.
"You'd better be in my quarters when your shift ends Flight-Lieutenant," Shepard said in her serious, 'the world's about to end' voice, but Joker heard the under lying laughter and question the statement hid.
"Aye, aye, Commander." He turned and gave her a cheeky salute and her smile was...breathtaking. Joker knew he was in way over his head, that soppy romance stuff just wasn't him and yet here was getting all soft.
Shepard turned and headed out of the cockpit, her gait less rigid than before and Joker counted that as a win. Her parting comment, just before the door slid closed was, "Hackett's got nothing on you." Joker grinned; he knew it was bordering on loopy, but he couldn't help it.
When he returned to his console and started tweaking their course, EDI looked over at him. Joker could feel her gaze more acutely now that she had a body then he ever could when she was simply the 'omnipresent overlord'. He glanced over at her, eyebrow quirked in a question. EDI's face was slightly scrunched, as it always was when she was trying to understand something strange about organics. He doubted she realized that she did that and how human it was.
"Something on your mind EDI?" Joker asked, silly grin still on his face. He'd just kissed the ever living hell out of Commander Shepard!
"What did Shepard mean when she said 'daddy issues'?" she asked.
Joker's grin faltered. "Uh, you're going to have to ask Shepard about that one EDI. Not touching that."