Chapter 2

The next morning they closed in on the Arcturus Prime Mass Relay leading them to Eden Prime's star system, Charon. Joker had set the steady course to the relay the night before, but they were in no hurry and the crew had been given orders to be well rested before the shake down run, which meant that the beta shift had had the watch during the 'night'. Usually Joker didn't appreciate time off from the helm, mostly because the second pilot always messed with his settings on the chair, the controls and his extranet bookmarks.

He had yet to find a pilot who would just sit still and watch the monitors so they could wake him if something was iffy. But he figured it was a pilot thing. After all, who would want to go through four years at the academy to sit on their thumbs when being behind the controls to a ship as awesome as the Normandy? He wouldn't, that's for sure.

He just couldn't figure why the second pilot would delete his bookmarks on the extranet, every damn time. It was a pain in the ass finding all his sites again at the beginning of each shift. It wasn't even that the sites were against regulations, even though some of them might not be directly – ahem – work related, if you wanted to get technical. But come on, he had really, really, fragile bones in his legs so getting his personal kicks in the shower like a normal soldier wasn't an option. And since they introduced the sleeper pods with clear windows, there really wasn't a whole lot of appeal to easing one's tension there either, thanks very much Alliance Engineers!

So Joker took matters into his own hands, in a manner of speaking, and often took the night shift in addition to his own daytime hours. 'Nighttime' on the ship was quiet and provided a person in a nook or cranny of the ship, such as the cockpit, to participate in a few more extracurricular activities… And in return for the extremely low work pressure he put on the second, all he wanted was that she quit messing with his settings!

He was going to have words with her… Awkward words. About his private life. Shit.

But business first.

"The Arcturus Prime relay is in range. Initiating transmission sequence." Joker was in full pilot mode, moving his agile fingers over the controls in rapid report and keeping his navigators as well as the ship's moves on a tight leash. You wouldn't want to miss something when approaching the enormous rings of the relay, not to mention the mass effect core that could suck you in and spit you out on the other side of the galaxy - or not at all.

"We are connected. Calculating transit mass and destination." The star jumps were some of his favorite maneuvers at the helm. For just a short moment, the gravity shifted and he was as weightless and free as a bird. In that moment it was only the skill of the pilot that ensured that the whole crew made it to the other side of the artificial wormhole. Call it hubris, if you like, but Joker felt like he was the most powerful person in the world - and he was good at getting everybody through in one piece. Never a bumped head on his watch.

"The relay is hot. Acquiring approach vector." This was it, the first jump on the SSV Normandy since she had been brought out of dry dock at the wharf. It would be interesting to see how she would handle the mass effect field with her own drive core being as massive as it was. He was a few degrees off from being dead-on course and immediately corrected by regulating the port thrusters.

"All stations, secure for transit." After the last corrections, he was finally ready. He heard someone come up from behind, but this was very common. After all, he did have the very best view on the ship and there was something truly awe-inspiring about passing through a relay. Kinda like watching a thunder storm close by, only more dangerous. He was pretty sure he'd heard the turian spectre, Nilus, come up earlier, but he hadn't made a peep since then. For this Joker was thankful. Something about the guy just rubbed him the way wrong way. -Gave him the heebie-jeebies to have him hovering behind him too.

"The board is green. Approach run has begun." The relay popped into view and as always he got a tingling sensation up his spine and a clear idea of what David must have felt like, facing Goliath. He'd always liked that story, even if he wasn't a religious man. If there was a God, and he really hoped there wasn't, Joker would have a serious beef with the guy after having been faultily equipped from the get go. Leg-wise, of course. Not the other way…

"Hitting the relay in 3 – 2 – 1." Woo hooo! What a ride! I LOVE this baby! Joker thought to himself as the craft rushed through the relay and then warped into real time in the Charon system.

Setting a course for Eden Prime he slowly began to come down from his adrenaline high.

"Thrusters, check. Navigation, check. Internal emission sink engaged. All systems online. Drift, just under fifteen hundred K." He leaned back in his chair with an extremely satisfied smirk on his face. He was just that awesome!

"Fifteen hundred is good. Your captain will be pleased," the dual voiced turian behind him said, making Joker flinch as he remembered the presence of a deadly alien at his six. Thankfully, said alien had better things to do than converse with the flight crew and left without waiting for a response.

Way to ruin my moment, man. He griped about Nilus to Alenko but didn't get any sympathy from the Lieutenant, because he thought that the counsel had every right to place their spectre on the boat, but no way in hell did a spectre get assigned to a shakedown run. Joker didn't care what kind of prototype warship or who worked together or yada-yada. The story didn't fly. Not for a second.

He nearly jumped again when the commander came to stand next to his chair. Great, now he was caught out bitching about the higher-ups. Couldn't he just catch a break with his bosses just once in a while? Captain Anderson already sounded like he had ants in his pants when he talked to Joker.

But lo and behold, she agreed with him! Maybe she wouldn't be so bad to serve under anyway. He indulged himself in a juvenile interpretation of the term for a few seconds before the captain rudely interrupted his daydream. Fraternization regs didn't mention anything about not being allowed to fantasize about your gorgeous -did he just say that? - XO crawling up his body in her delicates while tracing the contours of his damn fine physique –and yes, he did say so himself- with her hands and lips. Oh just imagine the reflection of her pert little ass in the windshield, wriggling slowly as she went… Anyway.

Wasn't like that was ever going to happen anyway. Not with his medical history and not with her being above him in rank, so he just filed the lovely image away for later contemplation and went back to business. Until she touched him.

She put a gentle hand on his shoulder with a soft squeeze and said, "I have to go. The captain's waiting for me."

"Alright, see you commander," He managed, even though his brain had suddenly become slightly woozy, as if it was full of static.

Joker wasn't used to being touched. The only people who had ever done so without hurting him, pitying him or being paid for it were his mother and physicians, and the warm kindness in the act did something to him that he couldn't quite put his finger on. It was as if something pulled him towards it, or her, craving more. But at the same time it was deeply unsettling – too personal and not something he could brush off with a citric comeback. It was a bit of an emotional ambush that he was just not ready for, and the commander had just instigated the attack as easily as breathing, making Joker feel more fragile than ever before. And he knew fragile like the back of his hand, hell by now he should probably have it tattooed on his ass. Heh, funny picture.

But as soon as the feeling had started, she was gone and he was released again to his own little world; where women were either cold or pitying, and tenderness was for children. Where a man could do what he really wanted if he didn't let anyone get close; get in the way, and where he could prove that he was good enough to do it alone, too.

Who was she anyway, to go around touching people? Keep your goddamned hands to yourself, is what he said. Yeah. Right. Did feel kinda nice though, didn't it? Shuddup.

Just then a message came through from Eden Prime, shocking the hell out of Joker and Alenko with its contents. It looked like a warzone where it should have been paradise. What the hell had happened down there?

"Captain! We've got a problem!" He called to the comm room.

"What is it Joker?" Anderson's baritone replied.

"Transmission from Eden Prime. You better see this." He was patching it through to the comm room even before Anderson told him to, and tried to make heads or tails of the vid as he reviewed it again. This did not look good. Once more he thought; he'd be a monkey's uncle if this was a regular shake down run. Dammit.

I know, terrible. I hate it when I trap myself by writing the original dialogue. Blech! And it took me forever, too. This I flat out blame on my 6 months old daughter who is very needy (Of course, and I love every second of it), as well as a self induced writers block due to incompetence.

Lemme know if you would like another, (better, I promise), chapter, where something interesting actually happens! YAY!