Chapter 2

"Why do they call you Joker?" I asked the Normandy's pilot next to me, who was content to let his chair consume him with his cap low over his eyes and pretend that I was nothing more than an irksome insect buzzing stupidly in his ear. I'd taken to tease him from an empty terminal nearby, mostly because I knew he couldn't bolt even if he wanted to. It was cruel, I know, but I was bored. Sitting down in the mess growling at every wide-eyed green marine that came waddling by had only entertained me for so long.

"It's easier than having to write down Alliance Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau on everything," he said curtly. It was almost a redundancy, telling me to run along and find someone else to play with. Like staring out the helm's prodigious windows at the glinting cyan lights of the Citadel was the most important thing he could be doing and I was tactlessly intervening. Well, this conversation was off to a great start. I'm thinking gold for our best friends bracelets.

I pulled my knees up to my chest, resting my chin on my hands and smirked at him like he was my new favored guinea pig . "Why is it you Alliance types are always hostile towards outsiders? Does it make you feel macho?" In my best impression of Arnold Schwarzenegger, "'Look at me, I've got the communication skills of a carrot. Run away as I scowl at you.'" I added a heart-chilling, menacing glower for extra effect.

"It's a wonder you don't have your own fan club yet," Joker said. He was trying to cover it, but I knew he was grinning under the brim of his hat. Revitalizing to know that some of the Alliance knew how to smile and their faces didn't disintegrate because of it. This might prove to be a little diverting after all.

"I'm working on it." I stretched my legs out in front of me and crossed my ankles, folding my arms behind my head as a cushion. "Don't worry, I'll make sure to add you to the list."

That got a snort out of him. "Can't wait."

We were still docked on the Citadel and life aboard a luxurious starship that cost more than I'd made my entire life was seeming disappointingly gray. I'd already asked Navigator "Chuckles" Pressly which way the pool was and got an abysmal expression as a response. To my great disappointment, I guess starships didn't have everything. Even ones as ritzy-glitzy as the Normandy SR-1.

After pointing a finger under my nose saying, "You break it, you buy it," Commander Shepard in all his glamorous glory had marched to his meeting with the Citadel Council, his twitchy quarian stumbling on after him. He had this absurd reverie that after presenting the Council with his latest findings, they would drop everything, get down on their squamous hands and knees and cling to him for aid against loony-looners Saren Arterius, who also happened to be their favorite toy in the sandbox. It was a waste of time and everybody other than Shepard knew it. No matter how smart you were, you couldn't convince a stupid person that they were stupid. That would make life way too elementary.

Shit had fit the fan, and now the Council was left scraping cow plop off the galaxy with a pencil. Our Merry Band of Misfits was the pointed tip and the council was going to abrade away with us until we were dull, flat and plodding. Then they'd move on to the next sorry sap who I'd have to remember saying silent prayers for every now and then. Being the Council's next lap-dog, they were going to need it.

"I think you've gotta live up to that name." I peeked at the pilot from the corner of my eye and smiled wickedly. "Go on, tell me a joke."

"What?"

"It's only fair. Though I'll warn you, I can be a very strict audience."

He sat stiff straight in his chair and wore an expression like he'd just swallowed the galaxy's sourest lemon. "I'm the best pilot in the Alliance Fleet, not an idiot stationed here to put on little comedy shows for nuisances."

"I'll make sure to put that on a plaque for you if I find your joke amusing," I told him. "Now go on, we haven't got all day, Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau." I added as much importance as I could muster to his title to please him. He didn't look satisfied.

"Fine." He pivoted in his seat to face me, tipping his chin up to see under the rim of his ancient discolored cap that looked older than the First Contact. "Ever heard of the girl that passed out on her own drool over Commander Shepard? It's one of my favorites."

Joker, one. Chyler, zero.

I could feel my cheeks burn slightly and resisted the urge to press my cool fingers against them. Instead, I settled for camouflaging it lounging back in my chair and shrugging him off while picking at an imaginary torn cuticle. Yep, he definitely lived up to his name. I think it was only too appropriate to drop the subject now. "Ha-ha." I rolled my eyes at him.

Seeming rather pleased with himself, he turned back to the terminal in front of him with a cheeky grin plastered on his smug, half-covered face. That's the last time I challenge someone with the nickname Joker. Yeah, yeah. Keep smiling, wise-ass. Just remember to sleep with one eye open from now on. Who knows what you'll wake up to, then we'll see who's grinning.

The door to the bridge behind us unlatched with a smooth swoosh. A current of air teased the back of my neck as Shepard marched in like he owned the place, which was, strictly speaking, true. Tali, the twitchy quarian, legged it in the opposite direction like a pack of wild mutts were chomping at her heels. Weird species, quarians. Their suits made it impractical for them to communicate through facial expressions so they thought over exaggerating their movements and body language was an acceptable substitute. When in doubt, watch their feet. If they weren't tap dancing for you that was grim sign. Find the nearest escape route asap.

Shepard came to a stop behind the pilot's chair. Immediately Joker seemed to brace, sitting forward in his seat as if there were shards of glass lodged into the cushioning of his chair. I wouldn't be surprised if he twirled around to say, "Look at me fly the ship, Commander! Look at me go!" I bit back a laugh.

"So, how does it feel to be not only the Alliance's Poster Boy but the Council's as well, Spectre?" I expected him to tell me to do them all a tremendous favor and stuff my head into one of the Normandy's toilets. But I got nothing. Nada. Zip. Not even a flick of the eye. It pushed my buttons more than a sardonic retort would've.

"Joker, set a course for the Artemis Tau Cluster," Shepard said in his very professional 'I'm an Alliance Superior, fear me' tone. I watched closely to see if Joker would flake out.

"Aye, aye, Commander."

Shepard turned to exit the cockpit. I followed after him, staggering over my own two left feet to keep up with his purposeful pace. "Anderson isn't here anymore," I said. I wonder if the Alliance had 'Stater of the Obvious' as a title.

"And?"

"And I want to know if that means I should expect to be thrown out of the nearest airlock at any time."

He turned around to face me, his eyes narrowing as he assessed me from the top of my head to my toes. Without thinking, I felt my spine straighten, my chin raising slightly, my shoulders rolling back. I tried make myself as lofty as possible, which next to him wasn't a sizable achievement. The man would tower over me even if I was in eleven inch heels.

"Just because Captain Anderson isn't here anymore doesn't mean I'll disrespect him by disregarding his previous orders," Shepard said firmly. "He saw you as a valuable asset, and I trust his word." He started down the bridge again. "Besides, if worse comes to worse, we can throw you in front of Saren and you can talk him to death."

An Alliance CO with a sense of humor; how ever did I get so lucky? I should chase after assassins in dark alleyways more often. They'll call me, "Chyler Hale, Hit-man Tickler."

I stuck my tongue out at his retreating back.


"And people complain that Tuchanka is a wasteland," the krogan, Wrex, grumbled as we gradually made our way closer to Dr. T'Soni's dig site. He turned to glare up at the sun as if it would cower away in fear of being head butted.

Therum was undeniably more habitable in the past than it was in the present, before we mined and looted the ever living shit out of it. There was no animal life, no foliage, nothing to block the tortuous rays that bared down on us like a crazed cat clawing nonstop at a rather unpleasant sunburn. In fact, it was a safe bet to assume that this planet had never been introduced to the color green before. The surface was dotted with ancient Prothean ruins, so it wasn't all that astonishing that an asari archaeologist would reside here. Not a popular vacation site, that was for sure.

The prickly part wasn't finding her but more so of reaching her. Geth had been plunging from colossal drop ships ever since we landed on the planet's surface, scurrying around like giant metal spiders too big to stomp with your boot. I'd have to remember to write Saren a lovely thank you card for the target practice, I was starting to get a bit rusty. The path ahead was obstructed by jumbo impenetrable boulders leaving only a narrow passage that the Mako would never be able to squeeze through and come out of in one piece, which meant we were on foot for the remainder of the way. I wouldn't have minded being able to stretch out my legs from the rough ride here if it wasn't for the blistering heat.

Me being a part of the ground team was a well orchestrated test, and I was aware of it. For my combat as well as my loyalty expertise. As far as Shepard was concerned, I was as much of an enemy as the geth. Hard to center on the mission when the barrels and fists would turn on you if you put even a toe out of line. I was tempted to ask him if he was enjoying the view since he was closely surveying my every breath. Was it too late to turn back?

"I think I prefer the lovely bombardment craters and radiation of Tuchanka over this," I said as I wiped my slick forehead with the back of my gloved hand.

"You forgot to mention our salt flats and alkaline seas." The krogans face shifted into a nightmarish grin that had me cringing away in terror. Strong species, but definitely not in the top five for galaxy's most attractive. Still, anything beat the vorcha.

"The underground bunker shouldn't be much farther. Let's get the doctor and go home," Shepard said ahead of us, his shoulders tight and his body tense like a coiled spring. "I want off this planet."

"I didn't realize I was traveling with a bunch of delicate flowers. Afraid you'll wither from a little heat?" the turian said. "Forget your sunblock?"

"Just trying to catch up with you on the shriveling scale, Garrus," I teased him, cranking my neck just in time to see his mandibles flare impatiently. I couldn't help myself, he was just too much fun to prod.

He huffed. "Not all of us want to be a squishy, soft human. Some of us actually have a backbone."

"I think you're mistaking that for the pole up your ass."

Wrex let out a big rumbling laugh from behind us that shook the terrain beneath my dirt stained combat boots. "You know, I'm starting to enjoy humans."

"Enough," Shepard's voice rang out. His body was bent low like a feline ready to pounce, his battered battle-scarred assault rifle raised to attention. Taking careful paces forward like a predator proficiently stalking his next prey. The rest of us were quick to follow suit, but not necessarily as graceful; all rushed hands and slippery digits.

It was quiet. Like the air itself had stopped to hold it's breath in anticipation. The tension was so thick you could cut through it with a knife and serve it as a five course meal. My shoulders felt unbearably hulky as if a rock giant was pressing his stone palms stubbornly and relentlessly down onto them in hopes of burying me alive.

Shepard peeked silently over the cliff barrier, then immediately drew back as pebbled splinters clouded the surrounding air in dust and mist from the shot that barely missed. He cursed. "Four troopers on the ground, three rockets on the top of the hill, and a sniper in the tower," he told us. "Vakarian, I want you on that sniper. Get him before he can take out our shields. Wrex, watch our backs as we push through but keep your head down. I don't want them boxing us in. Hale, you take point with me." Where I can keep an eye on you, he failed to add.

"See you at the party, Princesses." Wrex let out a deviously grumbling laugh as he reloaded his massive, monstrous shotgun the size of a human toddler, seeming all too pleased to get shot at.

Oh good, I'm guessing he won't mind me using his mammoth body as cover then.

We shuffled to our allocated positions as stealthily as possible. The surrounding air seemed to take a large gulp before the once whistling terrain erupted like a spontaneous volcano in exploding rounds and missiles crashing against hard rock. We pushed forward, my paired M-358 Talons melted into the palms of my leather covered hands. Fingers slightly trembling on the smooth metal.

My life had been absent adrenaline for so long that I couldn't help the worry that gnawed on my foot like a galling rodent I couldn't shake. Already, I could feel the wicked power coursing viciously through my veins. Starting from the pit of my stomach, working its way into my sleeping limbs and lacing everything like wildfire. The shift of its trickling stream to roaring violent currents uprooted me, spiking my heart and my breath stuck in my throat. My blood burned inside my veins in the familiar way that had me forcing back from vomiting all over my boots. I would rather die than puke my guts out in front of Matthew Shepard. 'Oh, don't mind me, Commander. I'll just be over here, fighting the battle of the ages with my weak stomach as you take on hostiles armed with missile launchers. I'm a total bad-ass, right?'

Then the humming began, like I knew it would. The lilting tones made my eyes water from its sweetness. It demanded blood, reveled in the thought of it. Promised complete satisfaction and drunken tranquility. I pinched my eyes shut as if that would pinch the feeling straight away. It petrified me, the pull to the dark side, the power, the promises. I held tight to its leash with both hands.

"Don't pass out on me now, Hale," I heard Shepard's voice say through the dulcet notes swarming inside my skull like smoke.

"I'm fine," I snapped back.

I willed myself to focus past the pull and on the blasts of firearms, the metallic taste of powder and gun oil that left a bitter edge inside the rim of my mouth. On the heat that teased hotly against my dry cheeks and digits every few seconds. The growls of Wrex gleefully tallying his annihilation's. "Three! Four! Come on, you synthetic pyjaks. Come to uncle Wrex!" Followed by a flamboyant war cry that would have even a rabid Yahg plunge over in submission. Berserk bastard. Tough though, I'd stand behind him in front of anyone.

The surface buckled in a small quake that had the ground vanishing from beneath my feet and reappearing under my ass. Suffocating grime coated my hair in a thin wispy gray and pebbles were crammed in places they should never be crammed in, making me walk with a funny limp. Nice. Very graceful.

Rock ash screened the area ahead. Beyond the wall of dust, a single blinding blue orb appeared, seeming to be held up by the air itself. It glowered menacingly above our heads, swaying ever so slightly as if rocking to an invisible tune that only it could hear. The ground trembled, the orb grew larger. Another earthquake forward that had my teeth rattling and my skull vibrating like a bobble-head. Peeling through the smoke screen, a long, sleek metallic limb glided forward, followed shortly by the body of a colossal machine I'd never seen before. The large, monstrous globe that was its head glared down on us like we were interminable ants it could stomp into oblivion with its leviathan feet. If geth could speak, it would say something along the lines of, "We have giant guns, also. Put your little pie-shooters aside and let the big kids show you how it's done."

"What the Spirits is that?" Garrus murmured from somewhere behind us.

A loud, nails-on-chalkboard shriek was its friendly response. It took another thundering step forward until it was towering a few feet from us. "Wild guess, but I don't think it likes you very much, Vakarian." Flaring mandibles.

With a brisk motion, and the sound of snapping hundreds of thickset branches in half, the colossal cracked it's four meaty, titanic shanks together. The sizable orb smoldered so profoundly that I had to shield my eyes with the back of my covered hand, as if staring into a glazing sun at extreme close-range with nothing but flimsy, half-assed sunglasses to protect you. It squealed for a second time before the sphere rocketed forward, its goal to make our heads burst like watermelons.

"Look out!"

The world detonated in slow motion, and the afterlife was purely scintillating white. The ringing in my ears was irritating, like an insect was permanently trapped inside my hollow head but refusing to concede to its poor, pathetic fate. My skull pulsing furiously in a heated competition with my heartbeat. And just as quickly as it disintegrated, the world flashed with color once again. I was sprawled spread-eagle on my back, head drowning from unsteadiness and sitting unevenly on my shoulders from the led that someone just forced down my ears. Nothing seemed broken, every limb attacked and eager to kick the sparks out of whatever the hell just made the entire universe pause with its impressive performance. The only damage I could detect was that my shields had been completely sucker-punched. Fuck, that's one nasty synthetic whoreson.

"You alive, fleshy earthling?" Wrex shouted over the non-submissive ringing. I suppose there were worse things he could call me. I could probably even deem that as a compliment, coming from a Krogan, who ate baby Thresher Maws for breakfast. Along with a glass of acid.

"Just peachy," I forced out as dragged myself behind a sizable storage crate nearby.

A crack whipped the air as Garrus leaned out of cover long enough to line up his battered sniper rifle and let a bullet soar free. An agitated screech came from the colossal monster on impact, but other than that there was no change, no falter to its appearance. I kept my head ducked between my knees as another energy pulse came hurtling towards us.

Wrex growled deep from his chest as he threw blue biotic orbs like they were rock pebbles at the titan. The Talons pulsed and heated my palms as I fired shot after shot, but I might as well have been hitting the metal beast with a water gun. I could sit here forever with unlimited ammo, humming inspirational tunes, twiddling my thumbs and it wouldn't make a difference. This geth was hell-bent on making reaching that asari doctor impossible. Then it hit me, like a fifty skycars head-on.

Where the hell was Shepard?

I cranked my neck to scan the surrounding terrain. Nothing. No evidence to indicate that Commander Shepard had ever set foot on this planet, let alone been with us at all. Panic spiked my pulse, causing the searing blood to rush to my head. I knew that the Alliance were assholes, but that wouldn't mean he'd leave us to be shish-kebabbed by Saren's giant synthetic lackey, would he? What sort of nimrod coward would immolate his crew for the sake of the mission? I bared my teeth in a silent snarl. If by some god-praising miracle I weaseled my way off this bloody planet alive I'd make it my personal duty to kick his pretty poster-boy ass into the next Galaxy.

Another blast collided with the front of the creaking crate that I was using as my cover, followed by unsettling crinkling. I lunged away just as the box exploded into millions of minute slivers, like the shattering of a glass window. I was huffing out air like I was a straining train, my back pressed against the roughness of the storage crate next to Wrex's towering hulk of a form. I peeked my head up to meet the glare of the geth colossal. Would praying it would get bored of us and move along to better sport be too much to ask?

Movement on the unfinished structure above the colossal giant caught my gaze. It was quick like a flash of lightning. I almost didn't catch it. Shepard hurled himself from the platform, latching himself onto the back of the geth like a nimble, agile feline. Like he did this as a morning warm-up to start the day out in substitute of a nice cup of coffee like every rational person did. I gaped open-mouthed like the dumbstruck moron that I was. The features of his irritatingly distracting face defined and enhanced by the orange glow of his omni-tool, adding a haunting auburn tint to his burning blue eyes. With a simple motion, he swept the blazing blade directly into the smoldering globe of the geth giant. Immediately and with the most satisfying crunch, it collapsed with its four bulky legs stuck out at odd, unnatural directions, resembling that of an arachnid.

It was like the whole universe had drastically shifted, everything aligning into place. It all made sense at that exact moment, the fascination with the esteemed Commander Shepard. Why his name was whispered in every corner of the Galaxy; whispered as if he was some omnipotent God and uttering it any louder would bring on you his supreme wrath. Why he was reviewed as humanity's golden boy. He was this newly unearthed breed, one of a kind. And as infuriatingly vexing as it was, I couldn't contradict that he was impressive.

He sauntered over to us as if taking down a mammoth colossal was a daily-routine for him. Which, knowing him, wouldn't be all that shocking. He looked to me. "You might want to close your mouth, unless you want to catch flies," he told me, a cocky-cowboy glint in his eyes before walking past me to join the others.

I snapped my trap shut with a sharp snap, my cheeks heating. Clenching my fists in tight balls, imagining them wrapped snugly around his throat, I glared death at the back of his ginormous head. Dick prick. "God" my ass; you'd find a tentacle-less hanar more impressive than some arrogant Alliance brat. Once again, the world stood uneven with everything shifted at an abnormal angle, and I failed to see any appease to the asshat. Nothing impressive there, at all.

"Let's go find our Doctor."