"Cannot believe you talked me into this," Mordin muttered, though when she turned, his eyes twinkled and his eager expression belied his excitement.
"Hey, we all need stress relief," Shepard said practically, scooping up two small bowls of popcorn, one in a suspicious purple shade. "And I suggested it to a few other folks, and - well, the rest is history."
"Cannot believe you found a copy." Mordin was actually bouncing on the balls of his feet slightly, and she couldn't help but grin.
"I'm really glad you're excited."
"Thank you."
"Oh, no," she warned, still grinning. "Don't thank me yet. We haven't even started, and I should warn you, it's going to get made fun of mercilessly."
Mordin collected a bowl filled with what appeared to be spinach. "Dated story," he said airily. "Not worried about it."
"I should also warn you, some of the other crew has - " She cut off as Garrus drew close, long legs carrying him across the galley easily.
"We're about ready," he said. "Everything okay?"
"All set," Shepard answered, stuffing the bowl of purple popcorn in his hands, and he let his head fall to stare at it.
"What is that?"
"Popcorn." She took some of her own and ate it.
"I can't eat popcorn," he said blankly. "Dextro - "
"It's some dextro popcorn substitute stuff," she told him, and fought not to laugh as he raised one brow, looking at it as if it were poison.
"Why is it purple?"
"Protein synthesis," Mordin jumped in. "Made of synthesized proteins akin to 3D printing. See texture? Amino acids - "
Garrus choked; he'd gingerly taken a small piece and thrown it in his mouth. "Oh God," he croaked.
Shepard cracked up laughing. "Don't like it?"
"It's just all squish!" Garrus said after he swallowed, perturbed. "Is it supposed to be like that? Mordin, no!"
Mordin had grabbed a piece and popped it in his mouth; his expression shifted to abject revulsion before being replaced by a more careful expression of moderate disgust. "Hm."
"You're a salarian, you'll get sick!" Garrus snapped, and carefully held the bowl away as if worried Mordin would grab for another.
"No," Mordin stated. "Small piece like that? Won't bother me." He paused and swallowed with some difficulty, one eye twitching. "Mm. Disgusting." He took one of his spinach leaves delicately, put it in his mouth, and chewed it slowly, as if trying to let the spinach taste seep into his tongue to replace the taste of Garrus' popcorn.
Garrus tilted his head to the side. "Are you just eating leaves?"
Shepard snorted and threw some more popcorn in her mouth, then said, "A lot of salarian diets are just vegetation," and Mordin nodded.
Swallowing the food, he added, "Liybh. Sweet leaves." He held the bowl out to Shepard.
Hesitantly, she took one and nibbled. "Oh," she said. "Oh, wow. It tastes like coconut."
"Coconut?" Mordin asked, mildly amused. "Could try some, too," he told Garrus, tearing off a tiny piece and holding it out.
"No thanks," Garrus said, putting the bowl off offensive popcorn down and holding his hands up, as if warding off an attack. "Nope. I'll stick with my nice dextro candy." He patted his pocket.
"Wise," Mordin agreed.
"Hey," shouted Kasumi, her voice echoing through the comm. "Are you all coming?"
"Yeah," Shepard shouted back. "Yeah, be there in a second!"
"I will answer you truthfully, master – I have a slight cold, but otherwise I am quite well."
"I am sorry for your cold, but I was referring rather to your personal appearance. Compared with other women, are you beautiful?"
"This is so old," Kasumi muttered to Thane.
"Hey, some of us are trying to watch," Joker complained, then yelped as Garrus gently kicked him. "Watch it!"
"I am watching it, you're still in one piece," Garrus said defensively.
"I'll make you eat more of that disgusting popcorn," Joker threatened.
"You're making more noise than I was," Kasumi said indignantly.
"Come on, guys," Shepard groaned. "Can you hush up?"
"Would like to watch movie," Mordin informed them.
"Of course you wanna watch it," Joker said, rolling his eyes - though he seemed to find it amusing, the corners of his eyes crinkling. "How can you stand this? 'I have been told so, dear master!'" He mimicked one of the character's lines.
"Don't watch it if you don't want to, Joker," Shepard told him. "Hush."
The movie played on.
"Did ever maiden wake, from dream of homely duty, to find her daylight break with such exceeding beauty?"
"I can't watch this without laughing," Kasumi whispered to Thane, who gave her a curious look.
"I don't suppose this makes any more sense to you than it does me," he said in his low voice.
"Hey." That was Shepard; she fixed them with a warning look, and Kasumi shot her a sly smile and a zip lips motion.
"I'm out," Jack muttered from her position at the back of the conference room, and left abruptly.
"Surprised she made it this far," Joker said, shifting in his seat.
"Me too," Kenneth mumbled. "Lady's far too nasty for this kind a' shite."
"Don't be mean," Gabby admonished. "We've been over this."
"Here's a first-rate opportunity to get married with impunity!" The on-screen pirates all scuffled with women clad in white lace and dresses.
"It is rather dated," Samara said speculatively, and stood. "While this is an interesting exercise, I will return to my meditations."
"Are we just gonna keep losing people?" Joker asked, hands raised palm-up in a questioning gesture as Samara left.
"Only if people keep talking," Shepard said coolly, stretching in her seat.
"They're leaving because it's old," Kasumi informed her.
"Shush," Mordin said suddenly.
Kasumi froze. "Did you just shush me?" she asked, a mix of incredulity and amusement on her face.
Mordin's eyes flicked to meet hers. "Yes. Shush."
Kasumi opened her mouth, eyes glittering with humor, paused, then said quietly, "Mordin Solus just shushed me."
"Hey," Shepard warned.
"I'm shushing, I'm shushing!" Kasumi said hastily. "I just want to know why - "
"And it is, it is a glorious thing to be a Major-General!"
"It is! Hurrah for the Major-General!"
The film stopped, and there was a chorus of protests around the room.
"Nope," Joker said, waving the slim remote. "I'm not starting it back up." He grinned wickedly. "Not unless…"
"Oh dear," Shepard muttered as Joker pointed a finger dramatically at Mordin.
"Not unless you sing."
There was silence; Mordin coolly began to inspect his own gloves.
"Sing?" Tali asked blankly, raising her head from her arms. "Mordin?"
Kenneth guffawed. "That's gotta be a sight. Or sound."
"Well, well. I want to see how this turns out," Garrus said mildly, interlocking his fingers and placing them behind his neck.
"I know you can," Joker taunted, wiggling the remote. "I'm not kidding, I'll call this whole thing off."
"EDI?" Shepard asked; the AI turned red.
"Not getting involved," EDI stated.
"Thanks a lot," Shepard grumbled. "Mordin, you don't have to."
Mordin continued to look over his gloves.
"Yeah," Kenneth snorted. "Save our ears, more like. Ow!" He yelped as Gabby hit him on the arm.
"Shut up, Kenneth," she advised.
Mordin sighed finally and interlaced his fingers primly. "Sing?"
"Do it," Joker intoned.
"I'm curious," Garrus said.
"As am I," Thane mused, and shrugged guiltlessly as Shepard shot him a reprimanding look.
"Come on," Joker encouraged. "Sing for us! Sing for us!"
Garrus joined in, chanting; several other crew members joined in after him.
Mordin finally rolled his large eyes and stood, gesturing for everyone to quiet down. "Haven't in a while," he said mildly, eyes not leaving Joker's face. "Patter song. Difficult tempo."
"You'll do fine," Joker said wickedly. "You ready?"
Mordin sighed, brushing off his lab coat, and walked calmly to the front of the room, then inclined his head.
Joker hit play.
A jaunty, rapid tune hit their ears; and then -
Hitting every syllable with almost mechanical precision, Mordin sang. "I am the very model of a modern Major-General, I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral, I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical, from Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical; I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical, I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical, about binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news – With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse!"
The crew sat in shocked silence as the song continued for five or six verses; Mordin sang the entire song dutifully. After the first verse, he began to gesture; then after the second, he paced; soon enough, he was waving and pointing at various crew members, accentuating his words as he sang. Several crew members had wide grins on their faces.
"And now that I've sung that, I should like to have some idea of what's going on," he finally said, panting slightly, at the exact same time the character on-screen said almost the exact same line. Joker hit pause.
"Shut your mouth, Kenneth, you're gonna drool," Gabby told her friend, and he closed his mouth with a snap .
"Wow," Garrus said, and began to clap slowly. "You could've made a fortune on Broadway."
"Never cared to," Mordin said, still slightly out of breath, and he quickly navigated back to his chair and sat down. "Sorry. Been a while. Patter songs - difficult." He smiled ruefully. "Getting old."
"Get what you wanted, Joker?" Shepard asked, eyeing him; Joker snapped to attention.
"Well, honestly, I didn't expect that," he said, spinning in his chair idly. "I expected it to be all cracky and choppy, you know." He gestured. "Not the whole fucking song. Mordin, dude. You're actually not bad."
"That was amazing!" Tali interjected. "Don't listen to anyone. You did wonderfully!"
"We're all saying he did good, though!" Joker raised a water bottle. "You need a glass of water or anything?"
"Have one," Mordin said, raising his own water bottle. "Thank you, though."
"That one was different than the one you sang for me," Shepard noted, pulling one leg up to loop her arms around one knee.
Mordin took a long drink of water before answering. "Parody," he said finally. "Production I was in was parody of it."
"You were in a production of that?" Tali sounded even more surprised, and Mordin nodded.
"Multispecies production. Cultural, linguistic exploration. Sang for Shepard once." He nodded toward her.
"Can you sing that one, too?" Gabby asked eagerly, and Mordin held up a finger and cleared his throat.
"I am the very model of a scientist salarian, I've studied species turian, asari, and batarian, I'm quite good at genetics (as a subset of biology), Because I am an expert (which I know is a tautology), My xenoscience studies range from urban to agrarian, I am the very model of a scientist salarian!"
Gabby and Tali both clapped cheerfully, and several other crew members joined in. Mordin gave a quick bow from where he was sitting, a smile tugging at his lips.
"You've heard him sing that before?" Garrus asked Shepard.
"Yeah, he sang for her a while back. Caught it on camera," Joker said casually, then held his hands out. "What?"
"That's how you knew he could sing!" Shepard accused him.
"Look, not my fault if the AI can't keep security files private," he said smoothly.
"Prefer not to be blamed, Mr. Moreau," EDI reprimanded.
"EDI, you haven't shown him security footage of anyone, have you?" Shepard asked suspiciously.
"I have not. If I recall correctly, Mr. Moreau hacked into them hoping to discover where he had lost his left shoe."
"Oh, come on, EDI," Joker groaned.
"Next time, look for it," Shepard told him firmly. "I will not have anyone hacking into something that could contain private information."
Joker began to say something else, but thought better of it. "Fine, Commander," he muttered sullenly.
"Now. Everyone want to continue watching?" she asked, and there was a chorus of agreement. "All right. Joker?" Joker hit play, and Shepard settled back into her seat next to Mordin, then spoke quietly. "Are you okay?"
"Yes," he replied.
"You didn't have to sing."
"Wanted to."
Shepard looked at him, mildly surprised. "Really?"
"Haven't had chance since…" He tapped a finger to his cheek. "Fifteen years ago?"
"Oh." She nodded. "Wow. You actually like performing?"
"Study of personality," he mused, then smiled. "And music, specifically. Fantastic example of culture and language."
"Of course," she said, and he smiled wider.
"That, and surprise crew, of course."
She laughed.
"Hey," Kasumi complained; Shepard quickly quieted.
"Sorry."
"Watch the movie."
"Yeah." Shepard grinned sheepishly. "All right."
They settled back down, and the movie played on.
Author's Notes: Credit where it's due - all the film lines and etc. are from the Pirates of Penzance, by Gilbert and Sullivan, which nowadays is a horrible movie/opera/whatnot if you take it seriously, but absolutely hilarious if you don't. The music is also really catchy. The "Scientist Salarian" parody is from the game, obviously.
"Pirates of Penzance" is the opera that The Major-General's Song (which is the song that Scientist Salarian is a parody of) is from. One of Mordin's voice actors had a role in the film, actually, which might be why they put that song parody in there!