WARING: The beginning of this chapter contains rape and extreme violence! It's back to normal after the first POV division line. Well, as normal as an M-rated story is, anyway :)
Jo still felt the energy of what had just happened in Afterlife course through her body when she, Vega and Garrus finally left the club. The adrenalin was making her skin tingle and setting all her nerves on fire. Warriors often experienced that kind of exhilaration and the easiest way to deal with it was to fuck. That was exactly what she planned to do once she was back on the ship and if she knew anything about her man, he'd be hard, ready and eager.
She turned a corner on her way to the dock, her head already buzzing with all the ideas for Joker, when her never-resting senses caught a noise from somewhere nearby.
This abandoned corridor carried almost no signs of battle after the trying day Omega just had, but there were people mulling around aimlessly. Jo estimated that this had been one of those places where the hopeless trash of Omega ended up, people with no hope at all, no homes, no family or friends, nothing to look forward to. They used to sit on the ground, rotting away in their misery whenever she visited Omega in the past, and today was no different for them. A few batarians, vorcha and krogans stood or sat around impassively amidst the filth and decay surrounding them, as if all the excitement of the day went by them unnoticed. And so did the noise.
Jo stopped abruptly and held up a fist. Vega and Garrus obeyed the signal, instantly going on alert. Jo turned her head this and that way, trying to locate the noise while the little hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, sending an icy shiver up and down her whole body. This was the noise that kept haunting her dreams and waking moments from that fateful day in the orphanage's back yard and well into her adulthood. Muffled, rhythmical screams of a tortured girl.
Looking around carefully for whatever spooked their commander, Vega and Garrus reached for their guns. Jo finally realised that the noise was coming from the house she stood next to. The door was rusty and the electronic security hadn't worked for years. It wasn't shut tightly, and through the crack Jo heard a muffled, high-pitched scream, a deep murmur and a slam. Another slam.
Jo's face turned in an instant. She grabbed her rifle and shot five explosive rounds at the door, then reached out with her leg and rammed her heavily booted foot into the metal plate. It spectacularly flew out of its frame and fell inside the house, raising clouds of dust. Her boys took battle-ready positions but there was no battle. Through the dusty darkness they could see three humans: two men holding down a girl. She was on her back over a crate, trying to fight. One of the men knelt at her head and held her hands in a painful twist, while the other man, pressing his hand against the girl's mouth and muffling her screams, knelt between her legs. His pants down around his knees.
They both jumped in shock when they heard the shots, but by some animalistic reflex the man between the girl's legs rammed himself into her one more time, just as Jo fixed her eyes on him.
Vega sucked in a sharp breath. Garrus needed a second to realise what exactly was happening before him. The girl tried to turn her head and see the intruders, panic and pain on her face, but the rapist's hand on her face stopped her.
The next thing happened so fast that neither Vega nor Garrus managed to keep up. Jo's boot landed in the rapist's face, throwing him across the room, and the butt of her rifle landed in the dressed guy's nose. Jo snapped her fingers at her team:
"Hold them."
As both rapists tried to escape with loud screams and curses, Vega and Garrus each grabbed a guy. A crowd began gathering around the house.
Now that the girl could see what was happening, she scrambled to her feet and threw her body at Jo, wrapping her arms around her neck. She burst out in tears and sobs.
Jo let the rifle dangle from her thumb as she put her arms firmly and safely around the girl's trembling body and whispered:
"It's okay, it's over, these guys will never touch you again, I promise you. You're safe. You're safe now, I'll look after you."
The girl cried against Jo's neck, and Jo gently, motherly, even lovingly stroked the girl's dark hair and whispered soft things into her ear. The crowd still gaped through the demolished door, while Garrus and Vega held the rapists.
It took a few minutes for the girl to collect herself a little. All that time Jo held her in her arms, shielding her from the gapers' looks with her own armoured body. The girl's clothes were ruined and Jo was not going to let anyone violate this kid's privacy any more. She looked around and saw some old cloth, probably packing material, thrown over the remainders of a couch. She picked up the cloth and gently wrapped it around the girl's shoulders.
"What's your name?" She asked.
"Alice," the girl said, clutching at the cloth with one hand, holding on to Jo with another. She was not hysterical anymore, but Jo noticed that she was unsteady on her feet, so she held her against herself.
"How old are you, Alice?"
"Fifteen."
"Where do you live? Where are your parents?"
"I live here alone, parents died four months ago, I have a place to hide a few blocks away, I was on my way there when those…"
The hysterics began once more. Jo gently rubbed her gloved hands over the girl's back and placed a tender kiss on her temple.
"I see. Alice, I will not let these guys go unpunished, I promise you."
Alice shook like a merc at a gunpoint. Still, she found courage to look over Jo's shoulder at her attackers. Both were sprawled on the filthy ground, as Garrus and Vega both chose to simply put their feet on their captives' necks.
Feeling that the girl was more receptive to her surroundings now, Jo also turned around. One of her arms was still around Alice, as she faced the crowd of gapers and her new prisoners.
"Get them out on the street," she commanded. Vega bent down to grab his captive by the collar, while Garrus simply kicked his guy in the guts. The crowd smelled blood and that animated them. An execution was still an entertainment of high value, no matter year, planet or species. The circle of the spectators didn't leave the rapists any chance to escape, even though both tried. They whined now, begging to let them live, rambling ridiculous excuses, shedding bitter tears. Jo's face was a stony mask of death. She wrapped the cloth tighter around her charge and stepped towards Vega.
"Alice, this is Lieutenant James Vega," she said to the girl. "He is a very decent, very careful and very gentle man. You can trust him just like you can trust me. The Lieutenant will help you stand while I take care of these scumbags, all right? It's perfectly fine, you can let him touch you."
Vega adapted a facial expression of the man Jo had described, even though Jo could see that he was green with sickness at what he'd just seen. He put away his weapons and offered Alice his empty, big, scarred, warm and gentle hands. After a long moment of hesitation Alice let Vega take her from Jo and support her weight against his broad, armoured chest.
Jo turned around slowly. One of the rapists was trying to weasel his way out of the ring between the spectators' legs. He almost succeeded, when two carefully placed shots from Jo's pistol crushed both his ankles. He roared, wailed and began rolling on the ground in the growing puddle of his own blood. The other rapist, the one who still had his pants around his knees and his dick hanging out, simply crawled as far from Jo as the spectators allowed, and whined quietly.
"Please," Jo addressed the crowd. "I don't want to ricochet-shoot anyone here except these guys. Give me that house wall."
The batarians, vorcha and a few krogans readily and happily stepped away, giving her space for an execution against a wall.
"I just executed both Aria and Petrovsky and they both deserved some kind of speech from me to mark their passing. You don't," Jo addressed the pants-less man, who was pushed against the wall. "Stand."
He refused. Some batarian kicked him, but he still refused. Jo stepped closer, grabbed the guy's neck and shoved him against the wall. He knelt, looking at her with hate and terror.
"Good enough. Now, hold your dick."
"What?" He gasped and the crowd sounded confused around them. Jo repeated:
"Hold your dick with your hand and turn to your side."
She was pointing her gun at him and he knew she was not afraid to use it. With trembling hands and curses on his lips, the man grabbed his balls and turned his side to Jo. She commanded:
"Don't cover your dick completely, just hold it, or you'll lose your fingers as well."
Before the guy could really think about what she'd said, he obeyed.
A shot sounded, followed by a wail of indescribable terror and pain, while the entire crowd fell silent for a moment.
Then they erupted in sympathetic moans, shocked gasps, feral screams and animalistic roars. The second rapist passed out, when he saw his buddy curl in the dirt, pressing his hands against what remained of his penis, hissing in unimaginable pain.
Jo stepped to the hissing guy, kicked him in the face to unfold his body, and shot him again, relieving him of the remaining stump of his dick and balls. The crowd cheered like mad and the guy passed out in shock.
Jo gave him a shot of medigel and let him be while she gave her full attention to the other man. He cried like a baby when she told him to undress, begged her not to take off his dick, and struggled with his broken feet, but whenever he tried to stop or faint again, one look into Jo's face was enough to convince him to obey.
"Hold your dick," she said in a nuclear winter voice and he wailed, threw himself on his belly at her feet and begged. Jo raised her gun and shot twice, taking away the thumbs on his hands. The screaming was horrible enough to cut skin of anyone who heard it. Slowly, one shot after another, Jo incapacitated the crawling man more and more, taking away bits of his body until he passed out. She knew he wouldn't come back to anymore, his bleeding was too heavy. She finished him off with an explosive round to his guts.
Then she returned to the first guy, the one she just relieved of his dick. Her medigel shot helped the bleeding to stop and he was conscious again.
"Just so you know," she told him. "You are not leaving my care alive. And there is no way I will ease your suffering. You don't deserve it."
She began with his ears, shooting each off his head. The spectators basically howled with delight at all the carnage. Then she started shooting him in each joint: ankles, knees, hips, wrists, elbows and shoulders. The final shot to a limp, unconscious body's middle was to stop the last convulsions.
The crowd erupted in some sort of an orgasm caused by witnessing extreme violence. But the spectacle was now over and Jo turned to her boys, who stood aside with Alice between them. The girl had a hard look in her eyes.
"I wanted to kill them. At least one of them. You should have given me the weapon," she said to Jo.
"No, you really didn't want to kill anyone, kid, trust me," Jo said calmly.
"I wanted to take revenge for what they did to me!"
"It's still murder. Alice, what you really need is to remain as pure and whole as you possibly can. Killing someone rips your soul apart, no matter the reason. Take your relief in knowing that the men who hurt you are dead, that they died in more physical pain than they caused you and that they knew exactly what they were killed for. Plus, they were killed by a woman, so in the end they both knew they'd made a huge miscalculation thinking a woman helpless. Pulling the trigger would only make you more like them. The last thing you need is to become like them."
Alice and both Garrus and Vega were looking at Jo with surprised faces. She wrapped her arm around the girl's shoulders and tugged her towards the end of the corridor where she came from, pushing past the crowd.
"I've killed many times, Alice. Two more won't change much for me. It's still dirty work. Don't ever go there, even in your head. Killing destroys you as much as the person you killed. Be free and happy, as long as you can."
"Where are you taking me?"
"To a clinic nearby. A friend of mine runs it, he'll look after you."
"I don't want any more men prodding me right now. I'd like to go home."
"Alice, let me ask you something. Why are you here on Omega?"
"I've got nowhere to go. No family, no money, nothing."
"I'll make you a deal. I'll put you on the next transport ship to the Citadel. I'll get someone to meet you and set you up. I'll give you money. I'll even send word to another good friend of mine, Captain Bailey. He works at Citadel Security and helps me out a lot. He'll find you work and will look after you, you'll be safe. Just please, please leave this rock."
"I couldn't possibly accept that."
"Kid, this might be your once in a lifetime opportunity to start a new life. If you don't take it while it's staring you in the face, you'll be raped around the next corner all over again, and this time there might be nobody there to save you."
"Why are you doing this?" Alice asked. She was already sold on Jo's idea to help, and her arm around Jo's waist was trusting and familiar, but she was still not willing to believe in her luck.
"I'm a woman in a tough, tough world," Jo said. No other explanation seemed to be needed for Alice.
Garrus and Vega, who trailed right behind the girls, exchanged looks.
"What does she mean?" Vega asked Garrus.
"Not sure, except that she has to prove her strength every day, even more so as a woman. Maybe it's some sort of sisterly solidarity, or even motherly feelings shining through here."
"Or maybe she's a rape victim herself?"
They considered it. Neither could believe that their Shepard, at any point in her life, could have been overpowered by some man. Or even several.
"What she did back there was brutal, though…" Vega sighed. Garrus nodded:
"You don't know the meaning of going berserk until you've seen Shepard do it."
Joker was torn and confused as he watched the whole thing. No one else around him - or perhaps in the whole galaxy - knew what Jo had meant with her words to Alice, nor could anyone else but him even fathom how deeply what happened to the girl had affected Jo. That also meant that he could never tell anyone. From a warrior's point of view it was a weakness, easily exploitable. Jo had trusted him with her only weakness (as far as he knew) and he would have to keep it even closer to his vest than he kept the mini-pad that tracked her heartbeat.
Jo got Alice to Mordin's former clinic, now run by his former assistant Daniel. Alice refused to be checked over by a man, so Jo did it personally, then helped the girl to clean up, got her new clothes, an omnitool, some money, a ticket on a transporter to the Citadel and made her promise to contact Bailey.
"It's fascinating how she turned from scary conqueror to a mother in an instant," Traynor noted. Liara agreed:
"Kolyat, Grunt, David Archer, and now Alice. Shepard just keeps picking up more and more children." She poked Joker's shoulder from behind with a grin: "How do you like being the father of four?"
"Four that you know of," he muttered.
"You have other children?" Liara squealed in shock, probably insulted in her role as the all-knowing Shadow Broker.
"Not me, dumbbell," he shook his head. "Jo does. Or did you really think she just randomly started picking them up last year?"
Liara didn't seem to be insulted by his name-calling, she knew him too well. Instead she rubbed her forehead:
"No, I suppose she didn't."
"I know of at least one more kid out there, a girl named after Jo," he shrugged. On his screens the ground team helped Alice board the transporter, which was overflowing with all the people who wanted desperately to leave Omega now that the Cerberus oppression was over, and then the three of them finally headed back. It was time to welcome their hero home.
When the airlock opened, Jo saw almost every crew member standing there, Joker in the first row. All of them without exceptions had proud and impressed expressions of awe and admiration on their faces. Even Javik.
"You are the Original Badass," Joker nodded, smiling. Jo knew that he remembered that one time long ago when she said she wished to be remembered by that epithet in the millenia to come.
"I try," she suddenly felt almost embarrassed to be faced with praise from her entire crew. She'd felt great using her abilities today solving Aria's and Omega's problems, but she was never comfortable with praise. Joker bypassed her awkwardness. He grabbed her head and laid a kiss on her that earned them applause and wolf whistles. It took her breath away.
"In my cycle sexual relationships between officers on the same vessel were punished by death," Javik declared and scowled when everybody laughed. In the easy, discharged atmosphere Joker took her hand and dragged her towards the elevator.
"I was so hot for you, I damn wished I was right there with you in Afterlife, fucking you in front of all those people," he whispered against her neck once the elevator door closed. His hands were already half-way through the buckles of her armour. Jo stilled him and held him away from herself a little to search his face for the truth:
"Is that a real fantasy of yours? Something you'd really want to do some day?"
"Uhm," the lust in his eyes faded a little as he thought about it. "I don't know. Why, would it be bad if it was?"
"I don't know," Jo shrugged. The elevator arrived on their level and she quickly pressed the number combination into the lock to let them inside. "Is it the possibility of being discovered during public sex or is it the actual image of all those people watching us going wild that does it for you?"
Now that they were inside their cabin, Joker stopped to think about it, while Jo continued to rid herself of her armour and underarmour.
"I think it's the second one. But not in a creepy way, you know. The situation has to be right. Like you pull another miracle, conquer someone, execute someone in cold blood, make a bunch of people fear and love you, when everyone is buzzing with adrenalin and excitement, when you're still covered in blood and soot from the battle, sweaty and so sexy, I just want to be there, let them all know, make them all understand that they can all be hard for you in that moment, but I'm the only one..." He faltered, but Jo finished his sentence for him:
"The only one who owns me."
Joker shrugged, obviously slightly embarrassed by his caveman fantasies and unsure about how she'd take them. After all, she was Commander Fucking Shepard, the strongest, most free-willed woman in the galaxy who didn't belong to anyone.
"I understand," Jo stepped towards him and pressed her whole body against him. That was when he looked up and realised she was completely naked. "I truly do. But for that to happen you need to actually be with me groundside and not up here, which doesn't really work with our team mechanics. I'll have to think about how to fix that."
As her arms went around his neck and his around her waist, Joker's breath caught:
"You'd really do that? Let me claim you so publicly?"
"I feel the same way, my love. When a mission like that is finished, I'm so pumped with adrenaline, all I want is to release it through wild monkey sex, and I don't care who's watching. I need you. Besides, you'd be surprised how many people out there would understand that kind of a claiming ritual. Now, will you take me to bed and fuck me stupid?"
The lust slammed into him with new force, Jo felt it directly because his shaft suddenly stabbed her in her belly even through his uniform. Like a true caveman, he grabbed her hair and plundered her mouth, all the while taking her down the three steps and towards their bed. Once there, he ravished her until they both lay in a sweaty tangle of gooey limbs.
"Hey, Jo?" Joker asked lazily, when their breathing and heartbeat calmed down.
"Hmmm?" She sounded like she had been pleasured to the point of exhaustion - just the way every man wants his woman to sound.
"Liara asked me today how it felt, being a father of four, but I wondered something else. How many children have you picked up altogether until now?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Alice, Kolyat, Grunt, David, you know..."
"Ah, right." She paused, her eyes still closed in postcoital bliss, but the smile on her lips suddenly started to slip. "How many people are there in the galaxy?"
Joker paused and so did she. In hindsight Joker realised that he shouldn't have asked that question. Jo really didn't need to be reminded that the lives of everyone in the galaxy depended on her right now.
Too late. Her breathing quickened, eyes flew wide open and her hands went to her throat, as if she wasn't getting enough oxygen. Shit. Joker scurried to sit and leaned over her.
"Oh my god..." she gasped, panic and tears twisting her features, as she tried to gulp in more and more air, like she was drowning. But she wasn't exhaling it, which made inhaling more impossible and she began to truly choke. "The whole damn galaxy..." She pressed through tears, clawing at her own throat as if ripping a hole in it would help her breathe. Considering her strength Joker couldn't exclude the possibility that she would actually rip herself a new breathing hole if he didn't stop her.
"Breathe," he ordered her firmly, grabbed her hands and forced them away from her throat. "Breathe with me, baby. You're hyperventilating." Panic was tugging on the edges of his own control, but he couldn't lose it when she just did so spectacularly. She tried to throw him off, but not seriously. He basically sat on her, pinned her hands and legs down and talked her down until he had her attention. Then he made her follow his breathing pattern until she could breathe.
"Holy fuck," she sobbed once the worst of the panic attack was over. They were both covered in cold sweat and crying. He released her hands and she immediately wrapped herself around him like he was her safety blanket. "Fuck," she breathed against his neck, hiding her tears against his skin. "They're all dying right now! Every minute I sleep, every second I'm not working millions of people die! My every idle moment costs millions of innocent people their lives! How can I... I need..."
"Can't save everyone. Jo, remember that you can't save everyone. Remember it. You know it, you believe in that, it's the only way to keep yourself sane right now."
Joker hoped like fuck that he knew what he was doing. He'd realised that from the day they left Vancouver he'd happily let her take the whole responsibility for the mission, since his own role in it was to simply take her orders. He hadn't thought about how she felt, how thin the layer of sanity would be for the one person who felt responsible for the whole galaxy. He could understand her reasoning, too: every minute they weren't doing something critical for the mission innocent people died in vain. And Johanna Shepard, the protector, the saviour, the mother to everyone she'd ever met, couldn't help but feel guilty for every second of rest if it meant someone was dying.
"They're dying, right now! People I could have saved!" She screamed through tears against his shoulder and his heart was breaking for her. "I shouldn't waste any second, any second is someone's life!..."
Joker knew he had to break the cycle of her panic somehow and he only had one idea. He leaned back just enough to grab her head and force her to look in his eyes. The despair and desolation he saw in her beloved grey-brown eyes cut across his heart like a knife.
"Feel the serenity to accept the things you cannot change." She still fought him but at least he saw a semblance of recognition in her face. "You already have all the courage to change the things that you can. Now please, remember that you also have the wisdom to know the difference."
There was a long, loaded silence between them. During those minutes Joker saw not a battle but a whole war waged behind those beautiful eyes. Countless battles won and lost in a matter of seconds. Waves of panic against years of training and the natural titanium core.
"Holy shit," she finally groaned and fell back onto the pillow, drained of all energy by that war. Joker exhaled and released his hold on her. There was no need to sit on her anymore, so he slid to the side. Now that he'd dealt with her panic attack his own hands began to shake.
"Fuck," he groaned in reply and fell onto his pillow just as drained as she was.
"That was a close call."
"Didn't realise how on edge you are."
"Let my guard down," she put her hand on her chest, calming her breath down. "Got so relaxed after the sex... And then it all came crashing down on me."
"How do you deal with it?" He whispered the question with genuine awe. He knew he couldn't have dealt with that kind of pressure and still stay as sane as she seemed to be.
"Sheer defiance and little else. By refusing to panic most of the time. By refusing to feel guilty for those who die while I'm asleep or use the bathroom or eat. Just... refusing to let myself acknowledge. Remember. Just... Fuck."
"Keep doing that. It wouldn't help anyone if you worked yourself into a grave without a minute's rest."
Her hand softly landed on his chest when she turned to her side:
"No pressure or anything, but you see now that I couldn't do this without you. The galaxy owes you more than they could ever know."
"Yeah, well." What a way to make a man feel like a ten-foot hero.
Next morning Jo received a request from Hackett to help out a few fellow N7 agents. It seemed that the Academy was waging its own war on the Reapers and on Cerberus, where each agent was worth an army, enlisting teams and capturing and holding strategic locations for the Alliance. However, it seemed that the enemy forces were paying a special attention to the white-red striped Special Forces. Jo's reports showed that those locations housing any N agents were being prioritised and hit with extreme prejudice. On the one hand it was almost flattering to realise how afraid both the Reapers and the Illusive Asshole were of Jo and the likes of her. On the other hand none of them were invincible. Her brothers and sisters in arms were being decimated.
Jo ordered the ship to rush to the next location, of course, but as much as it pained to realise that her family was being targeted, she didn't feel sorry or panicked. Sacrifice was the essence of each N recruit. She had trained with many of them, spent years with people just like her and knew - when each of them went, they took a legion of enemy forces with them. It was in their blood, in their hearts, in their very core. Those weren't innocents, nor unprepared Alliance soldiers. Those men and women were Jo's equals and by dying in this war they were fulfilling their destiny. One day very soon it would be her turn and Jo didn't feel sorry for herself. She felt sorry for everyone she would take out on her way. Perhaps Harbinger would be among them.
"Jo, I hate to bother you with a problem," Liara joined her at breakfast once the ship was on the way.
"What's up?" Jo felt a new wave of determination to see this whole thing through after yesterday's meltdown.
Garrus, Vega and Javik all looked up with interest from where they were eating, listening in on Liara's report.
"Those companies that you've invested in, they're producing and distributing fuel. Jo, they're losing money quickly."
"Because the Reapers take out fuel stations first wherever they move," Jo finished the thought. She'd seen the same picture everywhere: a ghost of a system, reaped colonies, destroyed com buoys and fuel stations. The techies had been able to salvage some fuel here and there but the network was being obliterated by the enemy and the friendly ships were often left dry.
"Yes. I'm sorry I can't find an immediate solution. I just thought you should know."
"Wait a moment," Jo rubbed her forehead. "How do we always escape the Reapers when they get alerted to our presence in a system?"
"The magnetic distortion from the planets makes it easier to hide," EDI spoke up. "Some planets have such strong magnetic field that when we enter the atmosphere the only way for the Reapers to find us is to look out of the window."
"The same principle as your former base, Liara," Jo nodded. "Hiding inside a storm, always moving. Find the most suitable planet in each system and send them the list and the idea. They won't be able to entertain big stations anymore, but even small ones are better than nothing. See if any military out there can help with cloaking systems and long range scanners. And to do our part, we will send them the most accurate reports on Reaper presence wherever we go. That should give their ships at least some advantage."
"That information is classified inside the Alliance, Shepard," EDI reported immediately.
"Why the hell would it be classified?"
"With the lack of the official government body and with Admiral Hackett being the highest link in the chain of command the Alliance officially declared threat condition saber one. Alliance forces are leaving the Sol system and regrouping. Alliance Intelligence has officially gone under lockdown two days after the Reapers arrived on Earth. No intel is being released to civilians because of the threat of indoctrinated agents and the lack of proper authorities."
"Admiral Hackett probably has more pressing business than thinking about this," Vega said carefully. Jo wanted to be angry with the other N7 but couldn't. As full as her plate was, Hackett wasn't any better off. The threat of indoctrination within the Alliance was serious in itself and she could understand their unwillingness to risk anything by opening themselves to civilians.
"And yet the lack of fuel hits the military forces as much as civilian ships. All right, I'll contact Hackett and unclassify this intel," she said. "Liara, put together a dossier on suitable planets and contact the asari leaders to join in on the intel exchange."
"I'll speak to my people," Garrus offered.
"In my cycle..." Javik began and everybody chuckled:
"Everything was punishable by death?" Garrus poked him and the Prothean bristled.
"I was going to say that we've found a way to hide from the Reapers in a similar way for several centuries. Of course, we were using our superior communication technology to spread the word and pass on the intel."
Everyone fell silent. No one knew how to react when he was saying things like that, unsure how much of an insult it was. Vega finally broke the awkwardness:
"Shepard, you have enough on your plate. I can take charge of this project, if you want." He faltered a little when everyone turned to look at him. It seemed that his own initiative surprised him a little. "To the best of my abilities," he added quickly, leaving it to Jo to deem him good enough or not.
"Thank you," Jo said slowly, impressed. It wasn't that she doubted his skills. It was just such a rare occasion that someone except Joker and Garrus offered to take care of something for her. Mostly people just came to her and dumped more problems in her lap, like Liara just did. No one objected when she delegated, but hardly anyone actually offered the help. "You have my full authority. Liara will give you the intel on my personal accounts with those fuel companies. I don't care if I'm losing money. Fuel supply network needs to be re-established."
He looked a lot like what Joker looked like so often in that moment: pleased with her trust in him and ready to move planets to earn her approval.
Jo went on two quick missions to help out the Alliance and some N7s in the next few days and was a little bit surprised to realise that her crew had been busy as well. Most of them finally finished the cosmetic repairs on the ship, tucked away all the cables, removed construction lights, closed panels and cleared crates. Some were busy with preparations for her birthday. Joker had been busy otherwise, which Jo only found out when the salarian Councillor appeared on the QEC.
"Judge, jury and the executioner, Shepard?" He sounded both amused and riled.
"Oh god, that got out on the extranet," Jo shook her head. "Look, I have my ways of influencing people and that was the only way to get Omega to listen to me. You know I'm usually not into so much drama."
"That's the thing, Shepard. We don't really know you all that well to be able to tell. You became a Spectre without the official trial period and bypassing most of the supervised training. Nevertheless, your methods may be crude, but you get results. This was not why I wished to speak with you."
"Oh?"
"It's about Councillor Udina."
The shit was about to hit the fan, Jo thought. It would take something very drastic to make the salarian Councillor contact her personally.
