This oneshot was written for the Secret Santa gift exchange on the Mass Effect live journal comm.


Jacob frowned at the console in front of him, coiled muscles tense as he scanned the tedious facts and figures of the Normandy's complex expense reports. When Shepard announced his promotion to XO, pride had been his first reaction, followed by suspicion that this was somehow a consolation prize or social worker distraction to keep him from brooding too hard about Miranda's death. But the more immersed he got into the daily routine of his new duties, which seemed to include a daunting amount of paper shuffling, he genuinely started to wonder if she'd given him the promotion because he pissed her off somehow.

With a flick of his fingers, he switched off the console, fed up with trying to make sense out of the streams of numbers for one day. Besides, Miranda had left everything in precise order so there wasn't much that he needed to do at the moment but familiarize himself with the process and wish like hell he was back in the armory where he belonged.

He stood and stretched, doing his best not to look at the stark and empty XO's office. Miranda's things had been cleared out a week before by Shepard herself, most of which had been put in storage or sent to Oriana. Jacob had kept only a few mementos for himself. His own belongings sat in a crate by the door, as he hadn't been quite able to bring himself to unpack just yet.

Just looking at the damned crate made the ache made in his chest tighten more. The room seemed to grow stuffy. Feeling the need to be elsewhere, at least for awhile, he grabbed the package that had come in today along with a load of repair parts and headed for the door. As he walked past the mess hall he could hear Rupert barking out orders to get ready for the Christmas dinner he was cooking for the crew. Jacob shouldered through the mayhem, not quite ready to face the relentless assault of holiday cheer and boarded the elevator before he was roped into helping.

Joker's voice drifted down the corridor as Jacob approached the cockpit. "Aw, come on, EDI. It'll be funny."

"Changing my voice modulator to resemble a fictional Earth holiday character would create confusion and chaos with the crew."

"Whatever. Everyone loves Santa Claus."

"It is unlikely that the non human members of the crew will appreciate the reference."

"Which makes it even funnier!"

"No, Jeff."

"Then what about those annoying little singing chipmunks? That would be awesome."

Jacob actually groaned as he stopped short behind Joker's leather chair. But before he could shut Joker down, EDI responded first. "The tone of my voice modulator were carefully programmed to cause the least annoyance with the human crew. To change it to be deliberately provocative would be completely counterproductive."

"But funny," Joker insisted.

"You're right," Jacob agreed. "It would be damn funny to watch Shepard get bombarded with complaints from the crew that just got finished working double shifts to repair the reaper damage. I definitely want to be there when she comes to kick your ass."

Joker's leather chair swiveled around so the pilot could glare at the new XO. "You two suck, you know that?"

Jacob snorted and tossed him the package. "Cheer up. This came today for you."

The remark was a sarcastic one, but oddly enough the package did seem to make the pilot happy. Pure glee made the pilot's voice rise. "Sweet! They're finally here."

It was not the reaction Jacob was expecting for something he thought must be specialized repair parts. Jacob frowned and crossed arms over his chest. "Must be important considering how much it cost to ship here."

"Yeah, yeah. Real important." He opened the latches on the side and revealed the contents. "See? How kick ass is that?"

Now it was Jacob's turn to scowl at the little multicolored bulbs connected by a cord. "Christmas lights? You charged five thousand credits to the Normandy's expense accounts for Christmas lights?"

"It's not like they have them here on Omega. I had to have them shipped all the way from Eden Prime."

Jacob sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "How the hell did you get the okay for this?"

Joker stood on his wobbly legs and began to pull the lights out of the box, looking around the cockpit like he was actually going to string the damn things up in plain sight. This was confirmed by his next words.

"I told Miranda that I needed to add some auxiliary lighting on deck. I just didn't tell her that it going to be going to be Christmas lights." He frowned for a minute around the room before his gaze landed on the banisters that flanked his chair. "Ooh. Let's put some here."

In his mind, Jacob could see Miranda's place her hand on one hip, arch an eyebrow and hear the irritated exasperation in her voice had she lived long enough to discover what the pilot had done. Once again, the ache in his chest tightened, but his attention was brought back to Joker who was starting to string the lights along the rail to the sound of EDI's continued objection.

"It is against Cerberus regulations to have devices that will distract from the operation of this vessel."

"I'm just personalizing my workspace. Besides, we don't work for Cerberus anymore."

"But we do work for Shepard," Jacob pointed out. "What are you going to do when she finds out?"

Joker shrugged and limped over to the other railing. "She'll be pissed. But they're Christmas lights. Everyone likes Christmas lights." He smirked. "Especially the ladies."

Jacob's brows shot skyward as he drawled, "Right."

"It's true. I had a friend once. Ash could take out a squad of Geth without breaking a sweat, but damn if she didn't love Christmas lights." Joker paused in stringing the lights for a moment, his smirk vanishing into a smile both sad and sweet. It took Jacob a few seconds to process exactly who Joker was talking about. He'd read the reports of Ashley William's death on Virmire, but had no idea that the gunnery chief and pilot were close.

A matching expression crossed Jacob's face as he took in the twinkling lights. Finally he cleared his throat and said, "You might be right. I think Miranda would have been pissed for awhile, but she would have come around."

Their gazes met and a silent nod was exchanged before Joker said, "Exactly. Shepard will like them too, although she'll scowl and bitch at first."

"What about EDI? She doesn't seem to like them."

"Untrue, Mr. Taylor. I am simply concerned about safety issues. But I do find them pleasing to my optics."

Joker's smirk returned as he jerked his thumb at EDI's glowing holographic interface. "You hear that? Even mom here thinks they're pretty. Now come on, are you going to help me string the rest of these up or not?"

With a shake of his head, Jacob gave in, digging into the box of lights. "Yeah, alright."

"It's about damn time you made yourself useful. And while you're at it, tell EDI to change the ship's running lights to red and green."

EDI's expected objection followed. "That would be most impractical, Jeff…"

As the pilot and AI continued to bicker, Jacob listened in silence, the ache in his chest easing a bit for the first time in weeks underneath the twinkling lights.