Chapter Two:
Eligible Humanoid: Kelly Chambers
Shepard hopped out of the elevator and onto the galaxy map. She was in a good mood today. First, she had Garrus back. The one person she needed to find among her old team. Tali, she had met on Freedom's Progress hours after she woke up from being dead. Wrex's whereabouts were clear. Liara was on Illuim on her own device so that meant she should be fine. Kaidan? Shepard never minded him. He would most likely be where the Alliance wanted him anyway. Plus, she was not sure if she wanted to meet Kaidan knowing how difficult it was to make sense of things to him. This whole Cerberus logo Normandy would throw him into a fit if he saw it and he might let lose his biotics and totally fry her new, longer hair. She liked her new, longer hair...
But Garrus... This dumb Turian had totally gone off the map a few months after she died, according to The Illusive Man. That Illusive Man was no help at all when it came to her personal business... Maybe that was being too judgmental. he did manage to give her Joker and Doctor Chakwas. Although Shepard felt like they were there more as unknowing hostages than Cerberus employees... But pulling a disappearing act the way Garrus did might have given her a heart-attack if her heart had not already stopped once and was now enhanced cybernetically with God knew what technology. Shepard wondered why none of her old team tried looking for him. Were they so strangly distanced without her around? Did they need her as the linchpin always? She actually thought she might have to send out extranet bulletins to her contacts to track down the Turian...
Anyway, and then, she got him back with very little hiccups! Good job, Resurrected Shepard! And then, he nearly went and died on her, which she thought he would seriously have some explaining to do if he did! And then, no thanks to Jacob's little psychotic trolling, Shepard really thought he was dead for a minute or two! And then, she was relieved to find the God knew what cybernetics Cerberus used might have actually saved his life as they had brought hers back! Double good job, Resurrected Shepard! Even though technically, it was not her credit to take, she was taking it anyway. And boy, since she had been pulling such a long face after finding out the Turian was missing and later rushing him back to the ship from the bowels of Omega on his back, she thought she might need a break from all the dramas and all the "And Thens".
Next on the list to make it into her Little Happy Shepard's Black Book was that she had found a rather amusing little Science Officer with a pendent for genetics and quirky speech pattern who was now nicely settled in her Research Lab, helping make upgrades to her ship, her armors and her guns. Ok, so he might not really be little when he stood at six-feet-two and one hundred and forty-ish pounds. Slim, maybe? This new Salarian Science Officer came complete with a missing horn, and a rather amusing story on how it was cut off too.
"Lost it in a fight," said the bona fide genius slashed doctor slashed commando slashed mathematician causally but with tones and movements of theatrics, pointing with his eyes upward to his missing horn.
"Years ago. Still young. Inexperienced. Never knew Hanar that sneaky. Sharp razor blades. Too many limbs. No Drells then. Saw it coming. Too late. Duct and lost horn. Hanar lost more. Not enemies now. Polite but still unfriendly. Met him again few years ago. Maybe a she? Not a he? Couldn't tell still. Both sexes sounded alike. Never asked. Not closed enough to. Rather not stand too close. Now has two Drells. Paranoid."
Shepard liked Mordin almost immediately.
"...His psych profile warned of hyper behaviour, but he… he's like a hamster on coffee !" Kelly Chambers was saying to Shepard as Shepard mused around with the map in front of her.
"Who?" Shepard asked. She was not listening. "What? Where? When? How? Why?"
"I mean Doctor Mordin Solus, Commander," the Yeoman said. "Like a hamster on coffee."
"Kelly, if you feed my hamster coffee, I swear I'll stuff your mouth with sunflower seeds and tie you to the waste disposal and get Zaeed to tell you all his "once upon a time" stories," Shepard only heard "hamster" and "coffee" because she usually filtered Kelly Chambers like her helmet filtered air when she was on the planet Eletania. Shepard really just needed to hear words like "mails" and "talk to" and "open quote, team mate's name, close quote" from Kelly. She had always been a woman who preferred people not talking xenopsychobabble that sounded more like "Woohoo! Is that thing available for humping?"
Kelly watched her with those big, brown, expressive, gorgeously exotic eyes behind the thick, black lashes. Because she was watching Shepard now that Shepard finally noticed Kelly Chambers' eyes were not properly aligned with each other, making her looked rather "air-headedly" retarded. No wonder Shepard had always thought those eyes looked off. Ok, so maybe those big, brown eyes were not so exotic or gorgeous crossed like that, but they sure were expressive.
"What?" Shepard actually felt a surge of guilt rushed through her. "That was a joke," she lied.
Kelly Chambers chuckled a little.
"I never knew, Commander, that you enjoy a little Kinbaku," Kelly said, smiling. "I quite like it myself, actually. I could see you doing it to me."
Shepard frowned. Was that a proposition masquerading as a joke? Or a joke masquerading as a proposition? And what the hell is a Kinbaku, anyway? It sounded Japanese. She told herself to make a mental note to ask Kasumi later.
"Is there anything else?" Shepard asked, not looking up from the map, pretending those words were filtered.
"Yes, Commander. You have unread messages at your terminal," the Yeoman said.
Messages. Shepard looked at her private console to the galaxy map to Kelly Chambers and back again to the console. Yes. Her proximity to the Yeoman would be so much more acceptable at the console then at the map until Shepard found out what Kinbaku meant.
Shepard jumped off the steps and went to her console, "click...toot...toot...click," the console went as she navigated to get into her mail. "Click..."
"Kelly, did Nicotine Head put you up to this?" Shepard asked, looking at the screen.
"Commander?"
"Did he? Because it looked like he did," Shepard said. "Did he pay you to piss me off every time I flipped him the finger?"
"I don't understand, Commander," Kelly was visibly uncomfortable.
"Why then do you keep telling me " you have unread messages at your terminal"," Shepard mimicked her Yeoman. "When I didn't!"
"Get your ass off cloak," Shepard said, walking into the main battery. "I need to ask you something."
"Shepard, can this wait a bit, I'm in the middle of some calibration," Garrus said automatically.
"I wasn't talking to you, Garrus," Shepard said. "Kasumi! I said get your ass off your cloak! NOW!"
Kasumi decloaked next to Garrus and smiled at him, sending the Turian hissing backward.
"What the fuck! How long have you been standing here?" Garrus yelped.
"Hey, Shep," Kasumi greeted. "Hey, Garrus. A while now?"
"What the... How come I... Spirits!" Garrus was still shell shocked.
"I'm not the galaxy's Master Thief in name only, Garrus," Kasumi said.
"What the hell are you doing in my room?" Garrus asked.
"I was bored."
"Spirits! No wonder my calibrations hasn't been right today. Every time I turned around it went to hell. I punched in the same numbers a dozen times and a dozen different numbers came back at me every time!"
"I told you I was bored," Kasumi said again, smiling mysteriously under her hood. "So, Shep. What can I do for you?"
"How many times have you been "bored" since you came on board?" Garrus was not happy.
But Shepard was snickering, her was mood lifted back a little. Oh yeah, this felt great actually. Garrus had holed himself up in the main battery since he came on board and every time she came over to say hi, he had practically chased her out saying he was "in the middle of some calibration". She was not bothered by it just yet, knowing he was doing the right thing to enhance the ship's firing power but still, payback was a bitch alright, and her name today was Kasumi!
"Tell me," Shepard asked. "Is "Kinbaku" Japanese? Do you know what it means?"
"Kinbaku?" Kasumi repeated, using her own Japanese accent.
"Yap. Kinbaku."
"Shep," Kasumi said. "I didn't know you like Japanese style sex bondage. I personally find that style of BDSM, or any BDSM rather distasteful."
"BDSM?" The Turian asked.
"Shut up, Garrus," Shepard hushed. "And no, I don't find bondage interesting. But I think I'm gonna kill the person who does soon. I can't believe anyone would dare to proposition me into doing bondage with them."
"Bondage?" Garrus asked.
"You are attractive, to say the least," Kasumi said. "Being propositioned for sex shouldn't come as that much of a surprise, really."
"It's not the sex. Sex I can totally deal with. It's thinking that I would even be into such things and being inappropriate enough to want it while on duty that I do not like."
"Sex on duty?" Garrus asked.
"I told you to shut up, Garrus," Shepard scolded.
"How do you expect me to shut up when you two are talking about sex and bondage and sex while on duty?" Garrus asked. "I'm male, you know?"
"I'm curious too," Kasumi said. "And I'm not male."
"See," Garrus pointed to Kasumi, who nodded.
"Shut up, both of you," Shepard said. Then to EDI, she asked, "EDI, can I fire Kelly Chambers?"
"I am afraid you cannot, Commander," came EDI's voice.
"Kelly Chambers, huh?" Garrus said, leaning back against the door.
"Should have guessed," Kasumi leaned against the console. "She'll hump anything that moves. If I brought a LOKI with me, I bet she'll ask if she can hump it."
"Shut up, both of you," Shepard said again.
"Can I space her?" She asked EDI.
"I am afraid that would require a lot of paperwork, Commander," EDI answered.
"Miranda can do that," Shepard said.
"I am afraid you cannot space her even if First Officer Lawson agreed to doing the paperwork. Yeoman Kelly Chambers is a vital part of this operation," EDI explained.
"What does she do that is so vital?" Shepard asked. "She tells me I've got mail and was usually wrong about that. She said she is the ship's psychologist but I still run around being the ship's counselor. All she gives are one liners psychoanalysis of people I brought back to the ship which anyone could have said them, if you could call those psychoanalysis. Most of them sounded more like her informing me who she would like to sleep with. "Oh, there's something about Garrus I just want to hold him close and whisper "it'll be all right"," Shepard mimicked.
"Spirits," Garrus said. "That was the most unsexy proposition any females has ever given me."
Kasumi laughed.
"You've a problem with the way I just propositioned you?" Shepard said. "Because that was what the Yeoman said."
"Not the words," Garrus explained. "The way YOU said it. The words sounded great but Spirits, Shepard. You've a lot to work on if you want to pick up someone awesome. Only deadbeat drunks would find that remotely sexy."
Kasumi laughed harder.
"Those were the Yeoman's words! Not mine! I was acting like her!"
"Whatever you said, Shepard," Garrus said.
"EDI, can I space Garrus?" Shepard narrowed her eyes on her friend who was smirking.
"If that is your wish," EDI said.
"Hey," Garrus stood up taller. "Whatever happened to being a vital part of the crew?"
"Officer Vakarian is part of the Commander original ground crew and personal friend," EDI said. "The Commander has full say on the matter. Yeoman Kelly Chambers is an operative under the employ of Cerberus. Spacing her would require going through a lot more red tapes. Spacing you, however, should require no paperwork or authorization except that from the Commander."
It was Shepard's turn to smirk.
"Get it, Garrus?" she said. "Next time I proposition you, you better say it was one hell of a sexy come on or I swear, Garrus, I will space your Turian ass out the ship."
Kasumi was still laughing.