in which Shepard pep talks Joker

Shepard eyes snapped open, she felt her body shake in fear. Then she felt an arm pull her close, a talon caressing her back, " 's ok, love, your safe, your alive, 'm here." Garrus murmured in her ear still asleep. Shepard smiled at him, what start out as a way to 'blow off steam' had turned in to a relationship. She had always admired the turian, both his belief in trying to protect the innocent and his belief in her. She had been drawn to him from the beginning, but was afraid to do anything about it. Human and turian dating was just not 'done'. But after finding him and nearly losing him on Omega, well she decide she did not care what anyone else though. Hell she had died for the galaxy, she figure she could have this one bit of happiness, and to find out he felt the same, that her feeling where not one sided. Though they still had awkward moment and Garrus still had not told his father. Shepard decide she did alright with him.

Shepard finally glanced over at the clock and rolled her eyes, not enough time to go back to sleep but too long to just luxuriate in bed. She scooted out of bed careful not to wake Garrus. She twisted out of the arm that was trying to pull her back to the warmth.

"mmm, what time 's?" Garrus blinked awake stretching his lean body.

"Go back to sleep, it's still four hours till you go on shift." Shepard said pulling on her 'uniform'.

"Then why are you up?" Garrus sat up allowing the sheet to pool around his waist. Shepard stop brushing her hair and traced the plates of his chest with her gaze.

"Come back to bed Jane." Garrus held up the sheet for her crawl back in to bed with him. She smiled and started pining her hair up.

"No, it's been a while seen I check on my night crew, just going to see how she is running." Shepard waved her arm around to indicate the ship. Garrus nodded in understating.

"No brooding." Was Garrus parting advice as she left. He then curled himself back in the bed, burring his face in her pillow.

***

Shepard made her way down to the mess area, and fixed two mugs of coffee. Then she amble her way up to the cockpit, stopping to speak a few words with every crew member on duty along the way. She was pleased everyone was in good spirits. Coming in to the cockpit she held the mug in front of Jokers face.

"So you trying to bribe me Commander, cause it so not working." Joker said as he grabbed a hold of the mug.

"Who me? Nah just happened to pour myself too many and thought you might need it." Shepard replied settling in the copilots seat. Tucking her legs under her as she sipped her own drink. The two sat in compatible silence, Joker looking at his monitors and Shepard out the window.

"You know, I think I want to take back what I said about Garrus." Joker said out of the blue. Shepard looked over at the pilot wondering what was on his mind. Finally she decide to take the bait, and hoped that she would not regret it.

"Joker you've said a lot about Garrus, care to enlighten me which one you're talking about?"

"The bit about wanting the old stick up his ass Garrus back." Joker shrugged a little, "you seemed to like this new Garrus better. Whatever else, he is making you happy, so he's ok in my books." Shepard looked over at Joker in surprise, wondering what had happened that made him say that.

"And you know the crew ok with uh, you guy's hooking up too. Kind of surprising considering that most of the crew is ex-Cerberus dogs." Joker started intently at his screen.

"Thank you Jeff, I take it something has brought this up. Do you want to talk about it?" Shepard put her drink down and smiled at Joker.

"Ah it's nothing." Joker shook his head refusing to look his commander in the eye.

"Joker, I doubt it's nothing." Shepard leaned back in the chair, "You have yet to make a joke since I have come up here, something is on your mind. I think you want to talk about it."

"It's nothing..." Joker glanced over at Shepard, and saw the set of her eyes, she would not back down till he was 'better' "There's this girl back on the Citadel, we went out for drink a few times back before the whole Normandy got turned in to a big pile of scraped thing. We even talked about going out to see a movie. But I sort of gave up before we got to serious." Joker leaned back and crossed his arms. Shepard studied her pilot a bit.

"Why give up, that not like you." Shepard ventured.

"it's not like we could do anything. More than likely break my pelvis or something." Joker mutter the last bit.

"Jeff Moreau! I know you're not as fragile as you seem." Shepard snapped, and held up her hand to forestall Jokers reply, "after Mindoir when I was in the orphanage, there was a boy that had you condition, it didn't click right away when I met you, and later there was no reason to bring it up." Shepard leaned back in her chair and smiled a bit. "We got in so much trouble one time with him, we were playing that silly game where you take styluses and weave them in your fingers, then slam your hand down on a table to try and break the styles, we talked him in to playing with us." Shepard looked over at Joker who winced, "he broke three fingers. Last I heard he is a father, apparently got his girlfriend knocked up and works at some desk job." Shepard picked her mug up and took another sip. "So tell me about this girl you met."

Joker sat for a bit taking in what his commanding officer... his friend told him. Taking a deep breath he settled down in his chair, "She a marine for the Alliance, a N5 or 6 I think. She got this great smile, and a wicked sense of humor. She was station on one of the ships that survived the assault at the Citadel. And she never seem to mind if it took me time getting around. She really didn't say but I think she has a sibling that..." Joker waved his had around trying to emphases his own legs. "But any time Cerberus was mention, she go all still. I broke contact with her when I got the job offer from Cerberus." Joker shrugged, "but hey that old news. So about our next stop."

"Joker I was not born yesterday." Shepard sighed.

"no but you where reanimated about 6 months ago..." Shepard shook her head and gave the keep talking sign with her hands.

"She sent me mail, out of the blue. I have not talk to her for over a year. She asked if she could buy me a drink the next time I'm at the Citadel. That she heard an interesting rumor, and that she understood 'the lesser of two evils'." Joker leaned forward and pressed a few buttons on the console, refusing to look over at Shepard.

"Sound like a good woman, I think if she willing to give you another chance, you should do the same." Shepard straightened up in the chair popping her back. Joker nodded, "yeah, thanks...Jane." Joker glanced over at Shepard as she got up to leave.

"You know Jeff, you're all right sometimes."

"Come on Commander, you going to ruin my reputation." Joker stated as Shepard started down the hallway. The commander just laughed.