It wasn't a surprise at all when news of Shepard's attack broke out over the regular comm lines, not to mention the frantic omni-tool messages being sent, and if that hadn't been enough to alert everyone, then Grunt and Wrex's yelling sure did the job. Which was strange because they hadn't been seen in a while.
James hurriedly geared up and grabbed his trusty shotgun with the orange omni-blade attached to it and quickly loaded it with a thermal clip with practiced fingers and packed as much ammo as he could carry. As he turned to leave his temporary leased room, James deliberated for a moment in front of the missile launcher he had received from Liara, should he take it with him just in case?
His omni-tool blipped and James turned on his heel half running and half walking out of the tiny one room apartment. There wasn't any time for this, he had to hurry and meet up with Lola before anything happened.
"I'm on my way towards Shepard's location." James spoke into his headpiece hoping that everyone got his message as he strained his ears listening for the distant sounds of gunfire and alarms that would lead him. Every minute that he spent deliberating which way he should go to get there the fastest was a minute that Shepard would be in danger.
"Send me a navpoint once you reach her. We'll send a shuttle over." Liara's voice fizzed in before cutting out as James leaped across a platform and slid down a ladder. From the sounds of it, Shepard was still alive. The gunfire had been constant with brief pauses when the soldiers took cover to reload their weapons.
James changed the frequency of the comm line in hopes of finding one that would connect with Shepard as he ran, "Shepard?" he panted but there was nothing, "Dammit." he cursed, it would take a while to scroll through all of the channels. Who knew which one Shepard was using right now especially since she didn't want enemies to hack into it and track her location with it.
A string of alarms went off and there was a loud explosion that made the hair on James' neck stand on end, "Lola!" he yelled in frustration as he flipped through the channels, "If you can hear this message contact me." he started to sprint towards the noise and realized that he would have to find someway across the platforms to the opposite side.
It looked like the fight was headed towards a car lot. Sweet.
"Lieutenant?" a voice suddenly came in through his headpiece.
The claws that seemed to constrict around his chest immediately released him, "Lola?" he almost hit himself when he heard the way he sounded. It was like a puppy dog tottering after its owner. But despite that, the relief he felt was immediate, "Everyone heard what happened. I'm on foot and headed your way. What's your location?" his training was starting to kick in and the soldier he was started to take over. James looked for a way across to the other side and spotted a bridge a few meters away.
"I'll send you my location." the reply was instantaneous before the line cut for good.
There was a ping and James checked his omni-tool to see that he had indeed received her location. She was steadily moving towards the car lot through a back alleyway.
"Alright, it's go time." he psyched himself up and began to sprint towards her location and as he neared the car lot, he spotted a side door into the building where two suspicious mercs were standing.
He quieted his breathing and ducked into the building using a display shuttle car for cover when he spotted a lithe figure through the other set of glass doors in front of him unknown to the enemies. James quickly stood up when he saw Shepard stumble a little before palming the doors open and in that second James shot them down using his shotgun and fist, "Contact with Shepard confirmed. Sending you our location." he quickly typed a few codes into the navigation program and sent it to Liara. Hopefully reinforcements would be coming soon, he could already sense an assload of mercs heading their way.
"James!" Shepard grinned and seemed to straighten up when she saw her lieutenant. She was talking as if they had coincidentally bumped into each other at the presidium while shopping. She walked over to the unconscious merc and stripped him of his weapons and ammo packs before moving onto the next one and doing the same.
"I heard about that fish place." James let out a laugh and flashed her a grin that he wasn't quite able to suppress as they both looked around to find a way out. He couldn't help feeling a little excited right now. Lola was fine, they were beating the shit out of the crazy pendejos, and it just felt like a regular good day for him.
Shepard made a face, "We'll talk about it later." she tried to brush it off as she spotted a darkened room and thinking that's where the gate controls were, she began to make her way there.
James followed after her making sure to keep an eye on their six as they went, "Come on, it's only the most popular place to eat on the Citadel." he teased, "They're booked for three years or something?" they stopped in front of the glass doors.
"We'll talk about it later." Shepard rolled her eyes and popped in a fresh thermal clip into her pistol, "I got this one." she said too impatient to talk to the scared Volus hiding inside.
James stopped her with a hand, "Let me." he made her lower her pistol and turned to the Volus inside and knocked on the glass window, "We just want to get out of here." he said softly, "So could you open the gates for please?" he asked.
There was a pause and then heavy breathing, "Leave please." a stuffed up voice replied. There was a soft mechanical whir as the large gates lowered themselves providing a way out.
James flashed Shepard a grin as he sauntered past her. He didn't need to say a single word, it was written all over his face.
Shepard frowned, "Well...I could have done that." she muttered to herself as she raised her pistol once more and followed after James.
...
It took a lot longer to clean up the mess and there were a lot of surprises along the way. Like meeting Shepard's clone for one. James shut his eyes for a moment and took a shot. Only with Shepard...he sighed and looked around to see that everyone had gone off into little groups and were talking amongst each other.
In the end they were all at Shepard's place getting piss drunk and engaging in conversation that they never had the opportunity to talk about with each other.
Maybe it was something about the type of music that was being played or the fact that they were in an apartment rather than a ship, but there was something different about the environment they were in right now. It was like the war wasn't even happening.
Shepard plopped next to James on the couch near the fireplace, "Having fun James?" she asked sipping her own drink. She leaned back in the seat looking relaxed and completely at home as she looked at her crew members, her friends just talking, laughing, and engaging in pointless competitions with each other. There was pride in her eyes and gentleness on her face as she watched with a small smile.
"I don't know Lola." James shrugged and poured himself another shot, "I think my kindergarten graduation was more exciting than this." he flashed her a grin and then threw back the shot of liquor. Not a bad aftertaste, he mused and looked at the bottle. Crown Royale...seriously? There were only about 100 bottles left and when he looked in the freezer he had seen 7 more bottles of it. How? One bottle cost more credits than buying two luxury shuttle cars and she had 7 more bottles lying around as if it were cheap Ryncol.
"Give it an hour James." Shepard gave him a knowing look, "You'll never want to leave." and with a grin she stood up and made her rounds talking to other people. She didn't even give him enough time to make a comeback.
James watched Shepard as discreetly as possible. It wasn't like he was trying to be creepy or anything, it's just that for some reason his gaze was always being drawn to wherever she was. This was a different side of Shepard he was seeing and for a few moments he could almost imagine what she would have been like if she hadn't joined N7. There was a loud whoop as Jack climbed onto Wrex's shoulders and began pumping her fists in the air when Grunt began to down drinks one after another recklessly.
A few hours passed with the party only getting louder and the people more drunk than sober. Grunt was half conscious in one of the showers while Garrus and Zaeed were going around the apartment rigging the windows, jacuzzi, and various kitchen appliances. EDI and Joker disappeared together while Liara, Samara, and Tali were drunkenly talking about catsuits upstairs. Miranda and Jack were somehow still downing shot after shot trying to see who could drink the most while Cortez and Wrex watched on in amusement.
James and Shepard somehow ended up alone together in her room talking and slowly sipping their drinks side by side on a couch.
"I guess you're a heavyweight." James watched Shepard down a shot and then take a sip from her cup. It was quiet inside her room compared to the noise that was coming from outside and they could hear laughter coming from the others.
Shepard laughed, "I'm not." she disagreed, "I just haven't been drinking much tonight is all." in truth, it wasn't because she didn't want to drink. It was more like she had been too busy to drink much. From restraining Wrex and Grunt from a headbutting match to smoothing out a potential war between Jack and Miranda, there had just been too many people to take care of.
"Well you're free to relax now." James grinned and leaned back in his seat, "No one to take care of here." he said with a knowing look on his face. Of course he noticed that Lola had been busy tonight making sure no accidents happened. Ever the responsible commander. But now with the party beginning to wind down, she could begin to relax, at least he would make sure that she did.
After all, it was her party and she deserved to let loose and de-stress more than anyone else.
"I don't know about that." Shepard laughed softly, "But I'll take you up on this offer." she took another sip of her drink and sighed. Her face was beginning to heat up and a slow creeping heaviness seemed to crawl along her veins.
There was a moment of silence as the two tried to organize their own thoughts. Although they had both thoroughly enjoyed the night with everyone there was something about spending time with just one other person.
"What do you think about the war?" James finally asked the question he had been itching to ask for a while. The topic had always been in the back of his head and although he had been doing what he could to forget about it for a few precious moments, the dark thoughts would always resurface. It was really happening. The war was real.
Shepard look at him in surprise and she hesitated to speak for a second, "I don't know." she softly said and then looked at her hands still holding onto the half-filled cup. And it was the truth. She didn't know what to think. It felt like just a regular war to her. But didn't it always seem like the end of the world to those involved in bloodshed? In that way there didn't seem to be a difference to her.
"Yeah...well I'm scared shitless." James played with the shot glass in his hand. He could feel the warmth from Shepard even though they weren't sitting close enough to touch. He never admitted it to anyone else before, but come on. Who wouldn't be scared?
There was a clink as Shepard poured herself another shot, "Who isn't?" she voiced the thoughts that he had been thinking, "But we're soldiers." she downed the liquor and set the glass down on the table in front of her, "We fight precisely because of fear." her bloodshot and glassy eyes found James' own bloodshot ones. There was a quiet conviction in her voice, as if she had already resigned herself to some fate, to the unknown.
It was this look that made James feel a twinge of fear. Not for him, not for the people, but for Shepard.
James let out a little laugh, "There's no winning you Lola." he pushed down that emotion and decided to ignore it even though he subconsciously knew it would bite him in the ass later on. He just didn't want any unnecessary things ruining the night. He didn't need that right now.
"Since I answered your question can you answer one of mine?" Shepard deliberated a moment before summoning up the courage to speak. To hell with everything, she thought to herself and downed her drink in the process, there was little chance of her survival so why not just wrap up everything tonight? If it was going to be her last night alive and whole, she might as well do whatever she wanted to right now.
"Sure." James shrugged his shoulders and turned his head to look at Lola waiting for her questions. He didn't know what she was going to ask but it seemed like it was a big deal to her considering her stone-faced hesitation. Maybe it was about the Collector mission with his former squad, hell it wasn't a big deal to talk about it to her now. Although he would never talk about it with anyone else.
"Sleep with me." Shepard suddenly blurted out and looked at James. Her face was red and whether it was from the alcohol or if it was a blush, or maybe both, he couldn't tell.
Silence crashed into the room as both people just sort of stiffened.
What in the...
James froze trying to comprehend what was happening. Had he heard right? 'Sleep with me'.
"Um.." he let out a nervous laugh and rubbed the back of his neck when feeling finally came back to his body, he looked at Shepard to make sure he hadn't been hearing things.
"Sleep with me." she repeated but didn't move. She was deliberately giving the choice to him. As officers of different rank something like this was a surprisingly significant decision. If Shepard did something and made the first move she would be using her rank above James (even if it's something she would never dream of doing) to coerce him into sleeping with her. However, if she didn't move then the choice was up to James to reject or consent.
James looked down at his hands. He wouldn't deny that he wanted to. Hell, looking down at his lower half he found that he couldn't deny it even if he wanted to since his body just seemed to be doing its own thing, "Lola..." there was frustration in his voice and he looked at her again. He felt so torn right now.
She had a guilty expression on her face and her gaze was turned down to her lap. If only her title didn't bother him so much..Why was this the hardest hurdle to overcome? Every movement and every word she uttered was important to James only because she was a CO and no matter how careful she was, the problem of being viewed as an authority figure would never go away. If anything, she embodied 'command'. She was a person to be obeyed no matter what, all because of her human given rank.
...