Warning: This chapter contains spoilers for the Overlord DLC. If you haven't played it yet, do so, unless you don't really care. In that case, you do you.
Things got strange the moment Tali and Dr. Chakwas disappeared into the clean room. Well, not at that moment precisely, but within the hour after that. Crow did his best to stay out of the way of the ensuing chaos, but old habits and fears led to the opposite happening. Looking back, it probably really started when Shepard and Garrus kicked Kasumi out of starboard observation and locked the door behind them, starting a whirlwind of lewd rumors about what they might be doing, and what might have happened aboard the Alarai. Some of them were so bad, Glint hid out of second-hand awkwardness, much like he sometimes would on the Shore.
The Shore had exposed him to far worse kinds of talk, though it still made him deeply uncomfortable. He wished, not for the first time and not for the last, that there was somewhere he and his Ghost could retreat to for real privacy, away from all the chatter and EDI's eyes. If there was such a place, he would have gone there before Joker strode into the mess, popped a beer, and hacked Miranda's office shut. As it stood, he had stayed in the mess out of morbid curiosity and a lack of anything better to do than clean the med bay window.
"Ahem, testing, testing, this thing on?" The pilot paused to take a sip of his beer. " Listen up, people; well, mostly you Lawson, but the rest of you should hear it, too. The reason I've locked you in your office is because you dismiss, interrupt, or blow me off if I try this in person, so I'm just going to talk, and you're going to listen."
"I know we've had an exciting day." Another, longer drink. "But if this were the Alliance, that stunt you pulled- combat EVA with that gremlin I saw you fight- you would be halfway to court-martial by now. You kept EDI from informing me about the extent of the situation, knowing full well about our crappy alert system configuration, and decided to jump out the airlock without telling anybody why, because I'm not 'Cerberus chain of command'."
"Well, let's get one thing straight here; as much as we both hate it, I'm Shepard's chain of command, Shepard is in charge of this mission, and if she relinquishes to me- which will hopefully never happen again- she expects that choice to be respected. Until she's not on the verge of chucking potatoes again, I'm in charge, which means if you have an idea on how to work a problem, it goes through me. You don't go off on your own like you have a death wish! You're superiority complex could have gotten you killed!" He then started a ten-minute lecture on standard procedure for in-vacuum EVA's, which Crow decided to pay close attention to because Jacob hadn't gone over those with him. The pilot ended this all by assigning Miranda to all of Gardner's 'dirty jobs' for the next week, insisting that if she wanted to pretend to be in charge, she best start by learning to catch the problems that fell through the cracks.
It took Crow a moment to get the joke, but he almost inhaled his own spit laughing when he did.
In the space of that moment, EDI purged whatever Joker had done to lock Miranda in, and a genetically modified biotic stormed out said door with an utterly terrifying expression fixed on her face. Crow clapped his hands over his mouth and wrapped the void around himself. On the Shore, that look meant a beating was coming, or a death. It was the look someone with power fixed his insubordinate underlings with before he did something awful and painful, and that was the look Joker was getting right now.
Crow was torn between hiding and trying to intercept her. His body started to move, but a very drunk Commander Shepard chose that moment to charge out of starboard observation with an equally drunk Garrus stumbling after her, a bottle in one hand and omni-tool activated on the other.
What proceeded only confused him and scared him in equal measure, and he was so busy trying not to panic that he missed out on some of the details. Shepard started by demanding to know every detail about the gremlin incident, and when Joker tried to remind her that she was drunk and he wasn't(yet), she challenged him to an Agni Kai. Whatever that was, even Joker didn't seem to know; he just asserted that he had everything under control, and that Miranda was just about to go clean the water filtration system.
Just when Crow let the void drop and thought he could relax, Miranda opened her mouth. He was too busy retreating to hear what she said, but quite suddenly she and Shepard are rolling on the floor, Miranda actually fighting and Shepard drunkenly pulling at her hair with Garrus cheering her on.
Joker scrambles out of the way of the screeching women, and yells for the people who are just standing around to actually help break it up. Crow scrambles to obey, because the mess hall has suddenly become like the Shore and he's not sure what will happen to him if he doesn't. He knows it's not the Shore, and Joker is no Spider, but the look on Miranda's face makes his brain decide otherwise. He lunges, and grabs her the same way the bouncer at The Empty Tank grabbed people. Several other crewmen grab Shepard, but Garrus tries to pull them off and egg the fight on.
"When I told you to make up, this is not what I meant!" Joker cries indignantly. "EDI, call Grunt and Thane up!"
"Belay that, EDI!" Miranda snarls, trying to break his grip. "He has no authority to-"
"He's in charge!" Shepard woozily.
"You're drunk." Miranda hisses coolly, starting to relax in his grip. It feels safe to let go, and he slowly releases her.
"I was un-drunk when I put him in charge!" Shepard drawls, slumping in her captors arms. It looks like she's cried recently, and her face is flushed bright red. "Why is Crow so hot all the sudden?""
The mortification he feels temporarily short-circuits his brain, and he let's go of Miranda entirely.
"What she said" Garrus butted in, voice slurred. "'Cept about Crow."
Crow is too busy wishing he didn't exist to make any sort of response to either of those statements.
"He isn't authorized, Shepard!" The irate aussie grits her teeth. "I'm XO of the Normandy, and you never let me take any of the load I'm supposed to! You never try trust me, and you put a man in charge who ignored important alerts for a burrito!"
"We already went through the alert glitch twice, Lawson." Joker glares and crosses his arms. "This isn't about that, this is about you going out for combat EVA without backup, leave, or giving notice there was a hostile on the hull. This is about EDI keeping it from me at your orders."
"And what would our illustrious pilot have done?" Lawson mocks. Garrus chooses that moment to throw up, but Joker doesn't miss a beat.
"I would have sent Thane and Mordin, since Thane knows better than to pull a geth prime towards himself, and Mordin isn't a fricking moron!" The pilot glares, clearly trying to restrain himself from crushing his beer(the fact he hasn't spilled it at all remains impressive). "The blast doors were up! If I hadn't closed it, what would've happened, Miranda? What would have happened if that thing had decided to try to bust in? Too close for sheilds to activate? Just because that glass can take small meteoroid doesn't mean a geth prime can't blast it's way in!"
"Ya shoulda done the control chip thing!" Shepard taunted. Miranda glared at her.
"Are you ever going to get over that?" The biotic asked, as if it were a serious question. It was answered by several variations of 'no'.
"It's not something that can be gotten over." Crow adds quietly, thinking about hostile hands clutching his Ghost and putting unwelcome things in him for the sake of control. Miranda turns to fix him with that look, and his stomach clenches; the narrowing of her eyes, and the blue of them, are suddenly too much like Spider's.
"You stay out of this!" She snaps. He barely manages to choke off the 'yes, Baron' that nearly escapes his mouth, and the mess is somehow darker than it was before. His blood is roaring in his ears, and whatever Miranda snaps at Joker next, he doesn't really hear it. His shirt is tight around his neck, there isn't enough air, and he gives in to the desire to vanish and run to the med bay. Glint blacks out the window, and Crow tries to loosen his collar but it still feels like he's suffocating. Suddenly, even the med bay doesn't feel safe.
"Easy, Crow, just sit down and relax." Glint urges. He wants to hide in the pipe room, temporary and fickle island of safety though it was, out of Spider's way, even though Spider isn't here. He stumbles into the AI Core and manages to tuck himself between the servers before he gets too dizzy. It's not the pipe room, but it reminds him of it so much that he feels simultaneously safer and even less so.
"Focus on the Light and breath with it." His Ghost soothes, pulsing his own Light gently even as Crow clutches him desperately against his chest. "You're okay, just focus on me."
He tries, and gradually, it becomes easier. He breaths, and soon Glint encourages him to summon a flame and pulse his own Light, growing and shrinking the fire in time with each breath. It's the first exercise in control a young Lightbearer learns, and soon he's lost in the familiar, calming rhythm of it. His heart stops pounding, and breathing becomes easier. Glint settles on his left knee.
"It's been a long time since that happened." His Ghost comments softly. "Can you recall what started it?"
"Miranda. I think." He admits, training his focus on the fire. The incident was still too close. "That look."
"Okay." His companion nods. "Let's just stay in here a bit longer, away from drama."
Crow really wishes there was somewhere truly private to hide.
Things stayed strange over the course of the next few days; or rather, they continued to be what Crow was beginning to think of as the Normandy's approximation of normal. When Crow had finally felt in control enough to leave the AI core, it had been to find Garrus and Shepard embracing and weeping in the med bay.
Neither of them felt like communicating as to why.
He had the feeling that their drunken selves didn't know either, and he beat a hasty retreat back into the AI core, this time to hide from the awkwardness of the situation. He wound up falling asleep on the floor watching cat vids, only to be woken by an irate Dr. Chakwas, who pulled an emergency cot out of the med bay wall and all but ordered him to sleep on it(the other beds were occupied by drunks and Tali). She also had him drink chamomile tea, and she was so intense in her care he dared not refuse(it helped that the tea was actually good). Apparently, EDI had snitched about his panic attack.
When morning came, it was to the sound of vomiting ripping him out of a nightmare about frozen nasturtium, and he spent the remainder of the day surrounded by rumors about why Shepard and Garrus were getting semi-along again. Even when Jacob was going through operational procedures with him, there were theories. If questioned, all the two might answer with was 'what happened on the Alarai, stayed on the Alarai.' Personally, Crow thought it was because Tali was having a bad time, not that he was an expert on friendships; his only friend was Glint, and that was hardly a wide range of study. If Glint was feeling down, an interesting pebble could cheer him up, but Tali had lost a family member, and nearly her home as well.
Still, the three seemed to be sticking oddly close together, and Joker was keeping a close but eager eye on them, clearly hoping the peace would last and that he could give command back to Shepard. From what Crow heard, things remained stilted when Tali wasn't around, but there was now hope for peace, and for that he was glad. This reality was ripe with drama, but he'd prefer to deal with said dramas one at a time, and it seemed like Joker had gone to war with EDI and Miranda.
One couldn't be in the same room as the other without an argument, aparently, and Crow tried to avoid being near the battlefield as best he could. It was a minefield of viscous questioning of authority and sarcastic comebacks. Despite Shepard making clear multiple times that the pilot was in charge, Miranda found some way to slip in less than flattering opinions of his leadership, most of them centered around the burrito incident.
In turn, once, he made equally unflattering comparisons to politicians who couldn't let anything go, which in turn led to comments about his recent stint as Tali's lawyer. All around, it was chaotic, even if Miranda was ultimately doing the work she'd been assigned as punishment. Unfortunately, this made her hard to avoid, but Crow found ways to manage it.
It took three days of this behavior until the workaholic Shepard got an itchy enough trigger finger to consult Joker about responding to one of the Illusive Man's requests. Aparently he unncerimoniously handed her back command of the ship and went to get a coffee in response. Crow was there when Donnelly questioned this decision, and Joker responded by telling him that he wanted nothing to do with anymore overlords.
This confused Crow until the squad was called to the debriefing room, at which he had to be reminded that he was, technically, part of the ground unit since Jacob had been giving him lessons in procedure, squad tactics, and other things that he had only been able to wrap his head around because of the man's patience. It was the first time he'd seen the entire unit in one room outside of the drill they had done. He planted himself nervously next to Thane, and Grunt decided to move seats and plop down at his other side.
"Did you try the noodles?" The young krogan asked, startling him slightly.
"Um, yes." He had to be referring to their recent lunch break.
"And?" Grunt pressed.
"They were a little spicy, I guess."
"Alright people, listen up!" All heads snapped in Shepard's direction. A planet appeared on the table's projector. "Aite. Air safe, temperature safe, gravity low and plagued by frequent earthquakes no matter where you go. The largest moon is in unstable orbit, so that's what you can blame if we experience one. Despite the violent locals and disruptive celestial bodies, Cerberus set up shop here for Project Overloard."
She took a troubled-sounding breath. "Unfortunately, that's all we're being given. There are several stations to the operation, but we're going to make entry at the main facility. The only other detail we know is that there's volatile technology involved. Joker is going to take us in as close as he can, we'll split into teams as needed, we'll be going over who and how in a moment. There are hammerheads on-site if we need to move in on the other locations."
"This will be the first time having everyone on the ground at once. This is a test run, I want you each at your best, I want to see what you do when the stakes are laid down." She paused, before deciding to look directly at him. "Crow, Chakwas says she's confident you can operate with certain conditions. You've only had one drill with us, but we've had less time with others in a pinch, and we need to get you used to working with us. Think you're up to rolling with us for this one?"
Half of him screamed 'no', but he was a Hunter who'd been cooped up in a space ship for nearly two weeks, he wanted to do more to repay them for letting him stay, and Grunt's eager nudge was the final push needed to get him over into 'yes' territory. Hopefully he wouldn't regret it.
"Yes." It was just volatile technology, hopefully it wouldn't be too bad.
"I'm sure it'll be fine!"- Crow.
I made some changes to chapter one involving Savathun's meat suit, and added a disclaimer that this is a sequel since it might not have been obvious enough.
In case you haven't noticed, I'm not a fan of Miranda. She's a dangerously narcissistic control freak, and even though she mellows out a little by the time ME3 starts, I still can't help but feel like there would have been more payoff if she was actually faced with consequences for her behavior. All Shep does is get her sister safely into Cerberus protection, and though it definitely feel like the kind of help that would instill loyalty, it never felt like it was enough for her to ditch Cerberus like she did at the end of the Collector mission- especially since they are the ones who hid and know everything about the sister she goes through so much trouble for. They could have easily done something to Oriana as payback, even if Miranda didn't survive the fall, and it certainly wouldn't have taken them until ME3 to do it. And if you give in, at any point, to her 'subtle' implications that she's the one for any off the suicide mission tasks, she gets herself or someone else killed.
In case you haven't noticed, I feel very strongly about her character arc. Expect changes to it.
Draedon's Forge: Glad you enjoyed it, and sure, go ahead; just be sure to mention where the trend started, I love free advertising, lol. I don't need luck; I have ammo(and an encyclopedia).
Servermeta: Lol, ty. It's all good, you keep enjoying!
edboy4926: As always, thank you.
Ebuc: Glad you think so! Yeah, I didn't like the way they did it because it was WAY too reminiscent of how our Ghost sometime fusses things up.
Mirrors Cracked And Broken: Gonna be honest, that mental image is half the reason I went along with that plot thread.
ThePilotArchangel: As much as I enjoyed Joker's spotlight, I'm glad to get back to Crow. I want to do his POV more than any other, because let's be honest, we've seen this story through Shepard's eyes a thousand times. I'm not sure what you mean by never explaining how Crow got here, it sounds like you didn't read the first installment. I thought I made it clear this was a sequel, but I guess I'll add a disclaimer in chapter one just to make it clearer. Yeah, the galaxy wouldn't know what to do with Lord Saladin on the loose, let's save that rabbit hole for a later fic. The whole crew is pretty young, I mean thanks to the dev's we know Garrus was only 26 at best in me1(they confirmed that he's 'a few' years younger than Shepard, who is 29 in me1), Liara's a teenager in asari years, andGrunt was literally born in-game.
Fare Thee Well!