[What do you think?]
That's all the message said.
There was no clue or warning about the deviancy about to occur. Just those four simple words and a picture of a black dress. So, Nikki gave her honest opinion.
[Ooh, that is sexy!]
[So you'll wear it?]
The feeling was much like that time they'd been ambushed by a mixed krogan and hanar mercenary squad: Shock, horror and a desire to laugh hysterically. At least with the ambush her best course of action had been clear.
[Umm... I think you have the wrong number, this is your OTHER girlfriend. The one who DOESN'T wear dresses!]
[Oh silly me, so it is! I thought I was talking to the girlfriend who agreed to accompany me to the tech awards.]
[Yeah about that... You didn't say anything about a dress, I think I'm cleaning my rifle that night.]
[Don't even think about it Shepard! I believe your words were 'I wouldn't miss it for the world'.]
There was a far longer pause than normal with no comeback and the sunbathing Trish started to worry she was going to get the text version of the silent treatment. Either that or an essay.
Eventually her omni-tool pinged with an audio file, already cued up to play part way through, she opened it and was instantly met with music.
{I would do anything for love, anything you've been dreaming of, but I just won't do THAT!}
Trish burst into laughter as the song built to a crescendo and when it ended she jumped straight past the marker to the very beginning for another listen. The noise soon caught the neighbour's attention, Ben coming out into the garden with a smile.
"I didn't know you liked Meat Loaf?"
"First time I've heard it. Nick just sent it to me."
His face faded to a concerned frown.
"Everything ok between you two?"
Instead of explaining she scrolled up a bit and held her omni-tool out so he could read the conversation. When he finished he looked up with a devilish grin.
"Just tell her I'll go."
"Well now, that could work." Her fingers rapidly typed across the interface. [Nice song. Don't worry about it then, Ben's agreed to be my plus one.]
The reply was nearly instantaneous: [The hell he is!]
The co-conspirators smirked to each other but a second message quickly followed the first.
[Hang on, does HE have to wear the dress? If so I want pics and you have my blessing. Have fun guys.]
"Damn!" They looked at each other for inspiration, Ben opening his mouth to say something and wordlessly closing it again several times before Trish started typing again.
He craned his head for a better view, eyes widening as he read: [Ben will wear one if you do.]
"What? No! Don't send that, I didn't agree- ... ... ... I hate you."
"Come off it, don't tell me you don't want to see Nikki in a dress too."
"Well yeah, but-"
[Guess that settles it. No dresses.]
[Come on sweetie, you knew it would be a formal bash, you didn't think you could turn up in a hoody did you?]
[No, but I've got this thing called no.1 uniform that I thought I could wear. I seem to remember you saying I looked good in it.]
"She does look pretty good in it."
"Who's side are you on here Ben?"
"What!?"
They continued debating among themselves, completely forgetting about the need to send a message back until Trish's omni-tool rang with an incoming call. She hit the accept button.
"Ben, if you're there do me a favour and sod off. I need to speak to Trish a moment." Was the less than cheerful greeting.
"Sodding off." The man replied before quickly scurrying away.
"Nikki! That wasn't very nice, what's got into you?"
"What? I want a private conversation and I don't have time for small talk. What's all this dress business really about babe?"
"It's just a dress Nick. It's not some dark sinister plot or something, I just thought you'd look good in it. I've never seen you in a dress before."
"Yeah, there's a reason for that."
"Which is?" Trish prodded after a moment of silence made it clear the soldier wasn't going to expand upon the topic on her own.
"I just don't like them... No, it's more than not liking. I'm not comfortable in them. That... doesn't really explain it either..."
This time the civilian kept quiet in the pause, knowing her partner was trying to think of the right words to use.
"It's... It's like my entire body is screaming at me to get it off right now. I don't know why, it just is. It's like a claustrophobic person being trapped in an elevator, I can't think about anything else except getting out."
"I didn't know... Guess if I want to see you in a dress I'll have to practice my photo editing skills then." Trish teased, earning a tension easing chuckle.
"Sorry babe."
"It's alright. You are still coming right? I don't care what you wear as long as you're there."
"Yeah I'll be there. Wait, did you just say I can wear whatever I want? Does that-"
"No hoodies!" Trish quickly amended as she saw where her girlfriend was heading.
"Damn, nearly... What about-"
"It's got to be smart dear, and you know I mean formal smart not clever smart, before you start going through your smart-ass quotes t-shirt collection."
"Fine, fine. I'm sure I can find something to wear."
...
Nikki possessed many varied skills. Unfortunately, sitting quietly and patiently for long periods of time didn't appear to be one of them.
Which was a little strange when you thought about it. After all, she didn't seem to have a problem with silence and stillness when waiting several days in the same spot to launch an ambush.
Maybe she just needed something to focus on. She could do with a hobby.
Right now however her near constant fidgeting and random mouth or finger generated sounds were bugging the hell out of Trish, no matter how hard she tried to ignore her girlfriend and concentrate on debugging the problematic algorithms.
She subconsciously smiled as she noticed the slight irony, before finally losing her patience as her partner blew up her cheeks and hit the sides of her face to noisily force the air back out.
"For crying out loud Nick, just go outside!"
"But it's raining." Came back the childish pout.
"Then go round Ben's house or something."
The soldier slunk out without another word and Trish breathed a sigh of relief as she focused back on her work. She felt a little bad that she was ignoring Nick after she came all this way for her, but she really wanted to get this finished before the award ceremony.
It felt like mere minutes before she heard Nikki's voice again and for a brief second she wondered if the N7 had merely hacked the clock, there was no way it had been three and a half hours already! Although it might explain why she was hungry.
She glanced up as the dastardly duo entered the room, halfway through what sounded pretty close to an argument, and she tried not to laugh at the sight that met her eyes.
"I don't know what you're upset about Ben. It's short, easy to maintain, out of your eyes and above all free. It ticks all the boxes."
"It's lopsided! I can't believe you slaughtered my hair!"
"What did you expect asking a marine to cut it? Killing things is what we do!"
"I didn't ask, you offered."
"I only offered because you kept going on about it being too long. Trish said you've been moaning about your hair for months. You could have said no. Or better yet, paid a professional to do it."
"I assumed you knew what you were doing!"
"First rule of life, never assume."
"Children, please!" Trish groaned, she had been so close to the solution but now she felt the answer, and her sanity, slip through her grasp. "Why are you back already anyway?"
"Figured I best bring you some food, I know you forget to eat when you get wrapped up in a project." Nikki stated, producing a takeaway bag with a flourish and looking about as smug as a cat who's dragged in a pigeon.
That simile became far too accurate when Trish opened up the containers to find only a handful of egg fried rice left, the grains of rice far outnumbered by peas. It was accompanied by a solitary chicken ball, HALF a pancake roll and an almost decent sized portion of chow mein. Although that last probably had more to do with Nikki's penchant for always buying three times more noodles than rice rather than any actual attempt to leave her some.
"Thanks... I think." For a moment Trish wondered why they couldn't have simply come in when the food first arrived and had the meal together.
Then she realised that would mean putting up with their annoying antics the entire time and decided she much preferred this scenario. Nicola's seemingly bizarre actions often tended to be well thought out and make a strange sort of sense if you just applied a completely different type of logic than normal to them.
Still, she felt an eyebrow raise of its own accord as she examined the pancake roll, noticing bite marks along the edge instead of the clean cut of a knife.
"You're lucky I love you."
"Love you too babe." Nikki cheerfully intoned as she gifted her with a kiss to the cheek, before turning to walk back out. "Come on Ben, off we fuck. See you tonight babe."
...
Ben had been wrong.
Nikki didn't look 'pretty good' in her Alliance dress blues.
She looked drop dead gorgeous and sexy as hell.
Of course it was possible Trish was biased. Considering the amount of attention her girlfriend seemed to be attracting from other quarters however, she doubted her assessment was too far off from reality.
She supposed she couldn't blame people for looking, Shepard was stunning and they were only human after all. Well... and asari... aaand she was no expert but there had to be a question mark about that turian by the bar...
Ok, so they were mere mortals, and if she hadn't been lucky enough to capture the soldier's heart then she'd be checking her out too. Hell, she had and she still was.
No, while she wished they were a bit less obvious about it, she could live with people devouring her partner with their eyes. Safe in the knowledge that she'd be the only one who got to devour her for real later.
What did threaten to piss her off however, was some people's subtle attempts to flirt with her N-baby. (Nikki's assertion that: as a level 7 she was an official N-guy now and no longer an N-baby, had been wholeheartedly ignored by Trish).
She had thought it had been pretty clear when they entered that they were together as more than just an escort, but as soon as her boss pulled her away with a brief 'can I borrow Ms Stewart for a moment' the vultures had begun to circle, desperate to usurp her position.
Part of her wanted to be annoyed when Nikki didn't immediately shoot down their advances, then again they were subtle. She didn't think her hopeless Mindorian had even cottoned on to what was happening. Nicola had always struggled to distinguish the difference between flirting and playful banter, tending to interpret all but the most obvious advances as the later.
With that in mind, Trish was content to reserve her irritation for the perpetrators and not take it out on her blissfully unaware partner. It certainly helped that, throughout the entire evening, the only ass she caught the N7 checking out was her own.
She'd been away for far too long now though, she decided as she witnessed the purple crested harlot attempt to give Nikki a drink for the fourth time.
If you're going to make a pass at her then at least pay attention to her! How can you still not have noticed she's not drinking by now? Trish thought enraged.
She made her excuses to her current social circle and headed back over, taking a slight detour along the way to request an empty cocktail glass from one of the servers as an idea popped into her head.
...
"What about this one?" One of the soldier's many admirers inquired, pointing to another of the ribbons on her chest as Trish crept up unobserved behind the group.
"Distinguished combat medal."
"And what did you get it for?"
"Sorry, that's classified."
Trish smirked at the response but the rest of the crowd weren't as impressed by the answer, clearly they'd been hoping for some heroic tale of daring do. Admittedly even the heavily censored and highly abridged version she'd been given when she'd asked about it had been rather dashing. Still, she figured now was as good a time as any to interrupt.
"Can I tempt you to a cocktail?"
"No thanks I-... Trish!" The clearly automated response cut off mid sentence as Nikki recognised her voice and turned round. The polite, careful smile that had adorned her features since being separated, swept aside by a much more genuine grin. One that only grew when she finally looked down at the contents of the cocktail glass in the civilian's hand.
"Oh, that is brilliant! It's even got one of those little umbrella stick things!" She immediately picked up said umbrella, using it to skewer a vol-au-vent and one of the mini cocktail sausages out of the glass and into her mouth.
"Mmm, best cocktail ever! This is why I love you babe."
It might be childish, but Trish would admit to feeling great joy and smugness at the looks that overcame the other hangers-on as they finally realised they had no hope.
"Because I bring you food?" Trish asked.
The soldier shook her head.
"Because you're smart, sexy and bring me food. I liked your speech by the way... Slightly disappointed you didn't use mine."
"The one that started: 'peers and peasants, thank you for finally acknowledging my genius'?"
"Yeah, it would have been awesome. Still, never mind... Can we go get more cocktails?"
...
The thing about Nikki not drinking was that she didn't have to suffer hangovers the next day, Trish grouched as she woke up just before midday with a dry throat and a sore head. It just wasn't fair.
Then again at least Nikki used to drink, so she was aware of the hell that was the morning after and it appeared today she was being considerate rather than crashing noisily round the kitchen under the guise of 'kindly' making her breakfast in bed.
Instead the house was silent as Trish reached for the water and painkillers on the bedside cabinet that she had forgotten to leave out the night before. Beside them led a datapad and once she was sure the light from screen wouldn't burn out her retinas she turned it on.
[You're alive! I'm going to take Jude round Ben's so we don't wake you. Call or message me if you want anything. Love Nikki
P.S - I ate the last of the bacon. If you want me to make a breakfast that utilizes this magic ingredient please make it very clear so I can steal Ben's before I head back.
P.P.S - Your award's in the kitchen. I know last night you said you didn't need it when you had me but I figured I'd carry it back anyway, just in case sober you had a different opinion.]
Trish smiled, briefly considering calling her partner back to wait on her. The painkillers seemed to be doing their job however so she decided to get up and hunt Nikki down herself.
She found the pair of them in Ben's garden. The civilian trying to work on his model army while the soldier flicked through something on a datapad.
"I don't get the point." Nikki was saying. "You're the only one on the colony who does this so you can't exactly play with them against anybody."
"I can play games on the extranet, just select an army and which units I want to field and then it mocks the whole thing up digitally."
"But then why bother spending all that money on the models if you don't need them for the game?"
"Because I like to, painting them's relaxing. At least, it is when you're not here." If the jibe was supposed to shut her up it didn't work.
"You should get one of these." Shepard declared, holding the datapad up to show him something. Ben glanced up briefly, shrugging before returning his attention back to his task.
"Can't, wrong army."
"But it looks badass."
"I already have warbikes... Page 83 if you want to look."
Nikki flicked through the pad and Trish belatedly realised it was a catalogue she was scrolling through.
"Meh, they're boring, you should get the others. Just leave the people out and put in the riders from your own side."
"Doesn't work like that, you can't just use units from other armies!"
"Why not? Half the merc groups in the Terminus use AX-9s even if they're not turian and more and more are getting hold of VT7s. As for shuttles, even batarians inside the hegemony have been known to use kodiaks."
"Will you shut up if I give you a model to paint?"
"Nope."
"What if I ask you nicely?"
"Doubt it. Hey, these spiky dudes would look awesome on your tank."
"They're not even the same species! I can't have them in my army."
"That's a little racist."
"It's not! It's a fictional game with made up species that existed long before First contact and you can't just mess with the lore. Besides, I'm not building a merc group, it's an official army. You don't have any aliens in the Alliance."
"Not sworn in as marines and supplied by us no, but there are plenty joint operations where we train and fight together with other species and we're always pinching each other's kit. You could totally have platoons from different armies fight alongside your main force."
"Look it's my army and I'll do what I want. If you think a mixed merc army would look good then get your own models."
"No thanks. Looks far too boring."
"You're just saying that because you don't have the patience to sit still long enough to work on them. Probably just as well really... it's far too fiddly for you to be any good at."
"Fuck off, too fiddly!" Came the incensed reply and Trish considered interrupting before things became too heated. However despite the seemingly antagonistic relationship between the two of them, they always seemed more than happy in each other's company. "Anything you can do I can do better."
All of a sudden Trish realised what it reminded her of, the interactions between the Shepard siblings all those years ago on Mindoir. The thought brought a smile to her face and a lump to her throat and she quickly retreated, not wanting to interrupt them. She was more than happy to continue eavesdropping though.
"Bet you the tank on page 3 you can't."
"That's a crap bet, I don't want a tank."
"Just as well, seeing as you're going to lose."
"I'm not poncing about with your stupid models."
"You just don't want to admit there's something I'm better at than you."
"You're very cocky for someone who hasn't even seen any evidence of my skills, you know I used to be a mechanic right? I can fiddle with things just fine when I want to."
"Oh sure, a mechanic, and how is that a demonstration of skill? You just slap omni-gel on things."
"You did not just... Oh, that's it. Give me that paint brush, you're going down!"
Ben shook his head with an impish grin, holding the brush out of reach.
"Not so fast, you got to build one yourself first."
Shepard glared at him, before reaching out for the glue instead. Completely unaware how wrong her silent assertion was that the miniature figure would be both the first and lastmodel she'd ever make.
….
Well that's it for this book, a bit of a random stopping point I know but when I was originally posting on FF the whole saga was one continuous story and Eden Prime is the next chapter.