Chapter Text
“A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.” Jean de La Fontaine
The Normandy was docked at Arcturus, taking on final provisions for the upcoming shake down cruise and waiting on the final members of the crew to arrive. Everyone boarding here had reported in so far … everyone except ….
“Any sign of her yet?”
John stood leaning against a stack of crates waiting for boarding in the shuttle bay; arms folded across his chest, but eyes focused on the doors at the far end of the platform. Patience was not one of his best virtues. “Not yet,” he replied.
The hand that landed on his shoulder, clapping it firmly but companionably wasn’t unexpected. Neither was the deep rumbling chuckle that accompanied it. Go ahead and laugh it up, Anderson. This was all your doing anyway. “Well, she’ll be here, son. No need to worry.”
John sighed. He wasn’t worried … not really, anyway. He’d been out on the tail end of a three month cruise when his orders had come through. Arrival at Arcturus had come a week sooner than originally scheduled as a result. Hell, he’d even had time to not only tour the ship thoroughly, but get his own hands to work in the engineering section to better understand how this new stealth system worked. She, on the other hand, was still out on an N7 mission. Had been for three weeks now. Out of contact. Working solo. Out of contact ...
John sighed again. He knew better than to worry about her. Really, he did. After all, she was N7 trained, like he was. They’d gone through basic together. ‘Seen it all’ as raw recruits and still decided to hang around one another. They knew each others ups, downs, ins, outs - all of it. Elysium had simply been the icing on the cake, so to speak, and setting their career paths for life. Their combined achievements there had been one of those ‘right place, right time’ sort of moments. And a hell of a memory.
“How much longer do we wait, sir?” a new voice asked.
John glanced to his left, eyeing his companion. Alenko was a good guy and all, and a hell of a soldier. He’d only known one other biotic who might rival the Lieutenant for control and skill by comparison. But when it came to going ‘by the book,’ John wondered if Alenko didn’t take things just a bit too strictly at times.
“We wait until she is here,” Anderson announced. “I have confirmation she was retrieved and is en route. She is one of the most important elements to this mission - we do not leave without her.”
“Yes, sir.”
John’s eyes darted back to face the older man’s. That was something Anderson had failed to mention before now. “Oh?” He tried to sound casual about it, but knew he failed when Anderson chuckled.
“You’ll find out about it soon enough.”
Grunting softly, John turned his eyes back upon the door ….
“Ten hut!”
Alenko’s command had John shifting immediately to attention. Occupational hazard. Blue eyes met green as his arm rose in salute. Anderson stepped forward, his arm rising in salute as well. Hers followed suit. “Permission to come aboard, sir?”
John groaned internally as the voice washed over him. Familiarity reclaimed him in ways he had forgotten, always forgot when they were apart for any length of time.
“Permission granted,” Anderson replied. He then lowered his hand to take hers and shake it. “Welcome aboard, Commander.”
There was a quirkiness to her smile, a small tilt that always seemed to be there - that corner with the scars she’d received on Elysium. But oh man, was it familiar. John took a step towards them.
“Thank you, sir,” she replied. Her eyes then shifted to meet his again. He thought he saw the smile widen as well as reach the green depths.
“Permission to kiss my wife, sir?” John asked as evenly as possible. And, though he kept his eyes locked onto hers, he saw her brow tilt in surprise. He could no longer hide a grin from her. Yeah, he was feeling better already.
Anderson’s laughter reverberated around them. “Don’t you think you should be asking her that?” he cautioned. “Come on, Lieutenant. I think perhaps we ought to leave these two alone for a few minutes.”
Alenko saluted the Commander smartly while replying to Anderson, “Yes, sir.”
When they were alone, John closed the final step between them, his hands coming to rest at her hips. “Commander Shepard,” he murmured before leaning down towards her.
Her soft chuckle was one of the best sounds he had heard in a long while. “Commander Shepard,” she returned, the amusement still there as her hands mimicked his.
~0~
Jane allowed her duffle to slide from her shoulder before her husband pulled her closer for a kiss. It was brief and relatively chaste considering it was him, but that didn’t take any of the sweetness of it away. Sighing softly, she leaned her head against his shoulder afterwards for a brief moment. Six months had been a hell of a separation this time.
“Rough day at work?”
She snorted softly, lifting her head to meet his look after he asked. This was always his first question for her. Probably because she always looked as if she’d just gone ten rounds with a thresher maw when returning from an assignment. “Something like that,” she replied. “Better now, though.”
He grabbed her bag then and she followed him to the airlock where they both went through decontamination procedures. “What’s our status?” she asked as they boarded.
“Ready to go,” he told her. “We were just waiting on your arrival.”
He led her through the CIC and down the stairs to the crew deck below. While he stowed her bag in a locker, she took note and glanced around. So far, she was liking what she was seeing of this new prototype warship. John had shot her over all the details Anderson had given him and she’d read them during her extraction flight. But there was a huge difference between words and specs and the reality before her now. Jane couldn’t help but smile. John had added additional notes as well - she knew he couldn’t help himself, that engineering mentality and all, but at least she could understand it.
“Who’s the doc on board?” Jane asked after a moment.
“Dr. Karin Chakwas. Mostly served aboard ships, from what she told me,” John replied. “She came over with Anderson.”
Jane nodded. “Name sounds familiar. Probably heard him talk about her.” She tucked the last of her belongings into the locker before he closed it. “And the Lieutenant?” she asked, recalling the dark haired man who had been standing with him outside.
“Staff Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko,” John announced. “Was with me aboard the Cairo before Anderson brought us over here. You’ll like him - he’s like you.”
Jane quirked an eyebrow. “Like me?”
“Biotic tech-head.”
Jane snickered as they began walking towards the elevator. “There you go again,” she teased, “assigning me labels.”
He flashed her a charming grin. “Thought I was doing pretty good with that, personally,” he told her as the door shut and they began to descend. “Wife was a good one.”
“Husband is even better,” she quipped back.
Following him through the ship, Jane took note of the different sections and the faces assigned to each. By the time they reached the bridge, she had made a mental note to return to engineering at some point to question Adams regarding the ship’s drive core and the new stealth system and run into the resident turian on board at least three times. Though she knew nothing about their pilot, Jane took John’s word that, despite his personality, he was one of the best.
“Alright, Joker,” Anderson’s voice broke in over the comms as he set their destination via the galaxy map, “let’s head out.”
“Got it, sir,” the pilot replied and moments later, they were moving.
Jane glanced up at John and grinned. She wasn’t certain why the two of them had been pulled onto this ship by Anderson - it was far from standard procedure - but she was excited about the ship and what she knew of their mission. Plus, this would be the first time she and John had actually served together since the incident on Elysium and before that, their first cruise after basic. Fate, she knew, had been kind to them in all things so far, and she had no reasons to doubt that it would change anytime soon.