How I Met Your Mother, Mass Effect How I Met Your Shephard

How I Met Your Shepard

"Shepard?" Her communication beacon chirruped just as she was leaving the ship. "You're not showing on Normandy's interior sensors. Where are you going?"  
_Away, Garrus_. She thought. _I'm going away._ "Just thought I'd check in with Anderson."  
"It's the middle of the night cycle on the Citadel," he protested. "Everyone's asleep!"  
"You know me and Ambassador Udina, Garrus. Just a couple of night owls." She shut off the communication channel before he could reply.

She was free—for a couple of hours, anyway. Shepard pondered where to go. The problem was, even though it seemed like nine-tenths of the crew always stayed aboard ship whenever they docked on the Citadel, it seemed like any time she went anywhere, one of the same damn six crewmembers popped up. She wanted to be alone, and she wanted to get drunk, preferably somewhere where an AI with a nanny complex couldn't monitor her blood alcohol level. Purgatory, Flux, Darkstar—no, a dance club was exactly the opposite of what she wanted. Too much noise, too many people, too big a chance of running into the people she'd just run away from.

Luckily, she knew just the place: a krogan-run dive bar in the Lower Wards called Mkloren's. Even most of the Lower Warders never heard of it. It took a while to get there—she took a circuitous route to avoid being seen, but she got there all the same. Garrus had been right about one thing; it was the middle of the night cycle, which meant all the good little council species were snug in bed. The pub was empty, except for one woman at the bar and the krogan bartender, dutifully wiping glasses.

"Hey Karul!" she called. The bartender looked up, and said nothing. Shepard slid onto the woman. "I'll have what she's-" she did a double take. "Is that pure ryncol? That is a _serious _drink."

The woman grinned wryly. "I'm a serious drinker."

"Apparently." Shepard considered. _What the hell. Let the ship run itself tomorrow._ "I'll have the same."

Karul nodded, and a few seconds later, Shepard was sipping on liquid fire. The woman watched her for a moment, taking her measure. "The name's Robin," she offered.

"Shepard," came the reply.

"Looks like you lost your flock, Shepard." _Like I haven't heard that a million times before. _"Sorry, you probably heard that a million times before."

Shepard shrugged, and took another long drink. The ryncol was already less a burn and more a gentle heat. "I felt a need to get lost myself for a change."

Robin matched her with her own long gulp. "I hear that." Their was another brief pause, but a comfortable one. "So what do you do, Shepard?"  
Shepard hesitated. She thought over her options and came up with three: lie, avoid the implicit question, or tell the truth. A whole universe of possibilities, but when push came to shove, it always felt like she had just three options. She picked truth, reasoning it'd be easiest to remember as the night goes on. "I captain a ship."

"Yeah? Which sh-" Robin's eyes widened suddenly. _Here it comes, _thought Shepard."Holy crap. You're THAT Shepard? Save the galaxy super space captain Shepard?"  
Shepard grunted. "Off-duty super space captain Shepard. Just here for a drink."

"Huh. You know," said Robin thoughtfully, "I've had people say I look like you."  
"Really." Shepard looked the woman critically. Tall, blue eyes, brown hair. Pretty, if humans are your thing. And a certain jut in the chin and glint in the eye that made her more than pretty. Shepard shook her head. "I don't see it." Belatedly, she realized how that sounded. "Uh, no offense."

Robin shrugged. "None taken. I don't either. But hey—if it gets me free drinks, I'm not going to complain." She looked at their empty glasses. "Speaking of which... I'd say a bit of galaxy saving means the next round's on me." She gestured to Karul, who refilled their drinks.

"I'll drink to that," said Shepard, and she did.

Robin leaned forward. "So.. what was it like? To be on Earth during the invasion, I mean?"  
"In two words? General chaos."  
Robin's hand flew halfway up to her forehead. "Gener-" she caught herself, and shuddered. "Sorry. Never mind. Please keep talking."

"Uh—okay. Well, it was awful. Like a bad dream. London was reduced to rubble, and then the Reapers set the rubble on fire. I've seen a lot of fighting but... it's different when it's your home world, you know? Even if you never lived there yourself." Shepard took a long drink, and glanced back at Robin. "You were elsewhere, I take it?"

Robin nodded. "I was stationed on Palaven. We saw plenty of action too, and my team did a lot of good work, but... like you said, when it's your homeworld, it's different. We were stranded there, and felt kind of useless. By the time I could arrange travel off-planet, the whole war was over." She shrugged. "Not a shining moment in the Sherbotsky career."

"We all go where we're ordered." _Unless we're revived by a secret paramilitary organization and go rogue for a few months_, Shepard could of added, but didn't. "Stationed, huh? What platoon are you in? Who's the CO?"

Robin shook her head. "No, not that kind of stationing. I'm a reporter."

_Shit. _Shepard stiffened, and jumped to her feet. "Ah, listen, Robin, you seem like a nice person, but... this clearly isn't going... I've got an early meeting, so I've got to call this a night."

Robin raised her hands in the universally known gesture of annoyed confusion. "What the hell? I thought we were having a good time."

Shepard studiously avoided making eye contact with her, while simulataenously trying to make eye contact with Karul to get the bill. The effort, combined with the ingested drinks, was making her go a little cross-eyed. "Nothing against you personally, but... I've had some bad experiences with reporters."

"Oh, how bad could it possibly..." Robin trailed off, and her eyes widened. "Khalisah al-Jilani."

Shepard nodded warily. "Khalisah al-Jilani."

"Oh man. I can't believe I forgot about that. You hit Khalisah al-Jilani. On a live broadcast! You have no idea how many _years_ I have been wanting to hit Khalisah al-Jilani. I kept that vid on a constant loop for a full month. A month!"

Slowly, Shepard turned back towards her. "Punching a civilian isn't exactly something I'm proud of."

"You should be! That civilian, anyway. I once heard Khalisah tell her camera man to be sure to 'give those salarian war-orphans something to cry about' because she thought it would make a better vid-op. Forget saving the universe. You deserve another drink for doing what the entirety of all journalism has wanted to do for years now." She saw Shepard's hesitation. "C'mon. Neither of us are on the job, and everything's off the record. Scout's honor. Reporter scout's honor."

Robin gestured over to Karul, who, Shepard noticed, was mysteriously able to respond to nonverbal social cues again. He filled up their drinks yet again. Shepard looked at the drinks, looked at Robin, and came to a decision. For once, it wasn't even a three choice one. She sat back down. "Leave the bottle, Karul," she said. Karul nodded,set down the rycol, and faded into the background. An infiltrator with a tactical cloak couldn't have done it any better.

She leaned towards Robin. "You know," she said, "that actually wasn't the stupidest thing I've done with a reporter. I... uh... kind of had a thing with another one, a while back."

Robin grinned wickedly and leaned in as well. "Anyone I'd know?"

"...Maybe. Diana Allers?"

"Really? I didn't think she'd be your type. She's just so... always on. Like she'd be the one in a relationship who'd make you go through a post-interview after every …" She trailed off. "Uh, no offense."

"None taken. And 'relationship' is overstating it. It was one of those 'end of the galaxy, seize the day' kind of things." Shepard darkened. "And then the galaxy didn't end, a new day dawned, and she started to get... clingy. Wouldn't give me a moment's peace. One good thing about being a captain is that you get to leave pretty much anyone you want at the nearest port. But it's times like that when you realize just how small a deep scout frigate is."

"Tell me about it." Robin flushed. "Not the captain thing. The big place seeming small one. I've been stationed... well, stuck... on the Citadel for a long time, before the Palaven assignment. And it's great, you get to meet all these different races, but... the Citadel gets small, after a while. I had this small group of friends, and two guys in particular... well, we had our own 'end of the Citadel, seize the day' kind of thing...which you know, obviously."  
Shepard nodded. "I caused and prevented a few of those."

"Right. So I got involved with them. Not both at once, because, ew. They were bad enough separately. But both of them, off and on. One was this Turian, Tonn Mosbus. He got a dispensation from the military to study Citadel architecture. He was this insane romantic, which is _not_ my type, but... he kind of wore me down. He pulled off this blue horn from one of the krogan statues and... never mind. The thing was... he was just so eager. So insistent that every damn minute had to be some big romantic moment. It got... tiring. I'd just want a bit of time by myself, and he'd get all hurt, with these puppy dog eyes.

"And the other one... He was a salarian. Barno Stinsorn. Never did find out what he actually did on the Citadel. He was just sort of... there. The best thing about Barno is, he'll make you laugh. Guaranteed. But that's the worst thing, too. Because he never shut up. It was always yap, yap, yap, like a a ..."

"Puppy?" Shepard offered. "I'm sensing a theme."

Robin threw her hands up in the air in mock surprise. "Of course!" she said. "All this time, it's been staring me in the face. Instead of dating boys, I should have gotten puppies!"

Shepard nodded. "Much easier to train." They clinked glasses. They finished their drinks and refilled. The bottle was down to one third, and it was dwindling quickly.

"The worst part, though," Robin continued, "was when I wasn't dating either of them. Because then, always, _always_, the other one got... expectant. Like it was just a matter of time before I hooked back up with him. Like it was absolutely inconceivable that, maybe, I didn't want to date either of them. Maybe I didn't want to date anyone at all. Maybe not everyone _wants_ a flowers and serenading relationship, thank you very much, Mr Mosbus." She paused. "And... I just realized that I've been talking a lot. Sorry. I must seem crazy."

"Not at all. I know exactly what you're talking about. It's the same way on the Normandy. You'd think that people would think twice before hooking up with the captain, but most of the time, it seems like anyone with a damn pulse is trying to throw themselves at me. And if I turn down one of them, then you can bet the next one will be hitting on me a few seconds later. I'm just trying to shore up morale by talking to them face-to-face, and they all treat it like it's last call on singles night.

"One example: Garrus. A turian. Your Mosbus sounds a lot like him, actually. He's a great guy, and he's had this dark streak ever since he spent some time on Omega, which made just... very appealing, let's say. So we had one night together. And suddenly, it's like we're joined at the hip. He's telling me about his family, his favorite foods... He started talking about how we could "settle down" after the war. _Settle down._ And then he asked me what I thought. And I told him—you can't say settling down-"

"...without settling." Robin finished. "It was the same way with me. Everyone acted like I was being some kind of monster for wanting a career instead of wanting a boyfriend, since I had _two _eligible men, just waiting for me to come to my senses! Well, screw 'em. This-" she gestured expansively, "this is what makes sense to me."

"Screw 'em," agreed Shepard, sagely. The bottle had been empty for a while, and she acknowledged to herself that they might-_might_-be drunk. "I am a captain of the Alliance, I have a job to do, and if I want a partner who understands that that job comes first, then dammit, that's the way it's going to be!"

"Hear, hear!" cheered Robin. They toasted, an effect only slightly ruined by the fact that the clink of their glasses belied their current empty status. The captain and the reporter looked at each other, and a current of understanding—and something more-passed through their alcoholic haze.

Karul materialized back into existence. "Closing time, ladies."  
Shepard leaned in close to Robin, and put her hand on top of hers. "Do, uh, you want to go somewhere more... private?"

Robin grinned. "Your spaceship or mine?".


End file.

How I Met Your Mother, Mass Effect, Romance