from X
In Luca’s defense, he was already pretty kinda drunk by the time he stumbles into the party behind the rest of his squad. He blames it entirely on Harris, small and mighty and an entirely bad influence, although when he tries to squint through the smoky club he has a dim memory of him actually being the one to cajole her into pre-gaming with a flask of Batarian moonshine he swears was totally above board.
But no, it was definitely her fault. Or maybe Thurman’s. Yeah. Thurman’s. He’ll roll with that.
Luca spots his commander first. She’s hard to miss in a brightly sparkling dress that’s short enough to be a barely even be a dress at all, teetering on high heels and her hair flowing over her shoulders. She’s surrounded by an imposing group of men – men that hold themselves suspiciously like her phoenix boyfriend does and oh... Oh… shit, so these must the rest of the project phoenix operatives that he keeps hearing whisperings about.
He had kind of expected them all to be like Nico and Ajax. Colossal and intimidating… generally mean and angry about life (but if he had been plucked out of obscurity and augmented against his will with fancy cybernetics and implants then set loose on the word as a walking weapon, he’d probably be pretty mad at life too) but the men crowded around her smiling at her so warmly are… kind of beautiful, actually.
“Harris,” he hisses, trying to elbow his fellow engineer to get her attention, only to misjudge the distance and almost stumble. A large hand clamped on his shoulder steadies him and he glances up into Braun’s wide, friendly face.
“Steady there, Moreno.”
“I’m fine,” Luca slurs then glances around once again. He blinks, then squints again and wishes that along with the implants to fix his hearing after getting too close to too many boom booms, the Alliance could have at least bothered to fix his vision too.
Oh. Right. The batarian moonshine. Whose dumb idea was that again? Bosh’tet, he rails at himself somewhere in the more sober corner of his brain, yours!
Harris finally finds him, looping her arm through his. She’s as unsteady as he is and for a moment he wonders if they’re both going to end up sprawled on the sticky floor. There’s a salarian nearby, arguing with a rather annoyed turian but Luca tunes them out when his eye catches something strange.
He blinks. “Um. Is… is the commander holding a cactus?”
--
Luca lasts all of twelve minutes and thirty five seconds before his curiosity gets the better of him and he untangles himself from his very, very drunk squad mate.
“Luca,” Harris whines, flailing at him with grabby hands. He sidesteps towards Braun and she latches onto him instead and Luca congratulates himself for the deft manoeuvre when all his edges are so uzzy from too many drinks. “Where are you going?”
“Just gonna say hi to the Commander,” he tells her but she’s already turned away, squealing when another tray of flaming pink shots are slid under her nose. Luca spares a moment to worry if her hair is about to catch alight but Braun moves her quickly out of the line of fire. He considers nabbing one of the shots for himself before discarding the thought. He was pretty sure one more shot would have him seeing double of everyone around him.
He shuffles his way through the crowd, making a bee line for all the shimmering sparkle that is his commanding officer. When he reaches her, she throws her arms around him in an exuberant hug before he’s barely uttered a word and Luca has to squirm slightly to avoid having an eye taken out by the sequins on her dress on one side and a spiky cactus on the other. When she leans back, her eyes seem suspiciously shiny.
“Commander?” he asks worriedly. Why does it look like she’s about to cry? Luca really hopes she’s not about to cry, or her big cranky boyfriend is gonna yell at all of them. And he’s kind of ridiculous when he yells and it’s too hard for Luca to keep a straight face and then he just yells more and-
“Luca,” she laughs happily and runs a hand through his hair to push the curls out his face so she can see his eyes better. It’s kind of... nice, actually. “You came.”
“Um, yes? You invited me?”
“I’m so glad. You’re here, you’re all here and this is wonderful and I’m so happy and this night is going to be amazing.”
Luca grins, despite getting a face full of sequins again when she hugs him. He hugs her back warmly, then blinks as he suddenly becomes aware of a pair of green cat like eyes watching them avidly.
“Help,” he sort of mouths at the stranger over her shoulder, trapped in the hug and pretending to suffocate. The stranger’s green eyes crinkle when he smiles and wow, he sure doesn’t hold back with that smile. Luca is momentarily enthralled before his hisses in Marie’s ear. “Who is that?”
“Oh, this is Scooter,” Marie says when she finally releases him and for the first time Luca notices there’s something different about Scooter. Something that even in his firmly inebriated state registers somewhere between beautiful and dangerous and… phoenix.
Luca wasn’t sure what he expected when he met the rest of the phoenix operatives, but he knows it wasn’t this. This one couldn’t be more different to Nico or Ajax or even the other ones standing around with Marie before. This one is smaller and doesn’t seem mean or hulking or even particularly angry, although he’s definitely pretty too.
“Hi,” Luca says, and then because he’s an apparently sixty per cent drunk and forty percent an idiot continues with, “Luca. I’m Luca. My name is Luca. You’re a phoenix!”
He doesn’t register Marie’s small laugh beside him, too busy admiring the way Scooter’s lips curve. It turns out he’s more than pretty. He’s beautiful when he smiles and it makes Luca want to smile in return and… oh, shit no. Nope. No, no, nooo he is not going to chuck a Harris or Commander Miller and suddenly crush on a phoenix too.
“Luca,” Scooter says solemnly, as though trying out the sound of it in his mouth. “Nice to meet... you.”
