(assuming this is for the relationships asks!)

16. What is Shepard’s favorite memory of their family?

In public, Duke always says it was the day Hannah got her officer’s commission, tied with the day Duke got theirs. Both days, the two of them went out for dinner and then ice cream and generally spent the best time that a mom and her kid/best friend can have.

In private, Duke admits that their favorite memory of Hannah is a much more tender one: her cradling a three-year-old Duke, deathly ill from the eezo accident that ended up giving them their biotics. Hannah sat in a chair facing the stars rushing by, holding Duke close and singing softly to lull them to sleep in the midst of the pain of eezo making its mark on their body.

29. What was [Shepard’s and their LI’s] first impression of each other?

Duke’s first impression of Jack can also be found here, but Jack’s first impression of Duke was a lot less positive; Duke had arrived in a ship with Cerberus colors (and with a Commander with red slashing through his face). Aside from that, Duke seemed almost childish in their frank emotions and smiles (too common, no one genuinely smiles that much, do they?).

James’s first impression of Duke was of a similarly emotional person, but with all their negative emotions pulled to the forefront. They would do karaoke in their “room” (read: glorified cell) until their voice finally gave out at 0200, then go almost completely silent for days; they would demand news on the outside world (and Cade and Noel) that they knew full well Vega couldn’t give them; their spells of anger often left scratched or broken furniture.

James didn’t really start getting to know Duke until after a psychotic episode that had them hurling a chair at their window repeatedly, with only a several-story drop below said window. James’s view of Duke slowly became less his charge and more just...someone very lonely. Someone who needed his help.

Duke’s first impression of James was that they hated him--based solely on the fact that he was little more than a glorified jailer. Long story short, they grew out of that.

38. Favorite non-Shepard OTP?

MAN idk

i’m a fan of kaidan/ashley i guess? but mostly bc i’m a sucker for a good poly trio and kaidan/ashley/shep is a Good Poly Trio (also in this category is jack/james but that’s cos of duke)

wrex and bakara make a hell of a couple tbh. i love both of them and besides their banding together to steer tuchanka in a new direction, i think they could really grow to love each other

10. What kind of friend is Shepard?

Duke’s kind, but also kind of pushy. Will alternately tease mercilessly and care selflessly. Very cuddly and affectionate.

(combined au bonus: Lives to call Cade Shepard out @commandcrshepard)

20. What are [Shepard’s and their LIs’] common interests or hobbies?

Well, Duke and Jack align very nicely in their preferred mode of combat. Armax Arsenal Arena will never know what hit it. James gets in on that too; it’s one of their favorite bonding activities with all three of them.

Aside from combat, James and Duke are both dog people, and Jack grudgingly falls in love with the three fluffy dogs they adopt once they settle on Elysium: Whiskey the St. Bernard, Bullet the Leonberger, and Kitten the Samoyed.

Plus the three of them get tattoos together sometimes. Duke doesn’t ever catch up to Jack in that regard, but they certainly get their share of tats post-war.

30. When did they realize they fell in love?

Here’s that answer for Jack, but I’ll talk about James here (with some details specific to their Shepard canon, with combined au details in parentheses).

Duke and James first met when Duke was put under what was politely called “house arrest” after Arrival. A few weeks in, James caught Duke lamenting that their undercut was getting too shaggy, and he offered to do their shave with his clippers. It became a sort of monthly ritual, them doing each other’s shaves. Duke was delighted that James kept the mohawk they gave him.

After the Reaper attack, after they ended up on the Normandy together, it got a little...awkward. They weren’t sure where they stood, now that Duke was suddenly his commanding officer rather than his charge. (While Duke wasn’t technically Alliance anymore (they’d been stripped of their rank and thrown in house arrest for desertion and working with Cerberus), their last rank before they resigned their commission and disappeared had been higher than James’s, and Duke was joined at the goddamn hip with the Commander.)

Duke realized that they had feelings for James relatively early on, but they did their best to repress it out of loyalty to Jack--until they finally broke under the stress and cried to Jack over vidcomm about many things, including the buff lieutenant who could cheer them up any day and actually, genuinely cared. Jack matter-of-factly asked, “Is he hot?” Duke showed her a picture, and Jack instructed, “Bang him,” which is the Jack equivalent of giving her blessing.

Duke approached James with their proposition, and he asked to think it over. A few days later, he came to the captain’s cabin (port observation, which Duke had essentially claimed as their quarters) to accept, and they spent their first night together.

Duke didn’t acknowledge to themself that it was love for a long while--not until the night before the attack on the Cerberus base, when James came up to their cabin (to port observation) and asked quietly if Duke was all right. They admitted that, no, they absolutely were not, and James made sure to hold them all night.

They couldn’t admit it to him in the lull before the final push in London, even as they laughed, “I love you too” to Jack’s “you better survive, because I’m getting laid after this.” They didn’t tell him, couldn’t find the courage or the words, until James was being hauled back up the ramp to the Normandy, fighting to get back to them, even as injured as he was. Duke put a hand on James’s face and told him, “Go. I won’t lose you here. I have to know that you survived. I love you, James.”

They turned and ran before his reply could weaken their resolve.

But once they’d been extracted, once they were back on the Normandy with Chakwas working frantically to keep them alive, James squeezed Duke’s hand and whispered, “I love you too, Lobo.”

(WHEW that got long srry!!)

40. Is there someone in the squad of ME/ME2/ME3 Shepard dislikes? Why?

Not after getting to know each of them.

Duke and Miranda were at odds as Duke’s trust in the Illusive Man began to wane; they felt that Miranda was the leash that Duke was tugging at, and the Illusive Man held the other end. But after the Collector ship, they realize that TIM is using Miranda just as much as he’s using Duke, and they enter a truce that eventually becomes a friendship.

They didn’t dislike Kaidan, but they were certainly wary of him after Duke got out of BAaT with their mother’s intervention and Kaidan was demonized for killing Vyrnnus. Once they talk, though, they realize that their old friendship from Jump Zero is still there, and that neither blames the other for what happened.

Other than that, Duke’s pretty chill with their whole team.

Dios, Lobo.

He didn’t say it out loud, but he definitely thought it. He’d had no idea how well Duke could work an outfit like that. The hem of their dress was high enough on one side to show off a muscled leg, and damn, were they showing it off.

“You like what you see, Vega?”

It took him a moment to realize that Duke, who was still smiling and waving at the spectators lined up on either side of the velvet ropes, was talking to him. “Oh, hell yes,” he murmured back. “We get out of this one alive and unharmed? I hope that dress comes off easily, cause I don’t want to tear it.”

“Mm, you don’t look so bad yourself. Leaving something to the imagination this time?” they asked, squeezing the bicep that their hand was curled around. The suit was a size or two larger than his usual tight t-shirt, but he’d never admit it.

“You don’t have to imagine it, Lobo,” James replied as they finally entered the casino.

“Right. I’m off!” Brooks started away, nervous enough that she didn’t notice that at the moment, James and Duke had eyes only for each other.

“We get out of this one alive and unharmed…” Duke lowered their voice as they took half a step closer to him, “you can have my undivided attention for as long as you want.” With a brush of fingers against his jaw, Duke slipped away to be Commander Shepard, leaving James’s skin tingling.

“James! Get down!” Duke’s fingers caught on a ridge of Vega’s armor and yanked him into cover next to them. “You’re gonna get yourself killed, and then where will I be? Up shit creek with no paddle, that’s where!” They stood up, throwing a biotic blast at the wave of husks loping toward their hiding spot. Vega followed up with a barrage of assault rifle fire before they both ducked back down.

“Paddle, huh?” Vega panted. “That what you like, Lobo? I’ll keep it in mind.”

“Shut the fuck up.” But Duke had smiled for the first time in days. “I’m just trying to keep you alive. We’re all mortal, you know.”

“Speak for yourself, Lobo!” James shouted back as he stood up again to let out another burst of bullets. He had a breathless grin on his face as he crouched back down. “I plan to live forever.”

“You’re going about it entirely the wrong way.” Duke flashed him an answering smile before peering over their cargo-container shelter. “Holy shit.”

“What?” James asked as Duke returned to crouching beside him.

“He made it back.”

Sure enough, the ancient mech had exploded out of the water back onto their spit of metal and rock. The cockpit opened, and Caderyn Shepard tumbled out onto the deck. “Shit,” James breathed.

“Brutes, one o’clock!” Kaidan’s voice broke through their relief. “They’re going after Shepard!”

“Shepard!” Ashley screamed. “Cade! Get up! Cade!”

Shepard crawled lamely forward a few feet before collapsing as Duke hollered, “Cade!” and the two brutes closed on him.

And then one of the brutes turned and slugged the other in the face.

Duke didn’t take long to formulate a plan. They hefted their shotgun onto their back, allowing the sparking pool inside them to well up to their hands as blue light. “James. I pull them, you open fire.”

“Roger.” Vega ejected his empty thermal clip and reloaded.

“And don’t hit Cade. On my mark.”

Vega flashed them a look, and Duke’s impulse took over. They grabbed his shoulder and pressed their lips to his for a fierce second before drawing back and whispering, “Three, two, one, now.”

They shouted in unison as Duke threw their power outward, catching the brutes and yanking their closed fists back to them to pull the creatures off their feet with biotic force. James poured his clip into the off-balance brutes, and Duke shouted, “Ash! Kaidan! Get him to the shuttle!” They vaulted the cargo container that had shielded them, James following them with his gun still up. They blasted brutes and husks and marauders out of their way. Nothing was going to get in their way. Nothing was going to get to Cade.

Kaidan and Ashley managed to hoist Cade’s dead weight over their shoulders and started for where Cortez was making a hasty landing in the repaired shuttle. Duke was aware of nothing save the hum of biotics and blood in their ears and of shouting, “Go, go, go!” until James nearly clotheslined them to grab them and get them into the shuttle. The door closed, and Duke felt the familiar lurch in their center of gravity that meant the shuttle was taking off.

“Dammit, we got a Reaper inbound!”

“We what?” Duke demanded, stumbling to behind Cortez’s cockpit. Sure enough, a Reaper’s maw was opening before them, the red light powering up–

And down, and the shuttle passed under it and out of harm. “Shit,” Duke breathed. “What the hell was that?”

“Shepard, snap out of it! He’s freezing!”

Duke turned to the back just as Cade came to, coughing and dry-heaving. “You okay?” Kaidan asked.

“Yeah… Yeah, I’m fine.” Cade pushed himself up to sit on the bench, still shaking his head as if to clear it. “Hell of a headache.”

“Never do that again.” The shake was gone from Ashley’s voice.

“James, what you said about living forever?” Duke called. “Future reference, getting in a mech that’s old as dirt and jumping into a fucking ocean to find something more powerful than a Reaper that may or may not be on our side? Not a good way to do that.” Their voice softened the tiniest bit as Cade met their eyes. “We’re all mortal, you know.”