Lessons

"Fly, bitch!"

Her body heaved with effort. Sweat dripped into her eyelashes and painted lines down her bare, decorated abdomen. With a feral grunt she vaulted over a shipment container, limbs blue and crackling with biotic energy, and landed in a crouch. Before the merc in front of her could replace his clip, Jack stuck out a hand. His body smeared into a blur of yellow Eclipse armor before it struck with startling force against the opposite wall.

Jack threw another mercenary fifty feet back in the time it took her to drag in a breath. Her chest tightened in response. It was a damn good thing Shepard worked quick because Jack simply didn't have the stamina to go full tilt like this for long. She resisted a groan as another enemy approached from the left. Her arm swung left and a colossal force heaved him from the ground before slamming him back so hard the shock almost knocked her off balance.

She was panting like a fucking varren, Christ. Her legs pounded underneath her as she bounded over another wall of stacked cargo.

"Jack!"

She heard Shepard's voice somewhere in the discord. He sounded pissed. Not that it was a huge surprise. He was always telling her to stick to cover and to pace herself in firefights like this. She snorted mid-stride. Pace herself? Fuck that. She hadn't been manufactured to do this kind of shit with a lot of finesse. Her biotics were about as volatile as her mouth. Everything she did was full force, unapologetic and unhinged. Sure, she lost her mojo faster than Shepard did with his rifle and back pressed against the wall, but she'd take results over mojo any day.

She liked going toe to toe with her enemies. Liked hearing them grunt and groan, watching the life leave them in loaded increments delivered by her hand. Where was the thrill in blowing someone's head off from thirty feet away? Jack had been conditioned to enjoy killing up-close and personal. Though she was long past being pumped with drugs every time she delivered a hit, the elation that followed hadn't left her. Thus, she'd developed a habit of running headlong into their enemies. And disobeying Shepard, apparently.

Her breath snagged in her throat as she let loose a roar and hurled another large biotic mass at an enemy to her right. The hit connected –with the merc and about six storage containers behind him. Red sand burst like a ruptured sunset in the blue afterglow of his corpse and choked the room.

"Damn it, Jack!"

She smirked, letting the cloud wash over her. Sweet, exhilarating familiarity. Her stamina somewhat increased by the exposure, she turned on the remaining targets and sent a shockwave for them that felt as though it could blow the entire fucking Citadel out. The heavy reverberations of energy shook the cargo bay like a drum before reaching the mercs and blasting them sky high.

Unfortunately, she almost blew Garrus sky high too. She was about as shitty with her aim as she was with her control. She heard a muffled curse before the turian got enough sense to roll out of the way of a shower of shipping containers that got caught up in the shockwave. When the dust settled and the echoes faded, silence dampened the room. A quick glance affirmed everybody was dead. Everyone besides her, a pissed off turian and a really pissed off Spectre, of course.

Jack braced her hands on her knees and caught her breath. A bead of sweat dripped from her chin onto the floor. Another snaked from the bridge of her nose to the tip before falling somewhere near her boot. The sound of someone sheathing a rifle met her ears. She straightened with a huff of air to find Garrus standing in front of her.

He stood a good foot taller than her and made a point to look down at her with disapproving, predatory eyes. She met his gaze. Of course, the polite thing to do would have been to apologize. But that wasn't really her style. Besides, she was about to get ripped a new asshole anyway in three, two, one…

"I told you to stay behind cover," Shepard said at her elbow.

He hitched his own rifle onto the back of his gleaming armor and glowered at her when she turned to look at him. Her breathing slowed just enough for her to laugh dryly.

"Don't act like I didn't just save us a good five minutes," she said, jutting her chin out.

"You also almost took out Garrus."

She passed a look at the turian and then popped her lean shoulders in response.

"But I didn't," she wiped her upper lip of sweat, "Besides, he's a big boy. He can take care of himself."

"Your confidence is inspiring, as always, Jack," Garrus said dryly.

She turned her eyes back to Shepard, who only continued to glare. Her head rolled back and forth as she stretched out her neck. Fuck, she was sore. She wasn't used to going this hard this frequently and Shepard wasn't big on taking breaks with the Collectors riding his ass. Not that she blamed him.

"You gonna slap my wrist some more?" she asked, "Or can we go?"

Shepard held a damn good poker face, she'd give him that. She could feel the heat of his anger coming off him in waves but he merely tightened his mouth and moved past her.

"We'll talk about this later."

She scoffed before following after him, "Whatever."

Of course, she hadn't really expected him to follow up with the threat. She assumed Shepard had bigger things to deal with than her minimal insubordination. But that night he called her up from her dark, quiet cave with a voice that left no room for argument.

"Jack, meet me in the hangar."

The intercom switched off and Jack sighed. She stayed still for a moment, arms behind her head and body stretched out on the cold metal slab she designated as her bed. There literally weren't enough words in the English language to express how much she loathed the idea of meeting Shepard anywhere on the ship. So she used two that summed it up the best.

"Fuck me."

But an order was an order, and she'd made a commitment to him. In return for a shit load of Cerberus files she wasn't even halfway through combing through. It was probably in her best interest to at least hear what he had to say.

She swung her legs over the edge of her sleeping area and ran her thin, tattooed hands over her face. When she stood, the low red light painted her skin in blood. She squinted at it before swearing once more and jogging up the stairs toward the elevator.

Jack hated leaving the engineering deck. Down there, she wasn't bothered. No one looked at her like she had four fucking heads. Shepard was the only one who ever visited –everyone else was either too scared or didn't have access. She liked it better that way. The less of the crew she had to interact with, the better it was for everyone.

She punched the button on the elevator, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one was about to join her. The doors slid open and she quickly closed herself inside. So far so good. The metal box lowered a floor and spit her out into the dark hangar a few seconds later. The cool air brushed against her almost bare upper half as she stepped out, heavy-lidded eyes searching for Shepard in the shadows.

"Jack," he materialized at her side.

"Make it quick, Shepard," she said through her teeth.

"You might be out of luck with that one."

She let her eyes fixate on his, searching for answers in his face. He almost looked smug. Whatever this was about, she was sure she wasn't going to like it. She folded her sinewy arms over her chest and shifted her weight to one side.

"What the fuck is this about?"

"This is about your performance today on the Citadel," he said evenly.

"Not this again."

"Yes, this again, Jack," he sighed, "You're biotics are powerful, but you don't understand how to control them."

She bristled, immediately defensive. Who was he to criticize her? It wasn't like Cerberus took the time to teach her any fucking technique.

"If you're going to be on my team, you're going to learn how to use your abilities in an productive way instead of a destructive one."

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," she groaned.

Shepard didn't move a muscle, "Deadly serious."

"I said I would fight for you, Shepard, I didn't agree to anger management classes."

"Not exactly what I had in mind," he said.

All right. Now he was definitely smirking. She opened her mouth to call him out on it when another figure emerged from the shadows. The lowlight from the hangar illuminated the assassin slowly, starting at his boots and travelling all the way up to a pair of expressive black on black eyes. He nodded at her and clasped his hands behind his back.

She'd only been out on a mission with Thane once. His was a presence that unsettled her. He was too calm, too reserved, too calculated. Everything about him rubbed her the wrong way from his spirituality to his steady, controlled presence. He was her opposing force in every way imaginable.

And just like that, she figured out Shepard's plan.

"No," she blurted out.

Shepard ignored her and gestured with a hand to the drell, "I asked Thane to give you some lessons in the art of restraint."

"I. Don't. Need. Lessons," she hissed the words through clenched teeth. Rage boiled up in her.

Shepard remained firm, "It's not up for discussion."

He moved past her toward the elevator.

"Your first lesson starts now, and I expect you to be on your best behavior."

She could hear the smirk in his voice. He wasn't even trying to hide it. The elevator doors pinged open and she whipped her head around.

"Bite me, Shepard."

The doors closed and an oppressive silence began to suffocate her. She turned back to Thane, who hadn't moved an inch. Her fists clenched.

He lifted his head and the dark rumble of his voice made her skin prickle.

"Shall we begin?"

Bear with me with this pairing. I've just always needed to know what would happen between these two.

This will be as much of an experiment as it will be a self-indulgent thing for me.

Reviews always appreciated!

Enjoy!