Shepard's Lost Sister
anonymous
June 10 2015, 13:36:29 UTC
When Mindoir was attacked most of Shepards friends and family were killed, but what if Shepard’s sister was captured by the batarians?
Things get worse for her.
Working through intermediaries, she is purchased by a human extremist group we all know as Cerberus and becomes known as Subject Zero and later on Jack.
Years later the two reunite during Mass Effect 2 but don’t recognise each other and everyone on the ship is ignorant of the connection, even Miranda, with The Illusive Man being the only one alive who knows the connection.
If Shepard and Jack become friends it would be interesting to see the TIM’s observations, more so if they were to become closer.
Could be played for laughs or drama, e.g: TIM trying to get Miranda to get in between the siblings (he may condone horrific experiments but there are some things he won’t condone.) Or the potential fallout with Shepard and the rest of the crew should the truth come to light e.g. Jack needs a blood transfusion after Suicide Mission and Shepard volunteers and Dr Chackwas finds out that way.
Once again this story could be played for laughs or drama.
If posting outside of the KMeme please post a link.
Thanks for reading this prompt and I hope someone takes this up.
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister
anonymous
June 23 2015, 22:39:53 UTC
I've tweaked the prompt a bit to keep the story from contradicting canon. Instead of Batarians, Jack (who had been separated from her family during the attack)hid in the burned out ruins when the alliance crew (that rescued Shep) came. She was later found by another, non-military, cleanup crew and dealt with by the foster care system. The ages get a little wonky since she is 8 instead of 5 when Cerberus got their hands on her, but we will chalk it up the memory loss to the extreme trauma visited upon her by those nasty scientists. I'm just assuming that the reason Miranda doesn't know is because TIM would have scrubbed the data from any source Shep had access to before he sent him Jack's dossier.
You also didn't mention whether you wanted femshep or broshep so I'm choosing broshep as he is my headcanon from my first playthrough. -------------------------------------------------------------------
Jack hated The Ratcage. Old Bat that ran the place insisted it was called “the Medbay,” but Jack knew a cage when she saw one. She'd been poked and prodded by people wearing clean white suits and plastic gloves more than enough for one lifetime, but what was she going to do? There was a hole in her chest. A big hole. So she laid back on the table with its crinkly wax paper that must be there to keep the rest of the crew from catching her Crazy and didn't tear the aging doctor in half with biotics. Doctors were good for holes in the chest. Keep it cool. Shepard came in through the airlock looking like an overprotective little pussy, all nervous and sincere and shit. Jack kinda wanted to punch him. She wouldn't, though, because if it wasn't for him there would be a lot more holes in her, probably in more vital places. “Commander,” said Dr. Chakwas. “If you would talk some sense into our young friend here, I would greatly appreciate it. She won't allow me to apply anesthesia to reduce discomfort while I remove the shrapnel.” “No one's doping me, Shepard. That's how you wake up in an ally without any kidneys or dignity.” “I don't see any alleys around here, Jack. Dr. Chakwas isn't going to hurt you. You can trust her.” The big idiot looked like he meant it, too. His naivety made Jack a little sick to her stomach. No one trusted doctors. That wasn't even a crazy biotic experiment thing, that was an everyone thing. “I don't trust people who use 'doctor' instead of first names. She's not doping me.” Jack snarled. “Then trust me, Jack. I'm not going anywhere. If I see her going for your kidneys I'll put her in a headlock,” Shepard deadpanned. Goddamnit, why did that make her feel better? Jack hated it when people pretended to be all noble and shit. I'll protect you, young damsel! There's no catch at all! Of course, if you feel the need to take all your clothes off so I can fuck you senseless later, I would be obliged to honor your request! Ha ha! Okay, stop with the crazy for a second. Shepard has never tried anything with you. Maybe he had even helped a little. No one ever helped. It made Jack nervous just thinking about it. But he had done right by her on Pragia in That Place. She could hardly begrudge him his big brother routine. “Fine, if it will get you to stop mooning, you overprotective ass,” Jack all but growled. “That's the spirit, Jack! Deflect my good intentions with bad humor and a surly attitude! You'll be back to normal in no time!” Sometimes Jack wanted to kill him, just like she wanted to kill pretty much everyone else. Then again, sometimes he threw her over his shoulder and carried her, her gear, his gear, and both of their guns for 400 yards through enemy fire when she fucked up and took a big hunk of shrapnel in the chest. So he was good for something. “Just dope me and get it over with. If I'm sore in places I shouldn't be when I wake up I'm going to rip you to pieces with my brain.” “You'll be fine, Jack. You're tough. The fancy needles she uses don't even hurt,” Shepard joked. “Little, tiny pieces,” she did growl this time. That was the last thing Jack remembered, because the damned doctor has snuck up while she wasn't looking and doped her.
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 2/?
anonymous
June 23 2015, 23:35:56 UTC
Miranda could not in good conscience go behind John's back about the whole Jack situation. Under normal circumstances, she would have ignored her conscience and done what was best for the mission, but the circumstances were never normal with John. He got under her skin and complicated everything, and he was so good-natured and sincere that you couldn't ever call him on it. It was infuriating. After informing The Illusive Man in a standard report about the latest mission's abortion, the subsequent rescue of Jack when John heroically and psychotically biotic charged over a hundred yards to slam himself into a Collector, his increasingly insane decision to then nova his entire barrier away to clear the area of husks, and his suicidal fireman's carry back to safety, she had been expecting support from her superior within Cerberus. His reply had been more than a little frustrating.
Operative Lawson, The Commander is in charge of both tactical decisions and medical procedure aboard the Normandy. The Illusive Man
Miranda knew Jack was a liability, but she couldn't convince John. He wanted to see the good in everyone. Jack, or what was left of her, wasn't good. She was even more damaged than the rest of the crew, and everyone on board had been through some serious trauma over the course of their lives. Miranda had done her research. John wanted to help her, wanted to fix her. No, that wasn't fair. He wasn't deluded, he was just so damned determined to help everyone. Miranda looked up from the datapad in her hand when she heard the airlock begin to regulate the air pressure on both sides of it. Speak of the devil. "I know what you're going to say, Miri. I'm not giving you her bloodwork. She's furious enough with me for letting Chakwas take it in the first place. You know how she is around-- around Cerberus," John delicately did not say "around you." Miranda and Jack had already had their share of disagreements, but the one neither of them was talking about out loud had happened after John and Jack and returned from the facility in which Jack had been imprisoned. They didn't need to talk about it. They both knew how ugly it was. "What if I can catch something the doctor can't? She is a ship's medic, John, not a geneticist. At least let Mordin look at it. He's probably the most prestigious published author on the subject." "We don't need a geneticist to find out if her bloodwork is normal. I just need to know that she's going to be okay. I don't want to find out the details of the long term effects of what Cerberus did to her. It's her business, not ours." There wasn't going to be any arguing with him about this. Once he dug his heels in, he never budged. Not for anyone or anything. Miranda had been there when he stood up to Aria T'Loak in the middle of her seat of power. It was a little bit terrifying, but she couldn't question his sincerity or effectiveness. "It's your call, John. Just don't be surprised when it blows up in your face." -------------------------------------------------- Before I continue to devote time to this, is there any interest in this fill? This is my first fill here so I would like any feedback you guys are willing to give.
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 2/?
anonymous
June 25 2015, 01:11:31 UTC
Alright, I'll try to keep filling in my spare time. Work is kind of hectic right night (I posted the first two parts on my day off), but I will use some of my spare time on this story. Honestly, I need the practice. Thanks for responding
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 3/?
anonymous
June 25 2015, 01:54:39 UTC
It had been six standard days since John had pulled Jack out of harm's way. She seemed to be doing fine, but he was still worried. She was acting erratically. She hadn't left her lair down beneath engineering in two days, but that wasn't alltogether out of her usual social pattern. They were on a long jump, a 3 day haul out to the middle of nowhere to deal with the next in a long series of crises. Tali, of all people, had been accused of treason by the Admiralty Board of the Flotilla. John knew that Tali was incapable of something like that. He had fought beside her, survived beside her, through hell and back. She was one of the most wonderful,loyal people he had ever had the honor to meet. He'd be damned before he let some politician from back home smear her name across the stars. So here they were, at the back end of nowhere headed toward who knew what, and for some reason his ship's medic had decided now was a good time to go crazy.
"Run that by me again, but this time use smaller words," John said.
"I'm sorry, Commander. I know this is a lot to take in, and I don't think I can express how surprised I am by it, but science doesn't lie. You and Jack share both the same father and the same mother. She is your sister."
"No she's not, doctor. I grew up on Mindoir in a little farming community fifty clicks from anything raised from the earth by man. Jack was raised in a hellish torture facility where insane scientists used her for some kind of derranged gladiator arena for children with biotics. I think I would have remembered if she was my sis... oh my God. No. They-- they died! They all died. She can't be... oh God, she's the right age. She's got the eyes. How didn't I see it before?" John got quiet for a while, not looking at the doctor. Could it be true? Had one of them survived, against all the odds? It seemed insane, impossible, but they had the data.
And then the truth came crashing in on him, the real reason why he didn't want the bloodwork report to be true. He had failed her. His baby sister had survived the brutal assault just like him. She had hidden, terrified and alone, and he hadn't found her. He never even looked. He had only thought about his own survival.
John stayed very still. He thought about the time he had survived on his own between the lightning rush of the Batarians and the time the Alliance had found him. He had found a little shelter, a small depression in a stone outcropping near the town, hardly worth calling a cave. He had been out in the fields near the treeline when the Batarians hit. He knew the land, knew where he would be safe from raiders. He hadn't run toward the conflict, toward his family. He had run away. And now, for the first time in his life, he realized that everything he had done since had been an attempt to wash away what he had done on that day. His actions in the Skyllian Blitz, his volunteer recon missions, his agreeing to undergo Vangaurd training, his appointment as a Spectre, all of it. He was trying to make up for that day.
Coward. Worthless. You left her. You let them take her to that place.
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 3/?
anonymous
March 12 2017, 23:16:37 UTC
Ohh, that last sentence made my heart ache. Hi, I know this is a weird place to leave a comment, but I was just looking around (going backward though the meme, and I thought I'd give this a try). I really, really like it so far. Thought I should say, even though I've not finished reading yet, and it's not really a complete story anyway. :)
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 4/?
anonymous
June 29 2015, 22:00:20 UTC
Jack was starting to get one of her feelings. Shepard hadn't been down for one of his little therapy sessions for more than a week. Normally that would be a good thing, but a bunch of other details were wrong too. He didn't say anything to anyone after they came back from that tin can the bucket heads called a ship. Jack was used to dealing with the authorities in Alliance and Citadel space, but the buckets played fast and loose with their law enforcement. Treason was some serious shit, even Jack had never been brought up on [i]those[/i] charges. Shepard had dealt with it and the weird little engineer had come back aboard, only now she was named after the ship for some reason. Jack wasn't really sure how he did it, but that was mostly true of everything he did. Nobody knew how Shepard was able to do what he did. That's what made him Shepard.
Jack couldn't shake the feeling that something major had changed for him. He was being cagey,hiding something, and that wasn't like him at all. Hell, he'd given her [i]full access[/i] to the Cerberus databanks when she'd asked for it. She didn't even have to ask twice, and in front of the Cheerleader too. If something had changed for Shepard it meant danger for Jack. He was about the only stable thing in her life, a life that had been anything but stable for as long as she could remember. She needed to start thinking about cutting loose. She needed a survival plan in case things with Shepard went sideways on her.
Jack was just activating her omnitool to access the extranet with vague plans about transport when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They weren't Shepard's, Jack had heard him descending enough times to know what his big stupid military boots sounded like. These were lighter, faster, and somehow bitchier. Jack knew who was coming before she came into view, she could practically [i]smell[/i] the Ice Queen's haughty, judgy attitude from here.
"Jack, I'm coming down. I'm not armed," Miranda said as she came into view on the stairwell. [i]Sure you're not[/i]. "We need to talk about John."
Jack backed into the corner with the most shadows, never taking her eyes off of her enemy. There was a pistol strapped to the far side of a cargo crate within easy reach, just in case, but if the bitch came at her she would opt for a biotic attack over conventional weaponry.
"What the fuck do you want that you couldn't say on a vid or in a message?" Jack asked, full of unbridled hostility. Miranda closed her eyes briefly, obviously suppressing a heated retort.
"This is important, and you don't open the vids or messages I send you." That was true enough, but it pissed Jack off that Miranda knew it. She hated to admit it, but she was pretty sure she and the Cheerleader had been thinking along the same lines about Shepard. Still, the way she said [i]John[/i] instead of Shepard or Shep like everyone else put Jack's hackles up.
"Fine. Talk." The hostility was not gone from Jack's voice.
"Something is seriously wrong with John. He won't talk about it. I'm worried about him. I know you don't like me, and to be honest I don't like you either. I think you're a danger to the mission and the ship, but for some reason I haven't been able to work out John trusts you. He's put himself to the hazard on multiple occasions to help and protect you. If working with me is the price of helping him, you owe it to him to put up with me until we figure this out." Miranda delivered the whole speech without stopping, like she had been rehearsing it in front of a mirror or something. It was irritating, but she was right. Actually, it was irritating [i]because[/i] she was right. [i]Fine[/i].
"Fine," Jack said grudgingly. "But I'm keeping you in front of me. I owe Shepard, but that doesn't mean I trust you any more than I can throw you." Miranda nodded. Jack did too.
Re: Version of 4 with working html
anonymous
June 30 2015, 23:37:42 UTC
[Sorry I forgot how html works for this post, I'm an idiot]
Jack was starting to get one of her feelings. Shepard hadn't been down for one of his little therapy sessions for more than a week. Normally that would be a good thing, but a bunch of other details were wrong too. He didn't say anything to anyone after they came back from that tin can the bucket heads called a ship. Jack was used to dealing with the authorities in Alliance and Citadel space, but the buckets played fast and loose with their law enforcement. Treason was some serious shit, even Jack had never been brought up on those charges. Shepard had dealt with it and the weird little engineer had come back aboard, only now she was named after the ship for some reason. Jack wasn't really sure how he did it, but that was mostly true of everything he did. Nobody knew how Shepard was able to do what he did. That's what made him Shepard.
Jack couldn't shake the feeling that something major had changed for him. He was being cagey,hiding something, and that wasn't like him at all. Hell, he'd given her full access to the Cerberus databanks when she'd asked for it. She didn't even have to ask twice, and in front of the Cheerleader too. If something had changed for Shepard it meant danger for Jack. He was about the only stable thing in her life, a life that had been anything but stable for as long as she could remember. She needed to start thinking about cutting loose. She needed a survival plan in case things with Shepard went sideways on her.
Jack was just activating her omnitool to access the extranet with vague plans about transport when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They weren't Shepard's, Jack had heard him descending enough times to know what his big stupid military boots sounded like. These were lighter, faster, and somehow bitchier. Jack knew who was coming before she came into view, she could practically smell the Ice Queen's haughty, judgy attitude from here.
"Jack, I'm coming down. I'm not armed," Miranda said as she came into view on the stairwell. Sure you're not. "We need to talk about John."
Jack backed into the corner with the most shadows, never taking her eyes off of her enemy. There was a pistol strapped to the far side of a cargo crate within easy reach, just in case, but if the bitch came at her she would opt for a biotic attack over conventional weaponry.
"What the fuck do you want that you couldn't say on a vid or in a message?" Jack asked, full of unbridled hostility. Miranda closed her eyes briefly, obviously suppressing a heated retort.
"This is important, and you don't open the vids or messages I send you." That was true enough, but it pissed Jack off that Miranda knew it. She hated to admit it, but she was pretty sure she and the Cheerleader had been thinking along the same lines about Shepard. Still, the way she said John instead of Shepard or Shep like everyone else put Jack's hackles up.
"Fine. Talk." The hostility was not gone from Jack's voice.
"Something is seriously wrong with John. He won't talk about it. I'm worried about him. I know you don't like me, and to be honest I don't like you either. I think you're a danger to the mission and the ship, but for some reason I haven't been able to work out John trusts you. He's put himself to the hazard on multiple occasions to help and protect you. If working with me is the price of helping him, you owe it to him to put up with me until we figure this out." Miranda delivered the whole speech without stopping, like she had been rehearsing it in front of a mirror or something. It was irritating, but she was right. Actually, it was irritating because she was right. Fine.
"Fine," Jack said grudgingly. "But I'm keeping you in front of me. I owe Shepard, but that doesn't mean I trust you any more than I can throw you." Miranda nodded. Jack did too.
Re: Version of 4 with working html
anonymous
March 12 2017, 23:21:07 UTC
Hi! Yes, it's me from the part above(geez, I'm always late to the party), just thought I'll let you know I find the fact that Miranda and Jack would team up to help Shepard really, really amusing. :D
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 5/?
anonymous
July 26 2015, 23:39:35 UTC
[Sorry about the long delay between postings, still working crazy hours.]
It had been surprisingly easy to convince Jack to work with her to find out what was going on with John. She knew that Jack and John had some kind of bond of trust, but neither of them ever talked about it with her. Jack for the obvious reason that she was obsessively private about anything to do with her emotional state (also because of her massive and arguably justified hatred for anyone connected to Cerberus) and John simply because he wanted to respect Jack's privacy. If she didn't want others to know something, that was her call. Even when, in Miranda's opinion, it put the mission and the crew in needless extra danger. If she ever stopped beating that dead horse, she might faint from shock.
The two women had brainstormed ideas down in Jack's freezing little cave for more than an hour, throwing out wildly complicated but ultimately impossible scenarios for discovering the source of John's strange behavior. In the end, they decided that stealth, diversion, and spying would all be too high of a risk and may indeed make the problem worse. Better, then, to approach the problem like John would. Blunt honesty, forthright concern. Jack was all for bluntness, but the honesty part seemed to make her nervous. Miranda found herself surprisingly sympathetic to the latter, though somewhat unnerved by the former. Showing all of their cards was definitely not in the nature of either woman, for obviously different reasons.
The plan was to corner John in the Captain's quarters, away from the prying eyes of everyone else on the ship (except for, of course, the ship's AI, but that was a headache for another day. EDI was at least discrete). If they could talk to him away from witnesses, he might be more willing to open up; he might be less likely to remain stoic so that the crew didn't see his emotional turmoil as weakness. His top priority was the mission's success and he knew, like any good officer, that the mission was exponentially more likely to fail if the crew lost morale.
Now all Miranda had to do was wait for John to finish his nightly routine of systems checks, his tour of the ship to be seen by the crew (again, for the sake of general morale), and his specific visits to the crew's specialists for both personal and professional updates. Once he was finished, he would head to the elevator to his quarters where he would most likely finish replying to priority messages and filling out daily reports both priority and mundane. He generally worked later than most of the crew, as Miranda knew from the few nights she had stayed in his quarters after their all-too-infrequent sex sessions to relieve the stress of the enormous burden they were both under. Self delusion doesn't suit you, dear. You know it's become more than that. That thought was more than a little frightening, but no less true for it. It was, in fact, one of the things that had led Miranda to parley with the crew member with whom she had the most personal and professional friction and who was most likely to stick a knife in her back if she ever let her guard down.
Don't become distracted. This is what you do. Think. Plan. Form a strategy and see it through. Adapt to new circumstances as they arise. Keep all threats at an appropriate distance but surrender no resources unless absolutely necessary. This had been the mentality that had seen her rise through the ranks of Cerberus more quickly than any other operative. If she was being honest with herself, it was also the reason she had survived that ascension. She could outmaneuver Jack if it came to that, and she gave herself even odds in a standup fight. Even odds were not to Miranda's liking. She had been in enough fair fights to know that fighting fair was for idealists and idiots, unless your name was John Shepard. She could never let it come to an open fight to the death with Jack.
She had a plan, part of which included Jack as an asset. Her initial strategy was set. Now it was time to wait.
Re: Shepard's Lost Sister 5/?
anonymous
July 29 2015, 04:36:32 UTC
A Miranda romance? Oh good lord, you've effectively made Jack and Miranda sisters-in-law. I'm not sure the galaxy is prepared for the level of drama that entails. Consider this my official "throwing support behind this fill" comment. ^_^b
Things get worse for her.
Working through intermediaries, she is purchased by a human extremist group we all know as Cerberus and becomes known as Subject Zero and later on Jack.
Years later the two reunite during Mass Effect 2 but don’t recognise each other and everyone on the ship is ignorant of the connection, even Miranda, with The Illusive Man being the only one alive who knows the connection.
If Shepard and Jack become friends it would be interesting to see the TIM’s observations, more so if they were to become closer.
Could be played for laughs or drama, e.g: TIM trying to get Miranda to get in between the siblings (he may condone horrific experiments but there are some things he won’t condone.) Or the potential fallout with Shepard and the rest of the crew should the truth come to light e.g. Jack needs a blood transfusion after Suicide Mission and Shepard volunteers and Dr Chackwas finds out that way.
Once again this story could be played for laughs or drama.
If posting outside of the KMeme please post a link.
Thanks for reading this prompt and I hope someone takes this up.
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You also didn't mention whether you wanted femshep or broshep so I'm choosing broshep as he is my headcanon from my first playthrough.
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Jack hated The Ratcage. Old Bat that ran the place insisted it was called “the Medbay,” but Jack knew a cage when she saw one. She'd been poked and prodded by people wearing clean white suits and plastic gloves more than enough for one lifetime, but what was she going to do? There was a hole in her chest. A big hole. So she laid back on the table with its crinkly wax paper that must be there to keep the rest of the crew from catching her Crazy and didn't tear the aging doctor in half with biotics. Doctors were good for holes in the chest. Keep it cool.
Shepard came in through the airlock looking like an overprotective little pussy, all nervous and sincere and shit. Jack kinda wanted to punch him. She wouldn't, though, because if it wasn't for him there would be a lot more holes in her, probably in more vital places.
“Commander,” said Dr. Chakwas. “If you would talk some sense into our young friend here, I would greatly appreciate it. She won't allow me to apply anesthesia to reduce discomfort while I remove the shrapnel.”
“No one's doping me, Shepard. That's how you wake up in an ally without any kidneys or dignity.”
“I don't see any alleys around here, Jack. Dr. Chakwas isn't going to hurt you. You can trust her.” The big idiot looked like he meant it, too. His naivety made Jack a little sick to her stomach. No one trusted doctors. That wasn't even a crazy biotic experiment thing, that was an everyone thing.
“I don't trust people who use 'doctor' instead of first names. She's not doping me.” Jack snarled.
“Then trust me, Jack. I'm not going anywhere. If I see her going for your kidneys I'll put her in a headlock,” Shepard deadpanned.
Goddamnit, why did that make her feel better? Jack hated it when people pretended to be all noble and shit. I'll protect you, young damsel! There's no catch at all! Of course, if you feel the need to take all your clothes off so I can fuck you senseless later, I would be obliged to honor your request! Ha ha! Okay, stop with the crazy for a second. Shepard has never tried anything with you. Maybe he had even helped a little. No one ever helped. It made Jack nervous just thinking about it. But he had done right by her on Pragia in That Place. She could hardly begrudge him his big brother routine.
“Fine, if it will get you to stop mooning, you overprotective ass,” Jack all but growled.
“That's the spirit, Jack! Deflect my good intentions with bad humor and a surly attitude! You'll be back to normal in no time!”
Sometimes Jack wanted to kill him, just like she wanted to kill pretty much everyone else. Then again, sometimes he threw her over his shoulder and carried her, her gear, his gear, and both of their guns for 400 yards through enemy fire when she fucked up and took a big hunk of shrapnel in the chest. So he was good for something.
“Just dope me and get it over with. If I'm sore in places I shouldn't be when I wake up I'm going to rip you to pieces with my brain.”
“You'll be fine, Jack. You're tough. The fancy needles she uses don't even hurt,” Shepard joked.
“Little, tiny pieces,” she did growl this time. That was the last thing Jack remembered, because the damned doctor has snuck up while she wasn't looking and doped her.
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After informing The Illusive Man in a standard report about the latest mission's abortion, the subsequent rescue of Jack when John heroically and psychotically biotic charged over a hundred yards to slam himself into a Collector, his increasingly insane decision to then nova his entire barrier away to clear the area of husks, and his suicidal fireman's carry back to safety, she had been expecting support from her superior within Cerberus. His reply had been more than a little frustrating.
Operative Lawson,
The Commander is in charge of both tactical decisions and medical procedure aboard the Normandy.
The Illusive Man
Miranda knew Jack was a liability, but she couldn't convince John. He wanted to see the good in everyone. Jack, or what was left of her, wasn't good. She was even more damaged than the rest of the crew, and everyone on board had been through some serious trauma over the course of their lives. Miranda had done her research.
John wanted to help her, wanted to fix her. No, that wasn't fair. He wasn't deluded, he was just so damned determined to help everyone.
Miranda looked up from the datapad in her hand when she heard the airlock begin to regulate the air pressure on both sides of it. Speak of the devil.
"I know what you're going to say, Miri. I'm not giving you her bloodwork. She's furious enough with me for letting Chakwas take it in the first place. You know how she is around-- around Cerberus," John delicately did not say "around you." Miranda and Jack had already had their share of disagreements, but the one neither of them was talking about out loud had happened after John and Jack and returned from the facility in which Jack had been imprisoned. They didn't need to talk about it. They both knew how ugly it was.
"What if I can catch something the doctor can't? She is a ship's medic, John, not a geneticist. At least let Mordin look at it. He's probably the most prestigious published author on the subject."
"We don't need a geneticist to find out if her bloodwork is normal. I just need to know that she's going to be okay. I don't want to find out the details of the long term effects of what Cerberus did to her. It's her business, not ours." There wasn't going to be any arguing with him about this. Once he dug his heels in, he never budged. Not for anyone or anything. Miranda had been there when he stood up to Aria T'Loak in the middle of her seat of power. It was a little bit terrifying, but she couldn't question his sincerity or effectiveness.
"It's your call, John. Just don't be surprised when it blows up in your face."
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Before I continue to devote time to this, is there any interest in this fill? This is my first fill here so I would like any feedback you guys are willing to give.
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would at least read the next part(s) to see where it goes.
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"Run that by me again, but this time use smaller words," John said.
"I'm sorry, Commander. I know this is a lot to take in, and I don't think I can express how surprised I am by it, but science doesn't lie. You and Jack share both the same father and the same mother. She is your sister."
"No she's not, doctor. I grew up on Mindoir in a little farming community fifty clicks from anything raised from the earth by man. Jack was raised in a hellish torture facility where insane scientists used her for some kind of derranged gladiator arena for children with biotics. I think I would have remembered if she was my sis... oh my God. No. They-- they died! They all died. She can't be... oh God, she's the right age. She's got the eyes. How didn't I see it before?" John got quiet for a while, not looking at the doctor. Could it be true? Had one of them survived, against all the odds? It seemed insane, impossible, but they had the data.
And then the truth came crashing in on him, the real reason why he didn't want the bloodwork report to be true. He had failed her. His baby sister had survived the brutal assault just like him. She had hidden, terrified and alone, and he hadn't found her. He never even looked. He had only thought about his own survival.
John stayed very still. He thought about the time he had survived on his own between the lightning rush of the Batarians and the time the Alliance had found him. He had found a little shelter, a small depression in a stone outcropping near the town, hardly worth calling a cave. He had been out in the fields near the treeline when the Batarians hit. He knew the land, knew where he would be safe from raiders. He hadn't run toward the conflict, toward his family. He had run away. And now, for the first time in his life, he realized that everything he had done since had been an attempt to wash away what he had done on that day. His actions in the Skyllian Blitz, his volunteer recon missions, his agreeing to undergo Vangaurd training, his appointment as a Spectre, all of it. He was trying to make up for that day.
Coward. Worthless. You left her. You let them take her to that place.
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Jack couldn't shake the feeling that something major had changed for him. He was being cagey,hiding something, and that wasn't like him at all. Hell, he'd given her [i]full access[/i] to the Cerberus databanks when she'd asked for it. She didn't even have to ask twice, and in front of the Cheerleader too. If something had changed for Shepard it meant danger for Jack. He was about the only stable thing in her life, a life that had been anything but stable for as long as she could remember. She needed to start thinking about cutting loose. She needed a survival plan in case things with Shepard went sideways on her.
Jack was just activating her omnitool to access the extranet with vague plans about transport when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They weren't Shepard's, Jack had heard him descending enough times to know what his big stupid military boots sounded like. These were lighter, faster, and somehow bitchier. Jack knew who was coming before she came into view, she could practically [i]smell[/i] the Ice Queen's haughty, judgy attitude from here.
"Jack, I'm coming down. I'm not armed," Miranda said as she came into view on the stairwell. [i]Sure you're not[/i]. "We need to talk about John."
Jack backed into the corner with the most shadows, never taking her eyes off of her enemy. There was a pistol strapped to the far side of a cargo crate within easy reach, just in case, but if the bitch came at her she would opt for a biotic attack over conventional weaponry.
"What the fuck do you want that you couldn't say on a vid or in a message?" Jack asked, full of unbridled hostility. Miranda closed her eyes briefly, obviously suppressing a heated retort.
"This is important, and you don't open the vids or messages I send you." That was true enough, but it pissed Jack off that Miranda knew it. She hated to admit it, but she was pretty sure she and the Cheerleader had been thinking along the same lines about Shepard. Still, the way she said [i]John[/i] instead of Shepard or Shep like everyone else put Jack's hackles up.
"Fine. Talk." The hostility was not gone from Jack's voice.
"Something is seriously wrong with John. He won't talk about it. I'm worried about him. I know you don't like me, and to be honest I don't like you either. I think you're a danger to the mission and the ship, but for some reason I haven't been able to work out John trusts you. He's put himself to the hazard on multiple occasions to help and protect you. If working with me is the price of helping him, you owe it to him to put up with me until we figure this out." Miranda delivered the whole speech without stopping, like she had been rehearsing it in front of a mirror or something. It was irritating, but she was right. Actually, it was irritating [i]because[/i] she was right. [i]Fine[/i].
"Fine," Jack said grudgingly. "But I'm keeping you in front of me. I owe Shepard, but that doesn't mean I trust you any more than I can throw you." Miranda nodded. Jack did too.
Then they started to plan.
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Jack was starting to get one of her feelings. Shepard hadn't been down for one of his little therapy sessions for more than a week. Normally that would be a good thing, but a bunch of other details were wrong too. He didn't say anything to anyone after they came back from that tin can the bucket heads called a ship. Jack was used to dealing with the authorities in Alliance and Citadel space, but the buckets played fast and loose with their law enforcement. Treason was some serious shit, even Jack had never been brought up on those charges. Shepard had dealt with it and the weird little engineer had come back aboard, only now she was named after the ship for some reason. Jack wasn't really sure how he did it, but that was mostly true of everything he did. Nobody knew how Shepard was able to do what he did. That's what made him Shepard.
Jack couldn't shake the feeling that something major had changed for him. He was being cagey,hiding something, and that wasn't like him at all. Hell, he'd given her full access to the Cerberus databanks when she'd asked for it. She didn't even have to ask twice, and in front of the Cheerleader too. If something had changed for Shepard it meant danger for Jack. He was about the only stable thing in her life, a life that had been anything but stable for as long as she could remember. She needed to start thinking about cutting loose. She needed a survival plan in case things with Shepard went sideways on her.
Jack was just activating her omnitool to access the extranet with vague plans about transport when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They weren't Shepard's, Jack had heard him descending enough times to know what his big stupid military boots sounded like. These were lighter, faster, and somehow bitchier. Jack knew who was coming before she came into view, she could practically smell the Ice Queen's haughty, judgy attitude from here.
"Jack, I'm coming down. I'm not armed," Miranda said as she came into view on the stairwell. Sure you're not. "We need to talk about John."
Jack backed into the corner with the most shadows, never taking her eyes off of her enemy. There was a pistol strapped to the far side of a cargo crate within easy reach, just in case, but if the bitch came at her she would opt for a biotic attack over conventional weaponry.
"What the fuck do you want that you couldn't say on a vid or in a message?" Jack asked, full of unbridled hostility. Miranda closed her eyes briefly, obviously suppressing a heated retort.
"This is important, and you don't open the vids or messages I send you." That was true enough, but it pissed Jack off that Miranda knew it. She hated to admit it, but she was pretty sure she and the Cheerleader had been thinking along the same lines about Shepard. Still, the way she said John instead of Shepard or Shep like everyone else put Jack's hackles up.
"Fine. Talk." The hostility was not gone from Jack's voice.
"Something is seriously wrong with John. He won't talk about it. I'm worried about him. I know you don't like me, and to be honest I don't like you either. I think you're a danger to the mission and the ship, but for some reason I haven't been able to work out John trusts you. He's put himself to the hazard on multiple occasions to help and protect you. If working with me is the price of helping him, you owe it to him to put up with me until we figure this out." Miranda delivered the whole speech without stopping, like she had been rehearsing it in front of a mirror or something. It was irritating, but she was right. Actually, it was irritating because she was right. Fine.
"Fine," Jack said grudgingly. "But I'm keeping you in front of me. I owe Shepard, but that doesn't mean I trust you any more than I can throw you." Miranda nodded. Jack did too.
Then they started to plan.
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It had been surprisingly easy to convince Jack to work with her to find out what was going on with John. She knew that Jack and John had some kind of bond of trust, but neither of them ever talked about it with her. Jack for the obvious reason that she was obsessively private about anything to do with her emotional state (also because of her massive and arguably justified hatred for anyone connected to Cerberus) and John simply because he wanted to respect Jack's privacy. If she didn't want others to know something, that was her call. Even when, in Miranda's opinion, it put the mission and the crew in needless extra danger. If she ever stopped beating that dead horse, she might faint from shock.
The two women had brainstormed ideas down in Jack's freezing little cave for more than an hour, throwing out wildly complicated but ultimately impossible scenarios for discovering the source of John's strange behavior. In the end, they decided that stealth, diversion, and spying would all be too high of a risk and may indeed make the problem worse. Better, then, to approach the problem like John would. Blunt honesty, forthright concern. Jack was all for bluntness, but the honesty part seemed to make her nervous. Miranda found herself surprisingly sympathetic to the latter, though somewhat unnerved by the former. Showing all of their cards was definitely not in the nature of either woman, for obviously different reasons.
The plan was to corner John in the Captain's quarters, away from the prying eyes of everyone else on the ship (except for, of course, the ship's AI, but that was a headache for another day. EDI was at least discrete). If they could talk to him away from witnesses, he might be more willing to open up; he might be less likely to remain stoic so that the crew didn't see his emotional turmoil as weakness. His top priority was the mission's success and he knew, like any good officer, that the mission was exponentially more likely to fail if the crew lost morale.
Now all Miranda had to do was wait for John to finish his nightly routine of systems checks, his tour of the ship to be seen by the crew (again, for the sake of general morale), and his specific visits to the crew's specialists for both personal and professional updates. Once he was finished, he would head to the elevator to his quarters where he would most likely finish replying to priority messages and filling out daily reports both priority and mundane. He generally worked later than most of the crew, as Miranda knew from the few nights she had stayed in his quarters after their all-too-infrequent sex sessions to relieve the stress of the enormous burden they were both under. Self delusion doesn't suit you, dear. You know it's become more than that. That thought was more than a little frightening, but no less true for it. It was, in fact, one of the things that had led Miranda to parley with the crew member with whom she had the most personal and professional friction and who was most likely to stick a knife in her back if she ever let her guard down.
Don't become distracted. This is what you do. Think. Plan. Form a strategy and see it through. Adapt to new circumstances as they arise. Keep all threats at an appropriate distance but surrender no resources unless absolutely necessary. This had been the mentality that had seen her rise through the ranks of Cerberus more quickly than any other operative. If she was being honest with herself, it was also the reason she had survived that ascension. She could outmaneuver Jack if it came to that, and she gave herself even odds in a standup fight. Even odds were not to Miranda's liking. She had been in enough fair fights to know that fighting fair was for idealists and idiots, unless your name was John Shepard. She could never let it come to an open fight to the death with Jack.
She had a plan, part of which included Jack as an asset. Her initial strategy was set. Now it was time to wait.
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Consider this my official "throwing support behind this fill" comment. ^_^b
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