New Dawn (OT5. SPD)
So, as of today I've been on lj for a year (sorry, you're still stuck with me. :P) and what better way to celebrate than with SWAT fic? Apologies to those who don't actually read it. :) It follows straight on from Defence Mechanism by kikos-ai. Many thanks to kikos-ai and wild_force71 for the beta. :)
Title: New Dawn
Pairing: Jack/Sky/Bridge/Syd/Z
Rating: PG-13
Sky shifted against the side of Bridge’s bed, trying to get comfortable. With four people pinning his legs to the floor he’d lost most of the sensation in them and his back was beginning to ache from the uncomfortable position. There was no chance of him getting up and moving around, not with his teammates lying on top of him, so that meant he was stuck there, with nothing to do but think.
It hadn’t been so bad at first, Jack’s hand slowly going limp as he fell asleep, and he’d spent a few minutes simply continuing the random patterns on the back of Jack’s hand he’d been drawing before Jack had drifted off. The peace couldn’t last forever though, and it wasn’t long before the events of the previous couple of hours began replaying, before the day itself began replaying. His hands tightened reflexively as he remembered Jack and Bridge’s description of the room Bridge had been in, reliving over again the sharp spike of fear over how close he’d come to losing his roommate.
But that was nothing; nothing, compared to the insanity which had followed, and the worst of it was it was his fault-- he’d started the whole damn thing by kissing Jack. Damn the man. Damn him for looking so haunted and un-Jack-like that kissing him had been his first instinct, trying to wipe that look away. It had been worth it though, part of him smugly pointed out. That kiss had been… well, it had been really something. He sighed to himself. It wasn’t kissing Jack that had been the problem, it was what had come after that: kissing Bridge; kissing Syd; kissing Z. Hell, there’d even been group kissing and all of it had felt so right, like it just fit, like it was something that was supposed to happen and therein lay part of the problem. It wasn’t something that was supposed to just happen. There were five of them, for God’s sake, there was no way that anything about what had happened this evening could be considered normal.
Gently disentangling his hand from Jack’s, Sky rubbed his arms reflexively against the goosebumps and made the mistake of looking over at his team. Wrapped around each other as they were, they looked absolutely perfect and he clamped down hard on that. It wasn’t perfect, because it wasn’t right. They were breaking the regs big time, just by being here. Jack could probably have got away with it, but there were rules against the two genders sharing quarters at night. Unless they were married anyway, like some of the officers on base. If anyone found out Syd and Z had spent the night in here, they’d all be in trouble.
He cursed softly under his breath, frustration getting the better of him. Thinking about his team and the things the five of them had gotten up to that night wasn’t productive; it wasn’t helping him get his thoughts in any kind of order and it wouldn’t help with the potential fallout. What if it all went wrong anyway? They all had their baggage and he and Jack could butt heads at the drop of a hat-- what if they argued so badly things couldn’t be fixed? They were fighting a war, they couldn’t afford to get into something that would distract them from that; never mind that it had the potential to make them stronger. What if, he shuddered, the Commander found out? Cruger would flip if he found out about this, Sky didn’t have any doubts about that and he didn’t even want to think about what the consequences would be if he did.
He turned his head and stared fixedly at the window, glad that it was summer and that consequently he and Bridge had left the curtains open; that made it much easier to focus on the slowly brightening sky outside, because the minute it was light enough he was getting out of here and going for a run.
***
Jack woke to the sensation of someone shaking him. “Come on, Jack, time to get up.”
“Go ‘way, Z,” he mumbled. “’s comfortable.”
“Jack, get your lazy butt up.”
Jack frowned. That didn’t sound like Z, that sounded like… he pried one eye open. “Syd?” Wait a minute, why was Syd…? Oh. Yeah. Memories of the previous day flooded back, fear a sharply edged blade, replaced by a deep sense of comfort that he hadn’t felt in far too long. He sat up, automatically pushing his dreads out of his face, feeling more awake than he had mere moments before. There they were, all of them: Bridge (thank God); Syd; Z; Sky… No. He blinked, re-examining the room in case he’d somehow missed the taller man, but no. Sky was notable by his absence. “Where’s Sky?” he asked anyway, with the faint hope that maybe he was in the bathroom or something.
“No idea,” Z replied. “He was gone when we woke up.”
Of course he was. “Okay,” he muttered, “raise your hand if you think we should have seen this coming.” Four hands raised in unison. “Alright, we’ll need to track him down. What time is it?”
“Six o’clock,” Z replied.
“Six o’clock?” he repeated incredulously. “Why’d you wake me up if it’s only six in the morning?”
“Firstly? Because Syd and I need to get back to our room before anyone notices we didn’t spend the night there. Secondly? The sooner we start looking the sooner we find Sky and beat the sense into him.”
Try as he might, Jack couldn’t fault that logic and sighed reluctantly. “Okay, fine. The minute we’re dressed and ready we meet in the rec. room. We can figure out how to find Sky while we’re there.”
***
Emptying the remains of his water bottle over his head, Sky slowed to a halt, hands resting against his knees as he caught his breath. The run hadn’t helped at all, except that maybe it had left him too tired to care anymore. His only problem now was getting back to his room so he could grab a shower and get dressed without running into any of his teammates, especially as that would pretty much defeat the purpose of his run. The one upside of having the reputation he did was that no one thought to question why he was up and running so early in the morning, because if he’d had to answer any questions he would probably have snapped like a twig.
Just as he came in sight of the door leading back inside, he caught a brief flicker of green out the corner of his eye and he stepped back immediately before Bridge could look his way and spot him. Damn it, he swore inwardly, they knew he was missing already. He hadn’t counted on them catching on quite so quickly and it just meant it was going to be harder to avoid them if they knew that was what he was doing. Damn it. Sometimes his teammates were a hell of a lot smarter than he gave them credit for.
***
“Any luck?” Jack asked, not holding out much hope. If any of them had found their reluctant blue ranger they’d have called it in by now. He asked anyway. As he’d expected he was met with a round of negatives and he slumped back against his seat in the rec. room. “Me either.” Damn it, why was Sky avoiding them? It didn’t make any sense. He closed his eyes and gave himself a mental slap up the head. Of course it made sense. Last night had been… unusual and Sky’s default reaction to anything that meant he might be getting in over his head with was to avoid it; hence the avoiding of them. And considering it was now lunchtime and half the day was gone without them having spotted him once, he was doing a damn good job of it.
***
It was a conspiracy, Sky was certain. Practically everywhere he went he had to do some last minute scrambling to avoid a teammate and he wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep it up. Every time he thought he was safe he’d catch a glimpse of pink, a flash of yellow, snatches of green and red; it seemed like there was nowhere he could go without having to detour to avoid his team. Most of them he could avoid relatively easily, but the conspiracy that was now his life kept throwing him in Bridge’s path and it was getting harder and harder to stay out of his way. Especially when all he could think of was tousled hair and lips that curved in a smile even as they kissed him.
He needed to hit something, take his mind off dangerous subjects like Bridge, Jack and the girls and channel his frustrated energy into something constructive. Unfortunately, just when an attack of krybots would have come in handy, Gruumm remained stubbornly quiet. It was as if the Troobian emperor knew he was suffering and was maliciously staying silent to deny him the chance of relieving some tension. He couldn’t go to any of the training rooms, because he knew the others had them staked out somehow and the moment he turned up there, they’d strike. He wasn’t ready to deal with them yet, so he stayed away.
***
“Alright,” Syd said, as they grouped inside Bridge’s favourite lab. “Enough is enough. RIC.” The robotic dog looked up at the sound of his name and then bounded over to where the pink ranger was crouched, tail wagging madly. “RIC, find Sky. He’s avoiding us and we can’t find him, so we’re counting on you, okay?”
RIC let out a cheerful cockcrow and spun around, all but bouncing out the door.
“Setting RIC on him?” Z commented. “That’s low, Syd.” She grinned wickedly. “I approve.”
Syd gave her roommate a look that was part glare, part smile and shrugged. “Well, nothing else is working.”
***
Sky sat on the roof of the base, staring out over the city as the sun steadily sank. He wasn’t looking forward to curfew. He’d managed to avoid his team for the day, but when Lights Out came around he’d have to be back in his room; back with Bridge. And the odds of Bridge not calling in the others the moment he entered the room weren’t good. By now they’d all be irritated with him anyway and there was no away he’d be able to avoid that guilt trip. He wished he could stay up here for the night.
From up here it was all but impossible to see the people moving around the city; walking along the streets, driving down the roads, riding the metro, all of them heading home now that their work was done. He wondered idly what they’d think if they knew what had happened between their rangers last night; if they’d be disbelieving, horrified, amused, thinking it was all just some kind of joke. But it wasn’t a joke, it was deadly serious and had potentially devastating consequences. If the people of New Tech lost faith in their rangers…
His eyes wandered across the cityscape, resting in the direction of his mom’s house, and he winced at the thought of what his mother would say if she knew about this. If his father was still alive he… he swallowed, tearing his thoughts away. Brooding over what-might-have-been’s was no good, you’d think he would have learned that by now.
“You know,” Jack’s voice said casually behind him, “there’s not much point in having a group sleeping pile if one of the group’s gone when you wake up.”
“Went for a run,” he replied neutrally.
“All day? Even for you that’s masochistic.”
“Shut up, Jack.” It shouldn’t be coming this easily, he thought somewhat desperately. They shouldn’t be falling into these rhythms as if nothing had happened.
“And why would I do that?” Jack asked, amused. “Shutting up won’t get us anywhere.”
“Nothing’s going anywhere.”
Jack sat down at his side, barely visible out of the corner of his eye. “That’s deep. Also depressing.”
“True though.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Jack--” He made the mistake of turning his head and meeting Jack’s gaze straight on, the words dying unspoken. He turned away, returning his gaze to the city beneath them. “It wouldn’t work.”
“Why not? Because it’s different?”
“It’s not normal, Jack.”
“None of us is normal, Sky,” Jack said quietly. “Never have been, never will be.”
“Does that justify it?”
“Don’t see why not. Trying to be normal doesn’t work for us, so why bother? This is what we want, Sky, all of us; even you, though you don’t want to admit it.” Sky did admit it though, even if only to himself and no one else. “Do you have some kind of problem with being happy?” Jack asked abruptly. “Because I’m seriously wondering if that’s what this is about.”
“I do not--” Sky cut himself off. He wasn’t going to give Jack the satisfaction.
“Don’t what?” Jack asked anyway.
“Want to have this conversation.”
“Too bad.”
Yeah, he’d expected that.
“You can’t avoid this, Sky. You can’t avoid us. This isn’t going away.”
“I already figured that,” Sky snapped, then forced himself back under control again as Jack raised his eyebrows at him.
“So… you know it’s a lost cause, but you’re fighting anyway?”
Well, when you put it that way… “Yes.”
“Figures,” Jack muttered. “Look, are you going to come in or am I going to have to drag you in?”
“This isn’t funny, Jack.”
“Who says I’m being funny?” Jack replied easily and Sky eyed him warily. Of all the others Jack was about the only one who could carry out that threat and if he was as serious as he seemed…
“Jack--”
“You have issues, I get that. We all do. We all have issues and we can handle them better if we’re together; we’re stronger together than apart, you know that.”
“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t know.”
“Why not? It’s the only way I get inside that head of yours.”
Sky had no response to that. Or rather, he did, only there were too many to count and he ended up staying silent instead, unable to articulate any of them. What was the point anyway? Jack had an answer for his every objection. “This is completely nuts, you know,” he said eventually. “Utterly insane.”
“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t know,” Jack grinned and slapped Sky’s shoulder as he got to his feet. And why wouldn’t he? He’d won and he knew it. “You coming?” the red ranger continued, holding out a hand to pull Sky to his feet. For a moment Sky debated not taking it, but in the end he reached up and gripped Jack’s wrist, rising easily to his feet.
“I still think this is nuts.”
“It probably is,” Jack agreed. “But we’re B Squad, by definition we’re pretty nuts anyway.”
“True.” He was silent for a moment and Jack stopped by the door, waiting. “What if this goes wrong, Jack?”
Jack shrugged. “What if Gruumm attacks tomorrow and we lose? We don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, that shouldn’t stop us going for what we want. Just end up with regrets that way.”
Sky studied him carefully, assessing what he’d said. Jack was such a contradiction sometimes. There were times, especially if you caught Jack in those ridiculous pyjamas of his, that he barely looked legal, and for all they knew he wasn’t, even Jack himself didn’t know; but other times he sounded so much older and the look in his eyes said you didn’t want to know why he sounded that way. But maybe one day they’d find out. He switched his gaze to the door and Jack gave him one of the cocky grins that both annoyed him and drew him and gestured at the door. “After you.” Sky scowled and stalked past him through the door.
The other three were waiting at the bottom of the stairs and Sky had no idea what to say to them.
“Don’t say anything,” Z advised. “You’ll just dig yourself in deeper.”
So he didn’t.
Link to table
Title: New Dawn
Pairing: Jack/Sky/Bridge/Syd/Z
Rating: PG-13
Sky shifted against the side of Bridge’s bed, trying to get comfortable. With four people pinning his legs to the floor he’d lost most of the sensation in them and his back was beginning to ache from the uncomfortable position. There was no chance of him getting up and moving around, not with his teammates lying on top of him, so that meant he was stuck there, with nothing to do but think.
It hadn’t been so bad at first, Jack’s hand slowly going limp as he fell asleep, and he’d spent a few minutes simply continuing the random patterns on the back of Jack’s hand he’d been drawing before Jack had drifted off. The peace couldn’t last forever though, and it wasn’t long before the events of the previous couple of hours began replaying, before the day itself began replaying. His hands tightened reflexively as he remembered Jack and Bridge’s description of the room Bridge had been in, reliving over again the sharp spike of fear over how close he’d come to losing his roommate.
But that was nothing; nothing, compared to the insanity which had followed, and the worst of it was it was his fault-- he’d started the whole damn thing by kissing Jack. Damn the man. Damn him for looking so haunted and un-Jack-like that kissing him had been his first instinct, trying to wipe that look away. It had been worth it though, part of him smugly pointed out. That kiss had been… well, it had been really something. He sighed to himself. It wasn’t kissing Jack that had been the problem, it was what had come after that: kissing Bridge; kissing Syd; kissing Z. Hell, there’d even been group kissing and all of it had felt so right, like it just fit, like it was something that was supposed to happen and therein lay part of the problem. It wasn’t something that was supposed to just happen. There were five of them, for God’s sake, there was no way that anything about what had happened this evening could be considered normal.
Gently disentangling his hand from Jack’s, Sky rubbed his arms reflexively against the goosebumps and made the mistake of looking over at his team. Wrapped around each other as they were, they looked absolutely perfect and he clamped down hard on that. It wasn’t perfect, because it wasn’t right. They were breaking the regs big time, just by being here. Jack could probably have got away with it, but there were rules against the two genders sharing quarters at night. Unless they were married anyway, like some of the officers on base. If anyone found out Syd and Z had spent the night in here, they’d all be in trouble.
He cursed softly under his breath, frustration getting the better of him. Thinking about his team and the things the five of them had gotten up to that night wasn’t productive; it wasn’t helping him get his thoughts in any kind of order and it wouldn’t help with the potential fallout. What if it all went wrong anyway? They all had their baggage and he and Jack could butt heads at the drop of a hat-- what if they argued so badly things couldn’t be fixed? They were fighting a war, they couldn’t afford to get into something that would distract them from that; never mind that it had the potential to make them stronger. What if, he shuddered, the Commander found out? Cruger would flip if he found out about this, Sky didn’t have any doubts about that and he didn’t even want to think about what the consequences would be if he did.
He turned his head and stared fixedly at the window, glad that it was summer and that consequently he and Bridge had left the curtains open; that made it much easier to focus on the slowly brightening sky outside, because the minute it was light enough he was getting out of here and going for a run.
***
Jack woke to the sensation of someone shaking him. “Come on, Jack, time to get up.”
“Go ‘way, Z,” he mumbled. “’s comfortable.”
“Jack, get your lazy butt up.”
Jack frowned. That didn’t sound like Z, that sounded like… he pried one eye open. “Syd?” Wait a minute, why was Syd…? Oh. Yeah. Memories of the previous day flooded back, fear a sharply edged blade, replaced by a deep sense of comfort that he hadn’t felt in far too long. He sat up, automatically pushing his dreads out of his face, feeling more awake than he had mere moments before. There they were, all of them: Bridge (thank God); Syd; Z; Sky… No. He blinked, re-examining the room in case he’d somehow missed the taller man, but no. Sky was notable by his absence. “Where’s Sky?” he asked anyway, with the faint hope that maybe he was in the bathroom or something.
“No idea,” Z replied. “He was gone when we woke up.”
Of course he was. “Okay,” he muttered, “raise your hand if you think we should have seen this coming.” Four hands raised in unison. “Alright, we’ll need to track him down. What time is it?”
“Six o’clock,” Z replied.
“Six o’clock?” he repeated incredulously. “Why’d you wake me up if it’s only six in the morning?”
“Firstly? Because Syd and I need to get back to our room before anyone notices we didn’t spend the night there. Secondly? The sooner we start looking the sooner we find Sky and beat the sense into him.”
Try as he might, Jack couldn’t fault that logic and sighed reluctantly. “Okay, fine. The minute we’re dressed and ready we meet in the rec. room. We can figure out how to find Sky while we’re there.”
***
Emptying the remains of his water bottle over his head, Sky slowed to a halt, hands resting against his knees as he caught his breath. The run hadn’t helped at all, except that maybe it had left him too tired to care anymore. His only problem now was getting back to his room so he could grab a shower and get dressed without running into any of his teammates, especially as that would pretty much defeat the purpose of his run. The one upside of having the reputation he did was that no one thought to question why he was up and running so early in the morning, because if he’d had to answer any questions he would probably have snapped like a twig.
Just as he came in sight of the door leading back inside, he caught a brief flicker of green out the corner of his eye and he stepped back immediately before Bridge could look his way and spot him. Damn it, he swore inwardly, they knew he was missing already. He hadn’t counted on them catching on quite so quickly and it just meant it was going to be harder to avoid them if they knew that was what he was doing. Damn it. Sometimes his teammates were a hell of a lot smarter than he gave them credit for.
***
“Any luck?” Jack asked, not holding out much hope. If any of them had found their reluctant blue ranger they’d have called it in by now. He asked anyway. As he’d expected he was met with a round of negatives and he slumped back against his seat in the rec. room. “Me either.” Damn it, why was Sky avoiding them? It didn’t make any sense. He closed his eyes and gave himself a mental slap up the head. Of course it made sense. Last night had been… unusual and Sky’s default reaction to anything that meant he might be getting in over his head with was to avoid it; hence the avoiding of them. And considering it was now lunchtime and half the day was gone without them having spotted him once, he was doing a damn good job of it.
***
It was a conspiracy, Sky was certain. Practically everywhere he went he had to do some last minute scrambling to avoid a teammate and he wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep it up. Every time he thought he was safe he’d catch a glimpse of pink, a flash of yellow, snatches of green and red; it seemed like there was nowhere he could go without having to detour to avoid his team. Most of them he could avoid relatively easily, but the conspiracy that was now his life kept throwing him in Bridge’s path and it was getting harder and harder to stay out of his way. Especially when all he could think of was tousled hair and lips that curved in a smile even as they kissed him.
He needed to hit something, take his mind off dangerous subjects like Bridge, Jack and the girls and channel his frustrated energy into something constructive. Unfortunately, just when an attack of krybots would have come in handy, Gruumm remained stubbornly quiet. It was as if the Troobian emperor knew he was suffering and was maliciously staying silent to deny him the chance of relieving some tension. He couldn’t go to any of the training rooms, because he knew the others had them staked out somehow and the moment he turned up there, they’d strike. He wasn’t ready to deal with them yet, so he stayed away.
***
“Alright,” Syd said, as they grouped inside Bridge’s favourite lab. “Enough is enough. RIC.” The robotic dog looked up at the sound of his name and then bounded over to where the pink ranger was crouched, tail wagging madly. “RIC, find Sky. He’s avoiding us and we can’t find him, so we’re counting on you, okay?”
RIC let out a cheerful cockcrow and spun around, all but bouncing out the door.
“Setting RIC on him?” Z commented. “That’s low, Syd.” She grinned wickedly. “I approve.”
Syd gave her roommate a look that was part glare, part smile and shrugged. “Well, nothing else is working.”
***
Sky sat on the roof of the base, staring out over the city as the sun steadily sank. He wasn’t looking forward to curfew. He’d managed to avoid his team for the day, but when Lights Out came around he’d have to be back in his room; back with Bridge. And the odds of Bridge not calling in the others the moment he entered the room weren’t good. By now they’d all be irritated with him anyway and there was no away he’d be able to avoid that guilt trip. He wished he could stay up here for the night.
From up here it was all but impossible to see the people moving around the city; walking along the streets, driving down the roads, riding the metro, all of them heading home now that their work was done. He wondered idly what they’d think if they knew what had happened between their rangers last night; if they’d be disbelieving, horrified, amused, thinking it was all just some kind of joke. But it wasn’t a joke, it was deadly serious and had potentially devastating consequences. If the people of New Tech lost faith in their rangers…
His eyes wandered across the cityscape, resting in the direction of his mom’s house, and he winced at the thought of what his mother would say if she knew about this. If his father was still alive he… he swallowed, tearing his thoughts away. Brooding over what-might-have-been’s was no good, you’d think he would have learned that by now.
“You know,” Jack’s voice said casually behind him, “there’s not much point in having a group sleeping pile if one of the group’s gone when you wake up.”
“Went for a run,” he replied neutrally.
“All day? Even for you that’s masochistic.”
“Shut up, Jack.” It shouldn’t be coming this easily, he thought somewhat desperately. They shouldn’t be falling into these rhythms as if nothing had happened.
“And why would I do that?” Jack asked, amused. “Shutting up won’t get us anywhere.”
“Nothing’s going anywhere.”
Jack sat down at his side, barely visible out of the corner of his eye. “That’s deep. Also depressing.”
“True though.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Jack--” He made the mistake of turning his head and meeting Jack’s gaze straight on, the words dying unspoken. He turned away, returning his gaze to the city beneath them. “It wouldn’t work.”
“Why not? Because it’s different?”
“It’s not normal, Jack.”
“None of us is normal, Sky,” Jack said quietly. “Never have been, never will be.”
“Does that justify it?”
“Don’t see why not. Trying to be normal doesn’t work for us, so why bother? This is what we want, Sky, all of us; even you, though you don’t want to admit it.” Sky did admit it though, even if only to himself and no one else. “Do you have some kind of problem with being happy?” Jack asked abruptly. “Because I’m seriously wondering if that’s what this is about.”
“I do not--” Sky cut himself off. He wasn’t going to give Jack the satisfaction.
“Don’t what?” Jack asked anyway.
“Want to have this conversation.”
“Too bad.”
Yeah, he’d expected that.
“You can’t avoid this, Sky. You can’t avoid us. This isn’t going away.”
“I already figured that,” Sky snapped, then forced himself back under control again as Jack raised his eyebrows at him.
“So… you know it’s a lost cause, but you’re fighting anyway?”
Well, when you put it that way… “Yes.”
“Figures,” Jack muttered. “Look, are you going to come in or am I going to have to drag you in?”
“This isn’t funny, Jack.”
“Who says I’m being funny?” Jack replied easily and Sky eyed him warily. Of all the others Jack was about the only one who could carry out that threat and if he was as serious as he seemed…
“Jack--”
“You have issues, I get that. We all do. We all have issues and we can handle them better if we’re together; we’re stronger together than apart, you know that.”
“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t know.”
“Why not? It’s the only way I get inside that head of yours.”
Sky had no response to that. Or rather, he did, only there were too many to count and he ended up staying silent instead, unable to articulate any of them. What was the point anyway? Jack had an answer for his every objection. “This is completely nuts, you know,” he said eventually. “Utterly insane.”
“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t know,” Jack grinned and slapped Sky’s shoulder as he got to his feet. And why wouldn’t he? He’d won and he knew it. “You coming?” the red ranger continued, holding out a hand to pull Sky to his feet. For a moment Sky debated not taking it, but in the end he reached up and gripped Jack’s wrist, rising easily to his feet.
“I still think this is nuts.”
“It probably is,” Jack agreed. “But we’re B Squad, by definition we’re pretty nuts anyway.”
“True.” He was silent for a moment and Jack stopped by the door, waiting. “What if this goes wrong, Jack?”
Jack shrugged. “What if Gruumm attacks tomorrow and we lose? We don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, that shouldn’t stop us going for what we want. Just end up with regrets that way.”
Sky studied him carefully, assessing what he’d said. Jack was such a contradiction sometimes. There were times, especially if you caught Jack in those ridiculous pyjamas of his, that he barely looked legal, and for all they knew he wasn’t, even Jack himself didn’t know; but other times he sounded so much older and the look in his eyes said you didn’t want to know why he sounded that way. But maybe one day they’d find out. He switched his gaze to the door and Jack gave him one of the cocky grins that both annoyed him and drew him and gestured at the door. “After you.” Sky scowled and stalked past him through the door.
The other three were waiting at the bottom of the stairs and Sky had no idea what to say to them.
“Don’t say anything,” Z advised. “You’ll just dig yourself in deeper.”
So he didn’t.
Link to table