Team Building with Jack Landors (SPD, A Squad, #10, K+)
characters: SPD’s A Squad (Jack/Sky)
prompt #10: sixth sense
word count: 1500
rating: K+
summary: Charlie and Des give Jack some advice on Sky.
Team Building with Jack Landors (sixth sense)
by *Andrea
He’d tried to catch a nap between dinner and the end of the second shift, but between the weird hours and the way Syd had spent most of her break making him feel like dirt, he couldn’t sleep. It didn’t help that he was getting every B Squad call in his room. Or that Sky had left a fake medal of commendation on their bed this morning: Awarded to Jack Landors, for surviving the worst patrol rotation ever.
If Sky had been back to the room since lunch, Jack couldn’t tell. Well, he could, because if Sky had been here he probably would have grabbed his book and his sweats and dumped them in the room he shared with Bridge, so that he didn’t even have to see Jack after his shift if he didn’t feel like it. Which Syd seemed to think he wouldn’t.
Jack couldn’t figure out if Sky’s absence was a good sign or a bad one.
With a sigh, he rolled off of the bed and looked around for Sky’s fancy electronic reader. It was, of course, right where it always was, because the world would end if one of Sky’s toys wasn’t in its accustomed place. Jack wasn’t very good with the thing, but he knew how to use the “notepad” feature, and he painstakingly typed a short message before setting it on Sky’s pillow and heading out into the deserted hallway.
In A Wing, the reader said. Call me.
The B Wing lounge was almost eerily quiet when he passed it, and he tried not to think about how screwed up his life had gotten. Okay, he hadn’t wanted to be SPD in the first place, but he’d found a good thing here. Even aside from a regular paycheck, he’d had friends that he could work with and a guy he couldn’t help but chase.
Now his old team was off fighting chaos and anarchy without him, and his new one had better things to do in their downtime than hang around a TV lounge playing lightball or having pillow fights. The guy he’d finally caught didn’t actually want to be caught, or didn’t want to be caught by Jack, or something equally inexplicable. And the rest of his friends seemed to think it was all his fault.
He wasn’t sure what kind of welcome he’d get in A Wing, but he hadn’t been expecting the disgusted look Charlie threw at him the moment he poked his head into the lounge. “Congratulations on being an idiot,” she said, turning her attention back to the screen where her disturbingly realistic looking video fighter was pounding some sort of gargoyle into the ground.
“Hi, Charlie,” Jack told her. “Nice to see you too. Des,” he added, waving to the only other occupant of the lounge.
“Yeah, man, what up,” Des said. He didn’t take his eyes of the screen, and Jack wondered briefly if he was the gargoyle character.
“I want to talk to you about returning to duty,” Jack said. “Is this a bad time?”
“Hey, hey, pause that.” Charlie’s character glowed red on the screen, and she reached over Des’ arm for something on his game controller. He yanked it away, but a shadow in the top of the screen glowed green a moment later.
“That depends,” Charlie said, now giving him her full attention. “Are you going to say we can, or can’t?”
“Can,” Jack assured her. “Coon says you’re cleared for light duty around the base, and I got Cruger’s approval to add you to the training rotation. If you want.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he continued, dropping into one of the chairs. “I’m sure it was really fun to hang around here doing nothing all day, and believe me, SPD owes you big time. If you want to hang around doing nothing, Coon can give you up to two months of therapeutic re-assimilation. If you do the counseling thing, she can extend it to four.
“But if you want something to do--or someone to beat up,” he added, glancing at the screen, “there’s plenty of training slots. And they tell me there’s this whole group of orientation level cadets who need instruction--”
“Which you wouldn’t know,” Charlie said, “since you were never one of them.”
He just shrugged. “What can I say? I like to skip to the high points.”
“Sky doesn’t,” Charlie remarked.
“I so don’t want to talk about that,” Jack told her.
“Hilarious, man,” Des put in. “Great story.”
“What did I just say?” Jack demanded.
“‘I’ve somehow never met Sky Tate’?” Charlie suggested. “What made you think embarrassing him was this great idea? The man doesn’t even let people give him birthday gifts in public, for crying out loud.”
Jack blinked. He didn’t know when Sky’s birthday was. It had never occurred to him before, but he sensed this wasn’t the time to share that revelation.
“Can I point out that he’d just accused me of cheating on him?” he said instead. “How was a declaration of eternal love an unfair response?”
“Based solely on Des’ description of the event as ‘hilarious,’” Charlie said dryly, “I’d guess it didn’t quite come across as a declaration of eternal love.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not a woman,” Jack informed her. “What do I know about that stuff?”
“Okay, here’s a tip,” Des interjected, before Charlie could do more than glare at him. “And I gotta tell you, this is wisdom gleaned from years of experience, so. Listen well.”
Jack turned to him expectantly, if only to avoid Charlie’s gaze of death.
“Pretend Sky is a woman,” Des intoned. “Pretend Charlie isn’t.” He held out his hands, as though bestowing a priceless gift. “Swear to god, it’ll save you hours of aggravation.”
“This conversation is over,” Charlie said. “Let’s talk training rotations.”
“Don’ll be in tomorrow,” Des offered.
“And Miguel will be gone,” Charlie added. “His flight leaves early in the morning.”
“When’s he due back?” Jack wanted to know. At the last second, he’d managed not to say, “Miguel’s leaving?” but it turned out that his substitute question wasn’t much better. He knew it as soon as Des’ gaze flicked to Charlie, even if she didn’t so much as blink.
“He’s not sure,” she said. Offhand, like it made ten kinds of sense, which it did. Jack wished he hadn’t asked, because it couldn’t be easy to say. “He doesn’t know if he’s coming back.”
“Right.” Miguel was a long way from home, and he’d been gone longer than anyone could have predicted. None of them had signed up for the kind of tour they’d gotten stuck with. “Anything I can do?”
“Yeah,” Charlie said, like she honestly couldn’t believe what an idiot she was talking to. “Talk about training rotations.”
So they did, and eventually Des convinced him to take over the losing game controller, and he was still in the lounge when the second shift came to an end. It wasn’t the time that he noticed, though--he was so busy completely failing to master “Gargoyle Doom” that he wasn’t paying much attention to anything else. It was something he would never be able to pin down if pressed, and it made him look up in the middle of getting his butt kicked by a gargoyle Charlie had somehow recruited--
Sky was leaning against the doorframe, watching them.
“Hey,” Jack said, the controller forgotten in his hands.
Sky just looked at him.
“I’m sorry?” Jack tried. He felt Des grab for the controller and he let it go without protest. “That was really stupid? Um... I promise not to propose to you in front of the entire mess hall again?”
Charlie snorted, but Des must have rescued his guy because her eyes were glued to the screen. “Try to sound less sure of yourself, Jack.”
“Shut up,” Jack told her. “You try to guess what he’s thinking.”
This, he saw out of the corner of his eye, actually got a smile out of Sky. It was gone when Jack looked directly at him, but he did say, “You know, I had this whole thing. Board party, leftover ice cream, Z made me come get you... it seems kind of stupid, all of a sudden.”
Jack brightened. “Because you’ve forgiven me?”
“Because you look so pathetic,” Sky told him. “Seriously, who tries to beat Charlie at ‘Gargoyle Doom’? There’s something broken in your head.
“No offense,” he added, nodding at Des.
“Uh-huh,” Des said absently. “Sure.”
Jack considered this. “I liked the part about ice cream,” he decided at last.
This time, the small smile lingered on Sky’s face. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Jack pushed himself to his feet. “I could maybe even pay... if we, you know, hypothetically speaking. Went somewhere other than the base?”
Sky straightened, clearly waiting for Jack to join him. “If you insist.”
“‘Night, guys,” Jack said, stepping around the end of the couch. “See you tomorrow morning.”
Charlie grunted something noncommittal, but Des actually tore his gaze away from the screen long enough to catch his eye. Woman, he mouthed. Jack tried to hide a smile, flashing him a thumbs-up as he turned toward the door.
Sky, perhaps pointedly, did not ask.
prompt #10: sixth sense
word count: 1500
rating: K+
summary: Charlie and Des give Jack some advice on Sky.
Team Building with Jack Landors (sixth sense)
by *Andrea
He’d tried to catch a nap between dinner and the end of the second shift, but between the weird hours and the way Syd had spent most of her break making him feel like dirt, he couldn’t sleep. It didn’t help that he was getting every B Squad call in his room. Or that Sky had left a fake medal of commendation on their bed this morning: Awarded to Jack Landors, for surviving the worst patrol rotation ever.
If Sky had been back to the room since lunch, Jack couldn’t tell. Well, he could, because if Sky had been here he probably would have grabbed his book and his sweats and dumped them in the room he shared with Bridge, so that he didn’t even have to see Jack after his shift if he didn’t feel like it. Which Syd seemed to think he wouldn’t.
Jack couldn’t figure out if Sky’s absence was a good sign or a bad one.
With a sigh, he rolled off of the bed and looked around for Sky’s fancy electronic reader. It was, of course, right where it always was, because the world would end if one of Sky’s toys wasn’t in its accustomed place. Jack wasn’t very good with the thing, but he knew how to use the “notepad” feature, and he painstakingly typed a short message before setting it on Sky’s pillow and heading out into the deserted hallway.
In A Wing, the reader said. Call me.
The B Wing lounge was almost eerily quiet when he passed it, and he tried not to think about how screwed up his life had gotten. Okay, he hadn’t wanted to be SPD in the first place, but he’d found a good thing here. Even aside from a regular paycheck, he’d had friends that he could work with and a guy he couldn’t help but chase.
Now his old team was off fighting chaos and anarchy without him, and his new one had better things to do in their downtime than hang around a TV lounge playing lightball or having pillow fights. The guy he’d finally caught didn’t actually want to be caught, or didn’t want to be caught by Jack, or something equally inexplicable. And the rest of his friends seemed to think it was all his fault.
He wasn’t sure what kind of welcome he’d get in A Wing, but he hadn’t been expecting the disgusted look Charlie threw at him the moment he poked his head into the lounge. “Congratulations on being an idiot,” she said, turning her attention back to the screen where her disturbingly realistic looking video fighter was pounding some sort of gargoyle into the ground.
“Hi, Charlie,” Jack told her. “Nice to see you too. Des,” he added, waving to the only other occupant of the lounge.
“Yeah, man, what up,” Des said. He didn’t take his eyes of the screen, and Jack wondered briefly if he was the gargoyle character.
“I want to talk to you about returning to duty,” Jack said. “Is this a bad time?”
“Hey, hey, pause that.” Charlie’s character glowed red on the screen, and she reached over Des’ arm for something on his game controller. He yanked it away, but a shadow in the top of the screen glowed green a moment later.
“That depends,” Charlie said, now giving him her full attention. “Are you going to say we can, or can’t?”
“Can,” Jack assured her. “Coon says you’re cleared for light duty around the base, and I got Cruger’s approval to add you to the training rotation. If you want.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he continued, dropping into one of the chairs. “I’m sure it was really fun to hang around here doing nothing all day, and believe me, SPD owes you big time. If you want to hang around doing nothing, Coon can give you up to two months of therapeutic re-assimilation. If you do the counseling thing, she can extend it to four.
“But if you want something to do--or someone to beat up,” he added, glancing at the screen, “there’s plenty of training slots. And they tell me there’s this whole group of orientation level cadets who need instruction--”
“Which you wouldn’t know,” Charlie said, “since you were never one of them.”
He just shrugged. “What can I say? I like to skip to the high points.”
“Sky doesn’t,” Charlie remarked.
“I so don’t want to talk about that,” Jack told her.
“Hilarious, man,” Des put in. “Great story.”
“What did I just say?” Jack demanded.
“‘I’ve somehow never met Sky Tate’?” Charlie suggested. “What made you think embarrassing him was this great idea? The man doesn’t even let people give him birthday gifts in public, for crying out loud.”
Jack blinked. He didn’t know when Sky’s birthday was. It had never occurred to him before, but he sensed this wasn’t the time to share that revelation.
“Can I point out that he’d just accused me of cheating on him?” he said instead. “How was a declaration of eternal love an unfair response?”
“Based solely on Des’ description of the event as ‘hilarious,’” Charlie said dryly, “I’d guess it didn’t quite come across as a declaration of eternal love.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not a woman,” Jack informed her. “What do I know about that stuff?”
“Okay, here’s a tip,” Des interjected, before Charlie could do more than glare at him. “And I gotta tell you, this is wisdom gleaned from years of experience, so. Listen well.”
Jack turned to him expectantly, if only to avoid Charlie’s gaze of death.
“Pretend Sky is a woman,” Des intoned. “Pretend Charlie isn’t.” He held out his hands, as though bestowing a priceless gift. “Swear to god, it’ll save you hours of aggravation.”
“This conversation is over,” Charlie said. “Let’s talk training rotations.”
“Don’ll be in tomorrow,” Des offered.
“And Miguel will be gone,” Charlie added. “His flight leaves early in the morning.”
“When’s he due back?” Jack wanted to know. At the last second, he’d managed not to say, “Miguel’s leaving?” but it turned out that his substitute question wasn’t much better. He knew it as soon as Des’ gaze flicked to Charlie, even if she didn’t so much as blink.
“He’s not sure,” she said. Offhand, like it made ten kinds of sense, which it did. Jack wished he hadn’t asked, because it couldn’t be easy to say. “He doesn’t know if he’s coming back.”
“Right.” Miguel was a long way from home, and he’d been gone longer than anyone could have predicted. None of them had signed up for the kind of tour they’d gotten stuck with. “Anything I can do?”
“Yeah,” Charlie said, like she honestly couldn’t believe what an idiot she was talking to. “Talk about training rotations.”
So they did, and eventually Des convinced him to take over the losing game controller, and he was still in the lounge when the second shift came to an end. It wasn’t the time that he noticed, though--he was so busy completely failing to master “Gargoyle Doom” that he wasn’t paying much attention to anything else. It was something he would never be able to pin down if pressed, and it made him look up in the middle of getting his butt kicked by a gargoyle Charlie had somehow recruited--
Sky was leaning against the doorframe, watching them.
“Hey,” Jack said, the controller forgotten in his hands.
Sky just looked at him.
“I’m sorry?” Jack tried. He felt Des grab for the controller and he let it go without protest. “That was really stupid? Um... I promise not to propose to you in front of the entire mess hall again?”
Charlie snorted, but Des must have rescued his guy because her eyes were glued to the screen. “Try to sound less sure of yourself, Jack.”
“Shut up,” Jack told her. “You try to guess what he’s thinking.”
This, he saw out of the corner of his eye, actually got a smile out of Sky. It was gone when Jack looked directly at him, but he did say, “You know, I had this whole thing. Board party, leftover ice cream, Z made me come get you... it seems kind of stupid, all of a sudden.”
Jack brightened. “Because you’ve forgiven me?”
“Because you look so pathetic,” Sky told him. “Seriously, who tries to beat Charlie at ‘Gargoyle Doom’? There’s something broken in your head.
“No offense,” he added, nodding at Des.
“Uh-huh,” Des said absently. “Sure.”
Jack considered this. “I liked the part about ice cream,” he decided at last.
This time, the small smile lingered on Sky’s face. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Jack pushed himself to his feet. “I could maybe even pay... if we, you know, hypothetically speaking. Went somewhere other than the base?”
Sky straightened, clearly waiting for Jack to join him. “If you insist.”
“‘Night, guys,” Jack said, stepping around the end of the couch. “See you tomorrow morning.”
Charlie grunted something noncommittal, but Des actually tore his gaze away from the screen long enough to catch his eye. Woman, he mouthed. Jack tried to hide a smile, flashing him a thumbs-up as he turned toward the door.
Sky, perhaps pointedly, did not ask.