Ch. 15 Waking Up is Hard to Do

Unaware of herself or anything of reference, Jack waited in a serene depth. Without the past to chain her or her current status to drive her, she was able to do what she'd never could, simply be. Though her perception remained, all she could see was ink blackness. All she could hear was a murmur in the emptiness that seemed benign. She tried to taste or smell the air but couldn't draw the air into her lungs.

The moment forced a piece of clarity on her mind as she noticed she couldn't breathe and began to panic when she tried and failed to. Another moment passed before she realized that it didn't hurt, not breathing, so she tried to ignore it for something else. The void around her began to shift into small patches of lighter or greater darkness began to appear. The small murmur began to break apart into high and low pitches, not discernable as voices but tones in pattern. Feeling the fog really lift from her thoughts Jack realized who and, more importantly, what she was.

She was the psychotic biotic feared throughout the Teminus and wanted on every home world. She'd faced threats alien and human, but not humane. She'd seen three prisons in five years, broke out of two only to be tossed into stasis in the third. She slowly remembered her rage as she felt the pains of memory lashing her blankened mind.

Feeling caged and alone, she howled as fear of being lost swept past. Feeling her life laid bare as her past dropped into place, she curled around her newly perceived limbs and almost broke before she felt a small comfort.

A memory of a bloody hand pulling away, eyes both cold with cold and fury, alive with purpose and hidden compassion. She cried as she felt the comfort, like holy water to a demon it burned her soul. Finally she saw his figure in total, a massive man with ripcord muscles in a blank grey shirt, the lightening world around her letting her see his massive shadow as a bulky build of armor and guns. It took a final moment to notice the shadow was alive, its eyes cracking open to show white light, its form before her like a shield as his human counterpart knelt to her.

Feeling fluttery and helpless and so safe, Jack couldn't rationalize her mind with her emotions, but could feel herself slipping away as light began to shine from everywhere.

Feeling like she was pulling away she reached a hand to her other companion. He easily caught her hand and she felt a permanence that the dreamlike fog had lacked. Despite her fears she fought waking as she finally realized it was a dream. She felt safe and comforted, sensations almost alien in its rarity. She could almost feel it like a foreign language, full of flowing and broken rhythms she couldn't understand but felt drawn to like a moth near the last sun in the universe.

As the light consumed everything and she felt herself slipping away, she cried out again, this time in rage as she lost her only comfort. Immediately she heard a voice, a deep resonant sound that stilled her thrashing. "Come back, Jack. Please. Just come back."

The words repeated and intermingled into meaningless slurry of sound, but called her to the waking world.

Sheppard sat at the edge of the cot supporting his… he didn't know what word to use for her. It seemed silly to hang up on words when her face was screwed with pain and fear. Sighing, he just couldn't keep his thoughts focused for more than 30 seconds before he was wondering if there had been any change in her.

Initially after leaving Jack with Chakwas, the only doctor on a Cerberus ship he'd ever let near Jack, he tried to follow through with the mission. One person was down and out, but he still had a war to wage. At least that was the intension, but after a error of inattention had almost put Tali in danger of being swarmed in a smugglers den, he'd handed off command to Garrus and had been essentially living in the med bay for the last 4 days.

Early attempts by Miranda to rouse him had ended less than civilly, though given that he'd had to deal with her bitching for the rest of the day as her ankle was being healed, he'd told her to simply direct any inquiries to Garrus before literally shoving her out the door. Seeing her tossed to the ground for the second time by himself since he'd met her, he felt a moment of aggravation with himself before composing himself. Turning back to the med bay and swiping the door activation, he belted out a clear and calm "Back to work, XO", as the door shut.

He'd normally worry for his position as commander in a terrorist cell, but had already had eight people seek him out to inform him that Miranda had been conducting "routine evaluations" to determine if she had the support to supplant him if ordered. He had to chuckle as even in a xenophobic terrorist organization, he still had the knack for attracting loyalty. Mirada's actions had infuriated him until Edi, rather pointedly interrupted his cursing to inform him that he might disturb Jack, and as he'd immediately petered out, had informed him she'd initially refused the suggestion to do the inquiry until the Dick made it a order.

The revelation had calmed him from shooting the traitor in the head, but still left him fuming. The fact that Edi had informed him had also put him in a confused state. Needless to say, everyone walked on egg shells when near the commander and given his current living arrangements, it meant the mess hall was even more somber than usual.

Needing movement to keep his emotions in check he walked to the windows looking into the mess. Seeing Joker sitting with Tali and Garrus brought a bit of comfort, especially when Joker waved, and upon noticing his action, both Garrus and Tali turned to see who it was. Noticing their clearly stressed friend, Tali gave a copy of Joker's wave with both hands flailing in the air while Garrus gave a double thumb-talon up.

Letting a small grin reach his lips and letting the stress in his clenched jaw relax as he gave a reciprocating wave before returning to his seat. Not a moment later he heard a small upswing in Jack's breathing as she seemed to suffer a nightmare. For days she'd fluctuated between shifting dreams to coma like stillness from which Chakwas wasn't sure she'd waken from due to damage. Still, like every time before Sheppard would place a hand on her shoulder in case he would need to stasis her to keep her from being flung about, and whisper to Jack.

Sometimes it was just a loop of encouragement, others he'd start to talk about anything.

It seemed to help, if in a minor way, but he couldn't see himself stopping talking.

"Jack, I don't know where you are or what you're facing, but you better be wiping the fools out. Don't give up on yourself, Jack. Come back, Jack. Please. Just come back."

Feeling out of sorts with the useless pleas, Sheppard was still moved to see her body still down as she rode out whatever wave of pain she was facing. Relaxing slightly as he prepared to resume his seated vigil, he felt his heart almost stop as she whimpered. Leaning close in case she was trying to talk, Sheppard tried to ignore the tingling of her breath on his ear as he listened.

"Bas..bastard..fu..please..Sheppard!" The last was a shout as Jack's eyes surged open and she surged upward, her forehead slamming into his ear as she surged to wakefulness.

"Jesus freaking god damn it!" shouted Sheppard as he landed to the side of Jack's bed rubbing his ear furiously for a second as a wave of disorientation flooded him. His distraction was less than a few milliseconds before he realized what had happened.

"Jack? Are you okay?" Sheppard stood and lifted his arms to her shoulder incase she began to loose it. Hearing the words and concern, Jack whipped her head up from her focus on her body to the hand near her shoulder. Her immediate jerk away and flatten some creep reaction only causing her to nearly fall out of the bed as her biotics didn't flare. Shock and fear flooded her before she realized it was actually Sheppard watching over her. His eyes seemed to latch onto hers and keep her steady. Fragments of her dream flicked at the edge of her memory, of eyes cold with fury and compassion at the same time. Pushing it away as irrelevant, she took in her surroundings and her companion.

Sheppard looked like shit smeared over a cover model, his face was showing some severe beard growth and his eyes were almost sunken, he looked like a rich boy slumming on a drug binge. His eyes and smile however laid that thought to rest as she saw his spark seem to lighted the room with his excitement. Very confused as his reaction, she couldn't keep up the eye contact for a couple seconds before her eyes would drop to stare at her hands.

Her first words were barely a whisper, but Sheppard could almost float for his relief at seeing her awake. "What happened?" Her first moment awake had shown a fear she would previously hidden, but now as she became more and more lucid, she seemed to shrink in upon herself. She'd eyed him hungrily and happily for a second only to twitch before her shoulders tensed and her eyes dropped to her hands, only looking up every couple of seconds.