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timptoe · 1 year

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Six Words for Shepard

Hi @all-truths-wait-in-all-things, I'm your Harbinger of holiday cheer for @masseffectholidaycheer! You said you wanted something fluffy about Jack and your Shepard, so I took the six descriptive words you gave me and wrote a sestina about Marin. And then I wrote a bunch more words about Jack writing the sestina, including teaching a toddler to say "fuck." The world is dark and cold, so I hope this silliness brings you a bit of warmth.

Read it on AO3.

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C-Sec Holding Cell, Presidium Commons, Citadel Fifteen days before the end of the Reaper War

In retrospect, it’s all Miranda Lawson’s fault, really.

Jack blows out a breath as she leans against the wall of the C-Sec holding cell. She’s seen worse. The three-meter square room is fucking spacious compared to some of the other jails she’s been in. And clean, too. Immaculate. Not even any blood on the walls. Is it really a jail if there’s no blood on the walls?

She touches the forcefield over the doorway, which sparks at the contact. Yeah, still a jail.

Really, if Miranda hadn’t put her nose where it didn’t belong— But that’s what she does best, isn’t it? Puts her fucking nose in other people’s fucking business because she’s always got the fucking best ideas.

Shoulda flipped the table over the moment she sat down.

Jack sighs, a particular voice in the back of her head whispering, That’s not fair.

She loves that voice. Hates what a goody-two-shoes it’s made her, but…loves it all the same. Which is why she even deigned to talk to Miranda in the first place. Why she was even able to without throwing her off the balcony and straight into the Presidium’s pool.

Because of Marin fucking Shepard.

A year ago, Jack’s conversation with Miranda would have ended with a detonation of biotic energy in the former Cerberus operative’s face. But Jack’s apparently mellowed in her old age. Shepard would say she’s “learned restraint,” with that fucking mischievous twinkle in her eye that makes Jack’s toes curl, but Jack knows what it really means: she’s gotten soft. Hell, the topic of her and Miranda’s conversation itself proves how soft she’s gotten. How soft Shepard’s made her.

So maybe Jack likes a little softness now, fuck you. She’s still a badass where it counts. And as long as Shepard never finds out about any of this, she can still hold her head high the next time she sees her, pretend she’s not some gooey, emotional, doe-eyed…

Ah, fucking hell. I am, aren’t I?

Jack sighs again, looking around the small holding cell, putting her head in her hands. She should’ve just left the moment Miranda sat down.

—— Café Majestique, Presidium, Citadel Ten hours before the present

She slams the pad down on the table with a mighty “FUCK!”

The crash of the pad echoes around the café in the brief silence that follows. She glances around at all of the patrons who are decidedly not looking at her, making eye contact with the one salarian who is. “What the fuck are you looking at?” she growls.

He beelines it for the exit.

Jack pinches the bridge of her nose and glares down at the pad where it rests on the table. What a fucking joke, she thinks. A war for survival raging across the galaxy, her own students facing Reaper-mutated soldiers every day now, fucking Cerberus ascending, and this is the thing that finally breaks her?

I’m the fucking joke.

“Glad to see you’re just as stable as ever, Jack,” comes a lightly-accented voice behind her.

She tenses more at the accent than at the unexpected interruption it brings. Of all the people in the universe, she would rather have Harbinger himself sit down in the chair across the table instead of the woman who does. Shoulder-length dark hair, skintight white bodysuit, enigmatic quirk to her lips.

Of course it would be Miranda Lawson right now.

“Cheerleader,” Jack sighs, “what a pleasant fucking surprise.”

Miranda pops an eyebrow. “That’s a downright cheery welcome coming from you. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I’m real fucking dandy. Is there something I can help you with?” Jack asks through gritted teeth.

“Not really, just ducked in here for a moment and saw a familiar face, thought we could catch up,” Miranda replies, smiling wide. The smile doesn’t reach her eyes, which flicker to look behind Jack’s left shoulder, then off to her right, before landing back on Jack herself.

Jack leans back in her chair, crossing her arms. “Cerberus?”

Miranda nods once.

Jack considers her options. On the one hand, she could get up, walk away, and leave the personification of everything wrong with the galaxy to her own just desserts. She’s pretty sure Miranda would be fine—Miranda’s biotics are almost on par with hers, not that Jack would ever admit that out loud—but she might break a nail, and that would be glorious. On the other hand, though, she could help the cheerleader screw over the organization that kidnapped her as a baby and raised her to be the twisted monster she almost became, had Shepard not stepped in. She owes Shepard everything. And Shepard’s voice, as ever, is in the back of her head, telling her what she should do.

Jack’s grown to love the voice, even if she hates having to help Eugenics Barbie.

“Fine,” she says nonchalantly. “Want me to blow this place up? Pretty sure I can channel the blast so it mostly doesn’t hit you.”

“Charming as ever, Jack,” Miranda says sharply, though Jack swears she sees a hint of relief in Miranda’s eyes, “but no. Just need to sit here a couple of minutes, then I’ll be out of your—“ Miranda glances at Jack’s mohawk-ponytail. “Huh, you actually do have hair now.”

Jack glares.

Miranda waves a hand dismissively. “Sorry, sorry. Just talk to me for a minute, give the guys following me time to give up.”

“Just…talk to you.”

Miranda arches an eyebrow. “A simple enough request.”

Jack laughs. “What the fuck do you and I have to talk about, cheerleader? The weather?”

Miranda rolls her eyes. “Anything. What about…” She looks around the cafe, her eyes landing on the almost-forgotten pad on the table. “What about this? Why were you yelling at it when I walked in?”

The horror that strikes Jack’s heart at the thought of Miranda seeing what’s written on the pad is the split-second of hesitation Miranda needs to scoop it off the table.

“Give that back!” Jack growls, practically diving across the table. Miranda deftly defends herself with one hand, starting to read the pad from the other.

“Violets are blue Roses are red—“

“Stop it!” Jack sends a biotic pulse out, trying to pull the pad back. The ease with which Miranda blocks the pulse, not even looking her way, is infuriating.

“Violets are blue Roses are red Your butt’s really cute I’m…glad you’re not dead?”

Jack groans in defeat, collapsing onto the table.

“Jack, what the hell is this?”

Jack mumbles a response into the table.

“What?”

“A gift for Shepard.” She sits back up in her chair and squares her shoulders, staring Miranda down like the former Cerberus operative’s a charging brute. If she’s gonna die of embarrassment, she’s gonna go down swinging.

“A…gift. For Shepard.” Miranda blinks. “You wrote Shepard a poem?”

“Writing, I’m writing a poem,” Jack snaps, trying—and failing—again to snatch the pad back. “It’s not finished yet.”

“That’s actually really—“ Jack can see Miranda physically stop herself from saying cute, and the shame of appreciating the gesture is almost unbearable.

“Don’t start,” Jack warns.

Miranda fixes her with a look. “You really do care for her, don’t you?”

Jack grimaces. “I’m not talking about this with you of all—“

“Jack.” Miranda places her hand on Jack’s, the tenderness of the gesture stunning Jack into silence. “Look. I was wrong.”

Jack raises an eyebrow, keeping her hand still.

“The psych profile Cerberus drew up before recommending you for recruitment on the Collector mission said you wouldn’t be able to form attachments. That you’d be a perfect weapon: volatile, dangerous, and expendable.” Miranda withdraws her hand, focusing instead on flicking through the screens on the pad. “I believed them. And I was wrong.”

“Yeah, well, you were wrong about a lot of things,” Jack snaps.

Miranda nods. “And you were right. About Cerberus, and about Shepard.”

“Well. Yeah. Good.”

Miranda continues idly swiping through the pad as Jack collects her thoughts. A year ago, Miranda would’ve been paste on the Presidum ceiling for daring to touch anything of Jack’s, much less something so…private. Even now, Jack’s fingers are unconsciously flexing as she holds back the reflex to destroy everything around her.

Because that little voice in the back of head, that voice she doesn’t get to hear often enough these days, is saying, Don’t.

“Actually, some of this isn’t bad,” Miranda muses, continuing to swipe through the pad. “Good, actually. Your use of imagery is evocative, and your word choice—“

“I don’t need a fucking lit-crit lecture, professor,” Jack says crossly.

Miranda shrugs. “I’m just saying. Some of the more free-form ones have potential. So why…?” She leaves the question unfinished, clearly unwilling to say So what the fuck was up with that first one?

Jack says nothing, just glaring out into the fake Presidium sky.

“Jack,” Miranda says, exasperated. “I’ve actually studied poetry, you know. I’m trying to help you.”

“Well, you don’t have to,” Jack snaps, finally snatching the pad back. “I don’t want your help.”

“Fine.” Miranda crosses her arms, her lips pressed together in a thin line.

She probably could help, you know, Marin’s voice echoes in Jack’s brain.

Fuck you, Jack thinks back.

Only if you’re good, Marin’s voice somehow winks at her.

Jack tries very hard not to think about what it says about her that she has conversations with her girlfriend in her head. Instead, she picks a window on the opposite side of the Presidium, stares it down like it’s an enemy Husk, and says to no one in particular, “I’m trying out metered verse.”

A beat. “I’m sorry?”

Still avoiding any sort of eye contact, she continues, “I submitted one of those free verse poems to a journal and got rejected. They said I should go for metered verse. That’s what…that was. An attempt. At meter.”

Another beat. Two. The silence stretches, so long that Jack wonders if Miranda has actually left. This was a bad idea, terrible. Telling Miranda anything, not throwing her bodily off the balcony before, deciding to write a stupid poem anyway, all of it. Fine, whatever, no worries, she’ll just—

“A sestina.”

Jack blinks, looking back at Miranda in confusion. “What?”

Cheerleader is looking at her thoughtfully, studying her like she’s never seen Jack before.

“A sestina,” Miranda says again. “Six stanzas of six lines built around six different words, with a seventh half-stanza recapitulating the six words. Blank verse, so it doesn’t rhyme, which I think is your problem. Highly structured, which I also think will help you, given how you thrived on the Normandy.”

Jack just stares at her. “What?”

Miranda rolls her eyes and leans forward. She grabs the pad again and starts typing. “Look, I’ll find examples for you on the extranet. I know it’s unusual, but if I know you, and my extensive additions to your psych profile would suggest that I do, you need a form that lets you be evocative while giving you boundaries. Which I know you secretly appreciate, because again, you’re dating Shepard.”

She hands the pad back, having successfully found half a dozen extranet sites with examples, definitions, and commentary about this poetic form Jack’s never heard of. Jack reads silently for a little while, Miranda giving her the space to do so.

After a few minutes, she looks up begrudgingly at Miranda. “Six words, huh.”

“All built around six words,” Miranda nods.

“But…how do I pick six words?”

Miranda shrugs. “Up to you, you’re the poet. Make a list of her qualities, flip randomly through a dictionary, talk to people around here who know her. Doesn’t matter.”

This…could work, damn it all. Miranda’s been right before, not that Jack will ever admit it. And she’s sure as fuck not gonna admit it now.

But something subtle in her eyes must shift, because Miranda gives the barest of smiles. “Here, start with this word: addict.”

Jack raises an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

“You’ve seen Shepard around coffee and you can honestly say she’s not addicted?” Miranda chuckles. “Plus, you can use it in multiple ways, which’ll help in constructing the verses.”

“Right.” Jack muses for a moment, lost in thought about poetry construction, Marin and coffee, the taste of coffee on Marin’s lips…

She shakes her head, clearing those thoughts in time to see a sly smile on Miranda’s lips. “See? Evocative.”

Then, suddenly, Miranda’s all business. “Well, thank you for letting me crash your writing session, but I think I’ve lost my tail, so I’ll be—“

Focusing intently on the pad, Jack interrupts conversationally, “Two men came in through the door behind the counter about five minutes ago and sat down at a table on your four. They’ve been staring at you ever since.”

Miranda goes perfectly, and utterly, still. “Ah. Alright. I…” She trails off, her eyes darting back-and-forth, trying to come up with a plan.

Jack chuckles, then looks up at her. “Miranda, you are an insufferable know-it-all, a war criminal, too obsessed with your own self-image, a patsy for terrorists, and just generally the worst.”

If possible, Miranda goes even more rigid, her ice-blue eyes staring daggers at Jack.

“And you’re one of Shepard’s, so I’ve got your back. Plus,” Jack ducks her head back down and mumbles, “you didn’t laugh. At this.”

She can feel Miranda’s eyes on her. She glares at the Shepard in her head. You make me soft.

Marin’s light chuckle just echoes in her brain. Doing the right thing sucks sometimes.

“Go,” she says to Miranda before she can change her mind. “I’ve got this.”

Miranda nods, and starts to get up. “Don’t…blow everything up.”

Jack rolls her eyes. “Oh look, you’re assuming the worst about me, what a shock.” At Miranda’s look, she glares. “I’d invite you to watch my finesse and control to prove you wrong, but you’re supposed to be getting the fuck out of here, Cheerleader.”

Miranda chuckles. “Right.” She turns as she walks away to say, “Send me a copy when you’re finished? I’d just love to see how the sestina turns out.”

“Not on your fucking life,” Jack calls back.

As Miranda gives a laugh and moves toward the exit, the two Cerberus thugs get up from their table, making a beeline for her.

Jack smirks. Not so fast, dickwads.

— Financial District, Presidium, Citadel Nine hours before the present

“I’m sorry, who are you again?”

Jack rubs her temple, trying her level best not to swear in front of the toddler in the woman’s arms. Rebekah Petrovsky, mother, Citadel entrepreneur, and—crucially—somebody who asks entirely too many questions.

“Ma’am, as I’ve already said, I’m a…friend of Commander Marin Shepard. She’s spoken so…highly of you, I just want to ask you a question.”

That is a fucking lie. Shepard’s ranted about this woman multiple times in Jack’s presence, decrying “breeder culture” and “genetically engineering kids” and also “people who apparently can’t make a decision without involving me for some ridiculous reason.” Somehow, Shepard had crossed paths with this kid-obsessed lady a lot over the last three years, much to Shepard’s chagrin and Jack’s delight.

Less delight now that she’s experiencing the woman’s shrill tone for herself. But who better to know Shepard than someone she’d helped out more than once?

“Oh, if it’s a favor for Commander Shepard,” Petrovsky says, the namedrop positively dripping with…something, “that’s different. How can I be helpful?”

“Just…” Jack grits her teeth so it looks like she’s smiling. “I’m working on a…project for her, so I’m asking people who…know her how they might describe her.”

This was clearly the wrong thing to say, given the pure delight that springs into the woman’s eyes and the word vomit that spills forth from her puckered mouth.

I’m in hell, Jack thinks, I died and I’m in hell and I’m being punished, I’m probably gonna have to plan this woman’s baby shower now, what the fuck is she going on about…

“I just couldn’t believe that Michael would put little Jake in danger like that! But that’s when dear Commander Shepard walked up and…”

“Ma’am— I’m sorry, ma’am, if I could just…”

“And I was just so tickled when she turned out to be alive after all! You know, I told Michael…”

“No, I don’t need— That’s not what I’m asking you for, just stop…”

“But Michael wouldn’t listen, he thought that the daycare on the Citadel would be—“

“Oh would you just shut the fuck up!”

Petrovsky stares at Jack, mouth wide open, for a long moment. Jack growls, “Just. Describe Shepard. In one word. One.”

The woman draws herself up to her full height, lips pursed like she’s sucking on a lemon, adjusting the laughing toddler on her hip. “Nice. She is nice.”

“Shut the fuck up!” the toddler parrots, delightedly clapping his hands.

Jack snerks.

The fury that crosses the woman’s face as she puts her hands over the boy’s ears feels almost better than sex.

“How dare you—“

“Look, lady, it’s not my—“

That’s when Jack spots the C-Sec officers in the distance over Petrovsky’s shoulder. And when they spot her. Guess her little stunt in the café got some attention.

Jack claps the woman lightly on the shoulder. “Thanks lady, you’ve been a big help. And you…” She leans in closer to the toddler, who looks at her with big, shining eyes, and says, “Fuck!”

The kid delightedly repeats, “Fuck!”

Jack sprints away, cackling as she hears the woman’s indignation. Nice certainly describes Shepard more than it describes her.

— Rodam Expeditions, Zakera Ward, Citadel Eight-and-a-half hours before the present

These C-Sec officers are better than the ones she’s tangled with in the past. That, or she’s easier to track now that she’s official Alliance personnel or whatever.

But Jack didn’t spend most of her life committing worse crimes than teaching a toddler to curse or, you know, biotically stabbing a couple of Cerberus assholes to get caught now.

She creeps along a wall, peering into the next corridor. A couple of shops, no sign of—

Wait. Shit. There they are.

Hoping they haven’t seen her yet, she darts into a nearby store, some tourism shop or other. As her body breaks the plane of the doorway, it chimes and a voice says, “I’m Commander Shepard, and this is my favorite store on the Citadel.”

Jack yelps in surprise and tumbles ass-over-teakettle into the counter.

The turian behind it cocks his head at her and says, “You alright, ma’am?”

She pops her head up and peers out the doorway. “Uh…old ex-boyfriend. Can’t let him see me.”

Turians don’t have eyebrows. She’s honestly not sure what they have, but whatever it is the merchant does, it feels like he raises an eyebrow at her. He points behind the counter. “Hop back here for a minute, then, catch your breath.”

Jack hops over the counter and crouches down, breathing hard. She looks up at the turian, who’s staring at her like she’s a particularly weird looking bug. She starts to glare back before deciding not to piss off the guy who’s kinda rescuing her.

And then she replays the last twenty seconds in her head, and her eyes go wide.

“Sorry, was that— Did Shepard actually record an ad for this place?”

The turian grins. “About a year ago! It’s great, my business has skyrocketed since she did that.”

Jack blinks. “You know that she did one for, like, every store in this ward, right?”

Now he full on laughs. “Oh yeah, it was incredible! The looks on the other guys’ faces when they realized…oh, it was too funny. They were so pissed! Buncha them tried to do something, but she’s a Spectre, so what’re you gonna do? So they all just decided to delete her ads and pretend it never happened. Which leaves me,” he winks, “the only one left with an endorsement from the woman kicking the Reapers’ asses.”

Jack chuckles. Then, she cocks her head at him; she can use this. “So…if you were gonna describe Shepard in just a word, you’d say…”

“Funny,” he answers without hesitation. After a beat, he adds, “Or sarcastic. She roasted me when I asked her to record that, but…” He shrugs. “Worked out for me in the end.”

Funny. And sarcastic. Yeah, those both track. Jack’s been on the receiving end of Shepard’s particular brand of humor more times than she count. It used to bug the shit out of her. Now…

She smiles softly. Hearing Marin laugh makes the worst day better.

The turian taps her on the shoulder, shaking her from the brief reverie. “Look, lady, I think your ‘ex-boyfriend’ went chasing a donut a few floors down, so if you don’t mind…”

Jack springs back up. “Yeah, got it. Uh, thanks, man.”

She vaults back over the counter and saunters out, Marin’s laugh still echoing in her head.

— Purgatory, Presidium, Citadel Seven hours before the present

“What do I think of Shepard? What are you asking me for, Jack?”

“I…it’s for a project, Tali. Just answer the question.”

Jack walks through the crowded bar, trying to blend in. Act normal. And what’s more normal than talking loudly on a call with a friend in public? Besides, there’s no point to suddenly having all this power from the Alliance if she’s not going to abuse the comm buoys for her friends.

“I mean…she’s great? Definitely one of the top ten humans I’ve ever met,” Tali responds, amused but with a note of confusion. “You of all people should know that, Jack.”

“Yeah, I know, I’m just…”

“…it’s for a project. Right.” The holo-mini of the quarian above Jack’s omnitool shrugs.

Jack swallows her frustration with a shot of…whatever she swiped from the bar, she wasn’t really paying attention. “Look, Tali, you were there at the beginning. Way before me. I’m looking for your…unique perspective.”

“I am rather unique, that’s true.” Jack can hear the smile in her voice. “Well, more than anything, I’d say that Shepard is a huge nerd.”

Jack raises an eyebrow.

“What, you think that every time she came down to Engineering it was just to visit you?” Tali scoffs. “She helped me recalibrate that intake manifold like a dozen times. I think it was her way of dealing with being on a Cerberus ship, at least as first, but she asked a lot of good questions. Like she was actually interested in how everything worked.”

Jack nods, thinking. Yeah, that sounds like Shepard: asking too many questions and, to Jack’s eternal surprise, caring about the answers. Those long talks in the engineering subdeck felt like interrogations at first, until they didn’t. Until she looked at Marin, really looked at her, and saw someone who wanted to know her.

It was terrifying. Still is, if she’s honest. But…good.

“You know,” Tali says conspiratorially, “on our last mission, Shepard stole the mounted head of a husk from this guy’s laboratory.” Jack snickers at the way Tali draws out the ‘oh’ in lab-OH-ratory. “She keeps it in her cabin so she can run ‘experiments’ on it, but really I think she’s just trying to get it to make friends with the hamster.”

Jack laughs. “What a fucking nerd.��

Tali crooks a finger at her, in a gesture Jack’s come to think of as a wink. “See? Told ya.” She cocks her head suddenly, looking at something out of the projected field. “I have to go, we’re pulling into Thessia. Call you later?”

“Sure, thanks, I—“

A large hand falls on Jack’s shoulder, another one clicking her omnitool off. She instinctively starts to flare, but the biotic explosion dies as she turns her head to see who the fuck is touching her.

C-Sec uniform. Military haircut. Stern look on his face.

“Hi, Jack,” Commander Bailey says.

She groans.

Ah, shit.

— C-Sec Holding Cell, Presidium Commons, Citadel Now

She knows she could’ve gotten away. Punched Bailey, thrown a shockwave at his team, darted out of Purgatory and hijacked a freighter to parts unknown. But her damn students need her to be on the Citadel right now, respectable, not a fugitive from justice or whatever.

So does Shepard.

Once, she would’ve been overjoyed to have a chance to punch a cop. Now…she sighs and kicks the floor. So fucking soft.

The forcefield abruptly shuts off, and she looks up to see Bailey and his un-punched face glowering at her. “Come on, Jack, you’re done.”

She stands up and follows him out of the cell. “That’s all?”

Bailey rolls his eyes as he walks. “Normally, using biotics to stab two guys through the feet with coffee spoons into the floor so they can’t move would get you a harsher punishment than a couple of hours in a cooling tank. Which…why, Jack? Just why?”

She shrugs. “They were Cerberus.”

He stops walking for a second, shaking his head. “Ah, well. I’d tell you not to do it again but…fuck those guys.”

She laughs in spite of herself.

Bailey keeps walking. “And anyway, I couldn’t keep you in there even if I wanted to. You’ve been sprung.” He glances sideways at her, eyes twinkling. “Special Spectre dispensation.”

Jack blanches. Shepard…wasn’t supposed to find out about this.

He chuckles at the look on her face. “Eh, I wouldn’t worry too much. Best soldier I’ve ever seen, but underneath it all, Shepard’s as fluffy as a goddamn marshmallow.”

They walk out into the artificial light of the Presidium proper. “Next time, try not to be so public with your vigilante justice, yeah?”

“No promises,” she bites back.

He sighs. “Yeah, I thought that’d be a bridge too far. Well. See you next time, then.” He turns to go, then stops and turns back. “Oh, right. She wanted me to make sure you got this.”

He swipes a message over to her omnitool, text only, before walking away. She pulls it up: an address, some apartment on the Silversun Strip she’s never been to. The rest of the short message just says, Meet me here. About 36 hours out. Thessia went bad. Need you.

Jack’s heart twists. Marin’s messages are usually longer, sprinkled with anecdotes or curse words, depending on who she’s dealt with. A message this short…

…deserves something soft.

Jack squares her shoulders. Well, she started today intending to write Shepard a poem, so Shepard’s gonna get a fucking poem.

Addict. Nice. Funny. Sarcastic. Nerdy. And…she thinks back to what Bailey said. Marshmallow.

Marin Shepard in six words.

Jack gets to work.

— Anderson’s apartment, Silversun Strip, Citadel Thirteen days before the end of the Reaper War

Jack is clearly not rich enough to be in this building. The doorman stares at her tattoos. The receptionist stares at her mohawk-ponytail. The guy in the elevator stares…elsewhere.

But all she has to say is “I’m with Commander Shepard,” and they move out of her way. She smirks at each one of them, reveling in the power that simple phrase contains. No wonder rich people are such assholes, this feeling is intoxicating.

Soon enough, she’s knocking on a wood-paneled door at the end of a hallway, awkwardly holding the oblong package. Jack’s cased enough buildings to know this is the corner suite, and she idly wonders who Shepard killed to get access to this place.

The sarcastic question dies on her lips as Shepard—no, Marin answers the door. There’s no trace of the soldier, the leader, in her posture. She just looks…exhausted.

“Hey, Jack,” she says. “Come on in.”

She leads Jack into the apartment, a two-story, wide-open, immaculately decorated space that immediately sets Jack on edge. Nothing good ever happens in places like this. Drug deals. Trafficking. People with too much power deciding the fates of people with too little.

She looks over at Marin, who’s now sitting on the edge of one of the many couches, head in her hands. Well. If anyone could redeem a place like this.

Jack walks over to the couch, resting the package against the table and sitting down next to Marin. “You look rough, Shepard.”

Marin chuckles bitterly into her hands. “I feel rough.”

“I like rough.” Jack puts a hand on Marin’s shoulder. She’s shaking; not a lot, but too much. “Alright, whose ass do I need to kick?”

Marin glances over at her. She’s not crying, but she has been. Her eyes are red and puffy. And kind. Always kind.

“We lost Thessia, Jack. Kai Leng beat us there and took something we need.” She takes a deep, shuddering breath. “We’re running out of time.”

She leans into Jack, and Jack just holds her for a long moment. Soft.

After a while, she says into Jack’s shoulder, “Tell me something good.”

Jack thinks for a moment, and then chuckles. “I stabbed two Cerberus jackasses with coffee spoons the other day. Felt fucking awesome.”

Marin laughs, squeezing Jack tight before leaning back to look at her. “Yeah, I think I heard something about that.”

“Thanks, uh,” Jack rubs the back of her head, “thanks for getting me out of there.”

Marin grins, tired eyes full of mischief. “What’s the point of being a Spectre if I can’t abuse my authority for my…friend?” She winks.

It’s Jack‘s turn to laugh now. “And what authority are you abusing to squat in a place this fancy?”

“Ah, yes. This,” Marin says, spreading her arms wide, “somehow belongs to Admiral Anderson, who was apparently a pirate king in another life and didn’t tell me. Pretty lavish, right?”

Jack arches an eyebrow. “That’s a word for it.”

“He’s loaning it to me for a little while,” Marin says. “Hackett wants us to go into drydock for retrofits before we take Earth, so Anderson offered me this place to stay.” She shrugs, as if the commander of the Earth resistance forces gifting her a palatial apartment is a regular occurrence.

Then, she gets a keen look in her eye, peering at the package. “But the tour can wait. What is this?”

Jack blushes out of nowhere, suddenly so fucking nervous. Ugh. Such a joke. “It’s a…present. A project I’ve been working on.” A huge grin starts to cross Marin’s face, and Jack furiously says, “Don’t you fucking start, you little—“

Marin throws her arms around Jack and hugs her tight. Jack stiffens for a moment, then awkwardly hugs her back. She mutters, “It’s not a big deal, don’t make it a thing.”

Marin laughs as she pulls back. “No promises.”

She picks up the package and unwraps it. The large frame shines in the apartment’s down-lighting, the canvas within white with swirling blue calligraphy. Jack has to physically stop herself from twisting her hands nervously as Marin’s face goes slack. “Jack, did you make this?”

“Yeah.” Jack gives a tight nod. “Yeah, uh, they taught me calligraphy when I was in…when I was little. Said it was good for fine motor skills, biotic control. I don’t get a lot of chances to…use it. You know.”

Marin nods absently, tracing her fingers over the letters. Then all at once, her eyes go wide. “Wait. This is a poem. Did you…” She looks up at Jack. “Did you write this, too?”

Jack nods again, not daring to speak.

She watches Marin read it, her lips unconsciously mouthing the syllables. Jack’s been an experiment in a lab, trapped behind glass walls, trapped under psychotic expectations. She’s been in firefights too many times to count, pinned down by overwhelming forces, out of ammunition, her amp fried, her companions dead. She’s seen horrors most people couldn’t even comprehend, in her dreams, in her thoughts, in her bed.

Never, in her whole life, has Jack been more scared than watching Marin read her poem.

It takes a while, too. A sestina is long; too long, she thinks. Marin’s eyes flit over it, back and forth, taking in every detail, every image, every mistake, probably, she thinks. This was a mistake. Too much. Too much of me, too silly, too soft, too—

Jack’s eyes meet Marin’s as she finishes reading. The look she gives her fills Jack with a warmth she’s never known.

“How?” Marin asks.

Jack huffs uneasily. “It’s Miranda’s fault. Told me about the form, told me go talk to people about you.” She grins, adding, “I got to teach Petrovsky’s kid to say ‘fuck’.”

Marin laughs, long and loud. She looks back down at the poem, and softly says, “Why?”

Jack can’t help herself. “Because you’re worth it.”

“Thank you,” Marin whispers.

“It’s a little rough,” Jack responds.

Marin’s smile outshines the stars themselves. “I like rough.”

She gently puts the frame down, and they lay entwined on the couch for a long time, reminding each other exactly what they’re worth to each other.

They don’t even need six words.

—

Six Words for Shepard

The light fades, dark falling like an addict Tumbling to the ground. Everywhere, the nice And the cruel, the meek and the proud, funny And serious and even the nerdy Fall silent, their echoing sarcastic Words melting like a steam-drenched marshmallow.

We are all drifting, like a marshmallow Drifts in the cup of a coffee addict, Buffeted by fate or the sarcastic Laughs of a galaxy that destroys nice People, nice places, all that the nerdy Among us hold dear, their grief turned funny.

Yet we have a champion, a funny Idea as we sink in this marsh, mellow Soil for the dark. But with her nerdy Humor, warrior’s will, she seems an addict Not of the drink, but of all that is nice, Just, and good, eschewing the sarcastic.

And although it may seem still sarcastic To extol her virtues, there’s a funny Virtue in this exhortation, a nice Reminder that my love’s sweet marshmallow Core is filled with steel, and like an addict, I’ll ever seek her, for she is nerdy.

She’s a champion because she is nerdy, Her great mind always at work, sarcastic Quips only for fools, never the addict. Her plans outstrip friend and foe, and funny Though it is to have such a marshmallow In command, her calm shepherding is nice.

Don’t think that I’m just being fucking nice. See for yourself: the Commander’s nerdy Sense of righteousness, as the marshmallow She is, kills hostiles like a sarcastic Retort, their lives short, brutal, and funny. The rest, her heart cleaves to like an addict.

So sings this addict, drunk on my love’s nice, Sweet wine, a funny showing of nerdy Verse for my sarcastic, fierce marshmallow.

#mass effect #jack mass effect #fshep #my writing #sestina #harbinger of holiday cheer #this was the MOST fun to write #I haven't written Jack yet!#and I haven't written a sestina in years #fandom is the best

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