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Sister Complex

Chapter 10

Jane's cloth wrapped fist plowed into the punching bag as she bounced on the balls of her feet. She wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead, and then sent a fist flying toward the swinging bag once more. She'd been at this for close to an hour, and still she felt like she'd go crazy if she sat still for longer than 5 minutes. She should have been asleep hours ago, but Tuchanka had shaken just about everybody, including her. So when she'd been unable to fall sleep, she'd donned a pair of shorts, a sports bra, and a tank top, and made her way down to the gym. She'd been spending more and more time down here as of late, though never so late at night. Her usual way of dealing with post mission stress usually included ingesting copious amounts of alcohol and waking up in someone else's bed. But she was quickly discovering that when aboard your brother's ship, you weren't allowed to have fun.

However, she knew exactly how much pressure and responsibility was being placed on John, and if dealing with his over protectiveness would placate him and make his day a little easier, then she was willing to put up with it. More than anything, she was frustrated that there was so little she could do to help shoulder his burdens. He'd always been a good hearted boy growing up, and later on the Alliance's golden boy, always doing the right thing even when it was hard and painful. She loved him for it. And envied him. She'd always taken the quickest and easiest paths to victory, which had always worked for her, but he always took the right path. For example, their debate after the Dalatrass had suggested that compromise. Jane had over heard their conversation and had later suggested he take the deal, but John, good and just John, had disagreed vehemently, stating all the reasons for which the krogan deserved their trust.

"Hey." She nearly jumped out of her skin, and turned, ready to slug who ever it was standing behind her. She relaxed slightly when she saw that it was Garrus, leaning back against the weapon consoles. "Couldn't sleep?"

"Something like that. And you? Do you grace the cargo bay with your presence at 2am often?"

"I'm known to, on occasion. Turians run on a shorter sleep schedule than humans. Since I've been a little... wound up lately, I've generally been coming down here to work out my stress." He'd shed the heavy armor he usually wore, and instead he had on a loose set of dark civvies that were most likely his sleep wear. He looked smaller, but not any less intimidating. She grinned, shifting her weight to one side, jutting her hip out, and crossed her arms.

"You certainly do seem to be carrying some tension... Maybe I could help you get rid of it." She stretched her arms up over her head, and his jaw slackened slightly, his eyes widening. She brought her hands back down, and started flexing her wrists and fingers, eliciting a series of small pops.

"Ooh, you mean like a sparing match?" Realization dawned across his face, and she couldn't help but chuckle.

"Unless you have a better idea?"

"No, I- Uh, not exactly." Jane turned and walked toward the middle of the large room, and watched as he pushed off from the console, but didn't take a step forward. "I'm not really sure whether its a good idea though. One of us doesn't have natural armoring." She scoffed and raised an eyebrow.

"What, never sparred with a human before? You'd be surprised how tough we are, even if we look a little squishy."

"No, I've sparred with a human before, but never a completely unarmored one." He remained completely still, but Jane was nothing if not persistent.

"Ah, I get it. You're worried that this 5'5" human female is going to mop the floor with you. Yeah, I suppose I'd be scared too, in your position." That seemed to do it, because an instant later he was striding toward her, rolling a kink out of his neck.

"Oh, you're on." As he came closer, Jane realized that he was perhaps more intimidating without his armor than with. He was thin, but his body was all lean muscle and hard, sharp plates. He moved with a feline like grace, completely inhuman. He was the epitome of an apex predator, and she felt a small surprising pang of fear bubbling in her core, along with something else that she wasn't quite ready to admit to.

Garrus lifted a forearm to block an incoming punch, and struck out with his own fist, hoping to catch her before she had time to react. But, not unlike most of his attempts, his fist flew through the space where she'd been only moments before. It was like she was made of water, flowing around him, almost impossible to land a proper hit on. He'd gotten her good a few times, but her speed and flexibility without her armor had surprised him. God, if she could move like this during a fight, imagine what she could do while-

He shook his head, and refocused on the incoming kick just in time to dodge out of the way. He wanted to believe that it was simply the heat and frenzy of the fight that was making his mind drift in that particular direction, but if he were honest with himself, he'd admit that it'd gotten incrementally more difficult to keep his mind off of her since their impromptu introduction on Menae weeks ago. She'd stood there, the embodiment of confidence, little blue droplets of blood splattered across her face, her shining green eyes alight with amusement as they landed on him...

The air was knocked out of him as he nearly doubled over from the powerful jab to his midsection, and he tried to swing out at her while she was close, but she darted away again. Focus... It wasn't necessarily that she was incredibly strong, but on top of her damned speed, she seemed to know almost all of his vital soft and weak points.

Ah. Right. Alliance Special Forces. Probably had all sorts of turian physiology courses...

He wasn't sure how long they'd been at it, but at this point he was positive he was going to feel it in the morning. She certainly was. She was favoring the leg with the recently healed gunshot wound, and had a small smudge of blood on her lip, thanks to an upper cut he was particularly proud of. A few bruises were starting to show themselves on her forearms (and a nice one on her cheek bone as well), and she was damned lucky she'd wrapped her fists, else she'd probably have to add bloody knuckles to the list. And the only reason he wasn't eaten away by guilt was that smug smirk never left her face, and the pain from the numerous hits she'd dealt him.

She danced from foot to foot, and with a wrist she wiped at her bloody lip, causing it smear, bringing his mind right back to when she'd stood over him on Menar, the blue blood smears streaked across her face in some sort of exotic impersonation of turian facial tattoos. She wouldn't have made a very good turian, she was far to unpredictable. But for some reason, that only made her more appealing...

Jane struck out, her fist coming toward his soft belly again, but this time he saw it coming and grabbed her wrist just before she could make contact. He reacted instinctively, whipped her around and up against a near by shipping crate. Her back was to him, and she struggled to turn her head so that she could watch him as he twisted her arm behind her back. She tried to grab at him, to dislodge the hold he had on her with her free arm, which he promptly grabbed and pinned above her head. They were both breathing heavily now, her struggles squashed as he applied more pressure.

His fingers tightened, his talons coming dangerously close to breaking through her silky soft, delicate human skin. Spirits, he could smell her now that she was up close, the distinct smell of sweat and medi-gel and Alliance regulation soap. The scent was an odd mix of familiar and strange, having spent most of the past 6 years around humans, and yet never having bothered to pay attention before now. He looked down at the gentle curve of her neck and shoulder, so unlike what he was used to, and taut muscles underneath. Spirits, what the hell am I doing?

He looked up and met her eyes, which were watching him not with fear or confusion, but an intent expression he couldn't quite identify. "Huh." They stayed like that for a moment, their breathing starting to return to normal before he released her.

"Your point." She stated evenly as she turned to face him, rubbing one of her wrists. He noticed a few small, red pin points dotting her flesh, and winced.

"Sorry about that."

"No worries. Me and the medi-gel dispenser are good friends." Her smirk was back, and though while that was relieving, it did nothing to ease the roiling knot of emotions in his gut. Silence sprung up like a particularly insistent weed, and Garrus shifted his eyes away, lifting a hand to rub at the back of his neck nervously. Not only was she human (and he did not have a human fetish), but she was John's little sister. John was his best friend, his commander, and the biggest damned hero in the galaxy. Feeling these... whatever sort of feelings they were- for this small human woman was insane. Absolutely insane.

"I uh- I should get going. I've still got some... work that I need to get done on the cannons." He muttered lamely as he turned toward the elevator. Her hand shot out and caught his arm, holding him in place.

"This was fun." Her smile lost its usual snarky undertone, and he felt the roiling knot wiggle a little. "We should do it again some time." He chuckled, sticking his hands in his pockets to keep them from doing anything stupid.

"So long as you don't tell your brother that those bruises are my handy work."

"Deal.