#threads: jack

It had been a nice evening. They’d eaten (a meal Angela had been rather proud of), and while there had been two glasses of wine for her, and a bottle of beer for Jack, they weren’t drunk.

And, as it often happened when Angela and Jack spent time together, the conversation had flowed naturally from dark to light and back again. Which had been when Angela, a little red faced and giggly, had admitted to missing sex, and occasionally wearing inappropriate underwear to work, just to feel desirable.

When Jack had requested to see, Angela had assumed he’d just wanted her to show him the actual fabric. But the idea of modelling for him had entered her brain. After all, they were friends, it wouldn’t be weird, right?

Stood in the doorway, wrapped barely in red lace and a bra that could barely claim the title, Angela felt her face flush. Especially upon Jack’s growled words.

But her feet carried her across the room, coming to stop in front of Jack. Her hands were clasped in front of her and she bit her lip. “You like them?”

It’s a bad idea. It was a bad idea when it started, and it’s a bad idea now. Jack’s breath is caught somewhere in his throat when Angela emerges from her bedroom, gift-wrapped in thin, crimson lace that’s vaguely blurry but still makes his heart pound. They’re friends, and more importantly they’re colleagues, and Jack doesn’t even have being drunk as an excuse but...

“Yeah,” he says, a little breathlessly. “Looks good, Ange.”

She’s close enough to touch. He could pull her into his lap, if he wanted. He could lean forwards and sink his teeth into the curve of her hip.

Long fingers brush up the outsides of her thighs, just-barely skimming against red fabric. Jack tips his head back against the sofa, looks up at Angela with eyes that are slowly going to shit but the pupils of which are dark and blown. He sits up straighter, leans up towards her.

(It’s still a bad idea.)

                                                         Jack doesn’t listen.

She’ll watch him for a moment as her brain tries to produce an answer while processing whatever it was he said. She’s counting and judging by the look on his face she’s taking too long to respond,

“ … Six days ago? I don’t remember. Theres simply too much to do.”

She waves her hand and it seems like everything is in slow motion. Maybe she ought to rest, just maybe.  

“Ana...” 

76 runs a hand over his face, the visor removed for once, and sighs heavily into his palm. Pale, milky eyes watch Ana intently, though she’s only a blur of shape and colour to him. He doesn’t need to see her face to know how tired she must look; her reflexes are slower, her thoughts seem... sluggish. 

Jack’s never been the type to coddle anyone, far from it. But Ana’s... the only friend he has, at the moment, and she deserves to rest. At the very least, she’s of no use if she can’t focus.

It’s an old wound, he knows, and the time for apologies, if there ever was one, passed a long time ago. Jack never was one for saying sorry, but he--remembers trying, and Gabe coming at him like a tonne of bricks: why didn’t you go back for her, what’s wrong with you, you’re damn right you’re sorry-

Jack rubs a hand over the back of his neck. It used to be a tell that he was embarrassed - now, all he feels is an overwhelming sense of shame. 

“I know,” he admits, face turned away from where he knows Ana’s sitting. “Reyes--Gabriel, he--” But he can’t quite finish the thought, whatever it was, fist curled tight in front of his mouth as he rests his elbows on both (aching) knees.

When he speaks again, his voice is uncharacteristically quiet, if still gruff.

“Maybe I just don’t understand,” or maybe he understands Morrison perfectly. “I’m not a psychologist after all.” There’s some sort of edge to the doctors words. “But no one can work properly if you’ve got them under your thumb all of the time.”

He leans against the desk behind him, hands curled around the edges of it, and resists the urge to rub at his temples. “No,” he concedes, looking off to the side. “No, you’re right. But there are rules and protocols in place for a reason, and I need to be able to trust my team to follow orders even when it doesn’t necessarily suit them, and I need to be--at least informed if they’re going to run off regardless, because otherwise I’m left without a plan if my superiors call in to ask what the Hell is going on. That affects all of us. The whole organisation.

And it’s not--” Jack cuts himself off, furrows his brow at the doctor, like he’s trying to decide on whether or not to trust him. “It’s not just Commander Reyes, Doctor. Reyes is--honestly, he’s the least of our problems. It feels like we’re being--it’s--information keeps getting to the other side, no-one can tell me how, and I’ve had three agents go missing in the past month, and one before that.

TOUCH MEME. ➝ Feel mine’s heartbeat

He wishes, frequently, that being Strike Commander gave him the authority to skip out on mandatory physical examinations. Jack avoids them when he can, reschedules and makes excuses when he can’t; sorry, meeting on Tuesday, yeah, no, looks like it’ll last all day. Can’t do Thursday either, nope. 

But Medical always catches up with him. 

He puts up with Dr. Nishi’s examination with the bare minimum of speaking required, grimacing when he feels the cold stethoscope press onto his chest. Currently, Jack’s main problem is his degenerating eyesight, but there’s not much they can do about it now unless he wants his eye replaced (he doesn’t)