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Quarian Directives	By : NakedOwlMan Category: +M through R > Mass Effect Views: 56175 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: Mass Effect and all the characters in it are owned by people that are not me. I have not made a cent off this work of fiction

Chapter List
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She brought nothing with her, other than what could fit in her pockets. She wanted to give no sign of what she had planned, to Miranda or any of the other Cerberus assholes. Couldn't bring a weapon, unfortunately; there was no way she'd get it past the screeners at the space-port. But that didn't matter. Once she was off Illium, she'd find a way over to Omega, where she still had a few contacts who could hook her up with a piece.

Walking down the CIC to the airlock, Jack frowned as she saw who waited there. "Have a nice time," said Kelly, that damned fake smile still on her face. Jack gave her a wicked grin back.

"You think you and Miranda have me beat, but I'm smarter than you thought, bitch," she thought to herself as she stepped out into the pristine beauty of Illium.

As soon as she was off the ship, she stuck a pair of wireless earbuds into her ear canals and cranked up the classical music that she had prepared. Not normally her style of music, but if she had used what she usually listened to block out the world, some of the lyrics might cause her to do things that would, at the very least, spoil any attempts to escape the Normandy and probably land her in jail, to boot.

"They always used to say that music could be a bad influence," Jack thought to herself mirthfully. "They had no fucking idea."

She was taking no chances. She kept her eyes down at the floor as she walked to the spaceport, afraid that even seeing written instructions might trigger whatever Miranda put in her head. The music in her ears drowned out anyone who might try to give her commands or cause her to waver from her path.

It took her a while, but soon she was in line at the spaceport ticket counter. Looking at the schedule, she picked the flight with the earliest departure time. Didn't matter where it was going. Just as long as it was away from this goddamned ship.

The turian in front of her finished his transaction, and the asari working the desk smiled up at Jack. "Destination, please?"

Removing her earbuds, Jack spoke. "Yeah, give me a t...." was all she managed to say before her throat seemed to clamp shut.

No. Fuck no.

The asari looked at her strangely, as she tried to force herself to speak. "I need a t... ti..."

"Ma'am, are you alright?" the cashier asked her. "Do you require assistance?"

"You can't go, Jack," said a voice in her head, unmistakably Miranda's. "You've got an appointment to keep, remember?"

Shaking her head violently, Jack kept straining to speak. The people behind her were starting to sound impatient, and the ticket seller looked very uncomfortable. Her finger drifted over to a button nearby, most likely to call for assistance.

"Have to do this," Jack thought to herself, trying to drown out Miranda's mocking voice in her head. Finally, she spotted an electronic display on the wall to her side. Desperately, she put a finger on her chosen destination and tapped rapidly.

"O...okay, that'll be 800 credits," said the ticket seller, still uncomfortable but probably happy to have found a way to get this strange human away from her. It was a struggle, but Jack was able to pull out her credit chit and place it in front of the asari, who swiped it and handed her a ticket. "Have a nice flight, ma'am," she deadpanned. "Next, please!"

Jack stared at the ticket in her hand, as a triumphant smile came to her face. "I beat her," she muttered. "Fuck you, Miranda. I'm not your slave."

Then she realized that the final boarding for the ship was in ten minutes. She started running toward the gate, shoving people aside in her way as she sped toward her freedom.

Finally, she reached the gate. The last few passengers to board were waiting for their tickets to be checked. Jack made to walk to the line.

And stopped dead in her tracks.

"Fuck," Jack snarled, drawing a few glances from the crowd. She tried again, staring down at her own feet and watching as they refused to move. "Please, please, you can do this!" she said, hearing a sob start to form in her voice.

"Excuse me," said a slim salarian as he passed her. Desperately, Jack grabbed onto his shoulder.

"Tell me to get on that flight!" she said to the alien.
The salarian looked at her uncomfortably. "What?"

"Just do it!" she yelled. "Order me to walk up and get on that flight! Please!"

"I don't have time for... whatever this is. I have a meeting to get to. Excuse me," the salarian brushed her hand off his shoulder and walked away.

Jack stared around at the crowd, feeling tears start to run down her cheeks and not caring. "Somebody, please! Tell me to get on that shuttle! Anybody, just tell me to do it!"

She got several odd looks from the people passing her by, but nobody answered her request.

"Excuse me, miss," said a voice from behind her. She turned to see two asari security officers. "Is there a problem here?"

"I... I can't..." Jack's shoulders heaved. As she stared down at the floor, she heard a beeping alarm coming from her omnitool.

"FIFTEEN MINUTES UNTIL YOUR SCHEDULED APPOINTMENT"

Looking over her shoulder, she saw the spaceport staff closing off the entrance to the shuttle, as the pilots made their final preparations to pull away from dock.

"If you need help, we can call somebody," the asari security officer kindly told her.

"No, I'm fine," Jack said, already starting to walk away. "I've got somewhere I have to be."

It was like she was just a passive observer in her own body, as she made her way out of the spaceport and towards the address Kelly had given her. After a long walk, she arrived at the location with a minute to spare. The place looked like some sort of storage facility, not sure why Kelly wanted her to come here.

As she wiped the tears from her cheeks, she watched the time on her omni-tool count down. "Maybe, once I'm done with whatever Kelly has in store for me, I can just stay in Nos Astra," she thought. "Find some place to hide until the Normandy has left."

But Jack wasn't fooling herself. She was willing to bet that, whatever Miranda had done to her mind, she had made sure that escape was impossible. No doubt that, as the time to return to the Normandy came close, she would watch her own feet direct her back to the ship.

"But I have to try," she told herself. "If nothing else, I have to give it a shot. Just park myself on a bench and refuse to move. Get a pair of fucking handcuffs if I have to. And then..."

The clock hit the appointed time. Jack's hand reached out to open the door. She stepped in and saw...
* * *
"Hey, hey, Jack!" she heard a voice call out, and her eyes snapped open.

It was Shepard. The red-headed commander of the Normandy was staring down at her with a bemused expression. "Party a little too hard on shore leave?"

Jack blinked, totally confused. The last thing she remembered was opening the door and seeing... what had she seen? "Wha... where the fuck am I?"

"Guess that's a 'yes'," Shepard said, smiling as she sat down next to Jack. "You're lucky Nos Astra security didn't pick you up, sleeping on a bench in the middle of the commercial district like this."

Looking around, Jack finally recognized the surroundings. "Goddamn it," she muttered, rubbing at her eyes. She felt sore all over, her muscles aching. It did kinda feel like a hangover, but she was pretty sure that Kelly hadn't just forced her to drink herself into a blackout.

What the fuck had happened? Looking at her omni-tool, she saw that two hours had passed since the time she arrived at the address. It was like somebody had completely removed her memory of the last few hours.

"Fucking with my head," Jack muttered to herself. "Goddamn that bitch..."

Shepard's face turned concerned. "Who is? Has somebody been doing things to you, Jack?"

"Forget it," Jack waved a hand at her. "Wouldn't believe me, anyway."

"Jack, considering the problems I've had trying to convince people that the Reapers are coming, I'm willing to listen to just about anything with an open mind. So try me."

Leaning forward and putting her head between her knees, Jack groaned. "Somebody's fucking with my mind. Taking control of my body, making me do things I don't want to do. Whatever somebody tells me to do, I do it, immediately and without question. Like I'm a goddamn puppet on somebody else's strings."

Shepard's face immediately turned troubled. "Damn it. I didn't want to believe she was capable of something like this."

"She... you know? You know who's behind this?" Jack exclaimed. "Shepard, you gotta stop her! I can't do a damn thing, she's fucked with my mind too much already. But you could take her out!"

Shepard shook her head. "It's not that simple. I'm not sure it's her who's behind this. There's not enough proof, not yet."

Dammit, Shepard, Jack thought to herself. Always the goody-two-shoes, doing the "innocent until proven guilty" shit.

"Shepard, you gotta do something!" Jack begged her. "I can't go back to that ship, can't have her screwing with my brain anymore. I won't be a slave, I won't, I won't..."

"Calm down, Jack," Shepard gripped her by the shoulders. And just with every other order she'd been given, Jack could feel her heart rate slow and her breathing start to even out. "Look, I've got some leads to check out. Trying to figure out the best way to break whatever control she has over you. Chances are you aren't the only one she's targeted. If I make my move too soon, without a way to counteract her control, she could have the entire crew against me."

Shepard had a point, as much as it pained Jack to admit. She wasn't sure if the rest of the crew still on the Normandy were following Miranda because they were loyal to Cerberus, or because she'd done the same shit to them as she had to Jack. But either way, they were going to need every advantage they could get to take that bitch down. At the very least, if Shepard could find a way to override the shit Cerberus had done to Jack, she'd gleefully help Shepard plug as many of the bastards as she could before they took her down.

"We're going to get through this, Jack," Shepard assured her. "Trust me."

And the funny thing was, even though it was a direct command, Jack didn't really feel anything change. And she realized that she already trusted Shepard.
"Okay," Jack said. "I'll come back to the ship. But as soon as you're ready to make your move, let me know. And I'll happily blow that bitch and that pretty little ass of hers all the way to hell."

"I'm hoping it isn't going to come to that," Shepard said sadly. "Maybe she can be reasoned with. But if that becomes necessary... I'd feel safer with you by my side, Jack."

Shepard's last words brought something back to Jack, a question she had forgotten about with all the insanity going on. "Wanted to ask you something," she stopped Shepard from walking away. "Back when we took down the Shadow Broker... you could have taken anybody with you. The turian, the justicar... the damn assassin, for fuck's sake. But you took me. And damned if I could figure out why."

The commander paused to choose her next words carefully. "Jack, I assume you know about me and Liara."

Jack scoffed. "No fucking shit. Hard not to notice the two of you making those 'fuck-me' eyes at each other all the way to Hagalaz. Half expected you to start ripping each other's clothes off to embrace eternity right there in the CIC."

"Jack, I love Liara more than I ever thought it possible for me to love anyone," Shepard said. "She is a part of me, just the same as any of my limbs or my lungs or my heart. And if I were to ever lose her... I don't know what I would do."

Sitting down next to Jack again, Shepard turned to stare her in the eyes. "And when we were heading toward that ship, ready to meet up against an unknown enemy, I thought a lot about who I wanted to fight with me and Liara. And I knew that, more than anything else, I needed somebody with me with your ferocity, your passion for battle." She smirked as she added. "I wanted somebody with me who would do everything in her power to destroy every last motherfucker in our path, so that the woman I loved would live through whatever we faced off against."

Jack couldn't help but grin, "Well, shit, glad I was homicidal enough to meet your standards," she said.

"But it wasn't just that, Jack. When you held up that barrier against the seeker swarms, I saw how much it took out of you. If you wanted, you could have let that barrier down and made a break for it. Swarms probably would have gotten to me, Garrus, or Grunt before they got to you. But you damn near killed yourself protecting all of us. You may not like to admit it, but there's a part of you that wants to be part of a team. Who wants to fight alongside people you can trust, and have them put their trust in you as well."

Standing up, Shepard reached out a hand to Jack. "So trust in me now, Jack. And I swear to you that I'll fix this mess I caused."

Grabbing her hand, Jack let the commander pull her to her feet. "Alright, Shepard. I'll trust you. But you better fix this before that bitch mindfucks me into being her slave. Can't imagine a fate worse than that."
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Quarian Directives