There's the Rub

Posted on Tue Apr 30th, 2019 @ 11:23pm by Major Jacob Asher & Civillian Shae

Mission: Interlude 1
Location: Shae's Quarters, Various
Timeline: Current

Shae was groaning by the time she made it back to her quarters. She couldn't remember the last time she had hurt this much! That Hunter fellow was deceptively powerful for his age, especially going up against two young fighters, but a loss was a loss and Shae was taking her loss in stride; at least she and Jeremy weren't fighting anymore, and she had learned quite a bit from Lieutenant Williams. Upon entering her quarters, she started peeling off her sweaty clothes, going straight for the shower. She really just wanted to go straight to sleep, but she felt so gross, she knew she'd regret it if she didn't at least try to take a shower first!

Jake heard about Williams putting a beating on Shae and Jeremy. He couldn't even say it was unconventional, because having two feuding airman beat the snot out of each other until they got along was sort of a time honored tradition. Having them both try to kick his ass wasn't a bad idea, either. Shae had said he couldn't sneak into her quarters. She hadn't said he couldn't just openly walk up to the door and knock, so Jake decided he'd go and check on her. He arrived at the door and knocked.

Shae was just getting out of the shower when she heard the knock. She swore under her breath and tried to dry off her tender, bruised skin as quickly as possible, but then she realized that this was going to take much longer than a person at the door might be willing to wait, so she decided to say something instead of going to answer the door.

"Who is it?" she called out, but then realized it didn't really matter. "I'm just getting out of the shower, please wait just a minute or two!"

Jake made a conscious decision to ignore the image of Shae in the shower that started playing in his head. "It's Jake. I just wanted to check on you. Stories of Williams beating the crap out of you and Crow are all over the mountain."

"Jake?" Still wrapped in only a towel, Shae made her way to the door and cracked it open to make sure that it was only Jake waiting out there, then let him in, quickly closing the door behind him. Right away, he could see a discoloration of a bruise forming on her shoulder from where she'd taken a particularly hard hit. "It seems the speed of rumors is consistently expedient no matter where one goes in the galaxy... Corvus and I did lose rather spectacularly, but it was quite the learning experience," she said, blushing slightly as she sat down on the bed to tousle her hair with a towel.

"Well," Jake said. As he casually took in the view. The bruise didn't take away from her attractiveness in his eyes. "After I teach you to use the four foot and the five foot staff you can ask for a rematch. So, you and Crow settled things I take it?"

"Yes," Shae said with a nod. "He... he didn't apologize to me even though I felt he should have, but I remembered what you said about swallowing my pride after my fight with Edith-kaasan, and after I saw Corvus break down and hearing some of the things he said, I realized that getting an apology truly didn't matter. What was important was that we were communicating and we weren't mad at each other anymore, so I chose to leave any perceived grievances alone and simply move forward. I'm still not fond of him and I gather that he's not too fond of me, but we're cooperating," she said, smiling at the end.

"Williams set the same thing up for me," Jake said. "Well, not to beat the crap out of him. I don't fight for sport anymore. But for us to talk things out. We'll see how it goes."

"Good thing no more beatings are arranged; I hear he got it pretty bad yesterday, and after today I think it would be cruel to make him fight again," Shae said in good humor. Then with a sigh, she raised her arms for a good stretch, her body popping and crackling as she groaned in discomfort at the punishment she had taken today. "Your new second in command really doesn't hold back," she remarked, wincing as her body continued to protest against her range of motion.

"Here," Jake said. "Lay face down on the bed. Turn your head to one side so you can breathe." Shae could be a little literal sometimes. "Come on, trust me. You said no sex on base, I agreed to follow your rules, and I'm a man of my word. Trust me."

Shae looked at Jake warily, but after his assurance she lay down as instructed, still wrapped in her towel. "What are you doing?" she asked curiously.

"Here," Jake said. "I'm just going to slide the towel down your backside. There, see, I haven't tried to devour you yet, have I?" Jake began to massage Shae's neck, shoulders, and back with his strong hands, knowledgeably applying just the right combination of pressure and gentle massage. "How's that feel?"

Oh! Ohhh, that's... that's very nice..." Shae said, her surprise quickly melting into enjoyment. Even after a shower, her muscles were still so tense that much of the pressure he was applying kind of hurt, but a good kind of hurt, and the hurt was fading into relaxation as he continued to work. "I can see now why your soldiers are so formidable if you constantly push each other this hard! I can't remember the last time I ached this much!" she said in a tired-lazy tone as her eyes started to grow heavy. "Does everyone get this kind of treatment afterwards, or is it just me?" she asked with a playful smile, then released a soft 'ooh!' as his hands worked over another tender bruise.

Jake chuckled. "Well, I don't do this for just anyone," Jake said. "And I don't always have someone to do this for me, so I just end up having to suffer. I can't say what happens to other people. While there are people who do this kind of thing professionally, a lot of people consider this rather intimate and only do this for someone they're close to, most often someone they're involved with."

"In that case, I would return the favor, but I don't think I will be moving much until morning," Shae said, chuckling softly. "Oh, now that I think about it, the morning after this is going to be awful... And poor Corvus has no one to do this for him! Where can I find these people who do this professionally? I think I want to hire one for Corvus."

"Well," Jake said. "If that's what you want to spend your money on, go ahead, but Jeremy is probably too shy to strip to his shorts and let someone rub their hands all over him, male or female." Jake continued to massage Shae's sore muscles, working his way down her back. Again he noticed her scars and again they did nothing to alter his attraction to Shae...and again they made him angry. People hurting Shae made Jake very, very angry. He was careful that his rage never traveled to his hands, and that none was heard in his voice when he spoke next. "We have from Friday end of day to Sunday evening, so about 48 hours, this weekend, before we start training bright an early Monday morning. Do you want to go to Lethuan for any of that? We're going to have less time later this week, and the last night of freedom I was going to take the team out to celebrate the end of the torture."

"You don't mind if we go to Lethuan, do you?" Shae ask. She knew he had offered, but she wanted to be sure he was willing to give up the comfort of his own to visit Lethuan with her, because she knew he would come with her. "Since I will be here so often, I may have to do some cleaning while I'm home, dispose of foods that will not keep in my absence, even in the cold. But after that, I would enjoy spending the weekend with you," she said invitingly. "So what kind of celebration do you have planned? Should I go hunting to prepare for a feast?"

Jake grinned. "I think someone might notice if we haul a rabbit the size of an Earth deer up to the cabin," he said. "We could go Lethuan this weekend, if you want. That way we can actually relax a little while we're there and not just turn right back around and trudge back to the gate the next morning. Secondly, I think I'm supposed to take the team out for alcohol in a couple of weeks. The way the training works out, we train Monday morning through Saturday afternoon, then have Saturday night to Sunday night off, then start bright an early Monday morning and run through Saturday afternoon again. I'm thinking that last Saturday night I'll take them out. Nathan's going to make an appearance, so he said he'd share the bill." Jake decided he could get away with placing a kiss on Shae's shoulder without either of them succumbing to any wild carnal urges, so he did so.

"You're not supposed to do that," Shae whispered to Jake, although the playfulness of her tone and her impish smile informed him that she did not mind, just this once. Then she realized that she could not drink alcohol, or at least not as much as everyone else would likely imbibe. "Will there be drinks without alcohol? Because I am not supposed to drink alcohol."

"Absolutely," Jake said. "I'm not going to drink more than one alcoholic drink, if that, Especially if we're going out to my place that night. And I'm going to set limits on everyone else. Otherwise, they'll all get drunk as hell and still be hungover the morning of the mission. So, yes, there will be non-alcoholic drinks available."

"Good," Shae replied. She just didn't want to feel left out! "Thank you for doing whatever it was that you did to me, I feel much better," she said as she sat up, holding her towel to her chest. She was still pretty damned sore, but at least the muscles were no longer tense, and now she felt like she might actually be able to get some rest!

"Uh," Jake said. "Right. I assume you're going to rest now, so I should go, I suppose. I've got PT early tomorrow morning, but after I clean up, you want to meet for breakfast again?"

"I may go check on Corvus in the morning to make sure he's okay, so if I'm indisposed then we can do lunch in the rec room instead," Shae replied.

"Okay," Jake said. "Goodnight then. Sleep well." Realizing that Shae couldn't very well walk him to the door naked, he nodded and left. He went back to his quarters and changed into workout clothing. He went to one of the open workout rooms and after some stretching moved through a Qigong routine, taking his time, until moving on to Tai Chi. He'd enjoyed the martial arts since he was a child, but he no longer fought for sport and he didn't use violence to deal with the frustrations of the day. He fought to train, to defend himself, to defend others, and/or to kill, and that was that. But once he'd learned enough Tai Chi to really use it as exercise, he found that it because a good stress reliever and helped him settle himself, especially after... no. There was no point in going over that again. Best to let the dark thoughts pass through him.