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Shepard retracted her omni-tool for the third time—still no messages from Liara.
The Prothean cut an imposing figure against the balustrade overlooking the gaping maw of the central quadrant of the Citadel. His back faced her, his chin slanted upwards with nostrils flared, taking in all the scents undetectable to her own dampened human senses. Whether he was genuinely taking in the sights of the new world he’d been thrust into or making his usual attempt at rudeness by ignoring her, she couldn’t tell. Nevertheless, his pretence at detachment was more convincing than hers. Shepard’s chest was tightening with every minute that Liara’s invitation to an outing together hung limp in the air between them.
Just then, the dash on her wrist flashed, and she flicked open her messages faster than she could reload.
I’ve been held up with work; please enjoy the exhibition without me :)
Shepard grimaced at the smiley face. She hadn’t mentioned to any of the crew about her midnight escapade with their resident—and very tipsy—Prothean after the party at Anderson’s apartment, yet somehow word had spread, and it seemed even Liara wasn’t above teasing her at this point.
“The Asari has deserted us, I see.” Javik spooked her out of her thoughts as he approached, looking anywhere but at Shepard’s face with all his usual effortless confidence. She closed her messages and stood straight.
“So it seems, but the exhibition should still be of interest to you. Liara said your perspective on some of the Prothean artefacts on display would be invaluable.”
“Primitive detritus, no doubt,” he sighed through his teeth, “but I promised that I would indulge my gracious hosts.” He looked at her then, all eyes focused on hers intently. Shepard felt the hairs on her arms skitter and quickly pushed some thoughts away as she turned down the hall to where a temporary gallery had been erected in the lower levels of the Presidium. Javik walked slightly behind her on her left side, the usual place he occupied when they were out on mission together.
“I don’t understand why your governments throw money at the arts at such a time when all assets should be directed at the war effort.”
"Normally, I would agree with you,” Shepard inclined her head, spotting the ticket clerk at the entrance to the small gallery. A scrolling holographic poster was placed outside, advertising the exhibit as Wonders from the Ancients. Javik sneered at it derisively. “At this rate, I think we could all do with a little uplifting. After all, beauty and majesty are what make life worth living.”
“The feeling of the burn on my face when my enemies turn to ash before me is what I live for, Commander.”
Shepard smiled at the attendant by the door as she paid for their tickets, wishing Javik didn’t speak so loudly sometimes.
Inside, the space was dark with a low, intimate ceiling. Display cases lined the walls, lit from beneath with a pearly blue light that showcased all the angles of the intriguing foreign objects that had been gathered together.
“Liara said that there would be a Prothean display.” Shepard glanced at a noticeboard glowing faintly near the entrance, but Javik walked straight past her, through a pair of floor-length curtains, and into the next segment.
She found him halted before a case, pouring over a group of items held securely behind glass. They were tall, cylindrical figures, displayed like valued ornaments, as one might place over a mantel on their ship.
“Fuel shells,” Javik corrected, jabbing his fingers at the display that noted these as religious icons. “They are specifically for civilian vessels—not something I had much use of, but I recognise them from my time.”
Shepard hesitated.
“And this,” Javik said, stepping over to another, larger display case. “Commander, tell me what you believe this object to be.”
Shepard looked at the long instrument with a ball-shaped end that sloped down into something that resembled a handle for a being with fewer fingers than she.
“It—well, it says on the notice that it’s some sort of medical implement used in healing practices, or potentially a rudimentary musical instrume—”
“It is a sex toy, Commander,” he said abruptly, and Shepard found her words dried on her tongue. Javik gestured to it, his expression neutral. “You have these things on your Citadel, do you not?”
"Listen, Javik, if you’re not enjoying yourself, we can go.”
“What are you talking about, I am having a great time.” He turned to look at her, but she found no trace of amusement in his face. “These primitive interpretations are comical to me; come, let us laugh some more at your race’s failure to categorise basic Prothean objects.”
They looked over a few more of the artefacts, with Javik pointing out various inaccuracies and mocking them as they went. After some time, Shepard relaxed into it. She had hoped this would be an opportunity for Liara to properly quiz Javik on some of his history, with Shepard playing no more of a part than chaperone at best. The fact that it had turned into something of a surprise date had made her uncomfortable at first, but she felt oddly safe with Javik, like she could let the lack of control wash over her a little and flow with it for once.
“Now this item is very interesting.” Javik had his arms folded, and he gestured with his chin at what looked to Shepard like a very large toilet seat. “It is incomplete—as is the majority of the junk contained in this so-called exhibition—but once there would have been a transponder constructed from thousands of particles of light that would transmit images across the empty central section of this device. It is for tracking ships across galaxies with minimal use of AI.”
Shepard glanced at the signage. A device which ancient peoples used for communication with their ancestors, it read. Javik sighed and was quiet for a time. Shepard bit her lip.
“You know, the superiority thing—the desperately hopeless last-of-his-kind shit. You don’t need to pull that with me, especially not here.” Shepard gestured around to the empty gallery. The contrast of the dim shadows over her face and the way the cabinet lit up all the textures on Javik’s did more than give her cause to stare. The light glassed across his eyes as he offered her his attention, making him even more ethereal than he already seemed to her.
It wasn’t dissimilar to how his gaze lingered on her when she checked over her gear as they were ready to disembark the Kodiak, or how he kept close watch on her six during a skirmish at the expense of whoever had the misfortune of being their third wheel. It felt different now, though, within the quiet audience of dead objects. His gaze was unfaltering, explicit in the plainness of his intention.
Something pulled in her chest then, and she looked away, but Javik had already stepped into her personal space. She could feel the pressure of him holding back, a mere few centimetres apart. His presence was overwhelming, like he might swallow her whole.
“From the moment you resurrected me from my frosted tomb, I felt something in you—something I was too arrogant to admit. There is a reason people follow you, Commander, a reason the council fears you.”
Shepard snickered. “The council doesn’t fear me.”
“Perhaps it is not fear, as you would describe it. In Prothean culture, there is a reverence towards fear. It is often welcomed as both control and protection.”
Shepard shook her shoulders as she glanced down, trying not to laugh in exasperation. “That’s not fear, Javik; we call that respect.”
He furrowed his forehead then, rocking back on his heel, “Respect alone does not raise armies.” He said it so matter-of-factly, as if she were arguing against a universally understood truth, “Respect cannot force your enemies to succumb to your power; no, what you have is something else. Something I have been trying to understand ever since our fated first meeting, Commander.” His last word rattled off his breath and sent a shiver down her spine. He stepped closer into her space, brushing against her. “There is one thing you possess that other primitives do not.” His dark eyes flashed in the low light. “A power over me.”
Shepard forced her hands to remain at her sides, but his was at the nape of her neck, stroking her skin like he were touching a work of art ten thousand times more valuable than all the priceless objects surrounding them.
She tried to retain her composure, but her breath caught. “There’s nothing special about me, Javik; I’m a soldier like you, like everyone else in the crew.”
Javik exhaled the smallest laugh and shook his head. She would not have this victory either, it seemed.
He kissed her, his lips softer and gentler than their initial drunken encounter, and Shepard found herself leaning in, memories of the night of the party flooding back. Javik’s rough hands on her body, the lingering alien alcohol on his lips and tongue, his collected surveying of her skin despite his inebriation as they figured out each other's anatomy—what felt good, and where.
Shepard pushed herself up against him, giving in. Finding the soft crevices between the sheets of his armour, to run her fingers against the cloth, hoping that he could feel her touch, then letting her arms rest behind his head as she caressed the slope of his neck. He hissed gently as she stroked him there, his eyes no doubt closing to properly take in the sensation, just as she’d discovered the first time she’d been on top of him.
“I am finding that your concept of kissing grows on me too, though I am not entirely sure yet what I am supposed to do with my tongue.”
"Oh, I’ll show you what you can do with your tongue." Shepard caught the words in her mouth as a small group of people entered the exhibition hall behind him, and she quickly retracted her arms from around his shoulders. Javik, however, was far more reluctant to withdraw. “Let's regroup at the apartment.”
***
The first step into Anderson’s pad felt like lowering herself into lukewarm water. The stage of their last big blowout before they ended things with the Reapers. The kitchen still had that morning-after smell—oily fried breakfast lingering over the undeniable stench of spilled alcohol—but the place had been cleaned and the sofa cushions re-plumped.
“It is all returning to me now,” Javik mused as he lowered himself onto the long couch. “I was here after Tali’Zorah forced us to sit through that dreadful film, and your human spectre was giving the muscle soldier what I have been told is called a ‘lap dance’.” Shepard laughed, remembering the scene, although she was pretty sure it was James who had been shaking it.
Javik lowered his gaze, his eyes darkening. Shepard rocked back, crossing her arms.
“No.”
“I said nothing, Commander.”
“I mean it.”
“You are projecting, Commander; I am merely sitting here.”
Shepard felt the pull as he laid himself out before her, legs spread open, his arm on the back of the sofa, his chin turned up slightly, baiting her, mocking her. She wanted to put her foot on that superior expression of his and press down slowly, eliciting those noises that she had forgotten in her drunken haze, but that lingered on the edges of her memory, both shameful and desperate.
“How do I know I can trust you?” Shepard squared her shoulders, “I didn’t say a word to the crew about the night we spent together, yet somehow everybody knows.”
Javik watched her smiling faintly and relaxed back into the couch even further.
“I said nothing to anyone.” He admitted, shrugging in a convincingly human manner, “but you must remember that your sense of smell is not as acute as that of other species. The non-human members of your crew could no doubt smell me on you, and you on me.”
He got up suddenly, no longer the bait but on the attack, but she slammed into him first, pushing him against the fish tank with a force that sent waves undulating through the water. She kissed him hard, biting into his lip, and he mimicked her movements, varying the pressure on her lips and tongue in response to her own need.
Her hands felt for his hips, but Javik was already at the fastenings to remove his exosuit. Under the hard, shining exterior, his body was wrapped in a silk robe, so different from the ridges that covered his upper arms and torso. Shepard traced the texture of his skin through the robe before burying her hands beneath it, feeling the warmth of him and the strength of his arms as he held her captive. Breathing fast, she remembered all the places that felt good, that made him moan in ways that made her insides burn hot. She was naked before she realised, not knowing or caring whether Javik had disrobed her or she’d shucked the clothes of her own volition. She was burning to feel him against her flesh.
“Get on the couch,” he rasped into her ear, his breath catching as her fingertips caught him off guard, “and I’ll show you what I can do with my tongue.” Shepard tried to push him down onto the rectangular cushions, but the Prothean would not relinquish his ground. He backed her onto the soft couch, parted her knees as she stared up at him, and stroked the insides of her thighs as his head lowered. She closed her eyes, feeling the hotness of his breath over her vulva.
Their first time had been hot and messy, what Shepard could remember of it, but the precise caresses and touches that Javik now exhibited felt like a performance, showing her that he was as skilled in the bedroom as he was on the battlefield.
Shepard threw her head back and collapsed lengthways onto the couch as Javik’s hot tongue entered her gently, then became firm, rubbing in circular motions around her clit before going in deeper to elicit those sighs that she had wanted so badly from him. His hands gripped her thighs tightly, like the predator he was, devouring her. He varied the pressure, taking a moment to stop and kiss the sides of her vulva, stroking up the edge of her navel with the tip of his tongue, leaving silvery lines on her skin.
“Commander,” Javik roused her attention. Shepard had become lost in the head-space he’d crafted for her, his body silhouetted by the mood lighting of the room. His broad, alien shoulders with their hard edges and his strong arms held her in place as if he thought she might flee were he to release her.
Shepard hooked her foot around the top of his thigh, pulling him closer as she ground herself onto the mound that housed his cock. She had been surprised to find the first time, after stripping him in hazy excitement, that Prothean’s kept all their bits neatly hidden away until foreplay had been properly executed. It made her all the more prepared when she rubbed her clit against him, the skin of his pubicefolding in on itself as his cock bloomed from beneath. Its ridges delightfully firm and lubed by the sebaceous fluid that made Shepard’s stomach constrict with desire in the knowledge that he was eager to take her—all of her.
Lying down, she arched her back, pressing herself up against him, and Javik held himself there, watching her work him before taking his time to dip and thrust himself into her. She took him up to the hilt with one go, and Javik sighed in agony with the relief it seemed he’d been holding for as long as she had. He leaned in, his chest pressing heavily onto her as he held her backside with both hands and began pounding into her with little remorse. Shepard cried out at first but held her moans as Javik smiled wickedly at her; she wouldn’t give him the full satisfaction yet.
She stroked the ridges on the back of his head again, trickling her fingertips along from the tip of his fringe to the base of his skull, and he stopped suddenly, holding his breath before letting it out in a gasp.
“You will end me if you are not careful,” he breathed with a visceral struggle to contain himself.
Shepard smirked. “I’ve seen better stamina from a rutting varren.”
He smiled again, but only briefly, before squeezing her tighter, pushing deeper into her, the couch legs scraping on the floor as it moved with them.
“Do not underestimate me, Shepard.” He pulled back and tilted his hips to rub his firm ridges against her soft spot, which made the insides of her legs quiver. He bent his head then, kissing her breasts and running his hands down the soft sides of her torso and neck, pulling out of her on occasion to rub his cock directly over her clit, sending shockwaves of fire through her body before plunging back in and cascading ripples of pleasure over her again.
When Shepard’s skin was coated in a fine layer of perspiration, Javik lowered his gaze to her, pressing his thumb in circles on her clit, watching on with lustful eyes as he pushed slowly in and out, ever more insistent, his breath growing thick and heavy as he watched her mouth open, a moan escaping as she convulsed in waves, constricting around him. Javik let her encouragement send him, and all the muscles in his hardened body tensed as he pulled her legs up against him, his own orgasm making him shake with a brief frenzy before he leaned over her, spent and overcome.
Shepard awoke sometime later. Javik was reading something on her omni-tool as he lounged between her legs, his head resting neatly in the crook of her hip.
“The human has arisen,” he said without looking at her. “Are you aware that you snore in a way my culture considers extremely unflattering?”
Shepard kicked him playfully in the head as she swept her leg over him and righted herself on the couch. Her clothes were strewn across the floor. Javik was dressed again in his silken undershirt, which modestly covered his bare legs. His armour was neatly stacked against the bar.
“The Asari is asking for my review of the exhibit,” he said, sounding bored, “but I cannot fathom your primitive communication devices.” He handed her the omni-tool, “I will dictate to you.”
Shepard took the omni-tool and glanced at her messages from Liara. There were quite a few actually. All asking about how the exhibition went and if anything had happened.
“Liara, you dog.” Shepard grinned to herself as Javik got to his feet, the silk robe falling to his mid-thigh. Shepard tried half-heartedly not to be distracted by this as he began to list the innumerous ways in which the exhibit was lacking in historical data, factual or otherwise.