Well, is it a problem if they aren’t aware of it? You swore you’d had this conversation a million times.
“Girl.” Johnny leans over your shoulder to not-so-quietly whisper (yell) at you. “Didn’t kno tha LT could be tha f’csed on something other than c’mbat.”
You wish he was wrong. You wish everyone was wrong. It was becoming a problem - and you didn’t know how to solve it.
“I wish I knew why he despised me so damn much.” You grunt, irritated with the weight of the lieutenants attention bearing on you. “I’m a rookie, of course, but I carry my weight. Captain praises my combat techniques every damn second he gets.”
“I dunno lass. I’ve never seen someone so stoic get even…more stoic.” Johnny laughs at himself. “But I’ll let you know if I find anything juicy”
I catch the tail end of the Lieutenant’s conversation as Soap walks away. He’s discussing an upcoming mission with one of the new recruits, emphasizing the importance of inventory run-through for the millionth time.
Was it that? Did you fuck up an inventory check on the last run? No - Cap would’ve put it in the mission report to render next time. You’re truly lost. You thought it had been going well with LT - you had JUST learned how he takes his tea.
Do you think it’s…?
No. There’s no way.
Whatever. You don’t give a shit about the Lieutenant and his problem with you anyways.
🂱
It’s warm. The warm press of a leg that’s not yours against one that is. You wish you didn’t crave the touch - you wish you didn’t crave any touch, but here you are.
“Sergeant!” Simon barks at you.
Right. The mission. You need to get your shit together.
“On it, LT.” You somehow get out, your head floating somewhere it shouldn’t on a mission this high stakes.
You head towards the East Wing of the decrepit - probably hazardous - building the task force was sent to this time. Yellow, peeling wallpaper surrounded you, leading towards a maze of office rooms and weirdly assorted furniture. it smelled of…eggs? Not the time to be hungry girl.
Eggs?
Your com cuts through its near constant static to Simon’s heavy breathing. You thought the base was abandoned? Did he find someone? Did someone find him?
“There’s a leak,” his gruff voice cuts through. A leak? Like…gas? “Location, now.”
You blink.
“East Wing, weird office, approximately 50 ft from the Log Room.”
You blink again.
Warmth.
“I need you to follow my every step until we get into that room.” You feel his breath cover your neck before the words fully register. Oh, okay. You feel his gloved hands slide around your waist after you’ve stared ahead a moment too long.
Right - the mission.
You force your feet to follow the path to the Log Room - you know this by heart, you studied it for weeks.
Left. Right. Left. Step over the cords. Left. Right. Left. Right. Simons’ hands clench tighter around your waist as footsteps register. Left. Right. Footsteps?
“Get in th’ room and go left.” Simons practically breathes into your ear.
The dust hits you first, the permanent mildew stains second. You kick away piles of old computer papers and years of dust bunnies to comfortably squeeze into the corner Simon guided you to. You take a moment to catalogue the potential danger you two are in - the footsteps are continuing to surround you, but they’re obviously still a floor above. You may have time to do this.
You take a look at Simon just as he turns to check if you’d made it. You nod. He signs ‘I’ll watch’. You nod. And inhale.
Focus.
“Okay,” you whisper inaudible to yourself. You grab the tools needed - stored safely on your Tac-Vest. “Time to do the fun part.”
What you were hired for - the best hacker on this side of the harbor. Price sought you out after one of your last schemes made national media - a rookie mistake - but one that gave you the most phenomenal job a girl could dream of. Of course, you had to be trained and ripped apart to prove yourself to the team (in your mind), but over these last 3 years you’ve done nothing but work your ass off to prove it over and over again.
So yeah - this is slight work. Could be better if you couldn’t feel Simon Riley’s fucking stare on you.
You pop the cover off of the control panel and get to work. Ghost’s slightly shuffling outside the door, no doubt getting impatient. He knows your rhythm by now though, so it can’t be too bad.
Huh. These wires look fairly fresh compared to the ancient computers collecting dust to your left. You warily continue accessing the board. Maybe they replaced these recently? But why? You finally get through enough layers of dust to access the chip you were after. After you remove it you notice a piece that’s definitely not supposed to be there, a sticker almost? You quickly peel it off and find…another chip.
Oh. They were protecting something.
You feel your feet dragging before you hear the alarm screeching in your ears. Ghost’s hand is wrapped firmly around the back of your gear, pulling you in a direction you can’t exactly decipher at the moment.
The closet - get to you trip slightly over those fucking cords the closet. East Wing, 30ft from Log Room. Are you saying this aloud? You hope so.
You hear a door whish open and your body being placed upright in possibly the smallest space you’ve ever stepped foot in.
Warmth.
“Oh.” You whisper.
Ghost has silently positioned the faux wall/door back into position before you’ve realized the proximity of his body to yours. His front pressed to yours, his body providing heat you haven’t felt so close in many, many years. Embarrassingly enough, the heat has made your brain register safety in a situation it certainly shouldn’t. The slack in your knees goes unnoticed entirely due to Ghosts body essentially holding you up.
“Hi.” You breathe. What a mistake. Your eyes begin to shut as the dust bunnies in the room make their way to your nose, a sneeze on the tip of your tongue, shi-
Ghosts hand wraps itself around your mouth, the sneeze hardly audible over his thick gloves. Shit. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the smirk on his face combined with the mortification of screwing up the mission bleeds onto your cheeks, flushing them an undoubtedly rosy shade.
The footsteps fall harder, getting closer until they’re directly outside of the makeshift closet you’d shove yourselves into. They lead right to the door, until they continue their path to the Log Room. Whew.
Simon’s thigh somehow finds itself nudged between yours in the chaos. Your eyes widen as you involuntarily squeeze him into yourself. You pulse. His grin deepens.
“Hi, bunny.” He breathes into your mouth.
🂱
You hear the pop of the cap before it’s placed on the wood table in front of you.
“4 beers and a Daniel’s with a fresh coke for bunny.” Gaz boasts broadly as he approaches the booth. You’d found yourselves at Malone’s, as always on a mission like today’s. It was somehow a huge success, Gaz and Soap clearing the North Towers as you and Ghost left the East Wing as quickly as you could - much to your chagrin.
“Proud of ya, team,” Price grins. “This one’s been a long time coming. Couldn’t be happier. Now drink you brutes.”
The four men hoot and holler while you giggle slightly into your whiskey. It had been a good one - you could say that. You’ve definitely seen worse.
You know he’s looking before you can even register to turn your head. Simon Riley and his damn staring problem.
“What’s y’r problem Ghostie?” You hiccup. You and Soap may have pre-gamed quite a bit before heading out.
“What’s tha’ bunny?” Ghost grins. Him and his stupid grin.
“You stare.” You grit out.
“Oh, do I?” He’s loving this, the bastard. You sigh. Maybe sulking is your best answer.
“Yes, you do. What’d I do t’ ya?” You pout slightly. He raises his hand to wipe your hair out of your eyes.
“Can I tell you a secret?” He whispers as he leans in close. Your breath hitches as you glance down at his lips through the mask. You always wondered how they’d taste on nights like these. Beer? Or the cherries he steals out of your Jack and Coke?
“Maybe both,” he laughs against your lips. Well, maybe not against, but with how little you’ve been touched in these last few years he damn well may have been. He heard that?
“Ukraine. August ‘23.”
The mission you’d completely bombed. Literally. The metal fragments are still buried deep into your naval - the explosion still echoing in your memory when night creeps into your room. That had been a rough one for the team.
You didn’t know the place was mined - it was your fourth, fifth mission? You were used to sitting at a desk, reviewing the many ways to bypass servers and firewalls tough enough to take down multiple CIA’s. The months of training holds nothing to common sense - see a giant ‘ant pile’? Don’t step on it. The fuck. You’ll never get rid of Kyle’s screams over the coms that nights. Your consciousness was like a frequency, in the atmosphere, then out. You could only remember slight waves of nausea and blurry grunts of pain. It was the first time you truly thought you were going to die.
You groan slightly, the shame reinventing itself into every crevice of your being. Your therapist would cringe.
“Thought I was g’nna lose ya, Bunny,” he says.
His stare lowers to your form, dressed in what you’d consider ‘risky’. The small amount of skin you’re comfortable showing, still more than the team has ever been allowed to see.
“Gotta stare at ya. Make sure y’r not g’nna vanish. Plus when it’s a view like this, how could I not?”
Oh. Oh. Your Lieutenant is flirting - you think. You also think that maybe you’re not as drunk as you should be to not remember this sentence every night forever more. You pulse.
“Oh.” You mumble, casting your gaze towards his hands. They’d saved you so many times, on so many missions. You wished they’d break the invisible walls you’d built around yourself. You wished they’d touch you.
Warmth.
Ghosts palm slides around your knee, respectfully, of course. Until it’s not. Your breath catches - whys he sliding up? That’s a little high, you haven’t felt that since 8th (?) grade, Seth Matthew’s in History - what a crazy time right? Your plans to distract yourself don’t work in the slightest as the warmth you’d been chasing for the last 3 years rushes over your body, cheeks, hands, cunt faster than you can process.
You let a whimper escape, involuntarily. Damn.
“I’ll do whatever y’ wan me to, Bunny.” He sighs. “Just please - let me stare as long as I’d like.”
the concept of a team of eridians keeping grace’s dome exactly how he likes it. not just habitable but perfectly tailored to him down to the temp of the sea and the levels of fog and the door on his home. and they’re so excited to be taught by him despite how strange he must look to them. the outsider finding a home where he should fit in the least. i’m gonna cry again
Shoutout to Project Hail Mary for being the only media where the unconscious protagonist is dragged off screen by an alien spider monster and the audience's reaction is heartbreak on behalf of the alien spider monster.
you may think misogyny is good because it is made up of miso, which is delicious, and gyny, which is woman. and girl miso sounds great. but 👆 it is not girl miso
