significantly less canon compliant than hunt. fun fact: all of the included code names reference characters i have already posted about. some sort of prize to whoever can guess
“You know why they keep Jaws out here?”
Maverick drags his eyes away from the thrashing sea below to regard the animal beside him. Its voice rumbles, low and reverberating. His broken clavicle throbs.
“To catch jumpers,” Megantereon answers himself, after receiving no response. “Y’see, the fall won’t kill you. You’ll just be too cold to swim.”
Maverick raises his eyebrows. “I don’t appreciate the implication.”
Again, Megantereon disregards him. “And that’s when Jaws plays fetch. It acts all put upon, but between you and me, I think she’s just waiting for someone to try.”
He’s met the sea leopard in passing twice before. It’s undoubtedly the largest sapient he’s ever seen in person, all beady eyes and sleek, serpentine muscle. A beautiful thing, really. It scares him more than Megantereon himself.
Maverick turns back out to face the sea, the stitches in his shoulder itching hotly beneath his jacket. “Projecting, are we?”
He hears Megantereon chuff beside him, and can picture its scarred muzzle quirked up in an affable smile. “No, no, I’ve had my fun,” the cat assures him. Right. Good, clean fun.
The world tilts dangerously, and Maverick grips the rails. The massive structure beneath him strains against the water and the wind, letting out a groan that could no doubt be heard for miles.
“Sea sick?” Megantereon teases.
“I was a marine for four years.” There’s a reason I never reenlisted.
The superstructure howls again, and Maverick can tell without looking that they’ve dropped about twenty feet in altitude. His knuckles are white. “It’s different on a boat.”
“How so?” Meg asks, his haunch brushing up against Maverick’s rib as gravity pushes him into a lean. Maverick braces against the tilt, but Megantereon seems content to sway.
You can steer a goddamn boat. Against his own best interest, Maverick considers the structure’s tethers. Great, screeching chains, biting deep into the rock thousands of feet below. They hold fast, for now. He does not consider the rust that no doubt grows cancerously along them as the days crawl by. He changes the subject.
Megantereon blinks at him. “Pardon?”
“I have a hard time believing that ‘serial killer rescue diver’ was a preemptive measure. Who tried to jump?”
“A few,” Meg shrugs. “Icarus got close.”
Maverick’s brow tightens. Soft, that one was. Is.
“War Machine talked him down. I tried, told him if he were really serious about offing himself, he ought to try something less thematic. He didn’t think it was very funny...” Megantereon rambles, his low voice a pleasant anchor. “I miss that kid.”
Maverick laughs flatly. Laughs the same way he did when he met Icarus’s golden eyes and they both knew that, despite the gun muzzle cold against his forehead, he wasn’t going to die. Soft.
“He should have put us both down.” You can’t be soft out there, Nate.
“Like dogs?” Megantereon smiles.
Good men die young, Nate. Good men die young.
