Benji feels like he can breathe for the first time in nearly an hour as Ethan and Will come tumbling in through the door of the safehouse. They’d lost track of each other in the chaos and confusion that had followed the explosion that had taken out a solid chunk of the warehouse-turned-base of operations for their terrorist du jour; Benji and Luther had already been clear of the building when it had blown, but Ethan and Will– they didn’t know.
As much as they’d wanted to stay and search, to find their teammates, they knew the plan: rendezvous at the safehouse and prepare for the next leg of the mission. So they’d acquired a vehicle and made their way across town to the little house they’ve been holing up in, where Benji had proceeded to pace nervously across the floor as the minutes had ticked up and there had still been no sign of Ethan or Will. And though Luther had told him more than once to relax, that they would be here, Benji could tell he hadn’t been as calm as he’d been pretending.
There’s a momentary release of tension, a sigh of pure relief when Ethan and Will finally do show up, but Benji’s breath catches in his chest again when he really takes them in. They’re both looking quite a bit worse for wear – bruised and smoke-stained and singed around the edges. One of Will’s sleeves is actually burned, the visible skin of his forearm shiny and pink.
“Were you in the warehouse when it blew?” Benji demands, a little shrill.
“Yes,” Will says flatly, at the same time Ethan assures them, “Just a little bit.”
They turn and look at each other. Ethan smirks. Will sighs.
“Are you alright?” Benji asks, despite the evident answer.
Ethan glances at Will again, tilting his head as if to say, “Well, are we?”
Will rolls his eyes, but answers with a firm, “We’re fine.”
“Good,” Luther says, “because I need your eyes on this.”
His tone is nearly businesslike, the “What took you so long?” implied, but Benji catches the way his eyes rove over both Ethan and Will, checking them over just as surely as Benji is doing. Still, he nods towards the computer, where he’s been reviewing the information they’d managed to lift from the warehouse before it had gone up in flames, and Ethan immediately snaps into focus mode, crossing the room to where Luther is sitting. When Will makes to follow, Benji intercepts him, glancing back at Luther and Ethan. Seeing their attention absorbed by the screen in front of them, Benji turns back to Will. “You’re really alright?” he asks, voice low.
He shouldn’t let his anxiety get the better of him, not in the middle of a mission. They’d promised that whatever happened between them, it wouldn’t get in the way of their jobs; they would trust each other, trust their skills, trust that they would come back to one another at the end of the day. And this isn’t a breach of that agreement – not really. Benji just wants to be sure.
“I’m fine,” Will promises.
Benji clucks out a little disapproving noise and reaches for Will’s hand, taking it and turning it gently so he can inspect the burn on his forearm.
“I’m fine,” Will says again. “It’s nothing. First degree. Ethan put me out.”
“There’s some burn cream in the first aid kit,” Benji says, as though Will hadn’t spoken. “I’ll go get it.”
Will rolls his eyes, but when Benji begins to let him go, he turns his hand in Benji’s grip and holds tight.
“Hey,” says softly. “Thank you.”
His eyes flash up over Benji’s shoulder, checking that they’re still beneath Ethan and Luther’s notice, before he leans in and presses a kiss to Benji’s cheek. For helping. For caring – it goes unsaid, communicated by the brush of his lips against Benji’s skin.
“Yeah,” Benji says, equally soft and a little breathless as Will pulls away. “Any time. Every time.”
Will quirks a little smile at him, tired but real, as he lets Benji go, and Benji can feel down to his bones that he’ll do anything to prove that he means it.
I am back on the no-glue pamphlet train! I splurged on some coloured linen thread yesterday purely because I thought it’d be nice to use for this kind of book. The thread is quite a bit thicker than what I usually use so I definitely won’t use it for regular books - but here I think it makes a lovely contrast.
A6, printed on long grain 90gsm Munken Smooth Cream, and the cover is printed on 160gsm Canaletto cream.
Take Shelter is mission impossible fic by @foxesonstilts - there’s a bit in there about a whale penis bone but do you know how hard it is to find any kind of picture of a penis bone?? and once you start looking at whale skeletons and you realise none of them have penis bones one might be tempted to write letters to museums asking them to please include the penis bones in the exhibits (and scientific illustrations)…
Benji is used to being needed. Needed for his intelligence, needed for his skills, needed for what he can do for his country (or someone’s country, anyway), needed for what he can do for the world. It isn’t a bad feeling, necessarily – it’s nice to be needed, really. It’s nice to be of value.
What he’s far less used to, however, is being wanted.
He isn’t trying to throw himself a pity party, or anything like that; he isn’t crying about how no one loves him, or has ever loved him. His parents had loved him, he knows, when they’d still been around. He’d had friends at university and anywhere he’s worked. He’s dated. It’s just that what people need from him has always outweighed the wanting. When he can’t provide what they need—when he can’t conjure up the appropriate emotional responses for the situation, when he gets absorbed in his work, when he’s tense and anxious and snappish—they no longer believe he’s what they want.
There have been exceptions, of course. Even if Ethan and Luther need Benji, he has no doubt that they also want him around. And Will–
Will is different, too.
Will listens to him talk, listens even when it’s high-intensity anxious rambling. He lets Benji introduce him to the things he loves, and starts sharing a few of his own. He understands Benji’s drive to work, to learn, to know as much as he can, to be the best that he can – and he pushes Benji to be better (apologizes, later, when he thinks he’s pushed too hard, but there’s nothing much to apologize for when Benji is pushing Will just as hard, forever and always trying to drag him out of his comfort zone). When Benji misses cues, misses dates, when they argue—and they do—Will never leaves him out in the cold – not once.
It isn’t quite what Benji had imagined when he’d thought about dating Will (and he had thought about it, enough that he’d wanted to put the work in to make it a reality). It’s wonderful, of course—he wouldn’t dare say otherwise—but it’s different.
Perhaps he’d been more taken in by the face Will presents to the world than he’d thought. Perhaps he’d still been expecting someone sharp and exacting, wound tight and seeking perfection.
What he’s gotten instead is the deep well of caring buried beneath those things, something that seems to pour endlessly into Benji whenever they’re together. What he’s gotten is need, yes, but also desire, and above all, want.
Will can’t hide it – not from someone he cares about. It comes out in the way he gravitates towards Benji, in the way he looks after him, in the way he lets his guard down, in little touches and significant ones, in the kisses he gives: full-body affairs that involve Will’s arms around him, legs pressed together, noses brushing, fingers tangled in his shirt or in his hair, always, always trying to pull Benji closer.
It’s almost comical, really, how far from reality Benji’s initial expectations had been.
“Are you laughing?” Will asks, pulling back from their kiss.
“I’m not laughing,” Benji says – and he’s not. “I’m smiling.”
“Seems like you’re laughing,” Will protests, but there’s a tiny smile ticking at the corners of his mouth. “You could give a guy a complex, laughing while he’s trying to kiss you.”
“I’m not laughing,” Benji insists, leaning in for another kiss, one that Will grants him, even if it’s a little difficult to manage while he’s smiling.
“Fine. What are you smiling about, then?” Will asks.
“I like kissing you,” Benji says, leaning in to do just that, once more. “I like you.”
“You damn well better,” Will grumbles, tone entirely belied by the smile that’s fully growing across his face now.
Both smiling like loons, kissing becomes a little more difficult, but they manage.
“I like you, too,” Will murmurs somewhere in between, lips still brushing Benji’s.
“Yeah,” Benji says, and like hell if he’s ever going to be able to wipe the grin off his face now. “I had a feeling.”
[*slaps the roof of fic* This bad boy can fit so many headcanons in it. Really just some silly fluff. Benji/Brandt, hinted Ethan/Luther, 1,245 words]
Will is squinting at his phone. It’s inches from his face and his eyes are nearly scrunched shut, and that never bodes well. It either means he hasn’t been sleeping, or he has a migraine. (Or both? Could be both.) If Benji tries to say anything about it, however, he’ll be met with defensive scoffing before Will scuttles off elsewhere to sulk and pretend he’s feeling perfectly fine while probably making matters much worse.
Benji chooses, for once, to keep silent, and settles down on the couch beside Will.
He hasn’t even been sitting for a minute before Will’s thrust his phone into Benji’s face and is demanding, “Tell me what this says.”
Now also squinting at the screen, Benji pushes Will’s hand away enough that he can actually focus on it.
“You want me to… read your email to you,” Benji asks flatly.
“I can’t see it well enough. I think my eyes are going to explode,” Will says by way of explanation.
Benji takes the phone from Will’s hand. “And you want to keep working?” he asks.
Will shrugs, jamming the heels of his palms into his eyes. “What else am I gonna do?”
“Oh, I don’t know, rest? Not do something that engages your overworked brain? Stop encouraging Hunley to send you email about office bullshit?” Benji knows Will doesn’t get anything remotely sensitive sent to his phone; if he’s reading it here in the open, it’s probably some kind of petty missive that Hunley’s sent just to see if Will’s paying attention.
(Benji won’t pretend to understand their relationship. He’s fairly certain they can’t stand each other, but is also reasonably certain they’d die for one another if it came down to it, though possibly only as a way of getting the last word in. Will in no way, shape, or form wants to actually be in charge of the IMF, but Hunley needs Will’s know-how and the knowledge he’d accrued during his time serving the previous Secretary. They jab at each other constantly, but they’re an impervious team when they want to be. Mostly, Benji just waits for the words “You won’t believe what Hunley fucking did today” to leave Will’s mouth and then settles in for a gossip session.)
Will groans, a sad noise from a sad, sad man. (Benji would have more sympathy if Will were actually willing to take advice in moments like this.)
“I’m not reading your email to you,” Benji says, placing Will’s phone on the couch cushion beside him; apart from the fact that would be encouraging Will, it also sounds really boring.
Turning to glare at Benji, eyes hazy and half-lidded, Will does something with his face that is not pouting, because William Brandt, former (ish) field agent and current chief analyst of the IMF (if that’s the story they’re going with), does not pout.
(He does, and he is.)
“Luther reads to Ethan when he has a migraine,” Will says petulantly.
“Luther reads books to Ethan when he has a migraine,” Benji says. “And he only does that when Ethan has exhausted himself past the point of being able to move.”
“So you’re saying you’d read my email to me if I were incapacitated?” Will asks.
“We are absolutely not indulging that line of thought,” Benji declares.
Will sighs, letting his head fall back against the couch. “Fine,” he says, holding his hand out. “Give me back my phone, then.”
“Yeah, we’re not doing that, either,” Benji says. “You need to rest.”
Will is silent for a long moment, face still pointed towards the ceiling, before he mutters something, mostly unintelligible but reluctant-sounding.
“What?” Benji asks.
“I said, I can’t,” Will snaps. “My brain just– it won’t stop, and it hurts too much to settle, so I just need something to focus on, alright? Anything, it doesn’t have to be the goddamn email, I’ll play some stupid, colorful phone game or something. Just– please.”
Benji purses his lips, looking over and taking in the miserable slump of Will’s posture, at odds with the way his shoulders are tensed up near his ears. “A game really isn’t going to help your head,” Benji says, and Will lets out a harsh sigh.
“Benji–”
“No, listen, just– wait here a minute, alright?”
“Benji–”
“Just a minute, I said,” Benji insists. Before Will can gather his wits enough to fight back, Benji drops a kiss on his forehead and then gets up off the couch. “I’ll be right back.”
Will lets out a little huff, but doesn’t move.
Quick as he can, in case Will decides to make a break for it (or at least make a break for his phone), Benji heads for the bedroom, moving to the nightstand on Will’s side of the bed and rifling through the many books Will has crammed into it. It’s terrible, really, the way he treats his books, but the ones in the worst condition are the ones he loves the most, and Benji unearths a copy of The Hobbit that has seen better lifetimes before heading for the kitchen. He procures an icepack from the freezer and makes it back into the living room before even a minute has passed. Will, either in acquiescence to Benji’s request or simply because he can’t, has not moved.
“Here, close your eyes,” Benji says as he approaches the couch.
This time, Will does not oblige. Instead, he sits up and squints at Benji suspiciously.
“Nothing good ever happens when you ask me to do that,” he says.
“Now that’s just a lie,” Benji says. “I can think of at least a few times I’ve told you to close your eyes and you’ve thoroughly enjoyed what happened next.”
“Maybe I’ve been faking it,” Will says, eyes still narrowed (likely more in pain than any outright suspicion at this point).
“Even you’re not that good of an actor, love,” Benji says. “Look, there are no guns, masks, or gadgets anywhere in the vicinity. Just trust me.”
Will continues to frown at Benji for another moment before letting his eyes fall shut. Benji moves back to the couch, settling himself in the corner before reaching over and gently guiding Will to lie back against him. For all his bravado, Will goes without a word, pliant and trusting in a way that makes Benji feel warm.
He places the icepack over Will’s eyes, who lets out a sharp breath of surprise before melting just a little bit against Benji.
“Good?” Benji asks, just to be sure.
“Mm,” Will answers quietly.
“Alright. Now, I know this isn’t the petty drivel from Hunley you were hoping for, but I hope it will suffice,” Benji says, picking up the book from where he’s left it on the arm of the sofa and leafing through to the first page. “In a hole in the ground lived a hobbit.”
Will lets out a breath of a laugh, a tiny smile finding a home on his face, and Benji can’t help the answering one on his own. Knowing he’s chosen well, Benji settles in for an evening of reading with Will warm and heavy at his side. There are certainly worse ways to spend his time.
“Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.”
Between him and Benji, Will is definitely not the first one to make a move when feelings get involved
He’s all too aware of the risks of having a significant other in their line of work. He thinks about Ethan and Julia, how the threat to Julia had been so great that the only way to keep her safe had been to fake her death. He thinks about Jane and Hanaway, how even Hanaway’s high level of competence and training hadn’t been enough to guarantee his survival. He thinks about the way it had felt like his chest was caving in when Benji had been taken by Lane, and he just– he can’t. He wants, but he’s too afraid to reach out, to try to make it a reality, because if the worst should happen, it will hurt all the more
Benji, on the other hand, has never met something he wanted that he hasn’t put his whole ass into achieving. He’s perfectly aware of their mortality, of the risks they take every day and of the fact that they might not come home from their next mission, but that’s exactly why he thinks they should give this thing a go. The people you love might not be here tomorrow, that’s why it’s important to be with them and tell them how much they mean to you now
So he sets his cap for Will and starts plotting how to scale those emotional walls
Benji has never really found a way to keep the nightmares at bay. Not since Mumbai, since Hendricks, since almost nuclear annihilation. (Probably not since Hanaway, if he’s being honest, but there had been so little time in between his death and breaking Ethan out of prison and then the nonstop shitstorm that had followed, he hadn’t quite had the opportunity to find his fallen teammate starring in his bad dreams.)
Time has made him a better agent; it’s given him skill and experience, but it has not soothed the thoughts of the horrors he’s witnessed nearly visited upon the world.
His brain does like to change it up, though, he’ll give it that. Some nights it isn’t all about the apocalypse; some nights it’s about the small-scale catastrophes. Personal tragedies that had very nearly come to pass.
Sometimes he dreams about dying. About what could have happened if he hadn’t made it far enough from the Kremlin in time to avoid the blast, or about the weight of a bomb strapped to his chest. Sometimes, though—and this is, he often finds, much worse—he dreams about his friends.
Ethan is a frequent flier in these dreams. What if Ethan hadn’t made it far enough from the Kremlin in time to avoid the blast? (Benji hadn’t found out until much later how close he’d really come.) What if he hadn’t survived the fight with Hendricks? What if Ilsa had been unable to revive him in Morocco and Benji had returned to find his cold, lifeless body lying on the ground because of a task Benji had volunteered him for?
He worries about the others, too, of course. Jane, Luther, even Ilsa once or twice – dead or dying, sometimes too far away for Benji to do anything, sometimes bleeding out right beneath his hands (he’s never been able to decide which is worse). And lately—like tonight—Benji’s been seeing an awful lot of Will when nightmares come to call.
This evening’s personal hell has dredged up that dark hallway back in a broadcasting station in Mumbai, the writhing shadows of Will and Wistrom struggling at the end of the corridor, the shot Benji had taken that had ended it. And just as he had in real life, Benji takes the shot and ends the fight – but something is wrong. The figure that stands after the report of the gun is bigger than Benji expects to see; taller, broader, holding himself differently than Benji has come to know from watching Will.
It isn’t Wistrom who stays on the floor, slumped and bleeding.
In the way of dreams, Benji is suddenly kneeling on the floor, Will’s prone body before him. He has no idea where Wistrom’s gone, and the mission is all but forgotten. All Benji can see now is Will’s paling face, blue eyes staring up at him as he gasps for breath, blood rapidly pooling beneath him. Benji can almost feel it soaking into the knees of his trousers as he presses his hands to Will’s chest, trying in vain to staunch the bleeding.
Will’s hand comes up, wrapping loosely around Benji’s wrist, still staring up at him – not even angry, not even accusing, just… tired, the light rapidly leaving his eyes. He manages a sound – just one word, just one: “Benji.”
And then he’s gone.
And then Benji wakes up.
Nightmares, he’s found, are an undeniable beast that he’s never been able to keep at bay. The aftermath, though – he’s developed something of a routine for that.
The real trouble with nightmares isn’t the dream itself—shitty as it may be—but the fact that afterwards, he’s never managed to get back to sleep. There is no “it was only a dream” moment after which he can simply close his eyes and drift off again. Nightmares mean that Benji is up for the night, and the first thing he has to do is talk himself down from the panic attack he often finds himself in when he wakes up. He’ll turn on the light, do his best to slow his breathing, wait until his heartrate settles and the trembling subsides, and then he’ll go and find something to do.
Some nights it’s a book or a TV show. Some nights it’s music and staring at a wall. Some nights he’ll put hours in on a video game, or a program he’s developing. Some nights he’ll hack into someplace just to see if he can (he’s a little more careful about this one now than he used to be, considering– well, he supposes he can’t count on the IMF bailing him out a second time). Often, there are copious amounts of caffeine involved, lest his eyes start to fall shut and trap him back in the place he’d just escaped.
It isn’t a perfect system, nor even particularly healthy, he can admit that much, but it’s worked for him in the past, and he’d seen no reason to consider changing it anytime soon.
Except–
“Hey. Benji.”
–things are a little different now, aren’t they?
“Benji,” the voice comes again, this time accompanied by a hand, warm and familiar pressing gently into the center of Benji’s chest as he struggles to draw breath. “Slow. Just breathe. You’re okay.”
It’s good advice, and normally Benji would follow it, but tonight – tonight he needs to see. Needs it more than air, needs it so the panic blaring in his head will finally go quiet. He rolls onto his side and finds himself nearly face to face with Will, who’s watching him carefully in the darkness.
He’s there, hair sleep-ruffled, brows drawn, mouth pulled into a worried frown, and gloriously alive.
Benji doesn’t even think, doesn’t need to, he just pushes forward, the distance between them disappearing in an instant as he wraps his arms around Will and pulls him close.
“Hey! –okay.” Will is startled and tense against him for a moment before wiggling out the arm that had gotten trapped between their chests and wrapping it around Benji, relaxing into his embrace. “Okay.”
Benji buries his face in the crook of Will’s neck, reveling in the familiar scent of his soap, of the fancy laundry detergent he’d talked Benji into buying (“If you’re wearing nicer clothes, you use nicer soap, it’ll make them last.”), of his sleep-warm skin. He can feel the rise and fall of Will’s chest right against his own, fancies he might even be able to feel the thrum of his pulse beneath his lips, and if it were possible to burrow in any closer, he thinks he would.
Will rubs a gentle hand up and down his back, and Benji tries to follow the tempo of it, to finally calm his breathing.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Will softly asks after a few minutes.
Benji shakes his head. “No point,” he mumbles. “Wouldn’t change anything.”
“Okay,” Will says. “Do you want to go back to sleep?”
This, Benji considers. The answer is usually a resounding “no,” but he doesn’t want to get up and leave Will, he isn’t ready for that, but he can’t ask Will to lose any more sleep over him.
Maybe this time– maybe it could be different.
“Might as well try,” he finally says, and he can feel Will’s cheek brush against the side of his head when he nods.
Slowly, they rearrange, Will on his back and Benji with his head on Will’s chest, the steady thump of his heartbeat echoing in his ear. Will doesn’t ask, doesn’t make him talk about it, just seems to understand. He brings a hand up and works it into Benji’s hair, skritching gently against his scalp, and Benji feels almost boneless with it within moments (probably Will’s intention, the sneaky bastard).
“Get some rest,” Will murmurs, sounding halfway back to sleep himself.
Benji hums, pressing just a little closer to Will, and slowly, slowly – he begins to drift off.
