happy super late v day @zittruschale !! i had a short lil comic planned but it didnt pan out unfortunately but its okay because im proud of how gabe looks in this!!
@r76valentines prompt was “something fluffy, like cuddling after a battle” so here’s a post-mission smooch… pretend they hug after this ;-;
Hey @tactical-necessity I’m your Valentine for @r76valentines! 💌💖 (ao3)
When Jack wakes, it is with no sense of urgency.
The house is quiet and still save for Gabriel's soft, deep breaths. There's warmth all around him; two legs wrapped around his waist, a hand curled into the front of his t-shirt. Jack reaches up for his husband’s hand, runs his fingers slowly, absent-mindedly, over his scarred knuckles. He doesn't stir. Still asleep, then. Gabriel has earned his rest, and Jack won't take it from him, not when sleep can be so rare for the both of them.
He never sleeps long past dawn. Hard to shake old habits, even out here with no clocks in the house and no schedules to keep to.
Slowly, reluctantly, he cracks open an eye.
He doesn’t want to wake Gabriel, which is a tall order when his husband is wrapped around him. Jack twists enough to face him and rests back on the pillow with a sigh. The sun slips across Gabriel’s warm brown skin. Jack follows the beam of light with a touch, smoothing over his bicep. His face is peaceful, his body relaxed. Good dreams, then, or none at all. Jack’s chest aches as he gazes at his husband, the love of his life, the one man he’d go to hell and back for. He has a lot left to prove, and it starts here, in the small hours of the morning. Jack leans in to kiss his forehead, gentle enough not to wake him, and rolls away.
There's a dog staring at him from the edge of the bed. Jack sighs, stretches out a hand to rub his muzzle. King never leaves their side, hasn’t since Gabriel had rescued him on their way to the remote cabin. The other dogs sleep in the living room on the couch, but Jack knows once he starts the burner they’ll all mass at his feet. Smiling, he pulls himself out of bed, takes one last glance at his husband— God, he’s gorgeous, handsome as ever with gray flecking his beard and lining his temples—and leaves the bedroom, stepping lightly to keep quiet.
The cabin is small and the kitchen is cramped with the two of them, let alone a man and four dogs. Jack leans down to greet their rescues with chin scratches and, in Oscar’s case, a belly rub. He puts them out before starting on breakfast, knowing full well that trying to cook with them around will just result in him feeding them half of his food. He fetches eggs out of the fridge, fresh baked bread from the cupboard, and sets a frying pan on the stove. Gabriel’s favorite breakfast is simple: two fried eggs over easy, a little bit of salt and pepper, two pieces of avocado toast, three slices of bacon.
Making Gabriel breakfast is a new tradition, one he doesn’t take lightly. After years on the run without access to a proper kitchen he was certainly out of practice, but after a month of settling in? He might say he’s pretty good at it. Gabriel rarely complains, which is all the proof he needs.
Quiet mornings like this are worth the isolation. Sometimes he sits on the back deck with the dogs and just watches the sunrise, Gabriel’s head in his lap. Sometimes they stay in bed and make love bathed in sunlight. Time is a faraway concept out here. Now they have their little cabin in California, now they have fake IDs and no one to bother them, no battles to fight. It’s just the two of them and a coop of chickens and the mountains rising in the distance, like a barrier from the rest of the world.
It’s a well earned break. Old wounds will heal with every passing day. Everything they’ve done, all the shit they’ve been through, they’ve been through together . Time apart had ruined them. Second chances like this are rare, and Jack won’t take it for granted, not like he’d taken his husband for granted before.
He flips the eggs without thinking and curses his mistake. Not that Gabriel will mind, so long as they’re not burned. The bacon looks good, so he sets to work on the avocado toast, one eye on the screen door, watching the dogs curl up on the deck.
A soft rustle steals his attention. Gabriel is moving on the bed, curling up to shield his face from the morning light. His hair is a mess and there’s crusts in his eyes but Jack fights to breathe, struck again by how much he loves his husband. When a warm brown eye cracks open, Jack flashes him a smile and gathers up breakfast.
“Perfect timing, angel.”
Gabriel just lets out a sigh, closing his eyes again. “Not awake yet.”
He sets the plate down on the nightstand and walks out to let the dogs in. Jack picks up Oscar, the smallest of the rescues, a wiry-haired terrier, who lets out an appreciative yap. With King, Ginger, and Marlow on his heels he returns to the bedroom. Gabriel is propped up now and starting on his toast. Jack plops down beside him, Oscar settling into his lap with a grunt.
“Verdict?”
“Not half bad.” Gabriel talks through a mouthful, smiles when he chases it with fresh coffee. “You do something different with the eggs?”
“Wasn’t feeling adventurous today.”
“Tried and true is fine.”
Jack chuckles. “I make you breakfast in bed every morning. Guess that’s fine. ”
“Your choice.”
“I do love spoiling my husband.” Jack leans over to kiss Gabriel’s grayed temple. He lets out an unimpressed grunt, fork and knife clattering on the plate.
“I’m trying to eat here.”
“Lots of time for that.”
Gabriel turns in to him, catches him with the full force of those big brown eyes, and Jack all but melts. His husband, the love of his life, his other half, take your pick of the cliches, none of them could ever do justice to how he felt about this man. To how his chest ached just looking at him, how his heart would still speed up at the slightest touch, just like it had when they first met and those touches were rare.
“Yeah,” Gabriel sighs, “Got all the time in the world for once.”
King jumps on the end of the bed and nestles in on Gabriel’s legs before he finishes breakfast. Trapped , Gabriel jokes, but the two settle in anyway. Oscar curls up between them so they lay with their hands wound together, silent, just breathing in the morning.
Maybe it’s not the ending either of them had pictured, but in the end, Jack doesn’t care where he goes, so long as Gabriel is ever at his side.
He’d snapped the box open and closed more times than he cared to remember, on occasion leaving it open to ogle at the beautiful rose gold ring inside. He’d run his thumb over the smooth metal before sighing and snapping the box shut, only to open it again a few minutes later.
“Are you going to stare at it or are you going to actually ask the man?” Jack had startled, eyes flicking upwards to Ana who sat across from him in the transport, rifle between her legs. She had a soft smile on her face when Jack looked at her, but his eyes wandered back down toward the ring.
He’d bought it a few months back, days after Gabriel had just barely survived an omnic ambush. His whole team had been eradicated, and for a short amount of time, they had thought they lost Gabriel too before pulling him from the rubble. Barely alive, and barely holding on, Gabriel had laid unconscious in the medical wing for two weeks.
It had been difficult to deal with for the first few days, but Jack was there, by his side every waking moment. He’d held Gabriel’s hand, pressed it into his cheek and nuzzled into that calloused palm of his. He’d leave little kisses there, eventually tucking Gabriel’s hand back at his side and just sit there, listening to the soft plip of the heart monitor.
More than once Angela had caught him asleep leaning against Gabriel’s bed, first planted into his own cheek to try and keep his head propped up while the rest of his body seemed to slouch almost painfully. Any attempt to move Jack or insist he go to his own quarters and rest had been met with gentle resistance. He’d whine and beg her, “Just a little longer, please”, and the deep bags that had formed under his eyes made his sweet face and eyes look sunken. He was exhausted, and terrified of losing something that mattered deeply.
She’d stopped jostling him, stopped tugging on his arm and cooing soft words of comfort to him as she tried to get him up. Instead, she had tossed a thin blanket over him wherever he had managed to pass out, left him some water, and gave his shoulder a reassuring rub.
As time went on and Gabriel had improved, he had woken up by the weeks end, leaving Jack to shower his bandaged face with painful but welcomed kisses.
It hadn’t been long after Gabriel had woken up that Jack had gone out and bought the ring. With the war against the omnics already getting to a critical mass, who knew when the next mission would be there last. If it was soon, at least the one thing he could do was take the hand of the one person who had mattered the most.
It had seemed so easy at first, get the ring, present it to Gabriel, get an answer, small celebration, and continue like they always had. Turns out, it had been more difficult than he had first thought.
There never seemed a right time to ask, plus they had been back to back busy with assignments leaving them both exhausted at conflicting times. Sometimes they were away from each other for days maybe weeks at a time, and Jack had just pocketed the ring and waited.
Only now, several months later was he regretting not asking a little sooner. The the most recent mission having been a success, they had suffered mass casualties and countless wounded. Gabriel having been among the wounded.
Though not in critical condition, he had been in a separate transport from Jack, leaving him dwell on past memories of nights Gabriel could barely breathe. It had left him in a daze, just staring at the ring he had fished from his pocket. He’d snapped the case open and closed so many times that Ana finally had to speak up.
“I’m working on it.” Honestly, he was, and as much as he wanted to be romantic about it, there was only so much he could do on base. “Just waiting for the right moment.” The transport jostled, causing Jack to rock side to side in his seat. He glanced up when he had heard Ana scoff at that. More than once she had told him there was no better time to ask than when it was just the two of them, enjoying each other’s company. It couldn’t and wouldn’t be any better than that.
“You really should be in the medical wing,” Jack’s voice was soft in the low light of their shared bedroom, “you know what she gets like when you leave before being discharged.
“Tsk, she’ll get over it.” Gabriel’s voice was gritty as he laid with his head tucked against Jack’s shoulder. Together they had laid chest to chest, Jack occasionally leaning up to rest his chin the top of Gabriel’s head.
It had been around eleven when Gabriel had tried to sneak back into their shared quarters unnoticed. He had cursed softly when he stepped into the main room and there Jack shot up from the couch, hair a mess and face surprised as if Gabriel had caught him sleeping on the job. His disoriented expression quickly flickered to confusion and then irritation as he recognized Gabriel, covered in bandages, not where he should have been.
Jack had opened his mouth to scold the man, but Gabriel had these puppy eyes and smolder that he could do so naturally it had Jack practically a pile of melted butter. All he had to do was glance at their bedroom and Jack was rubbing at the back of his neck and sighing.
And there they were. Their legs had been tangled under the covers, one of Gabriel’s arms slung over Jack’s hip.
“Gabe-” Jack’s voice was all but a whisper as he scooted himself down to Gabriel’s level.
“Hmm?” struggling to open one heavy eyelid, Gabriel looked at Jack’s soft face.
“Can I talk to you about some things?”
“Mhm.” Allowing his eye to close, Gabriel snuggled slightly closer to Jack and relaxed.
Jack was silent for a moment as he listened to Gabriel’s steady breathing, only when he felt Gabriel kiss gently at his neck did he lick his lips and speak up.
“You know I love you more than anything, right?” A soft hum of confirmation came down from where Gabriel had tucked his head. “Do you ever wish that we could…” Jack paused before nuzzling Gabriel’s forehead. “Are you ever-” He paused again, a odd knot forming in his throat. “Are you ever afraid that this might be it? That this is as far as we will get. I mean like… do you ever think about having a house, a dog, kids, a stupid picket white fence.” Jack continued, “Do you ever think about going out for groceries and hauling all the bags on two arms because you don’t want to make two trips. Do you ever think about homemade dinners and drive-in movies?” Nuzzling the top of Gabriel’s head again, Jack sighed. “I want to… I want to do all of those things with you and more. I want to have a little house with a cliche white picket fence and a dog. I want to have something outside of this and I want to have it with you more than anything. You don’t get mad at me for hogging the blankets even though you sleep like a starfish some nights. You yell at me when I put my cold feet on your back but then try and get me with yours. Gabe, there is nobody else I want to do this stupid stuff with other than yo-” A soft rumble against Jack’s neck had him pausing. “Gabe?”
Gently pushing Gabriel away from his neck, Jack looked down at the man’s scarred face. His eyes were closed, mouth slightly open as a loud snore suddenly escaped it.
Sagging in place, Jack sighed and pulled Gabriel snug back against his body. Reaching down and tugging up the blanket, he tucked the two of them in.
Reaching up from under the covers, Jack traced the scar along Gabriel’s cheek before cupping it.
“Goodnight, Gabriel.” Leaning in and pecking a small kiss against the corner of Gabriel’s mouth, Jack cuddled into his own pillow and closed his eyes. “Maybe tomorrow.”
The brisk morning air had tugged him from his slumber. He’d shifted, limbs extending in search of his warm partner only to come up empty.
Eyes fluttering open, Jack blinked and allowed his eyes to adjust to the morning light. He blinked a few more times and glanced at the empty place on the bed where Gabriel’s form should have been.
Sitting up and running his hand through his messy golden locks, Jack looked around the room. Empty.
“Gabe?” Voice distorted as he yawned, Jack rubbed at his tired eyes and tossed the covers back. Upon standing, Jack stretched and itched at his back, head suddenly cocking to one side upon hearing a low murmur.
Heading to the door towards the living room, Jack paused before stepping past the threshold, his eyes spotting Gabriel. He had been standing in front of their shared TV, Back to Jack wearing nothing but his usual issued sweatpants. He rocked slowly from foot to foot, gaze fixed on the morning news while lifting a spoon full of cereal to his mouth.
Watching Gabriel for a moment longer, Jack turned on his heels and walked to his night stand. Tugging the drawer open and removing his ring box, he flipped it open to make sure the ring was still there before heading out into the living room.
“Gabe.” Jack had said a little louder this time, hoping to combat Gabriel’s loud crunching. “Can we talk?” Hopefully he would stay awake this time.
“Hmm?” Without turning around, Gabriel took another bite of his cereal, “sure.” He kept rocking, only half listening.
“Gabe, I-” Looking down at the little black box in hand and up at Gabriel who still was rocking back and forth, Jack sighed. “I-” His eyes wandered over the fresh bandages and then to old scars stained into Gabriel’s skin.
Now or never.
Rushing across the living room and snagging Gabriel’s arm, Jack whirled him around. Before Gabriel could process what was happening, Jack had slapped his bowl from his hand, sending it clattering to the ground.
“Jack, what the hel-” Eyes popping wide as Jack crushed their lips together, Gabriel froze in place. He’d recovered when he felt Jack’s hands on his cheeks, caressing him, tugging him every closer.
“I love you.” Slightly breathless upon pulling away, Jack kissed the corner of Gabriel’s mouth. “I love you, you know that?”
“I love you too-” Reaching up and taking ahold of Jack’s hand, Gabriel kissed at his pale palm. “What is this about?” He’d watched Jack swallow hard, and with his free hand lift up a little black box between them.
“Gabe, I-” He licked his lips, heart pounding so hard that Gabriel could practically feel each beat against his own chest. “I’m not good at this.” That had earned him a chuckle, and he sighed as he thumbed the box open. “Do you want to not be good at this… together?”
Looking from the ring to Jack’s hopeful but terrified eyes, Gabriel’s face softened. A tender smile spread across his face and he leaned down, kissing Jack sweetly.
“I was wondering when you were going to ask.” A sly smirk bloomed across Gabriel’s face next at Jack’s sudden confusion. “You know, you’ve fallen asleep on the couch several times with this on your chest then I can counts.” Tapping the little black box, Gabriel relished Jack’s sudden embarrassed blush. He left out that some night he could hear Jack opening and closing the box next to him in bed. There had been something sweet about it, wholesome when Jack would finally close the box, put it away, and lean over to kiss Gabriel who he had thought had been asleep at the time.
“So-” Pausing when Gabriel took the little black box from him, Jack watched Gabriel remove the ring. Sliding it over his finger, Gabriel inspected his hand and hummed in sadisfaction.
“Yes.” Reaching up and cupping Jack’s face, Gabriel pulled him in for a sweet kiss. “Yes.” He kissed him again and again, smiling into Jack’s mouth when the man before him seemed to glow.
“I love you-” Jack huffed between kisses, pulling away after a moment only to slide his arms around Gabriel and tug him into an embrace.
