9 a661 9

It shouldn’t have had the effect it did on you. But it does. Your heart spreading up while your eyes widen a little, clearing your throat as if to stop the smile threatening to spread across your face.

“Would you like a cup ‘f tea? Before you guys, we’ll- are off on your way?”

How could they say no to you?

Looked up at the both of them with those big brown doe eyes they couldn’t get enough of.

It’s a cramped little studio, the bedroom is the living room and the kitchen is small, lucky you have two stools they can sit on at the kitchen counter as their eyes are trained on you. You can feel them as you get around the kitchen, finding three mugs, whatever tea you could find. G’Mo is asleep on the soft blue cat tower, tail swishing back and forth as you wait for the kettle to whistle. But it’s taking forever, maybe you shouldn’t have asked them to come up here—

“What do you do for work love? Something nice hopefully.” John gives you a soft smile as you lean against the counter.

“That’s a real nice thought,” you hum, arms folding over your chest, “but I’m a waitress at the moment. Nothing special.”

“You like it?” Simon asks.

“Would you?” No that came off too rough, harsher than intended, you’re shaking your head, “I mean- I’ve got one manager out for me but everyone else is nice. At least, everyone working there. I get free bread to take home so it’s not the worst.”

“Bein on yer feet all day, you alright workin like tha?”

You shrug, “You two are on your feet all day.”

“‘S different dove.”

“Trained for it, ‘s wot John ‘nd I signed up for. You-“

“—It’s honest work. I get paid on time.” You’re quickly on the defense, and maybe your arms being crossed is more like you holding yourself, keeping these two men from getting any closer than what’s already going on.

“It’s not what y’want to do swee’art. Not meant t’ do tha.”

The kettle goes off before you can say anything else. Quickly grabbing that little ‘home sweet home’ rag that was across the bar of the oven and taking the kettle off the stove. Your minds running a mile a minute, but the silence is comfortable. They thank you for their tea’s, the click over your head tick, tick, ticking away till their mugs are empty.

You manage to say something before they leave, “I’m sorry about earlier. Just- I gotta do what I gotta do. Don’t really have another option right now. You guys understand that.”

Of course they do.

But you shouldn’t have to settle when you deserve the world.

Least, not anymore.

John cups your face, caressing it with his rough fingers, “Course dove. ‘S nothin t’ apologize for. We…”

“We made it a little tense, yeah?” Simon finishes smoothly. You could almost melt into the soft looks they were both giving you. Hands sweating, you rub them against your pants. John tells you they have to go. Let’s his thumb rub across the apple of your cheek before letting his finger tilt your chin up. And Simons there too, pushing your hair back, his hand at the back of your nape.

“It was great getting to see you again, Dollface.”

You clear your throat, mystified, you nod, blushing you can feel the tips of your ears turning hot, but you know this is the last time. Or it, should be. “Y-yeah, ‘s been nice. Simon, John.”

“Don’t work that brain out too much alright honey? Be good for us.”

“Of course.”

And you’ve got too men already aching to find a way to bend you in half in that shitty apartment complex with the shit locks that John will probably be over to fix and renue by the end of the week.

One him and Simon will have easy access getting in and out of your flat so Simon can survey the complex, install a camera or two just to make sure you’re safe.

They’ve already decided, you’re theirs. Your Daddies precious girl.

Even if you don’t know it yet.

The 0600 briefing had been brief, clinical, and entirely too early in the morning for anybody’s liking. 

Price had laid out the schematics on the digital screen, harsh blue light illuminating the subterranean veins of an abandoned border town. Operation: Deep Water. Intel had pinned down an underground subway network being used by a hostile cell to smuggle chemicals. The team’s directive was to descend into the flooded transit line, locate the crates, neutralize the cell, and get the hell out of there.

As you sat at the edge of the long mess hall table, staring down at your untouched plate of plain eggs and toast —which you sprinkled whatever spice you could find on top, so not entirely sure how plain it’d taste— the details of the briefing kept looping in your head. 

Subterranean. Close-quarters combat in pitch-black conditions. Water up to your knees.

A proper fucking nightmare, in short.

Your mind instinctively mapped out the horrors. Subway stations meant endless blind spots, tiled corridors what would make every splash of water and footstep echo like a damn gunshot, narrow, flooded tunnels with absolutely zero room for error. A tactical meat grinder ready to make a whole burger out of you. Yeah.

A few years back, the mere thought of being trapped in a dark, windowless underground labyrinth would have made the walls of the room close in on your chest, making your hands shake before you even touched a mag. 

But today, your hands were perfectly steady. Perks of the task force.

Heavy scuffs of a boot broke your train of thought. You didn’t have to look up to know who it was, his gait was a perfect tell, and lately, one person over anybody else kept seeking you out. The sheer physical gravity of his presence always seemed to reach you a second before he did, too.

Simon slid onto the low wooden bench next to yours, his choice of sitting beside you rather than across noted down somewhere in your head, his massive frame instantly blocking out the noise of the waking mess hall. You loved how he kept creating a quiet, private pocket of space just for the two of you whenever he was near. He was stripped down to a simple black shirt, scarred forearms bare against the edge of the table. He hadn’t brought a tray. Just a fresh mug of steaming black coffee.

Without so much as a word, he rolled the bottom of his balaclava up past his chin, exposing the sharp line of his jaw and the pale, soft skin —save for a few days’ stubble— framing his mouth. He didn’t turn away to take his first sip, like he did for many months before. He just sat there, completely unbothered, letting you take a small look at one fraction of a man behind the Ghost because he knew you wouldn’t hold a shred of pity in your gaze.

If anything, you were staring right at his lips, and you could only break that trance when you noticed them curling into a smirk.

“You’re tearing that toast to pieces,” he murmured, his deep rasp incredibly low, meant strictly for your ears.

You blinked, looking down to realize your fingers had mindlessly shredded the piece of bread into a pile of crumbs on your plate. A small, faint ghost of a smirk tugged at your mouth as you dusted your hands off. “Jus’ mapping out the subway lines, Simon.” on the clock, technically, but you couldn’t possibly think of insubordination whilst half his face was in your view.

“Mm. Quiet tunnels,” he spoke casually, taking another slow sip of his coffee. He leaned his weight back against the edge of the table. “No wind, leaves rustlin’ or such. Just you, the sightline, and whatever’s in front of your muzzle.”

“And freezing shit water up to our knees.” you reminded him, turning your head slightly to meet his icy blue eyes.

“Good thing I patched the seals on your tactical boots last night, then,” he said, his tone entirely deadpan, though the faint smile on his lips told you what you needed to know. 

Your heart did a sudden, sharp flutter behind your ribs. He hadn’t told you he’d done that. While you were asleep, he must’ve quietly gone into the locker room, taken your gear, and ensured you wouldn’t be freezing in the dark. Carrying his side of the weight of the life that you shared.

“Thank you,” you said softly.

Simon didn’t answer with much, settling for a single, firm nod, rolling the balaclava back down to cover his jaw after draining the last of his mug. The small talk was over. Off the clock comfort faded slightly, making way for the cold, lethal synch of the 141.

“Finishing your breakfast?” he asked, rising to his full, towering height.

“Done,” you said, standing up with him, knees tracking right beside his as you left the mess hall behind. 

The armory cage was dead quiet compared to the rest of the base, the metallic tang of solvent and gun oil filling the air— a smell that no longer made you feel sick. You and Simon worked at the main steel workbench side by side, with no words between you. When you reached your left hand, Simon placed a heavy-duty tactical flashlight into your palm. When he leaned back to adjust the tension on his heavy plate carrier, you stepped into his space without asking, fingers moving efficiently to tighten the heavy nylon straps over his shoulders, pulling until the vest sat perfectly flush against his massive chest.

He didn’t stiffen like he used to. Now, he’d only stand perfectly still, like he was used to the proximity already.

You picked your rifle up, sliding the bolt carrier group back with a sharp clack. You checked the alignment of your red-dot optic, hands entirely steady as you locked a fresh magazine into the mag well. Simon watched you from beneath the shadow of his skull plate, eyes tracking every functional movement of your fingers. He reached into his drop-leg rig, pulled out an extra breaching charge, and silently slid it into the side pouch of your vest. Blink, and you’d miss the way his gloved knuckles lingered for a fraction of a second against your chest plate.

“Ready?” his deep voice rumbled through the cage, Simon letting the Lieutenant, the Ghost, man, myth, whatever, take the reins. 

You slid the small earpiece into your ear, tucking it there until it was solid. “Born ready, LT.”

“Good,” Ghost muttered, picking up his own weapon and slinging it across his chest with an easy grace. He caught your eye one last time before heading toward the exit. “Tarmac in ten. Let’s go turn the lights out on ‘em.”

The roar of the transport plane’s engines was a deafening, vibrating wall of sound that rattled straight through the soles of your boots and into your teeth. 

The interior of the fuselage was bathed in a dim, tactical red glow, which casted long and eerie shadows across the metal ribs of the aircraft. Outside the small windows, a thunderstorm was tearing through the night sky, throwing the massive plane around like a toy. Every few seconds, the aircraft would drop into a pocket of turbulence, forcing your harness to bite hard into your collarbones.

You sat on the netting seat, knees almost brushing against the heavy crates of equipment strapped down in the center aisle. Across from you sat the rest of the 141. Gaz was methodically checking the seals on his waterproof kit, Soap was tapping a rhythmic beat against his thigh, and Price was chewing on an unlit cigar, his eyes fixed on a digital tablet displaying the maps of the sunken metro. 

And right beside you was Simon. Or rather, the Ghost.

Even in the cramped, shaking belly of the plane, his frame was an unyielding anchor. He sat perfectly still, rifle resting flat across heavy thighs, large hands resting over the handguard. The printed balaclava and the skull plate were back in place, blocking out the humanity you’d seen in the mess hall hours ago. He was the Ghost now. Cold. Unshakeable. Lethal. But as the plane took a violent lurch to the left, his heavy shoulder firmly pressed against yours— as deliberately as it could be without being too obvious. You didn’t look at him, he didn’t look at you, but the familiar heat of just having him near you instantly cleared the baseline anxiety rising in your chest.

Price tapped the screen of his tablet, blue light reflecting off his rugged features as he looked up at the team. 

“Listen up,” the Captain’s voice barked through the internal comms loop, cutting through the engines. “We’re five minutes out from the drop zone. The storm is knocking out the local power grid above ground, which means the subways are going to be pitch-black and flooded, up to the knees if we’re lucky. Hostile cell is dug in deep near the central maintenance junction.”

You reached up, tapping the small button on your headset to dial into the frequency, adjusting the microphone close to your lips. “Comms check. How’s my read, Captain?”

“Loud and clear, kid,” Price replied, giving you a sharp nod.

“Got ya loud and clear down here, sunshine,” Soap chimed in, cutting his eyes toward you with a quick, subtle wink that told you he was glad to see how high your head was held. How you sat with more confidence than ever. You flashed a grin at him. 

“Solid on my end,” Gaz added, adjusting his night-vision goggles down over his eyes.

“Ghost, status?” Price asked.

Simon reached up, gloved fingers tapping his headset with a slow click. His deep rasp flooded the comms loop. “Green across the board. Comms are secure.” he turned his head a fraction towards you. “Weapon’s hot. Ready to turn the lights out.”

Price nodded, sliding the tablet into his vest pocket and gripping the overhead ceiling rail as the plane took another bounce. “Alright. I want us moving in tight, two-man elements to clear the sectors before we converge on the chemical crates.”

Price pointed his gloved finger toward Gaz. “Gaz, you’re on point for the western maintenance stairs, I’m pairing you with—” then, his gaze found you.

“Negative.”

The word cut through the comms like a snapped wire. It wasn’t loud, no, but the authoritative gravity of Simon’s voice made the entire cabin go dead quiet, even with the loud engines.

Gaz stopped mid-motion, his hand pausing on his visor. Soap’s jaw was practically dropped, eyes darting instantly from Simon to you, a massive, knowing grin completely taking over his face. Price slowly lowered his hand, eyebrows shooting up beneath the brim of his boonie hat as he stared at his Lieutenant.

“Excuse me, Ghost?” Price asked, his tone dropping into a dangerous, questioning rumble. You don’t negative your Captain’s orders five minutes out from the drop zone. You just don’t.

“She’s with me,” Simon rumbled back, completely unbothered by the sudden spike of tension in the cabin. He didn’t even shift an inch, nor did he offer a polite explanation or a standard request. He was just staring dead-ahead at Price. “We’ve dialed in the synchronization on the breaches back at base. She knows how to sweep without crossing me. Gaz can take MacTavish.”

“Hey! Who said I wanted to be paired with the guy who can’t even clear a room ahead of schedule?” Soap protested loudly, though the sheer mischief in his voice proved he was entirely enjoying the shitshow.

Price ignored Soap, sharp eyes cutting a hard path between you and Simon. He took a good look at you. Your posture. Steady hands. Then at the rigid, protective stance of the Ghost sitting right at your shoulder. A silent communication passed between the Captain and his Lieutenant— one born of decades of warfare.

Price let out a low huff, a quiet, knowing chuckle escaping as he shook his head, pulling his cigar to the side of his mouth. “Alright,” he muttered, reaching to grab the heavy red handle of the jump door as the warning siren suddenly began to wail through the cabin. The back ramp slowly started to lower, revealing the pitch-black abyss of the rain-soaked night outside. “Rosters stand as amended. Ghost, you and the kid take the eastern tunnels. Hold the line, cover each other’s six, and don’t get sloppy.”

Simon closed his gloved fingers tightly around the handguard of the rifle, shoulder giving yours one last bump before he stood up into the roaring wind. “Roger that, Captain,” he murmured, then, his voice dropped an octave and became that rough, honest whisper meant for you. “Let’s get to work.”

You unclipped your harness, standing up in unison with Simon. The plane took a dip as it hit a thermal pocket, but your feet stayed planted. You adjusted your goggles down, the world shifting into a grainier, high-contrast green. Simon stepped up to the edge of the ramp first, and checked his primary weapon, tapped his chest plate, and stepped off into the abyss.

You didn’t hesitate either. You followed him right down the throat of the storm.

The drop was short. Rain hammered against your visor like gravel, the wind tearing at your gear until the static line snapped your chute open. A minute of suffocating, blind navigation through the clouds later, your boots hit the muddy, waterlogged tarmac of the border town with a heavy thud. You cut the riser straps instantly, dropping the canopy into the muck, and raised your rifle, sweeping the perimeter.

Through the green tint of your optics, you spotted him three meters ahead. He was already up, a knee in the mud, rifle locked into his shoulder as he covered your sector. 

“Ghost to Bravo-Six,” after a click on the comms. “We’re on the ground. Moving up to eastern transit entrance now.”

“Copy that, Ghost,” Price’s voice crackled through the static. “We’re hitting the western stairs. See you at the junction.”

Simon rose, giving you a quick, sharp motion with his hand. You fell into stride right behind him, moving like a shadow just like him through the derelict streets. The town was a graveyard of some sort— no lights, no civilian movement, nothing at all. Just the relentless downpour pooling in the gutters.

He led the way to a crumbling concrete structure jutting out of the pavement, the entrance to the transit system. The iron gate had been blown off its hinges, hanging loosely from a single rusted bolt. Below it, the stairwell descended into an absolute, pitch-black vacuum. From the depths, the heavy, hollow echo of water flow could be heard.

Simon paused at the threshold, frame blocking the entrance for a brief second. He turned his head just enough to catch your eye through the visor. “Tight angles,” he murmured over the direct comms. “Watch your step. Water’s moving fast down there.”

“Roger,” you whispered back, heart rate elevated but steady. Your breathing was a calm cycle. Perfect control.

You descended together.

The air turned thick instantly, stagnant, and freezing cold, smelling heavily of rusted iron and stagnant river silt. By the time you hit the bottom platform, the water was already sloshing violently against your shins, the current pulling at your trousers. The white beams of your tactical lights reflected off the slick subway tiles and casted distorted shadows down the length of the tunnel.

It was an echo chamber. Every splash of your boots felt too loud to be safe, but you matched his cadence perfectly, stepping when he stepped, neutralizing the noise as much as you possibly could.

The tunnel stretched out ahead. Ten meters in, the first structural obstacle appeared, a massive, rusted steel doorframe leading into a secondary maintenance corridor. Simon slowed his pace, shoulders dropping slightly as he approached to the left side of the frame. You smoothly transitioned into his right, kept your muzzle low, sweeping the blind spot behind the heavy iron door while Simon took the high angle, his barrel tracking the corridor. The room was clear. No targets.

Simon lowered his rifle just an inch, jaw shifting beneath the skull print as he looked at you. “Thought you’d drop your stance,” he rumbled softly into the comms, throwing the kitchen critique back into the mix.

“Told you, Simon,” you murmured back, a faint smirk tugging at your lips behind your mask as you kept your weapon raised. “I’m adjusting for the space.”

“Good,” Ghost muttered, the Lieutenant returning in a flash as a distant, metallic clink echoed from the far end of the flooded rail line. The hostiles were close. He raised his rifle. “Room’s about to get loud.”

About ten minutes later, the central maintenance junction looked like a subterranean slaughterhouse. 

The initial ambush had turned the corridors into a localized hell. Muzzle flashes detonated in the dark while the deafening roar of automatic gunfire bounced off the concrete ceiling. You and Simon managed to move like a single terrifying entity— but then a desperate enemy combatant had blind-fired a heavy grenade launcher into the structural pillars.

The explosion had been a blinding flash of orange head, followed by the low-frequency groan of collapsing reinforced concrete. The ceiling had caved in with a thunderous roar, dropping tons of debris, steel rebar and dust into the rushing water, completely severing your line of sight from Price and Soap and rendering the main comms loop into a wall of static.

Worse, the shockwave had triggered the emergency lockdown protocols of the facility. A heavy, industrial iron security grate had slammed down from the ceiling with a violent clang, locking securely into the concrete floor. 

You were trapped on the other side. Alone. In the dark. With the echo of approaching hostile footsteps splashing through the water toward your position.

Where is she, where the hell is she?

Inside Simon’s skull, the cold Lieutenant had managed to turn to ash. The moment that iron grate had slammed down, cutting off his view of your tactical light, the hollow vacuum behind his ribs had ruptured into a frantic heat. He couldn’t hear you over the static. He couldn’t feel your shoulder against his. 

He didn’t care about chemical crates at that moment, Price’s orders were reduced to mere afterthoughts. The Ghost persona buckled under the primitive terror of worrying about you. He was losing his mind, the ticking clock in his head deafening him as he heard the distant clack of an enemy rifle chambering a round on your side of the wall.

You, however, refrained from panic. Backing up against the slick tiles, you felt the extra branching charge Simon had tucked into your vest back at the base. You ripped the plastic explosive from your pouch, slapped it against a secondary drywall partition that led into the hostiles’ blind flank, and blew it.

The drywall shattered. You stepped directly through the smoke, weapon hot, and caught the incoming hostile fireteam completely off-guard, systematically clearing the room all by yourself. 

On the other side of the iron gate, Simon didn’t have a breaching charge left.

With a raw, animalistic growl that tore right through his throat and into the dead air of the tunnel, he threw his rifle to the side and slammed his massive, gloved hands into the horizontal gaps of the iron security grate. His boots dug into the rushing water, heavy muscles straining until the fabric of his black combat shirt underneath threatened to rip across his shoulders. He didn’t have time to think about all that, then. He just thought about the ice in your eyes that he’d spent so much time trying to melt, and he refused to let the dark take it back.

With a screeching groan of protesting metal, Simon pulled.

The hydraulic gears inside the ceiling shrieked, sparks flying from the housing unit as he manually overrode the locking mechanism with brute physical force. The iron teeth of the gate ground against the concrete, bending and bucking out of their tracks until the mechanism finally snapped with a loud pop, as Simon heaved the grate forward, showing it into the ceiling frame until it jammed open.

He lunged through the opening, splashing loudly into the water, hand already reaching for the sidearm, ready to tear the room apart.

He froze, instead.

The room was already quiet. You were standing in the center of the flooded space, your boots planted firmly in the rushing water, your rifle raised and covering the far door. Three hostiles lay neutralized around you. Simon stood there, his chest rising and falling in violent, ragged gasps under his vest. He stared at you through the green tint of his optics. He looked like a man who had just dragged himself out of a grave.

Alive. Breathing.

The relief hit Simon so hard it made his knees feel weak beneath his weight—a sensation he hadn't felt since he was a boy. The frantic, screaming noise in his head died down into a thrumming hum, leaving him entirely exposed to the gravity of how much he cared. He didn't have the words to describe it, and he didn't have the manual answer to hide it anymore. He just knew that if that gate hadn't opened, there wouldn't have been anything left of the Ghost to salvage.

Slowly, Simon walked through the water until he was standing inches away from you, towering silhouette blocking out the smoke. He reached out, his gloved hand coming up to rest flat against the side of your neck— exactly like he had in the armory, calloused and utterly unyielding. His thumb gave a heavy twitch against your jaw, his eyes searching yours behind the skull plate, demanding that you look at him. 

I’m here, his eyes meant to say. You did fucking well but I’m here now.

Before you could whisper his name, the heavy crunch of boots and the splash of water signaled Price and Soap finally breaking through the rubble from the western stairs.

"Ghost! Kid! Report!" Price’s voice barked as he stepped into the light, his rifle raised.

Soap and Gaz followed right behind him, their eyes immediately darting from the buckled, ruined iron gate to the way Simon was standing right in your space, his hand still at the back of your neck. Johnny stopped mid-stride, the usual joke jamming in his throat. For once in his life, Johnny MacTavish wisely chose to keep his mouth shut, a soft, serious smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as he lowered his weapon. 

Simon gave your neck one last, firm squeeze, forcing the reality of the present into your bones, before he slowly turned his head toward the Captain. "Sector is clear, Price," Simon rumbled, "Chemical crates are secured. Let's get the hell out of the dark." 

The base was entirely dead by the time the post-mission debriefing finally wrapped at 0300. 

The rest of the team had scattered to their quarters, desperate to wash the stench of stagnant transit water and cordite out of their skin. You’d done the same, scrubbing the mud from your hair under a scalding shower until your skin was raw, changing into a clean, oversized black t-shirt and grey sweatpants. Despite the bone-deep exhaustion, your mind wouldn’t shut off.

Every time you closed your eyes, you heard the screech of hydraulic gears bending out of their tracks. You saw Simon lunging through the smoke, looking like a monster dragged out of a grave, chest heaving with a terror he never should have felt. 

You knew he hadn’t gone to the med-bay. He’d given Price a flat, clipped “I’m fine” when the Captain noticed him favoring his right side on the exfil chopper. 

You grabbed a small ice pack from the mess hall freezer, wrapped it in a clean dish towel, and walked straight down the silent corridor toward the back of the armory cage.

The lights were off, save for the single, low-wattage desk lamp illuminating the workbench in the very back.

Simon was there, sitting on a metal stool. He had stripped off his tactical vest and combat shirt, wearing only a sleeveless black undershirt that left his chest and shoulders bare. The skull balaclava was rolled up to sit snugly around his forehead like a makeshift sweatband, exposing his entire face under the low light— the sharp, tense line of his jaw, the rough stubble, and the heavy shadows beneath his eyes. The absolute beauty in all of them.

He was holding a tube of muscle ointment in his left hand, trying clumsily to reach over his own back to rub it into his right shoulder blade. His right arm was tucked tightly against his ribs, jaw clenched into a hard, rigid line as his muscles protested the movement.

The short scuff of your sneakers made him freeze, and turn his head away. “It’s three in the morning,” he spoke, seemingly knowing who you’d be without even looking. “Go to sleep.”

“You skipped med-bay,” you said simply, walking right past the threshold of the cage and stepping into the low circle of amber light.

“I’m fine,” he muttered, his shoulder giving an involuntary twitch that made the tendons in his neck tighten with pain. "Just a tight muscle. Pack it in." 

You walked straight up to the workbench instead, set the wrapped ice pack down on the steel, and picked up the tube of muscle ointment. You were standing behind him when you clicked the cap open, squeezed a generous amount into your palms, and rubbed your hands together to warm it up. 

Simon’s breathing was deep and measured. For a second, his weight shifted as if he was going to stand up and walk out in typical Ghost fashion. “Sit still, Simon,” you murmured softly. A low, defeated sigh hissed through his teeth. He let his head drop forward slightly, broad shoulders relaxing just a fraction of an inch as you laid your hands flat against his freckled skin.

You kept your touch firm, using the heels of your palms to dig into the tight, knotted muscle. A low groan vibrated deep through Simon’s chest as you hit the center of the strain.

“You’re lucky you didn’t tear a tendon,” you said quietly, thumbs smoothing out a hard knot near his neck. “What you did out there… it was completely against the manual, Lieutenant.”

“For the last time,” he rumbled, voice slightly muffled as he stared down at the floor. “Off the clock, it’s Simon.”

“You shouldn’t have done it. I had the breaching charge. I was handling it.”

For a long, heavy beat, the only sound in the armory was the low hum of the desk lamp. Then, slowly, Simon turned his massive frame around on the stool, forcing your hands to drop from his back. He reached up, his large fingers wrapping firmly around your wrist, stopping you from stepping away as he pulled you a step closer in between his legs. He looked up at you, his face completely exposed in the dim light, intensity of his gaze pinning you right to the floor.

"I couldn't hear you breathing," he whispered.

The words were rough, scraped raw from the back of his throat, carrying a confession so heavy it made your breath hitch. Or rather, it knocked the breath out of you.

The beauty. Oh, how pretty a thing, that he was hiding.

For a moment, I forgot what I had expected to find under the mask. Scars, maybe. Something brutal. Something that matched the name Ghost.

But Simon’s face was not monstrous. It was stark and pale and devastatingly human and oh, so, so pretty. Sharp cheekbones, a strong nose, a mouth set like he had spent his whole life holding back words he never trusted anyone enough to say. His hair was fair and mussed from the mask, skin marked by old violence and its scars, but none of it made him ugly.

God help you, he was beautiful.

Not in an easy way, though. Not in the way men in pictures were beautiful. Simon was beautiful like a blade was beautiful— cold at first glance, dangerous, finely made. And then his eyes met yours, blue and bare and uncertain, and all the danger seemed to fall away.

You saw him then. Not Ghost. Just Simon.

And he looked almost afraid of being seen.

"The comms went to static, the gate went down, and all I could think about was the dark in that room," Simon continued, his thumb giving a slow rub against the inside of your wrist, feeling your pulse there. “I would tear that bloody wall down brick by brick if it meant getting you out.”

You looked down at the hand on your wrist, then back up to his icy blues, realizing the weight of what Johnny had told you in the hangar. Being human again is a bloody terrifying thing for him. 

“I held it, Simon.” you murmured, voice dropping to an honest whisper as you whispered a half-inch closer into his space. “Held my lane, because I knew you were on the other side.”

Simon stared at you for a long, breathless moment, jaw setting as he processed the words. His eyes closed when your palms found the sides of his face, cradling it, whilst he exhaled a breath so deep he must’ve been holding it for decades.

“I’m always going to be on the other side.”

hiiiiiiiiii!! please lmk what you feel. i love you.