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Phoenix.

The callsign fits in a way that makes the lads quietly shake their heads. You don’t burn down to nothing; you rise. You’ve risen from the worst of it more times than anyone can count, and every time you do, you bring heat with you. Not reckless heat. Steady, life-giving warmth. The kind that coaxes frozen fingers back to feeling.

You arrive at the safehouse in the late gray of evening, boots scuffed, jacket dusted with the day’s grit. The team filters in around you—Soap loud and alive, Gaz with a tired grin, Price already issuing orders in that calm, anchoring voice. Ghost lingers at the threshold, mask still on, skull pale in the dim light. He’s been gone longer than the rest, eyes shadowed, movements precise and restrained, like he’s wound himself too tight.

He doesn’t look at you at first. He never does when the hunger is loud. When the want is dangerous.

You feel him anyway.

It’s a pull at the edge of your awareness, the way a campfire draws you closer without you realizing you’re moving. You drop your kit, roll your shoulders, and glance back. Your eyes meet his through the black hollows of the mask, and something in him stills. Just a fraction. Just enough.

Later, when the debrief is done and the house settles into its nocturnal quiet, you find him on the back steps. The air is cold enough to bite, fog ghosting from his breath. He’s got his elbows on his knees, hands clasped, posture folded inward like he’s trying to make himself smaller than he is.

“Couldn’t sleep?” you ask softly, not wanting to startle him.

He gives a low huff that might be a laugh. “Haven’t earned it yet.”

You sit beside him, close but not crowding. You’ve learned the distance that doesn’t feel like a threat. The distance that says I’m here, but I won’t trap you. Your shoulder almost brushes his. Almost.

For a while, you say nothing. The quiet is companionable, the kind that lets the mind slow. You watch your breath plume white and fade. He watches the dark.

Then, barely above the wind, he says, “You’re warm.”

It’s not a line. It’s an observation, said with the blunt honesty he reserves for things that matter. You turn your head, studying the profile of his mask, the tension in his jaw.

“Everyone’s warm, Simon,” you murmur.

He shakes his head. “Not like you.”

The hunger shifts, sharp and sudden. You feel it in the way his shoulders draw in, the way his hands tighten together. You don’t reach for him. Not yet. You let the moment breathe.

“You ever think,” you say, careful, “that warmth isn’t something you have to earn?”

His silence is answer enough.

The past clings to him like smoke. You know pieces of it—enough to understand that affection, for him, was a currency always in short supply. Conditional. Fragile. Taken away as soon as he dared to want it. So he learned not to want. Learned to survive on empty.

But hunger doesn’t disappear just because you ignore it.

A gust of wind cuts through the yard, and he shivers, barely perceptible. You make a decision.

Slowly, so slowly he can pull away if he needs to, you lean in and let your shoulder touch his. The contact is light. An offer, not a demand.

He freezes.

Every instinct in him screams danger—closeness means vulnerability, vulnerability means pain. But the warmth is there, real and steady, seeping through the layers of his jacket, through the armor he wears even off the field. It’s intoxicating in its simplicity.

You don’t move. You don’t push. You just exist beside him, solid and alive.

After a long moment, he exhales, a sound like something unclenching. His shoulder settles, the tiniest fraction closer to yours. It’s not an embrace. It’s not even a lean. But it’s a choice.

“Phoenix,” he murmurs, and the way he says your callsign is almost reverent. Like it’s a promise.

“Yeah?”

“Don’t… don’t go out on the next op without me.”

You smile faintly, though he can’t see it. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

Another stretch of quiet. The cold creeps in again, but he doesn’t pull away. If anything, he angles toward you, drawn by the heat he pretends he doesn’t need. The starving beast in him edges closer to the fire, cautious, ready to bolt if it flares too high.

You decide to feed it anyway.

You lift your hand and rest it, open and gentle, on his forearm. The fabric of his sleeve is rough beneath your fingers, and beneath that, the solid warmth of muscle. His breath catches. For a heartbeat, you think he might pull back, walls slamming down, mask becoming more than just a piece of gear.

He doesn’t.

Instead, his hand loosens from its clasp and turns, palm brushing your knuckles. The contact is accidental in theory, deliberate in everything that matters. His fingers hover, uncertain, like he’s forgotten how to close them around something that won’t be taken away.

“Is this… okay?” you ask quietly.

The question is an anchor. It tells him he has control. That he can say no and it will be respected.

He swallows. “Yeah,” he says, voice rough. “It’s… good.”

So you let your hand stay. You let the warmth speak for you. The cold recedes, chased back by the simple miracle of two people choosing not to be alone.

Minutes pass. Or maybe longer. Time does strange things when you’re standing on the edge of something fragile and precious.

Finally, he turns his head, mask angled toward you. In the darkness, you can just make out the intensity of his gaze. “I don’t know how to do this,” he admits. “The… normal way.”

You meet his eyes without flinching. “We’ll do it our way.”

A soft, incredulous sound leaves him. “You make it sound easy.”

“It’s not,” you say. “But it’s worth it.”

The word worth lands like a stone in water, sending ripples through everything he believes about himself. He’s been a weapon for so long. A shield. A ghost. Worth, in his world, has always been tied to usefulness, to endurance, to how much pain he can take without breaking.

Not to being held.

Not to being wanted.

He hesitates, then lifts his hand, mirroring your earlier caution, and rests it lightly against your side. The contact is tentative, almost reverent, like he’s afraid the warmth might vanish if he grips too hard. You feel the tremor in his fingers, the restraint, the need.

“Simon,” you whisper, and your voice is an invitation.

He leans in, just enough that your shoulders touch fully now, warmth bleeding from one to the other. The hunger in him is still there, but it’s softer, less feral. Like a fire that’s found fuel and no longer needs to rage to survive.

You don’t kiss him. Not yet. This isn’t about heat in that way, not tonight. It’s about presence. About proving, in the simplest, most undeniable way, that he is not alone with his ghosts.

He rests his forehead briefly against yours, the mask cool against your skin. The contact is brief, but it’s everything. A promise. A grounding point. A silent I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere.

For someone who’s spent his life braced for loss, that promise is almost unbearable.

When you finally stand, the cold has lost its edge. He rises with you, reluctant but steadier than before. As you head back inside, he lingers a moment, then reaches out and catches your wrist.

“Phoenix,” he says again.

You turn.

“Thank you,” he murmurs. Not just for the warmth. For the patience. For the understanding. For feeding a hunger he never learned how to name.

You squeeze his hand once, firm and reassuring. “Anytime, Ghost.”

You didn’t really understand Leon. Not for the first few years of knowing him, at least.

When you first met, you often wondered what Leon had seen. You and your fellow recruits couldn’t ignore how Agent Kennedy was years younger—and doubly less experienced with a gun—than the rest of your training group.

Leon seemed determined, but tired. His soft expression was coupled with a look in his eye that was too weary for someone in such an advanced cohort of soldiers. He seemed to mean well, even if he seemed far from approachable. Leon wore the face of a cold, hardened agent, and it didn’t really fit such a kind face.

You wondered during those first few days if training would change that.

Krauser worked the whole team hard. He made sure to beat any look of uncertainty out of Leon within the first three weeks of boot camp. When weeks turned into months, Leon only escaped his hardened exterior after-hours, when you and the rest of the group went out drinking or stayed up in the bunks playing cards.

After a year, all Leon seemed to utter out in between drills was a mouthful of sarcasm and actions that spoke louder than words. He grew cagey and cynical, but still couldn’t shake that look on his face when asked if he’d had another rough night.

By graduation into the next rank, Leon was stone-faced and far too good at his job for someone his age. After months of separation, you and Leon were assigned the same detail. After spending so long from your old training team, you never thought you’d get to work with him so closely again.

While you both immersed yourself in your new team’s culture, you picked up on the whispers about the new, silent soldier that joined their ranks. The one who reacted oddly to pats on the back and hands on his shoulders. The one who never smiled, never laughed, never raised his voice. Leon was colder than when you’d last seen him, but he didn’t hesitate to greet you when you first stepped into the office. It wasn’t long before the rest of the team began to talk.

I heard he survived something unthinkable.

Doesn’t seem like the socializing type.

I bet he doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger.

Can a guy so young lose his humanity so fast?

Sure seems like it.

You couldn’t blame the rest of them. If it weren’t for the few moments of tenderness you’d witnessed during training, you would have thought the same thing. You often wondered if the last bit of Leon’s softer side had faded since entering into the secret service.

Or…maybe it was just looking for a moment to creep back out into the open.

You woke up abruptly, with a jolt of energy that matched the thunder crackling somewhere outside. Your eyes fell open to a dark room, silent aside from the raging storm. You bit back your panic, trying not to jump to the worst case scenario.

No danger, you thought to yourself. No mission. No training. You were home. Or the closest thing to it, at least.

You were lying on the couch in your apartment, fully furnished and provided to you by the government until they inevitably sent you somewhere else. Your thoughts drifted toward earlier that evening. You had a stack of paperwork, reviewing a joint case between you and Leon, and—

Leon. Right. Leon had come over, hadn’t he?

You hadn’t talked with Leon much since you’d both been assigned to your new team. He kept to himself, apart from a few polite acknowledgements. But…you knew you both hated writing out your reports, so you grabbed a case of beers after you punched out and told him to come check out your new place.

You remembered the two of you eating boxes of takeout on your couch and doing work until the rain hit the windows too peacefully. With the stress of the day drowned out by the cozy weather, you remembered Leon’s stone-cold stare, him dryly commenting at every drawn-out yawn. Always something like, tired of me already? Didn’t know I was so draining.

You felt the warmth of the woolly throw blanket you kept on the couch over your shoulders. Gears turned in your head. The rain must have lulled you to sleep without realizing it, a blanket had “mysteriously” found its way atop you, and Leon had finished up his work and saw his way out before the storm got bad. That made sense, right?

“Fuck,” you whispered to yourself, sitting upright and stretching out your limbs. “My back is gonna kill me later.”

As you rose with another round of thunder, you caught sight of your pile of work…and realized there was far too much of it to only be yours. As lightning lit up the room, you drifted over to two metal briefcases, side by side, where you and Leon left them earlier in the evening.

A hint of dread bloomed in your chest. Leon wasn’t one to forget things. But…did that mean he was still here? If he’d left things so quickly, maybe he had to leave abruptly. Or…maybe he was taken by force.

You knew that was impossible—that the building had top-notch security and not just anyone could get access to the fob for your suite. It was most likely that Leon had a mission he couldn’t miss. Or maybe he trusted you enough to take care of his things so they wouldn’t get wet in the rain.

You stood up from the couch, tried to push down the growing anxiety that swirled in your stomach. You looked for any signs of life in your living room, your balcony, and over toward your bedroom. You didn’t expect Leon to turn up at all, which made it all the more surprising to spot his familiar silhouette when turning into the dining room.

You couldn’t exactly melt with relief just yet. You stayed frozen in place and observed him. He sat perched backwards on one of your chairs, shoulders hiked up to his ears and a pistol balanced shakily on the chair’s back frame. Leon stayed hunched forward, the rapid rise and fall of his chest betraying his attempts to stay still. He had the gun pointed at nothing. He was too wired, too vigilant to have it pointed at nothing.

What the hell was happening?

“Leon,” you whispered, your hands falling to your sides to draw fire on instinct until you realized you had your gun locked in the safe back in your room. When the he didn’t answer, you called out again, a little more forceful. “Leon.”

The pistol flew back around before Leon could, and you recognized the laser-red light pointed toward your chest. When Leon snapped forward and met your eyes, he looked caught in another world. His glassy gaze adjusted—the fear brimming in them just as intense—and he suddenly looked beyond mortified.

You felt that anxiety morph more into confusion when Leon lowered the gun and stood up from the chair. He didn’t look like himself. Not the cold-hearted agent he’d grown to become. Not even the quiet recruit you met on day one.

“I was leaving,” Leon breathed out, voice low and raspy, trying to block out any semblance of emotion. “I was on my way out.”

“Okay,” you nodded, still trying to figure all of this out. You didn’t want to scare him off. “Leon, what’s going on?”

Leon looked like he was ready to run right out the door, but something was stopping him. Rain pattered down on the windows and roof, and Leon couldn’t stop looking towards the door like it was a portal to Hell.

“The footsteps,” Leon forced out. The words clawed their way out of his throat in a sickened whisper. “Can’t tell if he’s coming from—from above or below this time. If he stopped outside the door, the room is safe. But—you can still never be sure.”

…what?

You stood there, unsure of what to say. Leon stared through you, acting like any of his words made sense. Your body still couldn’t decide if there was an intruder on the other side of the door. Full with adrenaline, you crept closer.

“I don’t understand,” was what you finally said. Leon seemed to have no problem jumping into things again. It only made you all the more confused. “Who are you talking about?”

“I should’ve just killed him. I keep trying but it’s like the bastard’s immortal. I don’t know how else to lose him. It’s like I…”

What the hell was he talking about? You didn’t cover immortal stalkers in training. Leon kept the gun raised, eyeing the door like someone might bust in at any moment. Looking at him felt like watching someone teetering off the edge of a tall drop. You tried not to get frustrated.

“I can call the lobby and get them to check the cameras if that’s what you want,” you reassured him. You still had your hands held above you on the off-chance he decided to shoot. And what an incident report that would be. “Can you please put down the gun?”

Leon didn’t look like a secret service officer. He looked like a man too shell-shocked to hold a pistol properly, as if he’d barely used the thing. Any instinct pounded into him from boot camp was gone.

“There’s no one to call,” Leon whispered back, desperate, “No cameras. Power’s out. There were other officers when I first came in, but I couldn’t—”

It clicked for you.

“Leon,” you cut him off, trying your best to keep his attention. “Look at me. Do you know where you are?”

Leon met your eyes intensely, now evidently disoriented. It felt like talking with someone who wasn’t fully awake. Something in his eyes changed, from threatened to utterly defenceless. Leon looked far too young to be an agent for a moment, then his body turned boneless. His shoulders drooped.

“I don’t…”

Leon ran one hand through his hair, covered his eyes with the other. A whimper left him, soft and vulnerable. You tried to internalize the shock that Leon looked like he was about to burst into tears in your dining room.

“You’re with one of your own,” you layed out the facts, slipped back into work mode. That was all you could do for him until he agreed to touch you. “You’re with an agent, Kennedy. Stand down. There’s no threat.”

Fully lucid, Leon let the gun hit the table softly. You moved swiftly and took it, hitting the safety lock and pushing it over to the other side.

“Sorry,” Leon choked on his words. His voice sounded higher, more emotive than the one you were used to. Despite trying to act more normal, Leon still looked like an absolute mess. “Shouldn’t have happened.”

You couldn’t help wondering if he meant that it shouldn’t have happened in general or just with you watching.

“You don’t have to worry,” you reached out toward his trembling shoulders. You let him step in and accept a hand on his back, even if it made him seize up. “What was that? A flashback?”

Leon’s lack of a response told you all you needed. You’d seen it in countless soldiers. The ones who’d really gone to war, the ones assigned to missions they weren’t meant to come back from. Flashbacks weren’t uncommon in your line of work. Neither was the paranoia and the shame that came with it.

You just…you didn’t expect Leon to experience them. Not this viscerally. Maybe you’d pegged him all wrong.

“Can I touch you again?” You asked. Leon barely nodded, head still in his hands. You cautiously rubbed at his shoulder, down to his bicep. He stared down at you with big, fearful eyes. “There you are. You okay? You with me?”

That question seemed to push him over the edge. You still didn’t regret asking.

“I’m an agent,” He muttered, as if he was trying to remind himself of the fact, “I’m an agent. It’s my job to do this. Why can’t I just do my job without—”

The younger, more doubtful version of Leon jumped out at you with such vulnerability, it made your heart want to break open. Like paper, he crumpled in front of you with a broken sound.

“Hey, hey. You’re okay. Take a few breaths,” you murmured, “Happens to the best of us. You don’t need to feel any shame about it.”

What you didn’t want to say was that you’d tackle anyone who tried to come in here. Leon’s breaths sounded heaving and wet and frustrated. You sat him down in one of the dining room chairs, pulling another one close to him. Leon’s heartbeat hammered away in his chest. He kept a flat hand pressed right above his diaphragm. He turned away from you, as if he couldn’t bear to have someone else seem him without his walls.

“You remember what they taught us during training?” You ghosted a hand over his shoulder. He shivered, but nodded. Without looking at you, Leon’s hand moved to grip yours. You assumed that was his way of asking you to lead. “On my mark, alright?”

The next 15 minutes was filled with grounding techniques designed for even the most wounded of soldiers. You tightened and released each muscle, let rounds of controlled breathing calm both your bodies down.

When Leon could sit in his chair without trembling, you snuck out of his iron grip and got him a glass of water. He still seemed too embarrassed to comment, too withdrawn and drowning in old memories to be more like himself.

Leon’s heartbeat still hammered against the palm of your hand on his back, even after he drank the water you gave him. Thunder rumbled steadily outside, keeping the two of you trapped in the bubble that defined your apartment.

“Feeling more grounded?” You asked cautiously. Leon let out a shaky breath, turned away from you like a wounded predator. He didn’t want you to see, even though you were far past that point.

“Yeah,” Leon swallowed his pride to respond. He sounded like he’d rather be swallowed up than perceived. “Thanks.”

A part of you wondered if he’d tell you about the immortal man he thought he heard outside your door. Perhaps Leon couldn’t sleep back at the camp because he was afraid of being pursued by something he couldn’t shake. If you asked, maybe it would open a part of him up.

Before you could, Leon stiffened under your arm’s length when rain rhythmically hit the windows. You decided against it.

“I think you should stay over,” you said instead. Leon looked up at you in disbelief. “It’s late. It’s pouring. And…” you stared at the gun sitting just out of reach. “I don’t think you should hold that thing right now.”

Leon laughed, soft and cynical, just a little too insecure. “I’ve already overstayed my welcome.”

“I’m your equal,” What kind of an agent would you be if you didn’t take care of a fellow soldier in need? “You don’t get to decide when you’ve overstayed your welcome. I want you to stay.”

“Why? Can’t leave me to lick my wounds by myself?” Leon was back to his colder persona. You could tell he was trying to push you away. It wasn’t going to work.

Because I care,” You tried to get it through his stupid, self-sacrificial skull. “Because I’m worried about you. I know you like to work alone. It doesn’t mean you have to do this alone, too.”

That seemed to strike a nerve. Leon’s face went from cynical to uncertain. You wondered about the last time someone had told him that. You wouldn’t ask about that, either.

“Fine,” Leon breathed out, eyes closed as he tried to wrangle his breathing under control. “Okay. Fine. Just—tell me when to go. I’ll go.”

Within one evening, your expectations of Leon had fizzled. Cold-hearted, quiet, arm’s-length Leon followed you into the bedroom more like a lost puppy than a trained agent. He dropped the scowl when he thought you weren’t looking, and never seemed to pick it back up.

As Leon stood behind you, the first thing you did was stick his pistol in the safe. As much as you wanted Leon to feel at ease, you didn’t want any bullets flying around so early after joining your new assignment. You passed him a pair of men’s shorts you didn’t remember having. Leon kept his t-shirt on. He turned his back while you changed.

Leon’s aura of uncertainty spoke louder than words. Your bed was big enough for two, and you were sure the two of you had slept in places far worse during your time in the military. Still, he stared at the bed like he’d never gotten into one.

“I can take the couch if it’s too weird,” you offered, knowing full well that the thing wasn’t nearly comfortable enough for that. Thankfully, Leon shook his head. You both settled under the covers and flicked the lights off.

Leon next to you looked stiff as a board. He stared up at the ceiling with stormy eyes, arms crossed tight over his chest. You wondered if he was still embarrased about earlier. He hadn’t said a word since he thanked you for the shorts.

After a few minutes of staggered breathing beside you, you realized sleeping next to him would be impossible without some kind of confrontation. You couldn’t take seeing him look so—you couldn’t put your finger on it—afraid? Alone?

“Come here,” you outreached your arms, and Leon rolled over, eyes crinkled with confusion.

“What?”

“Come here,” you repeated. A detached hand on his shoulder wasn’t going to cut it anymore. “You look like you need it.”

Leon looked ready to argue, but something about your tone of voice, the look on your face in the near-darkness shut him up. Hesitantly, he scooted forward until your arms filled up with his presence.

Leon gasped when you wrapped around him fully. You squeezed until he breathed back out again, a whine coming out with it. Your hands went to his neck, his hair, softly down his spine. His shoulders shook under your gentle grip, excess adrenaline escaping as his body as he finally started to relax.

“Was I right?” You asked knowingly. You paused when a pair of eyelashes pressed against the crook of your neck. They blinked something soft and wet onto your skin. “Hey…hey, I’m sorry. Too much?”

You didnt expect him to cry. You didn’t expect much of this at all, but here you were.

“I haven’t—” Leon hiccuped soft against you. You’d never seen him so fragile. “Haven’t felt like—no one’s done this in a long time.”

Leon dug himself deeper into your skin, hungry for it like oxygen. Was he really that touch-starved? You had your moments of feeling lonely, but you always had your fellow recruits. Hands on shoulders, pats on the back, huddling for warmth, visiting each other’s bunks when nights got to be too daunting.

But Leon never had that, hadn’t he? He’d closed himself off from day one. You always thought he didn’t want to be bothered. Your chest tightened. Right now, Leon seemed so lonely. How much of this had he weathered alone?

“You know I’m here, right?” You murmured into his hair, hands rubbing circles into his back. “You have people in your corner. People at the office wonder about you. They care. You can let us in.”

Leon squeezed his eyes shut, and uneven breaths turned to quiet sobs. You could tell he didn’t believe you. Or maybe was scared to. You rested your head against his and let him release it all into the darkened void of your bedroom.

“They all think I’m a monster,” his voice wavered, his breathing quick and wobbly. “I know what they think about me. I can tell.”

You had no idea that Leon was so worried about what people thought. He harboured enough guilt to tear him up, inside and out.

“There are professionals, too. Military doctors. Meds,” You tried to soothe him like you would a civilian caught up in the crossfire. “They can help with the flashbacks. If you get them often, it wouldn’t hurt to talk to someone.”

You could tell Leon didn’t like the idea before he even opened his mouth to speak. You hoped you weren’t making things worse. You just…you didn’t expect him to crumble so easily.

“They can’t know,” Leon muttered with defeat. “If they find out…if they have any leverage on me, they’ll throw me out. They can’t think I’m unfit. The people I’m trying to protect will…”

“Who?” You asked softly. You wanted so desperately to understand. Understand him. “Who’s they?”

Leon stiffened under your embrace. “It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have said anything. Forget it.”

“Leon—”

“Please just forget it. Please. I can’t drag another person into this.”

He sounded serious. You had no idea how much pressure he’d been under. He was cold and calculated for a reason. Leon had people he loved, people he thought were more worthy than his own life and comfort.

A surge of guilt rippled through you. If only the others knew.

“I won’t tell anyone,” you reassured him, “Your secret’s safe with me, okay?”

“Thank you,” he muttered back. “It’s not just you. I promise. I wish I could say, but—”

You realized tonight Leon was much more of a gentle soul than you first thought. A rookie with a heart of gold. A scared kid deep inside, as much as he was an agent.

“I’m here no matter what, though,” you made sure to tell him. “No questions asked. You can come over anytime.”

Leon almost cracked a smile at that.

“I’m sorry for dragging you into my shit,” He said quietly, though he didn’t pull away. Keeping his arms around you, Leon’s breathing finally slowed.

“What kind of an agent would I be?” You ran a hand through his dusty blond hair, scratching at his scalp until he let out a noise of relief. “No man left behind. Especially not tonight.”

The thunder raged on, but something about your room felt detached from the rest of the planet tonight. As Leon’s thoughts began to drift, you hoped the rookie in him was still listening.