#addprotectionsquad

16 days. That was how long Ray was gone. In those 16 days though, something changed about the young Hispanic man, and Ryan was starting to worry.

It had been about six months since Ray had been captured by a rival gang, and he hadn't been the same since the day the rest of the crew busted him out. He wouldn’t talk about what happened, but from the cuts and bruises and broken bones, they could all tell he was torture. And that was only the physical torment they could see, the psychological torture was probably far worse.

Even after the physical wounds had healed thought, Ray was still withdrawn, quiet, distant. He only went out when he had to, he didn’t play his x-box anymore, and he hardly spoke. All he really did was sit in his room playing his DS and sleeping.

Geoff had taken him out on one job since he returned and it didn’t end well. The minute he was put under pressure, Ray froze up and had to be bailed out. After that it was decided that Ray would stay behind during heists until he was feeling closer to 100%.

Ryan missed the old Ray, and seeing this shell of him walking around broke his heart. He was starting to get frustrated. Not in the ‘suck it up and be better already’ way, but in the ‘why won't you talk to me and let me help you’ way.

Ryan was done waiting for Ray to bring himself out of it. He had talked to Geoff and he had agreed to get the other three and himself out of the hideout for a couple of days so he and Ray could work things out.

Ryan walked into the empty hideout, save for Ray, carrying the youngers favorite take out in one hand and a case of cream soda in the other. The blond set the food and drinks down on the kitchen table before walking to Ray's room. He knocked softly to announce his presence.

“Hey Ray, I brought home your favorite, if you wanna come eat,” Ryan said as he watched the younger slowly look up from his game. He looked back down, assumedly saving, before closing the lid and slowly getting off the bed.

Ryan walked back into the kitchen and dished up their food onto two plates. He brought the plates and drinks out to the couch where Ray was sitting, pressed into the corner. Ryan set his food on the coffee table in front of the smaller man and sate down a respectable distance away with his own.

Ray cautiously picked up his food and began to eat. Ryan followed his lead and they ate together in silence for some time. Finally thought Ryan opened his mouth though.

“What to play so Call of Duty after we’re done?” He asked, looking over at the brunet to gauge his reaction.

“No,” Ray said simply, his voice quiet and slightly hoarse from lack of use.

“Why not?” Ryan shot back defiantly, figuring now was as good a time as any to confront the problem.

“What do you mean?” Ray asked, brown eyes glancing up from his food finally.

“I mean that ever since you’ve been back you haven’t wanted to do anything or talk to anyone. What’s going on man, you’ve really got me worried,” Ryan said his voice starting irritated before softening to almost a whisper.

“Nothings the matter, I’m just still….,” Ray began, but Ryan cut him off.

“Bull shit and you know it. We’ve all been captured and torture before, you’ve been captured and torture before,” Ryan began firmly, not letting Ray get away with excuses this time, “It’s never taken you or any of us six months to get back to normal. What did they do to you that was so different?”

“You want to know what was different?” Ray asked quietly standing up to put distance between himself and Ryan, crossing his arms defensively, “What was different is that this time you and I were together.”

Ryan watched quietly, a soft understanding look on his face. Ray curled his arms further around himself and clenched his fists, steeling his resolve before he went on.

“They told me, convinced me,” Ray started again, in a whisper, “That you were dead, and I don’t know I guess it just….broke me. I gave up. I didn’t see any point in putting up a fight any more.”

“But Ray,” Ryan said, standing up and walking slowly over to Ray, placing his hands on the others arms. To his delight he didn’t pull away. “I’m not dead, I’m right here, very much alive,” He reassured him.

“But what if you’re not!” Ray snapped, looking up into Ryan’s blue eyes with tears in his own, “What if this is just all some dream? What if I wake up and you really are dead and I’m still locked up?”

The tears were falling from Ray’s eyes now, and Ryan gently cupped his face, wiping and kissing the salty water away. “This isn’t a dream,” He told the shorter male, “I promise, I’m real and I’m alive, and I’m not going anywhere.”

Ray sniffed, his arms slowly uncurling from around himself and wrapping instead tightly around Ryan. The tears still fell as Ryan held Hispanic man tightly, Rays head laying over his heart. He could hear it beat, hear the proof that Ryan was alive, that he was here and real and not going anywhere soon.

“I missed your heart beat,” Ray whispered several minutes later, his tears having finally slowed.

“I’ve missed holding you,” Ryan replied, kissing the other on the top of the head.

“Gaaaaay,” Ray teased, and Ryan just laughed, glad that things were getting at least a little bit back to normal.

“I love you,” The blond whispered into the brunet's hair.

Michael counts down the seconds in his mind. His hand, the one holding onto the small, black detonator, is sweaty, and he’s holding his breath. He can faintly hear Geoff and Jack’s hushed conversation through his earpiece. Ray’s slow, steady breathing. Ryan choosing new ammo. Gavin clicking his mouse.

3.

2.

1.

“Wait-! Michael, wait! There’s more explo-”

Michael presses the detonator, far too concentrated to register the full meaning of Ryan’s cut-off words. His explosion rocks the whole warehouse, but there are more following, closer and closer until he can actually feel them rumbling the concrete under the soles of his battered, old kicks. He’s too stunned to move, but there’s no time anymore, anyway.

“Michael!” Geoff screams, his voice warping into a high-pitched screech at the end as Michael’s earpiece gets fried by an explosion from behind the wall. The redhead is thrown back with such force that he feels like he’s been hit by a fully loaded truck. He desperately reaches up to his ear and claws at the earpiece, prying it out. Its fried circuit still screeches demonically even after he throws it to the ground.

Michael doesn’t have the time to dwell on it as he is hit by a chunk of concrete. It connects with his chest painfully, knocking the wind out of him and forcing him to double over. But it doesn’t help; more and more pieces keep hitting him, harder and harder, until he is more than half burried by rubble and unable to breathe.

He’s sure at least three of his ribs are cracked, but he has no way of checking. Unable to move, he's forced to bear the weight of the concrete choking him down. Wiggling does absolutely nothing and only loses him some of his precious air as he huffs with effort.

At least I was alone, runs through his mind, everything except for gratitude wiped from his muddy thoughts. He's not sure if he could live through someone else dying. But he's sure the others will be okay.

Geoff and Jack will keep them all safe.

He loses track of time but it's not long until his lungs start burning, burning, burning. An inferno spreads through his chest. He thinks he cries out but he can't be sure because he's gone lightheaded and keeps flicking in and out of consciousness.

His blurry sight of fire fades into black one last time and then he is gone.

"Michael!" Geoff cries into the comm, but his only response is static from the other end. "Michael! Michael! Fuck, Michael!" No matter how many times he calls or how loudly, Michael's earpiece stays fried and dead.

"Geoff, we gotta go get him!" Gavin yelps, his face a painting of concern that Geoff can, unfortunately, vividly imagine.

He'd wanted to go with them so he could keep tabs on their enemies in real time, but Geoff wouldn't allow it. It was too dangerous; what happened to Michael a prime example of what could've happened to the Brit as well. Geoff can still remember when Gavin was forced to jump off of a building and almost didn't open his parachute - not a pleasant memory, he'll admit. But seated all alone with only his surveillance equipment back at their safe house, Gavin must be blaming himself for what happened to the redhead. Even though it wasn't his fault, no matter how you looked at it, Gavin has a tendency to blame himself if their intel lacks even the slightest bit.

"Don't worry, Gav," comes Jack's soothing voice from their comms, but Geoff can easily pick out the hints of panic in it. Gavin, though, not as used to Jack in high pressure situations, doesn't pick up on it and seems to calm a little as he hears the words. "We'll go check out the building with Ryan. Ray, cover us."

"Alright. Be quick, though, there're staggerers pouring out of the surrounding storages, and they don't look too happy," Ray mutters. His voice is oddly flat.

"Noted. Geoff," Jack addresses him, "get out of here, we'll be right behind. All of us."

The words leave a little wiggle room for the unfortunate turn of events. There's always the room, Geoff reasons with himself. He doesn't like the wiggle room. He's never liked it.

"Okay."

Jack exchanges a look with Ryan, or, more specifically, his mask, and then crosses the street, ducking into the alley that had been Michael's hiding spot. Ryan hurries after him, attentively keeping his submachine gun trained to their surroundings. There's no trace of Michael left, just a pile of bloodied concrete in front of the hole blasted in the side of the warehouse.

"Do you think he might've made it?" Jack asks. Jack always asks the hardest questions, just so no one else has to. Ryan isn't sure if he should be thankful for it now, because the thought of losing Michael sends a pang through him, like an electrical shock.

Ray's sharp intake of breath and the strung silence betrays what they are all thinking.

"There's his comm," Jack mutters, much more gloomily now, and bends to pick the small device up. He holds it up to his ear, but he can only hear a faint crackling. Dead. Just like Michael, probably. He wants to kick himself for even thinking that, but he can't help himself.

“I- I think we should go back… to the safe house, y’know,” Ray mumbles. His voice trembles and Jack can’t imagine how he must be feeling. Him and Michael were always together, even way before the whole Fake AH crew, and now… Michael is just gone.

Jack swallows down the horrid taste of puke assaulting his mouth. “Yeah.”

“You’d think they took some vacations, but noooo,” a man whines before sighing deeply.

“Can it and help me,” comes another voice, a female one this time.

The clean up crew arrives no more than three hours later, when the streets finally calm enough for them to be (relatively) safe.

The woman fixes her heavy gloves and looks around. The crews really did a number on the poor little Achievement city. Almost everything in the radius of a whole mile is blown up beyond saving. The main warehouse is now just a husk of a building, with only a few parts of some walls still standing.

"There," she says, pointing at a pile of rubble by a shattered wall. "There seems like a good place to start."

The man shrugs, adjusting his hold on the tools he's holding. "Whatever you say. I just wanna get it done and go home."

"Then stop yammering and let's get this over with."

They park their giant trashcan near the wall and get to work clearing the pile of rubble. Better to start with something bigger, right?

Piece after piece, they toss the broken concrete into the trash, efficiently chunking away from the pile. In a matter of an hour, half of it is gone.

"Hey, look. There's something in there," the man says, frowning at the patch of gray between the rubble.

They chuck pieces away until they uncover a body of a boy, no more than twenty five years old. The worst of it is that despite the blood stains covering his clothes and the fact that he was buried under half a ton of rubble, there are absolutely no bruises on his pale skin. No bruises, no cuts, nothing.

"What the fuck…?" they both echo, no louder than a whisper.

The boy stirs.

The man lets out a shriek.

The boy opens his eyes.

They both back away.

The boy stands up, rubbing his head with a pained groan. "Fuuuuck," he drawls. His red hair is wild, sticking out in all directions. Dust falls from it as he moves.. His brown eyes lock onto the two cleaners and he blinks confusedly at them for a few seconds. "I thought that angels would at least have fucking wings," he mumbles. "Fake advertising and all that shit. Then again, guess I did more shit to deserve hell, so like… I guess you're lacking horns, not wings."

The pair of cleaners exchange a look before glancing at the lunatic boy again. They come to the conclusion that they want nothing to do with him and turn to run.

Thankfully, the boy doesn't follow them.

Michael staggers to his wobbly feet, balancing precariously on the balls of his heels before regaining his full balance. His head throbs and he presses a hand to his pulsing temple in an attempt to soothe the pain. It doesn't help.

He blinks off his blurry sight, the shapes of his surroundings coming into focus. What he at first thought was heaven (or hell, as the case may be) is actually just the downtown of Achievement city, the very same alley he sat and waited in during the last mission.

His memory is lacking, he thinks when he can't quite make out what happened. He can remember explosions, lost of them, and then pain, searing pain in his chest.

There is none of that now. His chest feels as fine as always. He even presses a hand to the ribs he thought were broken, but no, they are absolutely okay. He doesn't even have a single bruise on him.

He fishes in his pocket for his phone, but what he pulls out is just a mess of broken plastic with a cracked screen. It doesn't even turn on. He shoves it back inside and stretches his aching muscles. It feels more like he just had a really long nap instead of being buried alive.

It will take him some time to get back to the safe house, but oh well. Not like he can hail a cab without getting himself turned in to the popo. Walking it is, then.

Ray feels like he's suffocating.

He tries to calm himself by playing games, but it seems he can't. Two achievements and his hands are still shaking. That might explain why it took him so long to get them in the first place. His wandering mind might've played a part in it as well.

The couch seems to be too big, Geoff and Jack on either side of him doing less to calm him and more to make him feel like he's being strangled. Finally, when his shaky and sweaty hands cause him to die one too many times, he sets the controller down and stands up, probably much quicker than he wanted. Too quick to appear as okay as he wants to.

But there's no lying to his boys anyway. They notice, and they send him a couple of concerned glances. They don't try to stop him from leaving, though. Ray thanks them mentally.

The room he locks himself away in is as impersonal as the rest of the safe house. The furniture is nice, Geoff and Jack (Jack, mostly) have a great eye for style, but there is a slight layer of dust settled over the half-empty shelves and the room lacks any personal belongings. It feels… well, like a safe house. That's not what Ray wants right now. He wants to go home and curl up in bed and probably sleep for like a week.

This bed dips slightly uncomfortably underneath him when he sits down. It reminds him even more that he's not home. But the others will start packing soon; they'll go home soon.

No need to stay at the safe house with the mission done. It was an utter failure, but it is done nonetheless.

He curls up and kicks the itchy blanket off. He can't find sleep, though. His mind is plagued by Michael's smiling face and, alternatively, a picture of his face blown up into billions of pieces supplied by his brain.

It's burned into his eyelids, so he tries just staring at the blank wall. He doesn't admit that the few cracks in it are blurring.

It takes him like two hours and his legs burn with overexertion, but Michael finally stands in front of their current safe house.

It's a small, nondescript house in a line of same ones. Nondescript and discreet is exactly what Geoff and Jack had gone for, but Michael knows how much Ray hates these safe houses. They are way too distant and just... not theirs. Michael is indifferent, but he sees where Ray is coming from.

The sun is setting and it is already dark enough for the shitty street lamps to be turned on already. The light in what Michael assumes is the living room is on. So they are still packing.

Michael smiles sadly when he thinks how worried they must be about him. He presses the doorbell, knowing that if he just entered without a warning, there'd be a bigger chance of him getting shot before they realize who he is.

He can't help his smile when he hears footsteps coming.

Gavin, leaning heavily, dejectedly, against Ryan's side, jumps up abruptly when he hears the doorbell ring out.

"Michael!" he cries out, his voice only breaking once.

Ryan grabs his wrist before he can run to the front door. He exchanges a look with Geoff and Jack, who have been busying themselves with packing the weapons. "Gav, I don’t think that's Michael," Ryan mutters, pulling the blond back. Gavin looks at him with wide eyes. They brim with hope, but Gav knows that there's only a slight chance that it's Michael standing in front of the door. "Do you think someone followed us?" he asks Jack, who frowns deeply at the thought.

"I… I don't know. I don't think so, but we did retreat pretty quickly. It's… possible," he admits finally, but not without a concerned look.

Geoff picks up two guns and passes one to Ryan. "Better safe than sorry," he says. It's so strange to see him like this, but Michael's… death... hit them all hard. Geoff probably blamed himself - he hasn't spoken at all until now - and didn't want to lose anyone else.

"Better safe than sorry," Ryan echoes a bit quieter, checking the clip.

The two of them go to the door while Jack and Gavin prepare to get Ray and bolt as fast as any trouble brews.

Ryan takes position by the wall, aiming at the door, and nods at Geoff. Geoff opens the door with a single fluid movement and they both immediately fix their weapon position.

Neither of them shoots, though.

Michael's smile widens into a grin when the door opens to reveal Geoff, looking worryingly sober but disheveled, and Ryan, whose mask is long gone and whose face paint is so smudged it doesn't resemble the skull-like pattern at all anymore. The pair of guns they have trained on him are lowered and then put away completely as he goes in for hugs.

"Michael?" Ryan questions, the tension obviously draining from his frame. Geoff smashes their mouths together in a heated kiss, frantically pawing at Michael's dirtied hair.

"Michael?" comes a voice from the inside. Then, "Michael! I was right! Michael!" Gavin yelps, running over to wrap his arms around the redhead right after Geoff lets go. Michael's lips are bruised now, but it's not like he's complaining when Gavin pulls him into a kiss as well.

It takes Jack - just like usual - to remind them that this is a safe house, and it they stay crowded around the front door like that, it won't be for much longer. He doesn't look any less happy to see Michael safe and sound than them, though.

"Michael?!"

They all turn to see Ray standing in the long hallway leading to the bedrooms, looking the worst of them all. His hair is sticking out even more than Gavin's, and his red face has way too obvious tear tracks running across it. He wastes no time in running at the redhead, impatient to make sure that his lover is okay. They all know how that feels.

Ray's way too light to topple any of them usually (maybe except Gavin), but his speed combined with Michael's delayed reaction get them on the floor with no problems at all. Ray hides his tearful face in the crook of Michael's neck, repeating his name over and over like a mantra.

They help the boys up and they all pile onto the couch, cuddling close and slowly calming down.

"What happened, Michael?" Gavin asks when Ray stops crying and they get him to drink some water.

"I got buried," Michael answers nonchalantly. It's obvious he doesn't very much want to talk about it, but his boys aren't about to let it go just yet.

"You got buried?" Gavin prompts and all the others look at him, awaiting an answer. They get a shrug.

"Yeah. The explosion buried me under rubble. The clean up crew dug me up. I wanted to call you, but my phone is wrecked."

Their endless gratitude that Michael is safe might've gotten them to overlook the fact that the redhead didn’t have a scratch on him. Michael was lucky, and he hoped no one else would go through something like that again.