#bradnate

Generation Kill, BradNate, M, 2k

Each time they'd done drownproofing exercises in the pool, Colbert had been the one to tie his hands and feet together. Watching the other instructors, it's clear to Nate he was going out of his way to do so. And the sections of black cording were always very tight. Swimming handicapped back and forth in the pool, Colbert had always been there, looming over the edge, watching him like a hawk. Maybe more akin to a heron, truthfully. A tall, foreboding, and very handsome heron. --- For the 2026 @au-roulette prompt, seafaring

Brad is gone when Nate wakes up.

His scent lingers on Nate’s pillow in an echo of the way Brad keeps lingering in Nate’s life—fleeting, sticking around long enough to be recognizable but not staying long enough to be something tangible, something Nate can take in his hands and feel like it’s real.

Nate isn’t surprised, and he isn’t disappointed, but he doesn’t know what he is. The sheets are cool to the touch when he swipes his hand across the indent in the mattress Brad left him with, and he kicks the covers off and gets up, putting his empty bed behind him.

In the middle of the bathroom, Brad’s shirt is crumpled on the tile floor; Nate bends over to pick it up, fingers curling in the soft worn fabric, and he drops it in the dirty laundry basket without a second thought—later, he won’t be able to find one of his own shirts, and even later still he’ll put together why.

Nate’s shoulders shine pink under the sun.

Water droplets decorate sunscreen-greased skin that’s well overdue for a reapplication, but he’s finally straddling his board like he isn’t afraid it’s about to tip over any second, so Brad figures it’s nothing a little aloe won’t fix later. He’ll even rub it in himself if Nate makes good on his promise that he’s actually going to make it to his feet on his next attempt.

Nate smiles at him, eyes crinkling and reflecting sea green above the surf, and Brad thinks about it—about cold gel between his fingers, Nate’s sunkissed skin burning hot to the touch. He thinks about the hiss Nate would let out at first contact, the quick gasping rush of air, and has to paddle away, diving under an oncoming wave with the nose of his board lest he succumb to the overwhelming urge to fuck the rest of the lesson and drag Nate right back to shore.

embrace the suck (military, slang): to consciously accept or appreciate something that is extremely unpleasant but unavoidable

Nate Fick traverses the fetid, vampiric underbelly of Los Angeles, and learns what it really means to be one of the living dead.

Generation Kill, Explicit, BradNate