#ghostsoapkonig

 (Ghost already knows the facts of it. He knows about the torn ligaments and the heavily bruised muscle and the fucking three inches of leather from Soap’s boot that had stopped the injury from being any worse. He knows what Soap’s hand feels like in his when he’s too drugged up to see straight, his fingers all loose and curling in all the wrong places to try and hold his hand. He knows Soap’s a lucky son of a bitch and he’s just going to get injured again in some other stupid accident unless Ghost stops him.)

 “Be fucking jigging by next week, LT. Just you wait and see.” Soap tries a grin, a little too small for his face, a little too much teeth as he tries to adjust his stance and reconsiders it in the same heartbeat, leaning back into Ghost. “How’re the new recruits doing?”

 “What do you think?”

 Soap snorts, drawing another set of eyes to them, this pair belonging to one of the recruits who quickly thinks better and looks away. 

 “Well, no-one’s curled up on the floor crying so I’m guessing it’s going well enough.”

 “Not bad.” Ghost turns his face away from Soap then, pressing his cheek to the shaved side of the other man’s head. It prickles slightly through the thin dark cloth of his mask and he can just make out the distant apple scent of Soap’s shampoo beneath the sterile blanket of the medical ward. His gaze locks on to the observer tucked into the corner, still mostly hidden despite his height, despite his mask, and dark eyes meet his. 

 König stands apart from the others, his shoulders curling in a way that reminds Ghost of a vulture’s hunch, part protection and part warning. He’s competent. He’s dangerous. And he’s watching Soap like he’s being fucking paid to. 

 “You’ve got a little bird watching you, Johnny.”

 Soap, to his credit, doesn’t look immediately. He hums low and lilting, reaching to one side to tuck his fingers into Ghost’s pocket, tugging at the small paper bag of sweets he knows is in there, just for him. It’s a rough handful of gummy worms this time, deliberately made lighter by the girl working behind the counter holding the bag up of the scale and Ghost couldn’t work out why. The bag rustles as Soap pulls it free. “Some of my favourites in here, Ghost.”

 “Is there?”

 (Ghost knows. He’d spent an exacting five minutes picking all of the colour combinations that Soap had mentioned he liked out of the twisted clinging mess of the others.)

 “But, yeah. It’s König watching isn’t it?”

 Ghost doesn’t answer.

 König doesn’t look away. 

 “He’s cute,” Soap says finally, his words slightly muffled as he chews on a gummy worm. “I think I’d like to see him cry.”

 “I can arrange that,” Ghost answers, immediate, focused. He can feel the dog whistle click in every fibre of his being, locked and loaded and waiting to be pointed at his target. All for Soap. Only for Soap. He won’t think too much about that until later.

 “Nah.” Soap tips his head to one side to press a sweet in every sense kiss to the edge of Ghost’s mask, high enough that he can feel the curve of his grin above the fabric. “Might take you up on it later though. Have you got work to get back to soon?”

 Ghost taps Soap’s hip in warning before he barks, “König!” There’s a shockwave of heads turning, first one way and then the other before they course correct back to minding their fucking business unless they fall under Ghost’s attention next.

 König straightens, slumps, then settles into a halfway measure between the two, his hands pressing into the small of his back. “Ja, sir?”

 Soap is so close to him that Ghost feels his chuckle rather than hears it, the tremble of his ribs that are likely still a mottled patchwork of purple and blue from his last half-thought through scheme, the slight exhalation that quickly resolves itself into a show at straightfaced placidity. It doesn’t work, never has, and Price has seemingly just resolved to ignore it at their briefings. 

 “Seen something interesting there?”

 If König was a few steps closer, Ghost fancies he’d be able to feel the heat rolling off his skin even at this distance. He’s carefully still, barely breathing if the sudden stillness of his mask is anything to judge. His gaze hasn’t wavered from Soap. “Ja, sir.”

Once the mission is completed—all six missiles recovered safely, the big bad gunned down in Istanbul after going on the lam—and he’s shaken hands with just about every bureaucratic officer in the chain of command, Ghost is required to take two weeks leave before his next assignment in Azerbaijan.

Home for Christmas. Hurray.

As a rule, Ghost spends his leaves resting and healing. When he settles into bed on his first night back in his Chiswick flat, he sleeps for fourteen dreamless hours. Once he manages to drag himself into the loo for a piss and a shower, he catches sight of himself in the mirror. He’s wearing civvies, pajamas at that, maskless, not a piece of tactical equipment in sight. He grips the bathroom counter and leans forward to get a closer look at his face, seeks to recognize the person staring back at him. He catalogs what he sees. Tries to fit the puzzle pieces together. 

From his right cheekbone to the corner of his mouth is a silvery white scar, keloided and gnarled. Got that one in Somalia over a decade ago, from a girl who couldn’t have been more than fourteen. She had come at him after he’d forced his way into the target’s home, a man who was wanted for a slew of things but chief among them in Ghost’s mind was the child trafficking. She hadn’t even hesitated to throw herself at him with her arm raised above her head, the blade already arcing down to cut open his face. Ghost had only realized after he’d killed her, firing the gun in reflex, blinded by his own blood and driven by his body’s stress response, that she was likely one of the victims. He had neglected to treat the wound, instead letting it become infected so the scar would never fade. He’d ended up in the hospital for sepsis two weeks later. He was pulled from active duty for two months after that. 

A scar on his neck, red and thin, an attempt to slit his own throat at twenty-eight, just returned from the dead after a seven month stint as a POW in Afghanistan and pissed to the point of alcohol poisoning;

a smattering of small, thin scars above his left temple, shrapnel he’d caught after a helo had gone down with him in it, the pilot’s lifeless eyes staring at him where he laid twenty feet away from the carnage, having been ejected from the cockpit by the force of the impact;

a cigarette burn on his left brow, a gift from his father when he was only nine years old. His eyebrow had never grown back the same, the line of it permanently broken by a slash of purplish skin. 

The list goes on.

Ghost struggles to reconcile the man he sees before him with the black-eyed phantom he sees from under the mask. It’s like uncanny valley, there’s enough there that he registers his own face, he just can’t tell if it’s real, doesn’t know who he is right now. Simon, he supposes. In all his naked, scarred glory. A creature of flesh, exposed and fallible.

Simon sighs, roughs his palm over his stubble, grown out enough now that it’s nearly a beard. He goes for the shaving kit in the vanity and then changes his mind, decides to let it grow out. 

-

Bam is Simon’s seventy-seven year old neighbor. Born and bred in Chiswick, she mother hens the hell out of him during the few times a year he’s actually home. She’d even talked him into taking up yoga and meditation “for your mental health, Simon, don’t be dense.” Had strong-armed him into attending a class with her, where other blue haireds had cooed and fawned over his first attempt at downward dog. It’s a practice he’d taken to rather quickly, reserving thirty minutes of his mornings for sun salutations, circumstances permitting. 

She doesn’t have any family, like Simon, and he often finds himself accompanying Bam on her shopping trips, chuffed when she insists on buying him a chocolate at the register like how he'd imagine his Nan might've if she hadn't passed when he was a baby. He helps her get her cat to the vet one time, the wretched thing hacking and howling, clawing the ever-loving shite out of Simon’s arm. He doesn’t tell her he’s allergic, but she brings him benadryl and a cuppa while he’s sitting on her sofa once the cat had been determined to be healthy and whole, just royally pissed that his owner had changed cat food brands. 

She takes him to see Rage Against the Machine at Finsbury Park for his birthday after Somalia. He wines and dines her to show his appreciation the next time he’s on leave, kisses her cheek after he drops her off at her flat. She always pats his face and says he’s a good boy, that anybody would be so lucky to have him. It’s the healthiest not-relationship he’s ever been in.

It’s Christmas Eve morning. He’s in St. James’s, shopping for a Christmas gift for Bam at her favorite jeweler. The shop is quaint and bright, playing Frank Sinatra’s Christmas album softly. He’s debating which style of chain to get for Bam’s necklace when he hears the bells on the front door jingle and someone behind him says “Ghost?”

He almost gives himself whiplash turning to face the source of the voice. Ghost recognizes those burning blue eyes. It's König.

Simon realizes his mistake instantly, the sleeves of his heather-gray thermal sweater pushed up so that the tattoos on his left arm are clearly visible. He’s usually so careful, covering his tattoos when he’s in London, the obverse to wearing a mask while deployed. König flushes, clearly embarrassed at having guessed right, probably wishing he hadn’t said anything at all.

“Not on leave,” Simon says. “Here I’m just Simon.”

“I will not be calling you that,” König says. He is blond, Ghost realizes with a twinge, a creamy ash unlike Simon’s dishwater. But blond nonetheless, and well groomed, dressed in civvies, a black peacoat overtop a pale blue button up and grey fitted slacks. He’s almost too pretty, face unmarred and symmetrical. His eyes are deepset and penetrating, even more startling blue like frost without the veil.

“Have it your way.”

“I didn’t come here looking for you,” König hurries, putting his hands up in defense. “I promise, I wasn’t following you.”

“Never said you were.”

“I’m visiting my sister in South Kensington for Hanukkah.”

“Happy Hanukkah,” Simon says.

“Merry Christmas,” König responds.

The bells jingle again and a young woman, similar in likeness to König but much shorter, enters the jewelry shop, a small dark haired child clutching her hand trailing behind her. König’s sister, Simon guesses.

“Klaus, wir werden zu spät kommen — oh, hello,” the woman says. 

“Petra, this is—” König starts, stops, brushes a hand through his hair. “Simon.” 

“Are you sure about that?” Petra asks, teasing, brow arching. Her accent is a bit posh but undeniably Austrian, like her brother’s. 

“Well—” König starts.

“A pleasure,” Simon interrupts, and shakes Petra’s hand. The child, still a toddler Simon realizes, stares up at him from behind Petra’s leg. “Hullo,” Simon tries, and the child tucks his face further out of view.

“Joachim, say hi,” Petra encourages. Joachim shakes his head against her leg. “Sorry, he’s a bit nervous around strangers.”

“My ugly mug doesn’t help, I’m sure,” Simon says, going for playful.

“Oh, not at all. That is, not that I–I mean, you’re very tall,” Petra stutters. “The scars are kind of working for you.”

“Please make this stop,” König whispers from behind the hand he’s slapped against his forehead. 

“We’ve got to go anyway,” Petra says. “We’re meeting mum for lunch at Fallow.”

“Oi, ‘aven’t they got one of those stars?” Simon asks

“A Michelin star? Yes, that’s right—” Petra responds, smiling. 

“Ja, ja, Petra is a successful barrister, a real wunderkind, she takes mum out to extravagant, Michelin-starred restaurants and puts me to shame,” König intones and waves his hand. Simon laughs. König stares like he's grown a second head.

“Right,” Petra says, looking between the two. “Anyway, it was lovely to meet you Simon. Klaus, wir sind spät. Let’s go, ja?” She hooks her arm in König’s and begins walking the three of them towards the door, Joachim still clinging to her other side. 

“Likewise,” Simon says. “Happy holidays.” 

“See you,” König says, hesitating in the doorway. He seems to want to say more but Petra’s not having it as she drags him out.

“Scheiße, Klaus. Just ask for his number next time,” he hears Petra say as the door closes.

-

Simon picks out a delicate silver chain with a dove shaped pendant surrounded by quarter karat diamonds. He's allowed to spoil Bam, has so much money in his savings account it’s a little sickening. He’s not one to splurge, especially on himself, but once he sees the dove he knows it’s the perfect choice for her, his saving grace.

As he’s rounding the corner for the tube station, he sees König leaned against a building across the street. When he spots Simon, he jogs over, nearly getting himself rundown by a black cab who honks at his wave of apology.

“How have you survived this long?” Simon asks.

“He knows jokes!” König says. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be at lunch?”

“I told Petra I left my wallet at one of the shops.”

“And did she say it doesn’t matter because you’re not paying for lunch either way?”

“Ha! Johnny said you were funny, I just didn’t believe him.”

And there it is, this unspoken thing between them. Simon recalls the way König’s back had flexed under the red light, how he had lifted Soap with ease, graceful line of his body coiled with power but not violent, almost tender in spite of how hard he had been fucking Soap. 

“Look, I didn’t know you two were—”

“It really isn't like that,” König interrupts. “Well, it is. But, it’s just not realistic for men like us is it? Doing what we do, the risks we take. ” Any promise they’ve ever made outside of their professional careers—to lovers, friends, family even—inevitably broken, disappointment festering into resentment. 

“S’pose not,” Simon says.

“I think he misses you, though he won’t admit it.”

“Could you. Well, would you give me his number?”

“Of course! Here take mine too while we’re at it” König responds and pulls out his phone. “What’s your number?” Simon gives it to him.

“Thanks,” Simon says when his phone lights up in his palm with the notification.

“What will you say?” König asks.

“You’ll just have to wait to find, won’t you,” Simon says. König flinches. He doesn’t mean it to be cruel, and isn't particularly bothered that Soap has shared the details of their escapades with König. He has every right to talk about it with whomever he pleases, trusts Soap wouldn't forgo professional decorum outside of this thing he has going with both Ghost and König. 

“I didn’t mean it like that—” he starts.

“Nee, nee, warte," König interrupts, holding up a hand. "Johnny likes you. He really, really likes you. And I could too, for him, I think.” König flushes, and Simon’s eyes watch it spread down his neck to the v of his shirt. Snaps his eyes back up to König's face, his pink lips. Then he turns on his heel and leaves, Simon staring after him. 

-

It’s a rare thing that he’s home for Christmas, so Bam had insisted on doing it up right. Had him carry a tree up three flights of stairs and forced him into a Santa hat while they decorated with popcorn garlands and dusty ornaments Bam had pulled from the depths of her hall closet. 

Christmas day, he helps Bam prepare dinner. Honeyed ham, roasted potatoes, rosemary brussel sprouts, yorkshire pudding, and Christmas trifle for dessert. They feast and get pissed on Kentucky bourbon, swapping stories and hurling jabs, bantering. Simon hadn't realized how much he missed Soap until now, sharing Bam's easy company and wishing Soap was there with him. They sway to Rod Stewart’s Merry Christmas, Baby and chain smoke an entire pack of Davidoffs. It’s midnight by the time Bam’s falling asleep at the table, cigarette dangling from between her fingers. Simon stubs it out in the ashtray and carries her to bed, tucks her in with a kiss on the forehead.

“Such a good boy, Simon,” Bam mutters, half-awake. “All alone in this world. Simon, when you find someone, don’t let them go.” She then turns over, pulling the sheets around her, and begins to snore. Simon backs out of the room and closes the door softly.

He sits in the armchair by the fire, basks in the warmth of it, dazed and well-fed. He considers what Bam said and isn’t surprised to find Soap waiting on the other side of that door once he’s dared to open it. König's words ring in his ears. “I could too, for him.”

Could he…? For Johnny? 

He would give Johnny the world on fire, he thinks, if he asked for it, but maybe he’s just drunk.

His blood pulses in his ears as he considers it. What it might be like to fuck Soap with another man’s dick shoved deep down Soap’s throat, in Soap’s ass rubbing against his. The bourbon sings in his blood: yes, you could. yes, you could.

Before he’s even decided, he’s got his pants unbuttoned and pushed down his hips. He palms his cock, rubs over the sensitive head, gets himself to half mast and grips the outline of it through his briefs. Snaps a picture. Send it to Soap with the caption ‘ You were right. ’ Then he adds ‘ Merry Christmas ’ and turns his phone off. He does up his pants and finds a throw blanket and settles on the sofa. The room spins. He closes his eyes.

*******

“You’re not joining me?”

He could say no. Just next to them, the table is a huddle of drinks, most still full as König had swapped his full glass for an empty one whenever Soap’s attention turned away from him. It had felt easier than to try to explain the nerves that twist through his stomach and the wire that curls around his tongue and renders him shaking and speechless and disgusted with himself. His tolerance is still high, higher than it should be after chasing confidence hidden at the bottom of a bottle for most of his teenage years and he could have kept pace with Soap. Somehow, that feels even worse.

“I will. I am.”

König’s hand doesn’t shake as he untucks his mask from his shirt, but he almost wishes it would. The bar Soap had chosen, had directed König to like he was laying out a battle plan, is still on base so his mask only attracts the usual curious glances that drift away soon enough. The air is cool, a little sticky to match the floor, and he focuses on the scent of Soap’s cologne, undercutting the normally neutral body wash and shampoo he uses. It smells nice, smoky in a way that suits Soap in the same way explosions suit him, a bright flash to distract from the slow sinking slide of the building beneath their feet.

König takes the shot.

“It’s good.”

“See?” 

Soap leans closer, the stool creaking and shifting as he braces his boots against a frame that he’s already had to kick back into place once. König is used to this, the deliberate knock of a hand against his shoulder, an elbow against his hip, an invitation he has not yet dared to answer. Steadying is one thing, sharing a seat during a mission is another (and he has barely recovered from that, the easy heft of Soap’s thigh against his own as the other man braced himself to wriggle further up the seat, utterly and completely comfortable in his slightly-under-half of the narrow plastic chair), and this entire situation is something else entirely.

“D’you want another for the road or are you good?” 

It’s a torment crafted especially for König, some exquisitely handcrafted punishment for one spiteful deity or another. He shakes his head as he tugs his mask down, breathing in the stale scent of his own worry that has steeped into the fabric. It isn’t as sour as he remembers it to be, small fragments of stability beginning to creep through. 

“Aye, I’ll follow suit. Be a good boy and– and all tha’.” 

(König doesn’t think about it. It’s the start of a road he has already stepped onto before and it ends at Ghost’s door, just as imposing as the man behind it, and yet König is entranced like a moth to a flame, uncaring of whatever charred and desiccated husk he’ll be left with at the end. Some part of him knows that rejection wouldn’t be the end of everything, it would just feel like it, but the not-knowing is familiar enough that König can’t step out of it. Not yet.)

“You’re just down the corridor from me, yeah?” Soap stands before König can answer with the same easy roll of confidence that he throws himself from a building, all in the shoulders and the too-wide grin he flashes. “I’ll walk you home.”

König doesn’t say it’d be him walking Soap home as he moves next to the other, every step measured and quiet. The argument wouldn’t be one he’d win even as he carefully starts to herd Soap towards the door, blocking the instinctive turn towards the bar and then again, when they pass another door marked ‘Staff Only’. He expects the arm Soap slings around his shoulders at the first breath of cold and rainy air, König’s lungs feeling damp enough to grow mushrooms in despite the relatively short distance between the base and his homeland, but the tremor that runs through him is a surprise. He catches it, still struggling, somewhere in the middle of his spine and masks it as nothing more than being careful of the seams of his jacket as he tugs on the cuffs. 

“You’re a sweet lad, König,” Soap mumbles. He’s too close once more, a jumble of whiskey-soaked limbs, the honey shade bleeding into the dark brown of his eyes as they pass beneath a streetlight. 

König doesn’t answer. He doesn’t know how.

(He’ll think about it later, later in the quiet of his room, later in the hush of blankets pulled over his head and his mask peeled off to feel the warmth of his breath condense against his skin.)

The walk itself isn’t long, the gravel crunching beneath their boots as they walk in uneven stumbling unison towards the long huddled row of barracks. It’s an ending, of a sort and König’s stomach twists as his nerves set their traps and ready themselves. His palms grow cold, a sweat breaking out beneath his mask as his breath only grows shallower, the whistle of an incoming bomb growing louder in his ears. The room Soap stops in front of isn’t, officially, his. On paper, the only occupant of the room is OCCUPIED, See Cpt. John Price, and König had heard the housing department complain more than once at the paperwork needed to shuffle that around whenever it came time for renewals. Off of paper, the room is Ghost’s. And what is Ghost’s is also Soap’s. 

“This is me,” Soap says, hiccups, setting himself to swaying so haphazardly that König grabs at his elbows to keep him upright, crouching slightly due to Soap’s arm still slung across his shoulder. He’ll feel that touch for days. 

Soap grins up at him, only needing to rise slightly onto his toes to be level with König’s gaze. “Thanks.”

König breathes out slowly, the final release of breath as he looks down a scope and picks out his target from the teeming mass. But there is no target, no objective, just a grin as bright as the sun and the gentle pressure of a kiss pressed to his cheek. 

Soap steps away from him towards the now-open door and König looks up at Ghost. 

Ghost isn’t looking at him, the dark shimmer of his eyes turned definitively towards Soap. He’s at ease here, the edges of him tending towards blurred comfort with his top riding up over one hip. There’s a bruise there, the deep purple beginning to bleed into a sickening mottled green, and König’s hip twinges in silent furious sympathy. Cuts heal, broken bones mend, bruises linger.

“He behave himself?” 

König straightens, feels his spine click into place before he stops himself, settling into his habitual curve. Is it a joke? He chances a second glance at Ghost, tracking the hidden upward slant of his mouth, the spark in his eyes. His current mask is a thin cotton and it hides far less than his tactical mask. 

“Mostly.”

“Hear that, Johnny,” Ghost mumbles, turning his face to the upturned riot of Soap’s hair. He drags his chin over the freshly shaved section and his mask rasps against it in the facsimile of a kiss. “Mostly well-behaved, atta lad.”

Soap mumbles something König can’t make out, slumped against Ghost’s shoulder. His grin is easy enough to see, however, the same lopsided one König had been blessed with throughout their time together.

“You’re in better shape than most.” It’s a gentle sort of noticing, a gleam of approval colouring Ghost’s voice in a way that reminds König of a hand pressed against his forehead, a balm against whatever torments him. “Manage okay?”

König straightens, settles, and feels his face flush beneath his mask. He doesn’t know how far the colour carries over his face, but he manages to nod, a little shakily. “It was nice. I liked spending the evening with him.”

He doesn’t say ‘I would have liked to spend the evening with you both,’ but it is a neat enough miss that he begins his retreat. 

“Goodnight, sir.”

“Night, König.”

König doesn’t look back as he makes his way down the corridor towards his own door, even as the skin on his back of his neck prickles beneath the weight of Ghost’s unseen gaze. His hands still hold the warmth of Soap pressed against him and he curls his fingers into it as he hears the door creak and the sound of stumbling footsteps. He doesn’t hear the door click shut; instead he hears a gentle thump like something heavy being dropped a short distance onto a mattress, and then the quiet creak of the door being pushed open again. 

used this tumblr ask as an excuse for a fluffy mini-comic