#speeding bulle

Seven days earlier…

Mick watched the sun rise from the steps of yet another porch and hoped this wasn’t going to become a habit. At least this time he had managed to catch a few hours of sleep, even if it was while sprawled haphazardly over the veranda's unforgiving wooden steps. Mick yawned and stretched, diligently ignoring the pain that sparked at various points along his poor mistreated spine.

It was beautiful here. Mick had almost forgotten how the morning sunlight flared bronze over yellow ochre and red stone. He listened to the sound of magpies warbling in the paperbark trees and watched a line of shadow as it retreated across the yard. Eventually, it surrendered completely to the coming day, and the only shadows left were behind him. Mick turned.

The house on Adelaide Street had a wide veranda, tin roof hung low to keep the sun out. When Mick was young it was a sanctuary; He’d spent countless spent hours there, waiting out the hottest part of the day while learning new knitting patterns with his mum. Now it stood empty and dark, the shade once so comfortable turned entirely to gloom.

The front door creaked back and forth in the morning breeze. Chips of wood and mangled lock still littered the floor from when they’d kicked it in. Mick hadn’t thought there was much point in repairing it. If he was honest, he’d been resigned to let the house fall to ruin. Half of his home was dead and gone, anyway, it had seemed only right he should leave the house to rot with them.

Bracken crackled underfoot as Mick stepped on to the veranda proper. It was the furthest he’d gone since he left to find his birth parents. Further than he’d ever intended to venture again.

Mick trudged onwards. His feet followed steadily a path, even as everything in him reeled backwards. Mick felt taut as a rubber band, shaking with energy. His bones yearned to release the tension, to snap away, to launch himself as far from here as possible.

And still Mick strode forward, through that door and into the stale air of a house that had once smelled like home. It looked less decrepit than he imagined it. In his dreams, Mick saw it crumbling to pieces, furniture decomposing like bodies on blood-slicked floors.

But the house looked almost normal. Sure, dust coated everything in a downy coat, and the curtains had been eaten away at the bottom. Dust and debris obscured large swathes of the hardwood floors, and the kitchen stunk to high hell, but the bones were there, strong as ever. The house was unbowed.

Mick was furious.

How dare this house live on. Didn’t it know its occupants were dead? It shouldn’t have been habitable. It should’ve been falling apart at the seams. Mick should have found it rotting, and then it would have been so easy to rot too, to lay down on a bed of wilting domesticity and decompose alongside it.

But the house on Adelaide Street hadn’t obliged.

The sound of the television meeting the ground wasn’t nearly loud enough. Nor was the thud of a bookshelf crashing home, or the clatter of pictures struck off of the wall. The crystal vase on the sideboard, the family china in the hutch, even the kitchen window – none of it was enough. Nothing abated the fire behind his eyes, or the way his breath hitched and hands quaked. Mick screamed, and it cracked in half.

Then the world reduced to nothing.

Two days, Mick spent in a haze.  He operated on pure instinct, mind blank and body stiff. Time lost all meaning. He salvaged canned spaghetti and baked beans from the cupboard when he was hungry and slept where and when the urge arose. The steady rise and fall of the Aussie sun might as well have been in code for all the sense it made to him.

When he came back to himself, Mick was tucked into an armchair in the living room clutching an old throw blanket to his chin. It had been his father’s chair for as long as Mick could remember, and no-one else was allowed to sit on save for very in special circumstances; he’d only ever been allowed on his birthday, and when the world became too much.

Mick didn’t remember sitting on that chair, nor did he remember draping that blanket over himself, though he knew – rationally – that he must have. But as he sat there watching the sunlight paint dust floating in the air, he swore he could feel his parents perched on each sofa arm the way they had done when he was little and afraid, and they wanted him to know he wasn’t alone. And if he closed his eyes, Mick could almost imagine it was his father who’d sat him on his prized throne, and his mother who’d drawn the old blanket to his chin once again.

Mick wept. For the first time since his parents died, he let his sorrow loose.

In the end, when the quaking subsided and the great pool of sorrow in his chest was finally siphoned away, he found that the pieces of his heart finally fallen back into place.

And there was Jeremy, scrawled on every waterlogged inch of his heart as if Medic had torn it out of his chest and let the bugger scrawl all over it.

Jer and his wicked grin and summer-sky eyes. Jer, for whom everything was a race, but who always slowed down just for Mick.

Jer and the little promise growing inside him that Mick had left him to raise alone.

Jeremy woke with one singular conviction: Mick was wrong. He was lying, or he was mistaken, or there was some strange reason why Mick would say those words to Jeremy. It couldn’t be because they were true. That was ridiculous.

Mick had to love him. They’d been through too much together. He knew Mick too well. Jeremy couldn’t be wrong. Mick loved him. He did.

So when he looked outside to see empty desert where Mick’s van had been, he didn’t panic. Nor did he, when none of his teammates seemed to know where the marksman had gone. Even when he learned that Mick had taken a week of leave without telling him, Jeremy had successfully managed to stay not-panicking.

Jeremy could wait a week. He just had to wait seven days, and then Mick would be back to apologise. Maybe he’d come back with a ring or something. Maybe he was at Jeremy’s Ma’s house right now asking for her blessing.

Yeah, that sounded right. Mick was all polite and old-fashioned and stuff. That was totally something he would do. Jeremy didn’t want to ruin the surprise. He could be patient. He would be patient.

And Jeremy tried.

To their credit, his teammates did their best to help. It seemed they had all decided the optimal strategy was to distract Jeremy from his thoughts, and so they’d each found ways to keep him occupied outside of battle. Jeremy had lost count of the number of tea parties Pyro had thrown for him, or jobs Engie had really needed his help with that required suspiciously little effort but suspiciously long periods of time. He’d played round after round of cards with Demo and Solly and spent enough time helping with Medic’s doves that he could identify them all by name. Heavy had even taught him his coveted sandwich recipe, something that Jeremy had been asking about for years. The secret, it turned out, was that the sandwich contained no ham at all; instead, the meat was something Heavy called “Doctor’s Sausage”, specially imported from Russia.

That was the only thing that had managed to make Jeremy laugh all week.

Days seven and eight came and went, however, with no sign of Mick. Jeremy decided that he was just running late. Maybe his flight was delayed, or his van broke down. Those kinds of things happened every day. Mick would be back tomorrow; Jeremy was sure of it.

Day nine was agony. There was no battle scheduled, and the long hours wore on Jeremy’s nerves. By nine o’clock his brain was full to bursting, riddled with thoughts too sharp and quick to comprehend. It was a mercy, perhaps, that the hurricane in his head kept them from sinking in, but it was exhausting. And it was loud. So loud it hurt.

Jeremy sought out the one person who might be noisy enough to drown it out.

Soldier wasn’t being particularly loud when he found him, much to Jeremy’s dismay. The man was settled on the couch in the rec room, carefully stitching a white star the size of a baseball onto a mass of blue fabric and humming that jaunty little song they play at graduations. Solly quickly put him to work cutting stars out of white canvas and – much to Jeremy’s relief – launched into a very long and very loud lecture about some military guy from ancient Greece who had the bright idea to actually run at the enemy.

Jeremy definitely made more than fifty stars, but Solly never told him to stop. The two were silent for some time, focused as they were on their respective tasks. It was strangely calming, folding the little circles of fabric just right so he could make a star shape with only one cut.

After a while though, Jeremy’s thoughts wandered back to Mick. The quiet reminded him of lazy afternoons spent together in the camper, no sound between them but the quiet click clack of Mick’s knitting needles and the scraping of Jeremy’s pencils on paper. He’d look over from time to time and see Mick staring off into nothing, brows drawn together like storm clouds. Jeremy had long wondered what Mick was thinking about when he zoned out like that, but he was always too chicken to ask.

He tried not to think about how he might never get to.

“Where are ya, Mick?” Jeremy sighed to himself.

 “YOU SHOULD ASK SPY.”

“Wha-?” Jeremy dropped the scissors; He had almost forgotten Solly was there. “Why?”

“HE’S A SPY, THAT MAGGOT KNOWS EVERYTHING!” Soldier broke his thread with his teeth before continuing. “ALSO, I SAW HIM TALKING TO SNIPER BEFORE HE LEFT.”

“What the fuck, Solly? Why are ya only now bringin’ this up? Wait-” Jeremy shot to his feet. “Before? Like right frickin’ before?”

“AFFIRMATIVE. AT APPROXIMATELY 0600 HOURS I SAW SNIPER TALKING WITH SPY ON THE PORCH BEHIND THE BASE. AFTERWARDS, HE ENTERED HIS VEHICLE AND DROVE AWAY. UNAUTHORISED. IT WAS A DISGRACE! HE IS A DESERTER AND IF HE RETURNS, HE WILL BE SHOT! NO! A BULLET IS TOO GOOD FOR-”

Jeremy didn’t stay to hear the rest of Soldier’s rant.

“Spy!” Jeremy beat against the door with the side of his fist. “Open up! I know you’re in there!”

 “Go away, Jérémy.”

“No! Not until ya tell me what ya said to Mick! I know ya spoke to him last week. What the fuck did ya say?”

A moment passed and Jeremy swung his fist forward again. It connected with nothing.

Spy regarded him from the doorway with one eyebrow raised. He was dressed impeccably as always, but Jeremy thought he gave off an impression of dishevelment somehow. Maybe it was in the skin around his eyes more than in the drape of his suit. Maybe he was just getting old.

“Mon fils,” Spy said, as he often did. Jeremy had long ago decided it was an insult.

The runner shoved his way into Spy’s smoking room. He could count on one hand the number of times he’d been there, but it had certainly made an impression. Jeremy hated every square inch of it, gaudy and haunted-house-ish as it was. He hadn’t grown up poor exactly, but there were enough lean months littered throughout his childhood that this kind of brash display of wealth always pissed him off. That spark of anger only stoked the bonfire in his chest. Pyro would be so proud. “Did ya tell ‘im to leave? God, did you frickin’ pay him or somethin’?” Jeremy snatched the lapels of that precious ten-thousand-dollar suit. “Did ya hurt him? I swear to God I will fuckin’ end ya if you did.”

Jeremy was sick of surprises.  It felt like it’d been one earth-shattering revelation after another lately, and he was frickin’ over it. So of course, Spy had one more for him. It wasn’t even anything he said or did that knocked Jeremy off kilter: It was the pity in his eyes.

“He is unharmed.” The Frenchman spoke in a monotone, words slow and controlled. “But I owe you an apology nonetheless.” Spy took four precise steps toward his chair and sat in it. One gloved hand twitched toward the side table where his cigarettes lay, but he did not reach for them.

Jeremy did not move, but his eyes tracked Spy’s path across the room. All that fire had turned to brittle glass.

“I did speak to your copain,” Spy practically hissed that last word, but the spite seemed to leave him as quickly as it had arrived. “I had overheard part of your argument and thought to intervene. I did not realise you hadn’t told him about your… situation, and for that I am truly sorry.”

Bile rose in Jeremy’s throat. “Ya told him? Ya knew somehow and you fuckin’… How did ya know? Oh god you told him. He knows. He knows and he left.” He shook his head wildly, as if to loosen the tangle of thoughts there. Jeremy’s gaze caught again on the Frenchman, held upright and still in his velvet armchair. “He’s not coming back, is he?”

Spy just looked at him with those pitying eyes.

‘I’m gonna be sick, I-” Whatever Jeremy was about to say was lost in a tide of stench and vomit. He dropped to his knees heaving bile and tears and wheezing gasps into Spy’s fancy silk rug. Rage and shame and despair played tag in the cockles of his heart.

Eventually the flood petered out and Jeremy became aware of a hand rubbing circles into his back. Another began to tug him gently upright by the shoulder. It was unbearable; Jeremy swiped at it blindly. “Don’t fuckin’ touch me!”

He lurched haphazardly toward the door and wrenched it open, only to find the hall beyond crowded with six concerned mercenaries. Jeremy steadfastly avoided their eyes, even as he felt the weight of their gaze on him. Mercifully, no-one spoke.

Jeremy staggered forward, and the crowd parted. Hands reached out as if to touch him but stayed suspended in mid-air. He heard an intake of breath from someone, as if they were preparing to say something, and Jeremy felt every muscle in his body pull taut. His brain filled in the empty space.

Left all alone again. Poor unlovable little Jeremy. He can’t even get anyone to stand him, let alone love him.

He took three steps backwards, head shaking again from side to side.

Look at that pathetic little whore, all knocked up and getting fatter by the day. Won’t be able to run for much longer, and then what’ll he be good for? Nothing!

Jeremy was weeping again, great gasping sobs that shook his entire body.

He was really starting to think he could be a parent too. What kid would want him as a father? It’d beg for him to leave.

His teammates’ gaze felt like molten lead. Jeremy was embarrassed to be seen like this, fresh from the mess he’d made on Spy’s floor.

He was embarrassed to be so exposed, to have so clearly displayed the weakness he’d been hiding away for so long.

Hell, he was embarrassed to be seen at all.

So Jeremy did the one thing he did best: he ran.

When the sound of distant gunfire told him that the team was in a battle, Mick wasn’t perturbed. Their contracts meant that any weekday and up to four weekend days per calendar year were fair game for a fight to be scheduled, so Mick had been aware he might return in the middle of one. He’d factored that possibility into his plans.

Mick stepped out of the cab of his campervan and set off for Resupply. He’d simply wait outside Respawn until Jeremy came through, or until the game was over, whichever came first. Mick was a patient man - it was part of what made him a good sniper - and besides, God knew he probably needed the time to practice what he was going to say.

What he found at Respawn, Mick could never have prepared for.

“A man’s life is at stake goddamn it! We need a ceasefire! Now!” Engie was elbow-deep in the guts of the respawn machine, shouting into a radio handset pressed between his ear and shoulder. “Don’t you put me on hold, son. No listen here, you-” Engie suddenly snatched the radio out of the crook of his neck and hurled it into the floor. “Son of a bitch!”

The handset clattered across the ground until it knocked against the toe of Mick’s boot. The abrupt stop must have caught the Texan’s attention because he looked up.

Engineer didn’t bother with pleasantries when he saw Mick, he just explained that something was wrong. That someone had tampered with Respawn, damaged a save and triggered a security lockdown. That Jeremy couldn’t respawn.

The knowledge made Mick’s bones lock tight, sent his stomach roiling.

Jeremy was in danger.

Jeremy might die.

Mick’s heart beat a frantic tattoo, his brain in chorus: Not again. Not again. Not again. The truce Mick had made with his brain while he was gone was suddenly nothing but rubble and ash. His van was parked right outside the front entrance; the keys burnt a hole in his pocket. It would be so simple to just leave again, to get in his van and drive until the base faded into hazy distance. Until New Mexico was just a shape on a map that might have meant something to him once.

And if Jeremy died out there, Mick wouldn’t have to know.

His hand slipped into his pocket. Mick’s fingers grazed his keys, but he also felt something else. Something smooth and cubic, and so, so special.

And then he was tearing open his locker and grabbing his rifle.

Mick’s lungs burned from more than just the exertion and he thanked God the old mate had seen fit to give him long legs. He loped along, stopping only long enough to quick scope anyone who threatened to halt his advance. A glimmer of blue here, the quiet sound of a minigun revving there. Mick reacted on instinct, relying thoughtlessly on skills honed by long hours of practice. It was easy this way, lost in the physicality of it all, not to think about the terror. It was there, though, thrumming quietly underneath, waiting to overwhelm him if only he paid it too much mind.

A shadow flitted across his vision, and Mick looked to his left, ready to fire.

“Sniper! Vhat are you doing here?” It was Medic. Behind him stood Heavy.

“Where’s Jeremy?” Mick barked.

“He vent ahead, like alvays! Wass ist-”

“Respawn! Its broken. His... his file is corrupted. Engie said...” Mick couldn’t finish. He swallowed pathetically against the bile rising in his throat, hoping that Medic would see the terror in his eyes and understand.

Medic’s shock turned sour.  “Mein gott, he…”

For a moment despair clouded them both. It was paralysing, killing all sound and movement but the desperate gasps still erupting from deep in Mick’s chest.

It was Heavy who broke the spell. His large hand landed on Mick’s shoulder. “We will find him,” he said simply before turning to Medic. “Come, Doktor.”

Heavy started off first, but Mick quickly overtook him as they charged down the long corridor, looking for any sign of the runner. Mick barely registered their presence behind him, intent as he was on finding Jeremy. Their low voices barely filtered through his ears as they spoke through their comms. Somewhere along the way Soldier and Demo filed in behind them. Then Engineer. Mick didn’t ask about respawn, the simple shake of the Texan’s head was enough to tell him what he needed to know

They reached the end of the hallway and someone’s hand on his shoulder pushed Mick to the right. He bounded down a flight of stairs to the sound of venting flames, praying whatever pyro he was running towards was on his team.

Red. Thank fuck.

Pyro gestured wildly when they saw him, whatever they were saying made more unintelligible than usual by the panic in their tone. Mick got the message, though: Go left.

Gunfire erupted from behind him as he turned, but Mick didn’t stop to look.

Jeremy was crumpled in the corner like a wet rag. He looked terrible, pale and drawn with crimson seeping through various spots onto his uniform. His eyes were glazed, and for one terrible moment Mick thought he was too late.

But then Jeremy blinked and a string of swears fell out of his mouth.

Mick dropped to his knees beside him. “Christ, you scared me, Jer.’

“I scared you?” Jeremy scoffed. “I thought I was frickin’ dead again for a second there.”

Mick didn’t reply, focusing instead on assessing Jeremy’s injuries. He took the runner’s head in shaking hands, tilting it as gently as he could from side to side looking for any sign of trauma. Satisfied, Mick unzipped Jeremy’s jacket and lowered his gaze to his neck and then shoulders. A wound bloomed from the skin of Jeremy’s clavicle like a morbid rosette, so close to the vulnerable flesh of his throat that Mick swallowed a gasp. It was from a shotgun, he would guess from the tiny pellets embedded in Jeremy’s flesh, but it wasn’t deep, and the flow of blood had already slowed to a dribble.

Mick’s eyes skimmed unseeing over Jeremy’s abdomen, opting to inspect the runner’s limbs instead. Jeremy’s arms were untouched, apart from a few small cuts and bruises, but his legs weren’t so lucky. Mick quickly lost count of just how many bullet holes there were, punched into the flesh of Jeremy’s legs. He traced the bloody constellations with wide eyes to where they ended at mid-thigh.

And then finally Mick ran out of places to examine, and he had no choice but to look at it. His gaze crawled upwards at a snail’s pace, slowly revealing Jeremy’s stomach inch by inch.

It was unharmed. They were unharmed.

Mick let out a breath he didn’t realise he’d been holding. His attention caught on the subtle rounding of Jeremy’s belly, just beginning to smooth the fabric of his t-shirt.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”

Mick let out a startled half-laugh; only Jeremy would crack a joke like that at a time like this. He looked up, half-expecting to see the runner’s usual cheesy grin. Instead, he was met with anger.

Mick shouldn’t have expected anything else - didn’t deserve anything else, honestly – but there was something so incongruous about the look on Jeremy’s face. It felt wrong somehow, like scrawling a shopping list on a priceless work of art.

Jeremy’s mouth wasn’t made for that scowl, it was made for teasing and cursing and grinning a mile wide. His button nose was supposed to scrunch in laughter, not disgust. And his eyes…

The fury in Jeremy’s eyes was a molten thing, hot and shifting, but the crease in his brow was all sadness. Mick remembered wanting to smooth it out the last time they spoke; now he coaxed it flat it with shaky thumbs, palms placed gingerly against Jeremy’s temples.

I’m sorry, Mick thought. I’m so bloody sorry. But try as he might, they wouldn’t turn into real words.

And then Jeremy, true to form, spoke first. “Ya came back,” He whispered. The magma in his eyes cooled to glittering blue gemstone.

Mick’s chest ached. “I -”