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beenbaanbuun · 4 months

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soft cuddles with ateez

park seonghwa

he’s sitting on the floor, very intensely reaching the instructions to his new lego set that you bought him

there’s no reaction when you sit next to him to watch as his pretty fingers attach the pieces to one another

it takes about 5 minutes for you to lean your head on his shoulder and snuggle your cheek into his shoulder

he chuckles lightly, but just carries on with his lego, not giving you the attention you so clearly crave

it takes another 5 minutes for you to get bored and try to move away but seonghwa won’t let you

he finally takes his attention away from his lego set when you lift your head and begin to stand up

with a discontented hum, he wraps his arms around you and pulls you straight into his lap

“and where do you think you’re going, hm?” he pressed a kiss to your cheek, “stay with me while i make this, yeah?”

you agree and rest your head on him once more, except this time, comforted by his warm cuddles

kim hongjoong

you get a text from seonghwa at around midnight asking you to go and rescue your boyfriend from the studio

you agree, feelings of excitement and annoyance bubbling up within you simultaneously

excitement because you get to see your boyfriend but annoyance because he was overworking himself… again

it takes 10 minutes to walk to his studio and by the time you get there, you just want some warmth

you walk straight up to his studio, bypassing the receptionist who knows you well at this point, and knock on the door

“the doors open!” he calls out, presumably not wanting to leave his desk for even a second, “oh, hey baby!” he smiles the moment he sees you

you don’t answer him simply ambling over to him and dropping onto his lap

he chuckles and holds you close before going back to his work, idly chit-chatting with you every so often

“your skin is cold, baby. did you walk here?” you nod in response, “you should’ve got a taxi! i’ll finish soon and then we can go home and get warm, okay?”

you fall asleep on his lap before he gets chance to take you home, and the two of you end up sleeping on the sofa in his studio

jeong yunho

he’s been gaming for what seems like hours and you miss him

yes, you might literally be on your bed, 2 metres away from his desk, but you miss him so bad!

and no matter how many times you call him over and beg him to pay attention to you, you just get the same response

“just one more game and then i’m all yours, honey!”

it was either a really long game, or it was all lies…

you eventually get tired of waiting and scramble out of bed on your tired legs

he doesn’t even flinch when you crawl onto his lap and wrap your limbs around him in a koala-esque fashion

in fact, the most reaction you get is a deep chuckle in your ear and a kiss to your cheek before he goes back to his game

it doesn’t take long for him to finish and say goodbye to whoever it was on the other side of his headset

he just wraps his long arms around your waist and the two of you sit in a comfortable silence on his gaming chair for a while…

kang yeosang

you’ve had a bad day at work and all you want to do is get home and sit on the couch with your boyfriend

you have so much to complain about and yeosang is such a good listener and feeling his arms around you as you complain would be the best right now

but you get home and yeosang is nowhere to be seen

in fact, the lights are turned off and the living room is completely silent

you sigh, realising your boyfriend must not be home yet, and kick your shoes off before carrying yourself to your bedroom

except when you get to your bedroom, you can’t help but notice a mop of bleached hair splayed across one of your pillows and a yeosang shaped lump under the quilt

you smile, but you don’t say a word as you crawl into bed beside him

he wakes up just enough to wrap his arms around you and pull you into his chest

he mumbles something that sounds kind of like, “how was your day?” but you can’t tell

“better now i’m with you,” you reply anyway

choi san

you’re only just awake by the time san comes back from the gym

you open your eyes to him in front of the mirror, checking his own progress as the sweat covering his skin glistens in the soft morning light

“pretty,” you mutter as you watch his muscles flex

he jumps in surprise and spins around to face you with a look of shock

“babe, i didn’t even know you were awake,” he smiles and you can’t help but get all giggly as his dimples show, “just give me a minute to shower and then i’ll come give you your morning cuddles, okay?”

normally you’d agree, but for some reason you’re feeling extra clingy

“come cuddle me now, sannie,” you say as you hold your arms out to him

“i’m sweaty, babe,” he chuckles, “i’ll get the sheets dirty

he gives in when you pout and look at him like you’re about to burst into tears if he doesn’t cuddle you

“sheets can be changed,” you say as he lays with half of his body on top of you, “this is more important right now…”

song mingi

it’s your day off and yet you’ve spent all of it bored inside of your apartment waiting for your boyfriend to get home from work

first it was supposed to be 1pm, then you get a text letting you know it’d probably be closer to 2pm, and then 3pm

its 6pm now, and you’re staring at the front door as if that’s going to make your boyfriend walk through it any quicker

as sad as it makes you that he’s not with you, you know it’s hardly his fault that works been busy recently

you finally turn away from the door with a sigh and lie down on the sofa

seconds later, you hear the lock click open and a tired sounding mingi announce himself

“i’m home, sweetheart,” he grunts as he kicks his shoes off and slams the door behind him, “sorry i’m l-”

he gets cut off with a grunt when you leap at him and attach your body to his in a tight hug

your thighs are tightly wrapped around his waist and your arms hold onto his neck for dear life

“hi, baby,” he chuckles into your hair, “missed me, did you?”

jung wooyoung

he’s sick and whilst you’re trying not to get sick yourself, there’s only so much whining you can put up with before it gets insufferable

it starts with him whining about the soup not being warm enough, so you give him a tight lipped grin before replacing it

then suddenly he’s cold and begging for more blankets so of course, you oblige before the sound of his aegyo drives you insane

after you bring back the blankets, he wants tucking in

you give him a look before doing as he asks all while he smirks at you

“somethings still missing, baby,” he pouts and points to his lips, “a kiss?”

“absolutely not,” you shake your head, “i’m not catching the black death just because you’re being whiny!”

“fine, but can you come and check my temperature?”

again, you oblige, but before you can even touch his forehead, he has a hand around your wrist and you’re toppling down onto the bed beside him

his vice-like grip suddenly finds its way around you and you suppose you just have to accept your fate and cuddle him back…

choi jongho

you haven’t felt great for a while but after an argument with a sibling and just an overall bad day, you decide to retreat to your bedroom with your boyfriends hoodie and a pint of icecream

he promised he’s be there once he finished eating with the rest of the guys, but you don’t know if you can wait that long so you send him a text

you don’t want to be a burden and make him think it’s too urgent, but you still want to make sure he knows you’re not feeling great, so it’s just something short and to the point

you don’t expect him too soon, but within 15 minutes you can hear the tell-tale sound of his spare key sliding into your front door

“i’m here, baby,” he calls as he shuts the door, “where are you?”

you don’t need to respond for him to know you’re in bed, and before you can get a word out he’s already poking his head around the door frame

he gives you a sympathetic pout as he sees your red-ringed eyes and quickly sheds himself of his more sophisticated clothing as he can be comfy as he crawls in beside you

his bare arms wrap around your waist and he brings you as close as humanly possible to his chest

“you don’t have to tell me what’s wrong,” he whispers as he pets the back of your head, “but just know that i’m here to listen if you ever want to.”

perhaps tomorrow, you decide as you nuzzle into his neck and let his strong form swaddle you

#ateez reactions #ateez fic #ateez fanfic #ateez fluff #ateez x reader #ateez scenarios #ateez oneshot #atz x reader #atz fanfic #atz scenarios #atz fluff

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sprout-fics · 1 year

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Stitches (Part Two)

(Simon "Ghost" Riley x F!Medic "Fix" Reader)

Part Three of Snowblind

Rating: Mature Wordcount: 7.2k Tags: Slow Burn, Heavy Angst, Trauma, Found Family, Taskforce 141, Team Dynamics, Major Character Injury, Whump, Hurt/Comfort, Unreliable Narrator, Self Esteem Issues, Referenced Familial abuse, Hospitalization, Self Sabotage Warnings: Explicit Injury mention, Forced sedation A/N: I'm in so much pain

Wakefulness comes in small doses, glimpses of another realm you've yet to enter. There's no physical sensation beyond the weight of your body, the effort it takes for your eyes to flutter open only for a mere moment before being forced to close once more. Like dreams, the world slips through your grasp, colors and sounds wavering like dyed mist. You struggle against it, feeling somehow like you're under water, trying desperately to swim to the surface even as you sink further down. Bubbles float up and away, the brilliant shimmering reflection of the waves above a taunt to your fatigue.

There's voices, spoken like they're warbled through water. There's the sound of waves in your ears, distant, churning and rhythmic. They crash against your thoughts, leave you scrubbed raw, bleached by the sun. Every time you try to wake, to stand, the force of the sea breaks over your head, forces you back down.

Between them, you can hear voices speaking, words indiscernible. You can make out the sounds, hear tones dipping soft and low with concern, mumbled conversations you can't make out.

You don't know how long you last like that, because every instance you get close to wakefulness there's pain, deep and unrelenting. Every breath forces a ragged, wet inhale that summons a docile touch, a hushed reassurance, and once more you're lost at sea.

It's unclear what is a dream and what isn't. You think you hear Gaz's voice, talking for some time, and his words are soft, almost sad. There's a distant, forlorn echo of him that curls beside you in the deep, whispers a sempiternal lullaby to you as you float inside the abyss. You think at one point you can make out sentences from one of your novels. You try and reach for Gaz- and find the calloused grip of his palm against yours moments before you're tugged back under into the evanescent depths.

Soap appears, talks with someone quieter, someone that you think you know. He hovers at the edge of your unconsciousness, skims across your thoughts like passing shadows. Yet the touch of him isn't cold. When you hear him stand at your beside, in the absence of others, you feel the presence of him weigh down on you, as if Ghost too, resides within the abyss.

He's gone before you struggle to the surface.

Soap talks to you like he would a conversation partner. His voice is light, cheery, but it contains falsities. You can hear the strain under it, listen to his words as they sometimes waver in his throat. There's a distant drone of a TV flickering with advertisements that pop with cheery tunes and colors as Soap watches. It summons a rare burst of clarity to you, the realization that you're no longer on base with the limited medical staff and rooms absent of much more than a cot and basic medical equipment. They must have taken you to a civilian hospital, but the reason why remains a mystery as once again you succumb to sleep.

You brush against full wakefulness when the lights go dim, and it's Price's voice that manages to bypass the haze of drowsiness. You hear him talking to someone who doesn't seem to be there, tone low, concerned.

"Yeah. Yeah I know...No. Not yet."

"You...just should have seen her, Kate. Scared, terrified, like some injured, sick animal. I...haven't seen anyone with eyes like that since...yes. You know what he was like. Wouldn't let anyone touch him. Can't blame him. Not after that."

"But that was...there's nothing like that on her file. She's never...no."

"Just...Christ, Kate. What happened to her?"

Darkness drowns you once again.

When you do at last wake fully, it's to the steady beep of a heart monitor, the low drone of a TV, and the smell of black tea.

There's something over your face, and when you reach a hand up to touch it you groan at just how heavy you feel, dizzy and weighed down.

"Jumping Jesus!" The person next to you flinches at your noise, clearly unprepared for your wakefulness. There's a moment before the world begins to focus and Kyle's face hovers over you, face in hopeful disbelief.

"Fix!" He breathes, clearly overjoyed, and the reaction seems severe for what you think you're feeling. The pain is muted now, and when you take a deep inhale there's not as much tightness as there was before. Something inside your chest feels different, somehow, clearer.

You try and talk, but your voice is muffled by whatever is strapped to your face, and quickly Kyle vanishes, talks with someone outside the door. There's a flurry of movement, and it only creates a further dizzying world around you, makes you groan as the lights switch on. There's hands, and when you flinch it's Kyle's voice that keeps you steady, holds your hand in both of his.

"Hey, easy. They're just getting you all settled, doll. Focus on me, yeah?"

You try to, even as the nurse tells you to take a deep breath, and then gently unstraps an oxygen mask from your face. She asks a few questions, which you answer with varying degrees of cognizance, until she makes a note and vanishes.

All the while Kyle talks to you in slow, steady murmurs, draws you back to him like an anchor, tethering you from the fear and confusion.

"What happened?" You manage at last when the nurses clear, voice grinding against the back of your throat like gravel. You wince at the horrific scrape there, feeling like someone has forced your mouth far too wide for far too long. The dry walls of your throat, tacky and gypsum, seals itself together like velcro, forcing a sputtering cough that only alerts you to the horrible, bone deep ache in your chest.

"Careful." Kyle warns you once more, as you try and grip a hand to your chest. Your fingers fist into unfamiliar fabric, an IV taped to the back of your wrist. Someone's changed your clothes. You're only in a cotton hospital gown now, and the knowledge of that alone has your heart racing higher in your throat, seeking reason in the midst of confusion and growing panic.

"Where am I?" You try, hating the way your voice wavers with fearful confusion, the warble of your hoarse words.

"St. George's hospital, off base." Gaz tells you gently. He's caught your other hand between his own, smoothes his thumb over the dry back of it in a paltry attempt to distract you. "There weren't medical facilities on base to handle you."

"Handle me?" You ask, and with every word you feel your voice returning. Even so, your senses feel cloudy, cloaked in a fuzzy, uncomfortably haze. The lights are too bright, the TV flickers with advertisements which feel too vibrant for your sleep addled brain. Kyle himself seems to blur strangely as your eyes adjust to your strange new surroundings. You find him in the midst of it- lost, wary, already ready to flee.

Kyle looks distraught then, as he watches the expressions flicker across your face. Then, slowly, he unravels to you the tale of your journey.

"You tore your stitches." He tells you at first, and you fix him with your stare because you know that's not it, nothing as light as that could have landed you in the hospital like this.

"Your...lung got blocked, somehow. Got blood into it. They had to intubate you and drain the fluid. Something got missed and you..." He swallows then, looks a little sick, eyes a little lost, almost frightened. "You developed an infection. They had to put you under so they could intubate you, and even then..."

He looks at you then, and despite the tight draw of his mouth there's something in his gaze that looks less like the steely resolution of a soldier and more of a friend, someone who nearly lost you.

"You nearly died, Fix." He mutters at last, and his eyes fall from yours, his brow scrunching in clear distress, hands tightening over yours. "You were so pale and barely breathing. We thought..."

You blink at him, and your chest feels a different kind of tightness now, a winding anxiety that coils in your chest, makes the outline of you shiver. It takes a moment for the immense weight of his words to sink into you. Yet when they do you can't contain a dry swallow at the whisper of the reaper across your nape, ghosting his skeletal fingers across the exposed flesh of you, tries to coax you into his cold embrace.

"How long?" You ask, voice rusty with disuse. There's a tremor there you've long since forgotten, an anxiety that lays dormant inside of you, a thing to never be shown to those who might glimpse at the fractured interior of you.

Kyle's face falls, he looks away. You feel your stomach sink with despair.

"Six days."

The world stills as you suck in a breath, so deep it hurts your bruised and battered lungs, feels much too like inhaling the cold, biting mix of frost atop the summit of your own failures. The memory of snow blindness, of huddling in the dark and freezing, praying for your body to hold out a little longer, curls around you like a sheet of white, engulfs you into shocked silence.

Six days.

Six weeks.

All of this, for six seconds of not paying attention.

Kyle must see the distress on your face as something else, as a flash of fear at your would-be fate, because he's leaning over you and trying to gently shake you from your thousand-yard stare.

"Hey, hey, you're okay." He murmurs, hands rising up to your shoulders now. "You're a fighter, yeah? You made it. You're okay."

You swallow, and the stickiness of your throat helps prevent you from speaking. You want to tell him, want for a horrifying moment to admit the truth: that you'd rather never wake up than disappoint them again. The realization summons a faint stab of pain, a distant, obscure thing you've nearly forgotten about. Mourning, for the person that the paralysis of fear has transformed you into.

You wonder then, if when you look in the mirror, if it will still be you who looks into your eyes, and not somehow a stranger.

Suddenly there's footsteps echoing down the hallway, and both you and Kyle startle as not one, but three figures hover in the doorway.

"You're awake!"

Soap manages to push his way past Price, and you ignore the grimace on your captain's face in favor of the pure relief that rolls off the sergeant. He's by your side in two large strides, just as Gaz leans back to give you some more space, not willing to crowd you in after such a rude awakening. You look over his shoulder to Price, and then to Ghost, who lingers just beyond the threshold, as if afraid to haunt what should be a joyous occasion.

"Steamin' Jesus it's good to see you." Soap breathes, and leans over you much like a brother would, takes your frail form into his arms with a delicacy you didn't know he possessed. The embrace lingers as he presses a hand to your hair, tucks you into his shoulder.

It's warm. You can smell his clothes, clean laundry and standard military issued bath soap, can just barely feel the dampness of a recent shower cling to his skin. He feels scrubbed clean, anew and fresh, and it feels far too pristine for the grimy things that dwell inside of you.

He leans back after a moment too long, and there's a part of you that feels like it isn't nearly long enough. His hands clasp onto your shoulders as he holds you at arm's length, head tilting as he looks over your face, brow knotting at the exhaustion he finds there.

"How do you feel?" He asks softly, and your expressions changes before you can help it, feeling an asymmetric thump of your heart at just how concerned he is, absent of disappointment, of any indication of frustration.

"I'm okay." You whisper back and blame the lack of conviction in your voice on the soreness of your throat, the fatigue that draws across you like a shroud.

Soap grins, but the smile doesn't meet his eyes. There's something there that lingers like a bitter aftertaste, something you don't yet know, but the gaze of it sets your heart to flutter in panic.

It almost looks like grief.

"Give her some space, Soap." A voice from behind him declares, and Soap twists to reveal both Price and Ghost. You can still smell the smoky, acrid scent of cigars on your captain, and as your eyes dart down you think you see the outline of the case in the pocket of his jacket.

He leans on the wall in front of you, exhales through his nose. You feel your heart murmur in apprehension at the silent, appraising look on his face. The air in your chest feels too tepid, sickly and warm as his gaze slides over to Gaz, and then back to you.

"Garrick gave you the rundown, then?"

You nod, swallow, wince at the hard scrape of your throat. Fortunately, Soap seems to notice instantly, and after a brief murmur to himself and a turn, he supplies you with a bottle full of cool water, which you suck down gratefully. You ignore the shudder inside of you as he soothes a hand over your back as you drink, nearly splutter as you swallow. It feels like he's touching something small, soft, breakable. Something that isn't you.

Yet you take your time, ignoring the tremble of your hands as Price's gaze never leaves you. With each sip you feel your throat restored, and yet the weight of unspoken words hangs heavy over you all. Oppressive. Imminent.

He knows. A voice whispers. He knows now that you aren't who you say you are. That you're nothing more than a pretender, that you don't deserve this.

Your eyes shift under Price's gaze as you hand the bottle back to Soap with a small murmur of thanks. The smile he gives you doesn't reach his eyes. Yet he stays by your side, one arm pressed in a feather-light touch to your back as he looks up at Price. Attentive, watching, guarding.

Price's eyes flick to him for only a moment, but there's silent words there you don't understand- a meaning conveyed between the two of them that lingers like a bitter aftertaste.

Yet Price relents, strangely, under Soap's stare. He heaves a sigh, drags a hand over his face, and it's only then that you notice the heavy bags under his eyes, a telltale lack of sleep coloring his complexion.

"How's your pain?" He asks instead. "We can get a nurse for you, probably get some pills in you if it's too much."

You blink, press a hand to your tender throat, let it drift down to your chest. You poke and prod for a moment, absorbing, noting, checking in with your body to catalogue the aches there, try to discern the physical from the phantom.

"My...chest hurts a bit." You supply after a moment, hesitantly. "And my throat, but it's...manageable."

Your mind summons the memory of agony before you fell unconscious. Of the horrific, clawing pain in your side that seemed to fissure outwards, clinging to your veins, your ribs, your lungs. This now, the pain that occurs only when you breathe too deeply, the lingering ache that you can't separate from your own anxiety...

You've lived with this pain for a while now.

Price nods, but otherwise remains silent, offering little insight into the dark, stormy heaviness of his gaze as it rests on you.

You swallow, feeling suddenly like Price can see you, can see through you, looking through the transparency of your form.

The whole room feels too heavy, too quiet. There's shifting glances between the men around you as they communicate silently through their eyes, have whole conversations you aren’t privy to.

You swallow, force a nervous smile as you turn from Price to Soap, then to Gaz, meeting both of their hard, averted stares.

"Damn, what's the matter with you guys? Thought you'd all be happy to see me wake up." You try, but your voice wavers, and it betrays the nervous energy that sparks inside of you, barely contained.

"O-of course we are!" Soap blurts out beside you and reaches his hand up to tousle your greasy, unkempt hair. "Was tellin' Gaz you’re a cat with nine lives, hard as shite to kill."

The lightness of his voice seems to shake loose the tense atmosphere between you all, drains the grey and ruin from the room and replaces it with something more vibrant.

Gaz smiles then, and even if it's halfhearted you drink in the sight of his expression like warm, honeyed tea.

"You were the one pacing in the hall and muttering to yourself, Soap." He supplies, and Soap scoffs, taking a step back to wave a dismissive hand at his friend.

"Because the Rangers match was going to shite." He declares, spreading his arms dramatically for emphasis. "I wasnae worried. Not for a single second."

"I had to order you to go back to base and shower." Price grumbles, voice low. Yet there's a fondness to his annoyance that tugs your lips into a smile.

Soap manages a look of mock offense. "Yer' callin me stink, now Cap?" He asks, feigning hurt. "I've smelled your ripe scent in the trenches before and lemme tell you-"

"For a bloke named 'Soap' you really do smell sometimes." Gaz pipes up helpfully, and you turn to see the sly grin crawling across his face, eyes dancing with mischief.

"Oh, smell my boggin arse y-"

"Already have, mate, that's why I'm tellin' you."

"I think you smelled nice and clean." You offer up at Soap, and he turns his eyes to you with fondness before turning back to Gaz and Price.

"Fix is the only one who likes me." He complains loudly, and it earns a chuff of laughter from Gaz on your other side.

"Great, then she can bunk with you next time you haven't showered for three days."

"Three?" You ask up at Soap, who's mouth flaps open indignantly.

"Two!" He bites back.

"And a half." Price offers wearily.

You shrug up at Johnny. "That is pretty much three days."

Soap fixes you with a look of betrayal that has a laugh bubbling up your throat before you can stop it.

"Then again-" You offer, raising your arm and giving a preliminary sniff, nose wrinkling. "I probably smell worse. Haven't showered for a week now."

You pause, face drawing aghast as you turn to Gaz. "Oh God, they didn't give me a sponge bath, did they?"

"Aye." Soap crows, a smirk pulling at his lips. "Had to pull Gaz here away when they said he couldnae help. Tried to insist on doing it himself."

"Oh, now you're taking the piss." Gaz complains, sitting back in his chair with a huff.

You turn to Gaz, feigning shyness, crossing your arms over your chest as you teasingly ask him: "You didn't look, did you sergeant? How could you?"

Soap's bark of laughter is nearly deafening when he watches Gaz straighten and splutter, stammering out an indignant "N-no! I-"

"I thought we were friends." You press, pretending to wipe away a tear.

"I didn't look!!"

"Couldnae take his eyes off you, lass." Soap jibes, voice trilling with laughter. "Man looked as if he were restin' his eyes on the birth of Venus herself."

"Soap!!"

You laugh then too, feeling your chest lighten, something inside of it shaking loose and rising up through your voice, dissipating between you all like a gentle breeze.

"Gents." Price suddenly says. "Will you give us a minute?"

And just like that, the oxygen drains from the room.

You feel it suck the air from your chest, Price's words, stale in your throat as the laughter cuts off abruptly. You can still remember the sound of the gunshot, the one that punched a hole in your side, robbed you of your air and sent you spiraling into unconsciousness. Now, Price's voice sounds very much the same. The toll of a funeral bell, a final, imminent sound from which there’s no escape. Only grief.

Soap sees the tight draw of your face, and it feels familiar to you, the way your lips thin, shoulders tense. You remember it, the sensation of waiting outside an office furnished with oakwood, a glossy desk with papers and ornaments meticulously placed, of the squeak of your father's chair as he turns to you, pins you with his untempered stare.

It shows on your face, you realize, and you jolt when Soap's hand lands on your shoulder. He offers you a smile, but behind his gaze you see the trepidation there. A whisper of a warning. Danger.

"I'll see if I can scrounge you a plate of somethin'." He tells you softly, an entreaty. "You like chocolate pudding?"

You nod a little numbly, swallow as his hand drifts from your side as he paces to the door, Gaz trailing close behind. It's only once they pass that you see him, the large, lurking specter that hovers just beyond the door. Ghost's head turns as he watches the two sergeants pass, only for his stare to slowly look back to you.

It's the first time you've seen his face since that moment where he found you, when you had let the ink-dyed threads of you spill into his palms and spoken the words to him that you'd been keeping hidden as an execrable secret.

"I-I didn't-" You hiccup, and the world is in chaos now, with your cries and your secrets exposed, with his gaze raking over your trembling, injured form. "Didn't want you to see, Ghost. I'm sorry-"

Now, Ghost locks eyes with you, holds your gaze captive in his stare.

"I see you."

You can't look away.

"Just you."

When he turns, you fight the urge to call for him, to ask what exactly he has seen in you, if it is enough to lose his faith in you, to leave you behind and march ever onwards, blotting out the light as you're cast in his shadow. You...you want to ask for forgiveness. To atone for the things you aren't, the things you might never be.

"Ghost-" You try, but he's gone, heavy footsteps fading down the hallway as he vanishes, leaving only you behind.

The silence that follows is unbearable.

"Fix."

You turn your eyes to meet the gaze of your captain, of his smoky, laden stare that feels rife with omens, sinister prophecies that press down on your shoulders.

"We need to talk about what happened."

Ah. This is it then. The moment you founder, feet stumbling from the apex of your achievements before tumbling down, down, down int the abyss that haunts your dreams. The one where you're left alone, empty, with only your failures and regrets to provide you with solitary company.

"Ghost said he found you bleeding out in the barracks, on your way to your room instead of the medical station." Price goes on, not bothering to mince words. Ever direct, forthright in a way that is unmistakably him. "Care to explain what that was about?"

You swallow. Your throat feels tacky, dry. You make a point to reach for the water bottle at your bedside, take a gulp. It's a blatantly obvious move to stall, but you are beginning to realize that no matter what you do, these men, your brothers, will be able to discern you like the rising tides under a full moon. It's futile. Maybe it always has been.

"I was on my way to the medical unit." You reply and manage to surprise yourself with how even your voice sounds. "I was on my way to my room to grab the keys to the supply closet."

"Instead of reporting to the medic on duty?" Price questions, nonplussed.

"Yes, Sir."

"Why was that?"

You swallow, feel a tremor in your hands, try to shake the image of your father sitting at his desk before you.

"I believed my injuries were not severe at the time, and that I could tend to them myself." You reply honestly, ignoring the dragging, haunting childhood memory of tall windows and a portrait above the fireplace, of the smell of your father’s cigars.

"Hmm." Price offers, the sound growling low in his chest, eyes unblinking, pinning you to where you sit. "Ghost mentioned something else too. About how you 'didn't want him to see.' Is that right?"

You should have expected this. Should have known Ghost would spare no detail in whatever report he gave Price, would toss you to the wolves like this.

"I don't recall saying that, Sir." You offer instead, lying, trying to keep your voice even, unwavering even as your heart thumps erratically in your chest.

"So, you believe your lieutenant gave a false report?" Price asks sharply, and you nearly flinch at the sudden shift of his voice.

"N-no sir." You falter, and your fingers fist the sheets under your hands. "Only that I don't remember saying that."

Price only ignores you, soldiering on with his questions. "Some of the squaddies said they saw you earlier that night on the training grounds." He states, and you watch as his finger taps on his crossed arm. "Give me a good reason why you were there and not resting and taking care of yourself?"

You try to remember how the breathe, feel the push and pull of you inhales and exhales, stifling the sensation to run. Run.

"What is going on Fix?"

You remember the first time you were caught in a sniper's snare. Seeing the red dot appear on your vest, looking for cover, finding none, trying to flatten yourself and make yourself as small as possible to avoid the hail of bullets that rained down on you.

Now, in the target of Price's scope, pinned beneath his gaze, you feel very much the same.

Your silence is telling. Too much time has passed already, and you know any answer you give now would be futile, instantly seen as the lie that it is. So instead, you stay silent, force yourself to breathe, imbue yourself in the rise and fall of your chest, the ache that oxygen summons as it flows through your lungs.

Price doesn't waver before you, unblinking, unrelenting. Still as a statue, his eyes gazing at you from below his furrowed brow. Face impassive, but his eyes dark, calculating, discerning.

"I know what I saw." He says at last as the silence drags on, voice dragging in his chest. "I saw a young woman who was terrified of being touched, who tore her own stitches by pushing herself too hard and then panicked and lashed out when someone noticed. That's not normal behavior. Not from a soldier who supposedly passed all her psych evals before joining my team."

You swallow, but the air feels stagnant, filled with ash and ruin. The aftermath of an explosion, where the gunpowder flavors across your tongue.

"I-I didn't-" You try, voice finally fracturing. Yet Price ignores you, plowing onwards.

"Fix." He goes on, and his voice sounds tired now. Weary, and it feels too close to disappointment. "You're a good soldier, a damn good one. One of the best medics I've ever met. But I can't have you risking this team by not taking care of yourself."

"I-I was taking care of myself." You manage, voice trembling down, shoulders shivering. "I was trying to recover sooner so you didn't...didn't have to wait for me."

"And where did that get you, hmm?" Price snaps suddenly, voice rising, straightening off the wall and you flinch, hard enough for him to notice. "You know better than that. You're the bloody medic. Do you have any idea how long it took for me to find a suitable candidate for this team? We've had you less than four months, and you've already landed yourself in the ICU twice. Once for not checking your corners, and the second because you were disobeying orders to stay put and heal."

"I'm...sorry, captain." You force yourself to say, and a traitorous sob clings to the back of your throat. You can feel the dam inside you cracking, feel the dark, ichor of you begin to seep out. It makes words choke your throat before you can stop them.

"I-I'll do better. I'll tend to my injuries better. I'll not tear my stitches again-"

"What you are going to do-" Price snaps, and the panic inside you flares brighter, and you swallow down the sob that threatens your voice, trying vainly to reign in your errant emotions. To not let him see, to not let any of them see. Please- "-is take a psych eval while you recover, and you are NOT going to repeat this behavior again or you'll be off my taskforce."

Off the taskforce.

You begin to shake then, trembling as you sit upright in the hospital bed, eyes glassy, unseeing, feeling the gale howl in your thoughts, and the phantasm of failure and inconsolable loneliness wrap her thin, pale fingers around your neck, starving you of air.

Alone, again. Because of the things you couldn't accomplish. Of never, ever being enough, of wearing a body too big for your meagre soul.

"P-Price." You manage, voice trembling as you attempt one last effort to save his faith in you, to cling to this place of yours you've worked so hard for and to never, ever let go.

"I'll do better." You try, and the words come tumbling loose, like an avalanche you can’t prevent. "I can. I can make it up to the team. I-I worked so hard to be here, I can't...can't fail. I just need another chance, so I can prove myself.”

You try and stop your words, but it’s a useless effort. You circle the drain in an imminent vacuum as it sucks you down, down. “I can prove I’m a good soldier, a good medic, and prove that I deserve to be here. I can prove that you don’t need to get rid of me because I fucked up. I can still do it. I can prove myself, can prove I’m not a failure. So please."

You swallow, but all you taste is bile and regret.

"Please."

The room stills.

In the silence, you think you feel your fragile heart begin to shatter.

"Oh Fix." Price murmurs at last, and you watch as the anger from his eyes melts, his shoulders loosening, uncrunching from their tight draw. There's an emotion that passes over his face, makes his eyes seem forlorn, lost at the sight of you. It's as if he's found not a soldier but an injured animal, skittish and afraid. It takes you a moment to name the sorrow in his expression, eyes blinking and threatening tears.

Pity.

It stabs at you sharper than the sound in your side, flays open the cavity of your chest and renders you exposed, vulnerable under his gaze. Sharp and sudden, it chokes the air in your lungs, makes your ribs tighten, seize as you try vainly to curl away from it, with no ground on which to retreat.

Price lowers his head, avoiding your gaze for a moment as if he's grappling with guilt, blaming himself for this instead of you and somehow that feels worse. Like he's shouldering a burden he doesn't trust you with despite the fact that it's your weight to carry.

When Price's eyes meet yours again they're traitorously sad. Not with disappointment, Price regards you as if he would a frail, grieving thing- something to be treated with a care you don't deserve.

"You have nothing to prove." He tells you, and there's a tone to his voice you haven't heard before, something that suffers at finally witnessing the cracked, broken shadows you fail to conceal inside your heart.

It's too much.

You can't...can't do this. They were never supposed to know, never supposed to see the wreck inside you you've been trying to hide so desperately. They were only supposed to see your triumphs, your victories and not the silhouette of devastation that flickered beyond your smiling form. Never were they supposed to glimpse the raw, rotten interior of you, witness the horrific truth of all those years ago that has since fused to your bones and created a horrible, grotesque reflection of you.

They were never supposed to know.

Now Price stands before you, despairing, despondent at what he's seen, and told to you the words you've feared this entire time. That all this effort has been for nothing, that you've suffered for nothing, that your struggle to stay with him, with Ghost, with Soap and Gaz and Laswell was nothing more than a naive fantasy.

It bubbles up inside you before you can stop it- the searing, scorching hurt and white-hot flash of fury. Like an eruption there's no warning as magma courses through your veins and you sit up in your bed, ignoring the sudden, horrible agony that claws into your side and chokes the air in your throat. Instead, you look at Price through a watery, burning gaze and raise your voice to the loudest you've ever allowed it to echo from the hurt of your chest.

"I HAVE EVERYTHING TO PROVE!!"

Your voice rises and cracks like a whip between you both, shatters the remnants of your composure and leaves you trembling, shaken, clinging desperately to whatever shreds of hope remain inside you.

Price looks stunned.

You've never seen that expression on his face before, you realize, and it's enough to make the anger seep from you, coloring with regret as you watch his face transform from shock to a stony, impassive silence.

Your stomach drops through the floor.

"You are suspended." He tells you flatly. "I'm giving you mandatory three months leave so you can heal and figure out whatever you've got going on."

Silence. Then, the fragile sound of your hopes and dreams fracturing, cracks spider-webbing out further, further, until they seem to consume you, mar your spirit into something that appears as only a mockery of yourself.

"Price-" You try breathlessly, unable to find any other words except his name, absent of his title. Trying desperately to appeal to him not as a superior, but as the thing you dare to dream he is- a friend. "Please."

It softens him, that, makes his face briefly scrunch as if he's the one in pain, not you. Yet he doesn't waver, not even as his voice dips softer between you both.

"This is for the best, Fix. Take some time to go home, see your family, get some distance."

No. You think desperately, paralyzed, unable to speak. That's the last thing I want. Don't send me back to them. don't take me further from you all. Let me stay here, even if I can't be useful, even if I don't deserve it. Let me stay.

Instead, all you give him is silence. Wordless, your voice dying in your throat.

Price looks at you then, and that emotion returns to his eyes- sadness. Guilt. He paces towards you, and it takes all your strength to not press yourself away from him, and yet to crowd even closer, seeking an anchor, a semblance of comfort.

He rests a hand on your shoulder, fatherly, reassuring and yet somehow his touch burns against your skin.

"You're a bloody good medic, Fix." He murmurs to you, softer now. "Might be the best one I've ever worked with."

Hope, vibrant and colorful. You look up at him with a wide, watery gaze, daring to dream of the things that could be.

The things that aren't.

"But I can't have a medic who can barely take care of herself." He finishes, and once again the world sucks into colorless monochrome, devoid of anything remotely related to the thing called joy.

A pat to your shoulder, and it feels like goodbye.

"You get yourself sorted." He tells you, turning away. "We will be here when you get back. Understood?"

You barely hear him, barely hear his footsteps fade from the room, barely hear him talk to someone hidden just beyond the doorway as they vanish together.

Silence reigns supreme in the absence that follows, carving deep into your bones, etching prophecies within the cracks, filling them with ash, runes to be discovered by a future you. The air around you is nothing but a frigid vacuum, sucking up the sound of your own heartbeat, tinnitus singing a wry, shrill sound in your ears.

Failure.

Of the highest degree. You feel the earth shake and tremble beneath you, and atop the mountain of bones from which you stand the chasm below yawns with a dark, gaping maw, threatening to swallow you whole. It feels like an inevitability, an imminent destiny from which there is no escape.

Your lungs must be filled with ichor, you think, because when you breath there's a wetness in the back of your throat that feels like a dark, horrid thing. You wonder if you slice back the layers of you if only ink will spill outwards. Perhaps it will drown you, fill the space in which you occupy alone, clinging to you like tar and taking you down, down into oblivion.

There's wetness on your face before you realize it. Hot, fat tears rolling down your cheeks in the absence of sound. They water your gaze, obscure your vision until the world is nothing more than the liquid haze of your own regrets.

I should have known better. You think, in a final, bitter sacrament. Than to think I could belong.

When you cry, it's with a hand clutched to your chest, fingers gripping at the cotton fabric of your hospital gown, threatening to rip it to shreds just like the remainder of your hope. Sobs crack your throat- broken sounds caught in the wet, putrid vile of your lungs. Pain blossoms like a funeral bouquet across your chest, white flowers symbolizing grief.

White. White. White.

White lace napkins, white sheer curtains, pressed white blouses, white pearls at your mother's throat. Unblemished, artificial, holy and yet somehow blasphemous to the fibers of your soul. Things that are a reminder of where you've come from, where you shall return, what you have to lose.

Everything to prove. Everything to lose.

A cry cracks at your dry throat, and you hate it- a broken sound that seems to show who you truly are, something fracturing and barely held together. You bow into your hands, tears spilling through your fingers, slipping away with the remainder of your composure.

There's footsteps, voices at the door, and a voice calls your name.

You don't respond, caught and ensnared within the silvery web of despair, absent from everything except your own self-hatred, the grief and hopelessness that forces shattered cries from your throat.

"Hey, hey, hey." A voice shushes you, and arms wrap around you. Warm, solid, tender. There's a hand in your hair, tucking you into a chest that feels like a comfort you don't deserve it. "It's alright doll, just breathe. Take it easy."

"I'm- I'm sorry." You choke between sobs, fingers clawing into Kyle's shirt. "Gaz, I-I didn't mean, I never thought. I'm...I'm sorry."

Gaz says nothing, only presses you deeper into his chest and you let him, surrendering to the temptation of just being held even though you don't deserve it, even though you know you'll have to say goodbye.

Briefly, you wonder if you should have let go then, in that grimy, dusty cartel hideout, so that way you didn't have to live with the disappointment, the pain, the hurt.

You continue to chant apologies, and Gaz welcomes them into him, never speaks beyond gentle words to try and soothe your cries. There's another hand in between it all, a voice that tries to speak but finds himself absent of the words needed.

"You're going to be okay, Fix." Soap offers at last, and you don't believe him. You want him to say you didn't disappoint them, that you can stay, that somehow they won't forget about you.

You want him to tell you that you can stay.

Yet he doesn't, only offers hollow reassurances that ring empty in your ears between sobs that you pour into Gaz's shirt.

They're finding ways to say goodbye.

You push back from Gaz's front abruptly, suddenly, the movement enough to dizzy you and shock the two men crowded close to your bed.

"Get out."

Gaz and Soap look at each other, brows knotted, words exchanging through their gazes alone.

"Hey, listen-" Gaz tries, echoing your name.

"Don’t. Don't call me that." You spit back, wrapping your arms around yourself protectively, refusing to look at them, to see the worry in their eyes. That wasn't your name. Your name, your callsign is Fix, even if you can never fix the broken things in your own soul.

"Go." You say again, firmer now. Hurt. Angry. "I-I want to be alone."

It's a lie, you know that. You want them, want them to be here with you, to comfort you in the face of your own insurmountable failures. Yet now, on the precipice of farewell, you can't stand the reprieve they offer you to indulge in. Not when you're about to say goodbye.

There's a pause as both sergeants wait for you to say anything more, pray for you to swallow your words and invite them into you once again, but you can't. You don't. You refuse.

So slowly, they pull away, as they all do, until there's nothing left but you and your own shadow that sems to swallow you from all sides.

It's Soap that pauses at the door, and you look up then, see the brokenness in his eyes. The hurt.

"Come back to us." Is all he tells you, voice barely strained, eyes sad. "Soon."

You blink, and his words summon something like the blossoms you saw blooming in the mountains of Nepal- striving against the harsh, unforgiving rocky outcropping. They turn their petals to the thin blue sky in search of a sunrise you can't yet see. Striving, resilient, hopeful, alive. Despite everything. Alive.

When Soap vanishes, you see them, see the blossoms bloom across your thoughts, roots fragile but deep, awaiting the thaw in which they'll stretch once more upwards towards the heavens. They entwine with your stitches like creeping ivy, hold you fast and refuse to let you crumble further as much as you want to shatter.

They march on, the four of them, vanishing into the blizzard atop a mountain of expectations you'll never meet. Yet in the snow where you've fallen, rhododendrons unfurl in the cracked confines of your lonely heart.

Taglist:

@atenceladusiaawfytbwb @nachtcirce @jujubashow @mutuallimbenclosure @kkinky @trash-boi-4-life @scatter-mind001

#simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #simon 'ghost' riley #mw2 #cod mw22 #Simon ghost riley x oc #reader insert #cod x reader #fic: shadow and bone #oc: fix

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