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boxofthings · 5 months

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bshsjsksk I've never written smut before so I hope this doesnt read as awkward lmao. (I kinda struggled halfway through so I'm sorry if the quality all of a sudden goes down the drain 🥲 i wrote this very late into the night)

Enjoy!

Read on AO3

NSFW below the cut!

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The post-mission adrenaline crash hits them hard. As soon as the team had returned to base, a hushed scatter of dragging feet had set the tone of their night.

For Ghost, he's high-strung, left on edge from today's most recent failures. He thinks he can still hear gunfire in the background of the night, and if he closes his eyes and lets his mind wander, he sees the poignant look of fear as the person he reaches for is just a little bit too out of grasp, and their screams etch jagged scars into his brain.

There's a tension in his bones that vibrates through his nerves, begging for reprieve, and he needs it gone—right now.

That's what makes him seek out the sergeant, finding him lounged against the corridor walls and hurriedly yanking the other into Ghost's quarters, pressing his body up against the door with rough hands and a stormy mind.

The sergeant doesn't protest, only reciprocates with the same ferocity as his lieutenant, filling the quiet with their two desperate breaths and lewd whispers.

"I need you," Ghost had groaned, face buried in the crook of Roach's neck, sinking deep reds onto marred but soft skin. Roach's breath had hitched, and the fingers latched tightly onto the lieutenant had only dug deeper.

It was all the confirmation Ghost needed before he begins stripping the younger out of his gear. Fast and desperate, like two teenagers at risk of getting caught by their parents, and technically, that wasn't too far from the truth.

His hands move mechanically, and there's a despondency that begins to fizzle into his head as he unclasps each and every clip on Roach's armour till he's just in his standard shirt and pants. There's a heavy cloud over his head that pushes him into that ugly, uncaring side of himself—the part of him that tries to make all the good things in his life meaningless, detached.

He feels the roughness behind his actions as his hands roam free over the sergeant's body. He feels like he's in a trance, familiar and lifeless, as his mind only chases for the ultimate pleasure that only serves to temporarily halt his turmoil.

This means nothing, he tells himself.

He expects the same in return—secretly begs for it in his mind so that this can all be just another vapid memory added to the list of casual hook-ups. But when Roach goes to take off his clothing, it's slow and gentle, unlike Ghost's brazen want. Roach moves like they have all the time in the world like this means something—represents more than what their activity depicts on the surface level. And Ghost—he feels disquieted.

The sergeant is methodical when he takes off Ghost's vest, pausing every so often to look at him and smile. Ghost's heart stutters and the greys in his head recede just a little more.

When it's just his undershirt and pants left, Roach gives him a soft push backwards, seating him down on the edge of his bed.

Ghost's eyes never leave Roach, watching closely like a hawk as the other climbs atop him and firmly grasps his chin, tilting it upwards.

"You think too much," he signs lightly. And before Ghost can respond, confident lips meet his own unprepared ones, and his disordered mind goes quiet.

With his balaclava rolled up to his nose, Roach holds the sides of his face as they kiss like longtime lovers, and there's a fierce burn in his chest that ignites hotter the longer they're connected.

When Roach pulls away, Ghost chases after him, high on the feel of the other's touch. His hands come up to encircle Roach's waist, keeping him firmly close and fervid against himself.

The sergeant's hands come to hold his face again, except instead of leaning in, he stares. His piercing green strikes Ghost immobile, but he recognizes what that look on the other's face means—he's picking him apart, trying to gauge what's going on in Ghost's head.

Ghost tries to avert his gaze, doing so by surging up, trying to capture Roach's lips once again, but Roach sees the action for what it is and pulls away, keeping his hold strong on Ghost. It forces him to look directly at the other.

"Are you ok?" he whispers, and it's soft—so gentle that a hard wall inside of him cracks just a little. Roach's face conveys one of searching concern, and Ghost feels pinned, flayed open at the mercy of those eyes.

He squeezes his eyes shut, shaking his head stiffly as his hands dig deeper into Roach's hips.

"I just-" he croaks, "I just need you."

Roach's eyes narrow, and Ghost lets a sliver of vulnerability slip through the cracks—just a tiny push. "Please," he whispers, and he can see in real-time how Roach's expression falls, a sad smile pulling meekly onto his mouth, and he nods.

Ghost kisses him—hard. This is familiar. If he's in control, he can't let those lingering terrors plague his thoughts. The sooner he can get this going, the sooner he can distract himself. He thrusts up into Roach, feeling the heat of the other on top of him, and the younger groans into the kiss as the two grind against each other, needy and fervent.

Hands push down squarely on his chest until he's forced to lay back. When he looks forward to Roach, the other smiles warmly and begins to work at his zipper.

"Let me take care of you."

And it takes everything in Ghost not to crumble at those words.

Roach palms at his erection, still confined in his boxers, and Ghost wants to kick him.

"Stop teasing."

He's met with a cheeky grin. "Stop teasing?" the other signs demurely. "You mean like this?"

A warm hand suddenly grasps his length, and Ghost's breath hitches, making the humour in Roach's gaze grow.

"Oh, piss off you-"

The hand tightens, stroking confidently up and down, melting the words on Ghost's tongue immediately.

Bastard.

It's been a while since they've done this. Missions have become more frequent and dire as the war rages on, and Ghost hasn't gotten a chance to get laid—to expel the stress.

He wants to say that's the reason why his stomach swoops so violently as the sergeant slowly takes him into his mouth, gaze never leaving Ghost's as he swallows him deeper.

God, he can't deny it; Roach knows how to take him apart. His eyes make Ghost feel like pinned-down prey as he sensually swirls his tongue around the tip.

His hand reaches to grasp at Roach's hair, keeping the sergeant in place, but Roach only dips lower, expertly sucking him off at a rhythmic pace that punches deep groans out of Ghost.

He bucks his hips upwards as Roach meets him halfway, setting an exhilarating pace that forces Ghost to concentrate on not finishing right into the sergeant's mouth. He wants this night to last.

He pulls Roach off his cock, leaving a string of saliva that Ghost immediately swipes across the other's lips. It makes the heat inside of him grow.

"Get on the bed."

Roach wastes zero time obeying, laying across the same spot that Ghost had previously occupied.

Shedding his cargos, he grabs the lube on the bedside table, fully seating himself between Roach's now bare legs as he drenches his fingers.

As he circles Roach's entrance, he leans forward, waiting for the exact moment the other's mouth hangs open as his finger breaches into heat, capturing lips in a hungry kiss, and Roach leans into it enthusiastically.

He adds another digit, awaiting for the stuttered breathing that will follow, and he curls his fingers, watching closely as Roach's back arches off the bed like a puppet.

The other scoffs, locks of hair falling in front of his eyes. Ghost wants to brush them away.

"Now, who's teasing."

A smile pulls at his face as he adds a third, and he revels in knowing that he's the one wringing those noises, those expressions out of Roach—revels in knowing he's the only one who knows how to make the other feel this good.

When Ghost pulls out, moving to lube himself up, Roach's hands come to press on his shoulders, a leg coming up to hook around his middle, effectively flipping their positions in a swift and practiced maneuver.

With Roach on top, he can see the smugness that paints his features, a nimble hand caressing up his torso to sit at his chest.

"I said I'd take care of you," Roach leans down to whisper low in his ear before Ghost can protest, and a shiver runs down his spine, pooling arousal at the base of his cock.

The sergeant takes him in hand and, just like before, never moves his sights from the lieutenant's face as he guides the head of his cock to his entrance, sinking slowly down until Ghost is fully sheathed inside of him.

Their combined groans mingle together into heavy breaths.

Ghost's hands climb to grip hard at Roach's hips. A choked moan threatens to spill once the sergeant begins moving, his heat all-encapsulating and enticing.

He sits up so he can better hold Roach in his lap, roaming hands gripping tight on the back of the sergeant's shirt. He pushes his hips upwards, setting a brutal pace and eliciting a series of gasps that only encourage him to move faster.

He wants to lose himself in this. Be buried inside this warmth forever, anything to take him away from the battles he'll be thrown back into once he leaves this room.

He scrunches his eyes shut, trying to focus only on the building pressure below. But despite his efforts, the storm cloud slowly creeps back into the cracks of his brain, along with the distant screams that follow with it. Eyes too young to display such fear watch him from the depths of his mind, and suddenly, Ghost can't get it out.

Two taps to his shoulder.

His eyes fling open, thrusts halting immediately.

The concern is back, more intense than before.

"What's wrong?"

Ghost inhales, taking in how genuinely worried the sergeant looks—how quickly he had noticed Ghost's inner turmoil.

"I-" he swallows, words weighing like bricks in his throat.

He doesn't want to talk about it, doesn't want to even spare a grain of space in his mind for images that will spiral him deep into disruption. It's why he'd even sought out the sergeant in the first place. This was just supposed to be another meaningless fuck.

But a part of him knew it wasn't going to be so easy, not with Roach. Not with someone who takes one glance at him, mask and all, and immediately knows which weak points to aim for to leave him an exposed, vulnerable mess.

He supposes he should've known this would happen—wonders if, deep in his subconscious, he had hoped for something more to come out of this.

Fingers gently grasp his hand, lifting it slowly, hesitantly, as if Ghost would run at the slightest hint of comfort.

Soft lips come to kiss at his knuckles, one by one, and it's so—kind. The contrast between Roach's lips and the scars that run down Ghost's hand feels undeserving, like such good things are ought to be for people like him.

"When people grow up in ugly homes, they can only assume everything in the world is ugly, including themselves."

It was something Roach had said to him offhandedly after a particular deployment. Although back then, Ghost hadn't understood where it came from.

He'd thought it had something to do with the mission they had just returned from. One that—similarly to today's—had left the task force a shaken crowd of solemn faces.

He remembers it clear as day. He and Roach had been the first at the scene, gazing upon the aftermath of what could only be described as a brutal execution—one that left an innocent family limp at their feet, like bloody ragdolls.

The sole survivor, a boy no older than twelve, had sat at the centre of it all, looking no more alive than the ashen bodies surrounding his small frame.

It was a disturbingly familiar sight, and Ghost had left that mission quieter than usual.

Now, though, he thinks he knows why Roach had said it. It's for the same reason why Ghost was thinking of such a phrase at a time like this—for comfort, reassurance.

Roach had recognized then how that mission had messed with Ghost's head, just as he recognized how today's mission had messed with him further.

Ghost takes a deep breath, calming the violent sea in his mind.

"Sorry," he breathes out, looking Roach square in the eyes with what he hopes is a genuine, small smile. "Just all up in my head."

Roach's thumb swipes back and forth at the palm of Ghost's hand—a grounding sensation despite how miniscule it is. A small smile reflects back on his face, a wisp of a concession.

We'll talk about this after.

Ghost rolls them over so that Roach is now under him. By the look of exasperation, the other had probably been expecting this.

"This is a two-way tango, bug. Let me return the favour."

There's enthusiasm in the arms that drape around his neck, and Ghost begins to pick up where they left off.

With Roach laid under him, Ghost's fingers crawl up his stomach to lift off the other's shirt, exposing him fully to the lieutenant. In response, Roach tugs at Ghost's own shirt, a challenging glint in his eye that Ghost readily accepts, leaving the two fully bare for each other.

Ghost is gentler this time when he pushes back in, making sure not to be as rough as he was before. Roach takes him in easily, whining softly as Ghost's hips snap to hit that sweet spot. It shouldn't affect him how well they fit together, and not just in bed, but in a warzone, too.

He tries not to let his thoughts wander again, and instead, thinks of Roach—Roach and how he's splayed underneath him, how his touches feel like they burn the skin off his flesh, how even without a voice, his words stick in Ghost's mind like unwilling tattoos.

-- -- --

"You think all these terrible things that have happened to you define who you are. They don't."

"How do you know?"

"Because I know you."

In the haze of pleasurable bliss, a thought weighs sudden and heart-stuttering.

I love him.

He loves him.

And it's more than just the sex. It's the way those brown curls splay out on the bed like a halo—the same curls he'd run his fingers through countless times during leisure hours. It's the kiss-swollen lips that smile warmly at him every morning at breakfast. It's the strong arms currently wrapped around his neck that aid him in battle with their assured grip and expertise and the fingers that softly grasp Ghost's own when they have fleeting moments of tenderness on the battlefield. It's the way that when Ghost looks at the man before him, there's a part of him deep down that knows what this is, a part of him that thinks of green eyes and gentle smiles, and he wants.

He stares down at Roach, beautiful and wrecked and gazes at the scars that embroider his person. Ghost traces his fingers softly on the large gash decorating the left hip. An ugly knife wound, he remembers. He helped stitch that one. The mark beside that one—a bullet not fully penetrated, but Ghost had been there when the shot had hit its mark, and it had terrified him at that moment.

The arms around him release, and then hands come to rest delicately on his face. Green eyes watch him, glassy from their intimate activity but strong in their tender gaze.

This is so much different than his usual hook-ups—the rough, quick-fucks he'd indulge himself in over the years as a way of forcing out the accumulative tension from his stressful lifestyle. But when he's with Roach, it's gentle, it's slow, and, dare he say it, loving. Ghost can't help himself as his hips slow to a stop, and his eyes move towards Roach's face.

His hand grabs recklessly at his mask, pulling it off with a haste he hasn't felt in a long time.

Roach's eyes widen. His partner's desperate pants have halted as well, and he looks straight up at Ghost, gaze shocked with an underlayer of hope.

"I love you."

Ghost feels nervous in his own skin, uncharted emotion rubbing hotly inside his chest, foreign and wild. But Gary inches his face closer, and immediately, those biting fears dissipate, leaving his mind completely once Gary pulls their lips together in a tender kiss.

It's the sweetest he's ever had. Completely unlike the past frustratingly-charged snogs he'd shared with past willing fucks.

When they break apart, Gary looks high, pupils blown wide, and lips a swollen red. Ghost suspects he doesn't look much different.

"I love you, Simon," he whispers, awed.

And the sharp zing of warmth shoots straight down to his groin, where they're still connected, and he groans.

The legs wrapped around his middle squeeze tighter, and Ghost understands, picking up where he left off and speeding up his pace once more.

Roach's head falls back, eyes squeezed shut as Ghost drives them closer to the edge.

His heart stutters as he watches Roach closely. He wants this, he wants more, he wants—

A hand on his heart.

"You think too much."

Ghost exhales, watching Roach closely, watching every minute change in expression. He notices how his breathing hitches when Ghost hits that sweet spot, notices how the other likes it when Ghost strokes his hair, notices how his nose scrunches up when he's concentrating on something hard.

It's not just sex. He knows all the little details about Roach without even having to look. Like when the other taps his pencil on his right thigh but only on the right, like when Roach drinks hot tea and always blows twice before taking a sip, like how there are calluses on his index and middle finger on his dominant hand from writing in his journal, and one on his left index from handling his gun.

I'm thinking about you.

But Ghost doesn't say it out loud; only aims to show what his mind yearns to spill.

He intertwines his hand with Roach's and kisses him feverishly as his hips pull sweet gasps out of Roach's mouth.

He's getting close. Ghost can feel it as Roach clenches tighter around him, and it takes everything in him not to let go right now.

No, he wants to watch Roach spill over the edge first; wants to watch the other fall into the pleasurable bliss brought by Ghost's own doing.

"Come for me, bug," he whispers lowly, and he knows that's all it'll take.

There's a final, strangled whimper before the other spasms and arches beneath him, eyes rolling back as he rides through his orgasm, shaky breaths filling the silence of the room. Ghost drinks in every bit of the sight before him, fuelling his own chase towards the end.

A hand roams his face. The affection on Roach's face is so overwhelming it gives him butterflies.

"Beautiful," Roach mouths.

And Ghost groans as his own orgasm overtakes him, unloading into Roach. Their collective moans are cut short when Roach goes in for one more kiss as Ghost basks in the aftermath of his climax.

This could have never been a casual hook-up, not with Roach. Even with all the past times they've done this, it'd only served to make Ghost hungrier each time for something more.

It was just unfortunate a mental spiral was what pushed him to spit it out.

Now, as the two of them lay together in bed, Roach softly carding fingers through Ghost's hair, he can only think of what a fool he was for assuming he could prolong those hidden desires in his chest.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

They'd hastily cleaned up the mess they'd made and thrown on simple clothes, with Roach borrowing one of Ghost's shirts.

It feels oddly domestic, and despite his earlier confession, Ghost can't help but feel scared.

"Sorry," he swallows, "if I hurt you earlier."

He's deflecting—just a little bit. He knows they have to talk about it, but he wants to sit inside this safe threshold just a little longer.

Beside him, Roach shakes his head.

"You didn't hurt me," he reassures, letting a minute grin slip through, "it's not like you haven't been rougher in the past."

Ghost huffs, his own lips betraying amusement, but he averts Roach's eyes and looks to the ceiling.

He can't keep holding it all in; feels like he at least owes it to Roach—attentive and caring, Roach—what was bothering him.

"It was the girl."

It's not a question, so Roach must've been sure that was it.

As usual, he was right.

"I was so close." He was. He was right there at the edge of the window. If he'd just been a little quicker–

"It's not your fault, Simon."

He can't help but sigh. He knows that. But there's a part of him, the irrational shadow of himself that looks suspiciously like a little boy, curses him for his incompetence.

And it's not just the blame; it's the principle of his role as a soldier. If he can't save one little girl, what good is he?

To serve and protect. If he can't even do that for a stranger, how does he expect to do it for the people he cares about?

In the dim light, he can just make out the grim line of Roach's mouth.

There's nothing the other can really say to make this all better. Regardless of everything, Ghost’s mind will always remain a wasteland of accusatory what-ifs. But-

"I...I meant what I said, though. Earlier."

And even with the sombre fog set over his mind, Roach's smile still manages to make it all just a little more bearable.

"Me, too."

He's scared. There's another reason why his failure today hit him so viscerally. When he stares back at Roach, he feels the phantom fear that imprints like a shadow behind his eyelids, with green eyes that fall into an abyss Ghost isn't fast enough to reach for.

It could be him one day that you don't catch, his ugly thoughts say.

But before he can further fuel those anxieties, Roach pulls him close, resting Ghost's head under his chin.

"You think too much," he mutters, running his fingers through Ghost's hair.

Ghost sighs, closing his eyes and leaning further into the embrace. He feels—safe.

Trust Roach to soften the blows of everything horrible in his life.

There are more things to say, more things they need to establish with this newfound step in their relationship, more fears that Ghost needs to acknowledge head-on.

But for now, he's happy to stay like this, in the arms of someone he knows he can trust.

Tomorrow, they’ll leave the safety of this room and be thrown back into the uncertainty of their fragile lives; however, the other side of his door no longer feels so daunting, not when he has this.

As his mind drifts slowly away into the lulling arms of sleep, he feels Roach hold him tighter.

"One day," Roach begins to whisper, and it's soft—wishful-sounding, "I hope you'll be able to accept that you're more than just your shortcomings, like how I see you."

For the first of many nights, his mind is at peace.

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