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The sigh you heave upon receiving your orders is monumental. Massive. Consequentially enormous. You’ve always been a solo operator. Not technically military, but not a civilian either. You work in the shadows of the shadows, one of the many people employed to go where the government can’t send teams. None of your work is official. To the world, you don’t exist. And you almost always work alone. Teams can’t be trusted to do what you do, go where you go. If one of you is caught, all of you are dead. But sometimes, your orders have you following along on a team’s mission, using your skills to help them complete their mission. And more often than not, you have your own tasks to go along with their mission. Ones they don’t know about.
You know of the 141. Of course you do. Their captain, John Price, is one of the few men outside of your handlers that knows you exist. You don’t talk to him, can’t in the line of work you’re in. You’ve met him a handful of times before though, from other missions and past lives. Before you became who you are. He’s tried to persuade you out of your half-life, to join the 141. But you know their reputation. Missions always go catastrophically wrong. Any operator that does a joint mission with them ends up either betraying them, horrifically injured, or dying. And you don’t plan on betraying them… Not technically, at least. Price would probably have some strong opinions about your secondary orders, but he doesn’t need to know about those.
Your handlers won’t care about your concerns though. Orders are orders, and if you don’t follow yours, they'll put you down and send the orders to the next operative. So you get up, beginning to pack a duffel. As per usual, your orders are much of a sent and respond immediately type. No prior warning. No notice that you’ll be shipping out. More of a summons, than anything. It’s okay though. What other life could you have, being who you are? Your handlers know you’re expendable and they make sure you know it too. So with nothing else left to do, you leave, locking the door behind you and heading to the airport, not knowing if you’ll ever see your flat again. Not much to miss, honestly.
Your arrival at the tarmac doesn’t have much fanfare either. Most of the 141 has yet to arrive, but Price is there. Of course he is. The captain is leaning up against some supply crates that have yet to be loaded, smoking one of those cigars he always has. Because regular cigarettes just aren’t fancy enough. Prick. But you stroll over anyways, bag slung over one shoulder, hands in your pockets. Easygoing. Relaxed. Casual. Trying valiantly to pretend like you’re not in love with him. Because you’re not. You can’t be. You’re a living dead man, more of a ghost than the infamous Simon Riley. See, you? You were ‘killed in action’ almost seven years ago, and picked up by your current handlers. Thus began your new life. Your new life that John Price could never be a part of. No matter how badly you wanted him to be. But you’ve never made your own life easy, so you approach him, utterly cool, calm, and casual.
“You look like a damn oil baron, captain! What’s with the chops?” You call out to him as you walk up, idly thinking about rolling your eyes. He did not have that last time you saw him.
John jerks his head up, evidently startled. He’d been zoned out smoking, not noticing your arrival. He may have a captain’s instincts, but you’ve always managed to sneak up on him. He begins to grumble, but responds anyway. “I’ve had them. They’re distinguished. And I do not look like an oil baron.”
“You most definitely do. Combine that with the cigars, and it’s like you’re trying to emulate Winston Churchill.” You’re finally laughing. One of your favorite things to do before your ‘death’ and ultimate separation from him was to make fun of Price, to rule him up and get him as red as he is now. That, and watching him try to hold back the laugh from you making fun of him.
He reaches over, swatting you on the shoulder. “Just because you’re off on all your fancy secret missions nowadays doesn’t mean you’re any different than the boy who trained with me.” Because you two had trained together, a lifetime ago. Trained as boys, before fate took you down different paths. By the time the other members of the task force arrive, you had already received the briefing from Price and tucked yourself back into the plane. There was no reason to connect with them when after this mission ended, you’d be splitting off, going back to the solitude you held. They’re staring, his team. Staring at you, the stranger, sizing you up. Wondering who the outsider is. You know all about Price’s team. The 141 is a legend across the entire British military, and probably out of it too. Each member is a legend in their own right, but you don’t care. The mission comes first. The mission will always come first. The mission is all you are anymore.
The mission had been to raid a weapons factory and shut down the terrorist cell running it. You had been told to assist with that, so you did. The team just didn’t need to know about your other orders. Having split off from the team to ‘hunt down stragglers’, you’d gone down to the basement to exact your mission. A prisoner was being held here, and you’d been instructed to execute him. You’d found the man and executed him, just as instructed. A simple bullet to the head. He may have been pleading for his life, but you at least weren’t a monster. You wouldn’t torture him.
You’d been heading back to the team when it all went wrong. Because of fucking course it did. What had you said? What was the rule? ‘Missions always go catastrophically wrong. Any operator that does a joint mission with them ends up either betraying them, horrifically injured, or dying.’ The mission sure did fucking go wrong. You were pinned down by enemy fire, shots ringing down the cramped halls. Before this had started, you’d been jogging up to exfil when you’d surprised the last few stragglers escaping. So now you were hiding in an alcove, exchanging fire with at least five men from the terrorist group. Bullets are pinging off the walls, ricocheting like mad. Of course, because things can’t go any more wrong, one lucky shot had taken out your radio. So comms were dead, and you couldn’t reach anyone. Maybe you really would die down here this time. There would be a body to go along with the grave, left back somewhere in Hereford, forever marking you as almost a decade younger than you really were.
It was alright, though. You’d survived so much you never thought you’d live through. Dying now was okay, you suppose. It had been borrowed time all along. So why does the thought of dying make you so angry? Not like this. Not stuck in a basement, loaned out to task force 141. Not when John Price is the mission leader. Not when John Price would blame himself till his death bed, carry your name around his neck like a stone with all the others. That’s a surprising thought, and a distraction. And in this line of work, distractions are deadly. At least, that’s the last thought you have before the first bullet tears through your shoulder. The pain that flares from that is throbbing, and distracts you just enough for a second shot. The men you’re facing off against take advantage of the opportunity, rushing down the hall towards you. You’re quick to start shooting again, but you’ve been down here long enough that you’re low on ammo. And you were already outnumbered, so the last thing you remember before your vision going black is being surrounded. Surely that’s it. Surely, you won’t be waking up again.
But you do. You fucking do. You’re sore, stiff, can barely move, mouth drier than a desert. Your eyes are heavy, crusted with sleep and weariness. The light over you is bright, half blinding, so you let your eyes slide shut while you take stock of the situation. You’re laying on a thin mattress, a blanket, or some sheet covering your body. The light had been blinding, sterile and white. There’s a few different steady beeps sounding around you, and the whir and hum of machinery.
You’re in a hospital. That doesn’t make sense. Why would you be in a hospital? Why would your captors give you medical treatment this thorough? And what is the weight on your leg? Opening your eyes again, you groan at the light. Who put a miniature sun on the ceiling? As you make noise, the weight on your leg lightens suddenly. A voice greets you, one you know damn well. New, far more pressing question. Why the fuck is John Price here?
When you don’t respond to him, he repeats himself. “How are you?”
You, ever so sociable, just grumble.
“Answer me.” He’s using his captain voice on you. Ordering you to listen. Ordering you to obey.
What gives him that right? “Answer me? Answer me? John, you have no goddamn right, how are you even here? Where is here?” You’re snapping, yeah, but you don’t give a fuck.
Since you can actually see him now, you see his face go red, eye twitching. “Shut up, soldier. Report your condition.”
You don’t take orders from him, and you choose to display this by picking a cup up from your side table and throwing it at him. At least, you try to. Your hands shake too much, and you can’t even grip it. What the fuck?
As per usual, John has all the answers. He’s still fuming red and snapping at you, but spits out one truly damning sentence, and just keeps going. “It’s been a month, soldier. You have been unconscious for a month. So out with it. What is your condition?”
You’re stunned into silence for a minute, but the shock takes over and gets you responding. “Fine. Sore, but not too bad. A little stiff. Can feel all the different parts. Solid six out of ten.”
John nods at you, and stands up. With a quick step, he’s next to you, holding out the cup of water. “Here. Your mouth must be dry.”
The conversation died after that, with you two just staring at each other. Hours must pass like that, sitting in silence. He’s still fuming, but he is here. After a month of you being in a coma, according to him. Finally, you snap, unable to take it anymore. “What are you doing here? I’m not a member of your team. Just because we trained together doesn’t mean you have to stay.” Your defenses are up, and yes you’re being cruel, but it’s true. He doesn’t have to be. Why would he stay? What force of the universe did you piss off so bad that they’re laughing at you now by taunting you with John Price? Holding the one man you want so badly but can never have right in front of you.
You’re faced with those dauntingly blue eyes as he just stares. Price has never been an easy man to read, and he’s certainly not being clear right now. You can see the expressions flickering across his face though, turmoil, anger, distress. So many thoughts, so much going through his head. You’re about to speak when he starts talking, tone gruff and weary. “I’m here because you died. When you didn’t show up to exfil, we went back for you. You died on the way to medical, and you died again on the table.” You try to interject but he just keeps going. “I’m here because I don’t want that to happen again. We trained together. We were friends. If you keep going like you are, you’ll die. You’ll be alone again, and something will happen, and you will die. I don’t want that to happen.”
Utterly taken aback, you start to sputter a response, but ever so used to giving orders as he is, John steamrolls over you, issuing an offer like an order, like an ultimatum. “Join the 141. You don’t have to be alone anymore.”
His words awaken something in you, the desire for home, a team, a life. But you can’t have that. Feeling the burn in your throat, like you’re a child being scolded, you look down at your hands. Bandaged, wrapped, held tight in your lap. “I can’t.”
“And why the hell not? It’s your choice. Put in transfer papers. You shouldn’t be alone.”
“I can’t! You don’t get it. It’s above your clearance.”
John’s face somehow gets redder at that. “Clearance? That’s the excuse you’re using?”
“Excuse?” Your voice raises, and you can hear the machine tracking your heart rate beeping faster as it increases. “Get out! Get out! How dare you!” And John does listen to that, storming towards the door. It slams behind him, leaving you alone in the silence. Alone again.
A week passes like that. You get no visitors, save for one of your handlers visiting to drop off a supply bag for you. Otherwise, you sit alone and in utter silence. You’re prepared to wait until you’re discharged and receive your next orders. They did show up. A text had pinged in, instructing you to be at an airfield in 72 hours for an intel drop. A new mission already. So you just wait. Wait in silence. The fight with John probably burned all the bridges with him. At least, that’s what you think until the door to your hospital room swings open and John stomps in.
He sits by your hospital bed, and you wait. You two have known each other for years, and John has always been a stubborn bastard. One that you love, but a stubborn bastard nonetheless. And finally he speaks. “I don’t want you to be alone again. I want you to stay…” He looks down, carefully avoiding your gaze. “I need you to stay.”
His voice is so fucking tired. Weary. Lower and sadder than you’ve ever heard John before. So you ask him the one question you’ve always wanted to ask. The one you’ve never gotten to ask. The question that burns in your mind every time you two see each other, that builds in your throat every time you’re parted. One question. One word. One, single, damning word.
“Why?”
You can see it, the moment the question pierces his armor. John’s face crumbles, and the raw, shattered vulnerability that appears in his expression almost has you retracting the question out of sheer guilt. But you don’t, because he starts talking. “Because I love you. It took me a long time to come to terms with it but I do, and I already watched you die, and I can’t do that again. Because if you die on one of your solo ops I’ll never actually know. You’ll disappear and I won’t know whether or not you’re alive or dead. So please, fuck, just join the 141. Come with us. Don’t be alone. You’re not an army, no matter how much you like to think it.”
Your heart breaks. You can actually feel it shattering. Of course he does. Of course, the chance for everything you want is being laid right in front of you and you can’t take it. So you look away too, able to bare your heart or bear the weight of his eyes, but not both. Never both. “I love you too.” Your voice is raspy, and you can almost feel the hope that fills the air, the hope that you have to shoot down. “But I can’t. You know I can’t. We can’t do that. There aren’t happy endings for people like us, John. You don’t want to watch me die? I don’t want to watch you die. But in this line of work, it’s going to happen. You and I both know that if we could walk away, he would have done it already. Death in the line of fire is the only option for us, so no, we can’t do that. I want it too, but we can’t.”
His voice cracks, and you break. But he can’t disagree with you. You know you’re right, and John knows you’re right. Death is the only ending either of you have. There’s no retirement for men like you two, men with blood soaking their hands, who leave nothing but bodies in their wake. Men who do things that the average person would vomit to even think about. For men like you two, what John is talking about isn’t possible. It won’t ever be possible. But still, he speaks. Pleads.
“Stay. We don’t have to be anything. Just stay.”
“I have my next mission already, John. You know I can’t stay. Don’t ask me that.” You can feel yourself breaking as you say no, reject everything you could ever want, turn away from the one man that’s held half your soul since the first day you met him in basic. Two scrawny teenage brats you’d been, turned into men stained by war, broken by death. You turn away, shattering both of you in the process, because you know. You know this is the better choice. The safer option. You never get to keep anything good. You turn away, because there are no happy endings for men like you two. You turn away, but you listen as he stands, as his footsteps retreat, as the other half of your very self walks away without another word, because he knows too. He knows men like you two don’t get to be happy. So he leaves. And three days after John leaves you, you leave too. Once again, you’re alone, standing on a tarmac and waiting for a plane, because men like you and John don’t get to be happy.