notjustaface | Calm Before the Storm

Calm Before the Storm

They're alive.

Some how, they're alive. They flew a fucking tank and they're alive in an abandoned cottage outside of Berlin.

The house crackles with their energy, but nobody's feeling it more than Murdock - clearly, he's about halfway off the rails.

"Boss, I'm gonna talk him down." Face offers, nodding to where Murdock was turning giddy circles around the living room, loudly describing the whole experience to BA again.

At first, the colonel doesn't respond, but then he nods slowly and says; "Keep his head on straight, we've got a big day tomorrow."

He nods quick acceptance - understanding the unspoken threat loud and clear, don't break him. "Come on, Murdock... time to get some shut eye." He claps his friend on the shoulder, the first honest to god close contact they've had in six months. "Let's get some rest."

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The smile is easy, the sensation... not quite so much.

"I did what I do." He replies calmly. "I pulled some strings... you know; tanning salon, massages, pulling for early parole."

He shrugs with a low sigh; "Just a waiting point between Baghdad and Berlin."

Smooth, man. Very smooth.

"You really were tryin' to fix things."

He has his ways. He might not always like them, but it gets him what he wants.

Face nods slowly against him, lowering his eyes as he quietly admits; "Even had a job lined up at the Army hospital so I could keep an eye on you."

He's quiet for a while, taking in the implications of this before speaking again.

"You know what I think?"

He doesn't wait for a response.

"I think we need to go kick some ass and get those plates back so we can get started on that plan of yours."

The soft grin curling Murdock's lips almost has him believing for a minute that it just might happen... but things don't ever work out that way.

And would they even be happy like that?

"Definitely kicking ass..." he brushes his lips against Murdock's cheek, catching the rasp of new stubble. "We'll see how it goes from there."

He senses the doubt creeping in and quells it with a kiss. Happiness isn't an endpoint, it something to work on.

"I can live with that."

And if he keeps getting kisses like that, Face is gonna end up on a whole other track he's missed sorely.

"So, I gotta ask... how many hot crazy chicks did you sleep while I was locked up?" He grins, meaning it well... honest.

Murdock just gives him an exasperated look.

"Really? That's where you wanna go with this?"

"What?" He replies innocently enough, his lips stretching to a self-preservation grin.

"Come on, you can't tell me you lived like a priest out here."

"I lived like a mental patient," he snaps, mostly without malice. "By the time I was with it enough to care I was pretty much flyin' solo, if you get my drift."

Malice or no, it's enough to make to it pretty clear he's definitely not make things any easier.

"Sorry, man... I just..." He lets a nervous sound that may have once been a laugh slip just quick enough to say; "I don't know anything about what it was like there."

He shrugs.

"Not sure what you want me to say."

"Did they treat you all right?" He asks quietly, letting himself deal with the things he thought about, things he wrote about in letters that got burned well before they could be sent.

"I mean, they didn't dope you up and fry your brain or anything, right?"

"Hmm. No more than necessary."

He's curled up now, in an unconscious gesture of self-protection.

"I mean I was kinda out of it for the first month or so..." He makes a wavey kind of so-so gesture with his hand. "But that was more from the stress than anything."

Almost on reflex, Face shifts to follow the curl - holding him a little tighter.

Awkwardly, he holds up his right fist where new scars give away where he'd beaten the wall until he couldn't anymore.

"I think we all had it hard. Hell, BA found pacifism."

"Now there's a sentence I never thought I'd hear."

He takes Face's hand and kisses his knuckles.

"This's what happens when no one's there to tell you stop."

He half-shrugs, "I couldn't figure things out until I had a way to stop thinking about how much it hurt to get burned like that and lose everything."

It's more true than he'll ever admit. He couldn't figure anything out, even things he thought he had.

"Shouldn't do that to yourself."

Everyone has their own ways of coping.

"There's a lot of things I should do..." he sighs against Murdock's ear, "hasn't stopped me yet."

It's easy to let a quiet moment fall between them, and he's nearly lulled to sleep after the high he's been riding since Hannibal snatched him when he murmurs; "Just glad we're all together."

"I know," he remarks. There's a lot of ways to take that statement.

"I'm really glad too."

The family unit is back together again.

As dysfunctional as they are, it fits right.

"I'm gonna kill the son-of-a-bitch that did this."

He means it too, as soon as Hannibal opened the stream of information, it had him biting at the bit. Someone was gonna pay.

"We'll get him."

He doesn't really have an opinion on the killing part - they're gonna need evidence to clear their names, at the very least - but the guy's gonna pay, no two ways about it.

"Damn right we will," he mutters, kissing him again almost triumphantly.

"And I'll be damned if anyone's gonna separate us again."

He returns the embrace with gusto, trailing fervent kisses down his neck.

"You promise?"

He lets out an audible groan when Murdock's lips catch his collar bone, mmm - he'd missed that too.

"Mmmhmm, promise." He groans; "Need this."

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