New allies or new enemies (fools, all of them) assume when interacting with the 141 that Ghost is the unit’s attack dog. And those that get close enough to start reading into their team dynamic often assume that one Soap MacTavish must hold the leash, despite their difference in rank. After all, the Sergeant is the only one who seems to ever get close to the hulking Ghost, more monster than man. They assume this because they think someone has to. After all, a beast can’t keep himself on the lead.
But what they could never anticipate with their little pea brains is this - Ghost is in complete control. Sure, he postures, and he wears his mask, meant to ward off anyone who would even think of getting close. But the mask is as much of a target as it is a tool for his isolation. For every 10 men who steer clear, there’s one who picks a fight just cause he’s the biggest, scariest guy they’ve ever seen. And so he honestly has learned to keep his cool. To turn the other cheek. To know when it’s important to fight, and when it’s better to just let posturing idiots be posturing idiots.
Soap, however.
He’s young, and he’s strong, and he has a painfully endearing golden-retriever sense of justice. He has no idea how to back down when the fight isn't worth it, to him it's always worth it.
And the only one who he'll listen to, the only person on the planet who can call off his bite is Ghost. When Soap bristles at some rando bothering a girl in a bar, ready to start swinging, it's Ghost that steps in with a cool word instead, stopping the fight before it starts. It’s Ghost who puts a hand on Soap’s back when he can feel him tense, teeth barred, it’s Ghost who calls Soap back to the present with a quiet hey, not now. And miraculously, Soap listens.
He holds the lead. He always has.
And when people underestimate them, when they’re unprepared for Ghost’s patience and even less prepared for Soap’s bite, they feel the wrath of Ghost’s attack dog, let loose.
Ghost likes that he can call Johnny back in, but he likes letting him free even more.
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Damn imagine that episode from john’s perspective. just vibing waiting for Arthur to wake up so they can go find his mason dad-in-law, and then all of a sudden Arthur gets up? and starts walking? and so john asks him what the fuck he’s doing, as is his right as the seeing-eye brain passenger, but arthur doesn’t respond? and then he walks to the ladder??? and john’s like oh okay maybe we’re gonna get a midnight snack I do enjoy a midnight bowl of cereal and then Arthur just fuckin. Falls. Straight down. Doesn’t even touch the ladder. Just smack on the floor below. And listen. Arthur is clumsy as shit, but you’d think he’d be better than this, surely. But before John even PROCESSES that, arthur walks to the door they were EXPLICITLY told to leave closed, and he just. Opens it. Waltzes on in. And what the fuck there’s a woman just tied up in here??? And now Arthur is walking up to her???? And ope okay now Arthur’s untying this woman. Cool. Super cool night they’re having. And then FINALLY arthur fucking TALKS to him and john waits for arthur to perhaps explain himself but he immediately makes it clear that he has no clue what the fuck is going on. And now john has to explain that yes, arthur. You threw yourself down a ladder and proceeded to untite the eldritch monstrosity living in this nice old lady’s house. Excellent work. Now we have to deal with this I guess. God forbid we get a single night’s sleep.
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Nora: You remember the Cabots and that affair with Emogene we helped out with?
Danse: Uhm, no. You took Nick and left me at home staring into the middle distance. After what we've been through you didn't have to sideline me like that.
Nora: Okay we are NOT going to dig into this ancient history right now, Danse.
Danse: Was it a social anxiety thing? Did... did I smell? I mean you only took one of us at a time.
Hancock: Some sad violin music coming from somewhere...
Nora: Can we not do this right now?
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I've said this before and I'll say it again but I'm menstruating and emotional today and actually have the words because @spurious and I have been talking about it--the reason why mcshep is the pairing of all time for me, personally, is this:
Rodney fundamentally believes the best he will ever get is to be tolerated. That if he suppresses his personality for long enough and does the right combination of Tasks, some woman will decide hes not so bad and settle for him. It doesn't matter if he wants her back, being tolerated is enough, and all he deserves.
His sister clearly reinforces this when she asks him about proposing to Katie Brown, which makes me think this was something his parents said as well.
JEANNIE: You think you're gonna find someone better?
McKAY: No, it's not that.
JEANNIE (laughing): ‘Cause you're not!
McKAY: Hang on …
JEANNIE: The fact that you found a nice girl who's willing to put up with all your many little flaws is a miracle.
He thinks it's a miracle, to be tolerated. "You're no John Sheppard," Jeannie reminds him. You can't have anyone in the world like your best friend (who he's painted, to her, as someone who can have anyone in the world). It has NEVER occurred to him that he could be wanted, or desired, for who he is. Only tolerated.
Rodney proposes to Katie Brown shortly after this likely because his sister reminded him the best he could hope for is a nice girl who tolerates him, and he was like I need to lock this down.
THEN, MEANWHILE. John Sheppard, who wants Rodney so badly. Not suppressed or polished or Best Behavior Rodney, either, but Real, Messy, Selfish, Arrogant, Prickly, Unmasked Rodney. John is, without a doubt, the person Rodney is most unabashedly himself in front of, the person who has repeatedly seen him at his worst, the person with which he totally allows his guard to drop, the person he spends his leisure time with. John has seen him, in whole, and wants him. Desires him powerfully and self destructively and all-consumingly with no hope for reciprocity for literal years.
For someone who believes he is fundamentally unlovable and only tolerable and has never even considered desire as a component in his lonely future--to have the person who knows him best (and a person he grudgingly but profoundly admires and loves and thinks is, for some reason, the Platonic Ideal of manhood and also coincidentally so handsome he could have anyone in the world he wanted) WANT him like that...it just!!! they're so romantic to me
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slowly parsing through all my feelings and thoughts about the ending and it's like. silver can accuse flint of waging his war out of rage and because he has nothing to lose, but that doesn't necessarily make it true. in fact it's actually so wild how flint, ultimately, is one of the only characters who keeps hold up such an unflinching, stubborn, white-knuckled hope. that there can be a better world and that it is worth fighting for. it's the one thing, no matter how much silver has become (like) him that he never understood, neither from flint nor from madi, who is one if not the only other character this applies to as well, although it's obviously different for her.
and then just. how flint got it from thomas and miranda, the two people silver keeps comparing himself to while not getting that yes, their loss made flint the way he is, but their love and loving them made him who he is just as much. "I don't think he would want me to." and silver doesn't get it. he loves them both but he entirely fails to understand them. at his core he is still selfish, it just means that now, it manifests in not wanting to lose them - madi especially - to this war, and so he will betray her/them if that means he doesn't have to see her/them dead (it's obviously a bit more complicated with flint, but even if he did kill him, he would probably twist it in his head as a kind of 'saving,' babygirl be delustional enough). he got so much from flint, except for the most important part, the one thing that kept flint afloat for all this time. something something hope is an action, it's bruised knuckles and bared teeth and keeping going despite despite despite. god.
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