wibixthecowboy

[wibixthecowboy]

Play the Song: Chapter 13: Sweet like Candy

Task Force 141 needs a new sniper and despite their complaints, they're assigned Flash, a joke-making, ABBA-listening, 20-year-old sharpshooter with better aim than the whole team combined. In other words, Ghost is practically handed the love of his life but he needs time to adjust because she's a firecracker.

Warnings/Tags: !graphic depictions of panic attacks!, references to suicide attempts (no descriptions), references to SA (no descriptions), Age gap (20/30-32), gore, descriptions of injury/blood/wounds, justified angst, tooth rotting fluff, slow burn, protective ghost, family dynamic, big brother soap has an attitude problem, father figure Price, wholesome brother Gaz, touch starved Ghost, eventual smut, praise, choking, thigh riding, unprotected (wrap it up people), size kink, oral f receiving, ghost will do anything to get his dick sucked, idk I’m sure it will get dirtier as I go, shifting POV  

A/N: Holy Fuck. Excuse my language but jesus. That last quarter literally gutted me. BUT I PERSIST. Here is what I think is the longest chapter by far? idk I haven't checked. Thank you for sticking around for so long. Smooches for everyone, enjoy! Also! I know the chapter links are broken :( , I'll fix them asap!

Words: 7.8k

Side note: All of these characters are fictional! Please don’t be weird about their real life actors, leave them out of this and be respectful!

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

@urfavsunkissedleo@butskii@abbiesxox@itsasecrets-things@thatonewriterthatnooneknows@copiasratscheese​ @Sheviro-blog @Simonsslvt

★Flash

Dust swirls up into a small cloud, forced into motion by Flash's incessant kicking. It travels a few feet before dissipating into the bitter morning wind. She shivers again in the thin cotton of her pajama shirt and sweats and debates going back in. Debates sliding the small phone back into her pocket, shoving off the single stair in front of the base doors, and throwing herself back into her sheets. They'd be cold by now, it's been nearly an hour since she'd tossed back her blanket, dug the phone out of her duffel bag, and sat herself down outside to call her sister. Well, attempt to call her sister. It's been over five years since they'd last talked, when she'd stuck fifteen-year-old Flash on a transit bus to Arizona with a small backpack of keepsakes and photocopies of her registration papers for the Safford Advanced Military Academy. She’d sent a few letters, from the cramped desk in her first dorm but had never gotten any back. The constant schoolwork was a good distraction but it still stung.

Filling her lungs to a near painful capacity, Flash double checks the faded sticky note her sister had slipped into her pocket so many years ago and then the glowing numbers on her phone before shutting her eyes and jamming her thumb into the call button. Flash's breath is stuck in her throat, stilled in anticipation almost as if its waiting alongside her as the phone rings. Much to her surprise, she picks up by the fourth ring.

"Hello?"

She sticks her head between her knees, absolutely convinced last nights dinner is about to come up but after a few breaths her vision clears and she answers in a rush of air.

"Sarah?"

"Who is this?"

Flash tries to swallow back the disappointment building in her stomach and then,

"Grace? Is that you?"

The dinner does come up now and she barely manages to make it to the sad cluster of shrubs before the sting of bile burns up her throat. The world caves beneath her, sucking her chest through the souls of her feet. It ricochets through her brain, slamming hard at each turn. Grace Grace Grace. She gags again, wiping her mouth on the cold skin of her forearm. 

"Hi." She manages, the sound of her voice echoes between her ears. "Yes its me."

"Are you okay- did you just throw up?" Her sister's voice is calm as always, despite not hearing it for several years, the cooling affect is just the same. Sarah was- is the personification of winter. Cold, calm, and biting if you stayed with it for too long. But she's the only person who's ever been there every time Flash really needed her.

"Yeah, I uh," a burning gasp breaks her words and she realizes she hasn't been breathing. "I don't know I think I ate something funny."

"Okay." There's an awkward pause and when Sarah realizes Flash isn't going to say anything she continues. "Did you need something?"

It's at this moment that Flash remembers why she hadn't ever called. Sarah was an expert at talking people off a ledge. Every time Flash got into a fight, Sarah was able to smooth things over with a carefully plated store-bought box of cookies and a sweet smiled promise. But when it came to dealing with Flash and her inferno of a temper, Sarah chose to sit on the sidelines and watch as Flash burnt herself over and over. If it wasn't causing harm to others, Sarah didn't bother. But years of burning herself meant Flash had developed calluses. 

"Is Taryn there?" The words are bitter, whether from the bile souring her mouth or the stinging disappointment, she doesn’t know.

Taryn was Sarah's on-and-off girlfriend and the only woman in Flash's life that gave her the softness she so desperately craved. If Sarah was winter, Taryn was Spring. On the days she came over, windows were opened, wildflowers were picked, neatly arranged in vases, and dinner was always something with potatoes. Taryn had made their small two-bedroom crash pad into a home. How Taryn and her sister had made it work was beyond her.

"Um- yeah, she's here. One second."

There's a rustling as Sarah drops the phone from her ear and then a murmuring of voices, even through the lowered phone she can hear the way Sarah's voice softens as she speaks to Taryn. She'd never spoken to Flash that way.  

"Gracie?"

"Hello?" Flash's response comes out broken and half-whispered and with all the heavy emotion that she’d secretly hoped she’d feel when speaking with her sister. 

"Gracie! Hi!" Taryn's sweet honey voice pours from the speaker, still soft from sleep and the tears building behind Flash's eyes begin to burn. "How are you, sweetheart? It's been forever."

"Good- good. I've been good." She presses her knuckles against her eyes until colors bloom against the backs of her eyelids, unshed tears wetting her fingers. "I just had a question."

"Oh?" There's another round of rustling and Flash can picture her sitting up in bed, blindly grabbing at her side table before fixing the round pair of tortoiseshell glasses she wore over blinking eyes. 

"And what's your question?"

"When you met Sarah," Flash rubs a hand roughly down her face before glancing around, "how did you know?"

"How did I know what?" Taryn's interest has clearly been piqued.

"You know." She hesitates before sighing and feeling five years younger, mutters, "That you liked her."

"It took having a crush for you to finally call me?"

"I don't know, maybe?" There’s another silence, but unlike with Sarah, Flash know’s it’s Taryn waiting patiently for her to find the words that sometimes tangled themselves when making the journey from brain to tongue. "Yes. I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize honey. I'm glad you did, it's nice to hear your voice." Then she continues on, like it hasn’t been five years, and when she closes her eyes, Flash can see the pink sundress Taryn had worn the last time she’d seen her. The hem had been stained burgandy the week before by Flash’s impatient blackberry painted fingers. "It was kind of love at first sight.”

Flash, either in a desperate attempt to hear to a story not about the plight of terrorists, or simply because Taryn’s voice made the world brighter, listened to her whole story. How when Taryn had met Sarah, she’d been enthralled, and even more so when Flash had threatened to break her arm if Taryn broke Sarah’s heart. How she’d so quickly decided that Sarah was the one for her despite Sarah’s supposed lack of interest and to both Flash and Taryns dismay, her complete and utter denial of being at least bisexual. 

Another kick sends more dirt floating along the breeze and Flash struggles to find a way to ask for advice. ‘I’m actually talking about my lieutenant.’ ‘Oh, you didn’t know? I’m not fifteen anymore, I’ve actually killed several people.’ ‘Anyways, I want to fuck the life out of him but when I touch him he looks like he’s either going to piss his pants or bend me over the counter.’ or maybe just ‘How do I get over the deeply rooted fear of love that my dead father and might-as-well-be-dead sister instilled in me at a young age?’. She’s debating rephrasing the last one when a sharp cry cuts through Taryn’s retelling of her and Sarah’s first date. 

“Is that a baby?” Flash’s voice is sharper than she meant it to be. “Do you have-”

She’s cut off by a fake laugh and a breathily muttered ‘no’. Taryn never cut her off.

“No don’t be silly.” Another nervous laugh. “I have to go, Sarah needs me. But do call again! Let me give you my number so you can call my cell next time.” 

Flash listens numbly as she prattles off a long list of numbers, more focused on the static noise around her words. Waiting to hear another cry. When it doesn’t come Flash just shakes her head and tunes back in just in time to hear Taryn mutter another ‘goodbye’ and the quiet buzz of a dead line.

She blinks a few times, simultaneously overwhelmed and underwhelmed by the call. And then the last few sentences Taryn had left her with slowly start to trickle to the front of her mind. In a rush, Flash flies through the front doors of the base, nearly dropping her phone in the process, grabs a pen from the table and scribbles the number along her forearm, hoping to god she’d remembered it correctly. Hoping she could survive another icily quipped sentence from her sister if not. 

Its then, mouth still gross and breathily reciting Taryn’s number in a desperate attempt to recall the sequence, that the sound of footsteps pulls her attention to the hallway. It’s the team, minus Price who’d left an hour earlier, and only gave Flash a fleeting worried look and a head shake as he passed her on the front steps, to get a headstart in traveling Alejandro’s farmhouse. 

Soap leads the group, hands tucked neatly into the front of his cargo pants. Behind him, Gaz is nearly identical in both stature and clothing, but unlike Soap, his hands fall confidently at his sides. Ghost, seemingly the odd one out, trails a few feet behind, dressed sharply as usual, but there are two distinct purple smudges under his eyes. They pass through the poorly crafted living room before each settling in their respective spots at the table, like an aged high school clique. She’s about to make a remark on this when Soap raises a brow at her. 

“And what are you doin’ lookin’ like that?” His hand waves up and down her body, at it hunched over the table. “We leave in like-” He glances down at his watch, “An hour?”

Ghost sits down heavily in the chair across from her and his eyes almost immediately fall to the messy set of numbers scrawled on her skin. His dark gaze narrows just the slightest bit and Flash can already see him jumping to conclusions. 

“I called my sister.” She blurts out, both to answer Soap and to stop whatever train of thought is starting in Ghost’s head. She’s not sure why she feels the need to defend herself. The three men sitting around her freeze, stopping their respective tasks to listen. “I uh- yeah.” 

“How did it go?” Gaz asks smoothly when the silence has stretched just a few seconds too long. “I didn’t know you had a sister.” 

He slides into the seat next to her, leaning on his arm and giving her just a tad too much concentration. It was times like these when Flash wondered if Gaz operated a black market of gossip, too eager and always asking the right questions. 

“We don’t talk.” Flash’s eyes flick up to see Ghost watching her warily. “Not for five years at least.” 

Gaz raises his brows but doesn’t say anything, just pitches his mouth down in the corner, enough that Flash know’s he’s no longer fishing for details. Part of her wonders just how much he knows.  

She looks across the table at Soap, sitting silent in his chair, picking at his nails, and suddenly becomes aware of the space left between him and Ghost. Now, after hearing Soaps late night confession the day before, the signs are obvious, like Soap has the words ‘I fucked my superior and now we don’t talk about it’ scrawled across his forehead in bright red pen. She clears her throat, 

“It was fine, I just called for-” She hesitates, still not quite sure why she’s telling them this. Maybe Taryn’s sweet tongued optimism rubbed off on her too much. “I just needed some sister advice.” Flash finishes with a shrug, hoping the burn on her cheeks isn’t too obvious. 

“I get that.” Soap starts, and Flash almost jumps at his voice, deep and raspy from sleep. “I’ve got my own sister. She can be annoyin’ as shit but she’s got some good advice.” 

“And what are you getting advice for.” Gaz teases, “You haven’t had game for the last year.” His words falter at the end and Flash doesn’t need any explanation to know he’s talking about Ghost and Soap’s relationship, or whatever the hell Soap had called it. In a quick attempt to smooth things over, she looks expectantly across to Ghost. 

“No. No siblings.” He says, and Flash watches the way his eyes fall to the worn table in front of him.  

“That's too bad.” Flash says, kicking him lightly under the table, “They’re a pain in the ass anyways.” This time, when he glances back up, she smiles at him with her teeth, remembering the way he’d so carefully parted her lips in the bathroom the night before. Something in his gaze shifts and his mouth moves under his mask, pulling up at the corners. But before she can see the full thing, he’s standing and moving towards the kitchen. Glassware clinks around, he pulls one of the bowls from the cupboard and stands at the sink, waiting awkwardly. She catches on a moment later and sits up.

“I’ll go back to my room while you guys eat.” She says, trying not to let the gesture sting too badly. “I’ve got to pack for the trip anyways.” 

As soon as she turns her back, even though she know’s its impossible, the rustling of Ghost pulling off his balaclava echoes through the concrete room. Just incase she has a sudden loss of self control and turns to see him making his breakfast unmasked, Flash speeds up her pace and practically throws herself through her door. 

Leaning against the foot of her bed is an empty duffel bag and next to it a small, half-filled laundry sack. In it are the clothes from that night. Just underwear, a tank top, and her favorite pair of cargo pants. All her other layers had either been torn or cut through. They’d been sent through the wash five times now, but every time she’d braved the task of opening the synched bag, a staggering fear grasped her so tightly that she would pull it shut and give it back to Price. He took it wordlessly every time and they would both pretend. Her muttering something about there still being blood and him nodding while sending it along with the rest of the laundry. Both of them knew the clothes were clean, practically washed thin, but she could smell the brine of the sea, the gory mess of the man as he splattered across her shirt without even opening the bag. 

So instead of kicking it to the side, or ignoring the sad, knowing look in Price’s eyes as she shoves the unopened sack into his hands again, she picks it up and sets it on the unmade sheets of her bed. Her hands shake violently and it almost makes her laugh, how they vibrate when the canvas whispers open.

On the top of the neatly folded pile is a small scrap of notebook paper. When she leans in closer, she can make out a single line of familiar scratchy handwriting ‘you’ve got this kiddo :)’. Tears burn behind her eyes as she picks the note up and sets it aside, reading it one more time before her eyes are too watery to see, and reaches into the bag to pull out the tank top. Her hands still shake, and the fold is done horribly, one strap sits higher up than the other making the whole thing a bit lopsided, but she finishes. The pants follow suit, folded neater this time. She picks them both up, along with the underwear, and shoves them into their respective drawers before leaning heavily against her dresser.

Taking a shaky breath, Flash turns to slide down the side of the solid wood, wedging herself between the wall and dresser she lets her head fall between her knees. There, away from the view of the laundry bag and clothes, she lets the adrenaline drain down her limbs and through her fingertips that rest on the cold floor. It shakes her body and looses a few broken sobs, but she’s alive and the clothes are folded. 

★Ghost

He waits outside of Flash’s door, hand half raised, fingers curled in a fist to knock. Soap had sent him to give her a thirty-minute warning which would now end up being a twenty-five minute warning. Shaking his hand out one more time, he raises his fist, and right as he's about to knock, the door swings open.

Flash stands in front of him, looking down at the duffel bag in her hand. She jerks back when she sees him. Just for a moment, in the few seconds, it takes for her to recover and slide back on her happy-go-lucky smile, he can see the crease at her brow and a small frown tugging the soft shape of her lips down.  

“You ready?” She asks, and Ghost nearly forgets that she is the one they’re waiting on. 

“Yeah.” He starts, and all the confidence he had built, all the words he’d carefully laid out for hours the night before wash away at the sight of her. “We uh- Gaz took the Jeep.” Flash nods for him to continue, and he does after another deep breath. “You, me, and Soap will be taking the truck with the rest of the equipment.” 

Flash watches him carefully, eyes flicking over every inch of skin his mask leaves uncovered. It’s this hungry gaze of hers, the one that scares the shit out of him, that she gives him before responding. Completely ignoring his words. 

“You didn’t sleep?” She says but doesn’t wait for him to answer. “Me neither.”  

Flash shoves her bag into his hand and jogs towards the front door, already arguing with Soap about her “perfectly valid” license. He carries both their bags in one arm and decides that it's the weight of their bags that is slowing him down. Not the fact that Soap reaching the truck first meant he and Flash would be stuck in the back together, strapped to a single bench. He wanted to thank whatever officer had replaced the passenger seat with a now out-of-date comms system.

_____

An hour in, Flash’s cheek is pressed hard into the knuckles of her fist and a shiny patch of drool starting at the corner of her mouth. He both envies her sleep abilities and fears them. 

When his eyes drift back to the landscape outside the windshield, his gaze catches on Soap watching them through the rearview. He struggles to remember if the mirror used to be angled down that far or if Soap had intentionally moved it to watch them. 

“So things are getting pretty serious?” He asks, not taking his eyes off the poorly paved road in front of him. Although he says it jokingly, Ghost can see the underlying curiosity, maybe even a twinge of jealousy. 

“We’re not doing this right now Johnny.” Ghost grumbles, keeping his arms tight over his chest, as if they could create a barrier against Soap’s prying eyes. He knows better. Years of using little to no communication during deployment meant that learning each other's body language was critical, especially in cramped bunks. 

Soap just shakes his head, still not taking his eyes off the road. Ghost can practically watch the countdown until his next snarky remark. A slow scrunch of his brow, followed by a slight downturn of his mouth, before- right on the mark, Soap drags a rough hand down the left side of his face before finally speaking. 

“Has she seen you without your mask?” 

Ghost’s eyes snap to Soap’s, still waiting for biting words to follow, to snap at a tender spot only he knows how to find. Instead it’s something much, much, worse. 

“Just remember what happened last time.”

The words slither through the air between them, squeezing around his ribs before sliding down to stoke the coals of fear burning in his stomach. The cab of the truck is too small and suddenly the heat of Flash’s body pressed so close is so present in his mind that if he doesn’t back away he might just- stop. Stop.

“Pull over.” He mumbles, staring into the dead space between horizon and road. 

Soap obliges wordlessly, slowing the truck to a slow roll before stopping in a cloud of dust on the shoulder. Ghost steps out, stumbling over the edge of the pavement as he braces his hands against his knees and heaves great breaths of warm desert air. 

The sound of a door opening behind him has his shoulders raising to his ears, a poor imitation of hackles. 

“Stop!” He clears his throat before lowering his voice and trying again. “I’m fine. Get back in the truck.” 

But the sound of footsteps persists, light and barely audible, despite the thin layer of gravel coating the road and landscape around them. When he turns, Flash is standing behind him. Her face is pink with sleep, an impression of the seatbelt running from her mouth to her ear, and one side of her hair has been rubbed upward, making her braided hair lopsided. When her eyes fall on his hunched shoulders, the freckled bridge of her nose scrunches. 

“Whats going on?” She asks suddenly, growing more aware. “Are you getting sick?” 

When he doesn’t answer, she steps closer, resting a hand between his shoulder blades. Ghost can't help the low sound that pushes from his chest. She keeps it there, rubbing circles into the expanse between his shoulder blades. 

“It’s okay,” Flash starts, still soothing his hunched shoulders back down. “I get sick too, just on plane rides. I don’t know what it is.” She laughs once, bright and musical. “Maybe the forty thousand feet in the air bit.” 

Ghost’s breaths come easier now, in through his nose and streamlined from his pursed lips, the way his psychiatrist had shown him. The small pouch of his pills sit comfortingly in his breast pocket, but he lets them stay there. Finally, he turns to face Flash, reluctantly letting the warmth of her palm fall from his back. 

“Yeah.” The word comes out staticky, like when the comms are just a bit too far apart. “That part is pretty shitty.” He doesn’t know why he’s agreeing with her. He’s never once felt an ounce of fear flying on a plane. There’s no point when everything is already so far out of his control. But when her lips split and reveal an amused smile he understands why. 

“C’mon.” Flash grasps his hand, pulling him back towards the truck. He hadn’t realized just how far he’d stumbled. “I’m sure we have something in the truck for nausea.” 

Ghost just nods and follows her lead, sliding smoothly onto the bench of the truck and shutting the door behind him. Flash carefully slips her pinky finger around his, squeezing tightly. And that single act sends a rush of heat through his chest both pleasant and burning. She knew. She knew damn well he wasn’t car sick. Soap says nothing.

Instead of folding his hands underneath his arms like usual, Ghost lets them be. One gently grasping the safety handle, and the other tucked neatly under Flash’s tracing fingers. And does his best to ignore the eyes watching them from the mirror. 

★Flash

Flash, in a desperate attempt to get out of the truck, barely manages to let it stop before bursting out and jogging a few short laps around the vehicle. 

“Jesus kid.” Soap swears, stepping out of the cab and stretching his arms overhead. “Weren’t you just sleeping like-” a disbelieving glance at his wristwatch, “three minutes ago.” 

“Four fucking hours.” She bites as Ghost slides from the back. “That’s basically abuse.” 

In a desperate attempt to relieve the cramping behind her thighs, Flash bends forward, slipping her hands under her sneakers. A relieved moan splits her lips, muffled into the fabric of her pants. Careful not to go light-headed, she slowly straightens out before reaching her hands above her and pushing her chest out. It feels fucking amazing.

When she finishes and turns to the two guys behind her, she can’t help but laugh. Ghost’s face is turned away, eyes downcast in a way that promises Flash his cheeks are burning hot. Soap glances between the two of them before laughing loudly and stalking off toward the large building that, in Flash’s humble opinion, does not look anything like a farmhouse. If it weren’t for the large yellow barn nestled into the field next to it, the large concrete building would probably look like a prison. 

Flash is about to follow after Soap, both eager to get to the briefing, and much to her annoyance, nervous to see Alejandro and Valeria, when a gentle hand grasps her elbow. She turns to find Ghost, still hovering near the car, one hand held behind his back. 

“Whats up?” She asks, eyeing his hidden hand and taking a few curious steps towards him. 

“I uh-” Ghost stutters in a way that two days before would leave Flash shellshocked, but after seeing him so vulnerable the night before, she just nods for him to continue. “I have something for you.” 

“Ooh a gift?” Flash says, trying to peek around his body, but the bulk of his shoulders easily blocks her vision. 

“It’s nothing, really. Just something small. I didn’t think you had one and you were looking at it. Then there was that guy.” He rambles, ducking his head slightly. 

Flash has to squeeze her hands into fists to keep from grabbing his face and kissing him. Even through the mask would be better than nothing, but the few moments of silence that lapse between his rambles and her watching the way his hand endearingly fidgets at his belt helps her somewhat regain her self control. 

“If it’s important to you. It’s important to me.” She says softly and steps closer. “Now let me see.” 

He hesitates for one more second before pulling his hand from behind him and showing her a folded blue square in his hand. Flash’s heart stops for a moment and then starts back up so fast that she nearly passes out. It’s the cerulean scarf she’d seen at the market.

“Ghost-” Her voice catches as she reaches up and pulls the silk from his hand, mouth suddenly dry.

“I just thought it would help, the dust is bad and- I think I got the right one, the blue right-” 

He’s cut off with a huff as Flash throws herself against him. She wraps her arms around his chest squeezing hard. The rough velco of his vest scrapes her cheek, and something is pushing painfully against her ear, but she doesn’t let go. 

“Thank you.” She says quietly. 

The words, muffled into his chest, are barely audible. He doesn’t respond, but a few moments later, she feels a hand rest lightly against her shoulderblades. When she doesn’t let go, his other hand slides up, pulling her into him.  

“Let's head in,” Flash says, reluctantly pulling away and sliding her hand into his, before tugging him towards the "farmhouse". 

They make it just a few paces before he slides his hand from hers and takes two measured steps in front of her. Flash is about to question him, but leaning against the open door of the farmhouse is Alejandro, handsome as ever.

"We've been waiting." He nods to Ghost, shifting out of the doorway to let him pass. Flash watches him go with a confused glare. "Everything okay Rubia."

"Yeah," She breathes, brushing past him without looking at his face. "Everything's fine."

_____

Much to her disappointment. The briefing is not as entertaining as she’d thought it would be. Both Alejandro and Price would be making final decisions tonight. This briefing was only to go over the information they already knew. But she still listened diligently and took her notes at appropriate times. Alejandro didn’t do so much as glance in her direction as he spoke, both he and Valeria remained impassive during the meeting. It made Flash wonder how many of the people sitting around her had shared a bed with them. Her eyes land on Gaz, who seems to be a little too focused on Alejandro's hands as he retraces a path on one of the topograph maps. She glances over to Ghost, hoping to point his attention to Gaz and his drooling mouth, but he stays facing the front of the room. Even when she stares at him, practically burning holes into the back of his masked head, he doesn’t turn around. So when the lights shut off and the projector whirs to life, she grabs the pen resting next to his paper, making a point to doodle little hearts at the corner of her paper when he finally looks her way. Instead of shaking his head and laughing like he usually does in response to her minor thievery, he pulls another pen from his pocket and holds it in his hand. 

Annoyed at Ghost's sudden coldness and bored out of her mind, Flash turns to Gaz to whisper in his ear, 

“Do you think if you stare at his crotch enough, you’ll see through his pants?” 

His face goes bright red and a stuttered cough cuts off the briefing. 

“You okay Gaz?” Alejandro asks, raising a dark brow as Gaz hits his chest with a fist, still coughing.

“Yes, sir. Fine.” Gaz mutters. 

Alejandro continues on, using a meter stick to draw an invisible line down a projected image of a warehouse. 

Flash leans back to Gaz’s ear again, feeling malicious. “Is that what you call him in the bedroom? Sir?” 

This time Gaz chokes, coughing wildly as Flash bites back a smile and forces her brows to pinch in concern as she pats his back. 

She does get Ghost's attention this time, but much to her disappointment, yet again, it's just a small shake of his head. Flash glares pointedly back.

“What is going on. Are you sure you’re okay?” Alejandro asks again. 

“I’m going to go grab some water and air, I’ll be right back.” Gaz bites out between coughs. 

Flash lasts another two and a half minutes after he leaves before muttering something about checking on Gaz and wandering out of the room and down the hall. 

It’s here, with fists shoved deep into her pockets that she passes a set of double doors propped open to reveal a small training room. It's modest compared to the one back at their base. The back wall is decorated with an assortment of real and fake weapons and a thick green mat covers the stained cement. A bright red sign nailed to one of the doors threatens suspension to anyone who brings the weapons out of the confinements of the training room. She's about to walk by, wanting to slip out of the building and explore the barn. But her curiosity wins over and she hovers in the dim hallway.

Once Flash is there, watching the fighting pairs, she's surprised it took her so long to hear the grunting and unmistakable thud of bodies bouncing off worn foam. One of the men leaning against the back wall, who'd been intently watching a rather unfair match play out, starts towards her in a slow prowl. The challenge is clear, confidence leaks from him like a poison, and his eyes scan her body, lingering for a few seconds on her chest. She recognizes him from the meeting, but can't quite remember his name. Liam? Larson?

"Get er' Lucas!" One of the guys calls, following with a series of whooping howls. She sends him a withering glare and is about to stalk away to find Gaz when her drifting eyes catch on a brightly colored package peaking from Lucas' pocket. Maybe just one match and then she'd find him.

"What do you say Rubia? Just you and me?" He stops just a few feet from her, close enough that she can smell the sweat that sticks the front of his shirt to his muscled chest.

She has to bite back a laugh at the stuttered way Alejandro's pet name falls from his lips. A far cry from the other man's smoothness. It's not that Lucas isn't attractive, his body is well-shaped and thick dark hair falls into a pair of bright hazel eyes. If she wasn't so busy at the academy she might have even gone for a guy like him. But all she can think of is Ghost's kind eyes and if she's being honest, the shape of his ass in one of the heli harnesses. She doesn't have to see Lucas's backside to know it'll pale in comparison.

"I don't know." Flash looks him up and down, letting the boredom in her eyes shine. "You look a little," she waves one hand around as if it will pull the word from thin air "small."

Lucas flinches back, obviously not used to being rejected. 

"Then it should be quick, no?" His smile is back now, and just as flirty as before.

She relents, “Rules?” She prompts, stretching her shoulders and removing the belt from her waist, doing her best to ignore the pinch as her stitched skin pulls taught.

“Clean fight. First one to tap loses.” 

Flash nods and smiles widely, more than eager to move after sitting for the past five hours. Lucas smiles wide, almost looking feral with a pair of pointed canines.

She follows him to the mat and they square up, him guarding high over his jaw and her standing still, hands at her side. Someone behind them shouts a command and Lucas is lunging, striking hard and fast towards her exposed midsection. She easily sidesteps him, having seen the flex in his exposed calf muscle just a moment before. Childs play. 

Flash lets him lunge, easily dancing around his brutally thrown fists and elbows as he tires himself out. She can already tell he’s used to using his weight as an advantage rather than a tool. Much like every other man she’s fought.

After a particularly poorly timed left hook, Lucas lets out a frustrated growl. Taking pity on him, Flash sighs before darting towards him. In just under two seconds, she’s slipped her leg behind his knees and with one shove of her elbow has him sprawled on the mat, blinking widely. In another second, she’s locked her bicep over his neck and tightened her legs around his chest in a breath-squeezing grip. 

When he doesn’t stop squirming, her bicep tightens around his throat, "Tap." She orders, calm and unwavering. "You've already lost."

Nails scrape at her grip leaving angry red scratches against the back of her hand and wrist. She winces but doesn't relent. His gasping lips have turned pale and the veins at his forehead bulge against sweating skin. If he doesn't tap he'll pass out, she's sure of it. His fingers scratch at her hand again, but this time they’re fumbling and slow. The men surrounding her are shouting at him to fight back and Flash wonders if they're too ignorant to see that the lack of oxygen has left his limbs useless, or if they're just that dumb.

Just as his eyes start to roll back, there's a weak tap against her outer thigh. She immediately releases and Lucas scrambles back against the mat, shoving her to the side in the process, and hunches over, violently coughing between gags.

"What the fuck." He spits out, still curled into himself, red face inches above the dirty mat. "What the fuck is wrong with you."

Pushing herself to her feet, Flash stalks towards him and jabs a finger at his sweating glare. "What the fuck is wrong with you?" She wasn't about to let him make her feel guilty, he'd started it, she just saw it through.

Lucas just stares at her with bloodshot eyes and the room around them stays silent. Nosy Bastards.

"I'll tell you what's wrong with you." She continues, stepping forward to rub the dirty tread of her shoe against the white of his shirt before leaning down, their faces just inches apart. "You're too slow."

He says nothing, even as she reaches over and snatches the cellophane bag of sweets from his pocket.

_____

Happily picking through the bag of candy she’d so fairly won, Flash wanders the property kicking rocks and half-assedly looking for Gaz. Just before she's about to turn and head back, she stumbles upon a smell that she can only describe as animal.

When Flash stops in front of the open barn doors, her jaw drops. One of the biggest horses she’d ever seen stands before her, lazily chewing on a mouthful of hay. She has to crane her head upward to see the ginger mane falling in neat tendrils over a huge, muscled neck. It's as beautiful as it is terrifying.

The horse's nose is soft like plush velvet when she runs a single finger across it, and surprisingly warm. The deep chestnut of its eyes stays relaxed and half-lidded so she strokes it again, this time with her palm. When she does, warm puffs of air blow against her hand and she jumps back, heart racing. The horse seems to sense this and with its long, nimble legs, lowers itself to the ground, nestling into the dry hay bed at her feet. Following it down, Flash drops to her knees and sits back against her heels, feeling braver now that they’re nearly face to face. Well, face to muzzle.

“You aren’t so mean. Huh?” She speaks softly, pressing her palm between the dark, watchful eyes and feeling the warmth of its skin. “Are you a boy or a girl?”

“She’s a girl.”

Flash falls backward, feet slipping from under her in the slick hay when a deep voice calls out from behind her. But large hands are under her arms in seconds, pulling her up and to her feet.

Ghost stands in front of her now, mouth quirked into a small smile under the cotton of his mask. “That’s the second time I’ve had to keep you from knockin’ yourself out.” His hands linger, squeezing her biceps reassuringly before dropping to his sides. “How often does this happen when I’m not around?”

“I- what?” Flash’s heart still beats wildly in her chest, partially from nearly cracking her head off the paved ground, but mostly from the looming presence in front of her. “What?”

“She’s a girl.” Ghost continues, choosing not to repeat his question. “Maple I think. One of Alejandro’s first girls. She’s a sweetheart.” He steps closer to Flash and for a moment she thinks he’s about to grab her, but then he’s reaching past her to rest a hand on the patch of cream-colored fur her own had been resting against just minutes before. Maple's eyes close and she pushes against his hand, moving to nose his palm. Ghost responds by loosening each finger of his glove before pulling it off and tucking it in his waistband. Flash watches intently as he returns his hand to the spot and smooths it upwards, following the patch of cream between her eyes.

“Do you still have that candy?”

Ghost's voice snaps her back and with burning cheeks, she pulls the small plastic bag from her pocket, feeling a pinch of shame at being caught but called out. “How did you know?”

“One of the guys was complaining.” He starts before turning to look at her, his brow furrows slightly at the scratches covering the back of her hand and forearm, but it eases when he glances up at her face. “And your mouth is bright red.”

Handing the bag to him, Flash uses the back of her other hand to wipe at her lips but it’s no use. “Horses can have candy?” She asks, now scrubbing her mouth with the sleeve of her fleece.

Ghost responds by pulling one of the round, brightly colored candies and placing it on the flat of his bare palm before extending it to Maple.

“Some.” He speaks lowly and in a calming tone that Flash knows is for the horse's sake, but she can't help but melt all the same. Maple picks the candy up with the soft skin of her lips before crunching it between a powerful set of teeth. “This stuff is just dyed sugar. They sell it everywhere.”

Then he’s grabbing her hand, flattening her fingers with a gentle swipe before setting a purple one on her palm. It's only when he starts to move her arm towards Maple's giant mouth that she jerks back, closing the candy tight in her palm. It’s sticky and in just a few seconds starts to melt against the heat of her skin.

“Keep your hand flat.” His hand curls around her forearm to grasp her wrist. “I promise she won’t bite. Open.”

At his command, Flash opens her palm and with shaking fingers, lets him guide her arm outwards with his hand wrapped reassuringly around her wrist. At the last moment, Flash shuts her eyes tight, not wanting to see the grisly sight of her fingers being ground to a pulp. But she’s only met with Maple’s warm breath and the tickle of whiskers as her soft lips take the sticky candy from her hand. A nervous laugh bubbles up from her own mouth, a mix of relief and joy at the strange feeling.

“See,” Ghost's voice vibrates from a warm chest, nearly pressed against her back. His hand still grips her wrist, “I told you she wouldn’t bite.”

“I trust you.” Flash says to their hands, “I just don’t trust the horse.”

“Give her another. This time with your eyes open.” She doesn’t ask how he knew her eyes were closed.

With open eyes, Flash lets Ghost set another candy, a bright orange one, onto her palm. Her wrist, still encompassed by his gentle hand, moves on its own accord towards Maple’s brown muzzle. She takes it just as sweetly as before, in a soft kiss of whiskers.

Flash does laugh this time, a sweet laugh that has her falling back a step with the effort, right into Ghost.

When she turns to apologize, still laughing, the words die on her tongue. He stares down at her, eyes wide and burning with so much emotion her breath catches in her throat. His own breath comes shakily through his nose as he brings a hand up to tuck a stray curl behind her ear before dropping it back to his side.

“Do you want to ride her?” He whispers, still staring intently at her face.

“Fuck no.” Flash breathes. But she doesn’t stop him as he pulls a saddle off a post and begins to strap it to a now-standing Maple. She doesn’t stop him when he lifts her like a rag doll and places her in the saddle, or when he gracefully swings himself up to sit behind her. And she doesn’t stop him when he reaches around her to hold the brown leather reins and guide them out and onto a dirt trail. She could have, but she doesn’t.

She’d severely underestimated the proximity that riding a horse with someone requires. Every inch of their bodies molded together, shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip. It’s glorious. She can’t help but settle back a bit, reveling in the way his arms wrap around her shoulders.

The setting sun shines orange and yellow across the tan field, turning it into an ocean of waving ochre honey, and the rest of the green flowing forest into a golden meadow. It seeps into her very bones, dragging her heartbeat to a dull thump that sounds in time with the gentle rocking of Maple's steps. She shifts further back, now laying entirely across Ghost's chest and nestling into the warm spot between his neck and shoulder. It smells delightfully of sweat, oranges, and dirt. He stiffens at first, she doesn’t know if it’s surprise or discomfort, but he relaxes just a moment later, resting his chin gently atop her head. And there, nestled in the warmth of his embrace and lulled by the swaying steps of sweet Maple. Flash closes her eyes and wills her mind to remember every detail, begs her body not to forget the gentle shift of muscle against her back as Ghost directs them down a rough path he seems to know so well.

“You’ve done this before?” Her question is quiet, spoken through a drowsy fog.

Ghost moves the reins to one hand and uses the other to gently knit their fingers together, the way she’d done in his truck. Here in her sleep-drunk state, the effort it takes for him to fit his fingers between her own smaller ones is too comical. “Yes,” His thumb rubs up and down the ridges of her knuckles, no doubt soothing his own nerves, “I’ve spent a lot of time here. Alejandro has done a lot for me.”

“With the horses?”

“Well,” he starts, hesitatingly, “A few years ago, I was having a rough time. Things were not going my way.” A large breath presses his chest tightly against her back “Alejandro let me stay with him for as long as I needed.”

“So you became a cowboy?” She teases, squeezing his hand tight.

“Not right away,” he laughs lightly and Flash involuntarily presses back into the sound, “I was scared shitless. Alejandro had to practically force me into the barn. But then I learned more about them. How compassionate and loving they are. Did you know they can have a whole conversation with just their ears?”

Flash hums encouragingly, hoping he’ll keep talking, if only to feel his voice against her back.

“They can love too. They’ll bond to someone, and love them the same way a human would. Real love.” An eager note shifts his voice, something Flash had never heard before.

“And did you bond with Maple?” Flash speaks into the soft cotton of his jacket.

“No,” a sigh tickles the soft hair at her nape “though we did get close. I have another horse. Her name is Rose.”

“Pretty name.” Flash hums “Where is she?”

Ghost stiffens again, and this time it takes him a few more beats to settle back and even longer to respond.

“She’s being cared for by my neighbor.”

“What’s she look like?” Flash’s voice is drifting, and the lids of her eyes seem impossibly heavy. She starts to imagine his home. A cupboard filled with chipped mugs and a wooden drying rack next to a deep basin sink. She’s decided that he’s not one to use a dishwasher.

“Golden hair,” his hand reaches up to tug at a strand of her own and she bats a hand at him, completely missing through her half-lidded gaze. “Blue eyes.” He’s brushing his hand along her cheekbone now and the feeling is like a magnet, tugging her eyes closed with a final drag down the bridge of her nose. “And a fiery temperament.”

“Are you calling me a horse?” Flash mumbles, half incoherent. But Ghost manages to decipher it and laughs breathily.

“No, I’m just noticing some similarities.” His hand reaches up to smooth the hair at her temple. Its awfully delightful.

“You keep doing that I’m going to fall asleep.” She threatens, even though they both know she’s far past salvation.

“That’s okay.” His hand drops to wrap around her waist, pulling her impossibly closer. “I won’t let you fall.”

“Okay.”

And for the first time since the incident, Flash falls asleep without the anxiety of what she’ll miss, what will pull her from her sheets, screaming and clawing. For the first time in weeks, she falls asleep in the sweet embrace of safety.

A/N: You cannot tell me that Flash isn't an ass woman. She's going to be grabbing handfuls soon. 

Also the idea of Ghost hyper fixating on horses AUGGHH HES TOO GOOD FOR THIS WORLD

Anywaysss, thank you for sticking with me through all of this. I love all of you and will talk to you again very soon!

#Ghost x reader #Ghost x female oc #SImon riley #Cod fic #Simon Ghost Riley #Alejandro Vargas #Valeria #Modern Warfare 2 #Ghost stories #Headcannons #John soap mactavish #John Price #MW2 #Gaz Garrick

[wibixthecowboy]

Bae wya

Babe you don’t even want to know… something close to hell, but with a lot more calculus and theory.

All jokes aside, I just barely scraped by this last quarter and needed to focus all of my time and energy into finishing those god damn classes 😫

Because apparently passing classes I paid thousands of dollars for takes precedence over writing fan fiction 🙄

BUT I’m finally free and on summer break so if all goes well I should be back to my “regular” posting at about every three ish weeks along with random ama prompts sprinkled in between. (That Price one is still in my drafts, I’m so on the fence about it I might just say fuck it and post it anyways 🙃)

Either way, the chapter is finished! I’m in the final stages of editing and tweaking a couple of things and then I will ACTUALLY HAVE IT UP (I PROMISE) probably this weekend/monday.

Thank you guys for sticking with my inconsistent ass I love you all 🫶🫶

P.S. all of you lovely people who are leaving little notes of encouragement in my ama… even if I don’t respond to every one, I see them all and I want all of you to know I am kicking my feet while I reading them. Even the strangely large amount of ones offering head in exchange for chapters and smut.

#feel free to shout at me #seriously I’m so excited about this chapter #MAJOR FLASH LORE OMG YOURE NOT READY #Play The Song

[wibixthecowboy]

Hello my lovelies!

I wanted to make a quick update and let you know that I am not dead!

I am working on chapter 13 now and hope to have it up by this weekend. I have absolutely no plans to abandon this fic, it’s my pride and joy!

As for the fic requests, so many of you have submitted such amazing prompts and I can’t wait to play with some of them (feel free to keep submitting!). I might upload one tomorrow if I can finally bring myself to post it. It’s got something to do with Price and a “Lana coded fem” (their words not mine). So hopefully that will tide you guys over!

As always thank you for being so patient, I love you all and will hopefully be chatting about 13 soon! 🫶

#I’m sorry don’t spit roast me #13 has some tooth rotting fluff it’s worth it #*cough* Ghost lore *cough* #cod fic #ghost x female oc #mw2

[wibixthecowboy]

Do you accept smooches as reward for your chapters because if so I owe you 11 big ones

I do accept smooches. I also accept credit card numbers and first borns.

[wibixthecowboy]

Play the Song: Chapter 12: As we Breathe

Task Force 141 needs a new sniper and despite their complaints, they're assigned Flash, a joke-making, ABBA-listening, 20-year-old sharpshooter with better aim than the whole team combined. In other words, Ghost is practically handed the love of his life but he needs time to adjust because she's a firecracker.

Warnings/Tags: !graphic depictions of panic attacks!, references to suicide attempts (no descriptions), references to SA (no descriptions), Age gap (20/30-32), gore, descriptions of injury/blood/wounds, justified angst, tooth rotting fluff, slow burn, protective ghost, family dynamic, big brother soap has an attitude problem, father figure Price, wholesome brother Gaz, touch starved Ghost, eventual smut, praise, choking, thigh riding, unprotected (wrap it up people), size kink, oral f receiving, ghost will do anything to get his dick sucked, idk I’m sure it will get dirtier as I go, shifting POV  

A/N: I know what you all want and I am here to give it to you. Enjoy my two, severely emotionally underdeveloped loves interacting in (somewhat) non-deadly scenarios. 

Words: 6.7k

Side note: All of these characters are fictional! Please don’t be weird about their real life actors, leave them out of this and be respectful!

Part 1  Part 2  Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

Tag list: @urfavsunkissedleo @butskii @abbiesxox @itsasecrets-things @thatonewriterthatnooneknows @copiasratscheese​ @Sheviro-blog

★Flash

     “Will you just take the fucking applesauce?” Gaz’s voice is bordering a whine and Flash doesn’t feel the least bit guilty when she declines again. She is hungry, but her hunger doesn’t outweigh her need for entertainment. For something other than the dusty novel she’d snatched from Price weeks ago and the small window to her left.

For the last three days, she’s been stuck in her bed. Her only solace being short trips to the bathroom and the horrible nurse service being provided in shifts by Soap and Gaz. Both arrive either so guilt ridden or angry that their conversations are reduced to mumbled words.

After she’d passed out in the truck- passed out, not died, (a correction she’s had to make every time Soap decides to give her another rundown of what he likes to call her ‘Rick Grimes’ moment) the team was able to stop enough of the bleeding and get her to the nearest med bay before her heart stopped pumping.

She’d been kept sedated for the next four days, lulled into a hazy half conscious state by a concoction of epinephrine, morphine, and god knows what else. The magic drug- a more advanced and highly addictive form of a stim shot, had practically healed everything. By the third night, she’d been able to lay on her back without pain, and by the fourth, her injuries were reduced to bruising and two half healed and itching cuts on her shoulder blades and forehead. When the doctors had given her the order to ‘take it easy’ and ‘stay in bed for a few more days’ she’d nearly laughed in their faces. But after an awkward ride back to the base with Price, it was made clear that she’d be on her ass until the doctors cleared her.

Since then, she’s been rotting away in bed. With the fog of a rather severe concussion gone and only a slight wobble in her step, Flash felt confident enough to get back into training. Others, not so much.

“Stop coddling me and I just might.” Her words, although bitter, are spoken through a half smile. The joints of her legs ache with the need to move. She can’t remember the last time she’d gone longer than a day without some sort of physical exercise.

“Oh for fucks sake. Just take it.” Gaz lets out a frustrated groan and tosses the container and spoon at her blanketed legs. They land just shy of the unread paperback by her shin. A copy of ‘True Grit’ that Price had silently handed to her after she’d begged him to let her join their next raid. “Maybe Ghost will spoon feed it to you if you ask nicely enough.”

His hand freezes against the door handle and Flash’s eyes widen. That was the first Ghost had been mentioned since the incident. After his freak out. No one had spoken to her about it, so she didn’t bring it up. Other than foggy memories of him sleeping in a chair next to her bed at the med bay- his head lolled to the side in a way that made her knees weak. Ghost had been absent.

“Just eat the food.” Gaz says nothing more before slipping from her room and shutting the door gently behind him.

Guilt coils her stomach into a tight knot and the game that she’d been playing for the last few days loses its appeal.

The applesauce is dull and pasty, and when she swallows, it sticks in her throat like mud. The first night she’d woken up from her drugged sleep, she willed her memory to clear, to give her a picture of Ghost’s face that wasn’t blurred with tears and blood loss. But it was useless. After that, avoiding thinking about the last few moments in the truck had been easy. Until now.

Although every sense of hers had been compromised, her brain had no problem recalling every point of contact that Ghost had made. As if her body remembering the gentle way he held her hand against his cheek was more important than remembering to breathe. As if it still is. The healing drugs didn’t touch the burns left by his desperate hands.

The scraping of her spoon against the nearly empty plastic cup does nothing to drown out the now crashing waves of memories. Him grasping at her legs and shoulders to haul her to the truck, begging her to keep her eyes open, removing his mask. The last bite of her applesauce tastes of brine and copper and it gags her. When she coughs the skin of her hand comes back splattered with shining red. Stumbling to the bathroom, Flash drops to the blessedly cool tile in front of the toilet but the food weighs heavily in her stomach, refusing to move despite the foul taste in her mouth. When she looks down there’s a splatter of pureed apple across her right hand where the blood stained just moments ago.

Avoiding her two mirrors, Flash rinses her hands, ties her hair back, and changes her clothes for the first time in three days. She needs out, and god help anyone who tries to stop her.

_____

     The hot Las Almas sun burns the sensitive skin of Flash’s scabbed and stitched shoulders and sends a steady stream of sweat gliding down her spine that drops to the dusty dirt road just a few minutes from their base. She’d found it while stalking Ghost on one of his runs after a dull morning of training. Now it serves as the perfect place for her to slip away unnoticed and run until her feet bleed.

She’d been going for about an hour already, entranced by the steady thump of her braid against her back as she let the hot afternoon sun dry the waves that so violently threatened to pull her under. An angry, clouding storm of failure covers every expanse of her mind. She’d failed the one chance she’d been given. Price had finally given her an in, a way to prove what she’d so desperately been trying to show them, and she’d blown it in less than an hour.

A familiar crunch of tires sounds from behind her and she moves to the edge of the rough dirt road, giving the truck room to pass, but it slows to match her pace. When she glances over, she nearly stumbles on a loose stone. Ghost is sat in the driver's seat, one arm steering at the base of the wheel and the other holding a bottle of water out the window.

“You don’t have to say anything, just take the water and I’ll leave.” His voice is withdrawn, quiet in a way that tells Flash that he understands her need for silence. And when she takes the bottle from his bare hand, the faded scars only prove her right.

He watches her drink and she pretends not to notice as the water wets her parched mouth and throat. When she finishes that one, he gently pulls it from her grasp and another is pressed into her empty hand. Flash sips this time, breathing deeply between swallows, catching the breath she hadn’t noticed she’d lost. His gaze falls to her shaking knees and the shivering of her strained thighs and she waits for him to admonish her, to order her back to the base and put a padlock on the door this time, but he only turns away to set the empty bottle somewhere in the back seat.

“Do you want to drive with me?”

The question catches her off guard. The softness with which its spoken, still detached and hesitant but sentimental nonetheless. She opens her mouth to deny, admit that she’s ran this far to be alone, but the aching in her chest tugs towards him like a magnet.

Silently, she rounds the car, slides into the passenger seat, and Ghost continues driving wordlessly down the path, at a leisurely unhurried speed. With the windows down, the hair that had fallen from her braid flutters around her face in the light wind, tickling the bare and damp skin of her neck. She licks the dry skin of her lips and tastes the salt beaded at the bow of her mouth.

The slow roll of sand dunes calms the racing of her heart and she syncs her breathing to their soft shapes, in with the incline and out with the descent. Her sweat slick legs stick uncomfortably to the warm leather seat but the relief of resting her strained muscles surpasses the discomfort.

Flash closes her eyes against the bright setting sun, oranges and yellows shine brightly in the sudden darkness and the knot in her stomach loosens enough that she can fill her lungs completely. Fresh air, spun with the sappy golden light spilling across the desert blows across her face and cools the twin trails trickling over the curves of her cheeks. Salt spreads across her tongue, but this time it carries something much heavier. They come faster now, rivulets running and turning into streams that course over her chin and down her neck, bleeding into the sweat soaked collar of her shirt. She doesn’t open her eyes as the crushing weight of the fear she’d felt sets in. So she cries. She cries for what could have happened, what would have happened if she hadn’t pulled herself from the water, and hates every second of it.

Then a warm hand is nudging her own. Ghost, in a silent mimic of her gesture from days before, wraps his smallest finger around her own and squeezes. The fear lessens, pulling back to a dull throb against her ribcage. She doesn’t open her eyes as she unwraps their pinkies and slides her hand into his to lock their fingers in a tight hold. His hand envelops her own, warm and comforting, and she fastens herself to him like a tether to a dock. Afraid that if she lets go she just might drift out of reach.

They say nothing as they cling to each other, and Flash doesn’t dare turn her now open eyes to Ghost, afraid that she’ll snap their tether by acknowledging it. So she keeps her gaze on the pinks and purples sprawled across the dimming sky and tries to ignore the burning disappointment when one final turn brings the familiar concrete building into view.

“Can we do one more loop, I can’t- I-” She begins to ask, faltering when Ghost obliges without hesitation. And a burning sense of endearment spreads so quickly through her that the stinging behind her eyes recedes. Blinking away the thick tears still lining her lids, Flash sniffs once and then sags further into her seat.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

His question is a formal invitation, an obligated question. One she’s been asked on multiple occasions and refused each time. She could ignore it now and it wouldn’t be brought back up, she knows that for a fact. But whether it's the burning need to confess or the lack of social interaction, Flash feels the confession loose from her mouth in a stream that she can’t seem to stop.

“I killed him with a rock.” Even though the words are spoken by her, the depravity of the statement makes her heart stutter. “When I missed with my knife I just smashed his head in with a rock.” The memory flashes through her mind, a stunted and bloody reel of pictures. “It was too easy.”

A long stretch of silence fills the space between them and Flash can’t help but worry he’ll slam on the breaks and shove her out, tell her just how damaged she must be to resort to something so animalistic, so beyond human norm. The weight of his hand in hers grows cold and she has the sudden urge to tuck herself into the small space at her feet, away from the heavy words floating between them and the piercing blue eyes at her side.

“When you know someone coming to kill you Flash, everything turns primal. It’s not something you learn through lectures. I’m sorry you had to learn so quickly.” His words are like a balm to her nerves. Petting back the raised hackles of her mind. “I’m sorry that I wasn’t there to stop it.”

“It’s the SAS Ghost. Things happen. I won't always have someone there to save the day.” She speaks firmly but turns to Ghost with a sad smile, the action has the dried tracks of her tears itching. When she brings her empty hand up to wipe her cheeks, the dirt lining her fingers has her squeezing it back under her thigh.

He lapses back into his familiar silence and Flash tries not to think about the dirt wiping from her hand onto his own clean skin where their palms meet. Then becomes increasingly aware of the dust clinging to her thighs and arms and how it rubs off onto the dark surfaces of the truck. Ghost doesn’t say anything. His unoccupied hand taps lightly against the steering wheel, another quirk that Flash quickly learned meant he was picking his words carefully.

“Knowing something is going to happen doesn’t make it any easier to cope with.” The tires crunch as dirt turns into gravel, they’re just minutes away from the base now.

His words, although validating in their own way, crack open a spot in her steeled mind that she is nowhere near ready to unravel. So instead of responding, she closes her eyes and lays back against the seat, focusing on holding the now cool night air in her lungs. She grips Ghost’s hand steadfastly. When they pull into the lot this time, her mind feels clearer and when she releases his hand to go inside, she feels a little less broken.

_____

★Ghost

     Although her eyes are focused on Price, taking in every word he speaks with an endearing efficiency, Ghost still watches them. Searching for the voided, lost look that most recruits adopted after their first incident. The look that he’d seen hints of while driving with her hours before. But the blue remains sharp as they scan the layout of the next warehouse they’d be raiding. A dilapidated barn just a few miles from Alejandro’s ranch. They would leave tomorrow to spend the next two days planning their approach with Alejandro and his team. His bag, packed the moment he got back from their drive, waits next to his door. It was his desperate attempt to keep himself in his room. To keep himself busy so he didn’t cross through the bathroom and to Flash’s door to press his ear against the wood. Just to make sure she was still there, still breathing.

It was easy to brush off at first. The shaking was from strained muscles and elevated heart rate from his morning jog. But that day, when she’d come over the hill looking half dead, still clutching a bloodied rock, the fear, and dread that gagged him was undeniable. The anxiety that shook his experienced hands as he attempted to wrap unwilling bandages over a seemingly unending expanse of flowing blood was beyond uncharacteristic. Soap had taken the gauze from his hands and shoved him to the side, working with Gaz to stop the bleeding. Her clouded, half-lidded gaze had sent him into a shaking, gasping sort of fit and it was Soap who had ripped the pill bottle from Ghost’s pocket and shoved two of the pills into his palm with shaking, bloodied hands before returning to monitoring Flash’s heart rate.

After getting her to the med bay and stabilized, he’d remained at her side for the entire stay. The gentle flutter of her eyelashes was his only respite as she drifted in and out of a drugged sleep. The only time he left her side was to slip into the staff bathroom and to down another cup of the never-ending supply of dirt instant coffee the front office kept. Price had ordered him back to the base hours before she was to be taken off the sedative. It was a short exchange over the phone, gruff, tired, and ending in a snapped command.

When Price returned with her that night, Ghost had been waiting in the window. He wasn’t sure what his plan was, but when he saw the way Price had to practically lift her from the passenger seat and brace her as she limped to the door, he’d retreated back to his room, unable to look at the bandages at her temple, ones he wasn’t capable of tying. Instead choosing to curl against his headboard and choke on uneven breaths until a drug haze pulled him under.

Looking at her now, nothing like the small girl, pale skinned and drowned in hospital blankets, the beating of his heart doesn’t slow. Soap, next to him, is doodling small flowers on the mission summary and Gaz sitting beside Flash, is tugging at her sleeve. After one particularly harsh tug, she whips around in her chair and levels him with a harsh glare, when she goes to turn back, her eyes catch his. The irritation melts from her brow and Ghost struggles to keep his breath steady when his gaze drops to the blue-green bruise that still curves along her cheekbone. Flash catches his line of sight and lets the hair tucked behind her ear fall into her face, covering the bruising entirely when she turns back to Price. But the image remains, permanently branded against the large corner of his mind she’s always occupying.

They go on like that for the rest of the meeting. Eyes occasionally meeting only to hover for a moment before flitting away. Acting like he hadn’t just watched her shatter in the small cab of his truck an hour before. He knew better than to push though, the need to just forget was more familiar to him than it should be. So he watches her take notes instead, careful little words in the spaces between paragraphs with a pencil he now recognizes as his own. Stolen from the space next to his paper, he hadn’t even noticed. And despite everything, amusement flickers in his chest, and a familiar warmth tightens his ribs. Ghost dips his head down to level his eyes with Flash, glancing at the pencil in her hands and up to her waiting gaze. She smiles at him. It’s half done, morphed into a slight grimace from the split in her lip, but it still carries her usual air of mischief. And he thinks that maybe, things might be okay.

_____

★Flash

     Flash is brushing her teeth when she sees Ghost again. Her hair still damp and curling from the shower she’d taken to scrub the dried sweat and dust from her skin. She’d also braved a look in the mirror. A small blue-purple bruise curves along her skin between her cheekbone and eye, a half healed split at her lower lip, and a stitched line at her temple were all that remained of her encounter. It wasn’t a pretty sight, but better than she’d been expecting. Her shower though, had run out of her allotted bathroom time and into Ghosts. It wasn’t the first time it happened, but when it did, he would politely apologize and leave her to finish.

But now, dressed in joggers and a delightfully worn shirt, he hovers in the open doorway. She wonders if he feels it. The pull.

He’s about to turn and leave when Flash finds herself mumbling through a mouthful of toothpaste, “Don’t leave I’m almost done.” She’s not quite sure why she asks him to stay, but she does.

Flash can’t help but smile at the way his socked feet shuffle awkwardly against the tile, not sure where to stand. It’s incredibly sweet, and the softness of the action only strengthens the pull that begs her to step forward and into him.

“So,” Flash starts, spitting her toothpaste into the sink before continuing to lazily brush in half circles, “do I get to see your face now? Or is that something you reserve for people who are near death?” In one smooth movement, she’s resting on the counter in front of him, hoping the toothbrush hanging from her lips hides the wince as her sore muscles strain. “Ya know, like a ‘I can show you but then I’d have to kill you’ type a’ situation?”

Ghost is silent, unresponsive to her prodding. Any other night he would have told her to drop it and go to bed. Maybe give her a snarky response if she’s lucky. But tonight he’s quiet, just as before. And then she sees it. The way his shoulders curve inward and the flickering of his eyes as they move to look at anything that isn’t her.

“You know it's not your fault right?” Flash’s voice is soft, the same one she’d use to coax a scared dog from a corner.

“What?” A whisper.

“It’s not your fault.” She slides from the counter, leaving her toothbrush next to the basin, she walks quietly towards him. Cautious, slow enough for him to back away, she reaches up to brush a hand against his face. It’s a daring move but he doesn’t pull away.

The cotton of the mask is warm from being so close to the heated skin of his cheeks. Golden lashes brush against them and their freckled surface as his lids shutter closed. Flash drinks in the rare moment of softness. Her mind drifts back to her last few moments in the truck, how warm the skin of his face had been and suddenly, she’s never wanted anything more in her life.

“Can I touch-” Her words breathe out into the empty space between them and Ghost’s eyes fly open, wide and searching her own.

“Blindfold, I - can you wear a blindfold?” His words are stuttered and rushed with a desperation she can’t even begin to understand. Flash offers him a silent nod and then the space in front of her is empty.

She lifts herself back onto the counter, just to busy herself as she listens to the opening of a drawer and the quiet whisper of him digging through clothes in his room. He returns with a beautifully patterned terracotta scarf. Like the one’s she’d seen at the market. He sets it gently in her lap but she pushes it back into his hands.

“Here, you can tie it. So you know I’m not peeking.”

He nods once before taking the brown fabric with shaking hands and folding it into a neat strip and leaning in close to wrap it gently around her eyes. Flash senses his hesitation as he pauses before tying the knot. Wary of the bruise beneath her eye. She gives her best reassuring smile and it seems to do the trick.

“Is that too tight?” He whispers and Flash shivers as his breath fans across her ear, light and warm.

“No. It’s perfect.”

There’s a gentle rustle of fabric and then his mask is resting on her lap. Nerves beat her heart up into her throat.

“Are you scared?” Her whisper is careful, spoken into the quiet space between them. A question spoken to him but a silent admission of her own.

“Yes.”

“It's only me.” She can’t help but smile at his honesty.

“That’s what I’m scared of.”

“Can I touch you?” She murmurs, and he hums a confirmation. It’s a quiet, broken noise.

A soft sigh breaks the silence when the pads of her searching fingers meet his cheek and draw upwards to a rather prominent cheekbone. She can’t help but smile at the heat she feels beneath her fingers, he’s blushing.

Quick breaths come from his nose, followed by two long exhales. Subtle enough that if she weren’t inches from his face would have gone unnoticed, but his warm breath falls against the small strip of her cheeks left uncovered by the scarf. Her heart swells in her chest when she realizes he’s attempting to calm himself.

“Why do you keep trying?”

His words catch her off guard and her exploring fingers come to a halt at his browbone. A displeased huff urges them on and to a soft brow. Flash takes a moment to think, but it doesn’t take her long to find a response.

“Because you deserve to heal.” Ghost turns his head into her hand, muffling a groan. It’s a noise unlike anything she’s ever heard before. An amalgamation of sadness and desperation that makes the blood in her veins slow to listen.

“Has no one ever told you that?”

“No.” He speaks into her palm, hiding his face as if she could see him through the scarf.

“Well, you do.” She smiles softly and flinches in surprise when his thumb brushes against the soft skin of her lower lip. He pulls back quickly,

“Sorry, I-”

“No, you’re fine.” Flash reaches down and grabs for his hand, bringing his thumb up to her lips again when she finds it. He takes a shuddering breath and she wishes for just a moment that she could pull the blindfold up from her eyes and look at him, see the way his body is reacting to her touch, rather than feeling, and hearing it.

“Your smile.” His thumb parts the plush of her lips, so gently she almost doesn’t feel it.

“What about it?” She can’t help but laugh at his odd remark.

His face under her hand moves, and a familiar divot forms under her ring finger.

“Oh good lord you have dimples?” She breathes against his hand.

“Just on the left.” His words are murmured, shy if she thought he was capable of such an innocent emotion. And in the warm darkness of the bathroom, without seeing the scars on his hands or the dazed look his eyes so often held, she realizes just how innocent he is. The boyish way he holds her face, similar to the way a child learning to write struggles to grip a pencil. Like the concept of touching someone without the intent of harm is as foreign to him as a new language. And the realization absolutely crushes her.

“Freckles, dimples, blue eyes. You must be a real stunner.” She teases, an awful attempt to fight the burning behind her eyes. The skin beneath her hand warms again and the overwhelming urge to throw herself into him is consuming, to wrap herself so tightly around him that their skin fuses and they become one. The thought is as terrifying as it is tempting.

“Far from it.”

She frowns at his words but the hand on her face smooths her brow in a gentle caress. Her next exhale comes shakily through her nose.

Braving the waters, Flash traces up the soft curve of his cheek and her fingers catch on slightly raised skin, silkier than the rest, a scar. It travels from his left cheekbone to his hairline just above his eyebrow.

“How did this happen?” Her imploring question is light and spoken without pressure. He could leave it unanswered if he wished.

“My father.” His response is quiet but it’s a scream to her ears. Images of him as a child, a defenseless teen screaming as he clutched his head in pain fill her mind in a rush. She quickly moves on. Feeling for more, battle-oriented scars, but she feels none.

“Do you have any more?”

A rumbling laugh vibrates down her arm and warms her chest.

“Plenty. Although the reconstructive surgeries helped, there’s always going to be a mark.”

“Where?”

A gentle hand reaches for hers and guides her fingers in an arc from the corner of his mouth to a point near his hairline. She traces the spot over on her own until she feels the slight change in texture, the jagged shape that whatever had cut him left behind. She didn’t dare ask its origin.

“Your scars make mine seem like papercuts.” A nervous laugh blows past her lips.

“And I hope it stays that way.” He glides warm fingers just inches from the stitches on her temple. “You already have enough.”

“Nothing near as cool as yours.” She protests, tracing his cheek once more to emphasize her point.

The room is silent, and for just a moment, she thinks she's ruined it and then he’s laughing again. Stuttered like he hasn’t had enough practice, and Flash wishes he’d never stop.

“What?” She asks, incredulous.

“I’ve never had someone call my scars cool.” The stuttered laughs come through his nose now, in gentle breaths of air that warm her own cheeks.

Another mostly nervous laugh looses from her parted lips at the absurdity of their situation. If someone told her a year ago, as she unabashedly stared at Ghost giving his lecture, that she’d be on the counter of their shared bathroom, blindfolded and committing his face to memory with her hands she’d probably laugh. And then file a report.

Flash smiles shyly before bringing her other hand up to gently cup his face, eager to change the topic. “Is this normal?” She breathes as he leans further into her, now pressing against the counter space between her legs. Heat radiates from him, warming her in a way she’s never felt before.

“Is what normal?”

“Wanting to touch you so badly my chest aches.” The admission makes her heart stutter in embarrassment and something warm and syrupy slows the muscles of her mouth.

“I don’t think so.” His answer is mumbled, and before she can feel the sting of rejection, he’s pressing his forehead to hers in an almost feline gesture.

Their lips are just inches away, all she’d have to do is tilt her head up and they’d be kissing. The thought sends her heart thumping so painfully that her stomach rolls with nerves. Enough that she just savors the closeness they have already.

“I feel like I’m going to puke.” She whispers to him with a nervous smile and instantly regrets it. There’s just something about his presence that loosens her tongue in ways it shouldn’t.

But then Ghost is laughing again and pressing his forehead harder against her own. “Me too.”

And the confession is orchestral.

Her arms reach from where they’re pinned between them and up into the soft curls at the nape of his neck. A muffled moan is pressed into the skin of her neck so she does it again, a gentle scrape through his hair. Tremors wrack his body in waves. Then he’s pulling away and her hands are slipping from his shoulders too soon.

“Off the counter, face the mirror.” Although his voice is still soft and shaken, it’s demanding enough that Flash doesn’t protest. She feels him reach around her for something on the counter, muscled chest pressing close to her shoulder.

“I’m getting some deja vu.” Ghost’s murmur is quiet and entirely self-indulgent.

“To what?” Flash’s brows furrow in confusion under the soft silk.

“Well uh-” His words stumble out, unprepared. “That night you took that pill?”

Flash’s stomach sinks and her tongue sticks to the roof of her mouth when she responds. “Uh-huh.”

“You were struggling a bit with cleaning the scratches. You couldn’t even hold the cloth.”

“Oh god.” Even with the scarf on her face, Flash still has to drop her head in her hands. “I didn’t do anything weird? Did I?” She thinks back to the table that morning, Soap's laughing and Ghost's not so subtle smile.

“No.” Ghost runs a finger slick with a paste that she quickly recognizes as the salve the doctor had given her for sore joints over her skin. Far from the scratches and cuts on her shoulders. She practically purrs at his touch combined with the cooling effect of the paste. “But you’re very touchy.”

Embarrassment floods hot through her chest and she starts to apologize but Ghost interrupts her again.

“Don’t apologize.” Those fingers drift up and to an unblemished space just past her shoulder. “Just be quiet and let me make up for my mistake.”

“You don’t have to-” Her words end in a sharp moan when his fingers dig into a tender spot against her neck. “Holy shit.” His fingers fumble a bit but he regains his composure quickly, returning back to the spot and rubbing delightful small circles against the knot. “Jesus-” Her mumbling is cut off with a soft hush and she finally gives in, dropping her chin to the heated skin of her chest as he loosens the muscles that had grown stiff after days in bed. When he reaches a spot along the arch of her spine, smoothing deep half circles into the muscle there, a broken whine falls involuntarily from her mouth. It’s entirely pathetic but she’s too far gone to care. This last sound seems to signal him though and he’s stepping back, dropping those magic hands from her lower back.

“Okay.” His voice is breathy ghost of a whisper and despite never seeing his face, Flash knows that if she were to pull the blindfold from her eyes, he’d be shaking and casting his eyes to the floor, those precious strawberry blonde curls falling across his forehead, and cheeks ruddy with the warm blush she’d felt just minutes before. But she leaves it tied neatly against her damp hair, even though her fingers itch to slide the soft fabric from her eyes.

There’s a rustling, Ghost is reaching past her to grab something from the counter and she can practically smell the anxiety leaking from his skin, along with something else she hadn’t noticed until now.

“Is that citrus?” She tries not to sound too surprised, she shouldn’t be. It had been one of the first things she’d noticed when flopping herself onto his bedding. Something she did not want to think about.

“It’s uh- oranges?” He sounds unsure, Flash is about to point this out but he continues. “My mum wore it.” There’s another brief pause. She can practically hear his internal debate over whether or not he should continue. “It’s- It helps with- anxiety.”

“Oh.” She stands there for another moment, not wanting to leave quite yet, but not having anything to say. He doesn’t move either, just stands quietly in front of her. “I like it.”

“Me too.”

Gentle fingers slide the scarf from her eyes, the light of the bathroom is blinding and she has to blink several times to clear the dots from her vision. When her eyes finally focus, she cranes her head upward from the soft cotton of his chest. Ghost’s eyes are staring into the mirror above her, at himself. There’s a small strip of exposed skin between his shirt and balaclava. She can see the collarbone that she’d whispered to so many nights ago.

“I’m going to bed.” She says to the strip, and without looking back at his face, turns and walks as calmly as she can to her room. Even though the racing of her heart screams at her to run, to hide, to grab him by his stupid masked face and kiss him.

The last thought scares her enough that she shuts the bathroom door with a bit too much force. The sound makes her jump. It’s entirely pathetic but the creeping sickness from this morning is gone, replaced with something much much worse. Something deadly, something terrifying, something that makes her want to laugh and cry. So she does both.

It doesn’t help.

_____

     Flash can’t wipe the love-sick smile off her face as she walks to their small kitchen. Her water bottle swinging in time with her steps.

“He won’t always be like that.”

The metal bottle clangs loudly against the concrete when her hand slackens in surprise.

“What?” She breathes, heart beating wildly in her chest.

“I said, he won't always be like that.” Soap says from the small couch in the ‘living room’. He’s draped himself lazily over the arm and is flicking through an old copy of the ‘New Yorker’. A cartoonish drawing of pointing Uncle Sam is printed on the front under bold red letters reading ‘I WANT YOU’.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She says calmly, swiping her bottle from the floor and continuing towards the sink, averting her eyes from the dramatic cartoon.

“Oh don’t play coy. You’re smiling like a fuckin’ teenager in love Lass. I know.” His tone isn’t accusing, if anything it's bored. Like he couldn’t be bothered to finish the conversation he’d started. “He’s true to his name. He’ll be kissing you like he needs you to breathe, and then the next mornin’ float right by you. Stings like a bitch. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“How do you know?” She asks over the flowing tap. “Did you two...” Her half question drifts, waiting for him to pick up. It takes the metal burning into her palm for Flash to realize the water is steaming, she tips the bottle over and starts again.

“Were we together?” He flips another page, casual, like he’s not admitting to fucking his best friend. “I guess you could call it that.”

“He wasn’t interested in that... stuff?” She thinks back to the way his hands trembled the first time he’d touched her, and the way he practically vibrates when their bodies come within inches of each other.

“No,” a devilish chuckle comes from behind the paper “we didn’t have trouble in that department.”

“So you were a thing?” She asks and is blindsided by a sudden burning in her chest. It curls around to tense the line of her shoulders, bringing them closer to her ears like raised hackles.

He finally lowers the magazine and shakes his head at her reaction. “No need to get possessive. It lasted about two months before he realized that fucking every ten minutes wouldn’t fix his shit load of issues.” His words immediately drench her in a cool wave, and an embarrassing guilt flushes high in her cheeks, along with a biting sympathy at his confession. “My feelings were unrequited, unfortunately.” He gives her a sad smile. “He needs someone who isn’t broken. He needs someone who can guide him out of the shit storm he’s been led into.” The magazine is flipped back open and brought back up, his tone turns curious. “Someone like you.”

She starts to deny, to tell him that she is far from unbroken, but Soap waves another hand at her.

“Don’t bother, I don’t care.” A plain lie. “I just wanted to warn you. He can be-” a pregnant pause splits his words, “he can be challenging. He’s got a cargo container of shit that he hasn’t even begun to unpack. It can lead to some pretty rough mood swings.” Soap puts the magazine back down. “What I’m trying to say is he’s a real piece of work, but if anyone deserves the help, it’s him. I just hope you’re the right person.”

Flash can hear the unspoken words ring through the air between them.

‘Because I wasn’t’

When Flash reaches Ghost’s door in the bathroom, away from the prying eyes still pretending to read the old magazine, she knocks softly, waits a few moments, and then knocks again. There’s no response.

He’s blocked himself off again.

Disappointed and trying not to think of Soap’s words, Flash slinks dejectedly back to lie in her bed. Her IPod still lay on her nightstand, nestled in the center of a neatly swirled nest of wires. Right where Ghost had put it her first night there.

Then for some reason, imagining him taking the time to do something so unimportant with so much care, for her no less, sends a wave of something nearing homesickness through her. A brittle sort of feeling. And for the first time in over five years, Flash has the urge to call her sister.

“This is not good.”

A/N: AHHH MY AWKWARD LITTLE BABIES. I hoped you loved this as much as I loved writing it. God I love unhinged relationships, they’re just *chefs kiss*.  

#Ghost x reader #Ghost x female oc #SImon riley #Cod fic #Simon Ghost Riley #Alejandro Vargas #Valeria #Modern Warfare 2 #Ghost stories #Headcannons #John soap mactavish #John Price #MW2 #Gaz Garrick

[wibixthecowboy]

God I am giving you the sloppiest most bestest head ever after that chapter im god we will both be crying after that cliffhanger.

I know I’m crying along with you guys. They’re just desperate, emotionally unstable babes 🫶🫶

But alas the fluff/comfort does not hit as hard without the angst. 😔

New chapter estimate is probably mid next week!

[wibixthecowboy]

Hope your studies are going well and that you don’t feel pressured to post anything <3

They are! I’m coming up on my last quarter and then SUMMER which probably means FASTER UPDATES WOOOO!!

This whole page kind of started on a whim after I rediscovered my love for fanfic writing and now that I’ve had some time and schooling to practice my writing, I finally feel comfortable posting! So this never was supposed to be a concrete thing, don’t worry about being to demanding, your absolutely unhinged comments are the best. 🫶

[wibixthecowboy]

This new chapter was incredible. I’m obsessed with this story. You’re so talented!

Thank you so much!! I really had so much fun writing this. Feral women are my favorite if you cannot tell. ❤️

[wibixthecowboy]

I think its time to offer my head services..

I’m starting to like this pattern

[wibixthecowboy]

Play the Song: Chapter 11: Buttercups

Task Force 141 needs a new sniper and despite their complaints, they're assigned Flash, a joke-making, ABBA-listening, 20-year-old sharpshooter with better aim than the whole team combined. In other words, Ghost is practically handed the love of his life but he needs time to adjust because she's a firecracker.

Warnings/Tags: !GORE! graphic depictions of panic attacks, references to a suicide attempt, references to SA, age gap (20/30-32), descriptions of injury/blood/wounds, justified angst, tooth rotting fluff, slow burn, protective ghost, family dynamic, big brother soap has an attitude problem, father figure Price, wholesome brother Gaz, touch starved Ghost, eventual smut, praise, choking, thigh riding, unprotected (wrap it up people), size kink, oral f receiving, ghost will do anything to get his dick sucked, idk I’m sure it will get dirtier as I go, shifting POV  

A/N: I’ll let you know right now that having to research actual military terms and processes is breaking my anti-military heart. Some of it is too much reading that I don’t have the care or desire to finish so if there are any logistical errors or inconsistencies in that area, do me a favor and turn a blind eye. Okay? Love ya <3

Words: 6.6k

Side note: All of these characters are fictional! Please don’t be weird about their real life actors, leave them out of this and be respectful!

Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

Tag list: @urfavsunkissedleo @butskii @abbiesxox @itsasecrets-things @thatonewriterthatnooneknows @ellouisa17 @shuttlelauncher81 @kristalhi  @xxghostyx 

★Ghost

     The ticking of the clock seems almost patronizing in the brightly lit space of Price’s office. Tick. ‘you’re sitting in front of a shrink?’. Tick. ‘Where’s your gun soldier?’. Tick.

“So the meds have been working?” Dr. Adam’s voice drills between Ghost’s shoulder blades, hunching them forward in an effort to hide the pieces of his mind he’d already laid bare. “I’m confused.”

You’re confused?

“Yes they-” His voice cuts in frustration and he turns to look at the half erased whiteboard. Plans for tomorrow's raid smeared across the board in his own messy handwriting. Paperwork from last night's mission still lay neatly stacked against the corner of the desk. Just another reminder that he would never quite gain reprieve from the 24/7 demands of his position. Even if his doctor insisted he was to leave his work mindset at the door. His next words are hesitant. “I’m sleeping.”

The doctor quirks a brow at his rather dejected sounding response. Ghost doesn’t blame him for his confusion. He should be satisfied that his nights consist mostly of sleep and not the ravaging flashes of gore that had him splayed over the toilet bowl and covered in a sheen of terror-soaked sweat as he puked up his last meal. But rather than disappear altogether, the nightmares have been replaced with something just as dangerous, something golden and saccharine that plagued him after he woke and crept into every desperate moment of silence during the day.

Almost as if reading his mind, Dr. Adams presses on, fingering a loose page on the desk. “And have your dreams remained the same?”

During their last meeting -a bi-weekly obligation now that Ghost had been put on a higher dosage of his anxiety meds- Ghost had told Dr. Adams about the obsessively domestic dreams, at the risk of sounding like a love-drunk teenager. But he had just mentioned them briefly, not quite ready to admit just how much of an effect they had and still have on him.

“To some extent.” Yes.

The collar of his shirt grows impossibly tight and even though the window behind the oak desk is cracked, the air in the room ticks up a few degrees. Dr. Adams, as he has many times before lets out a defeated sigh and flips the thick manila folder shut along with his small pad of paper. The few notes he’d gotten over their past few sessions must not be checking the right boxes.

“For this to work, Ghost-” he’d learned pretty quickly that if he was to get anything out of Ghost, it wouldn’t be through using his legal name, “you need to give me more.” A thick finger lands on the manila folder, not quite threatening, but making a point. “We don’t have to talk about this. Not if you don’t want to. But don’t come in here and expect me to stop whatever rampant thoughts plague you without knowing what they are. I can’t read minds.”

Ghost glances down from the bulging folder and to the arm of the ugly green armchair he sat in, at his nails picking the pilled fabric. Dr. Adams had consisted of soft words and reassurances from the day they met, it was a miracle he lasted this long. He waits for the final blow, the rejection. ‘I’m going to assign another doctor.’ or worse ‘I give up’. But it never comes.

“Tell me about her.”

“I don’t think this is going to help- That’s not what I’m here for.” Ignoring the man’s raised brow, Ghost shifts his feet to stand, willing to cut their session short if it meant the questions would stop, but Dr. Adams's movements freeze him in place.

“Okay then.” Short and calculated, he flips the folder open, rifles through, and pulls out a paperclipped bundle. With a final adjustment to his glasses, he begins to read. “December 27th, 2019. Lieutenant Simon Riley was found unresponsive-”

“Alive.” Ghost’s answer is a gasped plea, a desperate rope thrown around the doctor's words to strangle them before they can finish. “She makes me feel alive.” And though his brain screams at him to jump across the desk and beat the man sitting across from him for using what so many others avoided like a set trap to pry a response from him. The icy panic melts into a sense of relief when the folder closes.

“That’s a good start.” Dr. Adams removes his glasses and pulls a neatly folded handkerchief from his breast pocket to clean invisible dust from pristine lenses. “You’re dismissed.”

Dark eyes meet blue, piercing now that they don’t have a lens blocking them, daring Ghost to challenge his command. He can see it now. The way the man’s shoulders sit straight against his chair, the scarred backs of his hands, the wordless ‘what are you going to do about it’ stare.

Drained and itching with betrayal, Ghost leaves the room, not bothering to shut the door behind him. Just as he’s about to subject himself to the dark confines of his room, a bright laugh catches his breath. And without a second thought, he follows the sound, as if it alone could soothe the panic grasping at the ragged edges of his mind. It does.

★Flash

    Flash, now sitting warily atop the kitchen counter, waits for Gaz to address the bomb he’d so graciously detonated in her room the night before.

“So you did or didn’t see who ate my strawberries?”

“I didn’t Gaz. I already told you.” Flash slides a hand behind her and into the sink, grabbing the few strawberries left over from the night before and closing them inside a fist. Gaz turns to look from his hunched rummaging in the fridge, just a set of glaring brown eyes peeking over the illuminated door. The same eyes that had stared her down while teasing her endlessly about her ‘Salsa experience’. He turns back to continue his search for the missing fruit and she feels no sympathy as she drops the handful in the trash a few inches to her left. “I came back, cleaned my knives, and went to bed.”

When she’d returned to her room last night, heart still beating out of her chest, Flash had stared and stared at herself in the mirror. Searching for any sign of what she’d just done. Like the two sets of lips she’d had on her somehow branded marks into her skin. Then came the waiting. Waiting for Price to give her the ‘I’m not mad, just disappointed’ talk. Waiting for Gaz to force her into telling him every small detail just for him to then relay it to Soap. Waiting to see Ghost’s eyes revert back to their glazed-over state as he overhears drunken retellings. But they never came.

She could attribute that to the seemingly well-crafted cover story Alejandro had spun for his and Valeria's presence. He’d lingered just long enough to catch Gaz in the hall, and Flash cursed the thin wood of her door as she was forced to listen to Alejandro work his magic on an already infatuated Gaz. The car had left with all three of them minutes later. And when Gaz had stumbled into their base early the next morning in a too-big shirt and a dark bruise against one of his collar bones, and right into Flash just finishing a jog. They’d made a silent agreement that both their situations, would be swept under the rug.

“They didn’t just disappear Flash.” Gaz shuts the door and leans against the counter opposite of her. His body stretches languidly and the hem of his tight fitting shirt lifts to show off a tanned and muscled stomach. Brown eyes catch her drifting gaze and he raises a single brow. Missing fruit forgotten. “You know.” A slight tilt of his head and he’s resting back on his elbows. “You do have a good ass on you.”

“I thought I wasn’t your type?” The words slip easily from her tongue and she tries not to think about the last person who’d so confidently declared their attraction to her. His mouth left enough of an impression.

“You’re not.” And just as quickly as it had appeared, the sultry cadence of his words slips away.

“Is it the stubble that does it for you? Or is it his Spanish?” She speaks to the beds of her nails and fights the pull at the corner of her mouth.

Gaz is moments from lunging at her and she’s debating admitting to eating the strawberries just to push him over the edge when a familiar voice calls out from behind them

“Is that who ya’ went rompin’ with last night?”

“Fuck me.” Gaz drops his hands into his hands when he sees Price’s raised brows and Flash can't hold her laughter in any longer. A nervous stuttered laugh bubbles up from between her lips and Gaz turns a deadly glare her way.

“You fucker. You ate them!”

In her amusement over Gaz’s embarrassment, she’d left the red-stained skin of her palm open and out for him to see. Arms wrap around her shoulders in a half strangle and start to pull her to the ground. Tight enough that her now cackling laughs completely drain her lungs and she’s left clawing at his arms to loosen them. A large hand is brought up to cover her mouth and nose- he’s waiting for her to tap out. She’s moments away from sliding a heel around his knee to bring them to the ground when his grip leaves her entirely. Breathless and smiling, Flash turns to question him but stops when she sees his now serious expression. Following his gaze, Flash’s eyes fall on Ghost, and her own smile falls as she takes in his rigid posture and tired eyes. He’s staring right at her. Through her. She offers him a small smile, but he says nothing before dropping his eyes to the ground and taking a seat at the table.

Price passes by a frowning Soap and sits across from him. Flash follows Gaz to the table and carefully slides into the seat next to Ghost, making sure to leave a considerable gap between them. Even if it meant Soap would be half off the bench on her other side.

Ghost had quietly slipped from his room and into the office after the Academy psychiatrist had shown up and had stayed locked in the room all morning. As much as she wants to yell at him for leaving her behind again, a bigger, more consuming part ached at the sight of his glazed eyes taking in the pages of the folder Price had given each of them. What had they talked about? Her mind wanders back to his words from last night. How he’d so closely guarded his history against her prodding and expertly diverted her attention away.

Hidden beneath the edge of the table, Flash drops her hand to the seat and splays her fingers wide. The edge of her pinky brushes up against the bare skin of his own where it rests just inches away. In her periphery, she can see the stutter of his chest when he breathes in, and hear the faltering in his words as he answers one of Price's questions. Slowly, she drags her smallest finger along his before interlocking them and waits for him to shake her off. But instead, his finger tightens around her own, two squeezes. I’m sorry. She squeezes back once. It’s okay. Risking being caught by the others at the table, Flash glances over at Ghost. His eyes still remain dull and uninterested, but the corner of his mouth is raised in a whisper of a smile. It takes everything in her to not grin at her papers like a love-sick fool.

_____

    “You’ll be up on the cliffside with me Flash.”

Back at the table, only a few hours later, Price is going over a more refined plan for tomorrow's raid. One she’d apparently be joining them on. Only not in the way she wants.

Her mind whirls, fork stilling on her plate as she sees a golden door of opportunity open up.

“I can clear first.” Flash’s words are a statement, not a question. A tone that was taught to her very early on by one of her first instructors. If she wanted something, she wasn’t to ask, but to demand. “The buildings have skylights right?” She doesn’t have to see Price’s reluctant nod to know she’s right, she’d already studied the areal maps top to bottom in the few hours she’d had the images. “I will go in first, clear the guarded buildings, and then we can meet before the warehouses. It will be faster and cleaner.”

Price chews his food slowly before taking a long drink from the weathered glass at his side. She can see the cogs of his brain whirling, processing new information and running through the plan in his mind. Before he speaks though, another voice is calling out from her left.

“No.” Its Ghost, sat back in his chair, arms crossed across his chest. “We’ve never had a problem with doing it this way in the past. There’s no reason to change now.”

She wants to pin him to the ground and beat his face in. After whatever conspired under the table that morning, Ghost had retreated to his room, unresponsive to her knocking and only reappearing after Price’s demanding request for him to be at the table in five minutes. This time his eyes remained on Price and his hands tucked under crossed arms. Completely blocked off.

“Well, you have a new team member.” Her words are bitter and spoken to the food on her plate. "Things are bound to change. I promise I can clear faster working alone.”

“Ghost has a point.” Price drops his fork and leans back in his chair. “You don’t have much field experience and we can’t risk messing up. Not this time.”

Her own fork digs painfully into her palm and she has to swallow down the bubbling anger in her stomach. At Ghost’s constant refusal, at Price’s lack of pushback, at Soap and Gaz’s silence when she turns a ‘can you believe this?’  look to them.

Something snaps, a deep rolling black unfurls in her mind, and when Price dismisses them, she slips quietly into the training room and plans.

_____

    Flash can hear his stalking footsteps behind her, reluctant and tired. But the fury burning through her, the weeks of stagnant power slosh in her mind, drowning any sympathy for his disturbed peace.

“Just a quick one. I have things to finish.” Ghost says while shaking his shoulders out and taking a wider stance on the mats.

Flash’s heart pounds up into her throat at the easy way he brushes her aside like she’s a toy to be played with and then set back on a shelf. Her hands itch for the rope tucked neatly beneath the loose fabric of her top.

“Sure.” She breathes, hoping her desperation isn’t too obvious. “Just a quick one.”

He starts off slow, just like any other match they’ve fought. Non-committal jabs and lunges. Enough to show that he can do more, that he could take her to the ground if he wanted to, that he could hurt her. But he never does.

Flash follows in suit for the first few seconds, going along with the easy pattern. Hit, block, hit, block, jab, block. Long enough to gain his trust and watch his guard drop. His hits become lazy and slow, still enough to take out any average bar fight aggressor but a fraction of his real strength. She takes his next drawback as a sign and unleashes.

With as much strength as she can muster, Flash curls her hand into a fist, rears back, and punches him square in the jaw. Heat flares up her arm in a wicked spiral of pain and her knuckles split in hot flashes, but Ghost staggers back, stumbling across the smooth surface of the mat. Shock marring the small bits of his face she could make out beneath his cloth mask.

And then she’s next to him, planting a foot at his shoes and shoving hard at his back. A heavy puff of air leaves his lungs as he lands hard on his chest. Flash doesn’t waste a second before pining his hands behind his back and pulling at the rope hidden beneath the flowing fabric of her top, the coarse fibers burn against the sensitive skin of her stomach with the quick movement.

“What the fuck.” Ghost’s words are breathless, and he only starts to struggle when she’s grabbing at his ankles to tie them against his already bound wrists. “Are you fucking hogtying me?” His voice is incredulous but it's too late, Ghost’s struggling is in vain. The picture diagram that Flash had memorized just an hour before was perfectly burned into her memory and the knots tied around his hands and feet attested to that.

“No.” She bites out. “I’m making an example of you.”

And then she’s pulling him, dragging him by the bound shape of his ankles across the mats. It’s no easy feat, he might as well be the same weight as one of their trucks, and the bare skin and rippled muscle that his shirt revealed with every tug weren’t helping her efforts either. But the burning need in her gut, the primal urge to fight pushes harder.

And so she pulls. Across the training room, through the hall, by an incredulous Soap, past their rooms, and to the last door of the hallway, ignoring the angry cusses and yells the entire time. Flash tries not to think of the incredulous amount of effort it's going to take to regain his trust. A small part of her cries out to cut him free and beg for forgiveness. The same part that had comforted him earlier. The part that he'd so thoughtlessly crushed.

The door swings open to reveal not only Price but Alejandro. They stare at her incredulously, at the rumpled state of her clothes and the hair hanging in tendrils across her face.

“What’s wrong Flash?” Price has moved to stand from his desk chair and she realizes that she hadn’t pulled Ghost into the doorway yet, and he’d gone blessedly silent.

With one big lurch, she pulls him into view of the two men. Alejandro’s laugh echoes loudly across the room. Price, now fully out from behind his desk is frozen in place, eyes flickering from Flash’s still panting figure to a bound and silent Ghost. His mouth opens once, twice, but nothing comes out.

“I want to be on the field.” Flash grits out. “No more sidelines, no more cover missions, no more training. I’m done.”

She pulls the small knife- a twin to the one on Ghost’s belt - from a hidden sheath at her waist and cuts the length of rope binding his hands and feet together. They fall with a dull thud, and she takes that as her queue to leave, ignoring his grumbled complaints over his still-bound feet and hands.

If they wanted her to remain chained to a post, they’d picked the wrong recruit.

_____

    Twenty-four hours later. Flash is crouching in front of one of the first makeshift guard posts just outside the gate of the warehouse. Pistol raised and a rifle strapped to the pack on her back, adrenaline thrums through her veins but her hands remain steady.

After her stunt the day before. Price had come to her that night and given her permission to clear the guard posts on her own. Only if she then fell back to tail Ghost and Soap when they clear the main warehouse. It seemed like compromise would be the only way she’d get what she wanted.

“Where’s the safety again?” She speaks quietly into the mic at her throat, a subtle ask for permission from Price.

‘Breach when ready. Don’t hold back. These men will not hesitate before shooting.’

When the line goes quiet she takes one deep breath, sending it out in a steady stream through her nose.

Just a few yards up the hill, she can make out the dark outline of Ghost's rifle balancing on a boulder. Even though she can’t see Soap, she knows he’s somewhere nearby in the tall grass. Both ready to intervene the moment something goes awry. If something goes awry.

Cold concrete bites at the skin of her fingers, but the burning of her arms as she scales the side of the building only fuels the churning fire in her stomach. Searching feet find the smallest pockets and ridges in the mortar. In one smooth movement, Flash pulls herself up onto the roof and falls to a low crawl towards the single skylight. A swear slips from her lips when her eyes fall to the bolted bars over the glass. She’d have to switch things up. A cold cylinder of metal brushes her finger when she reaches back to the band of tools on her pack. It screws easily onto the front of her pistol. Settling the barrel between the bars, she directs it to one of the men sitting at a desk in front of a row of computer screens. Two silenced shots later, they’re both slumped over and she’s sliding down the back wall, falling into a heel-to-toe run to the next building. Her feet are soundless on the driveway. As if the gravel parts in time with her steps.

Just like before, she falls into a smooth rhythm. Climb, crawl, aim, shoot, move.

‘Damn what took us so long to recruit you.’

Soap's voice startles Flash, one of her fingers slips on a shingle adorning the third building and she’s forced to pull herself up using her one remaining hand. The muscle of her bicep shakes when she settles herself against the tiles.

“Fuck off.” She seethes against the furious beating of her heart. She’d have to get used to hearing them so loudly in her ear. They seem to catch on though, and the line remains silent as she clears the building.

When the last two men are left splattered against their bulletin boards, Flash scopes out two hunched forms by a padlocked gate surrounding the warehouse. Sticking close to the chain link, she skirts around gaps in the tall grass.

A biting wind blows off the peninsula, pushing in clouds, dark with the promise of equally freezing rain. It ripples the grassy plains in waves, mirroring those crashing on the beach just fifty yards to her left. Soft grass cushions her steps, silencing them even further, and when she glances down, a patch of bright yellow buttercups catch her eye. If the area wasn’t teeming with armed and angry men, she might have spread herself out in the lush greenery.

Now just feet away from the pair, Flash mirrors Soap who's crouched down next to Ghost and waits for one of them to see her.

“Jesus fuckin’ Christ woman.” Soap’s voice echoes through both in and outside her earpiece as he flinches away from her. Ghost just shakes his head. She just barely catches a hint of a smile before he’s turning back to the lock on the gate. “A warning next time would be nice.”

Flash just offers him a smug smile before watching over his shoulder as Ghost finally breaks the lock and chain with a sharp pair of bolt cutters. She can't help but gape at the way his forearms bulge with the effort.

After her example. They'd spoken only when necessary. The two times she'd attempted to find him to explain and try to piece together some semblance of an apology, he'd been conveniently busy and had brushed her off. Which only made her more bitter.

They creep forward toward the warehouse and the light humor cushioning them slips away as Ghost directs them with silent short gestures. She gives herself just a millisecond to mourn the loss of control before moving to crouch behind the stack of pallets that Ghost had pointed to. Just a few yards from the warehouse entrance. The handle of her pistol clicks easily into her belt and then she’s pulling the rifle from her back. The heavy weight of it brings an insurmountable amount of comfort and it curves perfectly into the junction of her shoulder and bicep.

A red crosshair leads Ghost to the door and stays there when both he and Soap breach the building, eager to latch onto anyone who decides to slip away unnoticed. Gunfire rings through the large metal building and any future attempt at stealth is futile. It’s just as she’s settling into a lower crouch in anticipation of a target that the loud rumble of a truck sounds from the opposite side of the fenced concrete yard. A black pickup speeds towards the open gate and careens around the corner, kicking up a large cloud of dust. Without hesitation, Flash pivots her rifle and through the haze and is able to take out the two back tires. Then she’s running. Abandoning her position and beloved rifle at the crates.

“Price, take the eye on breach point. I have a straggler.” Her words come out between controlled breaths as she sprints after the slowing truck. Concrete smacks painfully against her feet, and although the thin soles of her shoes made climbing a breeze, they did nothing to protect her feet and knees from unforgiving rock.

‘Copy. Gaz track Flash with your scope.’

Finally, the truck comes to a rolling stop a few yards away from the wooded strip and a man stumbles from the driver's side and starts towards the trees and beach beyond. Flash reaches for her pistol, but by the time she has it up and aimed at his last location, he’s disappeared into the tree line.

In a careful stalk, Flash follows the road to the truck and peers over the side and into the bed, keeping a weary eye on the woods. It’s filled with at least ten black crates. She mutters a brief description to Price before following the man’s footsteps. It’s easy enough, semi prints line a path through the grass. She’s just about to step over a large chunk of driftwood when blinding pain sprouts across the base of her skull. Once nimble feet catch on the wood and her pistol flies from her hand as she braces for impact. When she lands cold mud sprays across her front and across her back when she turns to see the man standing above her with a plank. It makes another move toward her head and she rolls to the left just in time. Desperate hands search the ground for her gun, but the pounding in her head blurs the patches of mud and grass together. A voice buzzes in her ear loud and demanding. The plank sends another splatter of mud up her side when it lands in the spot she’d been laying in moments before.

The man rips her up by the straps of her too-large vest and the velcro tears with the force. He chucks the fabric to their left and Flash’s chest is left bare except for a muddy, sweat-drenched shirt. She barely has time to recover before a gloved fist is flying toward her face. Plank long abandoned. Flash ducks, but the edge of his fist catches her temple, shocks of white explode behind her eyes and the world begins to sway. Refusing to go down alone, she swipes a foot behind the man’s ankle and they both tumble down the grassy embankment and to the wet sand below.

He wastes no time in pinning her arms to the ground, one above her head and the other under a knee. With the unstable ground though, she’s able to maneuver out and rip at the mask covering his face. It comes free with minimal effort and the man freezes at his sudden bareness. Murderous, dark eyes stare down at her and for a moment she hesitates, just a second, but it's enough time for him to pin her arms again and flip her over. Hands grab at her braid, without her vest it’s a weakness she can’t tuck away. A piercing scream tears from her lungs as he rips her head up from the ground, arching her back against him. There’s a crackle of static before Ghost’s panicked voice is ringing through her earpiece.

‘Flash! I need a location!’

“Worthless fucking woman.” His seething breath is hot against her neck and dread pools in her stomach. He’d heard the coms. The earpiece is ripped from her head and chucked across the sand, taking with it the mic that had been so carefully wrapped around her neck. It lands somewhere beyond her vision. She’s on her own.

“I should have left that on.” A venom-laced laugh shoots down her arching spine. “Let them hear your screams when I slit you open.”

Pain clouds her mind, slowing her reaction as a cool blade is drawn lightly up the front of her stomach. Then she realizes at the first tear of her shirt. Fury singes her mind and curdles her blood. Another rip at her braid fuels the burning rage in her veins and the taught band she’d been waiting on snaps inside of her.

Blood sprays hot against Flash’s neck when she rears her head back into the man's nose and with the time that his flailing arms give her, flips them over and straddles him. The man cries to deaf ears as punch after punch lands against his face, and Flash, numb to the pain each one brings, doesn’t stop. Golden hair, smothered in sand and knotted with mud, falls in a curtain around them, the elastic must have come free in the struggle.

Blind with desperation, Flash misses the stone in his hand as it collides with the side of her head. Another animalistic scream splits her lips and she falls to the side. A fist is brought against her nose and the world tilts and darkens. Bile burns her throat and she has to grit her teeth with the effort it takes to push against his restraint as he crawls on top of her, it’s to no avail. The man is easily a hundred pounds heavier than her. Another hit lands against her jaw and her head is thrust into the sand with the momentum. It seeps between her lips when her mouth parts in a silent scream of pain and crunches between her teeth as she grits them. The sky turns red and her mind screams a warning as copper fills her throat and mouth, blocking her airway. A choking cough sends hot blood spraying across her face and the man above her. Although her vision is dimming and another fist is moments away from stealing it all together, a manic grin splits her lips as the man's face crumples in disgust when he swipes at the red splatters covering his mouth. A final blow is delivered to her ear and everything cuts.

When she surfaces a moment later, the exposed area of her back screams in pain. Sand and rugged rock tear at the sensitive skin. She’s being dragged. Flash wills her eyes to open, to find a point of weakness and direct her in an attack, but they remain closed. She can hear the man’s limp as he stumbles through the sand and his exhaustion is clear in his panting breaths. It’s only when the stinging cold of the ocean wets her cheek and bubbles into her mouth that her eyes spring open.

He’s going to drown her.

In one last rush of adrenaline, numb fingers pry out from beneath her limp body and fumble against her belt, digging desperately for the small knife strapped between her pants and leggings. Red blurs her vision of the clouded sky, leaking from multiple gashes on her brow. When the cold sting of metal meets her fingers she has to bite back a cry of relief. Just as his boot is pushing her head under, she flips the knife out and slices at the hand grasping her arm. Blood sprays in an arc as he cries out in pain and stumbles back, releasing her arm. Flash rises from the ocean, gasping and clutching the blade in shaking fingers.

The world tilts and spins as she drags herself up to her knees and spits out a mouth full of salt and copper. The man gazes at her in horror, gripping his bleeding wrist. She can’t even begin to imagine what she must look like, half-drowned, hair hanging wet and tangled around a beaten and bloody face.

“Just fucking die!” The man’s enraged scream echoes across the bay and Flash can only hope someone hears.

“Fuck you.” She seethes and lunges at him when he starts toward her, swiping with her knife.

It catches his cheek, a far cry from where she had aimed but with the spinning of her vision, it's a wonder she hit anything. He cries out again and falls back, grasping his bleeding face. Blundering feet catch against rocks and he falls gracelessly into the water like a fawn on new legs.

Flash wastes no time, stumbling towards his writhing body she pulls her arm back and throws the small knife. It spins through the air, a blind flash of silver, before burrowing into the sand just inches from his head. Fuck.

The man lets out a blubbering laugh, no doubt choking on blood and ocean, and reaches up. His fingers barely caress the metal before a rock is careening toward his head. This time she meets her mark.

A dull thud, the sound of stone breaking skin and bone beneath echoes through her mind, and he goes still. It’s not enough. A shuddering breath still moves his chest. Shivers wrack her body and anger pulses through her limbs with each step toward him. Kneeling by his body she sees the wide glare of his brown eyes, the same ones that stared down and spoke of her womanhood like a curse. That threatened to ravage her like an animal.

With a cry of rage, she raises the rock above her head and with as much strength as she can manage, brings it down into his sneering mouth. Blood sprays onto the white sand and stains the foamy water a startling pink. Her own blood turns to fire, fueling the arc of her arms as they bring the rock down again and again. Power ignites in her core, another raging scream claws its way up her throat. Landing one final blow to the mangled corpse Flash stumbles back.

The tide washes a dangerous shade of red and the bile burning the back of her throat surfaces and she vomits. With it goes the rest of her adrenaline, shaking legs struggle to hold her weight as she stumbles towards the grassy embankment. When she reaches it the soft earth slides beneath her shoes and she nearly falls. The mix of cold, soaked clothing and hot blood cascading down her neck and face confuse her already muddled mind.

Where had they set up camp? The fog in her mind creeps further in, flashes of a yellow flowered meadow and a park sign flicker like a broken reel. Flash gazes up and toward a steep hill. Had she gone down that road? Without her focus, the awkward drag of her feet catch on a patch of gravel and then the ground is hurdling toward her.

The pain doesn’t register as her hands meet the rough ground and she collapses, cheek pressing into the cool stone. Her eyelashes flutter against the sudden weight on her lids. One minute, one won't hurt.

Just as her eyelids are about to shut and give in to the numb warmth creeping through her body, her drifting eyes catch a small golden shape. It glows bright next to the dark rock it grows against. A bloodied hand drifts in front of her face, and although it's not her own nimble fingers, she can feel the soft skin of the flower when a gentle finger caresses its petal. A flower. A golden flower.

A quiet rumble of the storm that had raged through her just minutes before starts at the sight and with a muffled sob, Flash pushes herself up, against the raging throb of her head and the blinding pain blanketing every inch of her body, and stands.

It’s all she can do to follow the sprawling color in hopes it brings her back to the van. Back to safety.

She stumbles blindly, across tall grass and dirt that kicks up in clouds when her heavy feet scuff through it. If Ghost and Soap hadn’t cleared the warehouse yet, she’d be an easy target. And then she spots them. Three men standing outside of a truck, arguing loudly.

“We can’t just leave!” She’d recognize Gaz’s irritated yell any day.

“She’s not responding to my callouts. Our best chance of finding her will be with the K-9 units. They’re on there wa-.” Price’s words cut off with a violent curse when he spots her.

It’s only when she sees the horrified expression on the team's blurred faces that Flash realizes she’s still clutching the stone covered in blood and gore. She can only assume her face isn’t any better.

“I got him.”

The words leave her lips and then her knees are buckling, the stone lands on the grass with an eerily familiar thud. Before her head can hit the ground along with it, strong arms wrap around her shoulders and haul her toward the truck.

“Move! Johnny pull the med kit. Now!” Although Ghost's shouting is just inches from her ear it's muffled and soft. “Don’t you close your eyes Flash. Keep them open. Tell me how you did it. ”

She tries, opening them as wide as she can, but she can only see a sliver of a white skull. Her mouth opens and the only thing that comes out is a pitiful moan. Cold metal bites into her back as she's shifted from warm arms to the hard floor of the truck. Her eyes close in a wince and she grasps at the arms as they leave her. They return in a comforting pressure at her bicep, but it's only to hold her still as a piercing pain erupts from her sternum. A stim shot.

“Flash!” Ghost’s words are garbled. There’s a quick movement and then a bare face is staring down at her. “Look.” She tries, so hard, to open her slitted eyes, to see the face above her. “Look at me, at my face. You pester me for so long and now you won't look?” Although his tone is teasing, she can hear desperation biting like a savage dog at his words.

In one last act of defiance, one more test of fate, Flash raises a hand to the blurred face above her, reaching. A hand grasps hers and presses it into his cheek. He’s delightfully warm against her own freezing skin. And if it's the last thing she’ll feel, she can die happy.

“Don’t you fucking dare. Johnny another!”

Shapes move above her, flashes of white and red as sodden bandages are passed over her and replaced with fresh ones. The hand gripping hers is painful, the last tether she clings to. Another sharp pain at her chest, and it snaps, and the warmth against her hand fades. Shouts echo through the small cabin and the dark figures surrounding her move faster.

The mouth above her speaks but the sound falls to failing ears.

“Please.”

#ghost x reader #Ghost x female oc #Simon riley #Cod fic #Simon ghost riley #Alejandro vargas #Valeria #Modern warfare 2 #Ghost stories #john soap mactavish #John price #Mw2 #headcannons #gaz garrick

[wibixthecowboy]

To start,

That was absolutely amazing. I enjoyed every second of it. An amazing chapter, much like everything else you’ve made to this point.

You’re too good at this, I can’t handle it anymore. That was so good, 100% worth the wait.

Overall: 100/10, absolutely amazing.

P.S: Get better soon <3

I don’t even know how to respond to amas like this. You guys are so incredibly sweet sometimes. ❤️❤️🫶🫶

I am so glad that you are enjoying reading my little story! Like I’ve said before, I was just planning on having this be a little mini series like my other fics (now erased from the internet) I’ve written. But this community is so interactive and fun that you’ve inspired A LOT more. Like 30k words more.

Just know that I read every single comment that is left, on every platform, and they all make my day a million times better. Even if I don’t respond, know that I appreciate you all! 🫶

(And I have mostly recovered! I’m just stuck with the stupid sniffles)

[wibixthecowboy]

Bae U ever go a month without Posting then.. I will Do bad bad Things Ok?

I won’t! (Not making any promises)

College has my schedule so out of wack so don’t ever expect me to have a regular upload schedule 🥴

In good news, chapter 11 is already in editing! I had so much fun writing it, you guys have no idea!! ❤️❤️

[wibixthecowboy]

i would give u the best head for chapter 10 today 😻

Say no more

[wibixthecowboy]

Play the Song: Part 10: Hope

Task Force 141 needs a new sniper and despite their complaints, they're assigned Flash, a joke-making, ABBA-listening, 20-year-old sharpshooter with better aim than the whole team combined. In other words, Ghost is practically handed the love of his life but he needs time to adjust because she's a firecracker.

Warnings/Tags: !graphic depictions of panic attacks!, references to suicide attempts (no descriptions), references to SA (no descriptions), Age gap (20/30-32), gore, descriptions of injury/blood/wounds, justified angst, tooth rotting fluff, slow burn, protective ghost, family dynamic, big brother soap has an attitude problem, father figure Price, wholesome brother Gaz, touch starved Ghost, eventual smut, praise, choking, thigh riding, unprotected (wrap it up people), size kink, oral f receiving, ghost will do anything to get his dick sucked, idk I’m sure it will get dirtier as I go, shifting POV  

A/N: Hello!! I am back! Thank you all for being so patient and amazing, I present to you, Chapter 10!

I will be adding warnings/tags as I upload new chapters so do me a huge favor and double check before you read! Nothing too bad YET but just make it a habit! They will always be added at the top of the list.

Words: 6k

Side note: All of these characters are fictional! Please don’t be weird about their real life actors, leave them out of this and be respectful!

Part 1  Part 2  Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

Tag list: @urfavsunkissedleo @butskii @abbiesxox @itsasecrets-things @thatonewriterthatnooneknows  

    ★Flash   

The knife squelches grotesquely when Ghost pulls it from the man's neck, and it's casually wiped on the waist of his button-up. Red blossoms over the white cotton and despite knowing it's not from him, Flash can't help the small hitch in her breath.

It's presented to her hilt first, just inches from her face, but she's frozen in shock. The man's body lay awkwardly in the gravel, like a puppet whose strings have been cut, blood pouring from the now open wound at his neck. His chest stutters in an effort to pull oxygen into a pair of failing lungs. She can see the glowing reflection of windows in his wide, dark eyes, and moments later, the slow loosening of his facial muscles as he dies.

Ghost is watching her, and she can hear a faint mumble. Her name?

"Flash. We need to go" Ghost's words ring through her head like a bell and she snatches the knife from his hand before sliding it under her dress and into the sheath.

He moves quickly, throwing the limp body over his shoulder with ease before walking to the car and popping the trunk. Flash's eyes are glued to him as he drops the body in. The thud when it lands is deafening. A hot flash washes up her spine and she tries not to think about how casually Ghost closes the trunk and wipes his hands clean on his trousers.

Not quite knowing how to help, Flash walks over to the small patch of blood and kicks at the gravel. It doesn't do much, just creates a dusty sludge that bleeds into the soft velvet of her heels. Not that it matters though, the man's radio is already going off, a muffled and rather irritated voice calling out from inside the trunk.

When she's satisfied with the muddy brown concoction, Flash jogs over to the passenger door and slips inside. The door barely clicks shut before Ghost is speeding out the gates and swerving around a rather annoyed looking valet.

Flash watches over her shoulder for any sign of disturbance but instead notices Ghost's wolf mask tossed haphazardly on the back seat. In all the chaos, she'd missed him swapping them out. His usual balaclava has been pulled back on, hiding the strawberry blonde curls she'd had her hands in just minutes ago.

Flash's head thuds against the seat when she's finally sure no one is coming after them and she sags further down into the plush leather.

"Holy fuck." She breathes out and swallows what could either be vomit or a laugh. "There's a body in the trunk."

"Yes."

"You just killed him."

"I did."

"How did you-"

"Flash?" He interrupts her, eyes not leaving the road as he speaks. "Be quiet."

She glares at him and turns to make an off-hand comment about him being an ass but stops when she sees how rigid he is. Maybe she'd pushed a bit too far tonight. Maybe she hadn't pushed him far enough.

"How do you know he's not innocent?" She speaks softer this time, hoping she could sweet talk him back into the charismatic James she'd spent the night with.

"No one there is innocent Flash." His voice is cold and distant and entirely fed up with her pushing. She's on thin, thin ice.

"You could at least let me know next time. That really wasn't a fair warning."

It's petty. She doesn't need his warning, it's their job. But her mouth seems to be speaking on its own accord.

The ice cracks, echoing through the cavernous silence between them, and right as she's about to slip into the frigid waters, a life raft is thrown her way.

'What's your status?'

Price's static voice stops Ghost's response and he snatches the radio from where Flash had tossed it in the cup holder.

"Heading to the med bay now. Single casualty."

'Got caught up at the end then?'

"Somethin' like that."

The rest of the ride to the med bay is spent in silence. Flash stroking her fingers down the velvet nose of her mask and not thinking about ways to flay Ghost.

_____

    The cold concrete of the barricade seeps through the thin silk of Flash's dress and into the marrow of her bones. Despite Las Almas being a sauna during the day, its nights are shockingly cold, and in the middle of the desert with no buildings to block the brutal midnight wind, she is freezing.

"How much longer is this going to take?" Flash speaks into the cupped hollow of her hands. The warmth of her breath does practically nothing to stop the shivering.

Ghost had radioed into the med station a few minutes before their arrival to announce that they'd have a 'drop off' and to call in another car for the two of them to take back to the base. When they'd gotten there, Flash was immediately tugged through the main bay and into a blindingly white room that smelled so strongly of disinfectant, her nose still burned. She was patted over by a female nurse, given a curt nod, and pushed back out the door and towards a waiting Ghost. He'd mumbled something about waiting for a car and then walked them outside to a small retaining wall near the entrance.

"I don't know."

"Can't you just call them?" Flash asks, kicking another piece of gravel across the lot. The kicking had started as an attempt to scrape the congealed dirt and blood off her heel, but it only resulted in a thin layer of dust that covered both their shoes and a small hole.

"Call who Flash?" Ghost sits half hunched on the wall, arms supporting him on either side, legs crossed at the ankles, and looking utterly defeated.

"I don't know? The guy who's bringing the car?" She kicks a particularly large rock and it skitters across the pavement and bounces off a metal barrel, making a satisfying ring, so she does it again.

"I don't have-" His voice cuts off as she kicks another rock. "Jesus fuckin' Christ. Could you stop?"

"Don't be so fuckin' rude." She mumbles, and just to piss him off more, kicks another rock. Hard enough that when it hits the barrel, a small dent is left behind.

Flash watches through her periphery as he heaves a sigh, drops his head into his hands, and roughly rubs at his masked face.

She only lets herself feel guilty for a moment. He was the one ruining it. She'd been having fun at the gala. Despite the less than stimulating conversations, watching Ghost woo the various partygoers of Las Almas had been rather intriguing. Not to mention the dancing. Jesus Christ the dancing.

While the banter with the rest of the team had never gone as far as fucking her for god's sake, they certainly weren't holding church sermons. Price had chided her more than once for distracting the team while they were on the field and she was resting comfortably on the couch, radio in hand.

As soon as the words had left her mouth though, muttered into the silken hollow of his collarbone, she knew they were true. As much as he frustrated her, there was something about his presence that activated something primal inside her. That same primal feeling that had surfaced when she'd had him pinned to the ground and wheezing beneath her. It was addictive and dangerous.

"I'm sorry."

The words are spoken into the palms of his hands and although they sound forced, they seem genuine enough. She breaks from her all consuming thoughts and tugs at the hem of her dress in hopes that it would somehow extend to cover the bare few inches of skin that press into the cold concrete.

"Just don't be so uptight all the time." Flash bumps his shoulder with hers and offers him a small smile. "You'd be surprised how much better your life would be if you stopped all your huffing and puffing."

"You don't know shit about my life." The words are meant to be sharp, to ward her away from prodding further, but he speaks to his dust covered shoes.

"So tell me."

This stops Ghost's fidgeting. Flash thinks for a moment that he'll get up and walk away, leaving her to freeze to death alone. But he eventually drops his hands to his lap and raises his head to stare at the dark horizon.

"It's a lot."

Flash, despite his hunched frame and tired eyes, bumps their shoulders again.

"I don't see the car, and you can see for- I don't know," She peers dramatically down the road, "about ten miles."

"Ask Soap. He's a better storyteller than me." Ghost words are shortening, and Flash can see the wall she'd so carelessly blown through rebuilding. He's evading, and if she doesn't save it in time, who knows how long it will be until he's talking to her again.

"But I don't want to hear from Soap."

"You don't want to hear it from me either."

Flash sighs and then redirects. "What's your biggest fear?"

Ghost stills next to her, but this time she can see the hard set of his eyes softening, reluctance slipping away into indulgence.

"I thought you wanted to know about my life." He comments lightly, and Flash can't help but feel accomplished for recovering what little progress she'd made.

"I think fears tell a lot about a person." She hums, hoping her last-ditch effort at having a conversation sounds at least somewhat inquisitive.

Ghost's head tips up towards the sky, brow furrowed in thought.

"Throwing up."

"That's your biggest fear?" Flash doesn't have to ask to know that he's humoring her.

"What? Did you expect somethin' worse?"

There's a beat of silence, and then Ghost is speaking again.

"What's yours?"

"Dogs."

Silence again.

"Like pugs? Or-"

Flash shoves his shoulder and laughs loudly. "No you asshole. The big ones."

Despite the topic, a whirlwind of butterflies erupts in her stomach and the sound of their fluttering reaches her ears, filling them with a low hum. Then he's laughing. Not the small huffs from their usual teasing, full-stomach laughs. The whirlwind turns into a storm. It ravages her mind, twirling the sound into a song and repeating it over and over.

Flash stares at him, speechless, afraid that if she speaks, the storm brewing inside her will somehow escape and drench the both of them in things she'd rather leave unsaid. She wants to tell him to never stop, to ask exactly what she'd said that was so funny so she could repeat it every day for the rest of their time together. To peel off that damn mask and watch every minuscule movement of his face.

Ghost doesn't seem to mind the lack of response though. When his amusement has faded to a small smile under his mask, his head lolls to his shoulder and he closes his eyes.

They wait the rest of the time in silence. Ghost unmoving and still resting his eyes and Flash unabashedly staring. Even though she knows that the idea is ridiculous, he seems to be warming the space between them. The ice that she'd so carefully tread on before melting away.

He doesn't open his eyes until the car rolls up in front of them and a casually dressed man tosses the keys in his direction. Ghost catches them in his hand and stretches languidly when he stands, revealing a small sliver of skin along his waistline. With his back turned to her, Flash stares at the strip, burning it into her memory.

"You can kick rocks all night," Ghost slips his hands into his pockets and starts a slow, casual walk towards the car, "but you're not going to get what you want."

"And what's that?"

Flash's question is meant to be coy, to push yet another button. But the song left playing in her ears softens her words, they come out quiet and searching.

"A reaction." He punctuates the last word by kicking a rock at the barrel. It hits the small dent that she'd made and ricochets back to land just a few inches from her feet.

"Asshole." She mutters and steps over the rock, ignoring the urge to pick it up and chuck it at his head.

Flash bites her tongue when the thought of teasing him about their dancing comes up. She'd most definitely gotten a reaction out of him then. But she instead follows him and slips into the passenger seat of the small truck.

It's certainly a downgrade from the Porsche. The smell of dust and sweat fills her nose and she debates waiting outside until the med team is done clearing the other car. But Ghost is already buckled and turning the key in the ignition.

"Who's car was that?" Flash asks while pulling a worn seatbelt over her shoulder.

"Alejandro's."

She can't help but laugh at his response. They'd most likely be getting an earful upon their return. It doesn't take a genius to see that he takes care of his car.

The truck, despite running just seconds ago, is just as cold as the air outside. When she jams her finger into the heater button, the vents remain stagnant.

"Shit." She huffs and resorts to shoving her hands under her shivering thighs.

Ghost, seemingly without thinking, tosses her his suit jacket.

"Here, stop whining." He's back to his gruff, nonchalant manner of speaking, but it lacks its usual stiffness.

"You aren't cold?"

"No."

"I guess you are built like a fuckin' polar bear." The words slip out before she can stop them, but Ghost just shakes his head, still sporting the small smile from before.

"Do you ever have any consequences for what comes out of your mouth?" Ghost's question is spoken as a sigh. He props an elbow against the car door and leans his head against it, steering with one hand. The motion is achingly domestic.

"No." Her reply is muffled as she burrows herself into the jacket, warm from being stuffed under Ghost's arm while they waited.

It's true. There's very little that she could say or do that would get her in any sort of trouble. She's a hot commodity, and it didn't take much for people to realize. Ghost just hasn't had a chance to see it yet.

"One of these days, they're going to come back and bite you in the ass."

"Oh, you'll scare them away." She looks up at him through her lashes, but he's focused on the road.

"I'd let them get a few good hits in. Then maybe."

Flash's grin is hidden beneath the coat, but she's sure he can hear it when she speaks next.

"You wouldn't protect me?" Her question is coy. She knows it and he probably does too.

"You don't need me to protect you."

"But if I asked you to?"

There's a pause, and she watches his side profile shift as he clenches his jaw. His fingers tap against the steering wheel. Once, twice.

"Yes."

_____

    They're nearly back to the base when she slips back onto the ice and into the freezing water. This time though, there is no life raft.

"I'm dropping you off." Ghost is exacerbated, clenching the wheel with both hands now. "You're not missing out on anything."

"Then why does it matter if I go or not?" Her question is a half yell, quieter than her first complaint, but louder than necessary.

Their easy back and forth, borderline flirting, conversation only lasted a few more minutes before Ghost mentioned he'd be dropping her off at the base before meeting the rest of the team at a local bar to 'celebrate'.

He'd told her, not asked. Told.

The not so quiet rage that had been building over her last few weeks stuck at the base rears its ugly head. Apparently pinning him to a mat didn't make it clear enough. She's tired of decisions being made for her.

"Because you aren't needed there."

Ghost's words bleed through her like a freezing wind. She grapples to hold onto the song in her ears, but the fluttering in her stomach increases and this time it's deafening.

"You know, for how much you mope. You put a shit ton of effort into ruining your friendships."

It's a low blow. But the anger burning hot in her stomach scorches the fluttering and thrums through her veins. She wants to hurt him.

"There's nothing there to be ruined."

The words are empty. A shell of his earlier reprimands. And Flash knows it's a weak strategy to push her far enough away that he can rebuild his wall in peace. But that doesn't stop the words from burrowing deep into the space between her ribs and wrapping around her lungs. It fills them with a cold air and the jacket still wrapped tightly around her shoulders does nothing to fight it.

"Okay." Flash bites back the flurry of emotion driven insults threatening to pry their way out of her mouth. If it were anyone else, she wouldn't hesitate to rip them to shreds, but she knows Ghost is lying.

The rest of the ride to the base is a painful silence. Flash can see his jaw working in her periphery, he wants to say something, but he remains quiet and focused on the road ahead of them. She glares at him and then turns to stare out her window.

When the car whines to a stop in front of the depressingly dark outline of their base, Flash doesn't bother saying goodbye when she slips from the car and drops the suit jacket on her seat. She's just about to shut the door when he finally speaks up.

"Hope."

"What?" Flash's voice is bitter and unrelenting.

"You asked what my biggest fear was." He doesn't look away from his grip on the wheel. "It's hope."

The furrow of her brow softens for a moment and sympathy begins to ebb away at the rejection burning in her stomach. But his words ring through her head 'you aren't needed' and any expressions of comfort beginning to form die on her tongue.

She watches his face for a moment, waiting for him to turn. When he doesn't, she lets the sour words slip from her mouth. Simple but effective.

"I think you're just scared of yourself." She doesn't give him time to respond before shutting the door and walking towards the base, trying her best to ignore the burning behind her eyes.

_____

    Flash's next few moments are a whirlwind. Swapping her dress for the sweats and t-shirt flung on the floor that morning, jogging back to the kitchen to look at the grocery list style of numbers on the fridge, and calling Alejandro.

If he was with them at the bar she'd just have to stew in her room until Gaz came back. Although he'd probably be intoxicated and an easy target, she needs some way to dispel the hurt and anger pulsing through her veins.

Much to her surprise, he answers within the first few rings and twenty minutes later he arrives with a bottle of wine in hand and Valeria tow.

"Rude of them to leave you to celebrate your success sober." He had murmured while pulling a container of strawberries from their fridge. Gaz would kill her for eating them, but consequences seemed nonexistent at the moment.

She's leaning against the counter now, watching the way his forearms move while expertly slicing the strawberries. Valeria stands next to her speaking in a low tone.

"So," She starts, turning her chin resting in her hand to face Flash, "how did you end up here?"

Flash shifts to lean her hip into the counter, reluctantly peeling her eyes from Alejandro's smooth movements, and wonders what version of her story she wants to give.

"Same as everyone else. A fucked childhood that left me with no other option."

It was a half truth. Starting a conversation by telling someone she'd won scholarships to nearly every advanced military school in the country by climbing to the top of the performance ranks in less than a year isn't something that people could relate to. Childhood trauma on the other hand is a jackpot.

"Ah." Valeria's smile softens and she turns to look at Alejandro, who's now pouring the wine into three glasses that have seen better days. "We've heard that one plenty of times haven't we Ale."

When he nods his head, Valeria turns back to Flash with a mischievous glint in her eyes. "Now tell me the truth."

Flash accepts a glass from Alejandro and stares into the deep maroon of the wine before answering.

"I'm good."

"That's it?" Alejandro's laugh is loud and echoes through the empty room. "You've made it this far by being good?"

"I'm better than good." She offers, still not looking up from her glass.

Warm fingers slip under her chin and bring her gaze up to meet a pair of enveloping brown eyes.

"Don't be shy." Valeria's words are a quiet murmur. "You weren't so quiet earlier, what changed?"

Flash's jaw clenches, who was Ghost to make her feel small? Her gaze holds Valeria's when she speaks next and although her words are quiet, they're more confident than before.

"I'm the best you'll ever meet."

"There's my Pantera."

Valeria drops her chin, scoops up her glass and the bowl of cut strawberries, and slides so gracefully onto the couch that Flash wonders how she's not the one being named after a panther. "Come, sit."

Alejandro leads the way and claims the opposite side of the couch, leaving Flash to sit between them. It's a comfortable arrangement, there's enough room for them to sit and not be crammed together, but the weight of both their gazes makes the space seem impossibly smaller.

"What do you usually talk about while celebrating?" She asks, leaning over to grab a small handful of strawberries from the bowl Valeria left on the coffee table. It's a poor conversation starter, but the silence between them has Flash shifting on her cushion. And from the smile on Alejandro's face, they know.

"Do you really want to know?" He continues lowly when she nods her head. "We debate who we want to take home for the night."

Valeria tuts at him, "Don't be so brash Ale. We talk about other things too."

Flash brings her glass of wine up to her mouth in an attempt to cover her shocked expression but realizes that this means she actually has to drink it. Without giving her brain enough time to overreact, Flash tips a mouthful in and swallows. The taste is horrendous and she doesn't bother hiding it.

Alejandro laughs loudly at her expression and Valeria just shakes her head with a small smile, "It's meant to be sipped, darling. Not swallowed."

Not wanting to embarrass herself further, Flash just sets the glass down on the table and returns to the fruit in her hand.

"You could have said that." She mumbles against a strawberry pressed to her lips. The tart of the berry is a sweet reprieve from the rotten taste of the wine. The two sitting opposite of her seem to have no problem with the taste, leisurely sipping as though it's something to be savored.

"So Flash," Alejandro's eyes dance with dangerous excitement. " Are you a virgin? "

She chokes on a half-chewed berry, "Excuse me?"

"Just general questions. I ask everyone." He gestures behind her. "Right Valeria?"

"Right."

Flash remains silent, rubbing the cool of the strawberry against her lips and willing the blush away from her cheeks.

"Have you ever been kissed before?"

"Yes!" She blurts her answer out and all it does is set off a round of laughter between the two of them.

Her first kiss had been with a- for lack of a better term, boyfriend at the academy, Jake. A twenty three year old recruit who'd got a little too excited when she'd pinned him. He never did more than peck her on the lips though, arguing that anything else would distract him from his work. She broke things off three days later.

"Have you ever had someone's tongue in your mouth?" His blatant question catches her off guard. Although the pink hue of his cheeks show the effects of the wine kicking in. She's spent enough time with Alejandro to know that this is just the way he operates, on a 'better to ask for forgiveness than get permission' basis.

Flash shakes her head lamely, giving up on the stoic, unresponsive act. It clearly wasn't working.

He sets his glass on the coffee table and crooks a finger at her, smiling devilishly.

"Come here, let me show you something."

She sets her handful of strawberries back in the bowl and glances back at Valeria who gives her an encouraging nod. Flash uncrosses her legs and leans forward, expecting him to give her a quick peck.

"Tell me if you want me to stop."

She's about to ask him what he means when he brings his hands down to her waist and pulls her up to straddle his lap.

"What are you doing?" Her voice is breathy and light and her stomach rolls with nerves. Although it's not what she expected, she's not one to complain.

"Relax Rubia." His face is just inches from hers, "Do you want me to show you what you're missing out on?"

Nerves race through her veins and the heat of Alejandro's hands on her waist burn straight through her skin and into the heat of her stomach. What's the worst that could happen? Gaz had talked about having sex with other team members, surely a kiss wouldn't hurt. All she can muster is a short nod of her head.

Alejandro is the light at the end of her tunnel of pent-up frustration and by god is he bright.

"Words." He chides.

"Yes."

Although she's given permission, his advance is painfully slow. The hands gripping her waist, guide her to sit back on his thighs, and brush her hair behind her ear in one smooth movement, before resting gently against her cheek.

Warm lips press softly against hers and she practically melts in his hands. He's surprisingly gentle, pressing two light kisses to her lips before nosing at her cheek and placing another over the burning skin.

"She's a Pantera Alejandro. I'm sure she can handle more."

Flash jumps at the sound of Valeria's voice. She's moved to sit next to them, lounging on the cushion and watching with a cocked head. She smirks at Flash's surprise. She didn't even see her move.

"Slow Valeria." He chides. His low voice is spoken into the soft spot below her ear, words caressing her skin and whispering down her spine. "We don't want to spook her."

Lips part against her neck and the hot press of his tongue is followed by a cool stream of air. Flash chokes on her next inhale and swallows down the ragged moan threatening her ego. Nothing Jake ever did felt this good.

"Did you like that Rubia?" Alejandro's voice is light and teasing.

"Yes I-." Before she even finishes her answer, he's doing it again, this time following the lick with a quick nip of teeth. Her response turns into an embarrassingly loud half-whimper.

"You're a tease." She bites out, pausing on the last word as he mouths his way back up to her ear.

"Ah, but you like it. No?"

Flash doesn't have to see his face to know he's smiling. It's taken him less than a minute to turn her into putty, and now he's happily kneading.

When he presses his lips to hers this time, the hot slide of his tongue at her lower lip parts her mouth in a gasp. He wastes no time. Weaving one hand into the hair at the back of her head and the other squeezing at her waist, Alejandro kisses her fervently and without abandon.

The room spins beneath her, weakening her knees. If she wasn't held fast to Alejandro's lap, she'd probably be on the floor. The taste of strawberries and wine fill her senses and twirl her into a daze.

The hands previously resting at her side slide up the muscular length of his arms and into his hair. It's not quite as long as Ghost's but her fingers still easily grip at the soft waves. Ghost. A pang of guilt threatens to pull her from her reverie, but Alejandro quickly snatches her attention back by taking her lower lip between his teeth and biting down.

A defensive flare burns up her chest and she bites back harder. Alejandro groans into her mouth, the sound burns down her chest and settles low in her belly. The hand that was gripping at her waist slides up and to the small of her back, arching her into his chest. She presses close and can feel the hard muscle of his abdomen through the thin cotton of their shirts.

When he breaks the kiss, there's a strand of saliva connecting their mouths. He doesn't hesitate in pulling her back to drag a slow lick up her parted lips. Jesus fucking Christ. Dark eyes watch her closely when he pulls back and Flash is seconds away from begging him to do it again when a warm hand at her waist pulls her attention to an impatient looking Valeria.

"My turn." She murmurs, voice soft and low. "Can I kiss you?"

Flash, despite Alejandro's earlier insistence, can only nod in response.

She is identical to Alejandro in her slow start, dragging a soft hand over Flash's brow bone before swiping her thumb across slick lips. Fingers pinch Flash's chin and pull her forward. Valeria's lips are soft but her kiss is anything but. The hungry lick of her tongue gives Flash little time to adjust, but when she does, a delighted tremor wracks her body.

Warm hands slide beneath her shirt and then Valeria is pulling her down to grind against Alejandro's thigh. A moan is pressed into Valeria's mouth and electricity courses hot through her body.

Alejandro is quick to stop them. Large hands close over Valeria's on her hips and hold them still. She wants to pull them off, to give in to the warm sensation Valeria's hands are creating. He's persistent though.

"Valeria." Alejandro's words are a clear warning but his voice is thick and heady. If she didn't know better, she'd say Alejandro was enjoying this just as much as her.

Much to her disappointment, Valeria listens to his one-worded order. She rolls Flash's bottom lip between her teeth before placing one more kiss against her mouth and settling back.

Flash is left in a daze. Half-lidded eyes watch as Valeria straightens the hair that Flash had been pulling at just moments before.

"Just touching Mi Amor." Her words are breathy and the apples of her cheeks glow a soft pink.

"I was just showing our Rubia here what she's missing out on. I am not looking for a death threat."

Alejandro's words have her turning back to gaze at him in confusion. Although the lustful tint to his eyes is still present, he seems to have pulled himself together a lot quicker than Flash.

"Death threat?" Her voice is wrecked and Alejandro smirks at the sound. Whatever scrap of ego she had left lay tattered on the ground.

"Don't tell me you haven't noticed." He caresses the side of her face, proving to be an awfully good distraction from their conversation.

"Noticed what?" She breathes and turns to Valeria for an explanation. The woman just smiles and tilts her head to the side in an artful manner.

"You seem to be haunted by a certain ghost Flash." She tuts at her. "Don't tell me you haven't noticed."

"You mean Ghost?" She rushes, still recuperating from the mind numbing kiss that she'd gotten from two different people.

"Yes, Flash." Alejandro laughs it away like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"That man doesn't care about anyone other than himself." She says and swings her leg back to sit in her spot. Suddenly, sitting on Alejandro's lap isn't as exciting as before, and the once warm feeling in her stomach turns heavy.

"And that's where you're wrong." Valeria swirls a finger along the rim of her glass before gazing up at Flash through dark lashes. "We just had to dip our toes in before you're off the market. God help the bastards that try to trespass."

Flash flinches at her metaphor, "I'm not a piece of property." She glares at the two of them and their shockingly calm demeanor. Speaking as though they didn't just have their tongues in her mouth just minutes before. Her heart still beat wildly in her chest, and the cold taste of the strawberries did little to cool the heat of her cheeks.

"Honey," Valeria reaches out to stroke her calf, "the moment you signed that contract you became a piece of real estate."

She's saved from responding to another cryptic metaphor by the familiar sound of doors slamming shut. Not wanting to be barraged by questions from the rest of the team, Flash grabs the bowl of fruit, mutters a small goodnight to the pair staring at her from the couch, and rushes off to her room.

So much for blowing off some steam.

_____

    Flash is sitting cross-legged on her bed cleaning the blood flecked knife with a polishing cloth when a knock sounds through the room.

"Come in!"

She doesn't have to ask who it is. The stumbling and laughing are telling enough.

"Stop." Gaz's giggle sounds easily through the thin wood of the door. "I got it!"

The door swings open to reveal a relatively drunk Gaz and Soap. Hair mussed and cheeks pinkened, both look like they've had an eventful night.

"Hello gorgeous." Gaz drawls. "Wiping away the evidence of your most recent murderous rampage?"

Flash can't say she's not impressed at his coherency. She almost lets him off the hook. Almost.

"Don't make me have to start over." She points the knife at him and then gestures at the door. "Out."

A half hour ago, she would have welcomed the playful banter and taken it as an opportunity to wrestle him to the ground. But the weight of the day has her pinned to her bed.

"Aw, she's so mean." Gaz's head drops to Soap's shoulder and he doesn't shove him off.

Flash thinks back to Gaz's earlier confession and eyes the point of contact before glancing down at the relatively small space between them. Interesting. When she looks at Soap though, his eyes are trained on the knife balanced in her hand.

"Ghost let you borrow one of his knives?" His voice is incredulous and he takes a hesitant step forward.

"What?" She looks down at the silver case in front of her. She hadn't even noticed. The case was nearly identical to the one that was always neatly polished and tucked carefully into his breast pocket. "No, he bought these for me at the market."

"Oh." His mouth tips down and she recognizes the familiar expression of rejection. He's usually pretty good at keeping his emotions in check, she has no doubt it's the alcohol coursing through his blood that's giving them front row seats to his inner turmoil

Gas buts in oblivious to Soap's pouting, "So he's buying you two matching knives? Seems like it's getting pretty serious. Are you sure you're not fucking?"

Flash chokes on her next inhale. She'd have to get better at locking her door if this was going to become a regular occurrence.

"You know." Gaz looks at her with a devilish smile. "Just because Price went dark during your guy's little dance doesn't mean we did."

Oh fuck.

A/N: I’m currently dying (maybe that’s a tad dramatic) in bed with the flu and am in desperate need of entertainment. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave them in my ama! <3

#Ghost x reader #Ghost x female oc #simon riley #Cod Fic #simon ghost riley #Alejandro vargas #Valeria #modern warfare 2 #Ghost stories #john soap mactavish #mw2 #mw2 headcanons #john price #gaz garrick

[wibixthecowboy]

New plan babes. Uploading around Thursday but adding a scene as we speak that will require a cool down lap. (I’ve had to take several)

I hope that’s a fair trade 🤭

#I need to stop giving myself deadlines #I promise I’ll actually upload it on time #*cough* Valeria *cough cough* something about getting handsy *cough* #cod fic #mw2 #simon ghost riley #ghost x female oc

[wibixthecowboy]

Could we get a little hint on when chapter 10 is gonna come out?

I'm just asking for a friend.. totally not because I'm impatient.

(Chapter 9 was amazing btw)

Hi! Yes!

School has been absolutely kicking my ass (as per usual) so things have been a lot more delayed than I wanted.

Make sure to tell your friend I’m hoping for Tuesday!

Thank you guys for being so patient, all of your messages are so sweet. I’ll have something for you soon 🫶

[wibixthecowboy]

How are you so tremendously talented? Chapter Nine was PERFECT. 10000/10 would read again, multiple times, back to back.

I’m so excited to see what you do with the story/chapters past this point!

Keep up the great work!

Aaah thank you!! I try my best and spend hours tweaking so it makes me happy to see how much you guys love it! Your comments really make my day! 🫶

I actually only meant for this to be a 2-3 part series but as per usual I got carried away and now have a whole plot arc and everything. We’ll see how it comes out ig 🤷🏼‍♀️