Chapter Text
Soap awoke to the sound of a shrill scream pouring from the lips of his roommate. He rolled onto his side, facing Ghost, before he slowly sat up, scrubbing at his face with a hand in an attempt to chase off any fatigue. His lips pulled into a tight frown as he slowly stood up.
Reluctantly, he padded over to Ghost’s bunk and found the lieutenant sitting up, back pressed against the corner of the room. Ghost’s eyes were wide and unfocused in the dim lighting. Soap’s hand hovered over his shoulder, hesitant.
“Ghost.” Soap spoke loudly. “Lieutenant?”
Still, Ghost was unresponsive.
Soap proceeded with caution. He pushed all of the potential weapons out of arms reach—or at least the ones he could see—before grabbing Ghost by both of his shoulders and shaking him. With every passing second, Soap’s “ Simon, wake up ,” grew more frantic.
Then, Ghost snapped. He surged forward and successfully knocked Soap off the bunk and onto the ground. They both clambered to the floor, but Soap had been pinned beneath Ghost’s hulking figure. The taller man easily outweighed him, and when it came to a show of brute strength, Ghost would always win.
“ Simon ,” pleaded Soap. “ Simon Riley. You’re safe. Wake up.”
Slowly, realization began to filled Ghost’s eyes as he began to shake off his sleep. Horror soon replaced it as he leaped off of Soap. The Scot pushed himself up onto his elbows as he took in the disheveled sight of his lieutenant before him. Ghost’s chest heaved with the act of breathing and his usually-loose shirt clung to him, likely drenched from sweat.
Ghost swore under his breath as he backed away from Soap, knocking into the nightstand and nearly sending everything on it onto the floor. Another flurry of swears poured from his lips as he stumbled around the room, frantically searching for something. He forced his feet into his boots and snatched up a jacket.
“Where are you going?” Soap asked, still laying on the floor.
Ghost didn’t bless him with a response as he threw open their door and stormed from the room. Lights out was nearly three hours prior, he realized as he glanced over the clock. Price was going to be pissed.
Soap pulled himself from the ground and found himself sloppily lacing up his boots and scouring the base for Ghost. It took much longer than Soap had hoped to find the lieutenant. He had searched the highest vantage points of the base—the rooftop of the barracks—the canteen, and the fitness center. It was pure luck to have found Ghost sitting beneath a stairwell, legs drawn close to his body, rather than his usual lax stance.
“Ghost?” Soap called out, trying to make his presence known. Soon after, he realized that Ghost had probably known he was coming five minutes before Soap arrived.
Ghost’s piercing gaze fell onto Soap, but he didn’t speak.
“Look,” the Scot began dumbly. “I’m not mad or scared of you, but you need to come back to the barracks.”
“There’s no point. I won’t sleep.”
Soap furrowed his eyebrows. “You haven’t even tried.”
Ghost scoffed and shifted his gaze from Soap to the floor. He was silent for a long while before going, in a softer voice, “Do you get them too?”
Soap managed a slight nod. He willed his brain to keep his own terrors at bay for the night. Long enough that he could help Ghost heal—even if it were just a little bit. “Not so much anymore, but when I do…”
He let his voice fizzle out into nothing. The meaning was understood between the two of them. While Ghost woke and became combative, Soap was equally as unfortunate—except he had the opposite reaction. He had startled Gaz awake on multiple occasions, and when Gaz tried to offer him some support—any support—he had curled in on himself and sobbed until the sergeant had put as much distance between the two of them as the room permitted. Soap remembered those nights all too well.
He remembered whispering to himself, reminding himself to breathe, and nearly wearing a hole in the small carpet from his pacing. He remembered the late-night runs that left his lungs screaming in agony and the scalding hot water that raced down his back. Most importantly, he remembered the numbness that always followed the fear.
“Do you sleep much after them?”
Soap shrugged. “Sometimes.”
At that, Ghost cocked his head to the side, still staring at the ground. The lieutenant might’ve looked scary to anyone else, but Soap had devoted all of his time to cataloging every tell Ghost had, from his repetitive fidgeting under duress to a sudden lack of eye contact. He looked so small and uncertain.
“How?”
Soap shrugged again. “Let me show you?”
He had intended to sound confident and self-assured, but, instead, he found uncertainty in his words. What had he planned on showing Ghost? What was the implication of his words?
Ghost’s eyes narrowed as he looked up at Soap. “What do you have in mind, Johnny?”
The nickname had Soap reeling. Quickly, a blush rose to his face, and, now, he was the one averting his gaze, flustered. “Just trust me.”
He bent at the waist and held his hand out to Ghost, who stared at the gesture for long enough to have Soap considering revoking his offer. As if sensing Soap’s building resignation, Ghost took his hand and let the sergeant pull him to his feet, even if the contact—the pressure of Soap’s bare hand against his gloved hand, pressing down on his skin—left him feeling… unpleasantly hot. He hoped he wouldn’t throw up.
Satisfied, Soap turned and beckoned Ghost to follow him with a rough jerk of his head in the direction he had come from.
The two of them slipped back into their shared room and, as soon as the door was shut and locked, Soap made his way over to their shared bathroom. In it was a simple shower-bath combo shoved into the corner, with a toilet and sink opposite of it. He caught Ghost’s confused look as he knelt over the bathtub, turned the faucet on, and put the stopper in the drain.
“What are you doing?” Ghost asked, peering at Soap from his spot on a bunk.
“Drawing ye’ a bath,” Soap replied. “I snuck some Epsom salt in ‘ere for when I have bad nights.”
The Scotsman turned and began to rummage through the cabinet beneath the sink. He produced a large plastic bag and set it on top of the sink before pushing himself to his feet.
The moment he laid eyes on Ghost, he groaned, frustrated. “You’re already discarding this idea before I’ve even explained it,” he accused. “A bath helps me relax, and the salt…” He squinted at the back of the bag. “Helps you relax more and… reduces inflammation.”
If looks could kill, Soap would’ve been dead a long time ago. He should’ve been dead, but he had always had someone watching his back—and more recently, that person had been in need of the surveillance more than he was.
“I know you’re filthy under all that fabric,” Soap continued. “I can smell the stench all the way in here.”
He, for good measure, dumped some of his shampoo into the water and swirled it around with his hand for some smell. He thought lavender was a nice smell. Hopefully, Ghost would too. Then, he began dumping the Epsom salt into the bath. He had no real idea of how much he should’ve put into the water, so he eyeballed it, and stopped when it felt like the right amount. Soon, the subtle aroma of lavender was met with the much weaker smell of the salts.
“Doubtful,” Ghost finally said.
“ Mate , you were drenched when you woke up. You stink.”
The Brit scoffed. “You get off on watching people shower, Johnny? Could’ve bought me dinner first.”
Soap’s lips parted as he looked at the lieutenant, incredulous. His eyes had widened and color quickly rose to his face, red dusting along his cheeks and the tips of his ears. Then, hurt flashed across his face, but Soap quickly pushed it down. Ghost had enough ammunition as is, and God knows he didn’t need anymore.
“Stop being a dick,” Soap told him. “I was jus’ trying to do something nice for ye’.”
He swore he saw Ghost’s demeanor change after analyzing the sudden tension that accumulated in Soap’s posture, drawing his shoulders taut. He swore remorse flashed across Ghost’s voice as he sat, perched on the edge of the bunk, waiting. Soap was thankful he didn’t grace him with another bitter remark, insecurity hidden beneath layers of cruelty.
Soap turned and looked at the bath. He turned off the water and swirled its contents around with his hand before pushing himself to his feet. He returned the bag of Epsom salt to its hiding place in the sink and threw a towel over the medicine cabinet-style mirror.
“It’s ready,” Soap said as he wiped his hands off on his pants, walking from the bathroom.
Soap found that Ghost had become unreadable, his expression purposefully blank. The Scot sat down on his own bunk and added, “I was going to offer to wash your hair, but I can’t even get ye’ in the fuckin’ bath.”
Soap wasn’t sure why he told Ghost that. What he had hoped to accomplish with that statement besides to present his heart for his lieutenant to stomp on. A cruel part of him hoped that Ghost’s sudden coldness to him was the result of his own heart being close to the surface, but more likely than not, Soap had crossed a boundary that Ghost hadn’t ever officially set.
He knew why Ghost wore the mask, how it fed into the legends surrounding his name, and how the pressure allowed him to focus on something when everything was too much. How it hid what Ghost felt were the ugliest parts of him. He knew why Ghost was unintentionally cold at times, but this time, it felt targeted and intentional. He knew why Ghost shut down, like now. It was too much. Soap was too much.
Soap started to move to go drain the bath when Ghost suddenly stood up.
The larger man moved with purpose into the dimly-lit bathroom. Soap averted his eyes as Ghost shucked off his clothing out of wanting to give him whatever privacy he could in their shared room. Soon, Soap heard the sound of the water splashing and sloshing about, accompanied by the sound of Ghost swearing under his breath. When it finally stopped, he risked a glanced in the bathroom and found that Ghost had settled against the wall, opposite the faucet, submerged beneath the water and bubbles.
The curtains that had been shoved aside covered most of what remained of Ghost, but Soap saw his arm hanging over the side of the bath, fingers dragging along the smooth surface. He watched the rhythmic motion, wondering if he was allowed into the small room. He desperately didn’t want to send Ghost spiraling after such a fresh nightmare, so he sat there, on his bunk.
“Is it nice?” Soap finally asked, hating the silence that had fallen between them.
The water sloshed against the walls of the bath as Ghost shifted. “Smells good,” he hummed. “I thought you were going to wash my hair, Johnny.”
His froze. In his chest, his heart stalled for a few seconds. He hadn’t expected Ghost to actually take him up on the offer of something so intimate. He had scarcely seen the man’s face, and now, he was supposed to be normal about being in such close proximity to him.
Soap moved robotically, mechanically. He pushed himself off of his cot and nearly ate shit as he stumbled over the lieutenant’s discarded boots. Normally, Ghost was a tidy roommate and kept his belongings tucked away.
“Fucker,” he grunted as he righted himself and finished the short trek to the bathroom.
Soap wasn’t sure what he expected to see when he finally laid eyes on Ghost—Simon Riley. His mask had been tossed onto his pile of sweat-soaked clothing, seemingly long forgotten. Bent knees stuck out from the water. His arms rested on top of the bath and his hands lazily moved through the few bubbles. As Soap ungracefully raked his gaze up to Simon’s face, he was met with pale skin, dotted with freckles, and a mop of dirty blond hair. Simon looked up at him through fair eyelashes, mismatched eyes expectant.
“I know you don’t like strong smells…” Soap trailed off, unsure of how to proceed.
“It’s nice,” Simon replied. “Smells familiar.”
Soap hummed quietly as he reached across the bath to pick up his shampoo and conditioner. Simon’s eyes trailed his movements, watching as he uncapped one of the bottles. “That’s ‘cause it is,” he told the Brit, offering him the bottle. “It’s mine.”
Simon took it from him and hesitantly sniffed it. “It’s nice,” he repeated.
Forever a man of few words , Soap thought with a soft smile as he took the bottle back. Aloud, he said, “Mind dunkin’ your head for me?”
Soap shifted where he stood and knelt at the end of the tub as Simon slid forward and lowered the back of his head underwater before he rose back up. Soap turned the bottle upside down and squeezed some of the product into the palm of his hand before setting it aside. His hand hovered above Simon’s head.
“Are you sure?” he asked. “We don’t have to do—”
“We both know if I didn’t want to do this, we wouldn’t,” Simon cut in.
He was right, and Soap knew that. He had seen how quickly the Brit had overpowered him earlier, and with Simon aware and awake, it would be easy for him to disarm and apprehend Soap.
Then, Soap began to lather the product through his hair. At first, Simon flinched, but he quickly relaxed under Soap’s careful and comforting scratches. He kneaded Simon’s scalp with his blunt nails, cleansing what he could. The movement was rhythmic and firm as he worked his way from Simon’s forehead, down to the nape of his neck. At some point, he noticed Simon’s eyes had fallen shut, and he smiled softly.
He wondered when the last time someone had shown Simon Riley kindness and he had let them. Soap didn’t know much about his childhood, except that he hadn’t gotten along with his old man and that he favored his mum in more ways than one. Soap’s parents had divorced when he was younger, but he expected that his experiences growing up were damn-near paradise in comparison to Simon’s. Only Price knew what had happened to Simon—what had made him into Ghost—but Soap figured it was only told out of necessity rather than trust, so parts were omitted and details were spared.
He hoped one day that Simon would trust him enough to confide in him. Maybe, he mused, it would help with his night terrors.
“I’m sorry,” Simon whispered, pulling Soap from his thoughts.
Soap’s eyebrows furrowed as he looked down at Simon, whose eyes were open, but they stared down at the water, rather than up at Soap. “For what?”
“All of this. Waking you up. Making you do this. By the time you’re done, it’ll be time to meet the greenies.”
“No need to apologize, Simon. I wanted to help.”
At that, Simon was silent. He let his eyes fall closed once more.
“I’m going to rinse this out, okay?” Soap told him. His hands were braced on either side of the lieutenant’s head, cradling it.
Simon hummed in response.
Once the shampoo was rinsed out, Soap began the same process except with conditioner. The fragrance was different—vanilla—but the woman who had sold him it said it complimented lavender well. Nobody had told Soap his hair smelled bad, so maybe she had a point.
He worked the products through the surprisingly coarse hair, wondering if, with proper care, curls would emerge and thrive. His lips pulled into a slight smirk as Simon began to lean into his touch. They were content to sit in the silence that had accumulated, and, Soap reasoned, Simon would speak to him if he wanted to talk.
With every pass of his hands through Simon’s hair, the man further relaxed. The walls he had built up for years lay in ruins. Simon was finally at ease—maybe even for the first time in his entire life.
Soap took this time to study what scars decorated his skin. His smile fell as he saw the raised scars that had since faded from a garish red to near-white and the large burn that had decorated most of his bicep and pec. Thin slashes along his torso were a combination of new and old—bright and faded. A particularly nasty wound left his skin with two large scars on his side as if he had been impaled. Soap wasn’t sure he wanted to know the story behind that one. The same freckles that dotted Simon’s face traveled down his body. Several moles accompanied each cluster.
When he pulled his gaze back up to rake it over Simon’s face. Soap could practically hear the smart-ass remarks pouring over the comms.
The mask , Soap had whined. Take it off.
Negative, came Ghost’s reply, crackling through the radio.
Are you ugly?
Without missing a beat, Ghost had replied, Quite the opposite.
And he had been right. Simon wasn’t ugly and was actually nowhere near it. His nose had probably once been straight, but repeated breaks and shitty resets had left the bridge crooked and septum deviated. Long, fair lashes brushed against his cheeks.
And his eyes. Soap wasn’t sure how anyone could hold eye contact with his eyes when he wasn’t wearing those colored contacts. It was hard enough to stare into his eyes when he was, and often, Soap felt like he was going to crumple beneath that intense stare of his. But the way that the brown bled into the blue—a stark contrast between them, yet, on Simon, it wasn’t conflictive. He wished he could see them now.
“I’m going to rinse,” Soap finally said as he began to lower Simon’s head into the water. He slowly massaged the product from his hair before lifting it once more and resting it against the wall of the tub.
Then, Soap withdrew his hands altogether. Mismatched eyes flicked up to look at him, momentarily confused before clarity set in. Fair eyebrows drew together as Soap moved to stand, his joints aching after kneeling for so long. He had to remind himself he wasn’t as young as he used to be.
Soap set both his shampoo and conditioner on the sink and turned to leave the bathroom, only for Simon’s words to cause him to stop.
“Stay?” he asked. “Just for a bit longer?”
Soap stopped and turned to look over his shoulder at Simon. “‘Course.”
He made his way over to the toilet and sat down atop the seat. He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, hands cradling his face. Simon’s eyes never left him.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Soap asked. “Any of it?”
In the bath, Simon shrugged. A simple roll of his shoulders. “It was… Did Price warn you about the cartel? In Las Almas.”
Soap frowned. “Price mentioned somethin’ ‘bout keeping an eye on ye’ but not much. Dinnae think ye’ needed it.”
Simon shifted and swallowed. Soap could tell he was trying to stay composed. “I was…betrayed by my C.O. shortly after my first leave, and he turned me and the others into a cartel in Mexico. They thought they could break me.” A slightly wolfish smile fell onto his face. “They abused and experimented on me. Beat me. Raped me. Buried me. I think they finally did poor ole’ Simon in.”
He swallowed and finally shifted his gaze away from Soap, staring at the wall opposite him. “I dream of those days—weeks—months. However long it was.”
An Oh, Simon, nearly fell from Soap’s lips, but he refrained. Instead, he asked, “Are they dead?”
“Every last one of ‘em,” Simon sighed out softly. He paused as if wondering how to proceed. “Are you afraid of me?”
The sergeant tilted his head to the side, confused. A part of him knew he should fear Ghost with his seemingly endless kill count and ruthless demeanor in the field. But, at the same time, he had seen the gentleness within Simon Riley, through his shitty jokes and small gifts that he offered to Soap.
“No. Never.”
“Why?”
“ Why ?” Soap echoed, clearly confused. “You’re no monster, Simon.”
He could conjure the long nights where they smoked outside the bars, feeling too ostracized to even attempt conversation with the others while liquor coursed through their veins or the way in which Ghost always knelt down to pet the strays they came across on missions. How gentle he was with Riley.
“You should be. The things I’ve done, Johnny…”
He could recall how Ghost had pressed his black knives against countless throats before slitting them with nothing more than a sigh, and how he had no qualms about participating in the torture of whoever their latest captive was. He had committed so many atrocities—ones that likely compared to the torture he had once endured.
“You can’t scare me off that easily, L.t.”
Simon turned to face him once more. That piercing stare of his… “Then, you’re a fool.”
They fell into a tense silence as Soap mulled over what to say. He didn’t want to talk about all of the things that made Simon human, because Simon would quickly shoot back all of the cruelties he had committed.
He wondered how to comfort a man as broken as Simon Riley—who bore his heart for Soap only to build every wall back up once Soap opened his mouth. That was Soap’s problem: he didn’t know when to shut up. He never had, and he wondered if he ever would. He would just push until someone had enough and told him to shut up or began to ignore him. Anger pooled in his mouth—an acrid metallic taste—before self-pity drowned it out.
There was no chance Soap would be able to piece together those shards of Simon Riley if he, himself, was a puzzle that had been discarded once those who owned it no longer found use in it.
“I beat your time.”
Soap lifted his head to glance at the man before him“Hm?”
“In ‘the Pit.’ 17.91 seconds. With an M1911.”
Soap shook his head softly as he let out a low laugh. “Couldn’t have the Rangers thinkin’ I was the best shooter on the team, eh, L.t.?”
Simon turned his head away as a smile tugged at his lips. From what Soap could see, it was a lopsided and awkward grin, showing the smallest hint of teeth. He was stunning, and Soap wished he could see that smile every day.
“Not at all.”
“ Alright . Whatever you say.”
Soap couldn’t keep the smile out of his voice or from his expression as he studied Simon. He wondered if anyone had ever seen Simon at such ease in a docile and near-domestic setting. For many of those in the military, sleep was rarely an escape from their daily terrors. They couldn’t even find peace in a crowded or empty room, with their back to a corner and their eyes trained on any entrances and exits. Like those of the 141, they felt most relaxed when the comforting weight of a gun, whether it be a handgun or rifle, was pressed against the palms of their hands. At least they had control when they held a gun.
Had Soap not known the man before him and the reputation that proceeded him, he might’ve mistaken Simon for a regular ole’ bloke, instead of one of the world’s most proficient killers. There was no gun in sight, and the knives… Soap couldn’t find the knives if he had tried, but they were hidden somewhere.
He wasn’t sure how long they had spent in the bathroom before Simon was quietly shuffled back behind the walls and Ghost reemerged. At the sound of the drain being pulled, Soap wordlessly got up from the toilet and made his way back to his bunk, leaving Ghost to dry off in privacy.
His eyes swept to glance out the window. It was still dark out. He could probably sleep for a while longer. Then, his gaze fell to stare at the clock. He didn’t have to be out to the course until 0600. He had almost two whole hours.
Soap knew they would never speak of this again, and Ghost would proceed as he always did: cold and with a purpose. His lips curled into a bittersweet smile, mourning the intimacy that had transpired between them, and how quickly it came and went.
He laid out on his bed, tugged a thin blanket up over his body, and turned away from Ghost when the man walked from the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his waist and his clothes bunched up under his arm. He forced his eyes closed when he heard Ghost begin to rummage through his dresser and pretended he had fallen asleep.
“Thank you, Johnny,” Soap heard Ghost murmur as he settled into his bed.
Soap didn’t respond. He just drew the covers up higher.