Chapter Text
One rule to follow when operating multi-million dollar weaponry is to assume that you are in danger at all times—even when in control.
The funny thing is that Bradley had never even made it to his jet when the engine of a helicopter transporting various equipment crippled and came crashing down on the tarmac, out of control in a downward spin and smoking. The sharp and piercing shrill of metal slicing through metal rings through Bradley's ears as the helicopter impacts the ground and flings him back into the stationary wheel of his jet. His head bangs against the thick rubber, his body spasming with a shock of pain before his vision goes cloudy, and all he can see is blurry shadows hovering over him.
Smoke and fuel hang thick in the air; the hectic scramble of boots and soldiers yelling out orders is lost to Bradley as he sinks below the stifling cover of unconsciousness.
He lingers between drug-induced sleep and foggy awareness, his nose burning at the chemically sterile air around him. The only thing he can make out is the scent of his blood (old and dried against his scalp, itchy) and the occasional brief soft scent of an omega that lingers above him like a warm touch. Bradley wants to reach out to that familiar scent, touch the person it belongs to, and bask in its warmth like he would on a sun-drenched day at sea, the tang of sea salt on his tongue. He breaches closer to the surface of awareness, chasing after the lingering aroma of familiarity and the fleeting touch that caresses his hands.
A warm, smooth voice is murmuring close to his left ear--the sound soft and unfocused under the constant ringing in his head. The omega is closer, hovering over him and brushing his blood-stained curls off his forehead. Bradley leans into the touch, into the old, yellowed memory of Maverick leaning over him and smiling after a long day at the beach. Bradley can't remember when that was; how much time had passed since the incident? Anxiety itches under his skin and the warm feeling leaves him as his body stiffens with pent-up energy, his muscles aching from stagnation.
The ringing in his ears dies down, drowned out by the haze of rushed voices talking in distorted echos. Bradley opens his eyes, his vision bleary and out of focus before he finally hones in on the face staring down at him—staring into the hazy green of the man who's known him all his life. Bradley smiles or tries to and fails, going off the way Mav grimaces and quickly schools his face at the awkward stretch of his dry lips.
"Oh, baby bird," wet fingers caress his lips, gently pressing moisture into the dry edges of Bradley's mouth. He can't help but poke his tongue against the thumb pressed against his bottom lip, savoring the tang of sweat and salt.
His alpha instincts flare up, rearing up to reach out and around Maverick. Bradley pokes at the shared bond between them, tender and affectionate. He feels Maverick's flare of surprise as if he is shocked by Bradley's boldness, but the older man accepts his insistent prodding and embraces it. Maverick looks tired; Bradley knows the older man must have spent who knows how long by his side, judging by the pronounced dark circles and mussed black hair that is messy and out of place. Maverick's hand leaves his lips, instead moving to rub tenderly as his jaw.
"Mav—" the rest of his words get caught in his throat, caught in a coughing fit from the disuse that has left it dry and sore. His whole body shakes with the effort of it all, but all he can focus on is Maverick's firm hand on his neck, thumb mindlessly placed at the edge of his bond site.
Bradley lets out a single low whine, leaning into the thrill of pleasure. He wants Maverick to touch him more.
Maverick freezes next to him, one hand on his neck and the other holding a glass of room-temperature water against Bradley's parched mouth. Bradley doesn't notice the omega's sudden stillness, only greedily accepting the liquid in front of him in quick and deep swallows. The hand on his neck moves away and finds its way to his back instead, patting the middle of his spine in a stilted rhythm.
Bradley can smell the confusion peppered in Maverick's scent, the warm salty undertone of it muddled. Bradley wants Maverick to go back to running his fingers through his hair, to caress his face so he whines again and leans closer to the warmth of the older man's body despite the flare of pain it sends up joints. Maverick glides his hand back to the nape of the alpha's neck, blood thrumming in his ears as Bradley's heavy scenting blankets the entirety of the room. The warm and almost burnt scent of sweet wood is thick and all-consuming. It is dizzying; Maverick closes his eyes and takes slow breaths from his mouth to try and focus.
The scenting and the whining are unusual--too intimate for the way Bradley prods at the throbbing bond between them. Bradley is leaning heavily into Maverick, the alpha having shoved as close he could in the confines of the medical bed, his face curled towards the omega's bare neck. Maverick can't remember the last time Bradley had been so brazen with him; the boy had always been tactile with him and Carole, affection never spared even well into his teen years and presentation at fourteen, but this was something else entirely. Bradley was disregarding any socially acceptable behavior between nonmates.
"You smell good, Mav."
If an outsider were to walk in, they would only assume the two of them to be mates.
The door clicks open, and in steps in is the heavy, overbearing presence of Cyclone. The Vice Admiral's characteristic grimace is present as ever, only for him to scrunch his nose in displeasure at Bradley's undoctored scent. He stares down at the two of them from the doorway, a doctor steady behind him as the two newcomers take in the scene.
"Captain Mitchell, why is it that something always seems to happen when you're around longer than a day?"
Maverick clenches his jaw, caught between wanting to give a smart-ass answer and wondering if perhaps he was cursed with bad timing. Maverick opens his mouth to speak, but before he can even move his lips, a deep rumbling growl vibrates out from Bradley and he finds himself frozen to the spot, fighting the innate urge to bare his throat at the eye-watering scent of a threatened and aggravated alpha. In all his years of knowing Bradley, even during the tense weeks of training and all that alpha posturing between his boy and Hangman, Maverick had never heard him growl.
Bradley was tightly wound for an alpha, careful to fall into step with the typical military knot-head stereotype. As a kid, Bradley had been soft and sweet, gentle from being raised in an omega household. He had never gotten the chance to be around typical alpha behaviors until high school and even then, Bradley remained out of place in his temperament besides the usual rearing of teenage hormones and instincts. It had been a growing pain but one well-managed.
Cyclone rolls back his shoulders, squaring them as he stares down the younger alpha.
"Lieutenant, I recommend you rethink your next course of action."
The putrid scent of a defensive, injured alpha doesn't reel itself in--instead Maverick finds himself weak-kneed and dizzy from his proximity to Bradley. Fight or flight is kicking in, submit or die is the instinctual evolutionary call back warning them all. The beta doctor steps back, nose covered with the palm of her hand. Cyclone is the only one to mask any effect that Bradley is having on him; his age and experience saving him from the suffocating stench of rage.
It's a battle of wills.
Amongst the posturing, Maverick feels the prodding at their bond again. It hums with emotion.
Are you safe?
Where are we?
Submit.
Touch me.
The barrage of feelings is confusing; his omega instinct reaches back, timid and slow. Neck bared all in all ways but physical. Maverick looks away from Cyclone. He inches his gaze back down to Bradley; the alpha's cheeks are flushed, his brown eyes wide and eclipsed in a circle of black. Maverick can see his hands twitching, fingers digging into the cotton sheets. Bradley's canines peak out over the edge of lips.
Maverick reaches up his right hand, slowly, like one would with a frightened animal but Bradley's full attention is on everyone but him. He holds his breath, heart pounding against his ribs as his fingertips graze the tender area of Bradley's bond site. The alpha physically sinks into his touch, preening at the gentle glide of skin against skin. The bitter stink of threat reels back in, sinking below the surface back into a lingering cloud of weariness. Maverick moves his thumb in comforting circles, massaging the tenseness out of Bradley's shoulder and neck.
The beta doctor peeks around Cyclone's shoulder, meeting Maverick's eyes with a gleaming curiosity as Bradley leans as far as he can into the omega's chest without turning his back on the other alpha in the room. The doctor nods encouragingly, her chin tipping upwards in both a display of a lack of threat and telling Maverick to continue. Bradley rubs his cheek against Maverick's chest, spreading his unhindered scent over the omega. The effect it has is almost dizzying. Bradley's scent is thick and sharp, as most unmated alpha scents are, sinking into the omega's shirt and skin.
It wasn't uncommon for packmates to scent one another, a gentle touch on the neck or a running of fingers through hair, but this was something else entirely. Maverick and Bradley hadn't been pack since the boy was eighteen, their relationship just in the beginnings of reattachment after their last mission, and now the alpha was scenting him as a lover would. Hot embarrassment crawls up the back of his neck, and he refrains from breathing with his nose, trying to avoid falling into a scent fog.
"Bradley, you need to calm down." Maverick's voice is clear and calm despite all the nerves that are standing on edge. "You're safe; you just had an accident earlier today."
Maverick tries to project a cool trickle of calm into their bolstering bond, but his nerves feel fried. Bradley is well-intuned enough to pick up on the anxiety that leaks into his scent. The alpha whines, distressed.
"Don't--don't do that, Bradley."
The whine pulls out an instinctive urge in Maverick.
When Bradley comes back to himself, he'll be embarrassed for having acted in such a way in front of another alpha and a superior. Bradley calms down in Maverick's hold; the stench in the air has become much more tolerable and the base doctor must feel it safe enough to approach the two of them. The beta woman is no threat to them; she is shorter than Maverick, small-framed, and near scentless under the scent patch on her neck. Maverick can't see Bradley's eyes following her, but he can feel his pulse quicken slightly and his body stiffen in his hold as the doctor pulls out a syringe from her coat pocket and needles it into the alpha's IV line.
Time seems to move at a crawl; the clicking of the clock hands on the wall is loud over their quiet, shallow breaths. Bradley's aggressive scent gradually reels back in, leaving only the sterile smell of cleaning supplies and fresh linens in the air. Bradley's head lulls against Maverick's chest, heavy with sleep as the tranquilizer floods his bloodstream. Maverick can feel Bradley fighting the exhaustion slipping in through their bond, the dull prodding of awareness slipping away as his body twitches into unconsciousness.
Cyclone pops his jaw.
Despite the scent blockers, the peppery scent of irritation stings Maverick's nose. He slowly leans over Bradley, settling him back down on the hospital bed as Cyclone approaches them.
"Doctor Stevens, what the hell was that?"
-
As it would turn out, Maverick's abrupt return and the subsequent traumatic events that had left them calling for each other through a decades-old, abandoned bond as they plummeted through the sky, had left Bradley in a fragile state.
Maverick almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all.
Their shared mission had set up the beginnings of a cluster-fuck (Maverick's words, not the doc's) of mind and bond-altering changes for Bradley. The concussion Bradley was left with following the crash, had left him reeling from the full effects of their damaged bond and little memory to set it back in place. As far as Bradley was concerned, Maverick was his omega, and he had no other reason to think otherwise.
"You can't be serious."
Maverick stares down at the doctor, who, for all the awkwardness of the entire situation, doesn't even seem phased.
"Your pre-established bond with Lieutenant Bradshaw and your subsequent, shared traumatic event has left some confusion. Paired with the memory loss from his concussion, he has, well, surmised your relationship to be that of a mated pair. It's not uncommon for bonds to become warped or perverted due to intense stress."
Cyclone groans beside him, eyebrows pinched together in frustration and most likely the beginning of a headache.
"A concussed and deranged alpha, that's just what I needed." The Admiral sighs deeply before turning to the doctor. "Is this permanent?"
Doctor Stevens flips through Bradley's medical file, thumbing open the most recent page of exam results. "Only time will tell. I'm recommending leave of duty until he's recovered from his concussion, and then, perhaps, his memory will return, and his bond hormones will stabilize."
"And until then?" Maverick asks.
He can't remember the last time he was at such a complete loss of words. Bradley was injured and confused, their once innocent and familial bond perverted by the flux of their ever-changing relationship. Maverick can't help but feel a dredge of guilt building in his gut.
"Captain, I'm aware that you and the Lieutenant have a past history, and since you are the one he has fixated on, I think it's best for him to spend his leave with you."
"Is that safe?"
"Do you have reason to believe Lieutenant Bradshaw will harm you?"
"No! No, of course not." Mav rubs his clammy palm against his starched slacks. "I just don't want this to confuse him."
"Playing house will be the safest route for his psyche while he's recovering. Without you near, he may be increasingly agitated and aggressive. We want his hormones to regulate, not worsen."
A heavy silence settles over them. If it weren't for the scent blockers, Maverick is sure he'd be drowning the room with his feelings of guilt and worry.
"At least the latest Top Gun session finished. Captain, I'm leaving Lieutenant Bradshaw in your surely capable hands." The Admiral makes a point to meet Maverick's eyes as he enunciates the last of his sentence. "Doctor, please send the paperwork over and I'll get it signed off."
The doctor smiles, patronizing and pitying.
Maverick sighs into his hand as he feels Bradley's tug on their bond, a hand reaching through the fog even while the alpha is drugged. He thinks about a younger Bradley, still growing, body pudgy with baby fat and caught between the awkward fluctuation of puberty. Maverick remembers Bradley's posturing, his attempts to be subtle failing, his puppy-love need for Maverick's attention. Carole had thought it endearing, calling Maverick her 'little alpha's first love'.
Now, Maverick can't help but wonder if he had been the one to mess up Bradley's formative years. Perhaps he should have cut the cord and not babied the alpha so much, but he could never find it in himself to deny Bradley.
He doesn't think he could deny the man even now.