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“He isn’t coming back.” Price had said it, Soap knows he had, but he can’t process it at all. Can’t even begin to fathom what he might mean.
“What?” He croaks out, throat strangely dry. Gaz’s hand slips over below the table to wrap around Soap’s wrist and squeeze tightly. Warm, steadying, not nearly anchoring enough to make Soap feel any steadier.
Ghost had been called into a mission briefing three hours ago, urgent and top secret and all kinds of hush hush. Soap only knew because he’d been stood there when the poor stammering corporal had been delivering the message that Ghost was to attend Price’s office immediately.
He’s not seen Ghost since, all he knows is he and Gaz were summoned a few minutes ago and now here they are. The other side of Price’s desk as he delivers this news with the blandest, most indifferent face he’s capable of. It would be more convincing if his voice didn’t crack, if his hands weren’t shaking.
“He isn’t coming ba-”
“No!” Soap interrupts, suddenly furious in the same way that he’s breathless. “No I fucking heard you, Price, but I don’t understand -”
“Soap-” Gaz starts, his own voice wobbling, when Soap spares him a glance there’s a tear on his cheek.
“No.” Soap says, because there’s no fucking way that they’re being told-
“It’s not the sort of mission you come back from, Soap. Not this time.” Price tries but Soap isn’t having it.
“Bullshit.” He hisses, throws as much weight and venom behind it as he can. “Bullshit, John, he always comes back.” Though even as he says it he hears the fear in his voice, the denial. The desperation. He simply isn’t willing to believe it, isn’t willing to acknowledge that there’s a world where Simon Riley doesn’t come back to him, to them. Certainly not one he wants to be in.
There are tears on Price’s face now though, anguish too and as he stands and comes round his desk Soap can see how hard every step is because he’s trembling so badly.
“Tell me it’s not true.” Gaz whispers.
“Tell me it’s not true.” Soap begs.
Price begins to cry, drops to his knees between their feet as his shoulders shake. Gaz slides out of his chair first, wraps an arm around Price’s shoulders, kisses his hair. Soap joins moments later, throws his arms around the pair of them like a drowning man to driftwood.
“I’m sorry.” Price is saying, “I’m so sorry I tried to stop it, I tried-”
Not hard enough, Soap thinks, though he isn’t cruel enough to say it.
They don’t leave the office for a long time and when they do it’s well after dinner, the hallways quiet. They collectively raid the kitchen, eating cold pasta out of a tupperware container, and they don’t speak about it. Soap leaves first, doesn’t say a word, but Gaz has always seen through him.
“You won’t find him, Tav, not unless he wants you to.”
“You don’t know that.” Soap answers, without turning around. He doesn’t find him, though he tries hard, morning finds him hunched at the picnic benches, bent over a pile of fag-ends and sporting new circles under his eyes. He feels weary, far older than his years and he feels like he’s missing something. He feels like something has been taken from him, though he’s not sure what.
[ airstrip, now ] is all Price’s message says when it comes through, but it’s enough to get Soap moving. He basically sprints through the hallways, heart racing at the thought of missing it, of missing his last chance to-
No.
He’s spent all night with this and he can’t accept it, won’t, Ghost will come back from this, he has to.
Gaz and Price are waiting for him on the tarmac, a look of bone deep sorrow etched onto both of their faces, though Soap thinks there’s something else in Gaz’s when they lock eyes. Pity, perhaps? Soap is the closest to Ghost, recently anyway, he’s the one who stands to lose the most, even if it feels like there’s more to it somehow.
None of them speak as Soap joins them, they all watch, keeping silent vigil as Ghost emerges from the barracks, duffel slung over his shoulder and chin set. His eye black is even heavier than normal, from a distance he really does look ghoulish, like he couldn’t possibly die on this mission because he’s already dead.
Soap almost wishes that were true.
Ghost comes to stand before them, giving nothing away with the proud set of his shoulders, the rigid clench of his fist.
“Ghost-” Gaz gasps, the first to break, and shocks all of them by flinging his arms around Ghost’s shoulders, tugging him into a hug that Ghost returns with equal care. Soap can tell they’re speaking, but it’s too low to make out. “Be safe out there.” Gaz says as he pulls away, bumping their foreheads together fondly.
“I’m proud of you, Simon.” Price says as Ghost turns to him, already reaching for him when Ghost steps forward to hug him close. Ghost is speaking again but he’s closer this time and Soap catches scraps of it.
“Take care of them, John.” Ghost is saying “Take care of him-” Price is nodding and before Soap can process who they’re talking about Price is pulling out a cigar, one of the expensive likely-illegal ones he keeps locked in his office. He slides it into Simon’s breast pocket along with his favourite lighter.
“For luck.” He nods, and steps away.
Then Ghost is turning to him. Soap blinks up at him, mouth dropping open, yet he finds all the words he’d considered dry up on his tongue.
“Ghost, I-”
“Shh.” Ghost speaks softly, a gloved hand coming up to cup his cheek gently and Soap can’t help but lean into it. “I know, even if you don’t. Not yet.” His free hand is moving up, hooking beneath the neck of the mask and peeling it up and off, his face exposed on the runway for anyone who wanted to look. No one but Soap does though, he can see the men around him averting their eyes, a final act of respect for the best of them.
A man whose country has asked him to give up everything, even his face.
The hand holding the mask comes to Soap’s other cheek so that he’s cupping his face as he leans in. Ghost’s lips are soft and warm as they meet his cheekbone, the kiss tender and far more than Soap thinks he can bear.
“Be better than me, Johnny.” Ghost murmurs.
“Think I’ll live that long?” Soap says it automatically but it has Simon’s hands tensing on either side of his face.
“Christ, I hope so.” Then Ghost is gone, walking towards the plane. He pulls the mask back on and he’s back to stoic, back to untouchable.
He turns at the doors, throws them all a lazy salute and calls “I’ll see you on the other side.”
The three of them watch the plane taxi and takeoff, and none of them leave until the sun is much higher in the sky and the plane has long since passed beyond the horizon.
WEEK 1.
Soap breaks a few records in the next week. Not all of them good, the largest detonation of TNT in base history had not specifically been what he’d been asked to do but he still thinks the way Price had screamed at him afterwards was uncalled for. His heart hadn’t even been in it, Price, and Soap had got off lighter than he thinks he would have normally. Lighter than he’d been hoping for if he’s honest with himself.
He drinks more than usual too, manages to coax the lads to come out to the pub on several separate evenings and most of the rest of them he retreats to his room with a bottle of bourbon and absolutely doesn’t think about why he’d picked that up off the shelf instead of the usual Scotch. It’s not healthy, not really, but it’s the best he can manage given the situation.
Gaz is quieter than usual, contemplative, and Soap knows that he’s hurting too so he doesn’t really understand why Gaz insists on handling him like he’s fragile, like somehow he’s the wounded party here. Yes, he’s much closer with Ghost than Gaz is but honestly, they’re all losing someone here.
“Why are you hovering?” Soap snaps at him one particularly bad evening, the blood still running lazily from the fresh cut over his eye. Gaz shrugs at him sadly, pityingly.
“Because he asked me to.” Soap doesn’t know what the fuck that’s supposed to mean but he knows he doesn’t like it.
On Sunday Price summons them both into his office and delivers the only news he can: he’s not dead yet.
Not yet.
The words echo around Soap’s head like gunfire, ricocheting off his mind and somehow piercing his heart. He’s lost men before, lost friends and officers before, it's part of the job, he doesn’t know why this time is affecting him so deeply.
You do know. His mind screams at him. You know why you can’t bear to lose him.
Soap takes long pulls from the bourbon bottle that night hoping for a dreamless sleep, instead for the next seven hours he pictures nut brown eyes and white bone.
WEEK 3
Price and Gaz are getting better. They still have these wistful moments, still mention Ghost sometimes and look a little lost, a little sad, but they’re getting better, accepting the idea that he isn’t coming home.
Soap can’t understand why he isn’t. He feels like he’s being held underwater, everything muffled and distant, the weight of his grief slowing him down even though he’s trying desperately to push against it. Price keeps dragging all them into private training sessions, focusing on new skills and techniques that they’ve never needed before. Soap gets the idea that he’s trying to mould them into something more, something unkillable. He’s trying to make it so there is no mission either of them could ever be sent on from which they wouldn’t return.
It’s impossible, he and Gaz both know it, but for Price? They do it without complaint.
The other men have started avoiding Soap, wary of his rage. He’s so angry all the time he could choke on it, angry about the unfairness of it; there’s no way Ghost is the most expendable member of this team, none. They all know that’s him, and he’s fine with it, he is. He’s good, really fucking good, at what he does, he’s not Ghost though. Not Price or Garrick either, he’s too much to be any of them; too emotional, too erratic, too selfish.
He’s the one they should have sent and all of them know it. Ghost must have known it too, so why the fuck did he agree to this?
Soap haunts the base, spends his days snapping at trainees and lurking in his room until it’s dark and safe to use the communal spaces without fear of being intruded upon. After dark is when he and Ghost used to use them anyway, quiet evenings sat talking about everything and nothing, making shitty jokes as Ghost fixed up his mask or Soap wrote in his journal.
Every night Soap sneaks out the back door they aren’t supposed to use, finds the telephone pole that stands just outside the bright amber light of the streetlight and runs his fingers along it. He finds the carving almost immediately these days, the wonky skull and the ‘SR’ carved beneath it. Ghost had shown it to him on a cool autumn night when Soap followed him out for a smoke, had laughed as he said what a stupid recruit he’d been back then, all piss and vinegar.
Soap traces his fingers over the carving, then across to the other one. A little rectangle soap with wobbly circles for bubbles and the initials ‘JM’ below. Ghost had goaded him into it, had told him he was too much of a goody two shoes to deface Crown property, he’d been laughing as he said it.
As usual, Soap presses his back to the pole and slides down to the floor. Leaning against it he pulls out a bag of baccy, Ghost’s favourite, and rolls the first of several cigs he’ll smoke tonight. Tomorrow morning he’ll wake up with his throat sore and his eyes gritty from exhaustion and he’ll start all of it again.
On Sunday he and Gaz follow Price to his office and receive the best news they can hope for. He’s not dead yet.
Not yet.
WEEK 6
The anger may have faded but the grief hasn’t, it sits like an open pit inside him, hollowing him out and swallowing everything else. He has good days, sometimes, days where he has a laugh, almost even has fun, when Gaz can draw it out of him. It’s just always swallowed up later by the crushing weight of loss, the pointlessness of it all. How it would have been more fun, would just have been better with Ghost.
He knows he’s being dramatic, refuses to see the psychologist about it because he knows this level of dependency on his CO is unhealthy. He doesn’t understand it himself and a part of him is terrified that maybe they will, that maybe they’ll tell him exactly why he’s struggling to come to terms with the idea of a lifetime without Simon Riley.
They tried to add in a new Lieutenant a week ago, Lt. Barnes, and it hadn’t gone well. Barnes had been nice enough, had tried and Soap can’t blame him for that, but he wasn’t ready, none of them had been. Gaz had refused to follow his orders, openly claiming he knew better in one of the most brazen acts of insubordination Soap had ever seen from him. Soap had been worse, he’d been contrary and mulish and downright unkind, he’s pretty sure he’d heard Barnes crying in the bathroom after lunch and he’d felt a vicious little thrill about it.
Soap isn’t sure what Price had said to him, when Barnes had gone to his office to complain, but he does know that they haven’t seen him again and he doesn’t think they’re likely to.
“Born bureaucrat like that, not even fit to wear the same rank as Ghost.” Gaz had said cruelly as they’d both folded onto the sofa that evening. “Prick was so fresh out of Sandhurst you could still smell it on him. Ghost wouldn’t have been caught dead having to buy his way up the ladder.” It’s not fair, Soap has worked with a lot of fantastic officers who came through Sandhurst, but it’s exactly what he needed to hear. In that moment he loves his friend so fiercely he has to hug him about it.
Gaz lets him, of course he does, and when Price walks past on the way to the microwave he runs a hand fondly through Soap’s mohawk and neither of them mention the way Soap is sniffling into the wool of Gaz’s jumper.
On Sunday, for the sixth time, Price says “Not yet.” and another little piece of Soap’s heart breaks off.
WEEK 8
The day Price finally has something else to say is the day that Soap finally realises he’s in love with Ghost.
‘Even if you don’t. Not yet.’ That’s what Ghost had said to him.
‘Not yet.’
Doesn’t that just twist the fucking knife. Soap has thought about it every day since, what he might have meant by that, what he might have known that Soap didn’t. The irony that he only discovers it once it’s far too late is almost too cruel to bear.
Price hadn’t had to summon them, the last couple of weeks Soap and Gaz have simply gone by themselves, waited for Price to be ready for them. That’s what they’d done today too, wordlessly walked there and waited outside the door. Price’s voice is different when he calls them in, tight. Soap knows it’s bad the second they open the door, Price’s eyes red rimmed.
“He’s gone?” Soap asks, but he doesn’t even really realise the voice has come from him. Gaz’s hand wraps around his wrist.
“They don’t know.” Price’s voice is so raw it sounds painful, Soap doesn’t doubt he’s screamed himself hoarse at everyone he could, and God help the messenger. “They lost contact two days ago, they don’t think it can be retrieved, they, uh-” Price cuts himself off with a choked off sob, “They think he cut the lines himself, on purpose.”
There’s only one reason Ghost would do that; to spare them from having to hear whatever was about to happen to him.
“No.” Soap says, “No, no, no tell me it’s not true.” He stumbles towards Price, who can’t even look at him. He slides to his knees, legs finally giving out, and wraps his hands in the fabric of Price’s trouser leg “Tell me he isn’t gone, John, please, tell me he’s alright, he can’t be gone. Not yet.” Soap’s forehead is pressed to Price’s knee as he hunches, tears wetting the fabric as strong arms wrap around him.
“I’m not ready to lose him.” Soap says and Price shifts, chair sliding back until he’s hitting his knees in front of Soap and tugging both he and Gaz into an embrace. The three of them stay like that, huddled on the floor, for a long time.
It’s there, on the floor, with the only two other people on Earth who knew the man more than the mask, that Soap understands.
He loves him, has loved him for a long time. The realisation isn’t scary, isn’t surprising, even though he’s never felt anything for a man before, it’s as simple and easy to understand as the rising of the dawn.
And it’s painful.
‘I know, even if you don’t. Not yet.’
Ghost had loved him too. Had loved him before, had loved him as they stood on that tarmac and had loved him even as he died.
‘I know’
It’s cold comfort, that Ghost knew Soap loved him. Meaningless when it didn’t change anything, didn’t allow Soap to hold him, to kiss him, to give him everything he deserved. It’s cold comfort, but it’s better than nothing.
“We should all get some sleep.” Price says finally, the three of them are so wrapped up together that it’s hard to know where one ends and another begins.
“Not yet.” Gaz tells him, so they stay, clinging to the only other people who could begin to understand what they’ve lost.
MONTH 4
No one else is taking this as hard as Soap is and it’s starting to piss him off. He knows that he needs to move on, knows that Ghost wouldn’t want him pining away for the rest of his life but dammit he thinks he deserves to, if that’s what he needs. He thinks that if he spends the rest of his life grieving Simon Riley then maybe that will almost be atonement enough for not realising he loved him sooner. For not insisting on going in his place. For not being the one to die in his stead, because Soap knows , he knows that everyone would be handling this much better if it had been him.
No one else is taking it as hard as he is, but they’re still pretty fucking awful. Price has been stoic, strong. He’s led missions and he’s been gentle with the men since Ghost’s death, like a good leader. Everyone on base has been affected by the news, if only because if Ghost, immortal avenging angel that was, can be killed then what fucking hope is there for the rest of them?
Price has been kind to Soap, has let him stay in bed on the days he’s needed to and he’s made sure he has enough food and water to see him through. The one thing he’s ruthless on now is ensuring Soap attends his therapy sessions, watches over him until he’s through the door and sits outside to make sure Soap stays the full time. It’s overbearing and frustrating and it’s absolutely necessary because without it there’s no way Soap would go.
Gaz in turn is running himself ragged looking after Price. Gaz cared about Ghost and his way of showing that seems to be to ensure that Price and Soap, two of the people Ghost cared most about in the world, are kept fighting fit. He seems to be forgetting that Ghost cared for him too and wouldn’t be happy to see the state he’s in. There are dark circles under his eyes and Soap knows he isn’t sleeping, he knows that Gaz alternates between his and Price’s doors at night, ready to spring into action if they have nightmares.
“You say he knew you loved him.” Soap’s therapist says during one session, “Is that not of some comfort to you?”
“No.” Soap glares. “No. All he knew was that I didn’t love him enough to do it openly.”
“You don’t feel that he may have been at peace with that?” She asks and Soap has to stand before he throws his chair into the wall, fists clenched at his side.
“Would you be?” He hisses, and leaves the room. Price lets him, which is a testament to the utterly ruined expression Soap must be wearing on his face.
The next session there’s a whole new therapist sitting in the chair and though the ants under Soap’s skin don’t stop crawling, they do settle a little.
After the first month Price had insisted that the three of them have dinner together, once a week in his place. The first couple are strange, the vacuum created by Ghost’s absence almost too much to look past. They manage though, once a week they gather around the table and eat, talk, and once a week Soap feels himself again and almost forgets Ghost is gone.
He both loves and hates those evenings in equal measure.
Grief, people say, is a lead weight around your ankles; slowing you down and digging into the weakest parts of you. Soap disagrees; grief is like being on fucking rollerskates when you never learned how. He feels like everything is moving too fast or too slow, like things will skitter out of reach just as he thinks he has a handle on them.
“One foot in front of the other and don’t be scared to land on your arse.” Ghost had told Soap that once, he’d been pissing himself laughing watching Soap and Price try to learn to ice skate and fail miserably, as Gaz skated circles around the both of them.
“One foot in front of the other and don’t be scared to land on your arse.” Soap tells his reflection every night. Repeats it every time he finds his feet gone from under him and has to scramble to get back on track.
“Don’t be scared to land on your arse.” Soap tells himself, knowing that if he does, he has two people right here who will help pick him back up.
“Come on.” Price holds out a hand as he tugs Soap off the Rec room couch. “We’ve got training before therapy.”
“Don’t be scared.” Soap tells himself, and tries his best.
MONTH 5
“There’s a team coming in, landing in twenty.” Price tells them as Soap and Gaz arrive for their usual Sunday meeting.
“Okay?” Gaz asks, a little quirk to his eyebrow.
“Rumour has it…” Price trails off and chews on his bottom lip as though he’s trying to determine whether he should finish.
“Spit it out.” Soap grunts.
“Oi.” Gaz smacks him up the back of the head and Soap grunts again, louder.
“Spit it out, sir .” He offers as he rubs the back of his skull and Gaz nods serenely.
“Much better.” Gaz looks across at Price and gestures for him to go on. “So what does rumour have?”
“The team that’s landing,” Price shoots a nervous look at Soap before continuing, “it might just be the last team Ghost worked with before he went dark.” The lead weight that Soap has been carrying in his chest since they lost Ghost shoots straight up into his throat. “You don’t have to, but if you wanted to meet them with me… well, they might have answers.”
“Yes.” Soap nods before he had any idea he was going to. “Yes, I need to.”
“Okay.” Gaz agrees. “We’ll go, all of us.”
“We’ll be meeting the CO on the airstrip.” Price tells them. “I’m well informed that it’s someone we know, though no one could tell me more than that.”
“Why?” Soap narrows his eyes suspiciously.
“Not sure that they even know, seems like communication’s been close to non-existent.”
“Let’s go find out then.” Soap says, jaw set and veins thrumming with the promise of answers, finally. Perhaps even some closure, though he doubts it.
It’s Soap who leads the way out of Price’s office and towards the airfield, Price and Gaz lingering behind, willing to let him take the lead on this as long as they get the answers they want. The plane is little but a dot on the horizon when they get there, sun glinting off the fuselage as it comes towards them. Soap’s breath catches in his throat as he gets his first proper look at it.
It’s the same type that had whisked Ghost away from him, all those months ago. Might even be the very same plane. The last time he’d seen Ghost he’d been saluting from the cargo door before he’d disappeared into its belly, and Soap’s life had never been the same again.
The plane is halfway to the runway before Soap realises there are tears streaming down his face, he starts to feel in his pockets but Gaz is there offering him a tissue, a steady presence at his shoulder, Price at the other one. They watch in silence as the plane finishes its descent and bumps down onto the runway, smoke billowing as the tires make contact and the plane taxis to a standstill.
They stay back, maybe fifty metres from the doors as ground crew begin to swarm the vehicle, performing checks readying the doors. They don’t even move when the first men start to disembark, they’re waiting for someone they know after all. The men all look exhausted, haggard. Most of them are wounded in some way and make a beeline for Medical.
There’s a tall man about halfway into the plane, he’s had his hood up as he’s been counting the men out. Whoever it is must be the CO they’re waiting for and Soap has waited five months for answers, he can stand to wait fifteen more minutes.
It’s only fifteen seconds until the man turns around.
Soap has taken five paces forward before he even knows what he’s doing, rage building through his joints as his fingernails dig crescents into his palms. How dare he. How dare this man put on that mask and pretend.
How dare he even think-
The man turns further and Soap would know him anywhere. He’s leaner than he was five months ago, he’s listing a little to one side and bearing his weight wrong but it’s him .
“Ghost!” Soap shouts and takes off running, doesn’t give a fuck if the others are following, just knows he needs to close this gap, needs to eliminate every inch of distance between them.
Ghost has taken a few steps down the gangway and is loping towards him too.
They collide in the middle of the tarmac, Soap virtually tackling Ghost round the waist with the force of his hit and lifting . He’s fucking heavy, not as thin as Soap had feared from further away, but he can still lift him too fucking easily. He’s going to have to feed him up, help him get back to where he should be. Ghost’s arms are wrapped around his shoulders and when Soap finally lowers him to the ground his forehead bows down to rest against Soap’s.
“They told us you were dead.” Soap whispers into the space, hands squeezing on Ghost’s waist so hard he’s worried he might bruise him.
“I thought I was.” Ghost whispers back.
“You came back to me.” Soap presses his forehead in, eyes squeezed tight shut.
“Of course I did I-”
“I know.” Soap tells him. “I know, now.” Ghost’s arms tighten around his shoulders as he sighs, long and low.
“Thank God. Soap, I-” A throat clears behind them, Price apparently finally becoming impatient for his own check in and ignoring the way Gaz is aggressively tugging on his belt. The two of them spring apart like teenagers, Soap can feel the blush glowing from his hairline to his chest, knows damn well under the mask and all that eyeblack that Ghost would be just as pink.
Price is wrapping Ghost in a hug, mumbling platitudes and apologies into Ghost’s ear before he’s pulling back to check him over. Soap feels itchy with the need to keep connected, to remain tethered to the man he had thought he’d lost. He slips a finger through one of Ghost’s belt loops and hovers as Price takes his time, as Gaz barges his way in to take Ghost into his own crushing hug.
Ghost is wincing each time like his ribs hurt, Soap wants to strip him down, to peel off the layers until he can find and fix every last hurt. Also because now he thinks of it, he’s wanted to see Ghost naked for longer than he has even really been aware of it.
Price looks like he’s settling in for the long haul, ready to take Ghost to Medical and get all the paperwork done here and now. Garrick looks like he’s not keen to leave either, but Gaz has always been a good friend and catches Soap’s eye, must see the lost look there because suddenly he’s hooking an arm through Price’s and steering him away.
Price opens his mouth to complain but Gaz leans to whisper something in his ear and his cheeks pinken, even as his shoulders slump.
“You’re right.” Price nods once, waving over his shoulder as he allows Gaz to lead him away across the airfield.
“Hello.” Ghost says, turning to look at Soap once they’re alone.
“Um.” Soap snatches his hand back from the waist of Ghost’s jeans and instead fiddles with the zip of his hoodie. “Hello.”
They both stand there, facing each other, neither one willing to be the first to bridge the gap between them. Ghost brings his arm up to scratch awkwardly at the back of his neck, eyes casting about until they land on something over Soap’s shoulder, eyes narrowing into a frown. Soap turns to follow his gaze, only to find that he’s glaring at Gaz and Price, who had walked away but are now sitting on one of the picnic benches near the barracks and very unsubtly watching them.
Soap groans with exasperation and spins back around to apologise but Ghost has already started moving.
“Fuck it.” Ghost grunts and yanks off his mask, stuffing into his back pocket as he closes the distance between them. A huge palm comes to cradle Soap’s cheek, thumb skimming just below his eye. “Did you mean it?” Ghost asks.
“That I love you?” Soap asks simply. “Aye, yes. I love you, have loved you. I’m sorry I didn’t know.”
“Hush.” Ghost is smiling, a fragile thing that shaves ten years off his face and casts him as almost boyish. “None of that now.”
Then Soap is being kissed, warm lips soft and tender as they close over his. Soap’s hands grip the front of Ghost’s vest, cleave to the straps as if afraid he could be ripped away again. It’s achingly gentle, tentative as though Ghost doesn’t realise that kissing him is the only thing Soap has thought about, has ached for, for months now.
“I’m sorry I scared you.” Ghost tells him as their lips part, foreheads staying pressed tight together.
“You’re here now.” Soap tells him, faintly aware he can hear cheering from over by the picnic benches. “Just promise me you will always come back to me.”
“I promise.” Ghost swears. “I promise.” Ghost’s chin lifts until Soap’s head is tucked under it, face buried into Ghost’s chest as they hold each other, fused into one shape under the shadow of the plane’s engine.
“You need to go to medical.” Soap finally mutters, after hours or minutes of them standing there.
“Not yet.” Ghost whispers into his hair.
Stood there, surrounded by their men, watched over by their friends, safe and warm and finally whole again, Soap finds it easy to agree.
“Not yet, then.”