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sonora_conejaPairing: Hannibal/Face
Rating: pg-13
Warnings: none
Summary: I asked for something angsty, and I got this in response! Which was perfect, BTW...
I've been thinking for a while about prompting something where Face joins the army, meets Hannibal in Ranger school, falls in love etc, the typical stuff... and then he discovers Hannibal is very much unavailable. And he can't even hate the other guy cause he's not a big bad rival, he's just a nice guy and perfect for the boss. Cue angst. But I kind of want to see Hannibal/OMC for some reason and I didn't think anyone would want to do that.
So there it is if you're interested.
Face has just recently been assigned to Hannibal's unit, and there seems to be something between him and his new commander. It'd normally be great...except real life gets in the way.
It started the same way it was going to end.
He knocked once on the door, waited, came in and walked straight across the room to the huge desk that dominated the far wall.
“First Lieutenant Peck reports as ordered.”
He snapped a salute, stiff and at attention. The desk was old, worn around the corners, clearly the product of some furniture buy from ten or fifteen years ago, cigar smoldering in an ashtray and holy shit, why couldn’t the Army ever replace anything...
“Templeton Peck?” the major asked with a little smile, standing up, saluting back, coming around the corner of the pine monstrosity to offer the younger man his hand. A warm hand, big and calloused, good firm handshake, something about the feel of that skin against his own... “Hannibal Smith. Welcome to the unit. Have a seat. “He pointed at a black leather sofa he’d probably purchased himself, and went for his desk chair. Pulled it up like they were buddies already.
That relax, we’re going to chat about what a fuck-up you are chat.
Face braced himself.
“This your, what, second base?”
“Last since training, sir. Before that I was at...”
“Drop the sir bullshit. My men call me Hannibal,” he said, and picked up his half-finished cigar. “And it’s, what, Face?”
“That’s right, s... er, Hannibal.”
Hannibal reached back behind him and pulled a folder towards him. “Got the reports from your last commander...” and Face knew what was coming. How’d you manage to rack up this much paperwork without getting kicked out? or maybe Did you really do all of this or Convince me you’re worth my time, but Hannibal didn’t say any of that. Just opened the folder and leafed through. “I read it. All of it. All your paperwork, your rebuttals, the legal stuff. Paints an interesting story.”
Hannibal paused, and took a deep drag on his cigar, watching Face. He stared straight at him, at a spot right behind the colonel’s head, not showing any emotion, not willing
“You’ve got a piss-poor performance record through school. Second from the bottom, wasn’t it?”
He nodded stiffly.
“You’re an arrogant little shit and a terrible soldier by all accounts.” He looked at the most recent performance report. “Does not play well with others, lacks team spirit, selfish... Is that how you would characterize yourself, Face?”
His ear were burning. “No, sir.”
“I believe in fresh starts, and you need one, don’t get me wrong.” And Hannibal puffed on the cigar, even though smoking indoors was extremely against regs. “I don’t need a soldier, kid, not some career-climber who’s here to kiss ass and marry his high school sweetheart and make it to a comfy retirement. I need somebody with a brain and some self-reliance, who can still stomach the bullshit and keep themselves in line. Can you do that for me?”
“I believe so...”
“Don’t believe it. Know it,” Hannibal said, and leaned forward a little. “I’m not getting a read off you, kid. Do you care about any of this?”
Face dropped his eyes, took a couple of deep breaths. What was he supposed to say? Start bitching about his last commander just wanted an acquisitions LT who didn’t mind writing up daily sit-reps and got hard for filing forms and never got bored with making powerpoints, who had no patience for a LT who talked back and asked questions and tried to fix broken processes that everyone seemed to love? Or how about his first captain, who used to blame all his mistakes on the hapless second-lieutenant Peck? Or, and this was a good one, the way he’d never gotten along with the unit’s other lieutenants, and how that had spiraled into a referral to the mental health clinic for isolationist tendencies and possible suicidal thoughts, all because he didn’t like staying in and playing Rock Band on Friday nights? How nobody had given a shit and neither had he?
No, saying any of that would be slitting his own throat.
Face swallowed, his mouth cottony, remembering the old humiliation. “I had to direct-line to the base commander to get approved for Ranger training. My own commander refused to even submit the package.”
He wished like hell that paperwork hadn’t followed him here. And he knew what Hannibal was saying, that he was going to have to work twice as hard to make up for it. How he couldn’t just be adequate, how he had to be shit-hot. Volunteer for bullshit, put in extra hours at the gym, come in early, stay late....
And then a pair of steel blue eyes met his, that smile a little wider in approval, and Face knew, he fucking knew, he was lost.
“How’d you get an appointment?”
“I didn’t,” and Face grinned, remembering. “I stole all his office furniture one night and set it up out on the range...”
And then he was telling the story, and Hannibal was sitting back in his chair, and they were both laughing, and he felt his stomach turn over. He had no idea if this man was gay, and he was a major, and his direct supervisor, and that was three layers of hands-off, right there. Still, there was that smile and that laughter, no wedding ring and no photos of kids, and Face hoped, hoped to hell, that maybe, just maybe... but when had anything he'd ever hoped come true?
+++++
And things got better from there.
Hannibal was true to his word; he gave Face a fresh start. Said that anything he’d done in his primary MOS didn’t mean shit now, because he’d graduated from Ranger school and that was what mattered. It wasn’t the regular Army, wasn’t the same office grind he’d put up with for the first year and a half he’d been in. This was better, lots of range time and exercising, land nav out in the woods and in the desert, training for missions, occasionally exercising old acquisitions skills in new and creative ways, football games and more interesting people.
The bullshit was still there, but Hannibal told him that life was all about figuring out what brand of bullshit you could put up with, and this wasn’t too bad. In fact, for the first time in years, Face was actually enjoying himself.
The worst part was Hannibal himself.
At first, Face wasn’t sure if there was attraction there. He thought there might be, the first week or two, and then he’d taken the bold step of heading up to the major’s office with a question about something.
“You don’t usually do this, do you, kid?” Hannibal had asked with a smile, and tossed him a beer out of his mini-fridge.
“Not so much, no.”
He’d lit a cigar and popped the tab on his own. “What d’ya got for me?”
It was a bullshit question, something simple he should have known himself, but Hannibal answered it easily and laughed and started telling him Cold War stories and before either man had known it, it was almost twenty-hundred-hours and long past close of business.
“Shit, kid. Wish we could stay here talking, but I need to get going,” Hannibal had said. “Going to be late for...”
And then he’d just stopped.
And then Face’s heart hit his shoes.
“Got a girlfriend, boss?” Face had quipped, and immediately winced. That was stepping over the line. But Hannibal didn’t yell at him for him, didn’t give him a lecture about rank and respect.
Hannibal just got a wistful little look on his face, and smirked, trying to hide it. “Something like that,” he’d said, and patted Face on the shoulder as he ushered him out, his hand lingering just a little too long.
And after that, Face found himself going to Hannibal's office after hours more and more frequently, always with an excuse, always greeted with a smile and a beer, always feeling a little hopeful and a little sick. It was torture, but he couldn't stop himself, and pretty soon, he noticed, Hannibal would come down to his office, or find him on the range or in the gym, just to talk. Always talking.
He thought he could talk to Hannibal forever.
Even if the man did call it mentoring. But Face suspected that was just a blind.
Then there was another one of those nights where they stayed at the office too long and they both still smelled liked cordite and dirt from a live-fire scenario earlier in the day. Hannibal had asked him to stay behind, supposedly to review his performance.
But they'd just ended up talking instead.
Face scrunched up a little as Hannibal locked the doors behind them, the major finally deciding that Face needed to go home, Face pretty sure he had another one of those mysterious appointments. But he had to say something.
“Boss, I’m...”
“I know, kid. I, I... understand. It’s okay.”
And a shot of heat went right through Face as Hannibal roughed his hair a little, pulling back too soon, and leaving him there, on the step of the unit's building, no answers forthcoming.
He let his head hit the door, just for a moment.
He was such an idiot.
+++++
How much of an idiot, Face would find out in the worst way possible.
As the weeks went by, turned into months, when they got sent over to the big Iraqi sandbox for a month, it only got worse. Face couldn’t quite resolve his feelings for the older man. For his boss, his commanding officer, his very male commanding officer.
All of that. And all that that entailed
He’d already figured out that there was something between them. There had to be. There was the way Hannibal looked at him, the way Hannibal talked to him, like he was the only thing in the world, like he was the most important thing in the world. And according to the rest of the guys, they’d never seen Hannibal bring any woman to the barbeques and the Christmas parties and the promotion ceremonies.
Lifetime bachelor, everybody laughed, and there were stories, lots of stories, about how his wife had left him and he never talked about it, or how he was married to the job and never had time, or about how no woman could ever put up with the hamster ball of crazy that Hannibal seemed to be, lethal one minute and chatting, laughing, the next. The most obvious one, that Hannibal was gay and didn’t want anybody to know, came up once during a poker game, but that was something nobody wanted to get caught insinuating. They all respected Hannibal. Screwing another guy clearly fell into the realm of wrongness, which was a land completely unexplored by their commander. An insult.
Face agreed - Hannibal was amazing. But insulting him with the implication? He’d laughed along with the rest and gone back to robbing them all blind and tried to push his treacherous thoughts away.
God, if only he could be so lucky...
So Face had to spend a very uncomfortable month in tight quarters with no privacy and no way to get laid - evidently, sex, like alcohol and everything else fun, was illegal on deployments. Even for Rangers. And he hadn’t made things any easier for himself.
Like that one morning, a down day, when he’d bumped into Hannibal coming back from a run on the hard top. Face had been on his way to the showers, and thank god for that. It was zero-nine-hundred, already roasting hot, and the major was soaked in sweat, his gray PT shirt clinging to every inch of hard muscle. He’d given Face a little head nod, and a smile and walked past, seemingly ignorant of the effect it had on his lieutenant.
Face let his hand drop down to his rapidly hardening cock once he’d gotten the water on, the smeared plastic of the shower divider offering a modicum of privacy. As he brought himself to release, all he could see was that body, naked above him, that sculpted chest sliding against his back, Hannibal’s cock, sliding into him, hands on his waist and lips against his ear, telling him...
And after he’d spilled all over his own hand and the plastic, Face realized that it probably wasn’t the best idea.
He tried, almost successfully, not to do it again.
By the time they got back to the States, Face was seriously considering throwing caution to the winds and telling Hannibal how he felt - because even though he refused to use that word, it was the only word that applied - and that last leg of the trip, from Ramstein to Atlanta, gave him plenty of time to work up his courage and frame it in his mind.
It played out a hundred different ways until he settled on the one he liked best.
Hannibal, I don’t know how to say this, but there’s this thing between us...
Yeah, kid. I feel it too...
He leaned against the window of the plane, staring out over the Atlantic Ocean with a smile on his lips, daring to hope as Hannibal read a magazine in the seat next to him, chewing gum furiously because he hadn’t had a cigar in three days.
They were both in uniform. He couldn’t have that conversation like that.
But after they disembarked and got through to the baggage area and the enlisted guys had all caught the bus back to base and the other LT was calling his girlfriend for the third time to come pick us the fuck up, honey, Face went over to where Hannibal was still waiting for his M-9 to pop up on the belt.
“Need me to go find it for you, boss?” he asked with a grin, and Hannibal just ran a hand through silver hair and shook his head. Fondly, Face hoped. Maybe he could ask for a lift back to his...
“You’re going to miss your ride, kid,” Hannibal told him, nodding down to where the other lieutenant was kissing a skinny blonde girl.
“She’s gonna get fat on him in a year or two,” Face joked, looking at them, and then looked back when he didn’t hear an answering laugh. There was that look on Hannibal’s face again, that slightly sad one, like the first time Face had gone to his office.
The other LT saw him, and waved, and Face held up his hand and reshouldered his backpack and started walking away. Had he misread Hannibal?
He bit his lip and looked back, wondering if he should go back or something, and what met his eyes damn near broke his heart.
There was Hannibal, and there was another guy, tall, slight, dark-haired. Face could see that they were talking, about what, he was too far away to tell. But there was something in their stances, the way Hannibal wasn’t moving, the way the other guy had one hand shoved in his back pocket, and then the other guy clapped Hannibal on the shoulder and Hannibal caught it, just for a split second, and then they were talking again, grabbing his M-9 case and the rest of the boss’ gear, walking away, laughing...
“Dude, Face, let’s get the hell out of here,” his fellow LT whispered in his ear urgently. “I haven’t seen her in a fucking month.”
“Yeah,” Face said, and let himself be led away, hiding his shock the best he could, “yeah, I know the feeling.”
An idiot? No, no, not that. Not that at all.
He was a fucking moron.
+++++
Face wanted to ask about it, he really did. Didn’t seem right, though, prying into a personal life that the boss had probably taken extreme pains to hide from the rest of the unit, the rest of the fucking Army. God, Face knew how that one went, needing to hide, needing to lie, and at least he considered himself double-hinged. He strongly suspected, although he couldn’t prove it, that Hannibal would have already been married happily with a couple of little rugrats running around, had he been able to bend like that.
As it turned out, though, he didn’t need to ask.
“Shut the door, Face,” the major said a few days after they’d all gotten back to work. He picked up the end of a mostly dead cigar and started chewing.
A wave of panic went through the younger man at that. This was it. This was the part where Hannibal told him...
“... his name’s Jake. I just thought... I know you saw us together at the airport, and I didn’t, I mean, that wasn’t exactly the way I’d wanted you to find out...”
“Right,” Face said, feeling like the bottom was coming out of him, like he was falling with no safety net, like his ‘chute wasn’t opening, like he was going to hit with a force that would split him open like a bag of rotten fruit. “Because you weren’t going to tell me about him at all. That’s be much better.” Even he was surprised by how upset he sounded.
A wave of anger passed over Hannibal, and then the man softened a little, came around and settled down next to Face on the couch. “It’s really not something I can...”
Face cut him off, stared down at his boots. “I know, I get it, boss.”
“Face...”
“Just...shit, is it a long-term thing?”
Hannibal shifted a little. “Six years now.”
Six years. Fuck. There was no way to compete with that, Face knew, and all he could suddenly think about was getting the fuck out of that room. “Wow. That’s...”
“Anything has its ups and downs,” Hannibal said next to him. Face couldn’t look up, couldn’t look at him, couldn’t see the happy little smile he knew was there. Knew from the way Hannibal was talking. That smile Hannibal flashed him sometimes, like they were sharing a secret. “He’s a reporter, I’m, well, so we...”
Every nerve in his boy was screaming and he was short of breath. Why couldn’t he breath? “I already said I got it, sir. Is there anything else?”
“I’m sorry,” Hannibal said quietly, at length, and Face had never felt worse in his life. “I wasn’t sure what was going on between you and me and I didn’t want...”
At that, Face looked up. “You and me?” he asked in an equally soft voice.
Whatever emotion was playing behind Hannibal’s eyes, he couldn’t discern it. “Yeah, kid. Us.”
And then Hannibal’s hand came over to cover his own, twinging together, squeezing tightly, the ends of Hannibal’s finger brushing slowly over the side of Face’s thigh and the lieutenant let himself relax into it, just for a little while, because if Hannibal was offering, didn’t that mean he was okay with it?
He laid his head down on Hannibal’s shoulder when the older man showed no sign of letting go, sitting on his other hand, not trusting himself with it free, and could have cried when Hannibal reached across himself to run his hand up into Face’s hair, thumb playing over the young man’s cheekbone. They sat like that for a minute, a long, long minute, and Face tried to tell himself not to relax, not to get comfortable, not to enjoy it...
“What are we going to do about this, kid?”
“I don’t know, boss.”
+++++
The next time Face saw Jake, it was at Hannibal’s promotion ceremony.
The boss had made lieutenant colonel, and any colonel promotion was always a big deal. It seemed like half the officer population of the base was packed into the club that night, and quite a few civilians. Jake didn’t stand out in any way. It was completely okay for him to be there. Non-threatening. Simple. Innocuous.
Except to Face, who knew.
And during the entire thing, he kept resisting the urge to look back over his shoulder at the dark-haired man, a few rows behind him. He coudn’t stop thinking about it, though. How hard it must be for the man, who looked like a nice guy, from the few glimpses Face had gotten of him. How hard it must be not to be able to go help with the pinning on. Not to be able to kiss him afterwards. Not to be able to sling an arm around him and whisper in his ear how proud you were, how thrilled for...
Face shook it off. Because, as rotten as he felt admitting it to himself, Jake wasn’t the man he was imagining, up there, changing out the gold oak leaves for silver ones.
The club exploded after Hannibal saluted the base commander and sat back down, everybody going for their second beer, over into the dining room for a rather impressive buffet - Hannibal had put a grand or two down for this and everyone was damn well going to enjoy it. Everyone except for Face, who was still nursing his first beer at the bar in relative privacy when Jake walked over.
Oh, sweet Jesus, how had he pissed off god this time?
“You’re Face, right?” the dark-haired man asked, holding out his hand. Face put on his best conman smile and shook it firmly. Limp wrist, he noticed, and wondered why Hannibal would be with a guy who... and he shoved that thought away, too. Irrational jealously was not a good look on him. “Jake Marsden. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Hannibal talk about me much?”
“Jo... Hannibal’s really proud of you. Lots of good things to say about you. His problem lieutenant who’s turning himself around.” Jake waved a twenty over the tip jar and got the bartender’s attention. “It must be great, having him for a boss.”
Face swallowed. He could do this, he really could. “How’d you two meet?”
“Bosnia. I was over there, covering the action and Hannibal was right in the thick of it. Invited me along on a couple of missions, and we...” Jake paused as the bartender deposited a pair of sweating Sam Adams in front of them. “I guess we just hit it off from there. I remember, he told me he’d never seen a man willing to go into a war zone without a weapon, and he thought I must be nuts. I told him that’s what my camera was for, and he...”
Jake laughed as he finished his little story about how they met, studiously leaving out the bits where they must have kissed, where they must have slept together, and Face laughed right along with him, something cold and hard formed beneath his rib cage, and he couldn’t breath. The story only lasted a minute or two - the longest of his life - before Hannibal came over and took the beer from Jake, their fingers meeting, just for a second, and Hannibal was saying something to Face that Face didn’t hear.
It was loud in the club, and all Face could think about was how those fingers had been touching him, just last week, and he was off his stool and in the bathroom as fast as he could manage, dry heaving in a stall.
He was a fucking moron.
When he came back, he couldn’t find Hannibal or Jake anywhere in the milieu. That was just fine with him. And since Hannibal was paying for the booze tonight, Face decided, right then and there, that getting roaring drunk was the best possible solution. Maybe fuck something, too.
That always made him feel better, right?
He settled on a redhead, that female lieutenant everybody was always trying to get with. Why the fuck not? She always said no, right? He was dimly aware of Hannibal watching him, their eyes meeting across the crowd as he sweet-talked and flattered and bantered with the other lieutenant. Screw that, Face thought, and ordered another round.
And either she was drunk too, or he really was that good, because she let him take her back to his small apartment and judging by her cries, really enjoyed it, and afterward laid there next to him, murmuring softly as exhaustion and alcohol overtook her.
And as one of his hands slowly stroking down her spine, the girl warm and pliant and soft and small next to him, he felt a sting in his face and a thud in his chest, and he stared up at the ceiling and held her a little tighter, helpless, as the tears finally came.
+++++
Hannibal didn’t ask him about it the next day. Hannibal didn’t ask him about it for the next week. But Face had been avoiding the man’s office, avoiding his gaze out at the range when it was their day to shoot, leaving meetings fast, so he wasn’t stuck talking to him. So it couldn't come up.
But Face really should have known he wasn’t going to be able to keep that up forever.
He’d been through everything in his head. He couldn’t get in the middle of Jake and Hannibal. Not that he had all the details, but it seemed like they were happy together. Like Jake was really a good fit for the boss. That Hannibal wouldn’t stay with somebody so long unless that was the case.
It was Saturday, and Face was nursing a Friday-night hangover, staring up at the coffeepot, wondering if he could remember how to operate the damn thing. Angry drinking being what it was, he had a couple of bruises he didn’t remember getting and he’d kicked another girl out about an hour ago. He hadn’t remembered her name. Why did girls get so pissed off about that?
Stupid thing to do, though, really, he thought to himself. Where had he left the coffee?
There was a knock on the door. Sarah? Stephanie? Had she left her purse or something? He pushed himself off the kitchen floor and pulled yesterday’s uniform shirt on over his boxers and padded to the door.
“Yeah, yeah, hang on a second...” he called, unlocking the dead bolt and jerking the thing open.
Revealing one furious Lieutenant Colonel John Hannibal Smith.
“Fuck,” Face muttered, and the colonel pushed past him, tucking his beret into his cargo pocket, making his way into the little living room.
“You missed maneuvers this morning, kid.”
What time was it? Face blinked and took a better look at the clock. 1300. “Jesus, shit, Hannibal, I completely forgot...”
“You hung-over, kid?”
“No,” Face groaned, and flopped onto the sofa. He was being disrespectful, and he knew it, and he didn’t care. It was getting harder and harder to care about anything. And being this close to Hannibal made him feel like he was on fire. In a wonderful way. In a fucking horrible way. Why did it have to be like this? “I think I’m still drunk.”
“You missed...”
“Fuck, Hannibal, I know.”
“This is dereliction of duty, kid! This is failure to go! Do you know what I’d do to one of my enlisted men who pulled this bullshit on me?”
He heard the anger in Hannibal’s voice, and dropped his eyes. What was the point? “I get it, Lieutenant Peck, fucking up again, right?”
“It’s an Article 15 offense, kid! You can’t survive something like this,” Hannibal said in that low, dangerous voice of his. “And I can’t not do something about it. Everybody fucking knows you’re not there!”
Face let the back of his head hit the cushions. “What the fuck do you want me to say?”
And there Hannibal was, crouching down, hands on Face’s knees. “I want to know what’s going on with you, kid.”
He almost laughed in Hannibal’s face, but that touch was distracting. Probably wasn’t a good idea, anyway. “Shit, boss...”
And then there Hannibal was, pushing up next to him on the couch, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, running one of those hands through his hair, and Face felt that explosion of heat, deep down.
“We can’t.”
“I know.”
“I can’t do that to you, kid. If somebody found out...you’ve got your whole career ahead of you...”
“...and you’ve got Jake.”
“Face...”
“I can’t get in the middle of that, Hannibal,” the younger man said softly, letting one of his hands fall onto Hannibal’s leg, squeezing a little. He couldn’t vocalize what he was thinking, what he knew. That Hannibal was the loyal type, damn fucking loyal, dedicated to the things he put his heart into, the things he promised to do and be. And asking Hannibal to cheat, making Hannibal cheat, would be tantamount to destroying the man. He wouldn’t survive it. “You two seem so happy together.”
“We are,” Hannibal said, pressing Face in a little closer. “We really are.”
“What are we doing?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s your decision.”
Hannibal didn’t respond, but his hand shifted, and Face could feel the man’s breath against his neck, hovering there, so damn close... and Face remembered, remembered that he couldn’t let Hannibal do this, he couldn’t. Because if he really cared for Hannibal, really, like he thought he did, he couldn’t let him do this, couldn’t let Hannibal keep promising things with his words, his actions, that they just couldn’t...
But it turned out that Face didn’t have to be strong, didn’t have to push him away, didn’t have to say one word, because suddenly all that warmth was gone and Hannibal was at the door, beret in his hand.
Ready to leave.
“I’ll tell the boys you had to take the day off,” Hannibal said slowly, crushing the red felt.
“Do you need me to go to sick hall or something?”
“No, no. I’ll take care of it,” Hannibal said. Awkward. Face was awkward. Everything was fucking awkward. “Kid, I’m...”
“Don’t.”
And that was it. The door opened, shut, and he was alone again.
Not a second too soon. As soon as Hannibal was gone, a sudden thought hit Face and consumed him entirely, a fire, burning wild and fast under his skin. He slid off the couch under the force of it, curling up, shaking as it ran through him, demanding acknowledgment, begging for it, begging to be given voice, to be set free, and even as he said it, all the lieutenant could think about was how something that should have been so wonderful...
“I love him.”
...could be so fucking horrible.
What the fuck was he supposed to do now?
+++++
Somehow, saying the word had made it more real for him.
I love him.
Not exactly something that should be admitted aloud, Face reflected later. He’d spent the rest of Saturday trying to recover from Friday, said fuck it again, gone out anyway.
He hated trying to find a decent gay bar in this part of the country. Had to go into downtown Atlanta, really know where you were headed, had to be careful. Park-your-car-somewhere-else kind of careful. Fucking regs.
At least it wasn’t like before, wasn’t like back when he still had his hair in that damn high and tight and everybody fucking knew who he did for a living. This was a lot easier, he thought as he sauntered up to the bar, his shirt just a little too tight. Less to worry about, fewer regrets... an older guy, maybe mid-thirties, graying around his temples, clearly interested.
After the shower incident in Iraq, Face had made a damn near heroic effort - in his own estimation of such things - to not ever think about Hannibal during personal time again. The afternoon after he’d done, well, that, they’d had a mission briefing. Hannibal up there, under the camo netting, in his desert BDU pants and tan t-shirt, dogtags clearly showing throw the damp fabric, nothing left to the imagination except what it would feel like, that chest against his own, backing up against the nearest hard wall or pole or anything solid, pressing him into the ground, maybe, lips crashing down, demanding entrance, demanding submission...
It hadn’t left his mind for days. It was all he could think about whenever he had looked at the major. He’d very nearly jumped him one night, when it was just the two of them alone, walking back from the general’s HQ, Hannibal so close, smiling at him... he just couldn’t get his stupid fantasy out of his head.
Face had promised himself he wouldn’t do that to himself again. It just made everything worse. Thinking about Hannibal like that, when he couldn’t have him? Bad, bad, bad idea. But that guy was walking over now, smiling a little, and Face let himself smile back.
He’d never gotten along with rules very well.
And right about the point where he was being fucked through the mattress in the other guy’s apartment, hands scrambling against the pillows, feeling more bored than aroused, it occurred to the lieutenant that things couldn’t go on like this.
Not anymore.
Because this kind of self-medication just wasn’t enough anymore.
Because he’d admitted it to himself.
And what a fucking mistake that turned out to be, he thought as that old familiar sensation filled him with something akin to shame. He was up and on his feet and gone practically before the guy pulled out.
“Asshole,” he muttered to himself and kicked the door shut.
+++++
Face had very little self-control left when it came to Hannibal. Hannibal had very nearly snapped it completely on Saturday. If Hannibal touched him again, he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to stop himself. And he was pretty sure Hannibal understood that, because for three days, everything was fine. The tension seemed to be slightly less, the looks less heated, no conversations after work. Everything like it was supposed to be. Professional. Easy. Plutonic.
But then Hannibal had some kind of blow-up with the brigade commander on Friday and decided, fuck this day, my treat, who wants to go to lunch?, which meant Face and the other LT and a couple of the senior-ranking enlisted guys got to leave work around 1300 and go have a couple of rounds at the brew-pub a few miles from base and watch football and laugh, while Hannibal lit up a cigar and unwound from whatever bullshit had gotten pitched at him this time. From what anybody could tell, the boss didn’t get along wth the base commander very well. Wasn’t political enough, or something like that.
Everybody else drifted out slowly, calling wives or girlfriends, going home, because who gave a shit, it was Friday? Pretty soon it was just him and Hannibal left. The colonel wasn’t drinking and Face was, because Face had stupidly agreed to let him drive. He had this stupid need to be close to the other man, absolutely stupid, and he was pretty sure his face was going flush every time he looked at Hannibal this week, and all he wanted to do was lean over and pull against the collar of those BDUs, tugging in, offering up, taking away...
Hannibal watched him finish his entire fifth beer in one go with something approaching paternal concern. “I think we’re good, don’t you, el-tee?” he asked.
And either it was the alcohol or that edge Hannibal’s voice took on when he smoked, because the use of his rank went right to Face’s cock. He managed a tight nod. The colonel paid the tab and practically hauled him out of there, pinching a hand under Face’s elbow to steady him once they got out into the parking lot.
Face leaned up against the passenger side door as Hannibal opened it for him from the inside. He could feel the fingers on his arm still, right over where that guy from last weekend had held him down, and he wondered what it would feel like for Hannibal to be doing that, Hannibal holding him still, spreading him open. Whispering encouragement, telling him...
“Kid, you okay?” Hannibal asked. Were they on the road already?
Face stared straight ahead. “I want you to make.... er, I need you to fuck me...” and he trailed off, mortified at what he’d almost said. Rangers didn’t do that kind of shit.
“Kid, you know I...” Hannibal said, sounding more unsure than he ever had in the six months since Face had joined the unit. “That’s not... jesus, kid... look, Face, I’m not the sort to... sit here and say something like I love you, Templeton Peck, because...”
“Oh, yeah, I know...” Face snapped back, harsher than he meant to. Hannibal laid a hand down on his lap, and he flinched. He'd meant it when he'd said it was Hannibal's decision. He was okay with that. But this? What was fair about this? What was okay about any of this? Hannibal, allowed to touch, allowed to talk, insinuate, offer, when Face couldn’t trust himself for even the simplest of such things? How in the hell was any of this okay? Wasn’t he better than this?
Was any of this worth it?
He kept his eyes caged out front of the windshield and didn’t talk for the rest of the ride.
+++++
That afternoon, a few people were still at work. People like the base commander’s secondary exec, that redhead he’d fucked a couple of weeks ago, sitting at her desk in an otherwise empty office, proofing slides for some Monday briefing, everybody else home for the day. Shit, he’d forgotten about that. She just looked different in uniform. Why did women always look worse, he asked himself as he walked over to her, and men, men like Hannibal, always look better?
And why did it have to be her?
She frowned up at him, pushed a pen around. “What do you want, Peck?” Had he kicked her out, too? Forgotten her name? He couldn’t remember, and he suddenly felt a wave of regret. Fuck, nothing around him was right anymore...
“I need to get on his calendar.”
It wasn't a casual request and they both knew it. Serious business, going straight to the top like this, but he didn't feel like stealing furniture tonight.
The other lieutenant just started laughing and he clenched a fist. Considered all the ways he could play her. Considered offering to take her out again. Favors exchange. Get everybody up here new... Fuck it. He leaned forward a little. “Please.”
She stopped mid-guffaw and stared. “You’re being serious?”
He nodded.
That frown melted into something he couldn’t quite place and she jabbed back over her shoulder with the pen. “He’s still here. Conference call. If you want to wait...”
He settled down in one of the chairs across from her desk, flashed her a quick grin, and she just shook her head, and went back to the slides.
+++++
Face pulled the wrinkled sheet out of the thickened folder and stared at Hannibal’s office door. PCS checklist. Almost everything had been marked off.
He didn’t want to do this.
He knocked on the door. He’d waited until the last second, the very last second, 1800 on a Thursday of a week he was supposed to be on leave. He’d spent the time running around, working on this damn checklist.
He hated this shit. Hated it for getting this bad. Hated himself for his lack of self control. Hated Jake for getting there first. Hated Hannibal for refusing to make a decision, for actually saying...hated everything.
But it wasn’t hate he was feeling, outside that door, right then. He wasn’t feeling anything. All he could hear was a question, a single question, pounding between his ears.
How in the hell had he gotten himself into this mess?
Face closed his eyes for a second.
He needed to do this.
Because Hannibal wouldn’t.
He knocked once, came straight in, right over to that monstrosity of a desk that dominated the far wall, and snapped a salute, his left hand heavy by his side, clutching the paperwork.
“First Lieutenant Peck reports,” he said.
Hannibal stared at him, cell phone held loosely to his ear. Face felt numb, absolutely numb, as Hannibal slid it away, mumbling something like “we’ll talk about this later, Jake, sorry...”, as he snapped it shut and tossed it on his desk.
“At ease,” he said automatically, and leaned back in his chair. “What are you doing, kid?”
Face steeled himself against that almost scared sound in Hannibal’s voice, and pushed the folder across the desk. “I need you to sign this, sir.”
Hannibal still looked a little stunned, like he couldn’t quite figure out the formality, the sir, any of this, but he took the paperwork.
Face’s permanent change of station paperwork.
His apartment was empty, the landlord surprisingly flexible about him breaking his lease. Everything that needed to be sold was sold. Just a couple of things left to do. Medical records needed to be mailed. Gear returned, sidearm checked back into the armory. Tickets to retrieve from the travel office. Avoid a going-away party, anybody seeing him off at the bus, make his own goodbyes in his own time.
And Hannibal’s signature. He needed Hannibal’s signature. He needed Hannibal’s signature to be released from his unit, from all of this...
He didn’t know what he expected Hannibal to say. Couldn’t have guessed at all. What he’d dreamed, and it had been a literal dream, last night was that Hannibal would take one look at this, come around the edge of his desk and sit them both down on the couch like he had that first time. Put an arm around his shoulders, tell him it was okay, tell him he didn’t need to leave, that he’d have a home in Hannibal’s unit as long as he wanted it, that he and Jake knew it wasn’t going to last through another deployment, that he didn’t care anymore, that it didn’t matter, lean in a little further, breath hot on hot skin, lips wet on wet lips, hands tightening down, fingers undoing buttons, telling him, telling him...
Hannibal didn’t do any of that, though. “What... what are you going to be doing at Camp Red Cloud?”
“General out there needs a new aide. I’m the first volunteer they’ve had.”
“You went around me? To ask for an early PCS?”
Face wasn’t sure if the utter betrayal, the sadness, he heard in Hannibal’s voice was coming from the first or the second fact there. He didn’t say anything, just lifted his chin a little and grabbed his own wrist behind his back, keeping his at-ease posture steady.
What was there to say? What else could they say to each other? What was left between them that hadn’t already been tainted?
“You hate doing paperwork, kid. And an aide position...”
“It’s Korea. I’m sure I’ll find ways to keep myself busy.”
“How’d you even do this...”
“The general hates you, remember?”
At that, Hannibal did get up and did come around. And Face could have kicked himself in the balls for the way his heart leaped right then, hoping, still hoping, after all this time, after all the uncertainty and unwillingness from Hannibal, that there might be something more that could happen between them.
A hand squeezed his shoulder, and he didn’t relax. He kept still, exactly like he supposed to, exactly like a soldier was supposed to when addressing a superior officer, and the look on Hannibal’s face, as he let his hand fall almost broke Face's heart. Would have. Would have, if anything was left.
“I can non-concur. With your disciplinary record, it’d really be best if we kept you in the unit for at least a year...”
“Do that and I’m in the Defense Council’s office Monday morning, telling them why my commander’s refusing me...”
They regarded one another for a moment, and Hannibal reached back across his desk for a pen and the paperwork that would send Face half a world away, away from all of this, away from him, and Face noted dimly, as if from a great distance, that the colonel’s hand paused, shaking, over the line where his name needed to go.
Goddamnit, where his name needed to go, sign the fucking thing...
“You sure about this, Temp?” Hannibal said softly.
“Aren’t you, John?” he managed to grind out.
Hannibal handed it over, clean blue ink over the previously blank space. Face took it, blew on it so it wouldn’t smudge as he tucked it back into his folder, along with everything else, and nodded. “Thanks.”
“When’s your last day?”
“Next Wednesday,” he said, and paused. “I don’t want a fucking going away. I won’t show up.”
"There are people here who are going to want to say goodbye to you.”
“I’m around for five more days,” he said. “I’ll make the rounds myself.” He paused. “And don’t let everybody show up at lodging morning-of and make a big deal, okay?”
“Kid...” Hannibal said, and licked dry lips. Face tried not to look. He couldn’t keep looking. God, he never wanted to see Hannibal again. “Kid, I...”
“Is there anything else, sir?”
“... no, lieutenant. You’re dismissed.”
And as he left the office, he tried to tell himself it was for the best, tried to tell himself not to look back as he walked down the hall, tried to tell himself that running back would be a very bad idea, tried to tell himself as walked back to lodging that Hannibal wouldn’t do anything different if he went back and told him how he felt. That he couldn’t burden the older man with such a thing. That he could take the pain, if it meant keeping it off Hannibal. That it worked like that, sometimes. That he couldn’t stop the PCS now, even if he wanted to.
That nothing would change.
I love you, Templeton Peck.
“Shut the fuck up,” he muttered, and kept walking, because the only thing he knew for certain was that he’d never see Hannibal again.
And he hated himself, right then and forever, for being okay with that.
Continue to Extended TDY...
Rating: pg-13
Warnings: none
Summary: I asked for something angsty, and I got this in response! Which was perfect, BTW...
I've been thinking for a while about prompting something where Face joins the army, meets Hannibal in Ranger school, falls in love etc, the typical stuff... and then he discovers Hannibal is very much unavailable. And he can't even hate the other guy cause he's not a big bad rival, he's just a nice guy and perfect for the boss. Cue angst. But I kind of want to see Hannibal/OMC for some reason and I didn't think anyone would want to do that.
So there it is if you're interested.
Face has just recently been assigned to Hannibal's unit, and there seems to be something between him and his new commander. It'd normally be great...except real life gets in the way.
It started the same way it was going to end.
He knocked once on the door, waited, came in and walked straight across the room to the huge desk that dominated the far wall.
“First Lieutenant Peck reports as ordered.”
He snapped a salute, stiff and at attention. The desk was old, worn around the corners, clearly the product of some furniture buy from ten or fifteen years ago, cigar smoldering in an ashtray and holy shit, why couldn’t the Army ever replace anything...
“Templeton Peck?” the major asked with a little smile, standing up, saluting back, coming around the corner of the pine monstrosity to offer the younger man his hand. A warm hand, big and calloused, good firm handshake, something about the feel of that skin against his own... “Hannibal Smith. Welcome to the unit. Have a seat. “He pointed at a black leather sofa he’d probably purchased himself, and went for his desk chair. Pulled it up like they were buddies already.
That relax, we’re going to chat about what a fuck-up you are chat.
Face braced himself.
“This your, what, second base?”
“Last since training, sir. Before that I was at...”
“Drop the sir bullshit. My men call me Hannibal,” he said, and picked up his half-finished cigar. “And it’s, what, Face?”
“That’s right, s... er, Hannibal.”
Hannibal reached back behind him and pulled a folder towards him. “Got the reports from your last commander...” and Face knew what was coming. How’d you manage to rack up this much paperwork without getting kicked out? or maybe Did you really do all of this or Convince me you’re worth my time, but Hannibal didn’t say any of that. Just opened the folder and leafed through. “I read it. All of it. All your paperwork, your rebuttals, the legal stuff. Paints an interesting story.”
Hannibal paused, and took a deep drag on his cigar, watching Face. He stared straight at him, at a spot right behind the colonel’s head, not showing any emotion, not willing
“You’ve got a piss-poor performance record through school. Second from the bottom, wasn’t it?”
He nodded stiffly.
“You’re an arrogant little shit and a terrible soldier by all accounts.” He looked at the most recent performance report. “Does not play well with others, lacks team spirit, selfish... Is that how you would characterize yourself, Face?”
His ear were burning. “No, sir.”
“I believe in fresh starts, and you need one, don’t get me wrong.” And Hannibal puffed on the cigar, even though smoking indoors was extremely against regs. “I don’t need a soldier, kid, not some career-climber who’s here to kiss ass and marry his high school sweetheart and make it to a comfy retirement. I need somebody with a brain and some self-reliance, who can still stomach the bullshit and keep themselves in line. Can you do that for me?”
“I believe so...”
“Don’t believe it. Know it,” Hannibal said, and leaned forward a little. “I’m not getting a read off you, kid. Do you care about any of this?”
Face dropped his eyes, took a couple of deep breaths. What was he supposed to say? Start bitching about his last commander just wanted an acquisitions LT who didn’t mind writing up daily sit-reps and got hard for filing forms and never got bored with making powerpoints, who had no patience for a LT who talked back and asked questions and tried to fix broken processes that everyone seemed to love? Or how about his first captain, who used to blame all his mistakes on the hapless second-lieutenant Peck? Or, and this was a good one, the way he’d never gotten along with the unit’s other lieutenants, and how that had spiraled into a referral to the mental health clinic for isolationist tendencies and possible suicidal thoughts, all because he didn’t like staying in and playing Rock Band on Friday nights? How nobody had given a shit and neither had he?
No, saying any of that would be slitting his own throat.
Face swallowed, his mouth cottony, remembering the old humiliation. “I had to direct-line to the base commander to get approved for Ranger training. My own commander refused to even submit the package.”
He wished like hell that paperwork hadn’t followed him here. And he knew what Hannibal was saying, that he was going to have to work twice as hard to make up for it. How he couldn’t just be adequate, how he had to be shit-hot. Volunteer for bullshit, put in extra hours at the gym, come in early, stay late....
And then a pair of steel blue eyes met his, that smile a little wider in approval, and Face knew, he fucking knew, he was lost.
“How’d you get an appointment?”
“I didn’t,” and Face grinned, remembering. “I stole all his office furniture one night and set it up out on the range...”
And then he was telling the story, and Hannibal was sitting back in his chair, and they were both laughing, and he felt his stomach turn over. He had no idea if this man was gay, and he was a major, and his direct supervisor, and that was three layers of hands-off, right there. Still, there was that smile and that laughter, no wedding ring and no photos of kids, and Face hoped, hoped to hell, that maybe, just maybe... but when had anything he'd ever hoped come true?
+++++
And things got better from there.
Hannibal was true to his word; he gave Face a fresh start. Said that anything he’d done in his primary MOS didn’t mean shit now, because he’d graduated from Ranger school and that was what mattered. It wasn’t the regular Army, wasn’t the same office grind he’d put up with for the first year and a half he’d been in. This was better, lots of range time and exercising, land nav out in the woods and in the desert, training for missions, occasionally exercising old acquisitions skills in new and creative ways, football games and more interesting people.
The bullshit was still there, but Hannibal told him that life was all about figuring out what brand of bullshit you could put up with, and this wasn’t too bad. In fact, for the first time in years, Face was actually enjoying himself.
The worst part was Hannibal himself.
At first, Face wasn’t sure if there was attraction there. He thought there might be, the first week or two, and then he’d taken the bold step of heading up to the major’s office with a question about something.
“You don’t usually do this, do you, kid?” Hannibal had asked with a smile, and tossed him a beer out of his mini-fridge.
“Not so much, no.”
He’d lit a cigar and popped the tab on his own. “What d’ya got for me?”
It was a bullshit question, something simple he should have known himself, but Hannibal answered it easily and laughed and started telling him Cold War stories and before either man had known it, it was almost twenty-hundred-hours and long past close of business.
“Shit, kid. Wish we could stay here talking, but I need to get going,” Hannibal had said. “Going to be late for...”
And then he’d just stopped.
And then Face’s heart hit his shoes.
“Got a girlfriend, boss?” Face had quipped, and immediately winced. That was stepping over the line. But Hannibal didn’t yell at him for him, didn’t give him a lecture about rank and respect.
Hannibal just got a wistful little look on his face, and smirked, trying to hide it. “Something like that,” he’d said, and patted Face on the shoulder as he ushered him out, his hand lingering just a little too long.
And after that, Face found himself going to Hannibal's office after hours more and more frequently, always with an excuse, always greeted with a smile and a beer, always feeling a little hopeful and a little sick. It was torture, but he couldn't stop himself, and pretty soon, he noticed, Hannibal would come down to his office, or find him on the range or in the gym, just to talk. Always talking.
He thought he could talk to Hannibal forever.
Even if the man did call it mentoring. But Face suspected that was just a blind.
Then there was another one of those nights where they stayed at the office too long and they both still smelled liked cordite and dirt from a live-fire scenario earlier in the day. Hannibal had asked him to stay behind, supposedly to review his performance.
But they'd just ended up talking instead.
Face scrunched up a little as Hannibal locked the doors behind them, the major finally deciding that Face needed to go home, Face pretty sure he had another one of those mysterious appointments. But he had to say something.
“Boss, I’m...”
“I know, kid. I, I... understand. It’s okay.”
And a shot of heat went right through Face as Hannibal roughed his hair a little, pulling back too soon, and leaving him there, on the step of the unit's building, no answers forthcoming.
He let his head hit the door, just for a moment.
He was such an idiot.
+++++
How much of an idiot, Face would find out in the worst way possible.
As the weeks went by, turned into months, when they got sent over to the big Iraqi sandbox for a month, it only got worse. Face couldn’t quite resolve his feelings for the older man. For his boss, his commanding officer, his very male commanding officer.
All of that. And all that that entailed
He’d already figured out that there was something between them. There had to be. There was the way Hannibal looked at him, the way Hannibal talked to him, like he was the only thing in the world, like he was the most important thing in the world. And according to the rest of the guys, they’d never seen Hannibal bring any woman to the barbeques and the Christmas parties and the promotion ceremonies.
Lifetime bachelor, everybody laughed, and there were stories, lots of stories, about how his wife had left him and he never talked about it, or how he was married to the job and never had time, or about how no woman could ever put up with the hamster ball of crazy that Hannibal seemed to be, lethal one minute and chatting, laughing, the next. The most obvious one, that Hannibal was gay and didn’t want anybody to know, came up once during a poker game, but that was something nobody wanted to get caught insinuating. They all respected Hannibal. Screwing another guy clearly fell into the realm of wrongness, which was a land completely unexplored by their commander. An insult.
Face agreed - Hannibal was amazing. But insulting him with the implication? He’d laughed along with the rest and gone back to robbing them all blind and tried to push his treacherous thoughts away.
God, if only he could be so lucky...
So Face had to spend a very uncomfortable month in tight quarters with no privacy and no way to get laid - evidently, sex, like alcohol and everything else fun, was illegal on deployments. Even for Rangers. And he hadn’t made things any easier for himself.
Like that one morning, a down day, when he’d bumped into Hannibal coming back from a run on the hard top. Face had been on his way to the showers, and thank god for that. It was zero-nine-hundred, already roasting hot, and the major was soaked in sweat, his gray PT shirt clinging to every inch of hard muscle. He’d given Face a little head nod, and a smile and walked past, seemingly ignorant of the effect it had on his lieutenant.
Face let his hand drop down to his rapidly hardening cock once he’d gotten the water on, the smeared plastic of the shower divider offering a modicum of privacy. As he brought himself to release, all he could see was that body, naked above him, that sculpted chest sliding against his back, Hannibal’s cock, sliding into him, hands on his waist and lips against his ear, telling him...
And after he’d spilled all over his own hand and the plastic, Face realized that it probably wasn’t the best idea.
He tried, almost successfully, not to do it again.
By the time they got back to the States, Face was seriously considering throwing caution to the winds and telling Hannibal how he felt - because even though he refused to use that word, it was the only word that applied - and that last leg of the trip, from Ramstein to Atlanta, gave him plenty of time to work up his courage and frame it in his mind.
It played out a hundred different ways until he settled on the one he liked best.
Hannibal, I don’t know how to say this, but there’s this thing between us...
Yeah, kid. I feel it too...
He leaned against the window of the plane, staring out over the Atlantic Ocean with a smile on his lips, daring to hope as Hannibal read a magazine in the seat next to him, chewing gum furiously because he hadn’t had a cigar in three days.
They were both in uniform. He couldn’t have that conversation like that.
But after they disembarked and got through to the baggage area and the enlisted guys had all caught the bus back to base and the other LT was calling his girlfriend for the third time to come pick us the fuck up, honey, Face went over to where Hannibal was still waiting for his M-9 to pop up on the belt.
“Need me to go find it for you, boss?” he asked with a grin, and Hannibal just ran a hand through silver hair and shook his head. Fondly, Face hoped. Maybe he could ask for a lift back to his...
“You’re going to miss your ride, kid,” Hannibal told him, nodding down to where the other lieutenant was kissing a skinny blonde girl.
“She’s gonna get fat on him in a year or two,” Face joked, looking at them, and then looked back when he didn’t hear an answering laugh. There was that look on Hannibal’s face again, that slightly sad one, like the first time Face had gone to his office.
The other LT saw him, and waved, and Face held up his hand and reshouldered his backpack and started walking away. Had he misread Hannibal?
He bit his lip and looked back, wondering if he should go back or something, and what met his eyes damn near broke his heart.
There was Hannibal, and there was another guy, tall, slight, dark-haired. Face could see that they were talking, about what, he was too far away to tell. But there was something in their stances, the way Hannibal wasn’t moving, the way the other guy had one hand shoved in his back pocket, and then the other guy clapped Hannibal on the shoulder and Hannibal caught it, just for a split second, and then they were talking again, grabbing his M-9 case and the rest of the boss’ gear, walking away, laughing...
“Dude, Face, let’s get the hell out of here,” his fellow LT whispered in his ear urgently. “I haven’t seen her in a fucking month.”
“Yeah,” Face said, and let himself be led away, hiding his shock the best he could, “yeah, I know the feeling.”
An idiot? No, no, not that. Not that at all.
He was a fucking moron.
+++++
Face wanted to ask about it, he really did. Didn’t seem right, though, prying into a personal life that the boss had probably taken extreme pains to hide from the rest of the unit, the rest of the fucking Army. God, Face knew how that one went, needing to hide, needing to lie, and at least he considered himself double-hinged. He strongly suspected, although he couldn’t prove it, that Hannibal would have already been married happily with a couple of little rugrats running around, had he been able to bend like that.
As it turned out, though, he didn’t need to ask.
“Shut the door, Face,” the major said a few days after they’d all gotten back to work. He picked up the end of a mostly dead cigar and started chewing.
A wave of panic went through the younger man at that. This was it. This was the part where Hannibal told him...
“... his name’s Jake. I just thought... I know you saw us together at the airport, and I didn’t, I mean, that wasn’t exactly the way I’d wanted you to find out...”
“Right,” Face said, feeling like the bottom was coming out of him, like he was falling with no safety net, like his ‘chute wasn’t opening, like he was going to hit with a force that would split him open like a bag of rotten fruit. “Because you weren’t going to tell me about him at all. That’s be much better.” Even he was surprised by how upset he sounded.
A wave of anger passed over Hannibal, and then the man softened a little, came around and settled down next to Face on the couch. “It’s really not something I can...”
Face cut him off, stared down at his boots. “I know, I get it, boss.”
“Face...”
“Just...shit, is it a long-term thing?”
Hannibal shifted a little. “Six years now.”
Six years. Fuck. There was no way to compete with that, Face knew, and all he could suddenly think about was getting the fuck out of that room. “Wow. That’s...”
“Anything has its ups and downs,” Hannibal said next to him. Face couldn’t look up, couldn’t look at him, couldn’t see the happy little smile he knew was there. Knew from the way Hannibal was talking. That smile Hannibal flashed him sometimes, like they were sharing a secret. “He’s a reporter, I’m, well, so we...”
Every nerve in his boy was screaming and he was short of breath. Why couldn’t he breath? “I already said I got it, sir. Is there anything else?”
“I’m sorry,” Hannibal said quietly, at length, and Face had never felt worse in his life. “I wasn’t sure what was going on between you and me and I didn’t want...”
At that, Face looked up. “You and me?” he asked in an equally soft voice.
Whatever emotion was playing behind Hannibal’s eyes, he couldn’t discern it. “Yeah, kid. Us.”
And then Hannibal’s hand came over to cover his own, twinging together, squeezing tightly, the ends of Hannibal’s finger brushing slowly over the side of Face’s thigh and the lieutenant let himself relax into it, just for a little while, because if Hannibal was offering, didn’t that mean he was okay with it?
He laid his head down on Hannibal’s shoulder when the older man showed no sign of letting go, sitting on his other hand, not trusting himself with it free, and could have cried when Hannibal reached across himself to run his hand up into Face’s hair, thumb playing over the young man’s cheekbone. They sat like that for a minute, a long, long minute, and Face tried to tell himself not to relax, not to get comfortable, not to enjoy it...
“What are we going to do about this, kid?”
“I don’t know, boss.”
+++++
The next time Face saw Jake, it was at Hannibal’s promotion ceremony.
The boss had made lieutenant colonel, and any colonel promotion was always a big deal. It seemed like half the officer population of the base was packed into the club that night, and quite a few civilians. Jake didn’t stand out in any way. It was completely okay for him to be there. Non-threatening. Simple. Innocuous.
Except to Face, who knew.
And during the entire thing, he kept resisting the urge to look back over his shoulder at the dark-haired man, a few rows behind him. He coudn’t stop thinking about it, though. How hard it must be for the man, who looked like a nice guy, from the few glimpses Face had gotten of him. How hard it must be not to be able to go help with the pinning on. Not to be able to kiss him afterwards. Not to be able to sling an arm around him and whisper in his ear how proud you were, how thrilled for...
Face shook it off. Because, as rotten as he felt admitting it to himself, Jake wasn’t the man he was imagining, up there, changing out the gold oak leaves for silver ones.
The club exploded after Hannibal saluted the base commander and sat back down, everybody going for their second beer, over into the dining room for a rather impressive buffet - Hannibal had put a grand or two down for this and everyone was damn well going to enjoy it. Everyone except for Face, who was still nursing his first beer at the bar in relative privacy when Jake walked over.
Oh, sweet Jesus, how had he pissed off god this time?
“You’re Face, right?” the dark-haired man asked, holding out his hand. Face put on his best conman smile and shook it firmly. Limp wrist, he noticed, and wondered why Hannibal would be with a guy who... and he shoved that thought away, too. Irrational jealously was not a good look on him. “Jake Marsden. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Hannibal talk about me much?”
“Jo... Hannibal’s really proud of you. Lots of good things to say about you. His problem lieutenant who’s turning himself around.” Jake waved a twenty over the tip jar and got the bartender’s attention. “It must be great, having him for a boss.”
Face swallowed. He could do this, he really could. “How’d you two meet?”
“Bosnia. I was over there, covering the action and Hannibal was right in the thick of it. Invited me along on a couple of missions, and we...” Jake paused as the bartender deposited a pair of sweating Sam Adams in front of them. “I guess we just hit it off from there. I remember, he told me he’d never seen a man willing to go into a war zone without a weapon, and he thought I must be nuts. I told him that’s what my camera was for, and he...”
Jake laughed as he finished his little story about how they met, studiously leaving out the bits where they must have kissed, where they must have slept together, and Face laughed right along with him, something cold and hard formed beneath his rib cage, and he couldn’t breath. The story only lasted a minute or two - the longest of his life - before Hannibal came over and took the beer from Jake, their fingers meeting, just for a second, and Hannibal was saying something to Face that Face didn’t hear.
It was loud in the club, and all Face could think about was how those fingers had been touching him, just last week, and he was off his stool and in the bathroom as fast as he could manage, dry heaving in a stall.
He was a fucking moron.
When he came back, he couldn’t find Hannibal or Jake anywhere in the milieu. That was just fine with him. And since Hannibal was paying for the booze tonight, Face decided, right then and there, that getting roaring drunk was the best possible solution. Maybe fuck something, too.
That always made him feel better, right?
He settled on a redhead, that female lieutenant everybody was always trying to get with. Why the fuck not? She always said no, right? He was dimly aware of Hannibal watching him, their eyes meeting across the crowd as he sweet-talked and flattered and bantered with the other lieutenant. Screw that, Face thought, and ordered another round.
And either she was drunk too, or he really was that good, because she let him take her back to his small apartment and judging by her cries, really enjoyed it, and afterward laid there next to him, murmuring softly as exhaustion and alcohol overtook her.
And as one of his hands slowly stroking down her spine, the girl warm and pliant and soft and small next to him, he felt a sting in his face and a thud in his chest, and he stared up at the ceiling and held her a little tighter, helpless, as the tears finally came.
+++++
Hannibal didn’t ask him about it the next day. Hannibal didn’t ask him about it for the next week. But Face had been avoiding the man’s office, avoiding his gaze out at the range when it was their day to shoot, leaving meetings fast, so he wasn’t stuck talking to him. So it couldn't come up.
But Face really should have known he wasn’t going to be able to keep that up forever.
He’d been through everything in his head. He couldn’t get in the middle of Jake and Hannibal. Not that he had all the details, but it seemed like they were happy together. Like Jake was really a good fit for the boss. That Hannibal wouldn’t stay with somebody so long unless that was the case.
It was Saturday, and Face was nursing a Friday-night hangover, staring up at the coffeepot, wondering if he could remember how to operate the damn thing. Angry drinking being what it was, he had a couple of bruises he didn’t remember getting and he’d kicked another girl out about an hour ago. He hadn’t remembered her name. Why did girls get so pissed off about that?
Stupid thing to do, though, really, he thought to himself. Where had he left the coffee?
There was a knock on the door. Sarah? Stephanie? Had she left her purse or something? He pushed himself off the kitchen floor and pulled yesterday’s uniform shirt on over his boxers and padded to the door.
“Yeah, yeah, hang on a second...” he called, unlocking the dead bolt and jerking the thing open.
Revealing one furious Lieutenant Colonel John Hannibal Smith.
“Fuck,” Face muttered, and the colonel pushed past him, tucking his beret into his cargo pocket, making his way into the little living room.
“You missed maneuvers this morning, kid.”
What time was it? Face blinked and took a better look at the clock. 1300. “Jesus, shit, Hannibal, I completely forgot...”
“You hung-over, kid?”
“No,” Face groaned, and flopped onto the sofa. He was being disrespectful, and he knew it, and he didn’t care. It was getting harder and harder to care about anything. And being this close to Hannibal made him feel like he was on fire. In a wonderful way. In a fucking horrible way. Why did it have to be like this? “I think I’m still drunk.”
“You missed...”
“Fuck, Hannibal, I know.”
“This is dereliction of duty, kid! This is failure to go! Do you know what I’d do to one of my enlisted men who pulled this bullshit on me?”
He heard the anger in Hannibal’s voice, and dropped his eyes. What was the point? “I get it, Lieutenant Peck, fucking up again, right?”
“It’s an Article 15 offense, kid! You can’t survive something like this,” Hannibal said in that low, dangerous voice of his. “And I can’t not do something about it. Everybody fucking knows you’re not there!”
Face let the back of his head hit the cushions. “What the fuck do you want me to say?”
And there Hannibal was, crouching down, hands on Face’s knees. “I want to know what’s going on with you, kid.”
He almost laughed in Hannibal’s face, but that touch was distracting. Probably wasn’t a good idea, anyway. “Shit, boss...”
And then there Hannibal was, pushing up next to him on the couch, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, running one of those hands through his hair, and Face felt that explosion of heat, deep down.
“We can’t.”
“I know.”
“I can’t do that to you, kid. If somebody found out...you’ve got your whole career ahead of you...”
“...and you’ve got Jake.”
“Face...”
“I can’t get in the middle of that, Hannibal,” the younger man said softly, letting one of his hands fall onto Hannibal’s leg, squeezing a little. He couldn’t vocalize what he was thinking, what he knew. That Hannibal was the loyal type, damn fucking loyal, dedicated to the things he put his heart into, the things he promised to do and be. And asking Hannibal to cheat, making Hannibal cheat, would be tantamount to destroying the man. He wouldn’t survive it. “You two seem so happy together.”
“We are,” Hannibal said, pressing Face in a little closer. “We really are.”
“What are we doing?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s your decision.”
Hannibal didn’t respond, but his hand shifted, and Face could feel the man’s breath against his neck, hovering there, so damn close... and Face remembered, remembered that he couldn’t let Hannibal do this, he couldn’t. Because if he really cared for Hannibal, really, like he thought he did, he couldn’t let him do this, couldn’t let Hannibal keep promising things with his words, his actions, that they just couldn’t...
But it turned out that Face didn’t have to be strong, didn’t have to push him away, didn’t have to say one word, because suddenly all that warmth was gone and Hannibal was at the door, beret in his hand.
Ready to leave.
“I’ll tell the boys you had to take the day off,” Hannibal said slowly, crushing the red felt.
“Do you need me to go to sick hall or something?”
“No, no. I’ll take care of it,” Hannibal said. Awkward. Face was awkward. Everything was fucking awkward. “Kid, I’m...”
“Don’t.”
And that was it. The door opened, shut, and he was alone again.
Not a second too soon. As soon as Hannibal was gone, a sudden thought hit Face and consumed him entirely, a fire, burning wild and fast under his skin. He slid off the couch under the force of it, curling up, shaking as it ran through him, demanding acknowledgment, begging for it, begging to be given voice, to be set free, and even as he said it, all the lieutenant could think about was how something that should have been so wonderful...
“I love him.”
...could be so fucking horrible.
What the fuck was he supposed to do now?
+++++
Somehow, saying the word had made it more real for him.
I love him.
Not exactly something that should be admitted aloud, Face reflected later. He’d spent the rest of Saturday trying to recover from Friday, said fuck it again, gone out anyway.
He hated trying to find a decent gay bar in this part of the country. Had to go into downtown Atlanta, really know where you were headed, had to be careful. Park-your-car-somewhere-else kind of careful. Fucking regs.
At least it wasn’t like before, wasn’t like back when he still had his hair in that damn high and tight and everybody fucking knew who he did for a living. This was a lot easier, he thought as he sauntered up to the bar, his shirt just a little too tight. Less to worry about, fewer regrets... an older guy, maybe mid-thirties, graying around his temples, clearly interested.
After the shower incident in Iraq, Face had made a damn near heroic effort - in his own estimation of such things - to not ever think about Hannibal during personal time again. The afternoon after he’d done, well, that, they’d had a mission briefing. Hannibal up there, under the camo netting, in his desert BDU pants and tan t-shirt, dogtags clearly showing throw the damp fabric, nothing left to the imagination except what it would feel like, that chest against his own, backing up against the nearest hard wall or pole or anything solid, pressing him into the ground, maybe, lips crashing down, demanding entrance, demanding submission...
It hadn’t left his mind for days. It was all he could think about whenever he had looked at the major. He’d very nearly jumped him one night, when it was just the two of them alone, walking back from the general’s HQ, Hannibal so close, smiling at him... he just couldn’t get his stupid fantasy out of his head.
Face had promised himself he wouldn’t do that to himself again. It just made everything worse. Thinking about Hannibal like that, when he couldn’t have him? Bad, bad, bad idea. But that guy was walking over now, smiling a little, and Face let himself smile back.
He’d never gotten along with rules very well.
And right about the point where he was being fucked through the mattress in the other guy’s apartment, hands scrambling against the pillows, feeling more bored than aroused, it occurred to the lieutenant that things couldn’t go on like this.
Not anymore.
Because this kind of self-medication just wasn’t enough anymore.
Because he’d admitted it to himself.
And what a fucking mistake that turned out to be, he thought as that old familiar sensation filled him with something akin to shame. He was up and on his feet and gone practically before the guy pulled out.
“Asshole,” he muttered to himself and kicked the door shut.
+++++
Face had very little self-control left when it came to Hannibal. Hannibal had very nearly snapped it completely on Saturday. If Hannibal touched him again, he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to stop himself. And he was pretty sure Hannibal understood that, because for three days, everything was fine. The tension seemed to be slightly less, the looks less heated, no conversations after work. Everything like it was supposed to be. Professional. Easy. Plutonic.
But then Hannibal had some kind of blow-up with the brigade commander on Friday and decided, fuck this day, my treat, who wants to go to lunch?, which meant Face and the other LT and a couple of the senior-ranking enlisted guys got to leave work around 1300 and go have a couple of rounds at the brew-pub a few miles from base and watch football and laugh, while Hannibal lit up a cigar and unwound from whatever bullshit had gotten pitched at him this time. From what anybody could tell, the boss didn’t get along wth the base commander very well. Wasn’t political enough, or something like that.
Everybody else drifted out slowly, calling wives or girlfriends, going home, because who gave a shit, it was Friday? Pretty soon it was just him and Hannibal left. The colonel wasn’t drinking and Face was, because Face had stupidly agreed to let him drive. He had this stupid need to be close to the other man, absolutely stupid, and he was pretty sure his face was going flush every time he looked at Hannibal this week, and all he wanted to do was lean over and pull against the collar of those BDUs, tugging in, offering up, taking away...
Hannibal watched him finish his entire fifth beer in one go with something approaching paternal concern. “I think we’re good, don’t you, el-tee?” he asked.
And either it was the alcohol or that edge Hannibal’s voice took on when he smoked, because the use of his rank went right to Face’s cock. He managed a tight nod. The colonel paid the tab and practically hauled him out of there, pinching a hand under Face’s elbow to steady him once they got out into the parking lot.
Face leaned up against the passenger side door as Hannibal opened it for him from the inside. He could feel the fingers on his arm still, right over where that guy from last weekend had held him down, and he wondered what it would feel like for Hannibal to be doing that, Hannibal holding him still, spreading him open. Whispering encouragement, telling him...
“Kid, you okay?” Hannibal asked. Were they on the road already?
Face stared straight ahead. “I want you to make.... er, I need you to fuck me...” and he trailed off, mortified at what he’d almost said. Rangers didn’t do that kind of shit.
“Kid, you know I...” Hannibal said, sounding more unsure than he ever had in the six months since Face had joined the unit. “That’s not... jesus, kid... look, Face, I’m not the sort to... sit here and say something like I love you, Templeton Peck, because...”
“Oh, yeah, I know...” Face snapped back, harsher than he meant to. Hannibal laid a hand down on his lap, and he flinched. He'd meant it when he'd said it was Hannibal's decision. He was okay with that. But this? What was fair about this? What was okay about any of this? Hannibal, allowed to touch, allowed to talk, insinuate, offer, when Face couldn’t trust himself for even the simplest of such things? How in the hell was any of this okay? Wasn’t he better than this?
Was any of this worth it?
He kept his eyes caged out front of the windshield and didn’t talk for the rest of the ride.
+++++
That afternoon, a few people were still at work. People like the base commander’s secondary exec, that redhead he’d fucked a couple of weeks ago, sitting at her desk in an otherwise empty office, proofing slides for some Monday briefing, everybody else home for the day. Shit, he’d forgotten about that. She just looked different in uniform. Why did women always look worse, he asked himself as he walked over to her, and men, men like Hannibal, always look better?
And why did it have to be her?
She frowned up at him, pushed a pen around. “What do you want, Peck?” Had he kicked her out, too? Forgotten her name? He couldn’t remember, and he suddenly felt a wave of regret. Fuck, nothing around him was right anymore...
“I need to get on his calendar.”
It wasn't a casual request and they both knew it. Serious business, going straight to the top like this, but he didn't feel like stealing furniture tonight.
The other lieutenant just started laughing and he clenched a fist. Considered all the ways he could play her. Considered offering to take her out again. Favors exchange. Get everybody up here new... Fuck it. He leaned forward a little. “Please.”
She stopped mid-guffaw and stared. “You’re being serious?”
He nodded.
That frown melted into something he couldn’t quite place and she jabbed back over her shoulder with the pen. “He’s still here. Conference call. If you want to wait...”
He settled down in one of the chairs across from her desk, flashed her a quick grin, and she just shook her head, and went back to the slides.
+++++
Face pulled the wrinkled sheet out of the thickened folder and stared at Hannibal’s office door. PCS checklist. Almost everything had been marked off.
He didn’t want to do this.
He knocked on the door. He’d waited until the last second, the very last second, 1800 on a Thursday of a week he was supposed to be on leave. He’d spent the time running around, working on this damn checklist.
He hated this shit. Hated it for getting this bad. Hated himself for his lack of self control. Hated Jake for getting there first. Hated Hannibal for refusing to make a decision, for actually saying...hated everything.
But it wasn’t hate he was feeling, outside that door, right then. He wasn’t feeling anything. All he could hear was a question, a single question, pounding between his ears.
How in the hell had he gotten himself into this mess?
Face closed his eyes for a second.
He needed to do this.
Because Hannibal wouldn’t.
He knocked once, came straight in, right over to that monstrosity of a desk that dominated the far wall, and snapped a salute, his left hand heavy by his side, clutching the paperwork.
“First Lieutenant Peck reports,” he said.
Hannibal stared at him, cell phone held loosely to his ear. Face felt numb, absolutely numb, as Hannibal slid it away, mumbling something like “we’ll talk about this later, Jake, sorry...”, as he snapped it shut and tossed it on his desk.
“At ease,” he said automatically, and leaned back in his chair. “What are you doing, kid?”
Face steeled himself against that almost scared sound in Hannibal’s voice, and pushed the folder across the desk. “I need you to sign this, sir.”
Hannibal still looked a little stunned, like he couldn’t quite figure out the formality, the sir, any of this, but he took the paperwork.
Face’s permanent change of station paperwork.
His apartment was empty, the landlord surprisingly flexible about him breaking his lease. Everything that needed to be sold was sold. Just a couple of things left to do. Medical records needed to be mailed. Gear returned, sidearm checked back into the armory. Tickets to retrieve from the travel office. Avoid a going-away party, anybody seeing him off at the bus, make his own goodbyes in his own time.
And Hannibal’s signature. He needed Hannibal’s signature. He needed Hannibal’s signature to be released from his unit, from all of this...
He didn’t know what he expected Hannibal to say. Couldn’t have guessed at all. What he’d dreamed, and it had been a literal dream, last night was that Hannibal would take one look at this, come around the edge of his desk and sit them both down on the couch like he had that first time. Put an arm around his shoulders, tell him it was okay, tell him he didn’t need to leave, that he’d have a home in Hannibal’s unit as long as he wanted it, that he and Jake knew it wasn’t going to last through another deployment, that he didn’t care anymore, that it didn’t matter, lean in a little further, breath hot on hot skin, lips wet on wet lips, hands tightening down, fingers undoing buttons, telling him, telling him...
Hannibal didn’t do any of that, though. “What... what are you going to be doing at Camp Red Cloud?”
“General out there needs a new aide. I’m the first volunteer they’ve had.”
“You went around me? To ask for an early PCS?”
Face wasn’t sure if the utter betrayal, the sadness, he heard in Hannibal’s voice was coming from the first or the second fact there. He didn’t say anything, just lifted his chin a little and grabbed his own wrist behind his back, keeping his at-ease posture steady.
What was there to say? What else could they say to each other? What was left between them that hadn’t already been tainted?
“You hate doing paperwork, kid. And an aide position...”
“It’s Korea. I’m sure I’ll find ways to keep myself busy.”
“How’d you even do this...”
“The general hates you, remember?”
At that, Hannibal did get up and did come around. And Face could have kicked himself in the balls for the way his heart leaped right then, hoping, still hoping, after all this time, after all the uncertainty and unwillingness from Hannibal, that there might be something more that could happen between them.
A hand squeezed his shoulder, and he didn’t relax. He kept still, exactly like he supposed to, exactly like a soldier was supposed to when addressing a superior officer, and the look on Hannibal’s face, as he let his hand fall almost broke Face's heart. Would have. Would have, if anything was left.
“I can non-concur. With your disciplinary record, it’d really be best if we kept you in the unit for at least a year...”
“Do that and I’m in the Defense Council’s office Monday morning, telling them why my commander’s refusing me...”
They regarded one another for a moment, and Hannibal reached back across his desk for a pen and the paperwork that would send Face half a world away, away from all of this, away from him, and Face noted dimly, as if from a great distance, that the colonel’s hand paused, shaking, over the line where his name needed to go.
Goddamnit, where his name needed to go, sign the fucking thing...
“You sure about this, Temp?” Hannibal said softly.
“Aren’t you, John?” he managed to grind out.
Hannibal handed it over, clean blue ink over the previously blank space. Face took it, blew on it so it wouldn’t smudge as he tucked it back into his folder, along with everything else, and nodded. “Thanks.”
“When’s your last day?”
“Next Wednesday,” he said, and paused. “I don’t want a fucking going away. I won’t show up.”
"There are people here who are going to want to say goodbye to you.”
“I’m around for five more days,” he said. “I’ll make the rounds myself.” He paused. “And don’t let everybody show up at lodging morning-of and make a big deal, okay?”
“Kid...” Hannibal said, and licked dry lips. Face tried not to look. He couldn’t keep looking. God, he never wanted to see Hannibal again. “Kid, I...”
“Is there anything else, sir?”
“... no, lieutenant. You’re dismissed.”
And as he left the office, he tried to tell himself it was for the best, tried to tell himself not to look back as he walked down the hall, tried to tell himself that running back would be a very bad idea, tried to tell himself as walked back to lodging that Hannibal wouldn’t do anything different if he went back and told him how he felt. That he couldn’t burden the older man with such a thing. That he could take the pain, if it meant keeping it off Hannibal. That it worked like that, sometimes. That he couldn’t stop the PCS now, even if he wanted to.
That nothing would change.
I love you, Templeton Peck.
“Shut the fuck up,” he muttered, and kept walking, because the only thing he knew for certain was that he’d never see Hannibal again.
And he hated himself, right then and forever, for being okay with that.
Continue to Extended TDY...
