Article 15 Part Two of Two

[sonora_coneja]

Pairing: Hannibal/Face, Face/OMC
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: non-con
Summary: Part Two of Two for a fill for this prompt over at the kink meme

Um. So I had this fantasy idea.
Hannibal and Face are together and very happy. But then Face is accused of something horrible - IDK, drug-dealing, killing a fellow soldier, something horrible. He's innocent, but nobody believes him. Not even Hannibal... Hannibal's so disgusted and angry he breaks up with Face and gets him reassigned. (your choice if this happens pre-BA and Murdock or after the team has already been formed). Dub-con/punishment-sex totally welcome in here *hint hint*.
Face tries to get Hannibal to believe him, but he won't listen. Face ends up in a different unit and is heart-broken, Hannibal too by the apparent betrayal. Some time goes by, and slowly Hannibal realizes that Face is not coping well. He doesn't want to care, but Face sleeps around - maybe hooks up with a guy from the new team or someone else who's no good for him? - and gets in trouble etc., and his new boss can't deal with him. Eventually - insert fitting plot device here - it turns out that Face was innocent all along and Hannibal made a horrible mistake!!!
Now he has to get his boy back and earn back his trust... easier said than done!

Face shoots a woman on a mission, and Hannibal throws him out. But Face soon finds himself at the mercy of a colonel who’s not afraid to take what he wants from the young lieutenant.



Face prefers this when it’s in at the office.

It’s quick at the office. Quick and easy and there’s no worries about lingering, about being kicked out, about anything. A fuck and go. But these hotel rooms, these are different. These let things draw out.

These let Harrison take his time.

“Look at you,” the colonel murmurs, a slight smile on his thin lips. He trails a hand down Face’s sternum, one of those soft hands. The sheets are thrown off, on the floor, and Face drops the towel he’s used to wipe them both off next to that tangle. “Just look at you.”

They both know Face could stop this, and the lieutenant knows that’s probably part of the reason why Harrison’s so into this, with him. The asshole gets off on the power.

But the colonel wasn’t exactly wrong, either. Face has been sleeping around his whole life - one of those things where he can’t remember when his first time was. Women or men. Sex was just a part of his life, and absent that... he was going to end back up here, like this, with somebody in this way, sooner or later, he’d figured. Something he craved, something he needed.

Hannibal had been the first time he’d gotten to top, the first one he’d ever cared about, his real first, the only one that mattered, and Face had once hoped that Hannibal would be his last. His only, ever again.

It had all been a lie.

Yet... this isn’t doing it for him, not with this man, not like this, dingy hotel rooms south of the freeway, everything hard and stealing. It’s okay, but it’s not Hannibal. His only comfort was that it’s honest.

He knows this doesn’t mean anything. Which is more than he ever had with Hannibal.

“You’re a beautiful man, Peck.”

Face rolls his eyes, staring straight up at the ceiling as Harrison shuffles himself a little closer, that soft hand pressing down harder now.

“Absolutely gorgeous...”

Face is prepared, totally prepared, to let the colonel get his rocks off, however, if it doesn’t mean another fuck tonight, but when he feels a soft pair of lips, soft as those hands, press onto his, he only freezes for a second.

Before lashing out. Hard. With a fist. Once, right up into Harrison’s stomach, and another, right across the side of his jaw.

The angle’s all wrong, his elbow coming out in a weird arc, which is probably the only thing that stops Face from accidently breaking bone, and he’s is too stunned at his own actions to do anything as Harrison backhands him right across the mouth.

The colonel spits out a tooth, blood dripping out in thick ropes, glares down at him, and slaps him again, open palm, the edge of his wedding ring cutting a gash along Face’s cheek.

An unmistakable insult.

Face feels the Ranger rising up in him, the man who has two sniper kills to his name and done things he can never talk about and has earned better than this insignificant little fucker. He could beat the living shit out of this bastard. He could kill him. Absolutely fucking kill him, right here, for something like that. Fucking, yeah, sure, whatever. Kissing, though, he’s only ever let Hannibal...

“Go to hell,” he growls, feeling the blood start rushing into his vision, and won’t this be lovely, five months of playing butt-boy to...

“Think you’re forgetting our arrangement here, lieutenant,” Harrison snaps back, and the colonel closes a hand around Face’s neck.

“I’m not. But kiss me again and I’ll kill you,” he says, eyes hard, and watches just a flicker of fear in the older man’s face get tucked away again, behind something smug and pleased.

“He’s not coming for you.”

And that spark of heat that was building up in him, that bloodlust, that sense of righteous violence, starts to fade once again. “Fuck you,” he says, but there’s not the same conviction behind it now.

Harrison chuckles, knowing he’s won, and runs a soft hand, now covered in his own blood from his own bleeding gums, down to just above Face’s cock. “On your stomach.”

And those, his intentions, are no lie.

So Face bows his head, and does what he’s just been ordered to do.

+++++

That was Saturday.

On Monday, Face comes to work with a swollen cheek and a butterfly-bandaged cut and a black eye and a lingering soreness that only just avoided being something worse because he was still slick.

The exec, Hannah, looks him over, and clucks in the back of her throat, like she knows exactly what precipitated this and isn’t happy about it. At all. And Face really hopes she’s not going to launch into one of her tirades about what a bunch of sinners all these Army men are.

Thankfully, she doesn’t. “Barfight, Face?”

“Real bad one,” he jokes, and winks at one of the secretaries, who’s clearly making up all the details of it in her head. “You should see the other guy.”

“Well, if you want to take the day off or something, I’ll approve your leave. Colonel’s out all week.”

Face frowns. “When did that happen?”

“Family emergency,” she says and unwinds her long brunette hair from its bun, fussing. “He called earlier.”

“So I can’t get on his calendar, then?”

Face knows that voice. Face does not want to hear that voice right now. He just scrunches down behind his computer screen and one of the secretaries, filing her nails probably, answers in that damn happy voice of hers.

“Not this week, Major Smith, but we can get you on for next week if you’d like. He should be back from leave by then. What day are you...”

And there are footsteps and there’s movement, and Face doesn’t have to look up to know that Hannibal’s right in front of his desk now. He keeps his head down. It’s all he can do.

“How you doin’, lieutenant?”

“Fine, major,” he says and pulls up Harrison’s schedule. “When did you want to come in and see him?”

“As... as soon as possible.”

Fuck, Face thinks. “Okay,” he says, forcing his voice steady. “He’s got an opening Thursday, I can get you in at...”

“No good. How late does he usually stay?”

Face knows that Hannah’s eyes are on him. She always leaves before he does. Does she know? She has to know... “Pretty late, sir.”

“What’s he doing here?" Hannibal asks, just a little too quickly, and shakes his head. "I mean, is it anything I can interrupt?”

“Paperwork?” Face guesses, wondering what most commanders do when they're stuck late at work. Fortunately, it comes out sarcastic, rather than confused. At least there's that, right now.

“Will he be here around eighteen-thirty, Monday?”

Face shrugs. Probably. Which means he’s going to be even that much later home on Monday. “What it’s about?”

And for this, Face has to look up. Has to see what’s in Hannibal’s eyes as he answers, wants to know what the hell the Ranger’s up to this time.

The major swallows, fidgeting a little. “What happened to you, el-tee?”

“Barfight,” he replies blandly, and clicks his mouse overtly over the block in Outlook. “So, what should I put in here?”

“A, uhh, a personnel issue.”

Goddamn Sergeant Davies, and goddamn tequila. “Hoo-ah, sir,” the lieutenant says with a sigh, and hits the save button. Folds his hands and stares right up at his former lover, over the computer screen and the five months between them. “Anything else we can help you with?”

“How..." and Hannibal licks his lips, just a little, like he can't quite find the words, "...how have you been, kid?”

But Face just looks over at Hannah again, back to Hannibal, stands.

And walks right out of the damn office.

“El-tee, stop!”

It echoes along the corridor after him and there’s a corporal with questioning eyes, and this is the last thing he needs right now. Face squeezes his eyes shut, hoping like hell this will all go away. That Hannibal’s not really up here. That all of this will just go away...

“Face...”

No, guess not.

He stops midstride and turns, wincing a little as the skin pulls on the butterflies over his right cheekbone. Hannibal’s just watching him, arms crossed, distant. Like he’s trying to remove himself from the situation and look at this thing objectively.

Right then, Face hates him.

“Haven’t seen you in a while,” he begins, clearly guarded. “How’s life treating you?”

The lieutenant doesn’t want to bother trying to cover up the anger boiling up inside him right now, but they’re in the headquarters hallway. He has to at least pretend. “Oh, you know. Half a year.”

“Long time.”

“No shit.”

Hannibal does that weird little shifting thing again, fingers playing automatically over his pockets for a cigar, which he probably doesn’t realize. This time last year, he would have been handing the major one from his own pocket. Hannibal was so forgetful sometimes, relying on his lieutenant for the details, and a lump starts forming in Face’s throat.

“Kid...”

“Did you want something, Major Smith?”

He watches the older man sag a little bit, and try to smile. “Let me buy you lunch.”

“It’s eight in the morning.”

“Get you a coffee?”

“I’m off the caffeine.”

“We need to talk, Face.”

And the lieutenant feels cold. All over again. Like the day when Hannibal walked out on him. When Hannibal decided he wasn’t good enough. Why the hell would he put himself through that again? “About what?”

Hannibal leans in, as much as is decent for a major to be doing in this setting, maybe even overstepping that level of propriety a bit, and Face just wants him to go away. “About why your face is busted up and you’re at a bar downtown last month telling my goddamn sergeant that you... is there a place we can talk?”

“No.”

But Hannibal pushes them both down the hall anyway, right into the empty brigade conference room, and locks the door. Basically throws Face into a chair, pulls up his own, across the table.

“What the fuck’s going on, Face?”

“No,” Face states firmly, loud, listening to his own anger It’s one of those soundproofed rooms, nice and secure, and Face wouldn’t give a shit about this even if it wasn’t. “No. Abso-fucking-lutely no. What are you even doing down here?”

“Who hit you?”

Face makes to stand again, and there’s Hannibal, right in front of him. “Sit the fuck down and answer the goddamn question!” he thunders.

The lieutenant, eyes downcast, sinks right back down into ergonomic leather, grumbling. “Why? It’s not like you’ve got any jurisdiction over me anymore...”

“Face, Sergeant Davies bumps into you downtown, you hardly talk to him, he says you're all kinds of screwed up, you mention something about a goddamn booty call?” Hannibal sits down, hard, on the lip of the table. “Is Colonel Harrison...”

"And getting kicked out of the Rangers has nothing to do with this being screwed up, in your estimation?"

"Face, come on kid, who knows you better than me?"

Oh, and Face really has to hold in the fury that statement provokes. Goes for something else instead, desperate. “He should have kept his damn mouth shut.”

“Harrison?”

“Davies.”

“Face, he’s obligated to report... he wasn’t even sure there was something going on and then he started asking around and there are some rumors, kid, about Harrison and some of the others who’ve been up here before you and...”

“Why. Do. You. Care?”

“I care, kid, I do...”

There are a thousand things Face wants to say to this. Like no you don’t or why the fuck didn’t you care then or maybe I don’t need your fucking concern right now. Something like that. Get Hannibal up and out of here, away from him. But anything he says along those lines is going to make him sound like a whiny little bitch, and that’s the last thing he wants right now.

“Just leave it alone, major,” Face says, and pushes back from the table. “I’ve got everything under control.”

“Doesn’t look like it, kid,” Hannibal says, grabbing him again, and pulling his hand away just as quick, tucking it into his pocket like it's going to do something stupid again. “What were you two fighting about?”

“This isn’t why you’re here,” Face states. This has to be true. Work started no half an hour ago and the rumor mill on this post doesn’t work that fast. Hannibal didn’t know about his bruised up face before this. Which means he came to talk about the other thing, the little throwaway about already-dying stripper.

And Face doesn't acknowledge the little explosion, deep down, that maybe, just maybe, Hannibal really does give a...

“Kid,” and Hannibal tries to pull his hand away from his side, like he used to when he wanted to hold it, but Face isn’t letting him get away with that any more. No more lies. He can’t stand for any more lies. “W-was she already dying?”

“Two bullets to the stomach. Taking her to the hospital would have been cruel,” Face says flatly, feeling very far away right now, seeing her face all over again, her hand, reaching out, lips moving... she had wanted him to shoot her, hadn’t she? She must have known. He had. What an awful way to die that is, how scared she must have been, how he’d reached back and held her as he pulled the trigger. “What else was I supposed to do?”

“Why didn’t you put that in your statement?” Hannibal’s voice is soft, sad. Like the day he walked out.

“ADC told me not to,” Face sighed, remembering that conversation, too, how he couldn’t disagree with the ruling, how he was counseling strenuously against that kind of argument. He jerks back away now, from Hannibal, from all of it. “What difference does it make?”

Hannibal sucks on the side of his cheek, clearly thinking. “I can get you out of this, Face, I can. We can get you a court martial, get the Article 15 overturned and...”

“Why? Because you think my boss is, whatever, raping me or something? You’re acting like he’s forcing me,” Face says. “How do you know he isn’t?”

“Isn’t he?”

“He was around. You weren’t,” Face grits out, just knowing he’s going to do something really stupid if this keeps up for too much longer.

“What... what were you fighting about?” Hannibal’s voice is hitching.

Face can’t meet his gaze, but he can’t not answer that, either. He spent the better part of a year under this man’s command, and if there’s one thing he learned, it was that Hannibal gets his information, sooner or later, one way or the other. “Asshole tried to kiss me. So I hit him. And I guess you could count what happened next as... yeah, probably qualifies.”

“Oh, god, Temp, we have to get you...” Hannibal groans, and that? His real name? That’s going to do it, right there.

“I don’t need your damn sympathy, or your help,” Face hisses back. “And I wouldn’t expect you to go back on your own judgment now, just because something bad’s happened to poor little lieutenant Peck. In fact, don’t.”

“Temp, that’s not...”

“Oh, Harrison’s a bastard. But you know what, John? He's never lied to me about what he wanted,” Face says in a near whisper, voice failing him almost completely, and turns sharply on his heel, away from all of this mess.

And he just walks straight into the office, grabs his backpack, and tells Hannah that he’s taking the rest of the day off, and walks right back out again, into the pounding winter’s morning.

+++++

The greatest thing about this week, Face figures, is that he doesn’t have to deal with Colonel Harrison. Sure, the bastard's probably out because of the bruising and the missing tooth and the obviousness of it all, and Face just knows he’s going to have to pay for that later.

But not right now.

No evening sessions this week.

That thought is the only thing that gets him out of bed on Tuesday.

He’s half expecting Hannibal to show. Like he’ll walk in, and there the major will be, wanting to talk to him again, that he himself won’t be angry at the man this time, that Hannibal will draw him in for an embrace, that he’ll melt into it, that everything will just wash away, that he can get it back, that he hasn’t ruined...

But it doesn’t happen. Not Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday, when Hannah makes him go home a little early in the afternoon and he ends up at his apartment, with nothing to do, not really remembering what it was he used to do before... everything. No, Hannibal doesn’t come, Hannibal's not going to come, Hannibal doesn't keep his promises, and Face is ready to resign himself to that fact by Friday, staring down at a bowl of Easy Mac, when his cell phone buzzes.

Hotel, time, room. A message, too.

If you want prep, do it yourself.

Fuck. He’s going to have to hit a Walgreens on his way over, and who knows if Harrison’s actually going to give him time to get ready. So, fuck, and he grabs his wallet, his car keys, and heads for the door, cell phone in hand.

But there, in the breezeway, leaning against the wall, smoking a cigar with a shaking hand...

Motherfucker. As if he doesn’t have enough problems in his life right now.

Hannibal looks at him, features shrouded in smoke, the half light from the breezeway bulb not really illuminating anything. Fitting, Face thinks, and tries to just push past it.

But the major stops him with a soft hand on his elbow, not really holding, but definitely preventing, and Face starts doing the mental math on how long this can go on for before he’s late, and he doesn’t want to think about being late. Not after knocking one of Harrison’s teeth out. It’s going to suck enough as is.

“Let go,” he says, and yanks his arm back, tucks his hands into his back pockets where Hannibal can’t get to them. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

“Came to see you, but...” and Hannibal holds his half-finished cigar out in front of him, like he doesn’t quite recognize it. “Wasn’t... wasn’t sure if you wanted to see me.”

“Right call there, major. I don’t,” Face says in the flattest monotone he can manage, that lump back in his throat, damn near closing it up, and tries to push by again.

“Where are you going, kid?”

He has, maybe, three minutes, to stop at the drug store on the way. If he speeds. “Out?” he replies, hoping like hell it comes out snarky and not scared.

“Out where?” Hannibal asks, and Face isn’t sure, but that might be worry in the other man’s face. Too dark to tell.

“Just... out.”

“Kid, if he’s...”

“If he’s what, Hannibal?” Face snaps, and they stare at each other for a moment, before Hannibal pulls his hand away from where it’s pressing the younger man backwards and goes back to his cigar.

“What... you think I lied to you? About... us? About...”

“The whole fucking time. Still are.” Face can feel the major’s eyes on him, the anguish that's in there somewhere, somehow, and squirms, brandishing his car keys. “I need to go.”

“Go where, kid?” Hannibal asks, soft and low and fast, and grabs Face again, swinging him around this time, and damn if he isn’t pinned now. His back collides with the hard, slatted siding and the older man’s weight is holding him there. It hurts. And his face is just inches from Hannibal’s. “Where are you going?”

He closes his eyes. “You know where,” and it comes out in almost a whisper.

“You don’t have to do this, Face.”

“I don’t really have a choice, Hannibal!” he snaps out before he can stop himself, and Hannibal presses a hand to his cheek, which he instantly shoot up to remove, but can’t. “Let me go.”

“So he can hurt you again?”

“He can’t hurt me, John. He hasn't,” Face blurts out, and realizes this is true the second he says it. He threads his fingers under that warm palm on his face, the one that’s been missing for nearly six months now, the one that always should have been there. “You already did that for him. Anything now’s just gravy."

"Face, you don't have to trust me, I get that, but you still need to realize that..."

No. No, he doesn't have to realize, and realizing is only going to make this evening harder to deal with, and Face just cuts that off before it goes any further down a path he doesn't have the option to follow any more.

"It’s gonna be worse if I don’t leave, right fucking now.”

He’s expecting Hannibal to start raging. Expecting yelling. Expecting the major to pull away and leave him cold.

But what he gets, what he gets instead is almost worse. A gentle tilt of his head, a murmured oh, Temp, a tentative brush of lips that turns into more, desperate, full and hot, his body seeking more of Hannibal’s as he lets himself flow up and into it, as Hannibal runs a hand between the wall and his skull, cushioning even as that kiss pushes him back more, pushes into him, floods him with something, something he hasn’t felt in half a year, something that’s been horribly, horribly...

...horrible, and Face shoves Hannibal away, as hard as he can, hearing the grunt as the older man contacts the opposite breezeway wall with a dull thud, and storms off towards his car.

He barely makes it to the store.

And as the clerk’s ringing up the tube of KY, giving him one of those looks he always gets from the female cashiers, like how could he betray their gender with such an unfortunate sexual preference, Face realizes his cell phone’s not in his back pocket.

Fuck it, he thinks and hurries back out to his car. Probably fell under the seat or out at home or something. Good thing he had the info memorized the second he looked at it.

And he doesn’t think any more of it.

+++++

“Sorry I’m late,” Face says the second he gets through the motel room door. “Really sorry, sir.”

“Only a minute or two.” Harrison’s leaning on an arm, polo unbuttoned as far as it will go, the evidence of Face’s outburst fading from the man’s face. But he pushes away at Face’s cringed little apology, and pulls him fully into the room, tracing the line of his jaw with a soft thumb. “I think I can forgive you this time.”

His voice is low, a pale imitation of how John used to sound when he was aroused, when they were in bed together, recovering, and the touching started up again.... but Face shoves those memories aside and goes stiff as Harrison’s hand circles around through the short hairs of the buzzed haircut he has to wear now, back around to the front.

“Umm, thank you... sir.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of a way,” Harrison practically purs, and some instinct in Face, one that’s kept him alive through his life, starts screaming. This is going to be even worse than he’d imagined. “Clothes off.”

Face stares at him for a moment, wondering where this is going, knowing anyway, and slowly pulls his shirt over his head, tossing it away. His fingers feel thick.

“All of it, my boy...”

The jeans are a lot harder, but he manages, slips out of his shoes, and shivers. It’s a little too cold in here, no heating at all, and he wonders how things could have ever gone this far, how he could stand outside his apartment and tell Hannibal... does he want this? Does he?

The very fact that he’s asking himself this question burns the shame clean through him. He’s not going to make it out of this intact, and Harrison fucking knows it.

So why can’t he stop it? It would be so easy...

“Who wouldn’t forgive you, lieutenant? You’re such a pretty thing...”

Harrison’s walking him backwards, that hand closing down now around his throat, just enough to be painful, just enough to remind him, he thinks bitterly, and tries to stay calm.

“...it’s no wonder Major Smith couldn’t keep you in check. Probably caught up in how you look, got distracted, forgot about what you are, where you fucking belong...”

His knees hit the bed, the nasty blanket, the sheets that probably never get changed, and Harrison’s hand gets tighter, tight enough so Face grabs up at it automatically but he’s got no leverage. It’s driving him back into the bed. And there’s that old fear growing in his stomach, the one a lifetime of foster homes had instilled in him, the fear Hannibal had promised him, promised he’d get rid of, that he’d fix, the one Hannibal swore to him that he’d never have to face again, but now...

“...writhing under another man’s dick, begging for it, crying out as your ass gets plowed again and again and again, you pathetic little fuck...”

It’s getting harder to breath now, and Face feels his legs start to thrash out, no matter how much he tells them to stay still, and that earns him a fist in the kidney and the colonel’s mass, straddling him, bearing him down and that hand’s getting dangerous as Harrison leans down over him, his erection grinding into his own groin.

“...that’s what you were meant to be, Peck, somebody’s fucking slave...” and Harrison’s teeth nip at his ear, that hand shifting a little as painful bites are rained down on his neck, as the quiet flick of a pocketknife being opened snaps through the still air of the shitty little room. “...who fucking needs to be reminded who he belongs to.”

As the steel trails down between his pecs, Face remembers Hannibal earlier, standing outside his door, smoking that damn cigar because he was too nervous to come in, the way he’d looked, the way he’d said you don’t have to do this, how it had actually seemed...

Hadn't it?

Couldn't it?

“I’m not...” he tries to say right as the blade settles against the soft skin, right under his right nipple. The words don’t come out just right, but there’s still a sick grin on Harrison’s face.

“Oh, you are. And Hannibal wasn't giving you what you needed because,” and Face feels the first twist that’s going to cut something he’d rather not lose, “he wasn’t willing to do it, you sick boy. He never loved you like I do...”

If there was more that Harrison was going to say here, if there was more that was coming, Face doesn’t hear it, he can’t, because something about that bites into his skin and shakes him out of whatever the fuck’s wrong with him, and everything blurs out into that beautiful red haze where everything’s simple and clear and falling around and the only thing that hurts are his knuckles, bleeding, pain shooting through his entire hand as he misses and hits the floor and catches square on bone on the next strike and screaming, he can hear the screaming, somebody screaming at him to back the fuck off, like he would, and screaming laced with pain, and that one, right there, isn’t that a delicious...

Until something’s hauling him off the still form beneath him, Until something's on him, something's holding him down and Face can’t stop himself from lashing out at until that something cuts through it all.

Stand down, lieutenant. Stand down.

He yells something he can’t quite understand, and there’s a hand ont he scruff of his neck, and sick laughter, that goddamn laugh Harrison has...

"Goddamn it, soldier, that's a fucking order! You're going to kill him!"

And now Face’s ass is hitting the mattress, hurtled backwards and the force of that, the radiating pain in his hand, stuns him just enough, back into reality, and he stares at the sight in front of him.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?”

That familiar growl. Damn, he’s missed that growl. But it takes him a minute to figure out it's not being addressed to him.

Hannibal, between the bed and where Colonel Harrison is hauling himself up on the flimsy dresser, groggy but spitting blood, somehow still laughing.

“You are both so fucked, assaulting a senior officer...”

“With good cause, you motherfucker. You think anybody’s going to back you on this?”

“Your boy’s quite the whore there, John,” the bastard hiccups, eye swelling shut. “Came to me begging for...”

But Hannibal drives his own fist, right into the bastard’s ribs, the crunch of bones snapping apart clearly audible, and falls down with him, whispering something in his ear that Face can’t hear, something that makes Harrison grunt, makes his legs flop about uselessly, and then Hannibal’s here. Right by the lieutenant’s side.

“You’re okay, kid. You’re okay,” he says, over and over.

And Face collapses in a sobbing heap into the arms that close down around him as the sound of police sirens fill the air.

+++++

The next few hours are a total blur.

Face registers, at some level, that he’s taken to the Fort Carson hospital.

That a doctor stitches him up and checks out his hand and puts it in some kind of brace and tells him something about pulled muscles and chipped bone that he’ll have to come back in for, surgery and everything.

That a base investigator comes in and a C-Springs sheriff’s deputy comes in and the sexual assault coordinator comes in, and they all have questions for him. A rape kit.

That Hannibal doesn’t let him say anything or sign a waiver or talk or anything like that.

That Hannibal’s there.

That Hannibal’s right there.

And Face lets himself float. Safe.

“Boss?” he asks, after all the activity’s died down and their little curtained-off section of the ER’s gone quiet and the major’s there, holding his good left hand, blue eyes set dark, grim. “You’re still here?”

“Told them I would drive you home,” Hannibal says, and standing, pulling his jacket back on. He holds Face’s out, and he starts crying, thinking about how the older man must have had the presence of mind to actually grab it out of the room before the ambulance came. “You ready to go?”

“Fucking painkillers,” Face replies with a sniffle, and smiles at Hannibal. “Sure. I could use some sleep.”

Hannibal drives them off post, just like that time six months ago, and just like that time six months ago, the car goes right when he wants it to go left, when he just wants... and his left hand clamps down hard over Hannibal’s, resting on the gearshift, gripping hard.

“It’s okay, kid,” Hannibal says, not looking over. And that’s okay. It’s dark and the streets are a little icy from yesterday’s snow. “You’re going to be okay.”

He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself.

"Yeah?"

"The fucker's in lock-up." And Hannibal's hands go white.

The lieutenant watches the clumps of dirty gray piling by the passenger window instead. He doesn't want to talk about this He can't. He won't.

But that's before Hannibal lays a hesitant hand on his thigh.

And at the feel of that thick, calloused skin through the thin hospital gown, the strength that's there, the way it's trembling, just a little bit, the faintest percussive force of another heartbeat, in there, like the last six months have never happened, Face starts crying again.

Because they have.

It all has.

+++++

It’s light out when Face wakes up. For a moment, he doesn’t remember how he got home, or why, or anything. But he hits that hand as he rolls over to look at his clock, the pain spiking up white hot, and Face knows.

The anger’s gone. That anger, the anger that’s been there for the last six months? It’s all gone. Like he beat it out of himself, like it faded the second he drew blood on that colonel last night. Some kind of victory, Hannibal telling him not to kill the bastard.

So, anger gone, he just feels empty instead.

Well, empty and pain. He feels a lot of pain.

He needs Vicoden.

So much that Face doesn’t even glance over at the abandoned sofa, where he’d hoped Hannibal might be, tells himself it doesn’t matter, that the major was just dropping him off anyway. He’s gone. Didn’t stick around.

Face can ignore the sinking feeling that realization starts up in his chest.

Vicoden. Right the fuck now.

The bottle’s sitting in its little brown paper bag, a neat orange little bottle whose white lid he can’t doesn’t get off without sending a fresh wave of pain through his hand so intense he thinks he’s going to throw up.

And Face realizes he hasn’t really eaten since lunch yesterday. Probably not the best idea to start downing the painkillers on an empty stomach, but there’s next to nothing in the fridge. Ketchup, beer, a couple of shriveled apples, milk. He sniffs the milk.

When was the last time he got groceries?

He can’t remember, and as he stands there, staring morosely into the fridge like if his does, the milk in his hand won’t be a week expired, something hits his shoulder and everything in his body jerks up at once.

The milk carton hits the floor.

“Ah, motherfucker,” Face groans as the goopy liquid starts leaking out onto the laminate, soaking up into the hem of his sleeper pants. “What the...”

“Sorry, kid.”

And there’s Hannibal, right behind him, going for a wad of paper towels. The door to the apartment’s half open, a half-dozen white grocery bags down next to, and he moves mutely out of the way as the major makes short work of the mess.

“Wow, that really stinks,” Face says, not really knowing what else he can, should, say right now.

Hannibal just nods, and goes for the undersink cabinet. Probably looking for Febreeze or something. “Like I said, sorry about that, kid. I thought you heard me come in.”

“No.” Face notices that he’s backing up, scrunching up into the corner of the little kitchen unit, automatically trying to get away from the other man. He notices that Hannibal’s noticing, and forces himself to relax. Wasn’t like the major tried to mark him, rape him, mindfuck him. And Face doesn’t want Hannibal to go away. He truly doesn’t.

Isn’t it nice, to have the luxury of not wanting Hannibal to leave?

“I’m sorry.” The older man shoves his hands in his pockets. He looks exhausted. “I just... thought you’d still be asleep, or I wouldn’t have gone out.”

“Yeah?”

“You were pretty messed up last night. I... couldn’t just leave you alone, and you’re a little low on food around here, so I thought...”

Face glances back over at the bags on the floor. Kind of transparent. Blueberries, milk, those brauts he likes, cereal, also the kind he likes...

“... didn’t think you’d mind if I restocked you a little.” And Hannibal starts unpacking, putting all the perishable stuff in the fridge. “You... you don’t, right?”

The lieutenant doesn’t quite know what to say, how to feel. A gesture? A peace offering? A guilty conscious? “Can I, uhh, pay you back for that?”

“It’s not a problem, kid.”

Hannibal hands him the half-gallon jug of 2%, and Face figures he ought to pretend he’s not a total animal and goes for a glass.

His apartment’s a mess. An absolute, awful mess. Not dirty, not grungy, just not picked up. stuff everything. Nothing where it should be, and Hannibal has to have noticed all of that.

Face knows he should be embarrassed. Is he? Is he? And he can't tell, which scares the shit out of him.

Have the last few months really changed him that much?

Would Hannibal still want...

“Did you get any sleep, major?” he asks, trying to cover the way everything’s starting to slide apart in his head - the pain, the fucking apartment, Hannibal being this close to him and actually talking to him - and downs the pills with a good mouthful of milk.

“Only got you home about two hours ago,” Hannibal replies, not looking over at him. “Wanted to make sure you were okay.”

So that was a no.

“Are you okay, Temp?”

Face swallows the rest of the glass in one gulp, squinting down at the bottom of it after it’s empty, watching the last little drips of white collect in the seam of the base. “I didn’t want to leave.”

“Temp...”

“You threw me out. I didn’t want to go.” He pauses, not really watching Hannibal. Not caring. Not able to care, if he’s going to say this. “I didn’t want to go, but you didn’t want me in your... “

“Life?” Hannibal murmurs.

“Yeah.” Face feels another stab of pain run through his hand, duller, this time. Painkillers must be kicking in.

“You hate me.”

It takes Face a second to realize this isn’t a question, it’s a statement, and that gets him to look up. At the major, who’s bracing himself on the counter with both hands, eyes closed.

“I can get you back in the Rangers, everything dropped, kid, everything.”

“I don’t want special treatment, Hannibal.”

"Special treatment?" The older man tries to laugh, fails miserably, and just keeps going, like he can’t stop himself. “I, I... went out of my way to make sure I didn’t want to play favorites with you, didn’t want to give you special treatment, told myself it would have been special treatment if I’d...just because, just because we...”

Hannibal doesn’t finish. His shoulders are heaving, breathing coming hard, and he’s gone pale under that combat-won tan of his, and Face wonders if he’d ever slept with any of his men before. If he’d ever tried to have anything with any of them. If maybe this wasn’t the first time Hannibal had opened up and tried to have a relationship.

And it was him.

Hannibal had picked him.

“I’m okay, boss.”

“Look what happened to you, Face. How can you sit there and say that?” Hannibal raises his head, and his eyes are wet with tears. “I did this to you. I threw you out. You were right. I wasn’t there. He wasn’t. Shit, kid...”

Face pours himself another glass of milk and drinks the whole thing without stopping to take a breath. He can really feel the Vicoden now. And he’s exhausted, too, like the whole of the last six months is crashing apart, bearing down, and what could anything possibly hurt right now?

“I didn’t kick you out,” he says, trying to figure out how to cap this damn jug with one hand, and Hannibal takes it automatically, does it for him. He leans into Hannibal’s shoulder. Just for a moment, but still. He gets to lean in. “I didn’t want to leave.”

“Kid...” Hannibal’s voice is trembling.

Face yawns. Can’t help it, even if he does exaggerate it a little bit. Yawns and pushes past the other man. “I’m going to go back to bed.”

“Good idea...”

“I sleep better with company, John.”

“I’ll take the sofa if I need to, Temp,” Hannibal replies softly. “Wouldn’t want to...”

“Right,” Face murmurs back, and go back to his empty bed.

But right as he’s drifting off, on his left side to keep his injured limb up, right as the Vicoden’s going to set him loose into some truly epic dreams, that body, that scent, fold in around him, all that strength flowing around him, and Face sighs back into it all.

“Wouldn’t want you laying on that hand.”

“Course not,” he whispers back, smiling, and that warm feeling, the one spreading through him, follows him well into sleep.

Because Hannibal's not going anywhere.

But that sleep shatters out of Face the second he realizes there’s movement.

In bed.

In his bed.

Something shifting around, something leaving that’s supposed to be right here, and before he’s properly awake again he’s grabbing out for it, reaching... and yelps as he tries to use that busted right hand.

“You okay, kid?”

“Oh, motherfucker,” he groans, and rubs the crust of his little nap out of his eyes with the back of his left hand. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” And then he sees, then he realizes.

There’s Hannibal, standing in the door.

“You leavin’ boss?” Face asks, still a little bleary from the painkillers. Which he made need more of now.

“I was just... going to the bathroom,” Hannibal says lamely, his fingers doing that thing they do whenever he needs a cigar.

Face scoots himself up a little, letting himself kind of fall back against the wall his bed’s backed into. “Were you?”

And Hannibal’s back at his side, folding his good left hand into his own huge paw, soothing down the skin of Face’s neck. “I was,” he murmurs unconvincingly. “And then I was going to make you dinner.”

“You’re a bad liar, Hannibal,” and Face tries to smile, so Hannibal knows it’s okay. That he understands. If it’s too soon. If he’s damaged goods now. If it’s been too damn long or if there’s somebody else or whatever else it might be.

“I wasn’t...” Hannibal begins, and then shakes his head, stares at the floor, stops talking for a few minutes. Face squeezes that hand holding his. “Okay, maybe I was thinking about...”

“I don’t want you to go,” he says, knowing he’s begging and not giving a flying fuck about pride right now, or anything else but the man right in front of him. That’s the only thing that matters. “You can’t go.”

“Face...”

And there’s so much pain in that Face surges forward and presses his face into that broad, warm chest, wrapping his right arm awkwardly around the major. “You can’t go,” he says again.

“How... how can you, after...”

“Harrison can fuck right the hell off,” the lieutenant mutters into the soft cotton of the boss’ t-shirt. “You’re here, he’s not.”

And almost as if he’s fighting a losing battle with himself, Hannibal lets his arms come up around Face’s shoulders. “I wasn’t here,” he whispers.

“Fuck the last six months,” Face says, feeling himself starting to shake now. “Fuck everything.”

Hannibal pulls him back, a hand stroking lightly up into his hair, and the older man’s voice is shaking but those words, those unpleasant words, are still spilling out. “It’s the drugs talking, kid. It’s not, you couldn’t possibly, this...”

And fuck that, too, Face thinks, and jerks in from Hannibal’s wandering hand, catching his mouth, hands-free and right on target, too, from the way Hannibal moans into that kiss, almost as needy as his own.

Just for a moment, though, and then Face pulls off the older man’s lower lip with a soft little sucking sound. He leverages as much as he dares with that busted hand, resting against Hannibal’s back, right over the nubs of spine, and lays his face on Hannibal’s shoulder, resting against his neck.

“I want you, boss. Don’t you want me anymore?”

Hannibal makes some kind of strangled sound and presses a soft kiss right below Face’s exposed ear, all along his neck. That hand’s still massaging his scalp. “I... I...”

Face undulates up against the major and prepares to wait. “You what, boss?”

And it does take a while to come. A long while, waiting for those words to flow, the ones all snarled and dammed up, under the surface. But come they do, and when they do, it’s like a flood, washing everything before it away.

“I... seeing you hurt like this, after what I did, I don’t deserve...you, like...shit, Templeton, I love you, I love you so goddamn much...”

“I love you, and I didn’t... I didn’t even bother with finding out... let the fucking lawyers tell you what to say... knew you shot her, and... and I didn’t... didn’t let you tell me... didn’t listen, didn’t ask... should have...”

Those halting words race through the younger man as they come pouring out of Hannibal in that stream, more words than he’s ever heard Hannibal string together at once, outside of a briefing room anyway, and now matter how wonderful it is, the shift, this being about the shooting again and not Harrison, fuck Harrison, it’s too much, too many, all trying to drown out that little...

“I love you,” he blurts out, and tackles Hannibal down onto the bed, wanting to feel every possible inch of this man. His man.

Who looks shell-shocked now, so Face bends to lay another light kiss on him, barely pulling off before repeating himself. “I love you, John, oh fuck, I love you too...”

Uncertain fingertips trail across his cheekbones, down his jaw, his neck, pressing to his chest, but Hannibal doesn’t push him away. Face watches that throat swallow a few times, and has to hold that handsome face still, prevent the boss from turning away, keeps those eyes locked with his own, saying it again and again and again.

Until that uncertainty fades under the force of one of those spine-tingling smiles and Hannibal’s hands slip around, under the lieutenant’s arms, resting on his ribs and his sleeping shirt.

“I love you,” Face says again, savoring the taste of the words on his lips. “I lov...”

Hannibal puts a finger to his mouth, closing it softly. “I don’t deserve you...” Those hands are exploring now, rumpling the soft knit of Face’s shirt, thumbs spreading out, just starting to massage. “And you deserve everything.”

“I only want one thing,” he murmurs back, letting himself sink into the sensation, letting Hannibal spread him out, folding his body out over top of that scarred one beneath him. He can almost forget about the throbbing in his hand. This is far too important to loose. "Only need one thing, boss."

“And what’s that, kid? Say it, it's yours...”

“Yours?” he breathes. "Want to be yours."

“Is that what you want, Temp? Being my lieutenant again? A Ranger? In my unit, under my command...”

And there it is, half of the whole he'd thought he'd lost forever. Only one answer for that. Only one, and he gives it now, his whole heart in his throat. “Yes... yes sir,” he pleads.

Hannibal growls at the mention of rank. Big hands push the shirt up, so it’s skin on skin, for the first time in six months, Hannibal touching him, catching him, holding him.

Good, for the first time in six months.

So good.

And then it all hitches, stutters apart, right as Hannibal says, “in my bed? With me...like this?”

“Oh, god...”

Those hands make one little circle. Another, before Hannibal licks bone-dry lips to speak again. “Tell me what you want, beautiful boy, it’s yours...”

“Yours,” he practically sobs between that overwhelming glide of flesh across his own, from his own now-raging arousal, the emotions he doesn’t have names for swelling up inside him. “Your beautiful boy?”

“...yeah, Temp, my... my beautiful boy, my clever, gorgeous, courageous, darling boy...”

“Fuck...” Face groans, and Hannibal’s practically trembling under him and they stay like that for a moment, breathing hard, both men watching the other, hanging between where they were and where they might be going, everything suspended...

... until they both seem to break at the same time and everything complex and difficult and wrong falls apart into the primal heat of a frantic, desperate, soul-searing kiss.

It goes on for long minutes, dragging out until the heat turns to fire, burning through him, and it’s only when Hannibal drags them both to the surface again that Face realizes that his lungs are screaming for oxygen. The older man arches a little, gaining the room he needs for both of them to pull his shirt off.

But the kiss doesn’t resume like it should.

Face lies there for a moment, full-length against Hannibal’s chest, tasting the lightest sheen of sweat that’s broken out there, preening up into those fingers running through his hair, and then he moves back up, letting his chin drag across that light dusting of chest hair as he goes to catch Hannibal’s mouth once again.

Hannibal’s got other ideas, though, or so it seems, because Face gets a kiss on his forehead for his trouble, and he’s hugged to that chest once again. “Shh, kid, I’ve got you. I’m not going anywhere. Never again.”

“I need you,” the lieutenant whispers back, grinding down with his pelvis suggestively, tugging at a few strands of that silvering hair. The major’s erection is pressing hard against his thigh and he wants it, he wants it so bad. “Please, boss. I need you...”

Those arms close a little tighter. “Can’t hurt you, kid.”

“You won’t,” he says. “There’s nothing wrong, you know, down... down there. John...”

“Not the time, Temp. You’re...injured.” And from the way Hannibal’s saying it, it might not be about...

“Fuck my hand, John, come on...” he says desperately, not meaning it the way it comes out, and Hannibal actually starts laughing. A good, deep belly-laugh, one that reverberates out of him and up into Face, who starts laughing as well and rolls off to the side, collapsing on his back, overcome with a shared fit of the giggles.

Then Hannibal wipes a tear from his eye and leans over Face, that strong frame braced halfway over him, and Face feels a shiver run through his entire being. Oh yes, this is exactly what he needs, Hannibal asserting himself, Hannibal reminding them both...

“Yours, boss,” Face says, tugging on a beltloop to drag the major’s hips towards him and he lays his bad hand up over top of him, resting it into a nest of pillows. “I’m yours, boss.”

Hannibal makes a sound somewhere between a growl and a whine, all those conflicting emotions mixing together, and straddles Face’s thighs. “You are mine, Templeton Peck,” he says in a low voice, and right then and there, Face knows it’s the most sensual thing he’s ever going to hear in his life. He leans in, letting kiss-swollen lips brush across an ear. “And I’m yours.”

Face can’t control the whimper as Hannibal’s skillful hand shoves those pyjama pants just down, as his cock springs free to slap wet up against his belly, as Hannibal’s own soon joins it, as that hand is wrapped around them both. As Hannibal starts to move, hips and hands and cock. As everything’s moist and sweet and smooth and the pressure wants to overwhelm him. As it all starts building up and up and up and further still, Hannibal pushing them both to the brink.

It doesn't take long. At all.

Face’s toes curl and he’s moaning like a whore, noise that could be Hannibal’s name, pleas for him not to stop, for him to never stop, and Hannibal doesn’t, doesn’t disappoint, and maybe it’s the lingering vicodin in his system, but Face barely feels it when he comes himself, right before Hannibal, their mingled essence splashing over both of them, trapped in the space between their bodies with the sound of their frayed breathing as they recover.

“Feel good, love?” Hannibal murmurs gently, off to the side now, placing another soft kiss on Face’s forehead even as he reaches for the lieutenant’s discarded shirt, cleaning them both with slow swipes of cotton knit. He's a mess, jeans shoved down at a weird angle and cock softening in the open space there, hair spiked from sweat and Face's hands, skin flushed and sweating... a total, gorgeous mess. Completely undone. Exposed. Open.

There's something sublime in that, the lieutenant realizes. And how close he came to losing it...

As far as an answer goes, though, Face can’t do anything but nod, and then wince, as his hand screams out in protest. “Beyond good, boss.” Yeah. His hand’s not happy right now.

It’s okay, though. Hannibal’s feeding him another little white pill, a glass of water and a few crackers coming off the bedside table with it, and yet another kiss, this one to the hollow of his throat.

Right before standing up.

“John, fuck, please, don’t...” Face says mid-cracker, trying to shake out of his post-orgasm lethargy lingering far after it should be, and he struggles up, towards his lover.

But Hannibal twines his hand into Face’s outstretched one, and holds there for a moment, regarding him with soft eyes. “Dinner, kid,” he says, and plants another kiss on Face’s shoulder. “Any special requests?”

“You?” And yeah, that’s probably the drugs.

Hannibal chuckles. “How about pasta?”

+++++

And dinner, when Hannibal comes and wakes Face up from his doze, is good. Some pasta concoction that tastes just as wonderful as everything else Hannibal makes, just like before, just like always now, maybe, hopefully. They don’t really talk, sitting next to each other on the sofa, Hannibal alternating between his own bowl and Face’s, helping the awkward left-handed eating by offering Face rotini and sausage and that from-scratch alfredo from his own fork. It’s pleasant. Perfect, really.

Still, Face has to go and ruin the mood by asking about the plan of attack for the next few weeks. He really does need to know. Everything’s still out of place with the Army, even if everything that matters is right where it needs to be.

Hannibal runs a hand back through that silver hair of his. “I’m still thinking about it.”

Which means he know exactly what he wants to do but doesn’t want to talk about it yet. Too insane, too left-field, too risky. At least two court martials. A new one for Harrison. An overdue one for him, overturning the damn Article 15. People threatened, people found, people convinced, people pleaded with - the right truth coming out at the right time for maximum effect, so he’ll get acquitted, so Harrison will get maximum sentence. Military politics were always so tricky. Face was around him long enough back then, before, to know this about the man. “Please, Hannibal, don’t go beat him to death.”

That gets him a mirthless little laugh. “I was considering that, but he’s probably done this to others. Maybe not as far, but...” Face squeezes a little, and Hannibal looks up at him, eyes clear, set. Determined. “You aren’t the only one who deserves justice here.”

“I’m sure they’ll...”

“But you do deserve it, kid. You know that? That I’m going to set this all right?”

The lieutenant takes a deep breath. “Boss, if anyone can fix this, it’s you...but you can’t go beat the guy to death, okay? Please?”

“Kid, I already said I wouldn’t...well, I do know the warden at Leavenworth,,” Hannibal replies, and serenely stabs a piece of pasta, holding it up for the younger man. “I got youtwo weeks of sick leave, too...”

Face grins a little and suggestively drags his lips on the prongs as he pulls the bite off.

“... and you’ll be reporting back in to me when it’s over, I guarantee that,” Hannibal growls, all protective, and Face just loves the way that particular inclination hangs off the man, but he can’t let it distract him now.

“I think I should go with you now,” he says lazily. “Your house, your bed. Mmm, your bed...”

“Our bed,” Hannibal says, fork , and grins back as Face feels himself come apart, melt into all the implications of that little statement. “You want to spend the next two weeks with me hand-feeding you and mooching my cable package and bitching about how you can’t work the remote right with your left hand.”

“Hmm, keep an eye on you in the evenings, make sure there aren’t any shenanigans.” He pauses. “That huge fucking shower you’ve got...”

Hannibal stares at him for a moment and wipes up the last of the sauce from his own now-empty dish and chews thoughtfully. Swallows. “I figured you’d say that,” he says.

“Oh?”

“So I already packed you a bag.”

Continue to Epilogue...