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“Target’s neutralised?”
“Shot himself in the head.”
“How about the rest of ‘em? All casualties confirmed?”
“Affirmative,” Chemo replied, voice crackly through the radio— “ah, uh— no— hold on— stand by.”
“What?”
MacTavish paused, glancing at Ghost, who shrugged; above them, they could hear footsteps thumping around upstairs.
Vasilije Aleksić was a pathetic excuse of a man. The target related in a string of arms-smuggling rings across the Bulgarian-Serbian border, he hadn’t even fought on the way out, leaving his guards to do the dirty work while he himself rounded up the help in his room. They were too late, ultimately— as they had completed the breach and taken out the guards into the armoured quarters of his house, he had turned the same pistol he had shot all of his staff with on himself.
He lived in a small mansion of a house, and it had taken three tac teams to cover every exit; Alpha and Charlie were already gone while Bravo had stuck around, cataloguing the damage. MacTavish was downstairs, Ghost the only one with him— Aston had been taken with Charlie team after a graze with a bullet for medical attention, leaving Adams, Scarecrow, Shogun and Chemo upstairs.
“Chemo, come in. What d’you mean, hold on? Who’s left?”
“He killed all the help because they knew something. Better to get them alive,” Ghost replied, looking around the huge living room again. The guards had been armed to the teeth, six burly men who had destroyed the house in their efforts to protect it; Ghost kicked at the armchair that had been knocked over, before pushing at the shattered glass of the table. They’d cut off the lights as part of their entry strategy, but Shogun had managed to get them back up, albeit damaged; the room was dim where not all the LEDs lit up, and the one in the corner flickered intermittently.
“Depends what it is they know, isn’t it?”
“Whatever it is,” Ghost replied darkly, unholstering a knife, “they’re going to tell us.”
MacTavish looked at the silver glinting dimly in the light, and nodded. Against the stark contrast of the pale walls, spilled blood already turning purple, Ghost looked every bit the spectre he lived up to be. He nodded at him, and watched his hands readjust themselves around the hilt of the knife, not quite restless, but comfortable with the energy thrumming through.
At that moment, though, Scarecrow came downstairs holding a baby.
“Sorry, sir,” Chemo apologised from behind him immediately, “we weren’t exactly sure what we were s’posed to say, or what the procedure was, or—”
“He was in the laundry basket,” Shogun explained. “Or— wait, is it a he or a she?”
“I’m not checking.”
“I thought it was a she,” Adams replied, “she’s got eyelashes.”
“Yeah, but how can you really tell? Babies all look the same.”
“Scarecrow,” Ghost frowned, “hold her properly.”
“What— wait,” MacTavish cut in, “what was it doing in the laundry basket?”
“We think— well, I think the mother was trying to protect her— him— it,” Chemo explained. “Aleksić must’ve been rounding them up, and the mother dropped him in the basket, and then got shot right on top, body covered the basket. No one heard him— it— fuck.”
At that moment, the baby babbled something, tugging at Scarecrow’s vest— he looked down at it, confused.
“Scarecrow,” Ghost said again, crossing his arms.
“What?”
“Support her neck.”
“What d’you mean?”
Scarecrow only seemed to get more confused, and then made to grab at her neck; Adams stopped him, and took her off him, demonstrating. The baby’s legs stuck out, and she kicked them, babbling again— Adams looked up at Ghost, who crossed his arms, before he scowled.
“What’s the problem?”
“Look at her legs!”
“How d’you know it’s a she?”
“She’s in pink,” MacTavish pointed out, gesturing to the pink onesie she was in. “Does she have a name?”
“Well— sir, I don’t think she can tell us.”
“No papers? Nothing?”
“Yeah, let’s check her driver’s licence,” Ghost suggested, glancing over at him slyly; MacTavish turned to scowl, thumping a hand into his shoulder.
“Fuck off. We can’t wait around here for Red Cross, let’s get her to medical on base and we can talk to the local authorities.”
She babbled a bit more, blinking big eyes up at Adams, who readjusted his arms—
“For fuck’s sake, Adams,” Ghost grumbled, as she kicked at the air and nearly fell. Adams caught her in the nick of time, and looked up at him to glower at Ghost.
“You do it, then!”
“Yeah, alright.”
Ghost stepped forward, taking the baby off of him to hold her properly, an arm supporting her head and her legs. She looked up at him very seriously, before babbling several sounds at him. Ghost’s expression was hidden behind the mask, and the glasses reflected the flickering light, but when he caught MacTavish looking, what was visible of his eyebrows furrowed in what was a very obvious glare.
“What?”
“That’s adorable, lieutenant.”
“With all due respect, sir, which quite frankly, isn’t that much—” Ghost began, hand already moving to his knife— at that moment, however, the baby tugged at his vest, and then his mask, cooing. Ghost stopped exactly where he was, and then, shaking his head, put the knife back into its holster.
“She does sort of take away from the effect,” Shogun noted, before Ghost’s glare turned to him, and he hurriedly cleared his throat. “Uh— sir, I mean, not really— uh, is what I meant.”
“Not a word from any of you,” Ghost warned, rounding on the rest of them. “D’we need to take along a blanket for her?”
The baby, wrapped in her pink blanket and safely in Ghost’s arms, had gone straight to medical, leaving MacTavish to hurriedly wrangle some Serbian officers to find whatever authority that would be responsible for the child. There was no one left in the house, and no relatives they could find of the baby’s mother— the Serbian equivalent of Child Protective Services would take the baby into their care, and that seemed to be the end of it.
The bigger problem, then, and what took up most of the next three hours for MacTavish was the incident reports for what Aleksić had done. He was almost ashamed to say it didn’t shock him— he had clearly considered the help he had hired an extension of him, and when he had killed himself, he had taken their lives too. They’d been too late, ultimately— too late to salvage any intel, too late to save them. Rationally, he knew it couldn’t be helped: nothing he said or did would have made their intel more accurate, nor bring them from the dead, but he didn’t feel good writing in the civilian casualties into the mission report, glancing over their names.
She only could have been young, the baby, the way she hadn’t appeared on any official records prior to the mission; later, Red Cross would identify her mother from the bodies and give her back her name. Without any living relatives, MacTavish suddenly wondered if there was anyone who still knew it.
He made an effort not to think about his family when he was deployed, if only to keep them seperate from the horror of war. Not for the first time, though, his thoughts drifted to his sister, to his niece, only three months old.
The last name went down on the mission report; he’d hear back from Charlie team and amend any details before he’d send it off to his superiors. A phone call confirmed Aston was fine, but he set off to the medical wing all the same to check.
“Here for the lieutenant?” The nurse in charge immediately asked as he came in. She had unruly curls, and seemed right at home in the bustle of the medical wing, all pristine white walls and scuffed linoleum floors.
“The lieutenant?”
“Lieutenant Riley, I’m afraid you’ve just missed him, he’s only just gone.”
“No, I’m here for Sergeant Aston— what was Riley doing here?”
“Aston’s only just been discharged,” she explained, sidestepping to avoid a passing doctor, “we’ve cleaned and wrapped the wound and he should be alright with a week of bed rest and a transition to light work— oh, and the lieutenant was here with the baby!”
The medical wing was predictably busy, and they both stepped to one side to allow a passing patient wheeled by a porter.
“Lieutenant Riley?” MacTavish asked to confirm, as soon as he could. The nurse nodded, tugging her curls back into a ponytail.
“He’s just left to make the baby some formula milk. We wouldn’t have normally let him, but he just seemed so fond, you know? I think he has kids.”
“And Aston’s alright?” MacTavish asked. She nodded again, crossing her arms.
“Just left to his room. I think he’s taken her to the kitchen,” she added, “Lance Corporal Marković stopped by with a bottle and formula about an hour ago.”
MacTavish huffed a disbelieving sort of laugh, shaking his head.
“Thank you.”
“See you later, captain.”
He knew what kitchen Ghost would be in, because Ghost had mentioned the schedule they rotated in on the base; it was a shorter walk than he might have expected. The sun was shining low in the sky, blocked out by the buildings, and the sky was tinged a warm lilac. The door was closed, and he nudged it open, stepping through near silently into the dimming kitchen. Out of sight from the door, he could hear the baby first, babbling away.
“I know,” Ghost agreed sagely, “I know. You’re right.”
The baby babbled some more, and MacTavish rounded the corner— Ghost had her on his shoulder, and was shaking up the baby bottle one handed. He was still in the skull mask, but had taken off all his gear and his glasses; as MacTavish watched, he switched off the stove and rocked her a little, still wrapped in the hot pink blanket. He wanted to say something, but found himself unwilling to interrupt the peace of the scene— instead, he leaned against the counter, silently crossing his arms, as Ghost finished shaking the bottle. He put the bottle down to readjust her, tugging up his sleeve to reveal a sliver of pale skin between his gloves and his hoodie, before turning the baby bottle over and carefully shaking out a drop of milk onto his wrist. Curious, MacTavish tilted his head to watch the movement—
“It’s to check the temperature,” he said out loud, before turning around, looking over to him. “How long were you planning on standing there?”
“When did you—”
“Heard you come in,” Ghost shrugged, turning around. “Told the nurse she could tell you where I was.”
The baby cooed again, waving a fist around; Ghost glanced down at her before turning around to put the bottle down again and pull her sleeves down so they weren’t stuck over her hands. The way he had turned, MacTavish couldn’t see his expression; when Ghost turned around, however, he looked over at MacTavish and immediately scowled.
“What?” Ghost demanded, somehow threatening even with a baby in his arms.
“What d’you mean, what?”
“Stop looking at me like that!”
“Like what?”
“Did you need something?” Ghost asked, turning around again to pick up the bottle, walking over to the sink and running it under the tap. MacTavish gave a half shrug, leaning back against the counter to watch; Ghost looked over him again, something almost suspicious in his eyes, before he shook his head minutely and switched off the tap, dabbing out another droplet of milk against his wrist.
“What’re you doing?”
“Cooling it down. It’s too hot to give her.”
“The medical staff all think you have a kid,” MacTavish replied; Ghost huffed a laugh, before shaking the bottle and feeding it to her. She took it in tiny hands, immediately drinking in big gulps— MacTavish watched Ghost’s expression soften all over again.
“Well?”
“Well, what?”
“D’you have a kid?”
“Sir, I think if I had a kid, you’d know,” Ghost replied, looking up at him. He readjusted her in his arms, holding on to the bottle, and then glanced up at him.
“How about you?”
“Got a niece, remember? She’ll be about her age when I’m next on leave.”
He glanced down at the baby again, and tried to memorise the way Ghost was holding her, one arm under her, supporting her head, the other holding the bottle— he kept getting hung up on how small she was, though, barely fitting into the crook of his arm.
Her mother was dead. She obviously wasn’t aware of what had happened, if the way she was so enthralled by everything around her was any indicator— and she was tiny, really, just a child—
“D’you want to practise holding her?”
“What?” MacTavish blinked.
“For when you’re on leave?”
Ghost pulled the bottle from her for a moment, as she made some noise; he lifted her a little, lifting his eyebrows.
“I—”
“C’mon, sir, she’s not going to bite.”
“Not her I’m worried about.”
Ghost was definitely smiling under the mask; with the loss of the bottle, the baby was tugging at his hoodie. She managed a fistful of his mask, and was tugging at it; Ghost turned his face away to pull it out of her grasp.
“You’re not going to hurt her, c’mon.”
“Think she wants the mask off.”
“Don’t get distracted,” Ghost replied, eyes falling on a foldout chair tucked away between the counters. Propping her against a shoulder, he tugged it out. He kicked it open, managing it all one handed with something almost like muscle memory; it was a moment before he realised Ghost was expecting him to sit.
“Lieutenant—”
“I’m not going to let you hurt her,” Ghost said, more insistent. “Come on, she’s hungry.”
Ghost was persistent, kicking the chair gently towards him when he didn’t move; finally, more apprehensive than begrudging, he took a seat, and Ghost immediately passed him the baby. He froze, shoulders in an awkward spot, and Ghost might have laughed very quietly, sound catching in the mask, before dropping to one knee and adjusting his arms for him.
“See?”
The sky was nearly purple behind the blinds in the kitchen; the baby was making sounds that sounded suspiciously close to tears, but Ghost didn’t seem particularly concerned. Finally, he passed the bottle over— she immediately latched on, taking big gulps of the milk. The bottle was slightly warm; as soon as he seemed slightly comfortable, Ghost stood up and turned to the counter, putting the pan he had been heating water away and closing the box of formula.
“Where’d you get all that?”
“One of the corporals ran to the nearest town for it,” Ghost replied. “D’you know when the police’ll be here to take her?”
“Soon, with any luck,” MacTavish replied, looking down at her. She had two hands on the bottle, holding it there, and looked at him with big brown eyes, blinking up at him.
“Cecelia,” he said, out of the blue.
“Hm?”
“My niece’s name. Cecelia, but my sister calls her Cece. After our grandmother.”
Ghost didn’t say anything, but tilted his head, leaning against the counter to look at the two of them. He suddenly seemed to understand Ghost’s problem with scrutiny whenever he was holding the baby— it was a surprisingly soft action, and nothing he was used to, far less in front of anyone else.
The baby pushed the bottle back to take a breath, before getting right back to it; MacTavish lifted his arm so it was a little more comfortable for the both of them. Scarecrow had been the one to find the baby blanket in one of the many bedrooms, hot pink and covered with cartoon characters; far from the firefight, it hadn’t come anywhere near the violence.
“Not so bad, is it?” Ghost asked, after several moments of quiet.
“No,” he replied, “it’s not. Need to scratch my nose, though.”
“I’m not doing it for you.”
“Didn’t ask you to.”
Still, he scrunched up his nose all the same; Ghost, finally taking pity, walked up to him, looking monumentally unimpressed.
“You can just let go of her and scratch your own nose.”
“Absolutely not,” MacTavish replied with something almost like panic, holding her tighter.
“Fuck’s sake,” Ghost muttered, scratching at his nose. MacTavish huffed a laugh at Ghost’s indignation, but for all his complaining, he did it anyway, eyes far too fond. Pulling his hand back, Ghost glanced down at the baby again, before dropping back to one knee by the chair, taking the bottle off of him and picking her up so she was upright against MacTavish’s chest—
“What’re you doing?”
“Bloody hell, sir, you’re more fussy than she is. Hold her there,” he said, readjusting his hands, “pat her back.”
“Pat her— what?”
“Her back,” Ghost said again, like he was speaking to a very young child. MacTavish scowled, but did, once; Ghost looked up at him, somehow even more unimpressed.
“Again, now, sir, c’mon.”
“Do I get to ask why, lieutenant?”
“No.”
Still, MacTavish did; Ghost was looking up at them, the same unbearable amusement in his eyes.
“Why the mask, then? It’s just us.”
“There’s a baby,” Ghost replied, like he was pointing out the obvious. “Keep going.”
“Yeah, you’re probably scaring her with the skull, aren’t you?” MacTavish pointed out, lighthearted. He patted her back again; Ghost glanced between him and the baby.
“Think I’d scare her more with it off,” Ghost shrugged, nonchalant. MacTavish blinked, and then looked up at him, absolutely disbelieving—
“Don’t be— oh, what the fuck?”
At that moment, the baby burped, and spat something out; Ghost snorted a laugh, and the sound nearly distracted him from the sticky patch on his shirt. He glanced at her incredulously, where she was looking up at him again, and then glared up at Ghost, still smiling—
“You knew this was goin’ to happen!”
“Was sort of hoping,” Ghost grinned in response.
He looked down at the baby incredulously, and something unplaceable suddenly passed over Ghost’s expression.
It wasn’t like he was going to do anything— he was only moving her back into his arms, but all of a sudden, the humour on Ghost’s face disappeared as his hands shot out to stop him— stop him from doing what wasn’t immediately clear.
A moment passed between them. Ghost’s eyes were wide, suddenly very careful, hands still on his wrists; MacTavish blinked, and the baby cooed.
“Did you think I was goin’ to hurt her?” He asked, almost incredulous. Ghost looked up at him, mouth opening and closing under the mask wordlessly, before he let go of his wrists.
“Joseph was in that phase kids get in of drawing everything they see when I got back,” Ghost said after a moment, instead of an answer. “And for the life of me I couldn’t work out why he was never drawing me.”
It wasn’t an answer to his question; Ghost’s hands had curled into loose fists, and he handed him the bottle back, looking at her instead of making eye contact.
“Joseph?”
“My nephew. And— turns out, my brother was throwing out all the drawings he did of me. So I wouldn’t get— upset at the way he saw me. I’m not stupid, sir, I know what I look like.”
That was all the answer MacTavish got about why Ghost suddenly expected him to take out his frustrations on a child, or why Ghost seemed to know so much about children; he didn’t push forward, and Ghost didn’t pull away.
In the meanwhile, Ghost had handed the bottle back, and the baby was happily drinking away.
“She’s got no clue what’s happened to her,” Ghost said, very softly. “In a bit, she’ll realise her mother isn’t coming back.”
“It’s—” MacTavish replied, pausing. Because it wasn’t okay, not really; but it had to be, at least for the child. Instead, his hand found the back of Ghost’s neck, a thumb slipping under the hem of the mask— Ghost looked up at him, more surprised than alarmed.
“It’ll be fine,” he said, looking at him with surprising tenderness. Ghost shrugged again, purposefully nonchalant, before looking back down at the baby again, and softening. She’d pulled the bottle from her mouth, having drunk her fill, and was looking up at them with a very gummy smile; MacTavish rocked her a little.
“You’ll have to burp her again,” Ghost told him, taking the bottle off of her.
“Will she throw up on me again?”
“Maybe.”
“Why can’t you do it?”
“You’ve already got sick-up on your shirt, sir. This is my favourite hoodie.”
“Fuck’s sake,” MacTavish muttered, but did it all the same; Ghost braced his forearms on his thighs to watch, eyes turned up with amusement.
“Did you raise your nephew, then?” MacTavish asked, unable to help himself with what little he knew of Ghost.
“Only for the first year or so.”
“You were in service?”
“Took two years out,” Ghost replied, “had to make sure he—… that he grew up better than I did.”
Without any more, he knew what was all Ghost would divulge; still, it was always more than enough. Ghost’s eyes were on the baby, on the bottle, back to the darkening sky behind the blinds, and didn’t meet his, but it was more endearing than evasive, and MacTavish didn’t mind so much, watching him stand up to the sink and rinse the bottle out.
“How long am I s’posed to do this?”
“Few more minutes. You find her a name?”
“What?”
“On the mission report. Did you find out her name?”
“No. Mother’s name looked to be changed, too, but we have people looking to find her family.”
“Been calling her Jane,” Ghost replied, turning the rinsed out bottle over to dry, and washing the top. MacTavish frowned.
“Why not Simone?”
“Jane. As in Jane Doe,” Ghost replied, “not Jane MacTavish. Did you think I named her after you?”
The baby— Jane, MacTavish called her— cooed in his arms, and he brought her back down to hold her in front of him as she babbled several important sounding sounds.
“And they made him captain,” Ghost exclaimed to her, like she had said something. “Can’t believe it either.”
“Are you— talking shit about me to a baby, Riley?”
“It’s good for their development.”
“You’re takin’ the piss.”
“Deadly serious, sir,” Ghost insisted, walking back up to them both. “Don’t think he believes me,” he added, to her.
“Because I know he’s lyin’ to me!” MacTavish insisted to her, as she cooed again, waving fists at him. MacTavish caught one, shaking it gently, and Ghost dropped back down onto one knee again, watching. It was jarringly domestic, everything from the smell of the kitchen, to the way Ghost readjusted his arms for him, the soft fondness in his eyes MacTavish knew would disappear if he said something about it.
“Yeah,” Ghost agreed, as she kept babbling, “and they let him in here, mohawk and all.”
“Ghost.”
“Yeah, we can make you an honorary private if you want,” Ghost continued conversationally. “Private Jane MacTavish. Get you a tiny uniform if you wanted.”
“Lieutenant,” MacTavish grumbled, shifting to nudge into him.
“What, an honorary lieutenant?” Ghost asked, looking up at him cheekily. “Replacing me, sir?”
“She’d do a better job. She’s less mouthy.”
Ghost scoffed, propping his elbows back on his thighs. The sky was darker purple behind the blinds, now, still tinged orange towards the sunset; MacTavish rocked the baby gently, as Ghost watched. Several moments of quiet passed, as she babbled away.
The mask came off with little fanfare. MacTavish was almost sure he was waiting for a moment where neither of their attentions were on Ghost, but he caught the slip of the fabric all the same. Jane paused for a second in his arms, before immediately twisting, making grabby hands at him; Ghost acquiesced with very little argument, screwing up his face and bringing it closer to let her grab at it. She took a fistful of his hair, tugging—
“Ow.”
“This is what you get for gettin’ baby sick on me!”
“It’s milk, sir, grow up.”
The idea that Ghost without the mask was scary in any world was preposterous to MacTavish; even now, in the dim half light, the scars across his face only served to bring out the softer curves of his face, the smattering of very pale freckles and long eyelashes. Under his sudden gaze, Ghost shifted a little, chewing at the scar on the inside of his cheek and looking away.
“You’re insane if you think you’re scarin’ a kid looking like that.”
Ghost frowned first, and then his cheeks coloured; sparing him a little embarrassment, MacTavish suddenly became unavoidably busy with the baby. His older sisters had had children before Cecelia, but he’d never been home to see them; she’d be the first he’d be a real uncle too. Jane was still reaching out to Ghost, smiling and babbling like she was trying to talk to him. It made something deep in his ribcage painfully soft; he’d never wanted kids, but Ghost had taken one fat fist and was waving it gently, eyes downturned and expression achingly fond.
“Captain MacTavish?” Someone called from the entrance; both of them looked up at the same time, Ghost stood up and tugged the mask on at the same time, rounding the corner after a moment.
“He’s back here. What is it?”
“Oh— er— the Serbian police officers are here to take care of the baby,” the soldier at the door explained. “They’re in the medical wing.”
“Alright. We’ll be there in a minute. Dismissed.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Come on, then,” Ghost began immediately, striding back into the kitchen and putting the formula and the bottle back into the plastic bag he must have brought them in, all softness gone in favour of tactical efficiency. MacTavish stood up, glancing at the chair and suddenly wondering how Ghost had got it open one handed; Ghost, in response, huffed a laugh and shut it for him.
He’d have to hear him laugh properly, MacTavish decided; an actual laugh, not a scoff or a huff. He carried Jane back to the medical wing, and Ghost handed over the formula and the bottle to the woman who had been tasked with taking the baby. Neither of them said anything in particular as they watched her go; if MacTavish stood a little closer to Ghost than necessary, and he leant against him, neither of them said anything to that either.
“Oh,” the nurse from earlier said, as they left, “it’ll be a shame to see her go.” And then: “captain, what’s that on your shirt?”