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The helo ride back to base is silent, save for the whupwhupwhup of the rotors. Not quiet—silent. Tension thick enough to choke on, tendrils curling around his entire being to snuff out any attempt at movement, at sound, at some bastardized reconciliation—
"You shouldn't be on point."
"Why the fuck not?" Why change the plan now? He's always on Price's six, it's always the two of them—
"It's too dangerous. You stay put on overwatch. That's an order, Sergeant."
Price sits hunched in the corner. The bandage on his arm's soaked through with blood. That same hand is braced on his knee like it's the only thing keeping him upright while Kyle stares at him and wonders if that argument was where it all went tits fucking up.
He'd broken rank. Rushed down to the breach after watching through his scope, breath held tight in his lungs as the charge slipped just an inch—
"Price is hit!"
—and run into the thick of it, grabbing Price by the back of his vest and dragging him across the kill zone, screaming at him to run, you stupid prick, run!
He crosses his legs. Uncrosses them, only to stack them the other way. Crosses his arms instead, staring forward with eyes harder than steel and a jaw clenched so tight he might as well be grinding rocks between his molars.
The hum of the engine feels louder than it should.
And still, no one says a word.
Really, what the fuck would he even say? Price hasn't looked at him—hasn't thanked him, hasn't cursed him—just keeps sitting there staring straight ahead like the bullet went through Kyle himself instead.
Soap tries to crack a joke. Beside Kyle, across from Soap, Ghost snorts a low huff of laughter. Some shite about nine lives or something—he doesn't laugh. Doesn't blink. Just keeps watching Price, wondering when their pathetic little contest will end.
Price shifts like he can feel the weight of Kyle's scrutiny. And yet, like a fucking coward, he still doesn't lift his eyes.
— 💰🧢 —
By the time Nik gets them safely on the ground, the rain's coming in sideways. It'd started as mist while they'd hauled arse back to exfil, curling like morning breath over dewy grass, clinging to their trousers and boots as the rubber caught metal grating.
He'd caught Price, then, when the man slipped. Stumbled, just a little, on his way in, woozy from pain with rivulets of blood soaking down his sleeve. Briefly, he wonders if it's still bleeding—did the gauze hold up during the flight? He almost—almost—moves to ask, but by the time the ramp drops and the four of them step out, the rain's turned full torrential and drowned out any hope of his voice carrying.
As if it couldn't get any more fucking miserable, Price still doesn't say a word. Doesn't even glance back as his boots hit the soaked tarmac like it insulted his mother—boots heavy, gait lopsided as he cradles his arm to his chest, storming off into the heavy, sharp, soaking storm.
Briefly, Kyle wonders if he should follow. Insist that his captain see a medic, get patched up properly so infection doesn't set in—
"Hey, we're gonna head to the mess. LT said debrief could wait till we're dry and clean."
—Soap claps him on the shoulder, shaking Kyle from his thoughts and pulling his gaze away from the Captain's retreating form. "Wh—? Oh. Yeah, alright."
"You good, mate? Been glarin' a hole through Cap's head—"
"Fine." Kyle cuts him off with a wave of his hand. "You two go on ahead. Tell Ghost I'll catch up."
Soap shrugs. "If you're sure… I'll sneak a few Jammie Dodgers for ye, aye?"
"Thanks," Kyle murmurs, forcing his lips to twitch up into a smile. "Shoot me a message before debrief."
Soap darts off with a grin and a nod, mohawk plastered to his head from the driving rain as he runs to catch up with Ghost. Kyle watches them go, jealousy blooming in his chest. He and Price used to be that close—where one went, the other would be hot on his heels. Inseperable. He wasn't naieve enough to say they were best mates or anything dumb like that, but… maybe in another life, they could've been.
Hell, maybe they would've been something more.
After all, there was years of shared history, now—from that fateful night in Piccadilly to being whisked away to Russia, from Verdansk to Urzikstan to the coast of Spain and all the way to Las Almas and Chicago… they'd seen each other's lowest moments and greatest triumphs. Cried, laughed, bled, drank… they'd been so fucking close. Shared everything. Smoke breaks. Protein bars. Quiet, meaningful looks when no one was watching.
Had they meant nothing? Was that why Price was acting so fucking aloof? Had Kyle just… invented all those ideas, read too far into everything like some starry eyed rookie?
With a sigh and an eyeroll, Kyle turns his sights to the road Price had disappeared down—hunched and soaked and so fucking stupid…
"Oh, for fuck's sake," he growls, launching himself into motion to go after the thick bastard. No reason, no plan, just the bone-deep certainty that if he doesn't, if he lets Price walk away one more fucking time, if he doesn't say something right now… that'll be it.
Game fucking over.
And if he's done something to make his… his what, best friend? Closest companion? Secret keeper? Savior? Mentor?—walk away, it'll just be another nail in the coffin. The kind they build with silence, with distance, until they're an ocean away from each other, each left wondering what went wrong.
He's lost a lot of people in his life.
And he'll be damned if he lets Price be one more.
— 💰🧢 —
Kyle catches up to Price behind the motor pool, tucked far away in the back lot where no one else ever goes—the graveyard, as he and Soap always call it, filled to the brim with lorries and trucks and jeeps in various states of repair. Price lingers near a rusted shipping container in the shadow of a flickering floodlight, rain dripping from the brim of his—quite frankly ridiculous(ly adorable)—hat. Water pools in the dips of the gravel, and the embers at the end of Price's cigar ripple in the reflection.
"You shouldn't have gone in alone."
Kyle spits the words without thinking. Watches as Price flinches, his tone cutting through the storm like the bullet that tore into the man's arm. Price stiffens, shoulders rising, but doesn't turn. Just flicks a bit of ash from the end of his cigar and shakes his head.
"You shouldn't have disobeyed," he says, voice so low the rain practically swallows it.
A humourless bark of a laugh escapes Kyle. "Right. So this is about… orders, then? Sir?"
Price says nothing. And fuck, if that doesn't make something mean and ugly bubble up in Kyle's chest, because who the fuck is he to just stand there and pretend like nothing's happened?! Like they're just CO and soldier, nothing more—like nothing ever grew in the spaces between each breath.
"Another inch, and you would've been bleeding out in the dirt. Bad enough I had to drag your half-dead arse across a kill zone—but sure, that's gotten your knickers in a twist? That I broke protocol?"
"I told you to hold position."
"I saved your life, John! Least you could do is a bloody 'cheers, mate!'"
That gets him to turn. Slow. Shirt plastered to his chest, beard soaked with shining droplets, fresh red blood running trails down his arm and staining the sleeve. "I didn't ask you to."
"Yeah?" Kyle scoffs, stepping forward. "And I didn't ask to watch you nearly fucking croak, but here we are."
Price's mouth twitches. It's not a smile—it's too bitter to be. Too rueful, like this isn't the first time he's heard this same argument. For a brief moment, Kyle pauses—how many different voices have said the same things? How many different wars? How many men have given up on his stubborn, pain in the arse war dog of a Captain because they didn't know how to go toe to toe with his bullshit?
"You think this is easy for me?" Price asks lowly.
"No, but I think you've made a bloody art outta shutting people out," Kyle grumbles, rolling his eyes.
"I was trying to keep you safe."
"Oh fuck off with that! You don't get to play protector when you're too damn stubborn to protect yourself!" The moment he shouts the final word, the storm crests between them—louder, meaner, like even the bloody weather's done with this shite.
But Kyle isn't.
Not by a goddamn long shot. Someone needs to beat some sense into John Price's thick skull, and it might as well be him, right?
"You think I'm made of iron?" Kyle demands, stepping closer, leaving mere inches between his heaving chest and Price's solid form. "You think it didn't fucking gut me, listening to you scream over comms, not knowing if it was the last thing I'd ever hear—"
Price cuts him off, bristling with barely suppressed anger. "I didn't scream—"
"You did," Kyle growls back. "You bloody did. Once. And then you went fucking silent, John."
Price's eyes widen. And Kyle watches as he takes an unconscious step back, flinching like the words punched him right in the jaw.
For a long moment, there's nothing but the pouring rain smacking the blacktop and the barely restrained heaving of their chests. Neither moves to break the silence. They stand. Stare. And wait.
Kyle cracks first, shoulders dropping ever so slightly as he shakes his head. "You think I'm some kid still wet behind the ears. Someone that you've gotta save from whatever horror show's playing in your head. But you keep forgetting—I've been there too. Maybe not as long, but I've been by your side for how many years now? Did you ever stop to think that maybe I knew what I was getting into all along? That maybe I followed you into this hellscape with my eyes open?"
Price looks away, jaw working like he's chewing a particularly tough piece of steak before he shakes his head. "It's not about you."
"No," Kyle agrees, voice snapping like a whip. "It's about you. You and your damn ghosts. You and your guilt. You and this fucked up idea that if you hold everyone in your life at arm's length, they won't care that you're bleeding the fuck out."
"It's not about me, either," Price manages, swallowing hard. "I… I've… fuck. I've buried enough soldiers in my time, Garrick. I don't want you to be next. Not knowing that if you are, it's because you followed me. I… I couldn't survive it, okay? I couldn't."
Kyle's breath catches.
And suddenly… it all makes sense.
Those stolen glances—in helos, in bars, in the barracks when it's just the two of them and their demons.
The way they seem to always gravitate towards each other, like two sides of the same coin. Yin and Yang. Night and day.
How, half the time, he doesn't even need to finish a sentence before Price is on the same page, same thoughts, same ideas—
He steps in close. Close enough to feel the warmth radiating off of Price's soaked form, close enough to catch the faint tremble of the man's bearded jaw he's trying so desperately to hide, how his eyes won't quite meet Kyle's like he's on the edge of something he doesn't know how to name—
"You're not going to bury me," Kyle says carefully, each word measured and soft. "I'm not going anywhere. I chose this. I chose you. So stop acting like I'm already dead."
Price's hands twitch at his sides. "Kyle—"
"Don't fucking play with me," Kyle warns. "Okay? Don't fucking say it if you don't mean it. You know I don't do things halfway—and I learned that from you."
"I mean it."
"Then fucking say it."
— 💰🧢 —
Price's mouth opens—
Closes.
Opens again, like he's going to argue, to bark back, but the words are stuck behind his teeth and too heavy to lift. Rain runs down his face in rivulets, hat completely soaked through now as droplets carve through grime and dried blood and hang off his beard. The rest of his hair—at least, what's visible—is plastered to his forehead and to the back of his neck, curling slightly.
It's his shoulders that move, though. Sagging. Like the ghosts he's carrying on too little sleep have finally caught up to him—
—yet he doesn't look away from Kyle. Those steady blue eyes stay locked on his, world-weary yet still filled with the kind of conviction that Kyle followed all those years ago.
It's… ironic, almost. It'd been raining that night, too. And here they are, standing once again on the precipice…
"I love you."
Price's voice breaks through the downpour, rough and hoarse like it's been ripped out of him, like he had to pull it from the very marrow of his bones so it could escape— "Christ, I love you. And that bloody terrifies me, Kyle."
He hopes Price knows it terrifies him, too. It's one thing thinking it, but now? Staring it in the face? It's—
Price exhales like it's killing him to admit. Like he'd intended on carrying this to his death bed, and very nearly had. "Because the moment I let myself want you… truly, genuinely want you… that was the moment I knew I'd rather take my own sidearm and off myself than face losing you."
Kyle freezes. For a moment, he'd thought of cutting the man off and admitting it, too—and god, it's not that he doesn't want to hear it, not when it's all he's bloody dreamed of for so many long, quiet nights. He's spent years imagining this moment, so many times in so many ways, and yet not a single one of them ever felt this fucking real.
Before he knows it, he's moving. Hand curling into the front of Price's sodden shirt, fist clenched and wrapped in the fabric just below the collar like it's the only thing with any hope of keeping him upright.
"You stubborn bloody bastard," he hisses, and then surges forward until their lips slam together in the downpour.
It's messy. Their noses bump. Their teeth clash. It's sodden and clumsy and rushed, and so fucking perfect he could weep. Kyle groans against Price's chapped lips, the sound finally free after having been coiled in his ribs for months and months. Price gives as good as he gets—arms moving and only hesitating for a moment before they crush against Kyle's waist to pull him in like he's drowning and Kyle's body is the only thing that can possibly save him. The noise he lets out is almost a sob, like the wait has nearly done him in.
They kiss like it's the last chance they'll ever have. Like there's blood and thunder and death and destruction ready to rain down on their heads, and this is the last moment they'll get to hold onto before it all goes black.
It's everything. Absolutely everything. And even as they stand there in the howling storm, wrapped up in each other, they only ever break apart to breathe before diving back in. Kiss. Surface. Breathe. Repeat.
It feels like years have passed by the time their foreheads press together, yet at the same time it only feels like a brief few seconds. Kyle laughs, breathless—will there ever be enough time to get used to this? To make up for all the bullshit tip-toeing around each other they've done? Their chests heave as rain pelts their backs, as the world spins on and time marches forward—but for a heartbeat, the only thing that exists is them.
Price's voice comes quiet. Frayed. Almost shy in a way that makes Kyle want to kiss him stupid all over again just to keep him like this. "I didn't think I deserved this."
The chuckle Kyle lets out is choked and raw, just barely on this side of ending in tears as he brings a hand up to cup Price's bearded cheek, thumb brushing the edge of his jawline. "Think I'm smart enough to know what I want, Sir."
"John," Price corrects softly, though there's mirth in his eyes now as he speaks. "Unless we're taking this to bed."
"Knew it was more than just a title. Think you should buy me a pint, first, though." Kyle teases before they fall quiet again.
For a while, they just… stand there. Holding each other. Staring in the way that he's always imagined gazing into a lover's eyes, breathing in sync. The rage is gone, long gone, snuffed out by the confession that's finally crested and broken over them both, leaving them with the ache and the aftermath.
"You deserve nice things, y'know," Kyle murmurs after a while. "You're not too old or broken or whatever. You're just too bloody stubborn to look past your own nose and believe that someone might choose to stay."
A puff of air escapes Price—a laugh, as broken as it is—as he shakes his head. "When did you get so bloody wise?"
"Hangin' around with old fucks does that."
"Cheeky."
"Come on," Kyle chuckles, stepping back. "You're still bleeding. Let's get you patched up before you collapse like a Victorian heroine."
Price snorts, a wet sound through the rain. "That mean you'll carry me, next?"
"Wouldn't be the first time."
That earns him a half-smile—crooked, tired, a little pained, but real. Kyle reaches out, curling his fingers gently around Price's waist before guiding him to his side. "Romance later," he murmurs. "Let me take care of you first."
For once, Price doesn't argue. They move slow. Step for step. Rain still clinging to them like smoke. Kyle holds him close—not because he has to, but because he can.
And when he glances sideways, catches the look in Price’s eyes—soft, steady, still his—he knows:
They’re alright. Not fixed. Not finished.
But alright.
Side by side. Just like always.