Chapter Text
The cargo plane smelled like hydraulic fluid, unwashed SAS operators, and the lingering metallic tang of a job well done. It was the kind of atmosphere that usually sent the team straight into a coma, and Johnny “Soap” MacTavish was no exception.
Johnny was gone. He was slumped against the fuselage, head lolling at an angle that looked like it would require a chiropractor and a miracle to fix, his jaw slightly slack.
Gaz, currently suffering from a mix of post-mission adrenaline and the kind of boredom that only hits when you're trapped in a flying metal tube for six hours, was debating the merits of waking him up. He was leaning toward when Johnny’s phone chimed for what felt like the hundredth time this flight.
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Gaz’s eyes drifted. It wasn't snooping if the phone was practically screaming for attention, right? Then he saw the name.
Gaz’s brain stalled. Simone? With a heart?
His jaw dropped straight through the floor. Just three weeks ago, he’d sat in the rec room for two hours listening to Soap whine like a Victorian widow about the "dearth of Scottish romance" and how he was destined to die alone with nothing but a tactical knife for company.
The absolute audacity. The betrayal.
Very carefully Gaz slid the phone out from under Soap’s hand. He snapped a photo of the lock screen with his own phone.
Maya was going to lose her mind.
Now, Maya was a social force of nature. Within two weeks of Gaz accidentally admitting he had a girlfriend, she had somehow managed to track down Eleanore Price and Alana Laswell. She’d formed a localized WAG intelligence network faster than Price could plan an extraction. They had a group chat, the ‘Military WAGs’, which was mostly used for venting about the "work-husband" bond the men shared and the fact that their partners frequently came home smelling like C4 and bad decisions.
Gaz sent the photo to Maya with a single caption: JOHNNY HAS A SECRET GIRLFRIEND. WELCOME HER TO THE CHAT.
He felt like a hero. He felt like he was doing Soap a favor.
He was, in fact, not.
Six benches down, tucked into the shadows where the light didn't quite reach, Simon Riley felt his tactical vest vibrate.
He reached into his pocket, expecting a status update from Laswell or perhaps a grumpy check-in from Price. Or maybe Johnny had finally seen the light of day and woken up.
Instead, his screen was a literal wall of notifications.
Ghost stared at the screen. His heart did not skip a beat, he was a professional, but his brain definitely stalled for a solid three seconds.
He looked at the contact name. Simone.
He remembered, suddenly, the night Soap had "borrowed" his phone to "fix the settings." The idiot had changed his own name in Simon’s phone to Joanne 💙, and apparently, he’d returned the favor by changing Simon’s name in his own phone to Simone ❤️.
Ghost looked over at Gaz, who was currently wearing a look of immense self-satisfaction.
Then he looked at the chat.
Ghost’s thumb hovered over the ‘Leave Group’ button. But then he paused. If he left, Gaz would know. Gaz would ask questions. Gaz would eventually realize that "Simone" was actually a 6'3" masked lieutenant with a penchant for knives and zero interest in discussing Johnny’s inability to fold socks.
His phone buzzed again.
Ghost gripped the phone tight enough that the reinforced casing creaked. He was trapped. He was deep undercover in the most dangerous territory he had ever encountered: a group chat of military wives. And he did in fact desperately want to know what his captain did to his wife’s favourite rug
Shit.
The cargo plane hit the tarmac of the airstrip with the grace of a dropped piano, the violent jolt instantly snapping Johnny out of his medically fascinating coma.
He startled awake, inhaling a lungful of recycled air and wiping a traitorous line of drool from his chin. "I'm up," he grunted, blinking rapidly against the harsh red interior lights. "Didn't sleep a wink."
"Sure you didn't, mate," Gaz said.
Johnny rubbed his eyes, finally noticing that Gaz was hovering over him. With the exact look Gaz got right before he threw a flashbang into a room full of recruits.
"Sleep well?" Gaz asked, his voice dripping with a casual innocence that set every tactical alarm bell in Johnny's head ringing at once.
"Aye?" Johnny answered, highly suspicious. He patted his chest rig, ensuring all his knives were still there. "Why are you looking at me like I owe you money, Kyle?"
Gaz leaned in, dropping his voice to a theatrical whisper. "Just wondering if you had any sweet dreams. Maybe about a certain... Simone?"
Johnny’s brain, still sluggish from sleep and altitude, buffered. "Who the fuck is Simone?"
Gaz’s smile widened into a full, shit-eating grin. "Oh, don't play coy with me, MacTavish. 'ETA twenty minutes, get your ass up.' She sounds delightful. Feisty. Maya’s already obsessed with her."
Johnny felt the blood drain from his face, pooling somewhere around his combat boots. Simone. His eyes snapped down to his lap. His phone was sitting exactly where he’d left it, but it had shifted just enough for the screen to be visible. The lockscreen notifications were glaring at him. He knew exactly who "Simone" was.
Very, very slowly, Johnny lifted his head.
Directly across from him, Simon was sitting as still as a statue. He hadn't moved to unbuckle his harness. He hadn't reached for his gear. He was just staring at Johnny. The skull mask hid his features, but his eyes, dark, unblinking, and utterly devoid of mercy, spoke bore straight into his soul. It was the look of a man silently calculating the exact depth of a grave in the Scottish Highlands.
Oh fuck. Johnny swallowed, his throat suddenly bone-dry. His message preview settings. He’d forgotten to turn off his lockscreen previews. His terrifying, highly classified, emotionally repressed boyfriend, was currently outed as 'Simone with a heart emoji' to Gaz.
"Maya?" Johnny croaked out, his eyes still locked in a death-stare with Ghost. "What does Maya have to do with this?"
"Well," Gaz said, slapping Johnny on the shoulder, completely oblivious to the silent assassination plot forming in the air between the two men. "I couldn't just let her be lonely, could I? I sent Maya the number. She added Simone to the WAG group chat."
At that exact moment, Ghost’s tactical vest emitted a rapid, aggressive series of muffled buzzes.
Bzz. Bzz. Bzz.
Ghost did not look down at his vest. He did not break eye contact with Johnny. He simply tilted his head, a fraction of an inch.
"Yeah," Gaz chuckled, already turning to grab his duffel bag. "Maya says she’s a real firecracker. Very intense. Says she threatened to sew your mouth shut. Sounds like true love, mate."
Johnny sat perfectly still, listening to Gaz whistle happily as he walked down the cargo ramp. He looked back at Ghost, offering a weak, terrified smile.
"So..." Johnny whispered. "How're the lasses?"
Ghost finally stood up. He towered over Johnny, a mountain of black gear and impending doom. He leaned down, his face mere inches from Johnny’s ear.
"Run."