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[nottheboss]

It's late at night. The corridors aren't quiet; they're full of men and women restlessly trying to sleep in their quarters. Bossie should be one of them. But instead he slips barefoot down the hallway to Carver's room, where he knocks.

"Hey, man, you up?"

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[nottheboss]

He can't help being shy. He puts on a brave face when his brothers are around, gets in on bull sessions as loud as anyone. But it's all bravado. And they all know it.

He lays his head on Gabe's shoulder. "So he's never going to respect me like he does you," he says softly. Accepting it. He accepted his own real father would never respect him, soldier or no.

[minuteofangle]

Gabe just hums and cups his hand to the back of Bossie's skull. Holding him, steadying him, just as Bossie holds the kitten. Symmetry, he thinks. This is how it goes.

"I'm saying he's never gonna make you an officer," Gabe replies gently. "And I'm sorry for that. So the question now is, what'd you want from him? Do you want him to treat you like Shaw? Because that means you gotta be like Shaw and that shit's exhausting. So, I want you to think about what you need. From him, from me, from this job. You want a place? You got a place. You'll have it until the end of days if that's what you need. You want to be in the command staff? That's gonna be hard, but if you want it, we could probably get you there in a few years. You want Pope to be the dad you never had?"

Gabe sucks on his teeth.

"I don't think any of us get that, kid. But it's okay to want it."

[nottheboss]

The dad he never had. Yeah, he craves that. It feels like a hole in him that could somehow be mended if he just had Pope's approval. There are moments where he feels Pope's pride like a warm light inside of him.

He draws in a breath; it shudders, a little. "I just want to be a good soldier. I just...want that to be enough. For everyone."

[minuteofangle]

He can feel that shiver. The way that Bossie quakes ever so slightly. And he sighs and then he leans in and kisses the top of Bossie's head the way Carver does when he thinks nobody's around to watch.

"You're good in the field. And you know me, I only bullshit people for fun." Gabe hums thoughtfully. "But you have a hard time when you gotta stand up and report back to him, huh? It always been like that? Not just with Pope. I mean the other officers."

[nottheboss]

"Yeah," he says very quietly. "Always been that way. Even when I was a kid."

That's how he feels when Pope calls him out. Like a little kid in boots he doesn't fit in. Like a fake.

"It's easier with Shaw and Carver. Reporting to them." Because they've never really hurt him, never ordered him to be drowned. Never screamed at him.

[minuteofangle]

"Okay," Gabe replies softly. He squeezes the back of Bossie's neck, hoping it's reassuring. In some ways, none of this is a surprise. Big sister and big brother always have Bossie's back. They might rag on him if he fucks up, but they don't scream and they don't throw shit. They don't hit their subordinates. "Okay. Thing is, kid, sometimes you gotta report to Pope. And he doesn't like it when people get scared of him, which is making you get nervous and tense up, which is making him pissy. And it's going round and round."

A cycle neither can stop.

"Now here's another question, and I want you to really think about this one: do you want me to coach you through that? Because I'll do that. I'll work with you if that's what you want. But you gotta commit all the way and it's gonna be hard. You wanna keep your head down and focus on your field tactics, be the meanest operator who ever was? You can do that, too. That's your choice. Hell, you wanna start building pieces for yourself outside of this life, I'll help you with that, too. But you gotta make the decision, I can't make it for you."

[nottheboss]

The easiest thing would be to just keep his head down and focus on what he does right. It's what he's been doing since Afghanistan. But where has it really taken him?

He sighs and closes his eyes. He's so touch starved that Gabe's fingers on the back of his neck send pleasant tingles through his skin.

"Teach me to be better," he murmurs. "I love this life we have here. I can't...I can't think of ever being away from you all. No matter what. So I want to learn to be better."

[minuteofangle]

“Okay, kid,” Gabe replies gently. Everyone in his orbit is in such goddamn awful pain and sometimes he feels helpless against the tide of it all. But this? This is something real. This, he can do. He keeps rubbing Bossie’s neck. “Hey, you wanna hear a secret? Promise you won’t tell the others.”

[nottheboss]

He has the kitten asleep in one hand. His other hand rubs Gabe's side in absent circles. He's thinking about how good it feels to just be here, with someone he trusts.

"From you?" He smiles at him. "Is it juicy?"

[minuteofangle]

"Mhmm, no. Just something I don't want you passing around."

Not that Bossie's much of a gossip. Some of the others are. Gabe hums a little.

"Shaw and Pope coached Carver before he went up for sergeant. Not on tactics or the test, he had that shit locked down. But how to talk to people. How to hold himself when he's in front of other officers, how to move like a leader. And I mean they coached him. It didn't come natural. He didn't learn it watching YouTube. They drilled him. And it's not their fault it didn't work out, that's not the point. The point is, he had people showing him the way. He didn't walk out here one day knowing how to do the shit he does. And that's okay, you know? That's how it works. You can learn this shit."

[nottheboss]

There's no small amount of hero worship in Bossie for Carver. Hearing this is like seeing the world tilt just a little. The idea that Carver needed help with people, similar to how Bossie needs it now, sits in a strange, reassuring space in his mind.

"He's so damn good at it now, though," he marvels. Everyone knows it was racist bullshit that Carver never got that promotion, and everyone resents the Army for it. Even though it means that they have Carver in the Reapers now; he might not have left with Pope otherwise.

[minuteofangle]

"He is," Gabe admits. Man's got a temper like a forest fire and no off switch, but Carver gets shit done. More important than that, Carver's got a way with people. He knows when to fall in line but he knows when it's time to make the calls himself, too. And when it matters, when it really fucking matters, he knows how to make a soldier out of a scared kid without beating the shit out of anybody.

And that's a rare talent in a world like this. An important one.

"So, I want you to think about that, Bossie. I want you to really think about what you want. Because I can coach you, and Carver can help. Shaw, too, I'll get her on board. And they can show you how to talk the talk, but you gotta be sure that's what you want."

[nottheboss]

"It is," he says urgently, holding onto Gabe. "I don't want to be the weak link. I don't want to be the bitch in the group, you know? I want to be able to handle myself off the field."

If Carver could learn to hold his temper, maybe Bossie can learn not to shrink under scrutiny.

"You got so much going on, man, this won't...be any trouble for you will it?"

[minuteofangle]

"You're not the weak link, man, we don't run with bitches."

But he's soft in a way that Pope disdains, and there's no denying that. Gabe sighs and runs his fingers through Bossie's hair. Wondering what the hell he's gotten himself into, again.

"But we can get you to talk the talk," he continues. "It'll be good for the whole crew. Give you some more responsibility. Everybody wins."

It's a dodge. It doesn't really answer Bossie's question. But what other choice is there? They have to take care of their own.

[nottheboss]

He hears the thing Gabe isn't saying and he holds him a little tighter. "If I start dragging you down...cut me loose. Okay?" He won't be responsible for hurting Gabe, even if it's just by adding more stress onto a man who has become the glue for so many troubled soldiers in their group.

[minuteofangle]

Aw, shit. Gabe hums a little and rests his hand on the top of Bossie's head. Then he flicks Bossie's ear.

"We don't cut people loose, man. Ya'll took me in when I was nothing but a fuckup stranger and I still can't do paperwork without somebody helping me. We're Reapers, we take care of our own. Don't ever doubt that, don't ever forget it - not for a second."

[nottheboss]

"Yeah I just... I know Austin needs you a lot right now. Carver, too." Men who were tortured by demons. Real problems.

[minuteofangle]

"I know."

Gabe breathes out slow. Goddamn, does he know. Austin needs him because Austin's brittle as glass right now. Carver needs them, too, all of them, and they've gotta be so goddamn careful about it because Carver could kill somebody without meaning to if he startles wrong. Nobody's sleeping right, or enough, everyone's on edge.

But this is the job. This is the work.

"So, I'm gonna need your help. I'm gonna need you to watch Carver's back. Think you can do that for me? And when Austin's ready, I'm gonna need you to do that for him, too."

[nottheboss]

"Yeah." A definitive nod. "I've got Carver. And when Austin's okay--you just tell me when and I've got him, too."

They're Reapers. They don't cut each other loose.

"You gonna let me watch your back too, though, right?"

[minuteofangle]

"Good man," Gabe murmurs, and he kisses the top of Bossie's head again. Gentle. "And I will. Promise. So you gotta come kick my ass if I'm being an idiot, okay?"

[nottheboss]

He is, somehow, so relaxed now, despite everything. Despite the threat they're all constantly under. He is boneless against Gabe, trusting him as utterly as the kittens do.

"I will," he says, his voice a little drowsy. "Starting with how much sleep you getting these days, Fifty?"

[minuteofangle]

"Ooh. Going right for the throat, huh?"

But this is part of it. They take care of each other. They promised. Gabe cycles his tech, feeling Bossie relax against him. Some of that tension bleeding out.

"Not much," he admits. "But I'm working on it. I bunk with Mancea and that helps."

[nottheboss]

No one's sleeping much these days. It's bad, he thinks. It can't go on forever like this but there's no end in sight to it all either.

"Yeah? He takes good care of you?" He hopes so. Gabe deserves it, for everything he does for the others.

[minuteofangle]

"He does," Gabe admits. "And it's funny, I know. Me and him. You'd hardly think it'd work, right? But it does. We balance each other out. And he holds me, kid..."

There's a quiet sort of wonder in Gabe's voice then.

"He holds me when I'm scared. And I hold him."

[nottheboss]

"Before you came along I thought he was a monk or something," he says with a little grin. "We'd have parties and we could bring a plus one, and he never did. I'd bring a girl, you know, as a beard--he never did that either. I had no idea he was into anyone, especially men, until you came along."

And as for who he would have thought Gabe's type was? Well, Mancea wasn't anywhere on that list. But they do work. He can hear it in Gabe's voice the good way they work together.