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cosmique-oddity · 2 days ago

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Phew, my last weeks of work are now complete >:)

I loved Dratchet and Ratchlock since the very beginning of my attachment towards Transformers, first TFP Ratchet…..but yeah….two of my favorites character….plus Keferon’s Mech AU…..I had to make my own thing about it.

A story….no…an illustration ! I couldn’t choose. So I did both :}

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That was not the first time Ratchet came back to his private lab angry, but this time, yelling at his superiors, and at the system, and basically at evverything that could be yelled at except the pilotd while leaving the manufacture, was certainly the last. He quit. That was enough,

you don’t win a war with feelings they said

well yes,

exactly,

but you win a war with soldier, and frying their mind before they have their first fight because you want them to be more perfectionned ? That was a little counter productive.

So he gave up. They are on their own now.

The lightly humming of his car was barely enough to keep him awake, it have been a long time since he last returned home, usually, he stayed at his work place, to have more time to sleep, but then, he was sleeping even less. An endless vicious circle, things were often like that.

But all of that was over for him.

He granted these young greenhorn with his experience, and what did they do ? Ignored his advices. Sending pilots to death. So now, he had himself out of the infernal machinery. This mindless waste of human life, even where this is what they tried to save was absurd.

In the middle of his quiet and late ride, he heard a noise. Rumbling, was it the engine ? As he stopped the car backroad to check, the noise wasnt stopping. Came from the sky, military patrol ? He raised his two tired eyes on the sky and saw a shining rail approaching his forest, falling fast. Not quintesson shaped, and with the gaze of an experimented biomechanist, Ratchet identified a mech.

At this moment, its violently crashed on the ground, behind the trees at maybe three or four miles away. No matter how hard he argued with the scientist sooner this day or how bad he wanted to say fuck to all of this death industry who killed young soldiers, he could do something for the one trapped inside the mech....maybe.... the man regained his car as fast as possible and urgently headed for the crash area.

Deafened sound of tires on the damaged road. Ratchet was already projecting, mentally stocktaking the tools he took with him, and lucky enough for the poor pilot, he quit with almost all of his material, and even if it was mainly mechs repairing material, he also bought some instruments which were used for the subtle neuromedicine between human and mech. Could adapt some of it and stabilize the pilot....then he may have the time to go home and grab proper materials. If there was life there was hope.

" bold of him to crash himself just the day i insulted all of his hierachy".

He frowned. Almost there.

The trees nearby were crushed and uprooted. A flickering pink light catched his gaze.

Almost immediately, the Ratchet analyzed the mech. It was different. He didnt know in wich country it was made but that almost looks alien. The curves and shapes, busted and burned on several places were demonstrating an incredible display of genius ingeniery he could just admiring. But time was not for being amazed on plating.

Someone was trapped there.

He stopped and parked his car in front of a fallen tree, rushing to the car's trunk, taking few indispensable objets, including some of them to help a safe disconnection between pilot/mech. In case he wasnt out already. And a crowbar, the cockpit might be stuck, seeing all the damages the mech has taken...

The sound of slightly wet grass under his feet was covered by a frenetic noise of aeration. Ratchet listened to it, while cautiously approaching the unknown mech. It almost sounded like a breath, but was certainly a depressurisation issue. The mech had fallen from so high on the sky....

The damaged plating were hot, probably from atmosphere friction. He raised his crowbar and his eyes followed the curves of the chestplates, searching for a familiar shape, that could lead him to the injured pilot inside. His gaze stopped on a deep wound, that might have cut through the cockpit.

The engineer stepped on the hot metal, his thick boots preventing him from feeling the heat, and he started searching for a hint....anything that could be a mechanism, anything that could open this damn mech !

Ratchet considered the damaged chest plate he noticed earlier. The surroundings of the wound were leaking bright pink, a very unusual color for fuel. Another of these definitively strange things about the mech. Again....not the time for that. Maybe if he could widen the gap, then he would be able to have an idea of what was going on under this armor.

He tapped the plate, -it was starting to cool down- with one of his finger. It was a very little tap, but the whole mech startled. A hiss of pain, recognisible easily by an emerite engineer-but-i-fix-people-too, it had come from the head of the mecha. Was this modele controlled from the head, like Vortex ? But Vortex was insanely huge for a mech, way taller than this one. He moved careful, noticing the shaking of his support.

"You hear me, kid ? Its going to be ok. You crashed in a safe area.".

He spoke in his medic tone, wich mean, of course brusque, serious, but also reassuring and calm.

He mumbled about the mech's features and tiny words of comfort while reaching for the head.

A red light, not regular and rather epileptic was coming from the head, and while he was almost there, on all four of his limb to keep balance, Ratchet saw it.

A spectacularly humanoid face, with sculpted nose and lips was tensed in a painful expression, frowning, but the thing who trapped his gaze was the two optics....

....staring back at him.

Mechs dont stare. Their eyes are glowing, oftenly to mimick human face, after all, human are pretty prideful creature, no point in piloting big ass metal titan if no one could tell these where their creation.

What human couldnt mimick with technologie, on the other hand, was the subtle expression between trying to evualuate a threat, his own injuries, and looking rather on the verge of death but also ready to tear any enemy's limb appart with its teeth.

With just one....very long....look at the other's eye, Ratchet was suddenly understanding what was going on.

Well....probably not but he knew what he had to save.

The pilot, the pilot he had to save.

The mech was the pilot.

He was the one he had to save.

He stopped trying to -certainly- open his chest. If it wasnt good for human it probably wasnt for living technology.

The giant technological humanoid seemed in a high distress, exhaling a lot of air from his vents, his eye still intensely staring at him and the engineer doubted his usual technique -including trying to make himself as small as possible- would work.

"Its going to be okay Kid. I can help you. There is nothing here that want to harm you".

He did his best to convey all of these emotions with his facial expression and gaze, still firmly watching back at him.

"the world better wait till im home and officially retired before killing me".

The mech's gaze -damn it was so more living than ANY human made machinery- seemed to soften a bit but still radiated with suspicion.

Deadlock had been in several bad situations. It happened quite a lot when a specie of giant aliens with tendrils tried to invade your homeland, and he was ready to it.

Trained to kill, and to do it efficiently.

And he was *good* at it.

This time was just another of these ‘i went too far in my excitation’ moments, and he has crashed on a random planet he hoped was not inhabited. He landed hard, and pieces of his ship must’ve been thrown near his location.

And now, now there was an organic like no one he ever saw, and the organic was on his *lap* and he had the kindest warmest eyes he ever saw.

And these eyes were directly looking at his own eyes, and the well named ‘Deadlock’ was starting to wonder if he finally had reunited with the Allspark. His pained and tenseful grin faded a little and he tried to move his head forward, searching a better point of view to watch the singularity in front of him.

Ow.

Moving hurt.

Some sound came out of the organic’s mouth, probably a language. He didn’t had the proper tools to decode it but the tone of the language was extremely….comforting ? Soft ?

This was scary.

He wasn’t used to be welcomed like that after a fight.

Usually it was either another fight, either the yelling of a superior, either nothing at all. But this actual living being was carefully examinating his chestplates, and he recognized the gestual of someone who was used to heal. A medic perhaps ?

He tried to move something, maybe a hand, to reach for the pale organic, to be sure he was real, but his body was rather uncooperative, from what he could say, one of his legs was missing, and a lot of wound were releasing energon on the ground he couldn’t saw.

The high probabilities of bleeding out and crash was an issue.

He let his head hang, too tired to watch for every moves of the organic, and barely aware of his environment.

There must be a big problem somewhere….

He confusely thought, while watching the stars.

Must be a bigger injury I haven’t saw……..

Ratchet saw the bright light coming from the alien’s eyes slowly fading, and cold swear ran through his back. Yet, he could still say the soldier was alive, the lights of his body were shining, not a lot, but it was enough. He looked at his first aid kit with disappointment. That wouldn’t be very efficient since the form of life he was trying to preserve wasn’t a tiny human. The nearest thing he could compare the Mech to was….well their own mechs, or eventually….Quintesson. An horrible mess of organic and technology. It was partially thanks to their weird constitution that Ratchet had been able to make sense with the ‘he is alive’ thought.

At this moment and with this material, he couldn’t help the kid, and didn’t possess enough knowledge to tell if he was even dying or not.

He had already an idea of what to do….to fix him, at least trying to, but it involved several objects he hadn’t right now. Leaving to search for these so called objects was risking to let an injured alone, he couldn’t take that risk. He was trapped with the mech, and had to hurry and find something. He stood and reached for more adapted material in his car, trying to find something…. Anything.

Surprisingly, the most useful artifact he came across was his electric screwdriver and a bunch of screw along with a long metallic cabke. A parallel between human stitch, with sewing threads and the material he had with him right now. He could manage something between human fixing and mech repairing, that was what the ‘bio’ in bioengineer stood for.

The kid would be ok. He would live and tell Ratchet why he fell from the sky, and maybe if he saw his friend Jazz….out there…….

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:)) @keferon

(I swear I’m not insane, your AU is just kinda giving me infinite drawing stamina lmao)

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lunarmothim · 11 hours ago

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shadowbound- john price x reader

part ii: soon - the truth comes out.

word count: 4.5k tags/warnings: language, abduction, canon typical violence.

It's quiet. Too quiet- all you can really hear is the creak of footsteps against the flooring downstairs, a small indication of your captors moving about. If they speak they don't do it at a volume you can hear no matter how hard you strain your ears.

It's fine. This is fine. You've gotten out of worse situations, haven't you? You were supposed to die in Al Mazrah, a bullet in your head while the Russians made off with your cargo. You didn't. You were supposed to die back in Texas, locked in a cell deep underground with no hope of escape. You didn't.

You can make it out of this.

Your options are limited, though. Breaking out of your zip cuffs would require an injury, something that would require medical attention and slow you down, and that's not even considering your chances of making it past the four men downstairs. Talking your way out of it is even less likely especially now that they know you're a former Shadow, something they don't seem to like all that much. So what's left?

You don't know. You've been in survival mode the last few months, no time to plan or prepare- not that you have that luxury now, but it's still a situation that requires some thought, and that alone gives you pause. What do I do? Figure a way out of here, obviously, but you can't quite figure out where to start, not when every thought you have has a counter-plan staring right back at you.

Well, when in doubt do what you know.

It's awkward, the shift to shimmy your wrists down to your ankles, bringing your bound hands in front of you, and for a second you worry your hips won't allow you to move your arms the way you need to. You make it somehow, immediately reaching up to yank the bag from your head.

Which brings you to the next step you're not a hundred percent sure of. You have your sight back but limited use of your hands- do you run? You're fast enough you could make it, but your mobility could present a problem until you're able to get the cuffs off. The city would be easy enough to disappear into until you could get new documents, but how hard would it be for them to find you? The military has resources, a lot more than you do at this point, and you imagine it would take them no time at all to locate and apprehend you again.

So what the fuck do you do?

You have no fucking clue, and you're not given a lot of time to think about it. The door slams open and you're looking up at the captain again. He doesn't look entirely surprised by the state you definitely hadn't been left in.

"We're moving," is all he says, stalking forward to yank you up out of your chair. Think. Think. Formulating plans on the go is your specialty, but everything you'd ever been taught is a vague memory on the edges of your subconscious, just out of reach, as he leads you through the house, down the stairs and out the front door. He doesn't bother with a blindfold when he throws you into the back of the van again, at least, nor does he change your cuffs to rebind you behind your back.

You're not sure if you should find that comforting or not.

You decide on not when it's Ghost that climbs into the back after you, his dark eyes boring into your soul.

"So," he says, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, lurching slightly when the van starts moving. Your patch is in his hand, the worn edge peeking between his fingers. "Wanna tell us what you did to Graves?"

Oh, you're not fucking ready for that. The silence between Ghost leaving you and you being dragged out to the van clearly hadn't been empty- they'd dug, found something you weren't entirely prepared to address if they know about Graves.

"Dunno what you mean," you croak out, voice breaking slightly on the syllables. He doesn't look like he believes it.

"Try again." His hand catches you by the jaw again, refusing to let you look away, refusing to give you even a second to gather your racing thoughts. They know you're a Shadow, they know about Graves. What else do they know? Do they have your file? His fingers tighten when he says your name- your full name, not just the first name you'd given the captain at the train station. They have your file.

Graves burned the files of anyone he lost. He clearly hadn't burned yours.

There's no use pretending anymore.

"You're taking me back to him, aren't you?" you whisper, staring up at him. If he's going to lie to you, you're going to make him look you in the eyes while he does it. You think of your last interaction with the commander, the barely healed scars scattered across your body. The days spent in a cell before he'd released you with the false promise of safety.

"It's just how we have to do things, doll," he drawled, dragging his palm over the deep cut on your shoulder even when you flinched away. "Gotta make sure you know how not to talk, no matter the circumstance."

You knew how not to talk. He knew that you knew how not to talk. He chose to torture you anyway.

So if this group is taking you back to Graves, you'll find a way to make them kill you along the way.

And if they won't? You'll just do it yourself.

You lunge before Ghost can react. The knife strapped to his thigh is in your hands, slicing through your cuffs in one fluid motion. In the same breath you have the back door of the van open, tucking in on yourself as you roll out onto the street- you can hear the screech of the tires, the van jerking to a halt, but you pay it no mind, leaping to your feet and sprinting back down the road. It's lined with sparse trees on either side and not much else, not a lot of options to hide.

Don't hide, your brain chides you, urging you on. Keep running.

You'd run track in school, a sprinter through and through. Always the fastest, taking first every time. It's been a while since you've needed it, but it's easy to fall back into old habits, keeping your elbows close to your body and your frame tilted slightly forward, your center of gravity kept low. Keep it close, keep it tight. Sprint like your life fucking depends on it.

The tree you pass catches the bullet shot after you. You hear it thud into the wood seconds after you duck around it, inches from your head. Too close. Keep running. There's a wheat field in the distance, tall golden stalks swaying in the breeze. Make it there and you can disappear into them, hide until they pass. Find your way back to the city, find your way out.

If only things were that simple.

A heavy weight strikes the center of your back, driving the air out of you as you crash into the ground. Your stolen knife tilts up, digging into flesh that doesn't even get a reaction beyond the hot spurt of blood across your knuckles before your arms are wrestled behind your back again. You feel the scratch of his balaclava against your cheek, his weight pinning you to the ground with ease.

"Makin' my job fun," he pants low in your ear, a hint of amusement in his tone. You struggle against his hold when he stands, hauling you up to your feet, but his grip is unrelenting. "C'mon then. Let's go."

The van is waiting in the same spot you'd left it. This time, after zip-cuffing your hands behind your back again, Ghost keeps hold of you.

"Slippery little minx, isn't she?" The captain's voice as you're shoved into the back of the van again has you bristling, wanting to rip free and strangle him with your bare hands. "You good?"

"M'solid," Ghost grunts, and you hiss when he brackets your shoulders between his knees. "Sit fuckin' still."

"Fuck you," you can't help but growl, wrenching forward until your shoulders ache. "Let me fucking go-"

"Not a chance." His tone brooks no argument, and you almost howl when he grabs you by the back of the neck, fingers digging into the sides of your throat. "Sit. Still."

What else can you do but obey? You don't relax against him, body tense against his calf and ready to run again- not that his hold on you would let you.

"Talk." It's the captain that speaks, and when you look up at him he's twisted in his seat, staring back at you.

"Eat shit, captain," you spit back, and his eyes narrow in response. "I'm not goin' back. Just fuckin' kill me."

That, it seems, gives him pause. Narrowed eyes widen slightly, really taking you in for the first time. The defiant set of your shoulders, the way you're ready to spit acid despite your captivity. He sees you, sees the way you're ready to run again, how you're ready to die. His voice drops.

"What happened." It's no longer a question, his hand twitching toward his gun. You're out of chances.

What can you do but tell him the truth?

DELIVERY ROUTE AL MAZRAH 12 AUGUST 2022, 0300

The road is dark, quiet. Not uncommon in the deserts of Al Mazrah this time of night, but still unnerving as you navigate toward the drop off point. The SUV follows a large cargo truck with a blue shipping container on the back, two more with similar cargo in front of them in the convoy. You don't know what you're transporting, but a nagging feeling in your gut tells you it's big. Important. Behind the wheel, Erikson seems to think the same.

"What are we carrying this time, Graves?" he asks, glancing at you in the rearview when you make a small noise of agreement, slightly narrowed eyes telling you to keep quiet. One curious team member asking questions is one thing, two becomes an irritation. No one likes it when Graves gets irritated.

The radio crackles with static, followed by that smooth southern drawl that to some is probably charming, but to you just feels slimy. "If I told ya, I'd have to kill ya."

"I bet he'd do it, too," Vance mutters, and you hum in agreement as you flick your gaze between the two men in the front seat and the truck in front of you. Of the members of your team Vance is the one you're closest to, the one who shares your whispered concerns about what the hell it is you're even doing these days and why you seem to be so far up Shepherd's ass you know what meal he's currently digesting. Concerns he'd only brought up to you over a stolen bottle of whiskey on the HQ rooftop, the haze of a shared cigarette hanging between you.

He's a good man, a little softer around the edges than the rest of the hardened soldiers that make up the Shadow Company. He'd told you once that he'd wanted to be a teacher, before a terrorist attack had taken down planes in New York. That he'd enlisted the next week and before long his hands were so bloody he could barely look anyone in the eye. To this day, he refuses to tell you why he decided to go private, how he'd ended up on this dark desert road transporting who the hell knows what to who the hell knows who.

Classified, Graves had told you all at the meeting before you'd shipped out, with some vague story about delivering some aid to your allies in the area. The rest is need to know.

Need to know always raises interest, makes you speculate when there's little else to focus on but making sure you aren't being followed. You can't speak for the dozens of Shadows that make up the convoy, but you know for sure that you and the other three in this SUV are all wondering what's so important that you have to transport it in the dead of night through hostile territory.

"This's nothing but a milk run, boys," Graves answers after a moment, sounding a little too smug as always. He enjoys having the upper hand, knowing things that others don't. He does throw you a bone though, edged with warning - "Guns for the good guys - you'll be back at HQ for breakfast. Don't shit the bed and there'll be bonuses all around. Find me when you're back."

While the other three answer in the affirmative, Vance and Erikson bumping fists, you stare out the window at the black windows of the abandoned buildings you're driving past, eyes scanning for anything out of place. Something about this just isn't sitting right with you, even more so when the radio crackles again and Graves informs you that Shepherd's waiting for a sitrep.

"Three containers..." Vance muses, and when your eyes shift to him, his own gaze is fixed on the shipping container in front of you, contemplative. His face is obscured by his balaclava and shadows, but you can see the corner of his jaw working behind the black fabric, slowly clenching and unclenching. He's on edge, too.

"That's a lotta fuckin' milk," Dipaolo agrees from where he's sitting next to you, and you can see his wry grin bunching up the balaclava at the corners of his mouth.

"Thirsty friends," Erikson responds with a slight shrug, radioing in to Shepherd with the sitrep, who warns them much like Graves had not to fail. That alone rings alarm bells in your head, but before you can voice them Vance beats you to the punch.

"Do not fail...? Told you this shit was important," he says, and when his green eyes meet yours in the rearview, you can see the worry buried in the furrow of his brows. You're sure his mouth is pressed into a tight line beneath the balaclava.

The cargo truck in front of you comes to a sudden stop, drawing all of your attention forward. You weren't supposed to stop, had been ordered to keep moving no matter what. Doesn't matter if there's a civvy, just drive through them, Graves had said. Fucking sick, you'd muttered under your breath in response.

"What's this?" Dipaolo asks, his grip tightening on his rifle as he glances between the stopped truck and Erikson, white-knuckled on the wheel.

"Three, this is Erikson, what's up?" the driver demands into the radio, fingers of one hand loosening to twitch toward the sidearm strapped to his thigh. Nothing but a crackle of static for two very long seconds, before 3-1's voice comes back.

"Got a vehicle in the road," he reports, followed by voices calling out loudly in Arabic.

"Stand by, comin' to ya." Erikson spins the wheel and carefully pulls around the cargo truck, and if the alarm bells weren't sounding before, they're practically screaming now - it's only you and the SUV behind you bringing up the rear of the convoy, and all of this feels like a trap. But Erikson is the superior in this car, it's his call. Still...

"Is this the best idea?" you ask quietly, shifting your rifle in your lap as you creep up alongside the stopped convoy toward the commotion at the front. "Weakening the rear like this?"

"Not your call," Vance warns, a flash of green in the rearview again. You can see the same unease you feel reflected in what little you can see of his face as he picks up the radio. "Graves, Vance - be advised, we're held up, sortin' it out now."

"Handle it - keep the line movin'." The look Vance gives as he acknowledges Graves' response says see? We're solid. You don't feel solid. You feel like the earth is about to open up beneath your feet, even more so when you reach the front and see the brake lights of 3-1's armored truck, doors open as he stands in the road trying to coax the driver of the heavy cargo truck blocking the road at an angle out of the way in broken Arabic.

"I don't like this," Erikson says quietly, glancing back at you. For the first time since the convoy had stopped, you can see a hint of unease in his brown eyes.

"Something's wrong," you murmur in agreement, fingers tightening on your rifle as your wary eyes stare ahead at the vehicle blocking the road, the lone Shadow trying and failing to convey the urgency with which he needs them to move. His Arabic is atrocious, an obvious fact that probably isn't helping matters, but even his bastardized accent and butchered words are clear - the person in the vehicle needs to move, and move now. But he doesn't, and that alone has the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end.

"Dipaolo, Harbinger, lean out and cover him," Erikson orders, and without hesitation Dipaolo hauls himself up into the open window, leaning out to raise his M4 at the situation in front of them. You mirror him on the opposite side, staring down your sights as the people blocking the road continue to refuse to move.

"We need a 'terp out here, what's the call sir?" 3-1 asks, sounding frustrated as another yelled order goes ignored. Your finger shifts off the trigger guard, wary eyes taking in everything - from the lone man standing near the tailgate of the truck, his two friends peering casually over the back to the man in the road... wrong. Something's wrong. Your instincts are screaming at you, but you tamp them down as you wait for orders.

"Vance, Dipaolo, go help him out," Erikson orders, gesturing to 3-1, who's yelling again. "Harbinger, cover from here."

"Aye sir," you answer, tensing as the door starts to open - and then gunfire erupts. You can barely tell up from down as you return fire, zeroing in on a man who's emerged from a hatch on the top of the body of the truck. 3-1 goes down in the mayhem, and several more enemies pour out of the surrounding shadows.

You barely hear your teammates yelling around you over the rush of blood in your ears, the explosive sound of gunfire echoing off the nearby buildings. The muzzle flash has a strobe-like effect, making you nauseous as you duck back down into the SUV to reload.

"Back up, back up!" Vance is yelling. His voice distant, like it's coming from the far end of a long tunnel. You can't focus on it, can't focus on anything but slamming the magazine into your rifle and leaning out the window again to cover your retreat from the truck that had driven into the road in front of you, full of enemy reinforcements.

Above it all, two voices stand out - Graves ordering you to eliminate the threat, and Shepherd... prioritizing the cargo. Something is wrong.

And then everything explodes in a spray of metal, fire and blood and body parts. Ears ringing, you throw yourself back into the vehicle as Erikson tries to maneuver you out of there. You can see the muzzle flash, your team's mouths moving, but all you hear is the ringing. When you reach up to touch your ear, your gloved fingers come away bloody.

Your eyes meet Vance's when your escape route is blocked off, the car jolting as Erikson throws it in reverse, and the last thing you see is Vance's masked face as the flare of the RPG lights the interior of the car, sending it end over end.

141 TRANSPORT PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC 06 DECEMBER 2024, 1830

"I was the only survivor," you tell the Captain quietly. The van had been silent as you told your story. You hadn't wanted to share it at all, but now that you had, it feels almost... cathartic. An outlet for the trauma of what had happened then and what had come after. "I woke up at a field hospital in Urzikstan two, three weeks later? Still not sure, it's all pretty fuzzy. Graves was there, which seemed pretty normal at first. He's a smarmy asshole but no one can say he doesn't care about his team. He was livid with Shepherd for not sending backup. We lost a lot of good men that day.

It wasn't until we were back on base that things started to change. He got quiet, even more secretive than before. Had a lot of closed door meetings with Shepherd, and one fine Thursday morning, he called me into his office. Wanted to hear again what I remembered about the attack. About the cargo. I, like an idiot, voiced my suspicions. Earned myself a one way trip to a cell for it. He did fight Shepherd about killing me, but in the end Shepherd won. In his words, I knew too much.

While the rest of Shadow Company headed out for a mission in Mexico, a dozen of them stayed behind to deal with me. I killed them and dragged their bodies into his office before I escaped. Little message for him. If I had to guess, he decided to just kill me in retaliation. Knew he'd never be able to find me, so he sent someone else to do his dirty work."

Wringing your hands, you stare out one of the two small windows set in the back doors of the van, watching a middle-aged woman in the sedan behind you yelling into her phone, swerving slightly in her anger. It seems so... normal. So mundane. You wonder what has the woman so pissed.

"Why give us so much attitude then?" It's the Captain that speaks. You glance over at him again, note the way his brow furrows as he studies you from beneath the brim of his boonie hat. You can't read his expression fully, but he looks conflicted.

"Don't know you, don't trust you," you answer simply, holding his gaze steadily. Your fear from the train station is long gone, and now you're just tired.

His expression flashes with understanding before smoothing into something unreadable again. "I see."

"Yeah." You study him for a moment, watching the corner of his jaw twitch, the way he rubs at his beard. "I'm not your enemy, you know."

"Do I?" His eyes are exhausted, deep blue staring into yours.

"You should." You want to go home. You want to sleep for a week, take a second to gather your thoughts before you have to move again. You can't help the way it bleeds into your words. "I'm fuckin' tired, Captain. I miss home."

"Where is home?" It's an innocent question, innocuous. It's a window into your soul.

"I don't know anymore." It comes out a whisper, a quiet breath. You haven't had anything to call yours beyond a small room on base in a very long time, the Shadows the only home you'd cared about. You rip your gaze back, staring out the window again. "Born in Minnesota, moved around a lot growing up. Had an apartment in Texas, near Dallas. Didn't much care for it, if m'honest."

"That why you joined the military?"

"S'pose." You don't want to answer the captain's questions but his voice makes it hard, deep and gravelly and demanding answers. "Family's more likely, maybe. Dad was a Marine, made me want to be one too. Went through MARSOC training with Graves. Fuckin' asshole, if m'honest-"

"We know." The Scot is the one to reply, surprisingly, and you glance up to find icy blue eyes staring back. "Nearly killed us." "Bit of a habit of his, isn't it?" you muse, glancing back down again. You hadn't been expecting to find a kindred spirit in this, spewing as much vitriol as you already felt toward Graves. You almost wonder what they'd say if you told them what Graves had threatened to do to you. "Heard he went a bit nuts after Mexico."

"My doin'," the Scot murmurs proudly, and your eyes track over to him once more. Up close like this you can see a scar on his head, the starburst of a gunshot wound. "Blew 'im up."

"Shame it didn't stick," you reply quietly, and his grin drops. They obviously have some kind of connection with Graves too, just as contentious as yours. You won't question it, but you're glad for that little bit of camaraderie. "Next time."

"Next time," Mohawk agrees, and you can't help the tiny smile that splits across your lips at the promise, vague as it is.

It's a flicker of hope. You can't help but latch onto it.

"Can't keep callin' you Mohawk," you murmur out loud, glancing between him and the black man sitting next to him opposite you, your shoulder still pressed into Ghost's knee. "You know my name, sems fair I know yours."

"Soap," he answers after a moment. You don't miss the way his eyes flick between Ghost and Mutton Chops up in the driver's seat. "Captain Price, Gaz, Ghost." You catalogue the names with the men- it's easy with what you know already. Price. The captain's eyes meet yours in the mirror, stormy blue.

"Harbinger," you reply quietly, drawing your legs in. They know it already, if they have your file. It still makes you feel at least a little better, makes you feel like you have even the smallest iota of control.

You keep your hold on the captain long after he's looked back at the road. He looks like he's in charge, turbulent eyes and tense shoulders. If you have even a chance at freedom he's probably the one that will decide, the one that will either order his men to kill you or let you go. You're not holding your breath either way.

"I'm not goin' back." You don't mean it to be rude, but it's true. "Graves can eat a bag of dicks."

"Not takin' you to Graves," Soap tells you, and you almost believe it. Almost.

"Then where?" They won't keep you in Prague. You know that, know the playbook they're working with. Their base is the most likely option, or some kind of middle ground with the agencies that wanted you in the first place. So where? Their accents scream UK.

The van stops. Ghost confirms it, his hand tightening on the back of your neck several minutes before he hauls you out of the vehicle and on to the tarmac. You see the plane you've been brought to, small and private, and it brings you back to the thought of who'd brought you here- you're a hot commodity and you know it, but the question is which three letter agency wants you the most?

They don't tell you. You're given no idea of your destination, no clue who blocks your path. All you know is the firm hold on the back of your neck, Ghost keeping you close. You want to throttle him for it.

Soon.

part one - masterlist - part two

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#john price #john price x reader #captain price x reader #captain john price x reader #ktwrites #shadowbound #:D

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