#adler x reader

[littlemissclandestine]

ASK: ahhh i’m obsessed w ur adler headcanons!! pretty pretty plsss could we have more soft!adler headcanons? or maybe a few headcanons for how adler might react to realising he’s slowly falling for bell!reader before they discover the brainwash twist?? 🥺👉👈 either way just wanna express my appreciation for how you characterise him!! <3

Author's Note: Tehe back at it idk. This was an ask I got months ago but just had incredibly bad writer's and art block. Trying to get those creative juices flowing again! Thank you so much for the ask and the kind comments anon. I really really appreciate it. Hope you enjoy! <3 (your ask disappeared after i put it into Tumblr drafts??)

More Soft!Adler Headcanons:

In the morning before work, Russell wakes up a little earlier than you to spend some more time on his appearance. You see him shaving his few day old stubble and decide to help him out, taking the razor. He’d study your facial expression as you concentrate on going round each jagged edge of his scar, making sure to not cut him. His blue eyes tracing every little mark on your face, absolutely in awe of how beautiful you are even when you furrow your brows and he’d gently push a strand or two of hair out the way that had fallen over your eye. As you rinse the blade under the tap, he’d grab your chin and peck your lips, getting the taste of shaving foam in your mouth and you two would laugh about it.

I can imagine in Winter, Russell and his s/o ordering hot chocolate with some cream on top/coffee, walking and talking. When he notices your cream/foam moustache, he chuckles to himself but you pay it no mind, thinking it was his response to something you said. But he chuckles again and you question him. -> “Oh uh nothing. You just uh…got a little um...hold on.” He’d lean in and lick your lips before planting a kiss on them and leaning back to look at you with a smile, leaving you dumbfounded.

Witty jokes and comments that make you think how the hell did he come up with that one are definitely on the menu. Russell will sometimes randomly just burst into Russian or German mode and will try and teach you some words and jokes too. Mostly the swear words because everybody wants to know the swear words 

Adler and his fellow operatives were chatting one day in public with their gear on as they were on their way back to a hotel for the night before their early morning flight but the sight of kids running up to him caught his eye. They asked him questions, the usual ones, the story behind the scar and what he does for a living. At first, he wasn’t exactly the warmest towards them but when one of the kids begged him to pick them up, he grumbled and gave in, watching them just take his sunglasses and the other asking if they could touch the scar, earning a smile from him. Him an his group sat down and spent some time kicking a ball around and taking the time out for the children before they had to head back. Adler gave them all fistbumps and bent down to plant a cap on one of their heads with a wink and a side smile -> “Keep it. I don’t need it, kid.”

Slowly falling for Bell!Reader Headcanons: Part 1

Russell Adler didn’t think it was possible to be honest. Him falling for another person. Always thought of himself as a lone wolf after his divorce. Never took any interest in dates or anything because he simply didn’t have the time and partly due to a fear of being hurt again that he refused to acknowledge

Yet he found himself weirdly drawn to you. Maybe it was a sick and twisted fantasy of his, the visage of him being a human, cracking with every fleeting touch. The true monster in him seeping out, revealing his true colours

When he picked you up and out of the SUV in Trabzon, he felt nothing. Perhaps some sense of accomplishment as he was one step closer to locating the man he’d been chasing for 13 years but nothing more. As the initial interrogations continued in a secure location and your balaclava was yanked off by his own hands, a part of him knew he’d get attached when he saw you, in your rawest form  but he quickly pushed that thought away as fast as it appeared in his mind. But it’d creep up every now and then during the experimentation as he’d speak into the microphone and exhale the smoke through his nose as he stared at you through the glass, watching you carefully before dipping his head as he hears you let out a gut-wrenching scream and struggle in the chair, putting out his cigarette and calling it a day.

He’d catch a whiff of your perfume nearby to where he was working in the safehouse. The perfume on your wrists stayed behind on the desk after your leaned over to pass him something or rested your forearms on the desk. The subtle scent of your shampoo and body wash in the bathroom, lingering in the air. He’d inhale deeply and close his eyes, imagining you as his head resting on the back of his chair for a few moments before he stopped himself and his eyes snapped open, making sure nobody was nearby as if he was scared someone could read his thoughts.

A candle you’d left on for him as he worked late into the night once was never forgotten. Adler would relight it to remind himself of you when you were gone on a mission with the others, telling himself it’s just because it smells nice.

A Brick in the Wall: As Bell took photos of Kraus, Russell would glance over at her, watch you paying attention, adjusting the camera lens, sticking your tongue out as the camera shutter clicked and a small smile would creep onto his lips before he looked away and cleared his throat, giving you your next order. God, what was he thinking?

Some things however were just pure protective instinct. Like grabbing your forearm to pull you away from the railing as you stepped up onto to look over the edge of a balcony at night. He needed you alive for the mission of course, no other reason

 Or when he’d tuck his extra magazines into your ammo packs and make sure all your straps and harness were tight enough. Or even holding his arm out and across your chest when he had to hit the brakes hard while driving with a gentle you okay? after a few beats of silence

Or when he’d bought some food and you were out of it after an MK-Ultra session during the early days and he’d give you a little extra without a word to keep your strength up, looking into your eyes briefly as you cried but the guilt was creeping up on him and he’d leave before you sobbed. He’d close the door just as you burst into tears, his hand on the doorknob behind him and he’d sigh deeply, his eyes shut, trying to compose himself before walking off to find Park. They’re just a red. He’d remind himself constantly. But just a kid too…

Desperate Measures: As Belikov let the two of you in and you took out the guards and changed into their uniforms, he couldn’t help but sneak a few glances. Before you walked up the stairs, he stopped you and checked you over, head to toe, the expression on his face neutral but his mind was in overdrive. Russell took a step closer and his hands found the bottom of your skirt and tugged on it, pulling it down so it revealed less. A single nod and his lips a thin line before he turned and walked off. He refused to admit he didn’t want anyone looking at you the way he did.

He finds himself a little self conscious. This isn’t like him..since when was Russell motherfuckin’ Adler worried about the way he was perceived by a red of all people? Putting more aftershave on himself, a spray of cologne to mask the smell of cigarettes that had found its way into his clothing after years of the bad habit. A quick check in the mirror to adjust his outfit and hair before pushing the bridge of his sunglasses up and into place

Safe to say, you took him by surprise. He was of course impressed by your combat and cryptography skills as well as endurance during MK-Ultra, thinking it was such a shame you were on the wrong side. Began thinking of what-ifs…

After one particularly gruelling session, you were screaming and refusing to take the pills that Park was giving you to help you sleep, saying they made you want to vomit and the anti-sickness was not doing anything but Park explained that she couldn’t do much about it. Russell heard this from the other side of the door as he walked past your room late at night, telling Sims to source a different medicine he knew of. The next day, he entered your room as you wailed again, thrashing against your cot and he adminstered a dose, barely speaking to you before leaving again but as you clutched his hand, he rubbed his thumb across the back of your hand before letting go. Your touch overwhelmed him.

When he’d see you hang out and play poker or some board games with the others as he was filing reports and chasing up contacts, a tiny frown would form on his face, he’d start picking at the skin on his lips as he watched them or he’d look down and dust his pants off or fiddle with a pen, anything to distract himself from the green-eyed monster

If he heard you singing a song in the other room, he’d put it on for you in the car without a word spoken, you just staring at Adler as if to say how did you know that?

On one chilly night, you fell asleep in the dark room and Adler stood there in the doorway, looking at you, your breathing steady, face rid of anguish and you looked at peace in the red light. Slowly, he made his way over and draped his jacket round your shoulders, thinking to himself it’s just what any decent person would do. Can’t have his tool catching a cold now…

During stakeouts, Russell would start telling you random facts about himself he’s never told another person, saying to himself you’ll be gone soon anyways, that you were an outsider so that’s why it was easier to talk to you.

This feeling he had only seemed to grow with each mission. Instead of letting the others help you out when injured, he’d grip your shoulder as soon as they got in, steering you towards the nearest stool before anyone had a chance to say anything and command you to sit, treating you like the dog you are while he fetched the supplies.

As the weeks passed, he’d take you to your room and patch you up there, wanting some one-on-one time with you, making casual conversation, half to distract you from the pain and half to suppress the thoughts going round in his mind about being so close to losing you

He made you laugh once or twice and couldn’t stop thinking about it. It sounded even better than when Woods or the other crew members made you laugh and it made him smile to which you pointed out but he stood up and left shortly after, his standard, stoic expression returning to his face

Adler would stay up on a few occasions to make sure you slept, scanning your face as the pills began to take effect, his arms folded as he stood, looming over you, his finger scratching at his arm even though it wasn’t itchy. It was just unease which he consistently pushed down but he noticed he was getting more fidgety when it came to you. Almost like the guilt was eating him from the inside out. He’d take off his watch, place his cigs on the side and settle into a chair, telling himself it’s just for a few minutes but once he did stay the whole night, leaving before the others woke up. Nobody ever knew

If you ever asked about your time together as friends and during Vietnam when you’d having trouble remembering, he’d keep it short and sweet, but every now and then he’d make up something that was what he wished it would have been like. Nothing too out there.

During mission briefings, he’d find himself laying his attention on you the most as he talked, wanting to know you were really listening to him and secretly asking for your input too and once the others had returned to what they were doing before, he’d pull you to the side, asking you if you were okay with the plan and if there’s anything you need to go over. I mean, you were the main star of course so it makes sense but his hand would reach for your upper arm and then retract. Boundaries, Adler…

One thing that killed him though was the fact that you only ever grabbed him out of fear, during MK-Ultra when you didn’t want him to leave, when in agony from a gunshot wound, or just as you dropped off to sleep after he injected your when you were being disobedient. Couldn’t admit he wanted you to grab onto him in desperation as he- Get a grip, Adler! When did he start thinking of you like that?

After Cuba, he felt nothing. No sense of accomplishment yet as he was one step further away from locating the man he’d been chasing for 13 years but now he was two steps closer to saying goodbye to you for good…

[altcvnningham]

canis major

adler x bell!reader

summary: adler doesn’t go back to berlin to forget, but he isn’t so eager to remember, either. after leaving you for dead on that clifftop in the arctic, he knows best to leave the past well alone. too bad that past seems to be alive and walking right in front of him; though where he wants to forget, it seems you’ve already beaten him to the punch. or; bell survives solovetsky and only has a hole in her head and amnesia to show for it. read on ao3

tags/cw: bell!reader, amnesia, light angst, referenced adlerbell, somehow bell survives the ending of cw, adler can't let shit go, adler is not capable of remorse but mayyybe a lil guilt?? dog symbolism always, no pairing yet but hopefully i continue this as a spicy drabble series idk wc: 2.7k

a/n: sooo this is my first fic for the cod fandom and the first fic i've posted online in a long time so hopefully this lil ramble suffices!! i've had adlerbell brainrot and wanted to get at least something out before bo6 ruins all of my headcanons so here's a snippet of something i hopefully find the motivation to continue into a mini series. enjoy :')

Sometimes, he goes back to Berlin.

Stumbling out of the muggy bar into the dank alleyway out the back, Adler fishes out a pack of cigarettes from the front of his jacket; two firm knocks of it against his palm before he plucks one out with his mouth, pockets the box, and flips open his lighter. The clink of the metal echoes into the empty around him, the sudden quiet suffused with the sounds of passing cars on the street, muffled laughter from inside the bar, and the distant barking of dogs. Strays.

The cigarette ignites, glowing a cherry red, and he gasps around the filter greedily. Upon exhale, he sighs.

Adler isn’t a sentimental man by any means. What little he clings to, he does so with a loose grip, less than happy but stolid enough to allow whatever else he deems unnecessary slip through his fingers. Places, people. Things. Memories. Tucks the important things- logic, rationality, work, duty- into orderly compartments at the forefront of his mind, archived and marked off ‘til he needs it, while the rest, the mess, gets done away with, thrown into the great black gorge of oblivion. Anything else that stays- more often than not a thorn in his side, an unbidden, wriggling tumour he can’t find let alone cut out- is sequestered to a dark aperture in the back of his mind, anchored deep where it can’t come back up. Yet somehow, some nights, they always do. The smell of his ex-wife’s hair. The day he got his scar. Vietnam. The lab. Solovetsky—

The next word, the name, forks across his mind like lightning, and he bites his tongue before he can think it. It sits at the back of his mouth, nestled like an aching cavity in his molars. A tremulous breath that he forces down with another drag of his cigarette. Out with the rest. Out with the rest.

The barking doesn’t cease. Dogs, a pair of them, he can hear a couple streets over. He pictures them from the gravelly register of their snarling- maybe German Shepherds, a Bullmastiff or a Rottweiler. Their fight enunciated by the violent rattling of chain-link fences, segregated, the only threshold that keeps teeth from necks.

But no, not a sentimental man. He tells himself that the itch to revisit Berlin every Summer is for superficial reasons, and by no means is renting out a shithole hotel room opposite a sewer-laden river considered a vacation from anything other than the luxuries he gorges himself mindlessly on at home- maybe this is to keep him humble, more than anything. It doesn’t do well to remind himself of old times, not when he’s lived the life he has. Remembering seldom accompanies itself with the bittersweetness of reminiscence, and the taste it leaves in his mouth is always acrid. He doesn’t miss Berlin any more than he misses that dismal safehouse, or that sterile room he wheeled you into, questioned- tortured- no, interrogated- well, he doesn’t care to remind himself of the picture. Or the person he strapped to the gurney. But he catches himself thinking back to the city divided more than he likes to admit, and for whatever ostensible reason it is that drags him back here, he relents to it every time.

He tells himself it’s the weather, the cool rain a nice reprieve from the scorching California heat. Or that the food is better, not so much overprocessed shit and sugars. Can take his coffee as black as he likes without the waitress turning her nose up about it and double-triple-checking if he’s sure. And it’s the people, maybe, who leave him well enough alone. Or the drinks. The views, some places. The- air.

Not like Arctic air. Not like—

The one dog’s snarl rips bloodcurdling through the night, all froth and venom, and as the chain-link fence screeches and judders in its rusted welding the other mutt quiets a moment. Cowers under the meaner dog’s ferocity. Then, like it had been wounded, it lets out a low, anguished howl, beast reduced to a scared little pup. Adler holds the smoke in his chest around a stifled breath anticipating a release. But the first dog just grumbles, the fence clinks, and there isn’t much noise after that.

But the quiet doesn’t last long- just as Adler drops his cigarette and snuffs it with a wrench of his heel, another sound resonates, yowling through the alley.

The grinding of tires upon wet asphalt crunches from just beyond the alleyway entrance. The streetlamp overhanging the entryway glares bright yellow as it bounces off of the garishly coloured taxi cab, pulling up to a groaning halt outside the bar.

He thinks nothing of it, pulling at the collar of his leather jacket. It’s getting cold, and he’s left his drink inside. Wouldn’t want to waste good beer. Adler turns, and makes for the door.

And you step out of the car.

A half-finished cigarette bounces on the sidewalk before you exit, the softened heel of your boot following soon after in a splash upon the flooded curb. Your German is rusty- always has been- but it’s easy enough to utter a quick and easy danke as you pull yourself up out of the cab. The door shuts with a slam, and you tilt your head back to gaze up at the sign above the bar- Der Fluss Lethe glaring in faded lightbox red- and you let out a contented sigh, your breath suspended in the frigid air. Pink, bitten fingers pluck at your gloves, fingerless faded green knit, shovelling them into your jacket pocket.

Adler’s fist is already curled around the handle of the back door as he clocks your presence in his periphery, a stranger like any other- but your image resembles the one that coagulates in the borders of old memory, the dried blood of you he hasn’t been able to wash his hands of since ‘81. Enough that he does a double take, his eyes wide behind tinted glasses, and he stops, his heart following suit.

He’s seen enough bodies in his time to fill the morgue in his mind twice over, and plenty ghosts to wander coldly among the unmarked graves. Vietnam alone is an unwinding cemetery stretching endless, catacombs along the inside of his skull, lined with what his old shrink would call remorse. Guilt. As if the feeling mattered. As if self-reproach could turn self-flagellation into something so incandescent as redemption. As if the bile in the back of his throat could bring back the dead.

And it couldn’t, because it isn’t… that’s not—

Bell.

It’s in the way you stand, your back rigid, that slight slouch to your shoulders, always dragged down upon you like they bore the weight of the whole world (and they did, once, do you remember?). The pelting of rain smacks off of the lapels of your jacket and ricochets like stars, caught in the light of the streetlamp overhead, but for all he knows or cares it could be raining diamond and all he sees is you- the wrinkling of your nose as you accommodate to the cold, how your cheeks flush at the chill (as they had those nights he pulled you into the darkroom, evidence of your apprehension drowned in the red glow of safelights); your hair is longer, unkempt, but still that same colour (clumps he’d find in his clenched fist when you’d argue yourselves into a wrestling match, pinning each other by the throats to dented walls in Die Landebahn); that scar upon your brow; that wavering line of your lip, pursed and hiding behind your reticence as you always did, and your eyes- your eyes—

—you feel someone watching—

—your eyes turn, and fix upon him with the startled softness of a doe, hunter betrayed by the snapping of a branch underfoot. Adler’s heel crunches against broken glass, his hand lingering right in that threadbare threshold upon the doorhandle, and he can’t speak, can’t move, can’t think—

Open the door, Bell, open the door—

—and you stop outside the cab, your breath caught in your throat. You see a shadow in the alley, in the shape of a man.

The darkness of the alley gives enough cover that you don’t see much, but what you do make out of the man prickles at a part of your mind long dormant: the haughtily broad set of the shoulders; the halo of blond tinted red just beneath the flickering exit light above the door where he stands; the shadow of a strong, clenched jaw; and in the brief glinting of passing headlights as cars rush on behind you, you see a face half gorged by a thick, forked scar, a fissure struck down his furrowed expression. A pair of dark aviator glasses hide those eyes that you know are looking at you, reflecting back nothing but your own bewilderment.

There is something you know. Deep inside that half rotted head of yours, where an incomplete recollection of your existence before you awoke bleeding on that clifftop lies, you feel a twinge of recognition. Familiarity. Something. Something stirring deep in your marrow- a fear inherited, a conditioned surrender, a faded polaroid, a kiss? Your migraine, chronic, comes clawing back with a vengeance, as it does most nights, but this time with a savage fervour that wrenches your face into an involuntary grimace. Where the hole in your head had once been all those years ago it tickles and burns, burrowing into your brain and groping greedy fingers along remnants of memory. It claws at you, digging through your amygdala to find something fresh, something old, something palpable, real, something- anything. Searching what little remains visible to you in the thick fog of your own mind to pin a meaning to this feeling, an answer to your question, a name to that face.

You’ve seen him before. You swear. Somewhere. In a dream, reoccurring, behind a red door. You don’t know how, or why you’d think you recognise him- in those dreams, the door never even opens. Your hand ever stuck on the handle, jammed and impenetrable, what sits behind it forbidden to you. Like not even your own mind wants you to know. It confines you to your ignorance, almost blissful.

Adler’s heart kicks violently in his chest. He shot you. He killed you. He’d heard your death rattle on that clifftop in Solovetsky and the sound was almost like singing, your last word, your last breath. A miserere for your short and fractured life. And he’s looking at your ghost, standing there all owl-eyed and as beautiful as the day he found you bleeding out on that airstrip. Before he took you. Before he took you and collared you and made a damned mess of things.

The only thing separating you from the Bell he knows he killed- his Bell- is the star-shaped scar split across your left temple. The only wound he never had to sit and heal as he belligerently patched you up, poking and preening you like his prize dog. Yet in spite of never seeing it before, he recognises the wound all too well. He put it there himself.

And as you stand there for that brief moment- no more than twelve seconds stretched to an eternity- he thinks for a moment that you’ve put it together. You recognise him. You see him. As he is. You’ve figured him out, Bell, as you always do. You’re the only one to have gotten away with it, nearly. Or so he thought. And now he’s watching a corpse having dug itself out of the grave he put it in, standing there, staring at him. Suppose you’ve always been a dead man walking.

You could do it, he thinks. Turn. Fling your heel round and barrel towards him with all the enmity of a cornered animal. He thinks of the strays, barking. Can picture your mouth frothing at the sides as you sink your teeth down into him- gnarled canines, hooked to your chain-link fence- which he probably deserves. Not an unfamiliar feeling by any stretch, but one faraway enough to seem almost sweet now through the hazy lens of nostalgia. If there truly is a sentimental bone in his body after all, then maybe it’s just for that. Still, he holds his breath, awaiting the killing blow he’s surely due. But it never comes.

You release your held breath, finally, tearing your eyes away from the callous faced stranger. It’s a ridiculous notion. Just an uncanny instance of déjà vu. You don’t know that man any more than you know yourself. You settle on a more rational answer- just one of those faces. And with a disgruntled sigh you rub the scar upon your temple to soothe the ache, turn around, and enter the bar alone.

Adler sighs, his heart sinking from up high in his throat back down to his chest. His hand has latched onto the doorhandle for so long it’s gone numb from the cold, bruised knuckles bluer than they were before (bar fights- not here, but another, as there will always be). He wrestles his jaw pensively, knowing he ought to take it off, keep the door closed, turn away, and leave. Slink back, tail between his legs, to that shithole hotel room to drink himself into a stupor. Let you haunt him there, instead. As you always have.

But he doesn’t. He has no idea what idiocy compels him, what soft, dewy-eyed weak link in him snags on that chain, to willingly wander back into the viper den of reminiscence, but he wrenches his fist around the handle, pushes, and lets himself back into the bar, the thick, hot air hitting him like a drug that he breathes in, tart and sour with the cloy of sweat and alcohol but still faintly- just faintly- of you. Like rain carried along the wind.

And Russell Adler is not a sentimental man.

But from across the bar he hides behind his beer glass, watches as you move about, a phantom, weaving through the faceless mass of people celebrating a championship he cares nothing to follow. You take your order at the bar with a smile he’s never seen on you before, boots folded to tip-toes as you lean over the liquor-stickied top, your perfect mouth pink and sweet and laughing and alive. The world seems to move about you in a haze, an indistinct mist of blurred faces and bottled voices and beyond all the light and life and joy that seems to burn bright around you like a halo all he sees is you.

Maybe, then, he’s a fool.

But it isn’t lost on him, how your fingers skirt across your hair in an attempt to hide the scar upon your temple. Nor is it lost on him how you wince at the feeling, the stars in your eyes dimmed for just a split second as you shiver, like a touch imperceptible running fingers down your back. Nor even the way you fight the urge to look, to follow the feeling of his eyes fixed upon you, and surely not the way you lose that fight, surrendered to it, your sweet face turning and finding him in an instant. Without so much as trying, like instinct, like something as pathetic and saccharine as fate. Your heart called to it, a lighthouse in the fog. Port in the storm. Ships passing in the night but called crashing to the same shore.

(The pieces of you are scattered everywhere, Bell. He finds you in every split seam inside himself. Splintered shrapnel dug through his temporal lobe, severing synapses ‘til they go dark. Even stars die quicker than that. Quicker than you. Is that what it felt like for you, too? When the lights went out, was it him you last saw- or the sky, waxen, over the Arctic? A waning night, a distant moon. The inconsequence of death- brief celestial ephemera.)

The stranger across the bar looks at you, offering nary a smile, eyes indiscernible behind shadowed sunglasses. And where you ought to find his apparent coldness disconcerting, instead you wring out of your chest with a white-knuckled caress a feeling like… comfort.

Sometimes, Bell, you go back to Berlin. You don’t quite know why.

[strawcherrys]

Russell Adler who tells you he's definitely NOT watching whatever lame garbage you're watching on the television. It doesn't matter that he's been standing behind you with a hand on his hips taking slow drags from his cigarette; he's not watching it remember? He's just really thinking about the television quality.

[animefreak1145]

Rest(Adler x Bell!Reader)

Summary: You’re here only because of what you heard about Russ. Out from the shadows of another life Adler carefully constructed for you(with a few edits with your own hand) back into the fold. You immediately tracking him down to Bulgaria in those months(because of course he doesn’t want you involved, that arrogant bastard of a man), doing your best to help him out this pit of a trap that he’s pinned in. That someone else pinned on him.

They’re dead once you figure it out.

(Or where you discover that you and Case don’t work well together. You despise mirrors being thrust onto you.)

| Only hints to imply how Bell is alive and being a secret throughout the story. Nothing clear cut. Fill the lines yourselves. |

Created with @makeyourpeacenow. Cross posted on AO3

Words: 24k

Tags/Warnings: Post-The Final Countdown Mission | Solovetsky Ending, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Angst, Action/Adventure, Drama & Romance, Codependency, Bell and Adler are obsessed with each other, Everyone is concerned about the psychos, Mostly Marshall, Manipulation, Mind Games, Bell does it this time, Adler too of course, Reader-Insert, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Mild Smut, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Older Man/Younger Woman, Character Study, Case Deserves Love, Bell too, Justice for Case and Bell, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault but not true, Mind Regression, Hallucinations, Cognitive Dissonance

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You tried to go solo at first, picking up the crumbs of the bread trail Russell had left you. 

Finding Rook was no easy feat, but it’s not a discovery you find worth celebrating, not as the circumstances stood. Commotion from down the cliff-hugging road had driven you into the bunker, derelict as the rest of the house. Unaware of who had arrived, friendly or otherwise, had left you with little choice but to corner yourself there. 

Your only reassurance was the old soviet-tech surveillance that you nearly managed to reconfigure, the familiarity of it nearly foreign as you worked to fix it, mentally cursing whatever idiot had wired the home in such a convoluted way. 

Audio… online. 

It was gritty, the audio cracking through the old speakers in a volume that nearly had you jump—of course the headphones you plugged in weren’t picked up by the system. 

Your heart skipped a beat when you heard it. Woods. 

Right. Friendly, then. Other voices, too, but you didn’t care much for that. It’s enough for you to holster your firearm and to work up the nerve to crawl out of the bunker you’d isolated yourself in.  

You didn’t cower at the gun that trained on you, opting for an unimpressed quirk of your eyebrow. The young man wasted no time in dragging you before Woods. Later, you’ll discover his name is Marshall, Troy Marshall. 

The shock on Woods’ face when he saw you was paralleled by your own. 

Your equal shock at seeing Woods, all movement and loud and free, being stuck in a chair and more reserved must’ve snapped him out of it.

“What the actual fuck?! Bell?! Is that you?!”

You winced, your hands that were raised moving slightly so you could put a finger to your ear. “You’re still loud. Knocking any extra mannequins on the floor with that tank of yours?” 

Woods stared before letting out a guffaw, hand slapping to his head.

“It is you, you little shit. What happened to not a word?”

Your lips quirked, teasing as Marshall and Case looked at each other in confusion.

“I feel I can get a break. The whole dead thing breaks off smalltime deals, I think.”

“But you’re not.” Woods straightened in his chair, and you spot just how quickly his mind was working while you assessed one another. “Adler has a shit ton of explaining to do.” Woods glanced towards Marshall and Case whose guns remained trained on you, quick to inject levity into the situation. “What are you doing? This isn’t a fuckin’ cowboy-duel. Put your guns away, trigger fingers!”

Marshall hesitated, allowing himself to tear his eyes from you, glancing at Woods while Case lowered his firearm, postponing holstering until he could properly grasp the situation.

“Are we supposed to know who this is, old man? This isn’t Sevati.” Marshall looked at you, brows pinching as he tried to figure you out. You could spot where his heart is without him even having to say his next words. “Did Adler send you here too? For Pantheon?”

Your brows relaxed at the verbal confirmation, friendly. Definitely friendly.

“You can say that,” you nodded, shrugging your shoulders casually.

Marshall’s brows only pinched more as Case merely tilted his head at you, quiet. “It either is or isn’t. Who are you?”

Oh no. You’re having fun.

You smiled sardonically, hands moving to your hips as Woods sighed.

“Depends who calls.” You could spot the young man’s growing irritation while the other only continued to assess you, not taking his eyes off of you. You met the quiet man’s eyes, something pulling you to. It felt familiar. “You can call me by my name.” You offered your name before looking to the side out the window, the Black Sea unusually quiet. “My friends call me Bell.”

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It pissed you off that you couldn’t be involved in grabbing team members. Woods had torn into you when you complained, accused you of not being companionable enough to those that had yet to earn your trust. You’d only huffed then, and muttered something about how Woods had really stepped into the mentor role. He used to hate rookies, called them fuckin’ idiots due to their inexperience. 

You’d been stuck with Woods who was trying, and struggling, to pick up the pieces of what happened in the last decade. You were good at skimping on the details, stubborn as always. 

Although, you also supposed you only had Woods to truly talk to about any of this, decade and now. You’d only given him tidbits. More than what you would say to the others, but less than what he wanted.

There was a look in Woods eyes that he’s not satisfied with your answers but it seems he’s still nosy for another useless question. You could feel his stare burning your head from the other side of the room from where you worked, computers open, routes mapped out for where they’ll go in to get Adler.

“Can you spit it out already, Woods?”

“Thanks,” Woods sarcastically spat before you heard him lower his beer bottle on the table by his cot. “How long you’ve been fucking the bastard?”

You startled, ears turning hot even as you turned your chair to look at him in a mix of askance and disgust. You hadn’t forgotten how coarse he could be, but it didn’t soften the blow each time he reminded you. 

“Woods!”

“What?! I’m just asking!” Woods raised his hands as if to surrender, but he clearly liked getting a rise out of you. Just like old times, always through Adler. “I thought the fucker would be icy for his whole life, but all he needed was someone like you to match his psycho.”

You turned your body back to the computer, throwing him the finger as you grumbled while he only laughed.

“You’re so nosy,” you remarked, your tone tainted with a sliver of disbelief. “You’ve turned into a gossip in your old age, old man.”

“That’s uncalled for.”

You went back to reviewing the map after a roll of your eyes. Near silence, save for the sound of glass against wood each time Woods took a drink and rested the bottle on the table. You were starting to feel your brow twitch in annoyance, you could hardly work when you knew he was there, undoubtedly staring at you for your attention. 

“I didn’t realize you were so prissy when it comes to Adler.”

“Oh my God,” you groaned under your hands, rubbing your temples. “Your ‘kids’ need to hurry up and bring these people in before they find your dead body on that chair.”

“You got something against disabled vets?” It was so sudden, so out of the blue, that you pulled a face at the absurdity of his words.

You turned, ever so slowly in your chair, gobsmacked. Eyes wide.

“What?”

“Prejudiced.”

Your exasperation was growing as you shook your head at him. Woods who had the special ability on how to pull your leg.

 “I’d be prejudiced if I—if I didn’t kill you for your constant poking and prodding like I would for anyone else… !”

Woods looked up in mock thought.

“I don’t know. Still sounds prejudiced to me.”

“I’m going to ignore you now,” you finally said, undignified, and turned back to your work.

“You can try,” he warned with jest. Maybe it was the alcohol, or that fact that was just you and him in the safehouse, but he seemed lighter than he had been before. Looser. “But you got a decade’s worth to catch up on me fucking with ya. It’s a lot to work with.”

You clicked a little louder on the keyboard, your fingers a little more forceful than necessary.

That Marshall and Case needed to hurry up. 

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Case found that the woman, ‘Bell,’ was… interesting. Mysterious.

Her answers were short each time he asked a question, tight-lipped in an annoying yet smooth way. Her eyes were either cooly assessing or seeming to have found him funny somehow, while other times she appeared bewildered by him. He wasn’t sure why.

He first noticed her analysis of him immediately when they met her. He dismissed it at first; he was used to people trying to figure him out, being scrutinized under a microscope. Yet somehow… it was disconcerting—messing with his head. From how she’d tilted her head at him when he denied treatment for the blow to his head—courtesy of Sevati’s part of the deal—to now when he’d asked what she thought of Adler.

“...you’re odd,” Bell stated by the computers to the wall near Felix’s own desk. The remark had been rather abrupt, Case could only blink.

“That’s rude,” Felix said, typing away behind his green shades. “At least that’s what others say when I also point out the obvious.”

“You think I’m odd?” He didn’t know why; he thought he was fairly normal. (Better.) “What makes you say that?”

Bell only pressed her lips together, frowning at him.

“I hear from Woods you’re pretty calm,” she started tamely, and Case agreed with the sentiment. He was calm. “Quiet. A good shot. Nearly invincible at times. Although, I don’t call your head being cracked by a butt of the pistol, invincible. You’ve been with Marshall for years.”

“Yes, and?” Case poked. He didn’t see the point in her statements, if there was any.

“And nothing. That’s it. You don’t talk about much else, even to your longtime friend.” Bell pointed at him, motioning all around his body from down to up. “Odd.”

Case decided to leave her and move on to talk to Felix. Her eyes never seeming to leave him even after he left the room to find Marshall and talk. Marshall never looked at him like there was something to be seen, something hidden to be unearthed. Just there.

Just Case.

It was only later on in the day, that Case found himself with the same observation Bell had of him, towards her. “What are you doing?”

Bell was crouching near Woods’ chest, seeming to stare intently at a certain item Case couldn’t see from the angle he’d stood at—just at the entrance of the room with the evidence board. He was torn between averting his gaze to avoid staring at her behind untowardly and scrutinizing her snooping.

Bell turned around and gave Case a dry look. “Well aren’t you nosy,” she remarked, supplying another one of those non-answers that she’d perfected.

Case’s brows pinched, incredulous of the hypocritical nature of it. “Are you self-aware?”

“I don’t know. Are you? You trail back to every conversation there is in this house.” 

“… not every one.” That wasn’t the point. “You shouldn’t look through people’s stuff.”

“Uh huh. I’m just… making sure of something.” Case noted the slight upturn of Bell’s lip, an imperceptible smile at the little picture with Woods and the recently deceased operative, Alex Mason. The moment was over before Case could properly comprehend it, and Bell stood, crossing her arms at Case. “You look through people’s stuff too.”

“Your accusations are baseless.”

“Uh huh...” If possible, the woman even looked more unimpressed with him than before. Something in him bristled. He held it back. Like always. “You normally look through Marshall’s drawings and people’s files in their own rooms or do they happen to just fall in front of you?”

Case eyes slightly narrowed, tilting his head. 

“Are you watching me?”

Bell shrugged.

“Someone has to. Especially somebody who claims he isn’t nosy. And odd. I’ll give you this, you don’t have good tracking skills like I do when it comes to information.”

“Is that what we’re calling it?” He kept the air nonchalant, blasé with his raised eyebrows and dubious look. 

“That’s what I’m calling it. I’ll let you get back to your little chase, Case.” Bell snickered before leaving the room.

Case remained standing, looking down at himself in quiet thought.

Am I really that nosy?

It happened again, right after they arrived and achieved in getting Adler back to the Rook.

Case was in the room where he was certain Adler had been residing, whilst the man was downstairs with Bell, organizing for Iraq—if their mild arguing could be called that. (Case lost interest when it seemed they were going in circles over Bell’s role in all this. Rare for him, losing interest. But something in Case… pricked at how Bell watched him. Like he was ready to turn, and she was prepared to pounce and bite his neck once he does). Bell not touching the room since they’ve been here, it made Case wonder once more at their relationship; Woods had painted it like they were Bonnie and Clyde. He already fiddled with the voice recording earlier, now he was trying to see what kind of medicine a man like the infamous Russell Adler took and what exactly he was hiding to need to cover the label. And to take it with whiskey as a shot.

“Good luck finding anything here.”

Case jumped, his eyes darting from the medicine on the bedside table to Bell leaning at a doorway.

She looked around as if she hadn’t said anything, eyes trailing over the room in mild concentration.

“He keeps his room clean. Any possible information you can gather from what you can see is because he’s letting you look, everything else is hidden; I haven’t had time to check the boards or the walls.”

“...I’m not trying to get information about Adler.”

Bell finally faced Case, eyes cool as she tilted her head, a nonplussed “Oh?” being released from her lips, carefully expressionless. 

Dangerous, Case supplied in his mind. He could see the threat of teeth, a bite worse than her bark.

“I was just taking a look,” he admitted, unashamed. His curiosity was only surface level, anyway. Bored. If they told him to stop, he would. “I wasn’t planning to dig around more than what’s already out to be seen.”

Bell raised a brow.

“You’re… polite. Still nosy. Though, not as nosy as me; I dig until I’m satisfied.”

Case didn’t quite understand Bell’s play, he only knew there was one. “You know everything about Adler, then? Is he trustworthy?” Maybe she’d answer now.

“You tell me. And not what Marshall repeats to you. You’ve seen him in action now. What do you actually think of America’s Monster, Russell Adler? Not Woods. Not Marshall. Not Sev. Not even Felix. You, Case.”

“Is this… a test of some sort?”

“Yes. You’re failing so far,” Bell said simply.

Case tried to think of what he gathered since he first saw the man to what he’d observed around the safehouse.

“… he’s capable. Knowledgeable. Seems to have good camaraderie with Woods, so he cares for those he knows. Appreciates loyalty. Secretive as you’ve said. I… have so far not seen what others say about him. For that moniker.”

“It’s gonna scare you off if you see it?”

Case’s brows furrowed.

“Why would it? He does everything for a reason surely. Not baseless.”

Bell blinked and the cool look in her eyes disappeared before she seemed to look at him in a new light. He couldn’t tell whether or not he’d displeased her yet.

“Careful, Case. You shouldn’t follow him baselessly.” 

“Don’t you?” Case quipped.

Bell smiled. It didn’t reach her eyes. Displeasure, then.

“I know what goes on in his head, you don’t. You have no reason to blindly follow someone like him. You need to be careful who you take orders from, or you’ll find your own moniker slapped on your face.”

“What would that be?”

“Case the Doormat, that’s what.” Bell snapped. Case wasn’t sure where this was coming from. He was having a hard time reading her; was she upset at him for willingly following her lover? Frustrated? Jealous? Something else? “You need to stick with your own morals and ways and not whoever you’re around. Pick someone to shadow and at least commit to it.”

“I follow whoever gives the order at the time.”

Bell’s brows furrowed, and Case could see she was analyzing him again. Turning over what whatever information she saw with each word he intoned. Every twitch of muscles and shuffle of his feet.

Dangerous, a voice said in his head.

“The Perfect Soldier type. Not used to someone like you. Follow all and loyal to none. What would Marshall say?”

“Marshall is my friend, I’ll do what he wants.”

“Right. But say you’re not near Marshall. He’s not in the team. You’re his friend so you know how Marshall sees things. How he works. Friends usually have the same moral code or views. So,” Bell finally stepped away from the doorway and took a step towards Case. “If you were ordered to do something the exact opposite of what Marshall would do, would you do it?”

She was trying hard to make sense of him, to find a loophole in how he functioned. He wasn’t intimidated by it, it was clear to him, after all. “I thought you appreciated me having my own opinion. Why should I copy Marshall’s? Which is it?”

Bell huffed out her nose, stepping back with a shake of her head.

“You’re fucking frustrating for a pawn,” she said bluntly, and somehow it felt incomplete—like she was vying with more to say but somehow thought better of it. “I don’t know whether it’s pathetic or pitiful.” Then, softer, quiet enough that he almost didn’t catch it: “You remind me of myself somehow.”

Case blinked. That was new. He thought she didn’t like him.

“Really?”

Bell gave him a look, meeting his eyes.

“Somehow,” she repeated and she left the room again in deep thought.

Case later on, slumbered on the couch with the TV—and wondered if he passed the test. He wondered why he felt as if she was right about them being similar.

He wondered if she hated being someone’s shadow and what she saw when she stared at him, able to so formlessly follow anybody.

He wondered why it bothered her so much—it didn’t bother him.

But… was that also the problem?

Case wondered if, inversely, the other problem was how easy it was to see her as nothing but Adler’s shadow, it was certainly a sentiment Marshall held—not that Case strictly had or agreed with all of Marshall’s sentiments—and Case felt it were apt enough, for a surface level descriptor. 

She’d called him a doormat, and he ought to have been offended—but he wasn’t. It just was. Then she’d claimed he reminded her of herself—and Case found himself considering that. 

If she was Adler’s shadow, who was he? Everyone’s shadow? Shadow for all. He wonders if that would be his moniker.

Case—Shadow for All, maybe. 

… America’s Shadow? He snorted at the imagery it inspired. Maybe not.

Everything reached a head when they found the facility on American soil in search of information on the Cradle. (The Cradle.) 

Bell was already irritated—miffed at how she felt she was slowing Adler down from tracking Gusev, with him back in the safehouse going over his resources, making phone calls and exhausting his connections in the area, working to track the Russian there as he waited for her with a sort of patience only reserved for her. (Their relationship was more, Case observed. Where Bell goes, goes Adler nearby—always in the corner or the next room, never further. Orbiting. Where Adler goes, Bell did her best to stay put, but like a magnet she gets pulled into the man’s space. Not lovebirds. Just… planets circling one another. Constants. Case couldn’t imagine what it is like—to be seen like those two see each other. They saved the world together before, Adler said. “Adler saved me,” Bell said at another time when the shaded man was nearby. Case spotted how interesting the man’s smile looked. Secretive. Yet filled with weight. There was something more. Case has yet to figure it out. Marshall couldn’t figure it out either. He found it odd. Marshall thought Bell was more dangerous than Adler. Dangerous, Case repeated. Co-dependant psychos, Marshall might have muttered after a few beers). 

Case never pictured the man being able to sit and wait.

The ladder broke, the rusted metal crumbling under his weight, and Case was stuck with Bell just as Bell was stuck with Case. Masks broken. Something in Case panicked. He reined it in just to answer Marshall’s concerned call.

“Masks are broken,” he informed dutifully, forcefully calm—blasé. Bell looked incredulous at his tone, and the lack of urgency therein. “We’re compromised.”

“Well, you’re still alive, that’s something.”

Case spotted Bell still before her eyes narrowed into something fierce at Marshall’s words. Case didn’t like it, it reminded him too much of (his brother) something better left forgotten. When Marshall’s orders continued, Bell looked as if she were seconds from snapping Case’s neck for Marshall’s gall, merely because his neck was the closest thing she could wring with her hands.

Gall? Gall at what?

What was wrong with following orders?

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“But we’re fine,” Case unhelpfully supplied. Again.

“What the shit?” You hissed, the abrasive gas started to make your throat itch uncomfortably. “You just admitted to Marshall that we’re compromised. We can’t go further. Throw a rope, Marshall!”

“Hey! You guys are alive down there! I don’t have rope right now. Sev and I will meet with you later! Just stay there if you’re so concerned, Bell,” Marshall stated over comms, his voice grating in your ear.

You saw red, you couldn’t accept this—not from him. 

“What the… what the fuck?! Marshall! Sev! No fuckin’ rope? What kind of amateurs…” You broke out into Russian, cursing, and dug through your pack to find a rope with a hook. You had your doubts about it, but it was all you had to work with. “Come on, Case. We’ll find our way up to them like this.”

“I don’t think that’ll work.” He stared at it dubiously and you huffed. You knew that. “You heard Marshall—we’ll meet up with them.”

Your jaw tightened as you eyed Case, who seemed perfectly okay with following Marshall’s easy going tune, when you knew the gas was burning his throat just like yours, your vision already getting somewhat hazy like you knows his was.

“We’re going up to them like this. End of discussion. You didn’t seriously think we’ll both waddle around here with gas in the air until we meet up with them. Are you a fool?”

“What does it matter? Marshall said we’re alive. We would be able to do it.”

You couldn’t tell if it was the gas that made you feel violent towards Case, or if you truly wanted to strangle him.

At your continued silent fuming of what you want to do, the both of you with no weapons, Case decided to speak. Again. 

Unhelpfully.

"Marshall said—" 

"I don't care.” You knew what Marshall said, and any reminder of his dismissal was enough to send you nearly over the edge.

Case narrowed his eyes as you tried to throw the rope with the hook above, only to curse and miss as it splashed down to the water.

“Suddenly acting better than thou towards me when I know you would listen to Adler.”

You darted your head toward him so fast that you think your vision might have blurred even more. His eyes were looking really punchable right now.

“Adler—“ You tapped Case’s chest with the hook twice, dampening his chest with each jab. “Isn’t here. And even he’s not this much of a rushing fool when biological weapons are involved! Your ‘friend’ should be tested! Is he even your friend?!”

Comms squeaked in both of their ears.

“Guys! Shut the fuck up and stop wasting time. Don’t drag Case down with you, Bell. You’re either in this mission or you aren’t.”

A bit late to back out now, you thought bitterly.

“Dragging...?! You little—“

“It’s my call, Bell. Do I really have to call Adler to have you listen to me?”

You felt the rage in you burn at that threat. It rose in your chest to your throat at the knowledge you wouldn’t want him to do that, to bother Adler over something so trivial. The knowledge that such a juvenile threat works. The knowledge just how easily they’re using you just like they’re using Case.

You discovered you don’t care much for Marshall.

You remained silent in your resentful concession, so Case answered for the both of you.

“We’ll find our way.”

“Good. See if you guys can find the power down where you are. It’s hard to see up here.”

You and Case didn’t answer, but you did curse again when you saw a screen flicker on the further you stumbled into the room, your head starting to spin—rice paddies in your periphery and you weren’t sure if the bell you heard was more than the memory you hope it was.

Case flinched at a mannequin, a suppressed yet audible gasp left his lips.

“We’re going to kill each other,” you deadpanned, your voice absent of the dread you felt. A familiar numbness came upon you, to protect your mind just like a decade ago. “это пиздец. у меня все было хорошо...”

“Did… you see that...?” Great. Case, Case actually sounded scared.

You laughed bitterly. Seeing a shadow of someone wearing a woven bamboo farmer’s hat run across the room, the silhouette of an Ak-47 in their arms and the phantom weight of an M16 in yours. 

“God. We’re so fucked.”

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The halls were quiet in the lab, Marshall used his flashlight to glance in every possible direction as Sev moved behind him. His uneasiness at how quiet the comms have been the last few minutes reaching a head.

“We haven't heard from Case in a while.” Marshall knew his friend was quiet, but Case knew when to give updates—when to fill in on new information. Case was a professional like that, and Marshall admired him for it. 

The lack of updates made him feel as if he might’ve made the wrong call, somehow. 

Sev’s next words, mildly concerned, only confirmed it.

"Bell hasn't insulted you in two minutes, Marshall.” Marshall bit his lip, careful where he stepped as he breathed deep through the gas mask.

It was no secret the two of them didn’t get along. She found Marshall trying to establish authority over Adler amusing—or that’s how Marshall saw it. It didn’t help that she added in a quip of her own, that she’d only follow one man unconditionally to the depths of hell, and it isn’t him.

Marshall didn’t think Adler was going to deny Bell’s clear loyalty, but he also didn’t expect just how easily the man accepted it. As if she just stated the sky was blue. The grass is green. The sun is yellow.

Bell will follow Adler to hell.

Marshall’s understanding of relationships was that you make sure your girl is protected, even from her own words. A little shush and a shake of the head, maybe an endeared smile or taking it as a joke.

Adler hadn’t reacted at all.

Just took another drag of his cigarette, staring Marshall down blankly, as if he thought that every word from Marshall’s mouth was just simply, and entirely, wasted breath. And it may as well have been, considering how little change Marshall’s assertion had brought about. A tilt of Adler’s head in Bell’s direction—acknowledgment to what she said—kept up that sharp smile on her face, softening at the edges at his motion. She beamed at the man. 

Marshall’s heard the stories of Adler. All the man’s monikers. There isn’t much anybody at the CIA who hasn’t. 

Someone as cocky and arrogant as Bell following anybody anywhere, let alone Adler? A linguistic and decoder genius that made someone like Felix impressed? Willingly following a wildfire? Marshall wasn’t used to someone like that.

Loyal yes. To Jane. To Old Man Woods. He thought he was loyal to the CIA but it’s just a lie. Blindly loyal?

Marshall liked having his eyes wide fucking open, thank you.

And Bell has made it clear just what cliff she’s willing to fall off of, back first.

Still, he could begrudgingly admit that the woman has her moments where even he thinks she’s funny. In an irritating kind of way.

Marshall cleared his throat as he checked the hall to their left, flashing at decorative chairs and an elevator that didn’t work. For now. They needed that power on.

“You don’t think she’s upset I used Adler right?” He knew well enough that they didn’t have to get along, exactly, to still be able to function well in a team, but it certainly didn’t hurt if they weren’t at each other’s throats. 

He didn’t have to see Sev to know she just rolled her eyes at him. “Using the ‘daddy card’ on a woman never goes well.”

“Uh,” he didn’t stumble, but it was a near thing. “What kind of father-daughter relationship are you seeing?”

Sev whipped her own flashlight at him, almost blinding his eyes—but he could see her deadpan.

“Haven’t had much bed experience in that, have you?”

“What...?!” 

Sev laughed and Marshall was thankful no one could tell he was blushing. “Get off my back, Sev!”

“Troy Marshall, the good ol’ Christian boy. Scared of a little salacious conversation.” 

“Oh, fuck off, Sev!”

Sev laughed again. The moment made Marshall’s shoulders loosen a little in tension. Still, he feels the weight of leadership.

Had he made the right call?

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“What the fuck, what the fuck— whattheFUCK!” You were running, M16 in hand blood rushing and your eyes(Needles, needles, needles, the red room, the red light, there’s a bell ringing—“We’ve got a a job to do”) as VC were chasing you. No end to them. They keep popping up. You’re sweating. The air is humid and hot but all you see are computers and desks and the lab. The lab, the lab, the lab. Tears were going down your cheeks as you ran and shot. Run and shoot. Jump the pits, drag your leadened feet through shallow streams, dodge the snipers in the trees.  “Russ…!” You yell brokenly, to nothing to no one. There’s no one here to hear. “Help…!” Your voice cracks, dehydrated and exhausted

Your vision is swimming. It’s being blocked. (Didn’t someone tell you to wait by the lobby?) Lobby? No. Trees? Leaves? Foliage. 

“You hid in the shadows and took out the VC one by one.”

Right. Yes. Stealth. 

You picked up a bow. Where did the M16 go? You dropped it. By the other key card.

Key card? Right. Key card. You need the key card. You need the key card to go up.

Up?

No…isn’t it through?

“Go through the door, Bell.”

You fall back to the floor as the Red Door lands a foot away from you, almost crushing you. The Red Door kills. The Red Door has secrets. 

Secrets. A weapon. What weapon? It’s new. It’ll kill millions.

“Where is Perseus planning to activate the codes, Bell?”

Perseus. The nukes. Yes. You must stop the nukes.

You get up and go to open the door but it’s locked. You let out a cracked laugh, hand to your face. Only for something cold and hard to smack you. You blink.

You’re in front of a computer dashboard for keycards. There’s the red one in your hand. The second one. You picked it up.

Picked it up? No. You killed VC for them. No. Perseus soldiers. No…Adler?

You killed Adler?

No, no, no, no, no.

“We gotta job to do, Bell.”

Yes.

You put the keycard in. You see one is still missing of the four. Where’s your partner?

(Who?)

You…don’t know. Actually, your team died. You were the only survivor. The only survivor of the crash.

It’s so bright. You can’t see. You stumble.

You land on the grass, you’re searching blindly for a weapon. VC are rushing at you! Shooting at you! You use the logs as cover, wood splintering off as bullets narrowly miss you.

You shoot but you keep hearing a ring.

(A bell?)

Why is it ringing?! The gun is broken. Throw it.

A VC throws a dart at you, but it’s not a dart. It’s a needle. You try to move but you’re stock still,  on the ground, you can’t move—you’re being held down.

You both feel and hear as the needles squelches into your eye.

You scream.

You scream yourself hoarse. Your throat is breaking. Someone is dragging you.

No. Choking. You’re being choked. 

You can’t breathe! Russ, please! You can’t breathe! Please stop! You don’t know where Perseus is! Stop!

“Bell?! Bell calm down! Sev—shit! Case, Bell?! Stop! It’s us! It’s us!”

There’s no us. Where’s Russ?! Where’s Adler?! You need Adler! You feel something coming out your mouth, it tastes like bile.

“She’s aspirating! Sev! Hold Case down for a sec.” You feel yourself get rolled over and you’re breathing, no. Choking. Is Russ your friend? If so, where is he? Where’s Russ? “Bell. I’ll call Adler after this. Just stay with me! How did you two even make it up here?” 

“Marshall, we have to knock her out.” Someone says, a woman. Park? But she’s British. You spit at the leftover vomit, adrenaline rush coming back full force. Park or Lazar? Lazar or Park? Who? Who? Who? Save who? “We can’t carry them both like this.”

“Shit…sorry, hold on Bell.” 

Hold? The grapple. Grapple who? You have to choose! There’s RPG’s! You struggled, trying to find the rope. Where is it? Where is it? 

“Marshall, you’re too soft!” 

A soldier got you in the head because all you see is black.

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

A phone rings.

“Yeah?” a voice throaty from smoke use rasped out, smoke exhaled out in that very moment. Casual.

“Adler,” Marshall greeted grimly. The pause the older man made on the other line caused Marshall to bow his head and squeeze the phone, tense. 

Sev glanced over her shoulder, pausing from her checking on Bell and Case as she drove. 

“Yeah,” Adler said, tone shifting in a word. Something simmered under the surface. Bubbled.

Rip the bandaid, Marshall. Just like mom used to do. Just like what you do for Terry.

Marshall let out a resigned sigh, he knew it wouldn’t go over well. 

“It’s about your girl.” 

“... ETA?”

“It’ll be another few hours before we arrive. Seven.”

“Have Sev make it five.” Marshall glances at Sev, her acknowledging that she heard with a dip of her head. “And Marshall?”

Marshall lined his shoulders up, prepared for whatever the man was about to say. “The explanation better be good.”

And just like that, the man hung up.

Could someone make such a casual sentence sound like a threat?

Marshall discovered Adler could. On a more light hearted day, he needed to figure out how to do that.

Right now, he had to help his team.

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

“What the fuck, Adler…?! I was just asking! She’s a part of my team whether she or you like it or not! Why Vietnam?! Case snapped, but not like this!”

Adler saw Troy Marshall had heart, he knew it would be the kid’s demise one day if he didn't change. The weight of it dragging him down. Too much compassion didn’t get you far in their world, and he respected those who knew their limits, those who knew they couldn’t go any further, the path they’d begun too treacherous.

But the kid had an uncomfortable amount of balls holding him back, too.

Adler smoked outside the front of the house, despite the rest of Marshall’s ‘team’ being an hour out. He wasn’t the kind of person to get restless, but he knew he couldn’t wait inside the safehouse, Woods’ heavy glances on him.

He walked up when they put the car in park, his mind going over every scenario again (Sims, this is scenario 17–), wondering exactly how shit hit the fan, what could have possibly happened. 

She was unconscious in the passenger seat, and Adler listened carefully to Sev’s explanation; she’d been like this for hours—subdued and knocked due to how uncooperative she had been. The few times they noticed Bell was awake, she hadn’t reacted to what was going on, or their voices, silent with her head bowed deeply to hide her face.

Adler only pressed his lips in answer to her words, gently taking a hold of Bell. Laid her down on the nearest suitable surface—a couch between the weapons bench and main entrance. He leaned on the armrest near her head after grabbing the nearest ashtray and placing it on the side table so he won’t leave her side, his hand combing through her hair as she rested. The contact seemed to soothe, somewhat. The only reaction were her brows forming lines between them, a weak noise escaping her lips.

Adler’s eyes narrowed beneath his shades before glancing at the others, and he feigned preparing a smoke as he put one between his lips.

Woods wheeled down by the other end of the couch, an obvious frown at the sight of Bell. Her skin was clammy, hair sticking to her forehead, her form boneless—unrelaxed yet pliant.

Felix came from the side hall of the basement and small bathroom, a hot towel held in a gloved hand, and cautiously maintained distance as he handed it off to Adler. He’d immediately understood that Bell had been impacted in an unforeseen way. It was apparent the moment Adler had helped her from the car, carrying her into the safehouse. 

(Look at that, he’d mused. Bell had made a friend of the germaphobe.) 

Adler nodded in thanks, pressing it to her head as Felix shifted over by the weapons bench, fiddling with the computer there, feigning work but facing the others, silently concerned. Sev leant atop the weapons bench too, lingering after she helped Marshall haul a worse-for-wear Case in the chair near the fireplace; the warmth would do him good.

Adler’s eyes finally faced Marshall, whose form was stood directly across from Bell, Woods and himself. It felt judicial, in a way—plaintiff, defendant and witness. Marshall, with a guilty air about himself, stood with a tense look on his face, staring down at Bell before the young man cleared his expression to face Adler. 

Marshall took one look at Adler and knew he was on borrowed time; he noted that it wouldn’t be wise to delay this any further and begun firing off what had happened. Their successful lab entry, followed closely by the mishap with the broken ladder for Case and Bell—their gas masks broken, exposing them to the compound-leak in the air.

“They were contaminated?” Felix asked in alarm, Adler was positive that the had German squeaked from how high his pitch rose. Felix’s eyes moved to and fro, darting from Bell to Case who was leaning his elbows on his knees, hunched over. “You brought them here?”

“And then?” Adler cut off the German’s building hysteria as he started muttering in dialect, something of the sächsisch variety, quickly going over the chemistry of most biological agents —especially those related to the Cradle as defined in the document from Hussein’s palace. He no longer idled at the workbench, clicking away. He needed more details. 

“And then…nothing,” Marshall supplied before straightening his shoulders, and despite it all, Adler was having a tough time seeing the man—it was just a kid hiding in a soldier’s skin. “The gas released in the lab didn’t display any nasty or violent side effects on them. Not like how we inferred back in Hussein’s sick playhouse with the lab tank he had in his basement. So I called it—for them to continue the mission.”

Woods expression broke a little, leaking disappointment mixed with shock.

“Kid…” Woods shook his head. 

Adler’s eyes went to Bell, his hand holding the towel to her head before moving it to wipe her cheeks. Similar to a decade ago, a half wit plan based on a whim atop the cliffs, arctic air cutting his cheeks similar to hers.

“What do you need me to do, Russ?”

Marshall took his silence for him to continue. Well, for Case to attempt to pick up the rest of the report, given that he was with Bell. Adler faced and assessed Case, who was heavy laden and despite his exhaustion—sequenced the events to the best of his abilities. How Bell immediately seemed to react to the gas, spotting things that weren’t there, and while Case had his own issues — he was sparse on providing details, he kept it hidden and focused on Bell, relegating his own reaction as insignificant. Adler picked up that Case was unnerved—only due to how Case’s boot was tapping every so often, a muted pattering against the hardwood flooring. The dismissal of his own wellbeing—his health—reminded Adler of Bell somehow, before Cuba. How she’d worked tirelessly in pursuit of her own people. 

And then Case mentioned it. Vietnam. 

Damn it all, Adler fumed, throwing away the used cigarette in the ashtray on the floor, lighting another with a flick of his lighter. 

Bell kept muttering about Vietnam, and an alarmed Case told her to stay by the lobby—just until he could retrieve the needed keycards for elevator access, where they’d meet Marshall and Sev on an upper floor. But he didn’t see her when he got them. Only knowing she also went to get keycards when he arrived with the last one from the right side of the lobby.

“Vietnam…” Marshall uttered, nodding at Case in thanks as he took over. “When me and Sev found Case and Bell seeming—seizing—over Case’s yelling, Bell kept screaming. But it was just…” Marshall paused, brows furrowing deeply, mind deep in thought as he started to pace with a hand to his head.

“Just what?” Adler asked, impatient. Calming when he felt Bell’s hand try to reach in his periphery. Adler let her take his hand and bring it closer to her face, and shifted slightly against the armrest of the couch to accommodate the movement.

Marshall stopped, turning towards him.

“She was… it sounded like she was calling for you, Adler. And—and not to you, but for you— pleading for you to stop…” he paused momentarily. “To stop whatever you were doing. And Perseus.” Adler felt her hand tense around his, her nails pressing crescent indents into the back of his palm in stress. “Why would she mention Perseus? I thought that guy was handled back in ‘84.”

Adler felt Woods glance. 

Adler took a long drag, embers lightning his face before he exhaled.

“Didn’t Bell explain anything to you guys on her background?”

Marshall scoffed, incredulity breaking through concerned perplexity. 

“Tch, no. She’s been tightlipped since we caught her slither out that bunker she cracked opened. Most she ever talked is how she got more involved in the field after ‘84. She didn’t specify what part of the underground exactly, just that she did.”

He could work with this.

And Woods would cover, too.

Adler glanced at Woods, a small frown around his cigarette.

“Didn’t tell them how you knew Bell, Woods? Despite how she helped save the free world with us? Thought you liked her.”

Woods shrugged, a sarcastic quirk of his lips.

“What can I say, I like to take all the glory.” 

Adler managed a quick smirk, seeing how Woods will play along, before shifting and taking another drag. All eyes on him as he gathered his thoughts, the timeline, fact and fiction.

Time for a story. 

“A story? I don’t know…Will this really work, Adler?”

He made it work for a decade. He just needs…some extra exposition for new audience members. He’ll make it work.

He thumbed the back of Bell’s hand before beginning.

“Bell extended her services to us a decade ago. Information came out that the man we all thought was Perseus had nuke codes that will kill millions. Bell was an ex-KGB operative that heard about it through mutual friends.”

Woods nodded. It was easy to build off of truth, not hers, but rather the countless other soviet defectors they’d recruited throughout the Cold War. “Just like another KGB operative that was sick of the Soviet’s shit. Belikov helped us out there too.”

Adler took an another drag, exhaling as he made a small glance towards Case under his side shades. This was where he had to be careful. He wasn’t sure what exactly Case remembered or how much he withheld.

“She helped with that fiasco. During that time, I took her under my wing you can say. After that, she went to semi retirement. She just wanted to help us with Perseus. We let her go on her way. She accomplished what she was meant to.” Adler could feel the pistol in his gloved hands, speech over and done with. Before he paused. A camera. Thoughts of books. Of a story. He remembered how he cursed in his head before he rationalized the opportunity. For an ear on the other side. “It didn’t stay that way. After the debacle of sleeper agents in ‘84, she took a more active role again instead of working on decryptions and linguistics. She reached out to me. After that, it’s history.”

Marshall turned over the information in his head while Sev quietly mused to Felix that no wonder he got along with Bell; they were both homebodies with the their tech at one point. Felix rolled his eyes before he tore his gaze from the computer to look at Adler.

“Curious, though. Case mentioned that Bell kept going on about Vietnam.” Felix quickly glanced over at Bell. “Impossible it was for that war. Too young.”

“Ehhhh,” Sev interrupted, hand to her cheek. “Might be. Never doubt a woman’s skincare routine. She was ex-KGB wasn’t she? Perhaps they sent her there when they already took over in Vietnam for a mission before she defected.”

“No,” Marshall said, raising a hand with pointer finger up, shaking his head slowly before gaining speed just as his hand moved up and down. “No, Case made it seem way more serious than a backwards one time mission in Vietnam. Something about your explanation is fishy.”

Adler rose a brow, free hand grabbing his cigarette.

“Fishy, huh? What’s fishy is how you’re leading this team to the ground, kiddo. You’re not exactly impressing me with your false macho bullshit.”

Marshall stilled. Everyone’s eyes now on the two of them—Adler’s inscrutable expression and Marshall appearing as if he were seconds away from snapping.

“What the fuck, Adler…?! I was just asking! She’s a part of my team whether she or you like it or not! Why Vietnam?! Case snapped, but not like this!”

To his knowledge, Adler thought. Case was more secretive than he let on.

“Just asking. Right. And your team?” Adler didn’t spit the word out, buts it’s a near thing with how icy he says it. Adler scoffed. “You’re lucky the world is facing a threat because I would take Bell and myself away from this. Or start calling the shots myself.”

Marshall’s eyes flashed, taking a step forward. Adler’s eyes narrowed at the kid getting near Bell’s body on the couch with so much emotion. This was already a fucking mess and the last thing he needed was for it to turn violent. 

“What—“

“Marshall!” Woods snapped. Marshall tried to take a deep breath before turning towards Woods—who only shook his head. “Lay off of him, would ya? Bell’s his protege and you fucked up. Bell will tell the rest of her story if she wants to tell you.”

Marshall’s hands clenched at his sides, while everyone else watched. Sev and Case looked in a more subdued fashion, whereas Felix made no attempt to hide his wide stare. 

“You won’t get answers to anything with the way you’re acting. You earn answers. And with the stunt you pulled?” Adler added, taking a major inhale, his third cigarette throughout this ordeal. Hold gentle around Bell’s hand despite the tension. “Consider yourself on the blacklist of needing to know.” 

Marshall opened his mouth before glancing at Bell. He relaxed, clicking his mouth shut. 

“Fine. But just…you can help her right? Your girl?”

“Of course. Now go, Marshall.” Adler moved and scooped her up, bridal style as she turned her face into his chest, blinking languidly as he made for the stairs. She might’ve mumbled something against him, despondent. He paused on a step, aware of their audience that had yet to disperse. “Don’t come in my room unless you want a bullet lodged in your head. Woods?”

“Ay, ay. You heard the chain smoker, everyone. Now stop hanging around like it’s a play and get to work!”

Adler entered his room and laid Bell atop his bed. He brushed her hair slightly with his thumb off of her face. 

He sighed.

“This is a shit show. But I got you, Bell. I got you.”

“…R…uss…?”

Adler’s hand dipped to your parted mouth, you tried hard to open your eyes.

“Easy.” Adler shushed, a light kiss to her forehead. “It’s me. I have you.”

“…’Na…m” Adler watches your lip trembling, a tear going down your cheek. “VC…Hue City…”

“That’s a long time ago. We’re not there anymore. That war is over.”

Bell let out a choked sound. Adler couldn’t tell if it were a sob of despair or relief. Perhaps both. 

“So…real…” 

“Yeah?” Adler grabbed her hand, placing it over his scarred cheek while he hung his shades from his collar. “As real as this feels?”

Bells eyes fluttered open and Adler finally took a look at them. Blown wide yet hazy. Not here. Adler did his best to not get affected by it. She didn’t need that.

Bell thumbed the scar on his chin. 

“Per…seus. He’s real.”

“He’s dead. He can’t get us,” Adler intoned, a quick kiss to her palm. “Nothing can get us. I’m here.”

This time, Bell did let out a cry. Pulling her hand away so she could hide her eyes and turn her back to him.

“You. You can get me. Needles. It…hurt.”

Adler pressed his lips together, aborted further attempts to grab Bell again but remained seated on the bed. She seemed to seek his presence before, on the couch. 

“Do you want me to leave?”

Bell shot up, much faster than Adler would have been comfortable with, but before he could nag her she yelled a loud, “no!”

Bell blinked out her fear, instead looking down and not meeting his eyes, clenching her hands around the sheets.

“No… stay… please?”

Adler didn’t need much convincing. He hasn’t seen you like this in a long time. 

“Scoot over a bit. And lay back down for me. You need to rest.” Bell did so, almost falling over with how much room you’re willing to give him. Sacrificing your comfort for his. Adler sighs at it. Back to square one again with their relationship. So hard to make it seem even between them and she’s back to this. Adler laid down but motioned his hand at her to come closer. “Come closer. You’ll fall.”

Bell looked hesitant. Eyes going back and forth from his hands to his jacket pockets to his shades. As if searching for something.

He sighed again before slowly sitting up, taking his jacket off and emptying out the pockets she kept glancing at; he threw everything useless onto the floor.

“I don’t have anything. Come, Bell. I won’t hurt you.”

Bell bit her lip, jittery eyes meeting his even ones.

“Needles?”

“No.”

“MK-Ultra.”

“No,” he repeated evenly again. He didn’t need it for her. He wasn’t lying. 

Bell placed a hand to her left shoulder, hesitating.

“Bullet?”

“…okay. Only for you, Adler. Just don’t miss the shot.”

Adler’s eyes tightened, closing before opening them again to meet hers.

“No. Never again. I need you to rest, Bell.”

“…okay. Whatever you say, Adler.”

Something twists in his stomach but she clambered closer to him, much closer than he thought she would. Head tucked into his neck and arm thrown over him, he could feel your tears on his skin. Adler can only slowly and gently lay a hand on your waist to not scare you off. 

He’ll let you rest. But later, he needs to know what happened.

For now though, Adler felt Bell’s deep inhale—as if wishing to memorize his scent and felt her breath on his neck. For now. 

“Sleep for me, Bell.” 

He felt her eyelashes flutter against his skin, eyes closing in answer.

For now, his girl needed rest.

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

You’re off-kilter. 

Not only because you can’t go down to the bunker anymore(red room, red room, Red Door—“Normal forms of interrogation weren’t working.”), or be anywhere near all the televisions—from the living room to the security feed (you flinch as napalm struck, a near deafening roar in your ears, diving for cover from the flames—only for Woods to coax you out from under his cot, your limbs trembling as you realized it was just the thunder that struck outside, before distracting you with a story with him and Mason and Mason’s son—David. Your fear and blood pumping slowing at the look Woods has in his eyes. Sad yet proud at a boy who’ll soon be a man. Your dignity was saved that the others were in the training grounds or the kitchen.), but because you can’t even go on the mission with Russell (Adler? Your old friend. Not old friend. Liar. Adler always lies. “You have to stay, Bell. I’ll handle Gusev. Trust me.” Adler always lies. You were pathetic how you wished for you to go, or him to stay, weak for even asking just once. Back to severe co-dependency. As if Adler’s plan of forcing you to be independent and make your own plans never happened. Back to not only wanting to be near him but needing him near you. Needy for praise. Adler finally having you to let go of the lapels of his jacket with his breath to your ear, “You can do anything, Bell. You can handle this for me, красивая. Stay and help me watch the kids from killing each other while I’m gone. You will, won’t you?” Of course. You can do that for Adler. ▚ Anything for Adler. ▟ You’re living for him alone. ▚) and at least help the others in the casino with the heist live on the ground. 

You feel useless. 

You can still help in the technology side of things, but what good is that when half of the tech in the safehouse is underground? Underground where your dread compounds, heart racing to the point it hurts. Ears ringing, your shallowed breathing doing nothing to help your panic.

Each time you blink, something skitters on the screen, reminders of a war you shouldn’t remember—of imposed pain that was never yours.

So yes. You may be moping. 

It doesn’t help you are still upset at Marshall for Case’s treatment back in the mission. But it does help to distract you from your miserable trauma you’re trying to shake away, because the man upsets you again about Case’s role in this mission.

You heard the plan from your spot near Woods cot, the both of you going over necessary supplies and exfil. Your head whipped back at them as Case just stood(Always just standing there. Willingly being led like a lamb to slaughter. You would do anything for, Adler. You did. You killed a man because you knew Adler would prefer his death over capture.) and seemed satisfied at the plan in place. Perfectly willing to be a tool.

“Wait—Case is going to be part of the bait of this mission?” You ask incredulous, hands tight around the binder Woods gave you to look over. The older man was staring at the side of your head, but you ignored it as you stood. “Even after what happened? It wasn’t just me that went through that gas.”

They all turned their heads from the evidence board towards you, Sev shifting on the desk she was sitting on. 

“True. But Case’s bender that accompanied your horrible acid trip has calmed.”

Marshall nodded at Sev’s words, putting the folder in his hands to his side for a moment as he slightly shook Case’s shoulder with a smile, his touch light—companionable. It nearly made you frown.

“Case would’ve told us if we couldn’t depend on him, anyways. I’ve known Case for years and he’s one strong motherfucker. Ain’t that right, Case?”

Case chose silence as his answer. You noticed he hadn’t stopped looking at you with a slight frown since you spoke up, a subtle downturn of his lips.

(Why were you defending him? He didn’t care. You wanted to punch him for it.)

He was scared. He’s a person. 

“Now all the subject needs is a name.”

He’s a person . 

Felix cleared his throat to gather attention, leaning on the desk behind his favorite computer screen, looking as apprehensive as you felt towards all of this. 

“I do share your concerns, Bell. Made it apparent to Marshall here.” Felix tipped his head towards the man for show; Marshall looked away in turn, letting go of Case’s shoulder at Felix’s stare before the German turned towards you, a bleak turn of the lips. “But, I digress. The short half-life of the gas indicates it’s in neither of your system’s anymore, although I am having trouble sleeping at night despite that—“ Felix couldn’t help but add.

“Get to the point, Felix,” Sev cut off, exasperated. 

“Right.” Felix looked miffed at the interruption before he gave you an understanding expression. “Case has demonstrated he is capable for a mission such as this, and has insisted on it the moment Marshall mentioned it. There are no obvious side effects displayed—unlike what we have observed in you, Bell.”

“Thanks,” you cracked sarcastically, too tired and self-deprecating to snap that you weren’t useless. But for the life of you, you couldn’t help but meet Case’s eyes with your searching ones. “That true, Case? Able to take a few punches for the team? I see that Marshall isn’t volunteering for that—willing to play some cards instead.”

“You know the kid isn’t like that, Bell,” Woods defended, because of course he did. You saw what Woods saw—a mirror of the veteran’s younger days. But it was different;  Woods wouldn’t treat Mason like how Marshall treated Case. How everyone treated Case. How Case treated Case. “Case has insisted that what happened was no big deal. Hell, the guy’s invincible like that. Almost like me.” Woods tried to joke, to make you crack a smile. You didn’t.

Only stared at Case.

How long would he be quiet?

(You were quiet about seeing Vietnam on screens a decade ago. A secret. You didn’t want to disappoint Adler. Seen as soft. Something to throw away.)

What are you trying to do, Case? You wonder, spotting how Case’s jaw twitched in discomfort at your assessing gaze. What are you trying to prove? To who?

Marshall took a step towards you, hand to his chest in defense and obviously on the defensive.

“What makes you think I’m just throwing Case to the wolves, Bell? Just cause at what happened in that last mission doesn’t mean I don’t care about my team mates.” Your hand twitched at your side. You could picture it. Socking the young man in the jaw. Maybe that would spur Case out of this pitiful pit he’s put himself. Marshall took a breath, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose before facing you, eyes open and full of regret. You couldn’t help but glance at it. “Look, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry about what happened down there, Bell. That was the wrong call. But this—this plan is the right call. We need to help Adler find Gusev and the casino is the key, whatever is in B24 is the key.”

Your lips thinned before scoffing and looking away, waving a hand at him in dismissal. Despite the obvious manipulation once more—you’ll give him some leeway due to his own obvious betrayal of one he saw as a friend.(See how it feels? A part of you thought with petty yet cruel satisfaction.)

“Yeah, yeah fine. Do what you guys want.”

You turned back to work with Woods, trying not to silently stew and focus on what Woods was saying and ignoring his stares. When the others moved to leave the room, you did stop Case from moving by the evidence board; grabbing his wrist firmly, opening your mouth to speak quietly.

“Case, what are you—“

But he beat you to the punch as he connected your gazes, causing you to falter at Case’s incredulous irritation.

“Why do you keep fighting?”  

“I—“ you blinked rapidly. “What?”

“Why do you keep fighting?” Case repeated, his tone growing more bewildered each time he spoke. You wondered for a second if he thought you were purposely trying to challenge Marshall’s authority—as if you you found amusement in destabilizing the dynamic of the team. “What’s the point in what you’re doing? It’s easier to just accept it.”

“Breaking a subjects will and erasing their mind is a difficult and painful process.”

Your eyes slit, tightening the hold around Case’s wrist.

“What?”

Case shook his head, he almost looked like he was pleading with you.

“Just stop. Just accept. Is that so hard?”

You bit the inside of your lip so you wouldn’t reach for his throat to tear it out—it’d be much more merciful than this pitiful display.

(It’s been so long since you wondered—your fate if you just talked. Confessed. Where did loyalty get you? To Adler, you answer, sure. But where did that leave you? To Adler, you answer, pathetically, longingly.)

It slapped you in the face, what pissed you off so much about Case. It disarmed you, making your hold loosen around his wrist and letting him escape with a final yet tense incredulous look towards you over his shoulder.

The way you easily fold for Adler, despite your natural loyalty and cognitive dissonance acting up on how exactly he got that loyalty from what occurred a decade ago—compared to Case who folded for all, found it easier to just accept than fight, unlike you.

Your loyalty was fictitious, then earned through years—falsehoods and reality mixing. You followed only the one, whether it was pre MK-Ultra or after—you would do everything and anything for the one you call yours.

Case—just took the easiest route in life and followed whomever. He couldn’t see himself fighting for one side—even if that side was himself. He did whatever was asked of him, no matter the consequence. The willing doormat welcoming all types of scrapes and scuffs off of shoes.

Dangerous, you thought. It made you sick. 

Your stomach only turned further at the thought of how long, or rather how quickly, it would take Adler to realize the same thing about Case.

You didn’t know from what.

You needed a distraction before your mind connected to what exactly Adler would do with a perfect soldier like Case—wandering after you finished with Woods for something to do. Only to find Felix in his customary spot, his favorite computer set up. You moved to join him, your presence usually welcome behind the computers, like always before the man raised a gloved hand at you, so sudden it nearly startled you. 

You wondered if he had a job for you, if you were needed elsewhere. 

“Please keep your distance,” the German said tersely. Blunt. “I rather like dreaming of unicorns and rainbows and not general horrors of my life.”

Ouch. You raised your hands in mock surrender, lips twisted up.

“I get it. Sorry.”

“…oh. Here.” He picked up a floppy disk and threw it in your general direction, you managed to catch it haphazardly. “Take a look at that please. It’s the encryption system the casino uses for their facility and I have exhausted enough time on that with no improvement.” Felix took a breath and he actually looked pained as he met your stare. “I’m stuck. I, Felix Neumann, finally admit I am stuck and need your help. Don’t rub it in my face.”

Your mouth parted at him, throwing his pride away so easily when they were in a childish and ego inducing competition before.

“…you want me to?”

“That gas really did a number on you.” Felix said in answer before giving you a shooing motion towards the computer by Sev. “Go. And don’t come near me till you finish that.”

You decided to take a quick look at Sev’s computer, raising your brow dubiously and throwing him a rising smirk.

“Easy as pie. Didn’t the Stasi train you for—“

“Oh. Good. You’re alive and back. Please leave before finishing that sentence and I decide to not be courteous to you.”

You crack a small smile, just an iota.

“…thanks.”

Felix made a noise, but outside of it—nothing. You decided to put your big boots on and help. 

Enough with the moping and Case; time to actually help.

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

Case really wanted a towel.

Blood stuck on his face and neck, firm and baked on by the sweltering heat of Iraq. It stuck no matter how much he tried to wipe it with gloved hands—the gloves weren’t much better off. He paused from trying to wipe, eyes observing the way the copper stained deep in his gloves. How it wanted to get deeper. Past the cloth. Past his skin—entering the flesh and in turn the muscles and making him squeeze. His fingers furled unconsciously. 

“You can dispose of him now.”

(“…̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷ ̷d̷̷o̷̷c̷̷t̷̷o̷̷r̷, ̷g̷̷e̷̷t̷ ̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷ ̷d̷̷o̷̷c̷̷t̷̷o̷̷r̷!” Very good, Case, the voice in his head—female—said. But it wasn’t in his head. Not then. She was right there—she said to kill him—his—his—)

His vision turned, pain shooting through his temples, quick and short. Not enough for an obvious wince, but for him to squeeze the hand in front of him into a tight fist.

“How we doing, Case?” He turned to face Adler who was sitting in front of him on the back of the army supply truck they were in. Rolling along back to the outskirts of the camp that Captain Sims was in(“Both of you can get out of my sight! We’re done, Adler! I don’t want you to set one motherfuckin’ toe on my grounds after that stunt!”) but separate from the commander. Case didn’t think they might be friends anymore; he didn’t understand why. Gusev needed to be disposed(̷D̷̷i̷̷d̷ ̷h̷̷i̷̷s̷ ̷b̷̷r̷̷o̷̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷̷r̷?). Adler, as always, seemed unaffected at what transpired—a smoke around his mouth with blood visibly on the base of neck, stains all over the front of his uniform. His shades half-heartedly cleaned from stubborn wiping, accompanied by Adler’s mild muttering annoyance, the most emotion Case has heard, save for the older man’s disappointed tone toward his old friend, hearing him mutter about needing cleaning wipes. “Hold on. Here,” Adler reached into the back pocket of his pants, a hand towel already soiled(that’s how his face was mostly clean, must’ve been when Case was still staring at the dismembered lower half of Gusev’s body, whereas Sims was focused more on the man.) and tossed it at him. 

Case caught it, giving him a quiet thanks and nod of appreciation—despite the towel already being used. He’s thankful he just has it. It’s the same man’s blood they’re wiping off, after all. No need to turn his nose up at that.

Adler took a deep inhale, embers quickly eating up the cigarette before he tapped off the edge to the side.

“Thanks for that back there.” Case glanced at the man, Adler’s tone still light but appreciative. Holding weight. “I know it caused a mess on ya. Tried to take the brunt of Gusev’s guts before Sims attempted something else.” Adler cracked a light smirk. “Didn’t want him to have something else to complain about. Having a man’s blood literally on his hands, whether true or not, would’ve pushed Sims over the edge.”

Case believed it would. 

When Adler gave the order to kill(̷D̷̷i̷̷s̷̷p̷̷o̷̷s̷̷e̷) Gusev, Case wasn’t watching anyone else. His vision blurring, his ears seeming to deafen his surroundings and only focus on Gusev’s erratic breathing and final plea—only for Sims to grab Case back. Unluckily for the man that reminded Case of Marshall, the momentum of grabbing Case’s shoulder instead of Gusev and his inattention to Adler’s subtle movement of destabilizing Gusev’s feet—it caused a short, curdling yell within the propeller. The metal squeaking in protest much worse than when Adler threw a rock in it—blood spraying upon Case’s front. Adler managed to shield Sims and Case from the majority of it, the sound of the skull thumping around and metal cutting through bones and flesh echoing in Case’e ears. Case watching as the man’s top half was gone, only everything from the waist down was untouched—outside the guts and skin trying to stay attached to said dead scientists waist. All while Sims went off on Adler. 

The man’s only defense is that he—Gusev, that is—slipped.

Sims used Case as his witness, pointing at him as Sims was in Adler’s face about to wallop his old friend. The only indication the man gave at his friend’s anger was the mild frown on his lips.

Except, Case didn’t do what Sims wanted. Agreeing that Gusev slipped. Sims snapped his head from Adler to him faster than blade cutting through bone(Not funny. ̷J̷̷u̷̷s̷̷t̷ a̷  ̷l̷̷i̷̷t̷̷t̷̷l̷̷e̷.), face practically all snarl. Adler raising a brow in reaction behind the man’s back at Case’s defense.

Sims cursed at him almost nearly as much as he did Adler once he let a few seething breaths in(“Another copy of you, Adler. Fantastic. Both of you trying to bullshit me…?!”) before he couldn’t stand the sight of them—or the body—anymore. Despite Adler’s weighted words towards Sims it became personal, it actually making the Captain pause before he walked away, a shake of his head and a disbelieving huff through his nose. (“Everything and everyone is personal to you with how much you’ve done the same dance. Well. I’m not willing to do the shitty Macarena with you anymore!”) 

Case looked out from the open back of the truck, watching the scenery of fire and tanks in the distance—explosions and gunshots and stealth bombers dull in his ears. 

“You don’t have to thank me,” Case dismissed as he wiped his face particularly roughly. Without a mirror, he wasn’t sure how much blood was still caked on—but he could feel it. “Gusev was a danger to millions. I understand.” Adler hummed, Case glancing at the man to see a brow quirked above his shades at the words. Surprised? Why? “…have you done gruesome kills before? Or was this a special case for Bell?”

Adler’s cigarette was in his lips for a quick puff as he answered, the smoke being breathed out with every word.

“Vietnam had no shortage of those. And it was easier to just throw him in there since we kept waving the threat in his face,” Adler did a half shrug, as if it was normal to throw people into propellers out of convenience. A walk in the park for a man like him. America’s Monster. (“It’s gonna scare you off if you see it?” No. He isn’t scared. He’s sure now where a man like Russell Adler lies. ““̷S̷̷e̷̷e̷? ̷H̷̷e̷’̷s̷ ̷a̷ ̷m̷̷o̷̷n̷̷s̷̷t̷̷e̷̷r̷, ̷l̷̷i̷̷k̷̷e̷ ̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷ ̷r̷̷e̷̷s̷̷t̷ ̷o̷̷f̷ ̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷̷m̷.”)”Bell had a part to play in that, true. But I would’ve wanted the man dead anyways. He made a deadly weapon that will kill millions. What happened to Bell in that mission however, sealed his fate—Sims or no Sims. Bell would’ve done the same for me. Maybe worse.”

Case frowned in thought, looking down. He knew Bell was loyal to Adler—greatly. He didn’t doubt Adler’s words; her loyalty was sound, based on what he’d overheard when Sev asked her, after the casino mission, prodding for more details. Felix in the living room, as well, while he and Marshall were in next room over. (“Nosy,” he heard her mutter as she passed by him, knowing innately how much he strained his ears, getting as close as he could without appearing obvious. Marshall trying to make light of her word and tone, said animatedly “What? I didn’t do anything, I swear!” Bell wasn’t amused, her brow rising at Marshall before moving on. At least the cold shoulder was mutual between them both; Case didn’t like her eyes on him anymore.) How she expounded that Adler saved her from the CIA, not wishing for someone like her to work with them despite other KGB operatives under their paycheck. Might’ve had to do with her connections to Perseus—and how she’d discovered those plans, Case guessed. That the man was the only reason she was alive, and why she’ll reciprocate everyday for him for that. 

“She doesn’t like me much,” Case confessed before he could rein in the words. Before he could get bewildered at the action and stop, he kept going with far much more emotion than he planned. His verbal deconstruction of her behavior spilling from his lips, now that there was somebody to tell—Marshall was his friend, sure, but Case always was the listener between the two of them. He didn’t mind. “She finds me odd, despite also saying we are similar somehow.”

Adler’s brow quirked, a smirk pulling his lips.

“Oh? That’s strange. After the stunt you pulled in getting me out the black site, you would’ve earned her respect there; Bell can be hard to please until you prove herself. Although,” Adler nodded his head absently while taking a drag, “she doesn’t like Marshall at all. Can’t say I blame her; she holds on to grudges tighter than a knuckle duster in a bar fight. Spiteful woman,” Adler chuckled softly to himself as he exhaled the smoke. He shifted on the seat of the wooden bench, the truck driving over bumps and sand hills that could be felt between them both before Adler faced Case again, shades hiding his eyes—yet Case couldn’t help but feel as if their gazes were meeting. “Never thanked you for watching out for her down there. Or trying to with the circumstances. Pretty calm despite having to inhale gas as part of a mission.”

Case’s skin pricked. 

“It was a necessary mission. Marshall needed us,” Case evenly answered, acutely aware of the subterfuge that accompanied Adler’s reputation, Marshall had fumed about it—made a show of establishing authority over it. “And I did my best with Bell but… the circumstances of her disappearing when I came back were unforeseen. I am sorry for not doing better.”

“…mm hmm.” At the absent hum, Case felt a spark of offense. “Speaking of Marshall, how’re you going to break it to him about Gusev? You’ve been friends with him for years, right? Based on what I’ve seen, his stomach might turn at that.”

This felt familiar.

“If it was ordered to do something the exact opposite of what Marshall would do, would you do it?”

Ah. That was why.

Adler was doing what Bell had. But unlike him feeling seen by Bell, with Adler it was different. It was as if… it’s an unmasking.

“I don’t see why Marshall would be involved at all in changing the events that happened.”

“And what event is that?” Adler asked, leaning slightly forward to tap away the ash of his cigarette.

“Gusev slipped.”

It was silent as Adler searched his gaze, for what, Case couldn’t say. When Adler appeared to have found what he was looking for, both his brows rose up—the most surprised he’s seen on the stoic man. 

“That he did, Case. That he did.” His brows settled, a victorious ghost of a smile around his cigarette as he leaned back in his seat. “You’re one hell of an interesting soldier.”

(“I think you’re going to make one hell of an operative, Case One.” At whose dispense? After whose sacrifice? ̷H̷̷i̷̷s̷ ̷b̷̷r̷̷o̷̷t̷̷h̷̷e̷̷r̷ ̷w̷̷a̷̷s̷̷n̷’̷t̷ ̷s̷̷u̷̷p̷̷p̷̷o̷̷s̷̷e̷̷d̷ ̷t̷̷o̷ ̷d̷̷i̷̷e̷. “We were the first and last trial volunteer.” No he  ̷wa̷̷s̷̷n̷’̷t̷!)

He had to say it. He had to.

He couldn’t hide this anymore!

Case opened his mouth like he did with Woods, about to spill everything—just as how Gusev’s guts were actively being spilled on the runway—to confess. Bell had already seen him and Adler is looking through, he has to say it!

What happened a decade ago—

We can’t talk about it, the female voice in his head interrupted harshly, his vision turning orange and yellow at the edges and another sharp pang shooting through his temples in warning. Remember? 

(“Remember your training, Case One. You can never speak of the Cradle program. Or the Pantheon division. Never. Doing so could have unpredictable consequences.”)

“Here. Have a smoke, Case.” Case blinked away his blurry vision to find Adler offering a cigarette from his expensive brand, he either hadn’t noticed Case’s mental struggle or made a point in not mentioning it. 

Case took it and put it in his mouth dutifully, not bothering to say he didn’t smoke to Adler who was already lighting it for him. Taking an inhale through a cough. Not the worst substance his lungs have been subjected to, still unpleasant. 

“The expensive brands are stronger.” Adler said in answer to Case’s difficulty, but his tone suggested that he wasn’t ignorant to Case’s inexperience. More… knowing. “Enjoy it, Case. We have quite a ways to go.”

Case frowned at the cigarette in his hand, eyes narrowed at the ashes already gathering at the end. 

This was one of the strangest orders he’s ever received.

Because Adler didn’t offer it, did he? 

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

“You’re quite adept at this. Using a virus and handing the floppy disk carrying it to Sevati, not only to take out their radar but for their computer and security system to do what we please. Leaving no stone unturned, as they say.”

“I do love it when you give me random compliments, Felix,” you responded with a smirk, typing away on the laptop and maintaining your balance on the moving helicopter as they flew over the Vorkuta camp, awaiting on the others as they facilitated the ground assault. “Although I can do without the surprise in your tone. Lessens the impact of your words. You should work on that.”

You could barely hear Felix’s mutter through the comms as he manoeuvred the helicopter around in the cockpit, but you were able to catch “Arroganz ist die Schwester der Einsamkeit.”

Perhaps too soon with an inner wince, still in mental recovery due to the gas (not so much hallucinations outside of the auditory ones your mind foolishly created when in the safehouse, or when using the training course. Still, no T.V. The nightmares haven’t stopped.) but Felix meant no harm, innocently blunt, and you can roll with the punches easily enough with humor as your defense. 

“Awwww, what happened to you saying us traitors of socialist regimes should stick together?” you replied back in German. “Here I thought we had a connection, Товарищ.”

“Putting words in my mouth and twisting it, I see,” Felix replied with distaste as he circled back around towards Vorkuta, spotting that they were still in the clear from any more possible reinforcements. “Fabrication, typische KGB.”

You snickered as you typed and watched the security footage, monitoring closely that Adler and the team below were on the right track. Clearly hearing the man was just putting up a front to keep up their false rivalry, the back and forth of using words such as ‘adept,’ ‘acceptable,’ ‘adequate’ or ‘satisfactory’ when it comes to judging the others’ more than mediocre skills. God forbid you actually tell the man you’re impressed at his abilities without even having to go out in the field; It’d ruin this whole dynamic you’re going for!

…perhaps you were a little shit, like Woods always says. 

Adler only implies “bratty” to you. (Don’t focus on what happened the night prior after Russ told you the news of Gusev’s death. Your cheeks pricked anyways. Adler doesn’t always  lie. Not much anymore.) 

You couldn’t help it with Felix however. You liked the man. Didn’t mean you trusted, too soon for that (you only trust one man implicitly and wholly, always. Ironic due to the circumstances around it, you realize, but you’ve had a decade to accept it. You’d give Woods second on your very small list, however.) but you genuinely enjoyed the man’s presence.

And a fellow intellectual! Those were becoming rarer and rarer nowadays. 

You couldn’t help but overhear the conversation between him and Sev the other night after the casino mission(Case did as well but he just stood there saying nothing and not adding onto the conversation, soon leaving after Felix told him “Not now, Case.”) as you were entering back into the house, only to pause. Passing by a self-righteous Sev and the bowed head of Case(Look at him, a mere shadow on the wall—wishing to not be seen by me. Too fucking bad. ▛ Ï̵̙͖̓ ̸̝̬̏š̷̠̭è̷̞̖̔e̵̢͝ ̷͔̈́y̸̱̰̿̅õ̵̟̕u̵͙͎̅̈́.▞), you grabbing a book you left on the table near the bay windows. You got near Felix, who was still warming himself by the barrel fire, and leaned your back against the banister. 

Once he protested about your presence and not wishing to “puff our peacock feathers” right now, only for you to say that you weren’t as you turned a page—he calmed, brows relaxing as he turned back to looking at the fire in thought. The only sounds between you two being of the crack of the fire or a turning of your page. It didn’t take long before Felix decided to speak first about your choice of reading. Making a snide comment about Nietzsche with you replying with a brow raised if he had something against the Ubermensche philosophy, before you winced. The meaning of what it was meant for, and Felix’s concerns about himself, not connecting until you said the sentence. Too soon; you opened your mouth for an apology—only for him to snort at you. Yes. Snort. Felix. Instead bringing it back to you if you disagreed being called Sharikov from Bulgakov’s Heart of a Dog. It made you smile. 

It didn’t take long for the both of you to go back and forth, all the authors that had commentary about their home country’s view of communist and socialist ideals. The conversation shifting somehow to Adler and his plan of contacting someone from CENTCOM.

“How likely do you think that this contact will assist?”

At this point, you joined Felix already closer to the fire with your book in the waistband of your pants, the lighting too poor to continue on reading, anyway. Staring at how the flames moved with a pensive yet confident expression.

“Adler is always two steps ahead. Despite his…well, what others call recklessness—he plans very well.” 

“You respect that about him,” Felix pointed out, making you hum distractedly, your smile turning a little softer (“Are you enjoying this? You’re risking the entire operation unnecessarily.” “It’s not unnecessary, it’s calculated.”). “…very intriguing. A love story between a CIA agent and ex-KGB. Was that possibly another reason the CIA wanted you dead and for Adler to do it?”

You snorted, hands rubbing to get more heat. 

“We’re not like Sev you know. Shame about what happened with her though...” You frowned, momentarily thinking of what you would do if Adler died. You moved on quickly to not dwell on it. It’s a thought you’ve had often, you already knew how you would react. “And if you’re hinting if I was trying to seduce him… no. I wasn’t. I just felt that him and I… we clicked. It’s odd. Not many can feel a connection like this—knowing the other innately and how they think. It’s like…we knew each other for years.” You’re getting too close. You had to be careful. Your lips formed a sharp smirk as you met Felix’s eyes over the fire. “Too bad for the CIA however; Adler didn’t want to play their game.”

“Two steps ahead,” Felix reiterated. 

You nodded. “Two steps ahead. I aim for the same. Maybe even three.” You couldn’t help but add, cocky, “that may be my Soviet side trying to prove my superiority, however.”

The man didn’t roll his eyes but it was a near thing.

“Arroganz.”

Your grin sharpened.

“Спасибо.”

When the two of you went in, Felix added a quiet yet heavy “thank you.” You threw him a mischievous look over your shoulder, brow raised. “Whatever for? Us traitors need to stick together.”

Your eyes carefully watched the security footage, the ground team now having infiltrated the sub-levels of the former gulag. Until they split. Case—by himself; your eyes narrowed before removing a transmitter, disguised as a landline phone, from your jacket to listen in.

You weren’t joking with Felix. You liked maintaining a three-step lead.

And after what you saw when Marshall, Adler, and Case came back from Kuwait—straight after the plan being made for Vorkuta (Case stopped you after you… “spoke” with Adler by the cliffs, catching you when Adler has already gone up to their room. Looking desperate, which made you pause from your disgusted sneer on your face. Except, he didn’t say anything. Opening his lips as if he would talk, but nothing coming out. Only stating with a pained voice, “There’s a reason I’m like this. I can’t say but…you…” his hand was trembling around your bicep as you watched the man, your pity only growing. Along with suspicion. You watched his fingers furl, before unfurling again. Shaking. Your gaze trailed up his arm to study his expression, lingering at the slight crook of his nose, half healed cuts and light bruising from Kuwait. He was either struggling to find the correct words, or struggling to talk entirely—it was hard to tell. “You…you see, don’t you?” he managed to get out before his eyes shuttered and he stepped back with a quick shake of his head, apologizing before quickly leaving. Something happened in Kuwait. You could tell when Adler made his report and talked to you on the cliff. You saw Case the other day. You thought you did. You’ll make sure you do.) you swallowed your fear and went down to the bunker. (Don’t go in the red room. A b̷̜̏e̵͙̙͋ḻ̶̨̎͠l̸̼̒echoes in your head.) Tinkering with the technology down there along with stealing from Felix’s stash. Perhaps it was an invasion of privacy (It didn’t matter a decade ago. It doesn’t matter now.) but you’ll do everything and anything to keep Russell safe.

Even if it means bugging comms and the whole house.

You activated the transmitter, although knowing you already couldn’t hear them due to being underground—layers of dirt and concrete tended to be effective in blocking transmissions—this would ensure that you could check the audio later on. 

You don’t trust Case on his own.

It didn’t take long; they soon collected Harrow, hauled her back onto the chopper and spoke over her head—talking around her about making her talk. 

Adler took the seat next to you, shoulder to shoulder as you kept working on your laptop. His warmth and presence grounding you despite your mind running through every possible scenario(“Let’s run through scenario 1A.” “Christ, what’s happening with her?” “Bell, we’ve got a job to do.” Your new job is to live.). Including as to why Harrow had a smug smirk on her face looking at Case, who had her next to him on the chopper, keeping her in place closer to the cockpit with Marshall on her other side.

Only for her eyes to wander towards you, brows furrowing deeply. The stare wasn’t bothering you, but it seemed it was bothering Adler; he leaned forward on his knees and moved closer to you, taking up your space—as if to shield you. You didn’t mind, her stare beginning to discomfit you yourself.

“What’s got you staring at her so hard, Jane? Why don’t you instead focus on the information you can tell us on the way to our hideout? Make this easier for us. Mostly for you.”

Harrow’s eyes flickered towards the man, you recognizing the hate in her gaze that rose before it quickly subdued. Her focus flickered back onto you, turning something over in her head before there it was. A flicker of recognition.

Great, you thought sarcastically.

Harrow’s smile was like a knife, cutting.

“I never thought I would see the day of a corpse walking around. Aren’t you supposed to be rotting in the ocean somewhere?”

“Too bad for you lot,” Sev cut in, standing and holding onto a bar to leverage her balance against the moving helicopter, eyes grimly satisfied on behalf of you(you did like the woman. Friendly. Cunning. Focused on vengeance. Although hasty. A danger.), but the subject matter made an awful feeling churn within the recesses of your stomach, the heavy laptop on your lap grounding you as your mind raced. “Adler here decided to say ‘fuck you’ to your ridiculous orders of killing someone who helped you.”

“A lot of those nowadays,” Marshall added, side eying Harrow with that angry yet betrayed look in his face. Still hurt. Still sees his friend when it’s just an enemy(A lot like you. Is that what you looked like? Solovetsky —you said Solovetsky—). You turned your eyes back to your laptop, biting your inner lip—pausing when you felt Adler’s hand over your knee, a comforting squeeze before standing up and joining Sev on the bar. The touch not lost on Harrow whose intense stare seemed to burn towards your knee, her brows pinching deeply with a frown to match. “The CIA seems to like throwing and using people away. I won’t be surprised if it was Pantheon’s influence too.”

Harrow released a disbelieving chuckle that you couldn’t hear over the whip of the rotor cutting through wind; you could only tell by the shake of her shoulders—the odd smirk pulling the corners of her lips, shaking her head.

“So naive, Troy. You can’t blame the Pantheon for everything. Always having to believe the best in everything, even in the previous CIA. But you,” she faced back towards you, pivoting as much as she could, and despite you trying to ignore the manic woman, you lifted up your eyes over your laptop to meet hers. Her smirk was lopsided as she stated your name—yours, not whatever the CIA had made up for you, not Bell. A sour taste in your mouth. “Or… as we liked to call you—Bell. What an interesting name. It has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?”

R̵̨̠̣̣̥̍̉į̷̳͖̰̀͆̿̽ṇ̴̻̦̏̄̔g̵̯̑̈͗̅̕

                                                R̷̪͒̅i̶̮̲̎͗ņ̶̼͝g̸̱͍͆

                      R̴͎̳̽̌͂̕͠͝ḯ̵̢̱̖̹̮̱̩̑͂̀͑͘͝n̵͉̗̈́̔g̵̣̣̊

                                                           R̸̢̢̛̪͕̦̜̥̝̯̘̙̗̖̣͔̝̞̘̬̍́̂̀͋̅̚͘͝í̷̧̡͔̮͓͎̲̪̖̤͙̥̘͙͇̣̯͙̣̮͎̥̏̊̓̊̽̂̆͑͜ņ̷̛̭̗̱̠̖͖̝̼͓̣̲̲͕͓̠̤͖̣̱̘̯͔̈́͗̏̀̓̑̒͆̄̄̈́̋̀̋̈́̓͂͗̚̕͝ͅğ̴̨̧̧̛̙͉͓͈̬̦̩̯̯̪̦̰̥̻͓̹͍̥̳̫̤̿͌̑̉͆͂̎̂ͅͅ

“Enough,” Adler commanded, taut and appeared as if he would knock Harrow out any moment now with the stock of his assault rifle. You focused on that picture instead of the sounds in your head, your fingers trembling over the keyboard. He stood over Harrow, brows deeply pinched—the only indication of his cool anger. “Stop with the games, Jane. Talk. Or even Marshall won’t stop me from getting what we need from you.”

Marshall gave Adler a look before facing Harrow grimly. The woman, instead, was staring up at Adler, with her brows up at his threat. Her eyes shifted back towards your knee, and her disbelieving expression turned into a curl of the lips—another connection made with her eyes turning viciously amused yet disgusted.

“It doesn’t have to be like that, Jane. Why don’t you start explaining—“

Harrow started laughing, throwing her head back. It was so sudden it made Marshall jump, the others staring at her in confusion but it only made you tighten your hand to a fist—slowly closing your laptop and stowing it away, cautious as you watched the woman snicker.

“Oh—this is—“ Harrow inhaled a breath, trying to calm herself down but failing as she released another short yet harsh laugh. “I can’t believe—This is a day of firsts. Really, Adler?” She asked, brow raised in cruel mischief. “You and her…? What an actual fucking shitshow because of course a man like you would,” she spat, all rage and bite in that one word before facing back towards you with a gaze filled with sadistic spite. “But of course, you always had a jó̵̦̰̤̈̑͑́̍̍̔̌̒́̀͘͜͝b̸̞̹̼̟͔̰̠͖̫̥̼̓̇̈́̋̀̀̑̎ͅ—“

A metal thwack met a skull, Harrow’s head falling towards her chest, her body held upright in her seat by the seatbelt alone.

“Woah, man! What was that for?!”

“Jane has a mouth on her,” Adler answered easily, fixing his gun and moving back to sit by you. You releasing a breath you did not realize you were even holding (She almost said it. The phrase. “We got a job to do.”) as Adler put his hand back on your knee, all casual and languid. Not like he just smacked the shit out of someone. You try to ignore how touched you’re feeling at how quick and protective he is now. (Adler from a decade ago wasn’t. Not much. Not like this. Russell is yours. Is he? You haven’t spoken at length about your suspicions of Case. Or what Adler may be planning from his own observations he’s had with you about Case. Stop it. You’re not like Case.) “She’ll keep talking and making up stories to get you wound up.”

“Wonder where she got that from,” you managed to quip. A distraction.

Sev raised a brow at the light shrug Adler did in response to your words.

“Well, well. How many protégés do you have laying around, Adler? Who also want to kill you.”

You’re loose tongued, you think. You’ll blame it on the gas as to why you answered the way you did. Plus the threat of sudden disclosure, your blotchy past nearly staining the fragile team-balance.

“Two for both, isn’t it?” you asked Adler genuinely, rotating your head towards him and all. Adler threw you a dry look beneath his shades. You tried not to shrink. You failed. Damn gas. Damn his icy blue eyes you can get lost in just like the touch on your knee. (Just like on the cliffs near the boulders when Adler said “I handled, Gusev. Just like I said, Bell. He’s shredded into tiny little mad scientist pieces. The gas won’t get you, лапушкаka. I got you,” he said to your ear, all low, breathy and husky to your needy and torn mind. His scent all around you, with your back to his chest—of course you grabbed him roughly and kissed him when he speaks so sweetly of another’s death.) “Too much?” You let out a short hysterical laugh, hand to your head, shifting in your seat to hide what’s rising low in your belly. “Not the same across the board when it comes to being in your bed, though.”

Felix made a choked sound even you could hear from the comms, the most he’s spoken since Harrow got in the chopper. You suddenly feel like you’re twenty eight again, cheeks heating as Sev let out a whistle, Marshall looking uncomfortably towards the floor. 

Adler didn’t have much of a reaction, only staring at the side of your head. His stare only making your cheeks prickle more. He can see. (The kiss turned wanting, your hands wandering to the base of his neck with beautiful wheat tresses and the other to his lower region. He made a delectable sound from the back of his throat that lit a fire in you. You wanted him here and now. All your fears of Adler from a decade ago gone when Russell turned the both of you, more hidden behind the boulders of the cliff under the moonlit sky. Shushing your whines softly or with a kiss and a burning touch from your abdomen to the waistband of your pants, quickly feeling out how needy you are already with his hands that make and unmake you. Have made and unmade. You don’t care, you want him now—not just his hands. Russell stopping you with a raspy chuckle, his large hand over your own on the tent of his pants. “Not now, Bell. Let me take care of you. Besides,” the both of you were laying against the rocks and pebbles, digging into your back but you didn’t care, desperate. Stilling only when Russell’s words breathed against the shell of your ear. “You’ll sing a little too loud if I fuck you. The kids may hear.” A kiss to your ear. The insertion of another key to unlock, make you break open with a gasp as he picked up the pace. “Is that what you want, Bell? Нет. Ты просто хочешь, чтобы я увидел тебя в сперме, покрывающей тебя и мои пальцы, хм?” He easily switched, knowing your weakness when he spoke your mother tongue, his mouth roving from your ear to neck, free hand from roving to pinching to starting to tug your pants farther down. You’re thankful you didn’t wear jeans, you’re so close. “Только для меня. Я тоже могу тебя съесть, а ты можешь дергать меня за волосы, как всегда, милая.”) 

Adler sees. Because he lets out a chuckle with a light smirk that makes you shudder. Just like how he looked with your juices dripping down his chin.

“No point in professionalism now. Too many types of fucking going around since this whole business started.” 

Oh no. You do feel twenty eight again. The only good thing coming out of that gas and regression. You really want to jump his bones right now. His need to take care of you be damned. Wait… bones? You’ve turned from hysterical to very hysterical. You’re more poetic in your head than that. Oh no. He can tell what you’re thinking because you keep staring at him and assessing. In front of everyone. You see him tilt his head at you, falsely curious with his lips a touch up, hand rising from your knee to the top of your thigh in one fluid motion.

Your head’s turns so quickly you see stars, opening up the laptop once more and faking work to get him to stop. So you can stop.

You really need to get your head together. Right after he gets his hand off of you.

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

Marshall knew he shouldn’t listen. Just like he knew in a deep part of him, that the Jane he thought he knew never existed. But he didn’t want to give up on her, not yet.

He always admired her tenacity, her ambition—how much she climbed to be where she was today. How she opened up to him about her journey of climbing up the steep cliffs to be right below the Director of the CIA. Just like how she admired his art, his drawings—his skills. Something settled in his stomach, whether it was nerves or warmth or a mix of both he didn’t know, when he saw she had it framed in her office. The drawing he gave her in private, her eyes alight and glittering up at him as she smiled softly up at him. He thought he did a smile back. Maybe a little awkward. A little hopeful.

The hope was gone. She’d been strapped to a chair, legs and wrists tied where he and Adler were interrogating her in the storage room of the house, windows tightly closed and dark. No way for her to know where they were.

And despite how he’d tried to be soft with her, reason with her—trying to find something, she dodged the question. Rolling her eyes at him even attempting to ask her about her evil master plan. Backhand compliments that used to be true and real but instead she twisted it—how studious he was, how annoyingly persistent, how his gentlemanly behavior was getting him nowhere fast. He thought he would be able to get through to her as a friend. He couldn’t. So he stepped back with a hand rubbing his face and motioned for Adler to take over—her mentor. The one who helped her refine her skills, sharpen her attributes (there’s a bitter taste in Marshall’s mouth, a part betraying him that Adler’s wildfire spilled onto his friend— and now she’s burning) and grow in the CIA.

Except it backfired. Marshall saw the way her eyes changed, the subtle shift of her lips curling. The sarcastic amusement in her eyes were gone, more dark. Twisted. Before she settled back into the sarcastic quirk of her lips, but her eyes didn’t change as Adler tried to get it out of her. That she’s helping no one. That will she really be responsible for thousands of deaths. Jane gave the same answers she gave Marshall. Shorter. Curt. Before she seemingly couldn’t take it anymore, the final straw when Adler implored her to take responsibility. 

“Responsibility?” She strained, shaking her head at Adler whose face was leaned down towards hers, his hand around her restraint on her wrist. “You’re such a fucking hypocrite. Is that what you’re doing with your precious project, Bell? Taking responsibility?” She rolled her head to try to face Marshall who was just a few feet away with crossed arms, his brows furrowing as he met her eyes around Adler’s form. “Why are you working with Adler of all people, Troy? You know what people have said about him. A man who kept a terrorist asset alive? Against the CIA’s wishes? Do you really trust him?”

Marshall frowned, thinking back on Adler’s explanation as well as Woods and Bell’s own.

Perhaps not so much ex-KGB, after all, as actively KGB like they’d said—claimed. Maybe even part of the Perseus ring, a low level person in his circle. 

“I don’t care what Bell was before.” He maintained eye contact with conviction. “She saved the world. That’s enough. Hell, we got a guy that was actively in the Stasi while betraying them at the same damn time.”

Jane clicked her tongue disappointingly at him. 

“You don’t know the whole story, do you? You wouldn’t be so chummy if you did.”

Marshall’s eyes narrowed before shooting Adler a look. He recalled how meek the woman had been the days following the gas incident. How, in her quasi-consciousness, she’d called out for Adler to stop—something.

“What’s she talking about?”

“You’re falling for her words on purpose,” Adler stated with a shake of his head, lifting up and away from Jane with pressed lips. The man had been doing that a lot to him lately. Ever since his mistake with Bell. Disapproving shakes of his head or disappointed sighs. “She’s trying to get you riled up and distracted and it’s working. Jane. Stop fucking around, where’s the weapon?”

“Come on, Marshall,” Jane cajoles, moving her hands as much as she could to motion a finger to her head. “Think. Something isn’t right with Bell. She’ll never be right in the head.” Jane turned to Adler with a sneer. “Adler I’m sure likes it that way. Don’t you?”

He’s trying to not doubt. They don’t need this. Jane is playing them. 

It’s pissing him off it might be working.

“Jane, just—“ Marshall flapped a hand around as if to motion for her to stop but he instead let it drop with a heavy tired sigh. Adler stepped back with a stoic expression towards Jane as Marshall stepped forward with a gentle yet firm hold on her shoulder while the other was atop her hand. “Just stop. Stop, okay? Woods wouldn’t lie to me. I trust him. Please, Jane. Just tell us the plan. I don’t want things to get ugly. It never has to get ugly between you and me.”

Jane’s eyes met his—and all Marshall saw was a stranger who pitied him. Her next few lines cemented where she stood—where she chose to make her stand. A hill she was willing to die on. Marshall’s head spun wretchedly, his mind unable to discern why. 

“You should know by now, Troy. Don’t trust anyone. Remember?” Jane moved her head back, top of her head against the back of the chair with a victorious smile on her lips. “Besides. It’s too late. Whether things ‘get ugly’ between you and me or not—they’re coming for you. And the plan will continue.”

Marshall’s eyes squinted behind his glasses, his mind going to the worst case scenario as Adler cursed softly behind him.

“How would they know?”

“Move, Marshall.” Adler pushed Marshall’s hand away from atop Jane’s own, pushing her sleeves up and feeling around with his digits before Adler’s expression turned hard. “Tracker. Thought of everything, huh?”

“You taught me to,” Jane quipped neutrally. No hint of bitterness or gloating—pure discretion.  

Adler turned his head towards Marshall, hand still firm around Jane’s arm with a grip tighter than strictly necessary. It made Marshall want to say something, to suggest they afford her gentleness, as if there was a sliver of chance she might come around. But—

He didn’t. Dread, or perhaps regret, began to compound—his mood taking a turn for the worse; were they doing the right thing?

“Change of plans, Marshall. We’re going to do this my way.”

Fuck. That’s all Marshall could think as he stared down at his once friend. His once something. What could’ve been. Fuck, Jane. What have you done?

▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▛ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚ ▟ ▞ ▚ ▞ ▚

The moment you heard the words, all perfectly constructed and subtle—too hard for others to tell on Adler’s meaning but you knew, you knew—a crack of betrayal occurred that no one else could hear.

“I’ve got something tucked away that can help.”

He lied, you thought, grip on the desk you were leaning on tight as Marshall gave his permission (Adler always lies.) and began to walk out the room. You were trying to not scream at Adler, whose gaze finally turned in your direction, a frown tugging his lips. He had no right to feel upset on my behalf, he l̷̺͌i̸̛͇é̶͇̹̇d̶̰͝! 

After he took a slow deliberate step towards you, seeing how you tensed—close to bolting away—he sighed through his nose and nodded at you instead, his head motioning out the room; Woods rolled to be by the man’s side, his own gaze knowing what Adler meant and a frown of his own pulling down to hide in his beard.

“Grab Felix to help you set up the house. Even when I have everything set up, we need to keep constant hands to make sure that Pantheon can’t get through.” Your eyes thinned, mind working overtime trying to find Adler’s meaning as he kept his gaze on you—being open and respecting your distance. (A lie? Adler was always good at baring his neck at you to show trust even a decade ago. Must be. He’s playing again. He s̵̹̄͝a̸̧͍͙̣̒͛͆͌͜͠i̶̝̟̖̝͈͂̃̈́̒d̷͇̠̠̮̖͊̆͑͝ he didn’t have it.) Sev followed after Marshall as he left the room, but of course Case was staring, his brows mildly furrowed so Adler couldn’t quite speak freely like you thought he wished. “Harrow is gonna get all that I had in the back burner. I’ve kept it for situations like this.”

It’s not for you—

—you heard him say in your head, jaw clenching as you stared at Adler in silence before your gaze turned towards where they held Harrow, in the storage room. Only to loosen your grip and relax your jaw as you thought back to your openly vulnerable position with Adler when you first arrived from the lab. Adler never said he didn’t have it, only ever responded to your questions of whether he would use it on you again. 

It was never meant for you.

(Right. This is Russ. He’s Russ. Adler’s mostly gone.) 

You nodded in understanding, watching how Adler’s shoulders interestingly relaxed a pinch before you focused on Woods—asked if he had a secret cache of deadly explosives stowed anywhere. The rugged man grinned up at you, noting how you didn’t appear like a rabbit about to bolt, and rolled his wheelchair to show you, his laugh remaining as obnoxious as ever despite the circumstances. You ignored how Case’s curious gaze seemed glued to your back as you went to work. Exactly what he witnessed and assumed was far from your most pressing issue.

By the time everyone else converged in the Evidence Board Room, you and Felix were still outside the front of the house setting up; sandbags and various weapons were arranged within easy reach for your crew. It was during this that you couldn’t but keep glancing at the lack of gloves on Felix, frowning as you loaded an AMES-85.

“… sorry.”

Felix paused his ministrations of setting up the RC-XD’s, eyes wide and blinking openly at you.

“This is a first. I never thought I would hear any word that may even hint at an apology from you. I doubted it was even in your vocabulary.” Seeing at how you stayed silent, only pressing your lips and avoiding his gaze before moving on to the next gun to load up, Felix rose a brow. “What’s brought this on, meine Freundin?”

“You weren’t supposed to go on that mission. In the casino,” you elaborated when you saw Felix’s confused look in your peripherals. “It was supposed to be me. You shouldn’t have needed to break your code. I… have my own set of rules I follow.”

“Involving Adler I imagine?” Your lips quirked at how the German man clocked you. Uncaring at how openly you are when it comes to your feelings about the man, despite the irritation still simmering. Your mind calmed after Adler’s words after all. You believe him. He wouldn’t lie, not about this. Not when he brutally killed a man for you so you didn’t go through that gas again. (“Or…as we liked to call you—Ḅ̷̧̞̳̳̈̇͘ȅ̶͓̗̈l̵̥̀̌l̵̠͕̖̠̟̋́̅̚.” A bell rings in the echoes of your bruised mind, distant. Not as clear. Fading.) Felix assessed you before turning back to what he was doing, checking over all the different grenades and extra armor plates as he walked past you—the air crisp from the forest yet carrying that ocean hint from the cliffs. (You shouldn’t like standing over those cliffs so much. But you do. You should’ve died that day. The reminder that this is where you began your life anew—reincarnation. “The shot won’t be fatal. Not if you get help quick enough. They’ll have soldiers patrolling around that we may have missed. You got to do this right, Bell. You understand?”) “What’s done is done. My burden is not something you should carry, it was my choice after all. And with this assault coming to our doors, I can’t exactly lounge behind my desk while all of you do the work now, can I?”

“Ah, I see how it is.” You check the scope of an AEK-973 and aim it towards the hilltops to check the quality, smirking. A soviet gun you were distantly familiar with; it felt more at home in your hands than any American iron did. “You don’t want to feel burdened by having me—of all people—protect you and one-up you in the field. Perish the thought, Felix.” At Felix’s delicate huff, you lowered the scope and looked at him a bit more serious. “Did Sev make you change your mind?”

Felix held C4 in his hand, and double checked the detonation wires with critical eyes as he answered.

“Not necessarily. She merely… had me open my eyes on rearranging my priorities.”

“I see… and this is the result of said ‘rearranging’?” 

You caught the C4 charge he threw at you, raising your brows when you noticed he added an extra charge to make it more explosive.

“Klappe zu, Affe tot,” Felix said an answer with the common tight lipped smile he does. “They’ll have a hard time getting us with this in hand.”

You raise your brows, a sharp smirk as you threw the C4 charges up in the air a few inches, catching it in clear approval.

“без усилий не вытащишь и рыбку из пруда.” You handed them back to him with a teasing pat to his shoulder. “Not bad. If I didn’t know you any better with how you stick your nose up, I would think you would be trying to seduce me, товарищ.”

Felix rolled his eyes and moved away from your touch as you both walked around the house, headed for the backyard to prepare the resistance effort there.

“To listen to your constant jabberings even more? Your presence is barely tolerable as it is with how distracting your large head is trying to fit through a door.”

You snorted a laugh.

“I upgraded to ‘tolerable’ have I? And here I thought I would be the arrogante Frau forever. Don’t fall for me too hard like the Berlin Wall, Felix. You’ll get hurt.”

You heard Felix mutter something or another again in German, now clearly wiping away at his shoulder where you touched as if to show.

It wasn’t long after that you had everything in order, you having to swallow back the nerves building in your throat as you went back in towards the Evidence Board room or how Marshall coined it—the ops room. Adler was leaning against the wall by the CCTV’s they had set up in there, smoking before he took notice of the both of you approaching. 

He let Felix pass but he managed to obscure your view, preventing you from staring at Harrow and Marshall, her eyes glazed over as he held her hand and spoke comfortingly in her ear. 

The scene was concealed by Adler’s chest, clad in his Henley shirt, his hand lifting carefully to your cheek. Allowing you time to move. You stayed.

(You’ll always stay.) 

You didn’t flinch, but your eyes did shutter at the touch, his thumb grazing below your eye. You rolled your head forward to lean against his chest, Adler easily maneuvering to accommodate the action, placing an arm on your waist and holding his cigarette with his other hand.

“Aren’t you supposed to be doing it?” You murmured into his shirt, blinking your eyes sluggishly. The others were too focused on Harrow to pay attention to whatever the two of you may be saying. You didn’t know why you felt tired all of a sudden. As if seeing the image of Harrow, even in those few seconds before Adler blocked your vision—your body remembered just how hard it was.

Ṱ̶̃o̶̖̒͂ ̵̧̧͋o̴̖̭̕ṕ̵̘̲e̴̠̜̋n̵̗̹̾ ̷͇̍̔ṯ̵̂̏h̸̤̊̂e̵͉̰̔ d̸̨͍̘̯̟̱͈̗̫̳̓̈́͠ơ̶̮o̶̢̪̣̣̫͍͖͕̹̥̊̓͆̀̎̉́̚̕͠r̸̛̲̫͉̹̓͑.

Stop it, you told yourself, as if that would hinder your reopened wounds from spilling out, slapping a bandaid on a nasty gash. I’m not doing that anymore. It’s Harrow. It’s Harrow!

“No. It couldn’t be me,” Adler softly answered in your ear, unknowingly stopping a bell that started to chime its cryptic song. “It has to be someone she’s close to. Trusts; I don’t think Jane has trusted me for a long time.”

Adler spoke with a hint of resignation, his resolute nonchalance troubled, as troubled as the typically stoic man could be. You couldn’t see his face to confirm your suspicions, only humming in acknowledgement as he inhaled a deep drag from his cigarette. He moved you slightly back, and you lifted your head to see him motioning his cigarette towards you. The embers burnt, freshly red, glowed with new life as he exhaled from the side of his mouth, blown so that you wouldn’t have a plume of smoke in your face—stinging your eyes. The proffered cigarette prompted you to think; Adler was fully aware of how clean you are from nicotine (him being the sole reason). He however sated the part of you that stared longingly at the smoke coming out of his lips with a cool exhale into your open mouth, prompted or otherwise—he certainly wasn’t in the habit of actually offering. 

“Your favorite de-stressor?” Moving your hand up, you didn’t take the offered cigarette, but rather limply held his wrist, your touch light as you thumbed his pulse point. 

“Second,” he corrected quietly.

You rose a brow as you faced him, a suspicious ghost of a smile rising.

Adler’s answer was his own brow rising, a shadow of a teasing smirk to match. You rolled your eyes before rising to deliver a quick peck to the side of his mouth, deriving comfort from the mouthfeel of his scar, the smell of his skin. You took in his warmth by nuzzling into his chest again, fully focused on his presence. 

You will for Harrow’s increasingly apprehensive words (spilling from her lips, bleeding from her mouth) to fade off somewhere in the distance.

“I don’t need it. You know I have to take it from your own mouth for me to like it.” You preferred  the delivery of the smoke directly rather than actually using it the “normal” way.

“Taking it like that might be more harmful than the normal way,” Adler nagged, you don’t know why. He does it when you ask. Sometimes unprompted as well. It always leads to something or another. You’re not asking him for it right now however. Not appropriate. 

Adler sighed, placing his cigarette between his mouth, freeing his hand to settle on base of your neck, weaving through some of the hair there and scratching at your scalp. It made you unconsciously lean more of your weight against the man as you breathed out contentedly. “You shouldn’t be letting me do that so freely, Bell.” Your brows pulled together, pulling your head back slightly to see Adler’s visage was a hint taut, his lips more pressed than necessary around the cigarette. Before you can ask what was wrong with him, his hand roved from the back of your neck to the side of it—his thumb at the apple of your cheek as he gazed searchingly down at you, using his other hand to grab at the cigarette so he could freely talk. “… after this mess is cleaned up, we should go to Berlin.”

The perimeter alarm sounded just as you were about to question him, his sudden yet vulnerable sounding statement. Bodies sprung into action as Felix announced they were coming from the north; you stepped forward a few feet away from Harrow, your eyes on the way she seemed to be not here. Her eyes closed, murmurs and mutters escaping—hands furling and uncurling. You glanced at Case, who seemed to be watching her the same, a set grim line for a mouth. And his eyes…

Vengeful? You frown at what you saw, only for orders to be barked for Woods to be the one to finish extracting information from Harrow while the rest of them held the perimeter—or at least attempted to defend it. Woods? Alone?

“Wait!” You spoke up, now between the door of the ops room and Adler’s table that he enjoyed using for his smokes. Marshall paused giving orders to offer you his attention; the others did the same. “I’ll stay with Woods. Just as an extra measure if they manage to get through.”

“Bell, are you sure?” Woods was looking at you in clear concern, gaze flitting from Harrow to you. Strange to be involved on this side of things, for once, but you were careful not to look too discountenanced; you’ve had a decade to get ahold of yourself. 

You nodded, hand tightening on your side as you grabbed an XM4 and a Grekhova from the table, giving Adler a nod along with Woods—determined.

“I’m sure. We can’t risk anyone trying to stop us from getting the information we need. Besides,” you threw Woods a smirk that didn’t reach your eyes, but you hoped it still sent the message, “I can’t leave you with just your tank, Woods; nothing wrong with a little extra firepower. You can try to kick my ass on the Nintendo once this is over.”

Woods snorted as he returned your nod, his eyes rolling up in exasperation. Marshall mirrored the gesture of affirmation with haste. 

“Got it, Bell. You and Woods handle Jane, then, while we focus on defending the house from all sides. Close the ops room, Bell—“ 

You looked up with wide eyes as Adler strode easily across the room towards you, your gaze rising as he neared closer. Using a loose—although firm—hand on your upper back, he pulls you in to plant a quick yet searing kiss. You felt your face heat up, acutely aware of the audience in your peripherals, as you fisted around his form-fitting shirt. He leaned back, and there was a split-moment that he paused—engaging you with a soft look—before he gave you a steady nod, returning to load magazines with quick fingers. You wonder if the gas had fucked you up more than you thought, for him to offer his affection so publicly. The action used to soothe your still frayed mind. Sev whistled, loud and impressed, as Felix stared before averting his gaze. 

Marshall appeared as if he was stuttering without saying anything; he blinked himself out of his mild stupor before he continued. “O—kay, listen up!” 

You stepped back, away from the table, into the ops room and slid the metal door closed. You didn’t hear the rest as you closed the door, turning your back to it with your firearm lax in your hands, observing as Woods picked up where Marshall had left off.

It was… strange. Watching Harrow as Woods tried to guide her through, despite her obvious fear, as if she were a little girl. You didn’t catch much—with Adler distracting you—but from what you could tell from observing Harrow’s fast mutterings (You looked like that. You never asked Adler and he never explained. About the murmurs and the visions you saw, of how you must’ve been trembling in place just like Harrow was. Did you switch from English to Russian consecutively? To German when you saw the sticky notes? They gave you an adrenaline shot too. Harrow is lucky.) something had happened to her parents. Someone had killed them.

When she said the name, it threw you and Woods for a loop.

“Her parents must’ve been working with terrorists,” you lowly interject when Woods called Adler’s name, appalled - disbelieving. Your gaze cool as you flicked towards Harrow’s form on the chair (You tried the p̴̢͒̚ͅẖ̸̇r̶͊͜ã̶̞̿s̶̡̮̾e̷̢͋̕, this is what you get.) to assess. “Adler doesn’t touch innocents.” You know that. You know it intimately. 

You must’ve talked louder than you thought because before Woods could agree, Harrow voiced her denial, her voice thick and desperate, you thought.

“No! You—you don’t know anything!” It’s as if she forgot to breathe between words; the hatred, force and desperation in her tone turned her voice hoarse—and bitter. “Adler killed my parents. You must know it. What he is, what he’s doing to you despite his shitty charms. He used you—and is still using you! Adler is disgusting—a wretch.”

You gritted your teeth, tightening the hold on your gun while Woods defended you.

“Stop it, Harrow! Bell isn’t brainwashed anymore! That’s not what we should focus on. How are you so sure it was Adler? You were a kid.”

“N-No…” a slight dither, “it was! I know it was!”

“How can you be so sure?”

Harrow was hesitating, you could tell by just how deeply disturbed she appeared at the possibility—the chance that the Pantheon used her desperation against her. The desperation of  a child that, for years, had tried to find a reason for her parents’ death; a child that needed for there to be some kind of sense behind it, a meaning.

The ever-growing pool of hateful pity rose in you, your expression turning colder when the woman started panicking. So lost. So fearful. Confused. At war with herself and her supposed convictions—denial that she got played in the first place like a fucking third hand used up doll with hope to make things right or being the self righteous bitch that thinks she’s in control.

What’s gotten her into such a tizzy? You watched as Woods’ own pitiful expression towards Harrow, a touch of concern as her eyes shuttered in time with her feet moving on the floor, as if she wanted to flee; he muttered about her rising heart rate as he felt around the pulse point in her wrist. Your fingers were clenching and unclenching around the fore-grip of your XM4, strong contempt at her - what she’d done; framing Adler for the intelligence fuck-up that was Panama. And yet Woods still had this concern, concern for who he thought Harrow was, only for it to be lie. Despite how the man put up a front, you knew his inside was soft. He had to be. 

She’s acting like they gave her multiple doses. I wasn’t this pathetic . Giving all this information so easily.

You couldn’t stand the sight anymore; you turned your focus, instead, to ensure the door of the ops room remained secure. You moved things from Woods’ desk a few feet away against the wall—out of the way—and turned his desk over, careful in your effort to not disturb the… interrogation exercise, forming a makeshift blockade. A bit of cover if the ops room were to be compromised.

Woods had his full attention on Harrow, too busy focusing on a seizing Harrow, coaxing her to say the last bit of information needed—where they’re deploying the Cradle, to bother nagging at you about messing up his stuff. You double checked his own weapons, too, and ensured that they were loaded and serviceable before placing them within reach of him, going as far as propping the shotgun carefully between the outside of his thigh and the sides of the wheelchair to hold it. 

She passed out? Woods’ sharp curse when you handed the weapon off prompted your gaze to lock on her, and you saw how Harrow’s head was completely forward and slack. Woods gave Marshall updates as he tried to shake the woman awake, firmly insistent that they weren’t done yet—as if she could hear, somehow—and that she needed to push through it. Your lips curled, sneering. She expects to lead the CIA when she’s so feeble in mental strength? This ambition of hers is just a pipe dream; she’s nothing more than just a mere ant. (Unlike you. You were better than that, you were going to be P— -̷̛͎̏̕) 

You would’ve grabbed the woman’s hair by the scalp and slapped her if Woods hadn’t handled it; she finally spilled just as separation wore off, her true self coming through—the version of herself that’s just a smug bitch who thinks she knows it all. Too late for her—Woods had managed to get the information that you needed.

Your ears pricked at an explosion near the ops door, the metal groaning from the impact. Getting behind the desk you turned over, you turned the pin of your XM4 to fire and held it ready, soberly anticipatory.

“Woods!”

“Shit!” Woods begun to roll his wheelchair back, and away from Harrow, to support you. Pantheon’s attempts to breach the room were audible, and it was clear that they were making headway, each attempt less fruitless than the last. A split second of shuffling has your eyes widening with realization—they were going to place a breaching charge.

The gun was held steady in your arms, your scope aimed towards the ops room’s point of entry as you crouched behind for protection—at the ready. “Yeah, I got it! I need to make a quick call to Livingstone!”

The silence was eerie, your heart hammered and you didn’t dare tear your gaze from the door. You forced yourself to breathe evenly and hoped that Woods would get the message out in time. 

“Woods,” you said in warning, hearing the heavy footfalls right outside the door as soldiers cleared back, preparing for the detonation. 

“Gettin’ there,” he barked. 

Just as you heard the distinct transmitted tone from the transponder, Woods just managing to get the message out, the Pantheon blew open the iron door; soldiers filed in—the lead equipped with a riot shield. 

You focused on the man with the shield and Woods used his shotgun, his sights set on the others filing in from behind the lead soldier’s sides, forming a human barricade between you—and the exit. 

There was only one way out.  

You shot the man’s feet, Rules of Engagement damned, and downed him just as you needed to reload. No time. You took out the Grekhova as more soldiers came in, cursing at the seemingly constant waves of them, and scrambled back—away from the desk—due to the speed of their flanking. 

Woods faltered in his support, cursing as he had to throw his shotgun away and reaching for his pistol, M1911, as you came by his side to support him. Seeing how soldiers were getting closer and closer. Hand to hand it was. 

You took a sharp inhale, lunging forward and closing the gap with the soldier in front of you before they could react. Your hand shot out, gripping their wrist and turning it down. The soldier snarled and tried to twist away, but he was so slow. 

You struck his wrist with your free hand, aiming for the grip on his firearm to loosen, succeeding. You grabbed it and gave a swift kick to his ankle, his balance faltering. That’s all you needed—you shoved the barrel of his XM4 under his chin at an angle, pulling the trigger as the fully automatic firearm sprayed into his skull. There was little time to think about the sensation of warm blood splattering down the side of your head. Shot in the head with his own gun. You scoffed, he shouldn’t have lost it so easily, then. Shouldn’t have let you get so close; a firearm’s only good when there was a bit of distance. 

Before it could fall, you grabbed the corpse by the shoulder straps of it’s armored vest, struggling to keep the dead weight upright as you shielded yourself. 

Bullets continued to come your way, your eyes hard as you tried to cover Woods, too, as he kept shooting with his pistol. You free your dominant hand, using the back of your palm to quickly wipe the slickness of sweat and tacky blood from your cheek before reaching for the corpse’s thigh holster—a GS45 fastened there.

Freeing it from the holster, you messily cover your right, conscious of the magazine capacity, as Woods handled your left. The longer you held the corpse, the more your arm started to burn with the effort—easily over eighty kilos of dead weight. 

It was unsustainable; a sharp surge of irritation when the pistol stopped firing, punctuated with a dull click.

“Ебаное дно!” You clicked your tongue, unwilling to give up until they had you six feet under. The soldiers advanced significantly—well within arms reach of you.

Too close.

You threw the dead body towards them, utilizing the temporarily distraction to grab a homing knife from your thigh strap. Immense pressure erupted from your shoulder, the feeling of powerful force indicated a shot was made—whether the bullet grazed you or worse was hard to tell, it hurt all the same.

Gritting your teeth, you grunted but kept your aim true as you threw the homing knife.

Bullseye. 

The blade impacted the one you shoved the body toward. Meeting an eye with a slick sound, their body joined their fallen comrades. The motion had aggravated the new injury on your shoulder, and although you anticipated the move, you hadn’t enough time to recover before the other soldier lunged at you. 

The breath was knocked out of you. You fell to the floor, hard, your teeth clacking together as the back of your head hit the ground. Blood in your mouth—you must’ve bitten your cheek— and an uncomfortable feeling jolted your bones, Woods not fairing any better; they’d torn him down, too. 

You snarled, grabbing a knife from the back of your boot to slash at the man’s ankle, your shoulder screaming as you forced the movement. He caught your wrist and twisted it, your fingers splaying reflexively at the pain, yelping. Your eyes followed the blade as it fell to the floor with a brief clatter, irritation spiking when the soldier kicks it from your reach. 

You harshly spit the blood gathered in your mouth to the side, turning your head forward with a huff. The overhead lights were a little harsher as your head spun; the reminder of the last time you were half-dead under blinding lights sat only a few feet away from you. The bitch was doubtless grappling with her returning faculties. Probably already had—she hadn’t required a heavy dose at all. Weak. 

Shame. Should’ve fucking shot her the moment she spilled. 

The barrel of a gun met your face, conviction still running through your veins despite your need to catch your breath, sweat and blood on your skin as you tried to twist out of it. You abandoned the struggle when you realized it’s in vain. Even if you were to break free of the soldier’s grasp, there were half a dozen more in the room. You were injured. 

And fuck, you seethed when you saw they released Harrow—now seemingly fully conscious. She stood from the chair, rubbing her wrists primly. You fought the urge to roll your eyes; she hadn’t even been bound that tight, certainly not to the point of pain. 

“I want both of them alive.” Harrow passed her disappointed glance from Woods to you, the Pantheon soldiers stood you up forcibly, propped you upright with a rough grip around your uninjured upper arm, likely unconcerned that you’d try anything with your other arm, blood staining through the fabric there. You didn’t dare assess the damage, you’d rather not know. Yet. 

Her eyes seemed to change into one of interest as she skimmed over the many soldiers you took down. Her voice was strange, seemingly pleased with herself. “Very interesting. You’re a special one, aren’t you?” 

You spat at the ground, Harrow’s falsely kind tone made your hackles raise, and another soldier grabbed your injured side, reconsidering their hold on you. That you might fight even with just the one soldier holding you back. Their grips grew tight on each side. 

“You’re a pathetic one.” One of the soldiers delivered a smack to your face, your eyes seeing black and stars in your vision, your legs faltering before regaining your balance. You chuckled through blood stained teeth as you rolled your neck to the side, facing Harrow directly. “You talked so easy for us… hah… embarrassing.”

The words didn’t seem to land as you wanted, Harrow—unlike how meek separation had made her—had the courage, the nerve, to attempt to grasp your face. You snapped your teeth at her hand in warning—Harrow’s brows only rising more in clinical interest rather than the annoyance you saw a smidge of. You received another blow to the side of your face, blood spraying onto the floor below you as Woods called your name in concern.

“Bell! You fuckers!” Woods tried to move his arms to no avail, the soldiers foot and hand not moving from his tattooed arms. Woods let out a growl of frustration. “Focus on me, Harrow!”

“Curious,” Harrow continued as if she couldn’t hear the man. “Didn’t know MK-Ultra was this effective. You’re the only live one we have. Adler kept you quite a secret. A dirty one too,” she added in a tone of disgust.

You panted as you tried to get yourself together. “Got a point on all this, сука? Just kill me and get over yourself.” 

Harrow blinked in surprise, mocking with a hand to her chest.

“Kill you? The only live MK-Ultra subject we have? Why would I? It’s clearly effective. You fell in love with the man who tortured you.” Harrow let out a sick and cruel laugh, your stomach starting to drop at the implications when Harrow successfully grabbed your cheeks and squeezed. The pain that prickled from the broken skin on your cheek paled in comparison to your aches elsewhere. Aches everywhere.

Your vision swam, not just from the punches, but from the silhouette of Harrow in front of you to Adler—a decade too young—standing over you in a gurney—g̶̨̦̒l̶̨̘̈͝i̴̥͚̚t̶͕͕͗c̷̢̈́h̷͉͆͠i̵͕̋n̸̨͒̕g̷̰͐ in and out of your vision. You gasped. “I don’t need to fuck you to keep you in line though. Not my type. And despite what you may think of me, I draw the line at sexual assault. But using MK-Ultra on you and maybe what I gave to Case, you’ll be my best asset.” 

“We either control the asset, or eliminate the asset.”

No…

“Leave her alone, Harrow!” Woods yelled through grit teeth, still on the floor. Harrow turned towards the man with sick pleasure and you could see the knife in her hand. “Your head must be twisted if you really think Adler killed your parents and would even touch Bell like that!” 

“Wa-wait, no. Just kill me!” You pleaded, struggling harder in the hold on you to no avail. Your shoulder was hindering you and the ache in your jaw spiked when you moved it wrong. Harrow mocked Woods, scornful gloating before she swung deftly, delivering a knife to his abdomen, your adrenaline rushing and coming two fold. Fight or flight. N̷̺̉͊̈́ö̵͈͙̻t̴̤̻̟̒ ̵͉͙̍a̴̫̬͉͑̈g̵̺͝a̵̻̐i̸̗͚̗̊n̷̨̪̤̒̓̏.

“No! Woods!” You tried to claw, you even tried to bite. But two men in this state was even hard on you. “You little сука! Aмериканская дворняга!”

“Oh?” Harrow stood up, blood slicked knife in hand. You swallowed, roughly; the blood in your throat abrasive. “That’s funny. Aren’t you the dog? You will be. This is the best vengeance. Adler killed my parents. Now I can use his Russian love as I please. My ultimate soldier. Oh sorry. Cолдат would be more appropriate.” 

No. No. No.

You’ll forget. Everything. You won’t know anybody! Again!

Your mind won’t survive this a second time.

Your chest is tight, you feel like you can’t breathe and the room is spinning. You can’t breathe.

You can’t breathe.

(̴͉̪͐̕“̸̟̩̓͂W̵͔̲̱̼̎̓e̵̦̝͋̀̈́́͝ ̶̨̮̪͛g̷͈̺͙̗̓̊̐o̶̭̪̟̒̎̅t̴̡̗̼̫̽̅̆̈́t̶̬̠͍̝̹͛̈́̇ā̴͎̤ ̸̡̜͎͔̭̄͑͝j̷͈̜̆ͅo̵̡̥̣̿́͛̆̔ḃ̸͖ ̴͙͔̭̂t̶͈͇͈̓̎ǫ̵͇̻̯̼͑͆̓͊ ̷̥̅̿d̸̥̹̝̗͂̕o̶̙̲̱͂̄̊́͑.̴̨̨̻̤͎͆̎̔”̶̦̼͕̋̐͗̒)̷͕̮͉̝̂̈́̈̔

No, you don’t! You haven’t for years! 

…right?

Right? 

The bell that was distant is now closer, over your head as it chimed to match the ringing in your ears.

“Bell!” You hear Woods call despite his grievous injury. “Keep fighting them, Bell!”

Time slips through splayed fingers, an immense pressure building somewhere in your head, pain erupting each time you come back to. You gasp.

They brought you outside, the thought suddenly registering as you feel the wind on your face, ice cold air prickling your open wounds. A Pantheon chopper in front of you. 

Your vision growing dark on the edges. You can’t. You can’t get on the chopper.

You’ll die before you do. Your vision swims, your head falling forward and looking at the ground. Chest heaving out of rhythm, gasping for air as if the soldiers hit you another time. 

The ground was shifting. From craggy rocks to puddles. From simple grass to the thick foliage that was home to mosquitos. You spot an MCI on the ground. A lone appendage on the other side. Fires on the trees like mini suns in their brightness and height.

Vietnam.

Your throat was closing tight. Needles.

“Needles?”

“No.”

“Well, look at that,” Harrow taunted, deceptively disinterested. She spoke of you as an asset, an instrument she merely needed to tune before deploying. “Classic panic attack. Don’t need to break you much, then. Hopefully you’ll still be able to take the Cradle better than Case.”

The grip on your arms loosen as your vision swims, you trying to catch your breath with deep gulps of air. You close your eyes. The sound of the chopper rotors whipping hurt your ears. 

The chopper. The only survivor. You picked up the M16—No. Adler. Adler the only survivor. The scar—

“MK-Ultra.”

“No.”

You’re more thrown to the back of the chopper than carefully laid down. The harsh metal jarring you as you tried getting your bearings, elbows digging painfully on the metal. The tread plate flooring scraping on your skin.

Hot metal atop of you. Danger close. Solovetsky.

Someone kneels on your side, grabs a wrist with gloved hands as you lay there with slow even breaths. 

Solovetsky.

Your mind supplies of a rugged voice to your ear atop of cliffs. 

“Follow what I say closely, kid.”

A plan. To live. To be.

“Bullet?”

“No. Never again.”

Adler just barely half an hour ago, looking vulnerable in his softness as he gazed down at you.

“…after this mess is cleaned up, we should go to Berlin.”

A promise.

Your eyes sharpen, a quick inhale as you use your free hand to seize the knife from the soldier’s thigh, slicing his neck before he could comprehend it. Blood spurting on you like the red blooded demon you are. A spray of red mist staining your skin, some falling down to your eyes.

Harrow and the other soldier spin as the helicopter starts to take off.

“What—“

You pounce, snarling just as the soldier takes a step towards you, moving to grab you only to fail as you use your foot—manipulating his momentum—trip him up, throwing him off of the helicopter. Your body hurts. Every part of you aches, but you don’t care. You can’t care, not with the surge of energy you feel. The euphoric high when you make them bleed.

“You fucker!” 

Your vision spins as you feel your nose break with a crack. You rose a hand to block another hit. Feet steady and secure. You give her a swift kick to the chest as she tried to punch you again, her arm swinging towards your abdomen before you terminated the attempt. She lets out a choked gasp as she falls, winded, vicious eyes staring up at you.

Her on the floor from your kick. You standing above, eyes cool with a white knuckled grip on the knife. 

Your figure of red. The Russian you are. 

You climb atop Harrow before she can even move, knife swift towards her chest. Only to be stopped by her own hands atop of yours, two inches away.

You grunt, eyes feral and hungry for more blood. Both of you have your hair matted and sweaty, stuck to skin, frustrated noises coming from you both as you fight to kill and she fights to live.

Live.

“N-no!” Harrow manages to slip through her mouth, knife growing closer. You shift your grip, hand more firmly atop the handle and you using your body weight to push. Push. Just push it in. “No…!”

You growl, teeth out and animal like noises coming out of you. Uncaring if your bloody spittle falls on the bitch’s chest as you grow closer and closer and closer.

Live!

Your knife meets chest, you see it entering slowly just as Harrow does with a yelp. 

“Never…again…!” You spit, pushing it more. 

Harrow’s head meets yours as a shock, nausea suddenly meeting the aching already settled there. The blood loss, your injuries, even the motion of the helicopter taking to the air—it makes it harder for your balance to resettle. Your head spins as you pull back, your back now on the floor as she seizes the upper hand, straddling your waist as her hands wrap around your throat. Your hold on the knife still to her chest, but you struggle without your weight behind it. Without air. You’re choking.

Harrow laughs in your face, all wild and insane—your former grim ferocity fading.

“Ha! Kill… me?! I’ll make sure… Adler sees your head on a spike… you commie bitch…!”

The helicopter is in the air, yet a new passenger arrives. Giving a swift kick down to Harrow’s back, therefore meeting the knife to her chest in a swift movement. It sinks in with the force, past skin, fat and muscle.

Her eyes are wide just yours is, your eyes shifting to beside you to see the stoic and sweaty Case. Harrow had her death rattle atop you her words a mere whisper only you could hear as she looked up at Case. Disgusting, you sneer. She got her fluids on you. Mucus, blood, sweat.

“I… made… you……”

Her last breath fanning your cheeks before you rolled the dead weight off of you. Case makes for the chopper pilot with a swift knock out and quickly gains control.

Your eyes move towards Harrow’s body, staring at her dull eyes with a ruthless look of your own. You put a foot to her shoulder with a sneer.

Never again.

You push her off with your foot. 

Down to the open water and you don’t care for what semantics this could mean.

You instead close your eyes, just like you did in Solovetsky. And feel the sun on your face as Case moves the helicopter. The sound starting to calm you.

“Live. You gotta live for me, Bell.”

“Ha…I did it, Russ. You’re welcome.” You say with a pained smile. And you say it again when you land by the cliffs, Adler rushing towards you with wide eyes—glasses atop his hair as he assessed you on the helicopter. A good thing, too; you’re not sure you have the strength to alight on your own.

His hands seeming to not know where to go, but he doesn’t hesitate. His touch ghosts up your sides, blindly assessing you with a nearly-spooked form of gentleness. He finally took a look at your bloody face, littered with cuts and nasty bruises, still with that distant ghost of a smile. Adler released a breath and brought you gently to his chest, whispering that he has you in your ear as he nuzzled softly into your hair. You could only release a chuckle, one that was more a breath of air than a huff of amusement, as you closed your eyes. You inhaled the familiar comforting scent of nicotine and leather. “I did it, Russ… You’re welcome,” you said again, more quietly than the first time, quickly fading to rest.

Russell shushed you, planting a quick peck to your bloodied temple before continuing to hold you. His hands surely covered in scarlet similar to how you’re drenched in it, spreading it to his own form.

“Yes. Good job,” Russell breathed, moving his forehead to tap against yours, blue eyes on your abused and tired face. “Rest, Bell. Do that for me.”

“O…kay…” You managed before all you saw was black. 

(An image of a bell in your mind’s eye, not moving for a ring.)

▚

▞

▚

A/N: makeyourpeacenow: There's something here to be said about Harrow, the CIA bitch, determined to end Bell, former Soviet, in early 1991 (before the Soviet Union dissolves in December)

Also Adler's two protégés fighting 🫠

Animefreak1145: Case needed a proper crash out and someone to try to defend the poor man. Even though his only defense is a woman who hates looking at mirrors who can't even defend himself from breaking. Don't let Bell get started on Harrow.(too many uncomfortable mirrors here for Bell to face) Also Soft!Adler here(interested at looking at a new potential tool/asset/operative like Case who reminds him of Bell, typical Adler) mixed with psycho. I like Marshall, just not his treatment of Case. Also ex-socialist/commie besties Felix and Bell forever and ever. Nerds for the win~ 💗 🤓Hope ya'll enjoyed this work we did together. There's other stuff I want to comment but I don't remember. Just poor Bell going through bad drug trip... 😔 And Russell making a massacre out of Gusev and willing to have bloody drenched hands along with Bell 🥰 Psycho couple for the win!

Edit: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTY5VWtvK/

Accurate. 😐

Tag List: @tr1ppylady @parkeepingparker @weirdoartist21 @gojocat247 @mayaibnlaahad @dallmaistir @salvija @kylezkie4adler @asaltryefl @stupid-stinky @aurora-windu @zachfoxx121 @pyxis-stellae @makeyourpeacenow @obsessedgremlin @butterfly-stitches @djloveyou3000

You have to tell me if you want me to tag you for each update or else I won't know. Or if you wish to be removed.

[ineylesian]

SEPARATION ANXIETY

— RUSSELL ADLER X FEM! READER SERIES

SYNOPSIS — Adler believed he had left you behind in the Cold War. Unbeknownst to him, you were festering in the very shadow of terror he was chasing.

GENERAL WARNINGS — fem! anatomy reader, smut (undetermined if explicit or mentioned), mentions of mind control (MK Ultra, Cradle), spoilers for BOCW and BO6, weapon violence, depictions of insanity, hallucinations.

GENERAL NOTE — this series is in the works and plans are still in development. any ideas or comments are welcome!

Amidst the faded movement of Harrow’s face, the camera pans, catching the glint of metal and a static laden voice that sends chills down his spine.

“Cut the feeds, we’re being watched.”

Adler never believed he’d see you again. He had watched you fall to your death in the jungles of Vietnam 20 years ago. Yet, here you are, casting a glare that seems to pierce through the screen before the footage dies.

He’s unaware of the clamming of his hands and paling of his face until all eyes are suddenly on him.

“…shit.”

PART ONE | DEAD IN WINTER HARBOR

He thought this was a figment of his imagination. Sleepless nights riddled with guilt and regret, staring at him like he was a speck of dust in the air. Yet, it was real, you were real, real as the cold press of the barrel on his head.

This was madness.

PART TWO | NO WIND OF BLAME

If you cannot recover, you can no longer live. It’s time to wake up.

PART THREE/ EPILOGUE (TBD)

[dearlydevoured]

russell adler x bell! reader. meant to be longer, meant to be proofread, inspired by @altcvnningham

berlin was home to you now.

you don’t know why—considering all that had happened—but you found illegally renting apartments under fake identities was just comforting that you stayed in the city months after your psyche was broken down and put back together with chewing gum and lint-covered duct tape.

maybe it was more of a safe zone but you consciously didn’t acknowledge it, too afraid to leave and see the rest of the world under the forceful title you gave yourself as a german civilian. months passed and you were still anxious about people and places you could barely picture in your head.

nothing more, always something less.

lighting your cigarette, you moved away from the kiosk and walked back to your building, winter chill nipping at the exposed tips of your ears. you started smoking again, trying to reclaim what chunks of identity had been taken away from you, no matter how little.

it was nearing midnight. usually, when it was this late and your pack had already been finished, you tried to ignore your body’s craving for nicotine and wait until the morning. but after cleaning your own sob-session-induced bile off the parquet with a dirty t-shirt the night before, you took the trip down the block and bought a fresh pack to semi-congratulate for not throwing yourself out the window—as much as you desperately wanted to. the acidic smell of your own stomach’s contents hit you mid-cleaning causing you to gag, stomach cramping painfully as you tried to focus on just cleaning the mess you already made, the only thing you could do in the situation besides forcing your body to keep everything down and to not think about it.

you often got away with beating memories of 1981 down. still, your chest would tighten when men at bars used a familiar cologne, closing your eyes and trying to imagine that they smelled of citrus and laundry detergent, not warm spices carried by wood and leather. you would imagine adler when you would hook up with these same men that led you to places you’d only see once yet criticize a million times in your head due to the lack of results when searching for a piece of décor that could scream his name at you as if to console, aching to focus in on just one thing that would remind you of his style. when you were completely disconnected, you only found comfort through pretending he was on top of you, a stranger’s fingers peeling your clothes off in a way so delicate that he could never compare, hands too rough and undeserving.

they would ask if you’re okay and you would only nod in response, sometimes putting a smile on your face just for them and of course, the men before them.

you forgot the pattern of his scars. climbing the first flight of stairs, you reached into your coat pocket, feeling for your keys before hooking a finger into the ring and pulling them out. cigarette hanging from your lips, you separated the apartment key from everything else.

in your head, they created the ursa major. a prfectly carved constelattion on his face, able to be seen even in the daytime.

[cherie-doll]

hiii! I was wondering if you could write jealous ! russell adler with a shy reader? maybe she's new and she talks with other people because they are less imitating than him? thank you so much !

DEFINITELY

Jealous!Adler x Shy!Reader

He's probably rolling in his bed at night at the mere thought of what happened earlier that day

Doesn't he realize he must be more straightforward and give up his stoic personality for once if he wants you?

You probably wouldn't even be able to notice if he were jealous because it's not like he smiles ever or goes out of his way to do things to you, or that's what it seems

To him he's already doing a lot just letting you inhabit his mind, you should be able to sense if he's thinking about you and act accordingly, but if you did he'd probably lose it

He has no trouble intimidating others you frequently converse with, he just doesn't understand why you're seeking these other people out when he sees you at your medical station like once a week

You won't deny he's hot, like you'd hit that if the man weren't so scary to talk to

Many times you've wanted to start talking to him but you can never tell his emotions if he's always wearing those frames that conceal his eyes

You don't catch his dry jokes and his attractive appearance only makes you more nervous, seriously you have to cool yourself down after having to apply bandages or clean a cut on his abdomen

He figures that you might feel lonelier at night when everyone else is resting and you have to stay up reviewing medical cases, he'll force sleep out of his eyes as he pretends to stumble into your station and dryly ask without much tone in his voice if you're going to sleep anytime soon

The problem is he thinks he's already doing too much being concerned for you but in your eyes it's as if he's telling you to stop making noise and lock yourself in your room

But he has pent up annoyance seeing those much friendlier people talk to you and how easily you let up around them, they're able to make eye contact with you and hear your laughter whereas with him you seem tense and avoid his gaze

He wonders what he has to do to get you to open up to him...

[moongumi]

⁀➷ ∵  ❝under the allure❞

⟶ adler goes on an unexpected blind date that doesn't end how he expected

⟶ cw. MDNI, smut, age-gap, use of 'kid', lots of cussing, unprotected sex, oral, lots of kissing

⟶ wc. 5.7k

⟶ note. little bitta something i just wanted to write before i go through more chapters of 'with your heart in a headlock', enjoy, i didn't really check this over it was a pure 1 siting smut

Adler doesn’t expect himself to actually go through with it but after focusing on his entire career on Perseus and practically growing an obsession to it he felt lost after it was all over. Everyone tells him to go out and live, live his life but how is a man like Russell Adler meant to know how to live a normal fucking life. It’s not like he hasn’t tried before, he was married once—had children and well, it didn’t work out for him. He always chose the job over it all.

He knew at least that he could pretend to be normal until the next huge threat needed to be neutralised and he could return to his normal routine of tracking down his enemies.

Yet, it wasn’t unlike Woods to poke and pry at Adler’s patience. “How about you go on a date?”

Adler had a displeased expression on his face, lighting his cigarette before he turned to Woods with a grimace. “Are you kidding?”

“Nope.” Woods drank his beer. On his side his good friend Mason came back after getting more drinks for the table. “I’m serious, let loose.”

“You’re one to talk,” Mason chirped as he sat down next to Woods in the booth. He pushes a drink towards the youngest at the table who catches it with ease.

“Thanks.” Adler said.

Mason took a swig of his beer before placing his drink back on the coaster, pointing his finger towards Adler. “I was the one who came up with the idea.”

Adler looked over at the pair with a confused expression. “What idea?”

“The blind date.”

Wood lets out a sound, before he snapped his fingers, “Right, I forgot to mention that—it’s a blind date, plus it’s already been booked, surprise!”

“What?” Adler’s eye twitched under his shades. He could feel a vein about to pop in his head from the thought of going on a blind date set up by Mason of all people.

Mason who had an excited look on his face, smiled at Adler. “Look, I already set it up and you’d be a right asshole for not showing up.”

Adler could’ve easy rejected even the idea of it but he felt in the moment that he had nothing else to do, better than another day drinking with these two. “Who is it?”

Mason does a fist pump after Adler basically assured that he was going on that date. “Just someone I know.” He had this sneaky expression on his face, one that Adler did not like.

“Woah, is it one of ya’ girls?” Woods asked, with a teasing tone. Referencing the fact that Mason had his way with women and well, he goes through them like he does pints of beer.

Adler groaned at the idea, the ashes of his cigarette peppering down onto the table messily.

“Hey, I promise you she isn’t one of those girls. I mean she’s cute and all.” The look on Mason’s face merely tells Adler that the girl could be one of his girls, had just hadn’t gotten around to it just yet.

Adler sighed, “She doesn’t know about our line of work?”

“Nope,” Mason reassured. “She’s a friend of a friend’s.”

༝

Russell Adler sat in a cafe, way too early for his date tapping away his cigarette against the edge of the ash tray. He hasn’t ordered anything, no drinks or desserts yet. He doesn’t actually know what to order and well, doesn’t want to seem like an asshole—eating before his date arrived.

His date was arriving after her job, after 4 pm, Mason mentioned. 

Adler’s eyes watched the television hanging from a mount on the ceiling in the small cafe, some more things about the Cold War, wherever Adler went he can’t seem to escape the job or the itch to do more about the state of the world.

He doesn’t even notice when you arrived.

You wrote down the cafe Mason mentioned, it was far from your job and well, you had a take a few trains to get here. You would have rather preferred it to be closer for convince but you couldn’t be picky.

You were also late, a lot later than the date was intended for. You even doubted that he would still be there.

So you felt a sense of relief walking into the very busy cafe seeing the man you’re supposed to meet still there, and he didn’t look annoyed at all.

He had his jacket off, resting it over the back of the chair next to him. He wore his sunglasses, Mason mentioned to find a man wearing umber tone aviators, light brown hair and a scarred face. You even recalled over the phone Mason reluctantly asking about the scars.

“He’s got a few scars, if it scares you—“

You scoffed, walking around in your small apartment. 

“Why would a few scars scare me, Alex?”

“You’d be surprised.” 

The scars on his face, there’s many and they were deep yet somehow even from a distance you felt like they suited him—even added to the appeal of him. He stood out in the cafe, something about him. The allure, his nonchalant way of sitting—

“Hi, sorry I’m late,” You said, pulling out the chair slightly squinting when it squeak a little too loudly. “Trains were packed after work.”

Adler gives you a tight-lipped smile, “No worries, I haven’t been waiting long.”

Which was a lie, he had been waiting over an hour but he wasn’t keeping track. Maybe the employees at the cafe were eyeing him up wondering when he was going to order.

You felt awkward, immediately as you sat down. Unsure of what to say to the older man.

“Mason—“

“I—oh, you go ahead.” You almost interrupted him, god, could this not get more awkward.

Adler didn’t seem to care much about the awkward silences or the lack of social skills. You weren’t usually a nervous person, maybe it was just him making you feel this way—you didn’t know much about him at all.

“Mason never mentioned your age.” 

You blinked for a moment, in shock. Mason really didn’t mention anything to him at all. “Oh, uhm, I’m twenty-five.”

“Shit,” Adler sighed, pressing his almost finished cigarette into the ashtray as his other hand came up to his face. He rubbed his eyes under his glasses. “He said you’ve be younger but not—“

You immediately felt the need to explain yourself. “Mason mentioned your age and I don’t mind—“

“Yeah? You’re a lot younger than I am.”

You shrugged, before you drew a menu from the basket on the right of you and looked at the menu for what you wanted in hopes he would continue the date anyway. “Like I said, it’s not a big deal.”

Adler was reluctant, the age thing. A girl half his age, what the hell was he doing messing with this kind of thing.

Adler watched the way you bite your bottom lip whilst you turned the pages of the menu until your eyes would light up at what you wanted.

“Let me order, I come here often.”

Adler nodded, leaning back in his seat. “Sure thing.” He wasn’t usually the type to wonder what others thought of him but he even had a glance around to see what other people would think. What would his ex-wife even think of him right now. But it shouldn’t matter, even if he didn’t want to—he was enjoying it.

You ordered him a red velvet cake and an americano, something about how he seemed like he didn’t enjoy drinking sweet drinks. You weren’t wrong, Adler did only drink black coffee.

“So what do you do?”

Right, he was expecting this kind of question but he hasn’t exactly prepared a lie.

“I’m ex-military, retired now.” It wasn’t a lie but he kept a lot of the truth.

You hummed sipping on your warm latte. “Retired so young.”

“Young,” He laughs, “I’m old, kiddo, old enough to retire.”

“People don’t retire in their forties unless they made enough money,” You said, tapping your feet against the floor. “Plus, you shouldn’t call me kiddo—if you’re interested in me that way…”

Right. Adler cleared his throat, hiding the way what you meant made him feel. He shuffled in his seat.

“I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t.”

He didn’t exactly get a photo of what his date would look like or even description from your assumption. Not even a taste of the personality. You leaned across the seat feeling slightly less awkward as the date goes on. “Hm, what exactly made you agree to this anyway, seeing as Alex didn’t tell you a thing about me.” You giggled slightly at the end, not even on purpose.

Adler could guess that you knew Mason well enough to be on first name basis. You were pretty, he wondered how Mason hadn’t already got his hands on you.

He didn’t know if he should tell you the truth or make up something pretty to make you feel good about yourself.

“I didn’t have anything else to do.”

You shrugged, seemingly unfazed. “At least you’re honest.”

Adler takes a sip of the americano, it tastes really bad but he doesn’t make it noticeable. “What kinda’ job did you come from?”

“Oh, I work in a cafe—kinda funny seeing as we’re in one now,” You mentioned. “If we’re being honest, I wouldn’t have chosen a cafe for a first date, you also don’t seem like the type to hang in cafes anyway.”

“You’re not wrong, I’m glad we can both be true to ourselves.”

You’ve almost finished your drink at this point and well, you can see that he’d barely drank his. His eyes even behind the almost opaque sunglasses you could tell he was focused more on the television behind you than you.

You kicked your feet under the table, brushing your bare leg against his trousered ones. “Let’s go then, maybe a walk will do us well.”

༝

Adler doesn’t remember what a real date is supposed to feel like but even now he could tell it was a strange situation. The pair walked side by side.

He wasn’t sure if he was willingly to commit anything to this, to you. He could feel you brushing your arm against him walking closer to him to avoid bumping into anyone else on the sidewalk as he was approaching a nice park. It was winter, very cold.

He held his arm out for you, almost instantly you looped your arm around his biceps holding your body against him for warmth.

“Seems like some men don’t understand that they don’t own the sidewalk.”

Adler chuckles slightly at your complaints. He could smell the faintness of your perfume, it smelt nice—he couldn’t complain. He also can’t deny the fact that you were attractive, by all means, Mason seemed to only know pretty girls but they tend to lack anything more.

You appreciated him accepting your want of physical touch. You recalled your phone call with Mason.

“Is this guy your friend?”

Mason hums, before he responded. “Yeah, I’ve known him a while.”

“What have you told him about me?”

He laughed, “Nothing, surprise him.”

“That’s a terrible idea, this is going to be awful.”

He clicks his tongue, feeling the need to ask, “You sure you’re alright with it, he’s a lot older than ya’.”

“You’re a lot older than me, Alex.

He laughed again, “Yeah, but you’re not interested in me.”

“Yeah, ‘cause you’re annoying.”

Mason scoffed, “Well, he’s definitely not an annoying guy, he can just be a little…different.”

“What kind of different?”

You can tell Adler was a very calm individual, he tends to take control of situations. If he was in the military he must’ve been a good rank and well he ended up with scars like that on his face yet he’s alive—says a lot about him.

You were facing his scarred side, and just something inside you wanted to feel them. Caress those deep edges of his skin—

“Wondering how I got ‘em?”

You snapped out of it, letting out a soft chuckle. “I was but, you don’t have to tell me.”

He seemed to like that answer. You two stayed quiet as you walked towards a frozen lake, a few people were seen skating across. 

Adler watched the way your face lights up seeing the skaters. You released him and walked up towards the edge of the lake.

“Seems fun, didn’t bring my skates though.”

Adler chuckles, “You don’t want to see me skating.”

You liked how he was joking around with you, it felt natural. “I doubt you’re that bad.”

“You don’t wanna’ see an old man like me skating like that.”

You scoffed, rolling your eyes, “You’re not that old. You seem capable.”

Adler was merely pretending to seem like the average man his age. Of course he was capable, the things he did for his country proved that.

“So, how’d you know him?”

You looked back at the older man, with your brows furrowed. “Who, Alex?”

“Yeah.”

You hummed, “Family friend, I have an older brother.” Short and sweet. 

“Do you enjoy your job then?” Seems like Adler had the hang of the whole, small talk thing and you merely entertained it as you continued to walk toward somewhere you could possibly sit at.

“Not particularly, I just do it—for now,” You said. “I’d prefer something more exciting, maybe I should join the military—“

“Don’t.” Adler interrupted, cutting you off with a stern look. “It’s not worth it.”

“You did it, you’re telling me there nothing about it you enjoyed?”

“That’s personal preference,” He explained. “There’s a lotta’ things better for you to do.”

You stopped in your tracks, “Or are you doubting my capabilities? Maybe I’d be a great spy or something.”

Adler chuckles, even if the slightest sense of his serious tone was still prevalent. “Sounds like something you could do.”

“I’d do you.” The words came out of your mouth faster than you could stop it. Your hand reached up and covered your mouth.

Adler lets out a short chuckle, slightly like a scoff. “Jesus, you’re just like Mason.”

“Woah, I’m not a man-whore like him.” You act offended.

Adler raised his hand, shaking his head. “That’s not what I meant, you’re straightforward like him not the other thing.”

You breathed out, pouting instead. “Whatever.”

Adler could tell you were joking around with him but he still felt a pang of guilt. He followed you as you sat down in front of a fountain.

He sat down next to you, his thigh brushing against your leg. He now notices how short your skirt was, a lot shorter now that it’s ridden up your legs.

He noticed the way your tights had little snags in them, maybe from a long days work. This makes him wonder if you were wearing your work uniform underneath—get your head out of the gutter, why was he thinking of this?

You could tell he was looking, at your clothes at the slightest peeks of your skin. You bit the dried skin off your lips before talking to him.

You leaned back, your hands rested against the cold concrete of the fountain. “I don’t expect you to think this date was amazing.”

“It was great.”

That sly smirk on his face.

“Don’t lie, not all dates go well—sometimes first dates just suck.” Your age was definitely playing a part in this, the way you talked about how casual dates were too. It was nothing like how Adler had experienced it when he was younger.

He then thought if there even was a chance he would have a second date with you—if he even had the time, seeing as the Cold War was only nearing it’s end and he would be needed. He didn’t have all the time in the world as he had played it off like he did, he wasn’t really a mere retired man.

In a selfish way he wanted to see you, know more about you and see the way your cheeks reddened whenever he’d catch your excited gaze.

The way you bite your lips waiting for his response. Like you were just begging for his attention.

Your soft hand come to rest onto of his rough, aged hand. Your fingers feel at his callouses and the lines of his palms underneath. He could tell you felt a lot more comfortable with him, being close to him and actually being able to tell if he liked you.

He did like you but he can’t just forget that he liked a lot of things in the past but the job always came first—or well, he always chose it.

“I know what you’re thinking.” Your voice was soft, lingering with disappointment.

Adler’s eyes looked for your expression, he can’t tell what you’re thinking when you’re looking down avoiding his gaze like that. Yet, he entertained the thought. “What am I thinking?”

“That this isn’t going to work out, ‘cause you’re not willing to commit to it—‘cause I’m too young—“

“That’s not the reason—“

You don’t let him speak. “It doesn’t have to be serious. I don’t need it to be, this could last one night, a few weeks or months—even a year, Russell.”

Adler sighed, reaching into his pocket for another cigarette at the idea.

“You’ve not been on a date recently have you? Girls these days don’t all need someone to marry them,” You continued, attempting to convince him further. 

It was quiet clear to him now. What you wanted from this. He can’t deny, it was something he wanted but felt like he couldn’t get it without the entire ordeal—your words made him feel like it was valid to imagine it being much more casual.

“A little fun won’t hurt anyone.” Your voice lingered in his ears

༝

He was easy to convince after that. You felt an even strange sense of giddiness managing to make his fold so easily, he seemed like a tough nut to crack.

He wasn’t a tough one to deal with when you had him in your small apartment. On one of the armchairs you had recently bought after needing somewhere nice to read your books.

His pants were hung off his legs as he sat on the fresh chenille cushion, his head thrown back against the back of the chair.

You were on your knees, a hand against the inner part of his thigh and the older holding onto the base of him with a hard grip.

His rough hand held onto your hair like a ponytail to the side of your head, exposing your neck and allowing him to get a better view of your actions. He groaned when he looks back at you with his full attention.

You stopped when he looked away, when he threw his head back in pleasure—to toy with him. You smiled at him, even innocently before prying your lips apart with the tip of his throbbing cock. Your wet lips glide over the slick skin, wrapping those pretty painted lips over it.

He gripped your hair harder forcing you to crane your neck up at him. God, your knees hurt in this position but the fact that between all of that you were getting warmer and wetter by the second couldn’t be denied.

His cock, hot and red slide down the flatness of your tongue to the deeper parts of your throat—you were good, you knew how to handle it. Easily taking him deeper than he expected or even had experienced. He let out the most erotic sounds you’ve heard.

Maybe you did like them older. And the way he still had his aviators on, it was like a power display or something.

“Holy fuck,” He moaned, reaching his other hand down towards your jaw and cheek. He holds your pretty face between his fingers and squeeze them to pucker your lips pulling you away from his cock. “Enough of me.”

You wanted to keep going, to see how long he could hold off—it was like a test. You wanted to prove to yourself you could make a man like him come undone.

Your eyes looked at him through those thick lashes, practically begging for him to handle you. He drew you in with his grip against your cheeks towards his face. His hot breath against your swollen lips.

“What a pretty girl.”

You bit your lips, leaning into him wanting to taste him. He held you back making you whine at him. “Mean.”

He chuckles darkly. He’s the one to make the move, he leaned in and pressed his lips against yours.

Those scarred lips taste like heaven, a heaven one could only reach from crawling through hell. It burns so good.

You taste the dew from his tongue, rolling yours against his as if you could become one with him. His lips were so soft even with the scars, you could feel them and it added to the danger of it all.

The roughness and sloppiness of the kiss had his glasses sliding around, you reached your hand up and pushes his glasses off his face, it falling somewhere behind him.

You practically whimper against him. He released his grip on your cheeks, his hands finding their comfort in your waist gripping you closer to him.

He basically pulled you onto his lap. His bare skin rubbing against your tights, you could feel his erection—hot and leaking against the risen parts of your skirt. Your ass was hanging out of them, one of his hands reached down to grip onto it pulling you into a rolling motion against his groin.

“Fuck, keep doing that.” You almost melt against him. The only thing separating his cock from your core was the thin layers of the thighs and your thong.

He gripped the tights so hard they start to snag and rip against his fingers. He toyed with the flimsy and barely existent fabric of your thong. “What kinda’ girl wears a fucking thong to work?”

“A girl like me.”

He groans, ripping your tights even more. “You don’t mind right?”

“No,” You whimper against his lips. “Do whatever you want.”

With the tights out of the way there wasn’t much in his way. His fingers danced on your hot lips, fondling them and feeling at the warm skin. He felt it now, how wet you were.

“You’re this fucking wet already, holy shit.” Even he’s surprised. He pulled away from your lips, peering over to look at the way your cheeks giggled when starts to move his fingers.

“When’s the last time you fucked a girl my age, Russell?” You teased. “We all get this wet.”

His fingers pressed harder feeling the raw skin hidden between the folds, it felt like fire under his touch. “Holy fuck—you’re so fucking wet.”

He pushes his fingers past the fabric of the thong pushing it away. With the pressure the top of it pulls harder against your clit and adds to the experience. You moaned when he pushes his fingers inside, they slipped in so easy even he let out a deep sound from it.

“You don’t need much prep, do ya’?”

You shake your head, pressing your lips against his scarred cheek. “I like it when it hurts a little.”

“Holy fuck.”

His fingers were all the way in, curling and looking for where it feels the best for you. He doesn’t struggle to find it. Your face contorts with pleasure, nearly drooling against his face.

“Fuck, it feels good.”

Adler hummed, continuing to add another finger to the mix. “Good, tell me what you like, pretty girl.”

“I like everything you do, Russell.”

He turned his face towards your lips, capturing you into another deep kiss. The angle of it and the pressure. Your hands rested atop his shoulder, allowing you to roll your lips into his fingers.

You turned your head, deepening the kiss ever so slightly. “I want your cock.”

“Always so upfront, huh?”

“I know what I want.” You stated, reaching in front of you to undo your uniform. The buttons come undone easily and you merely leave it on.

Your breasts look like they are threatening to escape that tight bra, Adler reached over with one hand to cup your breast squeezing them between his fingers. His eyes glued to the way they bounce and the way your face reacts to his touch. He slipped his fingers under the fabric to feel at your nipples, hard just for him.

“Anywhere on your body that isn’t perfect?”

You rolled your eyes, he really did know the right things to say. “You haven’t even felt how good I can make you feel, Adler.”

He groans at that, especially at your soft hands reaching down back to his throbbing cock. It’s neglected but for a man his age—he didn’t struggle keeping it hard. You shouldn’t really be surprised, he’s different from most men.

“You sure about this?”

You nodded, biting your bottom lips now he realised it was your habit. “If I wasn’t, you wouldn’t be in my apartment.”

༝

Things may have gotten a lot more intense on the bed. You knew you should’ve started trying to kiss him on the bed but it was sort of fun leading him to your bedroom, swaying your hips on purpose.

You stripped down to nothing and laid on the bed awaiting your prize.

“Don’t ask if I’m sure again, you know my answer.” You stated, seeing that look on his face as he takes off his shirt. 

The older man laughs, tossing his clothes and climbing onto the bed and over your body. “How’d you know I’d ask that?”

“Gut-feeling.”

You laid back, feeling his hand gently come up to grasp your cheeks before he pressed his lips against yours again. His kisses were so intense and full of meaning. He desired you so much and you could just tell by the way it felt like he never wanted it to end.

He tastes and explores you with so much experience. His other hand drawing your hips against his harshly.

Your hand reached down towards his cock, grabbing it’s shaft and you pumped it to warm it up again—he only got slightly soft but you also just wanted to touch him.

His hand on your face felt so gentle compared to the way he kissed you like he was hungry—he moved his lips down towards your neck, pressing heavy and wet kisses against the skin, those are definitely going to leave a mark.

Your back arches off the soft bed that had too many pillows and blankets. You didn’t care in this moment what was going to get spoiled, fuck all that. You had your eye on one thing only, Russell Adler.

You drew his cock towards your entrance, rubbing it’s swollen tip against your wet lips prying them apart. Your slick covering his cock with ease, you can feel him trying to hold back. “No need to rush…this is my favourite part.”

You loved the burn on the way in, especially from a cock so thick and heavy like his. 

He presses a gentle kiss against your chest craning his neck down to watch the entry. You pressed his tip harder between your legs, feeling him enter slowly—agonisingly slowly. 

The stretching burn, your warmth cascading onto him. He rested his head against your chest right between your breasts as his breathing intensified. “Jesus fuck.”

His cock stretches you further, he seemed to be unable to hold back after a few seconds of your slow teasing. He pushed his hips ever so slightly making you moan out. “Ugh, fuck.”

You didn’t stop him. His lips pressed against your chest, moving to encase your nipples in his mouth as he fucks his cock into you. He finally buried himself balls deep inside and rests for a moment to catch his breath.

You chuckle, feeling the centre of your pelvis swell and warm up from the pleasure. “You done there old man?”

He scoffs with a chuckle, “You doubting me?”

He pulled out nearly all the way before pushing himself back in with speed, taking your breath away. You choke on your words and only pathetic whimpers left your lips as he settles into an unforgivable rhythm. Maybe he also knew a thing or two about fucking.

He gripped one of your legs and threw it over his shoulder to deepen his depth pressing his palm to the under side of your thigh to force it higher, resting the other on his hips as he drove into your core with his pace.

He rested on his forearm on the side of your face, watching every twist and curl of your face, every bead of sweat that fell from your forehead and neck. He wanted to see what he was doing to you.

“Hm, do you like that, does it feel good?”

You slobbered your words knowing he was teasing you. “Fuck you, of course it feels good!” You were practically crying out the last words.

He could feel it, you getting close. He removed his hand from thigh bringing it to your already punished centre, he places his thumb against your most sensitive bud—rolling it with his large digit with confidence.

He could feel your clenches, you couldn’t even lie and tell him you weren’t close. You were even grateful you didn’t have to tell him, cry out to him that you were going to come.

Your abused hole told him enough, spluttering and making pathetic noises on it’s own. He couldn’t even pretend it wasn’t making him so fucking close too, all of it, your face, the way your body reacts to the tiniest touches from him.

He pressed his face against the side of yours, “Come on, pretty girl, come for me.”

He didn’t have to ask again. You released one last whimper, lips quivering and brows stitching together as you came undone, the heat from your stomach spreads all over your body making you shake as you felt the burn build inside of your most sensitive parts.

It felt even better to feel the way he fucked you even harder then, to catch his own release. The way he pressed his lips aggressively and hungrily against yours, tongue basically fucking your mouth at the same time.

Your hands pawed and gripped at his back, leaving marks indefinitely.

His hand on your clit moved up, feeling at the divots in your hips, the curve of your waist towards the swell of your breasts before he rests it back at your jaw holding it delicately.

He fucks his cock into your oversensitive hole, you could feel him blowing his load deep inside of you. It felt so wrong to love how it felt.

He pulled away, resting his forehead against yours after he finished—he pulled out his cock gently as it began to soften.

You were breathing heavily, chest heaving up and down. You could see the sweat on his skin and his perfect hair now messy and greasier.

He looked down between your legs at the mess, the cum spilling out of you. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

You were guessing the mistakes made during the haze of pleasure had finally caught up to him. You sat up, breast wriggling around as you did. “Don’t worry about it, that won’t happen.”

He knew what you were referring to, it lessened the worry—he didn’t need more children right now. He still felt guilty, he should’ve been more careful.

He began to sit up, but you reached over and grabbed his forearm. He looked back with a confused expression, “Gotta’ clean you up.”

“No.”

He looked even more confused, “What? You’re not one for aftercare and pillow talk?” 

Adler just had to joke, somewhat of a dig at your age too after your little nick name for him.

You smiled, pursing your lips before your shrugged, “Not particularly but I had other thoughts in mind, old man.”

You pushed him back, forcing him onto his back over the bed. You jumped over him even with your thighs leaking with his fluids. You pressed your lips against his, “More.”

“Gods sake, I’m not like the guys your age.” Adler said between your lips even he had to know when to feel inadequate.

You pulled back, you don’t believe him, “I can wait for your buddy to get ready again.”

༝

And you did, for a couple hours after that anyway. Even Adler didn’t expect himself to be able to go on for so many rounds but he did pass out right after the last one.

“I really can’t go again, kid.”

“Shouldn’t say that to someone you just fucked.”

Adler grimaced, “Sorry, force of habit.”

He was knocked out and you hopped out of bed, ready to clean yourself up. You did manage to tuck him into your bed comfortably.

You reached your bathroom and cleaned up then looking out towards the door to check if he was still sleeping. Very much, sound asleep.

You pulled out one of your drawers and pulled on the hole on the backboard, reaching inside you grabbed a phone.

14 missed calls.

Of course. You sighed. You take the phone in your hand and walk out towards the bedroom again but going straight towards your living room and out the balcony. In the cold rough winter air your shorts and tank top served no purpose of keeping you warm at all, only for slight modesty if a neighbour was to see you.

You dialled the number back, it answers immediately.

“Did you do it?”

You leaned against the cold bar of your balcony looking down on the main road.. “Not yet.”

“What’s taking so long?”

You rolled your eyes, looking around. “These things take time.”

“Yeah? And all this time you were fucking him.” His accent thick, hopefully no one can hear him.

“You sound jealous.” You spot him, a few cars down the road with his windows down and an arm out tapping away his cigarette ashes. “Just part of the gig.”

“Sure, whatever you say—get it done.” His voice deadpanned, “The trash is stinking up my boot.”

He hangs up, leaving you to face the freezing temperates and the weight of what stands between that you will choose to do.

[mockerycrow]

Hii here's my request if you'd like to write it; Adler x femreader w/ "I had a nightmare...can I stay with you tonight?" Thankss <3

DREAM OR REALITY? (Adler x Fem!Bell!Reader) — 4K CELEBRATION

authors note: i couldn’t resist.

[WARNINGS: Black Ops Cold War Spoilers, very slight Mentions of Torture, nightmares, minor paranoia, toxic little hurt/comfort.]

YOU WAKE UP in a cold sweat, your heart pounding against your rib cage and with a voice in the back of your mind. You’re trembling as you can’t make any sense of what the voice is saying, and soon the sound of your blood rushing in your ears overtakes the incoherent voice.

You rub your eyes to ground yourself before you glance around, noting you’re still in the warehouse. You look at your watch, groaning quietly as you realize it’s quite early in the morning. Your chest feels quite heavy, and you have an odd craving for a cigarette when you don’t remember ever picking the habit up.

It’s one of those nights; you can tell you aren’t going to be able to go back to sleep anytime soon. Adler and the others wanted you to stay in the warehouse just in case you were able to decrypt any more information; you had no problem with that, as mostly everyone else also slept in the warehouse, although in different areas. Unfortunately though, your makeshift sleeping cot is not too comfortable, so you have an ache in your neck along with stirring anxiety from your nightmare. 

You push the cheap blanket off of yourself and you adjust your sleeves before swinging your legs over the side of the cot. You slip your boots on and lace them up, letting out a heavy sigh as you do so. A nervous energy remains under your skin, like you’re being watched. You know you aren’t—or do you?— but you shudder nonetheless. You grab your leather jacket, sliding it on before you exit the room you’ve been sleeping in for the past couple of days. The common area is clear except for Helen by the radios with her headphones, trying to make out Russian messages.

You rub your sternum before exiting the warehouse right in front of the garage door, the cool nighttime air filling your lungs. Goosebumps rise underneath your jacket for a moment from the fresh sensation, and you’re so caught up in your own mind you don’t even notice the man standing a few feet away. “What’re you doin’ up?” You jolt at the sound of someone’s voice and you look over, locking eyes with Adler. Lacking his usual sunglasses, his eyebrows are more visible and furrowed. A half smoked cigarette is between his fingers like usual, and he takes a drag from it.

You let out a breath and you shrug, stuffing your hands into the back pockets of your jeans, shifting your weight as you glance away. “Couldn’t sleep.” You utter. You technically aren’t lying, though you didn’t even attempt to go back to sleep. Adler doesn’t respond as he tucks a hand under his other arm as he takes another drag off of his cigarette, shifting slightly closer to you. Your eyes train on some bugs flying around under the big light overhead for a moment, the silence being filled with crickets. 

“Couldn’t sleep, huh?” Adler hums, his eyes never leaving your form. He notes the way you’re reluctant to share anything, your conflicted and far away gaze; he’s already thinking you’ve had a nightmare. “What was it about?”

Your gaze moves from the bugs to him—his stare feels like he sees all of you, your bare soul; your skin and bones and every sin you’ve ever committed. Adler’s gaze has always felt like that and you’ve never known what to make of it. He’s so.. vague yet so on the dot every time he talks to you, so friendly yet so cruel. You aren’t sure if you should say anything. “Bell.” You feel a nudge against your arm and you blink for a moment before looking back at Adler, your hearing returning—you aren’t sure when it left.

“I just.. I had a nightmare.” You admit with a weak laugh, looking away nervously as your hands fidget in the back pockets of your jeans. Your weight shifts as silence fills the air between you two and you kind of want to reach over to strangle him a bit—you know he’s waiting for you to elaborate. “I couldn’t make any sense of it, honestly. It was a weird horrid mixture of Vietnam and.. this room. Televisions.. hm. I don’t know.” You mumble, trailing off before you look back at him. “Can I stay with you tonight?”

There’s an unreadable look in Adler’s eyes as he drops his cigarette, stepping on it and squashing it to put it out. It takes him a moment before he nods. “Sure, Bell. You can stay with me. We can go over some files, yeah? Take your mind off of it, since we have a job to do.”

A weird sense of calm washes over you from his words and you nod, letting out a relieved breath. “Yeah, we can do that.”

[delta-06]

Trying Shibari with Adler is all fun and games until you are the one tied on the chair with your legs spread and him teasing the fuck out of you

[littlemissclandestine]

please please pleaseeee write more soft adler hcs!!!! I'm literally obsessed with your work!!

Soft!Adler Headcanons: (Girl)Dad! Edition Part 1

GIF by h-a-unted

Author's Note: Ahhh! Back at it again. Uni has been kicking me in the balls and I've had writer's and art block argh. This has been in drafts for a while but this post was the catalyst in helping me add more so thank you! I have not proofread so um hope you don't mind guys. I miss my husband. ...And thanks for the ask anon! Gonna make me cry with your comment hehe. I hope this is okay for soft!Adler. I need to get this out. I'm working on the other ask as well with Bell, not sure if it's the same anon. Just gimme some more time. Appreciate you being patient and hope all is good with you <3

Adler was never really big on families. Didn’t see himself as the type of man to fit that stereotypical suburban lifestyle that everyone seemed to crave. Couldn’t even picture himself like that. Well at least not since his ex-wife…

As soon as he found out he was going to be a father, it was like time stopped. So many things going through his mind at once that he struggled to process it. Like those helicopter videos where the blades whir so fast it’s like they’ve frozen. That’s how Adler felt…frozen.

It took him a while to get his head round it. You’d see him randomly staring off into space, his nails digging into the sofa as he scratched at it out of nervousness. He’d sometimes just head out for the day, saying he’ll be back soon but never knew what he’d actually get up to. A walk perhaps. A trip to the bar. Or…walking round a DIY store, choosing the paint he’d use on the walls of the soon-to-be nursery of your home.

Every few weeks, he’d come home with something new. You’d walk in to the nursery while he was out and take it all in, counting down the days until the room was in full use and you’d notice something that wasn’t there before. A new book for the shelf, new clothes in the closet, toys in the basket.

When you gave birth, he was taxiing - he’d just returned to the US on a jet after another intense and gruelling operation he’s been sent on. He raced over in a cab all the way to the hospital, ringing around and receiving calls from your family too. His mind was all over the place as he approached reception, trying to stay calm as he asked which ward you were in but the apprehension was too much. There weren’t a lot of things that made Adler anxious but this most certainly was one of the most nerve-wracking experiences of his entire life to date.

As soon as he walked in, his stomach dropped, his shoulders relaxed and he exhaled, a sigh of relief that everything was okay. He immediately gave you a hug and a kiss to the forehead, an unspoken promise to make it up to you for not being there during the birth.

When you asked him if he wanted to hold her, he just blinked at you for a few moments as if you said the stupidest thing in the world. He took a deep, shaky breath as he reached out and took her with a nod, his hands shaking slightly. Adjusting her, making sure her head and spin was supported adequately in his arms, he just watched her with pure adoration in his eyes as a small smile crept onto his lips. Tears threatening to fall from his eyes, he turned around to look out the window, pretending to check on your car when in actual fact he just needed a moment to compose himself, taking a couple deep breaths and clearing his throat, overwhelmed with the feeling of not deserving this kind of joy after all of the things he’s done in his career. -> “God, she’s uh beyond beautiful, honey. Just like you.”

At home, you’d often find him shirtless. In the lounge, he’d be on his back as he plays with his daughter on the sofa, holding her up in the air and bringing her back down to rub his nose over her belly, making her giggle and raising her again. Sometimes, you’d find him just wandering the house with her - her thumb in her mouth and head on his chest as he carried her with one arm under her bottom, an occasional kiss to the head as he reached for something from the fridge with the other hand. Other times, he’d be reading in bed with her cuddled up and her head on his shoulder, softly snoring into his neck. Skin-to-skin contact was extra important for him.

He’d often sing to her or put on a baby voice as he played with her, something he’d only do when totally alone, unaware you were secretly watching him and when she reached up and touched his scar, it would always make him melt

Adler’s the type of dad to treat his daughter to pretty much anything she wants. He’s keen not to spoil her but when she looks up at him like she does, he can’t say no, almost every single time. His daughter would run to him when others would deny her things such as supermarket items, fizzy drinks at a family dinner or party or time at the park. He’d hand her whatever it is when someone isn’t looking and give her a side smile and a wink. -> “Just don’t tell your mom, kid.”

He notices that she tends to fixate on his sunglasses a lot, smacking them on the floor, touching the lenses and leaving grubby marks over them and although he’d scream internally, he dealt with it calmly and bought her her own pair throughout the years so they could twin.

Ah yes twinning! Same shirt? Same watch? Certainly. He finds it cute.

Adler would most certainly give in when it comes to pranks. In fact, he’d go out of his way to help his daughter prank his s/o, giving the kid a fist bump when it goes off without a hitch and you end up drenched in slime. -> “Slime suits you, darlin’!”

Russell owns a cap saying “Girl Dad” on it and wears it proudly around the house or as he pushes the pram or holds his daughter’s hand.

Whenever he crosses roads with his daughter, he’ll hold her hand. When she was young, he did that thing where he holds one hand and his s/o holds the other and they lift their kid up and lower them again repeatedly.

When putting her in the car, he’d be a responsible parent and put her in and take her out of the side on the pavement and not the road

He’d be super protective of his daughter, having ‘the talk’ when she hits that phase of her life and being serious about it. He wouldn’t let her wear crop tops, skirts and shorts until she was at least around 21 years of age. 

If he finds her messing with a boy home alone, you best believe that boy would be scared shitless of even being within 100 miles of Adler or his daughter ever again. No guns were involved but Russell was stern as fuck with him as he knows exactly what boys are like at that age. -> “Absolute fucking horndogs,” he says as he slams the front door closed and then points to the lounge and clicks his fingers. “You, in there. Now. Come on.”

When his daughter told him about a father-daughter dance coming up, his heart sank because he knew he’d be away at that time. He made up for it by taking her out and letting her dress up, Russell bringing home a beautiful necklace for her to wear and putting it on her. They’d talk and laugh about all sorts as they dance together and have a little catch up.

He definitely worries about her a lot and constantly questions himself. Is he doing enough? Is she happy? Will she end up like him? What if she ends up despising him when she eventually finds out what he does for a living?

But when she does? She’s more interested than he thought she’d be. He’d be sitting next to her in bed, reading her a story as she’s cuddled up by his side and she’d suddenly get bored, saying she wants another story about his army days instead. He tries his hardest to suppress his smile but it grows wider and they end up talking about his experiences until they both fall asleep together with Russell oversleeping and running late for work in the morning.

They’d often go stargazing together and get back home at a late hour. They’d lie on the roof of his car or on the grass together, pointing out constellations and talking about life. Russell would be tired the next morning at work but it’s okay because it was worth it to spend more time with his daughter

When he’d have to go away, it always hurt him but he was so used to compartmentalising and turning off that emotional part of him, he just got on with it, albeit carrying a little bracelet with beads that spell out ‘daddy’ she made for him for his birthday and in return? You guessed it, she got his dog tags. When he was alone at night halfway across the globe, he’d take it out and kiss it, his eyes closing, remembering her, wondering what she's doing and aching to see her and hug her again.

When she got older, her interest in his job peaked and she’d ask for lessons in shooting and hand-to-hand. Adler was hesitant at first but eventually gave in, thinking self defense was a good thing for a woman to learn of course. Frequent trips to a shooting range and setting up the back garden as a training area for close quarters combat? Hell yes.

Russell would teach his daughter how to drive too. -> “Yeah that’s it sweetheart. Now brake..no i said BRAKE…BRAAAKE! Ah shit, your mother’s going to kill me.”

He was also worried one day, his family would be a target so made it his mission to get them trained up too. Nobody really knew he had a family though. They wouldn’t go to very public spots and they assumed different identities so they weren’t tied to him.

He tends not to keep any photos of him and his family up on the walls in the house or in his wallet due to safety concerns

Adler secretly loves it when his daughter hooks onto his arm as they walk. It makes him all warm and fuzzy inside but he’d never admit that, smiling to himself before clearing his throat. -> “You wanna head down over there, kid? Nice view?”

He loves carrying her on his shoulders, her legs dangling and hands in his hair. -> “Careful with the hair up there, princess.” 

Some days, he’ll come back from work and find his daughter in the living room with a bunch of his clothes on. He’d try to stop himself from laughing at her but would fail miserably because it swallows her. Her impression of him wants to make him cry. -> “I do not speak like that nor do I stand like that. Is that a cigarette?! Gimme that!”

Don’t worry, she didn’t light it and Russell doesn’t smoke inside anymore, only outside. As soon as he sees his daughter, it goes out, even when she’s older.

When she clings to his leg as he walks, he rolls his eyes and smiles. -> “What are you doing there, kid? Come here, doll.” A grunt as he picks her up and kisses her cheek. “Better?” He smiles when she nods at him, knowing she just needs comfort right now and misses him when she’s gone.

He’s not usually one for the emotional talks but he’d try his best not to just dismiss her and send her off to her mother. He’d let her talk about her troubles and cry if need be, giving her a side hug as they sit on the edge of her bed and a kiss to her temple. -> “Okay and what are you gonna do about it, sweetheart? Remember how we said when things get tough, we don’t give up?”

Adler can do pep talks and offer practical advice to his daughter whenever she needs it. He’d take off his shades or look over the rim of them when what he was about to say was serious talk.

Russell tried his best not to call home when on missions, not wanting to let anything distract him. There were times he needed to hear his daughter’s voice though. Like when he’d been battered and bruised, half-dead on the floor in an alleyway, blood dripping down his face and hands and into the puddles as it rained. He pulled out his burner and closed his eyes, rolling onto his back as he heard her voice, tears mixing with the rain hitting his face. -> “I love you, sweetheart. Daddy’s coming home soon, okay?” He’d have to hold the phone away for a few moments, trying not to sob and his voice shaky. “And I’m taking you to that place you wanted to go to. Tell mommy to pack your bags, alright?”

He’d never been so scared of death before now that he had a family but he knew he had to pull through and make it back and he always did.

Life had completely changed for Russell when his daughter was born and he wouldn’t trade it for the world. He’d do anything to protect her. 

[altcvnningham]

idk why i thought ab this but imo adler isn’t huge on pda BUTTT he is serious about silent gestures of care + affection. being cia means his head is perpetually on a swivel buttt when it comes to the mundane he is constantly in tune with what you want and need, from the superficial to the serious.

dress you did a double take at past a boutique? it’s mysteriously hanging in your closet the next time you get dressed. he hears you sigh to yourself about the leaky faucet? it’s fixed, though you never recall touching it. you start waking up every day with a crick in your neck? hm, suddenly you swear these pillows somehow feel more plush, more comfortable, different. obsessing over a certain song you keep hearing on the radio? somehow you find the whole album in your record collection.

foot rubs without question after you take off your heels you’ve worn all day; dishes washed and house cleaned even though you’re sure you’ve both been busy at work; quietly doing up a button on the back of your dress without even telling you that you’ve missed it.

he’d spoil you to heaven and back in the tiniest ways and you won’t even notice it enough to insist that you don’t deserve it. somehow, you just think life got strangely easier when adler walked into it.

[strawcherrys]

Russell Adler x Reader

content warning: nsfw, unsatisfying smut, unedited (as all of my work usually is), fluff

MDNI!!!

When you look at Russell Adler, you do so with rose colored glasses. You've truly fallen for him, and him, for you. It's the conclusion of a rather long evening for the two of you. Not that any of it matters now, with his shirt unbuttoned revealing the curled hair on his chest and your shirt strewn on the corner of the bed.

He can taste the dinner the two of you had together on your tongue. It only spurs his movements as his hands cup the back of your head. The silence is filled with soft gasp and the racing of your breath. "I need you closer," you tell him with a whisper.

You're so close to him you can feel the way his face pulls into a smirk. You revel in the way the uneven stubble near his scar scratches your face. You wouldn't have it any other way. Sure, he's gone a lot, but his cheeky comments and lingering smell of tobacco will always feel like home.

He pushes your hair aside and lays you down. His chest laying flush with yours. It excites you, he pulls you into another kiss and his hand cups your face. "Need me closer?" He laughs under his breath, before pulling away and making quick work of your belt.

Any stress from the day is melted by Adler's touch, none of it was important anymore. Russell never failed to make you feel important, as he shimmys your pants down your legs. You can't help but giggle at the sight as he struggles before you shift your hips and your pants fall on the floor.

"You laughing at me?" He ask with a raised brow but there's no real offense behind it. He lets out a sigh, clearly checking you out. He takes a moment before he tugs his pants off just as quick joining your pants in unholy matrimony on the floor.

"Wouldn't dream of it, you know how serious you are," You pull your hair into a ponytail and ready yourself for him which only seems to fuel him further. His arm meeting the bedsheets besides your head. Anticipation builds inside you.

You had forgotten to account for something, he had forgotten to account for something. His signature sunglasses fall off of his face and hit you straight in the forehead. It's like you had grown so accustomed to seeing him in them that it has alluded you. You two had been so excited to get your hands on each other.

Adler freezes, grabbing his sunglasses from the way they tangled themselves in your hair. With a clink they're left on the bedside table. "Are you okay-"

You burst into laughter and Adler lets out a sigh of relief, plopping down nearly naked by your side. He can't help but smile too. He always thought you looked beautiful like this.

He pulls you closer to his chest with the rugged smile he knows you love so much. He plants a kiss to your forehead starting to laugh as well. "I love you," He says an undeniable hint of fondness in his tone.

"I love you too"

[animefreak1145]

Lightning in a Bottle(Adler x Bell!Reader)(Oneshot)

Word Count: 2k Summary: A one in a million chance. Impossible.

But Bell always was a chance, weren't you? Just like Adler always was confident in his odds. Warnings: Mature Rating/Graphic Violence, Dark Themes, Torture, Brainwashing, Manipulation, Toxic Relationship, Trauma, Female!Reader Bell, Adler x Bell, Crack Treated Seriously, Solovetsky Ending. A/N: Don't treat this fic seriously. You might get dissapointed. This is literally crack at the start which turns serious. Me and @makeyourpeacenow were just fooling around and she inspired me to write this thing out as we chatted. Less tumblr meme format and RPG style and more actual story. She added a paragraph in here that I kept.

The afternoon sun did nothing for the chill that hung in the air, the crispness only adding into the classic Russian cold. The waves hitting against the cliff side in the distance where you’re sure they were doing the same on the cliff they were on, as the flowers and long grass moving with the cool breeze.

It was beautiful.

Beautifully tainted as your hand made quick work of releasing from your holster just as Adler did, both pulling the trigger and the sound of twin guns breaking the calm atmosphere. Broken just as Adler did to you, your heart torn and anger boarding in your veins still hot from the betrayal.

Clang!

The sound rung in your ears more than the bullet being released from the gun, a brief spark in the air. A violent flash that went in the next blink before a bullet ricocheted to the rock to your left while the other dug deep into the ground by the flowers that were just innocently moving along—petals torn from the speed of the bullet. 

Your eyes were wide, mouth parted as you stared at the area where the bullet hit the rock, your grip on your pistol a tad loose although still up and ready. Adler in your peripherals sharing his own silent disbelief at what just occurred, gun still raised as well but head facing towards the torn flowers.

The air of heavy silence broke when you finally blinked your shock away, jerking your head towards Adler who continued to stare down at the bullets with a pressed frown.

“You just tried to kill me!” You accuse, gun gesturing wildly at the bullets on the ground while also motioning towards him.

Adler finally lifted his eyes, throwing you a blank stare. “That makes two of us,” he said blandly. He gave you a once over before stupefyingly deciding you were no threat for he took a cigarette out of his tactical vest and lighting it while managing to keep a grip on his pistol. You could only stare in bafflement as he took a lazy drag,  giving a subtle nod of his head towards you. The one you always were desperate for before. “Say…you’ve been a good team mate, Bell. Take this as a sign. Second chance.”

“Are you…are you seriously not gonna talk about this?!” Your voice pitched higher at the end, completely bewildered.

Adler’s nonchalance was not something that bothered you before. You were actually thankful for it and even a hint amused by it when he told Hudson he would be taking you and only you to Lubyanka. You remember his cool praise about you towards Hudson, how it created a warmth in your cheeks and feeling light momentarily before Hudson went off in a huff. Adler giving you directly words of comfort, speaking of Hudson not liking things not within his control.

Adler was just mocking you. You were in the palm of his hand all along, accepting treats from said hand with casual pats to the head.

You feel like you might hurl. Or cry.

“Hm?” Adler took a hefty drag, his gaze not leaving your form. It made you shift your legs, swallowing dryly. "Something on your mind, soldier?"

His words dripped with smoke, going purposely in your direction and hurrying it along by blowing the rest.

Your jaw tightened, glaring. You waved the smoke away before moving forward, Adler tensing but not making any move as you just snatched his cigarette from his silver tongued mouth and throwing it over the cliff. Adler turning his head with only a quick press of the lips to show his displeasure at your waste. As if he didn’t prompt you to feel your wrath in the first place. It only made your blood boil further.

“You just tried to kill me and now you’re what? ‘Giving me a second chance?’ You can’t be this crazy! Cause you have to know, this—“ You wave your pistoled arm around the area with the bullets back and forth from your chest to his, even poking him with the barrel of your gun. “—is crazy!”

You knew he had some issues. Your “shared” past and all, you saw things from his past maybe you shouldn’t have. He cut off a piece of his mind, forcing the piece to fit into yours with brute force—all blood and brain matter and pokes of needles. Your fault for thinking you were special knowing him so well and intimately, knowing his way of thinking and plans before he even finished the sentence. Your mind clicking away at the possible scenarios he would suggest before zooming into one and stating it out loud. He always paused when you did that, assessing you before there it was—the reward, the ghost of a smirk before nodding at you with the words “Exactly my line of thinking.” or “A bit of a mind reader, are we, Bell?” or “And that’s why you’re my protege. Good job, Bell.”

It’s not fair, you want to cry out, clenching your grip around the pistol still to his chest yet your finger’s off the trigger. Your throat feeling tight as you gazed up at the man who only rose a brow at you. It’s not fair! 

“So you want me to kill you?” Adler moved your pistol hand away, you letting him as you looked down with a defeated scowl. Your hold on your pistol obsolete. Your eyes tightened at that fact. You notice Adler kept his own pistol loose by his side. All it would take is one quick movement and you’ll be dead. Truly this time. Luck can’t save you like this. You’re closer to the cliff’s edge, maybe your body will fall into the waters below. Forever separate from him. Your stomach coiled back at the image. “What is it, Bell? What do you actually want?”

You can’t say. It gets stuck in your throat. 

You can’t say and you hate you still have it. This wretched feelings. Even after a deadly shot towards your chest. Even after his gall and apathetic nature to what just occurred(despite him still calling you soldier. “You’re still one of us.” Even now when you tried to kill him yourself, ignoring your own hypocrisy.) Your chest still bleeds only for one. You think only ever one.

It’ll only be the one because you’ve been ruined. Forever. Your trust dismantled for another yet still hopelessly, despairingly wishing to actually think you might have a chance. Even after this.

With him. You’ve been ruined for others. And the worst thing is, you’re actually fine if he is the one that’ll keep ruining you. This vicious cycle. You shot at him yes. But he had the gall to save you in Trabzon and make you think you’re close and something more. Not quite lovers. Not quite friends. Something in between.

He had the gall to make you feel this, your loyalties switched at the flip of a coin—you’re the tails he’s the head.

A coin. He had the gall to make you his other half. The tails. And he tried to kill you. And now he’s saving you. Because of…chance?

Take it, begrudgingly. Argue the matter, even if it's a nonsensical position. Argue because you want to argue—because you need to yell. Even if your feelings on it are oxymoronic. How can you hate him so much, yet refuse to part from him. Your stomach churned at the mere thought of your dead corpse even being away from his live one.

Fate? Bullets together? Is that what this is? Is he saving you to stick by him or to throw away and be by yourself? You don’t think you could be without him. Too tied together. You know his deepest secrets from Vietnam and he knows your mind. You’ve played in each other’s mind palaces, hands digging and blood spilling and bones crunching, napalm strikes on bodies—you’re tied.

You stay silent too long, biting at the inside of your lips before forcing yourself to look up at him meaningfully—eyes meeting for you can see them behind his shades at this distance, the sun helping you. Adler tilting his head and something passes over his gaze but you lower your head again and scoff, putting your pistol back in its holster begrudgingly.

“You’re stuck with me, then. Hope this is worth it.”

You notice the exhaustion set in his soul, the weight he bears. He carries it, alone, and you have no pity to offer.

You feel his weighted gaze just like you sense his exhaustion, putting his own pistol carefully away. Cautious if you will change your mind and decide to tear out his neck like he tore at your heart. You don’t.

Tied, your mind repeats. For better or for worse.

Like a twisted marriage.

You don’t look until your eyes widen when you feel the familiar touch of a hand on your head.

“Come on, kid. You know we’re stuck with each other. You’ve always been a slippery little thing,” his hand shifts and it’s on your cheek, feeling the leather as your eyes take in the quirk of his scarred mouth. What you always hunger for—the uptick to suggest a smile  “But not with me. I have you, Bell. I have you.”

You’re so easy.

You fall so prettily for him. 

You hate it. You love him.

You hate that too.

So it’s no surprise you let out a breathy sigh when he thumbs your lips and say an “Okay.”

He’s like a snake wrangler, you've got venom; you bare your teeth but you'll never bite—never him.

Always for others. He just has to point. He can be America’s Monster. 

But you? You can be Adler’s Dog.

You can accept that. You can accept the little touches and mindful quips of philosophy and books—even if you burn more at his touch then the danger close you experienced a mere half an hour ago—you can live with it. You can.

That’s your mantra in your head. Even as you stare up at him longingly, adoringly—a little lost yet accepting of whatever he says and does as he seems to look into you—that’s what you keep thinking.

You’re fine with this.

Be the tool. You can be that again for him. Willingly this time. He doesn’t have to love you like you do him. He doesn’t.

Even if you know him as equal or better than Sims. Even if you know the man behind the Vietnam soldier—behind the brave face. Behind the mask he’s made(the mask wasn’t supposed to be for you). Even with knowing where his mind goes and tracks, you’re satisfied with this.

You have to be. After all, nothing was personal. Those conversations outside the safehouse, the roof, the elevator of Lubyanka( “I need Bell”), defense against Hudson, the camera—

You don’t expect—

A tilt of the chin with firm fingers and a touch to the lips. You can feel his face on yours.

Your pupils are blown and your hands are still just as your mind has stopped. He didn’t seem to mind, a tease of your mouth and that’s all it takes for you open for him. Ready. Just a touch. A hint.

That’s all you need. Adler always gets what he wants. You’ll give it to him. 

You grab at him, the back of his neck and feel that hair underneath his beanie. Uncaring if it falls to the floor. You’re embarrassed at the pitiful sound you made when he pulled away. Only to silence when he taps his forehead to yours, hands on your waist with a comforting squeeze.

You can see his eyes. That electric blue.

“I have you, Bell,” he repeats, his breath tickling your face with that light smirk that unmakes you.

You blink. You assess, even with cheeks hot. 

You hold back the cheek splitting smile for a more mild hopeful one.

“Okay,” you breathe.

▞

▚ 

▚

A/N: Adler knows how to manipulate Bell perfectly well. Poor Bell. She knows how easy she is too. They're both satisfied where they're at. Sucks.

Tag List: @tr1ppylady @parkeepingparker @weirdoartist21 @gojocat247 @mayaibnlaahad @dallmaistir @salvija @kylezkie4adler @asaltryefl @stupid-stinky @aurora-windu @zachfoxx121 @pyxis-stellae @makeyourpeacenow @obsessedgremlin

You have to tell me if you want me to tag you for each update or else I won't know. Or if you wish to be removed.

[ineylesian]

Adler taking care of a drunk/and or high reader😭😭 THERES NOT ENOUGH ADLER FICS IM GONNA CRY I LOVR HIM

AO3 | NAV

wc — 1k

author’s note — hii sorry this took so long!! arqhms we’re-so-back arc took a little longer than expected, but here a little drabble for you. still learning how to write for adler, he’s a little tricky, but i’ll cook when BO6 comes out 🫡

Your head is pounding. 

The world around you is shrouded in a dark shear. Blurred sit the lights that shine down on shaking hands, gently tapping against the ring of a nearly emptied glass. Ice swirls and clashes as you slide the drink back and forth, in and out, steady as the breaths that pool from your mouth. 

In. Out. You’re convinced that you’re fine. You just need another drink– something bitter to wind you down and help you forget. That’s all it does, anyway. All you can do is forget, and drink it all down once you remember. 

You raise your hand, silently waving to the woman who served your last four, five shots to you. Her head falls into half of a nod, eyes moving from yours as she stills, cloth in hand slowing on the rim of the glass she cleans. 

“That’ll be enough for tonight, thanks.”

Your eyebrows narrow as her nod changes to acknowledgment toward the voice behind you, sending a look of sympathy your way as she turns. Sighing, you quickly down the last watered down drops in your glass, swiveling sideways to glare at a pair of tan aviators looking your way.

“You can’t tell me-”

“You reek of whiskey, can smell it all over you.” He’s quick to cut you off, ice clinking together as he pulls the glass from you, sliding it out of reach. “It doesn’t take a genius to tell you’ve had enough.”

Fighting the urge to roll your eyes, your gaze wanders down to his jeans. Your features contort into a resemblance of a sneer, finger jutting out to point at the outline of a pack of cigarettes in his pocket.

“And who says what’s enough for you?” 

A few moments of silence pass; you don’t miss the quick roll of his tongue over his lips. The aviators can’t hide the vision of him briefly closing his eyes, searching for what he’ll say next. It’s something you know he always does when he’s trying to pick his next words carefully. 

Drunk or sober, Adler is always logical with the way he talks to you. You believe it stems from the desire to never give the sense of a false promise. They sit reserved for nights of uncertainty, unsure of whether tomorrow is a guarantee. Whispers of his desires only seem to visit you in your dreams.

“Smoking doesn’t impact my ability to think.” You sense his gaze flick between your face and legs. “I could go through an entire pack and still be able to carry myself out of here. Half a bottle of Jack Daniels prevents you from getting up and walking out of here.”

Adler doesn’t miss the look of defiance that crosses your face after he’s done speaking. Following the clearance of your tab, he leans back, arms settling over one another. 

“Go on, then. If you can get yourself out of here, you can tell me when to stop for the rest of my life.”

Antagonizing, snide. It’s the tactic you’ve seen more times than you can count, saccharine tongue used to taunt and beckon failure. However, the amount of alcohol in your stomach lets his provocation slither into your brain like honey, liquid courage screaming at you to shut him up. 

You barely lift your shoes off of the barstool’s bottom level when your vision goes blurry, large spots of black making the floor seem akin to the wall 10 feet away. The rush of fear that you’re falling is swiftly diminished as a pair of hands pull you forward, and you’re met with the brush of cashmere on your cheek.

You’re too drunk to notice the action. He’s quick, the way that his fingers gently card through your hair, the feeling gone as a summer breeze washes over your skin. However, the warmth lingers, and you lift your head to look at him, eyes brimming with tears due to the gradual worsening of the pounding in your head.

“Take me home.” You drawl, arms blindly reaching around his torso, locking together. “Please, Russ.”

You hear his scoff, lightly chiding, but you can barely make out the amused quirk of his lips as he stands up, slowly situating your feet onto the floor.

“Walk with me.”

You do as you’re told, whining incoherently at him as he loops your arm around his neck. Adler calls a thanks to the bartender, and you stumble over your feet two or three times before you reach the door. The cool rush of night is quick to dust your face as you move outside, a harsh contrast to the contents of your stomach that causes you to mindlessly shiver.

“Adler...”

Your complaint is met with a soft click of the tongue, yet, the sensation of warmed leather falls over your shoulders within seconds. A lopsided smile graces your face, and you allow your eyes to roam from chestnut strands that fall over his aviators to the polished black leather on his feet.

“And the next layer?”

A gentle push follows your remark, and you scoff dramatically, arms looping around Adler’s neck as he spins you back toward him. You grin as he tilts your head up against his chest, silently celebrating the empty streets that allow him to hold you as he does. 

“Does the princess require any more care?” 

Still heavily whiskey blooded, you hum, neck craning up to meet his gaze. 

“Just your bed.”

You don’t expect a response, and he doesn’t give one. Satisfied, you lean back into the soft fabric of his turtleneck, knowing the soft strokes of his hands along your back won't leave you alone tonight.

[cherie-doll]

hiii! I was wondering if you could write some adled headcannons with a medic reader ???

yesyesyeysyeysyeysy

Adler x Medic!Reader hcs

Ngl, he's a bit stubborn when it comes to his regular visits to your office, he's always missing his checkups and you have to go hunt him down

Once he sees your face he's going over there more frequently tho

Not the funny goofy kind to crack jokes ALL the time just to try and make you fall for him, so he's not awkwardly tryna flirt with you but it's a lot more natural (?) when he does make a joke

Like it's not out of nowhere when he does choose to say something, and it's never something that'll have you melting right then and there, he says it so casually you don't really feel it sink in until he's walked a distance away and it hits you

Most of the time he's just silently watching you and with how he is, always correcting someone, you think you're doing something wrong for him to be staring at you

But if you pay close attention his gaze isn't hard, he's not focused in on a specific part of you, no he's just overall taking you in, trying to familiarize himself with your form

Also, yk how there was that trend online where it's like "if you wear sunglasses no one can see what you're staring at"? yeah i think yk where I'm doing with this, he has them on all the time and uses them to his advantage

When you were new in, he noticed you were somewhat hesitant to impose your treatments to those who wouldn't give a crap what you had to tell them about their health, so to a certain point he gave you the green light to use your authority

You know what's best for them, he just doesn't like it when you use it on him lol

He knows you stay up late a lot, spending hours alone in your little corner of the base, he once found you asleep at your desk, your glasses for studying sliding off your face

Just sat down in the chair across from you and stayed there for a while until he finally woke you up and suggested you get the rest you needed

You notice him being nicer to you in small things like that and you in return smile a little more when seeing him that it makes him feel confused

He likes it and he's confused

Will sit and WANT to listen about your day, just nodding and humming

Whenever he gets an injury, even if it's like a small cut he'd wave off whoever else is trying to treat him, "Just let me put a bandage on it and you'll be fine" "No the medic will take care of it" "Why would you bother them? It's not even that bad" "..."

He just likes seeing your brow furrowed in concentration as you lean in closer to his face to treat that razor cut he got, you biting your lower lip slightly as you dab the blood off and apply some ointment but all he can feel are how gentle and soft your fingertips are

Adler who likes going over to you as soon as he's done doing exercise so he can justify pulling his shirt off to "cool off"