Bad Blood
Story title taken from the song of the same title by Bastille.
The song itself has been worked into the story, although I would NOT call this a song fic.
Miles was tired.
Tired, fed up and everything in between.
They had gone from fighting skirmishes, to fighting all out battles and while he and Bass might be Generals, used to wading hip-high in blood and bodies, Charlie, not so much.
Not like this.
And he just wanted to find her, to check in with her now that they had time to catch their breath. He didn't know where Bass had disappeared to, having seen him briefly, from across the battlefield, probably giving much the same orders as he, himself had, just shortly ago.
When Blanchard had reinstated their former Militia ranks, strictly due to their usefulness in the field mind you, they had both sought to have Charlie ranked high enough to justify keeping her at their sides where they could keep an eye on her.
Neither of them could fully function without her, although should anyone ask Charlie, she would say that she and Bass couldn't function without Miles (and although Bass would disagree out loud to the world, deep inside his gut, he knew he couldn't function without either of them.). The one thing that they all agreed on was that they worked better as a trifecta than alone.
Blanchard, having been around the block a time or two, (but not that block, thank you very much), knew when to keep his thoughts and opinions to himself and granted the request, if only to keep them out of his hair. The Matheson-Monroe family dynamics were NONE of his business.
The three of them had been drinking last night. Their favorite pastime these days it seemed, especially the night before a battle when it was always possible that the unthinkable could happen and turn their trifecta into a random duo, incapable of functioning.
"Don't you think it's time?" Charlie had asked out of the clear blue silence.
Miles and Bass eyed each other a half second before turning their attention back to the woman in front of them.
"Time for what, Charlotte?" Bass asked.
Miles gave him a sideways look and shook his head. That was Bass for you. Always the talker. Always the one wanting to get in touch with his emotions.
"Time to let the bad blood between you lie."
She watched as the men simply looked at her for the space of a blink and took a draw from their bottles. She shook her head. Whether it was in exasperation, anger or some other emotion they couldn't tell.
"Can I count on the two you to have my back?"
"Always," Miles answered at the same time the word "Forever," came out of Bass' mouth causing both Miles and Charlie to arch an eyebrow.
"And I've got yours, because God knows I can't leave the two of you alone for a second." She softened the comment with a smirk, causing both men to snort.
"We've been doing this since you were in diapers, Kid" Miles retorted causing Bass to tilt the neck of his bottle towards him. Meeting it with his own, the sound of clinking of glass filled the tent.
Charlie waved the comment off. "We can't focus on the shit that happened in the past," she said solemnly leaning forward in her chair. "The only thing that's ever come from that is resentment. I mean just look at Rachel." Charlie couldn't even bear to call the woman "Mom" anymore after all that had happened.
"It'll drive us insane, and even worse," she paused looking between the two of them, "it'll drive us apart. And I can't fathom any of us walking away. Do you understand?" she asked the two men. The two men whom she couldn't imagine living her life without.
"The past may have defined who we are and what we are, but it also binds us together. Forever." She said looking pointedly at Bass. "So, I don't wanna hear about the bad blood anymore. I don't wanna hear either of you talk about it anymore, do you understand?" she pleaded with them to understand what she needed from them. That she needed them together. Because she couldn't do this by herself. What was left of her soul would fly apart into a tiny thousand pieces if those bindings were ever severed.
Miles reached out and cupped her cheek. "I promised you once that I'd never leave you, Charlie. I meant it then and I mean it now."
Charlie beamed up at him, nuzzling her cheek into his hand.
He knew in that moment that he would be wallowing in the bowels of a fiery hell before it was over. It was only a matter of time. A matter of circumstance, he thought withdrawing his hand and looking over at Bass. Bass, who had ALWAYS been his matter of circumstance.
Bass looked on as Miles withdrew from Charlie and her attention turned to him. "I'll stay as long as you'll have me, Charlotte," he murmured not moving his body, simply holding her gaze so she could see the truth that rested there.
She nodded once in his direction before downing the contents of her bottle. Setting it aside, she wiggled down into her sleeping bag, trapped in the middle of them, as it should always be, falling asleep to the low rasp of their voices.
Miles and Bass talked late into the night, trying their best to put all their emotional bullshit behind them for Charlie's sake. There was almost nothing they wouldn't do to see her happy.
They also shared concerns about Charlie's well-being. While they knew she was right, that the things that led them to this point had fundamentally changed them, Charlie, herself, was becoming hard and calloused.
Untouchable.
Miles knew that she would never again be that girl who came walking into a bar looking for her one living relative. She was a woman now. Intelligent, beautiful and deadly.
Were he and Bass to blame?
Probably.
They had been unrelenting, masterful teachers, bending her this way and that until she resembled something else entirely. Born in blood and battle, she was theirs.
And God help anyone who tried to take her away from them.
a.n. I hoping to add two, if not three more parts to this story. One from Charlie's point of view, one from Bass' and definitely a smutty one from the three of them. Or I may get it completely wrapped up in just one more. Who can say. Thanks for reading. Hay.
