Disclaimer: Don't own any of the characters.
What they do.
He was still shaking with relief minutes after Michael's voice had filtered trough. He had been so sure, for those three minutes between 'Michael's dead' and 'Michael's not dead' that the last two people he gave a dam about, the last two people who gave a dam about him were gone forever. Because he knew as well as he knew his name that loosing Michael meant loosing Nikita too. Then Michael's 'I'm batman' gruff of a voice had filtered trough. Snarking at Amanda no less, the guy was just all kinds of awesome today. Birkhoff had let out a shaky breath that mirrored Nikita's, shaking and unable to move, let alone wipe away the lone tear streaking its way down his face.
He touches two fists to his forehead and stays in that position for a while willing himself to gain some semblance of composure because dam it he's not the 16-year-old nub Division picked up all those years ago. He's seen enough shit that a house blown to pieces shouldn't get to him this much, even with two people inside.
Except that these two particular people have always been the two people who got to him.
'Always with the dramatics Mickey' he snarks trough the com once he can finally find his voice. 'Glad to know you're not dead. Now would you two lovebirds get back here and get a room? I don't need to hear you do that trough the com"
If his voice is a little shaky and raspy and even breaks a little they either don't notice or don't mention it. And for that, Birkhoff is grateful. After all, he's supposed to be the guy who doesn't care, as Nikita kindly pointed out, for that very reason.
He hears a somewhat watery laugh from Niki and can somehow tell that Michael's smirking trough the com.
"Shut up Birkhoff" Michael says and his response is expected as it is welcomed. It grants him some sense of normalcy after his world being turned on its head for those five seconds. Now he's annoying Mickey and Mickey's telling him to shut up. It's good; it's nice, it's normal.
Nikita and Michael head right back and don't turn off the coms the whole way even thou they could and Birkhoff wouldn't blame them if they did. Birkhoff for his part spends the rest of his day in his amazingly comfortable chair, listening to the com and playing whatever mind-numbing video game he can find and download. He doesn't thank them for leaving the com on, doesn't even mention that he's there. Right now this, the open communication, knowing they're there, is more than enough.
When Mike and Niki get back Birkhoff is proud to say he has back most of his composure on the screen, his fingers moving through the game control with dexterity gained only trough years of experience.
He looks as if he hasn't a care in the world, like this whole thing didn't affect him. It's a good cover not flawless, if you take time to notice his foot tapping with nervous energy or how tensely he's keeping his gaze on the screen. Because as immensely glad as he is that the two of them aren't …not here. He can't really look up at them right now. This is another flaw in his cover as the guy who doesn't care. But it's miniscule just like the rest of them and the cover's good enough that even Percy's underestimated him, looked over him.
Not that he'd ever want to lie to Percy that would have been suicide. But the point was, the cover was good, it was dammed good. So of course Mickey who had seen him play hacker cave trough mission after gruesome mission, and Niki who learned to read people from Amanda herself, see straight through it.
"Bedroom's that-a-way" he says with a ghost of a smirk. Because he can feel Niki's eyes on him and he won't talk about this. He won't. He's the guy who doesn't care. His cover is good he won't break it.
He sees Niki nod from his peripheral vision and walks into the room without a word. Most likely too shaken up about what happened to pay much attention to the computer guy especially if it's the guy who doesn't care. Michael follows but stops Birkhoff freezes, he doesn't Michael to say anything, he really doesn't. It's not what they do. He annoys Mickey and Mickey gives him the you're-two-glares –away-from- death look that never really works on Birkhoff, that's what they do. Deviating from that routine would mean that something's different today. Michael doesn't say anything though he does rest his hand on Birkhoff's shoulder for a second and Birkhoff recognizes the gesture, remembers it from being stuck on a Division room as agents and sometimes new recruits went through mission after gruesome mission with him being forced to watch because not only was he the hacker, but division did not look kindly on weaklings.
Birkhoff's shoulders sag at the contact, the tension that had been so tightly wound around him snaps almost audibly and just like that, he's 17 again, watching a girl his age torn to pieces because she didn't cut it according to division. Michael's hand stays where it is, just like back at Division when something had gotten to him, something that in Division was a baptism of sorts. Unless you were Percy or Amanda of course, or had no soul. Which if you asked Birkhoff they were the same thing.
'I'm here, you okay?' the hand on Birkhoff's shoulder asks what Michael himself won't voice. It stays there until Birkhoff gives a nod in response, his own way to say 'I'm fine. Go', a signal that also dates back to Division.
Michael nods back and after giving the hacker's shoulder a squeeze goes to join Nikita in the bedroom. Birkhoff knows they probably want to be together and so saves all comments, giving them a break until tomorrow when he'll once again annoy them without mercy. Because that's what he does.
He's tired, exhausted, but he can't sleep, too restless and with a video feed of today's events playing on a loop in his head. He's had night like this before and so he does what he always does. Work on a project. He stares down at the comlink and wonders how Amanda was able to hack into his frequency, how she was able to lock him out, render him useless.
He spends the whole night upgrading the com, making sure no one is ever able to find the frequency, encrypting in shields to make them undetectable to intruders and a tracker so he'll be able to find them if one of them does something stupid, he also makes sure only he can track them.
He also upgrades his all-around security because he's getting pretty fed-up with people hacking him and so help him if it happens one more time he's going to pull a Nikita, break into Division and kill those nubs himself.
He doesn't really fancy killing anyone, he's not really the killer type, never was, It's just not what he does.
So he settles for making dammed sure no one, Division or not, can ever hack him again. He spends the rest of the night on this task, building firewalls, blocking virtual backdoors and boarding up virtual windows. He's methodical, borderline neurotic about it. And by the time he's comfortable in the knowledge that his system is not just safe but downright awesome and that anyone who tries to hack him will go home crying with the remainder of their system resembling the goo from R.'s 'The thing', light's already filtering through the blinds and his eyes are blinking closed every two seconds.
He doesn't even realize he's fallen asleep until he wakes up somewhere between noon and afternoon. There's a blanket on him, and he recognizes it from the room Nikita and Michael are staying in. the smell of perfume ratting out the person behind the act of random kindness.
The coms are gone and there's a blue post-it on his forehead with what he recognizes to be Michael's handwriting.
-Found a lead, took the new toys. Come in when nap time's over. M&N.
Birkhoff crumbles the post-it and sticks the Bluetooth in his ear taking a grateful sip of the coffee he knows was Michael left there even if the agent will later claim it was Nikita's doing. He knows it's maybe just a bit weird but living bat-cave style with Michael sometimes being the only pleasant visitor for years Birkhoff could probably tell Michael's coffee from a single taste. He lets that train of thought die as he swallows the coffee before tracking Mickey and Niki in a dinner somewhere and hacking into a nearby security camera so that the video feed appears in his, high resolution, screen.
"You guys are eating pancakes without me that's just mean"
His voice filters through the coms and on the screen he can see Nikita pause with the fork halfway to her mouth.
Michael actually chokes in his coffee (something Birkhoff commits to memory both mentally and digitally) and glares as he hears the hacker laugh trough the com, taking the napkin Nikita offers him with as much grace and dignity as he can.
"You're finally up" Michael's voice snarks back once he stops chocking, and Birkhoff stops laughing. It takes a while "just when we were finally enjoying ourselves, do you time these things?"
"Only for you Mickey" Birkhoff says snickering as Nikita rolls her eyes and turns swiftly to the side as her mouth starts to suspiciously curve upwards. Not that Birkhoff doesn't find encouragement in this, or needs encouragement for that matter.
"Don't act like you don't really like me Mickey" he adds as Michael balls up his napkin as if trying to crush it into fine powder "or need me for that matter"
His voice is cocky and nothing like it was the day before and for that Birkhoff is glad. After all, how can he annoy Michael if he can't snark at him?
"Stay up with your toys last night nerd" Michael drawls paying for the breakfast as Nikita gets up to talk to the waitress about something. The quirk of his mouth resembling something between a grin and a smirk as Birkhoff audibly bristles at the 'insult' to his technology.
"These toys" Birkhoff says with a scoff "Are going to keep you 'top agents' from getting jumped from behind again" then adds after a beat "And hopefully give Amanda a coronary"
"Here's hoping" Michael's voice is laced with contempt and Birkhoff doesn't need to see the screen to see the smirk on the ex-marine's face. What he does see is Nikita roll her eyes mouthing 'boys' up to the heavens like some kind of prayer , and Birkhoff finds himself wondering for a moment if she's actually grateful for Amanda at times like these, if only because the joyful prospect of her death is one of the things that binds his friendship with Michael together.
"So Batman, Catwoman. What crazy stupid heroic-complex thing are we doing today to help the hopeless? And what can I do to save you?" Birkhoff asks getting an eye roll from both Nikita and Michael before they start briefing him in.
They don't talk about yesterday or even about this morning, about how they let him sleep because they knew exactly what had kept him up. They don't thank him for the upgrades; he doesn't mention the blanket or the coffee, and not just because Michael is likely to kill him if he talks about the latter. There are no 'thank you's' no 'we're all in this together', no team-effort speech, no tender-hearted moments. That's not what they do.
Instead they brief him in in on today's little adventure and Birkhoff puts in his two cents of smartass comment even as he's already hacking into the needed system.
"Can you do it or not nerd" Michael half asks half barks after one smartass comment too many. This early in the morning too, Birkhoff thinks he's having a very productive day so far.
"You hurt me Mickey" he says in that patented tone of his that ensures he's already got it hacked. Literally.
"You do remember, it's kind of what I do"
AN: This is set after the episode where Michael is almost blown up in the house, when they showed Birkhoff's reaction to the explosion. I started writing this, I rather like how it came out. Yes I played loose with Birkhoff's age, I am aware he most likely wasn't a teenager when he was 'recruited' but the idea of a teenage Birkhoff hacking into the Pentagon is just too tempting. I may or may not do it again in future Nikita fics.
Questions? Comments? Concerns?