Did you know that when you reinstall windows, you have to reinstall MS Word, too? Yeah, I didn't know that either, so I wrote this in notepad instead. Please ignore the spelling/grammar mistakes, I usually overuse spellchecker and I couldn't this time... oh well. On to chapter two!

"Holy shit."
Roach gapes up at the cliff. From this angle it looked less a cliff and more a 'sheer, insurmountable wall of ice,' and MacTavish, busy checking his gear one last notices a slight look of terror cross Roach's face as he says quietly "We're going up there?"
"Right." He swings his ice picks experimentally and even thought Roach is wearing thick gloves Soap can tell that the sergeant has his in a white-knuckle death-grip.
"The hangar is at the top?"
"Thought heights didn't bother you."
He grimaces. "Heights, sir, no. They don't bother me at all. Heck, I wouldn't even mind the falling, so much. What gets to me is the part where your neck snaps as it collides with the ground while traveling several hundred kilometers per second. That's what I'm not too... keen... on." He says nervously and glances again at the cliff; shifting his ice picks, he frees one hand and rubs the back of his neck, something that MacTavish notes and files away in his mind under the file marked Roach: possibly a sign of nervousness. Either that or those hickeys were a source of comfort, but he refuses to linger on that thought.
Roach was still chattering but MacTavish pays little attention because he's more concerned about getting through this mission alive. Two men against an entire base. This would have been so much easier with Ghost here.
"Start climbing Roach," He says tersely. Soap figures that command must have been the official start of the mission because with a final "Oh dear god" and one last longing look at the helicopter behind them, Roach starts climbing and stops talking.
MacTavish isn't much of a conversationalist, either, and the next hours pass in silence broken only by the scream of jets taking off and the occasional muffled curse from Roach, who, despite all his pretenses, really did hate heights.

"Roach, there's a ledge up here where we can rest for a minute," MacTavish calls down to his subordinate, already leaning against the sheltered wall and busy lighting a cigar. He can hear Roach grunt something in affirmation as he pulls himself into view, puffing. As soon as his hands hit the ledge he scrambles away from its edge, flopping down on the ice next to his captain and fumbling with a cigarette pack before holding one up to his captains proffered lighter. "How you holding up?" He asks, because despite all his pretenses, really did care about his young sergeant.
"Fairly well actually. Climbing really takes your mind off the fact that at any second your icepicks could slip and you could plummet straight down for thousands of miles-"
"Sanderson," he says, in a kindly-shut-up-now tone of voice.
"Sorry sir." He doesn't seem sorry, though, MacTavish notes in the silence that follows. Eyes closed, face split in a wide grin, it's an easy task to guess where his mind is at as he takes a deep drag on his cigarette and one hand creeps up to touch the bruises that are hidden beneath his cold-weather gear. MacTavish, too, thinks back to last night's activities and figures its the best time to ask all those questions he should have asked before.
"Sanderson," he begins again.
"Yeah, captain?" Roach keeps his eyes shut.
Something about his expression makes Soap suspects he's not paying close attention, so he decides to be very straightforward.
"How long have you and Ghost having sex?"
He's not surprised when Roach barely reacts at all, lazily opening one eye to stare at his captain. "Oh, a day. Actually- yesterday?- or, well, last night. Six hours ago. Maybe more than that, I'm a little fuzzy on the details and to be honest I sort of lost track of time after-" Roach finally realizes he's rambling and sits up, tossing the butt of his cigarette off the side of the cliff. "Why so curious, captain?"

MacTavish gives Roach a long look and waits until before replying in a matter-of-fact tone "I'm the captain of the 141, Roach. It's my job to know everything about everybody in my task force. Besides, you two weren't exactly being secretive last night, were you?" Roach goes beet red and says nothing, kicking the edge of the ice with his heels.
"How- how much did you see?" he finally asks in a strained voice.
When he hears his captain's explanation, though, he laughs in relief; when MacTavish raises his eyebrows in a silent question he says "Oh, well, you know how Ghost gets when he's drunk? I, uh, had a hard time persuading him to move our activities... indoors." He says, and smiles guiltily at his captain. "If you had spotted us five minutes later..." He says, and his smile quickly turns into a mischievous grin; MacTavish is about to make a remark about that when Roach takes their conversation in a whole different direction.
"Er, actually, sir, I was wondering. Uh he- Ghost, I mean- wears that bandanna all the time; and it's kind of hard to tell what he's thinking, or at least, it is for me but that's probably just because I'm the FNG but I figure that you probably know him more and-"
"This story has a point, right?"
Roach continues unfazed, ignoring the comment. "-I was wondering. Okay, so obviously I'm attracted to him. I mean, I wasn't trying to hide anything." He pauses and taps his goggles thoughtfully. "Yeah, I definitely wasn't holding back. I guess, I don't know, he's responded far more than I thought he would, but last night," He glances at his captain again and MacTavish notes the honesty in those wide brown eyes. "Last night went way beyond anything except my wildest dreams; and okay, I know this is going to sound kind of stupid but I really do like him, you know, but sometimes, he's just so damn unreadable..." Roach let out another breath and his last statement came out in one big rush "Anyway, what I mean to say is, you're his best mate, right, and - has he ever said anything about me? You know, like, in that sort of way?" MacTavish thinks for a second, trying to work through his sergeant's rather lengthy sentence in his head, before saying slowly, "I don't think the topic has ever come up,"
"Right, yeah." Gary says, sighing. "That's kind of what I expected but-"
"But if it has," MacTavish continues, interrupting him,"I'm sure he remembers it better. Have you tried talking to him?"
"Well, I was getting around to it, but then he decided to..." he trails off, and his hand is halfway to his neck before he glances at MacTavish and thinks better of it. "So you think I should talk to him about it, then?"
MacTavish takes another drag on his cigar; it's just about finished and he offers Sanderson a rare smile. "Works wonders, communication."
Roach lets out a surprised laugh as Soap stretches, flicks the remains of his cigar over the ledge. "Break's over, Roach. Let's go."

A/N: Soooo this chapter made me feel kind of stupid. WTVS, I guess. Next up: Ghost's turn.