Chrysalism: The feeling of being at peace while being inside as a thunderstorm takes place.
AN: From this chapter on we are in the present.
X
The water around him rippled.
William Brandt, field agent turned analyst turned wearer of many hats, stilled. The tunnel he currently occupied was dark, illuminated only by lightning. His still throbbing ears strained to hear a difference, ignoring the torrent of rain and thunder a few feet away. There was a myriad of reasons for the displacement of water, most of which were harmless.
The assassins whose attempt he had thwarted, not so much.
Deciding that the rippling was unlikely to kill him, as it had not yet, Brandt slid down the wall to sit. The water lapped right above his belly button, the temperature cool enough to be a concern but not a full blown worry yet. That spot was taken by the pressing issue of him being stranded, injured, and the com having little to no reception. Hypothermia had to take the back seat.
The com in his ear sputtered, but gave off little more than static. The brunette sighed, leaning his head back against the brick. Taking a deep breath, he stared at the dark above and tried to make his adrenaline riddled mind on focusing on one thing.
The mission. He had been tasked to infiltrate a diplomat's household, gather information, and ensure that the woman was keeping her alliances strictly. If she was not, gently reminder her she was being watched, and then disappear into the night. That was the plan, a month at the most, which almost came to fruition. Until he had identified an explosive device during a formal dinner, a sophisticated yet not well hidden one that would kill the asset.
Gently rubbing around his tender ears, he was relieved to only feel cool water rather than thicker, warmer blood. He had gotten the diplomat clear, exposing himself to the blast. He hoped the damage to his eardrums was only temporary and cursed his need for it in the dim surroundings. The result of the blast was contained without the house becoming destabilized, meant to kill the target it was near, but both he and the asset had sustained injuries. Him more than her, the assassins less than both of them.
The hand to hand fighting, running, and dodging bullets made him thank every member of his team for their attempts to make him more field ready. It had been a pet project of sorts, whipping him into shape and honing his sharp intellect more towards reaction than crunching probabilities. Jane had worked on him with hand to hand, beating him in ways that made him fear her thighs before forming a healthy respect. Benji appointed himself to ensure that any lapse in operative knowledge that had occurred during his absence was remedied and enhanced. He had grumbled about why he needed to know the chemical compositions and reactions of a near infinite number of item combinations. However it had helped him to create a distraction to escape the house, something he would never tell Benji about, it'd probably lead to an extension into fusing machines and animals. And Ethan...
Another lightning strike, rumbles close behind. The brief illumination showed a dreary surrounding. Seeing no immediate danger and no increased ability to use his com, Brandt thumped his head slightly against the brick.
It had been weeks, months now that he thought about it, since Cobalt. His life had become a whirlpool of investigations, training, missions, and somewhere in there he had no idea what was going on. There had been no acknowledgement that what had occurred on the train had happened. No words, no tilts of the head or smirks. No bumping shoulders, or random touches. The same banter was there from before, but like it was in the train yard, it was hollow. Lacking substance, abstract with no concrete expression of what was there.
It had occurred to him that it was a dream, a hallucination of exhaustion and fear from the shooting. That Ethan had never kissed him, hadn't pushed him against a wall. That the warmth he had felt down his neck was a yearning for intimacy. That it was all one big dream that he had cooked up out of a need for forgiveness and to alleviate the loneliness. And despite the fact that he remembers the feeling of skin against his and the heat contrasting with the cold, he's inclined to believe it.
Rationally he knows better, but it's easier to think of it that way. Easier to swallow that lie, to believe he created something rather than be left wandering on purpose. Easier to think than face the truth that he had been toyed with and then abandoned.
Cobalt hadn't allowed him time to react, between the death of a friend and being plunged into a river. He was without his balance at the time, to deal come face to face with the nature of the beast that was Ethan. It was jarring to be in water as it rose, only to be able to know it was there. It was easy to create a distraction to forget where you were, be it facing the past or being kissed by a familiar face. To create an image of safety, projected on a man who always finished the job.
Adjusting to the storm, the water rose to the next button of his shirt. The chill was getting worse, a hollow ache becoming a chatter in his jawbone he could barely suppress. The com piece was still spitting static when Brandt pulled it from his ear, unwilling to sacrifice his need to hear for the useless noise. Absentmindedly he noted he was lucky that relative to the storm, the water current was manageable and not dragging him under.
His actions had led him here, to ponder hypothermia and his pitiful love life. This was not the worst situation he had been in as an agent, Budapest being more volatile. Rigid shoulders ached from the tension as new weariness washed over him, perhaps it just felt worse than most missions. Before the whirlwind that thrust action, nuclear weapons, and Ethan back into close proximity, he wanted to be back in the field.
Being in the back office separated you from the sense of accomplishment, of responsibility brought forth by thwarting an attack. Or the shame of making a mistake, which made it a safer option which more were comfortable with. But him? He had missed it. Missed being part of a team, of falling asleep to the weariness of a mission accomplished, of winning.
But he had stayed back, analyzing rather than acting because of his fear of outcomes. Knowing the odds and recommending action was easier, safer than putting his heart and others on the line. He did not for a moment regret his actions that led him to the present, aside from not waterproofing everything, but it was exhausting. Now felt worse than before. Depression and guilt had been replaced with near death experiences and what would become arthritis. Maybe it was because he was older and not in prime condition, since the time from office to field work had been short. The whiplash of the transition was fierce, but he had signed up for it. He had enjoyed Dubai and at the time, he had wanted more.
A drop of water from the brick above him hit his forehead, he sighed. A waterworld remake had not been in the mission description.
Rousing himself from his rest, Brandt listened once more to the downpour before rising to move. Staying put was not an option, for his health and chances of safety were both diminished if he did. Extract would find him anywhere, but until then he was on his own. It was a familiar plague lately, considering his team.
Benji and Jane tried, but their various roles in the IMF led to little time together outside of missions. Benji was regularly called for technical consulting, especially with Ghost Protocol's lasting damage. Jane regularly went undercover, quick but numerous in nature. He himself was torn between his new role and old, his replacement for Chief Analyst had been appointed, but most of his staff still deferred to him, making the transition hard to quantify and solve. The new guy wasn't bad, but considering his staff had grown with him as he had recovered somewhat from the guilt of killing Julia indirectly, they were attached.
Unlike the last member of his team. The one he saw the most of was the furthest away, like a moon that he could see, but when he went to reach out, there was a thousand miles between them. Even if he was to reach out, it seemed like the man was like his code name; a raging storm of elusiveness and isolationism like the gas giant.
Not now, he chastised himself. Wading slowly, but securely through the high water. He was not going to give that more though, more of his time. It hurt, but giving time to someone who did not do the same was illogical and worse for him.
The other end of the tunnel was rapidly approaching, the washed out landscape greeting him. Going back out was not appealing, but knowing enemy agents were hunting him was a definitive motivator. He left the useless, waterlogged communicator floating in the water and set out for the treeline past the near shore. To keep out of his own head, he focused on each step and the world around, which was a safer option than brooding over an asshole.
The water level decreased, falling below his chest, then knee. Solid, through soaked and muddy ground was a welcomed platform to his shaking legs. He absent mindedly wondered if he would lose a shoe. The roar of rain and thunder limited his awareness, so he scanned best he could. But even that was futile, for a lesser agent the panic would start sinking in.
Brandt took it with a momentary pause as there was worse. There was always something worse. There had been narrower crevices, more volatile personalities, far intenser fires than this waterfall atop him. As he reached for the treeline, finally out of the river, he appreciated the canopy shielding him. He was far from dry, but a reduction of chilled water pooling on his skin was welcomed.
He shuddered, his body trying to keep him warm as he kept moving forward. His progress was faster, quicker without the drag of the water, but the storm still hid dangers. He wondered if he was in the top five of dangerous water situations in his friend group. Jane had seduced someone during a game of water polo, dodging elbows to the nose in the process. How she had did it was still a mystery. Clint always retold the story of him crawling through 3 miles of sewer piping to steal a package, then 5 back because he got lost. The milage and risks always increased with each edition, as he loved to do. And of course taking the cake was the poster boy himself who had drowned and come back to life before almost dying in a car wreck.
Will scowled bitterly, muttering "No, I'm nowhere near the top."
Talking to himself in the middle of a combat situation was not a good idea, but honestly his paranoia was likely just that and nothing more. Who else would be in his place at that moment? Who else would go on this rookie level mission, rejoin the field, in the middle of a tempest just to not be in the office when a certain someone got back from his latest deathscapade?
Sure, he and Ethan had seen each other over the course of saving the world, again. Thankfully he had been able to mostly turn his brain off at the time, stemming the want to hold the frenetic man until he stopped looking as though he would vibrate into dust. The car maneuvers were not unusual for their line of work, but seeing him in the overturned car, water still running from his mouth as he shambled from the wreck was too much. Benji had filled them in, him gripping the steering wheel tight in response to knowing that someone who was deprived of oxygen had roared off on a bike.
Madman; he had stayed cordial, eliciting some odd looks from Benji and Luther. Ethan had regarded him with a raised eyebrow and a curious look, but had said nothing. Which he had expected, his presence almost daring a response. They had parted, the big baddie subdued, and he had watched his complication flirt with the black widow of an agent. The knife had twisted further in his heart and when he heard that Ethan was coming to the main office later...here he was.
This was the second time he had run away from confrontation with the man and though it had done nothing for him in the past, the idea of being around him seemed riskier than not. He had forgiven himself for failing to help Julia, for dragging himself back into Ethan's life, bit he was still constricted in his feelings. The adult thing to do was ignore the kiss, ignore the man and treat him like an asset as most of the agency tried to do. The approach seemed to be working well for Ethan, he grimaced.
Why he was attached to the megalomaniac deathwish who taught the annual seminar on how not to be intelligent in professional situations, he could not fathom. Yes the man was organized, but not in the way that counted, like in the form of a survival instinct. He was brash, anti-authoritarian, and aging like a character in a superhero comic. The type destined to die spectacularly and not knowing when to quit. A liability to attach yourself to.
And yet.
A snapping sound, of a twig permeated his thoughts. Rapidly he turned to try and get a glimpse, tucking behind a tree when he found none. The vinegar that had been coursing through his veins drained, likely matching the color his face had taken on from the conditions. He stilled, knowing the decision he had to make.
Fighting was not optimal, but if the assassin had tracked him this far, running would prolong the inevitable. He cursed the mothering voice that whispered about parallels to other issues in his life. He pushed it aside. Neither option was his best, but he needed to commit. There were no other sounds than the ones he had been listening to for hours, the droplets hitting leaves and rolling murmurs of thunder. His hearing was strained, the dark storm rendering him blind and deaf.
In his mind he could hear the briefing on how they would take down the unseen target, and if the team was here which strategy they would employ. Benji would use whatever waterproof tech to determine the location, Jane would take to the trees to have the high ground. He would flank from the left, since most were right dominant, thus pay less attention to his approach. And Ethan...Ethan would be the bait. To be fair, the man wasn't the worst temptation in the world.
But he was on his own, so he readied himself. The men he fought initially were dangerous, but not taxing. The real issues lied with their number which were at least five at the time of the explosion. One got clipped in the crossfire, another he incapacitated. Which left three possibly, though likely two since the explosion rocked the part of the house where the counterintelligence agents seemed to haunt. Three, likely two.
Framing it positively, it would be beneficial to his health and his wildly vearing emotions from rage to bitterness. He preferred numbers, statistics, but violence - violence was an old friend. And considering his near photographic memory, it would be easy to project a certain face onto his opponents.
His weapon had been lost in the battle post explosion, kicked away towards the fire when he had choked the other person out. Not that it would be much use, waterlogged and likely to jam. Hand to hand was the simplest choice. But he had to be precise, the hours in the cold rain and aftermath of the earlier encounter had left him weary and stiff.
A plan in mind, he went left. The next grouping of trees gave him cover to flex his grip, to ready hands to break bone and smash nerves. He had to be quick, efficient as a one misstep could lead to his failure. Wrists rotated, then arms flexed. And then Ethan would have to come rescue him and the embarrassment alone would kill him so not coming out on top wasn't an option.
Clearing his mind, the world became clearer than it had in awhile. There was only the nature around him, his body, and the knowledge that there was someone else in the trees. Moving further into the dense forest, he feigned right, before moving further left. Most teams, including his own tended to attempt to surround the target and move in. When faced with an open area like a neverending wood, it was best to move in a line.
A line, which if he had to bet, would pass him if he was patient.
Again, he went up and left. And repeat.
The cat and mouse game, though risky, was a bit exhilarating. Knowing someone was hunting him and that he was winning, drawing someone in under the context that they had the upper hand. It was a thrill that was lacking in office work. While he remained humble, anxious, and reserved; it was delicious to know when others were below him.
Time had passed as it normally did when one was not around a clock and in the darkness it was unclear if he had been off the grid for how long. In this moment though, it felt as though it was going faster, and yet slowed all at once. The footsteps were getting closer, but he on his own command and each step seemed an expression of his will. One last time he feigned, and curl behind a tree to wait for the unlucky person to get just close enough.
Ethan crept back into his mind, how the man had looked humble almost time he had seen him. Attuned to his tension yes, but almost relishing the fact that he looked like hell from the mission. Basking in the light of victory or some adrenaline junkie high of the like. He had known Ethan to do so, to come off of the accelerated focus that came with his field work. But this time seemed different, perhaps it was the fact that the counter-agent had been saved.
Brandt had scoffed at the messiness of her before, but in his moment of hunting she just came and went as a thing that existed. Perhaps he was just numb to her, knowing that after all this time it was not her he had to accept in his world, but him. And acceptance of facts, like knowing that Ethan Hunt was going to die of middle age, was a part of life. A fact, like he was being hunted while likely suffering from minimal hypothermia and perhaps a concussion, was useful life and should be ignored. Facts, like the fact that Ethan had ghosted him after pushing him up against a wall and licked down to his collar bo...
Brandt sprung from his thoughts, a dark shadow appearing in his vision. Quickly he rammed the foe, targeting the handgun in the other's left hand. Knee to the stomach and elbow to the face did not defer the firm grip on the weapon, so he went for the inside of the elbow. This left him open, but disarming the other person was the main priority.
A higher pitch gasp and the female counteragent returned a kick to his side. It stung, but he turned to lessen the blow while crowding her. Female agents tended to be more agile and flexible, so a throat punch into a block gave him the upper hand. The only downside to overpowering her, even as she dropped her gun as he intended, was the arm that came around his throat to choke him.
He kicked her one more time, more as a flail, to the chin and she stumbled against the tree behind her dazed. Adrenaline pumping, Brandt attempted to forcibly elbow the assailant to no avail. Clawing at the arm, he threw himself back into one of the nearby trees. The arm faltered slightly, allowing the blackspots to flee from his eyes. He sucked in oxygen, breathing heavily as he turned and bodily pushed them into the tree. The masked agent dry heaved from the pressure, before retaliating with a knee aimed at the IMF analyst's stomach.
Dodging the hit, Brandt threw a few punches, aiming the neck and sides specifically. His hook from the right was blocked and the hits he took were only exasperated by the conditions around him. The rain had both parties sliding, their footing compromised. Brandt yanked his arm out of the block, moving to avoid the female agent who had recovered.
Facing both down, his internal calculation of odds of success had dropped from excitement for a victory to concern for his longevity. Still, the alternative remained of being rescued like a damsel by the IMF. Quickly taking stock of what hurt - his ribs, jaw, and head - he knew he had to get it over quickly, even if he had to channel his current frustration.
The counteragents surged to meet him, he ducked her roundhouse kick only to use her momentum to drop her to the muddy ground. The other agent settled into a boxing stance, going for power, though their punches required speed to counter. Looking for an opening, he sacrificed his shoulder to deliver an elbow to the temple. Gritting through the pain, Brandt dislocated their shoulder before taking a kick to the head.
He stumbled, narrowly avoiding most of the hits that came after. She went after him again with a kick, which this time he caught and twisted. Screaming in pain, her hip either broken or massively dislocated, she reached for her waist. He twisted more, ready to throw her away from him.
Expecting her partner to interject, Brandt felt a knife slice his face. She grinned, though in pain, as he dropped her throbbing leg. She was imobile, but the specialized throwing knives she carried promised clear accuracy. With a split second to react before she pushed through the pain further, he charged.
A knife flew into his leg and his already injured shoulder, the air flew from his lungs. But he made it to his target, spiking her to the forest floor. She thrashed against his grip, his forearm closing her air canal. She fought, scratching his face, unable to puncture his eyes. Finally, her eyes rolled back, her squirming ending. If he was a ruthless agent, a smart agent, he would of killed her. But he was an analyst, so he stood.
Dazed from the blood loss, his mind sluggish amd vision blurry. The rain was washing away from the blood from his face, as he took one step away from his opponent. Now he needed to find a dry space to wait for extraction and bandage his wounds. Perhaps there was a cave, he considered his options as he stepped further forward. His body ached, shivered from the combination of the storm and the fight. There was something he couldn't shake, like he had forgotten something...
A dark shadow appeared in his peripheral, moving towards him. The arms seemed wide open, but it could be the concussion he likely had. Defensively he swerved away, ending up against a tree trunk. The figure got closer and in the back of his mind, Brandt wondered if this was it. He had taken his eyes off them and now he was near helpless. Perhaps he could still take them by surprise, hell it was better than going down because of a monsoon.
When the figure was close enough, ballsy enough to touch his shoulder, Brandt smirked to himself. Big mistake he thought as he reared back, twisting towards the figure. He threw himself into the punch, landing the punch right as a bolt of lighting showed the identity of his would be assaulter.
Brandt missed it however, falling into unconsciousness from the exhaustion. The darkness was welcomed.