Ghost had always liked the feel of Credenhill. On a good day in late spring with barely a cloud in the sky and just enough of a breeze to cut the heat some, there was simply few things better in his mind. It was the best time to run the obstacle course, or even just take a hike.

Today was not one of those days. In fact, it was the complete opposite, as is the standard in England. The sky was dark with heavy storm clouds that brought down sheets upon sheets of rain. Thunder rumbled off in the distance, though that the storm could very easily end up overhead in an hour.

It'd been a couple weeks now since Ghost had joined the Task Force 141, and he easily found himself slide right back into routine. There was comfort in the predictable day to day lull; busy work never bothered him any. Unlike many of the men here, he almost dreaded his down time at the end of the day. Often times he tried to distract himself with more work if he could, reading if he couldn't. With no friends to interact with, and Manchester too long of a drive to even bother, the only variety to be found was in the tasks he needed to do at work that day.

What made this stormy Saturday evening an exception? One word. MacTavish. After Ghost's initial frustration with him, he made a point not to be anything besides professional towards his CO. Fortunately, Captain Price kept the man so bogged down with paperwork that he didn't have to interact with him too often. Today, however, Ghost had off, and as the sadistic Lady Luck would have it, so did his Captain.

Ghost holed up in the rec room to read, as per usual, when a hand heavily landed on his shoulder. Almost immediately, the Lieutenant dropped the book and grabbed the offending hand, giving the other man's wrist a tight squeeze. "Can I help you?" He looked up, found himself face to face with his Captain, and immediately let go. "Sorry, sir."

Despite how hard he'd grabbed him, MacTavish was virtually unphased by it. "All good. What'cha up to?"

"Reading," was his curt response. He picked back up his book and leafed through the pages to find his place.

He could feel the Captain's weight as he leaned onto the back of the chair. "Anything good?"

Patience is a virtue... Ghost took a deep breath. "It's 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde'. You tell me."

"So classics," he concluded.

"Is there a point to this?"

MacTavish hummed before he said, "You tell me. Do you think there's one?"

With a frown, Ghost gave up and shut the book then turned back to him. "I'm not sure I follow."

"Do you think there's a point," he repeated.

"I heard you the first time," Ghost deadpanned. "I'm just trying to mind my own business, sir. Don't you have friends to go talk to? Or maybe that extensive training regiment?" Take a hint, just take a bloody hint.

"That doesn't answer my question."

Ghost dug his thumb nail into the spine of the book, a nervous habit. "I think you want something."

He immediately regretted giving MacTavish an answer at all, because that smirk that Ghost oh so loathed made its return. "I wanted to see if you've been trying to manage your stress. That's what we agreed on."

"I'm reading a good book on a rainy day, I think I'm fine, sir," Ghost replied.

That should have been satisfactory in Ghost's mind. Apparently it wasn't though for the Captain, as he said, "I know you pile as much work on yourself as possible, and when you aren't doing any of that then you're here reading. Are you actually relaxing or is this just a distraction for yourself?"

"What...?" He gawked at the other. How? Either he was more obvious than he meant to be, or his Captain was far more observant than he gave him credit for. Ghost stood up now, gripping the book so tightly that the whole paperback tome bowed. "Fuck this, I'm going somewhere else to read."

Before Ghost could go far though, MacTavish grabbed him by the shoulder. "Come on."

After being dragged the first couple of steps, Ghost snapped "Let go!" and smacked at the Captain's arm with his book. The strike did virtually nothing except make MacTavish squeeze his shoulder even tighter as he pulled the unfortunate Lieutenant outside, straight into the rain. He didn't stop just outside the building either, he kept leading him away from the main compound until they were near the hiking trails and the building was little more than a phantom fog lamp in the storm. At this point, Ghost hit MacTavish again with the book with an annoyed, "Would you let go of me already?"

The Captain did, thankfully, and turned to Ghost with a serious glint in his eyes. "You want to yell at me, now's your chance to. Nobody's going to hear you out here over all the rain."

"You're out of your head," Ghost said, but the words were largely muted by the storm. "We're gonna get soaked out here!"

"And? Don't tell me you just don't want to get wet."

"I don't care if I get wet!"

"Then what is it, Ghost," he pressed, "you can say it out here."

If Ghost wasn't boiling with frustration, he would have been shivering as the cold rain left him completely soaked through. "Maybe I don't want to say it, have you ever thought of that? Stop trying to get in my head!"

"Why don't you want to?"

"Because I don't, you stupid wanker! I want people to get off my damn arse and stop watching me like I'm some fucking landmine! I want people stop asking me what happened and just leave me alone already." Sound logic flew out the window at this point, as Ghost found it so much easier now to just keep shouting than to stop. "And here you come in, saying you understand what I'm going through. You weren't held up for months and tortured. You didn't live a broken life that you exhaustively put back together, only for it to be ruined by one man! What the fuck could you know about any of that?"

Throughout Ghost's entire rant, Captain MacTavish stood there and listened. He didn't interject, he just waited until the pause. Then, with a clear air of calm, he rested a hand on Ghost's shoulder and told him, "You're right. I don't know. That doesn't stop me from trying to understand it though."

It was such a simple response, one that left Ghost shocked as he gaped at the Captain. All this time, the idea of someone just trying to understand him felt like a pipe dream. He'd written off all hopes of anyone ever trying. Much less the Captain of a highly elite task force. "Why?"

"Because, from the moment you stepped in my office, I knew you'd bring something different to this group. I think you're worth more than even you know."

Ghost pushed MacTavish's hand off of him. "Don't give me that load of bollocks. You didn't think that shit for a minute. I'll bet you didn't even have a fucking choice letting me in; General Shepherd's so far above you that you don't even try to make a rational decision. You said yourself, my record was reason enough for you to turn my arse away, so why the fuck didn't you, huh?"

This shut the Captain up for a good minute. That calm composure gave way to a muted shock.

Hands balled tight into fists, Ghost continued to shout, "Got nothing to say now? I'm right, aren't I? You didn't even second guess that bastard, now did you? If you tried, I'm sure you could've pressed that I'm not fucking stable enough for this sort of position. Instead you just went the fuck along with it even though there was no good reason to put any vested interest in me." With that, Ghost managed to yell himself breathless. He stopped to catch his breath, face heated despite the chilled rain.

MacTavish gave a slow nod, though still seemed stunned. "Alright... And do you feel any better now that you got that off your chest?"

"No, I don't. I'm cold and wet and frustrated. I didn't want to talk about this! I just wanted to be alone." Ghost huffed and turned on his heels. "To hell with this, I'm going inside..."

Upon hearing this, MacTavish tried to reach out and grab his shoulder. "Ghost, wait-"

"Don't touch me," he warned lowly, and headed back to the barracks, leaving his Captain standing alone in the rain.

-()-()-()-

Captain Price headed down to his and Soap's office to do a double check of what work still needed to get done before he could call it a night. What he didn't expect was to find Soap there, especially on his day off. It struck him as odd, since days off normally were an excuse for the younger to go off to town and pick up some 'provisions' (namely cigars and nip bottles of whiskey that would get stashed in a hidden space under the tabletop). Instead, Price found Soap sitting head down at the desk with a towel hanging off his neck and leaving a sizable puddle on the floor.

Standing in the doorway, Price strongly considered stepping out and leaving him to whatever existential crisis he was going through. The man tended to dwell on things and it could be a hassle to talk him out of it. With a heavy sigh, he decided it'd better to at least ask and make sure he was okay. "Soap, you still alive over there?"

He was met with a grunt as the Scot picked his head up off the table; a spot on his cheek was now bright red from being pressed down for so long. "Aye..."

"Any particular reason you're drenched?" He approached the desk now and started thumbing through the stack of paperwork left, adding in "Why didn't you get into something dry?"

Soap gave a half-hearted shrug. "I messed up, not exactly sure how to fix it."

It didn't sound like an actual answer to either of Price's questions, but it did provide far more context. "What'd you do now?"

"I tried to smooth things out with Ghost. I figured he had a lot of issues with me, so I pulled him out to tell me in private." He rubbed his hands against his face, groaning as he did so. "He yelled at me for a lot of shite, then just stomped off."

"I'm not all that surprised. You did put him on the spot." Great... there's still a lot of papers to do...

"But you'd think that by getting all those problems out in the open, it'd ease up some of the tension."

Price pulled a fairly thick stack of papers from the pile and smacked Soap upside the head with it. "Just give him time. He'll come around eventually."

Soap rubbed the side of his head. "And if he doesn't?"

"We'll address it. Now go get your arse in something dry and get some sleep. If I come back here in ten minutes and you're still sitting around dripping everywhere, I'll drag you to your quarters myself." With that, Price left on the thin hope that the younger would just follow his advice.

Ten minutes later proved otherwise.

Chapter 2, concluded.

Man, this one was a trip. I can't say I'll ever 100% like how it came out, but I've gone through it at least seven times "trying to make the words go" as they say. C'est la vie.

Thank you for the support I've been given so far. It's much appreciated.