"Newkirk," he heard a voice hiss at him. "Newkirk!"
"What?" he said crossly, refusing to open his eyes. He twisted the blanket around him tighter, burying his head in something warm and soft. A hand pushed at his shoulder and he batted it away irritably.
"Newkirk, get the hell up before I bust you down to private," the voice growled.
Newkirk bolted up in bed, staring at Hogan, who was glaring at him.
From all together too close.
He had been in this situation before—the symptoms were there; painful throbbing in his head, a queasy feeling in his stomach, and the unmistakable stench of homemade alcohol on the sheets. A quick look down verified the rest of it. Yup! No clothes, sheets drawn up, clothes everywhere.…
Except instead of a girl with buck teeth and too-close-together eyes that he had picked up after copious amounts of alcohol, his commanding officer was bunching the sheet around his waist like a virgin protecting her honor. He blinked. Some niggling flash of a memory at the back of his mind was screaming about how apt that analogy was, and it was worrisome.
"Guv'nor?"
Hogan pushed himself into the corner of the altogether too small bunk. "I don't remember, do you?"
Newkirk winced, trying to sort through the night. "Something… LeBeau kept handing me glasses of that wine he made."
"I remember that."
"And I kept drinking them."
"Same here."
"And…" He remembered standing up, the world tilting to the side and finding himself pushed against the lockers and laughing hysterically at something that was probably not at all funny.
Blank.
Carter pushing him into a chair and telling him something about getting him a washcloth.
Blank.
Someone shoving a bowl into his hands and backing away before he bent over and lost his stomach again.
Blank.
"Nothing."
Hogan sighed. "Great. Another pain in the ass—"
Newkirk looked up alarmed. "Not literally, right?"
"No!" The color drained from Hogan's face. "No. Um. I don't… you're not…" He gestured vaguely with his hand.
"No, I'm good."
"Good. That's… this is unbelievably awkward."
"Oh, I wouldn't say unbelievably," Newkirk said, glancing around. They were in Hogan's room, the door tightly shut and a chair wedged underneath it, which did not bode well for the events of the night before, if or when they were recovered. Shooting a glance at Hogan, he could see him thinking the same thing.
"Maybe nothing happened."
Hogan looked relieved. "Yeah. That… I'm sure we just got tired, and I know I wouldn't have been able to make it to the top bunk—"
"Nor would I been," Newkirk said encouragingly.
"And in our sleep, we just… Well, we sensed another body next to us, and—"
"Dreaming of women, of course," Newkirk said.
Hogan nodded, "Of course, dreaming of women, we, um, cuddled."
"Cuddled, sir?"
"Manfully."
"Right."
Suddenly a loud banging on the door had them both swinging to look, wincing at the motion. "Sir? Are you in there? We can't find Newkirk."
"He's in here. He must have wandered in here while he was drunk," Hogan called back.
"Oh. Roll call, sir."
"Be out in a minute."
Hogan and Newkirk stared at each other for a minute, then Hogan said, "I guess you
realize this doesn't leave this room."
"Completely agreed."