Author's Note: Right. Inside the brackets are the reasons I've been gone. Outside the brackets you'll find the information about the story. Read as you'd like. [[I've been gone for fucking ages here, and judging by the reviews I've been getting, some of you are a mite upset with me. I promise I have good reasons, including, but not limited to my older brother being deployed for almost a year, a younger sister graduating boot camp in the Corps a few weeks ago, a cancer-scare, the development of migraines that come and stay for days at a time, and the terrifying realization that I have a tendency to skip eating and sleeping with startling regularity when I'm stressed.]] So I am back for the moment, but updates will still be irregular at best. This one is cross-posted from a fansite I write for. I know, I know. Not exactly a Trish Original, but bear with me. I've had the same headache for two days and most of my caloric intake for the past week has been coffee, black and bitter. I've been on a serious Jeremy Renner kick lately because Jesus Christ with a blowtorch have you seen him and his arms and his butt and his like everything? So yeah. I watched SWAT over and over again because nothing is hotter than a hottie as a bad guy, amirite? So I sort of took a lot of influence from SWAT and ran with it and decided that looking back is for pussies. Enjoy.
LunaShadow99: Anderson, honey, you terrify me in every possible way. You need to get your shit together and get in touch with me. I was just talking to John and Hamish yesterday about how no one's heard from you since we took you to see The Avengers. But I'm glad you're obviously not dead by your reviewing things.
OMGJOHNFUCKEDSIMON: O_O Uh. I'm back kind of? Please don't hunt me down and turn me into a jacket. I'd make a much better lampshade, I swear. I know I've been gone, but this whole 'being an adult' thing sucks hardcore. I haven't even really spent that much time working on stuff for FictionPress. I actually did a massive delete of a lot of stuff from my computer, so you guys are not the only ones suffering, unfortunatelike.
BLKsheep: Haha. Well I'm glad you found dayf/Ameij. We've kind of got this weird sort of mutually-inspiring thing going on. It works for us, I suppose, haha. My brother hated me when I really started getting into this fandom. The summer after MW2 came out I would come home from work every day, kick him off the Xbox, and beat the MW2 campaign. Every day. For two months. And then he sold it because it was his copy. So I know the feeling. I had to go out and buy MW1-3, as well as Black Ops. That was a rough shopping trip.
jink4rules: Little more. Not much, but you know how it goes.
ahmed: I honestly forgot I ever even mentioned something about the number of reviews. I've done a lot of drinking and smoking and not a whole lot of eating or sleeping, so anything deemed 'not immediately essential' is deleted. Sorry 'bout that. I promise I wasn't holding out for some arbitrary number of reviews. I've just been too busy to write.
Some days I wonder what life would have been like if Ghost hadn't lost it after Shepherd tried killing him. He cleared the psychological exams, mostly. Physically he was still untouchable. But he was a right fucking mess after that. He asked why we didn't try warning him when we were attacked first. I tried telling him that it was hard to send a word of warning out when you're fighting for your own life, but he didn't hear it. This is the second time he's been fucked over by a commanding officer, by someone he trusted with his life. I can't really find it in myself to blame him for it too much.
He got out. Fucked around on his psychological evaluations just enough to be declared too unstable to keep around but not so much it would keep him from functioning normally as a civilian. He's a goddamned genius, so no one was really surprised when it played out that way.
I saw him about six months later. I'd just landed back home after a few weeks of trying to clean up Shepherd's fucking mess. His hair was a bit shorter, but it seemed somehow messier. New tattoos and a wild sort of smile that he only ever used to wear when we were jumping out of a fucking plane. He made a few obscene gestures at me from the snooker table, but he didn't come any closer or say anything. Maybe if I'd gotten word to him a little sooner we'd be sitting at the bar together, making comments at the expense of everyone else. But instead I sat at the bar alone while he made a mess of things just far enough away. I almost wished I hadn't seen him at all.
I went back to the bar a few days later, using up the last of my leave time before it was back into the shit. Simon was there again, only alone this time and about five shots into the night by the state of things around him. He eventually sauntered over to me and took a seat, not nearly as drunk as he should have been.
"So what was it gave you cold feet, MacTavish?"
"The hell are you talking about?"
"Well you waited until the last second to warn us off and we still lost Roach. Was it that? Is Sanderson what sent you into a tizzy of telling us it was a trap? Did Shepherd swear to let Gary live and then he shot him anyway? Is that what had you turning?"
"You've got no idea what you're talking about. Price and I were fighting off Shepherd's men and Makarov's. I didn't know what was going on until it was too late. You think it doesn't bother me that you and Sanderson were in that position to begin with?"
"I think you should've known it was a trap when you walked into it."
"You sure as hell didn't."
I don't really remember much of the fight, just that someone came up and pulled Simon away and shoved him out the door and there was someone in a far corner yelling something about the police being on their way. I got the hell out of there before I needed to use my one phone call to get Price out of bed to bail me out. It wasn't something I needed on my record.
I was only gone a few weeks this time, and I went back to the bar. I tried telling myself it was just for convenience and not because Ghost was there. Even I didn't believe it, and I'm fairly certain Simon was onto the fact, too.
He wasn't there when I showed up and I tried to pay attention to the blond that was trying so fucking hard to bed me. But the doors opened and there was that annoying fucking Cockney singing an old drinking song he used to belt out when it was us and the rest of the 141 out for a celebration after a successful mission. I don't know why it cut so damn deep, but that didn't stop it from cutting. He took a seat right next to me and ordered both of us a drink and I wasn't sure I liked where this was going.
Next thing I know we're both a few drinks into the night and he's confessing that the only thing he ever truly loved was the shit he did for the SAS and the 141. Said it only seemed right that he got fucked over on even those. I'm pretty sure it started out as a fight behind the bar, but the next thing I know we're back in my quarters fucking like mad animals. He was gone when I woke up the next morning, but that didn't really surprise me. Even when he was sane and stable he wasn't one for lingering. I was a little surprised by the knife stabbing a note into my end table that read only "You were a mistake".
Another month passed before I caught sight of Simon Riley again. This time it was out in the middle of nowhere, in a country I've never officially visited. Price and I ran into a group of mercenaries chasing down the same leads as us for a private bidder who pays more than any government will pay a soldier. Simon was there, grinning and waving a sidearm around, leading the rag-tag troupe. I gave him fair warning. I told him to stay he hell out of our way. His smile went cold at that one and he told me that my rank didn't mean shit out here. I think that one hurt a little more than it should've. He'd always joked that my rank didn't mean much because everyone goes to the XO with problems and that was him. It was all in jest back then. But this time he was mocking me and everything we went through. So I didn't say anything, just turned around and walked off.
At least when Simon was in uniform, he knew he had people to answer to and that helped curb his obnoxious cocky attitude. Not this time. This time he was top of the pecking order and he liked it. He could do whatever the fuck he wanted and as long as the job gone done, no one gave a toss how it happened. Looking back on it now, I should've tried keeping him in line. But wounded pride blinds and all that bollocks. So I didn't see him creeping up on my kill until he'd finished the job. I'd thought he'd headed south to chase another target with a smaller following. I was wrong. But he went from being bold and careful to cocky and careless and when the knife came down it was twice I'd failed to warn him in time.
"Live with a man 40 years. Share his house, his meals. Speak on every subject. Then tie him up, and hold him over the volcano's edge. And on that day, you will finally meet the man." For the longest time, they were just words from some show that Sanderson watched constantly, even though there was only one season. But with our target and his men dead and Simon bleeding too fast, they were startlingly true. I'd spent countless hours with Simon, in the field, in bed, in and out of danger, and yet holding him in my arms trying to stop a bleed I knew would kill him anyway, I saw him for the first time. He knew he was dead and he knew that I was only keeping death away. There wasn't any resentment in his eyes now. He wasn't scared or crying or begging. He was calm. The calmest I've seen him in a long time. He put one hand up to my face and he smiled, teeth stained with his own blood.
"Looks like the best always die young, yeah? Don't get weepy on me, you bastard. I'm saving you a seat in hell. God knows if I get stuck next to Hitler I'll shave his mustache clean off and be done with it." I couldn't help laughing, even if it was pained and choked.
"I'll never forgive you not warning us. But not for me. I can't forgive you for Roach," he said. His smile was fading and there was more blood on the dirt than in his body and I knew he was nearly there. His confession didn't hurt. I know now like I did then that I can't ever forgive myself for letting Sanderson die any more than Simon could forgive me for the same. If I was really pressed, I could've found a way to save him. But I'd thought they would be safe for the few seconds it took me to get to adequate cover. Simon cringed and grabbed the back of my neck, pulling me in and pressing a blood-laced kiss to my lips. He died and I held on. I buried my face in his neck and I am not ashamed to admit I cried. I would have stayed there until the body went frigid and started to smell if Price hadn't pulled me away and told me we needed to get the fuck out of there. He still wore his tags and I took them. Grabbed the first man from Simon's "team" I passed and told them that if he didn't get a proper Catholic burial back home in England I'd hunt them all down and show them exactly why I always got the information I asked for. He nodded and two weeks later there was a new hole in the ground in a small cemetery with Simon's name engraved on the headstone.
So that's the story of how it's been ten years since I went to a shitty dive bar with the name of "Casterly's" and why it's only been a few hours since I last saw Simon's face. Because he still haunts my dreams like the Ghost he was named for, only now he's an actual ghost and God knows he won't give me any peace. But, somehow, I think this is a better ending. Better than the alternative where I walk down to the bar every weekend and see him standing there, surrounded by people he should have hated had his life not fractured into "Lieutenant" and "Now". Better than when I still believed he blamed me for getting shot. But he didn't blame me and that's what still makes it sting after all these years. Because he didn't blame me at all, not really, not any more than he blamed himself. And in my stupidity and sentimentality, I never once told him he wasn't at fault for Gary's death. They couldn't recover Sanderson's body, so he's just a headstone on an empty plot. I'm the only one who visits either of them regularly. Occasionally Jester or Robot will stop by Sanderson's grave and leave a can of beer on the corner of the stone, some kind of fucked up tradition that makes them laugh and cry at the same time. I'm the only one to visit Simon. It isn't that the others resent him, but more that they couldn't understand why he did what he did. But I can. It's why I find myself sitting with my back against his headstone, telling him that he isn't really missing much with the 141 because it's all still paperwork and boring bollocks and sometimes, if I'm especially tired or intoxicated, I can almost hear him laugh and tell me I knew what I was signing on for.
So yes, some days I wonder what life would have been like if Ghost hadn't lost it after Shepherd tried killing him, and then I remember that he could've died in the mountains and we never would've gotten our goodbye, short and messy as it was. I wonder because there's a theory that says that just by imagining a different world, it is brought into existence. I wonder because I like to think about a different series of events because I know that in some parallel world, Simon's sitting next to me, laughing and telling jokes made in poor taste and things are a damn sight better than they are here and now. But, at the same time, I know there's some version of me that lost Ghost in the mountains and, old gods help me, I'm glad that I'm not him. Because at least I have scuffed dog tags that still feel like part of Simon and the well-worn memory of one last bloody kiss.