Chapter Text
Ghost was caught and he knew it, a veritable rat in a trap. He was good at his job, could almost literally disappear in an instant, but he wasn’t a god. Every mission he went out knowing that this could be the last, that this time he could be one of those bodies left behind in the field, and the fact that it was now was almost a relief. He didn’t fight when they caught his arms behind his back and held him down, and he could tell that it unnerved his enemies just like that. A small victory, and likely the last one he would taste. Another small victory was he knew the rest of the team had gotten out before him. The only thing worse than death was letting a man die under your command.
“Well well well, looks like you really can catch a phantom!” the ringleader spoke with a sickening grin, and Ghost couldn’t help but snarl a little under his mask.
A hand reached inside his tac jacket and he did jerk then, fighting the intrusion as they retrieved the flash drive in his pocket.
He didn’t carry dog-tags. If he died an unidentifiable corpse, that was just right by him.
“And you didn’t even escape with the prize,” the bogey kept talking.
As if Ghost would let them catch him if he actually carried the intel. This time it was him with the decoy.
They grabbed him by the back of the mask and tilted his head up so he had to look the man in the face. He couldn’t help but narrow his eyes.
“What shall we do with him, boys?” the leader asked, spreading his lips so that his teeth were exposed almost as much as they would be if someone had defleshed his skull. He paused, then leaned down on his knees to look Ghost in the eyes.
They didn’t even remove his mask. It sent alarm bells ringing in the back of his mind, that they had him here, at their mercy, and they didn’t even try to remove his anonymity. A normal hostile would have taken it off and held it as a trophy.
They didn’t want to expose Simon. They wanted the prize of netting Ghost.
Then he did struggle, but it was the writhing of a fox caught in a trap. He was almost certainly dead.
“I’m sure you’d rather die the death of a warrior, but that’s too good for the likes of you,” the leader said, and reached out his hand. A man nearby handed him a small insulated case, and the leader popped it open to reveal a single syringe.
Torture?
Ghost cursed his mask then, if only because it kept his mouth covered so he couldn’t bite.
“Do you know what this is?”
“I assume it’s your daily dose of formaldehyde to keep your corpse fresh and pliable, you rotting f-“
His retort was cut short as they whacked him with the butt of a rifle, making him see stars for a minute.
The leader snarled.
“Charming. No. As I can tell by your reek and your sharp tongue, I can tell you’re a particularly virile alpha.” He waved the syringe back and forth across Ghost’s field of vision. “This is concentrated alpha hormones. For even a weak alpha, it can send them into a blind rut for a week. I wonder… what will it do to a specimen like you?”
Ghost thrashed but they kept him held tight.
“You sick fuck, if you wanted to film a porno you could try asking!”
He received another whack to the back of his head and he wished it was strong enough to knock him out.
The leader didn’t move an inch despite how much Ghost struggled, and the grin barely wavered.
“I’m not going to rape you, Ghost. I have it on good intel that your team has an omega, a very perky little one at that. I want to see what you’ll do. Will you fuck him, or will you burn yourself out trying to avoid your instincts? I don’t keep omegas in my team, and there’s nobody around for miles. Fuck or die, Ghost?”
He knew they didn’t have Soap. He’d watched him escape with the rest of the team, made sure of it. But despite himself, he felt his protective alpha instincts flare and he gave a wordless growl, a sound that would make most flee in fear under different circumstances. His rage was beyond words, but it didn’t matter. They pulled his head back until his neck was fully exposed and they jammed the needle in, and he was done. If he’d had a cyanide tablet between his teeth, he’d have bitten down on it. Instead, his ears began to ring and he felt the heat run through his body, like they’d injected fire into his veins.
Dimly he was aware of a spray of gunfire and a sudden commotion. The hands that had been holding him released, but as much as he wanted to fight back, his limbs were suddenly weak as his body reacted to the chemical solution he’d been dosed with. He shivered and felt a warning, wounded growl rumble in his throat until he felt a new set of hands holding him. Even through the mask he could smell Soap, sweat and gun-oil and a hint of omega sweetness underneath.
“They dosed him with something!” Soap yelled, and Ghost tried not to look at his face, tried not to breathe too deep, tried not to get too close.
“Shit.” That was Price. “They got him with enough alpha Viagra to make an elephant rut for a month. It’s a miracle his heart hasn’t given out yet.”
Ghost could only growl low in his throat, but the bite of it was gone.
“Are you growling at me, Simon?” Soap asked, trying to pull him into their normal banter as if everything was fine.”
“Shut. The fuck up,” he forced out, and Soap clapped him on the shoulder.
“He’s still got a mouth on him, even if he’s out of it,” Soap grinned. “He’ll be just fine.”
“Let’s get him out of here before he reeks up the whole joint,” Price said, and Ghost felt hands grab him under the elbows and hauled him up.
He couldn’t help the threatening growl that started up again, unable to make sense of any of the other smells to tell friend from foe, but before he got too far, Soap stepped in front of him and purred.
The omega purr did what it was supposed to and calmed his instincts enough that he felt himself relax. Omega was happy, that meant there was no threat, and alpha didn’t need to protect. There was a reason he shouldn’t let himself give in, a reason the omega shouldn’t be comforting him, but he was too far out of it to fight.
“I got him,” the omega said, and he rumbled back a little in harmony.
“Fuck,” one of the other alphas said, but an alpha who wasn’t a threat. “I’ve never seen him like this. What can we do? Can we sedate him like this?”
“Negative,” pack leader said. He wasn’t as strong an alpha as Ghost, but he was in charge. “Anything else we give him could trigger a system shutdown. We want him alive, we gotta let him ride it out. Now get moving.”
“Roger that, Captain,” voices chimed in affirmative and Ghost let himself be moved.
As long as omega was happy, alpha was willing to follow.
He tuned out for a while, feeling dazed like someone had hit him with a tranquilizer, and when he faded back in, he was strapped into an aircraft and sweating. Some of his cognition was back, but the rut was hitting him in full force. He could smell his own rank, and the competing alpha smells made his blood boil. He didn’t even want to think about his cock, hard and heavy between his legs, thankfully tucked against his thigh in his pants, easier to hide. The rest of the team could smell him well enough; they didn’t have to watch him tent too.
He wanted to growl, but he held it back. He could hear Price and Soap arguing over the engines of the aircraft, and couldn’t help but listen in.
“Just drop us off, Captain. I’ll take care of him.”
“Like hell you will!” Price shouted. “You’re a Sergeant, not a whore, regardless of your designation. I brought you on for your skills and talents, not so you can be a fuckdoll whenever someone pops a rut.”
“That’s not why, Price, and you’re a motherfucking cunt for suggesting it.”
“Maybe you should be more concerned about where you put your cunt-”
“Hey, fuck you!” yelled Soap in response, and then dissolved into a string of incomprehensible Scottish insults that Ghost couldn’t be bothered to follow.
Gaz was clearly pretending like he was anywhere else, cleaning his guns and chewing on some sharp minty gum, probably wasn’t strong enough to keep the reek of Simon out of his nose, but it was at least a distraction. He noticed when Ghost started to stir and opened his mouth to alert the other two, but Ghost beat him to it.
“What, you two trying to raise the dead or something? Some of us are trying to sleep off our own misery back here.”
The argument between Soap and Price paused as Gaz gave him a wry grin. There were sounds of a brief scuffle which Soap evidently won as he appeared with a bright smile in the back of the plane while Gaz made a quick exit. Poor man. Ghost would have to buy the poor beta a drink later, just for having to put up with all this.
“Ay, Simon, yer lookin’ a bit peely wally, ain’t ya?”
“English, MacTavish.”
“You look like a right pile of shite L.T.”
Ghost couldn’t help a snort, though he could feel the pain from his injuries as he did so.
“Hell of a way to seduce a man, Johnny. Give me any more, and I might have to swoon a little.”
Soap laughed and casually settled himself in Ghost’s lap, sitting right on top of his raging boner, and Ghost couldn’t help but freeze. Soap paused and tucked his chin in, obscuring his scent marks a little so Ghost could think.
“This alright, L.T?” he asked. “I’m willing to help you out of this tough spot if you’ll let me.”
Ghost felt his heart twist a little. It wasn’t that he didn’t want Johnny, it was extremely difficult for any alpha in their right mind to resist such a powerful, self-assured omega as Johnny was, even without the pretty face. It was just hard for Simon to justify wanting to put a hand on something so bright and youthful. Johnny wasn’t much younger than he was, but Ghost felt the pressure of knowledge, experience, and pain holding him down. It didn’t seem right to saddle Johnny with all that, as much as his alpha brain couldn’t stop thinking about what Johnny’s tight ass would feel around his knot.
“You don’t have to feel obligated to save my ass, Johnny. Price is right. You’re not just a hole.”
“I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t want to, Simon.” Johnny let out a little purr and wiggled his hips a little. Ghost responded in a growl that seemed to spur Johnny on even more. “I like you alive as well, you know. Besides, it’s not exactly a ‘hard’-ship to offer.”
Half gone to rut as he was, Ghost still caught the innuendo.
“Your jokes are terrible, Soap.”
“Not as bad as yours,” Johnny responded, and after a beat where they caught eye contact, they both chuckled.
They fell into a moment of silence. Ghost hadn’t said yes, but he also hadn’t said no or tried to push Johnny off, and it was impossible to ignore the way their scents mingled in a pleasant haze. If he was going to say his piece, he had to say it now.
“I want you,” Ghost growled under his breath, trying to keep his voice low so Gaz and Price couldn’t hear. “But I’m not gentle, and I’m not going to want you just once.”
He reached his right hand around and gripped one of Johnny’s ass cheeks tight enough to get his message across.
“I’m no princess, Simon,” Johnny growled. “And I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t think I could handle it. If you’re anything in bed like you are out on the field, I think we’ll do just fine.”
“You like that Johnny? A bit of brute force and sharp tongue?”
“Hell yes,” Soap replied, and tangled his arms around Ghost’s neck. “Give it all to me, Simon. I can take it.”
Soap started purring like the sweet omega he was, and Ghost let himself press his mask against Soap’s neck and breathe in deep. The scent of omega pheromones just where it was strongest made Ghost nearly lose his mind. If he weren’t strapped into the seat, his alpha would have already mounted him against the wall.
The aircraft gave a shudder and Soap moved back and into his own seat just as Price game through the doorway.
“We’re leaving you two at the drop point. I hope you’re sure,” Price said, giving them both a stern look.
“Certain, Captain,” Soap replied with a cheeky grin.
Price looked at Ghost, and Ghost nodded back.
“Aye, Price, we’ll be fine.”
“Better be better than fine,” Price growled back, but gave his own nod of acquiescence. “Wheels down in ten.”
Johnny practically wiggled in his seat.
“Can’t wait to have you, L.T,” he said, with an uncharacteristically shy blush on his face.
Ghost just hoped he stayed just as sure once he had him.