neverwrongagent | Rescued?

Entry tags:

au,
brody,
rp

Rescued?

When the posters went up showing the two members of the Marine sniper team who'd gone missing, Carrie Mathison stood and stared at them. She didn't see two Marines in their uniforms, though, she saw only one of them half dressed on a rooftop looking up at the blanket of stars. She saw a sweet smile from a man who was too far from home and was trying to hold onto his humanity. Every time she passed the posters, even if she didn't turn to look, she was as aware of them as if someone had reached out and grabbed her. Months went by and the sensation never weakened.

Then came word that they'd been found, that two Marines had been found in neighboring camps. Both men were in rough shape: dehydrated, beaten and demoralized. One was worse than the other, but first reports didn't make it clear which it was and Carrie held her breath until she knew that Brody was in better physical shape. Not that she asked or spoke to anyone about knowing him. The moment she said a word, they'd pull her out of it all and that wasn't happening.

The men were kept apart while they were cleaned up. Carrie read both files, but it was Brody's she kept going over and over in her head. She knew every detail of what they'd found out so far. On the outside it probably seemed cruel to interrogate the men so soon, but the sooner they got it done, the better. These men were headed home, at least for a while, and it would be harder to get solid information from them when they were there.

It wasn't until minutes before she walked into the room that Carrie knew for sure which man she was going to debrief. She was ready to bounce out of her skin by the time she walked in, a feeling that vanished immediately when she saw him. "Sergeant Brody? I'm Carrie Mathison. I'm here to ask you some questions."

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He felt her watching him before she spoke. But she didn't look at him the same way the kid at the door had. She'd never looked at him that way. She'd always seen past the marks on his body.

When she spoke, he turned to look at her. Then he sighed again and turned off the water. "Sorry. I just..." He shrugged as he reached for a towel.

She grabbed a towel and stepped close, holding it up so he could either take it from her or walk into it and let her dry him. "Don't. You didn't do anything wrong. I should have punched the guy."

He stepped into the towel and sighed. "You didn't know. I should have punched him."

She caressed him gently, hoping that her touch would soothe him as it always seemed to. If it took her twice as long to dry him off as it needed, that was probably fine. "Maybe, but then you'd have dropped the pizza and I'm hungry." She leaned in and kissed his shoulder. "I'm sorry. I'd just finished telling you this could be a safe place."

He settled under her touch, leaning a little more heavily against her. "And we'd also just discussed that I shouldn't answer the door." Granted, the context had been different, but the point had been made all the same.

He turned to face her, wrapping his arms around her and pressing his face into her hair.

She got her arms around him in so she could hold him comfortably, her head on his chest. The details didn't matter, only that he feel safe. She could do that. She would do that for him. How, she had absolutely no idea, but she'd kept him with her for weeks after he was rescued, putting him through a new kind of hell. "We'll figure it out. Trial and error, that's all."

He nodded. "Next time, you answer the door." He sighed again, just trying to stay relaxed. It was vastly easily with her arms around him.

Were he to take a few steps back and look at the whole thing objectively, he'd see that he was probably using her. She acted like a drug, helping him forget everything. It was not a fix to the problem, at all, but it made the world tolerable.

With another sign, this one sounding of resignation, he pulled away a little. "Hungry?"

If they were to step back and look at the whole thing objectively, she was absolutely using him. She used all men she was with one way or the other because she was utterly incompetent in relationships. She didn't know how to be equal and open with someone. Helping him, being there for him, was part of the deal.

She ran her hand down his hip to his ass so she could pull him close. "Yes, but there's pizza first."

That was certainly one way to distract him. "If you insist." He pressed against her, the earlier slight forgotten for the moment. "It's fine cold, you know." He ground against her, then pulled back.

"Come on."

She rolled her eyes, mostly as a way of rewarding him for his reaction, then took his hand to lead him back downstairs. She considered making him put his pants back on, but no one else was going to be coming to the door. She'd just make sure that he had the towel over his lap while they ate hot pizza.

She curled up on the couch cross legged next to him and served him up a couple slices before taking one for herself. She really was hungry, as much from the emotional stress as the physical work out.

He leaned against her as he ate, sighing softly between bites. He had lost most of his appetite, but since she'd given him two slices, he was going to eat both of them. He was going to make sure she ate, too.

Of course, he didn't exactly talk through their meal, content to just be.

She did chatter at him some, talking about other take out options and how he should know her fridge pretty much always looked the way it did that day. Included in the recitation were hints that she could stand to have someone around to take care of her, but she wasn't really aware of those. Still, somehow she could hear her sister clucking in agreement.

She got through a second pizza slice before flopping back against him with a groan. "Needed that."

WHen she leaned back, he wrapped an arm around her and kissed her hair. If she needed someone to take care of her, he needed to take care of. His family was self-sufficient. He was not. He needed to feel like he was helping. And he wasn't getting that at home.

She shifted closer, wrapping an arm around his waist. After a long moment, she looked up at him. "It's so different here." She shrugged helplessly. "Different from there. People talk about things, worry about things, and I can't even concentrate on what they're saying because the important stuff is over there."

Even with her work being as intense as it was, it was different at home.

He nodded. "Not that there was really anyone for me to talk to there. Not after." He leaned against her. "Except you."

She nodded. "With what I do, there's never many people I can talk to honestly." Secrets kept her from talking to family and friends. Needing to appear totally in control kept her from talking to colleagues. "I relax when I'm with you."

He nodded. "The only time I relax is when I'm with you." Which was not a good thing if he wanted to keep his marriage alive.

He turned some, so that he was facing her, even as his towel slipped off, leaving him nakeder. He cupped her cheek, tracing his thumb over her lips. "It's not fair, you know."

She rubbed against his hand, smiling gently. She liked that he was comfortable with her, that she could give him that. Normally he made people nervous. "No, it's not." She blinked. "Wait, what isn't?"

He smiled softly. "How easy it is with you. That's not fair." He leaned forward, resting his forehead against hers. "Never been this easy with anyone else."

She exhaled slowly as she wrapped her arm more tightly around him. "No. Me, either." She caressed his hip for a while, aware of all the bare flesh, but thinking past that. She sat back a little to meet his eyes. "Never?" The man was married after all.

He shook his head. "Never. High school sweethearts starts out easy-ish. Then you become an adult. But it was never easy."

She caressed his hip again, then moved up to his chest. The idea of being with someone that long, even if you subtracted the years for his service, was foreign to her. "But you were happy?"

He nodded. "And some days, I still am. For a few hours, anyway." Mostly it was when the kids were around. He couldn't talk to his wife, try as they both might.

A few hours here and there didn't sound like enough reason to stay in a marriage, but then she wasn't exactly an expert. Still, it made her feel less like she was responsible for breaking up anything. That was going to happen anyway if something didn't change. "I don't want to mess that up. You've lost enough."

He shook his head. "I've messed it up plenty all on my own. Me and the US government."

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