churbooseanon

A finale on No Promises Broken, Dead Air and Call and Silence as I promised I would do long ago. Takes place after Season 13 finale and as the title might imply, it is less than happy. The message Epsilon leaves behind for Caboose, if you will. Or you will not.

“You want me to do what?” Church squawks and Caboose does his very very best not to frown because that would be bad.

“Hold my hand,” Caboose insists, holding his hand out and waiting for Church to do something other than be mean about it all.

“There is absolutely no way I’m going to hold…”

“Are you ashamed of me?” Caboose asks, and the hurt that flashes over Church’s face makes him sad. “Tucker says that sometimes the ladies he is with won’t hold his hand in public because they are ashamed of him. But they don’t know him very well so I’m not sure if it’s the same. We know each other really well and we’re best friends and we kiss and hug and I think we should…”

Church’s fingers are suddenly interwoven with his and Church isn’t looking at him so much as looking away but Caboose is happy. Very happy. Because Tucker was right. All it took was suggesting that Church might be ashamed and that would make him sad and he could get Church to do it.

Caboose decides he’ll have to do it again in the future in places where people can see him because it’s nice to have that warm hand with his. It makes his whole chest feel fuzzy happy.

“Are… you flirting with me?”

Caboose tilted his head and seemed to think about it for a moment, and Church wanted to rip out his hair because how the fuck did a question like that even need to be thought about?

“What is flirting again, Church?”

Fuck. No, he hadn’t wanted this to devolve into lesson time again.

“Flirting is when… Well… Fuck Caboose, why don’t you just ask Tucker? He knows all about what flirting is, even if he sucks at it.”

“But I’m asking you, Church.”

All Church could do to was sigh and shake his head and be certain that this conversation was not going to go well, or at all in the direction it was supposed to go because that was always what happened with Caboose.

“Flirting is when, well, you do things or say things to try and get someone to notice you in a romantic sense. Like, you want them to like you. The kind of liking that involves hand holding and kissing and all that.”

“Oh. Well then yes, Church, I was flirting with you. Because I would really like it if we did the hand holding and kissing and all of that.”

All Church could do was gape.

Third Time’s The Charm

He remembers the first one. Someone he went to school with who kissed him sloppy and tasted like too much cinnamon and he hated the taste of cinnamon but the kiss had been good so he hadn’t said stop. Remembers the way those hands had fumbled on him, trying to figure out where they belonged, and he’d let them because sometimes they fumbled into the right places and that had felt good.

He remembers the second one. Another guy in his basic training unit who would pull him aside and kiss him with a kind of tenderness that felt like a lie and tasted like sand and grit strangely against his teeth. His hands were stronger, more confident, and more certain of where they wanted to be. But they were rougher and pushed a little too hard and yeah it had felt good but it hadn’t felt right.

Church is the third one. His lips taste like chocolate chip cookies, and it’s not sloppy, it’s not tender, it’s possessive. Makes him feel owned and Caboose likes that. Likes that more than he knows how to say so he groans into the kisses and his hips press forward and then Church’s hands were hard against his hips, pressing him back against the cliff wall. Those hands were strange. They fumbled, but were strong when they did it. Confident but confused. Like Church knew how to touch someone, but didn’t know how to move those touches to Caboose.

He didn’t care, they were perfect. Perfect like Church’s lips trailing over his jaw and down his neck with kiss after kiss after kiss and they are hot and his body is hot and the trail of kisses leave behind moisture that is cool when the wind blows and Caboose groans and his hips rock forward again.

“Need you to stay still for me,” Church groans into his ear.

“Why?” Caboose asks, his voice breathy in his own ears.

“Trust me. I’ll make you feel good,” Church whispers, then his teeth are scraping over the outside of Caboose’s ear and that feels good, so good, perfect good.

They always told Caboose that. Always promised to make him feel special and nice and perfect. So far Church was the only one on the way to achieving that. Which was only right, because Church was the first one he had chosen, rather than been chosen by.

“I trust you,” Caboose promises before the lips are back on his, hot and insistent and pulling his lip between Church’s teeth for a suck and oh geez that was really nice too, why didn’t the other ones do that too?

“Close your eyes,” Church whispers, and Caboose squeezes them shut and just listens, breaking hard, utterly still. He knows the sound of the catches on his armor being triggered. The weight is gone from his chest first, and Caboose groans at the momentary cold before Church’s hands move over his undersuit.

“Don’t move,” Church purrs and Caboose holds himself back against the cliff as still as he can. Resists the urge to press forward as the weight of Church’s hands shift to his hips. Find another catch.

“Not moving,” Caboose groans, except his arm has come up and crossed over his eyes to keep himself from being tempted into looking. His helmet was long since abandoned and it would have been easier if he could have shut off his visual feed rather than rely on his traitor eyes to do what Church wants him to.

“You moved,” Church hisses and there are hands on his arm tearing it aside and Caboose gasped and did his best to stay still as Church’s hands move over his arm, picking piece of armor after piece of armor off of him.

“Church,” he gasps, holding still, feeling lips trail over the undersuit and wishing they were on his bare skin. Those hands are gone from his bare arm, moving over the other, and Caboose bites his lip and tries not to cry over how right it feels to have Church touching him.

“You want me to touch you, don’t you?” Church asks, and Caboose whimpers because words are too hard now. There are fingers on his neck, pressing against the suit’s pressure seal and running his fingers down Caboose’s chest. He can feel air over his slowly exposed skin. Feel lips following, kissing down his chest, moving down and down and oh god so far down. Hands slip under the edge of the suit, spread it apart.

“Please, don’t stop,” Caboose gasps. “Please, Church. I need you to…”

Except Church already knew. Church had the suit undone more than far enough. Church’s hands were strong and focused and Caboose had just enough time to process the touch of them on that special part of him before there was a mouth and he couldn’t stop. His hips buck forward and the sound Church makes before his hands grab Caboose and hold him back against the cliff is a mixture of amusement and annoyance.

“I’ll stop,” Church warns, and the words spoken against him makes him tremble.

“Please don’t. Please never stop. Please Church. I… Church.”

He can’t move his hips anymore but he doesn’t need to. Church is moving. He can feel it in the tongue that strokes him, the lips that move back and forth over him and Caboose squeals in the back of his throat.

“Please, Church… Please…”

Chuckles feel so good on him and Caboose stays still as a hand comes off his hips to wrap around him as well. And it feels so good, feels so right. Feels perfect.

He never wants to lose this. Never wants to let it go.

“Okay, but what the serious fuck is that?”

Caboose tilted his head, eyes wide behind his visor, and he followed the line that Church’s finger and arm made and oh, that was what he meant.

“Oh, that’s a table Church. Table. Taaaaa…”

“Not the table you fucking idiot. That…”

Church’s hand jerked back as the little kitten arched its back, hissed, and lashed out with a paw full of claws.

"Looks like the kitten likes you,” Tucker laughed across the room and Caboose pulled the little kitten closer toward him. The little brown thing started to purr almost immediately.

“Chapel, that isn’t very nice,” Caboose carefully reprimanded the kitten, because you had to teach them discipline when they were young because that was what you did with pets.

“Chapel?” Church asked, sounding like someone had hurt his throat and made it all high.

“Oh, that is perfect,” Tucker continued to laugh, his hands at his stomach and Caboose did not think it was really all that funny. “He named it after you.”

“Just in case you haven’t noticed, Tucker, my name is Church, not Chapel.”

“No, that’s just it. The kitten’s a little you, right down to the angry. So he named it after a small Church!”

Caboose ignored them both and ran his fingers down the little itty bitty kitten’s back and smiled at it as it purred at him. It really was so nice and sweet. Just like Church.

Church won’t talk to him anymore. Not because Church doesn’t like him, but because no one else believes in him anymore.

They keep saying mean things like ‘Caboose he got deleted,’ and 'Caboose he’s gone,’ and 'Caboose he isn’t coming back and he never liked you anyway.’ That last one was from Sarge of course, he was mean and never liked doing the kinds of things that Caboose liked doing, like talking to Church. But the worst part was that even Agent Washington, who was normally so really nice, kept saying the same mean things about Church, even in places where Church could hear it.

So Church had stopped talking. Stopped moving. Stopped caring about everyone else. He just stood there in the room they now shared these days, and didn’t say anything.

The only person he even listened to these days was Caboose. Caboose understood it, of course. He had been the one who had faith. He had been the one to build Church’s new body. He was the one who sat by it all night telling him all the memories and waiting for him to talk. Because Church was going to talk someday. To him. Soon. Because Church was his best friend, and wouldn’t let him down like that. He was just waiting for the right time. Waiting. Caboose could do that.