Secret
A Generation Kill fanfiction.
Summary: FYI Nate is a photojournalist attached to Brad's team.
This is part of ten days challenge that IDK even HOW was born during group messaging session with
a1y_puff and
nherizu earlier today. First day's prompt is secret.
Marines awaken in their holes to find the rain had worn itself out overnight, leaving behind a slightly overcast morning. The din of men mounting their sleeping bags and e-tools back to the Humvees filled the air.
Nate watched Team Two from afar, five men and an open top Humvee, no more than shillouettes limned by orange against the backdrop of rising sun. It was a slightly disconcerting view, like watching a scene from a movie where they were the last men to walk on earth. Five men dwarfed by vast, unforgiving desert. The endless sky promised yet another scorching, hot day.
He clicked the camera shutter twice.
"Out of the freezer and into the frying pan," Corporal Person observed at Nate's nine.
Nate let a smile tugged his lips. He lowered his camera and moved his eyes to meet Sgt. Colbert's at his one.
Nate raised his camera again, looking, now, at Colbert through his viewfinder. His blue eyes was stark, ringed by the hollow of those sunken eyelids. Nate pressed the shutter. The image would come out like one of those that made the cover of National Geographic, beautiful eyes amid the chaos of war. Except, maybe he would keep this one.
"How many of those will you take?" Colbert said. The sand had turned all their hair indeterminate gray, leeching out Nate's bronze and darkening Colbert's blond until they might all be emaciated, soot-faced, dark-mopped siblings.
Nate licked his lips, chapped by last night's bone-chilling wind. "As many as I want, Sergeant," he said.
It might be only Nate's imagination, but he could have sworn he saw Colbert's dark pupils dilate even from this distance. Nate's heart rate picked up.
Those eyes, he knew, would look almost black under the cover of the night; the sweep of blond lashes soft as Colbert blinked, kissing Nate slowly, savoring.
"Get a room you two," Person told them.
"I believe, Corporal Person, that you need to get your ass moving," Colbert said.
"Dude, sorry if I don't wet my panty at the prospect of marinating my ass in that tin can. I think I sweat so much I can fuck a Marine without lube any day."
"That's fucking disgusting," Lance Corporal Trombley threw from somewhere behind them.
Nate held Colbert's gaze even as the exchange of words occurred. When Colbert raised his brows, Nate shrugged, breaking eye contact as he spotted something moving in the distance.
Nate saw Gunnery Sgt. Wynn stepping out from the tangle of shadows forming the Team Two. The Gunny was walking determinately towards their direction.
"We're clearing through a town on our way north. The battalion is looking for a way around that town up ahead, so we can link up with RCT-1 on the other side," Wynn drawled as he unfurled a map on the hood of the Humvee and pointed to a small circle drawn on the map.
"Copy that, Gunny. Is there any intel on hostiles we might encounter in the town?" Colbert asked. He'd come to stand beside Wynn. His stance was relaxed, but Nate could hear something had changed in his voice.
"Nope. Satellite image showed nothing, but expect the worst," Wynn replied.
"Solid copy," Brad nodded.