Powder Keg
Aug. 29th, 2011 09:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
indigo_angelsThe team are trapped and tempers are running high. It's at times like these that mistakes are made which may have a devastating long term impact...
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Powder keg: a metaphorical term drawn from a perception that certain territories may seem peaceful and dormant until another event triggers a large outburst of violence.
Afterwards Hannibal would blame the heat. He would blame the fact that they had been stuck in a motel in Monroe, Louisiana without air con or reprieve for six long days, every one of them tipping the temperature at over 104°F. He would blame Murdock and BA and the constant bitching at each other. He would even blame Face, saying that the kid was deliberately pushing his buttons. But in his head and his heart, he knew it was him, all him, his fault, his failing, his mess to sort.
They were hiding out. Nothing manly or brave or Rangerish about this plan. The military had been too close, their clients had sold them down the river so they had fled. Run as far as they could until they encountered road blocks and then turned and headed straight back into the heart of the city, exactly, Hannibal hoped, where the MPs would never think they would go, and gone to ground.
Face hadn’t liked the plan, not at all, and had had no qualms whatsoever about telling Hannibal that.
“We need to keep running!” he’d almost shouted back on that first day as BA manoeuvred their stolen station wagon through the streets. “Going back is suicide, boss! I don’t want to go back to prison!”
And that little plea, the fear that Hannibal could hear in the words was like a fork down a chalkboard to his nerves. He knew damn well that Face didn’t want to go back to prison, couldn’t cope with another six minutes of fighting men off his ass, never mind another six months, never mind another six years which was more likely what they were going to get. Hannibal knew this because he’d heard it, coaxed it from Face’s reluctant lips cocooned in their cosy nest of a bed, long ago now, somewhere cool and safe and not this damn oppressive stifling heat that even Face couldn’t stand. He didn’t need to hear it again now.
“Shut up, Face!” Hannibal snapped. “No one is going back to prison!”
And that kind of set the tone for the next week. Face threw himself down onto the backseat of the station wagon, arms folded and glared at the back of Hannibal’s head, missing Murdock’s frown and the way he nervously chewed on his fingers.
Eventually they had found this dingy, rundown motel and Hannibal had sent Face in to get one room, wanted to keep all the others hidden, wanted the fat, lazy, half drunk owner to think that there was just one man in his room. No tall grey haired guy. No huge Afro-Caribbean. No slightly wild looking, baseball cap wearing Texan. Just one, ordinary, fairly handsome, loner.
But six days in one room, temperature going through the roof, Face’s constant edginess and the other two arguing and sniping all the time... No. That was never going to work.
And then came the day that it all came to a head. Hannibal had hardly slept, it had been his turn for the floor, and it was as hot as the depths of hell all night. BA had been snoring, and just when Hannibal finally dropped off as the dawn light started to creep under the blinds, Face had a nightmare that woke him up again.
His usual vast reserves of sympathy for Face’s constant night terrors had run out days ago and he just reached out and kicked up at his fitfully sleeping lieutenant where he lay on the old, stained sofa next to the boss; one well aimed kick straight into his shoulder. Face jerked awake instantly, “What the fuck...?” he muttered bleary eyes focussing on Hannibal’s cold stare.
“Shut up with the shouting out, kid,” Hannibal muttered, turning on his side away from Face. “I’m trying to fucking sleep.”
There was only a stunned silence from Face, followed by the sofa creaking as he guessed the lieutenant turned away from him, burying his face in the back cushions. Fine, Hannibal thought maliciously, let him sulk, see if I care. And right at that minute with his limbs sticky in sweat and his eyes full of tired grit – he didn’t.
When they all eventually rose to the full heat of the day, Face was still silently resentful, glaring at Hannibal the whole time, sitting at the chair in the window, peering out at the parking lot occasionally as he had done every day since they’d holed up. Hannibal ignored him, he had enough on his plate refereeing between BA and Murdock who were aiming for the world record in constant verbal sniping.
“Yeah, well, you think I’m sharin’ a bed with you ever again, then you crazier than ever, fool!” BA paced away from Murdock who tried to snuggle up next to him on the sofa.
“You don’t mean that,” Murdock replied following him across the room. “You just worried that you’ll find my hot body too much for you an’ you’ll wake up with your big mudsucker paw in my shorts.”
BA shoved past him. He had no problem with Hannibal and Face doing whatever it was they did in the privacy of their own bedrooms, was perfectly aware that Murdock had brought back plenty of men and women to their respective safe houses and hotel rooms over the years, and that didn’t bother him either. But he still hated it, hated it when Murdock insinuated things like that about him.
“You pushin’ your luck, Crazy...” he muttered, shoving Murdock off him again.
“Murdock...” Hannibal warned through gritted teeth, but the captain wasn’t listening.
“Come on big guy!” he taunted, “Admit it! Admit that you find me hot, that you want me...” He batted his eyelashes in what he obviously thought was an appealing manner. “You know haven’t had a woman for weeks now...”
“Hannibal!” BA appealed just as Hannibal snapped out, “Murdock!”
Face, silent in the window, rubbed his temples slowly.
“What?” Murdock responded, eyes innocently wide.
Hannibal rose to his feet. “Right, you!” he barked, pointing at BA, “Take the car, fill it with gas and check out if those damn road blocks are gone yet.” This was a daily run out for one of them as they waited with baited breath for the MPs to decide that the team had slipped out past them. “And you!” his finger whirled around to Murdock, “Walk down to the store and pick up some provisions, we are short on everything. And keep your head down!”
BA snatched up the keys in a second, desperate to get away from Murdock, while Murdock himself seemed totally irrepressible, pouting at BA as he followed him through the door, “Shall I pick up some lube for tonight, BA, while I’m there?”
The door closed on BA’s angry response, and in few seconds the station wagon could be heard pulling away from the room in an attention grabbing squeal of tyres.
Hannibal let out a long sigh and sank down onto the sofa, realising too late that now he was alone to suffer the full brunt of Face’s mood. He felt the kid’s eyes on him and resolutely ignored him, not in the mood for one of his emotional outpourings just now.
Face, it seemed, had other ideas. “Tomorrow,” he said, voice flat and emotionless. “I’m getting out of here. Road block or no road block, I’m leaving.”
Hannibal’s eyes were on him in second. “No,” he answered brusquely, “you’re not.”
Face’s eyes were cool as he looked back across the room. “Yes,” his voice was still level, “I am. We should never have stayed in town, it was a stupid plan and I’ve had enough. I’m leaving.”
Silence fell in the stuffy room and Hannibal counted to ten slowly in his head before he replied. “Grow up, Face,” he snapped. “You are a soldier, not a child and you will follow orders.”
The glare from across the room was like a laser beam as Face adjusted his position, sitting up a little straighter than before to answer. “I’m not a soldier anymore,” he ground out, “and I have followed your orders all these years since because I believed in them. But this? This is stupid. You think just because I let you fuck me every once in a while, you get to own me?”
Hannibal was on his feet before Face had even finished his sentence. “You let me fuck you? Jesus, Face, you’ve always been arrogant, but this?”
And then Face rose as well, his hands in fists at his sides. “Arrogant? Hell, you’d know about that then wouldn’t you boss? Making us all sit around here in this shit hole like fucking sitting ducks just waiting to get picked up, just ‘cause you’re too damn arrogant to admit when you’ve made a mistake!”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you, lieutenant!” Hannibal’s eyes were now blazing in anger as he stalked across the room to stand in front of Face. “You need to get some respect!”
Drawing himself up to his full height, Face glared back. “Yeah? Well maybe you should try earning it, boss!”
Neither of them really had any warning about what happened next. Afterwards Hannibal would replay it over and over in his head, see if he could find that conscious decision he must have made, see if it would end differently if he thought hard enough, but he never found that order to himself and the ending was always depressingly the same.
Face never stood a chance, Hannibal’s fist moved like lightening, smashing into the side of the lieutenant’s head, knocking him into the window frame with a heavy thump. He was instantly stunned, staggering sideways with the force of the blow and not even getting the chance to bring his hands up to defend himself against the right hook to his jaw that Hannibal followed through with. It dropped him like a stone, crashing him backwards and knocking the lamp over, landing him on the floor on his ass. Hannibal could never understand why he didn’t leave it at that; he wasn’t usually a man who let his emotions rule, but the red mist had well and truly descended, six days of stress and tension bursting out of him with previously unheard of violence.
He dropped to his knees and grabbed Face by the front of his t-shirt, pulling him up out of the corner just so he could rabbit punch him in the mouth. Face’s hands belatedly found their coordination and wrapped tightly around the hand on his chest, just as he pulled a leg back and kicked Hannibal hard in the ribs.
“You little fucker!” Hannibal snarled, his breath taken by the kick, and he punched Face again, and again, and again, not registering when that leg stopped trying to kick him, not even noticing when Face’s scrabbling fingers slid limply from around his wrist. Afterwards he found himself wondering with a shudder what would have happened if they had been alone in that room for any longer, if Murdock hadn’t gone to the store without money, but the next thing he was aware of, the only thing that managed to permeate through the thick fog of fury, was another voice, desperate in the heat of the room.
“Hannibal! Hannibal! Get off him! Jesus Christ, boss! Get off him!”
And suddenly it was all gone. All that red, all that anger and Hannibal was looking around him, feeling Murdock trying to push him away, feeling, for the first time in days, the hint of a breeze coming in through the still open door. His ribs throbbed and his fists stung and then he looked down and suddenly he’d never known a pain like it.
Face was barely conscious, his head rolling on the wall as he tried to work out which way was up. One eye was swelling closed, there was blood coming from his mouth, his nose, the gaping cut across his cheek bone, a livid bruise already on the other cheek, his jaw, his temple. Hannibal dropped him as if he were red hot and leapt to his feet, staggering back across the room until he almost fell onto the sofa, eyes wide in shock, one hand clamped over his mouth.
Murdock dropped into his empty place in an instant, reaching for Face, pulling him back up, voice a soothing aural blur as he cradled the lieutenant to his chest.
For a second the room was held in an awful, horrific silence, and then Murdock spoke again, louder this time, Face still in his arms as he turned and glared at the boss, “You!” he spat in an awful parody of Hannibal from not ten minutes earlier, “Get me some water and towels and the first aid supplies, and then fuck off and find some ice from somewhere!”
Murdock had never spoken to Hannibal like that before, never spoken like that to anyone in Hannibal’s memory. But he did what he was told anyway, far, far too shocked and numb to do anything else.
And that was how BA found them fifteen minutes later. Face still on the floor, still hovering awkwardly between a conscious and unconscious state, Murdock surrounded by bloodied towels and melting ice, Hannibal, his knuckles swollen and his eyes wide, just hovering behind them in horrified silence.
The big guy stepped in and looked around, his eyes flicking from Face, to the furious set of Murdock’s mouth, to Hannibal, cradling a swollen fist in his other hand and he rubbed his forehead with his palm as if this was exactly what he had expected to find on his return.
He sighed and closed the door behind him, blocking out the hint of a breeze that had started up. He was fed up of this room, he was fed up of this city and fed up of the damn oppressive heat. But most of all, he was really fed up of them all being cooped up together like that. “Road’s clear,” he muttered, starting to collect discarded clothing off the floor and throw it into a bag, “Get packed up, we’re leaving.”
No one argued.
_____________________
Sequel - Kit Bag
______________________________________
Powder keg: a metaphorical term drawn from a perception that certain territories may seem peaceful and dormant until another event triggers a large outburst of violence.
Afterwards Hannibal would blame the heat. He would blame the fact that they had been stuck in a motel in Monroe, Louisiana without air con or reprieve for six long days, every one of them tipping the temperature at over 104°F. He would blame Murdock and BA and the constant bitching at each other. He would even blame Face, saying that the kid was deliberately pushing his buttons. But in his head and his heart, he knew it was him, all him, his fault, his failing, his mess to sort.
They were hiding out. Nothing manly or brave or Rangerish about this plan. The military had been too close, their clients had sold them down the river so they had fled. Run as far as they could until they encountered road blocks and then turned and headed straight back into the heart of the city, exactly, Hannibal hoped, where the MPs would never think they would go, and gone to ground.
Face hadn’t liked the plan, not at all, and had had no qualms whatsoever about telling Hannibal that.
“We need to keep running!” he’d almost shouted back on that first day as BA manoeuvred their stolen station wagon through the streets. “Going back is suicide, boss! I don’t want to go back to prison!”
And that little plea, the fear that Hannibal could hear in the words was like a fork down a chalkboard to his nerves. He knew damn well that Face didn’t want to go back to prison, couldn’t cope with another six minutes of fighting men off his ass, never mind another six months, never mind another six years which was more likely what they were going to get. Hannibal knew this because he’d heard it, coaxed it from Face’s reluctant lips cocooned in their cosy nest of a bed, long ago now, somewhere cool and safe and not this damn oppressive stifling heat that even Face couldn’t stand. He didn’t need to hear it again now.
“Shut up, Face!” Hannibal snapped. “No one is going back to prison!”
And that kind of set the tone for the next week. Face threw himself down onto the backseat of the station wagon, arms folded and glared at the back of Hannibal’s head, missing Murdock’s frown and the way he nervously chewed on his fingers.
Eventually they had found this dingy, rundown motel and Hannibal had sent Face in to get one room, wanted to keep all the others hidden, wanted the fat, lazy, half drunk owner to think that there was just one man in his room. No tall grey haired guy. No huge Afro-Caribbean. No slightly wild looking, baseball cap wearing Texan. Just one, ordinary, fairly handsome, loner.
But six days in one room, temperature going through the roof, Face’s constant edginess and the other two arguing and sniping all the time... No. That was never going to work.
And then came the day that it all came to a head. Hannibal had hardly slept, it had been his turn for the floor, and it was as hot as the depths of hell all night. BA had been snoring, and just when Hannibal finally dropped off as the dawn light started to creep under the blinds, Face had a nightmare that woke him up again.
His usual vast reserves of sympathy for Face’s constant night terrors had run out days ago and he just reached out and kicked up at his fitfully sleeping lieutenant where he lay on the old, stained sofa next to the boss; one well aimed kick straight into his shoulder. Face jerked awake instantly, “What the fuck...?” he muttered bleary eyes focussing on Hannibal’s cold stare.
“Shut up with the shouting out, kid,” Hannibal muttered, turning on his side away from Face. “I’m trying to fucking sleep.”
There was only a stunned silence from Face, followed by the sofa creaking as he guessed the lieutenant turned away from him, burying his face in the back cushions. Fine, Hannibal thought maliciously, let him sulk, see if I care. And right at that minute with his limbs sticky in sweat and his eyes full of tired grit – he didn’t.
When they all eventually rose to the full heat of the day, Face was still silently resentful, glaring at Hannibal the whole time, sitting at the chair in the window, peering out at the parking lot occasionally as he had done every day since they’d holed up. Hannibal ignored him, he had enough on his plate refereeing between BA and Murdock who were aiming for the world record in constant verbal sniping.
“Yeah, well, you think I’m sharin’ a bed with you ever again, then you crazier than ever, fool!” BA paced away from Murdock who tried to snuggle up next to him on the sofa.
“You don’t mean that,” Murdock replied following him across the room. “You just worried that you’ll find my hot body too much for you an’ you’ll wake up with your big mudsucker paw in my shorts.”
BA shoved past him. He had no problem with Hannibal and Face doing whatever it was they did in the privacy of their own bedrooms, was perfectly aware that Murdock had brought back plenty of men and women to their respective safe houses and hotel rooms over the years, and that didn’t bother him either. But he still hated it, hated it when Murdock insinuated things like that about him.
“You pushin’ your luck, Crazy...” he muttered, shoving Murdock off him again.
“Murdock...” Hannibal warned through gritted teeth, but the captain wasn’t listening.
“Come on big guy!” he taunted, “Admit it! Admit that you find me hot, that you want me...” He batted his eyelashes in what he obviously thought was an appealing manner. “You know haven’t had a woman for weeks now...”
“Hannibal!” BA appealed just as Hannibal snapped out, “Murdock!”
Face, silent in the window, rubbed his temples slowly.
“What?” Murdock responded, eyes innocently wide.
Hannibal rose to his feet. “Right, you!” he barked, pointing at BA, “Take the car, fill it with gas and check out if those damn road blocks are gone yet.” This was a daily run out for one of them as they waited with baited breath for the MPs to decide that the team had slipped out past them. “And you!” his finger whirled around to Murdock, “Walk down to the store and pick up some provisions, we are short on everything. And keep your head down!”
BA snatched up the keys in a second, desperate to get away from Murdock, while Murdock himself seemed totally irrepressible, pouting at BA as he followed him through the door, “Shall I pick up some lube for tonight, BA, while I’m there?”
The door closed on BA’s angry response, and in few seconds the station wagon could be heard pulling away from the room in an attention grabbing squeal of tyres.
Hannibal let out a long sigh and sank down onto the sofa, realising too late that now he was alone to suffer the full brunt of Face’s mood. He felt the kid’s eyes on him and resolutely ignored him, not in the mood for one of his emotional outpourings just now.
Face, it seemed, had other ideas. “Tomorrow,” he said, voice flat and emotionless. “I’m getting out of here. Road block or no road block, I’m leaving.”
Hannibal’s eyes were on him in second. “No,” he answered brusquely, “you’re not.”
Face’s eyes were cool as he looked back across the room. “Yes,” his voice was still level, “I am. We should never have stayed in town, it was a stupid plan and I’ve had enough. I’m leaving.”
Silence fell in the stuffy room and Hannibal counted to ten slowly in his head before he replied. “Grow up, Face,” he snapped. “You are a soldier, not a child and you will follow orders.”
The glare from across the room was like a laser beam as Face adjusted his position, sitting up a little straighter than before to answer. “I’m not a soldier anymore,” he ground out, “and I have followed your orders all these years since because I believed in them. But this? This is stupid. You think just because I let you fuck me every once in a while, you get to own me?”
Hannibal was on his feet before Face had even finished his sentence. “You let me fuck you? Jesus, Face, you’ve always been arrogant, but this?”
And then Face rose as well, his hands in fists at his sides. “Arrogant? Hell, you’d know about that then wouldn’t you boss? Making us all sit around here in this shit hole like fucking sitting ducks just waiting to get picked up, just ‘cause you’re too damn arrogant to admit when you’ve made a mistake!”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you, lieutenant!” Hannibal’s eyes were now blazing in anger as he stalked across the room to stand in front of Face. “You need to get some respect!”
Drawing himself up to his full height, Face glared back. “Yeah? Well maybe you should try earning it, boss!”
Neither of them really had any warning about what happened next. Afterwards Hannibal would replay it over and over in his head, see if he could find that conscious decision he must have made, see if it would end differently if he thought hard enough, but he never found that order to himself and the ending was always depressingly the same.
Face never stood a chance, Hannibal’s fist moved like lightening, smashing into the side of the lieutenant’s head, knocking him into the window frame with a heavy thump. He was instantly stunned, staggering sideways with the force of the blow and not even getting the chance to bring his hands up to defend himself against the right hook to his jaw that Hannibal followed through with. It dropped him like a stone, crashing him backwards and knocking the lamp over, landing him on the floor on his ass. Hannibal could never understand why he didn’t leave it at that; he wasn’t usually a man who let his emotions rule, but the red mist had well and truly descended, six days of stress and tension bursting out of him with previously unheard of violence.
He dropped to his knees and grabbed Face by the front of his t-shirt, pulling him up out of the corner just so he could rabbit punch him in the mouth. Face’s hands belatedly found their coordination and wrapped tightly around the hand on his chest, just as he pulled a leg back and kicked Hannibal hard in the ribs.
“You little fucker!” Hannibal snarled, his breath taken by the kick, and he punched Face again, and again, and again, not registering when that leg stopped trying to kick him, not even noticing when Face’s scrabbling fingers slid limply from around his wrist. Afterwards he found himself wondering with a shudder what would have happened if they had been alone in that room for any longer, if Murdock hadn’t gone to the store without money, but the next thing he was aware of, the only thing that managed to permeate through the thick fog of fury, was another voice, desperate in the heat of the room.
“Hannibal! Hannibal! Get off him! Jesus Christ, boss! Get off him!”
And suddenly it was all gone. All that red, all that anger and Hannibal was looking around him, feeling Murdock trying to push him away, feeling, for the first time in days, the hint of a breeze coming in through the still open door. His ribs throbbed and his fists stung and then he looked down and suddenly he’d never known a pain like it.
Face was barely conscious, his head rolling on the wall as he tried to work out which way was up. One eye was swelling closed, there was blood coming from his mouth, his nose, the gaping cut across his cheek bone, a livid bruise already on the other cheek, his jaw, his temple. Hannibal dropped him as if he were red hot and leapt to his feet, staggering back across the room until he almost fell onto the sofa, eyes wide in shock, one hand clamped over his mouth.
Murdock dropped into his empty place in an instant, reaching for Face, pulling him back up, voice a soothing aural blur as he cradled the lieutenant to his chest.
For a second the room was held in an awful, horrific silence, and then Murdock spoke again, louder this time, Face still in his arms as he turned and glared at the boss, “You!” he spat in an awful parody of Hannibal from not ten minutes earlier, “Get me some water and towels and the first aid supplies, and then fuck off and find some ice from somewhere!”
Murdock had never spoken to Hannibal like that before, never spoken like that to anyone in Hannibal’s memory. But he did what he was told anyway, far, far too shocked and numb to do anything else.
And that was how BA found them fifteen minutes later. Face still on the floor, still hovering awkwardly between a conscious and unconscious state, Murdock surrounded by bloodied towels and melting ice, Hannibal, his knuckles swollen and his eyes wide, just hovering behind them in horrified silence.
The big guy stepped in and looked around, his eyes flicking from Face, to the furious set of Murdock’s mouth, to Hannibal, cradling a swollen fist in his other hand and he rubbed his forehead with his palm as if this was exactly what he had expected to find on his return.
He sighed and closed the door behind him, blocking out the hint of a breeze that had started up. He was fed up of this room, he was fed up of this city and fed up of the damn oppressive heat. But most of all, he was really fed up of them all being cooped up together like that. “Road’s clear,” he muttered, starting to collect discarded clothing off the floor and throw it into a bag, “Get packed up, we’re leaving.”
No one argued.
_____________________
Sequel - Kit Bag
