Post by do on Aug 9, 2009 23:40:09 GMT -5
NX-01 Enterprise
Hayes' Office
Stardate 30.09.2165
Years into months; months into days. Days into hours and hours into minutes. Five left, to be precise.
Like an atomic clock, Major Sloane McRae was on time and letting her into his office, Gabriel was more than anxious and full of pent up energy. He was unsure how she would react to what he had to say, but say it he must. There was a cool, clear truth that had to be spoken, for the urging beast within demanded to be let free. She didn't know about his Governorship and normally he would tell her the news, however there were bigger events to plan.
A great fear was in Gabriel that Sloane had been seeing that younger man and he knew damn well that he practically sent her down there. Would she want him, injured and sent away like so many ‘old had beens' before him? Two months ago nothing could stop Colonel Hayes, yet these past weeks he looked at himself in the mirror and didn't recognize who blinked back.
Both arms at his side, for Gabriel needed to have his uniform free and covering his cast, he had dressed in a more formal wear, but not full on dress. No sling to confine him, his fatigues were accompanied by the jacket zipped halfway up, exposing the dark, black T-shirt underneath. He actually had a debate if he should put on the maroon or black and knew that he needed to get a grip. Gabriel had not been himself for quite some time.
Glad to see her, Gabriel smiled and contained his nerves for internal use only. It would not do to appear unglued no matter how nervous he might be before his Major. The last time he went to ask a woman to marry him was twenty years ago and he never got to the question part of the conversation. At least Sloane wasn't sleeping with his best friend, but he did fear that his best friend was sleeping with somebody. A Damn Good somebody that Hayes loathed.
The cocky nature that the Colonel carried with him was present but said layer was ice thin. He shut the door behind her, once she entered his office and was resolved that there was no time like the present. Wasn't that what he was saying all along? "Thank you for coming to meet me." His cool voice began. There was no better way for him to do this, so, being very Gabriel, he ploughed through the field that was made for flowers, not grain. "Did you have fun planet side?"
'Very formal', Sloane thought, and wondered why. When did Hayes ever have to thank an officer for following orders? Or her for that matter? But since she figured this meeting had to do with the business surrounding Marke and Kazan's deaths and the deep hole Kemper had dug for himself, some formality was indicated.
"No problem, boss," she said, tone light though her eyes might have looked at him a bit funny, given his next question. Even used to his own brand of humour, she couldn't quite see what kind of fun he expected her to have planet-side given the state of the colony unless... unless he was chipping at something else. She suddenly felt like she had that day when she had had to face him in this very office, wondering if the now memorable pool game at Beasts would be seen as totally out of line by her superior officer. She took a seat as well as a deep breath. No, nobody had mouthed her and Rickman out to him yet. Couldn't have.
She didn't answer and Gabriel felt red flags go up in alert. "Did you have fun planet side?" His voice sounded more tensed, because if he was going to do this, he needed to know.
"Fun, Colonel?" Sloane asked incredulously as it didn't appear to be a joke after all. "Picking the place up and finding bodies ain't my idea of fun..." she started about to ask him if it was his. Not to mention the last few days chasing after Marke's ghost and wondering what had the corporal really been about. She had fooled everyone if what little they held presently had any credence and it made Sloane sick to her stomach. Yes, Kemper could be and was an ass at the best of times, but really who here was to blame for not spotting her game? Who here was really wearing Kazan's blood? Sloane felt that sticky mess on her uniform and on her hands.
"Right. Of course," he had to figure this out because he wasn't thinking straight. "That's not quite what I meant, McRae." Taking a deep breath, he tried it again. "On your off time." He sat across from her, thinking that this was the only way. "When you weren't swearing at things or fixing others, what did you do?"
Oh. What the hell was he getting at? It wasn't like she was coming back from a holiday. What was he fishing for? Sloane couldn't help wonder and was getting increasingly uncomfortable about his line of questioning. She tried to remind herself this was Gabe sitting in front of her. Her friend. But that was just it; Hayes did not normally just chitchat about fishing trips or a game of ... right. Pool. Bastard. If he knew something he best come straight out with it because Sloane wasn't about to play his little game. Riled up good now, her mind wasn't even on the consequences of being found out and she tightly replied, "Tried to catch up on sleep, sir."
He stared at her, sighed a bit, and leaned back in the chair. Looking at Sloane, trying to read her face was impossible for she was as practiced as a cold, hardened gambler in Vegas. "Did you miss me at all, Sloane? Down there?" It was a different approach, but one he'd swallow his pride and ask.
"Yes," she replied quickly, not needing to think on that. She had already told him the previous week, hadn't she? Then again, maybe she had thought to and hadn't. Lack of sleep was playing with her head a bit in recent weeks but still... this... this had to be another Weird Hayes Moment to classify with the last. "Of course."
That was what he was looking for and as opportunity knocked, the man who had been waiting answered. Coming around the table to Sloane, his ass off his chair as he all but kneeled before her, Gabriel took her hand and spouted the words without thinking. "I want you to stay. With me. Don't go back there."
It wasn't quite what he practiced in his head, but it was down the right path.
Surprised but amused, guessing that the MACO crew aboard Enterprise had been giving him a hard time or that Gabe had reached a certain level of boredom running things on his own up here, Sloane chuckled. "O-kay?" she replied questioningly, still taken aback by such a show coming from the colonel and not quite sure of the answer he was looking for.
This was, by far, the single bravest step he ever took in his life. His voice kind, happy, he told her, "I want you to marry me, Sloane. I want us to be together. Have kids. A boy and a girl. Two girls. Whatever you want."
Almost a gasp, he realized it was out there now. Did he actually finally say it? Yes, he did. Sloane was here and Gabriel was able to do what he had wanted to do for over eight years. It felt like such a relief and the man smiled as he looked at her. They could be as happy as he felt in this moment. Forever. As long as she did not say no.
Whoa, back up! Back up! Hell, sister, did you ever guess that one wrong, Sloane's mind made itself known.
Gabe? Sloane's jaw dropped while she looked at him like he had grown a second head. First a weird ass third degree about her down time and now this? A bunch of thoughts and explanations jumbled in her head, fighting to stick. She was dreaming. One of those crazy dreams she used to have years ago. Or Hayes had been shot up with a Phlox cocktail or, better yet, he had met some more Vulcans. Her eyes narrowed as she took a shallow breath. Or he was having a go at her. He knew what was going on with Rickman and was now, in his own weird way, playing with her, teasing her about it. Well, he wasn't at all that funny...
As she stared at him, she realised there wasn't a sign of mirth there on his face or in his eyes, or even a sign of a nasty prank. He looked... well, he looked sincere and... hell, relieved, she guessed. Sloane glanced down at her uniform, her free hand pinching her thigh.
Eyes back on him, she swallowed the saliva she didn't have, her throat gone dry for some reason. All she could think about was that he knew about Rickman. He did and he was fucking around, messing with her head. Had to be. Why else would he say those things? "You..." She cocked her head to the side. "You're joking, right?"
Gabriel looked at her and sputtered out, "No." Why would she think he was making a joke out of this? He took both of her hands in his, moving forward so there was little room between them. With conviction he spoke strong, "No, Sloane. I'm serious. Dead serious." His eyes went back and forth between hers and he said it again, "I want you to marry me."
It was like he was speaking to her in a different language, one she didn't know. Bolted to the chair, Sloane could only look at him with a deep frown, waiting for a translation.
"Sloane?" He spoke her name, looking at her. "Say something?" The silence was not the warm reception he wished for.
Nor was that look in her eye.
He meant it? The bastard meant it? It felt like the coldest shower Sloane had ever had or... or waking up with the worst hangover. Sloane wasn't sure which. Hell, she couldn't even tell which way was up.
From nothing between them to a sort of unspoken acknowledgement some years later - one which Sloane had come to believe she had dreamed up - to nothing once more, and then to some bizarre drug-induced confession to nothing again to... what? Jealousy? Checking the waters? To *this*... a, hell, yeah, this was a marriage proposal, wasn't it, she realised suddenly. Now? After all this time?
Still looking at him like she couldn't believe what she was hearing, Sloane went from flabbergasted to a fiery anger in a flash and pulled her hands free. He really meant it.
"Why the fuck did you wait so long?" she let out, unchecked. Her hard stare was almost accusatory. "You really mean this? Now?" Her tone was pained. Hurt.
Gabriel blinked, not expecting her to react that way but in all honesty, the man wasn't sure what to expect. Anything but pure, raw anger would have been at the top of his list. "But...Sloane?" He began, trying to get her to calm down from her swearing attack.
“You took your sweet time," she growled, seeing key moments between them flash in her mind like some sick, demented joke. "Seven years. I've wasted the last seven years of my life."
"How did you waste the last seven years? I don't recall you saying a word either..." For now, the man's words were innocent and he lifted both hands as if to keep her from striking out. Fear, instead, took its place.
Gabriel might have a point there but Sloane was in no state to hear or recognise it. Her thoughts, as they formed, just carried on pouring out. "When I finally meet another man who makes me feel alive - as you did," her index nearly went to dig in his chest for emphasis, "you spring this on me? Go to hell!"
"Sloane!" Gabriel found his voice; the nerves in his body heightening to a level of survival and in those situations, the Colonel protected himself. "Goddammit, look at me! I'm not the world's smartest man... but I thought you knew. How in the hell could you not have known?" He didn't want to curse at her, but she had racked him already and drew first blood.
"How could I not know? Are you for real? You never say anything. You barely let your guard down and when you do, it's coloured by humour. You turn everything into this deadpan joke style of yours. I never said anything 'cause I never sensed anything..." Well, there had been that tacit understanding once, the barest of nod to what might have been, but that was in sickbay, after Jides had played a nasty number on her. Sloane had never been sure after that if she hadn't been seeing things... things she had wanted to see but that hadn't been really there.
"Hell, Gabe, you're my direct superior. You know how much of a tight ass you can be about the regs! What if it hadn't been reciprocated? What if then?"
The beating continued and Gabriel looked at Sloane wishing to God in Heaven that he would have done as she berated and brought this up years ago. Hell. Not even years. Months. He could have gotten to her months before that little bastard Gunny and then nothing would have happened between those two. She would have been his but now, now. It was becoming more and more clear on what side of the line he stood and his fears swirled with anger thinking on whom she slept with.
A shake of his head, for Gabriel was reliving an age-old nightmare, he thought of Marli and how hearing that he missed Sloane by mere months, of his own doing, was killing him. After his fiancée slept with his best friend, there was so much pain Gabriel erected a wall of anger and hate so he'd never become hurt again. Never.
Yet, here he was now. Allowing this.
Angry, more at himself, but that hardly mattered now, Hayes lashed out at the one person who dared to take down his wall and make him care. Shifting blame, for it didn't seem to hurt as bad when he was screaming, Gabriel snarled, "I thought you always knew. Goddammit it, Sloane!" He reached over to slam on the table with his right hand; nerves shocking to life under the cast, the Colonel realized he could not fix this. There was no way to reverse her words nor was she even remotely interested in seeing him that way, much less his stupid marriage proposal. God help him, he was going to lose it.
"This is not happening to me again. It's not!" Taking in deep breaths, Gabriel forced his mind to calm but when it did not obey, he stood up to his full height and willed his breathing to be tight and constrained. The dry, stoic look he attempted to give had nothing behind it but a look of injury and betrayal. "No. It's not." Colonel Hayes was a man known for tactics and now his grey matter roared to life in order to come off these ground victorious. He did not need to accept defeat. His voice was low and dangerous as his plan unfolded, "Why? Why do we walk around here carefully hiding our casual airs with one another, making sure no one hears us say our first names, if you sensed nothing from me? Why? Why is it you see me away when I go off world? Or I look for you when I return? Or when one of us is in Sickbay, we sit loyal at the other's side, hoping no one will notice. Am I alone in that feeling? Am I such a suborn prick that you are going to stand there and tell me there is nothing?! Nothing?!"
Sloane's shoulders sagged as her gaze remained riveted on his. Breathing heavily, she struggled with what to say next... how to explain... "All this..." she said, showing the room with them both in it, "is because we're friends, Gabe. Been through thick and thin, you watch my back... I watch yours. I thought it was because you cared. Hell, I do it because I care. I hate it when you leave without me and I'm damned pleased when you come back in one piece." She ran a hand across her face. Yes, there had been a time when there had been more, when more passionate feelings had fuelled that behaviour, but for Sloane, those had been weeded out.
"I do care..." He felt like he was going to split open from anger or shame. Either emotion was up for grabs.
"Why we hide it behind closed doors?" she continued. "Well, 'cause it's frowned upon. Whether or not there's truth behind all that MacHayes bullshit, we still need to keep up the charade. You know this."
"Friends...?" He was stumped. "Just friends...." Sloane said the one thing that took all the wind from his sails and he looked almost defeated. Almost. "I know that I am extra careful around the men and crew because... " How could he say he loved her after all this practice only to face an unavoidable, permanent obstacle? "Because. Well hell! Now you *know* 'why because'!" With little warning, he moved over to her swiftly, a hair short of getting in her face. Gabriel was not giving in. Could not. There might still be a chance. "Do not do this to me, Sloane. Do not shut me out. Tell me there's nothing between us. I want you to look me in the eye and tell me that the men all came up with 'MacHayes' because there is absolutely NOTHING between us!"
Do not shut me out... That man! "Do not shut you out? You're the one shutting out everyone else. Fuck," she cursed, standing up and taking a couple of steps back. "I know more about Chef's private life than I do yours..."
Unsure how to respond, the Colonel said nothing and took her verbal slaughtering.
That hurt. That was partly what had decided her to let go back then... let go of these stupid, ridiculous dreams she'd had of leaving the MACO and settle down to play damn colonists with the rest of humanity. She laughed deridingly at herself. It wasn't the whole reason for burying that idea and her feelings, but it was a big part of it. "And I've only maybe met him twenty times in the last eight to nine years. You don't talk, Gabe," she said, her voice a lot lower now. She didn't know much about him. Not really. After all these years, she trusted him and cared for him - even had convinced herself she loved him once upon a time - but she didn't really know about him. His past, his childhood... Just little bits here and there, what he decided to let her see or know about him.
He felt the truthful sting in her words, as they were the exact demons he had been slaying these past weeks since those awakening eight letters came to him. "I never said I was a smart man, Sloane...." She was right in many ways, for he had done this to himself before. Gabriel only knew shame and glanced to the far wall on his right before looking back at her. Calming down a bit, he could feel his fingers throbbing. Despite this no-win battle, he dared to press on. "I had a wife once." There was no power in his voice, attempting to make her understand and if she knew him at all, she'd know he was putting himself out on a limb. "No. Not a wife. She was supposed to be my wife." Gabriel knew why he had to tell her this, and it was killing the Colonel inside. Not giving Marli a name, for there was no point in that, Hayes continued, "It didn't work out. She betrayed me. I probably deserved it, as I'm deserving this from you right now." Fuck this. He couldn't stop and despite all the warning signs and flags to protect himself, Gabriel could not let her go and shut up. The more he thought on it, the more he felt inclined to tell McRae. She had to know. If she was going to walk away from him, she had to at least know. "So, I didn't trust anyone. Fuck everyone, including myself. I didn't care for myself anymore, Sloane. And I trusted no one."
Very uncomfortable, he glanced at her, his eyes did a sweep over her head and then looked back at her. He owed her that much and continued with those choppy sentences. "For the past nine years we've worked together. At first, it was nothing to me. Another Captain. An Airforce brat turned into another MACO. But." He felt sick. "You. You're funny. Good. Professional. You understand me. A few years later... it wasn't... I guess. What I'm. Trying. To say...." Gabriel's body had taken an almost 'at attention' stance, as if he were the subordinate. "I trust you, Sloane. Real trust. I don't. Put that type of trust.” This was so hard to admit to another individual. “In any goddamn person on this ship. I haven't allowed it of anyone since my wife. No. Not my wife. Never mind." He dared to look at her again. "I trust you."
Sloane was frozen in place. His pain was so palpable, so raw. "I'm sorry," she finally said in a whisper when her throat let some air through. "I'm sorry for what your fiancée did to you." He trusted her. She might not have fathomed how deep his trust in her was nor how hard it had been for him to give it, but she already knew that he trusted her. Just like she did him. This was no real revelation. He trusted her, *really* trusted her, yet in all those years he had said nothing of his feelings for her. Why was that? Because one woman had betrayed him? Sloane wasn't that woman and Gabriel knew this since he claimed to have learned to trust again... to have put his trust in her. This was confusing. She wasn't sure what it was he was trying to convey to her.
She turned away suddenly and walked toward the window. She watched the stars slowly stream past as the NX-01 followed the geostationary orbit of Gaia below and reran in her head what he had just told her. After a moment, her emotions more controlled, she said, "Why do you say you deserve this from me? You're implying that I betrayed you? Like your wife to be did?" Her tone was flat and not accusatory. If she was hurt, nothing in her face nor eyes showed it. It was as if she was clarifying points on a despatch manifest.
Gabriel shook his head at her words the minute she suggested them. "No." He defended in soft voice, having to work to keep his jealous anger in check and not heighten matters worse once more. "I deserve this..." Dammit. Gabriel knew the reason. "Because. I let it go on so long... Didn't learn right the first time..." She looked like none of this even affected her, other than being annoyed. Taking a risk, for he'd gone this far, the foolish wolf sealed the death or deal. "And never said a word. At least, not when you were fully awake and could really hear me."
It was a risk the same as any other and Gabriel was at the fork in the road to either having it work or paying the price. His soul could not cash any check written by the collector if he had to pay and he held his breath as he began to offer silent prayer to the powers that were above.
Not much in life scared or alarmed the Colonel, and he could only recall a handful of times that he actually feared what the next sixty seconds might bring. Sloane McRae had in one way or another been involved in nearly all of those times.
She turned to him at that, her eyes narrowing on his. The weight of her stare must have equated a ton of bricks. The facade of indifference had fallen but there was no compassion in her features. She was protecting herself. She had been burnt once by his silence. Not again.
"... when I was fully awake? Gabriel, for god's sake stop talking in riddles! What is it?" Fuck, she was pretty sure she knew but she wanted to hear him say it. Needed him to. Some perverse need... Christ. She lifted her hand before he could utter a word. Maybe she should say it. Tell it like it was. Could she hurt him with the truth, the whole truth? Should she? He said he deserved it, that he hadn't heeded the lesson his fiancée should have taught him. Should she be the cold-hearted bitch everyone save one person thought her to be - expected her to be and show him the extent of what he had let happen again? Should she pour salt freely in his wound? She sagged against the windowpane. Hurt and frustrated as she was... angry with him... she couldn't find it in her to purposefully, out of spite, deliver the final blow.
The wolf tensed, the words about to be exposed but she lifted her hand to stop him. Biting his tongue, Gabriel Hayes took a step forward, lowering his head slightly to keep an even gaze with her as he approached. "You want me to say it, or don't you?" Instinct warning him, he gestured to her with his chin.
She nearly snorted in his face but bit down on it. Her eyes held his gaze, unwavering. "It seems to me it's not what I want but what you want." You want to say, say it, she thought.
"That's not what we're talking about here." Cornered and trapped, he had nowhere else to go to back out. "Here I thought the important part was the talking about it." He waited for her to throw that back in his face too.
Would he ever stop these incessant games? "Yes, talking about *it*..." She sighed. What is *it*, Gabriel? What do you want to tell me? What do you want from me? But these questions never left her lips. She shook her head lightly, as if in disbelief of what she was about to do.
"I was in love with you, Gabriel." Her breath hitched, the only sign of the raging emotions within her. "I was in love with you and I bottled it up, buried it. That's what you want to talk about?"
Love.
Past tense.
As in: Not anymore.
He picked up on that phrase right away, along with her building anger that could match his own; it was rather obvious that both amounts of their animosity were directed at the same person: Him. Hayes was not sure how to even reply, for her admitting this to him was not phrased in a positive manner. She'd taken to calling him by his full name repeatedly now, which also did not equate to a good sign. There were no games being played on his part, just one man's struggle to survive these foreign lands. Trying to find her. "Yes." His whole body felt light. "Us." He did not leave her question unanswered, "I. Was. In love. With you too. Sloane." He'd come this far, what was one more step? "I still am."
'Damn good' and 'was in love' were his enemies from this day forward. Foes that all his years of military training could never have prepared him for, and Gabriel had a bad feeling that there were more words to join in their ranks.
Her chest heaved, her tenuous hold on her body breaking. Looking away, her mouth quivered before her face contorted in a grimace of pain. No, he hadn't been. He had NOT. Her hands clenching into fists, she let her nails bite in the heels of her palm, breaking the skin. This little physical and insignificant sting anchoring her in the sea of pain she was drowning in. She blinked away the tears that burnt her eyes. She wouldn't cry for him. She had promised herself that. Fuck, fuck, fuck. All the emotions she had carefully stored away in a dark place alongside other feelings of loss, betrayal and defeat came pouring out and she was powerless to stop them.
She couldn't feel where she was or her body strung up tight. All she was aware of was him near her and that white-hot poker he was jamming in her heart. She had waited so long to hear those words, so long. She hadn't cared for them when the spark was ignited, but had come to yearn for them when the flame was at its brightest. Denied that, the fire had faded. She had made sure of it. If not a lover to him, his loyal friend she would be and remain.
How young and stupid she had been.
It was a surprise when she felt the cold deck plating beneath her ass. Her legs having given up their support, she had slid down the wall to the ground.
Floored.
"Sloane?" Gabriel approached slow as he was very cautious with her now. He crouched down next to her, a gentle reach to lay his hand on her shoulder. The face of her commander was nowhere to be found, for his senses were on alert and Hayes treaded respectfully on light ground.
Dead eyes looked up at him. "How long?" Her voice was strained, scratchy.
He did not finish the touch, for her look mirrored the warning and he did not make the soft contact with her shoulder that he wished. "Over five years." It sounded pretty bad, even to him and Gabe had to swallow for his throat was going dry. If he said the truth, over eight, she would walk out that front door, he was for certain. "You?"
She snorted and chuckled deridingly, pushing her hands to her eyes to wipe the tears that hung there. She paused, noting the blood and dropped her hands in her lap. "Seven... yeah, about that now."
Making her cry had to be the worst thing Gabriel had done in a long time. Almost in a submissive manner, the man sat with his legs crossed under him, leaning forward to gently stroke her hair. Something he'd wanted to do for almost a decade when she was awake. A downward glance, and thick voice was concerned, "You're bleeding."
She didn't shy away from his touch but she clenched her hands closed to hide what she'd done to herself. She glanced down before holding his gaze once more. "We're a pair of idiots... of losers, you know that, don't you?" She appeared calm now, deflated. Looking over his shoulder, she added, "I was waiting for a sign... something... and you were... well, you were," zeroing back on him, "what were you waiting for, Gabe?"
Fresh tears threatened to spill and she let her head fall back, a dull thud against the metal of the bulkhead her reward. She took a shuddering breath, trying to clear this tightness in her chest. God, it hurt. It burnt and it choked her. All this time wasted. All the walls she had erected to protect herself. What good were they now?
"I. I don't know, Sloane." Gabriel rested his hand near her neck and lowered his head, so it fell beneath his own shoulder line, where it hung in limbo. "You said. You're weren't in a position to express yourself. To me." Oh God this hurt. "Because I'm your superior?" Slow, Hayes lifted his chin to look at her. "What about. As your superior. I was in no position to put myself. Upon you?" This truth had to bring her back to him. Everything for his future resided in the side wings if she couldn't understand or refused to. "If you didn't care. For me. At all. You might have felt obligated or pressured."
She glanced at him then looked away again. He spoke the truth. She knew that. She had turned their situation in her head every which way for so many years; she would be lying if this wasn't an excuse she had given him before for not showing her anything. Not an excuse: a reason. And a valid one. Not for the first time she wondered what would have happened if she had taken the risk. Hell, she had even contemplated leaving the service altogether. "I know," she finally said.
Saddened by her inability to look at him, Gabriel's gaze once more looked to the floor. She had such hatred for him, it seemed, "So now what?" Once he fell into a safer place for talking, it would seem the reserved Colonel disappeared. All he could do was not give up. "You said... you said you loved me once. I said I loved you once." No money left to gamble, Gabriel exposed his soul. "I still do." There was still a rather large gap to be filled in by Sloane, and she might tag him again and say 'only friends'.
Her eyes moved on him once more, his hazel eyes, the ones she had found filled with mirth and mischief on so many occasions, were downcast and hidden to her. But she could see his features, looking tired and drawn. He definitely didn't look any better right now than she felt. So what now? That was a loaded question. She didn't really know herself. She knew what she had felt for him once and she had mercilessly stamped on that feeling for so long she wasn't sure what was left.
"I loved you once, Gabe. I was in love, probably a childish, wistful dream, but I was in love..." She swallowed hard, her throat tight. "I let you go. For the job, out of fear of losing you, your friendship... I let you go."
His throat tightened, along with his chest, and he demanded, "What exactly does that mean?" He knew what it meant, yet there was no way he could accept it. Gabriel would not lose out to the Gunny. He could not lose when he needed this so bad in order to feel alive. He was not ready to hang his hat on a desk and call it a day. Sloane had to want him again.
Part of him wasn't hearing this and part of him was fighting a hard battle to remain calm. Getting upset or worse, yelling, would not help him in his cause. He lifted his hand to touch her with the gentlest gesture he could. "Are you telling me there is no chance of finding that... those... feelings?"
Her gaze met his inquiring one. Of all the ways she had seen - dreamed of - them both to finally have this out in the open, this wasn't it. Of all the scenarios she had constructed, this one she had missed. Her hand reached for his resting on her shoulder and her fingers clenched around it, moving it to her cheek, she hesitated a split second before pressing her skin to his, closing her eyes briefly. She had wanted him to touch her for so long, not as a friend but as a lover. She clamped down hard on the need to go to him, to find refuge in his arms. A shuddering breath left her. "I don't know, Gabe... and it's not that simple anymore." No, it wasn't.
Nine long years. There was a definite feeling of loss and fleeting from one unstable ground to another. Sloane cared for him, but then dismissed that love. Sitting before her, giving her near everything he had, and there was barely a hint of recognition or hope. Even as she touched him, he could tell it was with great uncertainty. Or perhaps it was that repulsion of anger from the beginning of the conversation; where at each and every turn, she put all the blame on Hayes. Bad, he wanted to hold her, kiss her or both, but instead her words kept him at bay. Touching her cheek would have to do for these past twenty minutes were nothing but a living hell as they both ripped one another apart in their own way. The wolf wanted to curl around her protectively, nuzzle her side and whimper for forgiveness. Why couldn't he tell her this? How could he sit here and assume she knew after what she said?
Instead Gabriel remained as he was, trying to give her space or room, for if he opened his mouth, an argument would soon follow. So many thoughts flooded through his mind, but Hayes knew the mention and questioning of the 'damn good' chance another got would not earn him ground against his enemy.
The fact that his enemy was mostly him was also not lost on the Colonel. Gently, his fingers stroked the side of her cheek. Very slow and very careful. The will to have them wander put into check.
Contemplative, she slowly pulled his hand away from her face and pressed the flat of her other hand against his, palm to palm... like she had done on the few occasions he was injured and she had found herself at his bedside, worried sick. Such big hands. Strong hands. Good hands. Her smaller one lost in his shifted and she dropped her head to deposit a soft kiss on the back of his hand. Oh, Gabe. She closed her eyes again, nuzzling his fingers briefly before pulling back.
"Why now?" Sloane asked, breaking the heavy silence. "You said you couldn't let me know before... what's changed now?" She studied his face, waiting for an explanation, as she knew damn well nothing in their situation had changed in that respect. Why did he no longer feel it inappropriate to 'put himself upon her'?
She had his entire attention, watching Sloane touch and kiss him. It didn't last long, and again, those warning flags kept him rather stoic still. What the hell was he supposed to do if she came near him, only in the last moment to pull away? Her question did not ease his nature either, for he would not give hint to his research on this Gunny Sergeant. Gabriel would not deny that it may have taken the jealousy of another man to push him to this, but it was Sloane's actions, not some wild ride in the sack with Rickman, (IF there was a wild ride as Gabriel's imagination flew), that reduced him to this.
'He was good, Gabe. He was Damn Good.' Like a plague, those words.
"Does it matter, Sloane?" He had all but laid down every last card, yet she was keeping her hand close to her chest with the sternest of poker faces. The Colonel recognized the strategic moves and on purpose, played into them. Otherwise, there was no way for hope in winning this war.
"Yes. Yes, it does." How could he even ask?
She was killing him slowly. Testing him perhaps, because he had kept himself in check when it came to her for all those years. That was one theory. Another theory could be that Sloane McRae was as complex and emotionally feeling as any other woman, a mere fact that could instantly complicate a man's life before he knew he even stepped out of line. Jesus, he could not really find a good answer to her question. "Maybe I've come to realize I'm reaching the end of my tour, and it's time to either sink or swim." She wasn't going to like that simple, clichéd answer, but dammit, it was how he felt. "I'm not getting any younger, Sloane."
It was not a selling point on his part, and Gabriel knew that. Not when she could possibly have some young kid who was a little less worn for the wear in age. When you cut through all the bullshit of what lit a fire under his ass, the bottom line was the same as he had come to think about while locked in that cell. His panic was for a reason and that reason started with him being forty-six years old.
She looked at him curiously, thinking on his words. They might be true - though his age had never been an issue in her eyes - but she didn't buy it, not all of it. There was more. There was something nagging at her since his flabbergasting admission to her, and though she was still unsure what caused it she felt warmer. "You weren't getting any younger last year, Gabe. Or the year before. Why now?" she pushed, hurt that even when she was baring all as he had asked of her, he wouldn't be totally honest with her. She had even shed tears in front of him and he was still holding back on her. This was so fucking typical Gabriel.
She let go of his hand and pulled away, her initial anger at him dropping this bomb on her seeping back in. "I'll tell you what I think... I remember the exact moment when you turned weird on me. I tried explaining it with all sorts of different things but this..." she moved her hand to indicate them both, "this explains it. Whatever I said that day in reference to that pool game at the Beasts made you lock on something, Gabe, and that's when you started circling. From where I stand, we call it jealousy." She pushed herself up and took a few steps beyond him lest she showed him how disgusted that made her feel. Standing behind him, she gave him her back in case he turned toward her.
"So whether or not it's because you're a year older than the last, what really triggered your coming forward with this is my supposed attraction to another man. Why is that? Because he encroached on YOUR territory?" I got news for you, mate, she raged in her mind. I reserved myself as your territory for some time but no more.
She turned back to him, a scowl on her face. "Your so-called love... your feelings for me have been so strong that you could sit on them for over five years but when another bloke waltz in and no-clue-McRae pays attention, then you get moving?" Fuck. She couldn't believe this. Fucking chauvinistic males. She felt like property. MacHayes alright. She hadn't realised before how on the mark the moniker was. The others had really called it as it was, as it had been and as Hayes here still obviously wanted it. He loved her so that he could watch her wither and dry up without him, like a... like a nun, but couldn't bear to see her bloom and happy with someone else? Some love.
Try as he had to show her every last shred of him, not even Gabriel was a saint. He had given her near everything she asked for. Everything that humiliated him and threw him out on the slab for her to chop through like a Civil war bayonet. What had she offered in return, other than his enemy in the form of the words 'loved you once'? He told her all he could, trying to mask a bit of it so it didn't make him come off completely horrible. 'Yes, Sloane. It was nine years instead of five. Yes, Sloane. It took you talking special and new about some man to jolt me awake. Yes, Sloane. I'm an idiot and fool, but I'm here all the same trying to make amends.' He thought silently as she stood and moved away from him. Hayes sat stock still on the floor, unable to move.
Crippled.
She had accepted that he could not abuse his position, and that was nine years ago. Since then, they fell into a comfort level. A routine. He was proud of their work and relationship. Sure. It wasn't Marli, but then again, what could be and why should anything ever ...? But this Rickman. This Gunny Sergeant. It was another rooster in the chicken coop and Gabriel did not like that. Not one fucking 'damn good' bit.
And he wasn't getting any younger. Try as he may to not face reality, his father had him when he was forty-two years old. His mother thirty-eight. In his mind, it seemed perfectly logical that there might be more time. Now it was obvious there was not. Dammit. He didn't even know where he was going with this line of thought and finally brought his gaze up from the floor to meet her eyes. 'I'm sorry' did not seem appropriate. 'You're correct' would only come out in a flared temper snarl from his vocals. Three times he opened his mouth to speak and each time he bit it back because the words coming forth were not productive. His enemy had him cornered yet again, however this time with the firing squad fully armed and there was nothing kind in his will to defend himself.
"Perhaps the Planet Killer jolted me awake." He tried, but knew she didn't want any more of his bullshit, no matter how much it may or may not hold a hint of truth. "What do you want me to say?" His voice horribly controlled, or to say, fighting as much as he could to keep it on some safe plain while it did wobble and teeter on anger. Should he admit it was because of the Gunny or not? Either choice was not good and she already was using every vulnerable word of his against him. Gabriel looked up at her, loosing an internal battle, as he remained squatted on the floor. "You want me to," His voice began to rise and it was hard to rope it back, but he struggled to do so. "say. I'm jealous? Re-state. That I…." Gulping back the words, he could not believe he was reduced to this. Badly he wanted to let his voice fly, but there was no manual to help the Colonel, so Gabriel continued to battle himself. Sloane had chosen to protect herself, like they both always had, only now he had exposed himself and might as well have been standing naked in front of Sloane for her to take pot shots at. She had laid down enough cards to show him that there was no winning here. Not a single card she lay was to comfort or aid in finding some solid ground. He had a two, three, five, six, seven, nine and an Ace. Blacks and reds. A bum hand and there was no re-dealing this deck.
"Re-state that. That I. I. I'm not always. The smartest man." The trapped animal varied its eyes from her face to the memorial plaque on his office wall. Without a weapon or hand-to-hand combat, Sloane McRae was single-handedly slaughtering the Iron Colonel.
Nostrils flaring, she watched him as the pressure in her kept mounting. His pride be damned. He still wasn't talking to her. Really talking. He was just re-serving her the words she had fed him a moment ago. Sitting there on the floor like he was drowning in self-pity... what did he want from her? He expected her to pick up the few words he had given her, piece them together for him and understand what he was trying to tell her? A few words to explain years of silence?
"Damn it, Gabe!" she growled, her voice rising. Her arm slid across his table, sending everything flying. Piles of papers slid and collapsed, books tumbled. The glass fell on its side, spilling its content, and broke under her hand while the pitcher of water took a dive and shattered on the floor. "How about the truth? How about how the fuck you feel?"
How was it that Rickman had been able to communicate it to her in the span of all but one night and Hayes had not in over half a decade? Fuck. She didn't want to compare them. She refused to do that. Her foot connected with the paper basket next to the table in temper before she moved on to kick the innocent chair away from her.
Leaning over the table, she stared at him, ignoring the broken glass biting in her hands. She barely felt it. Enraged, she was, both at him and her. "You're admitting it's jealousy? Why me taking lovers over the years never brought this on, Gabe? I mean one of them was even in quarters next to yours," she specified nastily, her words totally unchecked. Her voice still raised, sounded raw and carried her anguish. The feelings for him she had carefully buried were stirred and it scared the hell out of her. "Why didn't you pick up on them? Of all of them, how could you pick up on HIM meaning anything to me when you couldn't even see I was in love with you?"
The wolf's eyes had snapped to her when she said this, his face going red upon feeling the sword. Gabriel did not want to even think who that might be, over the years. Jesus. His breath caught in his chest and the blood within his veins pounded so much, his arm pulsed under its brace. Her words continued to slay him and try as he may, Hayes did not feel comfortable in continuing to feed her ammo.
Ammo was not further needed, for he sat there watching her go berserk on his things and he did not feel it right to stop her. He deserved this. Damn be his soul, she was wrong and right but there was little he could do about it. Taking the cuts he sat helpless watching Sloane McRae. She moved over to his WWII collection, and began to take out her rage on the carefully displayed field dinning set. An old steel tray, canteen, pot and various other small utensils. He did not have it in him to stop her but Hayes did finally rise.
She turned and knocked the shelf on the wall behind her. When the brackets held, she slid her hand along, pushing its content to the floor in her fury, smearing her blood on the steely grey surface. "Say something!"
In all those years, she had never been content in terms of her love life. Never really on the lookout for one anyway, she had been afraid to open up after losing so many loved ones, but love had come and found her anyway. Hayes. She had fought against it but it had taken hold. But unrequited it had remained, and one can only live so long with that before dying inside a little more each day. It was only recently that she had found some measure of happiness again. Once she had faced her fears and decided to give it a go with Rickman, her other troubles, things not even Hayes knew about, seemed to fade a little. Rickman and her still had a lot to work through but... but now Hayes was rocking the boat.
What could Hayes say really? Her anger and rage were in truth directed at herself. For letting this happen. For not risking her livelihood and career back then to spell it out for him. For letting Rickman into her heart when obviously Hayes was still in there somewhere. Partly, if not all. But enough to rock. the. boat. Enough to make a mess of what she had just started with Rickman.
It was way easier to get angry at Hayes. To blame him for the wasted years and for the uncertainty he was causing in her feelings now than admitting it was her fault and her own stupidity for letting it happen. Yes, she had been foolish. Yes, she had been wrong. About him, about the situation, about his damn feelings. But damn it, so had he!
Her eyes zeroed in on a frame on the wall. A silly gift from her to commemorate his beating of the record in torpedo targeting. Yes, Starfleet had incorporated the MACOs aboard Enterprise enough to have them train with the ship's weapon systems as well as being used as the assault team. And well, Hayes had found his niche; he liked torpedoes very much and was a killer shot. She moved to pick the frame up to smash it.
Sloane screamed at him to say something, but he knew he had already said enough. In his mind he went over the scenario, knowing he told her directly he loved her still. More or less came right out and said yes, he was jealous as fuck. No. He had no idea she bedded down with someone in the next room. Damn Sloane. That should have been him! His eyes had gone red and the battle to remain calm continued, less Gabriel lose his senses like her and let his temper fly. The rage he felt would do harm if unleashed.
Hayes had done enough damage to them both for one evening.
Fingers enclosing around her wrist as his thick voice called out, "Don't." It was not an order and not a plea. Glancing at his vintage gun case, he'd rather her take out her anger on that than the small token of love he cherished. "I told you all I am capable of. I told you how I goddamn feel." Was she so stupid that she had no clue how hard this had been for him? And now she was going to start destroying any proof or sign that she had been connected to him somehow? It did not take long for Gabriel's voice to rise. He did not even realize he started screaming by the time he reached the end of his sentence, "I don't know what else to give you!"
His sudden reaction, one she had been trying to summon, startled her at first and she froze.
With his free hand, Gabriel plucked the small frame, in small bursts his head shook, enraged as he protected the memento from her. "What on destroyed Earth can I possible GIVE you that would satisfy, Sloane?" The wolf snarled, taking a step back because he now had been reduced to the one thing he had violently been trying to control. "I. Don't. Know. What. Else. To. Say. To. Make THIS ANY BETTER!" Looking down at the frame, he wondered if she gave this to him while bedding up in the room next door with some other officer. "I DON'T FUCKING KNOW!" Enraged at the image she planted in his head, Gabriel turned his back to Sloane, gave a primal snarl after drawing back his arm, a wild pitch of the little frame was let loose into a nearby case. Glass from the case and glass from the frame shattered loudly, the circa 1942 enlisted uniform crumpling off its perch and hung half slumped towards her broken plaque on the floor. "YOU WANT TO DESTROY SOMETHING? LET'S DESTROY SOMETHING!!!"
Sloane jumped at the crashing sound and swallowed thickly. Chest heaving, she was rooted in place. So this was what Gabriel Loman Hayes looked like unhinged. He was finally showing her real emotions, uncensored, and she hated him fiercely in that instant for making it so damn hard for her to get at it. Why was he always hiding it? It wasn't his rage she had been looking for, but a sign that he was really burning for her. Why was it so hard to show her that? Words were just words. "Ga--" she started to say, one step taken in his direction...
Out of desperation, out of having no contingency plan to this war, Gabriel did the only action that was left unsaid. He stepped forward to Major McRae, planted his hands on her arms and did as she would have asked years ago: He defiled his position as MACO CO and leaned down to kiss her. A rough, forceful, passionate act as he planted his lips on her mouth.
A gasp of surprise died in her throat. Tensed and unresponsive at first, Sloane soon gave in under his demanding, bruising kiss. To say she hadn't desired this would have been bullshit. To pretend he wasn't making her weak at the knees would have been going along that same line, too. She had yelled for him to show her passion and he was... and, the heavens help her, he had her melting.
Aroused by anger and aroused by her giving in, Gabriel wrapped his arms around Sloane McRae and took her full with his mouth. Held her full while his body reacted favourably to what should have been theirs years ago. He would have her. Gunny was no more and the Colonel would finally have his Major.
A moan left her, speaking of her capitulation, of her repressed need now bubbling back to the surface. Yes, Gabe. His embrace, his hands on her, all that heat… it was shivering that she leaned into him, willing and responsive. Until some sense seeped back into her.
"Nnn-no..." Her mouth struggled to get the word out around him as her hands found his shoulders to push him off. "Nn-not like this," she sobbed. It felt tainted, like payback, like he wished to hurt her back for all she had said – or hadn't.
Ripped from their attachment, Gabriel stood there in shock, exposed and almost breathless. What just happened?
She did it. She really said those words and did it. Her choice was obvious, final and he was flabbergasted, wandering around part of the table in pained humility with a crooked smile on his horrified face. Sloane McRae had chosen Gunny Sgt. Rickman and all the strewn pieces fell into place as the thick bell of reality sounded to hit him in the head.
Turning, Gabriel faced her, looking nothing short of a mad man. ”Get out of here…” his voice still shocked and soft. When she didn’t make a move fast enough, he added, “GET OUT OF HERE!" The animal warned in loud voice, for she sent him over the edge and remaining in control was no longer a possibility. Taking a step towards her, his table between them, he brought both fists down in a primal warning, the bang sending pain through his body, his bad arm screaming and the sound causing the large wooden unit to creak and moan. Something wet touched his cheeks, but in his rage, he hardly noticed.
He made her jump again and this time she took a step back. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she witnessed what she had driven him at. It was tearing her apart. "God, Gabe..." she let out, wracked by sobs. She could still feel him, his touch… she could still taste him.
"GETOUT!" Gabriel could not take anymore of her kicking him down. Torturing him. He was no saint and her comments meant to hurt did exactly that.
Sloane had succeeded in her kill.
The harshness of his tone and the bite of his words took another chunk out of her heart but she stood fast. "No." A meek little voice in all that storm. "Not yet."
"GETTHEHELL OUT OF HERE!" When she hesitated, Hayes screamed, "THAT'S A GOD. DAMN. ORDER!" Gabriel was driven out of his mind.
"Then you'll have to throw me into the brig, COLONEL!" she snapped back. "You started this... you're the one who wanted to talk about it... let me finish."
She had walked away once when he had dismissed her in a similar fashion, she would be damned if she did that mistake again. If they had talked about this that day, things might be different now. She wiped her face with the back of her hand before crossing her arms over her chest. Blood dribbled on her sleeves but she paid it no attention. No, all of her was on Gabriel.
Fighting every fibre of his nerves, Gabriel stood there, not wiping his face, looking at her. He didn't say 'yes', but he wasn't screaming at the moment. The look on his face border lined that he was going to lose it again. And soon. Right now, he hated Sloane McRae. Hated her for giving into a kiss only to fucking push him away once more tonight. Her games… they ended now in his mind. He was through.
She looked at him a moment, his stare another lash on her raw nerves, and nodded, taking his silence as an acquiescence. "Gabe..." She paused, quite sure that he was just humouring her and wouldn't really listen. To hell with it. She would say it now or never broach that subject with him again. If this was to be their last ever talk, she wanted him to know.
"Gabe, I never meant to hurt you... the stuff I said... shit, I was lashing out. There were only two." In ten goddamned years. She knew this had to have stung immensely so she started with that. "One you might have known, he was 'Fleet. The other wasn't even on this ship."
"I don't want to hear this FUCKING SHIT." The words were terse between clenched teeth. His fist balled up ready to strike.
Her eyes crossed his and she shook her head. He hated her. But she pushed on, trying to stop the sobs strangling her throat. "Don't... don't tell me you never had anyone. I knew you did..." Every time. She dropped her head, the sharp pain of those memories still very much alive now that he had unearthed these feelings, turning her upside down and inside out in the process.
"I. Did." The two words were raw in his throat, and as Gabriel worked to calm himself, he looked down at her in his rigid stance with both hands at his sides; fighting to not grab her and throw her out of his office. She was right on one thing: Hayes said he wanted to 'talk', so he must lie in this fucked up bed he made.
The kiss fucked him over and fucked him up. Air was in the room, but he couldn’t mentally breathe. Couldn’t think. So clouded with the scent of her body and the memory of the warm kiss, he couldn’t fucking think straight. Damn her for that.
She had not meant for any of it to go this way. She had wanted answers; not hurt him. She had wanted him to open up... prove to her that he could. How could he possibly expect her to drop everything and welcome him with open arms just because his old age had given him a kick in the butt? Why wait until there was someone else? Jealousy had woken him up, he claimed, but she still wondered if it wasn't just the alpha male in him unable to stand a younger man around his... well, what he apparently considered his woman.
"I'm puzzled... I'm confused as to what you expected. I mean, you know there's someone else..." God, this hurt, every damn word. It hurt her to say them just like she knew it hurt him to hear them. "You want to know if... if there's a chance of finding this love for you again..." She shook with another wave of sobs, feeling like she was betraying Derick. Hell, she was. "Truth is that it's still here," she said, tapping her chest. "I mean, I ignore it and I bury it... but you..." She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall behind, her head bumping the damn shelf. She barely blinked and shifted. "The real question is whether I want to or not."
Gabriel's eyes softened slightly, wondering if this was hope or another baiting trap. 'Truth is that it's still here.' She said.
The want for her to leave was still in him, countered by the will to comfort the tears. Gabriel could say nothing as she spoke to him; merely stand there like a statue as his red eyes opened wide to fight against himself. Anger fuelled him and he kept himself semi-composed, listening to each goddamn biting word. Why shove hope once more down his throat, biting like a fish to be tossed back into the lake? Sloane wasn't even making sense to him at times, but that didn't seem to matter for logic had long left the room. He wasn't calm, but Hayes was no longer yelling. "What 'but me'. I don't ignore feelings and choose to accept them being dormant because it is part of the job. That is my guilt?” God, let them fix this and go back to kissing. “You on the other hand have them buried, but they still exist?" Wasn't that what she had been punishing him on this entire time? His head was spinning from her; wounded and near flat lined.
She swallowed with difficulty. "Because it is part of the job? I never said I was any smarter than you... Gabe, I did what I had to do to be able to cope. Seven years ago, I was ready to leave the MACO... to walk out so we could be together - if I'd only gotten a sign that you could possibly love me... would want me." She glanced away, taking a shuddering breath.
No. His throat hitched as he listened to her. Did Sloane McRae just tell him that she would have left the.... As in a retire.... The room lurched and if he thought he felt sick when Mesu told him he was grounded, that was nothing compared to the knowing you had it all but gambled it away frivolously like an uneducated fool. Gabriel couldn’t talk and stood listening to her.
Hayes' Office
Stardate 30.09.2165
Years into months; months into days. Days into hours and hours into minutes. Five left, to be precise.
Like an atomic clock, Major Sloane McRae was on time and letting her into his office, Gabriel was more than anxious and full of pent up energy. He was unsure how she would react to what he had to say, but say it he must. There was a cool, clear truth that had to be spoken, for the urging beast within demanded to be let free. She didn't know about his Governorship and normally he would tell her the news, however there were bigger events to plan.
A great fear was in Gabriel that Sloane had been seeing that younger man and he knew damn well that he practically sent her down there. Would she want him, injured and sent away like so many ‘old had beens' before him? Two months ago nothing could stop Colonel Hayes, yet these past weeks he looked at himself in the mirror and didn't recognize who blinked back.
Both arms at his side, for Gabriel needed to have his uniform free and covering his cast, he had dressed in a more formal wear, but not full on dress. No sling to confine him, his fatigues were accompanied by the jacket zipped halfway up, exposing the dark, black T-shirt underneath. He actually had a debate if he should put on the maroon or black and knew that he needed to get a grip. Gabriel had not been himself for quite some time.
Glad to see her, Gabriel smiled and contained his nerves for internal use only. It would not do to appear unglued no matter how nervous he might be before his Major. The last time he went to ask a woman to marry him was twenty years ago and he never got to the question part of the conversation. At least Sloane wasn't sleeping with his best friend, but he did fear that his best friend was sleeping with somebody. A Damn Good somebody that Hayes loathed.
The cocky nature that the Colonel carried with him was present but said layer was ice thin. He shut the door behind her, once she entered his office and was resolved that there was no time like the present. Wasn't that what he was saying all along? "Thank you for coming to meet me." His cool voice began. There was no better way for him to do this, so, being very Gabriel, he ploughed through the field that was made for flowers, not grain. "Did you have fun planet side?"
'Very formal', Sloane thought, and wondered why. When did Hayes ever have to thank an officer for following orders? Or her for that matter? But since she figured this meeting had to do with the business surrounding Marke and Kazan's deaths and the deep hole Kemper had dug for himself, some formality was indicated.
"No problem, boss," she said, tone light though her eyes might have looked at him a bit funny, given his next question. Even used to his own brand of humour, she couldn't quite see what kind of fun he expected her to have planet-side given the state of the colony unless... unless he was chipping at something else. She suddenly felt like she had that day when she had had to face him in this very office, wondering if the now memorable pool game at Beasts would be seen as totally out of line by her superior officer. She took a seat as well as a deep breath. No, nobody had mouthed her and Rickman out to him yet. Couldn't have.
She didn't answer and Gabriel felt red flags go up in alert. "Did you have fun planet side?" His voice sounded more tensed, because if he was going to do this, he needed to know.
"Fun, Colonel?" Sloane asked incredulously as it didn't appear to be a joke after all. "Picking the place up and finding bodies ain't my idea of fun..." she started about to ask him if it was his. Not to mention the last few days chasing after Marke's ghost and wondering what had the corporal really been about. She had fooled everyone if what little they held presently had any credence and it made Sloane sick to her stomach. Yes, Kemper could be and was an ass at the best of times, but really who here was to blame for not spotting her game? Who here was really wearing Kazan's blood? Sloane felt that sticky mess on her uniform and on her hands.
"Right. Of course," he had to figure this out because he wasn't thinking straight. "That's not quite what I meant, McRae." Taking a deep breath, he tried it again. "On your off time." He sat across from her, thinking that this was the only way. "When you weren't swearing at things or fixing others, what did you do?"
Oh. What the hell was he getting at? It wasn't like she was coming back from a holiday. What was he fishing for? Sloane couldn't help wonder and was getting increasingly uncomfortable about his line of questioning. She tried to remind herself this was Gabe sitting in front of her. Her friend. But that was just it; Hayes did not normally just chitchat about fishing trips or a game of ... right. Pool. Bastard. If he knew something he best come straight out with it because Sloane wasn't about to play his little game. Riled up good now, her mind wasn't even on the consequences of being found out and she tightly replied, "Tried to catch up on sleep, sir."
He stared at her, sighed a bit, and leaned back in the chair. Looking at Sloane, trying to read her face was impossible for she was as practiced as a cold, hardened gambler in Vegas. "Did you miss me at all, Sloane? Down there?" It was a different approach, but one he'd swallow his pride and ask.
"Yes," she replied quickly, not needing to think on that. She had already told him the previous week, hadn't she? Then again, maybe she had thought to and hadn't. Lack of sleep was playing with her head a bit in recent weeks but still... this... this had to be another Weird Hayes Moment to classify with the last. "Of course."
That was what he was looking for and as opportunity knocked, the man who had been waiting answered. Coming around the table to Sloane, his ass off his chair as he all but kneeled before her, Gabriel took her hand and spouted the words without thinking. "I want you to stay. With me. Don't go back there."
It wasn't quite what he practiced in his head, but it was down the right path.
Surprised but amused, guessing that the MACO crew aboard Enterprise had been giving him a hard time or that Gabe had reached a certain level of boredom running things on his own up here, Sloane chuckled. "O-kay?" she replied questioningly, still taken aback by such a show coming from the colonel and not quite sure of the answer he was looking for.
This was, by far, the single bravest step he ever took in his life. His voice kind, happy, he told her, "I want you to marry me, Sloane. I want us to be together. Have kids. A boy and a girl. Two girls. Whatever you want."
Almost a gasp, he realized it was out there now. Did he actually finally say it? Yes, he did. Sloane was here and Gabriel was able to do what he had wanted to do for over eight years. It felt like such a relief and the man smiled as he looked at her. They could be as happy as he felt in this moment. Forever. As long as she did not say no.
Whoa, back up! Back up! Hell, sister, did you ever guess that one wrong, Sloane's mind made itself known.
Gabe? Sloane's jaw dropped while she looked at him like he had grown a second head. First a weird ass third degree about her down time and now this? A bunch of thoughts and explanations jumbled in her head, fighting to stick. She was dreaming. One of those crazy dreams she used to have years ago. Or Hayes had been shot up with a Phlox cocktail or, better yet, he had met some more Vulcans. Her eyes narrowed as she took a shallow breath. Or he was having a go at her. He knew what was going on with Rickman and was now, in his own weird way, playing with her, teasing her about it. Well, he wasn't at all that funny...
As she stared at him, she realised there wasn't a sign of mirth there on his face or in his eyes, or even a sign of a nasty prank. He looked... well, he looked sincere and... hell, relieved, she guessed. Sloane glanced down at her uniform, her free hand pinching her thigh.
Eyes back on him, she swallowed the saliva she didn't have, her throat gone dry for some reason. All she could think about was that he knew about Rickman. He did and he was fucking around, messing with her head. Had to be. Why else would he say those things? "You..." She cocked her head to the side. "You're joking, right?"
Gabriel looked at her and sputtered out, "No." Why would she think he was making a joke out of this? He took both of her hands in his, moving forward so there was little room between them. With conviction he spoke strong, "No, Sloane. I'm serious. Dead serious." His eyes went back and forth between hers and he said it again, "I want you to marry me."
It was like he was speaking to her in a different language, one she didn't know. Bolted to the chair, Sloane could only look at him with a deep frown, waiting for a translation.
"Sloane?" He spoke her name, looking at her. "Say something?" The silence was not the warm reception he wished for.
Nor was that look in her eye.
He meant it? The bastard meant it? It felt like the coldest shower Sloane had ever had or... or waking up with the worst hangover. Sloane wasn't sure which. Hell, she couldn't even tell which way was up.
From nothing between them to a sort of unspoken acknowledgement some years later - one which Sloane had come to believe she had dreamed up - to nothing once more, and then to some bizarre drug-induced confession to nothing again to... what? Jealousy? Checking the waters? To *this*... a, hell, yeah, this was a marriage proposal, wasn't it, she realised suddenly. Now? After all this time?
Still looking at him like she couldn't believe what she was hearing, Sloane went from flabbergasted to a fiery anger in a flash and pulled her hands free. He really meant it.
"Why the fuck did you wait so long?" she let out, unchecked. Her hard stare was almost accusatory. "You really mean this? Now?" Her tone was pained. Hurt.
Gabriel blinked, not expecting her to react that way but in all honesty, the man wasn't sure what to expect. Anything but pure, raw anger would have been at the top of his list. "But...Sloane?" He began, trying to get her to calm down from her swearing attack.
“You took your sweet time," she growled, seeing key moments between them flash in her mind like some sick, demented joke. "Seven years. I've wasted the last seven years of my life."
"How did you waste the last seven years? I don't recall you saying a word either..." For now, the man's words were innocent and he lifted both hands as if to keep her from striking out. Fear, instead, took its place.
Gabriel might have a point there but Sloane was in no state to hear or recognise it. Her thoughts, as they formed, just carried on pouring out. "When I finally meet another man who makes me feel alive - as you did," her index nearly went to dig in his chest for emphasis, "you spring this on me? Go to hell!"
"Sloane!" Gabriel found his voice; the nerves in his body heightening to a level of survival and in those situations, the Colonel protected himself. "Goddammit, look at me! I'm not the world's smartest man... but I thought you knew. How in the hell could you not have known?" He didn't want to curse at her, but she had racked him already and drew first blood.
"How could I not know? Are you for real? You never say anything. You barely let your guard down and when you do, it's coloured by humour. You turn everything into this deadpan joke style of yours. I never said anything 'cause I never sensed anything..." Well, there had been that tacit understanding once, the barest of nod to what might have been, but that was in sickbay, after Jides had played a nasty number on her. Sloane had never been sure after that if she hadn't been seeing things... things she had wanted to see but that hadn't been really there.
"Hell, Gabe, you're my direct superior. You know how much of a tight ass you can be about the regs! What if it hadn't been reciprocated? What if then?"
The beating continued and Gabriel looked at Sloane wishing to God in Heaven that he would have done as she berated and brought this up years ago. Hell. Not even years. Months. He could have gotten to her months before that little bastard Gunny and then nothing would have happened between those two. She would have been his but now, now. It was becoming more and more clear on what side of the line he stood and his fears swirled with anger thinking on whom she slept with.
A shake of his head, for Gabriel was reliving an age-old nightmare, he thought of Marli and how hearing that he missed Sloane by mere months, of his own doing, was killing him. After his fiancée slept with his best friend, there was so much pain Gabriel erected a wall of anger and hate so he'd never become hurt again. Never.
Yet, here he was now. Allowing this.
Angry, more at himself, but that hardly mattered now, Hayes lashed out at the one person who dared to take down his wall and make him care. Shifting blame, for it didn't seem to hurt as bad when he was screaming, Gabriel snarled, "I thought you always knew. Goddammit it, Sloane!" He reached over to slam on the table with his right hand; nerves shocking to life under the cast, the Colonel realized he could not fix this. There was no way to reverse her words nor was she even remotely interested in seeing him that way, much less his stupid marriage proposal. God help him, he was going to lose it.
"This is not happening to me again. It's not!" Taking in deep breaths, Gabriel forced his mind to calm but when it did not obey, he stood up to his full height and willed his breathing to be tight and constrained. The dry, stoic look he attempted to give had nothing behind it but a look of injury and betrayal. "No. It's not." Colonel Hayes was a man known for tactics and now his grey matter roared to life in order to come off these ground victorious. He did not need to accept defeat. His voice was low and dangerous as his plan unfolded, "Why? Why do we walk around here carefully hiding our casual airs with one another, making sure no one hears us say our first names, if you sensed nothing from me? Why? Why is it you see me away when I go off world? Or I look for you when I return? Or when one of us is in Sickbay, we sit loyal at the other's side, hoping no one will notice. Am I alone in that feeling? Am I such a suborn prick that you are going to stand there and tell me there is nothing?! Nothing?!"
Sloane's shoulders sagged as her gaze remained riveted on his. Breathing heavily, she struggled with what to say next... how to explain... "All this..." she said, showing the room with them both in it, "is because we're friends, Gabe. Been through thick and thin, you watch my back... I watch yours. I thought it was because you cared. Hell, I do it because I care. I hate it when you leave without me and I'm damned pleased when you come back in one piece." She ran a hand across her face. Yes, there had been a time when there had been more, when more passionate feelings had fuelled that behaviour, but for Sloane, those had been weeded out.
"I do care..." He felt like he was going to split open from anger or shame. Either emotion was up for grabs.
"Why we hide it behind closed doors?" she continued. "Well, 'cause it's frowned upon. Whether or not there's truth behind all that MacHayes bullshit, we still need to keep up the charade. You know this."
"Friends...?" He was stumped. "Just friends...." Sloane said the one thing that took all the wind from his sails and he looked almost defeated. Almost. "I know that I am extra careful around the men and crew because... " How could he say he loved her after all this practice only to face an unavoidable, permanent obstacle? "Because. Well hell! Now you *know* 'why because'!" With little warning, he moved over to her swiftly, a hair short of getting in her face. Gabriel was not giving in. Could not. There might still be a chance. "Do not do this to me, Sloane. Do not shut me out. Tell me there's nothing between us. I want you to look me in the eye and tell me that the men all came up with 'MacHayes' because there is absolutely NOTHING between us!"
Do not shut me out... That man! "Do not shut you out? You're the one shutting out everyone else. Fuck," she cursed, standing up and taking a couple of steps back. "I know more about Chef's private life than I do yours..."
Unsure how to respond, the Colonel said nothing and took her verbal slaughtering.
That hurt. That was partly what had decided her to let go back then... let go of these stupid, ridiculous dreams she'd had of leaving the MACO and settle down to play damn colonists with the rest of humanity. She laughed deridingly at herself. It wasn't the whole reason for burying that idea and her feelings, but it was a big part of it. "And I've only maybe met him twenty times in the last eight to nine years. You don't talk, Gabe," she said, her voice a lot lower now. She didn't know much about him. Not really. After all these years, she trusted him and cared for him - even had convinced herself she loved him once upon a time - but she didn't really know about him. His past, his childhood... Just little bits here and there, what he decided to let her see or know about him.
He felt the truthful sting in her words, as they were the exact demons he had been slaying these past weeks since those awakening eight letters came to him. "I never said I was a smart man, Sloane...." She was right in many ways, for he had done this to himself before. Gabriel only knew shame and glanced to the far wall on his right before looking back at her. Calming down a bit, he could feel his fingers throbbing. Despite this no-win battle, he dared to press on. "I had a wife once." There was no power in his voice, attempting to make her understand and if she knew him at all, she'd know he was putting himself out on a limb. "No. Not a wife. She was supposed to be my wife." Gabriel knew why he had to tell her this, and it was killing the Colonel inside. Not giving Marli a name, for there was no point in that, Hayes continued, "It didn't work out. She betrayed me. I probably deserved it, as I'm deserving this from you right now." Fuck this. He couldn't stop and despite all the warning signs and flags to protect himself, Gabriel could not let her go and shut up. The more he thought on it, the more he felt inclined to tell McRae. She had to know. If she was going to walk away from him, she had to at least know. "So, I didn't trust anyone. Fuck everyone, including myself. I didn't care for myself anymore, Sloane. And I trusted no one."
Very uncomfortable, he glanced at her, his eyes did a sweep over her head and then looked back at her. He owed her that much and continued with those choppy sentences. "For the past nine years we've worked together. At first, it was nothing to me. Another Captain. An Airforce brat turned into another MACO. But." He felt sick. "You. You're funny. Good. Professional. You understand me. A few years later... it wasn't... I guess. What I'm. Trying. To say...." Gabriel's body had taken an almost 'at attention' stance, as if he were the subordinate. "I trust you, Sloane. Real trust. I don't. Put that type of trust.” This was so hard to admit to another individual. “In any goddamn person on this ship. I haven't allowed it of anyone since my wife. No. Not my wife. Never mind." He dared to look at her again. "I trust you."
Sloane was frozen in place. His pain was so palpable, so raw. "I'm sorry," she finally said in a whisper when her throat let some air through. "I'm sorry for what your fiancée did to you." He trusted her. She might not have fathomed how deep his trust in her was nor how hard it had been for him to give it, but she already knew that he trusted her. Just like she did him. This was no real revelation. He trusted her, *really* trusted her, yet in all those years he had said nothing of his feelings for her. Why was that? Because one woman had betrayed him? Sloane wasn't that woman and Gabriel knew this since he claimed to have learned to trust again... to have put his trust in her. This was confusing. She wasn't sure what it was he was trying to convey to her.
She turned away suddenly and walked toward the window. She watched the stars slowly stream past as the NX-01 followed the geostationary orbit of Gaia below and reran in her head what he had just told her. After a moment, her emotions more controlled, she said, "Why do you say you deserve this from me? You're implying that I betrayed you? Like your wife to be did?" Her tone was flat and not accusatory. If she was hurt, nothing in her face nor eyes showed it. It was as if she was clarifying points on a despatch manifest.
Gabriel shook his head at her words the minute she suggested them. "No." He defended in soft voice, having to work to keep his jealous anger in check and not heighten matters worse once more. "I deserve this..." Dammit. Gabriel knew the reason. "Because. I let it go on so long... Didn't learn right the first time..." She looked like none of this even affected her, other than being annoyed. Taking a risk, for he'd gone this far, the foolish wolf sealed the death or deal. "And never said a word. At least, not when you were fully awake and could really hear me."
It was a risk the same as any other and Gabriel was at the fork in the road to either having it work or paying the price. His soul could not cash any check written by the collector if he had to pay and he held his breath as he began to offer silent prayer to the powers that were above.
Not much in life scared or alarmed the Colonel, and he could only recall a handful of times that he actually feared what the next sixty seconds might bring. Sloane McRae had in one way or another been involved in nearly all of those times.
She turned to him at that, her eyes narrowing on his. The weight of her stare must have equated a ton of bricks. The facade of indifference had fallen but there was no compassion in her features. She was protecting herself. She had been burnt once by his silence. Not again.
"... when I was fully awake? Gabriel, for god's sake stop talking in riddles! What is it?" Fuck, she was pretty sure she knew but she wanted to hear him say it. Needed him to. Some perverse need... Christ. She lifted her hand before he could utter a word. Maybe she should say it. Tell it like it was. Could she hurt him with the truth, the whole truth? Should she? He said he deserved it, that he hadn't heeded the lesson his fiancée should have taught him. Should she be the cold-hearted bitch everyone save one person thought her to be - expected her to be and show him the extent of what he had let happen again? Should she pour salt freely in his wound? She sagged against the windowpane. Hurt and frustrated as she was... angry with him... she couldn't find it in her to purposefully, out of spite, deliver the final blow.
The wolf tensed, the words about to be exposed but she lifted her hand to stop him. Biting his tongue, Gabriel Hayes took a step forward, lowering his head slightly to keep an even gaze with her as he approached. "You want me to say it, or don't you?" Instinct warning him, he gestured to her with his chin.
She nearly snorted in his face but bit down on it. Her eyes held his gaze, unwavering. "It seems to me it's not what I want but what you want." You want to say, say it, she thought.
"That's not what we're talking about here." Cornered and trapped, he had nowhere else to go to back out. "Here I thought the important part was the talking about it." He waited for her to throw that back in his face too.
Would he ever stop these incessant games? "Yes, talking about *it*..." She sighed. What is *it*, Gabriel? What do you want to tell me? What do you want from me? But these questions never left her lips. She shook her head lightly, as if in disbelief of what she was about to do.
"I was in love with you, Gabriel." Her breath hitched, the only sign of the raging emotions within her. "I was in love with you and I bottled it up, buried it. That's what you want to talk about?"
Love.
Past tense.
As in: Not anymore.
He picked up on that phrase right away, along with her building anger that could match his own; it was rather obvious that both amounts of their animosity were directed at the same person: Him. Hayes was not sure how to even reply, for her admitting this to him was not phrased in a positive manner. She'd taken to calling him by his full name repeatedly now, which also did not equate to a good sign. There were no games being played on his part, just one man's struggle to survive these foreign lands. Trying to find her. "Yes." His whole body felt light. "Us." He did not leave her question unanswered, "I. Was. In love. With you too. Sloane." He'd come this far, what was one more step? "I still am."
'Damn good' and 'was in love' were his enemies from this day forward. Foes that all his years of military training could never have prepared him for, and Gabriel had a bad feeling that there were more words to join in their ranks.
Her chest heaved, her tenuous hold on her body breaking. Looking away, her mouth quivered before her face contorted in a grimace of pain. No, he hadn't been. He had NOT. Her hands clenching into fists, she let her nails bite in the heels of her palm, breaking the skin. This little physical and insignificant sting anchoring her in the sea of pain she was drowning in. She blinked away the tears that burnt her eyes. She wouldn't cry for him. She had promised herself that. Fuck, fuck, fuck. All the emotions she had carefully stored away in a dark place alongside other feelings of loss, betrayal and defeat came pouring out and she was powerless to stop them.
She couldn't feel where she was or her body strung up tight. All she was aware of was him near her and that white-hot poker he was jamming in her heart. She had waited so long to hear those words, so long. She hadn't cared for them when the spark was ignited, but had come to yearn for them when the flame was at its brightest. Denied that, the fire had faded. She had made sure of it. If not a lover to him, his loyal friend she would be and remain.
How young and stupid she had been.
It was a surprise when she felt the cold deck plating beneath her ass. Her legs having given up their support, she had slid down the wall to the ground.
Floored.
"Sloane?" Gabriel approached slow as he was very cautious with her now. He crouched down next to her, a gentle reach to lay his hand on her shoulder. The face of her commander was nowhere to be found, for his senses were on alert and Hayes treaded respectfully on light ground.
Dead eyes looked up at him. "How long?" Her voice was strained, scratchy.
He did not finish the touch, for her look mirrored the warning and he did not make the soft contact with her shoulder that he wished. "Over five years." It sounded pretty bad, even to him and Gabe had to swallow for his throat was going dry. If he said the truth, over eight, she would walk out that front door, he was for certain. "You?"
She snorted and chuckled deridingly, pushing her hands to her eyes to wipe the tears that hung there. She paused, noting the blood and dropped her hands in her lap. "Seven... yeah, about that now."
Making her cry had to be the worst thing Gabriel had done in a long time. Almost in a submissive manner, the man sat with his legs crossed under him, leaning forward to gently stroke her hair. Something he'd wanted to do for almost a decade when she was awake. A downward glance, and thick voice was concerned, "You're bleeding."
She didn't shy away from his touch but she clenched her hands closed to hide what she'd done to herself. She glanced down before holding his gaze once more. "We're a pair of idiots... of losers, you know that, don't you?" She appeared calm now, deflated. Looking over his shoulder, she added, "I was waiting for a sign... something... and you were... well, you were," zeroing back on him, "what were you waiting for, Gabe?"
Fresh tears threatened to spill and she let her head fall back, a dull thud against the metal of the bulkhead her reward. She took a shuddering breath, trying to clear this tightness in her chest. God, it hurt. It burnt and it choked her. All this time wasted. All the walls she had erected to protect herself. What good were they now?
"I. I don't know, Sloane." Gabriel rested his hand near her neck and lowered his head, so it fell beneath his own shoulder line, where it hung in limbo. "You said. You're weren't in a position to express yourself. To me." Oh God this hurt. "Because I'm your superior?" Slow, Hayes lifted his chin to look at her. "What about. As your superior. I was in no position to put myself. Upon you?" This truth had to bring her back to him. Everything for his future resided in the side wings if she couldn't understand or refused to. "If you didn't care. For me. At all. You might have felt obligated or pressured."
She glanced at him then looked away again. He spoke the truth. She knew that. She had turned their situation in her head every which way for so many years; she would be lying if this wasn't an excuse she had given him before for not showing her anything. Not an excuse: a reason. And a valid one. Not for the first time she wondered what would have happened if she had taken the risk. Hell, she had even contemplated leaving the service altogether. "I know," she finally said.
Saddened by her inability to look at him, Gabriel's gaze once more looked to the floor. She had such hatred for him, it seemed, "So now what?" Once he fell into a safer place for talking, it would seem the reserved Colonel disappeared. All he could do was not give up. "You said... you said you loved me once. I said I loved you once." No money left to gamble, Gabriel exposed his soul. "I still do." There was still a rather large gap to be filled in by Sloane, and she might tag him again and say 'only friends'.
Her eyes moved on him once more, his hazel eyes, the ones she had found filled with mirth and mischief on so many occasions, were downcast and hidden to her. But she could see his features, looking tired and drawn. He definitely didn't look any better right now than she felt. So what now? That was a loaded question. She didn't really know herself. She knew what she had felt for him once and she had mercilessly stamped on that feeling for so long she wasn't sure what was left.
"I loved you once, Gabe. I was in love, probably a childish, wistful dream, but I was in love..." She swallowed hard, her throat tight. "I let you go. For the job, out of fear of losing you, your friendship... I let you go."
His throat tightened, along with his chest, and he demanded, "What exactly does that mean?" He knew what it meant, yet there was no way he could accept it. Gabriel would not lose out to the Gunny. He could not lose when he needed this so bad in order to feel alive. He was not ready to hang his hat on a desk and call it a day. Sloane had to want him again.
Part of him wasn't hearing this and part of him was fighting a hard battle to remain calm. Getting upset or worse, yelling, would not help him in his cause. He lifted his hand to touch her with the gentlest gesture he could. "Are you telling me there is no chance of finding that... those... feelings?"
Her gaze met his inquiring one. Of all the ways she had seen - dreamed of - them both to finally have this out in the open, this wasn't it. Of all the scenarios she had constructed, this one she had missed. Her hand reached for his resting on her shoulder and her fingers clenched around it, moving it to her cheek, she hesitated a split second before pressing her skin to his, closing her eyes briefly. She had wanted him to touch her for so long, not as a friend but as a lover. She clamped down hard on the need to go to him, to find refuge in his arms. A shuddering breath left her. "I don't know, Gabe... and it's not that simple anymore." No, it wasn't.
Nine long years. There was a definite feeling of loss and fleeting from one unstable ground to another. Sloane cared for him, but then dismissed that love. Sitting before her, giving her near everything he had, and there was barely a hint of recognition or hope. Even as she touched him, he could tell it was with great uncertainty. Or perhaps it was that repulsion of anger from the beginning of the conversation; where at each and every turn, she put all the blame on Hayes. Bad, he wanted to hold her, kiss her or both, but instead her words kept him at bay. Touching her cheek would have to do for these past twenty minutes were nothing but a living hell as they both ripped one another apart in their own way. The wolf wanted to curl around her protectively, nuzzle her side and whimper for forgiveness. Why couldn't he tell her this? How could he sit here and assume she knew after what she said?
Instead Gabriel remained as he was, trying to give her space or room, for if he opened his mouth, an argument would soon follow. So many thoughts flooded through his mind, but Hayes knew the mention and questioning of the 'damn good' chance another got would not earn him ground against his enemy.
The fact that his enemy was mostly him was also not lost on the Colonel. Gently, his fingers stroked the side of her cheek. Very slow and very careful. The will to have them wander put into check.
Contemplative, she slowly pulled his hand away from her face and pressed the flat of her other hand against his, palm to palm... like she had done on the few occasions he was injured and she had found herself at his bedside, worried sick. Such big hands. Strong hands. Good hands. Her smaller one lost in his shifted and she dropped her head to deposit a soft kiss on the back of his hand. Oh, Gabe. She closed her eyes again, nuzzling his fingers briefly before pulling back.
"Why now?" Sloane asked, breaking the heavy silence. "You said you couldn't let me know before... what's changed now?" She studied his face, waiting for an explanation, as she knew damn well nothing in their situation had changed in that respect. Why did he no longer feel it inappropriate to 'put himself upon her'?
She had his entire attention, watching Sloane touch and kiss him. It didn't last long, and again, those warning flags kept him rather stoic still. What the hell was he supposed to do if she came near him, only in the last moment to pull away? Her question did not ease his nature either, for he would not give hint to his research on this Gunny Sergeant. Gabriel would not deny that it may have taken the jealousy of another man to push him to this, but it was Sloane's actions, not some wild ride in the sack with Rickman, (IF there was a wild ride as Gabriel's imagination flew), that reduced him to this.
'He was good, Gabe. He was Damn Good.' Like a plague, those words.
"Does it matter, Sloane?" He had all but laid down every last card, yet she was keeping her hand close to her chest with the sternest of poker faces. The Colonel recognized the strategic moves and on purpose, played into them. Otherwise, there was no way for hope in winning this war.
"Yes. Yes, it does." How could he even ask?
She was killing him slowly. Testing him perhaps, because he had kept himself in check when it came to her for all those years. That was one theory. Another theory could be that Sloane McRae was as complex and emotionally feeling as any other woman, a mere fact that could instantly complicate a man's life before he knew he even stepped out of line. Jesus, he could not really find a good answer to her question. "Maybe I've come to realize I'm reaching the end of my tour, and it's time to either sink or swim." She wasn't going to like that simple, clichéd answer, but dammit, it was how he felt. "I'm not getting any younger, Sloane."
It was not a selling point on his part, and Gabriel knew that. Not when she could possibly have some young kid who was a little less worn for the wear in age. When you cut through all the bullshit of what lit a fire under his ass, the bottom line was the same as he had come to think about while locked in that cell. His panic was for a reason and that reason started with him being forty-six years old.
She looked at him curiously, thinking on his words. They might be true - though his age had never been an issue in her eyes - but she didn't buy it, not all of it. There was more. There was something nagging at her since his flabbergasting admission to her, and though she was still unsure what caused it she felt warmer. "You weren't getting any younger last year, Gabe. Or the year before. Why now?" she pushed, hurt that even when she was baring all as he had asked of her, he wouldn't be totally honest with her. She had even shed tears in front of him and he was still holding back on her. This was so fucking typical Gabriel.
She let go of his hand and pulled away, her initial anger at him dropping this bomb on her seeping back in. "I'll tell you what I think... I remember the exact moment when you turned weird on me. I tried explaining it with all sorts of different things but this..." she moved her hand to indicate them both, "this explains it. Whatever I said that day in reference to that pool game at the Beasts made you lock on something, Gabe, and that's when you started circling. From where I stand, we call it jealousy." She pushed herself up and took a few steps beyond him lest she showed him how disgusted that made her feel. Standing behind him, she gave him her back in case he turned toward her.
"So whether or not it's because you're a year older than the last, what really triggered your coming forward with this is my supposed attraction to another man. Why is that? Because he encroached on YOUR territory?" I got news for you, mate, she raged in her mind. I reserved myself as your territory for some time but no more.
She turned back to him, a scowl on her face. "Your so-called love... your feelings for me have been so strong that you could sit on them for over five years but when another bloke waltz in and no-clue-McRae pays attention, then you get moving?" Fuck. She couldn't believe this. Fucking chauvinistic males. She felt like property. MacHayes alright. She hadn't realised before how on the mark the moniker was. The others had really called it as it was, as it had been and as Hayes here still obviously wanted it. He loved her so that he could watch her wither and dry up without him, like a... like a nun, but couldn't bear to see her bloom and happy with someone else? Some love.
Try as he had to show her every last shred of him, not even Gabriel was a saint. He had given her near everything she asked for. Everything that humiliated him and threw him out on the slab for her to chop through like a Civil war bayonet. What had she offered in return, other than his enemy in the form of the words 'loved you once'? He told her all he could, trying to mask a bit of it so it didn't make him come off completely horrible. 'Yes, Sloane. It was nine years instead of five. Yes, Sloane. It took you talking special and new about some man to jolt me awake. Yes, Sloane. I'm an idiot and fool, but I'm here all the same trying to make amends.' He thought silently as she stood and moved away from him. Hayes sat stock still on the floor, unable to move.
Crippled.
She had accepted that he could not abuse his position, and that was nine years ago. Since then, they fell into a comfort level. A routine. He was proud of their work and relationship. Sure. It wasn't Marli, but then again, what could be and why should anything ever ...? But this Rickman. This Gunny Sergeant. It was another rooster in the chicken coop and Gabriel did not like that. Not one fucking 'damn good' bit.
And he wasn't getting any younger. Try as he may to not face reality, his father had him when he was forty-two years old. His mother thirty-eight. In his mind, it seemed perfectly logical that there might be more time. Now it was obvious there was not. Dammit. He didn't even know where he was going with this line of thought and finally brought his gaze up from the floor to meet her eyes. 'I'm sorry' did not seem appropriate. 'You're correct' would only come out in a flared temper snarl from his vocals. Three times he opened his mouth to speak and each time he bit it back because the words coming forth were not productive. His enemy had him cornered yet again, however this time with the firing squad fully armed and there was nothing kind in his will to defend himself.
"Perhaps the Planet Killer jolted me awake." He tried, but knew she didn't want any more of his bullshit, no matter how much it may or may not hold a hint of truth. "What do you want me to say?" His voice horribly controlled, or to say, fighting as much as he could to keep it on some safe plain while it did wobble and teeter on anger. Should he admit it was because of the Gunny or not? Either choice was not good and she already was using every vulnerable word of his against him. Gabriel looked up at her, loosing an internal battle, as he remained squatted on the floor. "You want me to," His voice began to rise and it was hard to rope it back, but he struggled to do so. "say. I'm jealous? Re-state. That I…." Gulping back the words, he could not believe he was reduced to this. Badly he wanted to let his voice fly, but there was no manual to help the Colonel, so Gabriel continued to battle himself. Sloane had chosen to protect herself, like they both always had, only now he had exposed himself and might as well have been standing naked in front of Sloane for her to take pot shots at. She had laid down enough cards to show him that there was no winning here. Not a single card she lay was to comfort or aid in finding some solid ground. He had a two, three, five, six, seven, nine and an Ace. Blacks and reds. A bum hand and there was no re-dealing this deck.
"Re-state that. That I. I. I'm not always. The smartest man." The trapped animal varied its eyes from her face to the memorial plaque on his office wall. Without a weapon or hand-to-hand combat, Sloane McRae was single-handedly slaughtering the Iron Colonel.
Nostrils flaring, she watched him as the pressure in her kept mounting. His pride be damned. He still wasn't talking to her. Really talking. He was just re-serving her the words she had fed him a moment ago. Sitting there on the floor like he was drowning in self-pity... what did he want from her? He expected her to pick up the few words he had given her, piece them together for him and understand what he was trying to tell her? A few words to explain years of silence?
"Damn it, Gabe!" she growled, her voice rising. Her arm slid across his table, sending everything flying. Piles of papers slid and collapsed, books tumbled. The glass fell on its side, spilling its content, and broke under her hand while the pitcher of water took a dive and shattered on the floor. "How about the truth? How about how the fuck you feel?"
How was it that Rickman had been able to communicate it to her in the span of all but one night and Hayes had not in over half a decade? Fuck. She didn't want to compare them. She refused to do that. Her foot connected with the paper basket next to the table in temper before she moved on to kick the innocent chair away from her.
Leaning over the table, she stared at him, ignoring the broken glass biting in her hands. She barely felt it. Enraged, she was, both at him and her. "You're admitting it's jealousy? Why me taking lovers over the years never brought this on, Gabe? I mean one of them was even in quarters next to yours," she specified nastily, her words totally unchecked. Her voice still raised, sounded raw and carried her anguish. The feelings for him she had carefully buried were stirred and it scared the hell out of her. "Why didn't you pick up on them? Of all of them, how could you pick up on HIM meaning anything to me when you couldn't even see I was in love with you?"
The wolf's eyes had snapped to her when she said this, his face going red upon feeling the sword. Gabriel did not want to even think who that might be, over the years. Jesus. His breath caught in his chest and the blood within his veins pounded so much, his arm pulsed under its brace. Her words continued to slay him and try as he may, Hayes did not feel comfortable in continuing to feed her ammo.
Ammo was not further needed, for he sat there watching her go berserk on his things and he did not feel it right to stop her. He deserved this. Damn be his soul, she was wrong and right but there was little he could do about it. Taking the cuts he sat helpless watching Sloane McRae. She moved over to his WWII collection, and began to take out her rage on the carefully displayed field dinning set. An old steel tray, canteen, pot and various other small utensils. He did not have it in him to stop her but Hayes did finally rise.
She turned and knocked the shelf on the wall behind her. When the brackets held, she slid her hand along, pushing its content to the floor in her fury, smearing her blood on the steely grey surface. "Say something!"
In all those years, she had never been content in terms of her love life. Never really on the lookout for one anyway, she had been afraid to open up after losing so many loved ones, but love had come and found her anyway. Hayes. She had fought against it but it had taken hold. But unrequited it had remained, and one can only live so long with that before dying inside a little more each day. It was only recently that she had found some measure of happiness again. Once she had faced her fears and decided to give it a go with Rickman, her other troubles, things not even Hayes knew about, seemed to fade a little. Rickman and her still had a lot to work through but... but now Hayes was rocking the boat.
What could Hayes say really? Her anger and rage were in truth directed at herself. For letting this happen. For not risking her livelihood and career back then to spell it out for him. For letting Rickman into her heart when obviously Hayes was still in there somewhere. Partly, if not all. But enough to rock. the. boat. Enough to make a mess of what she had just started with Rickman.
It was way easier to get angry at Hayes. To blame him for the wasted years and for the uncertainty he was causing in her feelings now than admitting it was her fault and her own stupidity for letting it happen. Yes, she had been foolish. Yes, she had been wrong. About him, about the situation, about his damn feelings. But damn it, so had he!
Her eyes zeroed in on a frame on the wall. A silly gift from her to commemorate his beating of the record in torpedo targeting. Yes, Starfleet had incorporated the MACOs aboard Enterprise enough to have them train with the ship's weapon systems as well as being used as the assault team. And well, Hayes had found his niche; he liked torpedoes very much and was a killer shot. She moved to pick the frame up to smash it.
Sloane screamed at him to say something, but he knew he had already said enough. In his mind he went over the scenario, knowing he told her directly he loved her still. More or less came right out and said yes, he was jealous as fuck. No. He had no idea she bedded down with someone in the next room. Damn Sloane. That should have been him! His eyes had gone red and the battle to remain calm continued, less Gabriel lose his senses like her and let his temper fly. The rage he felt would do harm if unleashed.
Hayes had done enough damage to them both for one evening.
Fingers enclosing around her wrist as his thick voice called out, "Don't." It was not an order and not a plea. Glancing at his vintage gun case, he'd rather her take out her anger on that than the small token of love he cherished. "I told you all I am capable of. I told you how I goddamn feel." Was she so stupid that she had no clue how hard this had been for him? And now she was going to start destroying any proof or sign that she had been connected to him somehow? It did not take long for Gabriel's voice to rise. He did not even realize he started screaming by the time he reached the end of his sentence, "I don't know what else to give you!"
His sudden reaction, one she had been trying to summon, startled her at first and she froze.
With his free hand, Gabriel plucked the small frame, in small bursts his head shook, enraged as he protected the memento from her. "What on destroyed Earth can I possible GIVE you that would satisfy, Sloane?" The wolf snarled, taking a step back because he now had been reduced to the one thing he had violently been trying to control. "I. Don't. Know. What. Else. To. Say. To. Make THIS ANY BETTER!" Looking down at the frame, he wondered if she gave this to him while bedding up in the room next door with some other officer. "I DON'T FUCKING KNOW!" Enraged at the image she planted in his head, Gabriel turned his back to Sloane, gave a primal snarl after drawing back his arm, a wild pitch of the little frame was let loose into a nearby case. Glass from the case and glass from the frame shattered loudly, the circa 1942 enlisted uniform crumpling off its perch and hung half slumped towards her broken plaque on the floor. "YOU WANT TO DESTROY SOMETHING? LET'S DESTROY SOMETHING!!!"
Sloane jumped at the crashing sound and swallowed thickly. Chest heaving, she was rooted in place. So this was what Gabriel Loman Hayes looked like unhinged. He was finally showing her real emotions, uncensored, and she hated him fiercely in that instant for making it so damn hard for her to get at it. Why was he always hiding it? It wasn't his rage she had been looking for, but a sign that he was really burning for her. Why was it so hard to show her that? Words were just words. "Ga--" she started to say, one step taken in his direction...
Out of desperation, out of having no contingency plan to this war, Gabriel did the only action that was left unsaid. He stepped forward to Major McRae, planted his hands on her arms and did as she would have asked years ago: He defiled his position as MACO CO and leaned down to kiss her. A rough, forceful, passionate act as he planted his lips on her mouth.
A gasp of surprise died in her throat. Tensed and unresponsive at first, Sloane soon gave in under his demanding, bruising kiss. To say she hadn't desired this would have been bullshit. To pretend he wasn't making her weak at the knees would have been going along that same line, too. She had yelled for him to show her passion and he was... and, the heavens help her, he had her melting.
Aroused by anger and aroused by her giving in, Gabriel wrapped his arms around Sloane McRae and took her full with his mouth. Held her full while his body reacted favourably to what should have been theirs years ago. He would have her. Gunny was no more and the Colonel would finally have his Major.
A moan left her, speaking of her capitulation, of her repressed need now bubbling back to the surface. Yes, Gabe. His embrace, his hands on her, all that heat… it was shivering that she leaned into him, willing and responsive. Until some sense seeped back into her.
"Nnn-no..." Her mouth struggled to get the word out around him as her hands found his shoulders to push him off. "Nn-not like this," she sobbed. It felt tainted, like payback, like he wished to hurt her back for all she had said – or hadn't.
Ripped from their attachment, Gabriel stood there in shock, exposed and almost breathless. What just happened?
She did it. She really said those words and did it. Her choice was obvious, final and he was flabbergasted, wandering around part of the table in pained humility with a crooked smile on his horrified face. Sloane McRae had chosen Gunny Sgt. Rickman and all the strewn pieces fell into place as the thick bell of reality sounded to hit him in the head.
Turning, Gabriel faced her, looking nothing short of a mad man. ”Get out of here…” his voice still shocked and soft. When she didn’t make a move fast enough, he added, “GET OUT OF HERE!" The animal warned in loud voice, for she sent him over the edge and remaining in control was no longer a possibility. Taking a step towards her, his table between them, he brought both fists down in a primal warning, the bang sending pain through his body, his bad arm screaming and the sound causing the large wooden unit to creak and moan. Something wet touched his cheeks, but in his rage, he hardly noticed.
He made her jump again and this time she took a step back. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she witnessed what she had driven him at. It was tearing her apart. "God, Gabe..." she let out, wracked by sobs. She could still feel him, his touch… she could still taste him.
"GETOUT!" Gabriel could not take anymore of her kicking him down. Torturing him. He was no saint and her comments meant to hurt did exactly that.
Sloane had succeeded in her kill.
The harshness of his tone and the bite of his words took another chunk out of her heart but she stood fast. "No." A meek little voice in all that storm. "Not yet."
"GETTHEHELL OUT OF HERE!" When she hesitated, Hayes screamed, "THAT'S A GOD. DAMN. ORDER!" Gabriel was driven out of his mind.
"Then you'll have to throw me into the brig, COLONEL!" she snapped back. "You started this... you're the one who wanted to talk about it... let me finish."
She had walked away once when he had dismissed her in a similar fashion, she would be damned if she did that mistake again. If they had talked about this that day, things might be different now. She wiped her face with the back of her hand before crossing her arms over her chest. Blood dribbled on her sleeves but she paid it no attention. No, all of her was on Gabriel.
Fighting every fibre of his nerves, Gabriel stood there, not wiping his face, looking at her. He didn't say 'yes', but he wasn't screaming at the moment. The look on his face border lined that he was going to lose it again. And soon. Right now, he hated Sloane McRae. Hated her for giving into a kiss only to fucking push him away once more tonight. Her games… they ended now in his mind. He was through.
She looked at him a moment, his stare another lash on her raw nerves, and nodded, taking his silence as an acquiescence. "Gabe..." She paused, quite sure that he was just humouring her and wouldn't really listen. To hell with it. She would say it now or never broach that subject with him again. If this was to be their last ever talk, she wanted him to know.
"Gabe, I never meant to hurt you... the stuff I said... shit, I was lashing out. There were only two." In ten goddamned years. She knew this had to have stung immensely so she started with that. "One you might have known, he was 'Fleet. The other wasn't even on this ship."
"I don't want to hear this FUCKING SHIT." The words were terse between clenched teeth. His fist balled up ready to strike.
Her eyes crossed his and she shook her head. He hated her. But she pushed on, trying to stop the sobs strangling her throat. "Don't... don't tell me you never had anyone. I knew you did..." Every time. She dropped her head, the sharp pain of those memories still very much alive now that he had unearthed these feelings, turning her upside down and inside out in the process.
"I. Did." The two words were raw in his throat, and as Gabriel worked to calm himself, he looked down at her in his rigid stance with both hands at his sides; fighting to not grab her and throw her out of his office. She was right on one thing: Hayes said he wanted to 'talk', so he must lie in this fucked up bed he made.
The kiss fucked him over and fucked him up. Air was in the room, but he couldn’t mentally breathe. Couldn’t think. So clouded with the scent of her body and the memory of the warm kiss, he couldn’t fucking think straight. Damn her for that.
She had not meant for any of it to go this way. She had wanted answers; not hurt him. She had wanted him to open up... prove to her that he could. How could he possibly expect her to drop everything and welcome him with open arms just because his old age had given him a kick in the butt? Why wait until there was someone else? Jealousy had woken him up, he claimed, but she still wondered if it wasn't just the alpha male in him unable to stand a younger man around his... well, what he apparently considered his woman.
"I'm puzzled... I'm confused as to what you expected. I mean, you know there's someone else..." God, this hurt, every damn word. It hurt her to say them just like she knew it hurt him to hear them. "You want to know if... if there's a chance of finding this love for you again..." She shook with another wave of sobs, feeling like she was betraying Derick. Hell, she was. "Truth is that it's still here," she said, tapping her chest. "I mean, I ignore it and I bury it... but you..." She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall behind, her head bumping the damn shelf. She barely blinked and shifted. "The real question is whether I want to or not."
Gabriel's eyes softened slightly, wondering if this was hope or another baiting trap. 'Truth is that it's still here.' She said.
The want for her to leave was still in him, countered by the will to comfort the tears. Gabriel could say nothing as she spoke to him; merely stand there like a statue as his red eyes opened wide to fight against himself. Anger fuelled him and he kept himself semi-composed, listening to each goddamn biting word. Why shove hope once more down his throat, biting like a fish to be tossed back into the lake? Sloane wasn't even making sense to him at times, but that didn't seem to matter for logic had long left the room. He wasn't calm, but Hayes was no longer yelling. "What 'but me'. I don't ignore feelings and choose to accept them being dormant because it is part of the job. That is my guilt?” God, let them fix this and go back to kissing. “You on the other hand have them buried, but they still exist?" Wasn't that what she had been punishing him on this entire time? His head was spinning from her; wounded and near flat lined.
She swallowed with difficulty. "Because it is part of the job? I never said I was any smarter than you... Gabe, I did what I had to do to be able to cope. Seven years ago, I was ready to leave the MACO... to walk out so we could be together - if I'd only gotten a sign that you could possibly love me... would want me." She glanced away, taking a shuddering breath.
No. His throat hitched as he listened to her. Did Sloane McRae just tell him that she would have left the.... As in a retire.... The room lurched and if he thought he felt sick when Mesu told him he was grounded, that was nothing compared to the knowing you had it all but gambled it away frivolously like an uneducated fool. Gabriel couldn’t talk and stood listening to her.