Super Crush (BxB)

Amiss and Hugs (S2)

"There's gotta be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this."

Clay. Way more optimistic than me. I have a hard time meeting his gaze as we sit facing each other on our flight back from Barcelona. We sit in silence most of the way as I let my thoughts run wild like a monkey driving a moped through busy city streets.

If this news is true, that my own dad is part of this Cloud 10 plot, then I am not the only one in the crossfires this time. Dad has essentially taken Clay and Abe in as his own. If he is harboring dark secrets, then me and the boys are in trouble.

I feel queasy. I am sure Clay can feel my vibes.

"Hey," he rests his big hand on my knee. "We will figure this out. But in the meantime, we have to stick together on this."

My hand covers his and I give it a few pats. Our eyes meet. I take a deep breath and try to let Clay's words ease my mind. Somehow our fingers intertwine. Part of me knows this is bending boundaries, but it is in the name of workplace anxiety control. 

My mind starts to defog. The warmth of his touch begins to soothe the crazy monkey-mobile beeping it's little scooter horn in my mind.

Yeah. Maybe Tiptoe's intel is wrong or her wires got crossed or something. It doesn't make sense that he would give Abe and Clay asylum just to turn on them or sell them out.

My eyes catch the laceration across Clay's right pec from the gunshots on Las Ramblas. A needed distraction. Clay doesn't say anything but I can feel his eyes on me as I reach out and move some of the fabric of his uniform to see the damage. He softly sighs when my cold hands touch his skin. I retract my hand quickly realizing my one hand mingled with his and my other touching his chest is all a bit more intimate than I intended.

"Do we have a care kit on board, Crafty?" I ask aloud.

"Cancl command. I'm fine. It is already starting to heal. I'll have your dad check it out when we get back," Clay gives me his half-smile and a final squeeze of my hand before letting go. "Crafty, what's our ETA?"

"Approaching headquarters in t-minus eight minutes," the aircraft robot announces.

"Crafty, alert The Boss of our arrival," Clay says without taking his eyes off of me.

A bah-donk sound of a system error chimes over the load speaker.

"Communications with HQ seem to be down, Agent Mason. Would you like me to try again?"

Clay's brow dips. "No, Crafty. Notify Agent Welder instead."

The same sound effect plays.

"It seems that Agent Welder's comms are offline also."

Clay stands and turns his attention toward the dash. Instinctively, I stand and move beside him.

"Everything okay?" I ask. Not wanting our physical nearness to end, I scoot my shoulder against his.

"No, and yes," Clay replies.

My queasiness is back. The furry Vespa capuchin in my head smiles a wily grin as he zigzags through rush hour traffic. My heartbeat quickens.

Why isn't Dad or Abe responding?

Clay presses a few buttons on the control panel.

Are we walking into something bad?

He rubs his stubbly chin and lets out a "hmmm."

Is this what Tiptoe was referring to?

He turns to look at me. My face must give me my concerns away. My giant drapes his right arm up and over my shoulder and pulls me into him. My head rests on his muscular chest.

"Hey," his tone is soft and cool. "Relax, okay. I am sorry. Didn't mean to be cryptic just now. The communications in the ship are down, which is weird. And the remote guidance from HQ is disconnected. All other systems are fine. Not to creep you out, but Crafty has been on autopilot this whole time. It seems like comms and guidance have been down since we left Barcelona. I am not sure why, but we are fine. It could be the bunker and it's outdated tech or this crappy hand-me-down aircraft."

Crafty clears its AI throat to remind us it heard that.

"Sorry," Clay says with a chuckle. This brings a little smile to my face.

"I am sure something has just gone out momentarily or the system needs to be rebooted. But no need to worry. Crafty knows how to land."

My stomach jumps, but this time because we are descending into headquarters.

"Carfty, run stealth mode," Clay requests.

The statement says that he does have enough concern about the situation as to not roll into home base without taking proper precautions. I feel both relieved and validated.

In a blip, we cross the threshold of the soccer field and plunge into the dim innards of the underground hangar. With a soft bump, Crafty lands and we turn toward the rear bay exit ramp.

Whether he means to or not, Clay steps in front of me so he is the first to exit the aircraft. His walk is slow as he scans both ends of the hangar. He lets me catch up to walk beside him as we notice nothing seems to be out of place. However, there is an eerie silence in the place that is only offset by the quiet padding of our careful footsteps.

Just as we reach the garage doorway to the main hall, a figure takes the corner and steps into our path. I jump and the jump scare catches Clay by surprise also. With a guarded sweep behind him, he maneuvers me to his six and I see stone ripple across his bare arms.

"Ayy!" the interaction catches the other guy off guard because I see an immediate red glow light up on the other side of Clay.

"What the hell, Rocky?!" It's Abe.

I see the crimson light fade, and Clay's skin goes back to its perfectly tanned complexion. The two bro hug as a way to show that hostility was a misjudgment and all is coposetic between them.

"Sorry, Abe. We are a little on edge."

My blond friend looks to his comm watch. "Did you guys come in ninja mode? You didn't pop up on the radar and the security system didn't alert us you were here."

"Something strange happened when we met up with the POI, whose identity you will never guess, and she told us some shit that blew my mind. Then on the way back, we couldn't get a hold of anyone back here at HQ. We tried my Dad and you and that's when Clay went into safety mode." I jump in and start rambling.

I must have "I need a hug" tattooed on my forehead because this time Abe pulls me into his tight embrace.

"It's all good, buddy. Everything is fine here," he nuzzles my hair with his chin.

Abe feels nice. Comfortable. I could nap here in his arms. I am about to let the last of my apprehension go when I catch the tail end of a nonverbal conversation going on between him and Clay. They are staring and head-nodding at each other as to say that something is amiss.

"Ahh, what's going on?" I ask, taking a step back from Abe.

"Noah," Clay says. It's my name but he is really saying, "Stay calm with what I am about to tell you."

I take a few more steps back from the pair. Their expressions shout guilt and embarrassment. I am starting to get mad and they haven't even told me what the fuck is going on yet.

"Noah, we need to tell you something. We've been trying to tell you something," Abe says stepping toward me.

My skin starts buzzing like it did when my ghost glass suit phased the bullets through me at the market.

"Noah! You're...you're here," a familiar face comes from my left out of the kitchen area.

I turn in horror-movie-slow-motion.

There standing just yards from me in my previously dead dad's secret hideout on an island in the Italian Mediterranean is –

"Mom!?"

She forces a smile and says, "Look, honey, I got my nails done!"