Work Text:
Mission Control had picked a hell of a place to put them up this time. One thing good about it, Miller thought dryly: there was very little chance anyone would find them. In order for that to happen someone would have to willingly book a night here, and he was pretty sure the last time that'd happened was a decade and a half ago at minimum.
The hotel itself was a squat, grim building, its exterior marked with mildew and water stains, and the rooms somehow managed to be even worse than what first impressions promised. The sheets smelled like cigarette smoke. The wallpaper was scratched and peeling in long, yellowing strips. The television was a model so old it still had a black plastic border around the glass, and Miller stared resolutely at the grainy picture onscreen, trying to pretend he was doing anything other than listening to the sound of the shower.
He was sitting on the edge of the room's singular bed. It wasn't a problem that they'd ended up with only one; he and Adam were both professionals, and there was no reason they couldn't split it, and—
Miller sighed, cutting off his own train of thought. He had to admit, to himself if no one else, that when it came to Adam he'd crossed the lines of professionalism a long, long ways back.
It would be easier if they didn't work so well together. If Miller weren't so desperate to get back out into the field. If Adam were anyone else, anyone less fascinating and infuriating in equal measure.
And it would probably be easier, too, if he could force himself to starting thinking of him as Jensen once more instead of just plain Adam.
"Fuck," Miller murmured under his breath.
He'd told himself he had it under control. And then there'd been their latest mission. The massive shrapnel round through Adam's unguarded hip as he pushed Miller to safety, burying itself right in the exposed gap below his tac-vest; the way his face had gone pale and drawn as blood poured from the wound; the relief Miller'd felt as he watched the wound start to knit back together—
The way Adam's mouth had felt on his, when, drunk on adrenaline and relief and the dizzying high of a mission accomplished, Miller leaned in and kissed him.
Miller could still taste Adam's lips on his. Could still recall, with perfect clarity, the cold, shocked expression on Adam's face when Miller had come to his senses and pulled back.
And any second now Adam was going to step out of the shower, and he'd say... what?
I'm sorry, maybe. It was a mistake. I promise it won't happen again.
All of those were true. He was sorry, and he had made a mistake, and he would make sure he never fucked up like that again. But he couldn't pretend it hadn't meant anything—and, as observant as Adam was, there wasn't a chance in hell he hadn't noticed.
The sound of running water cut off abruptly. Miller winced; so much for having a plan. He'd stewed over this the whole ride back to their room, and he was still no closer to coming up with a plan for how to deal with this that wasn't hoping Adam would be willing to politely ignore the way his commanding officer was embarrassingly, pathetically head-over-heels for him.
Forty-nine was too goddamn old to be acting like this. And yet here was.
The door squealed on its hinges as it opened. Miller turned to look at Adam, and then just as quickly ducked his head away to stare resolutely at the TV again, his face burning.
Now that just wasn't playing fair.
Adam had come out of the bathroom wearing nothing but an off-white, threadbare towel slung low over his hips. In the second Miller'd had to look, he'd caught enough that he knew exactly what his mind would end up drifting to the next time he got stuck in one of Manderley's interminable meetings: Adam's smooth, clean-shaven chest, every muscle starkly defined; the drops of water clinging to his shoulders, catching in the places where skin met metal; the smooth, sleek lines of his hips and groin.
For a long, long moment, neither of them spoke. Miller was looking at nothing but the TV, pretending the news anchor's story about a fallen telephone line two towns over was the most enrapturing thing he'd ever heard in his life, and waiting for Adam to grab his clothes and duck back into the bathroom. Adam, though, didn't move—he stood there, shifting in place with an awkwardness that was very nearly audible, and then finally he cleared his throat.
"Boss," he said, "I—could you..." A pause. He sighed. "I could use some help, if you've got a minute."
Against his better judgment, Miller glanced over. Adam's body was.... still very present. His face, beneath the scruff of his beard, looked every bit as red as Miller's had to be right now.
"Of course," Miller said. "What's the problem?"
If anything, the request was a comfort; it cleared away some of the awkwardness, snapped him back into the mindset he kept on the field. Adam wouldn't be asking if he didn't genuinely need help, and so long as Miller was making himself useful he didn't have to swell on what he'd done earlier today.
"It's the bullet. From earlier. It fragmented and there's shrapnel stuck. I was trying to dig it out myself, in the shower, but"—he shrugged—"I can't get it from this angle."
"Your Sentinel won't take care of it?"
Adam grimaced. "It's already healed the skin around the pieces. The Sentinel will work the pieces out eventually, but they end up with pockets of infection around them if I leave them in. It's something the Sentinel can't do much about. And... I'd rather not leave it to TF29 staff, if I can avoid it."
It felt strange, honestly, just how quickly it had become normal to hear Adam talk about his own body this way: in terms of tech and specs and maintenance, what the augmented pieces of himself could do better than any flesh-and-blood equivalent and what odd, unexpected flaws they had. He'd been so reticent about it for so very long, but these duo missions of theirs seemed to act almost as some sort of trigger, making him finally willing to treat it no differently than explaining a piece of gear in his weapons kit.
"All right," Miller sighed, ready to resign himself to misery. "I can help. Just show me where you need me to cut."
Not that he didn't already have a clue, of course: that bullet, and the way relief became panic as he turned towards Adam and saw blood, would be burned into his mind for a long time to come. Barely three hours ago he'd kissed Adam, and now Adam needed him to run his hands along his bare skin, cut him open, dig into his flesh. He had a real talent for picking the worst possible timing for everything, didn't he?
At least now it made sense why Adam hadn't dressed yet. Not that it left Miller any less hyper-aware of Adam's presence in the room.
Miller followed Adam back to the bathroom, carefully looking anywhere but his bare skin. The bathroom wasn't any less cheap and miserable than the rest of the hotel room: the mirror was cracked, with shards barely hanging to the spider-webbed edges of it; the tiles underfoot felt scuffed and worn down; and the light overhead hummed and flickered and glowed a dim, miserable yellow. But at least taking care of it here meant they wouldn't have to worry about leaving bloodstains on the carpet.
Miller perched on the edge of the bathtub, letting Adam brace himself against the sink set off-kilter into water-stained plaster. There was a cast-off nanoblade lying in the sink, one end of it already tipped with blood, and Adam wrapped a hand towel around the other end before handing it over to Miller.
Made sense. He couldn't have asked for a sharper blade than this.
Digging out shrapnel wasn't a pleasant task, but it also wasn't anything too grotesque; between the blisters and the sunburn and the biting insects, he'd much more unpleasant things just about every day back when he was with TAG. A little blood was nothing. He could do this.
And then Adam let the towel around his waist drop, and filled Miller's head with a whole new set of images he was going to have to fight not to remember.
The marks... Miller shook his head, scowling, and forced himself to focus. There were a series of rough-edged, already-healing lines carved into the skin near the back of Adam's Adam's hip, just above the point where his leg augments gave way to skin. The bullet had made it surprisingly far in, from the looks of it, or else his augments had made it shatter more aggressively than it otherwise might have.
It shouldn't have surprised him to see the wounds—Adam had said he'd made a go of removing them himself—but something about the depth and the intensity of them made a shiver crawl down his spine. The gouges looked almost angry, more like Adam had hacked at the skin there than made any attempt at care or precision.
Miller frowned. Before he could stop himself, he reached out with a bare hand and traced a finger along the marks. Adam sucked in a breath, and Miller just as quickly pulled his hand back.
"Sorry," he said. For lack of anything better to say, he added, "You could've called me in sooner. You did a number on yourself."
"I'll heal."
True enough. Just about any wound would, on Adam. That didn't mean Miller had to like seeing him hurt.
More gently, this time, he took stock of the outline of the wounds. Adam once more made a quiet noise when Miller touched him, but this time it sounded less pained, so hopefully it was all right. It would have to be, he supposed; one way or another he'd have to touch him for this to work.
Miller could feel lumps beneath the skin in three places, each of them close to the old augmentation scar tissue. He had a better angle than Adam to do this, but he'd still have to work carefully if he didn't want to leave a much worse mess than before.
"Okay," he said. "I'll start with the smallest."
"Fine by me." Adam met his gaze in the cracked mirror. His lenses were retracted, the way he normally wore them when they were alone these days, but Miller couldn't read his expression. "I trust you."
Miller scoffed, trying not to focus on the way the words lit his chest up. "Like hell you do. I've never met anyone more insubordinate in my life."
That, thank god, finally managed to coax a smile out of Adam. It was a small, crooked thing, half-hidden, but Miller was desperately glad to see it.
"I didn't say I listened to you, I said I trusted you. Those are two different things."
"Right. So, next mission we're on, if I say you should listen to me, you'll trust me on that?"
Adam's smile grew. "You can try it," he said, which meant no—but didn't, crucially, mean that Adam wanted to avoid future missions together. Miller hadn't realized how much of a weight that worry had been until it suddenly lifted.
He breathed in, the stale hotel air better than any summer breeze, and returned Adam's smile. His thumb found the smallest piece of shrapnel and stroked over it again and again with barely any input from his brain.
"All right," he said, "then, here, let me..."
Letting Adam tense up would only make his job harder; Miller dug in with the nanoblade before he finished the end of his sentence, catching him by surprise. Adam hissed and dug his hands into the sink so hard that crumbles of porcelain dust fell to the bathroom tile, muttering a bitten-off fuck under his breath.
"Sorry."
"No. It's fine." Adam breathed, his hands slowly relaxing. "It doesn't hurt much after the first cut."
"Mm." That hadn't been the case for any of Miller's army buddies, back when he'd had to do this for them, but if the Sentinel was making this less painful for Adam Miller sure as hell wasn't going to complain.
It was easy, after that, to get into the rhythm of this strange work: he swabbed up the blood with the edge of the towel before it could drip down to the floor, widened the cut a little more with the nanoblade, and then got to work carefully squeezing the bullet fragment out, taking care all the while to keep his eyes from wandering anywhere but the neat-edged wound.
The first, smallest shard was also the closest to the surface, and popped out after barely any effort. The second emerged more slowly, Adam wincing once more as Miller finally managed to slide it free of the tissue that had already grown around it. The third, despite being largest, was the most stubborn. Miller worked slowly, changing his approach whenever he heard Adam make a noise under his breath, doing everything he could to avoid the scars and the metal and the patches of wire mesh woven into his skin in unexpected places, everything that made Adam's body a minefield to do this kind of field surgery on.
Adam was a quiet, solid presence standing there, as much a concrete wall as a human being, and that was part of the problem—it was far too easy for Miller to let his mind wander like this, let himself circle back again and again to the feeling of a rough beard against his face, firm lips against his own, and the way his stomach had sunk right through his body when he realized what exactly he'd just done.
He needed to apologize. Not now, of course; later, when they were both clothed and in slightly less intense proximity, when they weren't trapped in a bathroom together with Adam bleeding steadily onto Miller's hands as he dug around inside his body.
Not now, not now—but the guilt grew and grew with every second that ticked by, with every press of the nanoblade, with every drop of Adam's blood. The only reason there was any need to dig this bullet out now was because Adam had made the split-second decision to jump in front of it for him, and Miller had repaid him with... this. An abuse of his position, and of the easy trust Adam had in him.
Finally, with one last careful movement, Miller squeezing the skin where he'd trapped it gently between his fingers, the final piece of shrapnel dropped with a bloody, metallic clatter to the tile. It left a red halo splatter where it landed, like the outline of an explosion.
"Ah," Adam said, rolling his shoulders. "Huh, I felt that one. Is that all of it?"
It was. He was done here. All he needed to do was say yes, stand up, leave the room—
"Jensen," Miller sighed. "I. No. Adam."
He was already kicking himself for speaking up, and the moment the name crossed his lips he wanted to kick himself harder. Keeping this impersonal was so much safer.
But the name, at least, caught Adam's attention; he glanced over his shoulder at him, concern in his eyes. "Something wrong?"
"No, I got it all. I just wanted to apologize to you. For my... actions, earlier today."
"Ah." Adam went still. He clutched tighter at the sink as his expression grew cold and flat. "Right. Your actions."
"It was a mistake—"
"Right." His hands dug in, hard enough that for a second Miller was worried it might shatter. There was real, genuine anger in his voice, barely restrained. "Look. I know it was a mistake, I know it didn't mean anything. Can we skip this conversation? I don't need—" He clenched his jaw and cut himself off with a shake of his head.
The words he was using, his tone... Miller felt his balance shifting. All along he'd thought he knew exactly where this conversation was inevitably headed: what Adam would feel, the kind of apology he would need to make.But Adam's unhappiness didn't sound like the anger of a man whose boss had betrayed him. He sounded more like a wounded animal, lashing out wildly, waiting for Miller to drive the knife home and twist it.
"Wait," Miller said, "Adam—"
Adam let go of the sink, then turned towards the bathroom door. He couldn't go far, not like this, but all the same Don't let him leave was the only thing Miller could think.
He'd misjudged this. Badly. And if he didn't fix it now, he'd regret it.
Miller stood and grabbed Adam's arm. The metal was smooth, warm to the touch; Adam could've broken his wrist in three places the moment he took hold of him, but instead he froze in place.
"You just said you trusted me. I'm asking you to hear me out."
The mirror caught Adam in side profile, its cracked reflection enough for Miller to see the frown that passed across his face. With a heavy sigh, Adam ran the hand that Miller wasn't clutching down his face.
"I said I trusted you. Not that I'd listen."
"I know. But I need both. For thirty seconds, that's all."
Adam turned.
God, he was gorgeous. It was deeply unfair that any man should look like he did. Just for a moment, Miller let his gaze flick up and down his body, taking in every detail he could.
That, though, only made Adam cross his arms over his chest, his scowl deepening. "Look. I'm not..." He grimaced. "I'm sorry. I'm making this all worse. It's not you I'm angry with."
"You'd be well within your rights to be angry with me."
Adam shook his head. "I'm not going to hold you to half a second that happened while you thought we were going to die. I know it was a mistake. And I know this"—he gestured down at himself, the quick, jerky gesture summarizing every mechanical part of his body—"is... a lot. After what happened, I should've just left the shrapnel for the TF29 medics. So. I'm sorry."
The final piece Miller had needed slotted into place. He'd kissed Adam, so desperately he bowled them both over—and then he'd pulled away quickly enough to give whiplash. He'd gone cold and standoffish from the moment it was done, avoiding looking in Adam's direction so desperately that there was no chance it could be anything but deliberate.
A mistake, he said, like he'd thought Miller was disgusted by it all.
He'd been so sure of Adam's ability to read him, he hadn't thought for a moment what signals he was actually sending.
"It was a mistake," Miller said, "because it was inappropriate of me. Not because I didn't want to do it." Not because I don't want you.
The next words took more willpower than he'd ever thought he could summon; he forced them out all at once, refusing to let himself trip over what he wanted to say. "It's stupid and irresponsible of me, but—if you asked me to, I'd do more than that right here."
Adam's eyes had gone wide. He was staring at him very, very intently.
"All right," he said."All right." He swallowed. "And if I'm asking?"
Miller grabbed his face, pulled him in and kissed him.
He took two steps forward, pushing Adam's back into the stained wall, barely sure what to focus on first. He wanted to touch every inch of Adam's skin, wring noises from his throat, see what exactly he looked like when he was too far gone to keep control of his expression.
"Fuck," Adam gasped into his mouth, his fingers curling into Miller's shirt.
This... this was still a mistake. Still nothing he should have let himself do. The Jim Miller of a year ago would be horrified if he see this: betraying his position in TF29 on a whim so he could fuck his own field agent in a grim, dingy hotel room, utterly unable to make himself regret a single second of what he had chosen to do.
And god, he couldn't regret this. Not when Adam was so much more responsive than he could have ever dreamed—arching into every touch like he'd never felt another person's hands on him before, rocking his body against Miller's like he'd die without the contact, trying and failing to swallow the noises he was making. It seemed like it was only a few seconds before he was hard enough he had to be aching, his erection pressed desperately against Miller where they were joined.
Not that he was any more composed. He was matching Adam beat for beat, running his hands across his body with desperate abandon. It felt as though the very fact of finally being able to do this had left him drunk, as uncoordinated and needy as if this was his first time all over again.
He wanted his clothes off. Enough, at least, that he could feel Adam's body against him properly. Adam helped him as he grabbed awkwardly at his own clothing, pulling his shirt off over his head and dropping it to the tile. He pressed a hand to the front of Miller's pants to feel the outline of his erection there, making Miller groan, and then hesitated.
"If you want, I could..." he said, dropping his gaze to the floor.
Miller understood in a second what he meant, and the mental image—Adam on his knees, mouth wrapped around his cock—was enough to send another pang of desire through him. But that would mean losing out on touching him, and right now there was no question what Miller wanted most.
"Later. For now, let me take care of it," he said instead, kissing him again.
He unbuttoned his pants, sliding them just low enough over his hips that he could easily free his already-hard cock, and then he spat in his palm and leaned into Adam so he could wrap his hand around both their cocks.
And fuck, the noise Adam made then—deep and desperate, like even just the feeling of a hand against him was something rare and new. Miller stroked them off roughly, flicking his thumb over the heads before pressing their shafts closer together as he stroked them both, embarrassed by just how close this alone was getting him, and how quickly.
It was Adam who came first, though, spilling himself across Miller's hand with a harsh, bitten-off noise, and the moment he felt Adam sag against him there was no helping him; he followed Adam barely a few seconds later, gasping as he came, and then stumbled so hard he might have fallen over if Adam hadn't caught him and guided them both back against the wall.
Reality began to seep back in around the edges. He was standing in a grim hotel room, pressed tight against Adam, come drying tacky across both their bodies.
Jim waited for the regret to come pouring back in, but it failed to show itself. One thing he wasn't changing his mind about: his loyalty to Adam was worth more than his loyalty to the organization whose highers ups had almost certainly once left him to die.
This was going to be a problem. And it was especially going to be a problem if someone found out. But, fuck, at this point he couldn't bring himself to care about anything but the feeling of a warm, muscled body tucked against him, augmented arms looped loosely around his shoulders and a beard tickling his skin.
"Well," Adam said. "Wasn't expecting that."
"I can't say I was either."
There were things he could say right now about discretion, about caution, about what next time had to look like to keep them both safe. But for a few moments longer, he was content to stay like this: skin to skin, breathing quietly against Adam's shoulder, holding the future at bay by sheer force of will.
Something good had happened today. Something had finally gone right. He was going to hold onto that—onto Adam—for as long as he possibly could.