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Lipton knew who Speirs was, of course. He knew even before the stories started getting around, because there was only one winged man in the battalion. Lipton wouldn't have been be surprised if there was only one in all of the Airborne, though surely there had to be at least one other in the rest of the army. Somewhere.
But here, there was only Speirs. Attitudes were changing quickly; in fifteen or twenty years the winged folks will probably be a frequent, if not common, sight, but Speirs was twenty-five, a grown man. When he was born, amputating the wings at birth was still standard procedure. It made the sight of Speirs startling, the wings jutting up above his shoulders, too thick and ruffled to ever be mistaken for the butt of a weapon.
It was impossible not to wonder about them whenever Lipton saw Speirs on the line. Did they work? Could he fly? How did he get them through his clothes? Did they ever catch on doors? Had he been shot in one? Did it hurt? Why were they always so rough and uneven? Bird wings never looked like that.
Lipton never figured he'd learn the answers, though, and he did his best to put the questions out of his mind, especially when he occasionally spoke to Speirs. The man's gaze was hard and cold, and there was something slightly wild about him, like maybe he'd gone totally nuts under that impassive expression. Lipton didn't think he'd take kindly to questioning on such a personal and irrelevant subject.
After Foy, it was different. For Lipton, at least. Never mind the wings, never mind the stories. Speirs saved all of their asses. Lipton had almost forgotten his questions when he knocked on the door of the room Speirs had taken for his quarters and opened it to find the man straddling a chair backwards, his shirt cast aside, scrubbing down between his wings with some sort of long handled tool.
Lipton stopped in the doorway and blinked. Speirs paused, then went back to scrubbing with an almost aggressive unselfconsciousness. Incongruously, a small black feather floated up over his shoulder on a gust of air.
After a moment Lipton mentally shook himself and started summarizing the report he'd brought. He wouldn't have thought anything of walking in on a superior officer shaving, after all. But Speirs kept grimacing, and more feathers came loose and drifted slowly to the floor and-- "Doesn't that hurt?" Lipton heard himself ask, interrupting his own train of thought.
Speirs shot him a hard glance. "Yes. But so does having something caught in the feathers." He went back to scrubbing, then almost immediately grunted harshly. A rather large feather drifted to the floor.
This was ridiculous. "Can I help?" Lipton asked, already stepping into the room and setting his report on a side table.
"Help?" Speirs paused. "How?"
Lipton managed a wry look instead of rolling his eyes. "I'm pretty sure it's easier to pick a knot loose with fingers than with a brush."
Speirs eyed him for a long moment before setting the brush aside and jerking his head to indicate Lipton should come around behind him. Circling around to get a good look, Lipton couldn't restrain a wince. The feathers a few inches up from the base of Speirs' right wing were matted with something tarry, and several of them looked singed. There was no way a brush would get that out; he wondered how long Speirs had been trying.
"This isn't going to come out easy," Lipton said. He looked around and pulled up a chair for himself. Close up, the burnt feathers smelled acrid. "You have a comb you don't mind me dirtying up?"
"Shaving kit," Speirs said shortly.
Lipton found the comb, then retrieved a small pair of scissors as well. He set the tools close at hand and leaned in to examine the tangle. The feathers were stiff and dry against his fingertips, rustling softly as he moved them around. The skin they were anchored in was red and irritated. "Okay, here we go," Lipton said, and set to work.
The tarry stuff, whatever it was, didn't want to come out. After a few minutes, Lipton looked around for something, anything, that might help, and spotted a large bottle of oil tucked in next to the shaving kit. Raising his eyebrows, Lipton shrugged to himself and gave it a try. The feathers softened under his fingers and the tarry clot thinned out just enough, though Lipton still had to cut a feather or two. Speirs didn't seem to feel the snips. He just leaned on his arms, crossed over the back of the chair, and let Lipton work in silence.
When the knot was cleared and the feathers--dark brown and not black, as Lipton had thought--lay smooth and shining against the arching bone of Speirs' wing, it seemed strange that the surrounding feathers should be so dull and unevenly clumped. So Lipton kept going, using comb and fingers to make them lie side by side and smoothing out the clumping so that each feather looked whole and unbroken. There was still some of the oil on his fingers when he started working and the feathers looked and felt nicer when it rubbed off on them, so he used that too. With nothing more than dirt and twigs tangling the feathers it went quickly, and soon every feather within Lipton's reach was gleaming.
He started to move his chair to better reach the rest of Speirs' right wing, and that's when he realized that he'd gone a fair bit beyond helping with a tangle. Lipton cleared his throat. "Sir?"
"Hmmm?" Speirs shifted his wing, stretching it out in front of himself a bit so that he could look over his shoulder at Lipton. His dark eyes were half-lidded, features relaxed as if Lipton had woken him out of a nap.
Lipton had been going to say that he was done, but when he opened his mouth what came out was, "Should I finish?" He gestured at the expanse of wing Speirs had stretched out.
Speirs blinked and seemed to come awake, straightening up. "You have better things to do, Lieutenant."
He wasn't technically a Lieutenant yet, but Speirs had been calling him that since Foy, so Lipton didn't argue. "I don't mind," he said quietly. Speirs just looked at him and Lipton shrugged. "It's satisfying, making them line up right."
Speirs chuckled, but lifted his wing a little and let Lipton arrange himself and the chair before laying it practically across his lap. "Some would say that says something about you, Lip."
"Maybe." Lipton bent to work on the feathers. "But that something doesn't have to be bad. Have you been using that brush on the whole wing?"
Speirs' shrug transmitted down the entire length of the wing, shivering the feathers under Lipton's hands. "It's faster."
"What is it?"
"A molting brush."
Lipton winced and looked up at Speirs. "I'm no expert, but that can't be good for them."
Speirs' gaze was wry. "It's not like I'm using them for anything."
"Do they not work, then?" Lipton asked, reluctantly returning his gaze to the feathers. Fixing them up without looking didn't work all that well.
"They worked when I was seven. I haven't used them since then, but I imagine they would if I exercised them properly."
"Why don't you?" Lipton asked absently.
"You only need to get shot down once before learning that lesson."
Horrified, Lipton looked up into resigned eyes. "Shot down? A seven year old?"
Speirs gaze was matter-of-fact. "A seven year old freak. Hardly even human. Couldn't let a monster like that frighten the other kids."
Lipton shook his head and found himself petting the feathers under his hand. "I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize," Speirs said. He held Lipton's eyes, his gaze intense but not cold. Not empty. "I think you missed a spot."
A smiled curled the corner of Lipton's mouth. He still had a third of this wing and better than half of the other to go. But he didn't said anything, just bent back to work with careful fingers.
An hour later, every dark feather lay shining warmly, perfectly aligned with its neighbors, and Speirs sat slumped over the back of his chair, fast asleep. Lipton woke him carefully and found himself watching, captivated, as Speirs drew his wings into their familiar positions against his back. With the feathers arranged sleekly against their frame he looked less wild and unpredictable and more hawkish. It was startling how the sweep of feathers and eyebrow and eyelash complemented each other, how the sharply drawn frame of wings threw lean muscle into relief.
"Thanks, Lip," Speirs said, sliding a heavy-lidded glance in his direction.
"Any time, sir," Lipton managed.
He didn't quite remember leaving the room.
--End--