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Tennessee Whiskey


***

Who we are is what comes out when shit goes bad. You can't tell anything about a person when things are great. If you want to really know someone, be there when everything goes to hell.

Eileen Cook

***

Neil Vikander, callsign Omaha.

Steady, ready for development.

Neil's callsign was a silly thing, though he was proud of it. Nebraskan born and raised, he'd gone to school in Omaha all the way up until the Naval Academy. The first day of class, they'd all been asked to give a short elevator pitch about themselves and where they were from.

Most of his classmates hadn't believed Nebraska was a state, let alone where it was on a map of the US.

It had turned into a joke, with Neil insisting it was a real place and his classmates refusing to believe him.

Sure thing, Omaha.

Until one of the instructors had overheard and as, he told the class, lost a bit of his faith in the human race. He'd pulled up a map and made them all memorize it, and they've called Neil Omaha ever since he stood up and laughed at his fellow classmates when they'd been proven wrong.

He meet Callie in the Academy and it only took about two seconds for an all-consuming crush to erupt, which was exactly how long it took her to lay him out in the hallway for an inappropriate joke.

Given what he knows about her sense of humor now, he knows she over-reacted, but he's never wanted to embarrass her by bringing it up again.

There were no girls like Callie around where Neil grew up. She loud and bright and worked her ass off to be one of the best. She was aggressive in the sky, sometimes too much so, but she was always ready to listen and help.

He's been in love with her ever since.

Not in a weird way.

In a comfortable, this is a fact of life way, that he has no intention of ever acting on.

He thought about it before, when they were at the Academy and then in flight school. Watching the others fumble their way through romantic entanglements had gone a long way to convincing him it was terrible idea.

Bradley and Natasha and Jake and Javy and the mess that was the four of them was definitely a giant, blinking warning sign.

In neon.

Callie brings it up sometimes, when they're relaxing together and she just needs to talk.

Neil's always been better at listening than talking himself, so it's easy to go through the motions of cooking and cleaning while Callie attempts, and sometimes succeeds, to help while keeping up a running commentary about everything that's going on.

Neil's not blind, but he likes hearing about it from her point of view.

Callie's convinced there's going to be a wedding before the year is out. Jake had told her he'd never ask because of his family curse, which is still weird to say seriously, but she had it on good authority, Nat and Bob, that Bradley had gone to the bank that held his parent's old safety deposit box.

Bradley had kept it after his mother had died and stored a few precious family heirlooms in it.

Including his parent's wedding rings.

They weren't anything really special. Cheap gold dulled with age and wear. His parents had married impulsively in Vegas with just Pete as a witness and the rings had been the cheapest the chapel offered.

There'd always been plans to get a nicer set but it had never been important enough for the money.

Bradley had never been the type to value something based on how expensive it was, Neil thought and Callie was of the same mind about Jake. Everything in his family was handed down, one generation to the next, a desperate attempt to keep them going against fate.

She figures there's a proposal coming and Neil knows money's been laid down on when and where, but privately, he doubts any of them will be around to see it.

Well, maybe Javy?

But also not. Javy loves Jake too much to intrude on something that important.

Bradley and Jake are very open about their relationship, Neil's ears have turned red a few times, but there are certain parts of it they're fiercely protective of. Which is smart, given how intertwined their lives are.

Neil knows first hand how suffocating it can be to be around one person so much and never able to find time to yourself. No matter how much you love someone, you loose yourselves like that and it never ends well.

Neil's parents imploded when he left for the Academy specifically because of that. It took years for them to realize what had happened and that both of them were simultaneously responsible and not for what had happened.

They were tentatively meeting up now, careful to make sure they took time to themselves in between.

Twice a week they disappear by themselves and no one's allowed to interrupt. The rest of the nights are split between being alone and hanging out with the rest of them, regardless of where they end up sleeping.

They're surprisingly mature about it. It took Neil a long time to figure out how to save himself when the immediately urge was to be around Callie all the time.

There'd even been a summer where they hadn't talked at all before Callie realized something was wrong and Neil had to straighten his shit out before she made him explain. She's good at not pushing, but Neil's knows he'd give in if she tried.

He doubted it would end well.

She loved guys like Jordan Seresin, cause he'd clocked that almost faster than she had. Maybe even Jake, if he was so gone on Bradshaw.

Which is good, because Neil doesn't like the percentage of chance that meant she'd be dead by forty in that case.

He's not sure how Maverick and Iceman are handling it at all.

Or Bradley.

Back in the beginning, Neil used to try and protect Callie from whatever or whoever he thought was dangerous, but he'd learned, through trial and error, that that never really helped her.

People never really learned other people's lessons, no matter how strongly they insisted they did.

They only ever learned their own.

And now Neil's happy. Not the happiest he could ever be, he doesn't know if that will ever come, but he is happy.

Callie's always been one of those people who thinks you're happy or you're not. She has lists of things she wants and thinks of it as working her way to being happy.

She's more like Bradley than Jake that way.

Jake's got dreams, but he's also learned to be happy by the day instead of the life, just in case.

Neil's finally there, after almost a decade of figuring it out.

The days with Callie are worth more than any relationship he's had so far and he doubts that will change.

Callie fills so many empty spaces so well, Neil's to afraid of what will happen if she leaves them to ever let it happen.

Maybe someday he'll work up the courage to see if they could ever be more than friends, but that day won't be anytime soon.

In the meantime, he's learning more and more about through the lens of Jake and Bradley's relationship.

She laughed her ass of when Bradshaw serenaded Jake at the Hard Deck the other night, but she'd rolled her eyes when he'd dragged him outside to slow dance on the sand.

She thinks their endless argument over dill verses sweet pickles is the stupidest thing she's heard but neither of them will drop it and they've taken to leaving one another passive-aggressive notes on the board in the planning room.

She thinks its the cutest thing that Mav and Lily Grace and Ice and Jake have bonded so well over things that aren't Bradley.

That Bradley's been asking Jake's opinion on redecorating his parents house, but no going solely with his suggestions.

Jake hates the couch Bradley got.

HATES.

Neil has it on good authority that he's been seducing Bradley on that couch with the goal of eventually rendering it ruined, but Bradley's onto him.

He knows she's much more worried than she lets on by Julia Fallon's frequent visits. The other woman's lonely, not that Callie doesn't understand, and that she insists she's over Bradley.

But....

She also hasn't visited Bradley.

Just Nat and Bob and Reuben and Mickey.

Aside from one memorable night she joined them at the Hard Deck and everyone but Jake and Javy were there.

Callie wants her to hurry up and get back with the ex she keeps talking about Bradley being a rebound for. Some guy she knew in the Vigilantes and Neil agrees to reach out to a friend he has there to ask about him.

***

Mickey Garcia, callsign Fanboy.

Great for morale, not for leadership.

Mickey is the friendliest guy you'll ever meet. He's always got a smile, a joke at the ready. He can find a reason to like anyone and for anyone to like him.

He got his callsign because he tends to latch onto things for a while and be a bit obsessed, fanboying Reuben called it in the Academy, until the interest fades.

He thinks the best of people.

Always.

He knows it makes people think he's naive, but Mickey's not willing to change that part of himself for anyone. Doesn't want to always thing about what could go wrong, that someone could be lying, or tricking him.

It's fucking depressing.

And Mickey is not going to be miserable for anyone.

So no matter how much Reuben worries about Jake and Bradley, Mickey is firmly in their corner.

The curse is insane, but whatever. His grandmother had been a witch in the old country, he grew up superstitious and open-minded.

The Seresins are, more than anything, sad.

That Bradley might die for loving Jake is also sad, but his choice and really, if he can't make his own choice, what's the point?

Really, Mickey thinks he's worrying too much. Bradley and Jake seem to have finally figured out how to talk to one another after all those years of yelling because they couldn't listen.

Things can only get better. Bradley's family likes Jake and Jake's family seems to like Bradley. Their careers seem pretty lined up and neither of them seem to have any weird ideas about money and property that came before they got together.

Bradley had laughed when Amelia had asked why his taste in clothes hadn't improved since he started dating Jake.

Jake had muttered something about some people being to far gone and they had to save themselves because they wouldn't let anyone else do it.

Really, Mickey thinks they'll be fine and Reuben needs to stop worrying.

***

Reuben Fitch, callsign Payback.

Explore leadership possibilities.

Reuben hears the rumor one morning when he has to scratch a flight for an engine issue.

Jake and Bradley are walking back from their own flight. Sweaty and elated and making eyes at each other, because no matter how much they insist their relationship stays outside of work it absolutely does not.

Mav's with them and just looks on indulgently. Semi-retirement suits him, Reuben thinks, even if he doesn't want to admit it.

Reuben doesn't have an opinion on their relationship either way, he knows Natasha and Javy are diametrically opposed but keeping their mouths shut for the benefit of their best friends, but as long as they both keep doing their jobs, Reuben couldn't care less.

That goes out the window thirty seconds later when one of the mechanics mentions that he's surprised Mav likes Seresin so much considering.

His first assumption is because Jake's an asshole most of the time and Mav can be one himself and Jake got the command instead of Mav, but Reuben didn't get this far by being stupid and it only takes a few pointed questions before it all spills out.

Javy and Cyclone in an empty hallway.

Why send the student when you can send the teacher?

Jake has a lot more years to give the military than Mitchell.

Reuben knew Jake and Javy were close.

He didn't realize they were that close.

And then, Jesus Christ, did Captain Mitchell know?

Did Bradshaw?

He can't stop thinking about it after that. It's kind of stupid, but not?

They survived because of they way everything worked out.

They might have survived if the line up was different, but he knows for sure they made it with the one they had.

Neither Jake or Mav seem to hold any ill-will about the choices made then and now concerning leadership and Bradshaw sure as shit doesn't care about not being team leader anymore.

If he really did at all.

They've all got their pride and it all got dinged when Jake was chosen, but they've all moved on. Everyone that wants it will get their chance eventually and Reuben's been in the military long enough to know this assignment will end eventually.

It takes him a few days to figure out why the information bothers him so much.

He's never going to be Jake's biggest fan, but he likes him well enough. And it's turned out that he's a pretty good leader, as willing to take shit as much as he is to dole it out.

He likes Mav about as much as he likes Jake.

And he and Javy have always had a thing of mutual respect between them but never more than that.

Really, he's closest to Bradley out of everyone involved and maybe that's why?

It was Bradley's godfather Javy offered up for sacrifice.

Never mind that it was Cyclone's choice in the end.

Everyone knows how Cyclone feels about Mav.

And everyone knows how skilled Mav is.

But even if he can make it make sense, logically, there's something that sticks with him.

They had all been in it together. The fear and the exhilaration of training for something that important. Even when they weren't getting along, they were in it together.

Oh.

That's what this is.

Reuben feels betrayed.

They'd all been it in together, except they hadn't, because Javy had only been concerned about Jake.

If he was willing to sacrifice Mav for him, then he was probably willing to throw any of the rest of them in front of Jake to protect him.

Reuben knows he has no say over who and how much Javy values certain people, but it still stings to realize someone Reuben serves besides thinks he's expendable and someone else isn't.

It's just...

The betrayal stings.

They all took the same oath, made the same promise. Die for your country if she needs you to.

It was almost like cheating that Jake had gotten out of it.

Even though, really, he hadn't. Reuben knew that.

Reuben KNEW that.

But it still stung.

And if it was just him, he would have kept his mouth shut and moved on. He probably never would have gotten closer with Javy or Jake, but he's unlikely to do that anyway.

But its not just him.

Its Bradley and Jake.

Jake and everyone else.

Javy and everyone else.

Jake and Bradley and Javy and Natasha and Bob and Mickey and Neil and Callie and Brigham and Logan and Billy and Maverick and Cyclone and Iceman and Reuben.

Because they're all tangled together now.

For however long this assignment lasts.

Does Bradley know?

If Reuben was the only one who knew, he'd just never bring it up.

But the mechanics were gossiping about out in the open, which means a whole lot of people know now and someone will say something.

And then everything will implode.

***

Julia's mother has been bringing up weddings every time they talk now.

Like, every time.

She get it. She's passed thirty and still not married. Her sisters are married with careers and kids on the way. Her brothers too.

She's the big disappointment.

But it's not her fault.

She's trying.

She tried with Bradley, carefully not to push because as long as you could let him go slow, he got there eventually.

Unfortunately, time and space got to them.

Too slow.

Bradley was seeing someone else and he'd never been the type to cheat.

Julia could wait for the relationship to fail, because so far, all of Bradley's had.

But she'd grown up in a military family.

One plan of attack was never enough.

Or in this case, one option seemed foolish.

There was always Jake after all.

And he looked much better in a uniform.

He'd be a lot hard to control though. He was just as dedicated to his career as she was and he suffered fools even less.

She'd been surprised by how much she liked him when she'd first meet him on their first deployment.

Everything she'd heard at the Academy had been wrapped up in Nat almost getting kicked out and Julia had been ready to kick down doors to protect her friend. Thank god it hadn't come to that, but still.

She'd had her father primed and waiting to make a phone call.

So she hadn't been expecting much when she met Jake that night at midnight chow and the wary, confused boy had been a welcome surprise. Enough pride to fight back, not enough arrogance to insist he'd been right.

He'd always been incredible to fly with and watching him blossom in the Vigilantes had been....

Yum.

And now he and Nat had pretty much patched things up, so Julia didn't have to worry about them getting along.

And he was close to his family, based on how badly he'd reacted when his brother had been hurt.

Family was important.

Especially if he joined hers. He'd have to learn to tow the Fallon line. Her father had banned a couple of past boyfriends from the house when they'd proved too slow to do so.

That wouldn't be an issue with Jake.

Maybe with Bradley, but she could get him there.

Bradley had looked good at the Hard Deck, fingers flying over the piano. She wasn't a fan of the shirts, but she knew they were a legacy from his father and that made them okay.

Even her father wouldn't say anything about that as long as he was in uniform at appropriate times.

And god, there was another text from her mother about a friend's kid's wedding.

Seriously.

She never even bothered asking Julia how she was doing anymore, just if she'd found someone.

Or if she'd finally like her to step in and find someone for her.

That was never going to happen.

***

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