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“Mrs. Jones had acted immediately. There had been five SAS teams on permanent standby in different parts of London, and as soon as Alex’s signal had been received and his location verified, she had alerted the team that was closest to him with the other four moving in as backup.”
-SCORPIA chapter 18
Standby. No one liked it. The tense inaction of waiting for the smallest signal, the inexplicable change that would have them all gearing up, hauling guns and packs and everything that they would possibly need to handle the threat, whatever that was. They hadn’t gotten much.
A terrorist attack. Satellite dishes. SCORPIA.
That part had been an even more hush hush type of thing; overheard in comms rather than the intel they had been given as a threat assessment. The spooks at MI6 liked to keep the SAS in the dark as much as they liked to haul them in to clean up their messes. It wasn't Wolf's first rodeo when it came to the cloak-and-dagger SOP. France had only been a few months ago. Clusterfuck that it had been.
His bullet wound had just healed up enough for him to rejoin the field and so he’d been shuffled onto a team ready for action once again. His own unit was somewhere in the Middle East, for all that he had been able to glean in sparse communication with them. So now he was back in London, on a team that should be a bunch of strangers but had one familiar face - Snake sat across from him, face stony and tense. A surprise to see her, and from that expression Wolf wasn’t sure that it was a good one.
She wasn't the only one with a face that looked like granite, but it gave her an edge that Wolf had found unnerving even at Beacons. The terse nod he received in lieu of a greeting only flustered him a little. It was par for the course given the situation on their hands. Afterwards they could go out to a pub and catch up but for now they were both on duty. Both stuck in a crowded van, weapons long since checked and scrubbed and anything else they could think to do to prepare themselves for the unknown.
Wolf considered breaking the silence. Snake beat him to it.
“So where have you been?”
He shouldn’t say anything but it was small talk not an interrogation and out of Selection not everything was a test. “France. Took a few bullets.”
“Where?”
In tactical gear she wouldn’t be able to see the puckered hole. Wolf rolled one shoulder, a shrug that snapped Snake’s eyes to the motion. Looking for any hitch of pain.
Wolf almost bared his teeth in a grin.
“Left forearm. It wasn't too bad.” Enough to put him out, the vest had taken the worst of them - shoulder and chest. But a bullet wound was a bullet wound.
He could practically see Snake add that as a mental note. No one wanted to see a teammate hurt. But it was best to know their weak point, especially going into a potential firefight.
“I'll stay on your left then.” It went almost unsaid for combat, just common sense, but it was reassuring in a way.
A few months out of action in rehab had had Wolf vibrating almost out of his mind with boredom. No working out, no shooting, getting back up to speed had been a bitch. Even a clean through and through had taken an eternity to heal. He nodded in return just in time for some radio chatter up front. It was muddled by the sound of their transport tearing away from the curb.
“Assigned to follow some debris from the main operation,” his commander barked back towards them then paused listening to further chatter. Hand pressed to his ear as tires squealed on the road, shoving past what civvie traffic had ignored the shelter warning. “A hot air balloon. Potential friendly with it but status unknown. Sighted just ahead of us in Hyde park. A will flank from the west entrance. B center, C east.”
“Wilco,” the two other commanders confirmed and then the group went silent again.
Tense minutes passed. Wolf, like everyone else, checked over his weapons one more time. And then everyone was in motion as the vehicle slammed to a hard stop. Clearing the lorry in seconds, moving toward the front of the park. Potential friendly, but potentially not, and with a terror threat haunting London no one wanted to be the one to miss a threat.
Scanning the tangled brush, Wolf brushed a careful thumb over his weapon. Safety already off.
The night was quiet save for the soft clinking of their equipment followed by the louder rustle of fabric and then came the muttered swearing. Almost in sync they turned - Flashlights out, guns up. All trained on an all too-familiar face.
“Cub?”
It came out almost unbidden. Hanging in the otherwise still night air.
“Wolf.”
There was just a little too much relief in that voice for his taste. The heady smell of smoke clung to Cub. Likely from whatever the hell had happened to get him in the middle of this clusterfuck.
He caught a hand signal out of the corner of his eye.
Friendly?
“He’s ours,” Wolf clarified, keeping his eye on the kid.
Surprise flashed across Cub’s face and was just as quickly gone. “Blunt sent you?”
That wasn’t a name to throw around casually and Wolf felt it register with the COs. A universal shift in tension away from ‘probable threat’ to ‘potential trouble’.
“Anyone else with you?” His leader pressed without bothering to answer. SAS Units didn’t believe in small talk for good reason.
“No, just me.” The kid looked like he knew just how tiny and alone that made him seem on the other end of six guns.
“Any incendiaries, weapons, anything?”
“Just what was left of the balloon. Platform’s back...” Cub tiredly waved back toward the Thames. Must be where everything went down.
That was all the information they needed to press forward. Wolf signed to his CO that he would stay while the others finished casing the area. They were gone with a nod..
“You hurt?” Wolf had just enough basic medical skills to keep Cub alive if it was anything bad. Instead, he got a shake of the head. He figured as much. Some visible lacerations, and a cheek that was already bruising but otherwise Cub was standing so he was good.
“Alright then, how the hell you’d get tangled up in this?”
Cub’s shoulders sagged a little then turned into a shrug.
“Same way as always.”
‘6 then. Had to be.
There was an uncomfortable pause. “What’d they tell you?”
Not much. They never did. “Terrorist Attack. Got told to follow the balloon once it was sighted.”
“Are you supposed to take me in too?”
Wolf paused. Was he? Taking in anyone involved seemed like the logical thing to do. Cub’s tone of resignation said that it was the exact thing he didn’t want to happen.
“We were just after the balloon,” Wolf hedged. That could easily change depending on what his leader said.
“So I can leave then?” Hope tinged with exhaustion.
Not for the first time Wolf wasn’t sure he wanted to know exactly what they had Cub doing in the field at his age. But that didn’t mean Wolf got to forget the job he was on. That they were on, if Cub was to be believed.
“Do you have any intel that needs to get passed on?”
Cub seemed to consider it for a minute then shook his head. “Nothing they don’t already know.”
“And what about that ?” He jerked his chin toward where the balloon had been dragged off the statue and was being examined.
“It was just to raise the platform.”
“Alright.” Wolf hesitated, considering his next steps. He could let his commander make the call, haul the kid back. But in his opinion Cub could use a bed more than a meeting at HQ, probably in a cell or worse while everything got sorted out. “You can go. Anyone asks, you had an RV with your handler, clear?”
“Won’t that get you…?” Cub returned, his eyes cut over to where the other units were gathered around the heap of fabric.
“Not if you stick to the story. Will that be a problem?”
Shouldn’t be, kid was a spook and apparently one with enough of a heart to give a shite about him getting reamed. If that was how the night ended, Wolf probably deserved it.
“No but… I should go in with you after everything they’ll want -” The confidence was gone and suddenly Wolf wasn’t staring at Cub he was staring at a kid skipping class - uncertain, awkward and guilty.
“They know where you live they can get you there-”
The kid’s brows shot up his forehead. Wide-eyed.
Alright, wrong thing to say, “-and if they wanted you they would have told us.”
“But I -”
Christ. Wolf swore the kid hadn’t been this talkative at Camp or in France. Time to try being direct.
“Look Cub, we don’t have any orders about you, stick around and we’ll get some, which means you’ll be stuck in a room with the rest of us waiting for this shitshow to clear up. So go home and get some sleep.”
Cub searched him for a second and then slowly nodded. “Alright…” he seemed to be convincing himself. A moment passed and then another, Cub staring at the ground and the first tremors of exhaustion touching his hands. Finally he looked up. “Thanks, Wolf,” it was a shaky, tired smile forced by the last gasps of adrenaline.
“Handler. Rendezvous. Got it?”
Cub nodded, this time with more confidence.
“Then get out of here.”
This time he didn’t wait, just hustled off into the night.
“No time for a reunion?” Wolf almost jumped out of his boots, but grabbed for his composure and slowly turned to see Snake standing there, just off to the side.
“Had to RV with his handler.”
“‘Course he did,” she said all too casually.
Well that secret had been nice while it lasted. “You won’t -“
“Nah.”
Wolf’s waning patience with the ‘silent threat’ bullshit must have been clear on his face, because her lips twisted around a smile.
Looked uncomfortable.
“We’re still a unit,” she nodded to where the kid had disappeared beyond the bushes, “at least for tonight.”
He glanced back towards the empty street. “Yeah, guess we are.”
“Good.” Snake gave him a firm pat on the shoulder. The left one. “Then you can fill me in on what I apparently missed out on in France.”
Wolf swore, wrenching his hurt shoulder away from his sadist of a teammate. Covering with a CO was one thing but dealing with a curious Snake was too much for a night’s work.
Kid now officially owed him for this. Wolf just hoped that he’d get the chance to cash it in. Maybe by getting the full story of whatever in the world had sent a balloon spiraling over the Thames. Maybe just by buying him his first ceremonial beer after a hard job.
There’d be time to think on it after Cub got some sleep.