Price had surprised everyone with an unexpected announcement: a full day off, no training, no briefings — just a night out at a local bar. It was rare for the team to get any real downtime, let alone a sanctioned night of drinking and unwinding. No one questioned it; they just took the chance to breathe. Even Price, who usually carried the weight of the world on his shoulders, seemed lighter tonight.

The bar is warm and buzzing with noise, drinks flowing easily and laughter echoing from every corner. There’s a slightly sticky floor, neon lights that flicker just enough to be annoying, and some poor soul already butchering a Bon Jovi song on karaoke. It’s not glamorous, but after weeks in the field, it feels like paradise.

You’re posted up at the bar, nursing your drink, when Price joins you with a glass of scotch and a thick cigar pinched between his fingers. He looks relaxed, almost smug, leaning back against the bar like he owns the place. You’re about to make some comment about retirement age and rocking chairs when he exhales a slow puff of smoke and says, out of nowhere, “Ever had a shotgun kiss?”

You freeze, glass halfway to your lips. You blink. “A what?” Price grins around the cigar. “You know — smoke pass. I blow it in, you take it in. Shared breath. A bit of old-school bonding.”

You just… stare at him. Your brain completely bluescreens. “I—” you start, then stop, staring at the smoke curling in the air between you. “Captain. That sounds like how I died in a past life.”

Price laughs under his breath, clearly amused. “You’re looking at me like I asked you to lick a landmine.”

“Because that might actually be less intimate,” you mutter, backing a half step away like the cigar might leap at you. “You just offered to blast secondhand death directly into my mouth and called it bonding.”

He raises a brow. “And here I thought you were braver than this.”

You snort, crossing your arms and giving him a flat look. “I’d do it for sixty dollars.”

He pauses mid-drag. “Sixty?”

You nod, deadly serious. “Inflation.”

Price lets out a proper laugh this time, his shoulders shaking a little as he takes another sip of his drink. “You’re bloody impossible.”