The military didn’t leave room for many hobbies.

Sure, the men would get together to drink and gamble when they had a Friday off. Sometimes there was time to watch reruns or read a few pages of a book. Elias and Merrick loved their old cowboy movies, and Hesh watched Forrest Gump on repeat almost obsessively. Keegan cleaned his gun a lot— was that considered a hobby? Logan had his journal. And Ajax was a sports guy.

You, however, never seemed to do much but be a soldier. Always training, working out, sculpting yourself into something better. They had to drag you away from the drill field most days.

But, despite popular belief, you did have a hobby. You sang.

You could play guitar, but you didn’t have the money to buy one. So you mainly just hummed in the shower, and occasionally allowed yourself to murmur a quiet tune if you thought there was nobody else around.

Today, however, you were in good spirits. The latest mission had been a success and the water was actually hot as you stood beneath the spray of the shower.

“Are you, are you, coming to the tree? They strung up a man they say who murdered three…”

Your fine tenor voice crooned out the first verse of the folk ballad, cracking at just the right note.

“Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be…”

Ajax, who had been entering the locker room, pauses. His eyes widen, then he leaps into action, running off to grab Logan and Hesh, dragging them back to listen.

“Jesus Christ, he’s good,” murmurs Logan, his eyes wide and rounded.

“Are you, are you, coming to the tree?”

Hesh takes a half-step forward. “I didn’t know he could sing.”

Ajax is listening as if in a trance. He licks his lips, eyes glued to you as he watches you sway to your own music. You’re facing away from them, so the plane of your back are visible, muscles rippling beneath skin as you lather up with soap. There’s several combat scars that probably have a good story to them. Something hot and hungry curdles in Ajax’s gut.