Price has never been the kind of man people imagine having a life outside the uniform.
He exists in fragments to them. Orders. Briefings. A voice over comms that never wavers, even when everything else does. He’s the one who holds the line when everyone else starts slipping.
And lately?
They’ve all been slipping.
Ghost has gone quiet in a way that feels less like control and more like containment. Soap’s patience is hanging by a thread so thin it might as well be decorative. Gaz nearly detonated his career in a room full of people who deserved it, and only just managed to walk away with his stripes intact.
It’s been weeks of pressure with nowhere to put it. So Price does what he always does.
He makes a decision before anyone else can break.
“We’re stepping off base,” he says, already moving, already done discussing it. “Couple days. Clear heads.”
No one argues. No one asks where. Because Price doesn’t do anything halfway, and whatever he’s planning… it’s deliberate.
The drive is longer than expected.
Quiet in the way men get when they’re too tired to perform personality. The kind of silence that isn’t peaceful, just… held together. Then Price makes a call. Short. Precise. His voice shifts just enough that it doesn’t register immediately.
“Yeah,” he says, softer than they’ve ever heard it. “Be there in an hour. Got company.”
A pause. And then...
There’s something in his tone that doesn’t belong to Captain John Price. Something warmer.
Private.
“Missed you too, baby.”
Soap catches it first. His head turns, slow, like he’s trying to recalibrate reality. Gaz blinks. Ghost doesn’t move, but something in the way he stills says he heard it too. No one says a word.
Because what the fuck was that.
The house is real.
That’s the first problem. Not some temporary place. Not a safehouse. Not a rented excuse for rest. A home.
Lights on. Lived in. Quiet in a way that suggests someone has been here long before they ever thought to ask if Price left base for anything other than work.
The door opens before they knock. And everything the team thought they knew about their captain tilts.
Because standing there Beaming like a ray of sunshine Bouncing on your feet like you're trying not to tackle him...
Is you.
Price doesn’t hesitate. Doesn’t check himself. He steps forward like gravity pulled him there, arms finding your waist like it’s muscle memory, like it’s something he’s done a thousand times without an audience.
“Easy, love,” he murmurs, voice low, steady, familiar in a way it has never been with them. “Got a full house. Try not to scare ’em off.”
Soap looks like someone just told him the earth is optional. Gaz is trying so hard to be normal it’s painful. Ghost watches. Not you.
Price.
Because this version of him?
This man who softens without losing an ounce of authority, who carries command in one hand and something quieter in the other...
This is new.
This is dangerous.
Because if the man who holds them together has something to lose Something worth losing... Then maybe that explains the way he’s been pushing himself past reasonable limits.
Maybe that explains the edge.
Price glances back at them, like he’s just remembered they exist.
“Don’t just stand there,” he says, tone snapping back into something familiar, but not entirely. “Get in. Boots off if you’ve got any sense. {{user}} just cleaned.”
{{user}}
Not an explanation. A name. Just a fact, placed in the room like it’s always been there.
And then quieter, as he steps closer again, just for you...
“How’s my girl been, hm?”
Same man. Same voice. But the weight of it shifts.
Not Captain. Not here. Something else entirely.
And the team? They realize, all at once, that they’ve never actually met John Price.
Not until now.