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precious-little-scoundrel · 2 months

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Those Who Can || integrated Female Air Force series

Introductory part 1: Flintenweiber, or “Rifle Broads”.

Summary: The American War Effort had conceded to the enlistment and commissioning of women into the Air Force at semi-integrated status. Deemed a more reliable if not safer combat post, the going rank of officer in the Air Force was intended to secure fair treatment and combatant status for these women, as it had for their male counterparts. Like most things in war -or life if one is a woman- such recognition must be fought for.

Authors Note: this is an Au, obviously, and I intend for the de-segregation in the force to not be entirely full, in fact in some ways they would mirror that of the Tuskegee Red Tails where they were held back from many opportunities and placed at a disadvantage, to say the least. However, as this is primarily a POW fic that aspect only effects their reception into the Stalag and the timeline of their crashes.

Inspo: thanks to all of y’all who contributed with suggestions and advice on this fic. I want to say that I based a great deal of the brutal treatment and indignity heaped on these fictional OC’s on the true and horrific treatment of the Soviet Female Soldiers taken as POWs. Taking into consideration that American ties would give these OC’s some leverage, I have moderated these horrors if anything, however as I intend for these girls to be some of the first of their kind, they in many ways endure the brunt of the cruel initiation. If you’ve got any questions or suggestions about this, have at the inbox.

Warnings: 18+ for disturbing content. War, brutality, cruelty, and references to sexual violence. Specifics: a woman’s head is forcefully shaved, a woman is kicked to death, a dog turned loose, concentration camps, brief infighting between Soviet’s and Americans, past tense illusions to rape which are underplayed and may be consequently more disturbing to some. Quite angsty ok?? It’s women at war. Rampant misogyny by Nazis.

Familiar faces: Gale Cleven, Benny Demarco, John Brady, “Hambone” Hamilton

Original Characters: Lt. Maureen Kendeigh (bombardier), Lt. Colonel Ida Brady, Lt. Tallulah Smith

If Maureen Kendeigh heard the word “degenerate” used one more time in regards to her profession, her sacrifice and skill, -she just might do something regrettable.

By this point she was ready to get off this cattle car and go back to talk with Interrogator Glasses about stupid and unnerving shit like why the clock in the mess hall at Thorpe Abbots had a broken arm. Her distressed inner monologue of “how did he know that??” at the time was preferred to this newest method of demoralization: death by aspersion and suspense.

It was nice to be back with the girls, ones she knew and ones from other squadrons. But that held a misfortune too, the fact that it was just the girls, still not a single male crew member in sight. Apparently the Gestapo and the Luftwaffe were having a spat over who got to keep them, these Flintenweiber: “Rifle Broads”.

In the meantime Maureen and her fellows got punted back and forth between the two institutions like unwanted stepchildren. First the horrible isolation but humane treatment of the Air Force interrogation cells. Then back to the prison where all bets were off and the hope of safety came from a herd-like defense of each other against the ever more erratic guards. In these holdings, if one of their members hadn’t been executed by a pistol to the temple by end of day, it was considered a successful defense by the whole. All other atrocity, indignity and assault were unbearable’s that required bearing for the time being until the Luftwaffe took them back.

And then handed them back over.

And on and on it went.

It was effective, Maureen gave them that, after each hosting by the Gestapo, the girls were softer, tenderized and more susceptible to any deal that might procure them a shred of honor and safety. Only Ida Brady, the most senior amongst them at the incomprehensible rank of Lt. Colonel, had held ranks together, spine of steel and bearing more terrifying than most men’s, she’d fought for every grueling respect of rank they had been afforded. Even if it landed them in harsher conditions, worse interrogations -anything to ensure that what happened to her girls were considered as war crimes against lawful combatants when the time came for justice.

But they’d been collecting the downed girls and holding them apart like prized anomalies while conflicting orders came in from Berlin, and while the Red Cross fussed regarding combatant status. Now they had a tidy number collected, well over fifty by the time Maureen saw Ida Brady pushed into the cell, having been downed with a significant portion of them after Munich.

But now they hadn’t seen Brady in over a day. Not since they’d been loaded on this rail car headed to god knows where by soldiers with the dreaded lightning bolts on their collars.

The SS.

With Brady missing, Maureen supposed that made her and Lieutenant Smith a leader of sorts. Most of her “leading” currently took the form of not responding to a single vile threat or taunt by the guards mingling amongst them in the ever rocking car. Ida would be proud of her emotionless detachment at one guard’s suggestion to let the dog loose and see who it chose to maul.

Lieutenant Smith -tender hearted Tallulah with the bronzed skin and knack with animals that rivaled Snow White’s- had made the cryptic observation in Maureen’s ear that she’d never known a dog could be trained away from the throat to go for the breasts instead.

As of last Sunday they now knew, and none of them were likely to forget.

“I’ll be faster next time,” Smith had mumbled in a simmering rage, “I’ll be faster. I’ll have my fist down that cur’s throat before they finish slipping the leash.”

It was a nice sentiment, would’ve been made more so if Maureen wasn’t so sure it would land dear Smith with a bullet in her head. Would be made more so if Sergeant Forsyth had lived from her injuries long enough to benefit from it. Lots of things would be made nicer by heavier coats and the presence of drinking water.

One of the new ones, a terrified little replacement who wore her ordeal on her face, made the rookie mistake of asking for a drink. She’d been given the predictable initiation of being pissed on by a guard in answer and now she bore her thirst as doggedly as the veterans.

When the train cars rolled to a halt, and the great door was hauled back, sprawling out before them appeared the most idyllic scenery one could ever hope for. A crystalline blue lake, dotted on its border with charming structures adorned with red tile roofs, a quaint church of the same, lush fields and sparkling water and deep forest for miles. Maureen did not think they would haul them so near a town only to execute them. But then what did she know?

Nothing, not even where she was.

When they had lined the girls up, some in worse shape than others and a motley collective group from various military branches, they hauled off Ida Brady to the head of the pack, her bruised face considerably more busted than when she’d been loaded on. Maureen could see her craning her neck as she was drug past, counting down her flyer girls, looking for any missing from the trip.

They were marched, four abreast and with guns at their backs, down a wide and well traversed road into town, past cottages on its outskirts with little garden plots and clothes blowing on the line. Maureen was reminded of the idyllic countryside she had landed in with her chute before being seized and hauled off. There were women and children in row boats on the lake and the path they took through the woods was more peaceful than ominous. A traitorous sort of hope began to bloom in Maureen’s heart.

That was dashed when the tree line broke and out before them stretched what seemed to be miles of wire. And beside it a sign, welcoming them to Ravensbrück -a concentration camp. A camp for civilians, a camp to never return from.

Their new guards were ready for them, smiles on their faces and whips in their hands. Among them were a few remarkable for their sex, they were women too -if women who enjoyed such craft could still be called that. And for all the horror inflicted on them by their male captors so far, there seemed to be a general presentment amongst the arriving girls that the finer arts of terror had not yet been endured.

Standing for hours in the infamous square inside the compound, roll call and registration took on a form of torture yet unheard of. Round and round it went, repetitions of ranks and serials over and over and each time they were met with two alternatives. Renounce the ranks and be admitted as civilians with no further targeted harassment. Or-

“If you insist on being special, we will be forced to make you special.” as one officer put it to Brady’s stone cold face. “Ask your Soviet compatriots, the ones who wanted to be special like you. They claimed to be officers too, and now they service officers in Buchenwald. They have not left their beds in months. Special, no?”

“I’m not ‘claiming’ a goddamn thing.” Brady would go round and round with them in turn and up and down the line was the echo of ranks and serials.

Nothing but ranks and serials.

The minute they dropped one or the other, they’d be freed from this standing purgatory, and they’d be as good as dead. They might wish it were so anyway, if the threat was carried out but they’d suffer as officers, with honor. Whatever that meant this far from home and any appreciation of it. A fresh batch of guards relieved the first and the banter continued, even through roll call of the general camp where a mass of the most miserable specters of female kind poured out of the huts and were made to await the call of their one single number.

A serial for a serial. Maureen would keep hers. By dawn she had kept it, as had all but one of her group, a navy nurse with a broken leg who’d succumbed to the allure of a chair.

Civilian status for a seat.

Maureen thought a drop of water might be her own undoing were it offered, but one look at Smith's cracked yet unmoving lips cemented her in her own determination. As did Ida Brady’s talk, straight back in front of her, trousers bloodied on the inseam but not a cringe to be discerned in her stance.

By morning roll call for the entire camp, their guards were tiring of them, or else thought a new method of persuasion more likely to bring success. Off they were marched to their new billet to “meet their Allies” and what Smith wouldn’t give to have her brass knuckles back when met with a hut full of Soviet soldiers. Females, if females could have shoulders like that. They were impressive women with murder on their faces at the intrusion of a new gang of American blowhards.

“Did you give up already?” The one with the most English taunted and for the first time since capture, Maureen saw Ida Brady’s spine bow backwards just a fraction -a pacifying gesture in the face of the Russian’s nose to nose staredown.

“Hey, we’re not here to make trouble.” she insisted, cool and stern. “Did you?”

“We’d rather die.”

Brady gave a sharp nod, “Then we’re Allies in that, too.”

“Your precious Red Cross won’t come for you here.” That likely verdict seemed to bring the woman satisfaction, and Maureen wondered how many months, weeks, hours of this grueling place it would take before she too took savage satisfaction in another’s misfortune. How long before all better impulse to be glad for others was stamped out and all that was left was crowing self preservation. “You are not the firsts. There were others, Americans, like you, they are now wearing the ink of field whores- or they are dead.”

“One might assume the same of your predecessors.” Brady pointed out mildy, and both groups shifted behind their leaders, ready and tense.

“Anyone who accepts-“ the Russian warned, “-we kill.”

With that incentive clear, a tentative peace was made, which included a few trying to fraternize, converse and share news. There was little that aligned to create any cohesive figure, despite their shared experiences and sufferings.

When night fell they were hauled out for roll call amongst the masses, and together after hours of waiting to be called upon, they answered with their ranks and serials, each in their own language. The Russian who had confronted Brady was beaten so badly she did not rise again after it. The guard left her lying there and asked Brady herself what her occupation was.

“Lt. Colonel in the United States Air Force.”

The unfortunate rookie who had so ill advisedly asked for water on the train stood beside Brady; and got a bullet to the head for her superior’s answer. What Colonel Brady thought of her judgment being given to another did not show, her face white and her lips sealed, only the speckle of blood on her profile stood in stark relief in the early morning.

“Kneel.” a very shiny Luger barrel was pressed, still smoking to Brady’s temple.

She did so, braced for the inevitable execution. A soldier's death, it’s what they’d signed up for. The Kommandant waved over one of the female guards and spoke to her in German. She took off at a run to one of the buildings with a bright smile, and Ida Brady stayed kneeling, the splattered brains of the unfortunate dripping out of her hair and into the leather of her jacket, a mockery of her own upcoming fate.

The female guard returned with scissors. “Your poor hair, so pretty. Now it is ruined.” the Kommandant bemoaned, gloved fingers sliding though Brady’s wet tresses, “See what happens to beauty when you pervert the order of things? Now it must be sacrificed. Perhaps then you will see how ugly you are become.”

Maureen felt Smith’s restraining arm before she had even registered her impulse to charge forward, caught about the middle she strained against her friend's surprising strength and in the end was forced thusly to keep ranks and watch with the rest as the Nazis fucks scalped the Colonel of her femininity with a pair of sheep shears.

Dribbling blood down her face and shaking with rage, Ida was in better shape than her Russian counterpart. When her ordeal was over, she rose again, even if she swayed dangerously upon doing so.

And when asked, she had her serial at the ready.

Crowded back into the hut, Maureen and Smith watched the Russians hopelessly fuss over their insensible leader, knowing all too well how likely it might be that they could be found doing the same tomorrow, in a week’s time, who knew. For now, Brady sank down against the wall with the rest of them, the scowl of her formidable brows deflecting any potential commiserations for her battery.

When the navy nurse was pushed into their hut next evening, a dead silence greeted her. One of the Soviets, a sniper by her markings, came up to her and unceremoniously tore open her shirt. If the girls had doubted the Russian’s warning about “wearing the ink of field whores” upon their skin as mere hyperbole, such speculation was removed. It was a dreadful tattoo, large and damning as was the reaction it elicited amongst the servicewomen.

By the end of the night there were two dead bodies on the hut floor. And it didn’t seem to matter who had killed which. One had died for honor, the other for giving it up. And in the end? Where was this ephemeral honor? Ida Brady could only find it in the tense faces of her girls, lining the room from their places along the wall, waiting for another roll call or worse.

But in war, as in peace, sometimes the dead sent favors and in this instance it came to them with screams of:“Amerikaner Soldat!” in the middle of the night. They were marched out to the square and stood to attention once more in the sweep of the spotlight, all the while were shouts of “Amerikaner Soldat!”

All they knew was the bitter waiting in the gray dawn chill and the choking anticipation of some sick, final joke, or some methodical mass execution. Maureen wished she could knock her shoulder into Ida’s one last time and tell her she’d been a rock -she was a rock- but Brady stood there in front alone, as was her privilege and her curse. Talullah Smith would not meet Maureen’s side eyed glance for a farewell. Maureen wished she had less of a roar inside her, wished she could step off calmly into whatever was on the other side but the idea was repulsive, even after all she’d endured, and she looked about in vain for some semblance of the same revolt on her fellow’s faces.

What came instead was the dreaded whistles and the order to march. They were marched right out of the gates and down the idyllic lane they’d been marched up days ago, back through town to the railway station. There the soldiers herded them back up into a cattle car that smelled more of death than livestock, and then the train pulled away, hurtling south -perhaps the only one to do so with living cargo.

There were no guards inside the car, only the cramped space to keep them docile and the lack of promise that the great door would ever grind open again.

“The hell do you think happened?” Maureen hissed to Ida, finding her superior propped up in the corner in a suspiciously casual pose that she suspected hid a limp and unfathomable fatigue.

“Haven’t got a clue, Kendeigh.”

“Maybe someone got word out.” Maureen suggested, thinking of their predecessors, thinking of the useful dead.

“Or we’re headed to a nice rural dumping ground.” was all Ida would speculate. “Or brothels.” she added after a long minute.

Maureen chewed her cheek and kept peering out the slats at the beautiful countryside flashing past. “Well, at least they’ve ensured you’ll be least wanted of the bunch at such an establishment.” she joked and watched with the careful precision of a trained bombardier as her mean joke landed and Ida Brady’s legendary eyebrow ticked up in something that might have been amused disbelief, had she any energy left for such a display.

“Pistol whipped in the mouth and still no respect for rank, Kendeigh.” Brady observed and it was so like her brother John’s flat lined humor that Mauren’s heart throbbed with something alarmingly akin to sentimentally. For John Brady -and all the other lucky souls still at Thorpe Abbots, God willing. “I’m not laying on any damn beds for them.” Brady suddenly broke the silence again in a low voice, one Maureen knew was meant between officers only.

She pitched her head closer in agreement. “Me either.”

“I don’t care if they shoot me first,” Ida went on, as if reciting it to herself, “-and I don’t care if they shoot all of you first. I’m not going to.”

“Wouldn’t want you to.” Maureen agreed again, vacillating briefly in her intent before proceeding to say, “That Sergeant -she wasn’t your fault. The nurse either.”

“I know that Lieutenant.”

“I know you know,” Maureen muttured, “but some stuff bears repeating. Places like these, we’re liable to lose our bearings without a little repetition.”

“Mm.”

Maureen shuffled beside her and wracked her brain for pleasant conversation, something besides the Soviet girls they’d abandoned and the skeletons they’d seen at Ravensbrück. “Ya know,” she remarked tiredly, “if someone in here’s hydrated enough to pee, I might be ready to drink it.”

Brady slowly turned from her view out the slats to give Maureen a blank faced stare. “Should I make an announcement or are you hoping to keep that between us?”

“Oh hell, Colonel,” Maureen grinned, mischief bubbling to the surface at the first chance, “I wouldn’t trust anyone else but you, liable to get stds from this lot.”

“Kendeigh.” Ida hissed warningly but there was that disbelieving wobble to her stern mouth, “That’s not funny -not with where we’ve come from.”

“It kinda is.”

“It’s not.”

“It is- a little. Admit it, a little.”

“It’s not.” And still her cheeks were pink with suppressed amusement, just like John’s got when Maureen pressed him on a dig about basic training.

“You sure you’re ok?” she ventured again, eyeing Brady’s extensive injuries visible above her clothes.

“Yeah?” Ida looked nonplussed, “I mean -what’re you ranking as ok, these days, Lt. Kendeigh?

“It’s just,” Maureen bit her own busted tongue briefly as a spur to get it out,

“-you’re bleeding a lot, Ida. Couldn’t help but notice.”

Ida Brady didn’t even glance down at her trousers or make a motion to feel her lacerated scalp, instead she answered in the same, almost bored way she always did, “Yeah, Candy, it’s called being a good Catholic.”

Maureen blinked. “Oh. Oh Shit.”

“You know, maybe some of you girls had the right of it,” Ida actually winced before staring back out the slats, “go off and do it ahead, in peacetime. But here I am, twenty eight and as sacrosanct as the Virgin Mary, dropping into occupied territory. What could go wrong!” To her credit, her snort was wonderfully genuine.

Maureen kept after her, “You signed up to fight, to get fought against. We all did -never this.”

“Mm, well, couldn’t choose a better gang to get put down with.” Brady smiled, begrudgingly raising an imaginary glass of her own to Maureen’s already raised one.

“To bitches who bite back.” Maureen toasted.

“To bitches who bite back.”

——————————————————-

Two cases of MIA troubled John Brady the most: Egan, who he had seen jump first after their dispute, and Maureen Kendeigh who he had learned from Blakely had jumped over Bremman. That’s two flyers who should’ve been here by now, before him even, in the case of Kendeigh, and yet they weren’t.

He went round and round the argument with Cleven and Crank and Hambone, all three downed from separate missions yet here together - proving his point. Cleven held staunchly to the belief they were being kept segregated, as befitted their ranks and sex. They could be one sector apart and not hear of them. It was the only hopeful response, it was a leader’s response. There had been women downed before Kendeigh, not many but a few of the escort fighters, and none of them had showed either. Brady wasn’t sure that was a good sign at all.

“So where’s Egan then?” he’d always hit back with, “They mistake his shoulders’ for a dame’s?”

“I dunno John.” Cleven would reply with that newly blank gaze of his somehow enhanced by the twin cuts on his cheeks.

Demarco took Brady aside when he arrived to tell him that whatever had happened to Cleven in interrogation wasn’t pretty and it wasn’t ethical. Those cheek scars weren’t both due to flack. Like a dog with a bone, Brady took this already suspected information about his stoic superior and ran with it, pointing out hotly to an uninterested Demarco, “if it’s happened to Cleven, what about them?”

“What can we do about it?” Was Cleven’s demand that always wrapped up the little circular arguments as they sat huddled in their hut. “Red Cross knows they’re not here, no colored flyers either. They know where they are. What can we do besides ask after them?”

He was right, there wasn’t anything, but still, like a presentiment hung over him, Brady found himself leaning on the wire each time a new batch was marched in, counting heads and scanning faces.

“Ida hasn’t even been shot down, John.” Crank kindly reminded again and again.

“As of two weeks ago.” John snapped.

As of two weeks, and then as of three, and then it became four and -where the hell was Kendeigh? Gale had stopped arguing when the subject came up, apparent but impotent fury slowly racking his wiry frame, face gone wane already above his grimey fleece collar. Winter wasn’t even here and they were fading.

And then it happened, what John had been waiting by the fence for, and boy was there a crush at the wire to see them marched in when they came up the muddy enclosure through the gates.

“The fuck are they bringing the women here for?”

“They don’t belong in here, bastards!”

“Ar’those Brady’s Banshees?”

“They’re not gonna hold ‘em here are they?”

Like he’d been reanimated by the presence of a cause, Major Cleven cut his way through the rabble to the front, addressing the German officer escorting them.

“Hey, hey you can’t bring them in here. They’re women, they belong in their own section.”

“If they are women,” the Commandant pointed out, not unkindly, “then perhaps your country should have recognized that before enlisting them? They belong here.”

Cleven shook his head, vehement in his conventions and rules, “It’s not right, you know it’s not.”

“Then tell your Lt. Colonel to stop fighting for combatant status.” he jerked his chin towards Ida Brady and Gale’s eyes widened at her injuries and tufted hair, “The SS had them tucked away at our most prestigious female camp. But they would not accept. They want to be men.”

“Combatants!” Gale argued the point Ida had been making since her feet touched occupied soul.

John Brady yanked his arm, whispering urgently in his ear, “She’s makin’ sign to me, torture, she says. Don’t fight it, Buck.”

Cleven searched the battered faces, some he knew like Ida, T.Smith and Maureen, and some from other squadrons, -ones who must’ve been damned unlucky to get captured considering their safer postings.

“If it can happen to you it c-“ John Brady was a bit of a pain in the ass, Cleven had found, but he had never found him to be wrong.

“Roger, loud and clear, captain.” Cleven warned him his point was made with a bite in his own tone.

“Have we come to an understanding?” The Commandant, amused by the fluster his female charges had caused, it was ample proof that women could never be fully integrated, not even by a society so pervertedly equal as the American’s. “Ja? Sehr gut. It wasn’t like you had a choice anyway, was it?

Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed. Feedback is a writer’s life blood, let me hear your thoughts and screams, they mean so much to me.

We have so many prompts already thrown around for this AU, I can’t wait to explore them, and I welcome any more if you have them.

Taglist (if you’d like to be added please drop a note below):

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@ab4eva

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jakes3resin · 18 days

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Modern Reincarnation AU

"Sorry," Bucky grins, stepping out of the way. The other man stares up at him, blue eyes wide. "You alright there?" "Coffee for Buck!" The barista calls out behind them, jolting the other man out of his stupor. The man grabs the coffee. He thanks the barista in a rush, barely even looking at his coffee. He turns back to Bucky, lips pursed as he stares at him. His grip on his coffee, Bucky notes, is verging on too tight. The poor cup looks like it's going to crumple. Bucky smiles, gesturing for the other to walk by, but Buck just stands there. "Sorry, this is weird, but you look a lot like a guy I once knew from Wisconsin." Buck says, not once taking his eyes off of Bucky. "Also went by the name Bucky." "Wow," Bucky says. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "What a coincidence!"

You know those reincarnation AUs where one person remembers their shared past while the other doesn't? Well, what if only Buck remembered, and he met Bucky, who didn't?

#mota #masters of the air #buck x bucky #clegan #john bucky egan #gale buck cleven #bucky egan #john egan #gale cleven #buckbucky #should i be working on england arc? yes but i can multi task #got inspired seeing stills of callum from only living boy in new york #mota au #mota fic

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austeenbootler · 18 days

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Not your father

TW: alcohol mention and eluding to abuse and addiction of alcohol

“have you been drinking?”

bucky stumbled to the couch adjacent to where buck was reading. falling haphazardly onto the cushions.

“nope im about as sober as a nun buck.”

he knew that was a lie. could smell the whiskey when john walked through the door. but if john wanted to lie. so be it. gale just nodded and closed his book getting up. he was tired… exhausted even. he was tired of john.

#buck x bucky #buck cleven #bucky egan #mota au #clegan

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air-exec · 11 days

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MOTA AU where Gale starts losing his memory (illness? Accident? Who knows!)

so he starts keeping a journal where he keeps track of all of the things he loves about John, in an attempt to make something tangible to remind himself of the love of his life if/when he no longer recognizes him.

#mota #clegan #mota au #gale cleven #john egan #I hurt my feelings #air exec talks

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getinthefuckingjaeger · 1 month

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The actual Gale Cleven being an astrophysicist makes me think of a Star Trek mota AU and the 100th BG being the only starship crew in the entire fleet' that can rival the Enterprise in terms of getting into the dumbest and craziest shit on their exploration mission plus Lt Commander Montgomery is always tryna poach Lemmons

#masters of the air #mota au

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edits-art-and-roleplay · 10 days

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:: Warnings!! The following story is only suitable for people over 18 years old!! It includes sexual acts and a wonderful love story between two men! :: :: Please don't copy nor steal my writing. ::

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

'The couch? Seriously?', Gale's mind spoke and his gaze swept across the room, over to the fold-out couch where John could be found sleeping. It could have been much easier. The bed in this hotel room was so big that 4 people could have easily slept in it without getting in the way. Their best friend had been quite generous when he celebrated his big birthday at the fancy hotel, allowing all his friends and family to stay there. Gale and John shared a room, like in the old days when they were roommates. That's exactly how it felt now when Gale took in the distance between them.

His confession a few weeks ago that he had separated from his wife had obviously not changed anything between the two of them. He had confessed to John that he realized why John had kept his distance and it was all the more frightening that he felt exactly the same thing. That was the first time John had admitted that he was in love with Gale either. ‘Then why doesn’t anything change?’, Gale thought and let out a deep, quiet breath. Maybe he needed to make it clearer to John what he wanted.

So Gale slowly and noiselessly pushed himself up off the mattress, slid out of bed and just as noiselessly walked over to the couch. It was so frighteningly quiet that he could clearly hear John's breathing the closer he got. Reaching the edge of the couch, Gale leaned forward and down so he could gently snuggle against John's warm body.

Perhaps it was fate, a premonition or a deep-seated wish on John's part, that he kept the left arm away from the body in such a way that Gale found it comfortable, his right hand resting relaxed on the stomach. John didn't move at first, but looked happy in his sleep and it was definitely three minutes before Gale felt the slight body movement. His best friend was no longer asleep, but wide awake and aware that this was no dream. His head turned to the left, lips touched Gale's smelly and soft hair and a deep breath of contentment was heard. Gale felt it, heard the quiet heartbeat and was quite sure that this was the moment John had been longing for. Still, both of them couldn't stop teasing.

"What are you doing here?", John was heard whispering, lips resting gently against Gale's hair.

"Well, we were at a birthday party and ended up in the hotel room.", Gale smirked even though his Major couldn't see it, but he heard the gentle wheezed laughter.

"I know that. I mean, what are you doing -here-?" He emphasized the last word lovingly and the fingers of his left hand tapped almost tenderly on Gale's hip, which he had grasped from behind and pulled close to him.

"Well - I woke up in that huge and quite comfortable bed over there and couldn't bear to see you here on this rather uncomfortable couch."

"We can swap. - Uuuh ouch.", John added quickly, feeling the playful boxing in the side and that's when his laughter was heard more loudly. To his surprise, he got a kiss on the shoulder joint and grinned happily to himself with his eyes closed.

"Do you feel uncomfortable when I'm lying here?", Gale was heard asking softly and cautiously after a long moment of silence had passed and they just held each other. As if they had never had bad times, never had been separated, never went through a self chosen distance to each other.

"No not at all." The soft and relaxed tone of John's voice encouraged Gale. Not that he didn't have one, but that the closeness between them and in the here and now wasn't a problem gave him the courage to finally say what he wanted to say.

"Then never leave my side again."

"I'm here. I always was."

"But never completely and that's what I want. You by my side, without the limits we have imposed on ourselves, but rather enjoying now that we both love each other." So began a plea of love, which Gale's heart absolutely had to get off his chest. All of that had been building up in him for so long, had had to remain hidden for so long that now as he had spoken the first few sentences, he felt the pressure in his chest really painful. So he sat up, sat on the knees, shoved the slightly trembling hands between his thighs to calm him down and continued to speak with fervor.

"It took me so long to figure out and realize why you made yourself so rare in our friendship. The worst part was not realizing why you did it, but that I would have had exactly the same reason. Namely, that I love you . And you still love me. So why does it feel like you still like the distance more than being close to me."

"Gale." He heard those whispers very close and looked straight into John's eyes, for he had long since sat up and taken his lover's hands in his own. But Gale's mind still hadn't really realized this.

"No, John. We seriously have to talk about it.", he shook his head, not wanting to interrupt the speech.

"And I want you to stop talking."

"Why? Isn't all that just as important to you anymore?"

"Yes. It is.", John smiled and now Gale finally realized how close they were, because the warm breath carried John's whisper over a very short distance to his lips. Eyes that Gale loved so much couldn't look more directly into his as he then heard. "But I finally want to kiss you."

Such a request had never set Gale's heart pounding so fast. However, when John said those words, his heart pounded so fast against the ribs that the vibration was almost unbearable. Like a newborn that sucked in the first breaths hectically and uncontrollably, his chest moved up and down so quickly and yet it was the most beautiful agony Gale had ever suffered. Their gazes never parted and when John put the warm hands on his cheeks, there was this unspeakably beautiful relief and relaxation on Gale's limbs. That feeling ran down his cheeks, down his jaw, down into his chest where it calmed the excited heart and breathing. But only until the next sensual storm blew up in him.

Magnetically attracted to each other, their faces had moved closer together and when the surfaces of their lips touched, Gale noticed that John had long since closed his eyes. Wanting to enjoy it in the same way, the eyelids drooped, letting the long lashes rest on the silky skin under the eyes, and now the inner explosion felt even more intense. This moment wasn't forced, it wasn't planned or foreseen. No, this moment was simply carried by love and enclosed the two of them like an invisible cage. Not one you were trapped in and wanted to escape as quickly as possible. God no, Gale liked to be trapped in this cage until the end of his life, knowing he was with the man he loved. Knowing he was safe, alive and his love was returned.

But this love was not only reciprocated. That love turned to passion and Gale felt John's body pushing closer and closer against his. He felt the slight twist that pushed him backwards into the pillows, the mattress snuggling up against the back and his front being gently buried beneath John's. However, he also felt the tremor that stirred up the passion and made John's muscles tremble. As soon as he became aware of this, he heard this strained moaning and stopping breathing as if his lover was fighting something.

"Major? What's going on?", Gale whispered, cupping his lover's face in both hands and hoping nothing more than that he would look at him. "Your whole body is shaking."

"I'll be fine in a second.", John muttered haltingly, suppressing the deep groan and everything about him was tense. His forehead rested on Gale's bare chest, next to whose body his hands had gripped the sheets and were tugging at them. And now it dawned on Gale what was going on.

"It's all a bit much at once, isn't it?", he grinned, doing everything he could not hear it. He now knew what was going on in John and how much he fought against lust, because he couldn't do otherwise. Neither of them had been prepared for this explosion of emotions. There was no bootcamp for that.

"A little.", John wheezed laughing, clearing his throat and now having given up the stubbornness not to look at his lover. His head slowly rose, he shifted the body weight slightly to the right forearm and tenderly stroked the side of Gale's face with the left hand. "I've waited for this moment for so long.", he whispered lovingly. "For this moment, for you, for us. Words cannot express how happy I am, Gale."

"We don't need to talk.", he sounded mischievous. "I would be very content to feel you in any sensual way."

He received no verbal reply to this request. Rather, a flood of tender kisses came towards him, which took him by storm again. John's lips were so sensual and beguilingly soft. The flowing movements of his body are so devotedly light, as if small, flat waves were pushing against the shore. It was so easy to let yourself fall into this stream, switch off your head and find relaxation. But Gale wanted more than that. He was overwhelmed with the urge to lose himself completely in John. Not only did he want to be one with him in an act that went with it, no, Gale wanted to disappear body and soul into John. Becoming one with him, sharing the same heart and soul forever.

And that's exactly what happened at that moment. With each caress of the hands, each other removed the last barrier between their bodies. With every kiss that touched the heated skin. With every stroke of the tongue, it tickled errogenic zones and tenderly made you want more. The small flame of passion had long since turned into a firestorm and Gale almost missed the moment, this one important moment, in which he now fully felt John. But John had stopped, forcing him to look at him and realize what was happening. And what happened was the best thing in their lives. Gale was totally relaxed and as they locked eyes, he felt John's hips move closer to his. It was the most beautiful way to be buried under him and to be caught by his waves. Those waves that were no longer small and flat, but that had picked up the storm from far out at sea and whipped against the shore.

Carried away by this storm, Gale's hands were wrapped around John's shoulder blades. Legs had wrapped themselves, like a passionate clamp, around the hips that rocked both their bodies. Why had they waited so long for this? Why had they allowed themselves to stay away from each other, when they really needed each other? Gale didn't know anymore. He didn't want to look back either. He wanted to stay in the here and now. At that moment, when they were finally one and bit by bit the pressure built up in him that he almost got dizzy. And just as that feeling became too aching and strong, Gale could feel their bodies giving in to the need. He could feel John's explosion and just two seconds later his own spreading hotly against their bellies. Gale wanted to scream out loud, but their kisses had muffled any loud gasps and moans before, and still did.

It wasn't until the last wave of their climax that lips parted, but faces stayed close and hectic breath rushed between mouths. Gale's fingers on John's shoulder blades relaxed again and he hadn't noticed that the fingernails had dug into the skin. Very lightly, but he felt the marks as the fingertips caressed tenderly and John seemed to whimper softly. "I'm sorry.", Gale whispered, lifting his eyelids and looking at his lover's overjoyed face.

"I'm not.", John grinned with the lascivious look and small tears had mixed between the beads of sweat on his face. "I'm not sorry for a single damn second.", he whispered, both still struggling to fill their lungs with fresh oxygen. "I love you, Gale. And I swear to you, I'll never let you go again.", he sealed these words with a heartfelt kiss and the night gave the two enough time to enjoy their togetherness.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:: Thank you for taking the time to read my work. If you liked it, please tell me, share the post and/or leave a heart. If you didn't like it and you don't have anything nice to say, I'll be grateful if you don't say anything at all. God bless you all! ::

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hogans-heroes · 2 months

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Adding to your pile of messages: DeMarco vet AU. Bucky is his friend and he’s at the vet office when this cute, blond stranger brings in his pet. We see Bucky fail to be subtle as he tries to flirt, and Gale flirting back in his own reserved way. All from DeMarco's POV

Cute fic ideas from you instead of devastating angst??? Who are you?? 😆

But OMGG I LOVE THIS! I can literally just see the cute fools Gale and Bucky are making of themselves while Gale’s cat is like omg dad don’t embarrass me I’m literally about to die at this vet?? I’m getting a shot?? (I HC his pet is a cat because Austin is a huge cat lover, but he also has a dog so that could work too).

The only suggestion I might have is that since DeMarco is Gale’s copilot it might make for sense for him to be DeMarco’s friend? But there’s so many different awesome ways this could go! Thank you for volunteering to write this 🤣

#love this au now so many cute possibilities #thanks for the ask!#masters of the air #mota #mota au

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victoryrollsandredlips · 1 month

Text

The AUX Cable

You agreed to pick your brother up from the party, you didn't agree to pick up all his friends and drive them to your hometown's one late night fast food place.

You sigh, trying to make your frustration known to him and everyone around you as they all pile into your shitbox car. Somehow it can barely hold everything in your tiny apartment, but now it fits, what, six people??

"Pass me the AUX cable?" someone asks from the backseat, and they squeeze your shoulder. You find it, somehow, in the beam of the dome light, and sigh loudly again as you pass it behind you.

"Thanks."

The first notes of an old jazz song are barely audible over the sound of everyone climbing into the car. Confused, you turn around and gasp. "Rosie? Is that you?"

He grins. "Took you long enough to recognize me."

#rosie is the kind of guy who steals your aux cable #masters of the air #mota #masters of the air fanfic #mota fanfic #mota au #college au #hometown au #modern au #fanfic #robert rosenthal #rosie rosenthal

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precious-little-scoundrel · 21 days

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Can you write something with gale and Maureen? Like him taking care of her when she’s sick? Or trying to help her fall asleep?

Love this request doll, thank you. I’ve gotten quite a few requests asking for a fic of him taking care of her when she’s sick/cold, etc, and while I’ll certainly write another corresponding with those, I felt like yours gave me a chance to establish a little chronology of his doting on her. Which leads us to—helping her fall asleep on the:

First Night

It had been lights out for over an hour now, and still, Gale could sense the shifting restless around him. As the men’s initial post-battle fatigue had lessened and the dull predictability of one’s camp days settled in, the nights became longer, less restful and more of a routine than a respite. They could lay in their beds most the day or else walk and sit and lay somewhere else, there was no exhausted relief to be found climbing into a bunk. Gale missed the taxing demand for rest that came with a regimented military life. He knew he wasn’t alone in it.

Now there was the invigorating addition of the presence of the women at camp, and like kids at a sleepover -or so Gale heard sleepovers were like that, he’d never been to one- all rooms were filled with restless chit chat and lack of calm. He’d had to go along the hall of his integrated combine before lights out to warn everyone to shush it.

At least they were amalgamating well.

There was so much to catch up on by each crew and any new bit of information a new prisoner carried in was worth more than Broadway tickets back home, added to that was the old natural way of men not knowing when to shut the hell up around the fairer sex.

So Gale had knocked on doors and doused lightbulbs like the bucket of cold water that he was, and then returned to his own bunk in the subsequent quiet, only to cave and allow John Brady thirty more minutes of risky light use to keep mending -and watch his tolerably death-like and unconscious sister as she shallowly breathed on a lower bunk.

Gale had once hauled himself up and out of his second tier bunk opposite her to put his hand in front of Ida’s lips, she had gotten so still for a bit. “You should sleep by her.” he told Brady, recalling times his father’s warmth had been the only thing to keep him alive some nights in the park. He was rather certain Johnny meant to do it anyway, but he wasn’t a readable fella and his curt nod was all Gale got along with the ever faithful, “yes sir.”

When Gale had finally demanded they cut the bulb, he watched as Brady carefully climbed in and lay behind Ida without disturbing her, two lanky, stacked sardines with plenty of room and not enough fat on either of them to keep a water bottle thawed in this weather. Gale shrugged and flicked the light -family genes couldn’t be helped.

What could be helped was Maureen’s dripping hair. After the showers she had sat herself down at the table and demanded they deal her a hand of cards, burnt auburn hair dripping ice water down the back of her borrowed shirt.

Her shivers rattled her so badly she had dropped her cards multiple times, made worse by her mangled hands. They’d paused the game to have Hambone and Tallulah come in and wrench her middle and fourth fingers straight. Hamilton swore he had experience from his own injuries and T. Smith had grown up on a farm, excellent referrals both. The ordeal could’ve been worse, Gale supposed.

Benny had gagged while watching it, Gale had wanted to while holding her wrist down, Hambone had growled “fuck” more times than John had ever heard him during a mission and Ida didn’t even wake from Maureen’s yells -so out of it was she on the bunk she’d wobbled into and fallen asleep on.

Now Maureen sat stubbornly at the table in the dark, still consulting her deck of cards as if she could discern a diamond from a spade.

“Bed.” Gale told her despite her petulance, and the boys were good enough not to encourage her rebellion for once, taking themselves to their own bunks with little fanfare, “Don’t wanna get us in trouble for lights on your first night do ya? Make Ida stand out in the cold for inspections? Good, because I don’t want you out there with that hair.”

“It’s taking forever to dry and I don’t want to get my pillow wet.” Maureen protested.

“You can’t just sit here in the dark.” he muttered.

“Johnny would’ve.” she hit back. Gale wasn’t sure since when John Brady had been the yardstick by which Maureen measured human behavior, but it had been about as long as Gale knew her.

“Yeah but now Johnny’s in bed like a good boy.” Gale observed.

He heard someone titter and if he had to throw a dart at the offender in the gray dark it would be aimed towards Demarco’s bunk. “Johnny hasn’t got my hair. Ida either…anymore.” she added with childlike insensitivity.

“You should braid it.” Demarco’s voice suggested from the dark of his bunk.

“Hands can’t do squat.” Maureen was starting to sound offended by how often they forgot about her hands. She’d dropped her cards as often from their gnarled swelling as from her shivers, and every time one of the guys tried to ignore it or give a kinder explanation she would hold them up like she wanted them to recall what she was working with. Most of the fellas would’ve rather looked into hell’s portal than keep contemplating her hands or what they meant.

“Lemme braid your hair.” Gale told her, he didn’t ask and he didn’t thank Benny for the suggestion.

Maureen scoffed as he scooped up the frigid, wet strands from her shoulders and began to divide them in his hands. “Like you know how.”

“I do.” he patiently insisted after a few moments of the more convincing argument of his actually braiding it.

“Who else have you done this for? Who taught you?” Maureen’s jealousy was palpable to everyone and even Brady snickered softly at her this time.

“Horses, Maureen. My uncle had horses.”

Maureen didn’t reply to that, in fact, besides brawling japes during cards and her arguments against bedtime,

she hadn’t said much since coming back from the showers. She was cold to the touch when Gale finished his braid and squeezed the last bit of wet he could from the woven rope and then he bodily deposited her in her bunk. An adjacent one to his, on the same level, their heads were nearly beside each other’s in the cramped stack.

And now, an hour afterwards, everyone was still tossing in the dark except for Ida and her brother, and Gale had no peace with Maureen’s chattering teeth just a few inches away and her crushed hands dancing in front of his eyes everytime he closed them.

He thought of a lot of things to whisper to her, questions, comforts, even jokes. They never got out of his tightening throat as sixty minutes ticked by and he kept staring up at the slats of the bunk above him like that would keep the flashing image of her hands away. Suddenly the chatter of teeth stopped and he felt himself begin to relax in turn, hopeful she’d drifted off.

The unmistakable sound of a sob followed shortly after and it messed with the rhythm of his heart worse than jumping from his spiraling plane had.

“Maureen?” he questioned softly, as if there could be any doubt.

The sobs only gained frequency and vigor. Gale rolled himself over on his belly, and without thinking it through for once, impulsively threaded his arm through the divide to her bunk, laying his arm along her pillow and cupping the cheek closest to him. The humid blast of her breath against his palm tore at him and he thumbed over her wobbling lips. “Maureen,” he begged again, hoarse from his damn throat and in an effort to be quiet, “what- what is it?”

What can I do?—is what he meant.

“Having a cry Cleven.” She informed him angrily and without discretion in her volume except for what her sniffles required, “Can’t a gal have a well earned cry? Told you I wouldn’t manage to sleep.”

Ah, so the cry was his fault. Gale sighed and couldn’t help his sideways glance at Ida’s bunk. Not that he wanted such unnatural, deathly peace for Maureen. It would scare the fuck out of Gale, just as it was scaring the fuck outta Johnny who Gale knew was owl eyed awake right across from him and his now sobbing bombardier.

“I’m sorry.” Gale offered her impotently, childish habits coming to the fore in his helplessness, -how sorry he’d been time and again growing up, sorry for wall street crashing and Hoover having won that last time and the fact there weren’t any more quarters left for a soda and that the malnourished dog lost that one race and being sorry, so goddamn sorry all the damn time just so his father would finally absolve him with, “it’s ok, son” in return.

“And now my pillow’s wet!” -Maureen never absolved him of shit, she piled on and somehow Gale found himself devoted to that honest cruelty too, in a more mature, twisted, fucked sorta way. “I told you my pillow would get wet and I’d be cold!”

“You can have mine.” he tried.

“Oh yeah, and get it wet too.” her anger huffed out into his palm and it made him feel funny, like he was feeling her breath all along him, her emotion too, her outright disapproval of him. It always made him feel funny, feel desperate without feeling wrong or sorry. He’d never taken the fall for something that wasn’t his to own up to, not since he became a man. Not until her. He felt himself swelling against the mattress and wanted to say sorry for that, too.

—can’t help it around you.

He’d taken up excuse making as well since her, it proved so damn effective. Way more than his apologies.

“I could use cooling down.” he realized aloud and tugged her damp pillow out from under her head without warning, “Don’t fuckin’ test me Kendeigh, not tonight.” he warned at her stiff neck as he used her braid to lift her head and slide his under her head.

He settled his confiscated pillow closer to hers, his cheek pressed to her tears and shower wet, their heads practically aligned and in the dim light he could make out the curve of her nose. Such a pretty nose, he’d been enchanted with it from the minute she cocked her head at him in the glass nose of Our Baby.

Maureen had stopped crying. Her arm swung above her head and slithered under his blankets until she’d grabbed hold of what she wanted, bringing his hand up by the wrist until it was cupping her cheek again. She nuzzled her face into it and kissed his palm, the glitter of her eyes discernible between his fingers to the scrutiny of a lover as enamored as Gale.

“Sorry.” she whispered at long last into his palm and he shuddered.

“Don’t be sorry.” he commanded.

“I feel better.” she said.

“Good.”

Her hand darted out the top of her blanket and cupped his cheek, mirroring him. She thumbed at the smooth skin of his face with a swollen thumb until she found his poorly healed scar. “Wanna give it a try?” she asked. “We swapped pillows, it’s wet anyway, no one would know.”

“I don’t need a cry.” he declined gently.

“Ooh, does my Major need other things?” Maureen’s voice had gone saucy -and thankfully hushed- despite the stuffed up quality of her nose but the thought of her hands curdled his reaction to the tease immediately.

“No.” he breathed, hating the crowded room and the faux intimacy of this moment. Maureen was always more immune to intrusion but he couldn’t pretend to match her. “I just need you safe.” he begged, for if her ordeal had ended at her arrival here, he felt his had just begun.

The thumb stroking Gale’s cheek dipped lower until it was tracing his upper lip, slipping to the crease of his mouth, gently parting his plush lips until she had her finger past them, resting on his teeth. “I’m with you.” Maureen muttered, “Of course I’ll be safe.”

Gale closed his mouth around her, tongue lathing at the pad of her thumb, cheeks hollowed in an innate impulse for suction. Maureen’s presence made him feel odd, always had. Her nose came to rest against his and that was the last he recalled of the night, the gusts of her breath evening out against his face, the weight of her thumb on his tongue, the drowsy and unheeded regret that he had already compromised so far on their first night.

When he was startled awake next morning by a shake to the shoulder, mouth dry and her thumb still between his teeth, Cleven could only be grateful it was by Brady and unseen by the rest of the still sleeping men. The fact Maureen seemed to have been already awake and merely staring at him while he slept was another unsettling matter. As were the deep circles under Brady’s soft eyes: the kid looked like he hadn’t slept a wink and Gale wondered briefly how long his poor subordinate had stared at his bunk and hoped the thumb would fall out before rousing his superior. Or if Maureen had made eye contact during it. Oh for God’s sake...

Obviously Brady’s patience had run out with a hard shake, because -“It’s Ida, she won’t fuckin’ respond but she’s bowin’ up till I think her neck might snap.”

Well that got Gale tumbling out of bed.

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