Sierra Six X Y/n - Blog Posts

Into The Gray Chpt. 8 (House Call)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Tags: @medievalfangirl, @biblichorr, @pyrokineticbaby, @lxvrgirl, @asiludida164, @torchbearerkyle, @jasmin7813, @comfortzonequeen, @96jnie, @ryanclutched, @the-light-of-earendil

You sat in the opposite chair, chin in hand, watching Claire Fitzroy push around the dinner that you’d made. You may have been a little biased, but you hadn’t believed that you’d done that bad a job, considering cooking had become something of a hobby for you—but watching her turn herbs over and inspect them with a vaguely disturbed look, nose scrunched and repeating the action with the seasonings, had you doubting. There may have been too much complexity in flavor for a pre-teen to handle, one that you reminded yourself had lived on a strict diet of Hawaiian pizza and ice-cream. 

Claire’s body angled backwards, ready to leap from the chair in case the plate suddenly leapt off the table.

Garlic and zest may not have been the best option that you could have chosen.

The fork was eventually laid to rest against her plate with a clang. Tentative fingers nudged it away, a few inches and then halfway across the table. Her forearms folded on the table’s edge, the wooden finish worn from years of sitting. She’d addressed you briefly when you’d first entered the safehouse–a wooden cabin in the middle of nowhere–but this was the first time that she’d officially looked at you since you’d arrived. Her eyebrows raised, and yours instinctively copied the action.

“So,” Claire started, trailing off. 

“So?” You echoed. 

She leaned forward, and those raised eyebrows suddenly furrowed, narrowing with her eyes as though she had started some kind of interrogation. Her expression mirrored suspicion, but you thought that she was just curious. It was kind of cute; you could admit that. “You and Six aren’t friends?” 

There was a pause before you answered. Your gaze never left her. “We share secrets.” 

“That’s kind of what friends do.” She pointed out, skeptical. 

You nodded, once as if in understanding, but you didn’t really know. No one came to mind that you would trust to keep a secret, no one that you would consider a “friend” on either side involved. You thought about Dani, and you thought about Lloyd, but every secret that you’d learned about them had been without their knowledge. 

You doubted that it counted. 

Social standards and attachments weren’t lost on you, the sociology and psychology of it, but the fact that you’d only thought about it in a scientific aspect, synapses firing in the brain and the chemistry, only proved to you that you wouldn’t be the ideal person to get that kind of advice from—you were too blunt; too literal. 

“You tried to kill Six,” She accused, flat.

You didn’t. You told her that. “I didn’t.”

“You broke into our house,” her eyebrows flicked upwards, as though she’d caught you up in a lie. “I saw you. He had a gun, and then those people broke in. They took him.”

You didn’t know what to say to that; most of it had nothing to do with you. Most.

“Why did you go after him? Do you know Six?”

You briefly contemplated the extent of how much you should confess with a pre-teen and also the niece of the one person that you’d been after at the very start–the original dividing cog in an already fragile machine. Should you explain? Apologize? 

“I’m only concerned about him through proxy.”

“What does that even mean?” She grimaced, voice terse.

Your own remained even. “It means,” you trailed off, eyes flicking around the small space of the kitchen. “That when I get what I need from him, that’ll be the end of it.”

“And what exactly do you need ?”

When you didn’t answer right away, Claire leaned forward, turning your attention back to her, the suddenly intense stare in her gaze as she rested her chin on top of her fist, squinting as though determined to find some kind of secret that could have been hidden in your expression. You didn’t have anything to hide, so you found yourself staring back despite yourself.

“What are you doing?”

“Reading your mind.” She said as a matter of fact. “I can usually do it with Six; you both have this zone out thing that you do sometimes.” She exhaled, then gave up, the brunt of her shoulders colliding back against her seat. She rolled her eyes. “He’s easier.”

“You know him.”

Claire exhaled through her nose. “You two aren’t that different,” she then clarified: “You both can be really frustrating to talk to.”

It wasn’t often that someone could pull a smile from you, and you hadn’t expected Claire Fitzroy to be one. You could see how Sierra Six was attached to her, the contradiction to the rules–an innocence in a world that was quite the contrary. 

She was a child, and had it been your world before it’d gone, you knew without thinking too hard that she wouldn’t have made it. In your world, you learned how to hide from the CIS, NSA, the DIA, the NRO… among others. Your boss’ bosses, the groups they worked with and who knew their names, but never knew yours. 

You were a stray sitting across from something with an impressive pedigree. 

“If you have a prison tattoo with some Greek guy’s name, I’d consider the two of you twins.” Claire rambled on, her interest in you lost and your puzzled look left unanswered as she turned and slid out of her chair, her dinner left barely touched in the middle of the table. 

She left you, the sound of an old record lilting from a crack in an open door a moment later. You took that as your cue to leave, packing up what was left into the fridge–you didn’t count on the idea that she would eat it if she was hungry enough; you made a mental note to grab a few freezer pizzas when you were able. ~~~~~~~~~

You didn’t know if it was because of Sierra Six, or because of your own, albeit brief, experience with Claire Fitzroy, but you found yourself looking for—not at, but for—specific dynamics among groups of people that you’d initially cast aside as irrelevant. There was no distinct purpose behind it and it had become more of a subconscious behavior, but you found it very ironic that you were surrounded by attachments that exerted the same effort to stay together as much as they also did to keep Six and Claire apart. 

Your interrogators on your first day, the brash one and the twitchy one that still couldn’t meet your eye in the hallway as you passed, carried photos around in their wallets of children–also unbeknownst to both of them–the same wife, but you hadn’t cared to ask who was technically the other half of that agreement. 

Dani fretted with her mother on the phone daily, and there was a working couple in the office a few floors down that fostered children. 

The accounting department went to karaoke once a month, and you were pretty sure that one of the intern’s sudden employment offers and the office manager’s vacation presiding on the same weekend wasn’t just a coincidence. 

They behaved as though Claire and Six’s dynamic, their own miniature version of something resembling a family, was any different from the ones they made up on their own–secretive or otherwise. The only difference was that their circumstances had been created by manipulated events; Claire had needed someone, and whether Six had chosen it on his own or decided that he was her best chance, he’d stepped in.

Funnily enough, these people were the ones that had created the circumstances that had forced them together. 

You hadn’t been to see Six since your last conversation. Carmichael had bombarded you with bullshit busy work to hide the fact that he was compiling evidence against you–unsuccessfully–and still looking into the job report that had coincidentally landed you in Florida at the same time that they had found Sierra Six.

Dani never said anything, whether she had any suspicions or not, but there was something about the looks she gave you that told you to cover your tracks a little harder before every single eye in the agency went back to following you around. She wasn’t as subtle. Her curiosities and willingness to go along with anything that could inconvenience Suzanne and Carmichael had kept you safe on several occasions. 

You liked that about her.

“It’s a Friday night,” the familiar baritone of Carmichael’s voice directly beside you was not enough to persuade you to acknowledge him. You were crouched in front of a series of file cabinets, sifting through dated assignment reports–your search was specific, but to an outside observer, you probably looked like you were sorting through junk; past cases considered closed. 

“Everyone’s left the office,” he said when you didn’t answer.

“You haven’t.”

“I’m waiting on a few friends.” Out of the corner of your eye, you watched his hands slide into the pockets of his pants, suit jacket having been discarded and the absence of it showing the hourly grind. His plain button up was rumpled, his tie partially undone. His head pivoted. “What’s your excuse?”

“I don’t have any friends.” 

“No?” He asked with mock surprise, raising his overly bushy eyebrows. “That’s shocking. I would go so far as to say emotionally complex if I thought of you as the emotional type.”

“I’d rather you not think about me at all.”

“It’s not voluntary, I promise you that.” 

“Is someone telling you to do it?” 

“No, but it's come to my attention that despite your stellar employee record, we have yet to find any kind of outside file on you.” He shrugged nonchalantly, and you heard the sarcastic lilt to the idea of you having a stellar anything. “Suzanne thought that you could be useful if you supposedly took out Sierra; she said that your potential would be a waste serving a life sentence.”

“Should I also be thanking her for this conversation?”

 He didn’t waver. “Interest alignments and general surveillance keep you here, but the lack has me curious.” 

His remark led into silence. You weren’t in the mood for this. You looked up. 

“You’re wasting your time looking.”

“We had Lloyd Hansen on a very thin leash, and I’ll admit that it was an idea doomed to go South, knowing as little as we did, but you’re an entirely different risk.” 

“I’m spending my Friday night looking through paperwork.” You tapped the drawer that you had open for emphasis. 

“Wasting your time looking for information that doesn’t exist, right?” His mouth tilted up at the edges, his suspicion evident; it’d always been. You could tell the lack of anything concrete was frustrating for him. He didn’t understand why you were here, nor why you’d been allowed to stay here. 

You understood that it was because of that lack of existence; you’d have been blamed for the CIA’s fuck-ups already if Sierra Six hadn’t been spotted at the scenes. 

“If I had my way about it, you’d be in the cell beside Six’s, and you’d be let out when we want you out—Suzanne lets you walk free, and I don’t quite get that.”

“If we are basing it off of your negotiation skills with Sierra Six so far, I do get it.” You answered. 

The subtle twitching of his facial expression told you that you’d struck a nerve, but Carmichael was not the type to let his pride get the better of him. You knew that the stab would further his attempts to incarcerate you, but in your opinion, he had more things to worry about. 

The squeak of his leather shoes cut through the tension as Carmichael stepped back. His hardened gaze bore into you, a death glare shot back over his shoulder as he left. You mustered up a smile that you made sure he knew was very obviously fake before you went back to what you were doing–but unfortunately, he was right. 

You wouldn’t find what you were looking for here.

It was not the only thing that he’d said that gave you pause, either. He’d mentioned Sierra Six in a cell. Not a room, where you’d first talked to him, but a cell. 

Over the years, many things had made you hesitate. One had been someone’s daughter, rushing to a dance lesson, outside of her mother’s sight but centered directly inside yours, another had been a scientist who thought himself a comedian but took entirely too long to explain what made his jokes funny, and another a reflected light off a skyline; you’d heard the bullet before you’d felt it. 

You found yourself hesitating now, but what you would have considered previously a very well-controlled ability to maintain your curiosity seemed to contradict itself where Sierra Six was concerned. The file cabinet was slammed shut with more force than necessary, and you rose, taking the straightforward path from the basement to the holding cells, one single angled hallway that was housed behind a reinforced door only available with a keycard. 

You didn’t personally have access to that, nor permission, but you’d taken Dani’s keycard when you’d considered going into the basement earlier.

You wondered if Carmichael had realized that. 

The lights in the hallway were the only guiding points to his cell, the lights inside each having been dimmed until what was visible beyond the glass were mere vague shapes among outlines. There was only one that was inhabited–the one at the very end, farthest from the door. You surmised that decision was made with purpose. 

A swipe of Dani’s keycard granted you entry, and when you walked inside, you were immediately met with the sight of him sitting by the wall farthest from the bed, the folded replacements of his clothes untouched at the very end. 

Six’s legs were bent at an angle, arms folded over his knees. The tousled mess of his hair was flattened against the wall where his head was laid back, blood matting it and specks of it spotting the wall. Upon closer inspection, you noticed that there was a leaning angle in the way he was sitting, as though there was an injury to his ribs. His appearance didn’t immediately alarm you, but you suspected this inevitability after enough time fighting his interrogations. 

 When he didn’t open his eyes, you wondered if he was dead; he was too observant to not have noticed you walk in.

Rather than immediately turn toward him, you pivoted in a slower motion. Your face remained passive despite the gruesomeness of him.

“You look like you got into a fight.” You noted. 

“Your friends don’t make good company.” His casual but strained tone was the only indication that he’d noticed you after all, but he didn’t open his eyes to see you.

“And I do?”

Six shrugged, a wince following the motion. “Better company.”

“And here I thought that Carmichael’s personality was just stellar.” You thought that you’d heard the beginnings of a laugh ushered from him, only to be cut short by a hacking cough before he spit a glob of blood across the floor. You didn’t immediately move to help him, lingering by the doorway as though encroaching on the personal space of his cell was worse than encroaching on the personal space of his house. 

In comparison, it was much smaller. 

“How bad are the other guys?”

“Worse off than me.” He wheezed.

With a hum, you finally strode across the room, finding a meager box of first aid supplies sitting on top of the folded clothes. You weren’t surprised that they had left him to patch himself up after beating him half to death, and like you, he’d chosen to be stubborn rather than oblige to anything they handed him. 

After retrieving the box, you’d knelt down in front of him. 

“Got anything to drink?”

You scoffed as you took a small bottle of antiseptic out of the box. It wouldn’t be enough, but it would work. “You’re going to have to deal with this sober,” you said, still digging out some essentials. You threw a glance up at him, only to notice that he was finally looking at you. It didn’t deter you from the order. “Take your clothes off.”

When he didn’t immediately move, you raised your eyebrows. Six looked back at you, one of his eyes partially squinted, promising a bruise within the next few hours. He hesitated to oblige this particular request and you found yourself marveling. 

The Gray Man, who had broken out of a secure CIA building through agents with years of similar–if not more–experience, felt awkward. 

You raised your eyebrows further. 

He still didn’t move. 

“I can’t help you through your clothes.” You pointed out.

Six exhaled through his nose, shifting with a soft grunt so that he could grab at the hem of his shirt and begin tucking it out of the cover of his jeans. His expression twisted at the extension of his movements, a strain on his wounds that had soaked through the fabric and left residue wherever his hands grabbed. You shuffled closer to him. 

“Let me help.” Six moving his hands out of your way was the only permission that you needed. You tugged his shirt free from the confines of his jeans, careful to avoid his wounds while you worked your way up over the defined muscles of his chest, skilled fingers gliding up his biceps and carefully working the sleeves through his arms before you could yank it free over his head. It was dropped to the floor.

Scars covered nearly every surface, old wounds from old places that you’d observed through the window at his house in Florida. There were new wounds and new bruising over the old, some that would leave new scars, but it did little to hinder his rugged handsomeness. You weren’t a fool; you would give credit where it was due. 

Your hands went for his belt next, but he grabbed them.

“I got it,” he insisted. 

“Are you shy?” You teased. 

Your little mockery gave rise to a very light smirk, refreshing the frustration that’d previously occupied his face, but your hands retreated so that he could take over himself, unbuckling his belt and carefully wiggling out of his jeans until he was down to his boxers. Those were discarded beside him on the floor along with his shirt. 

You poked at the space next to one of the bigger bruises at his ribs, purple and green discoloration starting; you went for an open gash adjacent to that space first, taking the antiseptic and gauze into your hands. Your head was bent low, your eyes wandering over the rough outline and bruised edges with practiced focus. 

“Did you finally sign that confession?” You asked.

“No,” Six murmured, soft. “They started beating the piss out of me before then though, so,” he hissed a sharp intake of breath as you dabbed at it with the antiseptic. “It felt like a win.” 

You glanced up, the edge of your mouth twitching. He was looking down at you, eyes wandering, and when your lashes fluttered and your eyebrows raised, he looked back up, to the space around the cell–as empty and disinteresting as it was.

“Uh, thanks.” He went on. “For–for this.”

“I wouldn’t thank me yet. This is not going to be comfortable for you.” 

Six nodded, leaving his appreciation in the air for another time. He leaned his head back again, closing his eyes. He looked more peaceful like this, the lights of the hallway blanketing over him and giving a warm, favorable sheen to features marred by blood. His hair fell away from his forehead, revealing another cut there; another eventual scar. 

You elicited a low groan from him as you pressed the antiseptic into the wound and dabbed at it with the gauze. One of his eyes opened to look at you.

“Just making sure you’re still with me.” You said. 

“Barely. I am beginning,” he hissed out, the words rising like bile in his throat, “to seriously question my life choices.”

Your head tilted. “The Sierra Program taught you how to take a beating, all things considered.” 

“That’s a family trait.”

You exhaled through your nose, poking on another bruise toward his left hip making him gasp; the skin there tender, but nothing that you had to immediately worry about. Nothing felt broken. “You’re hilarious,” you murmured good-naturedly, the action and remark earning a gentle glare from him. “Here I thought that it was the blood loss making you so passive.” 

“Just another Thursday,” he quipped. 

“It’s Friday,” you corrected him, your knees tucked against his thigh where you’d moved against his side. Six held up his hand except that his arm couldn’t extend that far and it fell back down to his knees. One hand pushed against his knees to flatten them both so that they were laying straight, granting you more access where it was needed.  “I’m going to work on your side first. I’m going to need you to hold still, okay?”

Other than a sharp intake of breath, and an occasional flinch, he hardly moved at all; one sharp jerk had you leaning your arm over his legs to hold him still, pushed close to his abdomen and practically laying over him. You’d nudged him closer to the wall to make more room for yourself, your hip pressed against the side of his thigh. 

Threading a needle with a closed eye, you glared at it in focus before your thumb and index finger guided the needle through his skin right beside a hole, drawing it over. As you worked, refined, you ignored the gentle sounds that you elicited from him. Soft sounds of pain were nothing new to you, and you did have to admit that they had made him rather resilient. You didn’t know what you had expected, but for some reason, you expected backlash.

You assumed that his and Lloyd’s pain tolerance were drastically different.

The iris scissors were lifted, and you tied off the thread before snipping it.

More antiseptic was soaked onto the wound before a bandage was applied. You shifted up his body to inspect the wound by his shoulder. One of your thighs was forcefully planted to one side of him, trapped between his and the wall, and the other folded beside you. The supplies were placed on his chest for assurance. He’d lifted his head up when he felt you move; the two of you were nearly nose to nose, but your head was turned, focused on his shoulder. 

He placed his hand beside your thigh, holding himself in place should he somehow find himself leaning. Where one of your hands was planted against his chest to hold yourself steady, you felt his heartbeat underneath your palm, pounding in a frantic rhythm. His skin was hot underneath your fingers. 

Charming.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that you’ve never had a woman this close before,” you said softly, and low without looking at him, your hand moving away to grab more of your antiseptic. 

His breath hitched when he was about to answer, but you interrupted him.

“I don’t want to know.” You mused.

“I have.”

You snickered. “I said if I didn’t know any better.” You felt his muscles relax underneath your hands, but you associated it more with defeat than relaxation. Granted, you had that effect on people naturally. Considering how often you had knowingly or unknowingly infuriated and simultaneously puzzled Lloyd Hansen and Denny Carmichael, Sierra Six was hardly an added challenge. 

Your slender fingers worked at disinfecting and closing the wound at his shoulder, gradually brushing up the length of his arm. Your skin was cold to the touch as always, and you thought that you felt him shiver under his fingers–there was an explorative nature to your demonstrations, touching every little line and mark as you worked your way up over scars old and new in search of other wounds. 

Your eyes never strayed from the work, speaking in their own silent words. Your hand traveled up to drape across his shoulder and toy with stray hairs, twirling blonde strands in between with gentle tugs that were strangely casual. From there, one would consider a conversation starter, or a knife positioned directly where your other hand lingered at his side, doing the same demonstrations where your fingers splayed at the sensitive skin by his hip bone.

It wasn’t often that you were able to get this close to a man without any other intentions.

Six’s hands lay limp, arrested, slowly curling into fists. When you nudged his arm to look at a wound at his other side, he obliged your wordless request. You felt him tense underneath your fingers, seconds teasing him, trickling past. He waited, and he watched. He didn’t risk another glance, another breath too deep. 

Slowly, mechanically, through painstaking precision, he turned to face you completely opposite with a crinkle in his crescent eyes. You knew that look. You’d seen it before, only with much less speaking involved. Then he truly did subside toward you. He pushed the heel of his palm into the floor for support.

All at once, you found yourself pulling away, your hands retreating from his skin, two breaths escaping in unison once you finally made distance and pulled yourself up from the floor. His fingers lingered, brushing your wrist and curling around your knuckles.

“Are you done?” Six asked, voice sounding groggy, lulled into a kind of security that was never meant to be found with you.

“I think you’ll live another day,” you answered. You forced yourself to not submit, to subside against unwise impulses. Especially with as pale and cold as he was—oh, how he could play the game. 

Later, you promised to no one in particular. 

Six finally exhaled, unable to challenge that certainty in your gaze. He managed a pursed smile, then the smile faded, unreadably flat now. With great reluctance, he let go of you. Not once did his attention stray from your face, clinging to it.

“I can’t promise that I’ll happen to be around the next time you piss someone off.” You advised, the barest twitch pulling at the edges of your lips. “So, be careful.”

“Why did you come around this time?” He’d asked when you’d turned away.

“I wanted to tell you,” you inhaled. “Claire is safe. She wants to see you.”

“I want to see her, too.”

Your hand lingered on the doorframe, and while that hadn’t been your original intentions in coming here, you were glad to give him that reassurance. Claire had never outright said it, but you knew as soon as you’d walked into the safehouse who she’d been hoping to see. You never lied, especially not when the facts were directly in front of your face.

“And you will.”

Into The Gray (Chpt. 7)

Secrets (Into The Gray Chpt. 7)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Tags: @medievalfangirl, @biblichorr, @pyrokineticbaby, @lxvrgirl, @asiludida164, @torchbearerkyle, @jasmin7813, @comfortzonequeen, @96jnie

Everything that you’d learned about human behavior and habit had been through careful instruction, nothing ever given to you without intention. There were things that you’d picked up through basic experience and casual observation–people had a habit of writing their name when given a new pen for example, and if you have a plan B, then plan A is less likely to succeed. 

Sierra Six had uprooted the CIA’s plan A and B, and so far, he was already eliminating all expectations for plans C, D and E. Just like with you, interrogations only left the interrogator more exhausted than when they started, and although you found the entire thing entertaining, you reveled in Carmichael’s frustration with coercing any kind of confession and the realization that he didn’t have Claire to use as leverage this time around. He told Six otherwise, but out of many things that The Gray Man was, ignorant wasn’t one of them. 

For once, you could say that you weren’t the only cause of Carmichael’s misery as much as you wished you were. 

Undoubtedly, getting Six’s compliance was going to take more than pulling a few teeth.

You traversed down sterile white hallways in search of his room–the holding cells had been searched already, and he hadn’t been there–so you strongly entertained that he was put in the same room that you had been during your induction. Carmichael had never said exactly, and although he had suspicions about your whereabouts when apprehending Six, he didn’t have the time to properly look into it, and you’d already been covering your tracks just in case he did.

Your list of things that Carmichael didn’t need to know was growing exponentially longer you realized, but you were too far in to consider confessing them all now. 

Watching him spin in circles had also proved to be vastly too entertaining. 

A few winding hallways and empty rooms eventually led you to find him. Sitting in a stationary chair in the middle of the room with his elbows propped on top of his knees, he looked as though he were debating the world. His expression was fixed into something akin to contemplation, tunnel vision on the tile, but you suspected that he was aware of you outside the room. You weren’t trying to be subtle, anyway. 

“You’re here,” he said once you stepped in, looking up. 

“You should go into espionage with those observational skills.” 

You thought that he bit back a smile, but you couldn’t really tell. There were things that he was good at hiding, such as your involvement at his house at all, you’d learned. He hadn’t told Carmichael; he’d acted dumb when Carmichael had asked. Six had knowingly or unknowingly backed your lie, but you didn’t thank him for that. 

It was the reason behind it that most perplexed you, and you couldn’t help but be a little curious. It was only another thing that you’d find out eventually on your own, so you didn’t ask. He did ask the most obvious question however, still traversing on that very fragile line, and risking the plummet. He’d gone outside of his conditioning and learned to care , and a killer with morals was still a humorous concept to you.

You’d noticed that you had a habit of looking at him, a little too much and a little too long. You had never been a creature of habit, but there was something about looking at a book and suddenly not knowing how to read. Your eyes flickered, traveled , over his form in the chair; no particular direction, and no particular reason. 

“I’m surprised they didn’t cuff you to the chair too.” You mused aloud, recalling the number of irritated negotiators that had left the room with you, then with him –they’d never been brave enough to negotiate without restraints, but they had been more afraid of Sierra Six than you. You’d been frustrating, but him ? “They’re scared of you.”

He scoffed. “I don’t think I’m anything to be scared of.”

“I believe you.” You hummed. “But people like you tend to say that.”

“People like me?”

“A total contradiction that somehow balances out.” You said, but didn’t clarify. Even when he looked at you, eyes probing, you didn’t offer an answer. His brows furrowed, first in confusion, but eventually they settled into the neutrality that you were so familiar with. He recognized very quickly that there was no point, that he may as well have backed down instead of pushed forward. You considered that he didn’t care about that much, and he shouldn’t have. Your opinion hardly mattered as much as anyone else’s. 

You were nothing and no one special, not where he was concerned. 

“Do you know where Claire is?” He finally asked the most obvious question.

“Not here,” you answered immediately, walking further into the room, your arms crossed. There was still a reasonable distance between the two of you, several feet that demanded conversation higher than a whisper. You didn’t mind. It wasn’t as if you were passing secrets. He knew that Claire wasn’t here. 

He sounded tired. “Do you know where ?”

“What makes you think that I do?”

Lips pressed together, he waved vaguely, as though it were really a question worth asking. Unlike you, his eyes never lingered on any certain part of you for too long. “I couldn’t really tell where she went because of your friends from the CIA pummeling me, but I’m pretty sure that you were the last person to have been with her.”

“I know. I watched you get pummeled,” you corrected him.

Then he really did look at you, and quirked a brow. 

“Long enough to watch you get a cheap shot on Agent Morrison.”

His brow quirked further.

“I never liked him that much.” You clarified with a shrug, eyes darting elsewhere. “He has an extensive record, but he had enough connections to wipe his slate clean.” A pause. “He’s also a prick.” 

He looked down. “Sounds familiar.”

“Depending who you asked.” You confessed. “If you’re going to be a prick to anyone, I think you’d at least be honest about it.” 

Then, you thought Six really did smile, even if at the floor; an approximation of one, as close to one as someone like him could get. A scoff of a laugh escaped him, and when he looked up again, his gaze was darting, never staying. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not exactly in with the popular crowd.”

“You’re not missing much.”

Your eyes followed his to the same familiar sterile white walls, the minimal amount of furniture, parts of the tile and the baseboards still protruding from where you’d tried to pry it apart so many months ago now; not so much a cell as an actual room . 

You wondered what had changed to get you promoted to being on their payroll, earning an inch of freedom at a time, but you’d always been good at pretending. As far as they knew, you’d only wiped out one of Carmichael’s key obstacles, and you contemplated that he kept you close by for the same reason that they kept Sierra Six alive. Blame. Carmichael hadn’t found your record, nor any hint of your past. 

Yet. 

“I’m assuming that Claire went to a safehouse that you showed her,” you went on. “I didn’t follow her, so I can’t say for sure where she went. If I don’t know, then it’s safe to say that Carmichael doesn’t know, either.”

Something akin to relief flashed behind his eyes—he knew the location, but you didn’t. You didn’t ask; you’d said that you’d find her when you needed her, and that was true with or without his help. 

“You said you weren’t with the CIA. Who are you with?”

A smile crept onto your lips, lingering close to the surface. You could have scoffed, could have laughed, but you didn’t. Your head tilted, your expression flat despite your amusement. “You ask a lot of personal questions for someone who doesn’t go by their actual name.” 

“You don’t ask enough.” He retorted.

Then you really did smile, a slow upturn on both corners of your mouth. “I told you the answer already.”

“The truth.”

“I wasn’t lying.”

His brows furrowed, clearly skeptical. “So you’re parading around with the CIA for… what, fun ?”

“The same reason you’re sitting here when you can leave at any time, I guess.” You said. “You want something.” 

“What do you want?” 

“What do you ?” The two of you stared at each other, level but with one more perplexed than the other. It wasn’t you. When he didn’t answer, you shrugged, incapable of supplying the answer yourself. Instead, you asked: “Have you ever heard the phrase ‘supply and demand’?”

He nodded slowly, still with that perplexed expression that you somehow found endearing. 

“You’re demanding, but you’re not supplying.” You explained. “I’ll give you,” you paused, but it wasn’t a critical decision on your part; the choice wasn’t hard. “Six questions.” You caught him resisting the urge to roll his eyes at your choice of amount and smirked. “Whatever you want to know. But only six.” 

Six looked to think for a moment, picking his words carefully. His eyes had a way of darting you noticed, observing nothing and everything all at once. He was acutely aware of everything in the room, from the protruding tile to the resewed lining in the mattress, to you . From an outside perspective, he may have looked like nothing special, but he definitely was as smart as you gave him credit for. The depth of his mind was far from anyone’s reach. “Why did you let Claire escape?”

“First question. She wasn’t my target.”

“Who was?”

“Do you want to use one of your questions for that, or can you work it out on your own?”

His brows pinched. “... Why me?”

“Second question. I needed to see if you had information on Donald Fitzroy. I was going to search his house—“ well, it’d been closed off as a crime scene until the FBI could tear it apart at its foundation, and that was before Six had gotten ahold of it. You shrugged. “There’s not much of it left.” 

“What kind of information?”

“Third question: A program. Not Sierra.”

“Are you going to count every question?”

“Does that count as four?”

Six shook his head. “Fitzroy didn’t have any program besides Sierra.”

You shrugged. 

“He did ?”

You raised your eyebrows, a silent question. Question four? 

He’d deduced it on his own. You could see his mind working, but in a much more delicate process than your mindless interrogators. He sighed. “Fitzroy’s dead.”

“I know.” You shrugged. “It doesn’t change anything.” To anyone else, it would have. The main target had died, and that usually meant the case was closed. Anyone else would have moved on, but you weren’t just anyone and there were still things that you had to do, and still things that you had to find. 

You were stubborn, but that was what had led you to Sierra Six in the first place. 

“Fitzroy had a lot of secrets,” Six said, still sitting in that same position as though he were debating the world. At least, you knew that he was debating his circumstances inside the room. His fists were curled on top of his knees, sitting straight in a demeanor that suggested he could pounce at any moment. There was a relaxed tension in his muscles that you hadn’t noticed before, but that could change in a second. “The Sierra Program hardly had any records.”

“There are always two people to every secret. If not you, then someone else.” 

Six’s eyes searched your face for the first time since you’d arrived, lingering longer than what was normal for him. You held gazes, but then he was standing, suddenly towering over you despite being several feet apart. His build didn’t strike you as intimidating–if he’d meant it to, it would’ve been. He shuffled closer. The two of you could have whispered if you’d wanted to. 

“What about you? Who do you share your secrets with?” 

You looked up, your voice nearly a whisper now as well. “Question four. You , apparently.”  

“I still feel like I don’t know anything.”

“Maybe you’re not asking the right questions.”

“You still owe me three.”

“ Actually , I owe you two, and I’m done answering them for now.” You were leaning up, leaning toward him, bare inches of space that had become familiar for you to invade. He didn’t lean away, even if the coil of his muscles suggested the urge. You’d turned to walk away, but his voice stopped you.

“Wait.”

You half-turned; waited.

Your arms were still crossed, but his were at his sides, two completely different barriers shoving against the same wall. “Whatever you’re doing, whatever you’re looking for; uh, be careful.”

“We share secrets, remember?” You laughed at what was probably the most genuine one in a long time. “I can’t let you out of my sight just yet. I’m not going to make that mistake twice.”

Incarceration (Six) (Into The Gray Chpt. 6)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Running had become instinct, hiding second nature, every step taken in the last few months planned down to the smallest detail to ensure that he could keep running and keep hiding. Six played his part, did what he was told, and ensured that nobody knew the truth about Courtland Gentry. For years, he obeyed the idea that he was replaceable; at any given moment, if his handlers decided that he had outlived his usefulness, he would kneel down and let them shoot him in the back with only gratitude given for the opportunity. 

Now, they had never outright said that, and it wasn’t in tiny print on any contract that he’d ever signed–that he knew of–but he wasn’t foolish enough to think that everything would be cut and dry. He’d only assumed that what he’d been doing over the years had made up for things, and that he was working toward something. Not to end up being the CIA’s scapegoat.

Not to once again be reduced to the convict that had been incarcerated for the same exact damn thing–being the blame because there had to be someone to blame. 

 When Six was hired by Donald Fitzroy to protect his niece, tunnel vision on the ground and breaking every rule on day one, Claire taught him about normalcy and routine in his world–one that didn’t have those things–and she had successfully enacted a strictness on him that the toughest agencies in the U.S. government could not. It wasn’t a trait inherited from Donald, but one completely her own. 

He was not allowed to lock the doors. 

He had to ask about her day at least once and act interested about it even if he wasn’t. 

No chewing gum in the house. Period. 

Ice-cream was a suitable dinner choice and he wasn’t allowed to argue. 

At the first instinct to run, he had to ignore it.

Claire didn’t like running, or hiding. It guaranteed his freedom, but to her, it may as well have been prison. Living life watching your back constantly thinking several steps ahead wasn’t living, not to her, but he had come to enjoy having his own terms since becoming a fugitive. 

Again.

It beat waiting to be stabbed in the back, his old life that he’d willingly let them burn suddenly reignited because they needed it to be. Claire had unknowingly given him a new purpose, and even after everything, no amount of training or experience taught him how to exactly explain that to her. He spoke several languages, had learned tactics to approach every social encounter imaginable, and he could spot a lie in literal masters of deception.

Yet, he wasn’t sure how to tell a pre-teen ‘ thank you ’. He’d come close, on days that she was understanding of their circumstances, only to clam up on days that she was angry and spiteful, reminded of what he couldn’t give her. 

Like her rules, he was struggling to keep up. 

Ignorantly, he’d chosen to spend a few weeks closer to his hometown so that she could get some grasp of normalcy, and it was because of that they’d finally caught up. His downfall was because of an agent with a ‘come hither’ smile and a whole lot of bad luck. He could have scoffed at his own stupidity had it not been well-deserved.

So, Six was left with not knowing where Claire was again , and waiting until he could confirm that she wasn’t in the CIA’s custody before he made a break for it. The number of bodies stacking up hadn’t made a difference before, and Claire wasn’t there for it to make a difference now. His one viable clue was unfortunately, as far as he knew, on the enemy’s side.

Harsh overhead light washed Carmichael’s face in deep shadows, pulling it back into darkness with every flicker and sudden dim from a failing bulb. It didn’t matter. Six knew that he was the most terrifying thing in this room. The handcuffs were uncomfortable and dug into his wrists every time he shifted, but he could have it around the prick’s neck and have the job done before anyone knew what was happening. 

His pensive stare bled through the man around a wad of chewing gum. It was a previous attempt at winning his favor several hours ago, only for more frustration to succeed when it fell through. Nobody had proved brave enough to take it from him, either.

He slouched back against his chair, his index and middle fingers tapping no particular beat on the metal table. He had yet to look up, questions and demands shifting into the background in one hazy, drowned out sound. His patience with all the shit was thinning considerably. He glanced at the one-way mirror, wondering if you were watching, if you were mocking him just on the other side. ‘ This is the Gray Man?’

And whose side are you on?

Nobody’s.

Clearly somebody’s or he wouldn’t even be here. You’d said your name, and now as much as back then, he hadn’t expected an honest answer. He may as well have driven himself crazy thinking about it, but it did distract him from Claire, what little bit of time that he didn’t think of her; that he didn’t think that she would be better off in the long run without him. 

He drove himself crazy thinking about that too.

A manila folder was shoved into the center of his vision, breaking his concentrated focus. His eyes flicked over, the beat that he’d been making on the table finishing its chorus with one more resounding tap. It bounced across the emptiness of the room, and echoed off the silence burying itself into the walls. Carmichael had been quiet so far, waiting and attentive but still putting out a tough farce. Six had since become disinterested in him about an hour ago. 

He’d watched multiple trained officials come and go already, several making obscene gestures as soon as they made it out of the door. This one would prove no different. Carmichael was the man behind the scenes–the intelligence, but not the skill. It was Lloyd and Six that had fought in the war, tumbling through the trenches spilling blood. He never saw Carmichael there to finish the job that he’d started when Lloyd failed. This was his first time seeing him at all.

If there was a definition of a corporate prick, Denny Carmichael would be the example picture directly beside it.

The folder was slid in-between them, opened with precision, then flipped across the table. Every action was taken with practiced restraint, Carmichael’s hands moving to fold on top of the table, leaving the folders' contents exposed in their macabre glory. It was all a show, he knew. They needed this for records, to say that it had been investigated and closed. The cuffs on Six’s wrists were placed there for the CIA’s own peace of mind. 

He dared think even Carmichael’s peace of mind, seeing as the door was probably locked.

“If you’re going to charge me anyway, can’t we just…” Six waved a vague hand gesture over the table, suggestive, one brow taking on a high arch, the movement of his hands limited within his restraints. “Skip this part? I’ve played this game several times and it's never worked out.”

Carmichael tilted his head, vague amusement flickering through his expression behind his glasses. The reflection of the lamp glared just inside the lens, making him harder to read, but he had hardly been hiding his intentions this whole time. He’d expected a confession and a closed case as soon as Six had been apprehended. “What makes you think it won’t this time?”

“Because you don’t care what I have to say.” 

A scoff of a laugh from the man followed Six’s bluntness, exposed to the truth and unable to deny it in all of its honest sincerity. His posture mirrored Six’s, the brunt of his shoulders pressed back against the harsh metal of the chair, arms crossed. He shrugged. “If you have something to say in your defense, I’ll be glad to hear it.”

“I’m going to guess ‘I didn’t do it’ isn’t convincing enough?”

Carmichael’s amused smile grew broad, the signs of a man knowing that he’d already won before an argument could be started. “The accusations against you are stacking up the further we look into your background. You’ve never had a clean history. I can pull records before your time in the Sierra Program just as easily if you want to put your old life back into the public eye. Or, we can keep this private. It’s up to you.”

Six nodded solemnly, as though suddenly understanding his position, and the lack of having a way out of it. He would have no other choice but to agree eventually–whether willingly or not, but that didn’t stop him from fighting it in the meantime. He was not foolish enough to not realize that they had ammo stacked against him since the beginning, all of the assignments they’d sent him on further fuel for when their secrets finally slipped, but for someone used to running, he guessed he never expected it to catch up.

“I see where this is going.” 

“Then confess.” He invited. “You’ll take the fall either way, but it makes my job a lot easier if I get it in words.”

“I’ll confess to my fuckups.” Six’s eyebrows furrowed, and only then did he cast a glance at the folder. “Not yours. And that ,” he pointed down at the file. “Wasn’t me.”

“You didn’t kill Lloyd Hansen either, I take it?” He pushed against the edge of the table, his chair grinding against the floor with an audible screech. It didn’t deter either man inside the room. 

“Actually, I didn’t.”

While Carmichael rose, he circled around the table to stand beside Six, circling a man without realizing that he was the one in the shark tank. He had an ominous look about him, his hands braced on the table beside Six, leaning in, leaning down so that they were barely inches apart. “You’re a dead man to the world and nobody will be able to argue in your defense. If I jump, you need only ask ‘how high’, because that is what we made you to do. Other than that, you’re a rogue agent. What advantage do you think you have?”

“The one that makes your job a little bit harder, I guess.” Six answered without missing a beat, meeting his glare with a level look of his own, smug despite his position in it all. “You should probably get started on that paperwork. It’ll take you a while.” 

Carmichael pushed off against the edge of the table, putting some much needed distance between them. He hummed thoughtfully, his nostrils flaring but his rage staying contained in its most primitive form. When he moved, it was stiff, and slow, his gaze sweeping over Six in the chair one last time.

“And what about Claire Fitzroy?”

Six looked up.

“We’re not privy to Hansen’s methods, but we do know people who are. If we have to elicit a signed confession from you with less than tolerable means, then we will.” Carmichael’s hands folded behind his back, his tone even despite what he was suggesting. Six could have moved from his chair right then, but retaliation was what they were wanting, more evidence stacked against him in an ever-growing list. “I don’t want to have to do that. Especially to the family of a colleague.”

Six could have scoffed, considering that colleague was dead because of him. It didn’t matter. Claire wasn’t here. The last place that he’d seen her was with you . “Where is she?” He asked, not so much meaning Claire as he was you. He expected that you would have come to talk to him yourself, negotiating Claire’s well-being if she was in your custody. 

Yet, you were nowhere to be found.

“Safe.” Carmichael was lying.

Six’s gaze slid to the mirror, but it didn’t grant him any kind of answer. He could have been meeting your eyes for all he knew, that come-hither smile that was innocent but simultaneously lethal flashing in his direction on the other side of the glass. He was met with his own reflection, frowning at himself while he tried to picture your face, but he couldn’t imagine your expression; your reaction to everything had been perplexing to say the least.

He couldn’t figure out your angle.

“I want to talk to Claire. If I know she’s safe, I’ll sign whatever you want.” He decided.

Who’s side are you on?

Nobody’s.

The CIA would have been the obvious answer, and yet it was your complete dismissal of the idea that gave him pause at all. He needed to talk to you. 

“I don’t think you recognize the position–” Carmichael started. 

“Claire,” Six’s gaze once snapped to him, gradually losing his already thin patience. He ground his teeth, unable to hide just how exasperated he was anymore. He was tired, and the day had been too damn long already. “She’s here isn’t she? I couldn’t tell exactly because of your guys. If she was accidentally killed in the crossfire, just tell me, then I won’t waste my time sitting here.”

“She’s safe inside the facility.” Carmichael said, flat.

“Great.” He said sarcastically, lips pressed tightly together When he leaned forward, he angled himself toward Carmichael, brows drawn. “You want my cooperation? Then go get her.”  He jerked his chin toward the door. “ Now .”

Carmichael’s expressions flitted between several different emotions, not too quick for Six to read, but not important enough for him to care. It was somewhere between annoyed and unnerved. When he slid away, his body followed his trek to the door.

It slammed with more force than necessary. 

Six looked at the mirror, still unsure if there was a possibility that you were there or some regular observer with only half the intelligence. He asked no one in particular, shaking his hands inside the cuffs: “Can someone come take these things off? I really have to piss.”

Nobody obliged his request, taking Carmichael’s exit as their own.

A Friend to None (Into The Gray Chpt. 5)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Parts of your memories felt like lies, other parts blurring together or not there at all. Faces and voices, names–you hardly remembered your own some days, but you entertained that it was because you had been filed down to a what instead of a who your entire life. Sometimes, you stopped just long enough to think about it, sort through what was real and what wasn’t. More often than not, you ended up with more things being on the fake end, some aspects of your life balancing precariously between the two.

Six was not a victim of prejudice like you were, defined by what he did in the present only. He was moral, and loyal–two things that you didn’t think you were. After all, you’d slept with men that you knew you’d have to kill–blank faces and printed names on a manila folder. You never regretted it, and it wasn’t something that you laid awake thinking about. They weren’t good men, and you’d do it again as many times as you had to.  Lloyd hadn’t been a good man, but you hadn’t killed him. There was something about that; having it mean something, and having a choice. It felt like that semblance of a choice was taken away like most things in your life, except that you didn’t think that you would have done it.

But now you also didn’t have the opportunity to know for sure.

Your eyes rested calmly on Six, his tense and strong outline the most profound thing in the darkened space. A gun was aimed between your eyes, the hand that gripped it steady and practiced from years worth of contracts against people who hadn’t earned the hesitation that you had. His finger didn’t rest on the trigger, but hovered beside it. He hadn’t yet made his choice, but that could change within a fraction of a second.

“You didn’t,” you’d said softly as you toed off your shoes by the door and traversed further into the house, careful against waking Claire. His eyes followed your every move, every languid stride, noticeably taking a step to the left to cut you off from where Claire’s room was. That didn’t stop your curious meander around the edges of the space in all of its emptiness and lack of any expressive or original personality. It was very reminiscent of your own space in some ways.

“Forget to lock anything, I mean.” You clarified before he could answer, picking up an old record– The Yes Album by Yes–before setting it back down on the shelf, more neatly in between a few other records that you didn’t recognize. You didn’t look at him, not at first, too focused on your own natural curiosity about a space you’d mapped, but had yet to test the complete accuracy of. “I can’t read your mind, just your face.”

“I don’t actually have to have to talk to have a conversation with you, do I?”

You hadn’t said anything in response—and only then did you give him that warm, soft smile. It was the heart of that double-edged sword that you did so well. You read people, not because you had to—that part didn’t matter to complete a mission. It wasn’t about violence and calculation.

Not all the time.

You liked people just fine, and you liked Six, some part of him expressing something to you that he was someone that could be likable, but the rarity was you expressing it. You’d consider that much a privilege to whoever ended up on the receiving end of it.

“I thought for someone as smart as you, you wouldn’t try to settle.” You mused, taking another sweeping glance around the house. You didn’t have time to appreciate its simple architecture, but you appreciated the concept. “I’m assuming that after you grabbed Claire, you tried to move closer to your origins.”

Six’s expression changed, while to him may have been indiscernible, to you , you knew that you’d hit close to home. “How much do you know about me?” He asked, cautious, afraid to give away much else; anything else–he’d already given away more than he meant to.

“Nothing,” you said simply with a vague shrug of your shoulders. “Like everyone else. That’s why I think this particular move was very intelligent on your part.”

He glanced behind him, quick, then looked back at you just as quickly. You saw his urge to back up and peek through the blinds, to search for anyone else, but he didn’t take his eyes off you. He was smart. As smart as you gave him credit for. “Am I surrounded?”

You quirked a smile at one edge of your lips, tilting your head. “Just you and me.”

Six remained wary. “And who are you?”

You told him your name, matter-of-factly.

“Are you here to kill me, because if you know anything about me, you know they’re not paying you enough to do this.” He scrutinized your expression, and you didn’t think there was anything on your face that he could decipher from it, nothing that you didn’t want him to see. “But something about you tells me that it won’t make a difference.”

“I’ve been throwing Carmichael off your scent, but now I’m going to need you to come in.”

“What if I say no?”

You didn’t watch where his finger lingered by the trigger, twitching between a lethal decision, but you saw it out of the corner of your eye. He didn’t shoot you for the sake of keeping Claire asleep, if subjecting her to more carnage could be avoided. You hadn’t proved yourself an outright threat, either. Not yet.

“If you say no,” you shrugged again, less subtle. “Then you’re right. It won’t make a difference.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Because I’m not here for Claire, and you’re very attached to her.”

“You wouldn’t get very far if you were.” He answered, blunt.

“Oh, I know that.” You smiled. Your feet had lingered at the border between the living room and the kitchen, then you finally crossed from tile to plush carpet directly into his space. Only then did his finger move to the trigger, and you raised your hands, turning them around so that he could see you weren’t armed. “Just like I know that you would rather shoot your way out of a problem.”

“I’d rather not shoot you at all if I don’t have to.”

“That’s your first mistake.”

One of the many things that you’d learned while studying Six were a few of his mannerisms, his quirks, the subtle little movements telling you whether or not he would be a threat. He wouldn’t. Not unless you attacked him first–he fought honorably one-on-one–and not until you proved a threat to Claire. With that knowledge, you pursued him.

Six retreated as you persisted. Your feet were in tow with his own, nearly stepping on his toes with every backward stride that he made across the living room. His back hit the opposite wall, and you were there, looking up at the slope of his chin and the way he tilted his head up to get away from you. Your own head pivoted to the side, eyes narrowing in a casual curiosity.

“Your morality is going to get you killed.” You chided, even with the muzzle of his pistol pressed against your temple.

“It hasn’t yet. I try to be optimistic.” He huffed.

There was hardly an inch of space between the two of you, chests nearly brushing, voices lowered to a whisper as though sharing a secret in a crowded room. Secrets were the only thing that the two of you had, things that you both hid well from a world that you were no longer a part of. Ideas of domesticity and something akin to normal were lost to the both of you, and you believed that maybe, they always had been.

“Optimistic.” You mused aloud with a smile, shaping the unfamiliar word over in your mouth. “For you, or for Claire? It’s been a while since her last incident, and I know that you don’t want to break that streak.” You leaned up, rising onto your tip-toes, your voice a low silkiness that you were sure made him tense, rippled goosebumps along the flesh of his biceps and his throat where he swallowed.

But you knew that somewhere, you’d hit a chord, a harmonious tune that only spoke the harshness of the truth. It wasn’t anything that he hadn’t thought of already, his own insecurities spilling from your mouth in the only place they’d been able to consider a home since Six’s breakout from the hospital–the result had been bloody carnage, special forces wiped out by one injured man.

Six’s skill and morality were a strong and weak point that bounced off one another like two charges at the receiving ends of a battery. Both dependent on the situation, but held steadfast to his value that some people in the world deserved to die. Six may have been something akin to a machine in the past, taking orders and following the demands of his master, but his self-preservation for someone else’s sake and his complete refusal of orders if something immoral happened to get in the way of him and his goal would be his downfall.

Eventually, if not right now.

“Is that what you know?”

“I know that even Dani Miranda wanted to use Claire against you.” You didn’t blink as you listed off the familiar set of names. “Denny Carmichael. Donald Fitzroy. Lloyd Hansen.” You shrugged. “They’re all two sides of the same coin. With Claire involved, that’s one fight you won’t ever win.”

Six looked down at you, but his was an easy gaze that you met with equal force. In the silence that neither of you disturbed, you heard the steady pitter-patter of rain off the roof, the storm sweeping in too late. You’d already proved to be an unstoppable force on your own, the tension in the room too thick to cut through, and yet comfortable all the same.

“And whose side are you on?” He asked, quiet.

“Nobody’s.” You answered, and somehow that was still the truth even in the few months spent in the service of the CIA. Your loyalty never belonged to them, and you’d come from a different set of rules. “Not anymore.”

In the beginning, you supposed that you owed Lloyd, but you couldn’t owe somebody that was dead. You were more practical, and had no intentions of preserving his memory, or living in his name. You didn’t end up a pawn to the CIA because they wanted you to. You were with the CIA because your intentions happened to lie within the realm of their convenience.

“So a friend, then?”

“Is that what you want me to be?” You raised your eyebrows. “Because you’re in the wrong business for that.”

“I’m not in that business anymore.”

You almost laughed at the irony–the both of you still very much a part of that business. It was what you knew best, cozy fairytale endings and white picket fences far outside your reach. You had to give him credit for trying, but you knew that he was in the same mindset that you were–a life like that was never meant for people like you, tools like you.

And it was terrifying. Caring about people. You’d learned not to.

You nodded, only once. “That’s right. You’re in the business of menial labor.” You clicked your tongue. “And you’re terrible at it.”

Six snorted.

Down the hall, the tired shuffling of feet over carpet split between the two of you, the small crack in the door opening wider. “Six?” The voice of a young girl– Claire –called out into the darkness of the house, the only light from the lamp illuminating both of your shadows across the wall, and hers, growing closer, a small blob spreading wide into a silhouette.

The two of you didn’t move, didn’t breathe.

You glanced at him, but he was no longer looking at you. His raging focus was on the hallway, a concern taking to a placid expression. You started to move away, and the barrel of his gun began to lower, but there was another sound too. A quiet shuffling at first until the source of the new noise became clear, a plethora of footsteps in rapid sync, the sound of a hiss as something smashed through the window behind you.

Gas.

All sound was suddenly muted, a dense mirage crawling over the enclosed space. Claire’s further calls drowned in your ears, as well as the sound of sudden gunfire–the embrace of death did not come from a swift bullet to the head as you expected. Six was shoving you to the floor, glass shattering overhead from the windows that had been behind you moments earlier. You thought that you heard him grunt, a sudden string of scarlet running down the crown of your head.

But not from you.

His weight was off of you within seconds, the loud thumping of combat boots and rushed orders signaling the arrival of the CIA–Carmichael was closer than you’d thought. You moved to your knees and crawled the length of the living room, the flurry of bodies nothing but distorted movement in your peripherals. You didn’t go for Six and finish the job for yourself, and you didn’t go for the exit as you should have.

You went for the hallway. For Claire.

She’d backed away at the sudden invasion of smoke, the scene becoming too much of a familiarity for her to start crying, to start screaming. She called Six’s name and backed toward her room. When she saw you, she pivoted back on her heel to run, but you were on your feet and grabbing her arm before she made much distance, yanking her back in the direction that she was already going.

“What are you doing? Let go!” She hissed, her nails digging deep arcs into your arm with violent, terrified desperation.

You yanked her into her room and slammed the door shut, ignoring the ache that split down your forearm. You were sure that if you’d looked, you were probably bleeding. She continued backing away, backing into a corner, instinctively moving for the window.

“Did Six give you directions to a safehouse in cases like this?” You said as you retrieved a backpack by the bed, shoving anything inside that looked relevant plus a few things that you’d quickly noted as sentimental. Through the dark, most things were guesswork, vague outlines of familiar objects, but you were suddenly working against the clock–more akin to a ticking time bomb, you supposed given the circumstances.

“What?”

“A safehouse? Like a–”

“I know what a safehouse is.” She scowled.

You didn’t bite back at the retort. “Okay. You’re going to go there. I’ll find you when I need you.” You’d turned–unable to gradually lose your patience because at the moment you didn’t have any–shoving the backpack into her arms, shuffling her back a few steps. Her bewildered eyes followed you as you moved to lift the window up. It stuck, but with a few forceful tugs, it finally gave way. You were immediately met with an onslaught of rain, the sandy terrain morphing into a muddy sludge sliding downward around the edges of the house.

Claire was looking at the door, at the commotion happening just on the other side.

They were coming.

“Claire.” You said, and she jumped and turned toward you, eyes wide. Dark tendrils of hair stuck to her sweat soaked face, her shoulders rising and falling in rapid succession. Her eyes flicked warily to the door, then back to you.

“Who are you? What’s… What’s happening to Six? Are they going to hurt him?”

You ignored her, standing in front of her, looking directly into her terrified eyes as you spoke just to make sure that she understood. “You’re going to stick to the right side of the house, head toward the crest of the hill, then go where you need to go. Understand?”

“Are–are you one of Six’s friends?”

You didn’t possess the moral compass that advised you to lie in order to comfort a kid. There wasn’t any point, seeing as you were certain that she already knew the answer. “No. I’m not.”

“Okay.” Claire nodded numbly, swallowing the tears that she desperately tried to keep at bay. Her arms tightened around the backpack, growing progressively more unsure. Her feet had slid into ratty tennis shoes, absent of any socks. She was smart. Between the gunfire and the yelling from what was likely a similar group of people that had taken you, she knew which was the more obvious option in her case. She didn’t run for Six even though you could tell she wanted to. “Is he gonna be okay?”

“He’ll be fine.”

She didn’t believe you, but in that regard, you hadn’t lied. Instead, she turned, and only when she’d turned away did the tears begin to fall as she lifted herself out the window. You listened for the sound of her tennis shoes landing in the sludge, the squeaking slide as she narrowly avoided falling, then the rapid, clumsy steps as she retreated.

Once her footsteps faded into the background of the storm, you followed her out, however when your feet touched the sludge with more grace, you ran in the opposite direction.

Eyes on Target (Into The Gray Chpt. 4)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

The Gray Man’s moniker stemmed from his ability to keep a low profile. The entire program was built with that conception in mind. Donald Fitzroy may have been the first, and he had slipped past your notice until his untimely death in pursuit of a drive filled with Carmichae’s baggage, but you had been right when you told Dani about cornering Sierra Six. Fitzroy and Lloyd had been the one’s unfortunate enough to end up in Six’s corner, whether willingly or not. That was your own personal baggage that you pushed aside for later, your feelings about the two not consistent with each other at any given time. 

Carmichael basked in the victory, and the skeletons in the CIA’s closet were far outside your area of concern, but you did find it rather humorous that all it had taken was a long list of resources that Sierra Six had single-handedly upended at every turn. Single-handed if not for Dani Miranda’s involvement, but that was another secret put into the ground along with a busted drive and the truth about Lloyd Hansen’s death.

You had never met Sierra Six personally, but when he’d been brought into the CIA’s custody–bloody and beaten, but still able to address the corporate assholes with witty remarks and sarcasm–you thought that you got a better understanding of his quirks and his mannerisms. He didn’t pretend to be anything, or anyone when it best suited him–a measure of himself that was as infuriating to everyone else as it was intriguing for you.

You could see why Fitzroy would employ him. Where you lied and manipulated to survive, he endured on skill alone. So when you’d learned that he’d broken free of his restraints and executed a number of their best operatives on his way out after the shitstorm with Carmichael’s drive, you weren’t surprised.

What did surprise you was that he didn’t care about using the information from the drive for his own gain. He’d just wanted to be left alone.

“You’re punishing yourself,” you’d said to Dani shortly before you’d left to pursue his contract alone, resorting to stark statements if you weren’t allowed to ask questions. She couldn’t handle your ‘answering a question with a question thing’ but you thought that she asked a lot more questions than you did, even when she wasn’t trying to pry. 

“The Sierra agent,” she’d said by way of explanation.

“Sierra Six,” you’d confirmed. 

“He escaped the hospital,” she’d huffed, breathless, a fierce punch landing a definitive and resounding tap against a punching bag, echoing across the abandoned silence of the gym and nudging you back on your feet where you held it steady for her. It wasn’t often that this space was empty when she was here, but you’d associated it with Dani’s easy frustration and lack of remorse to whoever ended up on the receiving end of it. “He’s on the run. Probably going to find Claire.”

“This upsets you?”

“But not you?” Another tap, then another. Part of you was glad that you hadn’t decided to practice one-on-one this time around if an escapee was enough to get her fired up. Strangely, you didn’t feel anything when the news broke out, even if you had considered it your chance to talk to him. Being on grounds that would be considered your territory would have been preferred but you were nothing if not adaptable.

You found yourself asking. “Should it?”

Dani slowed down, then stopped altogether. You’d let go of the bag, the resistance of holding it still the last few hours made your palms feel raw, a tingling sensation traveling from your palms to your fingertips. She turned around to grab a bottle of water, wrapping a towel around her shoulders. 

“You can never give a straight answer, can you?” Her words were lost on a long swig of water, shoulders rising and falling with the continued adrenaline rush, slowly filtering down until she only looked exhausted. “I was using Claire as leverage to keep him safe from Carmichael. Now he’s going to shoot up the countryside until he finds her.” She shook her head. “That might seem okay to you, but it’s not."

“It’s not okay,” you’d corrected. “To him, it’s probably necessary.”

Dani’s low-browed stare only further cemented the confusion behind your support or disapproval of the asset. You hadn’t needed to explain. Carmichael had grabbed the two of you for busywork immediately after that, and as soon as you’d had the chance, you’d slipped out.

There were many things that Six could run from, but time wasn’t one of them. It’d taken you a few weeks, but you’d found him. You’d thought that he would have a more sporadic schedule, or be constantly on the move, switching hideouts and being like other typical textbook deserters that you had pursued before. He proved to be the rare exception.

Having settle in a small neighborhood in the outskirts of Tallahassee, Florida with deceased senior CIA official, Donald Fitzroy’s daughter: Claire Fitzroy–Claire–you’d spent some time before advancing on the target to map out his schedule, only to come to one conclusion:

His schedule was very mundane, and you would even consider it domestic.

All of his time was spent keeping up with Claire, who floated around him like a sunbeam, blissfully unaware of the dangers looming outside the safety of her domestic sanctuary. Her laughter rang out like a melody, high and sweet–and that urged Sierra Six into behaviors that you thought had been beyond the program’s realm of teaching. Aside from cooking, he did relatively well for himself, having adopted a new identity with a steady supply of odd jobs to keep him stable financially.

Six, who was renowned for being characteristically stoic, stone-faced, and having a preference for dry-humor, looked the complete opposite now; an approximation of happiness that only someone like him could get. It was a perfect picture from an outside perspective, but that would never get rid of what he was. A weapon. You could use a spear as a walking stick all you wanted, but that would never change its nature.

You’d never been much of a poet, but you suspected Six traversed along that fragile line somewhere. He’d fallen victim to the easiest mistake someone like him could make: caring. The agency had said that Claire was the leash to bring the wolf to heel, but you weren’t morally unethical enough to consider kidnapping a kid, let alone using one for your own personal agenda. You remembered what you’d told Dani: His actions following his escape had been necessary. If you were in his position, were you more foolish, you strongly entertained the idea that you would have done the same.

For now, you considered a different approach, combatting natural instincts that begged you to satiate your natural curiosity, positioned at the peak of a hill with binoculars and taking note of his day-to-day. The safe way. Also the boring way. Regardless, you didn’t send in any of your notes. A location was enough to bring in a whole team–albeit as many as the agency had wouldn’t be sufficient, considering they were still recovering after his initial escape.

Until you could find an adequate approach to the Sierra agent, you were left reverting back to the stone-age of personal recon.  Observation cameras, GPS trackers, public information, drones, social media–all would be naturally ineffective against someone as familiar with watching his back as you were. 

You’d counted day fifteen when Carmichael finally caught on to your absence–the timing couldn’t have been better. You’d settled down on your stomach on the hill, binoculars having become a permanent fixture to your eyes, and draped in a poncho because of an inconvenient storm–knowing Florida weather, you knew it would be clear in a few minutes anyhow. A resounding buzz emanated from your pocket. Wiping your hands dry on your poncho, you grabbed your phone, knowing the caller without having to look.

“I’m working.” You said, flat.

“I’ve got another job for you,” came Carmichael’s calm baritone over the phone. If you didn’t know him and his less than endearing quirks, you could almost see him in an 1800 Regency Period romance drama. He had the voice and the looks for it if he didn’t talk so much. “How do you like the beach?”

“I don’t,” you answered absentmindedly, binoculars still held in one hand, hovering just over your eyes. “What’s the job?”

There was a moment of pause, as if he genuinely considered your likes and dislikes, or that you had told him that you disliked something in the first place before settling with pointing out the obvious. “I don’t remember you mentioning that you were pursuing another job. Aren’t those supposed to be approved through me?”

You looked through the windows where Sierra Six had disappeared into the bedroom, panning over to the adjacent window to watch him rifle through some drawers, yanking his shirt over his head in favor of another one. You noted his well-muscled frame, his shirt catching on the bulging muscle riddled with deep scars–his own private collection of imperfection. “I’m making progress.”

“I expect a full mission briefing, but I’m going to need to pull you out. We’ve located our target, Sierra Six.”

“Have you?” You managed to keep your voice level, but the amusement rumbled just underneath the surface. “I’m surprised. I thought it’d take you a little longer.”

“He is our highest priority until he’s brought in.” Carmichael went on. If he had any tips on your sudden change in demeanor, he didn’t mention it, but you knew that he was marking your exchange in a private file for later. “He’s been filtering between the border of Florida and Georgia, but there’s a middle point that we believe may be a safe bet to where he’s hiding. I’ll send you the location. Meet me there ASAP.”

“Understood,” you said and ended the call.

With no other choice, you rose to your feet. There would be enough suspicion against you already if you didn’t meet Carmichael, but approaching the target was your first priority. With less urgency than you likely should, you traversed down the slope, your feet slipping in the mud during your descent. Compared to your training the first few months, it was basic child’s play, a trail winding downward guiding you the safest route for the most part.

Once you arrived, you picked the lock with relative ease, slipping through the front door with a silent grace that you’d been taught in your youth. Efficient study of the house and mapping out its interiors led you to be able to traverse through the dark with little difficulty, noting the minimal furniture, and the lack of pictures on the walls. Even after the last few months since his escape, Six wasn’t getting comfortable. He was ready to run at any time.

As you crept through the living room, every step softened by the layered dust of the neglected abode, your thoughts circled back to the mission–your mission. Sierra Six had somehow managed to create a semblance of life amid the chaos spiraling around him. You could almost hear the gentle sounds of Claire's breath from the bedroom, the rhythmic rise and fall that suggested a kind of serenity rarely afforded to people like him—or like you.

A soft hum of the ceiling fan punctuated the stillness. You navigated around a jagged coffee table, careful not to disturb anything.

Sierra Six, a man notorious for his lethal skills and refusal to bow to anyone—turning his back on a life built on violence and chaos. And here, scattered about his so-called sanctuary, were remnants of a life he seemingly wanted: a crumpled grocery list on the counter, the faint scent of something home-cooked lingering in the air, a couple of worn-out sneakers by the door that showed the most sign of wear. 

You’d turned as a light to your left flicked on. Six’s stark outline stood in the entryway to the hall, and the light that illuminated his face almost made him look soft if his neutral expression didn’t appear so deadly, lethal. His eyes were focused and searching but not showing any sign of the suspicion and sudden security that you were sure he felt. He’d glanced around, but there was no one. 

Just you.

And him, with a gun aimed at your head.

Pot Roast and Power Plays (Into the Gray Chpt 3)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Words: 1.5K Tags: @medievalfangirl, @biblichorr, @pyrokineticbaby, @lxvrgirl, @asiludida164, @torchbearerkyle, @jasmin7813, @comfortzonequeen, @my-tearsdryontheirown, @96jnie

It became apparent very quickly after your induction that you made Dani Miranda very uncomfortable.

A quick sweep through her house had told you everything you needed to know about her versus what she needed to know about you; which as far as you were concerned was the bare minimum only. You’d noted the distinct lack of luxury, the furniture kept to the bare minimum of what she’d needed–and you’d already perused her closet to get an idea of her personality when not wearing a suit. 

She didn’t need to know that much. 

The contents weren’t anywhere outside the realm of ordinary, anyway. In fact, they were more normal than what you’d expected. A quick search through the drawers and the space told you that it was clean, almost abandoned if not for the few sentimental objects that you’d found and promptly left alone. Her personal life didn’t matter to you as much as her temperament in the field, but you convinced yourself that anything in her personal life could come back to bite you if her head wasn’t on straight. A glimpse through her contacts told you that she didn’t have any kind of romantic attachment; potential messages with anyone matching that kind of description were too mundane for further pursuits, and you’d noticed that she hardly replied back if further pursuits were attempted. She had a history with a dating site though, as brief as it was. 

In conclusion, Dani’s life was dedicated to work, tediously rising through the ranks with the promise of a position on some similar level to Carmichael. She ran on a set schedule, hardly ever straying away from her fixed pattern. There weren’t many things concerning–at least to you–that could get in the way. Regardless, you’d had to be sure. 

“What the hell are you doing?” Dani’s inquiry bordered somewhere between incredulous and annoyed, the rise in her tone tipping precariously between the two. 

“Making dinner,” you replied, your voice nonchalant as you stirred the simmering pot on her stove. The aroma of garlic and sauteed vegetables filled the air, a stark contrast to the sterile atmosphere of her meticulously organized home. 

Dani crossed her arms, her stance solidifying into a defensive posture. You kept your back to her as she kicked off her shoes and shut the food with more force than necessary. “This is my house.” 

“You act as if I don’t know that it’s not mine.”

Dani closed her eyes, her face pinching into a soft grimace. The hand that she’d balled into a fist uncurled, hovering between the two of you, as if whatever argument she’d been about to make was snuffed out by the immediate truth as opposed to some half-assed excuse. A harsh exhale through her nose preceded her next words. “Why are you here? I thought you were still on assignments overseas.”

You tossed some herbs into the pot, having ground them by hand, much like everything else. You’d always liked the thought of a kitchen, but you wouldn’t ask for one because that would be admitting too much about you. Something that you didn’t want to do in front of Carmichael. Or anyone else for that matter. “Debriefing. I need someone to give my statement to. No one’s at the office.”

“So you came all the way here instead of waiting until morning?”

“I made a pot roast.”

You knew without turning that the usually confused pinch in her eyebrows were evident, the slight shuffle of her feet forward as she was still coming to grips with you. She didn’t trust you, but her trust wasn’t something that you were looking for so much as seeing if you could trust her. “You’re supposed to give your statement to the DCI.”

“If I wait, there’s a chance I’ll forget, and my word hardly matters if I omit key details.”

“You? Forget?” Her eyebrows shot high, and she laughed. You could have laughed too, if Dani weren’t so unaware of the truth, how much of your own life you hardly remembered as much as what felt like somebody else’s. Dani only bobbed her head, the thought still ridiculous to her. “Right.” Her lips smacked together. “Well, I doubt how much credibility that I could give you. I’m still on Carmichael’s shit list.”

“Because of the failed mission in Bangkok involving the last Sierra agent.” You didn’t say it like a question, but you hadn’t intended to. 

“You know about that?” She was still staring at your back, but you could hear her more urgent steps across the apartment, her voice lowered to a hushed sense of urgency as though someone else would hear you. They wouldn’t. You’d checked for any trace of cameras or hidden surveillance systems already. Only then did you turn. Dani had planted her palms face down on the kitchen island, leaning to fix you with an incredulous stare, suddenly bewildered. She bristled, distrustful. 

“Yes,” you said without missing a beat. 

“How? Carmichael is keeping that under close wraps until he’s apprehended.”

“I don’t trust him.”

She snorted. “You have a funny way of showing that. Working for the one guy that you don’t trust.” She leaned forward, and her arms draped across the counter’s marble surface, hands folded together. “What’s in it for you? They think that you’re a double agent, which is why they never let you go anywhere without surveillance.” She shrugged helplessly. “That was Lloyd before he left–”

You raised an eyebrow, harboring a smirk that you kept to yourself. “You’ve done your homework, too.”

Dani pursed her lips, clearly not appreciating the turn of the conversation. “That’s different,” she insisted, her voice sharp but unwavering. 

“I owed Lloyd,” you went on, your expression falling flat again. “I don’t anymore.”

She gaped. “You owed Lloyd Hansen and his perv stache? I doubt that subjecting you to serving under Carmichael would make you owe him as much as him owing you.”

“He could have left me to die.” You shrugged. “He didn’t.”

“Well, I hate to be the one to tell you, but Lloyd Hansen has an alternative reason for everything he does. Mostly, it’s so that he can get a good fuck out of it later.” Dani’s eyebrows pinched together, looking at you with vague concern. You didn’t need that from her, but you didn’t tell her, either. “You never owed Lloyd anything. He made his own choices.

“So did I.”

The next few moments passed in silence, and you’d taken the opportunity to pour some of the roast into a bowl, then a second that you’d passed over to Dani. She took it with less hesitation than before, the idea of you being inside her house less discomforting seeing as you weren’t proposing yourself as a threat.

You could see Dani mulling over questions while you ate. The way that she pushed her food around suggested that it was something akin to working through her thoughts, devouring one at a time until she found one that made sense. You didn’t press for conversation in the meantime. Pot roast wasn’t your favorite food–not that you were a picky eater by any means–but there were a lot of limitations in Dani’s house, and you did what you could with what you had.

Dani pushed her bowl away, leaving most of her food untouched.  “Why did you go out of your way to wipe out the Sierra Program?” She asked the most obvious question, of course, the reason that you’d been filtered into Denny Carmichael’s custody in the first place, put under surveillance, followed around by Lloyd, and forced onto a team. “What did they do to you?”

“Carmichael tell you to ask that?”

Her scrutinizing stare didn’t pressure you, the way that her eyes pried over your expression, attempting to gage something. You didn’t relent. “I should’ve figured.” She sighed, her tone suggesting some sort of plea for honesty. “What was it about? You figured out that you missed one and came back to finish the job?”

You remained silent for a moment, studying her face as she wrestled with a mix of curiosity and apprehension. It was a question laden with unspoken implications, and for the first time since stepping into her space, you felt the weight of her gaze. Dani wanted answers, but more importantly, she wanted to understand—understand you, understand the world you inhabited, the choices you made, and the chaos that had led both of you to this point.

“It wasn’t personal,” you finally said, your voice steady yet evasive. It was an easy assertion—one that dissolved any deep exploration into your motives. “Not in the way you think.”

Her brows furrowed. “So it was just business?”

“Something like that.”

The tension in the air shifted, her disappointment palpable. “You wiped out an entire program of rehabilitated operatives because it was just business?” Her incredulity propelled her forward in her line of questioning, fists tight against the countertop again as if bracing herself for whatever answer lay ahead. “That’s a big gamble considering you missed one.”

“I had my reasons,” you said carefully, your tone calm but dripping with an underlying tension. The line dividing personal vendetta from strategic decisions had always been thin for you, often blurring into something that felt undeniably complex yet simple to navigate in your mind.

“You don’t have to worry about it.” You went on when she didn’t answer. “I don’t plan on killing Sierra Six.”

She didn’t believe you. “You don’t?” Her eyebrows quirked up.

“No.”

“So, is it regret, then? You’re looking to make amends?”

“No.”

“Right. I often forget that this is you that we’re talking about, and that would be way too easy.” Dani couldn’t have appeared more perplexed, but you had that effect on her since the two of you had been introduced.  She ran a hand down her face, exasperated at what she couldn’t understand. “You killed the majority of the program before he even dissented. Why leave one?”

“Sierra Six has connections to Donald Fitzroy. He has information that I need.”

“You mean Senior Officer Donald Fitzroy? He’s been retired for years.”

You hadn’t known that in the beginning, Fitzroy having nearly disappeared off the map altogether after he adopted his niece. You shouldn’t have been surprised, considering the Sierra program’s specialty–the reason that they were created was to place blame should the CIA ever find itself cornered. It was easier to place blame on convicts after all. Sierra Six was a failsafe. Nothing else. He was hardly worth value to you on his own, at least not now, not anymore.

“Are you going to bring Sierra Six in?” You asked her instead, diverting the conversation. She blinked at you, then you clarified. “Your reputation is shot, otherwise.”

Dani’s smile was forced, and you suspected her words were more sarcastic than sincere. “Yeah. Thanks for that.” She leaned back in her chair, busying herself by pushing her food around with her fork, again picking for an answer that you suspected you already knew. “I don’t know,” she decided. “It feels wrong. Sierra Six had a reason for going rogue all of a sudden. We never had cause to question his loyalty before now.” Another shrug, this one more subtle than the others. She averted her eyes away from you, refusing to look up. “I can’t help but wonder why, and why now?”

“I don’t know.” You said, and you didn’t.

“You’re telling me that there’s something you don’t know?” Dani mocked a gasp. Only then did she look up, giving you a droll stare that you didn’t feed into. You stared at her, and she shook her head. “I don’t think it matters. If I’m given the order, the decision is made for me.”

“If you want to keep your job,” you agreed, blank. “Being one step underneath Carmichael must have its perks.” Dani scoffed, brows furrowing. “When we kill him, what does that mean for you? Doesn’t that beat the purpose of whatever reason you have for coming into the CIA in the first place?”

“I’m not worried about it.”

“Shouldn’t you be?”

“I have eliminated every agent in the Sierra Program. I missed one.” You said, tossing all attempts at subtlety or propriety to the wind. Six had become something of a star in the world of private operators, and a legend amongst covert operators and the rest. His personal ethic had been to only accept contracts against targets that he felt had earned the punishment of extrajudicial execution. It was a small post-it-note in an otherwise empty file, a thin manila folder that held no confidential information worth locking up.

That much about Sierra Six was public, and as far as you knew, that was all that ever would be. A killer with a conscience was a humorous concept to you, but the morality of it didn’t matter. You knew what people like him did to survive, had seen it and experienced it firsthand with plenty of other desperate Sierra before him.

The atmosphere in the kitchen felt heavy, an unspoken tension coiling between you and Dani as you sat there, merely a pot roast dividing your two worlds. You could sense the myriad of unasked questions hanging in the air, but you opted to let her stew in her thoughts. Dani was no stranger to the dark recesses of the intelligence world, but there was still a palpable innocence to her approach—something about her moral compass that made her vulnerable to this life, while you had long since abandoned yours as being too cumbersome.

“I don’t understand why you’re taking this approach,” Dani finally said, a hint of frustration creeping into her voice. Her eyes were narrowed, scrutinizing you as if she hoped to peel back layers you had spent a lifetime building. “You’ve made it clear that you don’t owe anyone anything and that you’re capable of dealing with things on your own terms… so why not just finish the job?”

“It’s not that simple,” you replied, leaning back slightly in your chair, the tension in your shoulders easing a fraction.

Dani huffed, her gaze a mixture of disbelief and annoyance. “So you expect me to believe that after everything you've done, you're suddenly looking for answers instead of blood?”

“You should know better than to assume anything about my intentions.” The words slipped from your mouth, sharper than you intended. But the truth stung; you had long taken the path of blood, and yet here was the contradiction unfolding before you.

“This isn’t personal.”

“Why do you want him alive?” Her question was there, lingering as firmly as the scent of garlic. “He’s just as dangerous, if not more, than the others.” You couldn’t help but shake your head. “It’s about the information he might have.”

“Information that could lead to Carmichael or… whoever?” Dani asked, the challenge evident in her voice.

Your gaze steadied with hers, and something flickered at the edges of your mind, a momentary flash of tension that you had not often shared with others.

“I’m keeping my options open.” Your fingers tightened around the wooden spoon. “Getting to Sierra Six is an opportunity. It positions me to control what information gets out to the wrong people.”

The challenge in Dani's eyes softened, a flicker of understanding threading through the layers of doubt that she wore so comfortably. “And if he doesn't want to talk?”

“He won’t have a choice.”

Carmichael was a monster, but even monsters had a hierarchy. Getting to Sierra Six wasn’t just about revenge or even justice for you.

He was a key to something bigger.

Intimacy (Into the Gray Chpt 2)

Into The Gray Chpt 2 (Intimacy)

Fandom: The Gray Man (2022)

Pairings: Sierra Six x Reader, Courtland Gentry x Reader, Sierra Six x You, Courtland Gentry x You

Type: Multi-Chap

Words: 2.8K

Tags: @medievalfangirl, @biblichorr, @pyrokineticbaby, @lxvrgirl, @asiludida164, @torchbearerkyle, @jasmin7813, @comfortzonequeen, @my-tearsdryontheirown

Intimacy

While your intrusions may have paralyzed Lloyd in the recent weeks since you had gradually gained new freedoms, it was now made obvious by his complete lack of reaction that he had acclimated himself to them. No rhyme or reason could be made of your quiet alliance. It simply was. It existed. He thought that knew how to read intentions, thought that he could read yours , and he had since labeled them as consistent–harmless. You considered the idea that he enjoyed the concept of harmlessness within these walls. Perhaps he even considered it a luxury.

Easier to manipulate.

With eyes closed, breaths slowed in an imitation of sleep, you could see the way his face ran down a few cluttered hallways in his mind to search for the proper approach to his natural curiosity. In typical Lloyd fashion, he took the impatient route. Those eyes then opened, blue-black pits in a blue-black room. His mouth, ravaged by what Dani had often referred to as a ‘perv stache’ broke into a smile. 

Part of you wanted to shave it. That same part of you could have. 

Compared to his room, yours might as well have been a maintenance closet. The space, overall, was fit for a man of his stature–the sheets smelled like fresh detergent and were cleaned religiously. You never noticed a thing out of place, a man who took so much care in his appearance constantly aiming for some semblance of perfection. A flowery smell lingered in the air, and your own space kind of embarrassed you–the absence of any personality, blank white walls in a blank white room. There was nothing in your space that gave a peek inside as to who you were, and even after the few months since you’d been here, you hadn’t worked to correct it.

Some habits never changed, even when given enough time.

That didn’t matter to you after the fact. It was a slice of privacy to return to at the end of a long day. You’d slept in worse, places that smelled of mildew and covered in mold, dark and damp. Compared to that , your empty space was on a similar level to the highest luxury. 

“I know this isn’t a social call.” He chided. 

You’d settled at his side, legs tucked in, your head pillowed against your forearm. Your fingers gingerly scraped against the buzz at the nape of his neck, the ends of your fingernails dragging in random arcs to the top of his skull. It felt different without product, but the motions remained strangely casual, the only familiarity that you’d given anyone here. Lloyd’s head tipped back, following the motions of your hand until you heard a low, soft noise rumble in his throat. His eyes fell half-lidded, his expression running in the same similar motions as before. 

“You were awake when I came in. Can’t sleep?” You asked.

“Not with you doing this, I can’t.”

Your eyes wandered, even in the dark, resisting the urge to roll. The pads of your fingertips had moved to brush against the bare skin of his torso without a shirt, tracing the lines of hard muscle with innocent interest. Lloyd’s face, a canvas bound over knife-sharp bones, settled into passive neutrality at your touch, some semblance of satisfaction that begged a silent request for more. 

The casual affection had been something that he’d had to get used to in the beginning. Lloyd had settled like a hostage, frozen, trudging through the long minutes while pretending to play dead so that he didn’t succumb to the urge to roll you over and risk a knife to his throat. You took the opportunity to learn about him, test his limits. In a way, it was similar to how you had decided to learn about Dani, except that Lloyd had no connections. He had partners–numerous–but none that lasted beyond a night. He didn’t have family, or anyone that you thought he could or would ever care about. 

Unlike Dani, you learned that Lloyd wasn’t the type to be the team player. He looked out for himself. Anything with Lloyd was brief and fleeting. You used the arm tucked underneath your head to prop yourself up on your elbow, your eyes still wandering, roaming along with your hand. Maybe this was what people did when they didn’t have sex, forming their bizarre little rituals of physical touch. It was new to you. 

“Fuck, you’re killing me.” Another tug had Lloyd easing himself nearer to oblige the wordless request. He kept his arms limp, hands close to his abdomen even though his fingers twitched. They lay arrested to the sheets, slowly curling into fists. 

You were an enigma. A relief, incorrigible, impossible to define. Beautiful, in that perilous sort of way that sent the eyes darting elsewhere. He’d learned shortly after meeting you to receive and never return these odd, tender gestures that you brought. Your touch soothed, and confused, and stung all at once–both needle and feather, warmth and biting cold.

“I have to ask you something.” You crawled over his side, using your knees to push him onto his back so that you could straddle him. Your nails grazed his chest, using the solid surface to hold yourself there. 

A soft groan rumbled in his throat, and he sighed in defeat. “I may or may not be able to answer you.” 

“It’s about Sierra Six.”

“You picked one hell of a time to ask about another guy.” He tensed as you moved, seconds teasing by, trickling past like the clock during your interrogation. He waited and waited, but you wandered wherever you so pleased until he laid beneath your fixed gaze with little more than his own underclothing between you. He wasn’t any different from the men you’d killed. You knew that without having to look too hard. 

You felt him against you, throbbing. The heat that emanated from in between his legs betrayed him entirely. The look on his face could be defined as strong starvation, his fingers skirting up your thigh until it rested just underneath the waistband of your pants–you’d finally taken the initiative to wear the clothes they’d given you, only after they’d been thoroughly searched. His other hand hadn’t moved, pressed against his chest. 

He was getting brave. His breathing picked up. 

Lloyd tried to read you, but it only infuriated him that he could never get anywhere. Locked eye contact kept him level-headed, but even you knew that had its limits. You could feel his heartbeat under your palm, wildly out of control. 

“Do you know Six?” You asked him. 

“Mmn,” he mumbled, closing one eye first, then the other. His answer came out a little ragged. “Can’t say I’ve had the pleasure.” He breathed. “I know that he’s got credibility, but I try not to involve myself with Fitzroy’s pets.” A grin flashed at you, and you could see his perfect white teeth, even in the dark. “You thinking about asking him to join?” He chuckled, only to wince when you dug your nails in. 

You thought that only excited him more, and a slight twitch beneath you told you that you were right.

“Why do you give a fuck about the Ken doll?” He went on.

“I’m… curious.” You said and Lloyd listened, not risking another word, not another breath too deep. His fingers relaxed against your waist, aching. Shadows blanketed the two of you through the silence you disturbed. You looked away. 

“You have an alternative reason for everything. I can’t buy your bullshit.” His fingers reached up, catching a rebellious lock of your hair and returned it behind your ear. That same hand trailed the ridge of your jaw and turned your head back to him, his expression more amused than irritated. He smirked. “You know, normally I would have found a really desperate chick looking for a good fuck. We’re not going to get a lot of opportunities like this once I go to the private sector.”

It wasn’t that you were immune to that feeling. How you were trained, how you were raised , that couldn’t combat natural instinct. The heat that buried its way in between your thighs was a natural inclination that a part of you wanted this, all of your taught instincts combating against it. Not without an alternative reason. 

Having it mean something and having a choice. That had been beyond you years ago. 

You leaned down, the space between your faces marginally smaller. Your voice dropped to a low whisper, heat creating ripples of goosebumps up the side of his neck. “I can take care of that myself if I have to.” Intimacy had always been a job, a chore , and never did you want any of them to want you before you’d watched their life bleed away underneath your hands. 

“Why would you want to when I could do it for you?”  His hands gripped your waist, flipping the two of you over until he pressed into you. His body screamed, a want so overwhelming that you nearly succumbed to it too. He breathed down your neck, fingers trailing to the waistband of your pants before dipping inside. “You’re giving yourself away.”

You twitched, earning a soft smirk from Lloyd in turn. “You never know. It might be my funeral you’re going to next.” His lips trailed up your neck in soft pecks, facial hair brushing against your skin. You shivered underneath him, fingernails scraping against the rigid muscle of his back. He let out a guttural groan against your neck, pressing into you harder. 

You gasped, breathless. “It might be because of me that you have a funeral.”

With one practiced tug, the waistband of your pants were pulled down, and just like when you were exploring him before, he explored you . Perfectly manicured fingers danced their way across your skin, tracing the lean muscle of your stomach before following a trail along the bone at your hips, up your sides until it was your shirt that came next, tossed off into a meager pile on the floor. 

You reached down and cupped him, and he bucked against your hand. You scratched him in your attempts to yank down his underwear, feeling him against you, throbbing and hot. The pain only further spurred him on. Lloyd nipped at your neck, leading a trail down toward your chest. Deft fingers trailed up your forearms before grasping your hands, stretching them above your head. “Sorry, Sweetheart. I’m going to take control here.” 

You didn’t tell him that it didn’t matter. In the end, you’d always be in control.