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I’m not getting seasick, Maverick tells himself for the eighth time as he lays on his bed in the stuffy cabin getting rocked violently from side to side. I am not seasick and I will not be seasick.
But of course the carrier had to hit the worst storm recorded in three years on the night after the gut wrenching mission he had just flown. Maverick gets seasick if the sea is just slightly choppier than usual, but this was no slightly choppy water, god no. This was a fully blown ‘the deck is swaying, the waves are metres high, and the skies are blacker than the dark side of the moon’ kind of storm.
Goose, Slider, Iceman and everyone else were having a great time in the mess hall eating dinner, but Maverick was in his cabin telling himself not to throw up.
The mission they had just flown earlier on was terrifying, but they did it all the same, it was a great success and no one was badly hurt.
Don’t get sick…
His pleading thoughts are not working as he reckoned they would. Closing his eyes doesn’t help either, and neither does imagining himself on dry land.
“Goose do you think Maverick’s alright?”
“Huh? Oh, I think so, he’s probably just a little seasick,”
Iceman looks at Goose with an eyebrow raised. “He gets seasick if the water is anything other than a flat calm,”
“… True,” Goose replies. “In that case, he’s probably a lot seasick, and one of us should go check on him after we’re finished,”
“Yeah,” Ice agrees. “Do you want to go?”
“I can, but since seeing somebody else sick makes me feel sick then-”
“Alright, Goose, I’ll go,” Iceman shakes his head and sighs.
“Thanks, it’s not that I don’t care, it is just simply that. I’ll go and see him in the morning,”
“I know, don’t worry,”
Fifteen minutes later, they finish eating and Ice stands up to go.
“Wish me luck,”
“Good luck Ice,” Goose says, still looking guilty. “Tell him I’ll see him tomorrow, please,”
“Thank you, and I will,” he smiles and leaves the mess hall.
As soon as Ice gets to the cabins, he senses something is up. And not a minute later, he knows something is definitely up- Maverick’s cabin door is flung open and the door to the bathrooms is swinging slowly from side to side with the motion of the boat.
Oh no. Goose was right about him being seasick.
So straight to the bathrooms he goes, silently hoping he doesn’t have to clean up anything, not that he wouldn’t mind. Once he gets there, only one of the stall’s doors are open, so Ice heads to that one, dreading what he might find.
“Oh god-” Ice says, finding Maverick in the fetal position with his head on his knees, shaking ever so slightly, his back pressed to the wall. He crouches down in front of him, folding his legs beneath him. “Pete..”
Maverick slowly raises his head to look Iceman in his eyes.
Jesus he looks so sick, Ice thinks, taking in his bloodshot eyes, the unusual red colour smattering his cheeks and nose and how pale the rest of his face looks, his dry lips and how dried tears made reddish streaks down his cheeks.
Ice decides to tear off some toilet roll and wrap it around his fingers, whilst gently lifting up Maverick’s chin with his left hand, before gently wiping it over his eyes, nose and mouth.
“How long have you been here for?”
He shrugs, “T-ten, fifteen minutes,”
“Can you stand up?” Ice asks him when he finishes cleaning up his face.
No, no, absolutely not, Maverick thinks, untrusting that his legs will hold him up, but not wanting Ice to think he’s that sick. “I think-” He attempts standing up, slowly, both his hands flat against the wall, tremors from his legs threatening to make him fall over, and takes one step towards the door and stumbles over.
Iceman catches his hands though, stopping him from falling flat on his face. “I think that’s a no, Mitchell,” he says, a slight smile on his lips.
Maverick half-heartedly glares at him, but doesn’t push away Ice’s arm as he wraps it around his shoulders.
“Can’t imagine you’re doing this willingly,” Maverick says as they get to the sinks.
“Pfft, why not?”
“Why? Because I thought you would hate all this- dealing with me and me being seasick,”
“Well, no I don’t mind,”
“Huh,” Maverick replies as he splashes the lukewarm water from the hot tap on his face.
“The more you know, Mav. Anyway, Goose would be here but he said-”
“-that he would be as sick as me?”
“Hah, yeah,” Ice replies. “He looked pretty guilty though, but he did say he would come see you tomorrow,”
“Typical Goose behaviour there,”
“Is it?”
“Yeah, he’s so squeamish, it’s kinda funny. Like he’ll get you to where you need to be taken care of, then leave you until the next day where you’re hopefully feeling better. Always looks so guilty about it though,”
Ice chuckles a little. “Are you alright to go back to your cabin or do you think you’ll need to stay here for longer?”
“I think I’ll be alright back at the cabin,” Maverick replies.
Ice nods and helps him walk back to it, where he gets him a pint of water and lays a towel on the side of his bed, just incase the worst happens in the middle of the night.
Maverick lays down on his side, facing the door and not the window that’s getting slashed with rain on the outside. He still feels terrible, but a lot less terrible than half an hour earlier. Maybe Ice doesn’t mind looking after me.
He inhales as Ice comes in to sit down by the bed after turning the lights down. “I think this might be a little more than… seasickness, this time, Ice,”
“Yeah? Why’s that? Don’t you normally sit in the bathrooms for twenty minutes?”
He frowns at him. “No, it’s more like five minutes,”
Iceman smiles.
“But in all seriousness, I honestly don’t feel this bad when I get seasick normally,”
“You think you might’ve caught something?”
“I don’t know,” he pauses to take a breath. “We- I’ll have to see once I get back on ground that doesn’t sway if there’s a storm,”
“Hm, good plan,” Iceman replies, leaning back on the wall. “Do you need anything else?”
A hug. “No, I don’t think so,” Maverick says after a long yawn. “Wha’s the time?”
“Quarter past eleven,” Ice replies, stifiling his yawn.
Maverick catches his hand as he lowers it to put it back on his lap.
“What?”
He doesn’t say anything as he brings it to rest on the bed. He doesn’t say anything as he presses his lips to Ice’s fingers. And he doesn’t say anything, he just fixes his eyes on him.
And then Ice finally gets the hint, shifting slightly to be able to push Maverick’s hair away from his forehead with his other hand.
“Let me ask you again, do you need anything else?”
Maverick cracks a smile. “A hug?”
Ice smiles and scoots his arms around him, the hug lasting for slightly longer than it should have, but neither of them care.
“Anything happen at dinner that I missed?” Maverick asks slowly, after they let go, but he still holds onto Ice’s hand.
“Mhm, not much, but Goose gave an overly dramatic speech about ‘How Maverick was amazing today’”
“Bet you loved that,”
“Ha ha,” he says sarcastically. “He ended it with ‘but sadly he could not be here tonight,’”
Maverick laughs, and Ice feels warm. “Did Slider do anything… Slider-ish?”
“When does he not?”
“True,” Maverick yawns again. “How are your hands so warm? Especially because your callsign is ‘Iceman’,”
“Because I’m not suffering from seasickness for the hundredth time, Mav,”
“Hey- I’ve only been sick-”
“Every single time you’ve been on a boat?”
“I- no,” his voice is full of uneffortful annoyance.
“More than when you’ve been on a boat?!” Iceman mocks shock.
Maverick huffs but can’t keep the smile off his lips.
“Ice can you stay?” he asks after a moment of comfortable silence.
“Stay? For how long?”
“Tonight,”
“I’ll stay until you fall asleep,” Iceman says after a moment.
“’m not gonna fall asleep then,”
“Sure you’re not,”
“I’m not, Tom,”
He raises his eyebrows at the mention of his first name from Maverick. “You do that then, Pete,”
“I just wanted to say thank you,” He says. “If you didn’t come and check on me then I would still be on the bathroom floor,”
“I know,” Ice gives him a smile. “Guess I’ll be your guardian angel,”
“I don’t want a guardian angel..”
“You are someone who definitely needs one most,” Ice strokes Maverick’s hair back, who sighs under his touch. “Now go to sleep,”
“Only if you stay,” he says slowly, still managing to keep his eyes open.
Ice sighs.
“Please…”
Ice gives in. What harm could it do? Even if he was in the hospital room instead of his room, Maverick would still want him to stay. And he doesn’t really mind. No the bed isn’t quite big enough for both of them, but so what? There’s always the floor.
“Alright then Mav, I’ll stay,”
He smiles, his eyes finally closing to the sound of Ice’s voice, which sounds more caring than he’s ever heard it.
“Now you can sleep without fearing that I’ll run off in the night,” He lifts up Maverick’s hand and kisses his fingers. “Which I won’t do,”
“You are my guardian angel after all..” His words blur together.
“I certainly am, Pete,” Ice says quietly.