A/N: This was written based on a request by ramblinquixotic on the slash comm, the request being 'angsty GrifxSimmons concerning the cyborg operation (happy ending required.)' As a side note, there's mild sexual themes but nothing really explicit.

"Grif! Shut the hell up with that already!" Simmons snapped. Grif frowned, clinging onto a battered guitar. No-one was really sure where the guitar had come from, maybe left there by whoever had been stationed out in the box canyon before them. But what Simmons knew for certain is that Grif strumming away at it late at night (or at least the time they had decided was nighttime, since the sun was always up) was not pleasant.

"But I can't sleep until the caffeine wears off. Seriously, Donut must put a lot of that shit in his coffee cake. No wonder he's so hyper if he eats that all the time."

"Do you have to play guitar while you're waiting?"

"Yeah. I traded my porn magazines with that blue guy, Tucker, for oreos. So what else am I supposed to do?" He went back to playing guitar.

Simmons clasped the pillow over his ears, but it did nothing to block out the noise. "What the fuck are you even playing?"

"I dunno. Some rock song. Can't remember the name of it. Or half of the notes, really."

"No wonder it sounds like shit."

"Hey!" Grif pulled a face. "Come on, it's not like it matters when we go to sleep. It's always sunny out. And the Blues have barely done anything for, like, three months. So all we do is pretend to work."

"You pretend to work. I actually do."

"Well, it's your time you're wasting. We could be doing stuff much more interesting. Like sneaking off to the caves to do the horizontal tango."

"...What."

"That's what Donut called it."

"Ah."

"And speaking of the horizontal tango..."

"Not now!"

"Aw, why not?"

"Because I'm trying to sleep."

"Can't sleep until I stop playing guitar, though. And I'm not doing that until I'm tired. And... well, tangoing does take the energy out."

"Okay, can you stop calling it tangoing? My grandma taught tango classes, so that brings up a whole bunch of mind-scarring images."

"Fine. Fucking, then. Goddamn fucking. Can we already? I'll go to sleep afterwards, I swear."

Simmons scowled. "Fucking blackmail. Alright, alright. Do I have to move much?"

"Eh. If you don't move much, you're gonna end up on the bottom."

"Fuck that."

That was the night before the accident. It was the last night they could have considered themselves normal.

To say that Grif felt like shit would have been a massive understatement. It was like he'd walked into a fire. Everything burned with pain. Grif groaned, keeping his eyes shut. One of them hurt more than the other. Neither of them wanted to move. The light hurt too much.

"Grif?"

Grif heard Simmons speak. He just groaned again in recognition. The hell was Simmons doing?

"Grif? How do you feel?"

Grif felt so crappy. Why did he feel so crappy? Last thing he remembered, what was...

"Grif! Come on! Don't you dare die on me! You keep your fucking eyes open!"

"Ah, typical lazy dirtbag. Probably couldn't be bothered to run from the tank. Oh well! We repelled the blues and Grif is dead. It's a good day for Red Base, men."

"He's not fucking dead! Grif, come on! Do something, do anything, come on, don't die..."

Oh, right. That stupid tank. Fuck, no wonder he hurt so much. ...Actually, how was he still alive?

"Um... maybe we should do something. Like... shoot him in the head real fast. He looks like he's in a lot of pain... I don't think he's—"

"Shut up, Donut! He's not fucking dying, don't even say..."

"Are you suggesting a mercy kill, Donut? You suggesting I waste bullets on his sorry hide? Now if he were alive and healthy, I'd be happy to shoot him. But wasting bullets when he's already doomed?"

There was no way he could have survived the tank plowing into him. Being crushed under those wheels tended to have a bad effect on one's health. Squashed the armour (and what was underneath it) like tinfoil. So, how...

"There has to be something... Anything... Please, Sarge, there's gotta be some way to save him..."

"Grif? Come on... You gotta wake up..."

Grif didn't really like the idea of waking up properly, though. With the amount of pain he was in, it seemed like a good idea to try and sleep through it. But then Simmons grasped his right hand. And Grif's eyes shot open, because something didn't feel right. The hands that Simmons was using to hold his own... One of them was warm and soft. The other... not so much.

Grif's eyes were blurry, but he could see. The first thing landed on was the figure standing over him, holding his hand. And then he immediately shrieked and yanked his hand away.

The thing standing over him... It sort of looked like Simmons. But... But a large portion of him, especially on the left side... His pale, freckled skin ended at the left shoulder, and his left arm and the majority of his torso was comprised of machinery. There was a panel on his chest that was blinking slowly, and Grif could hear a faint whirring noise. And while one of Simmons' eyes was the same green it had always been, the other flashed a demonic red.

It was rather like waking up to find the Terminator standing over you. If the Terminator was a nerdy Dutch-Irish man.

"Holy fucking shit!" was all Grif managed to choke out.

Simmons looked rather spooked as well. Hell, he was a fucking cyborg, why wouldn't he be freaked out? But Simmons was staring at him, not at his own metal parts. ...Why was Simmons part-machine, anyway? He hurt too much to be stuck in a fucked up dream.

A feeling of unease and fear was creeping into his stomach. Grif slowly looked down at his own hands. One of them was still the same. Tan skin, pudgy fingers and chewed fingernails. But the other had longer, thinner fingers and was covered in freckles. Grif twitched the fingers warily. His normal hand moved just as it always had, but the freckled hand took a few seconds to mirror the movements. Even so, he was undeniably the one moving them.

Still, there was nothing but confusion. The realization wasn't quite setting in. Grif looked down at his hands (no, only one of them was his) then back to Simmons. Simmons gazed back, the bionic eye still glowing an ominous red. The red eye matched up with the eye that was really hurting Grif at the moment.

Grif frowned before reaching up and feeling the area around the painful eye. A couple of inches from it he felt very large, clumpy stitches. The pieces were starting to catch up with his brain, as he finally realised what had happened.

"No fucking way." Grif stared around frantically. "Shit. Mirror. Where's the mirror?" Simmons stood up, walked towards a set of drawers (Grif could hear the whirr, whirr, clunk of his mechanical parts) and picked up the mirror sitting on top of them. He walked back, looking nervous.

"Do you really want to see? Maybe you should wait until you feel a bit better."

"Hand it over."

Simmons did so before edging back slightly. Grif squinted into the mirror, his mind going absolutely blank at the sight.

On the right side, he was still fully Grif. But his left side was covered with patches of pale, freckled skin. A large chunk of it was plastered onto the section around his eye, held in place with very lumpy, obvious stitches. And the eye on that side was the same vivid green as Simmons' remaining one. Grif tried blinking. Just like with his arms, the eye that was formerly part of Simmons took a while to move, so it ended up looking like a bizarre double wink. Grif squinted for a bit longer, before pulling up his sheet and taking a peek underneath it. More patches of Simmons' skin. And across his chest was a huge, badly stitched autopsy scar. Or at least it looked like one.

"Sarge replaced most of your organs. Some of them had kind of died from all the bacon marshmallows," Simmons said. "And your left arm was completely crushed by the tank. It was... It was... well..." Simmons shook his head. Grif could hear a faint whirring sound as he did so. "You know. I'm... not sure why he replaced the eye, your face wasn't damaged. He said something about aesthetic effect."

Grif didn't say anything for a long time, still gazing at arm, at his reflection, at the parts of him that used to be part of Simmons. It only seemed to be on the left side, apart from the autopsy scar. If anything, it looked even weirder. Unbalanced.

Grif glanced up again, but he had to look down. It felt like that cyborg eye was staring right through him. Hell, it could have been. Who knew, he could have X-ray vision now or something. He had to say something. Something to get Simmons to stop staring at him with that goddamn creepy cyborg eye. Grif opened his mouth and just said the first thing that came to mind.

"Did I get your lips? Because maybe then I'll finally figure out how to kiss Sarge's ass."

In retrospect, he could have chosen something better.

Simmons spent the next few days incredibly frustrated for a large number of reasons. All of them relating to the surgery.

First off, there were the complications of being a cyborg. His new parts didn't work that well. It was to be expected, seeing as Sarge had pretty much scraped together whatever spare junk he could find around base. Simmons was at least thankful that they worked at all. But he really could have lived without his newly developed habit of shooting himself in the foot regularly. Sarge insisted that was user error.

Furthermore, the cyborg eye Sarge had plastered onto his face was really annoying him. For starters, it was completely unnecessary. Sarge had only taken the eye and shoved it on Grif for the aesthetic effect.

"What kind of cyborg doesn't have a murderous glowing metal eye? Get with the times, Simmons!" he'd said, the one time Simmons had brought it up.

Now, having the eye might have been really cool. It was actually one of the few parts of him that wasn't made of junk. Apparently Sarge had intended to put it in Lopez, and since Lopez had run off that hadn't come to pass. So it did have some neat features like night and heat vision.

Problem was, Simmons couldn't turn them on by himself. They just did it at random moments. The only way to get it seeing normally again was to smack himself in the side of the head really hard. Something that got old really fast.

It was also difficult to sleep. It was like trying to sleep on a pile of junk metal. Except the metal was inside him. And it kept making that humming noise, like computers and other machinery did. It was quiet enough so that Simmons didn't notice it in the daytime. But at nighttime, when he was trying to sleep? He could hear it then.

Even if he could get past all the annoyances and malfunctions of being a cyborg, there was... there was the others. Having to sit still for a good amount of time each day while Sarge opened the panel on his chest and tinkered with the wires inside of it was not his favourite way of spending time. And he had no idea what Sarge was even doing. Sarge insisted he was trying to fix the errors in Simmons' system. But they never got any better. And Sarge sticking a screwdriver into his chest cavity was just... weird.

Donut kept following him around, annoying him incessantly with questions. What's it like being a cyborg? Can I touch your eye? Will it hurt if I poke it? Does it feel weird to be filled with metal? Is it like having a heater or an air conditioner inside you? Did Sarge really put a fax machine in your butt? It just went on and on and on...

But Sarge and Donut were nothing compared to how infuriating Grif was. Simply because Grif had barely acknowledged the change at all. After waking up from the surgery, he hadn't mentioned either his own surgery or Simmons' one. Besides the one joke about kissing ass, he hadn't made even one mention to the fact that he was now a human meatpuzzle and Simmons was a tin can man. He hadn't changed his routine at all, he just kept smoking, drinking, eating snack cakes... Just kept doing all the things that ruined his organs in the first place. Outside of getting hit by the tank again, anyway. When Simmons nagged him about it, Grif simply pulled a face and told Simmons to quit bitching.

The only difference in the routine was that he was avoiding Simmons a lot. Or was Simmons avoiding him? He honestly wasn't sure. He probably could have found Grif easily if he really tried. But he didn't, because just looking at him made him angry. Because Grif adjusted so damn quickly to being a meatpuzzle, while Simmons was still stuck on the fact that he no longer had a heartbeat. And the fact that Grif had barely acknowledged the fact that Simmons had given up most of his organs for him.

And Simmons was starting to wonder why he'd done it in the first place. It'd happened so fast... one minute, he'd been pleading with Grif, begging him not to die... The next minute, Sarge was handing him a bottle of alcohol to use as anesthetic. But why had Simmons done it? He could have let Grif die. He could have gone 'fuck it, I'm keeping my organs.' Sarge wouldn't have minded. Hell, he'd only reluctantly agreed to save Grif in the first place.

Simmons kept trying to remember why he'd done it. But he couldn't. And every time he looked down at his metal arm... every time he smacked himself in the side of his head to get his eye off night vision... every time he tried to sleep and heard only the whirring sound of his parts... Every time any of that happened, he regretted more and more the choice he had made.

Grif frowned downwards at his guitar. He'd dug up some old sheet music he'd had buried at the bottom of his footlocker, hoping it would help him concentrate enough to be able to play. But concentration just wasn't enough anymore.

He tried strumming out a simple tune. But Simmons' fingers (no, no, his fingers, they were his fingers now) couldn't keep up. They moved a bit faster than right after the surgery, but they still didn't react properly when he told them to move. It always happened too late. And what came out of the guitar was not a coherent tune, just a mess of wrong notes that were so mangled that guessing the song he was trying to play would be an impossible task.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!" he growled under his breath, another swear being uttered every time he hit a wrong note. And every note he tried to play was wrong. The tank just had to hit his left hand, didn't it? Fucking left-handedness. Although he wasn't left-handed anymore, he was just... no-handed. Grif stopped, raised his new hand to his eyes. Kept trying to move it. It always took a couple of seconds.

"Fuck," he repeated. As he went back to his attempts at playing guitar, he heard footsteps outside the door. Quickly, he slid the guitar back under his bunk.

Simmons walked in a couple of seconds later. He didn't say anything. Just glanced at Grif before trudging over to his own bunk. He rummaged around in his footlocker for a book (he used to read a lot of books about machines but he'd been avoiding those books lately) before lying down on the bunk. It used to be that he'd just kind of flop on the bed, in a real casual way. But since the operation, he'd been moving... well, a lot more like a robot. The way he climbed onto the bunk was very... rigid.

No words were exchanged. Eventually, Simmons climbed to his feet again (whirr, whirr, clunk) walked across the room and switched the lights off before returning back to his bunk. It was absolutely silent except for the faint whirring sound. Always that sound, that light buzzing which had replaced Simmons' pulse.

Right, because Simmons didn't have a pulse anymore. He didn't have the organs necessary for that. Instead of a heart, he had a cavity filled with machinery. A cavity that Sarge kept sticking a screwdriver into, tinkering away.

Since he'd woken up a few days ago, Grif had tried his best not to really think about the operation. But at night all he could hear was Simmons. And all he could think about was what they both were. And what they'd been before.

What they'd been before was kind of hazy. It had mostly been, well, sex. Quick, rough sex. And sometimes it felt like Simmons only went along with it so that Grif would stop playing guitar. But there were... moments. Moments when there was something there.

And now all Grif could think about was that last night... That last night of rough tumbling around in the sheets... Despite Simmons complaining that he didn't want to move much, once it started things always changed. Half of it seemed to be arguing and fighting over who got to be on top (last time it had been Grif, partly because Simmons was already tired at that point.)

But during the afterglow... There was those moments. Grif could recall, clear as anything, the feel of Simmons' skin under his hands, the soft pressure as he rested his forehead against his shoulder, the faint smell of the soap Simmons used, just a slight hint of it under the sheen of sweat both of them were coated in. And he could recall the faint beat of Simmons' pulse that he could always feel during those few quiet moments. It was during those moments... between the rough sex and Simmons complaining that Grif had made a mess of his bed... when Grif was sure there was something there.

But it was different now, wasn't it? Grif had parts of that skin that he'd gently rubbed his hands against. He had the sweat glands that Simmons used to have (and they didn't even work right) and it was harder to smell the soap Simmons used because washing machinery in the shower with soap was just stupid.

Grif could still hear the mechanical buzzing. Buzzzzzzzz...

Simmons didn't have a pulse. Grif had his pulse. What the hell did that even mean?

Buzzzzzzzzz...

Weren't feelings supposed to come from the heart? Hell, wasn't that why there was so many phrases to do with it? Wearing your heart on your sleeve? Cold-hearted? Giving your heart to someone?

Buzzzzzzzzz...

...The hell did it mean when someone literally gave you their own heart? Was it still possible to feel things when you had a chunk of machinery there instead?

Buzzzzzzzzz...

"Oh my god, can you shut off that goddamn buzzing?" Grif snapped.

Simmons sat up. His glowing eye was the only source of light in the room. He glared at Grif.

"I can't. I would if I could, but I goddamn can't, alright? Not without shutting my whole system down, and that would result in a mild case of death. Only a minor inconvenience, sure."

"Okay, okay. You don't have to get pissy about it."

"Of course. Why would I be pissy about giving up my organs to some..." Simmons stopped. "...Never mind."

"You got something to say?"

"No."

"Yes, you do. If you got something to say, then fucking say it."

"Oh, so I'm the one not saying anything now? After you've spent the last few days avoiding me and doing fucking nothing but going back to the habits that wrecked your organs in the first place? You've barely acknowledged the fucking change, and I'm the one who isn't saying anything about it now?"

"What do you want me to do? Huh?" Grif stood up, heard a popping noise come from his (was it his?) spine. It did that a lot lately. "How, exactly, do you want me to acknowledge the change? How do I bring that up in casual fucking conversation? 'Oh, hey. You remember that time when I got crushed by a tank and you decided it'd be a bright idea to let Sarge shove your organs into me? I just wanted to say that it definitely happened.' Because seriously, I'd rather not think about it."

"You don't have to think about it twenty-four seven! But you could say something! Anything! You... You could have at least thanked me or something for..."

"Fine! Fine, Simmons!" Grif planted his hands on his hips angrily. "Fine! Thank you very much for letting us both get turned into fucking freaks of nature." After spending his days trying to suppress every bitter thought about the operation, it just came flooding out. "I'm so grateful that I'm a fucking frankenstein! Because, hey, I always wanted to look like a patchwork doll! There, you happy?"

Simmons climbed to his feet too, in that rigid, mechanical way. "Not especially. What should I have done, then? Just let you die?"

"No, I... I don't know." Grif shut his eyes, sitting back down on his bunk. "Why'd we both have to go through this? You didn't need to be dragged into it."

"You think that would have made it better? You think everything would be awesome if you were part machine?"

"'Course not! But at least..."

Grif stopped there. He didn't want to say what he was thinking. That if he'd been the only one operated on... Sure, being a cyborg would be weird. He'd seen Simmons malfunctioning. Shooting himself in the foot, having to sit there and be tinkered with for hours... Being a cyborg would suck. Maybe as much as being a frankenstein. Maybe more.

But if Grif was the cyborg, then Simmons would be... just Simmons. And this whole mess wouldn't be so confusing. Because he'd know Simmons was just Simmons. He wouldn't be wondering whether Simmons could still feel emotions when he had a tin can for a heart. Even if having a tin heart took away Grif's emotions, at least he'd know about it. He wouldn't be so fucking confused.

And then Simmons would be fine. They wouldn't be avoiding each other, they'd still be standing on top of base squabbling about whatever subjects came to mind.

Grif didn't say that out loud. Instead he said, "At least being a cyborg looks cool."

"Being a cyborg isn't sunshine and rainbows, jackass!" Simmons snapped.

And Grif couldn't help but wonder whether Simmons was really feeling the rage. Are you actually mad, Simmons? Or are you just going through the motions?

"You know Sarge wouldn't have made you into a cyborg! I had to p—had to argue pretty hard to get him to save you. It was the only way! He wasn't going to waste the cyborg parts on you!"

"And now I'm a waste of space."

"I didn't say that, you douche!"

"Why'd you argue in the first place? Why didn't you just let me die? Why did you give up so fucking much?"

"I don't know! I'm starting to wonder that myself!"

The door was kicked open. Donut was standing there in a frilly pink apron, holding a tray of cupcakes.

"Cake!" he yelled desperately.

Both Grif and Simmons stared at him. After a few moments of silence Donut went slightly pink, still holding the tray out.

"Um. I heard you both arguing. And when I wanted to stop an argument at home or make someone happier so they wouldn't yell at me, then I would make cake. And we had some cupcake batter, so I made cupcakes."

"...Wait, you made cupcakes because you heard us arguing? ...We've only been fighting for about a minute," Simmons pointed out, raising an eyebrow. "How'd you do that?"

"That's not important. Please stop fighting and have some cupcakes?"

The argument defused after that, because Donut did have a point. Why argue when there was cake to eat? But still, Grif and Simmons refused to talk to each other for the rest of the night and throughout the next day.

A couple of days later, Simmons was up at the crack of dawn (or at least what time would have been dawn, if the sun ever set) cleaning the Warthog. It was easier just getting his chores done while everyone was asleep, since all the time Sarge spent tinkering with his parts took a lot of time out of his work day. And like Grif was ever going to do it.

Oddly enough, despite the fight he'd had with Grif... He actually felt a lot better. Maybe because he knew that Grif wasn't adjusting as well as he'd thought. Which was probably a horrible thing to feel good about, but even so... Misery loves company.

When he finished cleaning the Warthog, he trudged back inside base to wash his hands. Cleaning the Warthog was a messy duty, it was always covered in crap. When Simmons reached the bathroom, however, it was locked. Simmons knocked on the door a few times.

"Hey, you gonna be long?"

The only reply was a retching noise. Simmons wrinkled his nose with disgust and stepped back. He waited. A few minutes later, the door was shoved open and Grif stumbled by looking rather green and clutching his stomach.

"You look like shit," Simmons said.

"Shut up," Grif muttered before going back to the room they shared. Simmons shook his head before entering the bathroom to wash his hands.

Later on, he entered the kitchen to find Donut sitting on the counter, watching the oven. Kicking his feet back and forth impatiently.

"Hey, did you let Grif stuff himself with those cupcakes you made?"

"No, why?"

"Well, he's throwing up everywhere for one."

"And you blame my cupcakes?" Donut looked offended. Simmons quickly backtracked.

"No, no, I wasn't."

"Besides, he was acting weird yesterday. Came out here when I was pulling the last batch of cupcakes out. Didn't even grab one."

"Yeah, right."

"It's true. Looked green then, too." Donut wrinkled his nose. "Gross colour."

"Huh."

Simmons figured Grif had just ate something gross. Like that time he found a half-eaten candy bar under the couch. That had been absolutely gross. And only served to prove that Grif would eat anything when he was sufficiently hungry. Anything unhealthy, anyway. But of course, give him something green and healthy and he'd look at you like you just told him to eat out of a garbage can.

When Simmons woke up the day after that, however, he found Grif curled up on his bunk. Still clutching his stomach even in his sleep. When Simmons shook him, trying to wake him up, the only response was a pained whimper. Furthermore, he looked feverish. Simmons reached out and felt his forehead. Felt like he could fry bacon on his face.

"...You didn't just eat something you found under the couch again, did you?"

Grif shook his head slightly.

"How bad does it feel?"

Another pained whimper. Simmons frowned. Normally, Grif would at least say something. The fact that he was only whimpering...

"Alright. I'll get Donut to keep an eye on you while I try and find Doc."

Simmons went to move away, but he felt Grif grab his metal hand. Grif had opened his eyes, they were wide and glazed but they were still focused on him. Just like...

"Grif! Grif!"

Simmons ran as fast as he could towards Grif's unmoving body. He'd run out there as soon as the Blues were gone, and he would have run out there a lot sooner if Sarge and Donut hadn't been holding him back.

When he reached Grif, he had to fight the momentary urge to throw up. Even though they were in a war (or something close to it, the whole thing had seemed like a complete joke until now) he'd never seen anything so gory. Most of Grif's left side had basically been reduced to a pile of vaguely human-shaped mush and splinters of bone, especially his left arm. That was just a smear of blood and bone bits. But Grif was breathing. He was still breathing. Worse than that, his eyes were still open. He was still conscious. He wasn't screaming, possibly because at least one of his lungs had been crushed, but you could see the raw, undiluted pain in his facial expression. He didn't seem to be recognising his surroundings, his eyes weren't focused on anything.

"Grif! Come on! Don't you dare die on me! You keep your fucking eyes open!"

Sarge and Donut had caught up to him at this point. Donut looked pale, terrified and guilty. But Sarge looked a mix between disgruntled and pleased. "Ah, typical lazy dirtbag. Probably couldn't be bothered to run from the tank. Oh well! We repelled the blues and Grif is dead. It's a good day for Red Base, men."

"He's not fucking dead!" Simmons snapped. "Grif, come on! Do something, do anything, come on, don't die..."

"Um... maybe we should do something," Donut suggested nervously. "Like... shoot him in the head real fast. He looks like he's in a lot of pain... I don't think he's—"

"Shut up, Donut! He's not fucking dying, don't even say..."

"Are you suggesting a mercy kill, Donut? You suggesting I waste bullets on his sorry hide? Now if he were alive and healthy, I'd be happy to shoot him. But wasting bullets when he's already doomed?"

Simmons had stopped shouting for that moment, because maybe Donut was right. Maybe a mercy kill would be the best thing. How could anyone survive something like that?

Grif then reached out, fingers brushing Simmons' hand weakly. It was all he could manage to do. He gurgled, throat clogged up with too much blood to say anything coherent. But he was staring at Simmons.

All the memories of their arguments, their ridiculous discussions that they filled the time with... the memories of the nights they'd spent together, filled with just as much arguing as the days... Simmons recalled that, and remembered what it'd been like in the base before Grif had shown up. Just him and Sarge. There'd been no conversation beyond orders and confirmations that the orders had been heard.

Simmons gripped his hand firmly. No. He couldn't give up on Grif just yet. He needed Grif. He had to save him.

"There has to be something... Anything... Please, Sarge, there's gotta be some way to save him..." Simmons closed his eyes, thinking as hard as he could... and then he recalled a conversation from earlier... something about needing another robot on the team, something about making a... "You were going to make one of us a cyborg, weren't you? You can make Grif one!"

"Same matter as the bullets, son. I ain't wasting any on his hide. If this team is gonna have a cyborg, it's gotta be someone who's gonna be useful for the team!"

Simmons swallowed nervously, looking down at Grif. His eyes kept shutting, he looked on the brink of passing out. If he did, it might be the last time he ever opened his eyes... Not unless...

"Then make me one." Simmons gripped Grif's remaining hand tighter. "Make me one and give the organs to Grif. Then you'll have your loyal cyborg."

"But... Saving Grif? Just seems like a waste of—"

Sarge was interrupted by Simmons punching him in the face. Donut let out a shocked gasp.

"Simmons—" he started with a yelp, but he was interrupted by Simmons shouting as loud as he could at Sarge.

"Goddammit, this isn't the time for your petty hatred! You have to save him! If you don't go with this, I'll cut out your organs and give them to him myself!" Simmons screamed.

He was sure, from the look on Sarge's face, that he was about to be declared a traitor for decking the C.O in the face. But then Sarge nodded.

"Alright, but it's a waste of resources. Could be fighting the Blues with those organs. Donut, run and get the vodka! We're gonna need it!"

It only took that look to remind Simmons why he'd given up so much to keep Grif alive. Simmons looked down at Grif before nodding.

"Okay, I'll send Donut to get Doc. I'll stay with you. But you have to let go of my hand for a moment so I can tell him."

Grif let go after a few moments of hesitation. Simmons hurried off to find Donut and send him off to look for Doc.

Simmons stayed next to Grif until Donut appeared again, Doc in tow. Afterwards, he was forced to leave the room while Doc did his check-up. Although the fact that Doc was holding a book titled 'Medicine For Dummies' was not comforting.

It didn't take a long time for Doc to leave the room, however. Doc strolled out, asked Sarge what book he'd used to find information on how to transplant Simmons' organs into Grif. After Sarge handed Doc a chart with a picture of a cow on it and a book called 'Organ Transplants For Dummies' (did the army buy those sorts of books in bulk or something?) Doc returned to Grif.

Another hour passed. Doc left again, found the other Reds that were seated in the kitchen.

"Basically what's happened..." he started. "Is that Simmons' parts are being rejected by Grif's system. Partly because Sarge didn't give Grif the required drugs."

"There was nothing in that book that said anything about drugs. Go ahead and read it, there's nothing," Sarge insisted.

"The whole third chapter is about it."

"Ah, fish hats."

"Anyway, it lists the immunosuppressive drugs he was meant to be taking. Start giving him those and he'll probably get better."

"Probably?" Simmons questioned nervously. Doc shrugged.

"I'm not a doctor, I'm a medic. Doctors cure people. Medics make them more comfortable while they die. And this isn't really my area of expertise. But I think he'll get better. I have to go over to Blue Base now, about this time every day Caboose sticks his hand in the toaster and Tucker shows up to drag me over there." Doc frowned a little. "Always with the dragging, no-one ever just calls. It's quite rude, really."

Grif dozed off during Doc's check-up. Which was quite a relief really, the pain had been awful. When he woke up, he still felt pretty shitty. But the nausea he'd been feeling for the past couple of days was much less. That was something, at least.

The first thing he noticed was that Simmons had dragged up a chair next to his bunk. He was asleep in it. Even though he was asleep, his metal eye still continued to glow ominously. Grif shivered, before eying the panel on Simmons' chest (he wasn't wearing a shirt because he said the fabric kept catching on the metal, and the bodysuit that they wore with their armour felt strange to wear to bed.)

Grif was still curious about what exactly Sarge had replaced Simmons' heart with. That curiousity got the better of him, and he reached out (with his own hand, not the one that belonged to Simmons) to open the panel, see what was inside.

His fingers were inches away when a hand (Simmons' one, not the metal claw) grabbed his wrist.

"Quit it," Simmons muttered, opening his organic eye.

"Jesus. Alright, sorry."

Grif didn't move his hand away. And Simmons didn't let go of his wrist. They just stared at each other for a moment. Two pairs of mismatched eyes. Then Simmons blinked (although the cyborg eye never blinked) and looked away. A faint tinge of pink stained his cheeks.

"Uh. So, uh, earlier... I kind of screamed at you that I couldn't remember why I saved you..." he muttered. "Well, I remembered."

"Yeah?"

"It's just... well..." Simmons shifted. "Before you showed up, it was just me and Sarge. And Sarge is fine and all..."

"Speak for yourself."

"But he's not exactly fun to hang around with. Always fiddling around with Lopez and plotting against the Blues. Every interaction consisted of orders and 'yes, sir.'"

"Of course it did. Kissass."

"Shut up. Anyway, then you showed up... And you were a fat, annoying dumbass..."

"Eh, can't argue with that."

"...But for the first time, I had someone to talk to. And I mean in the entire army, there was no-one at boot camp, either. And it was the most retarded conversations that I'd ever had, but they were fun. They were pretty much the highlights of the day.

"I guess... I guess what I'm trying to say is that... well, you're the only thing keeping me sane in this place. I would have snapped long ago if it weren't for you. And, you know... You're really... important to me. I guess. And I know I said I couldn't remember why I gave up so much, and I spent so much time after the accident regretting it... But if I could go back, do it all over again... I would make the exact same choices every time."

"You mean that?"

"Right down to punching Sarge in the face."

"You punched him in the face? That's awesome."

"Yeah, I think I just cost myself any chance at a promotion, which is actually really annoy—" Simmons was about to start blabbering about something or other, but Grif silenced him by leaning forward and kissing him roughly.

After a few moments, Grif pulled away again. "Thanks." Simmons blinked a few times before going pinker and grinning sheepishly.

"No problem."

Of course, Grif couldn't resist ruining the moment. "Admit it. You just saved me because I'm good in bed."

"Don't flatter yourself, dumbass."

"I'm not flattering myself, it's the truth." Grif tugged Simmons forward more, lips ghosting over his. "I can prove it right now, if you're unsure."

"Lies." Simmons didn't object at first. He seemed fine when Grif pulled him into another kiss. It was fine until Grif stuck a hand down his pants. More accurately, he stuck Simmons' old hand down his pants.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Simmons flinched back, and accidentally toppled off the chair at the same time. There was a very heavy clunk as he hit the floor. "Uh... Uh, I... That's..."

"What? Oh..." Grif looked down at the pale, freckled hand. "It's not that bad, is it? Kinda just like masturbating. If, like, a ghost was controlling your hand or something."

"...That doesn't make it less weird." Simmons climbed back to his feet. "I... No, that's just... Just too weird. Seriously, how would you feel if I stuck this down your pants?" he waved his metal hand. Grif frowned a little.

"Well, probably scared. It's a fucking metal clamper. That's not quite the same, though."

Simmons frowned as well. "This sucks."

"Yeah."

They sat in silence for a while. Grif was the first to move. He reached out and gripped Simmons' metal hand with his pale, freckled one. Simmons did twitch a little, but he didn't move away.

"We got time. We'll deal with it," Grif said bluntly. "What else are we gonna do in this dump?"

"Yeah. True."

Grif kept a hold on Simmons' metal hand. The cyborg parts of Simmons still disturbed the hell out of him. That demonic red eye, that metal claw, the fact that he had no pulse... It still disturbed Grif more than anything besides that time Donut had dressed up in his Officer Hotpants outfit and jumped out of a cake.

And he knew Simmons was disturbed by him. Hell, seeing parts of you attached to someone else had to be fucking disturbing. Especially when the parts were attached to someone that looked so different (it wasn't easy to wear the parts of a skinny, pale and freckled Dutch-Irishman when you were a chubby, tanned Hawaiian man.)

And besides all that, Grif still couldn't help but wonder if a tin can could function like a real heart could. But if Simmons was really an emotionless robot under all that, he probably wouldn't have gotten so freaked out at Grif grabbing his crotch.

It'd be hard to return to what could be considered normal. And adjusting would probably carry with it a lot of arguments and awkward moments. But f they could survive a tank collision and getting most of their parts swapped by a questionably insane C.O... then they could survive this.

Grif broke the silence by asking, "Did Sarge really put the fax machine in your butt? Because that could be really awkward later on."

"Fuck you."

They could survive this. Because either through death or intense awkwardness, neither one of them wanted to lose the other.