A.N.: First time I write something like this. I tried to not make it very detailed. Also I wrote it in present tense because I wanted to try something. Please let me know if it's distracting or confusing.

Skipper and Kowalski had been gone for a few days now. In the hurried briefing he gave, Skipper had told Rico and Private that this was more of a diplomatic mission and the General HQ had requested only the presence of the senior officers. So, the two of them remained behind. Keep the home front strong and all that…jazz.

It's evening on their second day of absence now and Rico is sitting on the couch, sliding further and further down, like gravity's got a hold of his legs and gives a tug now and then. The only source of light in the darkening living room is the TV, which Rico zaps incessantly. There's really not much on in the middle of the week. Something catches his eye to the side of the room and he gets his guard up for a moment. But when he turns his head, it turns out it's just Private. Just Private, leaning awkwardly against the doorjamb watching him. Rico gives him a quizzical look, but it seems to trigger Private's nervousness. At that moment he appears to Rico even younger than his 18 years. Private had been recently promoted to Private First Class, but he was still restricted from a lot of high-rank stuff, like this mission. And jokes, but that was just Skipper messing with him.

'What's with that face? Did your Lunacorn die? Why do you look so scared?' Rico asks him. All he gets in return is Private worrying at his bottom lip. The young man has an air of indecisiveness about him, like he wants to say something, but doesn't know how and he is trying his best to convey the message through his big, blue eyes. Rico, not being a mind reader, just says. "Would you, maybe, like to join me? I'm not gonna bite you." He adds with a smirk, thinking that Private is nervous to be alone with him.

Private makes a few steps into the room, then plops himself on the couch, taking care to leave a visibly large gap between him and Rico. The man eyes the gap warily, than his eyes turn to Private. This is not looking very well for what I came here to do, is it? Private thinks.

'Um…I actually wanted to ask you…'

'And it talks!' Rico interrupts him before Private gets the chance to finish his sentence.

'I'm really nervous, as I'm sure you can see.'

'Yeah… What I don't understand is why?'

'I'm getting to that. Please, would you let me get it out?' he's getting a tad angry, but just a tad. It doesn't have space in his body right now, with all the other things going on: nervousness, fear, a bit of excitement.

Rico thinks it's endearing that even when he is annoyed, Private sticks to his politeness, saying his "pleases" and his "thank yous". 'OK, go ahead.'

Private takes a few deep breaths of air before he shuts his eyes tightly so he doesn't have to look Rico straight in the face when he asks him. Strange. He can shoot a gun at the right person without remorse, break a man's arm in five ways*, but he's a coward in the simplest ways. 'Would you teach me how to kiss a bloke properly?' he blurts out as quickly as possible. He cracks an eye open, hopeful, now that the HQ didn't go up in a glorious explosion. Rico's still there, staring at him with his head cocked to one side.

'I'm sorry. My brain does this thing sometimes. I thought I heard you say you want me to teach you how to kiss a guy' Rico says.

'Yes.'

Rico's face goes through a series of fast changing expressions that, strangely, resemble the five stages of grief, until he finally says, resigned 'Okay. But, why me?'

'Well, my first thought was Marlene. You know, she's friendlier. No offence.'

'None taken.' answers Rico with the straightest straight face. The sarcasm flies over Private's short head.

'But she wouldn't have served my purposes. And she doesn't really strike my fancy, if you know what I mean. Well, I guess it's no big secret now.'

'Trust me I guessed a long time ago, bud.' says Rico giving the Brit's leg a reassuring pat.

'Kowalski, he would have drawn me diagrams, prodded me with needles and made me answer endless questionnaires. As he would say, you were the only logical solution. What, did you want me to go to Julian?'

A visible shudder shakes Rico's body. 'Ugh! Don't even joke about that. I can't tell if he is really an incompetent fool or it's all a front for all the kinks and fetishes he has, starting with that thing he has with his feet and ending with some weird dominance thing involving a safety word along the lines of "your majesty". How about Skipper?' he asks. He knows Private would have never gone to Skipper with something like that and Skipper would have never indulged him. He likes to ask, though. Putting people on the spot is kinda his thing.

'Would you go to your CO with something like this?' is Private's nonchalant answer.

'Oh, all is relative in life Private. Maybe I wouldn't…' Rico returns, raising his eyebrows suggestively at Private.

Itching to change the subject, the young man begins.

'Um…so…'

'Right.' Rico says determined. If he is going to do this he might as well do it right. He lifts himself on his knees on the couch. 'Come here.' Private approaches him, then waits for the next move. 'You probably guessed by now that I prefer the practical more than the theoretical approach. I'm a hands on kinda guy.' To demonstrate exactly this, he puts his hands on Private's arms and leans in for a kiss, but half way there pulls sharply back. 'You're not doing this 'cause you have a crazy crush on me, are you?'

'No. It's not you.'

'It's not me…' Private just realized what he said and starts blushing fiercely. But Rico's eyes start darting back and forth with the pace of ideas in his mind connecting. While he's thinking his hands unconsciously tighten their hold minutely on Private's upper arms. Images, snippets of conversation, looks come back to him. Kowlaski may say that his IQ is lacking and the word psychopath is thrown with leisure around. But Kowaslki isn't good at noticing these things, lost half the time in science as he is. Rico on the other hand… 'Does he know?'

Private, convinced that faking dumbness would not be to his advantage this time, answers 'What do you think?'

'So then, do you really don't know how to make out with someone or are you just venting your sexual frustration on me?' Private looks away, while his blush gets even deeper, if that is even possible. 'That tells me literally nothing. I think it's a little bit of both, hmm? There's only so much energy you can spend by hitting a punching bag.' Private turns to look at him, eyes wide with surprise. He wasn't aware himself that his newfound interest in spending his extra time training had anything to do with his… crush? (too girly?) attraction (yeah better) for Skipper. It did make Skipper smile extra large every time he heard he was training on his own and pat his already sore shoulder, prompting fireworks to go off all over in his body.

'Well, you came here for a kissing lesson. I can't have my star pupil waiting.' he doesn't want to scare the poor kid into bolting away when he came this close, since he can feel Private is already on the verge of shaking again. 'Relax. Tell me to stop if you want me to stop and just follow my lead. I'll let you know if you're doing something wrong, but I think that would be hardly the case.'

Private wants to keep his eyes open to see everything that happens, to observe, but Rico is coming too close and his eyes shut on instinct. In the darkness he feels lips on his own. He doesn't know what he expected, but it's nothing like that. It's better, it's nice, it's good. He likes it and he moves his head to explore the feeling. The next moment the feeling's gone and he frowns a bit at the loss. When he opens his eyes, Rico's there watching him with a smile.

'Don't worry, that was just… warming up.' Private is relieved, because if that was the man's big lesson he was all bark and no bite.

Rico moves one hand against Private's neck, fingers splayed some through Private's hair, some to the back of his head to hold him in place. He didn't anticipate this, but he can feel Private's pulse under his fingers and it's a welcomed bonus. Private really doesn't know what to do with his hands right now, but he soon forgets about that. Rico starts giving him a series of quick, short kisses, interspersed with deeper more lasting ones. On a lingering kiss, the Brit feels the other's tongue licking at his bottom lip once, twice… At the third count he opens his mouth. His brain short-circuits as the realization of what he's doing and the sensations crash into each other and he lets a throaty moan escape. Rico moans his approval. Private is vaguely aware that he is holding on to Rico's T-shirt, but he is very aware of Rico's upper thigh between his own. He doesn't remember when he moved it, but it's a very solid presence.

This time when Rico pulls back he's breathing harder and even in the TV lit room his pupils are slightly more dilated. Private can bet he looks about the same. 'Why don't you try?' prompts Rico. No one can't say from now on Private isn't an eager learner. How do you go about shoving your tongue in other people's mouths, though? Knock-knock? Who's there? My tongue. So he's gonna do what he just learned 5 seconds ago. He's on Rico faster than he can blink. When he traces the man's lips with his tongue, he is surprised and delighted at the smoothness of the scar that splits both his lips. For a good while the dark room is filled just with wet kissing sounds, swallowed moans, the sound of clothes moving against each other and panting as their make out session goes back and forth.

Finally, Rico draws back just to move down to Private's neck, who sneaks a hand in his hair. God, thank goodness his hair isn't styled, I don't know what would have happened if I had grabbed a handful of gelled**-up, spiked-up hair. The British boy had always known that his neck was his most sensitive body part, but this was indecent. The sounds Rico was prompting from him with just his well placed mouth on his neck were unbecoming, not to be heard in polite company. And that damned thigh was really becoming too much. He is sent in overdrive, when Rico's left hand starts making its way under his shirt. He feels it touch his abdomen and ignite a heat wave that travels even lower. He wants to feel that hand with his whole body and for that hand to feel his whole body, so he arches into the touch, his head thrown to the side where Rico is mouthing at his collarbone, very likely living a visible mark. Private is sorely tempted to use that bloody thigh as the invitation for release it obviously is, in his mind at least. But he is too much of a gentleman, even in this situation. Bugger his posh British upbringing. He is spared anymore torment and debate by Rico's hand sliding down to his pants. He starts undoing them and then his hand slips inside.

Private's only response is a half whispered 'Oh, fuck!' Hearing the vulgarity spilling out of the proper boy's mouth in that voice and knowing what prompted it in the first place made a heady combination that sent shivers all through Rico's body.

The idea that this has gone on past what it was intended passes through both their minds, just briefly, but it's discarded without regret. Private can not abide it right now in his lust infested body, with his head thrown back, eyes fixed on the ceiling, biting his lip while his heart is beating like a caged bird. Rico, on the other hand, toys with it for a little longer, but he is a danger addict. The part of his brain that craves adrenalin wins over the responsible part (that over the years has acquired Kowalski's voice, oddly. Neither him, nor Kowalski are quite sane. One would think, if there were a voice in his head to yell at him to do normal, responsible things, it would be Skipper's. Alas!) and now he wants to see how this plays out to the end.

Curiosity is gnawing at him again and he has to ask. Between a kiss aimed at the side of Private's face and panting he manages out 'Have you ever… I mean, I understand you never… with someone else…'

Private gets his bearing enough to understand what he's getting at. 'I have a hand, too, yes.' And he does, it's true. But the sensations of being touched by someone else are ten times more intense than what he can do alone. Especially since there's so much more going on and you can feel that other person reacting right there close to you. He wants to enjoy this as long as possible, but let's face it that's … unrealistic. There is already that sensation like he is riding an endless roller-coaster and it's getting harder to keep it under control. The 1% of his mind that still functions to maximum capacity decides just to ride the sensations into the oncoming oblivion and fucks off as well. His hips start rocking apparently on their own volition.

Rico really wants to do something with his free hand. He is torn between placing it on Private's hip to still the young man (more for his own sake than Rico's own. With all his writhing he…might…lose something. Gah! What a disturbing thought!), bracing himself against the back of the sofa so he doesn't lose his balance against Private's swaying and giving himself a one-hand-break, he's just a human man. He doesn't get to do any of the above as his upper arm is grabbed.

'Mmhmm, Rico… don't…' He kinda likes his name being said like that, in that voice, with a hitch. He likes it a lot. By this point he knows that Private means "don't stop", nor was he intending. The young man drops his head on Rico's shoulder and holds on for dear life to the back of his T-shirt. Rico carries on once in a while nuzzling the blond's neck, while Private breathes hot "oh fucks!" and "oh gods!" on to the other's collarbone.

When it finally happens and pleasure finally overwhelms him, Private bites down on Rico's shoulder moaning through the fabric in his mouth. The man gives a hiss of pain when he feels the teeth bearing down on his flesh. He extracts his hand from Private's pants and keeps it at a safe distance, while said private is getting back to reality.

The next minute or so is as awkward as the beginning. Private straightens himself up and tries to say a thank you, but all he manages is a thankful smile. If it were possible to blush in his flushed state he would have. Rico just tries not to touch anything with his "used" hand. Next thing he knows, Private dashes straight to the bathroom.

He doesn't know if the young man forgot or just doesn't know that Skipper has cameras all over the HQ. And by all over, he means all over. Yes, even the living room. What's best is that he watches the footage at every end of the week. He loves it when Skipper's paranoia pays off. Now, to go get rid of this thing on his hand somehow.

* I don't know, maybe there are more ways of breaking a man's arm, but I'm no expert in breaking arms.

** I don't know what hair products men use. Apparently neither does Private.