#crow.ini

[ Get up.

No one will save you.

Get up.

One breath after the first. One centimetre at a time. Through blood thicker than wine, warm and tacky. Through rattling gasps that shake his body. Through the cold that has settled in his bones. Through it all, he drags himself.

No one will save him. Get up. Get up.

His gloves soak blood into the fibres. His arms tremble as he tries to push himself up. Get up, C—

And he falls. He’s falling fast into the thick fog, where his thoughts catch on mud and his consciousness is dragged below the bog. He’s falling, drowning, dying, and no one will save him. No one can.

Footsteps. Slow. Measured. Close, but so distant. Boots stop before his hazy gaze. A knee drops into the blood pooling on the floor. A voice, so familiar, says something—but through the cotton in his ears, he can’t hear it. What they said. Who it is.

His eyes close.

And open to blinding white. It sears his eyes. His chest heaves, the clothes he’d been given drenched in a cold sweat. His hand touches at his throat and comes back dry.

He can’t stay here. He won’t stay here. On wobbly legs he stands and leaves the infirmary.

The base is quiet. The moon hangs high in the sky. And Crow sits atop the hangar, legs dangling off the edge, eyes on the sky.

[ Crow had accepted it, when Price dragged him out of Verdansk as a dead man; he'd die forgotten in some battlefield somewhere. Either from a bullet or flayed skin, he'd die alone. He'd die deep in enemy territory. And every mission that goes sideways, he thinks--this is it.

Being taken by the Shadows had been part of the plan. Being interrogated by the Shadows had been part of the plan.

Being found was not.

Surviving was not.

And now, here he is. Picking up the pieces. Putting himself back together alone, as always. Staring at the bruises and the bandages in the mirror again, wondering when it'll end.

Hasn't he given enough? Hasn't he done enough?

Crow lets out a slow breath, the deep bruises and fresh wounds on his ribs screaming in pain. Not the worst he's been through, not by a long shot--incompetence extends to interrogation for Shadow Company, it seems. But still--it's enough. More than enough. It's enough to see another piece of himself slipping away.

He rubs his eyes. He leans heavy against the mirror, blood from soaked through bandages smearing on the glass. He breathes, even still.

No rest for the wicked, but damn--Crow is tired. And part of him hopes that next time--

[ Restocking their more remote bases, secluded and embedded deep within enemy lines, is always a challenge. Doing so without compromising their security, without prising the chitin from vulnerable systems and highly-classified procedures, doubly so. Doing so without compromising the shipment itself—incredibly difficult.

Crow rides shotgun, the truck rattling and shaking on the remote dirt road. Trees loom high, swallowing their surroundings in foliage and bark. Winding and uneven, it’s no wonder they’ve had trouble restocking this particular base; the whole path is prime for ambush.

The details for this mission were sparse, but—Crow had asked for this. Asked for a mission short notice. Any holes in intel are the fault of his own impatience.

“Yer a quiet one,” the driver says into the silent cab, accent thick and gruff. “Last lad they shipped me out with talked m’ear off.”

Crow makes a small noise, sparing the man a glance. His eyes return quickly to the treeline. Something—something nags at him, though, so he plucks his phone from its pocket on his vest.

“You’ve been on this route before?” The text-to-speech asks; the man looks confused for a brief moment, eyes on Crow’s phone.

“Aye, this is my regular route.”

“What do the ambushes usually look like?”

The man grunts, and for a second his hands tighten on the wheel. “They’ll crawl out the woods like roaches, stick us up, and scamper off with our supplies. Only time they’ve gotten violent was when the last lad decided to fire on ‘em. Shot him full’a holes, they did. Been on my own since.”

And yet, they don’t send a convoy. Don’t protect the supplies. Don’t fight back. Don’t even send more than one man. Crow’s eyes return to the treeline. He nearly tricks himself into thinking he saw movement.

The man is whistling, idle and lazy. Loud. It’s giving Crow a headache.

Fortunately, the drive in is mostly quiet—aside from the whistling, that is. The delivery makes it to the base just as the sun begins to set, and a grateful captain offers them a bed for the night. The man takes it without hesitation, wandering off with heavy footsteps. Crow lingers in the captain’s office.

And the captain—Richards, he’d introduced himself as—notices. “Somethin’ on your mind?” He asks, raised brow.

“Why do they not send a convoy for these shipments?”

Richards makes a small noise before gesturing with his head to the small, almost ramshackle base. “You’ve seen the place. We’re here for recon, mostly. Don’t have the manpower to send out our own, and command doesn’t care much about us down here. Enough makes it here to keep us goin’, so it’s not a high priority.”

Crow hums a bit, eyes out the window. Darkness has settled on the small base, thick and impenetrable.

“Look, Lieutenant, I appreciate your concern,” Richards says, and Crow’s eyes flick back. “But we’re fine. We get enough to get us by. Don’t need to worry yourself about this, aye?”

Something pricks the back of Crow’s neck. But he nods, offers a smile hidden under his mask, and retreats to the cluttered barracks.

They watch him wherever he goes. Like a caged animal, there to be gawked at and kept just on the other side of the glass. Always at arm’s distance, as if he’ll bite. Always with that same dehumanising slant that pares him down to nothing more than a commodity. All he is, all he'll ever be to them, is just a topic for idle gossip.

He doesn’t know how Ghost handles it, being around during the day. Being seen. Crow can hardly stand it.

With hands that shake more than he’d like, he slips his headphones in. Familiar bass riffs fill his ears and settle the gnawing unease in his stomach. The guitar blooms in his chest, hums in his bones, screams in his blood, and he settles on the treadmill.

Each footfall meets the kick. Each breath dances with the snare. Every muscle screams with the guitar. Every thought thuds in time with the bass. His lungs burn with the vocals, raw and aching. Fast. Faster. Faster, until he’s in a dead sprint—

Warm. Too warm; Crow sighs and leans back in his chair, pushing his hair away from his face for any relief. The heat clings to him, sticks to him, tacky and thick and uncomfortable.

He doesn’t dare remove layers, though. His gloves stick to the skin between his fingers. His sleeved shirt is damp from sweat. His mask reflects hot breaths back. His trousers chafe. All he wants is to retreat to his room and take the coldest shower he can tolerate.

There’s still more paperwork to be done, though. More, always more—from operations to a private setting the microwave on fire again, there’s always more to do and so few hours to do it.