#oc_jacek

They sting from the methodical scrubbing he'd given them, before he'd changed into the clothes they'd stashed near the showers.

His hands are spotless. He knows they are.

He checks again anyway.

His thumbs run slow shapes over his knees; tracing out the geometry of something that isn't making sense.

Something isn't right. Hasn't been right since they'd returned without Vetch. Now that the man is no longer with them, the certainty of the logic they'd acted under is falling apart.

Jacek is a slow thinker, but a thorough one.

He started working on the farm the moment he'd completed the compulsory basic education, and he'd never been a good student. But he was always able to figure things out if he took the time.

He closes his eyes, his thumbs still drifting over his kneecaps.

After Brennan died, Vetch had been a good friend. He shared smokes with him on the nights that grief sat boulder-heavy in his chest. Listened as Jacek hesitantly shared stories of his cousin and the farm they grew up on. The time they fell out a tree together and had to wear matching arm slings. The time they got into a fist-fight over a girl and she ended up breaking both their hearts.

Vetch remained silent most times, but one night, as rain tapped a broken rhythm on the tarpaulin overhead, Vetch had said very quietly,

"It must have been hard to know that medic kid passed him over for triage."

Jacek looked at him slowly, cigarette hanging forgotten between his thick fingers.

Vetch took a long draw from his cigarette and continued, still looking out into the rain.

"Maybe he thought a backwater grunt like him wasn't worth the time."

He shook his head. "Shame. Brennan would have lived."

Jacek watched his profile, silhouetted against the patchy light of the camp.

After that, it was as if his eyes were opened.

He saw the arrogance, the swagger, the meanness behind the laughter.

Once, Riko said something at the canteen table they were sharing, something that Jacek didn't quite catch, but drew scattered mirth from everyone else there.

Jacek had looked around, wondering if he was the butt of the joke. He was used to not catching things, of being just out of step with everyone else. Used to the ribbing that came with having that heavy rural accent that curled his every syllable.

Vetch had leaned into Jacek's space and said kindly under his breath, "Don't mind him, he's just a little shit."

Jacek was grateful for the gentle squeeze Vetch pressed into his shoulder.

He learnt to spot the showboating, the sneer behind the medic's words, the underhanded jibes made in his presence. How he spoke too fast on purpose, and with words too big for Jacek's limited vocabulary.

He'd seen it all for himself... except now he remembers Vetch's presence just off to the side. Shaking his head slightly with exasperation when Riko blustered and bragged, patting Jacek comfortingly on the back when Riko said something that seemed to hold the shape of veiled insult.

One night, after a few beers, Vetch told him what he'd seen on the battlefield.

"I was by the damaged transport on the east quadrant. I saw it all."

He spoke in the flat monotone of someone who found the memory painful, but was trying to find peace in the retelling.

He told of how Brennan had clutched, weeping, at the medic's arm, and how Riko's face had twisted in derision. Shook the dying man's hand off him like it was filthy.

How he had jabbed Brennan with a sedative instead of a coagulant, his fingers skipping past the injectors that would have actually helped.

And Vetch's voice went rough describing how the medic had mocked, "There now, you're through the worst of it," as he let Brennan fade.

Jacek had heard the words himself, through Brennan's open channel.

He had thought the words kind, then.

Vetch fell silent, the mouth of the beer bottle hovering close to his mouth.

And then he said very, very quietly. "I could kill him."

Jacek had never heard him sound like that before, scraped raw, with an honesty that sounded like it was being pulled out bloody.

After a long moment, Vetch shrugged as if he was shaking something off, and said with a chuckle, "Ignore me, I'm stupid drunk."

Jacek looked at his own beer bottle, his fingers strangle-tight around the neck.

When he spoke, his voice was low. "We don't have to kill him."

Vetch looked at him with an emotion that Jacek couldn't name; hadn't bothered to decipher in the moment.

But now, he would say it looked like... arrival.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

Vetch showed them what to do. Showed him and Serae where to cut. Exactly how deep, holding his finger against the blade and indicating how many knuckles deep to push it in so it wouldn't kill the medic.

Because that wasn't the point. The point was to humble the man.

Days before, he brought them to the depot where they would ambush him, and he showed them what to do, and where.

Choreography.

He repeated the instructions like doctrine. Made them say them back to be sure they got it.

And he had added, "No head shots. And leave his hands alone."

They hadn't questioned him. Just nodded, obedient.

He was the man with the plan.

The night they laid in wait, tucked into the alcove, Serae was vibrating with nerves.

He jabbed at the air like he was about to enter a boxing ring, muttering viciously to himself as he skipped from foot to foot.

In the whispered stream of curses, Jacek heard the name “Kolcha”.

Serae caught him looking. Stabbed a savage jab into the air. “Do you know what the bastard did to her?”

Jacek nodded slowly.

The girl was a civilian from the next town over; had been working in the mess kitchen for a few weeks. She was found weeping behind the storage tent, beaten black and blue, her clothes torn off her. She'd been cradling her teeth on her lap.

Jacek thought they'd caught the one who did it, heard that he'd been sent back to be court-martialed.

He shrugged. Frontline justice was not a given, and there were countless reasons why a guilty man might get away scott-free, or an innocent man might be implicated.

Footsteps echoed down the corridor. Vetch put out a hand, and they readied themselves.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

Riko had been different from what he expected.

On his feet, talking, he was the Riko that Jacek knew. But once he was on the ground, and Jacek's hands were on him... the uniform felt like a disguise.

There was lean muscle under the thick fabric, twisting and coiling to get away.

But something about the way he moved... it was the same kind of weight and motion Jacek had felt years ago, when roughhousing with his younger cousins back home.

And when Jacek had leaned his weight on Riko's chest with a knee to keep him down, crushing a desperate wheeze out of him, Vetch had let out a soft sound that made Jacek look up.

The man's face was avid, almost rapturous. His eyes were wide and bright, his lips parted slightly.

He looked like a man who had been presented with a long-awaited meal, and was about to dig in.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

Jacek opens his eyes. His fingers have gone still over his knees.

This had been... mapped. Scripted.

Vetch had wanted something, and had gotten it.

Used him. Used Serae. Even Brennan.

Jacek looks around, an awful feeling skating up his spine.

Serae is pacing in front of his cot, his hands twisted in his hair.

He looks insane; locked in some dreadful internal loop. But he stops short, his eyes peeling back wide, as Jacek stands up slowly.

Jacek's arms prickle all over with gooseflesh.

Vetch is not here.

Vetch is not here.

Something inside him settles like a boulder.

He walks out of the barracks.

Serae's terrified gaze skitters after him.

Minutes later, Jacek returns with officers. His hands are cuffed in front of him.

The barracks goes dead quiet as he points Serae out to them.

Serae’s legs fold; he wilts silently onto his cot as the officers cut across the barracks to him.

He looks petrified.

And at the same time, so, so relieved.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Selah Arc: Tourniquet ▸ Goodnight ▸ Knife ▸ Duck and Weave ▸ Battle After Battle ▸ Maintenance Corridor ▸ Now I Can See You ▸ Choreographed

<< Masterlist

(Jacek is what I’d call an Inadvertent Whumper)

The impact punches the air right out of him, and he lies there for a moment, trying to breathe. He lifts his head, trying to look for his weapon.

He spots it in the distance-- just as a battle drone tramps over it, snapping it into smithereens.

Vetch curses. He can't hear himself. His words are lost in the roar and thump of explosions, the high whine of air drones laying down strafing fire. Someone is screaming in the near distance.

Orders are snapping tersely through the comms, and layered under it all, Brennan’s voice warbling in agony. “I’m down, I’m hit-- come get me, someone--“

The man's comms channel must be stuck open.

The click and ping of Brennan's beacon lights up on Vetch’s HUD, pulsing with the frantic rhythm of his persistent triggering.

Vetch’s calf leg is torn up. He can't tell how bad the damage is, but he knows he has to get behind cover before the shock and blood loss make him pass out.

He drags himself up, but his leg won't hold him. He pitches down back into the mud-- right as a laser shot scorches the air where his head had been. It hits the battle drone behind him instead, and it slams to the ground, it's limbs locked, weapons aimed uselessly at the sky.

Vetch leopard-crawls behind it as laser shots chase him. It barely provides any cover.

He taps once to trigger his own beacon.

Brennan’s is still pulsing hysterically, his voice spiking through the cacophony. “--think I'm okay, just need-- help me up--“

It’s breaking up now. Vetch can’t tell whether it’s static or blood interrupting the cadence of Brennan’s words. The voice cuts out abruptly. One of the officers must have muted Brennan. Vetch can still see the waveform spiking on his HUD, but it’s greyed out.

He rolls his head to the side, trying to figure if he can make it to better cover-- maybe the downed transport several metres away. It's smoking and a body is hanging out the driver's seat, very obviously dead.

Through the haze, Vetch sees movement. Someone darting across the uneven ground, vaulting the wreckage of a two drones that had tangled in battle.

Vetch recognises the uniform; a medic.

The man lands in a crouch, then looks up sharply and dodges out of an air drone's doomed downward trajectory.

He locks eyes with Vetch. It's Riko.

He doesn't hesitate. He sprints in a low run right at Vetch, shoving his shoulder into the bigger's man's armpit.

Vetch is up and moving.

Muscled movement under his arm. A hand clenched around the fabric of his injured leg, lifting it so it doesn't snag on the uneven ground.

No words, just rhythmic gasps. Vetch's back feels horribly exposed.

And then they are behind the cover of the destroyed transport. Riko lets out an explosive exhale that sounds triumphant.

The medic ignores the driver. The man has a large part of his neck and shoulder missing, leaving no question about survivability.

Riko doesn't drop Vetch, but he isn't gentle either. He props him against the vehicle, and immediately rips open the tear in the bloodied pant leg, exposing the injury.

Riko douses it generously with a-spray, tears open a pressure bandage one-handed and slaps it on. Vetch hisses.

Riko grabs his hand and presses it over the bandage.

"Pressure on that," he says, and he's gone.

Vetch watches Riko's receding back, his bag moving tight against his body, the soles of his boots flashing as he sprints right back into chaos.

Shots sear and sizzle through the air. One takes down Jonk mid-run, and his body rolls to a stop right by Min, who is dragging Mok behind cover. She screams with exertion as she hauls Mok's frame fully behind cover and collapses next to him.

Jacek and Serae are behind f-shields, laying down covering fire, their faces streaked with dirt and sweat. One of the shields flickers and sputters out with a shower of sparks, and Jacek drags Serae behind his own as shots pepper the space he'd occupied.

Through it all, Riko moves. Ducks reflexively as a shot zings by too close. He takes cover next to a fallen medic, reaches out to check for a pulse, and without ceremony loots the medpack for a handful of injectors. An explosion rains dirt over him.

He's moving again before the falling debris has settled. He sprints up to Jonk, using the momentum of his run to haul him where Mok and Min are taking cover.

Riko checks Jonk for a pulse, but the man is already grey and gone.

The medic turns immediately to Mok. Min has her hands clamped over Mok's leg, and Riko pushes her off him. He shears open his pants in seconds, exposing the groin. Even this far away, Vetch can see it's bad. Blood is coming out in pulses from the junction between Mok's thigh and his torso, spilling down his leg and into the ground, which is already dark with blood.

Mok's face is off-color, and his eyes are rolling in his head. But even in this condition, Vetch can tell he's trying to be jocular. His mouth moves, probably saying something filthy, and his lips tilt up in a smirk.

Min slaps him over the head. Vetch can tell there's no power behind it.

Riko ignores Mok's words, gloving up, pushing his fingers directly into the wound. Deep. Mok throws his head back with a yell that Vetch can't hear through the cacophony of battle.

Riko's face is drawn with concentration, his fingers moving urgently in the wound. Mok is barely conscious. His head is lolling against Min's hands.

But the blood is slowing. Riko draws a patch gun from his bag, uncaps it one-handed and pushes the nozzle right into the wound already crowded by his tightly curled fingers.

Vetch watches Riko click down once, then twice, not releasing the pressure. He holds it there for long seconds, then very slowly and carefully eases the nozzle into the space his fingers are slowly vacating, clicking repeatedly until pink-tinged hemo foam rises out of the wound.

Even as he eyes the seal, he's laying gauze on top of the gash. He pulls Min down next to him by her vest. Says something to her and pushes her hands over the wound, tugging at her so her entire weight is over it.

Mok yells again, the veins on his neck standing out. He clutches weakly at Min's hands, before passing out in earnest.

Riko doesn't bother rousing him. Simply jabs the unconscious man with a coagulant, then a painkiller, right through the fabric of his uniform.

He tosses the injectors to the side, strips the bloodstained gloves off. Tightens the straps of his bag, and is off again.

The next time he crouches, it’s next to Brennan. The man is chest down, still moving.

Riko puts a hand on Brennan's shoulder, rolling him carefully onto his back. Vetch privately unmutes the downed soldier's channel, just in time to hear the ragged noise he lets out as the injury is exposed.

The man has been torn almost in half. The expanse of soft tissue under his rib cage is gaping open, shiny innards spilling out onto the muddy ground.

Riko pauses, just for a moment. Brennan’s head has started to tilt down; he's trying to look at his abdomen.

Vetch hears the sharp snap of Riko's gloves even over the comms, and sees Brennan's head jerk back up.

The medic bends over Brennan, pushing him back to lie against the ground. He peels Brennan's eyelids back, shining a penlight into them. His voice murmurs over the open channel, "Just stay down for me, will you? You might have a concussion."

Brennan's voice is whisper thin, slurring over the comms. “Is it bad? You can help me, right, doc?" He reaches out a searching hand, hooks it on the fabric of Riko's sleeve.

Riko nods, giving nothing away. "I have something that will help."

A distant blast rains dirt over them. Riko shields his patient's head, not bothering to keep the light debris from landing in the open trough of Brennan's body.

When the worst of it has passed, Riko pulls out an injector. A sedative.

"This is going to sting just a bit," Riko says. Vetch hears the soft hiss of its deployment.

He places the empty injector next to Brennan, and then lays his hand over the man's grip that is still tight on his sleeve.

Brennan's voice drifts over the comms in a soft, relieved hum.

Vetch watches the tableau from afar.

The moment seems to stretch unendingly. But it takes mere seconds for Brennan's chest to stop jerking.

Riko's voice is quiet, barely audible. "There now, you're through the worst of it."

He lays the soldier's hand on the still chest.

Riko pauses for a single breath. And then he's tightening the straps of his med pac, pulling off his gloves.

And he's running again.

+++++++++++++++++

The battle is over.

The air drones are still whining overhead, but they're not dropping bombs or shooting, just keeping watch.

The ground drones that are still mobile have lined themselves up neatly for transport back to base. The ones lying shattered and askew on the ground will be hauled back too, for repair or salvage.

There are human bodies too.

Two medics are laying Mok onto a stretcher. He reaches out for Min's hand before they tuck his hand under the blanket and strap him in. She jogs alongside them as they run him to the air transport. As she passes, she turns to look at Jonk--

He is being folded into a black body bag.

He looks impossibly young. A child, being tucked into bed.

Brennan is already zipped into one, the top part left open. Vetch can see the still, white face; gazing up into the sky. Jacek sits cross-legged next to the body in the churned up mud, his eyes wide and blank; clutching his rifle like it will comfort him.

Riko comes walking up to Vetch. He's limping slightly, listing a tiny bit to the left.

He pulls on a new pair of gloves. His movements are slow. Tired; but no less precise.

"Riko," Vetch says. "You're back."

"I'm back," Riko agrees.

Riko checks on the bandage. It has held up, but is almost soaked through. Riko pulls it off, and checks on the wound. He nods silently, satisfied, before reapplying a new pressure bandage.

Vetch watches him work. His eyes have rings under them, and there's a red smear on his jaw. There's blood around his wrists where his gloves hadn't reached.

His shoulders slope forward, but his hands are still moving with that same damnable composure.

Vetch wonders what it would take for that self-possession to stutter.

“You ever give everything you’ve got and still come up short?” Vetch asks quietly.

Riko doesn’t look up. The hands keep moving. His mouth is pressed in an exhausted line across his face.

Vetch thinks maybe Riko didn't hear him. Or that he's ignoring the question.

And then, the mouth softens.

“Yeah," he says softly. "And I keep going anyway. Don’t think I’m built for stopping.”

His face is open and unguarded, his eyes on something else beyond the blood and the skin and the bandage.

Vetch feels almost breathless.

He feels the shift, the crack of the door. And through it, a glimpse of something real.

Riko's finishes taping down the edges of the adhesive with quiet efficiency... and Vetch detects the warmth of something more.

Finally. Contact.

He wants to hold the moment. Press his fingerprints into it.

Riko redistributes the weight in his bag. Leans back and rocks back up onto his feet.

He smiles from where he stands, showing his teeth. He looks right at Vetch.

"There you go, big guy." Riko pulls off his gloves. “You’re through the worst of it.”

Vetch goes completely still.

The same words-- the same cadence-- he'd used on Brennan, before he'd moved on.

Vetch watches Riko walk away. To the next man, the next stretcher. Another patient.

Vetch is just another.

The door-- the one he'd thought had opened for him-- closes with a soft surgical click.

Vetch's pulse is beating in his throat; he feels a high breathlessness. Everything has become over-bright, tunneling strangely.

He stares at the gloves Riko has discarded on the ground. They fill his entire vision.

The moment stretches unbearably. And then,

Clarity.

Reality rushes back, pushing back the terrible brightness. The high-pitched ringing subsides.

The thing about doors...

They open both ways.

+++++++++++++++++

Selah Arc: Tourniquet ▸ Goodnight ▸ Knife ▸ Duck and Weave ▸ Battle After Battle ▸ Maintenance Corridor ▸ Now I Can See You ▸ Choreographed

<< Masterlist

Note: I am so happy I got to this chapter! I've really been looking forward to it... I hope it delivers a payoff after the buildup of the prior chapters.

I didn't know Jonk was the other soldier who going to die in this scene, until I looked up from my writing and went, wait, where's Jonk in all of this? And then I realised, oh no, OH NOOOOO... Ah, I'm so sorry, Jonk.

Stick around, there's more coming in a new arc!