The knife to his breast - it hurts, of course, but the pride underpinning it all makes it bearable. Uncle Sam sending Leon to him was the best thing that happened to him, just as he’d said, how long ago? Minutes? Or hours. It felt like hours…
His chest, not quite as armoured as his arm, burns as it splits beneath the pressure of his own knife - no, Leon’s knife, now - and he feels it puncture vital organs, the stink of infected blood welling up, oozing out along with the blade as it rips free.
His head hits the floor, eyes flickering once, twice, before darkness takes him into its sweet embrace
and then
and then salt, but not the salt-iron of blood, and his blood would be oiled with parasitic muck anyway
wetness, roaring and rushing past his ears, sucking him down into its depths, inevitable as the dawn, as the tide, maybe…
the sea? oh, yes, he was by the sea… an island? explosions… not of his own making, not this time, his have a different stink to them…
rough hands under his armpits - fuck, why does that hurt so much? he hasn’t hurt like this in such along time… not since before las plagas, it feels like
more sounds around him, the urgent chatter of a familiar voice - pleading? hah, what a joke - over the top of that rushing sound, like his ears are plugged up with wax during demo training
and then black again, chilled to the bone and weak, so fucking weak he could rage and scream, if only he could control his body, if only his body was his own once more, if his mind was his own-
oh
quiet, inside his head. no chittering-skittering honeyed words
no power
darkness once more, but this time it keeps its hold on him, and Krauser lets himself sink into its soothing embrace.
- - -
The next thing he knew, his eyes were blinking open under harsh medical lights, but it was quiet - not the usual bustle and beeping of a hospital, which Krauser had gotten uncomfortably familiar with, after Javier. No, this felt… different.
He looked to the side: hooked up to a machine, okay, that was as expected. The other side: a drip stand, with a bulging bag of liquid, still mostly full, hanging from it.
Shit, but his head hurt. He clenched his hands, thinking to test the stability of the drips and whatever other bullshit they had him wired up to, and instantly regretted it as sharp, throbbing pain lanced through both arms from fingertip to shoulder.
Krauser bared his teeth, gritted back the grunt that nearly escaped him. He’d make no noise until he knew exactly what his sitrep was, until he knew where the fuck he was.
‘Breathe,’ he thought, teeth still gritted. ‘Breathe and think. What do you remember?’ Pain, mostly. Pain and pride, as Leon did what he had to do. Not a rookie any more, huh. But besides that? Hm. Besides that… nothing. His head felt like it’d been stuffed full of steel wool, scratchy and thick, as he tried to think, to remember.
Krauser forced his hands to relax, mentally counting down from five, breathing out through his nose in long exhales until he felt like he could think again. The pain subsided to something in the background, and he continued to reconnoitre as best he could.
So. Drip, machine, arms horrifically painful. Not the best situation, but he’d been in worse.
His legs weren’t strapped down, and the lack of security in his peripheral told him it wasn’t an army hospital. The lack of slick whispers in his head told him it wasn’t a Los Illuminados hospital either, if they even had any. He felt sure that he’d be more than aware, if they were anywhere near - his plaga couldn’t help but respond when sensing its brethren, even if Krauser possessed enough strength of mind and will to fight its total control.
The walls around him were bare - another sign. There wasn’t a hospital in the world without posters and medical bullshit plastered across every damn wall. You couldn’t move for being told about mental health phonelines, or what to do if you think you might be infected by something that they never said was a biohazard, but everyone knew. No one ever wanted to say the word ‘zombie’ out loud - that’d make it real, despite more than forty nine point seven percent of the population being painfully aware of their existence by now.
So. Civvies.
And as if on cue, the last person he’d expected to see walked right on in, as if he was at home.
“Leon.” Krauser’s voice was rusty, like he’d just come off fifty smokes and a whole bottle of whiskey to himself.
“You’re awake.”
“Unfortunately.” Krauser grunted. “What, they run out of the good stuff? Couldn’t swing me at least some morphine?”
Leon squinted at the tiny writing on the side of the drip. “Looks like there is some in here. Not working?”
“What do you think.” He had to force himself to not clench his fists, to not twitch his arm muscles and invite more of that horrific searing pain to rage through them.
“It’s not exactly the best stocked place.” Leon sat down in the battered chair next to Krauser’s bed, one elbow propped on his thigh.
“No shit. Where are we, anyway?”
“You’re not cleared for that, Major. Somewhere quiet, that’s all you need to know.” He looked as though he was going to reach out, emotions flitting across his face. Always so easy to read.
Krauser had to look away, before he saw something he didn’t want to face.
He snorted, humourless. “Right.” Shit, he needed a drink. And not even an alcoholic one, just some fucking water would do. “So what am I cleared for? Or can you not tell me that either.”
Leon made a disgruntled sound, and Krauser couldn’t help but snort internally. As easy to rile up as he was to read.
“How about don’t ask any questions and let me do what I-” Leon’s voice faltered, then he continued, but quieter, “what I have to do. You’ll be out of here in no time.”
“Not soon enough.” Krauser ignored the twinge in his chest as Leon unconsciously echoed his words from the ruins. His fingers moved reflexively, echoing their remembered mutated shapes, but this time he couldn’t stop the reaction as pain flooded through him.
He growled, squeezing his eyes shut. His breath came in heaving pants. It burned. Fuck. Like his muscles were being flayed from his bones. Like his skin was being peeled back. His face prickled with sweat.
There was sound, around him. Urgent words he could not parse, like orders shouted through an exploding minefield, underlaid with even more urgent beeping.
And then blackness.
The next time he awoke, it was easier to breathe. His head was turned to the side, and through blurred vision he saw Leon, asleep with both arms folded across his chest, head lolling back at an awkward angle. He had huge dark circles under his eyes as if he’d been going toe-to-toe with a boxing champion for five rounds.
He opened his mouth, but only a croak came out.
Leon jerked awake like he’d been shot, standing up so fast from his chair that he nearly fell over. “You’re awake!”
“Said that already,” Krauser mumbled. Like trying to talk through cotton wool.
“How’s the pain? I gave the doctor an earful and he gave you more morphine.” Leon shot an angry glance towards the door. “Fucking asshole decided he knew better about treating BOWs.” He looked back at Krauser, eyes softening. “You sound like shit.”
Again, that abortive hand movement, like he wanted to take Krauser’s hand or some shit. Well, that wouldn’t be happening for a long time, if even the smallest twitch of his fingers was enough to knock him the fuck out.
“Drink’d be nice,” he managed, nearly choking on the dryness of his own damn throat. Pathetic.
He would have laughed at the way Leon scrambled to get him water, if he didn’t feel like so much shit heated over. As it was, he took the offered straw and drunk it down like the sweetest elixir, Leon’s other hand cradled behind his head to support it.
“Better?”
Krauser just grunted. Water was gone too fast, but drinking any more might not agree with his stomach, depending on what this whackjob doctor’d done to him.
“Well, good.” Leon put the glass down on the tall wheeled table, then sat back down in his chair. “This is gonna be a really stupid question, but how do you feel?”
“You’re right, it is a stupid question.” Krauser rolled his eyes. “But hardly unexpected. I feel like shit, rookie.” His lips twisted in a grimace of distaste. “Better than last time I was awake, so I guess that’s an improvement.”
“I should hope you do, he gave you about triple the amount of morphine this time.” He smirked, eyes cold. “With a little persuasion, of course.”
Krauser snorted. “Wish I’d been awake to see that.”
“Yeah, I bet you do.” Leon shifted to the edge of his chair, one hand on the bed. “Seriously though, how do you feel?”
“Drowsy. I hear three times the amount of morphine does that to you.”
“You’re hilarious. You had me worried sick, you know.”
“Did I? Why’s that?”
Leon stared at him, flatly. “Don’t be a dick, Krauser.”
“I’m the one being serious now. Why? You did your job, you didn’t falter.”
“I did falter, a bit.”
“Not when it counted.” The urge to move his hands, to grab Leon’s and squeeze some sense into it, was strong. He resisted it, focusing instead on his breathing, slowed from the morphine.
“Hm.” Leon’s eyes shifted away from Krauser, but there was a hint of pink at his cheeks. “How did you even survive that, anyway? My aim wasn’t false.”
“I was hoping you’d tell me.” Krauser tried to convey the depth of his shrug through his words and eyes. It was easy to let his thoughts skim off those memories with all that morphine singing through his bloodstream, like oil off water.
“You don’t remember?”
“Nope. Don’t remember jack shit. Just the sea, I think.”
“That’s where I found you. Didn’t expect you’d float, you dense bastard, but there you were, bobbing up and down on a piece of wood like a shit that won’t flush.”
“Guess that explains the sea.”
“Yeah. I’m surprised you were still there, honestly. You were trailing enough blood behind you to call sharks from all around.”
“Didn’t know there were sharks in Spain,” Krauser said, muzzily. The morphine was beginning to take its toll.
“You’re hilarious. You know what I mean.”
“Was I… you know. Mutated still?”
“No, your arms were normal. Well, as normal as arms can be when they’re torn to shreds.” Leon scratched the back of his neck, scrubbed his hand through his hair. “Never seen so much blood come from a guy still alive. It’s a miracle you’re even talking.”
Krauser’s eyes were drawn to the livid red mark on the inside of Leon’s elbow. “Looks like you had something to do with that.”
“Huh? Oh. Yeah.” Leon smiled, oddly bashful. “We have the same blood type, who knew.”
“Didn’t think blood type counted with plaga.”
“Guess it doesn’t matter.” Leon shrugged. “Honestly, I’m not questioning it. You’re here, you’re alive and being an asshole as usual.”
“It does explain why you look like shit. Have you seen yourself in the mirror?”
“Oh, you’re one to talk. You should see yourself.”
“No thanks, I’ll pass.”
“Coward.”
“How much did you give?”
“Way to change the subject. I dunno, a few pints?”
“Yeah, figures.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“You look like shit, I already said. Sure looks like you’re missing a few pints anyway.” In the absence of being able to make air quotes, Krauser emphasised his meaning with a low drawl, all the while feeling like his head was stuffed full of greasy rags.
Leon snorted, but turned away, brow creased. “Enough about me,” he muttered, suddenly growing serious. “Is the morphine enough? Are you still in pain?”
Krauser turned his attention inwards - not that he had to concentrate too hard for that. “I’m not sitting here and giving you a catalogue of my pain,” he said, sourly. “It fucking hurts. That’s all you need to know.”
“Do you think you can walk? We can’t stay here for much longer.”
He couldn’t stop a bitter laugh. “I can’t even lift my arms and you’re asking if I can walk. Sure, why not.” His voice grew fuzzy again and he struggled to actually get the words out. “Want me to… fly as well?”
“Alright, if you’re gonna be an ornery fuck, I’ll…”
Krauser didn’t hear the rest of the sentence as sleep took him once more.
His dreams are fitful things, shot through with bloodred transformation and a sensation of something slithering from his body, skittering away like it flees from an enemy. That feeling of emptiness suffuses him throughout, warring with fiery pain for his attention.
He is… free. Free of the parasite? Free of mutation. Free of the power he’d fought to achieve… left abandoned on bloodstained wood like he’s nothing better than a lowly cultist, too weak to stand up and accept the holy body without losing his mind to it.
A control, they’d said, in their own twisty way of speaking. Not one to be given lightly to the masses, but a plaga for those who could hold their own against its might. Those with the presence of mind and strength of body to withstand, to grow with the plaga, become something more than human.
He hears Saddler’s laugh echoing through the dreams, winding in and out and blending with the sounds of his own body growing and splitting and stretching to accommodate. His arms split apart anew, his shoulders and chest consumed by writhing, implacable appendages, only-
only they aren’t there any more. They leave him bereft of power, but irrevocably changed by it, and he hears himself scream-
And he was awoken by a gentle hand on his leg, one of the only remaining safe areas of his body.
“I know you’re not ready, but we have to go.” Leon looked harried, although it was hard to tell through the grit in his eyes.
“What… what d’you mean? It’s only… been a day.”
A flash of concern flitted across Leon’s face, hastily stifled. “It’s been ten days, Major. Our time’s up, we can’t stay here any longer.”
“S-stop… calling me that. M’not Major any more…”
Leon leaned in and began to unhook the machine from him. Krauser twitched away automatically, fearing the pain response before it’d even hit him, but- oh - it didn’t come. And he definitely couldn’t feel the amounts of morphine he’d had before, last time he was awake… Huh.
There was a sting down below, and a dull ache, as what he assumed was a catheter was gently pulled out. The drip followed, and Leon dumped all the various cables and medical bits off the side of the bed.
He pulled the blankets down all the way, then took a moment to just rest his hand on Krauser’s thigh. “There’s no chair here, so I’m gonna have to carry you. As much as I can, anyway.”
Leon leaned down and pushed one arm under his knees, then braced himself against the bed as he slid the other arm behind his back. “I’ll try not to hurt you, but you’re gonna have to keep quiet if I do. We’re going out the back way - there’s a transport ready, thank god, so I won’t have to carry you far. Just hold on, okay?”
He was talking more to himself, but Krauser found it oddly comforting anyway. Going through the motions as though he was talking a skittish target into cooperating.
“Why are we extracting?” His brain began to work as he finally came round from his morphine-pain induced sleep. The dreams still rattled around in there, but Krauser managed to tamp down those thoughts, compartmentalising them for later.
He realised, with surprise, that he was able to lift his arm enough to wrap it around Leon’s shoulders though there was no strength in it whatsoever. He probably couldn’t even grip his knife, let alone gather the core strength to stand and walk whatever distance to the extraction point.
“I’ll tell you when we’re in the transport. Hold on, if you can.” With a mighty effort, Leon managed to lift Krauser from the bed, hands firm under his legs and around his back. “Sorry, I need to hold you here. Try to keep quiet.”
“You said that already,” Krauser replied through gritted teeth. He might have been able to lift his arm enough, but the way Leon’s fingers were forced to dig in under his armpit was waking up all the pain he’d slept away for ten days.
He breathed hard through his nose, tamping down that pain as well as the dream thoughts and memories. Breathe. Focus. Master the pain as he mastered his powers, though that felt like a dream now too.
Leon straightened and turned, haste in his movements, though he was struggling with Krauser’s weight, if the heaving of his chest and the hard huffs of breath past Krauser’s face were anything to go by.
Krauser managed to tighten his grip, holding onto Leon’s shoulder as he turned and got them through the plastic strip curtains covering the door.
One small corridor and they were out into the open air. It was late, and Krauser blinked around as his eyes grew accustomed to the change in lighting. The alleyway they’d entered was lit by a single shitty bulb above the door, and it flickered twice as Leon booted the door shut behind them.
Krauser held in a wince as the movement shuddered through his body. He breathed out hard through his nose as Leon made a beeline for the end of the alleyway at as much of a jog as he could manage while carrying him.
Their transport was waiting at the end of the alley, just as Leon had promised.
“I’m gonna have to put you down for a minute, okay?”
“I’m sure I’ll manage. Just get on with it,” Krauser hissed.
Leon set him down gently with his back leaning against the back end of the jeep, then he yanked open the door as wide as it would go. There was a full leather duffel on the seat, and Leon pulled it out and dumped it on the floor.
With a soft grunt, Krauser allowed Leon to help him into the back seat. The seatbelt went across his lap, which was a relief because if it had touched his shoulders and chest, he wasn’t sure he could keep quiet.
When Leon shut the door, grabbed his duffel and hopped into the driver’s seat, Krauser felt himself drift, safe in the knowledge that Leon was taking care of things. Even the short walk while being carried and a little bit of standing was apparently enough to wipe him out completely, and he dozed on and off throughout the entire journey until the sky started to lighten, just as they pulled into a parking lot.
Krauser looked around blearily, noting how much sharper his vision was, however many hours after his last dose of morphine. Sharp enough to pick out a plain-looking block of apartments as Leon opened the back door.
Getting inside was just as hazy as the journey, although with additional flashes of pain as Leon carried him through doors and into the elevator. It stank of hot metal and too-strong cleaner, and Krauser hated it with every fibre of his being; all the more so when it juddered and jerked, sending tremors through his entire body as he leaned heavily against both Leon and the elevator wall.
Seven floors later and the doors opened with a jaunty ping. Leon shouldered Krauser’s weight again, and then they were outside a nondescript door.
It swung open silently to Leon’s key, and they awkwardly shuffled sidelong through and into the cool, still-dark apartment. The blinds at the end of the entrance corridor were half-slits of light as the sun rose.
Leon exhaled a lengthy sigh, then let his duffel drop to the floor with a muffled clunk. “Thank fuck for that.”
Krauser leaned against the wall as Leon detached from his side, although his legs were shaky. “You gonna tell me what that was all about?”
His eyes found Leon’s in the dimness, and he wondered if he looked as fucked up as Leon did. Probably.
“Yeah, maybe after I’ve slept for a week.” Leon scrubbed a hand through his hair then down his face and sighed again. “How are you feeling though? It wasn’t the smoothest journey, I know.”
“About as well as you can be after all this shit.” Krauser attempted to wave his hand dismissively, but the deep twinge of pain through his shoulder aborted the movement before it even begun. He breathed out through his nose, heavily, eyes squeezing shut as he fought the pain.
“Ah, shit!” Leon grabbed the duffel and unzipped it, rummaging around until he came up with a small bottle of clear liquid - probably more morphine. “Sorry, I didn’t think. Let’s get you to the bed, then I can give you your dose and you can rest.”
“Just-” Krauser ground out through gritted teeth, “just give me a minute.” He breathed in and then out through his nose, letting the pain wash over him, trying to remember the days when he embraced pain, when the bright flash of a knife would get him hard as a rock.
Hard to, hah, get hard now, when it felt like his entire upper body and both arms were quite literally on fire.
But it passed, the flames dimming as he breathed, until he could open his eyes again, see Leon’s pale, fucking concerned face.
“Bed.” Krauser’s voice was rough with pain, and he stifled a low groan as Leon ducked, gathering his strength before scooping him up again and staggering through the apartment to the bedroom.
The door was another sideways shuffle, and though Leon clearly tried to set Krauser down onto the bed as gently as possible, he felt it when his legs buckled. Leon staggered against the bed, catching himself with his knees on the mattress.
Krauser swallowed another grunt as the bed shifted. He allowed Leon to fuss with pillows, then laid back gingerly. The pressure on his shoulder blades and back did not feel good, but the wave of exhaustion that flowed over him was strong enough that he could ignore it, for now.
“Hey, don’t go to sleep yet. Here.” Leon snapped his fingers in front of Krauser’s face, then before he even got any words out to bitch, a dropper slipped between his lips. “I’ll get a spoon for next time, but for now this will have to do.”
He swallowed the sharply bitter liquid with a grimace, then allowed the sweet embrace of darkness to envelop him once more, aware of the bed dipping on the other side of him as Leon’s weight settled down.