Disclaimer - I do not own The Musketeers.
Aramis couldn't understand.
The air around him stilled. The musket in his hands suddenly felt leaden. His breath released into the air as events caught up with him.
The second of stupefaction cost them dearly…
… More so than the misfire of his weapon.
His weapon had failed to discharge. For the first time since he had joined the regiment he had failed to make his shot. But the misfire wasn't the problem. The seconds it took for the musketeer's mind to process this information was.
Suddenly he was moving, but not of his own volition.
He was toppling sideways, his weapon – leaden and useless – falling from his grip as he landed heavily in the mud. The damp of the earth seeped through his cloak and doublet and the mud splattered across the side of his face, but by now his mind had caught up with the sad reality of his failed shot, and he processed his situation quickly.
It was no longer the dud musket or his mud drenched side that was of concern to him, but the dead weight that was sprawled across his prone body.
He started to shift in an attempt to dislodge the weight. The mud was in his eyes, hindering his vision. He pulled his head out of the mud and freed his hand, slipping his main gauche from his weapons belt. He attempted to pull his bruised body out from beneath the stubborn weight that held him down and felt at that moment a hand on his shoulder.
Now he moved quickly, only to still his hand and the advance of his sharp weapon with the cry that he quickly realised was his fellow brother-in-arms.
'Porthos,' he breathed, almost sagging slightly.
'Hold on a moment while we move 'im,' Porthos said.
Aramis vision finally cleared as the heavy rainfall washed the mud clear of his eyes and now that he was no longer finding it necessary to scramble to defend himself. He watched as Porthos and Athos carefully pulled a disturbingly still D'Artagnan from atop his body, and gentle settled him on the ground beside Aramis.
Aramis sat up quickly, ignoring the protests of his ribs, which must have not enjoyed their rather harsh impact to the ground only moments earlier.
'How is he?' he asked as he crawled through the mud towards the prone lad, not awaiting an answer. 'Let me see.'
Athos and Porthos made space for their brother and watched anxiously as the medic examined the lad. From the moment he'd heard Porthos' deep baritone voice Aramis had paid little notice to the scene beyond that of his fallen brother, trusting that the others would not let their guard down had the scene not been in hand. The fact that Athos and Porthos barely shifted an inch from the Gascon's body was all Aramis needed to see to confirm that the bandits that had assaulted them were dead.
Aramis now had the whole of his attention focused on D'Artagnan.
He ran his hands up the lad's body to confirm that there was nothing of concern hidden beneath the mud, then he turned his focus entirely onto the Gascon's head wound. He hummed in dissatisfaction at his inspected the bloody wound.
'Aramis?' Athos' anxious voice penetrated his thoughts.
'It's a deep graze, but I hope not to see any long term damage,' Aramis sat back on his haunches and sighed. 'Unfortunately, we won't know for certain until he awakes.'
If he awakes.
Aramis shook himself. He couldn't think like that. It was true that head-wounds could be difficult affairs, but Aramis knew the Gascon; he knew the fire that lived inside of him, and knew that he would – he had to – pull through this.
'You idiot,' he muttered softly and affectionately. 'Damn hero always has to go save the day.'
He felt a hand resting on his arm. Porthos. The three men remained still for a few moments longer before Athos rose.
'We need to get out of this rain,' the elder musketeer declared.
'His head needs stitching,' Aramis informed them. 'He's bleeding a fair bit more than I'd like.'
'There was an inn about half a mile back the way we came,' Porthos said. 'If we wrap it for now will…' He trailed off, his unspoken question lingering in the silence.
'I can wrap it for now and clean it and stitch it at the inn,' Aramis confirmed.
With this now decided the three men moved quickly and wordlessly. Porthos retrieved a clean bandage from Aramis' saddlebag, which the medic used to wrap the lad's head tightly, while Athos tied D'Artagnan's horse to his own. Aramis then carefully lifted the unconscious Gascon into the waiting arms of a mounted Porthos. Finally, Aramis collected his discarded musket, mounted his horse, and they set off through the downpour back the way they'd came.
In a cosy room with two beds and an armchair, the musketeers stripped themselves and D'Artagnan of their muddy and drenched clothes in favour of the dry spares they'd had stowed away in their saddlebags.
The warmth of the fire and the taste of the brandy that Athos had retrieved from the innkeeper upon their arrival, warmed them, and, with only the occasional groan emanating from the Gascon's lips, Aramis stitched up his head wound without any complications.
'You're going to have an impressive scar,' Aramis teased the unconscious lad. 'Something to impress the ladies, eh? Although I expect the lady you most want to impress will more likely shout at you – and me – when she discovers the conclusion to this little venture.'
Athos and Porthos watched the exchange silently at Aramis finished re-wrapping the wound and settled D'Artagnan's head down upon the pillows. The bullet had grazed the Gascon's left temple, but the medic's examinations upon arrival at the inn had seen that the lad was already reacting to light and to pain. Aramis had concluded that he would awake with a pretty terrible concussion, but that he would recover sooner rather than later.
Almost thankfully, they had been on the return part of their journey and were only a day and a half's ride from Paris, so they were unconcerned about having to rush back to report to Treville.
Once he'd finished treating D'Artagnan, Aramis settled in the armchair near the fire and took a long draught from the brandy bottle. And then another. And then…
… Porthos' hand swiped the bottle from his hand and passed it to Athos who, surprisingly, didn't look in the bottle's direction, but merely placed it on the side table.
Aramis looked up at his friend blearily.
'What?' he asked almost shortly.
'Something's up,' Porthos said, an oddly gentle, yet firm lilt inflected in his voice.
Aramis snorted.
'Aramis…' Athos beseeched.
'I missed…' Aramis finally spoke, his voice almost a whisper. 'No. I didn't even miss… I couldn't fire… I pulled the trigger and… and the… the gunpowder… the shot didn't go off.'
'The gunpowder was probably damp,' Porthos placated him.
'Is that supposed to make me feel better?' Aramis responded angrily. 'I'm not… I didn't… I couldn't take the shot. Yes. I screwed it up. But that's not the problem. The problem is that I was so shocked… so surprised that I missed the shot that I froze. My own fucking ego couldn't take it, couldn't process it, and the only reason I don't have a bullet in my brain is because D'Artagnan moved and I… and I didn't.'
Aramis' angry tirade suddenly deflated so that his last words were almost silent.
'Aramis,' Athos spoke softly, placing himself before his friend's face. 'No one is at fault for what had happened this afternoon. It was merely bad luck: your gunpowder was damp and the gun didn't fire. I think that's the first time that's ever happened to you. In fact I know it is, because I hesitated when I realised what had happened. You only stilled for a few seconds at the most, and then you had your wits about you even before you landed on the ground.'
'A few seconds lost in battle is the time is takes to decide life and death,' Aramis intoned.
Athos winced, recognising the words as his own, thrown out towards the new recruits at the garrison whenever they got sloppy or distracted during training.
'Aramis,' Athos tried again. 'You want me to say you made a mistake, then fine, you made a mistake. A human mistake. We all make them as much as we like to pretend we don't. I do not blame you for it. You understand? I do not blame you.'
'And neither do I,' Porthos put in.
'Nor I,' said a hoarse whispered voice from the bed.
All three men swept around towards D'Artagnan's prone form, and Aramis lurched to his feet to join the lad's side.
'You're awake,' he said.
D'Artagnan grimaced and looked at his brothers with pain filled eyes.
'Have been for a while,' he croaked.
'Here,' Pothos held the previously discarded Brandy bottle close to the lad's lips. 'Drink.'
D'Artagnan managed a sip or two before his eyes clenched shut.
'D'Artagnan?' Aramis called to him softly.
'Feel nauseous,' he mumbled.
'It will pass,' the medic tried to reassure him. 'You have a concussion but you will be okay.'
D'Artagnan nodded his head slightly. The movement was so small that Aramis nearly missed it.
'I'm so sorry D'Artagnan,' Aramis said. Even having now seen the boy awaken, deep-seated fear still gnawed in his chest.
'Don't blame you,' D'Artagnan whispered, as he drifted off.
'You see?' Porthos said to Aramis in a way that demanded that the medic let it go. Aramis shifted his gaze across the three men… his three brothers… and then nodded.
He nodded because the others needed to see it. But deep down he still felt the guilt fluttering agitatedly deep within him.
He thought he'd played the game well enough for the others not to notice. And at first they might not have, but there are only so many times a man can clean his weapons before it starts to look less like attentive and closer to obsessive.
Athos tried speaking to him again, but Aramis wouldn't listen. Porthos all but pulled the weapon from his hand after a particularly agitated argument between the two. It had ended with a fist-fight that had resulted in a very pissed off Captain Treville and had left both men on parade duty for the next three weeks.
After that altercation, D'Artagnan kept his distance.
Aramis didn't blame him for it either. His hesitation out in the field had nearly gotten both himself and the Gascon killed. Even when the lad had been cleared for duty, he kept himself mostly to the practice of sword fighting, going nowhere near the shooting range, where Aramis had settled himself.
When Treville had called them into his rooms and given them their next joint assignment – their first one since their misadventure – Aramis had all but baulked. The only thing that had stopped him was his duty-bound decree to serve as a musketeer. To serve in a uniform he didn't believe he deserved.
The men made their arrangements and preparations to leave.
Despite the need to leave quickly, D'Artagnan had left the barracks almost as soon as they had departed Treville's office, with barely a backward glance at the others. Guilt panged once more in Aramis' chest… a near constant companion that surged forth every time he laid eyes on the Gascon… and on the scar that sliced down the side of his temple.
His other two brothers had let him go without making any comment, and Athos took to preparing D'Artagnan's mount without a word of complaint, behaviour that did seem rather odd all things considered.
As they were about due to leave, D'Artagnan returned, slightly out of breath. A light mizzle of rain was between to pepper the air; cold and misty.
D'Artagnan nodded at his mentor's enquiring gaze, and Athos nodded back before mounting and heading towards the entrance of the barracks, with a now smiling Porthos at his side. Aramis made to join them.
'Wait a moment Aramis,' D'Artagnan interrupted the medic, who had been lifting his foot to place it in the stirrup. 'I have something for you. It took a while to get it arranged so… apologies. But here you go.'
Aramis tentatively took the package that D'Artagnan offered out to him. He unwrapped the coarse linen to reveal a slim, long oiled-skin sleeve.
'It's for your musket,' D'Artagnan told him. 'It will protect it from the damp weather. And you can reach it quickly in a fight. The seam it buttoned in such a way that it will hold firm unless you pull at the handle of your weapon, like so.'
D'Artagnan snatched up Aramis' musket – the same one that had failed him – before the medic could intervene and showed him how the seam split easily with the upward tug of the weapon. Aramis couldn't look away as D'Artagnan returned the musket to the case and then returned it to the strap of his saddle.
'D'Artagnan…'
'I said it before and I'll say it again,' D'Artagnan said, 'I don't blame you. I never did. We all make mistakes. You won't make this one again, so let's move on. You need to move on.'
With those words D'Artagnan mounted his horse and moved to join the others. Aramis hesitated, for the second – and last – time, before he also moved to join them. Together the four brothers left the barracks.
The guilt didn't dissipate over-night… but it did leave him eventually.
Five weeks later they were set upon my bandits. It was raining heavily, and there was thunder grumbling amongst the dark grey clouds.
Aramis pulled his musket free of its case. He fired. He hit. He didn't hesitate.
His brothers had his back, and he had theirs.