Uh, Hi?
Thanks for clicking on this story. I'll try to give you a good reading experience.
So this is the story of Easy Company, starting in "Bastogne" (aka in this story Halabjah) and carrying throughout the war, except in modern times. It is a Roe/OC, but I will do my best to try and make the OC as unMarySue as possible. If you have any suggestions or complaints on that front, please tell me, because I am really trying to do my best.
Well okay, back story. Easy is on tour in the Middle East (I'm not giving them a specific country even though that might be how its done, I really didn't want to restrict them to Iran or Afghanistan so... CREATIVE LICENCE) The OC, Claire Barton, is based off of Clara Barton, a field nurse in the American Civil War and founder of the Red Cross. She's kind of a badass.
So yeah, please enjoy.
Chapter 1
Eugene Roe was lost. He knew he was lost, but it wasn't his fault. Every inch of this God-forsaken, arid, wastelands looked exactly the same to him- the same burnt dirt, the same dull rocks, the same sparse vegetation, the same radiating heat. It was easy to get lost.
Roe was in the in-between area: the deserted space spread between both Easy and Dog Company, too far away for either to be any help if he should fall into trouble. It was dangerous, but Roe had to do it. Otherwise men wouldn't live.
Easy Company had been holed up in the mountains on the border between Iran and Iraq for a week now. During the day the sun beat down upon the soldiers like they were in hell, at night it was as if God had chosen to freeze hell over. They had been shot at periodically, a few of the men had gotten injured but nothing too serious. The soldiers had little food, and little ammo, while Roe and the other medic were running low on bandages, morphine, sutures, alcohol, and basically anything else they need to keep serving the wounded.
So Roe carried on through the arid plain in the hopes of finding D Company well supplied and willing to share. Until he found the massacre.
Roe had smelt the reek of decay before he even saw the bodies. Past an outcropping of rock men in both American and Arab uniforms, lay sprawled in the bloodstained dust. Rotten flesh, made rancid by the sun's heat, hung off the soldier's bones, blood congealed around the bodies in dark pools, insects buzzed around, indiscriminately landing on the soldiers, feasting.
Broken bodies, and a red haze clouded Roe's mind. Bile and fear rose into his throat. Roe took a step back, away from the corpses. Horrific images of mangled people, blood coating his hands as he tried, futilely, to stem the flow, limbs being blasted off by a bombs or grenades, bones protruding from skin, the endless screams of pain and panic, swarmed his brain. Roe's face blanched. His mouth parted. Eyes glassed over. Numbness encased his mind.
And somehow he found the sense to move. One shuffling step, another, and then he ran. The heat didn't bother him anymore, he just had to get away.
In a daze Roe returned to camp, vivid memories of the grisly scene still haunting him behind his lids. "Roe!" A voice called out. Automatically Roe stopped, stood up straight, and turned, his body at attention but his mind elsewhere.
Captain Winters, half shaved, stood in his tent, flap open, a mirror in one hand and shaving cream in another. "Did you find anything?' Winters asked. Roe ducked inside the tent. He couldn't help but stare at a spot of red on Winters chin. Obviously he had nicked himself shaving; not life threatening, not disfigurement, a common normal injury. Roe felt the numbness lift slightly.
"No, I was making my way to D Company but I…" The bodies interrupted his speech, and his mouth went dry. "I uh, lost my way, Sir." Winters nodded.
"How much supplies do you and Barton have?" Winters asked. He returned his attention to the mirror.
"Not much, sir." Roe admitted. "Some gauze, few bandages; the Morphine, Narcan and Phenergan syringes are running low, along with clean needles; a few catheters but no IV drips to use it with; we keep some sick call meds and a cricothyrotomy kit on hand in the tent, but…"
"Cricothyrotomy?" Winters asked, confused.
"Basic surgical equipment to open the trachea." Winters unconsciously stroked his throat, smearing his shaving cream.
"I see." Winters removed his hand from his throat, and his face grew concentrated. "Well-" Whatever Winters was going to say got cut off.
"Captain!" Someone called, running up. Leibgott was red faced, out of breath, and in full combat fatigues. "Captain we found something." Behind him were two men, Muck and Malarkey, struggling to drag along a third, dressed in desert colored camouflage. The man had brown, tanned skin like leather, dark eyes, and a dark, trimmed beard.
An Arab. A prisoner.
"Found this around the back of camp. We took his gun." Malarkey boasted. The panting Leibgott presented the handgun to Winters. He took it and systematically unloaded it; to Roe, the sliding metal, and click of the bullet cartridge, sounded like death.
"Ask him why he's here." Winters commanded. Leibgott translated but the prisoner remained quiet. Winters sighed and turned to Malarkey. "Did you search him thoroughly?"
"Yes Sir, all we found is the gun and this." Roe perked up as a roll of bandages was exchanged. Winters passed it immediately to Roe, who took it gratefully.
"Alright if that's it, take him to CP." Muck and Malarkey drug the man off. Roe didn't care about the prisoner; he had something to augment their dwindling bandage supply.
Roe turned the bandage roll around in his hand as he walked. No one stopped him, which he was thankful for. He tried to remain aloof from the soldiers. Roe thought it was easier to cut and hack and cause pain if he didn't know the man on the receiving end. It was still hard.
The only person Roe really interacted with was Barton, and they were literally forced together. Their positions as medics, their limited opportunity to stay aloof, their shared living and operating space, made avoiding each other impossible.
When Claire Barton had joined the company after their last medic had got shot down in a failed mission in Turkey. She had been friendly, excited, sociable, young, and greatest of all, she smiled. The battle field was slowly robbing her of all her bright qualities. He knew she didn't sleep well, he would hear her tossing and turning at all hours of the unbearably cold nights as he himself lie awake. She would hardly eat, he would watch her as his own meal went unforgotten in his hands. They both suffered the same wounds.
Roe pushed open the flap of their tent to see Barton groggily turn in her cot. Her fatigues were strewn across the ground, but her pack lay within reach. Her grey eyes were highlighted by the dark circled under her eyes. He was angry with himself for waking her up.
"Find anything?" She yawned, sitting up.
"Bandage." Roe held it up for her inspection. Barton squinted.
"Doesn't look like one of ours." She commented. "Where'd you find it?"
"Arabic POW. Muck, Malarkey, and Leibgott brought him in." Barton nodded, digesting the information. Her face was emotionless and pale. Not in that she was fair skinned, no every soldier in this God forsaken desert had the same chestnut tan. Her tan skin was dead, lifeless, the pallor drained.
"Good, maybe we could trade him for supplies." Barton suggested. Roe shook his head; the idea had crossed his mind also.
"Any supplies they gave us would be worthless, and then we would be down a bargaining tool." It didn't bother Roe that he was thinking of the prisoner as a tool, little more than currency to be traded. It was war.
"I suppose." Barton nodded. "What happened? Did you find Dog Company?" Images of bodies crashed into Roe's vision. He felt dizzy and sank weakly into his own cot. Red. Red everywhere. The numbness seized control.
"Roe, Roe? You okay? Do you feel nauseous?" Her voice pulled Roe back to reality. He was here, in the tiny medic tent with Barton, his friend kneeling in front of him. "How long were you out in the heat? Did you drink water?" Roe knew she was going through the motions. She knew it was not heat stroke that made him so lethargic.
"Yeah." She took his wrist and measured his pulse. The soft pressure of her fingers kept him anchored. Roe focused on the movement of Barton's lips as she counted his heart rate out silently. His mind went blank. Not terrifyingly numb, but blissfully blank.
"What happened?" She asked after she was done. Barton removed her hand his life line was diminished.
"I got lost." Roe stated simply, horrified of any trigger that would make the decomposing bodies reappear in his mind. Barton searched his face, and then did what she had to - let the matter drop.
"I'm going to see if I can find D later, maybe I'll have more luck." Barton declared, straightening up to stand over Roe. Her figure was not imposing, she seemed small and fragile despite the dearth of evidence to support that. She was trained as a soldier and a paratrooper, even if she was just a medic.
"Take one of the men with you, and a map." He instructed. Roe wanted to make sure she was protected. While he could not, and would not, protect her from everything, at least he could prevent her from stumbling upon the same nightmare as himself.
"Okay." She assented.
"Have you been asking for med kits?" Roe inquired as Barton moved to put on her fatigues.
Shaking out her pants and slipping them on over her shorts Barton answered. "Yeah, I've started organizing them on the bench." She nodded towards the wood plank, thrown across two saw horses that they had generously nicknamed 'the bench'. On top was a scant amount of syringes, bandages, and gauze. "I've asked-" And that's when the first shell went off.
Both the medics jumped, and grasped instinctively for their packs. Soon enough the call of "MEDIC!" echoed through the camp, along with gun shots, shouting, and chaos.
Barton was out of the tent first, still pulling on her jacket as she ran. Roe watched her disappear into the confusion of bullets, dust, and rock. The courage to follow her into the fray had deserted Roe. He could only picture the bodies. The rotting bodies, except this time it was of his friends. This would be so much worse. "MEDIC!" The call sounded again. "DOC!" Roe finally forced himself out of the tent.
Dust hung in clouds, blasted into the air by bombs. Men ran around Roe, shouting or shooting or both. Most were taking cover behind rock outcroppings, but Roe didn't have that luxury. He sprinted forward, taking any scant cover he could find.
The call for a medic had stopped. Either Barton had gotten there or the soldier had died.
Still Roe ran.
Barton answered the call for a medic. Two soldiers were huddled behind a rather pointy and tall spire, closed in by a sheer rock face. Immediately she sensed the injury. Penkala was grabbing his wrist as his gun mate alternated between worried looks at him, and worried looks towards the line. "Angel! It's the artery! It's the artery! Oh God I'm going to bleed out!" Penkala cried in hysteria.
Dropping to her haunches, Barton took his wrist sharply in her hand. "Relax your arm!" She commanded. Penkala clenched his fist tighter.
"It's the artery!" He repeated. Barton almost slapped him. His words catalyzed her own panic.
"RELAX YOUR ARM PENKALA!" She shouted at him, her voice cracked slightly. In response to the order, Penkala's fingers uncurled and his forearm settled. It took Barton one look to know his fear was misguided. "It's not the artery." She reported her findings. Her hand dived into her pack, searching for disinfectant and gauze. The cut was still jagged and dangerous, but it was not the artery, thank God.
"I ain't coming off the line Doc," Penkala swore, grabbing her other arm for emphasis. "I ain't going out there." His eyes focused on the chaos of the battle field.
"You won't have to, you have me." Barton answered, shaking off Penkala's grip. "Now, I'm just going to-" Her words were cut off by a ping, and a sharp pain in her back. Some force threw her forward and she landed across Penkala's lap.
"Barton!" Roe's familiar Cajun voice cut through her confused mind. Barton shook herself. The repetitive phrase she used every day echoed through her head. You're alright, You're alright. Just do your job.
Forcing herself to sit up, Barton returned to her kneeling position. "Sorry about that Penkala, jumped." She explained as she continued to wrap his wrist. Roe was at her side, his had rested on her shoulder. "I'm alright." She echoed.
Roe didn't say anything, but took his hand off her. "Okay Penkala, you're done. Don't take the bandage off until tomorrow morning. If the wound is red, or puffy, or if you feel light headed or feverish, come see me." Penkala seemed to gain control over his panic enough to digest this information. "Good."
The bullets had stopped falling when Barton was still bandaging Penkala. She stood up as naturally as she could manage with the pain in her back. Even with being careful, a grimace escaped her controlled face.
Roe was by her side in an instant. "Where?" He whispered. Barton shook her head.
"Back," She answered in equally as low of tones.
Wounds are as common as rocks in Easy's camp, but usually the wound came with a certain, expected, but still hardly enough, time to recover; either from lighter work, or rest in Halabjah (their CP). With a medic there could be no recovery time. Easy could not spare either Roe or Barton, for any length of time. It would be better to minimize panic by keeping the wound a secret.
"Ricochet probably." Roe assessed. "Two punctures," Roe had transitioned into his medic mind set. It was as if he could just turn off his fear and agony – Barton was jealous. "I'll need to take it out."
Barton nodded. You'll be alright. She assured herself.
"Everyone else alright?" Barton asked.
"Yes." And then they were silent.
Men rushed around them, carrying ammunition of supplies back and forth. People emerged from tents and people went into tents. Some laughed with each other, some shouted, some were just quiet. Occasionally people would stop Roe and Barton to give them spare bandages or disinfectants, but for the most part they were ignored.
When the pair had successfully negotiated their way back to their tent Barton let her resolve falter. She grimaced, the only outward sign of her pain. Roe held the tent flap open for her. "Sit down." He ordered as she walked past.
Barton looked around for the chair that they didn't have. "Where?" She asked. Roe looked around as well. Finally he pulled his cot away from the canvas wall.
"Here." He instructed. Barton perched on the edge and tried to take off her jacket. "Damn it Barton, wait for me." Roe's accent sounded thicker. Maybe his became more pronounced with stress, just like hers.
Slowly, Roe helped her ease the jacket off, revealing the bloody undershirt she wore. "I need scissors." He complained. Roe had pulled the bench next to them, and settled himself behind her. Barton wished she could see, but every time she craned her neck pain shot from her back like lightning.
She felt Roe's fingers gently brush her injury as he ripped her shirt. The contact made her pain flare violently. "Lean forward," He said. Barton sucked in her breath and did as he commanded. She hissed as the pain struck.
"I know it hurts." Roe soothed, as he tore the fabric of her sports bra to get a better look at one of the holes. Barton was surprised at how comforted she was by those little words.
"I'm going to have to get the fragments out." Roe said, examining the dark red holes in Barton's back. Every time his fingers accidentally touched the wounds she tensed. He knew she was trying to suppress the pain, and he hated it. He hated how she was in pain. He hated how much pain he would cause her in the process of fixing her. He hated how after he finished healing her, she would still be in pain. He hated how after the dark red holes closed, she would scar. He hated it all.
But Roe forced himself to do it, because if he didn't the result would be much worse. Picking forceps from his pack, Roe steeled himself. "Be brave." He said to himself just as much as to her, and dug in.
Barton gasped, and her muscles tensed, Roe forced himself to keep going. He pulled the skin further apart to get a better angle. Barton whimpered, and that sound stabbed him. But he kept going. After a few, long, minutes Roe dislodged the first bullet shard. He inspected the metal and the fabric which it had carried with it. In a wave of disgust he cast the bullet away, not carrying to see where it landed. He would have to find it later and dispose of it properly, but in that instant Roe just wanted it as far from Claire and him as possible. "First one gone, Claire." Roe informed her, trying to make his voice as soft and comforting as possible.
Claire. When did he start calling her Claire?
Roe began on the second bullet fragment, and pain began again, and again he found it.
Claire was panting as Roe set the bullet on the bench. "I think you'll need stitches." Roe informed her. He saturated a cotton swab with Hydrogen Peroxide. "This will sting, I'm sorry." He wiped the blood away. Roe focused on how the red stain disappeared from her back, instead of the sounds of pain Claire was trying to suppress.
Roe was hyper-aware of how tiny she was. Her ribs cage stuck out prominently, and, despite her obvious muscle, she seemed weak. Her skin was clammy and warm to the touch, but that could be a byproduct of the radiating heat.
How could he cause her so much pain? How could healing someone cause so much pain? The blood oozed out of her wounds at a slow pace. He was sick of blood, sick of pain. Why can't it just end? He hesitated with the suture, unable to force himself to carry on.
"Roe?" Claire murmured. Roe didn't answer. "Just do it. Please." Her voice sounded so feeble.
A bitter taste stung the back of his throat as he pierced her skin. Healing an injury, with injuries. Small rivets of blood dripped from the puncture wound, pooling in her white undershirt. Claire tensed and bit back a moan.
After too long, Roe was finished. He cleaned her back, and taped gauze over the stitches. He tried to be gentle, as if that would negate all the pain he caused.
"Thank you." Claire murmured. Roe's fingers traced the tape one last time. She wasn't supposed to get hurt. No one was supposed to get hurt. Why did they have to get hurt? The numbness crept back into his mind, he was beginning to welcome it.
"Roe?" She turned around slowly. His hands didn't move, still ridged in the space where her back used to be. Claire took them in her own, steady hands. "Eugene?" He hardly recognized his own name. All he could focus on was the dried blood around her fingers. They matched his. "Gene." Her soft whisper brought him out of his down spiral, if only temporarily.
"Barton?" He answered and looked up into her face. She carried an aura of serene empathy. The numbness receded.
"You have me," She whispered. "I know how you feel. I know the horror, and the pain." If anyone else had said that Roe wouldn't have believed them. But Claire sees what he sees. "You're not alone. I'll be here. That's what helps me. Knowing you'll be there, to bare this with me. So don't feel as if you have to carry it alone." Roe couldn't look away. She was right. She helped bear the trauma. She helps him continue on.
"Thank you." Roe . Claire squeezed his hands, and let go. She stood while he sat, contemplating what she said.
There were times when he wanted to pass off his damage onto someone else, let someone else crumble under the burden. But knew, if offered the chance, he wouldn't. Just knowing that Claire was crumbling under the same burden made him want to take it from, give her the rest he never could. Not because she was a woman, not because she was small and fragile; simply because he couldn't stand to see anyone in pain. His sole desire was to fix people, at any personal suffering. But he didn't have to suffer alone, Claire stood with him.
"I'm going to beg med kits." Barton said. Roe ducked down and scooped up her jacket.
"Don't strain your back too much." He instructed as he helped her into it. Barton nodded. Her blood was unrecognizable midst the multitudes of other stains.
"I won't." She said. She smiled faintly at him, and left.
A/N: Thanks for reading. If you see any mistakes or anything poorly done, please don't hesitate to tell me. Please review if you liked it, and if you didn't review just to tell me what a bugger all shit job I did.
Okay so I don't make any promises to upload frequently (if you chose to follow me on this adventure with me), but I will try to update as soon as possible. Please be patient.
Also the story behind the nickname "Angel" for Barton is next chapter, but really it seams from the nickname for Clara Barton as "The Angel of the Battlefield".
Thank you for reading, I love you.