Title: Casualties (1/3)
Fandom: Firefly
Pairing: Mal/Simon
Rating: R
Genre: Angst, AU
Summary: Simon wasn't even supposed to be here. Not with the Browncoats, not in this valley, not even in this war. He was supposed to be at MedAcad right now, studying. But if he hadn't been here, this man would have died.
Warnings: OC death, war, non-explicit sex
Word Count: 2032
Notes: Alternate Battle of Serenity Valley, c. 2510. Mal is 24 (born 2486), Simon is 20 (born 2490).

A twig crunched beneath Simon's feet as he stumbled when the large Browncoat shoved him in the shoulder blade with the butt of a proportionately large gun. It was dark outside, probably into the smallest hours of the morning by then, but Simon wouldn't have been able to see through the thick foliage even if it had been the middle of the day. Simon hopped a little when some dirt found its way into the cuts on the bottom of his bare feet and the silent ape that had taken him from his tent that night, still dressed in his sleep pants and shirtless, shoved him again.

The wind breezed past at the same time as he pressed his way through an old pine, the needles prickling into his shoulder. He wondered what kind of chance he had of getting away but one glance back at his armed captor dispelled the notion. The area was too heavily forested for him to get very far before getting shot, not to mention the fact that even if he got away he would just be lost in the woods. He toyed briefly with the concept of dying out here in the name of unification. Dying for a war his father had practically forced him into. He thought about the irony of the fact that he had supported unification right up until the point where he'd been enlisted to fight for it.

Which was, of course, not to say that he supported the Independents. He'd never even understood what they were trying to protect. The whole war seemed like a waste of life to him. So many people died, so much pointless death. He would probably be one of those pointless deaths.

The forest was silent except for the distant sound of gunfire and Simon's own ragged breathing. It was eerily devoid of life. The rich color of the sap running down some of the trees looked, to Simon's weary eyes, like blood. He imagined the war here, right in front of him, hundreds of bodies, dying or dead, around him. He felt helpless and did his best to shake the image from his mind. The unease lingered inside him for a while.

The man behind him was silent, neither steps nor breathes making a sound, but the gun never left the small of Simon's back, cool metal on his skin contrasting the burning in his blistered and bloody feet. Every so often, he would nudge Simon forward, prompting quicker steps. To walk across the valley would take about ten minutes, but to walk across the valley in the middle of a war would be suicide. As it was, they'd been in the woods surrounding the valley for a couple of hours and Simon didn't want to think how much longer it could take if his captor had gone very far out of his way for safety.

Simon was looking up when it happened, observing the pollution and smoke from the bombs and fires, and trying to catch glimpses of stars in the gaps.

A giant explosion colored the sky and let loose a deafening sound from somewhere to the left. That way. That was where the valley was. That was the way back to safety. Simon didn't waste a second. His captor was completely dumbstruck by the blast, covering his ears, eyes squeezed shut in pain and letting out screams Simon couldn't hear. When he took off running, the man didn't even notice until Simon was out of sight. He didn't slow down, wouldn't dare to, even when his lungs burned and his chest heaved and his legs transformed into entirely unstable things. This was it. He was going to make it.

The forest blurred around him into a mess of nighttime greens and browns and blacks and suddenly, as his stomach seemed to become a medical anomaly, somehow in his throat, nothing at all.

"Simon! Wake up, sleepy head!"

River was giggling. Simon blinked his eyes open to take in the blurry world around him. It was warm, the suns rays high overhead blocked out by River's shadow. She looked young. Had she really still been that young? Somewhere in the back of Simon's mind, the sound of gunfire and yelling raged on. That didn't make sense. It was peaceful out here, far enough away from the house to not be disturbed but close enough for the safety it provided.

"Wake up."

Simon blinked a few times, but the edges never came into focus. His body resonated with an aching pulse. He couldn't focus. He tried to lift a hand to his head to check for any injuries, but his arm was heavy.

"Simon, please."

He couldn't make out River's face. It was dark, the sun right behind her, haloing out around her dark hair, but he could see something glinting. Tears?

"Wake up, Simon!"

The sounds of arguing from somewhere above him stirred Simon out of an uncomfortable sleep. A pain shot through his leg and his head was throbbing. There was a sticky warmth covering him and he still felt tired and disjointed, but he had enough presence of mind to notice that the sky had lightened, but not much. He hadn't been out for long, but they had still found him. He could really see the sky for the first time since they'd entered the forest and he looked around himself to find that odd slope of the ground against his back was the wall of the hole he'd somehow fallen into. He cursed himself for falling for a trap the Independents had set.

He remembered River. Her voice growing desperate, her tears. He took a moment to convince himself that River was safe at home.

One of the men jumped down, symbolically brown coat torn and ragged, even to Simon's spinning vision. The scratchy texture of rope wrapped around his waist and upper back, rough, dirty hands touching his skin as little as possible, before it moved around his thighs as well and was tied in a knot right at Simon's naval. The rope began to tug and drag him up and Simon let out a cry as his mostly likely broken leg protested the rough treatment. To Simon's surprise, gentle arms came around him to help ease the process.

The swirling clouds of smoke above him were disconcerting and Simon was taking huge, gasping breaths by the time they had laid him down on solid ground. Voices sounded around him.

"I told you this was a bad idea!"

The voice sounded terrified and young. Younger than Simon, probably. Simon's father's voice came back to him, his response to Simon's complaints that he was only twenty and shouldn't be a part of any war. There a people younger than you. It's not about age. It's about devotion. Don't you care about what happens to all those people?

"What? The hole was your idea."

"Not the hole! Everything. Kidnapping a doctor! Look, even if we get him back there without gettin' caught, it's not looking like he can do anything for us. He needs a doctor himself."

"We had to try. We don't have anyone. People are dying, kid. At least now we don't have to say we just sat around an' waited for it. We fought, kid. That's what we're here to do. Don't go regrettin' it now."

Someone grunted their agreement. Simon forced his eyelids open and then blinked them closed again rapidly to disperse the tears that formed. Looking around, he realized it was the man who had taken him in the first place. The two other men were a short, round-faced boy with long, messy hair, and an older man with graying hair and worry lines on his face underneath lines where sweat had cleaned away the grime that covered him from head to toe.

Simon shifted and instantly wished he hadn't. He let out a whimper and the youngest looked over to him, concern bright in his eyes.

"You doin' okay, doc?"

There seemed to be kindness seeping out of the kid's pores and Simon wondered for a second why he was here, thought about how he must have really cared about that thing that Simon couldn't understand. Independence. Probably had people who really cared about him, too, people he cared enough to fight for.

"I've been better," Simon bit out, but he sent the boy a grateful look.

The kid knelt down next to him and wrapped an arm around Simon's shoulders, leveraging Simon up without putting any weight on Simon's injured leg. The hold was familiar and Simon knew that this was the one that had helped him out of the hole so gently before.

Simon had been close, it seemed, to freedom, because their walk from there was short, made eventful by the quiet, fond bickering of the two additions to their party. They left the forest and walked around under the cover of debris, unnoticed as they made their way through the mouth of a cave. It was dank, unsanitary, and had almost no tactical advantage. They may have been safe from some of the gunfire, but not from explosives, and there was no way for them to attack back from inside.

The coppery scent of blood was thick and nauseating and only grew stronger with each step he took further in at the soft urging of the boy. Simon turned a corner into the main chamber.

Simon's voice was shaken as he let out a creaky, "Wo de tian, a."

Bodies. Bodies everywhere, some dead, some just exhausted, but dirty and propped up limply against rocks. Simon thought of the comfort of the tent he'd stayed in, the sterility of the well equipped tent he'd worked on the injured soldiers in, the large, looming white tents that held the mess and the meeting halls, all safe behind the many strong barricades of solid metal.

"This way, doc."

Simon allowed the kid to maneuver him through the cave until they came to one man in particular. Simon swallowed.

"What happened here?"

The boy shot Simon a look he couldn't quite read. "War."

The boys eyes were sharp and clear, older than they should have been. Simon felt suddenly ridiculous, privileged. He turned away, back toward the man he was supposed to treat, and almost wished he hadn't. The man's eyes were screwed shut in pain, chest heaving with each gasping breath he took.

"I mean, what are his injuries?" Simon asked quietly, desperately. "I-I don't have any of my instruments, any, any antibiotics. What do you have here?"

This time, Simon didn't look at the boy as he replied, eyes caught on the man in front of him, but he recognized the apology in his tone. "Not much. Not yet. Some more people are coming back with more supplies."

Simon nodded absently and sank to the floor, the boy's arms settling him into a comfortable position before lifting off of him completely for the first time. He got straight to work, stripping the shirt off to assess the wounds. Tian a, it wasn't good. He looked around for something to wipe it with and was met with a woman, dark, curly hair tied away from her stained face, holding out a bowl of water and a clean towel. "His name's Mal," she explained. "He's our sergeant. Got shot a few times. Some cuts and bruises. Some are probably infected." There was something like a pleading quality in her voice, well hidden, discreet enough that Simon wouldn't have noticed it if he hadn't been raised on subtlety.

"I'll do what I can. I haven't had a chance to fully assess his condition, but if I can get some decent equipment, it shouldn't be a problem." He'll be fine, Simon had really said, and from the look on the woman's face, she understood and was grateful. "I'm Simon."

"Zoe," she replied. "I'll just be over there, call me if you need anything. And, doc? Thanks."

Chinese
wo de tian, a - dear God in heaven
tian a - oh, God