Chrissi-the-random-whump-writer on Tumblr requested "Accidentally hurt by a friend" like...two years ago at this point, and I am just getting around to it now.

Clarifying note: 68-Whiskey or 68W is name for combat medics - if you're talking to one of them one on one, it is almost universally going to be "Doc" as a sign of respect, no matter the rank.

I fudged a lot of details - namely that the drill part was actually a tactic used by our *allies* to execute people.

As always, many thanks to gaelicspirit/amandagaelic for a sanity check and feeding my ego ;) and blazeofobscurity for my habit of hurting Rick AND Thomas

It was cold. Winter in Afghanistan was always so miserably cold.

They started out under the cover of darkness as though the fact that they were leaving base was a secret even to their own people. The group in the back of the jeep was small. Small might've been an understatement. Besides Rick, there were three other Marines, and he recognized Sebastian Nuzo, a SEAL chief and clearly the mysterious Thomas Magnum's friend given the way Nuzo seemed to be the only one Magnum talked to. All male, and all ones Rick knew from around base as having less than stellar reputations as Marines. Maxwell was never in regs, Diaz could never be bothered to do what he was told to do, and Rick was pretty sure Rogers…well, everyone just thought Rogers was slow.

Rick was oddly impressed. Not that he would say anything.

The guys might've shit reps as Marines, but he knew for a fact that Maxwell had at least three dogs living under his cot in the barracks - mangy looking mutts that looked more like dingos crossed with a gopher than anything registered with the AKC. He'd picked them up on missions into bombed-out towns and villages; the dogs were so small no one noticed when the kid bent down and shoved them in his BDU pants pocket and took them home.

Diaz - who had a degree in criminal justice from Harvard and for some reason no one quite understood joined as an enlisted instead of officer - refused to obey unlawful orders or things he just thought were particularly dumb, like walking with his hands in his pockets, drinking (non-alcoholic) while walking, or wearing the uniform-issued gloves that were made so flimsily they seemed to trap the cold instead of the heat and wore non-uniform replacements.

And Rogers…Rogers wasn't slow, he just talked slower than most and everyone assumed that meant he was a paste eater. Meanwhile, the guy had set up an amateur telescope made out of spare parts in the back of the barracks with the help of a scrawny Army EOD tech who was only too happy to support the sciences.

Bad Marines.

Good people.

And they were talking amongst each other enough they covered up the fact that Lt. Magnum said hardly anything.

The lieutenant was crammed into the back of the jeep, his back pressed into the corner with his rifle in his lap; he kept a wary eye on the rest of the group as though at any moment he was expecting a mutiny. Nuzo talked quietly to him every once in a while, and the lieutenant would occasionally reply, but it was a quiet conversation, and Rick could make nothing out.

The mission was simple. Magnum apparently was one of the few officers who had a useful skill: local language spoken and understood, and, given the conversation now several nights ago between Rick and the lieutenant, was one hell of a negotiator. They were meeting with a local man about an enforcer - Assef whatever his last name was - for a Taliban warlord, but the lieutenant was adamant that they not be noticed. Captain Greene refused outright to let him go alone, and wouldn't allow just one guy as back up.

"Why only six of us?" Rick asked.

The conversation screeched to a halt. If not for the rumbling of the jeep as it trundled along the goat paths that constituted as road in this area, one could've heard a pin drop.

Rogers, Maxwell and Diaz all turned to look at the lieutenant.

So. Nuzo knew why there were only six, but the others didn't, and they apparently hadn't had the courage to ask a senior officer why.

Magnum, on the other hand, smirked slightly. A funny little grin that was gone almost as soon as it was there. "Numbers attract attention," he replied. "These people…they have to be able to trust us if they're going to talk to us. And they have to trust that we're not going to bring something worse down on them when we leave. Around here, for these families, just talking to Americans can get them killed. And we're not going to be able to find the bad guys if we can't talk to the people who live here, who know them."

That explained why the jeep and not the humvee. And why their driver was a local, not TC. Rick still wasn't happy about being sent off on a mission without his friend, but Magnum had been insistent that Rick was the one he needed, and TC hadn't pushed. Which seemed sort of odd, but the pilot wouldn't give any further information on it.

"Why us?" Rick pressed, gesturing toward the other three. "Not that I don't trust that you and your BFF Chief can get it done, but seriously - why us?"

"Good people don't trust bad people."

Well…damn. He didn't really have a response to that, and from the looks of it, neither did the others. Though they did half-smile at the praise. Rick wondered if the young lieutenant had found the other three the same way he'd tracked Rick down.

Goddamn that man, Rick silently cursed. He didn't want to like the guy, but damn if he wasn't making it impossible.

The mission was supposed to be simple. And it was.

Until it wasn't.

He was never quite sure what happened, but in the blink of an eye, the quiet street in the mid-morning hours erupted into a very active war zone.

Looking back months, or even years, later, Rick wouldn't remember what happened in the moments before the doors to the house Magnum and the others disappeared into; he would only remember the chaos: shouting and gunfire and screaming shattering the silence of the street. Eleven men, all wearing variations of the perahan tunbans, half with some form of western or military jacket over the top, all carrying guns as they lay down fire at the building.

Rick did a double take through his scope.

Not all of them had guns.

One man, dressed almost entirely in black, clutched a kid in his arms. No more than seven or eight years old, he was pinned against the man in black. It took Rick a second to recognize the profile of Assef without the context of the surveillance photo Magnum had provided. Assef had his arm around the kid's neck as he hauled him into the middle of the street and threw him down in the dirt, pinning the kid there with his knee against his neck, just out of the line of sight for Rick. He could see the kid's feet, he could see part of Assef's arm, and he could hear them, but the target was just behind a burned out van.

Shit.

One of the sentries with a Kalashnikov shot at the door to the building, and Rick saw movement out of the corner of the door frame - a flash of camouflage, so one of their guys - and white and black. One of the civilians? It didn't matter, because they didn't exit the building.

Fuck, he cursed to himself. One guy, fine, two guys, sure - three? Four? More? How long before they shot the kid? Were there more?

If he opened fire on the ones he could see, what happened with the ones he couldn't? What about his own guys? Were they even alive now? And as soon as he fired a first shot, the element of surprise was over, gone. If they were this prepared for them, there was no reason not to think they didn't have their own man on the roof of another building, and then that would become his biggest problem, not the ones on the street.

"Goddamn fucking intel shitshow," he snarled. This is why he preferred to work at a distance. Nobody knew where the shot that killed them came from. He didn't have to see up close and personal what happened if he failed.

Rick mentally shook himself. Now was not the time for complaining. That would come later, at the mess hall, where everyone was fine and he could yell at the lieutenant for letting them be blind-sided.

Assef pointed to the doorway, shouting something, and then turned back to the kid pinned beneath his knee. The boy was crying, loud enough Rick could hear him above the gunfire from the sentries and the guys, and then suddenly the kid was screaming. Screaming like nothing Rick had ever heard before, not from a person, not from an animal, and it took a second before he realized there was another noise, something familiar and yet alien in a street in Afghanistan and almost lost in the sheer agony from the boy.

A power drill.

Rick remembered intel from weeks before, that some of the militia members were using power drills to torture and kill their victims.

He swallowed back bile.

Assef was shouting again, pointing again at the doorway, and this time, Rick could see Magnum fighting with another man, forcibly restraining the man from going outside, even as the surrounding plaster exploded from gunfire from the sentries. Best guess - the boy's relative, and Magnum was trying to keep the guy from running out into the street to immediately be killed.

So his team was likely trapped in the building, stuck with pretty much the same problem as Rick, except their position was known. Rick weighed the moment carefully, considering his options - none of which were good. Rule was that he was supposed to eliminate the target - Assef - and to not give his position away for anyone but the target.

He'd worry about going to the brig for not following protocol after they lived through this.

Rick fired, taking out the trigger-happy sentry lighting up the building with the lieutenant and the others, and didn't bother to make sure the man was down before setting sights on the next closest to the building. A careful breath, hold, squeeze and just like that - the threat was eliminated in a puff of red and gray, and odds were now nine to six.

Diaz and Rogers burst from the building, laying down cover fire but hitting nothing as they broke in separate directions while the sentries ducked from the unexpected sniper fire.

While the sentries were distracted and pulled in multiple directions by the sudden multiple targets, Rick grabbed his rifle, wrapping the strap around his left hand so he wouldn't drop it, roughly gauged the distance, sent a quick prayer to whoever was listening and took a running leap to the next roof-top.

It was a few feet shorter than his previous perch - part of the reason why he didn't pick it - but it had a more direct line of sight to Assef, and a low barrier wall that would provide adequate coverage from other shooters that would come looking for him from where his shots originated and give him badly needed extra seconds for his shots.

Rick wasn't sure why he thought it would work; the rest of the morning had gone oh so according to plan already, he should've expected it to further shit roll downhill from there. He almost shorted the jump, his boot catching just shy of the edge and instead of landing with both feet level on the rooftop, he stumbled, rolling rather than landing.

Right into the dog.

A snarling mass of brown fur and snapping jaws came from out of nowhere, the clank of the chain tied around its neck rattling like an anchor being dropped, and Rick barely managed to get his arm up in front of his face before the teeth came down.

The dog bit down hard on Rick's forearm, teeth sinking into skin and muscle until they hit bone, the dog violently shaking its head as Rick tried to pry the dog loose with his other hand, still caught in the rifle strap. Something tore that wasn't fabric and Rick stifled a yell. He could still hear gunfire, could still hear yelling from every direction, but what he could hear louder than anything else was the sound of the power drill and the terrified kid shrieking in agony.

"Fuck this," Rick snarled, ripping his helmet off and smashing the dog as hard as he could in the head. There was a crunch and the dog fell still and Rick found himself apologizing despite himself. Mostly nonsense, because how do you apologize to an animal that didn't know any better, half starved and just as desperate as anyone else in this hell? Blood ran freely down his arm, soaking his BDU's sleeve, seeping into the cuff of his gloves and off his fingertips, which spasmed and shook and refused to clench.

He pushed himself up with his good arm, bracing against the rooftop as he hefted the rifle with his other hand, the metal casing sliding in his grip despite the tactical gloves. The wall was short, thank God, because he didn't have the option of trying to find a secondary perch. He tried to focus.

The Talib were scattered, standing sentries for their boss as he pressed the power drill harder against the kid's leg, shouting as the father begged for his child's life. Rick didn't need to know Pashto to understand the threat: 'This is on you, this is what happens when you help the Americans'- as the sentries laid down cover fire against the other soldiers to keep them at bay.

They could handle themselves, Rick reminded himself, trying to force a steadying breath through chattering teeth, the rifle jerking as his hand spasmed painfully. Count, he thought. You can do this.

Threat assessment: sentries first. Eliminate the biggest threat to the biggest number. Fewer of them, fewer threats. The kid was just one person. Assef didn't have a gun and was relying on the others for protection.

The drill whined and caught on something Rick didn't dare consider.

"Dead men, dead men, swinging in a tree," Rick recited, bracing the barrel of rifle against the roof, his mangled hand alongside to direct the kick back. He fired once, shooting the furthest sentry center mass, the explosion of blood and bone as it tore too far to the right. Another like that and he could miss entirely.

Compensate.

He pushed the butt of the rifle harder into his shoulder. "How many dead men do you see?" He fired at the second sentry, hitting low to the right again, hitting the man in a kidney, and the man fell screaming.

Compensate. He wasn't ambidextrous, and his aim was getting further off - soon he'd be shooting at their feet. He tried to clench his right hand around the front guard, cursing the lack of bipod to stabilize the rifle, but dismissing just as quickly because only so much error could be attributed to the gun.

"Tongue turned blue and face gone gray." Another shot, another near miss, but Diaz melted out of the shadows to return fire, finally able to get clear of the building he was sheltering behind.

"Watch them twist."

The fourth sentry spun when Rick hit him high and barely nicked his shoulder, but Rogers finished the job, Rick already realigning the scope before the man's body hit the dirt.

His right arm was shaking violently now and all Rick could feel was mind-numbing cold, his teeth chattering even as he clenched his lip between them. Last one. Had to be. The others had to handle the last two sentries.

Assef wasn't walking away from this.

"Watch them sway."

He fired at Assef.

And hit Magnum.

Time stopped. Rick forgot to breathe. His mind went blank. That wasn't… Where the fuck did he come from?! He'd looked - right?

For a horrifying moment, Rick drew a blank on what he'd seen in the scope. Was it the black of Assef's keffiyeh or was it Magnum's black hair? Fucking Christ, did he just murder a SEAL?

There was another gunshot and Rick felt himself jerk, his arm spasming painfully against the rifle. He watched with morbid detachment as Assef fell, killed by the SEAL Chief - Nuzo, his brain supplied belatedly - as the Chief broke cover from the building. With the same detachment, Rick counted the bodies in the street. The two sentries he'd ignored in favor of the target that he -

Missed.

He didn't just miss, he shot an officer.

He needed to get down to the street. He'd have to go back down through an unfamiliar building. He wondered if they had any more dogs on chains he had to worry about.

He stared at his arm. It still hurt, but somehow…it seemed far away. Like something that happened to someone else. Someone on TV. It couldn't be his arm, because his arm should move when he told it to. An ugly voice in the back of his head reminded him that military working dogs were trained via bite and hold and not bite and release, and the bites were treated differently than average dog bites, and the dog on the roof seemed like he took a page from the MWD playbook.

There could be broken bones. Torn tendons. Massive tissue trauma. He laughed, almost giggled, at the idea that the blood loss was also probably a bad sign.

He grabbed something off the clothes line on the roof. He didn't even know if it was a shirt, a blanket, or pants. He wrapped it as tight as he could with his non-dominant hand and decided that would have to do. He reflexively reached for the rifle with his right, and was momentarily confused why his hand didn't grasp the weapon. Oh well. Nothing else has worked today. Why should it? He lifted the rifle and managed to haphazardly snap it to his chest harness.

He didn't remember what the house looked like as he passed through. He felt more like a ghost than a trespasser. He was pretty sure it was empty. Or at least, no one was home. No more dogs.

There was a hollow ringing in his ears, a desperate whine that grew louder and louder and he wondered if he'd triggered an IED, until he stepped outside.

The relative chaos in the street was overwhelming to the silence of the empty house.

Diaz and Rogers stood perimeter alternating between talking to the crowd that came from nowhere and talking into the radio, calling back their ride. He idly weighed the odds of them calling in a helo versus taking the jeep back. Maxwell was digging into his medic bag, roughly dressing the horrific wound on the child's leg that was bleeding through the QuikClot gauze that Maxwell pressed against it.

Nuzo was with the lieutenant, who was sprawled in the dirt, flat on his back, head lolled away from Rick. But that didn't keep him from seeing the red, bright and wet against the man's face. Or on the Chief's hands. Or soaking into the dirt. Or the way that Nuzo gently turned the man's head, and Rick could see his eyes were half open, staring into nothing, and he felt bile rise in the back of his throat as he twisted away.

The kid was crying, great heaving sobs as his mother clutched his hands in hers as she wept with him, hands shaking as they pressed against her son's face, smearing blood as she did so. He didn't know if the blood was her's or her child's until she looked up at him, cheeks tracked with tears a vicious cut across the side of her face, the gaping wound from ear to chin and deep enough he saw a flash of white when she tried to speak. It was a wound meant to maim, not to kill - to show what happened when you helped the Americans, and mark her shame to anyone who saw her.

And still he could hear her say "Manana!" over and over again.

Thank you.

Rick looked away, swallowing harshly against the sudden dryness in his mouth.

Assef was dead just beside her, a single bullet to the chest. His hand still gripped the drill, muscles spasmed tight in death, and the bloodied bit spun on high, stubborn bits of gore and skin clinging to it.

Rick couldn't help but stare, the high pitched whine suddenly the only thing he could hear. Not the kid screaming, not the desperate chant of manana, not the whump of the approaching helicopter.

Just that insufferable drill.

He toed the drill out of the dead man's hand, and crushed the tool beneath his heel, rendering it useless as the plastic crunched beneath his weight.

The whine only grew louder.

Someone grabbed him by his shoulders, spinning him around in place with little effort, and he found himself almost nose to nose with a very angry Chief.

Nuzo's mouth moved. His face was red, and not just from anger. Rick tried to concentrate, to understand the words coming out of the SEAL's mouth, but it just sounded garbled, like a partially tuned radio channel.

His gaze slid sideways, away from the chief, and found himself staring over the shorter man's shoulder.

And directly into Thomas Magnum's eyes.

His very much not dead eyes.

"You're alive," he blurted out.

Half the lieutenant's face was a swathe of blood, bright red in contrast to his pale skin and dark hair, and he was only sitting upright thanks to Diaz, who was holding another QuikClot gauze packet against Magnum's head. Magnum looked more than a little shaken, and maybe a little on the woozy side, but he was very much alive.

Rick wasn't even sure when Diaz left Rogers's side.

"No thanks to you, dipshit!" Nuzo shouted, giving him another shake, hands clenched around Rick's TAC vest. "What were you thinking?"

Rick didn't answer. He couldn't. He didn't know how he managed to miss Assef so badly that he hit an entirely different person.

The wind kicked up, blowing dirt and dust and debris into the air, the chopper having finally arrived, and Rick's focus slipped from the lieutenant and irate chief, watching as the adapted Blackhawk touched down in the middle of the road.

Had it really been that long?

Rick's arm throbbed in response, and his fingers spasmed closed, making him hiss and wince. He'd worry about it later.

The lieutenant frowned at him. Sort of. The blood made it hard to tell, and the split in his scalp where Rick's near-fatal shot hit pulled with the expression, and Magnum hissed in pain, folding up on himself as he tilted sideways before the 68-Whiskeys caught him, pulling him upright as they took him toward the waiting chopper, along with the kid and his mom.

One of the medics was talking to him, or trying to. She grabbed him by his TAC vest, pulling him along when he didn't answer. Something about inbound threat, and they needed to go.

He thought that's what she said, anyway.

She reached for his arm with the half-assed bandage wrapped around the ruined sleeve of his uniform, and he yanked it back - the first command his body actually obeyed since the roof - and said the blood wasn't his, and it was fine. The kid with the hole in his femur, the mother with the facial wound that gave her a second smile, the lieutenant with a bullet to the head - those were the ones to worry about.

The helicopter was far from quiet, but Rick heard none of it. Not Nuzo berating him, not the shouting between medics, or the pilots calling back to base. If the other Marines tried to ask him something, he heard nothing.

But he felt Magnum's stare the entire ride back, and the one time he caught the man's dark eyes, he thought he would suffocate under the weight of them. There was something…haunted there. He couldn't hold the lieutenant's accusatory gaze, and kept his head down for the rest of the flight, fixed on a point in the floor as he tried to think of what he saw down the scope of his rifle: Magnum's hair, or Assef's keffiyeh - and wondered how much he would have to drink to drown out the whine of the drill and the piercing shriek of agony, or the memory of the lieutenant lying lifeless in a nameless street in Afghanistan.

Notes: There will be a third chapter around this particular mission - namely the fall out from this and the incident that seals Thomas and Rick as "ride or die" besties, given how badly their first impressions have gone. As always, feel free to come find me on Tumblr disappearinginq! Thanks for reading!