A/N: I've seen Virgil written as a total pacifist, and I personally disagree on that point. I feel Virgil is at heart a good man and I've always loved these two quotes about good men (and women).
"...So hope like hell your captor is an evil man. A good man will kill you with hardly a word."
Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms
"There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man."
Patrick Rothfuss, The Kingkiller Chronicle
The heavy rain was pelting down from the leaden skies over Zimbabwe, an unceasing rattle on the metal hides of the two Thunderbirds. It collected in little rivers and became a dozen miniature waterfalls pouring off wings, fins and cowlings and down the pointed red nose cone of Thunderbird One to turn the bare earth beside the open cast emerald mine into a quagmire.
But Jochen Ardaker, owner of the emerald mine and sprawled half seated in the reddish-orange mud had no eyes for that.
He only had eyes for the bolt action rifle pointed at him, the rock-steady hand on the trigger and the cold brown eyes locked on his. Behind the brown-eyed man with the green baldric a second man with a steel-grey baldric was sprawled on the ground, pale and blue around his lips and making an awful wheezing gasp each time he breathed. One bloodied hand was clamped over the bullet hole in his chest, the other clawed at the mud.
'Sucking chest wound' was the instant diagnosis Jochen had heard from the man in the green baldric. He was vaguely aware of what that meant- a hole through the chest wall, usually into a lung as well. Every breath in pulled air into the chest cavity and collapsed the lungs a bit more, if a lung was damaged every breath out did the same. The hand clamped over the hole and the man's own congealing blood sealing the gaps would buy time, but not much.
Jochen cursed The Hood for letting him think that he could pull off a scheme like this- luring the Thunderbirds in with a false report of miners trapped in a mud slide, taking out the pilots and stealing their equipment. The Hood would take the planes, he just wanted their digging machines to expand his operation.
The Hood had told him only the eldest and second youngest had military training- the ones in grey and yellow baldrics. A woman in a blue and charcoal grey uniform was dangerous but unlikely to come to something like this. The Hood assured him the ones in green, orange and red were all civilians. He'd told him their names too but Jochen wasn't really a 'names' guy. Descriptions were much easier to remember and it was so helpful that they were all colour coded.
Jochen had been pleased when just two pilots disembarked. Sure, Green was a big guy, but Jochen was a miner. He'd dealt with men twice the size of Green and come out on top. But still, two of them and one of him meant he had to prioritise.
So he'd guided Grey away to point out the collapsed section of the mine while Green went back into his Thunderbird to ready his equipment. Halfway to the top of the pit Jochen had pulled a rifle from an equipment shack, intending to shoot Grey in the back and loop back to take care of Green, trusting the noise of the rain on their Thunderbirds to cover the gunshot. He must have made a noise as he closed the door and Grey had turned just in time for the shot to miss his heart and take him lower in the chest instead.
Standing over his victim with the smell of cordite hanging in the air and cocking the rifle to finish him off, Jochen had heard a wordless bellow of incandescent rage moments before the impact of a lowered shoulder to his back smacked him into the mud. The rifle had been wrestled from his hands and pointed at his head while Green glanced at the injured man's chest and tapped the icon on his shoulder to summon help.
Now, only seconds later, with the rain pouring down and looking down the barrel of his own gun, Jochen knew he was going to die. He saw the thoughts going through the younger man's mind, the tightening around his eyes and clenching of his jaw as the decision was made. Green set his feet more firmly in the mire, braced for the recoil and bent his head to aim.
"No...Virgil."
The voice was strained, a sickening, rasping wheeze and weak. Grey had stretched out with his spare hand to grab Green's ankle, restraining him with just that light touch. "You… you...don't ...do that."
A corner of Jochen's mind noted the distinction with an abstract curiosity. Not the 'we don't do that' he would have expected from International Rescue but 'you don't do that'.
"He doesn't, but I do." A new voice broke in.
Jochen risked turning his head to look and saw a third man in a yellow baldric striding towards them. He swore softly, he'd missed one! Yellow had a dive knife in hand and his narrowed amber eyes told Jochen he had both the will and the desire to use it.
The knife flashed down and Jochen knew no more...
.
..
...
...until he woke.
Tied to a dead tree.
The now bent rifle tossed in the mud at his feet and his head was killing him.
Yellow must have knocked him out with the pommel of his dive knife, Jochen realised as he looked around.
He could see a reddish patch left where Grey had lain. Deep puddles in the mud showed where the Thunderbirds had sat. And a GDF flier was roaring through the murky sky towards him.
Jochen ground his teeth in impotent frustration. He shouldn't have listened to The Hood.