Note: Sorry for any missed typos. Happy thirteenth, everyone!
Breathe. Don't panic, just breathe. In, one two three four five six seven, hold, one two three four five six seven eight, out, one two three four five six seven. In, one two three…
There's a hand gripping her arm; she only really notices because her arm's jiggling, but she's not the one doing it. Then there's Sergeant Gutterson's face in front of her, and a hand on each arm, but he's a bit far away, which is weird since he's close enough to touch her, and no that's definitely someone else moving her arms for her now.
"Lena!"
She snaps to. "'m good." In, one two three… "I'm good."
"Lena." He speaks slowly, making sure she's hearing him, "I'm going back out to see what's hit."
Lena knows with an instinctive, gut-punch certainty that this is a terrible idea and grabs a handful of jacket, pulling him to a stop. "No."
"Hey," he tries to detach her hand when she won't do it herself, "Hey, it's fine, you'll be fine in here. These bunkers can take hits from stronger shit than the Taliban can even get their hands on."
"No that's not…" He needs to understand. "I'm sorry… I didn't mean to…" Damn, she'd panicked. English, use it. It's time to focus. Panic is useless. You're here to do something, and panic isn't doing something. It's waving at other somethings as they fly by. You are not helpless, and you will not act like it. Lena rights herself, shaking off the ashes and putting everything back in its place. "No, you are not going out there." This time her voice is solid, and it sounds like an order. He's not required to follow any of her orders, but you can get a long way by pretending. How does he not get that that's a terrible idea?
The jacket tugs back against her hand. "Lena, the sirens are off. It's fine." Her pretending skills need some polishing. She lets go of his jacket, defeated. "It's fine, I swear."
She listens a moment. Oh, they are off. Get it together, dollface. Lena steps out of the bunker towards the site of the explosion only to be jerked back by a hand around her arm again.
"What the fuck are you doing?" He barks. She's confused, crouching slightly and looking around again for another threat. There's nothing.
"I'm going to see if anyone is hurt."
"Just stay here. There could be unexploded shells or something."
"You don't get it both ways, Sergeant. Besides," she raises her eyebrows meaningfully, "you said it was safe."
"Jesus Christ, fine, just stay back a bit." She stays to the side.
By the time they reach the fire, it's more smoke than fire. The containerized housing units are metal, and there's not a lot in them to keep a fire going. Several people from the surrounding units are already out and inform them upon their arrival that everyone is present and accounted for. There's a lot of relieved laughing and 'holy shit, I pissed the bed' jokes, and since everyone is safe and – except for one bump gained from falling out of bed in shock – uninjured there's nothing to do but laugh along with them. The wave of adrenaline shock at the explosion is starting to wear off, leaving her giddy and a tad shaky. When the cleanup crew arrives, Lena takes that as her cue to move on.
It's then she realizes it was her CHU she saw get blown to shit.
"Well sergeant, it seems the universe agrees with you about my wardrobe choices. Although if you wanted to see me in ACUs that badly you could have just said so."
She laughs at her own joke, earning a few confused looks from those around her. It's fine; she's alive. Clothes? Who cares? Fucks are not given. The world can behold the field in which she sows her fucks, and lo, it will be empty. She can go shopping when she gets home, celebrate that a bunch of clothes got blown up and burnt instead of her. See? Bright side to everything. Actually, now that she thinks about it she's really looking forward to the idea; it'll be nice.
"Lena?"
"I'm fine. See?" She raises her hands to fully demonstrate her fine-ness. "I am A-OK."
"Yeah." It's a syllable drawn out and run through with doubt. "Come on. We need to get you squared away. I doubt you really want to spend a night in the barracks." Mm, no, no she does not. Single-housing CHUs are a hot commodity, and Lena hopes that they have extras.
"I can take care of it, Sergeant." Wow, she is in a really great mood right now. "I mean, you should probably sleep. You've had a much shittier night than I have."
His face scrunches together a little more than usual. "I'll deal. Now let's go." Well fine then Sergeant Cranky Pants. He starts off in the direction of what is probably the place that will assign her housing, and she complies, although what they'll do about it at this hour is anyone's guess. Or maybe they stay open late in the event of surprise rocket attacks. Either way, her cooperation means they will both get sleep sooner, so it wouldn't be polite to stand and argue.
The rest of the base is quiet as they walk, unmarked by Taliban rockets or mortars. From the safety of the bunker, they could hear the echoingly loud brrrrrrrttt of the C-RAM phalanx guns, designed to shoot down incoming projectiles before they could hit. Lena had seen a demo once and been duly impressed. Her poor little CHU must have been hit in the first volley. It was really lucky none of the others were damaged.
Lena slows her pace, already turning back before the thought is fully formed.
"Lena?"
Another thought bumps up against the edge of the first, growing insistent, and she turns in an entirely new direction, picking up certainty and then speed. The prison.
o.O.o
"Where the hell are your shoes?"
"I dunno," Lena waves vaguely over her shoulder, trying to catch her breath; Gutterson's not even a little winded. "Left 'em somewhere back there."
"What the fuck?"
Lena throws up her hands in exasperation. "Well, I don't know about you, but I can't run that fast in heels."
"What do you think that says about wearing them in the first place?"
"Sergeant, I promise you that I'll listen to all the I-told-you-so's you want when we have a quiet moment, but for now I have a bigger problem, so let's focus on that."
"Oh right, well excuse me for being concerned about you impaling your feet on sharp objects."
"Fine, I appreciate it. Jesus." What she's not sure she appreciates is his presence. There are three possible scenarios. One, she's paranoid and dragging him into an unnecessary waste of time when he could be elsewhere. Two, she's not paranoid and this is going to get ugly and she's dragging him into a shitstorm, or three, she's not paranoid and he might not be the one she wants next to her when the clouds burst. Option three is quickly dismissed, earlier events in the evening being pretty good evidence of him not being a traitor. Lena reaches a compromise between options one and two.
"Sergeant, I need you to stay and make sure the MPs don't let anyone near Hadid's cell."
"Not gonna happen." Gutterson crosses his arms, dug in. "And while we're at it, how about an explanation for whatever the fuck we're doing here."
Oh Christ, there is so not time for this. But nor is there time for her to be annoyed with his refusal to cooperate. Adapt and survive. "I'm pretty sure someone's going to try to kill him if they haven't already."
"Oh yeah, why's that."
"Because the odds of a rocket randomly hitting the one room I sleep in and missing the others packed tight around it are about nil. So for starters, I'm going to go with someone besides the Taliban being behind that, and I'm also going to guess they don't want Hadid to talk."
"And you thought running up here barefoot was a good idea." But instead of blocking the path he's already walking ahead of her into the prison, so that's something. "You have your ID?"
"Yeah." Tim flashes his own ID and Lena gives her credentials to the outer guards, along with instructions that only military personnel be allowed in or out. When they reach Hadid's cell, there's someone waiting to let them in. Unfortunately, the cells in Bagram have only metal bars for ceilings – great for watching prisoners, not so great if you don't want to be a trapped rat in a cage.
"Do any of the interrogation rooms have a real roof?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Let's get him in cuffs and go then."
The guard throws a look at her feet, then at Gutterson, who remains silent. He decides not to ask questions and shuffles Hadid into a full set of shackles. Three minutes later they're in a sterile room with exposed cinderblock walls where the only window is a six inch square piece of glass near the top of the door.
The sergeant pushes Hadid into a back corner, pulls one of the chairs off-center of the door, and sits down, gun resting in his lap.
Lena's first thought is that he's too exposed. The pervasive, growing fear that she's leading him into harm's way negates any sense of relief she might feel at having a heavily armed, trained killer along. It doesn't matter that he's just returned from a mission given by her own directive. It doesn't matter that one of his fellows is being flown by the critical care air transport team to Germany for his injuries. For a sickening moment she's back on that road, lying in the dirt with a shard of metal sticking out of her ribs, grabbing the shoulder of the person on top of her but he's not moving because he's dead, and she's about to be too, and the worst part is the stark, horrific realization that this is all her fault.
You are not helpless.
"Alright I'll stay here and watch him. You go wake up the captain and let him know what's going on. You've got two guns, so leave whichever isn't your favorite with me, and I'll take good care of it."
"Have you ever shot a gun?"
"I'm pretty sure I can grasp the concept of point and shoot."
"That's what I thought. Get in the corner and stay down. And since you have a phone, how about you call the Captain." Sit in the corner my ass. Anger is the best defense against fear.
Lena walks around to stand in front of him. "Ok, let me try this again –"
"Look, I didn't come here because I need the excitement in my life. I came in here with you because I believe you, and I've been through too much trouble to get that piece of shit," he jerks his head at the corner where Hadid sits against the wall, "to have someone mess that up too, so I don't give a good goddamn about whatever high and mighty bullshit you have about why I shouldn't be here. Shut up and go make the goddamned call." He gestures to the side with the gun barrel. "In the corner."
The look on his face says she's already lost this fight, but experience and her conscience won't be quiet, so knowing better becomes irrelevant. "Sergeant –"
The chair falls over as he pushes abruptly to his feet and Lena's considers the very real possibility that he's about to bodily throw her in the corner. But then the sound of glass breaking catches his attention and hers, and the small, dark ball that flies past her shoulder and bounces off the back wall lands on the table with a metallic clang.
Her heart takes a single pounding beat and then stops. The fear evaporates, some small part of her brain already accepting the inevitable, or perhaps it has become so intense as to be unrecognizable. There are no breathing exercises in the world that can rein in the adrenaline blooming through her blood and even if there were, the seven seconds between the time a grenade is thrown and the moment it detonates don't leave time for such luxuries.
"Oh s –"