A/N: We get a glimpse into Fitz's military past and how it has changed who he is today. Enjoy and feel free to leave a review or comment!

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing from ABC's Scandal or anyone/anything else.

I remember waking up early on a warm April day eight years ago in my tent in Kosovo, around five A.M. I was actually up earlier than normal; we had to be fully dressed in gear and ready to go by six thirty. Warren was to my left and Phil to my right, both still asleep.

I never knew that would be the last time I saw Phil.

I got up, ran the usual two miles and lifted weights just like every other day, showered, and ate a granola bar for breakfast. Warren and I, as Navy SEALs, desperately missed the water; we felt landlocked, which, technically, we were. We were the only two SEALs on this mission; the rest were two captains, three Marines, four SWAT officers, and three soldiers from Canada that tagged along. Phil was one of the Marines assigned with us.

I came back from the showers around the main base building at 6:10, fully dressed and armed, to find three members of our team left, waiting on my instructions. They informed me the others had gone out early on word that some local terrorists were getting an early start this morning, and we were supposed to stay behind and watch over camp.

Me, a trained Navy SEAL, being left to watch a camp and babysit three soldiers on their second mission.

It took all I had to hold back my laughs and anger.

But that's what we did. We watched over camp until ten that morning, guarding the perimeter, ready to fire if necessary. Captain Owen came and informed me we had lost two men to three hand grenades in a humvee. As I watched the other men file in for lunch since it had been a slow day, I became more afraid to ask who had fallen. He proceeded to tell me it was a Marine and a SWAT officer. As I scanned the tables, I immediately knew who wasn't there, and one of the two men was Phil. I thanked Captain Owen and saluted him before he walked away.

I had no time for shedding tears, but the fresh wounds to my heart hurt for days. They were flying home on the first plane available, which would be in two days. I was asked by our mission leader to do the honor of escorting them to back to the States. I said yes without hesitation; I needed to make sure my fellow military brothers got back home safe and sound.

Little did I know I would be on a plane that afternoon, fighting for my own life.

I remember everything so vividly, even to this day. We had swapped duties for the afternoon, and Warren and I were assigned to patrol and look for the same man we had been searching for for three days now. We were still hopeful and had clues he was still in the area.

I had first met Warren in SEAL training. Our first training simulation together was on the beach, at night, laying at the water's edge and letting it wash over us, feeling the effects of drowning. We got each other through that rough first night.

He was from Utah, a 27 year old civil engineer. We were lying beside each other, among sixty other men, and they were dropping like flies. He looked over at me and whispered that his name was Warren. I said, "I'm Fitz." He looked me dead in the eyes and said, "Don't quit on me now. We can do this. When we make it out, I'll buy you a beer."

I knew then he was something special. I had no idea he would be my best friend a few weeks later, and that we would end up on the same mission a year and a half later.

I jumped in the driver's seat of the humvee with my M16, helmet and vest on, and Warren got in the passenger seat, ready to go. I turned the camouflaged truck on and put it in drive, not thinking much of just the two of us being in there as opposed to five or six people. It was empty besides us, which was very unusual. It was what we were told to take, and we were not going to argue.

Our only clue for the day was our guy was last seen wearing a light brown bandana around his head and was carrying both an automatic rifle and a pistol. I drove down the dusty dirt road through the outskirts of town and looked around for him or anything suspicious. Warren had his M16 in hand, ready to fire. We drove like this for an hour and twenty-seven minutes until we noticed a man constantly looking back at us as he and some children ran away, having stirred up the dust.

I lowered my sunglasses and looked in his direction. I slowed down and called out to him, holding up a picture to see if he had seen our guy.

"Hey, what are you doing? Have you seen this guy?" I shouted, but it did no good. He disappeared with the children and as we slowly rolled forward, I had a sense of nervousness wash over me. Something just wasn't right. My heart skipped a beat as I turned to my right and looked at Warren, who had the same feeling.

Then I knew.

All I heard was a loud boom, then saw a flash of light, followed by scorching flames. It took me a second to realize what had happened; I was too focused on getting out of the melting truck and thick, black smoke.

They had planted a bomb in the road.

I had only seen horror stories of this kind of thing on TV.

My next thought was Warren. I was crawling out of the flame-engulfed truck and looked under it; Warren was on the ground on the other side. I could smell my hair burning, my skin charred underneath my clothes. I knew these had to be at least second-degree burns. I couldn't feel my left foot; I was afraid to look down at it. I saw it was mangled, melted, just barely hanging on by some skin. I don't remember anything cutting it, but it was such a clean slice, a piece of shrapnel must have cut it off, right at the bone. There was so much adrenaline going through me, I didn't feel any of the pain. I tried crawling around to the other side of the burning humvee to get to Warren. He was unconscious; when I called his name, he never answered. I didn't see anyone around, but I knew they were coming. They had to be on their way.

I finally dragged myself around in the dirt to him and pulled both of us, best I could, as far away from the truck as I could. He finally started coming to and I held him in my soot-covered lap, knowing I couldn't get us to a safer location.

"Hey buddy, look at me," I said shakily, coughing up dust. "Can you move your arms and legs for me?"

"How are you?" Warren asked, moving his arms, but unable to move his legs. "Well, they fucked up my legs, but I'll make it out," he sighed, wiping his face.

"They got my foot, and we're both pretty burned up," I told him. "But we're gonna get out of here, Warren. And then I'm gonna go get us some beers," I joked, having to make light of the situation.

"How the fuck are we getting out of here, man? Neither of us can walk," he said, holding his side. He pulled up his shirt and looked down at his stomach, slowly turning purple. "Damn it," he sighed, losing hope.

I prayed that our captain would come for us soon; Warren could still be saved, even with the internal bleeding.

"Man, it'll be ok. They're coming for us. I know they heard it that close," I reassured him.

It was then I saw a kid come out from a nearby house and emerge through the smoke and dust, coming towards us. He was dressed in dirty brown pants and a matching shirt, with shaggy black hair and no shoes.

"I don't speak Albanian, man," Warren whispered weakly. I continued to hold him close to me as the little boy approached us faster.

"I'll do my best," I said, hoping I was fluent enough to get this kid to help. He wasn't with the crew of bad ones. I hadn't seen him earlier.

He walked up to us and stopped, looking me dead in the eyes. I had to get him on our level if I wanted to get us out of there. Our guys still hadn't shown up, even after seven whole minutes.

"Hej pak djalë, çfarë është emri juaj?" I asked him what his name was, hoping he would understand and get closer to us.

But he didn't. He just looked at us silently. I had a feeling we were already in deep trouble.

"Ku janë prindërit tuaj? Mund të shkoni të merrni ato për të na ndihmuar? Ne jemi të mirë. Ne nuk do të ju lënduar," I asked him where his parents were because we needed help. I also explained we were the good guys and were not going to hurt him.

He stared blankly into my eyes, looked down at Warren, and back up to me before running back into his house. I was hopeful he would bring help back.

Boy, was I wrong.

The boy ran back and stopped in front of us, turning back to shout to his father that we were the men he had found. A man emerged from the clay house and around the burning vehicle, and as he got closer, I saw he had a gun. He was a tall man, about 6'4", dressed in tan clothes and a white robe just like his son, had a shaggy beard, longer black hair, and a cloth hat on his head. Surprisingly, he had shoes on, and as he got closer, I realized the gun was a shotgun. I was thankful it was only a shotgun and not a military rifle.

We could live through close range shotgun wounds.

He approached us and stopped after he saw our intense burns and bleeding wounds, then turned to his son and whispered some things to him. I couldn't hear anything they said; all I did was pray to God that our people were on their way to get us.

Next thing I knew, he had the barrel pointed at my face and was yelling at me, demanding answers as to why we were there. It was in that split second that I decided I wouldn't utter a word of Albanian to this man. They were also talking so fast, I barely understood what they said. Warren looked up at me and got the gun pointed at him as the man loaded it.

"We were making patrol rounds when our truck blew up," I barely got out before he started yelling at me again. His face was getting red with anger and he pointed the gun back at me, telling me to quit speaking in English and explain why we were really there. He then accused us of searching for all men possible to question and torture.

I remembered I had to keep my cool and play dumb. This was killing me on the inside. If my guns hadn't been in the truck, I would've shot this man between the eyes. I knew he was our inside guy.

He was too calm, yet also fearful.

"Name," he said in poor English.

"Fitzgerald Grant," I said, the adrenaline of the explosion wearing off. I was beginning to feel the effects of it all, especially as I watched blood continue to pour out of my ankle and my foot dangle by a thin piece of skin. If I was feeling this weak already, I knew Warren was almost unconscious again.

He pointed to Warren and he weakly replied.

"Warren Taylor," he said with a cough. I pulled him closer to me and got the gun pressed to my chest. He told the boy to go inside. He followed his orders.

"Why you here," he asked angrily, ready to kill us. I was furious.

This asshole knew English.

Here we were, suffering second and third degree burns, partially paralyzed, lacking a foot, and having internal bleeding. I spoke Albanian and he spoke English.

We were killing each other.

But he was the bad guy.

"Daily patrolling," Warren said. "We aren't trying to kill anyone."

"Bullshit," the man yelled, hitting both of us upside the head with the gun. I felt the whole right side of my face begin to swell.

He pointed the gun back at me and demanded I tell him the truth that we were not trying to kill their people, we were not the bad guys, that we were there for good, to help them.

"We are here to help your people get rid of terrorism," I said. The next thing I remember is hearing a few loud bangs and feeling bullets rip through my shoulder and hurt ankle. I cried out quietly in pain and all I could hear was him shouting at us. I didn't even try to make out what he was saying once I looked down and saw Warren.

He had shot him in the head and chest. He was bleeding out, suffering slowly as he took his last few breaths.

"I can't quit on you now," he whispered weakly, trying to focus on me.

"It's ok, Warren. We're going to be ok. You're going to be ok. I love you, man," I assured him, squeezing his hand. He squeezed back and nodded understandingly.

"There's a letter in my bag," he barely got out. "Give it to Hailey...tell her I love her."

"I will," I said, fighting back tears as the man continued yelling and began hitting me with the gun again.

I watched my friend take his last breath. I watched him die. I was covered in his warm blood.

My first instinct was to kill this man, but I couldn't do that. It wouldn't be right.

He punched me in the face and grabbed me by my collar, dragging my beaten, burned body through the dirt and into his dirty house. I saw a fire crew coming to put the truck out as he shut the concrete door quickly.

He said nothing after that. He threw me in a dark room with no furniture, no blankets, no food or water. He shut the door and left me.

Left me there to die.

I dragged myself to the corner, looking at the small window near the ceiling. I had to get up there, but I had no idea how.

I leaned against the cold, gray wall and looked at my disgusting foot. My friend just died in my arms and I had to leave him out in the dirt. I would have to tell his wife. This Albanian-speaking man took me. I would bleed out before they found me. I was already weak.

I knew I was going to die, and I didn't even get a chance to tell Mellie goodbye.

I knew I had to do something for my foot. I managed to get the boot off my right foot and took my sweaty sock off, ripping it into strips. I slowly unbuttoned my uniform shirt and managed to get my bloody, burned t-shirt off and sighed. I was exhausted.

But I had to keep going if I was to live.

That required tearing my own foot off. I picked up my dangling foot, hanging on by some skin and tendons, and pulled out my pocket knife. I quickly grabbed the t-shirt and bit down on it, knowing how bad this would hurt. I opened the blade and quickly cut through the skin and tendons, trying not to scream, and wrapped the shirt around the still bleeding wound, then tied the strips around it to keep it compressed.

I had just cut off my own foot.

What the hell was I supposed to do with this foot lying on the ground beside me? They couldn't re-attach it now.

I put on my uniform shirt and wiped my tired eyes. I laid down on the cold, dirt floor and closed my eyes, praying that someone would find me.