Author's Note: I really enjoyed writing this chapter, I hope you like it! Quick question for the masses… do you like it when I have rapid fire chapters posted close together, or would you rather I spread them out more? Please review!

Disclaimer: I do not own the Outsiders.

Chapter Eight

Good Soldier

Soda lay in his bed, staring up at the ceiling and listening to the murmur of voices coming through the thin walls. He couldn't make out any of the words, but he could hear the concerned tone in Darry's voice. They were out there talking about him.

He knew it wasn't smart what he had done that evening. His leg was still aching painfully, feeling worse than it had in weeks. The doctor had told him to go slow for a while, but Soda was impatient. He hated this feeling of restraint. He wanted to be able to play football with the guys. He wanted to be able to crawl under a car to work on it. He wanted to be able to beat up Socs that wanted to mess with him.

"Hey, hey I bet his greasy hair leaked all over the floor and he slipped in it!"

The words were still echoing in Soda's head. It was what had bothered him the most out of everything the Socs had said. When they had poked fun at what had caused Soda's injury it was like they were making light of what he had been through. He had terrible nightmares about the night he had gotten injured while in the hospital. He still remembered every detail from that day. It haunted him. It would always haunt him. Because the truth was, he knew that shouldn't have survived it.

XxXxX

One month, two weeks and four days ago…

Sodapop Curtis was a good solider. Exceptionally good. Although he had never fired a gun before, he had grown up on the rough side of town. He was paranoid enough to be always looking over his shoulder. He knew to never brush off strange noises as figments of your imagination. He knew how to always be on his guard. And after seeing the looks on both his brothers' faces when he left, he was determined to make it home. He was determined to live through this.

Soda had one major flaw when it came to being a solider: he valued human life too much.

So much of Soda's life had revolved around death. He lost both of his parents. Not even a year later he lost two of his adopted brothers in two separate incidents over the course of one night. He had enough of loss. He was the soldier going back for fallen comrades. He was also the one hesitating when given orders to burn civilian villages. This always angered his commander.

But of course in the heat of an attack Soda didn't hesitate for a second to protect himself along with the other men in his platoon. In those situations Soda found that he was very capable with his firearm. He was not squeamish about it in the moment and did his best not to think too hard about the soldiers he had killed after the fact, even though they were enemy soldiers who would have liked to have killed him first.

It had been late at night when Soda's luck had finally run out. They had made camp and one of the youngest soldiers in the platoon, John, had been on watch duty. It was unclear whether he had fallen asleep or had just not noticed, but he was the first killed in the ambush. Soda had been as close to asleep as he ever got when they were away from the base when he had heard it.

"Run!" he shouted immediately, knowing something was wrong as he jumped up. "RUN!"

But he hadn't run himself. He was pulling his fellow soldiers up, pushing them away from the ambush. He fired again and again on the intruding enemy, watching several crumple in heaps but never pausing, never hesitating.

Suddenly there was an explosion. He was thrown like a rag doll and landed heavily on the hard ground. His head was spinning and he was disoriented. It was suddenly strangely quiet except for a persistent ringing in his ears. He tried to get up and run but his leg painfully buckled under his weight and he collapsed back to the ground, biting back hard against a cry of anguish.

Soda panicked even as he held his body as still as possible, hoping to be mistaken for a corpse. This was it. He couldn't run. If he couldn't run, he would be killed. And even if he wasn't found by the enemy, he would surely bleed to death from his injury. He could feel blood soaking his pants as his left leg throbbed with excruciating pain. He would die here, on the opposite side of the world, never to see his brothers again.

Suddenly someone was yanking him up, dragging him along.

"C'mon man, you gotta move!" someone was yelling frantically.

Soda's head was so fogged he didn't even know who was dragging him along, but he was relieved to hear English. It was pain beyond anything he had ever felt before, but he forced his legs to move as he staggered through the brush, leaning heavily on a fellow soldier. He gritted his teeth together, grimacing hard, his head swimming.

"Atwood, get down!" The commander was yelling. Suddenly Soda was shoved roughly back to the ground and he could hear gunfire overhead. He didn't know how long he was down before he was pulled up again and dragged forward.

"Is he even alive, Atwood?" someone shouted.

"He was a minute ago," came Seth Atwood's voice. Seth had occupied the lower bunk under Soda's back at boot camp. He was one of the few soldiers that Soda had gotten close with and considered a friend. The fog was starting to lift and Soda realized his eyes were closed and he was back on the ground lying flat on his back. "Curtis, you still alive?"

Soda let out a groan as he forced himself to blink his eyes open.

"Curtis still alive?" came the commander's voice.

"Yes sir!" Seth answered. "He's bleeding like a stuck pig though."

"Get a tourniquet and wrap him up, we gotta get back to base."

Soda stole a glance down at his legs and his head swam even more at the amount of blood he saw. His blood. Just the smell of it made him feel as if he were going to be violently ill. However he was relieved to find that it looked like both of his legs were still attached. It wouldn't have been the first time someone in their platoon had lost a limb or two.

"Hey, keep your eyes open, Curtis," Seth said, smacking Soda's cheek a few times in an attempt to keep him conscious. He was hovering over Soda as one of the other soldiers started wrapping up his leg and Soda groaned loudly as the pain intensified. "I just risked my life for your noble ass so you are not allowed to die now."

Soda was dragged painfully to his feet and he swore loudly and cried out in agony as his full weight fell on his injured leg.

"Shut him the hell up, he's gonna alert every gook within a hundred miles to our location," the commander hissed.

One of Soda's arms was thrown over Seth's shoulders and his other arm was thrown over Mike Forester's shoulders. Thankfully both were a little taller than him which took some pressure off his injury.

"Here, kid, bite down," Mike said, shoving some sort of cloth into Soda's mouth to keep him quiet.

He was held between his two comrades as they started off through the rough Vietnam terrain. He was carried all the way back to base, several hours without stopping, as he wandered in and out of consciousness. He was vaguely aware of Seth talking to him, reminding him that he had brothers to go home to. Soda would talk endlessly about Darry and Pony and Seth knew all about them.

Suddenly Soda was aware that he was being loaded into a helicopter. He reached back, grabbing Seth's arm.

"Thank you," he croaked, finding that the cloth in his mouth at fallen away at some point. He knew that he should be dead right now. He knew that Seth had saved his life by going back for him.

"You woulda done the same for me, man," he said with a shrug. Then he grinned. Seth had always had a very strange sense of humor. "I hope they don't have to cut your leg off!"

As the helicopter took off, Soda passed out cold with that thought echoing in his ears.