Prelude for Losers?: Church

Find out what happened before the events of When We Were Soldiers in the Prelude for Losers? specials!

In this prequel collection, you'll find connected character-specific introspective one shots that delve into the backstories of our favorite mismatched group of soldiers before they arrived in Chorus.

The third story is Church's.

Main Pairing(s): Chex, Sheila x Lopez, Docnut, Grimmons, Tuckington

Legal Disclaimer: I do not own Red vs. Blue or any of the show's characters. They are the rightful properties of Rooster Teeth.

Prelude for Losers?— Church:

The sounds of fighting filled the corridors. The noise reverberated through the halls, heavy and explosive-filled. Epsilon stood in the medical bay's doorway, his head pounding along with the erratic thudding of his heart and lungs.

He was panicking, suddenly feeling overwhelmed. The instant that the death knells for this fucked up project of his father's had begun, Epsilon had felt as though he were drowning and falling all at once. Like he'd be crushed under the weight of it all too.

…Which would definitely happen, especially if he didn't start moving his fucking ass like yesterday.

That one thought alone compelled his sluggish body into action. Self-preservation became a motivational factor, one that moved Epsilon's ass into the hallway.

The sounds of fighting faded into the distance, getting fewer and farther in-between with each heavy footstep. Looking around him, Epsilon could see just why that was.

There were bodies in the hallway, too numerous to count. Epsilon couldn't bring himself to look too closely down at any of them because he knew. He just knew that his genetically engineered batch "siblings" and his naturally born sister's comrades were among the number of bodies littering the area.

Somehow, out of all the oddly named Fragments, Epsilon knew that he was the last. Lucky him, he guessed.

…A "way to bring an ongoing, who-knows-how-long-it's-been-going-on pointless war to a swift and decisive end" his ass.

Dimly, his brain unhelpfully informed him that there was no sign of cyan or black in the quick glances of his surroundings that he allowed himself. Epsilon knew that Washington had been taken to recovery somewhere outside of the facility after Epsilon had freaked out and nearly killed both of them.

He felt a pang of guilt about what had happened with Washington, the unfamiliar feeling gnawing in the back of his mind. Epsilon wanted to say it hadn't been his fault even though he knew that was bullshit. The truth was, he had remembered something from Alpha and he'd just panicked. Washington had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. A victim, like so many people in this world.

Of course, that incident was the reason why Epsilon had been in the med bay for observation in the first place, and it also happened to coincide with when shit had started to hit the fan.

In a way, some of them had been lucky. Washington was still likely alive thanks to that relocation, and the sounds of distant fighting probably meant that Tex and Carolina were too.

So, there. Epsilon guessed that there was some glimmer of hope or whatever type of bullshit people liked to talk about to keep them going. He could understand that, seeing as how he had had his own coping mechanism to keep pushing forward.

A while ago, Tex had told him to leave the second that he was able to, to not look back. He fucking didn't need to be told twice.

Leonard Church blinked open blue eyes to stare up at the merciless stars above. His head currently hurt from the fucking hangover he was bound to experience well into tomorrow.

That was to be expected considering how Church now spent his days since his escape, wandering from region to region as cheaply as he could. Whenever he had the credits for it, he'd get plastered at some dive bar. Naturally.

The cyborg groaned and realized that he must have passed out outside again. Fucking figured. Church tried not to puke as he rolled over onto his side on the cold, hard ground.

As far as he was concerned, fucking memories could go fuck themselves.

Church's self-destructive habits continued for months afterwards. They probably would have continued even longer if life hadn't interfered in that fucking nasty habit it tends to have. One day, he found himself in a bar in some dingy town that he couldn't even bother to remember the name of. That's when it happened, when his vagabond solitary exile lifestyle came to a sudden end.

On that seemingly normal day, Church was sitting at the counter mentally preparing himself to chug back his last remaining credits. It was always his hope that he could ignore things for yet another day if he stuck to what he considered his normal routine. Church had been designed to store memory thanks to the neural cybernetics he carried with him, so ignoring shit was sort of hard to do. Not that that kept him from fucking trying.

He had been just about to order when a group of soldiers or mercs or who-the-fuck-cares had started picking on a tall, blond-haired boy wearing blue. The bullied victim had evidently glanced at the assholes "funny" while cradling a gun in his arms. Out of the corner of his eye, Church surmised that the poor kid had simply wandered into the dive by accident. Unlike Church, he doubted the kid had meant to be at the bar at all.

So, basically, the kid was being picked on by a group of power hungry bullies. Real fucking original. Church tried his hardest to fucking ignore what was going on, but it was hard when it was only five fucking feet away.

"I do not understand the question." The blond stated blankly in response to whatever insult one of the bullies had just said about his hypothetical mother.

That only got the assholes angrier. Naturally, they apparently decided to settle things with their fists. Real fucking original, these assholes. Ignorance was apparently not bliss in this situation.

Church really didn't want any more blood on his shoes or anything else that might kill the pretty good buzz he was just now starting to get. He reluctantly got up from the counter to say something to the jerks, even though he knew he'd likely make things a whole lot worse before everything was said and done. He was good at running away and avoidance, not at combat.

Of course, that was right about the time when the younger boy's gun decided to apparently speak up instead.

"HOSTILES IDENTIFIED." A surprisingly loud electronic voice spoke from the weapon, "READYING SUPPRESSION FIRE."

…A few well-aimed warning shots later, and Church and the blond were the only ones still in the now hole-filled bar. Even the bartender had disappeared through the back at the sight of the shooting, talking gun.

"Oh, hello." The young man in blue turned around to greet the still gaping cyborg, "Are you my new best friend?"

The young man's name was Michael J. Caboose. Like Church, he was a genetically engineered man created for the war.

Caboose didn't talk a lot about his past beyond that his batch "siblings" were comprised of a whole lot of sisters, and that he was apparently left to fend for himself after one too many "friendly fire" accidents. Although, in retelling, Caboose alternated from saying those friendly fire incidents were just games to being no way his fault whatsoever.

Truthfully, Church had wanted to get rid of Caboose as fast as he could. Having another person around kind of cramped his "wanting to be left the hell alone" lifestyle. But, for some inexplicable reason, Caboose seemed to oddly like him.

Following the declaration that Church was his best human friend, Caboose insisted on going wherever Church went. The blond insisted that his sentient weapon, Freckles, was his best gun friend…which, naturally, pissed Church off since he was playing second fiddle to a fucking gun.

At first, Church was vehemently annoyed by the forced company. But, he didn't have it in him to really kick the kid to the curb, as much as he was often tempted to do so. Where the fuck else would a genetically engineered soldier go once they had been forcefully removed from their batch? It wasn't like there were a shit ton of options for people like Church and Caboose.

…Church stopped drinking too. The dark-haired man wasn't quite sure if the two were related or not, but when he was being pestered by Caboose, he found himself thinking less and less of those days with the project.

Caboose, as it turned out, had a habit of finding rather sentient machines all on his own whenever he would wander off. Church was amazed at how freaking natural it seemed to come to the blond. Dumb luck in the truest sense of the term.

This natural habit of Caboose's was evidently how he had found Freckles. Church had only heard that story about fifty fucking times during their travels. Now, apparently, this Caboose talent was going to bite Church in the ass.

"Goddamn it, Caboose!" The cobalt-wearing man couldn't help but exclaim in exasperation, "I leave you alone for five fucking minutes and—!"

"This is Church." Caboose ignored Church's rant to address the rather feminine-looking robot in gunmetal green armor standing next to him, "He yells a lot, but he is nice!"

Church sighed, knowing he wasn't going to win this fight when Caboose was already fucking introducing him to who was obviously going to become the newest member of their traveling party. Did Church ever get a say in what was going on in his fucking life?

"Hello. It's nice to meet you." The robot said in a voice that was painfully familiar to the Virtual Intelligence of Project Freelancer, and Church absently wondered if they weren't somehow related.

"Yeah. Great." He rolled his blue eyes, already knowing the drill, "So, what should we call you?"

"My name is Sheila."

The motely party of four, which consisted of two genetically engineered humans and two Virtual Intelligences, traveled without any real destination in mind for quite a while. They simply avoided going to regions with a lot of fighting, which suited Church perfectly. Avoiding shit was exactly what he wanted to do.

Oddly enough, Church found Sheila's presence to be surprisingly tolerable. Her polite mannerisms balanced out Caboose's more annoying tendencies as well as Freckles' "shooting" ones.

Honestly, he preferred having the others around to drinking himself all alone into a stupor. It was oddly comforting in a way to focus more on keeping their little group together and safe than reliving old nightmares and regrets. …Not that Church would have ever told those assholes that out loud. He had a fucking reputation to uphold, after all.

Eventually, their party made their way to a dump of a town called Blood Gulch. It was there that they ran into a red-armored soldier named Sarge, an older man who seemed to be in the habit of collecting strays from the ongoing Red and Blue conflict and giving them a home of sorts.

Sarge had some questionable behaviors like sleeping with his shotgun and insisting that "Red was better than that damn dirty Blue!" There was no doubt in the cyborg's mind that Sarge was insane, but Church recognized that the older soldier read situations better than he was often given credit for. Church figured tagging along with someone who actually knew what they were doing would help them stay alive longer, so the four merged into the odd, mismatched family that Sarge had put together.

There was Doc, a medic-in-training whose "take no sides" mentality drove Church up the fucking wall more often than not, as did the glasses-wearing pacifist's tendency to describe orange juice as a cure-all for just about everything.

Next was Donut, a cheerful, exuberant orphan in pink. Church actually couldn't bring himself to hate Donut too much, although he definitely wasn't in love with the dirty-blond's innuendos and tendency to break into song-and-dance numbers at the drop of a hat. If anything, Church simply questioned Donut's judgement since he was often hanging around Doc (who seemed to have a bit of a crush on Donut that the pink-wearing young man seemed oblivious towards) or Caboose.

After Donut there was Simmons, a redheaded suck-up extraordinaire and a nerd of the highest order. Church found the anxiety-ridden man frustrating, although the two did bond a bit over loving coffee.

Lopez was a robot that Sarge had built out of spare parts. The brown-armored robot only spoke Spanish, though Lopez and Sheila hit it off really well for some reason that Church couldn't figure out. He tried not to think too much about York and Carolina when he saw the two robots huddled closely together.

Finally, there was Tucker. The dark-skinned man was an asshole who liked to talk big, but he was also okay too. Church and Tucker ended up getting along fairly well, much to Caboose's chagrin. The blond had developed something of a one-sided rivalry with the teal-wearing Tucker.

…Sarge's group really was like a family, and Church maybe wasn't as miserable as he liked to claim to be all the time when he was around them. But, still, being with them made him miss his own family more than he'd care to admit.

His sister and Tex had somehow managed to track Church and the others down in Blood Gulch despite how off the beaten path Sarge liked to traverse. When they first found the group, both women stood in front of them—intimidating as fuck.

Church almost thought Simmons was going to piss his pants out of fear for being around females, and Tucker seemed to be mentally debating if flirting was worth the obvious physical repercussion.

Carolina in particular looked like she had gone through hell, as if she couldn't let her guard down even in an obvious safe place.

Honestly. Church wasn't sure what was more shocking: the fact that Tex and Carolina had even bothered to track him down at all, or the fact that they had obviously done so together. He truthfully would have thought the two women would have ditched each other the second they could. …That, or they would have killed one another.

"Church." Carolina's voice was hoarse when she spoke and he couldn't help but wonder when the last time she'd even drank something was.

The redhead took a step forward and reached out as though she wanted to touch him, to make sure that her brother was real. She hesitated, however, awkwardly holding back. Carolina never was good at the touchy-feely shit. Must be a family trait.

Truthfully, he was just glad to know she was still there.

"Screw it." Church thought a second before he was hugging her: "Just shut the fuck up for now, okay?" He said as she returned the gesture not a moment later.

Tex watched the display for a moment, a slight sort-of smile curving her lips upward before she turned to leave.

Church broke away from his surprisingly understanding-in-this-moment older sibling to chase after the black-armored redhead. It always seemed that one of them had to be in pursuit of the other. That was just how things had always been between them.

"It wouldn't kill you to fucking stay for a while, you know." He said as nonchalantly as he could while struggling for breath next to her. Goddamn it, Tex was fast when she wanted to be.

"I didn't want to mess up the reunion." She joked, and Church realized just how much he had really missed her too.

Before he could even think of how to respond, Tex leaned forward and kissed him.

In that moment, Church couldn't even tell up from down. Fucking bitch always knew how to get him to shut up.

Sarge continued to get new additions to his group. A few months after Tex and Carolina had found them, a new guy named Grif came to Blood Gulch with his little sister, Kaikaina.

The orange-wearing Grif preferred eating and napping to talking about his past, so all Church really knew about the Grif siblings was that they were genetically engineered and had been kicked out of their batch for supposed imperfections. It seemed that, like Church, Grif had decided that Sarge's offer could at least help protect his sister.

…Oh, and the only other thing Church knew about Grif was that, for one bullshit reason or another, he and Simmons did not get along. At all.

The two were constantly yelling at each other day in and day out in such a way that Church was starting to get Caboose-level migraines whenever he simply overheard them. And, yet, there was something intangible about the way they interacted, and in the secretive glances that they both threw to the other when they thought that no one was looking.

Church noticed it one time after Grif had called Simmons a "fucking kiss-ass" for the umpteenth time. The cyborg, narrowing blue eyes in annoyance at their usual antics, watched as Grif and Simmons had stormed off to opposite sides of the barracks.

Simmons, very red-faced and flustered, mumbled a "fat-ass" under his breath as he walked past Church. But, his green eyes were almost feverish when he risked a glance back over his shoulder at Grif. Grif, meanwhile, had an undefinable, intense stare when he turned slightly to regard Simmons again.

The two quickly acted as though they hadn't just been caught staring at the other a second later as they went about their business.

Church raised a dark-haired eyebrow at the exchange. The nerd and lazy-ass weren't particularly subtle, although they might be moronic enough to not see what he saw.

He felt a headache looming behind his temples. Shit like this reminded him that people are stupid assholes.

…Although, for some reason, witnessing that exchange between Grif and Simmons had made Church want to find Tex.

The red-haired woman stared at Church like he was the one who was an idiot after he (foolishly, in hindsight), told her why he had sought her out in that particular moment.

However, a smirk crossed over Tex's face a minute later: "Want to put some money down on when they'll finally get together?"

Washington, as it turned out, was alive. Church found that out because, somehow, Washington and Tucker had managed to meet after Tucker disappeared during a rather bizarre mission with an alien relic.

What was even more surprising was that, when the two men showed up at the barracks, Tucker had a baby with glowing teal lines in tow. Church wasn't sure how to wrap his head around that one, and Tucker kept his mouth tightly shut on the matter.

While Church's eye would twitch uncontrollably whenever he thought about that whole alien relic situation, he was slightly relieved to see Washington and Tucker show up in Blood Gulch all the same. …Not that he'd ever fucking saying that out loud, of course. He had to maintain his aloof prick mantle.

Truthfully, it was mostly just awkward for him to see Washington again. Not to mention it was pretty fucking awkward for Washington too, but Washington seemed to relax somewhat at Carolina and Tex's presence in Blood Gulch.

So long as they didn't discuss the "incident" overly much, Washington and Church seemed to be fine. Or they were getting there, at least.

Washington was adamant about staying with the group, which was surprising since he had become the type of person who carried the weight of the world on his shoulders and didn't seem to really get the whole "being part of a team" thing again.

However, Church suspected Washington's decision had to do with the fond expression that crossed over the blond's face whenever he was with Tucker and Junior.

Caboose, Sheila, and Freckles were still there in Blood Gulch too, as was everyone else. Even Carolina had apparently decided to stay put to ensure that her brother had a somewhat happy life for once.

Thankfully, Grif and Simmons had now become friends with one another, though the tension between them had only skyrocketed to the point where Church was halfway tempted to just lock the two dumbasses in a room together to get things over with.

Church and Tex had broken up more times than he could count while they resided in Blood Gulch, but they were more often than not together. Truthfully, he had always simply liked having her close by, though the sex was definitely fucking awesome too.

Church still had nightmares from time to time while in Blood Gulch. But, Tex would comfort him when they were in bed together until he could once more fall asleep, arms wrapped around her gratefully.

Sometimes he'd talk to Carolina about her own nightmares, and Church had come close to daring to breach the subject with Washington too. Most of the time though, one or more of the others would do something dumb and that would distract him from the past.

He might not say it much at all, or more likely ever, but Church couldn't be more fucking grateful for the annoying assholes in his life.

Author's Notes: Here we have Church's prequel story! :) Hopefully, it was an enjoyable read that helped shed a bit more light on a few of the characters' histories in this story-verse.

I should note that not every character is going to be getting a prequel story of their own, as a lot of them are covered in other individual's prequels (such as Caboose, Freckles, and Sheila in this one). That's the only way I'd be able to finish the prequels here considering that the cast is quite huge! XD Still, I hope that I will give everyone, even the characters that don't get their own personal prequel story, a bit of attention in the prequels to make up for that.

Next up in Prelude for Losers? will be Washington and Tucker's turn. Yep, they'll be featured in their own story together! :D

Thank you for taking the time to read this! :)