Chapter Text
"So how did you met Big Boss?"
Bat looks down at Kaz who was laying on the floor of the helicopter arms crossed under his head with his legs dangling out the door. Kicking the open air without a care in the world.
"I've already told you."
"Huh," Kaz grunts, unsatified with the answer, "Yeah, sure you did but...it was boring!"
"My apologies, Commander Miller."
Bat catches Kaz's hand before it can slap his kneecap, he wanted to entwine their fingers but it would be overstepping his bounds. He lets go of the hand and Kaz rests it on his chest.
"C'mon tell it to me again, but with more je ne sais quoi. I wanna know more about you,"
"..."
"Please?"
"Fine"
-------
Unspecified South American Jungle, Outpost 8, XX, XX, 1967
There's a collective sigh of relief in the tent when he enters, its not a nice thing in his opinion.
"Where is he?"
The soldier he addreses frowns in thought, "This way?"
Bat nods, and the soldier leads him to a bed with a whimpering man in it. He had a gunshot wound in his arm, and needed a few stitches by the looks of it.
"Victor?" Bat asks, keeping his questions short and simple.
"Break." The soldier replies nervously.
With a sigh, Bat gets to work. Some fucking translator he was. Barely ever around to actually do his damn job and translate for him. Whatever, this was his last patient before turning in, any other injuries will go to the night shift. No point making Victor hate him more than he already did.
Guy was a asshole, and the only other person on this base that spoke English.
It takes 7 minutes to extract the bullet and stitch the man up. Record time in his books. The wound should be fine in a few weeks with only a small scar to show for it.
"Gracies...ángel"
Bat holds back a grimace and nods in acknowledgment. He hates it when they all him that. He turns away to clean and disinfect his medical equipment, not planning on sticking around any more than he has too.
When he steps out of the tent a few minutes later, he sighs into the humid air. This place was hell.. This place was hell, but home was worse.
It was getting dark, no time to dwell on his situation out in the open. He starts his usual route to his assigned tent, maybe he would send word back to his connection for a transfer to a place where he could actually talk to another person without a proxy. He would hate to leave this base to their own devices. It was obvious that him being around raised moral and kept these men healthy. But he didn't care about their battle enough to stay. Some angel.
Bat stop in his tracks, a strabge wet glint catching his eye.In the shrubby overgrowth just on the edge of the jungle, was a blood smeared leaf. He steps forward to inspect the blood, noticing that it was still wet. He glances into the jungle, and rests a hand on his pistol. Maybe if he was lucky a tiger would kill him.
The trail is hard to follow, a speck or two on the ground or another leaf. Bent grass or broken twigs here and there. Whatever was leaving the trail did a good job hiding its tracks, especially if it was in pain.
Bat frowns as a thought occurs to him, the man he just treated. The bullet wound was fresh. Sometimes guys got careless and shot themselves, that what he assumed happened. But then again he couldn't understand the conversation the guy was having with the nurse. Not to mention shooting yourself in the arm by accident isn't very plausible.
Deep in thought, he idly pushes a branch aside, and finds himself looking down at a man crouched on the ground. He was dressed in tiger stripe camo, almost blended in with the trees behind him. What didn't blend in to the trees was the pistol thr man had pointed directly at Bat's head.
"Don't move,"
He wasn't planning on it. There was something in the man's eyes, in his stature. It was like looking at a sleeping bear, or stalking tiger. Something feral was just beneath the surface of humanity. Armed or not, this was a threat.
The mans other hand was pressing a folded gauze pad to his upper thigh, one mystery solced. Next to him was a pair of tweezers, needle, thread and disinfectant.
It was a strange instinct that propelled Bat. He had always wanted to be a Vet, help and car for animals. People were hard to talk to, but animals? He understood them well. This man wasn't an animal no, but he had the air of something else.
He slowly, carefully, pulls his pistol out of its holster and underhand tosses it off to the left. Out of reach of them both. Keeping his movements slow and his hands up, he approaches the other until he can kneel infront of him. The gun is close enough for the injured man to press it into his temple and blow his brains out.
"I can help," Bat says voice soft and steady. The same voice he would use to calm rabbits and dogs.
The man meets his eyes. Its only now that Bat realizes he has an eyepatch on, and not an odd shadow from the bandana obscuring his face. He doesn't see any fear or mistrust in the steely blue eye. Only caution.
The man nods, and lowers gun. He moves his hand away to reveal the wound on his leg. Clearly nonfatal, the man stopped the bleeding and was already halfway through extracting the bullet. Bat gets to work, completely removing the bullet before disinfecting and suturing the wound. Ge knows for a faxt this process is very painful but the man is completely still throught the entire proceeder. No grunt of pain, or twitch.
Bat looks up after tying the gauze tight around his thigh, about to say something before the man lunges forward to grab his shoulder. Still on his knees he spins Bat around easily, putting him chokehold and pointing his gun at Bat's temple.
At this angle he sees his translator standing a few feet away, looking incredibly smug as he watches them.
"I should have assumed you would be a traitor," Victor taunts in his heavy accent. He's flanked by two uncomfortable looking soldiers.
"How long have you been working for Big Boss, huh? Selling him our secrets?"
Bat frowns in confusion, this guy was the Big Boss? The arm on his neck and cold gun to his head do a great job at keeping him from being able to look back and check. But he doesn't doubt Victor's claims.
Big Boss says something utterly incomprehensible, but definitely Spanish to Victor. He was always terrible with languages, hadn't picked up a word of Spanish in the two years he's been in South America, and not from lack of trying.
The two have a small conversation while the other soldiers look more and more anxious as it goes on. He recognizes them vaugly, he rarely remembers the patients that live.
Victor takes a step closer, saying something particularly rude judging by how the soldiers wince, causing Boss to painfully tug Bat and himself back a pace. He points the gun away from Bat to Victor now.
Bat thinks he has the gist of what Victor is saying. And he was not going to die by the hands of that prick.
Boss is oddly small so it's easy to hide a hand behind his back. He awkwardly runs his hand over Boss's thigh and knee. Big Boss thankfully doesn't react outwardly to this, instead he waves the gun slightly. Drawing Victor's eyes away as Bat slides the large bowie knife out of Big Boss's leg strap. Its heavy, not ideal for what he has in mind.
He spins it deftly in his hand to pinch the flat end of the blade. Boss lossesn his grip, allowing Bat to lurch forward and throw it towards Victor. The blade sinks into the assholes shoulder and he falls back with a cry of pain. Boss then shoves him face first into the dirt and leaps over him. He can hear the sound of the other two soldiers getting their shit kicked in as he gets to his knees.
There's a muffled pop, and when Bat looks up, Boss is pulling his other knife across Victor's throat..
"Hope you didn't like him too much," Boss says as he wipes his knife on the now dead mans shirt and tucks it into the holster. Doing the same with his second.
"Not particularly."
They stare at eachother for a few moments. Bat feels hes being evaluated by him as he stands Finally Boss speaks.
"You wanna come with me? Don't have to but..." They look down at Victors corpse and the two unconscious men behind Boss. Bat feels he's reached the event horizon of his life. No turning back now.
He nods.
-------
"Oooh that was exciting!" Kaz says after Bat finishes. He hadn't moved from his spot on the floor. He was so still Bat thought he had fallen asleep.
"After that we stole a jeep and rode off into the sunset. He gave me my code name right there,"
Kaz lets of a dreamy, mocking sigh, "Wow that's so romantic!"
Bat kicks him in the side, just above his fresh stitches and Kaz lets out a loud cry of pain along with a few curse words.
"So what did you think of him when you met him?" Kaz asks, sitting up and moving out Bats reach.
"He was...." Bat pauses, trying to find the right words. There were a lot of ways to describe Boss. He was something beyond human, or at least beyond a soldier. He was a saviour, his saviour, their saviour. Maybe it was a small act to free him from that outpost, to give him a place to call home. There was no hope for him, he was so steeped in war and blood that peace was beyond a joke. A quiet life was nothing but a distant thought. Big Boss was his pillar, he needed that man more than he needed anything.
No...maybe not just him.
Kaz was against the oppisite wall of the chopper, relaxed. His face was smeared with a bit of dirt and blood, but the small smile he always wore around him was there.
He needed Kaz more than anything, he needed both of them.
"...shorter than I expected."
Kaz laughs, a light and beautiful thing.