Chapter Text
It was a hit gone wrong.
Barry lay there, on the ground, reflecting on what had gone wrong. It was supposed to be a simple hit. Go in, take out the target, get out. Three simple actions that went wrong somewhere along the way.
Barry supposed that it probably had to do with the nature of the hit. The Chechens had ordered a hit on “Hanz Yipman” and the name itself should have been a warning sign. Another was when they had refused to tell him the reasoning behind the hit. The third was probably when Fuches had told him to be careful, and Fuches never tells him to be careful.
He had entered the residence at 1900 hours, carefully sweeping the area, only to find that no one was in the home. It was overtly and suspiciously empty and quiet. He had circled around back, which is where he found the shed. The shed that had stairs, that had led down to the bunker, in which he found the drugs. Pounds upon pounds of cocaine, stacked one on top of the other, lined across the walls. There was a chair in the middle of the room containing a body; an unmoving body; the body of Hanz Yipman. It was too late that he realized that he had made a mistake. He felt something hit his head and the next he knew was black.
…
When he came to, he reached the startling realization that it was now him in the chair, rather than Hanz. When he tried to stand up he realized his hands were tied behind him. Typical. He immediately started working on freeing them when three men walked into the room.
“Who do you work for?” asked the First.
Barry didn’t answer, instead casing the area, trying to locate possible means for escape. Maybe a loose nail, a window, a kni-
He was hit in the stomach, knocking the wind out of him. He couldn’t breath. Why couldn’t he breath? Oh, it was probably the hands around his throat.
“Let me ask you again,” said the First, “who do you work for?”
Barry shook his head, warranting another punch to the stomach, and a release of the hands. The first man drew out a knife.
“It’s not everyday we have strangers walking into our base. And you certainly don’t look like our enemies, which is why I ask, who do you work for?” The knife was now against his throat.
Barry couldn’t determine where the accent from, but he suspected it to be European in origin. He shook his head again, and spat in the face of the first man. This angered him, although why would it not? At the nod of first man, the second man shoved Barry’s chair over, and the third began to mercilessly kick at Barry’s stomach. He tried to curl in on himself, but felt strong hands grasping his legs and stretching him out, leaving him more susceptible to the countless kicks, punches, and assaults on his body. Again he couldn’t breathe, this time it wasn’t because of hands around his neck, but rather damage he was sustaining to his ribs, stomach, and lungs. He felt something crack, then another. He needed something to focus on. He went back to working on his hand restraints, rather than struggle against the man holding his legs. He was almost there.
The kicking stopped and Barry gasped for breath, wincing at the same time. The first man’s face crept into Barry’s vision. It was sideways, why was that? Oh, he was on the ground. That’s right.
“Are you ready to talk now?” asked the man.
Barry then began to wonder. Why did he protect the Chechens? They’ve done nothing for him. They had let Fuches go and he was just left doing their dirty work--for money of course--but the idea still confused him. Looking back at the man, Barry slowly nodded his head in compliance.
Satisfied, the first man instructed the others to lift Barry from the ground. He couldn’t help but cry out as they did so. His torso felt as if it was on fire. His arm hurt, he knew he had landed on it wrong and something certainly happened as it was pinned underneath the chair during all the kicking.
Now upright, the face of the first man looked and him, and asked the exact same question:
“Who do you work for?”
Barry knew that at this point there was no point in protecting them, but he needed to stall for time so that he could successfully escape. Time for the acting class to finally pay off. He opened his mouth to answer but coughed instead. All while working on his bindings, he lifted his head, making sure blood was trailing from his mouth. He began to speak:
“I work-” he coughed again. The next time he talked, he used as raspy and grovely a voice he could muster.
“I work for the ch-” he coughed again, and more vibrantly this time. It wasn’t hard to fake as he truly did feel as shitty as he currently sounded.
The first man sighed. He gestured at the second.
“Get him some water.” He returned to facing Barry. “Quite the drama queen, you are.”
“Thanks” was all Barry could cough out. He was almost there. Now all he needed was the perfect opportunity, and he suspected one was coming up.
The second man returned with water and gave it to the first. The man approached Barry with the cup. He lifted Barry’s chin up so that he could drink, and right as the cup touched his lips, Barry shot a hand up and punched the man in the face. He followed this up with a head butt, of which completely knocked the first man unconscious. With that taken care of, all that was left was the other two men. Barry grasped at his side, preparing for what came next.
The two men collided with Barry, slamming him to the ground. Again came the merciless assaults on Barry’s body, but this time he had an advantage. Arms, freedom, and the removal of one of the three men from the equation. After a strong hit to his stomach, Barry managed to maneuver his body into a position that gave him leverage to slam the second man’s face to the ground, also knocking him out.
One left. Barry locked eyes with the third man, who clearly wasn’t as enthusiastic about the interrogation as the other two. He put his arms up, in surrender, but Barry already had blood on his hands and darkness in his eyes. Barry walked up to him and took him out with one swift punch to the face.
With the three men out of the equation, Barry took a second to look around at his handiwork. The pain in his chest was now overwhelming him and he was just now realizing that he couldn’t breathe very well, this accompanied with a sharp pain in the left side of his ribcage. He should take care of that. Later, not now. He had one thing left to do. He picked up the knife that was thrown to the corner. There could be no witnesses.
He emerged from the bunker/shed with blood on his hands, literally. He couldn’t breath. His head was pounding. All he needed was a nap, at that very moment, so he took that time to do so in the backyard of the empty house.
…
It was a hit gone wrong.
Barry lay there, on the ground, reflecting on what had gone wrong. It was supposed to be a simple hit. Go in, take out the target, get out. Three simple actions that went wrong somewhere along the way.
He came to again. He didn’t know where he was, oh wait he did. He was in the backyard and he had just-
He tried to sit up but instead was met with an intense, hot pain all across his chest and torso. He couldn’t move without feeling pain of some sort flaring up. He assessed the damage:
Head: hurts. Neck: eh. Shoulders: been better. Left arm: probably broken. Right arm: okay. Ribs: Probably broken, probably with some lung damage. Other internal structures: heavily bruised. Legs: Sore. In conclusion, he’s had worse. At least he wasn’t bleeding from the outside for once. He rolled over to his right side, careful not to move too much, but who was he kidding. Everything hurt; there was no way to avoid pain.
He considered calling Fuches, but he didn’t want Fuches risk being followed or worse. He came to the conclusion that he would just drive back to the hotel and rest up. Hopefully Fuches wouldn’t fuss too much. At the end of the day, Barry had technically done his job, and that’s all that should matter.