Chapter Text
Joining the army was nothing like Donut had seen in movies. In fact, it was the complete opposite. Sure, basic training was as it was always shown-- rough, tiresome, fear inducing. But the moment he was shipped off to Blood Gulch Outpost number one he knew something had seriously been fucked with.
And sure, now that he looked back on it he really was a rookie who knew shit, still dressed in regulation red. Of course it wasn't his fault that basic hadn't prepared him to be put with dumbass teammates and put against dumbass Blues, but that was besides the point because this was his placement and you can't really argue with that.
What he could argue with was the first 'mission' Grif and Simmons had sent him on when he first reached the box canyon. How the hell was he supposed to know that there wasn't a general store in their box canyon?
Donut still went though because there was a part of him that wanted to be a people pleaser. If he did what they asked of him he'd definitely get on their good side... right? No matter though, he'd managed to infiltrate Blue Base in a confusing and leave with the Blue flag, so he'd done something at least.
That whole situation ended with a Blue guy getting killed by his own teammate... so score for Red?
Instead of succeeding and getting his team to like him, he just made them more pissed.
The real problem began when the Blues got a Freelancer on their side. Almost immediately after they'd arrived in the canyon Donut ended up with a grenade stuck to the side of his helmet.
He didn't knowmit was a grenade at first, Grif and Simmons were hardly helpful in that aspect. It wasn't a spider. It wasn't a blue spider. It was a blue pulsating thing that happened to blow up his face.
He'd felt pain for only moments. Deep, red hot pain that made him wish he'd died immediately instead of having to sit through those mere seconds of agony before the blessed bliss washed over him as he succumbed to unconsciousness.
Donut woke up in some medical base a few days later, disoriented and afraid for his life. He tried to ground himself and fend off the rising panic by tangling his fingers into his hair and pulling on it, but the moment his hands reached the top of his head he felt nothing but bandages on one side. Instead of diminishing any outburst he was about to have, it simply amplified and Donut began to cry out, thrashing beneath the covers of the bed he was in.
At some point a doctor had come in, unceremoniously and unapologetically dropped the bomb that was the fact that half his face had technically been blown up and they couldn't do much more than make sure he was still alive and had part of his face still attached. So there it was, he was half blind, half deaf, still alive, and somehow not forcibly discharged from the army due to his injuries.
When he was released, command shoved a new set of armor into his arms and sent him back on his way to that damn box canyon.
When Donut returned to Blood Gulch with lightish red armor, it definitely was not pink, he felt different. A good different though. More confident, happier, and he was sure as hell not going to let his teammates tell him what to do. (Though he still wanted them to like him of course.)
But even in those events, there was one thing Donut hadn't failed to brush over.
None of this was supposed to happen.