Chapter Text
You couldn’t hear a thing, you couldn’t see a thing.
All you recall from just a few seconds ago was a barrage of loud bangs followed by earth chunks and human body parts flying. Or at least you think those used to be part of a person.
No one even had time to scream in fear or pain it went by so fast.
You still kept your eyes closed shut. You didn’t want to see the result of these explosions.
It’s not like you have never seen blood or ripped up flesh before, you were a medic for the military after all, there are bound to be injuries of all kinds.
But never had you been on the actual battlefield before where all these wounded soldiers always come from. Never had you seen the remains of the men that never made it back to the medic station.
You were in the trenches, sent out to the field as a combat medic since all of the actual ones got fatally injured and are either recovering or have passed away and you as one of the only medics who knew how to use a gun were sent as a last resort replacement.
Sure you knew how to use a gun, you used to go to the shooting range with your father all the time when you grew up. It was one of your favourite bonding ways with him and he taught you all about it and other ways of self defence.
But you didn’t think you’d actually end up having to aim the barrel towards another actual living person and pull the trigger. Needless to say, you were frozen in place. Unable to even look up over the trenches as you sat with your back to the dirt wall, your knees to your chest trying to make yourself as small as possible hoping you’d vanish if you just pretend long enough that you weren’t here.
Distant detonations still ring in your ears, but you start hearing something else as well.
Loud footsteps thump closer to you quickly. You couldn’t tell if it were enemies closing in now that they had bombed your trenches or one of your soldiers. Sitting as still as possible to not make any noise to make yourself noticeable, you suddenly release a breath you didn’t know you were holding in when you hear an unfamiliar voice yell “Medic! Thank god there you are!”
You finally look up and open your eyes. You’ve been closing your eyes for so long you need a moment to adjust to the bright outside you tried to ignore so hard. A giant man looms over you. At least 2 meters tall, he had to crouch quite a bit to not have his head poke out from the trenches, decked in military clothes and various gears and tools. His face was covered by a sniper veil that was attached to his helmet, 2 holes were cut into it revealing dark eyes poking from under the veil staring right back into yours.
You have seen this man before many times back at the base, but never heard his voice. He didn’t come to the medic tent very often so you never had the opportunity to speak to him before. All you knew was that he was good at his job, almost a legend within your military, and that he kept to himself most of the time. You’ve never learned his real name before. Even his file doesn’t list any other name besides his alias: König.
You can’t help but wonder what the reason was for him to get this noble codename.
He took a look around your surroundings, quickly inspecting the mess you still try to ignore. In only a few glimpses he was able to count 2 and 2 together to figure out what had happened here.
“So you are the only survivor left” he said almost too quiet for you to hear. It was less of a question and more of a statement while he looked into your eyes waiting for you to confirm his conclusion.
The look of shock in your eyes answered for you as you couldn’t bring yourself to answer him verbally.
“Scheiße... They really focused hard on your side for some reason” he murmured again to himself while breaking eye contact to look into the direction of piles of flesh lining the ground and walls next to you.
He quickly composed himself again to snap his gaze back to you.
“Anyways, we need help on our position, our medic is down and we have more soldiers that need medical treatment immediately!”
It took a while for you to finally snap back into reality and process the information he just told you.
Still not able to fully break from your frozen shock you were at least able to nod as he held his hand out to you and commanded “We have no time to lose so follow me and take cover!”
With a quick yank he pulled you back onto your feet. As you finally grounded yourself back into the fight König patiently waits for you to regain your composure before he start running back the direction he came from with you close behind trying to keep up with this giant.
“Keep moving, we are almost there! I can see my wounded men just ahead!” he yelled back to you over his broad shoulders as you slowly came to a halt.
Breathlessly you throw yourself to your knees in front of one of the soldiers lying on the ground, a dark spot of blood soaking his uniform on his torso. You gather all the first aid materials you were equipped with before you got dispatched next to the body as you start rummaging for some bandages and antibiotics you knew you’d at least need.
In the meantime König threw himself against the wall of the trench and starts to prep his sniper.
“While you take care of them I’ll take care of the enemies, don’t worry I got your back!”
As soon as he reassured you he turned around and was already taking out the troops that were trying to start approaching to your lines from the distance.
You turned your attention back to the wounded solder under you. “Can you take off your jacket or does it hurt too much to move?”
He shuffles around a bit trying to move his arms around to take of his gear. After a couple of grunts and hisses he slumped back down again in defeat. Taking this as a no you start to remove the vest with his gear on it and open the jacket. A bullet wound reveals itself near his shoulder as you rip the hole on the shirt made by said bullet open to get a better look at his injury. Doing your best to remove the bullet, clean up his wound , stitching and bandaging everything up you could hear him scream and whine in pain as you don’t have any painkillers on you that could instantly numb his nerves.
You proceeded with the other few men that seemed unable to even hold up their gun anymore while every now and then you catch some yelling from the big guy next to you in German. Some of them would have made you chuckle if you weren’t so concentrated on helping the wounded, like him throwing a grenade yelling out “Gute Nacht, Hurensohn!”
It seems clear he enjoys the thrill of battle. With him yelling insults and curses as well as giving mischievous laughs when he gets a clear shot on an enemy.
You knew for sure you were scared of a person like him who has this much fun killing fellow humans, but at the same time you couldn’t help yourself finding his childish laughter somewhat adorable even when it was filled with spite.
After you were done patching up the last injury you weren’t sure what to do next. You knew that your work is only a temporary fix, that they’d need to get properly stitched up at the medical tent and it would take days for them to fully recover. At your previous trench position you were told to help them with pushing back enemy forces when there was no man down, but you couldn’t bring yourself to do anything so you were cowering in fear. That was probably the only reason you survived the bombarding rain of grenades that were sent your way earlier.
As if König could read your mind he quickly glanced back at you “Reinforcements are on the way. We just need to hold out a little longer until we can bring the soldiers back to base.”
You decided to take cover near the other soldiers that are still unable to move, keeping an eye on them just to make sure to react in time in case one of their stitches opens up again.
As you waited you couldn’t help but feel like someone was looking at you every now and then, but as soon as you try to look around and check it was gone again.
The minutes felt like hours as you sat there and waited. By now you had grown numb to the amount of noise around you. You didn’t jump at the sound of distant detonations anymore, only the sound of nearby gunfire that sounded way too close.
While it felt like an entire day about an hour later there was finally sight of relief in the form of friendly troops running towards you. Finally the reinforcements had come.
You stood up as soon as you saw them, wanting to run towards them to get out of here as soon as possible. But you knew the injured soldiers had priority to make it back to base. As soon as the other medics from the troop get close enough you fill them in on all the patients wounds and treatments you had done. While you were exchanging information with the other paramedics you noticed König doing the same with the other troops. Just like the past hour with you he always kept his sentences short, never saying more than was necessary.
As soon as you guys were done talking he turned to you throwing his head towards the direction the troops came from, giving you the sign to leave while he and some other soldiers helped to carry the injured back to base.
The walk was long and silent, no one said a thing. You didn’t know what to say either this wasn’t the time for small talk. You didn’t even have the energy to open your mouth, everyone with you seemed to be just as tired.
“After we are done delivering the bodies to the medic tent you can get back to your quarters and get some rest, I’ll make sure to cover for you” you heard a voice in front of you. König walked ahead not turning around when he told you this. His voice was much lower than before, much quieter as well. You could tell he was just as tired as everyone else in your group.
That was the last thing anyone said for the rest of the march as you carried your burning legs through the dirt.