Chapter Text
Jason Kolchek had never been one for poetry. He'd never understood the appeal of a bunch of pretty words, and he'd never intended to either.
But pushing the motionless body of the last vampire he'd killed to the dusty floor, the ache in his arms, seeing them scatter in panic seconds earlier to thereafter hear the unearthly screeching from the rest of them burning to ashes in the sun? That seemed to him a lot like what he supposed poetry were to the scholars.
Fuckin' beautiful.
"Are we all good?"
Nick was the first to speak, out of breath, and with a tremble to his voice like he was scared he wouldn't receive an answer, and Jason instinctively searched the room for Salim in response.
He flicked his eyes from Rachel helping an unsteady, and disheveled Eric to his feet, back to Nick towering above them with his hands clutching his weapon like it was a lifeline.
"I'm peachy," Jason answered when Nick raised a questioning brow toward him, before turning his head to the side to scan the dimly lit room for a certain Iraqi soldier.
Piles of alien corpses lay scattered around them, in a jagged circle and on top of each other.
The sunlight shone through the slits of the boarded-up windows, revealing a whirlwind of dust particles dancing wildly in the aftermath of their battle, slowly beginning to settle.
He'd grown so used to having Salim's presence at his side, it had almost evolved to the extent of familiarity.
...Almost.
At the very least, Jason could feel his heart hammering quicker in his chest when he didn't find him right away, hear the blood thrumming in his veins, deafeningly loud.
An airy laugh escaped Rachel. "Yeah," she finally answered Nick, her utter disbelief at the fact that they'd survived clear as the day outside, "we all fucking made it."
“Thank God,” Eric exhaled.
Not all, though.
"Salim?" Jason called, moving away from his fellow marines, hating how desperate his voice sounded.
A string of incomprehensible words in Arabic came from the darkest corner of the room at his name, sending an overwhelming wave of relief through Jason's body.
"Fuckin' hell, Salim," he hissed, stepping over the scattered wooden boxes toward him, "I thought you were dead."
His hand emerged from the dark and Jason grabbed it without a second thought, hauling him off his ass back to his feet.
"Not dead, my friend," Salim said, standing steadily before him. "Not yet."
"Oorah!" Nick suddenly shouted behind them in an earnest celebration of their survival.
"Oo-fucking-rah!" Jason answered just as loud by reflex, thrusting his closed fist up in the air, smiling flippantly toward Salim and feeling rather pleased with himself.
They had made it through hell on earth. They'd survived.
Both men broke out into a fit of laughter the moment they locked eyes again. "Oorah," Salim said in a weaker fashion, gasping for air between laughter, supporting himself with his hands on his knees.
"Jesus, what?" Jason finally asked, not really getting what they were actually laughing about.
Salim settled down, wiping his eye with the back of his hand as he looked up at him. "Even you seemed surprised by the force with which you said that."
Jason suddenly felt self-conscious. "Shut up," he mumbled, ears burning, "it's a–"
"–marine thing," Salim interjected, smiling.
"–marine thing. God. You're insufferable."
Salim laughed again, and then he stopped abruptly. "Shit," he whispered, clutching his chest and turning away.
In spite of what he had just said, Jason was grinning like a madman by then. Even though they had lost Joey, Merwin and Clarice, and even though it fucking hurt – causalities were a given in war, and they were still standing.
Salim would get to see his son again.
Jason clapped him on the shoulder as Rachel ordered them all to, Get the hell out of there, and sign it up to old habits dying hard, or respect ingrained in their very spines, but they all obeyed her without hesitation, walking out of the room and toward the bright sun.
Eric requested Air Support over his radio, and Jason turned to look over his shoulder at the noticeable lack of movement behind him. Why wasn't Salim following him?
He slowed down, earning an indiscreet side-eye from Eric in return, and waved Salim with him in spite of it, but still, the other man hesitated, his hand clutching his chest, his earlier smile nowhere to be seen.
"Hey," he simply said, reaching his open hand out. "Are you coming, or moving in?"
Jason did not like the vacant look on his face. It unsettled him how Salim refused to meet his eye when they'd just been laughing with each other like old friends seconds ago.
"Salim," he took a determined step forward, nerves growing for each passing second he just stood there. "Let's get you back to your kid."
As if the mention of his son had sent a pulse of electricity through his motionless body; Salim’s head jerked up. He stared back at him with wide eyes, and was that fear he saw in them? Jason had a moment to think before he quickly turned his body around, trailing after Salim as he had suddenly begun to stalk away from him with purpose.
They walked through the cramped corridor in line, the sunlight was a beacon on the other side. With just a few steps left, Salim folded on the middle with a groan, clutching his stomach with one hand and supporting himself against the wall with the other.
"What the fuck," Jason hissed, hurrying up to his side.
His head lowered toward the floor, he spoke under his breath a somber sentence in Arabic, and even when he didn’t understand the meaning of the words; Jason sensed their finality without needing to.
His heart tightened with dread.
"Come on," he grabbed his arm. "We’re almost there," he said, as if getting Salim out in the sun would lighten the forlorn expression on his face.
"I think–" Salim said painstakingly without looking up at him, pressing the words through clenched teeth. "I think this is as far as I will go."
"Like hell, it is," Jason said.
Nick had made his return to the house to investigate the turmoil, standing in the doorway.
"What the fuck is taking you so long?" he asked quietly so to not alert the Kings', the sound of a chopper could be heard in the distance, and as if on cue; a cough ripped itself out of Salim.
Jason staggered backward. Nick went for his rifle, cocking it. It sounded like he was about to cough up his lungs, and the world flipped upside down for Jason.
No, no, no.
An involuntary sob welled in his chest and he choked it back down.
This isn’t happening, he thought disoriented. But in spite of his wishes, it sure was. Nick aimed the muzzle toward Salim, and Jason just about had it in him to step forward, grabbing it and twisting it away.
Don’t he said dangerously with his eyes, and Nick opened his mouth wordlessly in protest but said nothing.
As the hacking finally settled, Salim straightened his back, wiped his mouth with his hand and slowly gazed up at them. His expression was blank, and unreadable, daring them to react.
Nick said, "That sounds like a nasty cough," and glancing at the rifle in his hand, Jason figured he wasn’t pointing it out like you’d comment on the weather. A sunny day in Iraq today, isn’t it?
"Are you going to shoot me with that?" Salim asked, and it took a moment for Jason to realize the question hadn’t been aimed at Nick.
He had been so occupied with keeping Nick from shooting Salim, he hadn't even noticed Rachel and Eric entering the scene.
"Shit," he cursed himself under his breath. Raising his rifle and not really caring about committing treason as he aimed it toward them.
"What the hell, Jason!" Nick exclaimed.
Rachel held her handgun trained on Salim without flinching though, and the look in her eyes told them to, just say the word. "You're infected," she explained without any greater emotion, "and I'm taking the necessary precautions."
“I fully understand that, Ms. King,” Salim said, and then, “I’d advise you to take the shot.”
Which was fucked up in so many ways he couldn’t even count ‘em on two hands. Jason was standing between them like a human shield, and he could hear the chopper getting louder.
Fuck.
Fuck, he thought.
"Let CENTCOM help you," Nick tried to mediate.
"Not happening, Nicky," Jason said, refusing to back down.
Because CENTCOM would want answers. He could see Salim’s future play out before him like on film; scientists cutting him up like a lab rat in the name of knowledge, discarding his body as soon as they had no further use of it like he was nothing.
"I'm taking him home," Jason said firmly, speaking it out loud before he'd start to think about what he was actually doing.
Salim touched the back of his arm. “Jason,” he said calmly, though uncertainty could still be heard in his tone of voice. “I can’t allow you to do that. My luck had to run out at some point.”
Jason ignored him.
The others blinked at him as if he’d really just lost his mind. “You can’t be serious.” Nick sounded positively aghast.
“Tell ‘em, that I fell in battle–” he motioned his arm toward the chopper in the stark blue sky, flying over the mountain,
"Don’t throw your life away for him.”
“–or that you don’t know what the hell happened to me, I don’t really give a shit either way.”
“Please, man."
But he wasn’t hearing Nick’s pleas.
The moment Jason heard Salim cough, was the moment he decided to betray his country irreversibly. And he wasn’t backing down now.
The chopper was circling them in the sky above. “There!” The operator said over the radio. “It’s the assault team.”
And perhaps Rachel and Eric were remembering that they’d all been on the same side down in hell – or that the Iraqi soldier had a son and didn’t deserve to be experimented on – because they didn’t stop him when he pushed Salim further back into the house.
They didn’t correct the arriving air support when they exclaimed, “We’ve got three survivors.”
They let them go.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Jason said, sparing one last glance toward his team, what he’d considered his family, as he supported Salim with his shoulder. He waited quietly for him to finish another coughing fit tearing through his body, dragging a thumb over the tattoo on his arm, caught in thought.
As he assessed the area outside the farmer’s house, scouting for enemies, Salim asked him, “Why?”
“Why, what?”
“Why would you save a condemned man?”
Jason raised his shoulders, and within the simple, and safe words of, "Semper fuckin’ fi,” he refused to think about it any further.
He startled when Salim touched his arm.
“Thank you,” he said, and Jason swore he’d take him to his son, feeling as if a thread had been tied around his heart from the moment he first met him, tightening so very slowly, he hadn't even noticed it.