Work Text:
The characters are not mine but I do love their interactions. Here's a brief scene and hope they are able to film another season soon.
In another situation it would have amused Flambeau that they sheltered in a cattle shed. As it was, he flopped down onto the thin layer of hay with a grunt and an audible crackle from his shoulder muscles. Father Brown was distinctly slower. Flambeau had shed his jacket and managed to adopt a more relaxed pose by the time the priest had staggered to lean against the creaking door post.
"Father, I would have thought your conviction to saving my immortal soul would persuade you to keep up. As it is, we may have shaken our pursuers temporarily but I intend to be many miles away and in much grander surroundings than this before the night is out." The tone was still, perhaps, a little breathless but he had vaulted several fences in quick succession.
The father groped about his cassock for a large handkerchief and clumsily mopped his red face as he gasped and slumped over the wall of a stall. 'I...I-I need a brief rest."
Gracefully Flambeau climbed up to his feet and stretched. "You have fifteen minutes, if you insist on bothering me further. You know, I am the villain fleeing from justice, not you." He tweaked Father Brown's sleeve. "Your priest garb is too distinctive. You would do well to shed it if only until we get within spitting distance of a church or, better yet, abandon it entirely. I have no desire to be caught or preached at for the duration of our acquaintance." Father Brown stayed slumped and huffing shallowly but gasped out "You need help and the Lord helps those in need." There may have been more but a sudden intake of breath stuttered any further comment.
"Father, maybe you are the one in need." Flambeau took a firmer grip on the cassock and tugged until he was able to wrap his arm around Father Brown's waist and ease him up and sliding down the wall to set on the cold ground. Undoing the collar of the cassock and shirt underneath, cold, sluggish hands flailed to stop him.
"No, no, just a few minutes. I will be fine. Just fi-"
He started to toppled to the side and Flambeau seized two fistfuls of robe to jerk him upright. Father Brown pressed himself against the wall and screwed up his face as more buttons were undone. There was another weak groan. "Hercules..."
"Too much communion wine and wafers? I am half-tempted to just leave you - you don't seem to be fit enough to 'be on the run.'" Even as he spoke, Flambeau noticed dampness under his hand. Pushing harder against the father's side, he managed to raise another louder groan. Shooting him a sharp look, Flambeau shoved his hand through the gaping robe and pulled up the buttoned shirt to reveal a red patch on the right side of the father's white vest.
He kept his hand pressed against it as he worked hard to pull the priest's arm free from the cassock sleeve. It proved a struggle as Father Brown had all his weight against the stall and he contorted as Flambeau tried to shift him. The stronger man won and Flambeau unbuttoned the black buttoned shirt underneath, tugging that sleeve off before the father's eyes were able to refocus. "What are you...what are you doing?"
"Sorry I had to defrock you, padre, but it's for the best, I assure you." Flambeau wrapped his free hand around the side of the father to feel for more injuries. "Just checking if divinity is bulletproof."
The huff of pain was tinged with annoyance. "No. How does it look?" There was another startled noise as Flambeau pulled his undershirt up to expose his stomach.
"Deep graze, nothing more." He scruntised it briefly before applying more pressure with his handkerchief. "You may have avoided it completely if you took my advice and stopped trying to interfere with my honest work." He grabbed the father's hand and pushed in down on the wound. "Keep your weight on this."
Father Brown looked up as Flambeau climbed back to his feet. He was pale and sweating as he was in shock but his eyes followed as Flambeau stalked the wooden shed, pushing open doors and sweeping his foot through the hay. A rattle and splashing noise, he returned with a pail of water and plonked it down beside the priest.
"There's a rain barrel out the back. Hopefully it should be clean enough for removing some of the blood."
It was unnervingly quiet as Flambeau shrugged off his layers to remove his own undershirt to serve as rags. Father Brown had stopped focusing but he gazed ahead without any indication of hearing the man. "Come on, father, how are you holding up?" Flambeau paused in his tearing of cloth to wave a hand in front of his eyes. "Father? Father Brown?" There was a sway as faint shivers ran from the shoulders down to the black shoes raising a rustle from the hay. Flambeau slowly reached out to steady his hand and the bloody handkerchief but, the moment his fingers connected, Father Brown flung himself to the side with a shout and was quivering on the ground.
Flambeau started forward and quickly stopped, settling back on his heels. He had seen the behaviour many times before but it was hardly ideal timing. The father had mentioned war service but, despite their varied and violent encounters, he was yet to avoid danger and frankly seemed to have seen more paperwork than trenches. And he, Hercules, was not exactly the most sympathetic of people. Still...
"Shush, shush. It will be alright." Kneeling along aside Father Brown, he hesitantly patted his clothed shoulder. The priest's round brimmed hat had been lost somewhere in their flight across country and there was a clammy sweat glistening across his forehead and neck. Flambeau slowly increased the weight of his hand until he had a firm grasp of the father's shoulder and then gave an experimental rub along the arm to gauge a response. There was a flinch but nothing more. Emboldened, Flambeau shuffled closer and pulled Father Brown around until the priest's head was cushioned on his knee, accompanied by some groans but no struggle beyond a flinch as his arm was accidentally nudged with a foot.
Double-checking the father's hand was still covering his wound, he sat back and huffed. "Come on, snap out of it! I have no time for this! You're barely injured and I have places to be. Take deep breathes, lie back and think of England, just... stop." There were several more tense minutes of them sprawled on the ground until the tremours lessened to the point Flambeau heaved them both into a seated position, admittedly propped up against each other.
With a choked grunt Father Brown spoke. "Where am I?"
"Not France. I am guessing that is where you were a minute ago? At best we are perhaps 10 miles outside of the nearest British town and 3 miles away from the people we were running from."
The father shifted his weight and gasped, tightening his grip on his stomach and hunching over slightly.
"If you would care to hold still, that can be treated and I can be on my way." Flambeau reached out for his pail of water slowly and tugged it closer, attempting to maintain an air of indifference while supporting the priest. "Your help would be appreciated, as I don't wish to be held here much longer. Hold yourself up so I can get at that scratch."
"It was a grenade." The father mumbled the words as he unrolled slightly. "Careful, Flambeau, I am starting to suspect you care. Am I starting to open you to the goodness inside all of us?"
Flambeau felt a jolt of evil pleasure watching the churchman shudder and yelp as he put some force into the sodden rag pressed against his side. On the other hand, the malice may have had a tinge of guilt. "No, Father, I am a cynic who finds a priest a good ambush deterrent. Or at least it would be if we were not surrounded by useless miles of farmland without a dimwitted village in sight." Flambeau huffed and eased the pressure to peek at the wound before renewing his grip. "And don't tell me you are hallucinating grenades now. They don't have grenades."
"No, Hercules." There was a faint wheeze, then- "they had grenades then. In Flanders." A shift of weight and Flambeau tugged the father's handkerchief away from his now slack hand. "We won that war. Surely you remember that. It does no good to dwell on what happened back then." He dunked the handkerchief in the pail as well, wrung it down and ran it along the still clammy forehead. "Clean yourself up a bit. We need to get back to running for our lives soon."
Perhaps a poor choice of words but Father Brown managed to shake himself and took over wiping his head and neck.
"I am afraid somethings linger long in the memory. Springing to mind when you least expect it. But there was a grenade. Just a few steps away from me. My friend took most of the impact, but I caught some to my right. Two operations, a few months recovery, and then I was ordered to return to the trenches." Flambeau slowed his sponging of Father Brown's side.
"My regiment needed me, but I could barely stand the sound of a slamming door. I was reassigned to guard the transport routes for a short while, until the trenches called again. Oof!"
The father grunted as Flambeau shoved him when he pushed a dry pad of rags against the bullet wound. Hercules grunted in response and dragged the priest's hand down to hold the cloth as he started to secure it in place.
"The war is over, padre. Both of us survived. Dwelling on it does not make it better."
"Hercules, we have both lived through war. Your scars must ache just as much as mine."
Flambeau growled as he tore more strips from his own shirt. He worked efficiently to bandage the priest's side. "We don't have time for this, and I do not have the patience for it. If you do not pull yourself together and get ready to leave, I will leave you behind." He rose from his crouch and peeked over the window frame. Father Brown's fingers trembled but he still managed to re-button his shirt and enough of the cossack to appear decent. Still he sat on the dirty straw-covered floor and shut his eyes, and murmured a brief prayer.
"Father, we have lingered long enough. Do you need help getting up?" Flambeau skulked to one of the side doors and peered around the corner. "This way is clear enough. Hurry up!"
Father Brown clasped the edge of a stall and, though there was a definite tremour in his frame, he managed to drag himself up to a standing position. A sharp tug on his sleeve and Flambeau was already propelling them both towards the exit. "Flambeau ... I am not sure how much longer either of us can run if this is to continue," he puffed as they rounded the stables toward a hedged fence.
"Enough that they decide it is not worth the chase, padre." There was a pause. "That side will need a much thorough going over once we next stop. While you have tended me in the past, I cannot claim to be much of a nursemaid." The thief braced himself as the priest struggled over the next wooden fence, griping onto Flambeau as he stumbled on the dismount. He was still trembling slightly.
"We are not too far from one of my parishioners. Farmer Warren is rather terse but also a very heavy sleeper. He has dozed off a few times on a Sunday. If we can make it to his barn, it is a much more comfortable place to spend the evening. And in the morning we can ring Sid for a lift back to the village without much fuss."
Flambeau grunted as the father stumbled again. "I would much rather leave you there and continue on my own. However, that Farmer Warren might have a change of shirt and food as well. Lead on, padre. Perhaps, at least for tonight, we share a common goal."
While this story does have some insensitive treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, this is to reflect some of the historical attitudes rather than any personal view of the writer.