Archive of Our Own

Wes had been on many a posting, and somehow, this one managed to take the cake.

Which really does say a lot, considering the many drunkards, PTSD ridden veterans, and adrenaline junkie rookies he’s had to deal with. No matter where he finds himself, it’s the centre of the local chaos.

In the end he’d come to acclimate to it, but this base has blown his expectations out of the water. The bar was low, but he wasn’t excepting whatever the hell this is.

As it is, Wes stands in the medbay, struggling to follow the train of thought of a rambling Private in front of him.

"So then he-he says that me and-Listen, man, I’m not gay, but-” his hands flail about like there’s a fly in front of his face. He’s mildly impressed the man hasn’t noticed and abruptly stiffened his hands to his side yet.

“Private.”

“-And he’s writing like, stories about us? Fucking? And it’s just-I’m really worried about him! So I thought I’d-”

“Private!”

The Private in front of him slams his mouth closed so fast Wes could hear his teeth clack in his skull. He’d wince if he hadn’t heard worse. 

“What the hell are you talking about. You aren’t making a single lick of sense.” Wes said flatly.

The still visor stared back. Wes gave him 15 seconds before he pushed again. “....You’re concerned about a squadmate? Why?” Before the Private can speak again, Wes interjects with an addition. “Be concise this time.”

He took a steady and prepared himself to speak, seemingly using most of his brain power to come up with something another person can comprehend.

“I’m Private Newt from West Squad. Uh. My squadmate, Private McJohnson? He’s been like-Me and another squadmate, Perry Willis, are really close. Not in a gay way! We’re just friends!”

Wes isn’t sure he wants to hear this whole thing. He opens his mouth to interrupt. “Private-”

“-We are! I swear! And McJohnson’s been really weird about us lately! He’s been writing stories about us. Uh. Getting it on?” Newt took this moment to gasp in a breath of air, and before Wes can interject, he plows right on.

“Some of it isn’t even about having… intimacies, it’s like romance stories about us getting together! And it’s worrying because normally McJohnson is pretty good with boundaries and we’ve both tried to tell him it’s uncomfortable! Especially the sex stuff! It’s really weird and gross! Wait. That sounds homophobic doesn’t it? I’m not homophobic! My brother is gay! It’s just weird that he’s talking about us like that- not the gay part! If he was writing about me and Jenny like that I’d be just as upset!”

The stream of seemingly unfiltered thoughts pause for another gasp of air, and Wes actually managed to get an interjection this time. “Newt!” The visor snaps to him again. Absentmindedly, he notes that this particular Private reminds himself a bit of a puppy. Scatterbrained, struggles to retain attention…

He takes a moment to compose his thoughts, and starts carefully with “Have you talked to your Sergeant at all?”

Newt wrings his hands. God. “..Yeah.” He mutters. “Didn’t do shit about it, said we need to work it out amongst ourselves.” He seems to realize this might undermine his argument, and quickly continues with a scrambled “But we’ve tried everything!”

Somehow, even through the visor, Newt manages to convey pleading puppy dog eyes. 

Wes sighs. Heavily. “Private, listen.” All hope seems to drain out of Newt. He feels a little bad. He digs up some of the old scripts from training anyways. “I’m not licensed, or trained, to deal with psychological issues. So unless you want me to send a request up to command for a psycheval- which I can do- you’re oughtta luck.”

Newt is slumped into his chair. Wes stands awkwardly and only briefly considers patting Newt on the shoulder before realizing that he’s being emotionally swayed by a vaguely sad 21 year old in full body armor.

They sit in silence for a moment before Wes hesitantly breaches a last question. “...Do you feel like you’re in danger from Private McJohnson?”

Immediately, Newt frantically starts shaking his head. “No! No. He’d- he even hates shooting the aliens, man.”

Wes manages to clamp down on the twitch from being referred to as “man” in a professional setting, and begins to herd the private out of the medbay. “Well, in that case there’s nothing I can do. Please let me know if that-McJohnson being physically harmless- ever changes.”

As he’s led out of the medbay, Newt sighs to himself, and mutters a quiet “Thanks anyways, doc.”

“That’s what I’m here for.” Wes replies as the private finally leaves the medbay. He can’t even bring himself to be overly happy about it, because now he needs to finish taking inventory.

He turns to the medbay and gazes at the open door of the supply closet. Maybe he can find something to put it off. He mentally juggles the options. 

…Maybe taking inventory is a better option than dealing with a marine with a broken arm.

Wrangling a pen out of the never-ending depths of the random shit drawer, Wes gets to work.

The outpost is in disarray, and the post-battle is ravaging the entire staff.

The medbay is slightly less so, Wes’ stranglehold over the medbay protocols having finally paid off. He passes by a few cots, quickly checking the vitals.

Despite it being such a small outpost, one that shouldn’t be targeted, they’d suffered heavy casualties. He checks the cots one by one, making sure none of them have died or are moaning in agony he can fix with some well chosen painkillers.

The medevac from command will hopefully come soon-Wes is a medic, not a doctor goddamnit, and he isn’t equipped for some of the care these men will need.

He stops at one cot, only briefly. Private Newt is completely unconscious, red hair haphazardly tangled and matted with blood. His left arm-ending in a sudden stump-has not begun to bleed its bandages yet. Wes’ eyes drift to the empty chairs next to Newt.

With a quick flick of his eyes, he pulls up the manifest of the outpost onto his HUD. 

Only a few of the men hadn’t shown up for checkups yet. Several are noted as being in meetings or have called in earlier to inform the medics they would be held up, but there are.. There are two individuals who haven’t checked in yet.

One of which Wes was fully expecting to see here. Private Willis and Private McJohnson. They’re listed as being alive, not even MIA, so where the hell is Willis? The man is a burr to Newt’s side every moment of the day, and yet…

The unnerved feeling in his gut is not rational, but it sits there anyways. He glances back to Newt. He’s half awake, and his eyes are glazed with effects of painkillers and pain.

Decisively, he closes his HUD and marches out of the medbay. He’d need to wrangle the two either way.

He starts in the barracks, stepping into a mixture of grief and joy as people whisper and sob. Eyes snap up to him, soldiers holding themselves as tight as a wire, clearly recognizing him as a medic. After a moment, Wes narrows down on a sergeant sitting close to the entrance, and leaves the doorway to talk to him.

Helmets and heads shift to watch him move and breath is held as he speaks. “Sergeant, have you seen Privates Willis and McJohnson of West?”

The sergeant looks up as the tension drains out of the room on the realization that nobody has died or is dying. Or at least not anyone they need to worry about.

“..No, I haven’t. I’m their Sergeant, what do you need?”

He licks his lips under his helmet. “Ah, neither of them have checked into the medbay.” Wes can practically watch the thoughts tumble through the sergeants brain, and watches as he shoots to his feet. 

“Willis hasn’t visited Newt?” He says in a hurry, words tumbling over themselves. Wes silently shakes his head.

Carefully, he says “Do you have any ideas on where they might be? Rooms they hide in, places they go to smoke?”

There’s a pause, and then the sergeant starts walking out of the room at a quick pace. Wes is quick to follow, and the sergeant quickly explains. “Sometimes when McJohnson is-” He glances at Wes, eyes flickering with something of.. Hesitance. “..Having a hard time,” he continues, “he likes to hide out in the storage closet in 2B. The one nobody goes into?”

He knows the one. If he didn’t have the storage room in the medbay, it’s probable that he would have gone to that one when he needed a minute to recompose himself. He nods shortly, and picks up his walking speed to get ahead of the sergeant.

Doing his best not to even jog- seeing a medic run would cause some panic, he’s sure- he walks as quickly as possible. Wes isn’t the type to be superstitious, but the sinking feeling in his gut is one he does best to heed.

It’s happened often enough that it’s been right, and well. Wes doesn’t have an anxiety disorder to trigger irrational anxiety over everything and nothing at all.

The storage closet door is closed. He can hear voices behind it, rising and falling with a frantic nature to it. He sets his shoulders, reaches for the handle, and shoves the door open without any announcement.

As a medic, the first thing Wes notices is the blood. It’s coating the hands of a man, who upon the door being shoved open, immediately presses a knife to the neck of another. The man now being held at knifepoint freezes up like a board, and the knife-holder has a wild, frantic look in his eyes that Wes doesn’t like one bit.

He absentmindedly attempts to track the source of the blood on the hands of what he can assume to be McJohnson- and he should’ve called in that pyscheval, even if he couldn’t have known any better. Wes grabs the hand of the sergeant behind him. Wes’ fingers clamp around the mans wrist mid gun draw.

Wes exhales a slow, careful breath. “...McJohnson?”

Frantic eyes flick to him for a split second. The knife is pressed harder to Willis’ throat, and Wes catches a glimpse of something running down his neck. He tightens his grip on the sergeant's wrist who mutters a quick “his name is Adam.” As he releases his grip

Wes slowly, methodically, lifts his hands. “Soldier?” he says tentatively. McJohnson laughs a bit to himself, wheezy, as Wes shifts forward a bit, locking eyes with Willis.

The panic there has faded a bit, replaced by the trained response they’re supposed to have in a sudden intense circumstance. Wes speaks again, carefully placing his words. “I’m medic Wesley. I’ve been looking for you two, we’ve been worried.” He pauses, attempting to get a good read on McJohnson’s reaction. He just twitches a bit.

Willis holds eye contact with Wes for a moment, and then glances down to the knife. His hand twitches like he wants to go for the knife. Taking advantage of McJohnson’s seemingly distracted mind, he lets his hand from the Halt sign at his side. Willis stops. Wes exhales

“Can you release Willis for me, Adam?”

McJohnson- Adam- shakes his head, hard, and musters a “No. No, no I can’t. He can’t-” He cuts himself off, shuddering. His hands are shaking, and Wes notes it for potential tactical usage. Additionally, he can now see that the blood is dried. Newt’s, perhaps?

Slowly stepping forward once again, Wes gets a little closer to physical intervention. “Can you tell me why you can’t let him go?” Adam’s eyes finally lock onto Wes from their distracted nature. There’s a genuine raw fear in him, and Wes bundles up the empathy he feels for unpacking later.

“He- Newt’s hurt. They’ll die. They’ll all die. ” The knife is pulled away from his throat a bit as Adam pulls Willis back further, emoting a bit with the hand holding the knife. The sergeant twitches behind Wes. He barely resists stepping on the mans foot to halt his movement, in fear it’d set off Adam.

The knife is far enough away from Willis’ throat Wes could go for it. He signs a quick sequence, and waits for Willis to shakily blind a confirmation before he speaks again. “Okay Adam, I understand. Do you want to go see Newt?”

This visibly throws the private off, knife dropping even further, confusion overtaking the mania in his eyes just a little bit. “I-I, uh, I-”

Wes lunges forward, and in the same breath Willis attempts to throw himself out of Adam’s grip. It works about halfway- Adam manages to retain a grip, but he doesn’t get the time to pull the knife back to Willis’ throat as Wes gets a grip on his wrist.

He quickly twists the man’s arm, forcing him to drop the knife, before restraining him best he can while Adam is still standing. He forces him down to his knees, and the sergeant gets involved before Adam can even reorient himself from his place on the floor. He takes over restraining Adam while the man thrash

Wes redirects his attention immediately to Willis, who has moved himself to the doorway. He runs his eyes over him, looking for any additional injuries. He marches up to Willis, checking his throat for any knicks that get too deep, before herding the man out of the closet.

Willis hasn’t quite regained his wits until they exit the storage closet, at which point he gets out a “What the fuck. What the fuck.” He fumbles his next step, and Wes stabilizes him as he stumbles, and helps him to the floor.

He checks his HUD as he pulls up Willis’ vitals. Hm. Maybe that sergeant is good for something, the man called up reinforcements while Wes was juggling Adam.

As footsteps rush down the hall, Wes awkwardly gives Willis a reassuring shoulder pad as the man’s adrenaline drops. He’s in for a hell of a crash.

Wes turns his attention inward, and notes the knot of emotions he’ll need to unravel and what he’s fairly sure is a headache forming.

God. Wes needs a fucking break.

“Oh hush, let him have some fun!”

“Fun?! Okay. Lil- Look. What he’s doing is fucking weird. I don’t mean that in the derogatory sense, I mean that in the he’s at risk and needs guidance kind of sense!”

“Oh, it’s not that big of a deal is it?”

“It’s a huge deal-”