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It was all his fault.
There was no excuse he could make, no way he could spin the story, nothing he could do to fix what he had caused. Walker hadn’t been fast enough to take out the rogue alien before it threw its weird space grenade, and now Bob was lying in a hospital bed, unconscious and unresponsive – and it was all Walker’s fault. He sat in the only chair in the room, studying Bob’s too still and too pale form under the pristine white sheet and trying to ignore the bitter tang of guilt in his mouth that not even the stinging bite of the sterile antiseptic could cut through. Bob’s face was a map of dark, purpling bruises under both eyes and across the bridge of his nose, spreading like the Rorschach blots in his therapist's office over his cheekbones. There was a thin, neat bandage that hid a gash on his temple, stark white against the bruises. Wires snaked from beneath the sheet and connected him to the beeping machines around him that didn’t do much to settle Walker’s nerves. Heartbeat too slow, breathing too shallow. Unconscious, unresponsive.
Walker reached out a hand and his fingers hovered a few inches above Bob’s arm, but he wasn’t able to work up the nerve to actually touch. His hand was trembling slightly and he squeezed it into a fist until his knuckles turned white before letting it drop back to his lap. So much good those hands did Bob earlier, all of the strength and training in the world and still Walker had failed him. Once again, the people who trusted him paid the price for his failures and he got to keep walking. There was a soft click of the door, but Walker didn’t bother to turn his head to look away from Bob. He could tell from the gait that slightly favored the left foot that it was the same nurse who had made rounds an hour ago. She quickly looked at all of the monitors, adjusted something with Bob’s IV, and offered Walker another tense smile.
“You should try to get some rest, sir,” she said softly and gestured to the cot they had set up for him the previous night – blankets untouched. “We will wake you up the second anything changes.”
He didn’t respond. He couldn’t. Rest was an alien concept, as far away and incomprehensible as the creature that had caused this. He just sat in the chair, stiff and unmoving until he heard the click of the door that announced her departure. He waited a few minutes after that, then he stood briskly and left the room, the silence of the corridor a different kind of oppressive than the beeping machines in Bob’s room. The memory of the mission was a jagged shard in his mind, constantly reopening the wound whenever he tried to stop thinking about it. It started like any other mission. The briefing room was half lit while Bucky pointed at a holographic display of a creature coded-named ‘The Scuttler’ – a multi-limbed, chitinous alien that shared Ava’s ability to phase through solid objects and a penchant for generating localized energy pulses that worked like supercharged grenades.
Walker had sat, had listened, had accepted his job without hesitation. He was the bait and the primary deterrent. Bob’s job was to help the police with clearing a building of citizens before the creature could destroy it. It was his usual task, and everyone on the team was confident in his ability to do it. Walker had never once doubted Bob’s abilities in his role; he was meticulous, calm under pressure, and good with people. He trusted Bob to get the job done. No one else on the team was better suited for it. The mission itself had been the usual whirlwind of chaos. The Scuttler was faster and more agile than their intel had suggested. When it phased through building walls, it created sonic booms that shattered windows and sent pedestrians screaming in every direction. Walker had barely managed to capture its attention, barely managed to keep pace as reality warped around its tentacle arms. He’d been cornered in a narrow alleyway, a dead end between two towering skyscrapers, and the rest of the team was at least a block out. Before he could react, a brick had flown out of nowhere and slammed into the creature and it turned to face the entrance to the alley.
“Pick on someone your own size!” Bob shouted and the alien screeched.
Walker had lunged, shield first, aiming to pin its largest limb to the ground when it wailed. He reacted without conscious thought to the sound that he had come to associate with one of its space grenade blasts, muscles coiling in anticipation. He could flatten himself against the wall, reduce his profile and use the shield to cover his head – or use the shield to try and bat the grenade away. But instead, he looked past the creature and saw Bob. Determined and unmoving and not even trying to get out of the way of the creature. There were civilians behind him who he had been ushering, maybe fifty yards away but still easily inside the blast radius if it was as strong as previous ones had been. He didn’t hesitate. He started to pivot and throw himself between the grenade and the civilians – between the grenade and Bob.
But the alien was faster than he had anticipated. A wave of concussive force, green energy rippling through the air and expanding with terrifying speed. Walker was still mid-leap. He had managed to get his shield up just in time, absorbing the brunt of the immediate impact. The force still slammed into him and sent him flying back into a wall – or more so through the wall. The alien phased away, disappearing into the concrete of the skyscraper, but not before a secondary wave of energy flooded the area, without his shield in the way to block it.
He heard screams.
Then silence.
A ringing in his ears.
Dust had slowly filled the air, acrid and suffocating and making him choke on each inhale. He had pushed himself up, his head swimming, his body aching, but still able to stand. He scrambled through the dust and debris, his eyes scanning and adrenaline flooding his veins. He found the civilians first – most of them stunned and lying on the ground, but everyone was still alive and groaning. Then his eyes landed on Bob. He was sprawled awkwardly on the ground, on top of the the base of a shattered and bent lamppost. His shirt was torn, head tilted sideways at an unnatural angle, and blood already matting his hair at the temple.
Walker had rushed to him without a second thought, uncaring of wherever the alien was going – he could hear sound of combat, the rest of the team had caught up, he could stay here and try to salvage one of the biggest mistakes of his life. He carefully rolled him onto his back and cupped his face. Bob’s eyes were open but staring blankly at the dust-filled sky, his breathing already shallow and ragged. There was a dark bloom of bruises already forming on his face.
“Medic!” he roared with a terror he rarely allowed himself to feel. “I need a goddamn medic! Now!”
He pressed his fingers against Bob’s neck, searching for a pulse and finding one that was faint and thready. A wave of sharp nausea washed over him. He had been there. He had been right there. He had seen the grenade. He had known the danger, Bob hadn’t. And he hadn’t been fast enough. Hadn’t been good enough. When a rescue ambulance unit arrived, he watched them work but his mind was replaying the moment over and over in perfect, vivid detail. He could have moved faster. He could have covered Bob more effectively. He could have taken the hit for him fully. He was a super soldier, he could take it. Bob couldn’t.
An alarm tore him into the present, the hospital walls closing in around him like a cage. He wandered the sterile corridors and the white walls blurred around him until he reached the ICU, looking at the other patients, other tragedies. People had offered condolences and support, but their words were hollow and meaningless. None of them had been in his place. None of them had seen the split-second decision, the fractional delay, the failure to intercept the blast. He was the only person who knew the truth. He was fast enough, strong enough, his failure wasn’t one of capability, but of execution. He had miscalculated, been over confident, hesitated to choose the perfect angle, and now Bob was paying for it. Walker flinched when something tugged on his pant leg, and he stepped to the side as he looked down at a young boy blinking up at him.
“You fought the alien,” the kid whispered quietly like it was the biggest secret of the world. Walker stared down at him and found himself at a loss for what he could say, so he just nodded silently. “You saved the nice man.”
“What?” he managed to choke out weakly.
“The nice man who saved my dad, you saved him,” the kid reasserted confidently before grabbing his hand. “C’mon, my dad is here. You saved my pop and the nice man.”
Walker stared down at the tiny hand in his and before he knew it, he looked up to a door to a different hospital room. The kid pushed the door open and pulled him in, but he pulled his hand away the second they were through the door, staring at the bed with wide eyes. The man lying in it looked about as bad as Bob, blond hair pushed back from his face where bruises and bandages covered most of his skin. There was a second man in a military uniform – Navy, Walker’s brain supplied unhelpfully – sitting next to the bed and holding the unconscious man’s hand. He stood up when he heard the door open, smiling despite the exhaustion in his eyes when he saw the small boy. He held his free hand out and ran a hand through the slightly tangled blond curls before stiffening when he caught sight of Walker in the door. He stood quickly, tugging the boy behind him.
“Who are you?” he demanded, but the heat in his voice was overpowered by a familiar exhaustion and guilt.
“I–”
“He saved the nice man!” the boy chirped as he clambered up onto the bed to lay curled against the man. “The nice man who saved you! He saved the nice man and pop.”
The man stared at Walker with suspicion in green eyes as they trailed over him, taking in every inch of his posture, outfit – it felt like he was staring through him and into his soul. After a long moment passed, he seemed to find what he was looking for and offered a slight smile, “You were with those heroes?”
“Yes, sir,” Walker managed to get out through a mouth that felt like it was stuffed with cotton.
“Thank you,” he whispered and held his hand out. Walker felt like a stranger in his own body as he stepped forward and took the man’s hand in his. He squeezed one of Walker’s hands tightly with both of his and tilted his head. “I owe you so much.”
“How is he doing?” Walker asked, and the man dropped his hand to turn back to the bed with a wistful expression. He reached out and took the man’s hand again, running his fingers over bruised knuckles with a tenderness and love that made Walker’s throat ache.
“The doctors are waiting to make any judgments until he wakes up, but he’ll live,” the man said quietly. He looked back to Walker, tears brimming at the edge of his eyes but a more genuine smile on his face than what had been directed at Walker in years. “You saved my husband’s life.”
“I was just…just doing my job,” Walker replied weakly with a pathetic excuse for a smile.
“Please, I’ve seen the news casts,” the man scoffed and waved a hand dismissively. “I know plenty of men just like you. You weren’t just doing your job, you were putting yourself on the line for other people. That might be the job we think we signed up for, but no one says you have to do that. You chose to risk your life, and you saved my husband – and so many more people.”
“Is the nice man okay?” the boy asked from the bed where his head was resting on the unconscious man’s chest. “Or is he like pop?”
“Oh, Bee, pop is okay, remember? He’s just sleeping because his body is really tired, and the machines are helping him until he’s not tired anymore and can wake up,” the man said gently, reaching down and cupping the boy’s cheek lightly before brushing his fingers through the short blond curls again. He looked over to Walker again and tilted his head. “How is…the nice man? Is he alright?”
“Um–” His brain shouted at him – No, he’s not. He’s lying in a bed hooked up to machines and barely breathing enough to stay alive on his own. – but then his eyes landed on the young boy and trailed up to the unconscious man’s face, bruised and battered but still alive, and something pinched in his throat at the sight of the boy’s small hand resting against the man’s collarbone. He cleared his throat and made eye contact with green eyes again. “Yeah. Yeah, he’s going to be just fine.”