Thanks for the prompt, Anon! Part 3 of the fucked-up feral!Soldier 76 AU, courtesy of @tophatlass‘s inspiration. And now that I have three parts, I’m going to have to actually name this thing.
By the time they’ve cleared the Talon personnel from the labs, Jack is literally drenched in blood. He uses whatever’s on hand to kill—being out of his mind hasn’t dented his talent with knives, guns, or thrown objects—but he’s spent the majority of it tearing into people with his bare hands.
He’s also still naked.
Gabriel stops moving when he realizes this, gets tackled into a bulkhead by a snarling Morrison, and has to turn into smoke to slip out from under him without hurting him.
The problem isn’t so much that Jack is naked. It’s how to get the damn clothes on him, how to get the damn blood off him, how to get him away from this motherfucking base when he’ll try to kill anybody who shares a confined space with him—such as a goddamned car—. Gabriel’s learned a lot of profanities in a lot of languages over the years. He finds new and creative ways to combine them while he stalks off toward the residential area of the base.
Then he stalks back because Jack isn’t fucking following him. He finds him half-conscious in a puddle of blood just outside the door of the labs. “Hijo de la chingada.”
Well, at least it solves some problems.
He manages to bundle Jack into a shower in the staff quarters with a minimum of fuss. He pulls the curtain and stands outside, because if there’s one thing he can predict, it’s that cornering a terrified, injured and exquisitely trained super-soldier in a three by five foot space is a recipe for disaster.
When he goes in to pull him back out, it turns out the water woke him up. There’s an explosion of violence and water, and Gabriel has a blurred sense of fighting a greased wolverine before Jack is past him and moving.
Jesus, that man can run.
Gabriel sighs and pulls out the controller. 50 feet down the hallway, Jack arches backward, makes a “HRKGKK” noise and collapses to his knees, twitching.
Gabriel picks up the little pile of bandages, cloth, ointments and butterfly strips he put together and goes over to him. “Goddammit, Morrison, have you noticed you’re injured?” He points to the blood leaking down his side, coming from a long score down the side of his ribs. It’s not likely to kill him, but it needs to be dealt with.
Jack scrabbles at the floor, trying to get up, but the collar must deliver one hell of a payload, because Gabriel knows exactly how much punishment Jack can take and he still can’t get himself coordinated.
“I’m not going to hurt you, pendejo,” Gabriel growls, reaching for him. Maybe he should’ve gone lighter on the tone, because Jack twists like a cobra, wrapping himself around Gabriel’s outstretched arm. HIs unguarded arm; Gabriel stripped off his gauntlets and coat to deal with Jack. He howls at the teeth that sink into the soft tissue near the inside of his elbow.
“Fantastic,” he hisses. Mother Mary, that hurts. “So now I know you were listening when I taught you to be an asshole in hand-to-hand.”
Jack bites down harder. Gabriel punches the ground a couple of times in lieu of screaming or punching Jack, and then reaches for the supplies. At least he’s staying fucking still. Gabriel twists them around a bit till Jack’s more conveniently positioned to have his wound treated.
It’s funny how things come back to you. It’s been years, but Jack’s body in his lap still feels as familiar as ever.
Doing this one-handed is awkward as hell, but less so than the alternatives. Every time Jack looks like he’s thinking of changing tactics, Gabriel shakes his arm a bit or taps him and he sets in again. “I’m going to make you pay for this, cabron. Oh, believe me. I’m starting a new list. And between that and me putting you back together enough to function, you are going to owe me your soul, farmboy.”
Reaper ranting aimlessly in a voice that sounds like a crude oil spill catching fire will probably never qualify as soothing to anybody. But maybe they didn’t bother speaking to him much, because Jack doesn’t seem to know quite what to do with being addressed by another human being. Ish.
Once he’s done patching up the wound and gluing Jack back together, Gabriel tickles him on his lower abdomen, just above the line of his pubic hair. Works for cats. Works for Jack. He uncoils like a shot and thumps his back against the other side of the hallway, looking surprised as hell. Gabriel grins at him, for just a second nothing but a guy entertained at the expense of a friend. Jack always was sensitive as hell there.
He stretches a bit to reach the pants he dug out of Talon’s uniform stores and tosses them into Jack’s lap. “You remember what to do with those?” God, please. He really doesn’t want to have to fight with Jack to get him dressed.
Still looking shocked and baffled, Jack fumbles with the clothes and stares at them for a bit. Then at Gabriel. Then at the clothes. Gabriel’s about to despair before he finally scrambles to his feet and moves off down the hall several more feet to put them on, still eying Gabriel like he’s planning an ambush.
Gabriel stays put on the floor, watching Jack from the corner of his eye while he turns most of his attention to his own wound. They both probably need a course of antibiotics. He’s probably going to get tetanus. Can he still get tetanus? Thank Christ the SEP overcharged their immune systems because after bathing in the blood of that many Talon operatives, Jack’s probably been exposed to STDs that are new to man.
Jack buttons the trousers up, backs away a couple more steps on the balls of his feet, like he’s about to run…then hesitates, watching Gabriel tend to the bite mark Jack gave him. In his peripheral vision, Gabriel watches his posture ease from fight-or-flight to mere asskicking-ready.
Jack inches back a little more when Gabriel finally stands up, but Gabriel’s careful to keep his movements smooth, slow and directed anywhere except in Jack’s direction. He collects the heap of medical supplies—they’ll probably need those again—and then just stands there with his arms full.
“Well, viejo? I don’t know if you can understand me, but you can either follow me out of this hellhole or stay here.”
Jack looks him up and down, but doesn’t even look like he’s inclined to move. Gabriel lets his mouth twist. He’s not sure what he expected. He’s not good with this shit, with tolerating peoples’ weakness. He keeps wanting Jack to just snap out of it and come back to himself, but that’s not going to happen. He knows about torture; he’s done enough of it. Whatever Talon did to Jack is going to leave long-term damage and permanent scars. Eventually Gabriel will have to decide whether he really wants to put in the work it’ll take to get Jack to the point of being useful to him, or if he’d rather wash his hands of it and put a bullet in his head.
And some of that depends on Jack himself: whether there’s enough of him left in there to fight for it, or if it turns out a bullet in the head would be a mercy to the remains of someone who, for all Gabriel’s hate, was still a fellow soldier.
But hell, half an hour ago Jack was covered in the blood of his enemies. So Gabriel picks up his mask and gauntlets and starts walking. He’s nearly to the next turn in the corridor when he glances back to see Jack start after him. He smiles behind his mask.
from Tumblr http://ift.tt/2bble9z