It was the early morning hours. Not even sane enough for the military or Red Cross to be up. But Mike was up, as
were two Deltas. They were known to the camp, Swanson and Mark, and all three were talking quietly outside the
mess tent, serious looks on their faces. Mike was rubbing his face as he shook his head.
"Do we tell her?" Mark asked Mike. "He won't."
"He should be the one to tell her." Mike said with a grunt.
"He won't." Swanson said with a shake of his head. "So that's why we're here, and then you intercepted us. You're her
friend. You tell us whether she should hear that Hector got his dumb self shot up, then didn't tell anyone, carried it in
him for a week and is now septic."
"Who gets shot and doesn't say anything?" Mike's question was rough.
"Middle of an op." Swanson sounded equal measures of angry and guilty. "We had a time line that couldn't be missed.
I still don't even know exactly which time we were getting shot at that he took it."
"That slave trader's house." Mark supplied. Simply looking guilty. "I saw him go down. But he just waved it off and kept
going."
"Jackass." Swanson snarled. Indicating his dark haired friend.
There was a general nod of agreement and then a bit of silence. Finally Mark cleared his throat.
"So - uh... we gonna tell her?"
Mike exhaled. Looked up at the sky. Shook his head.
"Go get the jeep." He growled finally. "I'm going to go get Andi."
"This should be fun." Swanson said.
"Will be even more fun when she starts asking us questions we can't answer." Mark piped up as the two Deltas walked
to the jeep, since they weren't medical people in the slightest. The word 'septic' they had picked up from the doctors
after dragging a nearly delirious Hector into the infirmary.
Mike was still shaking his head when he poked his head into the staff tent. "Andi? Come on, time to wake up." It really
wasn't, but at the same time, it was.
"Wssat?" The bed closest to the door shifted and one of Andi's pale long hands flailed in the air above her as if she
was reaching for a light pull. "Buggary bastard. Fish eyes in the soup. Sod it!" She finally sat up, sudden and straight,
hand reaching... and stopping. Blinking, she ran a hand through her hair, pushing it back from her face.
"Obnoxious Brit." Suz grumbled from the next bed over. Using English so she'd be entirely understood.
"Mike?" Andi rubbed the back of her hand against a cheekbone. "What's going on? Did we get new arrivals?" She was
already slinging her long legs over the side and fitting her feet into her sneakers as she asked.
Mike rubbed his jaw.
"Not exactly."
The way he said it had her stopping and looking up at him. And he watched the curious puzzlement slip to the side
and all the color drain from her face. And didn't move to correct her.
"Hector..." She whispered it and he nodded.
"Got shot. Went septic. We've got a ride."
Suzette sat up in her bed. Looking sleep tumbled and still easily gorgeous.
"How long?" She asked.
"Just got done taking it out of him this morning." Mike supplied when Andi suddenly jolted back into action. "About an
hour ago."
Andi, face pale, was murmuring under her breath, words coming out on both inhale and exhale and Mike didn't need
to hear the snatches that came to him to know she was praying. Suzette shoved her legs over the side of the bed and
wrestled her sneakers on as well. Andi pulled on an over shirt and was past Mike before he realized it. Face calm and
set. And pale. Words that sounded more like a plea than a prayer slipping into the morning air.
Suzette joined Mike and had to trot to keep up with the long strides he used to catch up to Andi, already using her own
long legs to be halfway to the jeep.
"Mal?" She asked and without thinking about it Mike nodded.
"Yeah. He's bad."
Andi swung herself smoothly into the back of the jeep next to Swanson and gave him an absent, painful smile. Mike
shoved in next to Mark in the front and Suzette squeezed into the back. Sam stepped out of his tent just in time to see
the US Army drive off with his best doctors.
"You know, we've got doctors." Swanson said to Suzette as he lit a cigarette.
"Oh, ma chere, I'm here for Andi." Suzette said sweetly. "Besides, what kind of operation do you run? Where you let
men get shot up and infected before doing something about it?" She couldn't help it, she reached over and took
Andi's hand in hers, her friend looked so pale and pained, the sharp words accented in French just wouldn't stop
coming.
"Don't start with me." Swanson said. "You weren't there. You have no idea what the hell was going on---"
"Can it." Mike said. "The first thing we need to do is get there, preferably in one piece. Got it?"
The comments stopped and if there was tension, Andi wasn't paying enough attention. Time passed but she didn't feel
it and then the base was there. Just - suddenly there. She blinked and it didn't feel odd to have things suddenly
appearing. Mostly because it was hard focusing on anything that wasn't immediately important. The door of the jeep
opened almost before it stopped and Andi was out the door. Already striding toward the infirmary. Suzette and Mike
unloaded a bit slower but just as determinedly. Mike followed but he was going to stop at the front and read the report.
Andi pushed inside, moving from memory as her eyes adjusted to the sudden dimness.
"Where?" She asked Martinez. And he gestured. Silent, she let herself into the post op section of the building.
The first thing Andi saw when she came into the post op room was that with the exception of three people, it was
completely empty. A nurse in scrubs writing on a medication record. A man with a black armband with MP written in
white sitting next to the bed reading a book, and Hector on the bed.
His wrists were tied down, several IV lines running, their machines softly beeping at times as he would flex his forearms
to try and get out. That's when the MP would clear his throat pointedly, On one arm he had a blood pressure cuff that
recorded his blood pressure every fifteen minutes, nasal cannula supplying oxygen, and the nurse had placed a cool
damp washcloth on his fevered brow.
He wasn't quite with it, but he had already tried to leave twice. Once in the OR after the surgery (the surgery itself was
minor) when he came to afterwards. And again in the post op area. Hence, the guard. The guard looked at Andi and
raised an eyebrow. She certainly was not authorized personnel.
Andi missed the guard. Oh, she registered his presence but the fact that he was something other than a disconnected
object didn't connect. The nurse luckily was paying attention and had met, and envied, Andi during a previous visit
and motioned to the rising guard.
The room seemed - very hollow to Andi. She'd never noticed that before and she paused past the doorway. Waiting
for everything in front of her to make sense. The straps on his arms hurt her deep in her chest.
Sneakers silent on the concrete floor she walked over to the bed and sat down on the edge of it. She'd read the
reports and the monitors. Later. Now she gently leaned over him and pressed a soft kiss to his forehead.
"There are easier ways to get my attention." She murmured.
Hector chuckled tiredly as he felt the press on his forehead. "Are there?" He asked and opened his eyes and looked
up at her. "Shh...they think I’m nuts."
"We think you're unreasonable." The guard corrected, going back to his book. "There's a difference, not much of one,
but one all the same."
Hector rolled his eyes a bit, eyes almost closing again from that, but he opened them again anyway. "Did I ever show
you the anti aircraft missile range?"
She gave him a soft smile. Heart aching and breaking and twisting, twisting, inside her chest. Careful not to dislodge
anything or jostle it, she leaned forward and rested the side of her cheek gently against his stubbled one.
Smelling pain and 'medicine' and sweat and blood. And below that....? Shadowy secrets in the African night. Her eyes
fell closed, lashes brushing against the edge of his cheek and she turned her face enough to press a gentle kiss to
his scraped jaw line.
"No. You haven't." She answered his question, her own voice low. "Maybe in a few days. For today, I just want to see
you."
"It’s a nice quiet place." He tried to lift his arms once more and groaned in frustration, not feeling any pain yet thanks
to the anesthesia. He glared at the guard. "I'd show you, but I seem to be a bit tied up right now."
"That's what you get for trying to leave against orders." The guard said whimsically, turning a page, having been over
this already with the sergeant.
"Andi...can I have a pair of scissors?" Hector asked. "Please?"
She drew back to brace over him, watching his face. Shook her head calmly.
"No, love." The endearment came easily despite never having been used before. "Today you get to stay in bed." She
turned the cloth on his forehead over, feeling the heat against her fingertips before gently brushing the backs of them
down his cheek. Surprised he was as coherent as he was. "And since I don't think you'd use those scissors to cut
paper angels, we're going to have to hold off on those. Besides," her brows came down and she looked at one of his
wrists. Saw how red the skin was despite the padding to prevent that kind of thing. Saw the bruises from IVs that
hadn't been taken out professionally and knew he'd done that. She'd restrained patients before but usually only when
they were hopped up on street drugs. Which Hector most certainly wasn't. His arms continued to flex against the
leather straps randomly. Thoughtful, she moved a leg, so one of his hands rested over it just above her knee. Looking
back at him, she continued mildly: "You really need a hacksaw, not scissors, if you're planning an escape."
"Do you have a hacksaw?" He asked with a chuckle. "Oh come on...its bright in here, and he's obnoxious...and the
nurse keeps sticking me." The nurse shrugged. It was medication, what was she supposed to do? "Thought my
dreams were supposed to go my way, not theirs...what's in that medication?"