churbooseanon

Wherein David answers the distress call and finds himself thankful for all he already knows.

To Get Out Alive [Part Three] - (A Guns for Hire Fanfic)

Caution had always and would always be the better part of valor. Or, at least, that was what David had learned in the service. Go in after a lost man, yes. Bring your team out alive, yes. Take down the enemy and complete your objectives, yes. There had even been a few situations that he’d been forced to put those skills to use during his service. Not, of course, that the UNSC army had too much to do other than train since the distant ending of the war which had made major steps towards unifying the greater part of humanity and it’s colony worlds. Hell, even the mostly undeclared war against the Separatist Movement had ended just after David had joined up. But there were always things that planetary governments might ask of their established branches of the UNSC. ‘Put down this drug cartel’ or ‘help rescue people from this terrible transport crash’ or ‘deal with a terrorist organization that we can’t handle.’

Normally it wasn’t a problem, of course. The military served, with no restraints or worries, in part because the loyalty of their men and women were to the UNSC, not to the world they served on. No one was ever trained on or deployed to their homeworld, to prevent conflicts of interest. And so David had found himself training on one of the more ecologically disastrous of humanity’s worlds. Not because he had experience from his own homeworld that would suit it. Not because Adaptive often called on the UNSC to mediate in conflicts between the city-states that were scattered across the surface of the more or less barren mining world. No, it was because his father was a fucking UNSC Army hero turned Major General stationed on a core world and no one wanted to be responsible for putting his son into an active hotzone. No, better to trust him to a world where taking a breath outside was a danger. Still, David had proved himself, and his CO who hadn’t given a fuck about powerful patronage had recognized David’s potential and put the promising Corporal into the position to prove himself time and time again.

Caution, his CO had always reminded him, was the better part of valor. How many times had those words rung in David’s head while out on missions sanctioned by one city-state or another to do ops they needed done, and done within UNSC regulations? How often had he told himself that as he stood by silently and assured himself that it was okay that they were being used as pawns in the ongoing power struggle of this planet that tried to wipe humanity off of it with every passing day? And when, he wondered, had it not been enough to stand by and watch the way this world operated like ‘legal’ was this very vague concept of right and wrong that was waved off in attacks, spying, theft, and accepted mercenary practices? Watching the UNSC stand back and let this happen, let this go on, not step in and enforce the proper behaviors of civilized planets and colonies had to have broken him at some point. When, David wondered, had that been? He couldn’t remember.

What he remembered was that caution was the better part of valor. That, he supposed, was why when the clerk that had processed his discharge had reminded him that UNSC wasn’t appreciated in the cities, he had taken it seriously. The second thing that David had done after getting to Gulch and getting himself a small apartment in a towering condo building, had been to go to the nearest gun store and get himself a weapon. Why he spent a night every week keeping up with his skills at a gun range. Why a kevlar vest he had acquired through less than legitimate means was always in the backseat of his truck.

These were the first things on his mind as David pulled his beaten up truck to a stop two blocks from the location marked with an amber dot on his GPS. That was where Karim’s message had come from, and until he had an argument against it, he was going to assume the other man was there. Part of him wanted to drive closer, to get there faster, but caution was… well, he didn’t need to repeat that point a hundred times over. Instead he just turned the vehicle off, pulled the vest on over the beat up t-shirt he had selected by merit of cleanness when he’d showered before work, and lamented how loose it felt. He hadn’t worn any form of body armor since his discharge, and it felt both impossibly heavy and frustratingly light. Civilian grade stuff would never, he supposed, match military. But it was what he had, and as he reached for the pistol and started tucking clips into his pockets and pouches on the vest, he had to hope it would be enough.

Move slowly, his head told himself even as his heart shouted to rush. The clear winner, of course, was David slowly getting out of the truck, closing the door as quietly as he could, and moving to get some cover against the side of the building he had parked by. For a moment he considered turning the lights on his helmet on, but then just crouched low and started to move quickly down the road. Anytime he came up on a place where an enemy might be able to hide he stopped briefly, checked around the corner with his gun out, and when he was satisfied, he advanced further.

No one told the man in gray and blue at the end of the alley about caution and valor. The man was just standing there at the mouth of the alley, a M7 sub-machine gun fully extended with the stock braced poorly against his shoulder, his attention clearly further down the alley. The man didn’t seem concerned with being seen by someone and getting the cops called in. He didn’t seem bothered at all by the idea of cover. In fact he just stood there, his stance loose and terrible for all that he had the gun up.

“Come on, kid, you’re going to run out of bullets sooner or later,” the man calls, and the amusement in his voice disgusts David. “Just give up and I promise to make it quick and painless.”

“Fuck… you!” a voice called from down the alley, behind a dumpster if David was any judge, and the pant in it, the sort of pain that sounded like there was grit teeth and silent tears behind it, was what made him move. Granted the movement was to tuck his pistol into the back of his pants, safety on, and stroll down the street. His steps were silent, quiet, a prowler’s pace.

In another situation, one without helmets, he would have just come up to the guy, tapped him on the shoulder, and knocked him out with a punch. As it was David slipped up behind the man and, after a calming breath, lunged forward. It was far too easy to get his arm wrapped around the asshole’s throat, to lock his arm in place by bracing his free hand against it, and while he winced at the sound of the gun clattering to the cement, it was quiet enough not to be too much of a concern. David held him, pulling the man back and down a bit to keep him from moving easily, and he just held tight, not letting up even as the man slapped at his arm and tried in vain to claw at his head, anything to get out of the hold as David slowly choked him out.

“Should have held onto your gun,” he whispered as the fight started to go out of the man. “But don’t worry. You just give up, and I promise I won’t snap your neck.”

He got a pathetic croak as the man’s arms went limp, and he held on just a bit longer to make sure that he’d knocked the target out. Then he slowly lowered the stranger to the ground. Still no movement. Good, he’d taken care of that, which meant he could go to Karim. Well, no, not just yet. Training said disarm the man first, and so, despite the concern, David quickly patted the person down, acquiring two mags of ammo for the man’s weapon, a grenade, and knife. Part of him worried over the fact that the asshole had a grenade, and wondered over the fact that it hadn’t been used. Could only mean he was supposed to bring Karim, or at least something Karim was carrying, in with him. Not the best sign, but David had dealt with this man, and after collapsing the stock on the man’s weapon and checking to make sure there wasn’t a biolock on it, he moved down the alley at a slow pace.

“Karim,” he called out, his voice a hissing whisper. There was always the chance that this man wasn’t alone. Granted, the fact that no one had stopped David despite the noise of taking him down, he had to assume he was alone. “Karim, I’m here. Don’t shoot. Where are you?”

“Here,” his voice called weakly from behind the dumpster, and David barely caught sight of a hand waving, a hand gloved in black and brown and the uneven glint of liquid. Heart in his throat David moved quickly and cautiously down the alley before ducking down behind the dumpster.

Karim looked like shit, it didn’t take a medic to see that. The second David was at his side his left hand wrapped back around himself, and the way his shoulders tensed told David all he needed to know about how badly that had to hurt. But the way Karim’s arm curled in tightly around himself wasn’t in the way David had seen from injured arms before. No, his hand was slipping under his coat and pressing firmly against his side. David half wished he could take his helmet off, could smell for the blood he knew had to be in the air, but he wasn’t willing to risk that and he knew any hint of it would be scrubbed by his helmet’s filters. Maybe that was for the best.

“What happened?” he asked very carefully as he pulled his coat off from over his kevlar vest. As he opened Karim’s coat he winced to see the spread of darker color over the man’s dark brown shirt. Blood, no doubt. David grit his teeth, lifted Karim’s hand, and frowned at the wound. What sort of idiot went into this work without some measure of protective gear? No, he wasn’t going to chide the other man now. Instead he folded his coat quickly and pushed it firmly against the wound. He’d seen worse, a lot worse, and if he got Karim to a hospital, he could pull through this.

“They were waiting for me,” Karim gasped in pain as David pressed the fabric firmly against his wound. Not that David could let it stay like that. He grabbed Karim’s hand and encouraged the man silently to hold it in place with as much pressure as he could. “Don’t, oh god Davie it hurts…”

“I know, but I also need to know what I’m dealing with to get you out of here, Kar. Please,” David said as he worked the GPS in his helmet to bring up the nearest hospital. Three miles away wasn’t too bad. He could load Karim up in the truck and get there in no time.

“First one followed me, I guess. When I got near the target, he drew security’s attention down on me,” Karim hissed in pain as David started looking Karim over for any other wounds. There weren’t any obvious, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t internal damage. Probably was. “Had to abort, wanted to come from another angle, but had to take care of tail first. We ended up here after security stopped chasing. Tried to get my employer out of me. Not sure why, but… oh god…”

Instinct and training made David reach for the PMK that should be on his belt, but no, this wasn’t the military, and as he touched the pistol at his back, he remembered that. Fuck. He had no pain medicine, no biofoam, not even a sedative. Be prepared? Like hell he was prepared. There was going to be a fully stocked kit in his truck this time tomorrow. But for now, he had someone else to focus on.

“Come on, we’re getting you out of here,” David said at last, leaning down to pick Karim up. “I’m getting you to a hospital and they’ll get you…”

David was cut off as he started to stand. His helmet must have just peeked out from over the dumpster because a gun went off and then his head was jerking a little to the side. Immediately he was back down, lowering Karim, his hand coming up to stroke over his helmet. He could feel a slight dent on the top of it, but tried to shake that off. They missed, that was what was important.

“You didn’t take them both out?” Karim whimpered through the pain, presumably from being lifted or dropped.

“You didn’t tell me there was two,” David growled in protest. He made sure Karim was set carefully out of the way, handing over his pistol. “Just in case.”

“Got my own,” Karim answered, and David shook his head.

“Figure you’re out of bullets just… just hold it,” David insisted. Then he got down, stretching himself out on the cement of the alley. Once he was fully stretched out he pulled the submachine gun out in front of him, and took a deep breath.

“I’m getting you out of this, I promise,” he whispered to his ex-boyfriend as he took one last breath, settled the gun before him, and rolled out of cover. The second he could see toward the road he opened fire, and the screams of pain as he let loose were more than enough to tell him of a hit.

Ankles, no one ever really thought to protect them.

The person at the end of the alley was whimpering in pain, sprawled on the ground, and David quickly scrambled to his feet. He ran down the alley and kicked the gun out of the squirming woman’s hands before she could raise it against him.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, “but I’m in a rush. I’ll call an ambulance for you once I’ve got him out of here. I promise.”

Always had too soft a heart, he was told. David tried not to think as he kicked the woman as hard as he could in the helmet and she went limp as her head snapped a bit to the side. He didn’t let himself look at her legs as he ran back for Karim. His concern right now had to be getting him help, not in worrying about someone who had just tried to kill him. There were priorities, and as David rushed back down the alley and got Karim into his arms, he just hoped he’d gotten his right.

This was, he figured, the sort of risk the people attacking Karim had agreed to. Right?