Every Spark (1/5)
Well, I guess I talked about this enough, huh? Time to post something.
Title: Every Spark (1/5)
Author: Krista or smilesawakeyou
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Pairing/characters: Future Babe/Doc Roe
Rating: PG-13 for language and some disturbing imagery
Disclaimer: I didn’t invent this show and I don’t propose to own it. Even if I did and you sued, all you would get is a shitty computer and my broken dreams. Anyway, I don’t so please leave me be. Also, this is meant to be based off of the characters of the HBO show, not the actual men themselves. So yeah... don't pitchfork me.
Author's Notes: Hello! This is my first BoB fic ever and it started out as a one-shot that has now spiraled into this… thing. Anyway, I mentioned that I was writing this to annakovsky and she was all “omg post it!” so I am (perhaps foolishly) listening to her. This is un-beta’d so any mistakes are my own and each chapter will be disproportionately larger than the last, because that’s how this bitch rolls. The title is stolen from an Arcade Fire song because I’ve been listening to them a lot and I doubt they’ll care that I poached a lyric off of them. So enjoy!
Length: 1531
Summary: Four times Babe Heffron and Doc Roe almost collide and one time they do.
Every Spark
(1/5)
It’s snowing and Babe Heffron can’t hear a damn thing.
The silence is something he’s not accustomed to; like the world’s been put under a blanket and his ears have been stuffed with cotton… so different from the busy streets of Philly full of yelling and honking and laughter. But then he remembers - he’s in the forest, it’s always quiet in the forest. But this is different. It’s all weighty and still and there are no men shouting, no men screaming, and something unnatural is in the air.
The heaviness of it all presses into him as the ground begins to swallow him whole.
Oh God, he realizes in panic. It’s happened.
He struggles against it as he slips, yet he can’t move his leaden body - it doesn’t even hurt , he marvels- but his eyes begin to water as he realizes he can’t breathe. He cannot breathe. Fingers drifting up, he touches his neck to find it in tatters, his breath struggling and bubbling around the wound.
So many times Doc has jumped into his foxhole, demanding he walk around. “Get the hell up, Heffron. Gotta get the blood flowing,” he’d say, his voice subdued and often amused as Babe would grumble in response. Now the blood’s flowing everywhere, out of him, out of his neck, he can feel it pump, pump, pump out onto the snow covered grass. Yet still, he doesn’t feel the pain or the cold of it, just a slow draining… like a bathtub being emptied of water. Water flowing out. Blood flowing…
“Medic,” he hears. “Medic.” The muffled voice belongs to no one.
He blinks, long and slow, and Gene’s there, looking down at him, that sad crease forming between his eyes but he doesn’t move. Doesn’t stir. Just stares down as his pale blue lips form a thin line. Babe’s seen that face before. Too many times. He reaches up a hand, fingers trembling and covered in the bright red as he tries to say, “Help me, Gene, help me,” but the words die and sputter out of the hole in his throat, his mouth moving uselessly.
But then he has to stifle a silent scream as another figure appears standing next to Gene: it’s Julian, his throat matching Babe’s - an ungodly mess of sinew and tissue and his eyes staring down at him. Gene doesn’t seem to see him as Julian steps forward and points, his breath gurgling and his eyes accusing, deep and black. Babe knows what he’s being accused of.
“I couldn’t do anything,” he tries to say, wanting to get away, to run. “I couldn’t get to you.” But Julian just stares and Gene starts to shake his head.
“There’s nothing we can do,” he says in French though Babe understands it, “it’s too late.”
With that he’s bending down, looming over Babe as his fingers descend to shut Babe’s eyes, shut them forever as Babe tries to shout that he’s not dead, he’s not, and when Gene’s hands come to rest on his face he suddenly feels it, feels the cold screaming around him and the searing agony in his neck as he tries to yell himself hoarse. It’s no use. There’s just an encroaching blackness and everything is gone, the earth swallowing him whole as he struggles to breathe, gasping, gasping, gasping as the blood flows out-
“Babe… Babe? Heffron!”
He sputters awake as a firm hand wrenches his shoulder.
Gene is crouching in front of him, the small crease between his eyes and Babe fights the wild wave of panic that flares through him.
“Babe, it’s alright,” Gene soothes, his thumb rubbing in circles on his shirt above his heart. “You’re alright. Just a dream.”
Babe sucks in a halting breath, feeling his eyes sting. “Fuck,” he mutters, looking away. “God, it was… you… Julian was…” At remembering the look in his friend’s eyes, he feels a sudden surge of desperate anger. “Fuck,” he spits, pounding a fist in the frozen earth beside him, causing Gene to release his shoulder. “Fucking fuck.”
Gene leans back onto his haunches and eyes him warily. Babe gives the ground one more good punch before he deflates, sinking back against the wall of his foxhole.
“Fuck,” he breathes, only quiet this time. Defeated. Gene observes him for a moment more before shuffling to rest against the side of the wall at his side.
“I take it it was a bad dream, then?” he says, his eyes flicking up to look at Babe. In spite of the knowing sadness in his gaze he’s got that almost-smile on his serious face, the kind that makes Babe want to laugh in spite of himself.
So he does, only it sounds more like a cough and he’s pretty sure he’s not smiling too good. “Yeah. You could say that.”
Gene just grunts in reply before taking Babe by the wrist and inspecting the hand he had been using to beat the ground. It’s wrapped in blue and it takes Babe a moment to realize there’s a shock of red bleeding through the fabric. Gene’s eyes flick up to look at him again, his expression almost bemused.
“Shit, Heffron,” he says, pulling out his bag and rifling through it one-handed, his other hand remaining fixed to Babe’s wrist, “you gotta stop beating yourself up so much, I’m gunna run out of all the good sulfa.”
“Aw jeez, Gene,” Babe says, feeling genuinely stupid. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…”
But Gene’s giving him that look again, the one that says he doesn’t really mind and that he even finds it a bit funny so Babe shuts up, watching as the blue cloth comes off and white powder is poured onto the wound. His right eye twitches at the twinge of pain it causes. Gene either doesn’t notice or pretends not to. Reaching into his pocket, he grabs another bit of the same cloth and wraps it back up.
“Where’d you get that?” Babe wonders out loud. He’d been inspecting the bit of material ever since it had first got fixed to his hand, the blue thread fine-woven and pale against his white skin.
Gene’s face does that thing that Babe’s noticed plenty of times - it’s like someone’s suddenly pulled the shutters behind his eyes and his lips tighten a bit at the corners. He just shrugs. “Bastogne.”
“Oh.” Babe pauses, feeling incompetent in the face of the sudden change in Gene’s demeanor. “It’s… nice.”
That seems to shake Gene out of it a bit because he raises an eyebrow Babe’s way, his mouth quirking and his almost-smile seeming to convey that he finds Babe quite the strange creature to behold. A blush forms at the base of Babe’s neck as he looks away in an effort to recover some dignity.
“Erm, thanks,” he says lamely when Gene’s done. His wrist isn’t released right away; Gene takes a while to fasten the cloth just right and Babe’s collar feels especially warm once he’s done with his extended attention.
There’s a pause then - not exactly uncomfortable - as Gene looks out into the tree line, his eyes going distant again. After a moment he shakes himself like a dog shaking water off its coat and gets to his feet. Babe doesn’t realize just how much heat he was getting from the body next to him until it’s gone. He shivers.
“Right,” Gene says, scratching two fingers until his helmet. Babe notices there’s blood under the nails. He doesn’t think about whose. “I was just coming by to tell you to get up and walk around a bit. Get the blood flowing. Gunna turn into a damn popsicle at this rate, sitting all the time.” He gives Babe a curious look when he snorts.
“Funny, I thought about you saying that in my dream,” Babe grunts as he gets to his feet. “Gotta get the blood flowing…” He stops, his jaw clenching as he struggles not to remember but remembers anyway.
But then Gene’s putting his hand back on his shoulder, his eyes briefly on Babe’s face before they flick to the ground and his eyebrows draw together. But then he looks back up to give him that tight, sad smile of his, the hand on Babe’s shoulder squeezing for a moment before dropping away to leave a patch of cold behind. With that, Gene clambers out of the hole and disappears into the white again.
That night all Babe dreams about is the white - snow on snow on snow. But the dream about Julian comes again. And again. And pretty soon Gene takes to staying in his foxhole, muttering about running out of sulfa and how Babe’s going to freeze to death and about not being allowed to have two medics in one hole anyway. Babe doesn’t mind it - any of it. He especially doesn’t mind when it seems to mean that he doesn’t have to drag Gene to men in need anymore; he’s popping out of their hole like a fucking groundhog all over again to run and weave between the snow-covered trees and Babe thinks maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with him. Maybe he’s helping.
Maybe.
Onto chapter 2...
Endnote: Thanks for reading - any feedback is really appreciated. I'll most likely be updating this again soon. Hooray?
Title: Every Spark (1/5)
Author: Krista or smilesawakeyou
Fandom: Band of Brothers
Pairing/characters: Future Babe/Doc Roe
Rating: PG-13 for language and some disturbing imagery
Disclaimer: I didn’t invent this show and I don’t propose to own it. Even if I did and you sued, all you would get is a shitty computer and my broken dreams. Anyway, I don’t so please leave me be. Also, this is meant to be based off of the characters of the HBO show, not the actual men themselves. So yeah... don't pitchfork me.
Author's Notes: Hello! This is my first BoB fic ever and it started out as a one-shot that has now spiraled into this… thing. Anyway, I mentioned that I was writing this to annakovsky and she was all “omg post it!” so I am (perhaps foolishly) listening to her. This is un-beta’d so any mistakes are my own and each chapter will be disproportionately larger than the last, because that’s how this bitch rolls. The title is stolen from an Arcade Fire song because I’ve been listening to them a lot and I doubt they’ll care that I poached a lyric off of them. So enjoy!
Length: 1531
Summary: Four times Babe Heffron and Doc Roe almost collide and one time they do.
Every Spark
(1/5)
It’s snowing and Babe Heffron can’t hear a damn thing.
The silence is something he’s not accustomed to; like the world’s been put under a blanket and his ears have been stuffed with cotton… so different from the busy streets of Philly full of yelling and honking and laughter. But then he remembers - he’s in the forest, it’s always quiet in the forest. But this is different. It’s all weighty and still and there are no men shouting, no men screaming, and something unnatural is in the air.
The heaviness of it all presses into him as the ground begins to swallow him whole.
Oh God, he realizes in panic. It’s happened.
He struggles against it as he slips, yet he can’t move his leaden body - it doesn’t even hurt , he marvels- but his eyes begin to water as he realizes he can’t breathe. He cannot breathe. Fingers drifting up, he touches his neck to find it in tatters, his breath struggling and bubbling around the wound.
So many times Doc has jumped into his foxhole, demanding he walk around. “Get the hell up, Heffron. Gotta get the blood flowing,” he’d say, his voice subdued and often amused as Babe would grumble in response. Now the blood’s flowing everywhere, out of him, out of his neck, he can feel it pump, pump, pump out onto the snow covered grass. Yet still, he doesn’t feel the pain or the cold of it, just a slow draining… like a bathtub being emptied of water. Water flowing out. Blood flowing…
“Medic,” he hears. “Medic.” The muffled voice belongs to no one.
He blinks, long and slow, and Gene’s there, looking down at him, that sad crease forming between his eyes but he doesn’t move. Doesn’t stir. Just stares down as his pale blue lips form a thin line. Babe’s seen that face before. Too many times. He reaches up a hand, fingers trembling and covered in the bright red as he tries to say, “Help me, Gene, help me,” but the words die and sputter out of the hole in his throat, his mouth moving uselessly.
But then he has to stifle a silent scream as another figure appears standing next to Gene: it’s Julian, his throat matching Babe’s - an ungodly mess of sinew and tissue and his eyes staring down at him. Gene doesn’t seem to see him as Julian steps forward and points, his breath gurgling and his eyes accusing, deep and black. Babe knows what he’s being accused of.
“I couldn’t do anything,” he tries to say, wanting to get away, to run. “I couldn’t get to you.” But Julian just stares and Gene starts to shake his head.
“There’s nothing we can do,” he says in French though Babe understands it, “it’s too late.”
With that he’s bending down, looming over Babe as his fingers descend to shut Babe’s eyes, shut them forever as Babe tries to shout that he’s not dead, he’s not, and when Gene’s hands come to rest on his face he suddenly feels it, feels the cold screaming around him and the searing agony in his neck as he tries to yell himself hoarse. It’s no use. There’s just an encroaching blackness and everything is gone, the earth swallowing him whole as he struggles to breathe, gasping, gasping, gasping as the blood flows out-
“Babe… Babe? Heffron!”
He sputters awake as a firm hand wrenches his shoulder.
Gene is crouching in front of him, the small crease between his eyes and Babe fights the wild wave of panic that flares through him.
“Babe, it’s alright,” Gene soothes, his thumb rubbing in circles on his shirt above his heart. “You’re alright. Just a dream.”
Babe sucks in a halting breath, feeling his eyes sting. “Fuck,” he mutters, looking away. “God, it was… you… Julian was…” At remembering the look in his friend’s eyes, he feels a sudden surge of desperate anger. “Fuck,” he spits, pounding a fist in the frozen earth beside him, causing Gene to release his shoulder. “Fucking fuck.”
Gene leans back onto his haunches and eyes him warily. Babe gives the ground one more good punch before he deflates, sinking back against the wall of his foxhole.
“Fuck,” he breathes, only quiet this time. Defeated. Gene observes him for a moment more before shuffling to rest against the side of the wall at his side.
“I take it it was a bad dream, then?” he says, his eyes flicking up to look at Babe. In spite of the knowing sadness in his gaze he’s got that almost-smile on his serious face, the kind that makes Babe want to laugh in spite of himself.
So he does, only it sounds more like a cough and he’s pretty sure he’s not smiling too good. “Yeah. You could say that.”
Gene just grunts in reply before taking Babe by the wrist and inspecting the hand he had been using to beat the ground. It’s wrapped in blue and it takes Babe a moment to realize there’s a shock of red bleeding through the fabric. Gene’s eyes flick up to look at him again, his expression almost bemused.
“Shit, Heffron,” he says, pulling out his bag and rifling through it one-handed, his other hand remaining fixed to Babe’s wrist, “you gotta stop beating yourself up so much, I’m gunna run out of all the good sulfa.”
“Aw jeez, Gene,” Babe says, feeling genuinely stupid. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…”
But Gene’s giving him that look again, the one that says he doesn’t really mind and that he even finds it a bit funny so Babe shuts up, watching as the blue cloth comes off and white powder is poured onto the wound. His right eye twitches at the twinge of pain it causes. Gene either doesn’t notice or pretends not to. Reaching into his pocket, he grabs another bit of the same cloth and wraps it back up.
“Where’d you get that?” Babe wonders out loud. He’d been inspecting the bit of material ever since it had first got fixed to his hand, the blue thread fine-woven and pale against his white skin.
Gene’s face does that thing that Babe’s noticed plenty of times - it’s like someone’s suddenly pulled the shutters behind his eyes and his lips tighten a bit at the corners. He just shrugs. “Bastogne.”
“Oh.” Babe pauses, feeling incompetent in the face of the sudden change in Gene’s demeanor. “It’s… nice.”
That seems to shake Gene out of it a bit because he raises an eyebrow Babe’s way, his mouth quirking and his almost-smile seeming to convey that he finds Babe quite the strange creature to behold. A blush forms at the base of Babe’s neck as he looks away in an effort to recover some dignity.
“Erm, thanks,” he says lamely when Gene’s done. His wrist isn’t released right away; Gene takes a while to fasten the cloth just right and Babe’s collar feels especially warm once he’s done with his extended attention.
There’s a pause then - not exactly uncomfortable - as Gene looks out into the tree line, his eyes going distant again. After a moment he shakes himself like a dog shaking water off its coat and gets to his feet. Babe doesn’t realize just how much heat he was getting from the body next to him until it’s gone. He shivers.
“Right,” Gene says, scratching two fingers until his helmet. Babe notices there’s blood under the nails. He doesn’t think about whose. “I was just coming by to tell you to get up and walk around a bit. Get the blood flowing. Gunna turn into a damn popsicle at this rate, sitting all the time.” He gives Babe a curious look when he snorts.
“Funny, I thought about you saying that in my dream,” Babe grunts as he gets to his feet. “Gotta get the blood flowing…” He stops, his jaw clenching as he struggles not to remember but remembers anyway.
But then Gene’s putting his hand back on his shoulder, his eyes briefly on Babe’s face before they flick to the ground and his eyebrows draw together. But then he looks back up to give him that tight, sad smile of his, the hand on Babe’s shoulder squeezing for a moment before dropping away to leave a patch of cold behind. With that, Gene clambers out of the hole and disappears into the white again.
That night all Babe dreams about is the white - snow on snow on snow. But the dream about Julian comes again. And again. And pretty soon Gene takes to staying in his foxhole, muttering about running out of sulfa and how Babe’s going to freeze to death and about not being allowed to have two medics in one hole anyway. Babe doesn’t mind it - any of it. He especially doesn’t mind when it seems to mean that he doesn’t have to drag Gene to men in need anymore; he’s popping out of their hole like a fucking groundhog all over again to run and weave between the snow-covered trees and Babe thinks maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with him. Maybe he’s helping.
Maybe.
Onto chapter 2...
Endnote: Thanks for reading - any feedback is really appreciated. I'll most likely be updating this again soon. Hooray?