An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Tw/Tags: Minor/Implied Violence, Implied Non-Consensual Surgery, Major Character Injury, & Minor/Implied Deaths
Again I'm not great at tagging so if I'm missing anything, please tell me.
Hubert would've preferred anything over this.
The mind number static on the car's radio, explaining hectically that they were under a strange attack. That a red escape pod with lightening speed boomeranged into Earth's orbit. Or siren he returned to his post, the sirens were blaring loud and proud as the announcer explains in panic that it'd crash landed into a command center of all places.
While fortunately no one got gravely hurt in the mess, only roughed up and dirtied, to his relief, it still didn't answer what's going on. As well, as the ringing in his ears ceased to linger since then, exactly fours days after the incident. Information on the incident is minimal, something Hubert acknowledged isn't privy to anymore.
However through the elongated grape vines of mouths too loose, hears there weren't any more pods in the surrounding area and that the 'mystery person' had been swiftly put in their custody.
That word traveled throughout the country, asking questions. People were concerned on what this could've meant for them. He held those same thoughts.
Was this an attack or rather a total accident on the Toppats' part? What was the reason they would dare leave their safety net held up in space for?
Theories did float about, the most common is of a solo heist gone wrong. Another one is perhaps the criminal in question was trying to visit family still on Earth. The latter had Hubert recoil with visceral disgust, couldn't imagine them as anything remotely human. When in reality, they're destructive, foul creatures with skewed morals.
This one should've been different. Arrogant Hubert expressed vindication over the fact this monster practically signed off on their own death sentence. Any sensible criminal wouldn't have taken such a stupid risk. Not when the government made it a clear order, circumstances be damned if they dared step foot on Earth's soil again, mercy won't be had for them.
A part of him sickeningly wanted to watch as the life drained out of them.
Now Hubert finds himself at a hospital half a day's drive from base, in a cold sweat, and quite unwilling to move from his spot at the opened door.
This isn't what he initially expected his day to go. On a random to receive a strange call, in his office at ten in the morning. For the man of higher rank then him, a General he barely knew in passing, to say on the other end of the line that he's needed at a hospital a couple states over.
To identify a John Doe. That the case with the acquired Toppat as he and everyone else once thought is actually a hostage and likely a government affiliated person. Somehow the person knew him and the agents sent by the government pieced it together that the doe had once been under his wing.
"The kid picked you out in a photo" The general over the phone remarked. "Didn't speak. Kept pointing, jabbing his finger at yours, wheezing when we shown him the line up of photos"
Hostages were frequent with the clan, used as leverage or for fun. They nabbed anyone in broad daylight or in the dead of night. At the wrong time and wrong place, they had no chance.
Survivors are not as frequent. On one hand alone, he can count the people, civilians or his own that barely made it out alive from their interaction with the clan. Usually not coming out of it well, physically or mentally but alive nonetheless.
His eyes darts between who's in the room to the crowded hallway. Nurses, doctors with or without patients are rushing past him, ignoring his obvious discomfort. A young training nurse moments ago led him to this room specifically upon his planned arrival only twenty minutes ago.
Shakily he grips the handle. It can't be him, just couldn't be. The young man in the bed. He should be dead as his bones lay scattered across the vast jungle. Declared him dead even without the body being found.
Charles Calvin shouldn't be alive. Shouldn't be the frail, tiny ball of a man laying in the bed, motionless, hooked up to a plethora of machines and looking half dead. This can't be happening, he couldn't believe it and his sight must be deceiving him.
What a cruel underhanded trick.
But it isn't, this was real. Very real and Hubert steps back into the hall, searching frantically for anyone to reassure him that he's not going crazy. Tell him this isn't who he thought it was when everyone else made him believe the pilot is dead.
It wasn't like they didn't see him almost hit the wall in disbelief. The shortened huffs and tense body language.
"You're Captain Hubert Galeforce? Sent to help identify?" Eventually a doctor noticed and took pity on him. "Everything alright?" She carefully asked while standing far away enough to not get close. Gloved hands clasp together in front of her, a clipboard held to her chest.
She was a smaller woman, older, almost his age and soft too however sharp in ways that came with the profession. The lower half of face is covered by a mask, her graying hair up in a bun. Told him her name, Adler, and she was overseeing the case.
Nodding despondently, "No. No, it isn't" He said, the emotions he's experienced are less then spectacular. "That's him, isn't it? Is he okay? Will be?"
Then she breezes past him, taking a look in the room he once stood. Warm brown eyes flickers over to Hubert, pondering what to say.
"So you do know him? Great. We needed a name for our files then John doe. Its a pain having to work with so little information" She replied, "I understand why you reacted in that manner. When he first arrived here, he looked absolutely brutal"
"He was that bad?" He swallowed dryly, a desperate need to know.
Was it bad to want to know what the pilot had went through? She described the day they received the younger man. Four days ago. When Hubert was returning to base from that awful murder of the politician's murder where he sat in the backseat as the radio angrily sparked to life. Then died as swiftly leaving everyone with the silence.
Of course, the doctor wasn't there when the pod crashed, as the officers told this part to her; where the pod's door facing out of the building had been jammed shut and they'd to pry it open.
When they did, a good twenty minutes to half an hour later, the young man is on the ground, crumpled with a broken arm, and even worse injuries somehow then that. He was also suffering from a nasty concussion as noted by the wooziness to his blown out pupils that wouldn't stay focused, and the stumbling as they tried to pick him up.
"Catatonic when we got him. Still is, comes to rarely. We've yet to fully examine him of his injuries and he's got a lot of them" She flips through the papers on her clipboard, he assumes are about the pilot. "Thought you'll be able to help. As you did recognize him easily, so was he one of yours?"
Stepping towards the room Hubert musters out a response, "Yes he was a pilot under my supervision. Our, my best. Did. Did he say anything?"
The nurse's expression changed, squinting her eyes and the wrinkles around her face deepens.
"He hadn't so far and if he could, he isn't capable of speech. We found there's been significant damage and almost surgical like scarring around his throat and likely on the inside as well. We just don't know the extent of it yet or if its permanent"
Confused and concerned Hubert tilts his head, in the corners of his eyes, the young man. "What?" He guessed it would've been from the tubes some go in the mouth and nose. However there's none of that, only a plastic breathing mask strapped to a gaunt face, connected to a tank of oxygen. Hates to wonder whatever the Toppats did as a twisted experiment.
"Also, take this as merely a warning before you go in and see him. When he comes to, he may come out fighting"
Hard to believe in this weakened state, the pilot would be capable though it isn't much of a surprise for Galeforce. Like any soldier, especially those who gone through a lot, the younger man must've been on edge already and so being jostled by staff accidentally set him off, causing a very hectic scene for the hospital at the time.
Although Doctor Adler didn't seem to upset or the least bothered rather motioning him towards the room. For it to click as Hubert finally steps inside as she respectfully dips out, leaving them alone.
Slowly Hubert gets up closer at a gradual pace and couldn't distinguish whether the pilot is truly sleeping or doped up.
What he saw first are the bruising wrapped around the neck. A distinctive rich purple, nearly black in color and there's some more on the man's wrists, ankles, and elsewhere on his body. That appears tame of what the doctor would inevitably show him.
Hesitantly he hovers by the side of the bed, over the pilot and hearing the faintest raspy huffs when bloodshot eyes sprang open as a strangled noise escapes the pilot's lips.
