Chapter Text
When Legundo had come to this town, he hadn’t expected to be so… popular. He’d wanted a quiet rest stop where he could stay for a few days as he waited for his body to recover from the long journey. He’d wanted peace. Comfort. Safety. However, Avid’s decision that it would be a good idea to mess with whatever the large, glowing box in the centre of town was had seen to it that nobody would be able to leave.
Legundo included.
And, being the only doctor in town, he was stuck fixing everyone. Whether it be Pearl’s sleep problems (which he simply gave her the medication he was meant to take for his own problems - it had stopped working for him - and that solved them readily) or M’s hand cramp (“painkillers and rest. It’s good for you”), he was stuck dealing with the trivial problems of the town members.
Well, mostly trivial.
It was the hurried knock on his door, so different to the usual polite knock he had come to expect from Cleo, and the shouting of “Doc, you better open this door right now or I’m kicking it down!” that set him off with knowing something was wrong. Cleo was never that aggressive with him - they’d long learned to be slightly softer with the veteran than the others - so he knew something must be wrong. He flung open the door, letting the wind chill from the outside hit his face before it was blocked by not one, not two, but four people rushing into his house.
“Come on in,” he muttered to himself, before internally slapping himself. Come on, Legs, you’re on the job. “What’s happening?”
Cleo looked up at him as the other two (whom he now identified as Martyn and Pearl) set down what looked to be the semi-conscious form of the butler onto his work bench. They, themselves, had a decent amount of blood on their hands and looked a bit more shaken than he had seen them in a while. “Wolf attack. Abolish was out on his own (like an idiot) and me and Pearl came across him laying against a tree, bleeding out. Martyn had managed to track the wolf down and kill it-”
“I do still think we didn’t need to kill it!”
“-I know, Pearl.” Cleo pinched the bridge of her nose, shaking her head slightly as she pushed the doctor over to where Abolish lay. “Anyway, he’s not dead but he isn’t too good. Think you can fix him up?”
‘Isn’t too good’ was a bit of an understatement. In the few weeks he’d been here, nothing more had really happened than someone falling off a roof as they tried to build it, and that only really ended in a twisted ankle. Abolish’s clean white shirt was torn to shreds, stained pink with the blood from the wound. The wound itself looked decently shallow, but wide. There were so many cuts, so many smaller cuts around the three larger gashes that he didn’t know how Abolish was still holding onto consciousness.
Just another soldier, fallen in the war. Keep this one alive.
Legundo took a deep breath. He could do this. He rushed around, grabbing his antiseptic and a clean cloth rag, dowsing the rag in the cleaner and starting to clean the wound, ignoring the seethes from the younger man. The people around him tried to speak, but he was deaf to them. Maybe they were trying to help, maybe they were asking if he was okay. It didn’t matter. He had a job to do and he would do it.
Abolish was a soldier. A soldier in the eyes of Legundo. He could see it clearly now.
Once he’d cleaned the wounds, he properly inspected them, seeing just how deep they went. It didn’t seem too bad now he was looking at it cleaned. Shallower than he had anticipated. It wouldn’t need packing, maybe just stitching. Stitching and wrapping. And time.
He picked up the needle and thread from his medkit, steadily threading the needle and walking back to Abolish, looking down at him and sighing. “This is gonna hurt.”
He started stitching the wound together, trying his best to ignore the way people moved around him to soothe the butler. He seemed to be doing better than most people did when being stitched up: another thing to note down about him. He was always strange to the doctor. Held himself as if ready to fight.
When Legundo was done, he grabbed a bandage, soft and familiar under his hands, ordering Cleo and Pearl to help Abolish sit up so he could wrap the other man’s injury. Routine. Familiar routine. Wrap it and keep it in place with tape. Make sure the others knew he couldn’t take it off for at least 48 hours so he didn’t dirty them. Prescribe rest. No activity. Then shoo them out the door.
Just another soldier, fallen in the war.
Another man. You saved this one.
Once everyone was out the door, Legundo let out the breath he had been holding, sinking down into a chair. The shoulders that seemed, now, to bear the weight of the town’s health dropped and he let himself a few seconds of reality. He’d been able to ignore it for a while. For the few short weeks he’d been here, he’d been able to chalk his steps that had returned to the march, his hand that seemed to be poised for a weapon, his clipped sentences and bubbling anger up to stress. Up to sleep. But he’s running out of excuses now.
He was slipping. He could tell he was slipping. His dreams had been harder and his days longer and the bleeding corpse of Abolish, for those few fateful seconds, had been another dying soldier from the front lines. He was slipping fast out of sanity but he had to hold on.
The town needed him after all.
Legundo stood up again, splashing his face with cold water from the basin in the corner and grabbing his cloak, pulling it on. “A walk. A walk is all I need.” he mumbled to himself, pushing the door open and stepping out into the biting air, ignoring the way it chilled him even deeper to bone. A walk. A walk and nothing more.
The forest should be fine.
The more he walked into the dark embrace of the trees, the heavier his heart felt. He was, by technicality, abandoning his post in the town. If someone got injured while he was in the woods, then they were screwed. Maybe Abolish would have been able to help, yet the other was stuck in bed by the doctor’s own orders.
He was a deserter.
Deserter.
God, the name sounded like ash in his head. They’d called him that, initially. The Deserting Doctor: left for no reason after killing thousands. There was a reason, a big reason, the generals just hadn’t told anyone. So now he’s a horror story. The man who took the medals, the glory, then left.
He didn’t know how far he’d walked from town at this point. The trees were still full of life, but the path was largely untrodden. He could hear the sounds of something (or someone) else around him, hustling. There was a full thunk of metal against wood that he’d largely blocked out for the majority of his journey, yet it seemed to get louder and louder, thudding in his ears like a slow, taunting heartbeat until…
THUD
The ground around him shook with the force of whatever had fallen, echoing around him like an explosion that ran like poison in his veins. He spun on his heel, searching for the source of the assault. The trees morphed into men, men that reached out their long, dead, lost hands to claw at Legundo.
The veteran sank to his knees, curling in on himself and clamping his hands over his ears, trying to drown out the noise of the screams, yells, and bullets that filled the air.
He had been getting better, He could have sworn he was getting better.
“Good work, Soldier.” The voice was distant, muted, but clear in his head. He’d heard the speech so many times he could recite it. His heart was in his throat and his head swam, faces swirling around him.
He felt an uncharacteristically soft hand cup his face, tilting his eyes up to look at the owner of the hand. They had sharp nails: the king that dug into your skin even when they weren’t trying. It was comforting, in a way.
The comfort, however, was short lived. A hard, lined,chilling face looked down at him, swimming slightly as though through a heat haze, mouth pulled back in a sharp sneer. His eyes, though still colder than the icy trenches he’d seen them most in, were a fraction warmer than usual. They held comfort. Didn’t stop him being terrified.
***
When he entered the woods alongside Owen today, Louis had not expected to stumble across the panicked, shaking, potentially lost form of the town doctor. Louis had successfully coaxed him out of the tight ball he’d huddled himself into, but he still shook terribly.
“Owen?” The elder vampire called softly, turning to where his lover had appeared out of the corner of his eye. His large brown eyes were fixed on Legundo unblinkingly, a hint of worry behind them. “Love, would you mind fetching Abolish for me?”
Owen blinked up at him. “Was he not injured? On bed rest?”
“He heals fast, I’m sure of it. There’s vampiric blood in those veins.”
Owen grumbled something unintelligible, but started running the short journey back to town, leaving the mayor to turn his attention back to the distant eyed doctor.
His eyes were full of a fear that Louis hadn’t seen on the face of anyone for more than 100 years, and - even then - this felt stronger; there was a desperation in his face, mingling with the innate terror. It made Louis pity the veteran doctor and what had caused this attack.
“Doctor, can you hear me?” Louis kept his voice soft, quiet, and low. He’d crouched down in front of the other man now, holding his face carefully so as not to hurt him. “Are you alright, Doctor?”
Legs tried to pull his face from Louis’ grip, muttering something that sounded strangely similar to “I’m sorr, sir-” which - if possible - only concerned Louis more.
“Doctor-” the name received a shudder, the other shaking his head at the mayor. “Legundo, can you hear me? Do you know who I am?” He whispered, cupping his face and holding his chin. God, how he hoped that the chill of his hands would soothe the other man somewhat.
Legundo blinked at the other man, eyes glassy and fearful. “Yes, sir.” He nodded, eyes drifting downwards to the floor, Louis’ heart sinking with it.
“You’re safe, Legundo.” Louis assured, looking up as Abolish and Owen crashed into the clearing, the former looking much healthier than he did earlier (almost like he’d been healing for weeks already). “I’m so glad the two of you are here.” The mayor sounded terrified for Legundo, evidently not used to someone as strong as the doctor being so scared.
“What… happened?” Abolish asked, crouching down beside Louis and looking at the older man, eyes narrowed. “Is he okay?”
Legundo’s face softened at the sight of Abolish, reaching up towards him with a shaky hand. “William…?” He whispered.
“Who’s William?” Abolish whispered to Louis, who just shook his head in response, just as confused as Abolish himself.
“I don’t know, just run with it, though… we need to get him back to town.”
“Right…” he turned back to Legundo, blinking down at him. “Legs, I need you to listen to Louis; it’s not safe here.”
“Where are we going?” Legs looked at Abolish, too scared to look back at Louis.
“Home.” The mayor replied, the words audibly receiving a groan from Owen (who hadn’t moved from his slightly distant position).
“Oh… alright.” He seemed to shrink away slightly again.
Abolish sighed, looking back to Louis and Owen. “How do we move him?” He looked between the two lovers as they met each others eyes.
“You know what you need to do.”
“No, love.”
“It’s the only way.”
“I hate to do it.”
“Louis, love of my life, you have to push that aside for this. It’s not possible to protect him without doing so.”
Louis sighed, looking sadly back at the doctor and bringing his face up to look at him, practically entrapping the others stare within his own.
“Legs… you need to sleep. You’ve been awake for days.” He said, biting his tongue to stop himself from telling the truth. Suggestion always made him feel sick with guilt. He hated to use it. He hated to use it so much. “It’d be better for us all if you sleep.”
Legundo blinked once, twice, before he dropped his shoulders and fell forwards into Louis’ arms, the tension losing his body entirely. Usually, it would have taken more to convince someone with such a strong mind as Legundo, but this didn’t. Evidently, the doctor hadn’t slept enough recently.
Louis looked across to Abolish, shifting Legundo’s weight onto the other. “Please can you carry him home? Me and Owen don’t want any suspicion on our names, especially with Avid shouting-”
“I won’t tell anyone you’re vampires.” Abolish said, heaving up Legundo into his arms with a slight huff, holding him close. “I’m not cruel like that. I know how humans react.”
Louis smiled at that and even Owen cracked a small grin. “Thank you, Abolish. Thank you so much.”
Abolish nodded. “Let’s just get the doctor back to town.”