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Jack tracks the men with his eyes from their point of entry at the shop door as one flips the open sign to CLOSED. They circle the front counter but move nervously--two of them, two visible weapons--one pointed at Mrs. Bogdanić and the other doing a slow sweep of the store.
He is close enough to the front that he can hear the demand for money. "I'm not-I'm not moving, I'm not doing anything!" The cash register clatters. Jack can’t see from here, but it’s likely Mrs. Bogdanić just handed over the contents of the till. Good for her. This place probably doesn’t even have a safe anymore: Mr. Bogdanić had been proud as hell to show off his new tap-to-pay machine years back. Early adopters and all that. Still, the guy in front of her isn’t moving. “That’s all. It’s all! There’s nothing else!”
Mrs. Bogdanić's voice is hushed but firm in the way it has always been, the way it has to be for a smaller woman tending a convenience store on this side of Pittsburgh. And it is convenient: four blocks from their house, the perfect distance for a quick beer run or for snagging a last minute ingredient on the way home. Mrs. Bogdanić lets Robby fill up his thermos from the coffee pot on his walk to work, and Jack has seen her actually pat his cheek in delight while complimenting him in Yiddish (having to rock onto the tips of her toes to do so). Robby had blushed furiously most of the way home.
Jack hunches slightly to stay obscured from the other men. Robby has his hand in the fridge case, petting the orange juice containers. He is choosing between full pulp and half pulp like it’s the most important decision of the day. To be fair, it just might be. It's their day off, the one they spend together every fortnight, and Jack got it in his head to wander down the street for eggs and juice and now, he’s managed to plant them in the middle of an armed robbery.
One against two: Jack likes those odds for himself on a normal day. He sees it play out in his mind--the slant of his approach, how a takedown at the counter would parry into him subduing the man at the door. But there are civilians in the store. He sees Fiona getting her morning coffee two aisles over on the way to teach third grade. Javier is delivering this week’s baked goods. Stuart, the kid who started mowing their lawn a few summers ago to supplement his allowance, is posted up in the back corner, hammering away at the pinball machine.
But worse than that--Robby is here. Robby, fuck-off tall Robby, with shoulders for miles, who can't hide behind these kiosk-sized half shelves, or suppress his instincts to jump in and help. Jack is at least a decade out of active duty, but some things can’t be unlearned. He has to run the scenarios. Do the assessment. And right now, the risk is too great.
Jack reaches down to fasten his hand around Robby’s wrist, squeezing it hard. Robby, for his part, reacts fairly well, cutting off his verbal contemplation of calcium and how they both need more of it and doesn't making a scene. He must sense that Jack needs him to be compliant, because Robby's eyes cut to Jack, and he can feel the moment Robby keys in on Jack’s hypervigilance. Jack's fingers were honed by the army into precision killers but they can also detect fluctuations in pulse at the thin skin of Robby's wrist. Robby’s pulse is flying. Jack keeps him tethered in his strong grip, and runs through another scenario in his head- if he causes a big enough distraction, could he catch the taller one unaware, somehow disarm the wiry one?
In the end, it doesn't matter. The rambling of Mrs. Bogdanić shifts into panic when the gun aimed at her chest doesn’t waver and it tips off her husband, who retrieves a shotgun from under the counter. A bunch of things happen at once, but to a trained eye, and Jack has a hell of a trained eye, it goes like this:
Mr. Bogdanić swings his shotgun around, too large and impractical for his frame, and shoots before he's even centered. A sloppy blast of pellet tears through the taller man's thigh, but not before he fires off two reactive shots that slam into Mr. Bogdanić’s chest and neck. Both drop, and then the shop explodes with noise. Mrs. Bogdanić’s scream is one of desperate grief: it’s clear from where Jack is that there won’t be any hope of resuscitating the man. Fiona yelps and dumps scalding hot coffee down her arms, and Javier kicks over his pastry cart in his haste to dive to the ground. Jack doesn’t see Stuart, but he hopes the kid took cover.
Robby pulls and tries to slip Jack's grip. Jack bets all the money in his bank account that he’s trying to get to Mr. Bogdanić, and fuck if Jack's letting him do something so stupid. But stupid surrounds them and permeates the air, and Jack gets to watch in both slow motion and high speed as the thin man catches Robby's movement and fires.
Jack knows what it sounds like when a bullet thunks into sand. The sound when a bullet plinks off armor plating, when it is dulled by rubber, or ricochets off metal, or shatters stone. He knows intimately what it sounds like when a bullet hits flesh, soft and spongy, and the sight of blood arcing from a body. Now he also knows the sound of air punched out of Robby's diaphragm and the whimper that chases it up his throat. Robby sounds confused, and curious: it's probably that investigative, diagnostic mind of his. Jack knows all those sounds will follow him into his dreams.
Robby pitches backward with the force of the bullet and Jack catches him with one arm around his chest in a mock hug, and the bulk of his staggering body pulls them both to the ground. Jack doesn't even register the second shot until the case above them shatters and the air fills with shards of frozen glass. He tries to shield Robby but things are moving fast again.
"Stay down, all of you! On your fronts, face down!" The man approaches, gun out. Jack doesn't even look up. "You, stay where you are. I don't want anyone fucking moving."
"You fucking shot him," Jack snarls, sliding himself out from under Robby to lay him flat, hands already patting him down. Glass cuts through his pants. Where's the- where's the entry-
"I said stop moving." Jack hears heavy boots stomp towards him, and he thinks, good, come closer, easier for me to take you out. But just before the man comes within grappling distance, he steps back, attention dragging to the front of the shop where his buddy starts hollering. "Teddy, Ted. It's a lotta blood man. You gotta-"
Shitstack with the gun--Teddy--pivots, looking back at his friend. “Jesus Christ Sam, look what you did! This was supposed to be easy. Old lady, single till.” When Jack glances up, he can see Teddy’s arm shaking where he’s keeping the gun up, but he also gets to see him stride back up the aisle toward his friend.
"Ow.” Robby rolls his head, trying to find Jack. Jack's hand comes away from Robby's upper chest red, wet and smeared. Robby's left arm slides up and pushes at him, tries to stop his probing, but Jack growls and thrusts the arm away. He's already got his knife out--pulled from his boot--and he's cutting at the top hem of Robby's sweatshirt. "Noo, no. 'S my favorite," Robby whines and his hand comes up again. It takes less effort to push it away.
It's Jack's favorite sweatshirt, too. Grey, snug on Robby’s broader body, ARMY branded across the chest. Jack lost possession of it some time ago, figured it looks better on Robby anyway and sue him, he likes the way it feels in his stomach to see Robby marked as his. But now it's soaked clean through with blood and Jack could do with less Army shit drowning in crimson. Fabric cut away, he finds the entry wound: upper right, just below the collarbone. The bone itself is pinched inward and could have been struck, depending on the angle.
"Gonna roll you, okay? Need to see the back." Robby closes his eyes, good enough permission as any, and Jack does his best to stabilize before tipping Robby over. Exit is relatively clean: the bullet didn't yaw too much on its way through. Jack probes around the puckered skin where it’s bleeding and Robby makes noises of objection and distress. "It's good. It went through, looks good." Rolling him back, Jack wads up the sweatshirt and presses down with the strength of his upper body. Robby moans, eyes locked on Jack with a look that says, I’d prefer if you stopped but I get it.
Heavy boots again, "Drop the knife, man. I let you check him out. Now drop it and kick it over." Jack hears Teddy put another handful of bullets in the gun. When he looks up, the gun is pointed at Robby. So, this guy isn’t as dumb as he looks. Jack, because he’s a son of bitch and always has been, tosses the knife under the fridge case. If he can’t have it, this guy can’t either.
The man at the front, with the buckshot in his leg, keeps whining. The heartbroken gasping sobs of Mrs. Bogdanić as she crouches over her husband’s body echo up the aisle. Gun still trained on Robby, Teddy forces Jack to his feet. “You a doctor or something?”
Jack tries to shuffle step his body between Robby and that fucking gun. “Or something,” he confirms. Glancing down, he sees Robby take over applying pressure with a shaking hand. Teddy gestures to the front of the store with the gun. “Go up and fix my friend.”
“Pretty sure what he has can’t be fixed. No cure for stupid. Contagious, though. You caught it too.” Jack can’t help himself. He just can’t.
Teddy steps forward, still just out of reach, and pulls back the hammer. “You son of a-“
“Jack. Jack, go.” Robby is pale under the shitty fluorescent lights, and he’s frowning like Jack’s the one in trouble here. That’s not fair, all he wanted was juice and french toast. It’s their day off.
He glances around the rest of the store and sees Javier crouched with Fiona, who has her scarf wrapped around her arm. Tear tracks paint her cheeks, but there’s a stubborn set to her brow that matches Javier’s.
“Just let us go. You got what you wanted, you got the cash.” Jack’s hands are out in front, showing how unarmed he is. “None of us have seen your faces, right? Just go.” Nevermind that they have seen their faces, and that their DNA is all over the place, and that Mr. Bogdanić is dead one aisle over, and-
That’s about when the sirens drown out all thought and reason. Teddy gets a spooked look on his face, and Jack’s gut plummets. That was their window. They’re trapped now. They’ve all transformed from 'wrong place, wrong time' people to actual fucking hostages.
Teddy, gun pointed at Robby again, barks at Jack. “You said you’d fix him. Let’s go.”
Nodding down at Robby, Jack says, “He’s coming with me. Them too. Everyone in one place.” He crosses his arms. He’s not ignorant to the fact that it reminds everyone that he never misses arm day at the gym. Teddy gives him a once over and starts to clock that yeah, maybe having Jack wander the store isn’t the greatest idea.
Moving Robby up the aisle and settling him by the register is a slow ordeal. Sitting him up bottoms out his blood pressure, so Jack ends up mainly dragging him fifteen feet by his belt. It’s undignified, and leaves a sick blood smear that Jack can’t look at. “See why night shift has- has low patient satis-s-satisfaction scores, D’Abbot.” Jack kisses the crown of his head fast as anything, brushes the hair from his brow, and-
That’s about when the shop phone starts ringing.
Gunshots in this part of town might not be rare, but they still merit a 911 call at eight in the morning. Cruisers are outside and they’ve decided the situation inside necessitates a conversation before they storm the door. Everyone stares at the phone before Sam, bleeding all over the floor, picks up the receiver and slams it back down. It’s maybe thirty seconds before it starts ringing again, the sound loud and trilling in the otherwise tense silence of the shop.
Sam has his hand, the one not fumbling with his gun, pressed to his thigh. The blood pooling under him is significant. The bullet fragments have shredded his major veins. Jack’s hands return to Robby’s belt and slowly threads it through the loops. There’s not much he’s willing to do for Sam beyond tourniquet his leg and slow the bleeding, so that’s what he does. Teddy presses his gun to Robby’s skull during the procedure, which is a bit fucking much. Robby turning his head, blood streaked, pale faced, eyes closed with a pistol to his head- that’s brand new nightmare fodder. Sam whimpers when Jack tightens the belt, then tightens it further before tying it off. He doesn’t care much if the guy loses his leg.
Jack duct tapes three maxi-pads to Sam’s leg. When he steps back, it doesn’t look like a half bad job. He hears Robby huff and Jack chooses to interpret it as amusement.
The phone is still ringing. “What’s the plan here, guys? We wait until two people, three people die instead of the one you already killed?” Jack holds up his hand, starts ticking off his blood stained fingers as he looks at Teddy. “Armed robbery, hostage-taking. Your friend here pulled the trigger on Mr. Bogdanić. You’ll take a murder charge yourself if you don’t let us go.” Jack has to compartmentalize. That’s Robby he’s talking about. Robby’s death that he just laid out as a potential outcome.
Teddy is pacing now, looking down at Sam, cluing into the corner he’s backed into. “Just let me think. Shut up and let me fucking think.”
“J-Jack.” Jack’s head whips around. His moron, the moron he loves, would willingly suffer in silence rather than mildly inconvenience someone and now he is interrupting an enlightening conversation. That tone sounds like panic, and Jack’s got warning claxons that ring louder than the incessant phone. He points at Robby and addresses Teddy. “How far you gonna let this go? Answer the fucking phone.”
“I like you better when you keep all your blood inside your body, Michael,” Jack says, kneeling beside where Robby is splayed out. Blood seeps into the fabric of his jeans.
Robby swallows, eyes darting from Jack's face to the shelves around them and back again. “Don't-don't call me that." He’s still frowning. He means it.
Jack tsks, projecting more calm than he feels. That's his job right now. “I'll full name you all I want, Michael, when your fucking blood is spilling all over our fucking convenience store. How are we ever going to come back here?"
Robby is taking shorter and shorter breaths, Jack watches as his eyes flit around without locking onto anything solid. His pupils are wide, bordering on panic. "How you doing, brother? Can you slow it down for me?" Jack rests a hand on his chest, low, cupping the widest part of Robby's ribcage, while the other sneaks up to press two fingers to his carotid. Pulse is fast, shuddering. Robby shakes his head while taking useless gulping breaths. Jack can hear in his head the wild wails of the monitors and machines back in the ER. There is blood pooling into Robby’s pleural cavity and pushing on his lung, and that means-
“Chest tube,” Robby gasps, hand sneaking up to palpate the wound again. Jack slaps it away again. “Hurts.”
Jack is already looking around. This convenience store isn’t a pharmacy, not great for emergencies. Teddy is still watching him, and Jack gestures down at Robby. “He has a hemothorax.” The guy blinks back. Jack can feel his calm demeanor slipping, “He has blood in his chest where it isn’t supposed to be. I need to drain it. I need supplies. You gotta let us leave or let them send supplies in, man. Answer the phone. Ask for a doctor and a med kit.”
“Thought you were a doctor.” Teddy is looking at Sam, who is slumped against the counter, pistol sitting in a shaking, white hand. “Keep him alive. We gotta think. Right Sam? We are thinking.”
Fucking thinking. “You don’t have any options. Surrender. What do you even want? There’s no more money, there’s no scenario here where you walk away. Your friend is going to bleed out and we need help.” Teddy doesn’t respond, just crouches down to check on Sam.
Robby must sense that Jack is about to do something really stupid, like rush at Teddy, straight into the path of two guns. Jack feels a familiar hand--familiar long, strong fingers--wrap around his ankle. Robby is struggling to breathe, bleeding out on the dirty linoleum, but he’s the smartest guy Jack knows. His grip gives a weak squeeze and hold. Don’t you fucking dare.
“I need supplies.” He holds up a hand before Teddy can talk back. “I know, you have to think. I need some from here. Let me just grab some stuff.”
Teddy picks up the phone just to slam it back down again. “No, not you. You fucking sit down. She can go.” He gestures at Fiona. The woman locks eyes with Jack and he can see the set determination in her. It reminds him that teachers these days have more active shooter training than ever before.
Fiona stands and accepts the basket Teddy kicks at her. Jack starts to call out things he might need as she steps around the store. “Gloves. Those dishwashing ones, yeah. Gallon ziplock bags. Rubber bands. Any sewing needles? And thread. “ He makes a face at Teddy. “A knife would be helpful. Razor blade, anything sharp. I need a tube or a pipe.” Fiona pauses by the drinks and holds up an Icee straw. Shen would love this. “Yes, a handful of those. And liquor. What do you think, Robby? Vodka? Vodka.”
Robby refuses Jack’s offer of a slug of Vodka before they start. It’s the best he can offer: he can’t get Robby to swallow any of the painkillers Fiona pulls from behind the counter. “I know, it’s a bit too much battlefield medicine for your taste. No bullet to bite, either.” Jack does pour some over Robby’s side before he starts.
He's done this incision hundreds of times: in sterile environments, in field hospitals under a canopy of fluttering tarps, on the sides of roads with sand under his knees. This procedure isn't any easier or harder. It's just different. The razor blade slashes through Robby's flesh jaggedly, but Jack has a steady hand and he knows what amount of pressure to use. Combat medicine forged him into this kind of doctor. He filters out Robby's ragged scream. He ignores the spikes of pain where Robby has his nails dug into Jack's forearm. In the coming days, the sound will come back to him in the dark and later still when he sees the crescent moon scratches where Robby drew blood.
Robby's legs kick as he begins a futile effort to scramble away from the tear in his side, from where Jack shoves two fingers into his body and presses against his lung. Blood flows out. "Just pass out, man. Just go. I got you." Jack hears the plea in his own voice. Robby keeps squirming--where is this fucking strength coming from--and Jack has to raise a leg and pin Robby's hip with a knee. He feels like a specter crouched over him, grim and menacing.
Robby is sweating, grunting, and his eyes are ghosted over. “I don-you don't want that." He's right. If Robby passes out, Jack will have a hell of a time monitoring his vitals, keeping him stable. And if he passes out, Jack will be alone.
Dropping the blade, Jack pours vodka over the three straws he banded together and doesn't hesitate before replacing his finger in the plural area with the bright orange, plastic thing. Robby sucks in a breath and for a second, Jack's not sure he's gonna let it out, eyes rolling back. The ziplock is next, then more rubberbands, and it’s the ugliest drainage set-up but thank god blood starts running again and the muscles in Robby’s neck relax. The breath he exhales is like a balloon deflating and if he had his steth, Jack’d confirm the pressure release. Jack does another shitty thing that Robby does not appreciate, and dumps more vodka on the incision point before sewing it in. He has to take big bites with the sewing needle.
Robby slams his fist against the floor, fighting against the torture Jack’s putting him through. Jack doesn’t try to gentle him beyond a quiet, “It’s good, draining well man.” Robby’s metered chant of “Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck,” is all they can hear, anyway.
Robby is breathing better, but he’s sweating and when Jack presses lips to his forehead, there’s a growing fever. Robby’s collarbone is definitely broken but Jack can’t do anything to stabilize it until they get to the hospital. Instead, Jack applies more maxi-pads to the front and back of the bullet wound and wraps them together as a pressure bandage with duct tape.
Jack is fussing now, having stripped off his own sweater to tuck around Robby’s torso and bundling the cleanest remains of the ARMY sweatshirt to use as a pillow. He already tended to Fiona’s burns--luckily superficial--and made sure Javier was alright. Robby’s strung out and exhausted, and Jack makes him recite procedures to keep him awake. He gets a pinch to the hip or a sternal rub when he trails off. It’s gonna do wonders for their relationship.
Jack’s head snaps up when he notices it: the phone has stopped ringing. He looks over at Teddy, who is pacing the front window and chewing his fingernail bloody, and Sam who is slumped unconscious with the gun lax in his hand. Jack makes eye contact with Robby, who frowns and shakes his head. Jack smiles and nods his head: it’s a parody of the arguments they generally have at work and at home. Jack wins. A lot.
Sitting and kneeling on the floor for hours has really fucked with his leg, and shifting to crawl is awkward and painful. He’s old and it’s been a shit day. The cool metal of the pistol in his hand is a revelation. Now he can plan his attack. Teddy is distracted, back to the store. Jack isn’t willing to use the gun, but-
That’s about when the back door is kicked in.
The back door, the one that leads to the alley and was obscured by the storage shelving, and the one that the kid, Stuart, had snuck through and flagged down the police. Four police officers flow into the store, up the aisles, shouting at everyone to get down, faces on the floor. Nice symmetry to this experience, ending up face down on the floor. Jack ditches the gun, and scoots back to lay protectively over Robby.
“He’s at the front door. He has a gun. That’s him,” Jack yells. “There’s another up here, disarmed, unconscious. We need paramedics, now!”
Teddy makes the only smart choice he has all day and surrenders. Robby takes this as permission to finally pass out, and Jack lets him go.
“What the actual fuck is this?” Parker interrupts the paramedic as they wheel Robby into the Pitt, lifting the blanket from his torso and staring at the improvised chest tube. Jack, jogging alongside the gurney, turns to glare.
“Listen-”
“No seriously, my brain cannot process what my eyes are seeing.”
“I’ll give you all the same supplies and see if you could do-”
The paramedic, Jimenez, jumps in, loudly. “As I was saying, 53 year old man, single GSW to upper right chest, chest tube administered in the field. Approximately 500cc out. Two liters of saline in, shocky, BP 95/50, pulse 124. Okay, please, continue bickering.”
Once Robby is stable enough to be hustled up to surgery, Jack gets more shit for his MacGyver medicine from Walsh. But his adrenaline is almost gone and so is his fight. Doctor’s privileges mean he gets to sit with Robby while they prep him and while they finally give him the meds he deserves. The pained crease between his brow flattens out. Jack lays a kiss there just in case.
"You are a marvel, man. I had to go all the way to Fallujah to get shot and you manage to do it on our own damn street. You ought to be studied." There’s some other stuff he did overseas that he absolutely does not want Robby to achieve stateside. They’ll go over that later.
“Efficiency.” Robby says, slowly, careful to enunciate. His blinks are long and syrupy; he is struggling to stay awake. “S’why I’m chief.”
Jack manipulates Robby’s fingers in his hand, enjoying the feel of skin on skin. He pauses to kiss his knuckles. It hurts inside his ribcage to see Robby in a hospital bed, but it’s a pain he’ll endure his entire life if it means he’ll never have to see a single drop of blood outside Robby’s fucking body again. “Okay, boss. Whatever you say.”