Grey's Anatomy 1. Chapter 1

**This is the flashback I had planned for Chapter 16 of my 'Dog Tags' story which turned into a new fic. Funny how my brain works, huh?**

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_I'll carry you home._

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The packed sand swirled around Owen's combat boots each time the jolt of his footfalls shuddered up his bones while the backpack and first-aid kit slung over his shoulders took alternate turns slamming into his back.

"Wait up, Hunt!"

Turning at the sound of his name called on a desert wind by a familiar voice, Owen turned and waited.

Teddy, who was similarly laden with multiple packs, huffed and puffed towards him a few yards back. Her blonde hair was bunched up at the nape of her neck in a raggedy ponytail, and it streamed out behind her as she ran.

"Damn, don't you know your legs are twice as long as mine?" She joked playfully as she reached Owen and doubled over breathlessly.

"Keep up, Teds. This is serious." His brow scrunched up as he extracted a pair of binoculars from his waist pack.

"Oh, come on. I left those two guys back there in the dust a whole half hour ago. Are we waiting for those slowpokes?"

Owen was busy scanning the landscape, and didn't answer her when she asked.

"Oooowen." She dragged out the 'O' sound and laughed.

"Teddy, it's not safe here, we need to get out of the open. Now's not the time."

"Well, alrighty then. No need to be a dick about it. It wasn't my fault our rig broke down." The army medic vehicle had decided to quit moving three-quarters of the way to the place Owen's team was relocating to, and they were left with the excellent option of travelling the rest of the way through the scorching desert on foot.

"Hey, I think I see Tate and Danny." Teddy tapped Owen on the shoulder. And again. "What, you ignoring me now?"

She didn't notice anything amiss – her sweet smile marked the calm before the storm.

A second hung suspended between them as Owen whipped around to face her with wide, horrified eyes. The next second elapsed as time came crashing down and Owen had tackled Teddy to the ground.

The sound of shredding, ripping sky deafened Owen to anything else. Ten, twenty mechanical pops peppering open air within the infinitesimal space of a second violated everything surrounding them, scarring the sand.

A slash of agony seared Owen's calf as he felt the graze of a bullet burn and pull at his flesh. _Make it stop, make it stop, _he prayed. And as soon as it started, the gunfire ceased and the silence came just as deafeningly as what preceded it.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, Owen cautiously lifted his head. The sand was suffocating; it coated his lips and caked itself in the corners of his eyes.

"Teddy? Teddy, are you hit?" Owen asked shakily.

No answer.

A few feet away, Teddy lay limp upon the sand.

The dust on her face blackened her skin, and the sand was in her hair as well as his. For a second, she didn't move, and Owen feared the worst. His heart skipped a beat in his chest.

Then, as if his words had delayed in reaching her, Teddy moved her fingers. They twitched upwards towards her leg, and she screamed.

And she didn't stop.

Owen would never forget the sound of that.

Scrambling over to her on all fours, Owen dumped all his bags and raked his eyes across Teddy's body. The blood snaking down her pant leg was immediately apparent, as was the still-smoldering hole marking the spot where the blood was darkest.

"Oh god, Teddy, hang on. Just hang on."

"Owen, it hurts, make it stop, make it stop, it hurts, _Owen!" _Teddy cried, out of her mind with pain.

Placing his hand over the wound to stop the bleeding, Owen cringed as her screams got shriller – any movement would cause her pain to multiply a hundredfold.

"I'm sorry, Teddy, but I need to stop the bleeding. Breathe, okay?" Owen's brow furrowed, and he lifted his hand for just one second to assess the damage… his pale skin that somehow never tanned even in the desert came back slick with blood.

Ripping off the leg of her pants, he could see the hard lump of the bullet where it penetrated her flesh. The conditions of the dry, stagnant desert were far from ideal, but it was too far to the base – she'd bleed out before they got there. Owen knew there was only one option left to them both…

"The bullet's still inside of you," he said gently, taking the utmost care to ease his palm back onto her thigh. He didn't have to explain what that meant; Teddy understood the connotations of that all too well.

She bit down hard upon the screams, barring them from audibility with her teeth; she tasted blood in her mouth, but no pain could measure up to the agony burning like fire up and down her leg. The screaming had only slightly relieved her hurt, and her throat felt raw from the dry air ripping through it. She wanted to die from the pain; anything to end her torture.

"Hunt, what happened? We heard the shots." Danny called as he crested the dune, sending sand up in flurries.

"Get your ass over here, Dan, it's Teddy – she's hit!" Owen hollered back. "Come help me!"

"Oh, lord. Alright. Coming!" Calling back to Tate and telling him to speed up, Danny skidded on the heels of his boots down the slope to where Teddy lay and where Owen was bent over her.

"Hunt, you're hit too," Danny commented as he approached.

"I'm fine," Owen said impatiently. His wound was superficial.

Tate's mouth twisted. "Jeez, Altman, that's gruesome."

"Yes, we know, for god's sake. Are you going to stand there and make stupid comments or are you going to keep pressure on this wound so I can prep her for a penetrating object extraction?"

"What – right here?" Both of the guys standing over Teddy looked slightly daunted.

"Please…" Teddy cried imploringly.

Owen glared at Tate and growled, "Grow a pair."

"Alright, alright – what exactly do you need me to do?"

"Stop her from bleeding out while I get my kit ready."

Tate scooted over to kneel by Teddy, and traded places with Owen. The exchange sent ripples of savage pain up Teddy's entire leg, and she let out a sob that she could in no way control.

Owen tried his best not to hear her as he doused is tweezers in the last of the alcohol and discarded the empty bottle. Twisting a length of bandage around a ballpoint pen, he secured a tourniquet around her upper leg with shaky hands.

"Teddy… I have to take the bullet out now. You ready?"

She whimpered, pupils dilated and jaw clenched.

"Don't you have any more alcohol?" Danny asked desperately as his fingertips turned purple from the pressure Teddy was putting on his hand.

"It's all at the base. Teddy, I'm so sorry." To Danny, he said: "Put this in her mouth." Owen handed him a square of gauze.

"Just do it!" Teddy growled before letting Danny stuff the gag in her mouth.

"Over in a second, sweetheart," Danny whispered into Teddy's ear, making sure his voice was low enough for Owen not to hear.

"Move, Tate." With a few deliberate swipes, Owen cleaned the blood off the area, wincing when Teddy did.

He poised his tweezers over the ragged hole in her flesh.

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Teddy's head lolled over Owen's arm, the back of her neck chafing the hard tendons anchored to his bones. Her hair had come out of its ponytail; it was caked with sand, and it swung freely as Owen ran. And all the while, Owen was praying that she wouldn't wake up – at least not for now.

The scruffy bandages wrapped haphazardly around Teddy's leg were soaked through with blood; the tourniquet offered little help when a bullet needed extraction from a wound as wide as a nickel and deep to the bone. The pain had been unimaginable, and this brief respite in the form of unconsciousness had only come once the bullet had been pried from the bone. Too late.

It seemed to be the longest distance of his life, that quarter-mile to the relocation site. Owen hadn't gotten tired - the adrenaline coursing through Owen's veins spoke to that, or perhaps there was nothing else on his mind but Teddy. His boots pounded a furious rhythm upon the roughly-hewn spaces between worn buildings and faded tents.

"Incoming!" Danny yelled, ripping aside a triage tent flap for Owen to pass through with Teddy. Inside, it smelled of ammonia masking the smell of festering flesh.

"What do we have?" A tan-skinned brunette with a spray of freckles across her cheeks called from a corner, trying to intubate an unconscious man. The collar of her standard-issue beige medic's shirt was darkened with sweat.

"We've got a medic injured, penetrating trauma to the upper leg, bullet extraction done on site. Her femur's shattered," Tate supplied.

"Get her to Bed 2, I'll see to her in a sec. Y'all are medics too, right? You guys do what you can first – I've got my hands full over here."

Owen shuffled over to the tattered cot which was barely more than a plank of wood propped up with rusted bars. He was wordless as he laid Teddy down as gently as he possibly could, placing his hand behind her head and lowering it slowly. She'd be waking up soon.

"We'd better set her leg and stitch up that wound before she comes round," Tate mumbled. He grabbed a support and a few rolls of linen bandages from the sparsely stocked shelves, chucking them over to Owen. "She'll need a cast."

"You think I don't know?" Owen snarled, but half-heartedly. His hands worked the bandages like second nature, replacing bloodied ones with the fresh. "Get me a suture kit."

Danny knew better than to comment as he handed it over.

Suddenly, Teddy's eyes flew wide open. For a second, she looked fearful.

And then the pain came once again, full force. Her nails dug into her palms and her back arched before she began to writhe like a fish out of water. The sounds of her screams filled the tent, even louder than they were out in the desert.

"Help me hold her down!" Owen yelled, dropping the instruments in his hands.

Owen wrestled her onto the bed, pinning her down by the shoulders while Tate threw himself across her midsection. Teddy thrashed in their unbreakable bonds, head whipping back and forth and jaw locked in a scream.

"Christ, Hunt, can't we get her some morphine?" Danny pleaded helplessly, trying to steady Teddy's leg and narrowly avoiding a kick in the face.

"She doesn't react well to it." Owen grunted through gritted teeth.

"But, Hunt…"

"No! No morphine!" Teddy sobbed between screams, her eyes focusing for just a second. She stared Owen right in the eye with a type of steel he'd only seen in her, breathing hard.

"Teddy…" Owen muttered, torn. He couldn't stand to see her in so much pain.

"Owen, you promised! You promised you wouldn't –" Teddy managed to get another sentence out before her eyes rolled back in her head and she let out another bloodcurdling wail.

"Get the morphine," Owen said in an undertone. Danny heeded his request and returned with a dusty vial and a syringe. He pulled the plunger back.

"Give it to me." Owen extended a hand, struggling to keep Teddy pinned. He laid a forearm across her chest, making sure she couldn't hurt herself.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, groping for the crook of her elbow.

And then he pushed down the plunger.

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**Do you want more chapters or should I keep this as a oneshot? Review, or PM me!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Continuation from the previous chapter. Not sure what I have planned yet – feel free to pepper me with ideas! Trigger warning for rape and sexual assault in this chapter.**

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_I know you feel so helpless._

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Owen buried his head in his hands as he took up a midnight vigil by Teddy's bedside. It was never quiet and almost never dark in the barracks, but always lonely even with the voices of a hundred others. Maybe it had something to do with being so far from home.

Teddy muttered in her sleep. Her brow furrowed and her expression seemed pained as she rode out the wave of painkillers.

"Shh," Owen whispered, kissing away the crease in her forehead. He left his lips there and cradled her head in his arms.

"I'm so sorry." He couldn't stop saying it, even though she was deaf to him and the day was long gone. He couldn't escape the guilt. He deserved it. Even now, with Teddy's leg casted and wound stitched up, he wondered if he'd done the right thing. Was it really his place to choose what pain he could stand for her to endure?

_"Never, okay?" Teddy stared at Owen with those imploring eyes that he loved. "Don't ever make me go through that again."_

_"I won't," Owen whispered. _

_"Promise me."_

_Reaching over and holding her tight, Owen vowed: "I promise."_

She'd trusted him. He'd betrayed her. He might as well have thrown her to her demons with his own two hands.

Owen could remember what she'd told him like it was yesterday.

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_It starts like this._

_I'm fourteen. It's Christmas. Everybody's over at my dad's place for dinner. Mom's not invited, of course, but I don't mind. _

_The hands of the clock are nearly aligned; it's midnight, and all the adults and half the kids are boozed up – I'm a little tipsy, myself. I've gone around sipping out of other people's wineglasses. _

_It's too loud and too stuffy in the living room. Too many people are crammed into a space only meant to accommodate a few. I head upstairs, and no one notices - at least, I didn't think anyone did. _

_My room is empty and I collapse on top of the covers. Maybe I overdid it with the wine, because my head's swirling and my cheeks feel very, very warm. I'm tired._

_I hear footsteps outside on the landing, and I smell him before I see him. He reeks of eggnog and cigarette smoke; the stench of him carries across the room. I prop myself up on my elbows, and see that it's my uncle standing there in the doorway. _

_I tell him where the bathroom is. Third door down the hall, on the left._

_But then he comes right in._

_He mutters indiscernibly, coming closer until he's standing over me. I stand up. Something feels wrong._

_It is._

_His voice is slurred. He tells me I have pretty eyes. He's drunk, I tell him._

_I back away, and all of a sudden he grabs me and shoves me back onto the bed. He yanks the scrunchie out of my ponytail and some of my hair along with it. _

_I scream for the first time that night._

_His hands grope for the button of my jeans, and I try to break free, but he keeps me pinned. He uses his teeth to pull down the zip, and I can't free my hands. He's too heavy. _

_I keep yelling for him to stop, for someone to come and save me. It's a small house. Someone has to hear me. He tells me to shut up, and I scream louder. And then he stuffs my panties in my mouth. _

_The bed rocks under me, and I shut down. Don't feel, though it hurts; I close my eyes so I don't have to see._

_That's how it always goes. Whenever I take one too many sleeping pills, have a bit too much to drink, or get shot up with painkillers, that's what I always see. I've never told anybody._

_Owen, I don't ever want to have to see that again. _

_Owen, please._

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"Forgive me, Teddy. I'm so, so sorry."

Owen couldn't be sure what he was apologizing for anymore. Was it for her pain, his broken promise, or the fact that she'd even been hurt in the first place?

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**How was this chapter? Too graphic? I know this subject matter is sensitive to some people, and I'm sorry if I've hurt or triggered anyone in any way. If it's a really big deal, I'll take this down. Fanfiction should only be for enjoyment.**


	3. Chapter 3

_You never know when things will turn around._

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The rugged, young-looking doctor lifted the pus-yellowed bandage to reveal Teddy's leg; swollen, shiny, and smelling of festering disease. A circle, dissected down the middle with a line of ragged sutures, stretched so far that the stitches seemed to be on the verge of ripping through her flesh. The mottled skin surrounding the wound was dotted with spatters of ruddy red, of bruised black.

"Her leg is seriously infected. The conditions out there weren't good, and that was an open wound." He carefully replaced the bandage before taking out a battery-powered thermometer from his waist pack.

"What can we do?" Owen asked with hollow eyes.

The doctor pushed down Teddy's chin with his thumb and inserted the thermometer under her tongue. "Well, for now, we'll shoot her up with antibodies. That leg will only be viable until the infection reaches the bone. But don't worry; it's early stages yet."

"Owen?" Teddy groaned. She came around suddenly as the thermometer was extracted from her mouth.

"Temperature's a hundred; it's not too bad – yet. Hey, can you tie a tourniquet around her arm for me?"

Owen obliged, taking a strip of bandage from the drawer and twisting it around Teddy's upper arm.

"Okay. Hold her still." He poised the needle over her now protruding vein and broke the skin, pushing the plunger down slowly.

Teddy whimpered, not from the pain but from the fact that it had taken her by surprise. Even through the raging fever, her fear of needles and what the stuff in them could do showed – she feared it was morphine once again, but she could bear the pain! She tried to jerk her arm away, but Owen was holding her down too tight, and after a second the needle came out and the spot of blood was dabbed away.

"He's done. You'll be okay now, don't worry. How're you feeling, Teds?" Owen placed his hand upon Teddy's forehead, and her skin nearly could've burned him.

"Like crap. It's so cold…" Teddy's head lolled, hair damp across the pillow.

Owen frowned. It was a hundred degrees out.

Her face relaxed slightly as Owen proceeded to cup her cheek. "Feels good, Owen."

"She's got a fever that's stable for now and we're monitoring her. There's ice in the cooler, but that's the last of it so don't waste –"

Owen was past caring as he flipped the lid off the cooler and scooped out the last few cubes of ice. Wrapping it in the shirt he'd discarded on the floor, he laid it on Teddy's head.

"N-no, Owen, s-stop, it's f-freezing," Teddy stuttered, cringing away. Owen hastily withdrew, biting his lip.

"I don't know what I can do to help you, I'm sorry!" Owen said, near tears. But not really. Real men didn't cry; not Owen, for sure.

"It's 'kay…" Teddy responded after a second. She made her best effort to open her eyes, but conceded when a flutter of her eyelashes didn't get her anywhere. "Don't be… don't b-be sorry."

The doctor scratched the back of his head awkwardly. "I'll leave you two. Send someone to me with if her condition changes, alright? I'll be in one of the tents." He shut the door quietly behind him.

"I'm sorry, Teds," Owen whispered helplessly once again as the doctor left.

"My head," Teddy mumbled. "It hurts."

"Go to sleep, honey, don't think about it. It'll ride out."

A few minutes later, Teddy curled in upon herself and ground the heels of her palms into her temples, moaning in pain. Her head felt like an inferno – hotter than the hottest day in the desert, more parched than a year without rain. And her leg – she couldn't even begin to describe how that felt. The morphine in her system had long since left her veins; the images went along with it, for which she was grateful. But still, the ice, the fire, flash burns and frostbite were working their way through her and making sure every ounce of fight was consumed.

All he could do was lay his shirt – now damp with the melted ice – across her forehead. How insignificant that seemed. "Teddy? It's gonna be okay, you hear me? I know it hurts. I know. It'll be over soon, baby."

The 'baby' had slipped from Owen's lips before he could stop himself, but he took comfort in the fact that she was too far gone to really hear him. As it was, his cheeks pinked and struggled to think of why he'd say such a thing.

"Temperature's spiked to one-oh-four," Owen muttered to himself, nearly snapping the thermometer in his hand as he pried open her mouth to retrieve it.

_Dammit. Dammit! _He chucked it roughly onto the bedside table and shoved a fist into the crumbling concrete wall. There wasn't going to be any recovery if he lost his best friend after all they'd been through together.

_You can't go, Teddy. I need you. I need you more than anyone. _Owen needed her strength for he was weak; where he lacked in it, she had in abundance – it rubbed off on everyone around her. His head came to rest between his knees as he collapsed into himself slowly, quietly – a quiet pain, just like hers when her soul was broken over and over again by those things that happened to her, those things preyed on her mind.

It was her that dragged him back to reality at last. Words he never expected. Words he'd never and always wished to hear. She lingered along the border of consciousness and oblivion; not ever deciding to say it but meaning it just the same.

"Owen, I love you. Just thought you should know." Teddy said simply, softly, out of the blue. Her voice sounded next to normal, not slurred as it had been the past few times she'd spoken. Her eyes opened but didn't see, and a small smile graced her lips before slackening as the fever took reign once again.

Owen couldn't speak. He heard, but he didn't believe. He wanted to believe it. No, he didn't. He had Beth; he'd put a ring on her finger, made a commitment – he loved Beth!

But he loved Teddy more.

Why had she said it? She couldn't truly love him – could she? Was it the fever that moved her lips to form words she didn't mean, or was what she said the truth? Owen hung on to her hand, his mind full of storm clouds. He'd come to terms with his feelings for Teddy long ago, and he'd tried to quash them by any means possible. Why now? Why her? How he wished he'd see Beth the way he did Teddy; how he wished he could lie to his heart!

He laid his head next to hers, closing his eyes before starting to sift through the thoughts that were as great in number as the grains of sand in this endless wasteland so far from home.

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"Your fever's broken," Owen murmured, relief exuding from every cell in his body. Stowing away the thermometer, he couldn't help but smile. Teddy looked so peaceful in her sleep, unpursued by neither the horrors of her past nor the pain of the present. The little crease in her forehead had ironed out.

He deliberated for a moment with his hand against Teddy's warm face, and then kissed her lightly.

Right on her cracked, exquisite lips.

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**Haha, I made Owen sound somewhat like a trashy Romeo. Not exactly what I was going for, sorry guys.**


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Grey's Anatomy, Friendship, Hurt-Comfort