Chapter Text
The first thing he noticed was how cold he was.
"No, the Jane Doe was brought in by an elderly gentleman, said he'd found her just lying on the side of the road. She hasn't been awake since."
It was inside him, he was sure of it. That cold was in the core of his chest, trying to drag the life out of him.
"Oh, poor dear! How long has it been?"
Ha! Good luck doing that to him. He was an American soldier, damn it! He wasn't going to just lay down and die!
"More than four days now. I'm not sure if she's ever going to wake up."
He took a deep, shuddering breath. The air reeked of antiseptic and citrus. The shuffling around him got louder as it came into focus. He could just barely hear a radio in the distance.
"Ma'am? Ma'am?"
Even though he felt like his eyelids weighed a ton each, he forced them open, only to be greeted by blinding white light and searing pain. He screamed before he even proceeded what had happened, eyes snapping shut as he sat up and frantically turned his head side to side. The shuffling around him was approaching a fever pitch - even more people had run into the room.
None of this was because it hurt too badly, mind you. Regardless of how fuzzy his mind was and how unsteady everything else felt, he had much more pain tolerance than that. He could take a little pain. He screwed his eyes open, scanning the room with a heavy squint. He could make out at least three people dressed in white, all crowded around him and leaning towards him in a way he did not appreciate. Beyond them, there was a row of hospital beds continuing down the room. They spoke in hushed whispers, but he could still hear shouting outside the room.
"She's awake! Jane Doe is awake!"
He was in a bed. A hospital bed. He must've been injured in battle! Yeah, something to the head that'd explain why he didn't know anything, couldn't remember anything. His breathing started to slow as he came around to what was actually going on here. "Is…" He hated how weak his voice sounded, hated how it cracked. "...is this the field hospital?"
There were a few seconds of more unintelligible whispering until a woman finally spoke up. "Well, no ma'am, you're at Saint Luke's Hospital. In Kansas City?"
Ma'am?
"That's no way to talk to a man injured in combat, sister!" he snapped, glaring at her. "Show some respect!"
More whispering. Mostly unintelligible, but there were two pieces he could pick out clear as day. "She thinks she's a soldier," and "She thinks she's a man."
Oh, shit.
This wasn't a field hospital at all! And it might call itself Saint Luke's, but there was nothing saintly about this. That brief respite from the panic he'd woken up with went away, his breaths coming short and shallow. He felt a dawning horror as he realized the truth of this place. They were Nazi spies. Each and every one of them here, posing as hospital workers to corrupt and confuse the American people. Well they weren't gonna do that to him!
... whoever he was.
He leapt from the bed and onto one of the so-called nurses, grinning as she hit the floor and the people around her erupted into a panic. He stumbled as he hauled himself back to his feet, freshly mopped floor slippery under his still-shaky legs. His eyes were wide open now, adjusting to the light well enough that they didn't even hurt that bad. Not any worse than the sensation that he'd ripped something out of his arm. All the better for him.
Before he could get anywhere, another nurse grabbed him by the arm, no doubt planning to knock him back out and fill him with their Nazi drugs. He was not going to let that happen. He grabbed her by the head and twisted as hard as he could. When he heard a sharp cracking sound, he pulled his hands away like he'd been burned. Neck snap. Good tool for any soldier to have in their arsenal.
With two spies down, he finally had an opening to run, something he was more than happy to take. He shoulder checked a third on the way out, but he was just barely able to stay upright and keep going.
He'd dealt with much worse than this, he was sure. As soon as he got back to the front lines, his war buddies and him would talk about spending 3 days face down in a shell hole, and this spy-infested compound would just be dinner chatter!
His footfalls echoed dully as he ran down the room, hoping that when he turned the corner he'd find the way out of there. Most of the patients he passed were sitting up and leaning forward, watching him. He turned and started running backwards just long enough to give them all a true-blue-red-blooded-American salute on his way out.
There was a door around the corner, he discovered. Unfortunately, there was also a broad-shouldered and stocky nurse there to grab him by the shoulders.
For a moment, he felt sure that there were only three things in the world; himself, those who meant to do his harm, and the crackling song of the radio.
The radio on his left. Just within arm's reach.
"Now the rain's a-fallin', hear the train a-callin'-"
The song cut off as he slammed the radio into her face. Blood and teeth clattered to the floor as she stepped back, reeling. She didn't even scream. The right thing to do was finish the job, make the world one bit better, one bit safer.
He turned and ran.
A glance out the window was enough to tell he wasn't on the ground floor, so the current objective was to find a staircase down. The hallway was quieter than the room he'd left behind, the only obstacle a security guard who started fumbling for his gun the moment he saw him. Kill on sight, huh? He froze, glancing around the room for anything he could use as a weapon.
"Don't you dare shoot her!"
He hadn't noticed the footsteps coming up behind him until the nurse spoke, her thick (and obviously fake) southern accent colored by panic. She really wanted him alive, didn't she? Probably to torture him for information. Well he didn't have any of that, but he was tempted to go back with her all the same, just to show them what an American soldier could withstand! He'd never talk, not even with holes drilled through his teeth and his fingers cut off knuckle by knuckle! It was only duty that kept him from staying, only obligation that drove him to grab a fire extinguisher off the wall and run at the guard with everything he had.
He had to get to the front lines. It was the most important thing in the world.
The guard never stood a chance. The gun didn't even fire before fire extinguisher connected with security guard forehead, sending the bastard falling to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Ha! It was too easy!
It was too easy. Much too easy. Taking down all of them had been too easy. He knew his job wasn't done here.
He dropped into a crouch and slammed the fire extinguisher into the man's head again. Again. Again. Until the guard's blood stained his clothes and his hands and his face. Until he stopped breathing. Until he could be sure.
Nobody made a move to stop him. The hallway was silent aside from his own ragged breathing and the terrified sobbing behind him. Cowards.
He grabbed the guard's gun and shoved it in one pocket, then shoved his wallet in the other. Just in case he'd need an ID to get out of this place, or more likely money to get back to his squad. As he tried to stand again, he collapsed to the floor, but he ignored the pain and just hauled himself back up. He had to keep running.
Every door he came across looked exactly the same as the one he'd just gone through, so he kept going until he came across one that looked different. He slammed it open with his whole body weight, the momentum almost sending him down the stairs beyond. He caught himself on the railing and started down the stairs one step at a time. Too slow, too slow. It was a clever trick to make the stairs impossible to discern from each other, forcing escaped prisoners to take them at a snail's pace while the people who worked here would know them well enough to run. Even when there was nobody around, they were still trying to stop him from breaking out. But they couldn't.
He didn't know what floor he started out on, but the stairs felt endless. He hoped to God that nobody would come up behind him. The quiet was leaving room for fear to set in. He'd have to practice withstanding torture, have to be really ready to withstand it for the next time this happened to him. As excited as he was to prove he could do it, his hands shook at the thought.
His teeth itched.
When he ran out of stairs to go down, he took it as a sign he was on the ground floor. He paused long enough to pull his gun out of his pocket before he opened the door.
He stumbled out of the doorway covered in blood, gun in his hand, sides heaving. It was the ground floor, thank God. He could see the doors to the outside world, just beyond a waiting room that had erupted into a panic and a receptionist doing… something.
None of that was blocking his path, though. What was stopping him was a trio of so-called nurses in front of him, hands out.
"Hey, hey miss! It's alright, it's alright, just gotta settle down. It's all ok, it'll all be-"
Bang. Bang. Bang.
The gunshots rang cold in his ears. The one that spoke, the one with the southern accent from upstairs… her fake gentleness, her false comfort, it made him so fucking angry. Alright? When he was alone, here, away from the front lines, away from his squad? These people didn't know what it means to be a soldier. Figures.
The fear he felt turned to panic at the ever-growing chorus of screams in the room. Dear god, these patients didn't know! They were innocent Americans, all about to be tortured or even killed in this so-called hospital! The crowd ran for the door, thankfully - he'd saved them from this. He just had to follow them. He ran for the door like his life depended on it - which it did! - only to be cut off by the man at the reception desk. He pulled the trigger on his gun, but nothing happened. No gunshot, no bloodshed. That stupid guard had been running around with a half-loaded gun. Now he was going to have to kill this receptionist the same way he'd killed him! How horrible!
The fire extinguisher was wet with blood, and when he slammed it into the receptionist's skull, it slipped out of his hands. Unfortunately for the injured man now sprawled out on the floor, that meant it fell and hit him square in the dick. He tuned out the screaming and ran out the door.
It was freezing out there, a light drizzle chilling him even more, cold on his skin and cold in his core. Something like exhaustion, but which couldn't be because he was just getting started, why would he be tired, sat heavy on him as he kept running. One foot in front of the other. Through the parking lot. Across the street. Ignore the cars, ignore the honking and the swerving and the sound of two of them hitting each other. He had a mission to get to, he had somewhere important to be. America needed him!
The streetcar barreling towards him couldn't swerve like the cars could.
For a moment, he was absolutely certain he was going to die. He simply decided not to.
He threw himself into the dead grass on the other side of the road, coating his clothes and body in mud. Exhausted, he just laid there for minutes of time, trying to catch his breath and get his bearings.
But he'd done it. He'd escaped. The orange light of sunset was much easier on his eyes than the hospital had been, and he'd survived. Aside from the scraped knee he'd just gotten, he wasn't even injured. He could be proud of a job well done. He could be proud of a world and an America made safer by his hand. Killing Nazis, killing anyone that evil, was what he was made for, why he was put on this earth. He was sure of it.
In the distance, he heard police sirens. Dear God. They even had the cops on their side. He'd have to get to the front lines and his squad soon, but maybe it was better to lay low for the night. A good night's sleep would be nice, anyway. It was important for a soldier to keep himself in top condition.
"But wait a minute, stop. What is the enemy? We know what we are, but what is the enemy?"
The woman at the front desk had told him every room had a radio. At the time, he hadn't really cared, much more concerned with whether or not every room had a bed. Which they did, of course. He knew how hotels worked. He'd been ready to pass out as soon as he got into one. But after stripping off his bloodstained clothes, he realized he really should get cleaned up. He needs to look presentable for his meeting with Uncle Sam (metaphorically, of course) tomorrow, after all!
So it was the sink, and warm water, and hand soap, trying to get the blood out of the nicest clothes he had. It was the kind of repetitive task that could leave a man lost in his head if he let it, so the radio was being enlisted to give him something else to focus on. Nothing more than that.
He was taken by it immediately.
When he turned on the radio, he was greeted by the deep, gentle voice of a man reading a letter from the president. He spoke about how radio represented freedom, truth, and facts, how radio let information about the war be broadcast to the American people. Apparently, every radio network in America had devoted their resources to it! As a soldier, that show of patriotism almost brought a tear to his eye. The Axis had used their radio for propaganda, for lies, but America would never fall for such a thing! Even a child knew better than to be convinced by fascism. That kind of thing had never, would never happen in America, he was sure of it. With the stories of pain and bloodshed in his ears, he felt calm like he never had before.
Probably. His memories from before today still weren't back, for some reason.
As the water started to stain red with blood, the broadcast continued, telling more stories of America at war. He felt a real sense of brotherhood with the voices he heard. Here, there was real tangible proof that he wasn't alone in his fight! America could win this, goddamn it! They just needed him there.
He wrung the water out of his shirt again, trying to ignore how completely wrong his hands felt. Uncalloused, soft, civilian hands that felt like they'd never known rifles and barbed wire. They couldn't be his. No self-respecting soldier's skin should be the least bit irritated from a harsh soap. No self-respecting soldier's eyes should be sore from bright lights, either, but that wasn't something he could get rid of with hard work and discipline. At least, he didn't think so.
The room was dim enough that after a few washes, he was struggling to see if the blood was actually still washing out of his white t-shirt and khaki-colored pants, and he just had to trust that he was actually accomplishing something. He'd taken several minutes figuring out which lights to turn on when he got here, and he'd managed to deduce the ideal situation, but it was far from ideal. Anything brighter than this was too bright to see well, and it hurt on top of that. He could take a little pain, of course, but he was a tactical genius and knew one of the many rules of war was that you shouldn't do things that hurt you for no reason. Sun Tzu said that! He… at least thought he did. He'd have to study up on the art of war on his way home.
God, what would he tell the boys when he got back? He'd have to explain that he'd lost his memories, first of all. He wasn't even sure what his name was. The spies had been calling him Jane Doe to each other, though, probably thinking he couldn't hear it. That must be his name. Idiots, revealing such crucial information to him. So much of a man's identity was tied to his name, or at least the fact that he had one.
So that's five things Jane knew about himself. His name was Jane Doe, he was a soldier, he was a man, he was an American, and it was his job to protect his country. Preferably on the front lines. Preferably with a squad. He didn't want to think about the rest of it, the parts that were fuzzy and the parts that weren't there at all. It didn't matter who he was, aside from a soldier. It didn't matter where he came from, aside from America.
He refilled the sink with water and started scrubbing at his clothes again. It would be good enough after that, probably. He was eager to get to doing his bedtime routine, almost as much as he was to sleep.
Take a shower. Brush your teeth. Check for bugs (like listening devices). Check for bugs (like the animal). Make sure the door is locked and bolted. Check to see if your phone is tapped. Decide you can't be sure and smash it on the floor. Check for bombs and tripwires. Check for spies. Make extra sure the door is locked and bolted. Recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Lay awake for longer than you should. Leave the radio playing and pretend that voice means you aren't alone. Fall asleep and stay that way until the next morning.