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Soap.
The soft wheeze of his breathing has become a soothing noise to his ears, and that’s probably a problem.
it’s a nicer noise than anything else though, and he can’t stop making it, so his pain addled brain has deemed it nice.
There’s not much noise out there to begin with — the most present being the annoying buzz of electricity. It’s better than some while ago when he could feel his heart beating in his chest and hear nothing but the pounding of blood in his ears, but that’s over now.
He hopes its not a bad thing, that it’s over. He’d think maybe he’d died, and this is what the afterlife is, being trapped in your body unless you’re cremated to nothing. Then his lungs expand, air wheezing in through his nose, wheezing out past his lips, and it reminds him that he’s not dead yet.
Not quite, anyway.
His eyes droop past half-mast and a sharp pain explodes in his muscles, forcing them to tense up. He jerks with a small noise. There’s no one to hear it.
It’s a fabulously inventive device they’ve got him attached to. Brilliant for several reasons.
First, it ensures that Soap is going to die, and if the 141 try to save him, they’ll likely die with him. Second, it ensures that Soap will endure a great deal of pain and torture before he dies.
There’s a bomb underneath him, and he is the timer.
It would’ve worked for anyone — Price, Gaz, Ghost — the person didn’t matter. They just needed a warm body to sit in this chair. The pressure plate is wired in with the same sensor in the generator that’s measuring his heart rate. When his heart rate gets too low, he gets a short shock, with feels very much like getting tased for a few seconds.
Rather brutal for him. It’s been two days. He can’t sleep.
If he sleeps, he gets shocked. If he sleeps through getting shocked, the 141 won’t be told about the bomb. Soap saw it before he was put in the chair, it was built well. There’s no way to tell that Soap is on a pressure plate.
If he dies, the bomb goes off anyway.
They left him twelve hours ago. He’s not sure about the time, but that seems about right. There’s a gap between the bottom of the floor and the door to his little closet. The sun wasn’t strong when they left him, and now it’s dimming again.
It’s funny, the small part of him that’s a bit excited for darkness. They gave him no light, making his fight against sleep even more difficult. His eyes have since adjusted to the shadows, and he can tell that this whole event was targeted.
Well — that may not be true. The group perhaps only created this plan (which they executed flawlessly, Soap might add) to target whatever military asset was going after them. It just happened to be the 141.
They sent the ransom message to the UK government , that’s how unsure they were. Not Laswell, not anyone in SAS, the fucking government.
It’s an easy plan. Capture one member, set them up, send an intentionally sloppy ransom message to whoever, and correctly assume that the team of the captured soldier will come for them.
He knows the the 141 is coming for him. They have to be.
Not because he thinks he’s that important to the military, but because he trusts Ghost. He trusts Gaz. He trusts Price. He may not be important to the military, but he knows he’s important to them.
Also, he was taken while on mission with them. So. Price is likely very pissed off. Even if Laswell said no. They’re still coming for him.
It wasn’t a dramatic event by any means. They split up to cover a target, Soap was going between buildings and saw the van approaching too late. A bullet to his chest plate had him on his back already, and by the time he was able to get his body back online, there was a gun muzzle pressed between his eyes.
Soap did not fight them after that.
Theres blood on his neck, dried and tacky from where they knocked him out in the van, but other than that they’ve been relatively nice. Which is how Soap realized they planned all this. If they wanted him dead sooner rather than later, they wouldn’t have given him water before they left.
No, they needed him alive long enough to properly act as bait.
Another jolt of electricity runs through his body, but it doesn’t do much. He tenses involuntarily with it, but it doesn’t help him keep his eyes open.
That’s the problem with this as well. Everyone on the 141 has had experience staying awake in the field for long periods of time, Soap included. But thats with stims, that’s combined with movement, and even when it’s not, even when its twelve hours on his stomach in a snipers perch, he’s not injured.
This is trying to stay awake with a concussion and a constant staggering of trauma to his body. Twelve hours of doses of electricity have left him in pain and exhausted beyond measure.
Naturally, it’s right when his eyes slip closed that he hears them.
Another shock has him tensing, this one longer than the rest. He groans through gritted teeth, shoulders rolling back as his arms try to curl free. Loud footsteps towards him, then the door is ripped open.
Soap squints up at Gaz, even the dim the light of dusk too much for him. “You look like right shit, mate.”
Gaz raises an eyebrow. “Did you want me to get dressed up for this occasion?”
Soap grunts as Gaz yells behind him. “You might’ve tried lookin nice for our date.”
Gaz crouches down in front of him, not yet touching. A good move, since Soap doesn’t know what wires are connected to what triggers. “Left my tux as home.”
“Rude— oh, aye Cap’n, fancy seeing you he- ere !” The second half of the word comes out funny as he’s shocked again. “ Fuck, that one hurt.”
Price is in front of him quickly, almost knocking Gaz into the door to create space. “Talk to me Sergeant, what’s going on.”
“Bomb.” Soap replies casually, struggling to find even a modicum of care. “Ahm sittin’ on it.”
Price blinks. Gaz doesn’t even bother. “Your ass is not fat enough to cover a bomb.”
“It’s under the chair, you bawbag.”
Price wacks Gaz on the arm. “Shut up.” He puts his hand on his radio. “Ghost, get over here.”
“Here.” Ghost materializes behind the other two, his massive shoulders dwarfing the closet doorframe. “God damn it Johnny.”
Soap huffs out a painful laugh. Leave it to Ghost to give him shit after being kidnapped. “What’d I do this time?”
“Sitting on a bomb, apparently.” Ghost sorta kinda gently pushes Price away. “Whats with the generator?”
Gaz is poking around at it, and he must hit something because Soap finds himself jerking against his restraints, breath stolen from him. He can’t even scream.
Fingers tap against his face. Ghost is there, dark eyes focused entirely on Soap. It’s a lot, being subject to that intense gaze. Especially since Soap is starting to feel like he’s drugged or something, the way everything is fuzzy.
Ghost grabs his chin, jerking his head around. “With me, Sergeant.”
“M sorry,” Soap mumbles — slurs maybe? He can’t tell. “Bit tir’d.”
“Talk to me then,” Ghost says something to Gaz. “You’re good at that.”
Soap lets out a laugh, as strained as it is. Two compliments in one day, he’s rockin this.
He does, somehow, manage to explain the current situation, although he’s not sure how much he actually needed to say. By the time he’s done, Gaz has announced that he’s almost finished disarming it. At least Soap isn’t being shocked anymore.
“What was the point of the shock play?” Ghost asks, using one of his many knives to cut through the zip ties around his wrist. “Why keep you awake?”
“So you’d die,” Soap mumbles, groaning as he stretches his arms out. “Wanted to take out a whole team, I guess.”
“Well, they fucked that up.” Gaz announces. “Either that, or I fucked this up, but we won’t know until our darling demolitions expert gets off the chair.”
“That seems dramatic.” Soap huffs, right as Ghost tucks his arms under Soap’s and lifts him up.
Nothing blows up, so thats nice. Also, Ghost is now holding him up, and Ghost is warm and strong and sturdy, and Soap perhaps tells him so. He can’t tell. Just that he’s very tired, and he’s standing for some reason, and that means that there’s a lot of blood rushing to his legs and away from his brain.
He cannot be blamed for passing out.
.
(Bonus)
Ghost .
Soap wakes up for a bit on the ride back to the base. He means a bit, because the sergeant is exhausted from being kept awake, and his body is dealing with the trauma of being electrocuted a probable hundred times.
Still. It’s…unfortunately endearing, because Soap is completely out of it.
He won’t stop talking about Ghost’s leg. Which he’s currently laying his head on in the back of the truck.
“S…really firm. But squishy. But— in a firm way? Like. the best pillow.”
“Sure, Soap.” Ghost glares at Gaz’s phone, which is currently taking video.
“Nah, Lt. you dannae understand—”
“Soap—”
“—’s like a firm lil cloud—”
“ Johnny —”