Work Text:
The crease in Clara’s brow had been a permanent feature all morning, her eyebrows knitted together in concentration as she poured over the great swathe of documents and maps she had spread before her. She was plotting Libertad’s next big move to thwart Castillo and his forces but this in itself was a challenge, even more so because the power plant she was planning to attack had virtually no easy escape routes once her guerillas were within its walls.
She’d spent hours drawing, erasing and redrawing diagrams and plans on the old whiteboard she had in the room she’d commandeered as her own at camp Maximas Matanzas. Every time she was faced with a new problem to overcome and she couldn’t find a solution that covered them all; Clara was a great strategist but this was testing her patience and she found herself growing more and more frustrated by the second, the death grip on her marker was proof of this.
Perhaps if they went in from the west side? No, there were sniper towers along that wall and no foliage for the guerrillas to use as cover. Maybe the south…no that wouldn’t work either.
“Pinga!”
The marker got thrown at the wall and Clara’s chair clattered to the ground as she stood abruptly, her brain too fried to continue for the time being.
She needed some air.
The weather had finally dried up after several days of rain and now the sky was as blue as sapphires with the sun beating down on Yara spreading warmth all over the war-torn country. After spending so long inside Clara revelled in the cool fresh breeze that greeted her as she stepped out of her cabin and into the sunshine, taking a deep breath and enjoying the sweet scent of nature that surrounded her. The peace was short-lived as she heard a shriek come from across the gangway in the central pavilion of the camp. The camp was otherwise surprisingly quiet with very few people present so Clara decided, despite the lingering irritation she still felt, to find the source of the shriek and see if she could help.
As she got closer to the pavilion she recognised Bicho, mainly from his ‘pineapple hair’ as Dani had so delicately put it before, stood on one of the tables with his legs trembling in fear. Clara couldn’t see what was causing such a severe reaction though so she let her hand fall to the pistol on her belt just in case she needed it; she knew Bicho wasn’t the bravest soul so it was entirely possible that he’d simply seen a spider but she wasn’t going to take any chances.
For once it seemed that his fear was slightly justified as Clara came face to face with Guapo hissing and snapping at the legs of the table Bicho was stood on.
“Cabron, just leave me alone! Please little Cocodrillo I’m a friend of Dani’s!” He cried, his voice practically shaking with fear almost as much as his legs were. Clara was at an impasse, Dani loved Guapo and would be furious if anyone hurt him but Libertad’s leader was worried that if she didn’t do something soon then the croc would devour Bicho for lunch.
“Oye, I need you to calm down ok?” Clara said calmly to him and he span to look at her, relief flooding his face only for fear to resume its place as Guapo snarled again.
“Clara! Save me! Por favor he’s gonna eat me alive!”
She eyed the croc whose golden tooth was glinting menacingly in the sunlight, realising that he was now staring directly at her, his reptilian eyes burning holes into her soul. Still unsure of what to do she put one hand out in front of her, keeping the other on her gun as she kept her eyes glued to him to watch his next move.
“Easy Guapo, we’re you’re friends. Take it easy.”
The croc tilted his head slightly and started to crawl slowly towards Libertad’s leader, his claws scraping against the floorboards of the pavilion; this was possibly when Clara’s heart started to beat a little faster and her palms began to sweat. But much to both her and Bicho’s surprise, Guapo simply maintained his steady crawl until he reached Clara’s feet as he came to a stop and tilted his head up, opening his jaw as wide as he could (wide enough to fit a whole human head Clara noted) and it was only then that she noticed something hooked around one of the smaller teeth on the crocs bottom jaw.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into him man! He came in here all angry and just started running at me so I jumped up on the table to get away from him! I thought I was gonna lose my leg or something!” Bicho cried, still trembling on the tabletop, refusing to come down yet. He went on about what had happened but Clara ignored him as she watched Guapo stay as still as a statue with his jaw still wide open right in front of her. He looked at her expectantly and it was then that she realised that he wanted her to remove or at least look at what was around his tooth.
Slowly and slightly nervously, she started to crouch down as she put one hand on the top of the crocs nose, just gently touching his snout, as her other hand cautiously went to unhook the small metal piece on his tooth. When she made contact with the item her heart rate only increased further as she felt the rough edges and texture of the reptiles fang against her fingers which was really quite unsettling.
Clara slowly pulled the metal loop up and off Guapo’s tooth and she frowned at the item as she realised it was a small keychain of some sort. It had a dog tag on the other end of the keychain and when she took a closer look she noticed that very faintly ‘Dani Rafaela Rojas’ was etched into the metal.
Her heart dropped into her stomach.
Shit
------------------------
Dani groaned as she clutched the deep slash wound in her side. The outpouring of blood had definitely slowed a little which gave her a brief sense of relief but the pain hadn’t subdued and every step caused another tear-jerking wave of agony. She really really hoped Guapo had found some sort of help at this point because she’d lost a lot of blood and was feeling quite a bit weaker with each passing minute; then again, she also hoped she was left to die because if anyone found out how she’d ended up with a massive bleeding gash on her side and what was a definitely broken nose then she’d never hear the end of it.
At the time, test-driving a car-plane hybrid has seemed like a really good idea...driving it off of a mountain to see if it would fly…maybe not such a good idea. Perhaps her time as a guerilla had made her a little too gung-ho about everything because she hadn’t even hesitated before she agreed to the ridiculous idea. She’d been assured by Yami that it would work and had been test driven before but on reflection she should have asked if it had been test flown before too.
To be perfectly honest she was lucky to come away with only a broken nose and what was effectively a huge stab wound where she’d impaled herself on some of the metal when the vehicle crashed. She was sure that Matias would find a load more damage she’d done to herself; that was if she reached him before she bled to death. Her phone had been lost (and Dani presumed smashed too) in the wreckage so she couldn’t even call for help, luckily Guapo had been waiting at the bottom for her so she’d been able to send him off with her dog tag charm from her rifle when he found her hobbling away from the now on-fire vehicle.
She wondered if Clara would cry at her funeral; they’d been ‘dating’ for a couple of months now although they used the term loosely because it’s difficult to date someone properly when you’re in the middle of a war. They couldn’t go out together for dinner unless they wanted to risk getting shot at and the most romantic they’d managed to be was sharing a tray of Dani Trejos’s famous tacos with two cold beers and a candle in one of their cabins. Dating was difficult during a revolution. Especially when your girlfriend is leading said revolution.
They’d also decided to keep the whole thing as hush-hush as possible because they really didn’t need their relationship becoming appoint of gossip between guerillas when they had other things they really needed to be focussing on. A few of their close friends knew but beyond that it wasn’t public by any means.
Dani was pretty sure Clara would cry at her funeral, she may be stoic in front of her troops but behind closed doors she was as emotional as the average human, shedding tears, laughing until her belly hurt and curling her fists in rage when she needed to. The guerilla felt her funeral becoming more and more inevitable as blood continued to escape from her side, her legs feeling weaker and her body heavier with each step.
Dani wished she could say goodbye to Clara or tell her she loved her because she really really did and it wasn’t until she was facing her demise that she’d realised it. A bit too late to be honest but Dani was never one for punctuality.
Her boots scuffed against the tarmac as she dragged her feet forwards, still trying her very best to stay upright until in the distance she saw a faint white light shining in the darkness; since when did it get dark? She could have sworn the sun was out just a second ago!
Wait, this was it. The light was getting brighter and bigger and…closer.
“Dios mio.” Dani whispered, she was literally going into the light. She had no idea that this was a real thing, she thought everything went black when you died and there was no afterlife or shit like that but maybe she was wrong after all because the light was still getting brighter and bigger and somehow louder?
That wasn’t right.
A godawful screeching sound rang through her ears and the light stopped moving but instead was followed by the sounds of hurried footsteps and someone calling her name in a rather desperate voice. Pain erupted through her side again as she tried to walk closer to the source of the noise, her vision blurring as black crept in at the edges of her sight. It was only when warm hands clasped her cheeks that she realised who was with her.
No one else smelt like sweet jasmine flowers the way Clara did and it was so comforting as the soft tendrils of the floral scent crept into Dani’s nose as she inhaled weakly.
“Mierda, Dani what happened to you? Shit I need to get you to Matias!”
Despite her blurry vision she could vaguely make out the shape of Clara’s face and even though she was nothing more than a multicoloured blob to Dani right now she was just as breathtaking as ever. Or maybe that was her lungs giving out, she wasn’t sure.
“I’m fine.” She managed to mumble out.
“You look like you’re about to faint!” Clara cried, her voice consumed with worry.
“Yeah…yeah you might wanna catch me.”
Her legs gave way and thank god Clara was strong because her arms caught Dani and stopped her from smacking her head into the road as she blacked out. The last thing the guerilla heard was her girlfriend calling to Bicho for help.
------------------------
Clara had never driven so fast in her life, it was a miracle she didn’t burst a tire given the speed she drove through some of Yara’s pot-hole-covered roads. Even more of a miracle is somehow Bicho hadn’t thrown up despite being car-sick on the most gentle of journeys.
They’d carried Dani, who at this point had a deathly pale tone to her skin and was terrifyingly cold to the touch, into Matias’s clinic and Bicho had practically screamed for the doctor who burst out of one of the many rooms in the clinic having clearly been woken from his sleep.
He’d taken Dani from Clara and shouted to others in the clinic for assistance until one by one a team of doctors and nurses had flocked together in their pyjamas to tend to the half-dead guerilla. Once she was on a gurney and being wheeled into their makeshift operating theatre Matias went to close the doors in Clara and Bicho’s face but Libertad’s leader stopped him.
“I’m coming in!” She barked, hoping her authority would force Matias to let her in; she wasn’t leaving Dani’s side for a second.
“Like fuck you are amiga, stay out here and let me do my job. I’m not letting you see what we’re about to do, now go find somewhere to sit or sleep, I’ll come talk to you when we’re finished.”
Clara went to argue but Matias didn’t give her a chance as her shut the theatre doors firmly in her face and then presumably locked them given the click that followed. She wanted to scream at him, she wanted to yell and bang on the doors until he let her in, she wanted to-
“Dani’s only gonna get through this if the doctors are one hundred percent focussed jefa, we need to give them space as hard as that may be.” Bicho comforted her, placing a gentle hand on her back as he slowly guided Clara away from the doors and into another room in the clinic that had a couch and some random chairs in it. “Sit. Get some rest, you’ve been driving all over Yara for hours, you must be exhausted.” He reasoned and she opened her mouth but closed it again simply nodding as she quietly took a sit in one of the armchairs situated in the room.
“I’m gonna call Paulo and Talia to let them know what’s going on but I’ll be right back! Don’t go breaking into the surgery theatre ok?” Bicho warned as he pulled his phone out of his pocket and headed to back through the doors they came in but Clara was too drained to respond, feeling her eyelids already starting to droop as he spoke.
She was so exhausted, Guapo had arrived at camp sort of mid-morning and she’d been out looking for Dani ever since so it was no surprise that no matter how hard she tried, sleep tugged at her sleeve until she eventually fell into its warm embrace, ignoring the worrying voice at the back of her head telling her that Dani was dying.
She could’ve sworn her eyes had only been closed for a second when they started to flutter open again, morning sunlight blinding her as a particularly eager ray shone through the window and directly onto her face. Oh. She must’ve slept for hours. Groggy and stiff from her night in an armchair, Clara rose to her feet and winced as her spine made a few uncomfortable cracking noises, readjusting itself to a more natural position.
She didn’t stop to observe the room or her surroundings once she was up, only focussed on where her feet where taking her as she tried to figure out where Dani could be. For an old hospital building it seemed surprisingly busy with guerillas popping in and out of most rooms, most of them she didn’t recognise but the occasional familiar face popped up. None of them were Matias though who she was sure could guide her to her girlfriend so Clara continued to pop her head into each room and around each door for any glimpse of the man but before she could spot him she noticed one room held a particularly unusual sight.
A crocodile sat squarely in the middle of the floor, staring up at the bed’s occupant, not moving a muscle as it gazed intently at the person.
“Oye Guapo.” Clara beamed as she moved into the room, coming to stand level with the reptile so she too could look at the bed’s occupant. The crocodile made a gentle hissing noise, acknowledging her but didn’t move as he simply waited for Dani to wake; there was a chair next to the bed that Libertad’s leader gladly occupied, bringing her hand up to gently hold her girlfriend’s very still one however it was at least warm now and not that deathly cold she’d been earlier.
Dani’s eyes were closed and she was tucked into the bed with a clean white sheet that almost seemed impractical for a hospital given the amount of blood this place seemed to mop up. Her face had been wiped cleaned with a bandage over her nose, gone was the dirt and dust she was usually covered in; it was strange seeing the guerilla so still, most of the time she was rushing off to intercept a supply drop or clear out an FND base, the only other time she was still was at the end of the day when they would both collapse into bed with each other, finding solace in one another’s arms as they simply held each other until the next day of war started.
“Promise you won’t be mad?”
Clara’s head whipped up to look at Dani whose eyes were cracked open, just enough to look at Libertad’s leader properly.
A choked gasp jumped out of Clara’s throat and her free hand came to hold the guerilla’s cheek as gently as if she were a china doll, she knew that there were probably tears rolling down her cheeks but she didn’t care. Clara was too relieved that her girlfriend was awake and seemingly ok that she didn’t give a shit who saw her crying.
“Rojas.” She said through a smile as she ran her thumb softly over the guerrillas cheekbone, stroking it back and forth.
“Garcia, mi amor, don’t cry.”
“You nearly died Dani, of course I’m going to cry. I’m not a sociopath!”
A small smile graced the guerillas face and that ever-present twinkle in her eyes only grew as she looked up at Libertad’s leader.
“Do I get a kiss?”
Clara rolled her eyes and chuckled as she squeezed Dani’s hand gently, leaning over the edge of the bed to press her lips to the other girl’s forehead, she was pulling back when Dani’s free hand met the back of her neck and pulled her down into an actual kiss. It was sweet and soft, both of them smiling into it, not caring that Dani’s lips were a bit dry or that Clara’s had been chewed with worry in the past day.
“Why do you think I’d be mad mi corazon?” She murmured against the guerilla’s lips, barely louder than a whisper.
“Because I drove a car off a mountain…”
“YOU WHAT?!”
------------------------
3 weeks later
Dani stared at the scar that ran sort of diagonally from behind her hip bone up across a few of her ribs. It was a thick scar, still quite pink and very ugly, unlike her other smaller ones which didn’t bother her at all.
After the initial meltdown Clara had at Dani for her stupidity that led to her near-death experience, she’d promptly burst into tears and since then had been nursing her girlfriend and keeping a much closer eye on her to prevent her from doing something daft again. She hadn’t been able to actually leave camp Maximas due to her stitches but she didn’t actually mind; now that she was physically incapable of doing anything for the guerillas and with Clara’s caring eye on her at all times it meant that she actually got to spend some time with her girlfriend. Even if Clara was busy still trying to draw diagrams and create plans, Dani was there with her now giving a new perspective and opinions (her opinions were usually that Clara should stop working and kiss her instead).
She didn’t like this particular scar, given its awkward placement and stark contrast to her skin it was a very obvious one that reminded her of her own senselessness but when warm hands appeared in the mirror, snaking around her waist and tracing the line of the scar, she couldn’t help but smile as Clara’s chin came to rest on her shoulder.
“Oye hermosa, come to bed, por favor.”
Soft lips met her cheek and another smile bloomed across Dani’s cheeks, along with a slight blush but Clara didn’t need to know that.
“Ok bebita, let’s go.”
They sort of half walked half waddled to bed as Clara refused to extract her arms from Dani’s toned abdomen and eventually tumbled into the sheets, their limbs entangled and bodies pressed together. It didn’t take long for sleep to take them and eventually the only sounds in the cabin were the quiet breaths of the two rebels and a quiet hissing of the crocodile stood guard at the foot of the bed. Guapo was just happy his amigo was back.