Chapter Text
Clint was the first to see the new prisoner. Clint was always the first to see new prisoners; it was part of his job, sitting quietly in his nest in the rafters of the recreation hall. He had the best view of the gates and he saw this one coming from about half a mile away on the gravel road.
The camp was laid out like a bull’s-eye, with the prison at the center. The sleeping Huts, kitchens, rec-hall, and sinks were surrounded by sixteen-foot tall barbed wire fences with guard towers at the corners and every 200 feet in between. Outside the prison-proper were the guard-grounds. This consisted of guard barracks, officer quarters, offices, mess, kennels and the cooler. This was surrounded by another high wall, this one of concrete and topped with more razor wire. They were patrolled by guards and dogs.
This was Stalag III, the prison-camp for the high-priority Allied prisoners of war. Prisoners from all the Allies were here: British, American, French, Canadian even. Nationality didn’t matter, just as long as they were important enough (or notorious enough) to get in.
There were three ways to get a ticket to Stalag III, and none of them especially pleasant. The first was to be born famous or rich or important. Like if Winston Churchill’s son got himself caught on the Western Front. The second was to piss someone off enough to be sent away from the lesser-security prisons. That’s what Clint had done. Well, that in tangent with the third way to be sent to Stalag III: which was to escape from lesser camps enough to be considered “a serious liability to the efforts and morale of the soldiers” as Clint’s last Kommandant had said.
The rec-hall was in the very center of the camp and was high enough for a full view of the entire camp except for inevitable blind spots behind buildings and in the lee of the wall. Clint loved this place.
He squinted his eyes as he looked into the Eastern sun and frowned. It was a shiny black town car rather than a jeep or a truck. That was not a good sign. Jeeps and trucks meant infantry had picked up the prisoner and maybe interrogated them some and shipped them off for the Stalags. Town cars meant Gestapo and Gestapo meant torture. Clint swung down from the rafters and ran for Hut 12.
***
Tony regained consciousness somewhere between the car and the Kommandant’s office. One moment he was floating the lovely black velvet of sleep; the next two Nazi Officers were dragging him by his elbows with his toes scuffing the dirt. It was not a pleasant awakening.
Tony knew better than to thrash. It was an idiotic human impulse that did nothing but alert the enemy to one’s awakening. This knowledge, unfortunately, did not stop him thrashing in the arms of his enemies and almost earning himself another blow to the head. The only thing stopping the officer was the door to the Kommandant’s office suddenly opening.
This Kommandant looked to Tony like every other German prison camp Kommandant. Tall, thin, balding, with sharp pale eyes and a posture that suggested he had an iron rod rather than a spine. In his spotless uniform, he looked like one of the toy soldiers that Tony had played with when he was five. He’d always hated those toys.
The S.S. officers dragged him into the office and helpfully stood on either side of Tony. He was glad because he wasn’t sure he’d be able to do so by himself.
Tony let himself drift as the Kommandant greeted the S.S. officers. He knew he should probably be paying attention to what they were saying (they might mention whether he would be spending the remainder of the war in the cooler) but he couldn’t seem to focus. The fourth blow to the head will do that to you, he mused to himself as he surveyed the office.
Pretty standard camp Kommandant’s office, he thought. Huge damn eagle of the Nazi party on the wall behind the desk. The desk itself was huge as well, and dark walnut besides. This Kommandant certainly wasn’t a cheapskate when it came to his office. Probably skimming off the top of the prison funds and letting the prisoners eat gruel, Tony thought bitterly. He’d been to one of those camps. It was his fastest escape yet.
The rest of the room was decorated in the same vein. Prussian rug on the floor, leather-backed chairs, photographs Nazi-party rallies and the Fuhrer himself. Tony fought the urge to make a face at the photo.
Tony looked up when he heard a suspicious silence.
“Ah, Sergeant Stark, I see you have rejoined us,” The Kommandant said with a smug little grin on his face. Tony hated him already. But to be fair, he would have hated him if the man had offered him a drink of finest French champagne, a Cuban cigar, and Rosalind Russell wearing only an American flag around her shoulders. That image allowed Tony to smile foggily at the Kommandant and answer back, “Nice to meet you, sir.”
The Kommandant frowned. Tony blearily wondered if he has something in his teeth. Probably blood.
“Sergeant, you have spent six weeks in S.S. company and they have assured me that you are completely cured of your desire to escape the Stalags. I must admit myself skeptical with your record of attempted escapes—43 was it?”
“Forty-seven, sir.”
“Ah,” the Kommandant wrote a note in Tony’s file. “I assure you, Sergeant, that you need not resume your activities hear in Stalag 3. This camp has been designed for troublemakers like yourself. I believe the idea was to put all our rotten eggs in one basket. This camp is, I am assured, completely inescapable.”
Tony fought the urge to snort in derision. Inescapable? That sounded like a challenge to him.
The Kommandant seemed to guess his thoughts.
“Of course, nothing is truly inescapable, so we have devised a number of discouragement measures. Escape attempts will be punished with nine days in the shoe, solitary. You may not have noticed on your way in, but the shoe is on the other side of the camp. It is the largest building on this compound, so no matter how many escapees we have; we need not lodge them together. Furthermore, there will be repercussions for all the prisoners if an escape attempt should take place. Rations will be reduced by ten percent for the entire camp. This will continue for one week, and every additional member of the escape party will add another week to the count. Those caught helping escapees in any way, whether it be answering back for them in roll call or helping them steal supplies will be punished as if they were the escapee. Nine days in solitary no exceptions.”
The Kommandant looked Tony up and down again.
“Do you understand this, Sergeant Stark?”
Tony nodded without looking up from the rug.
“Sergeant Stark, I do not tolerate any form of insubordination in my camp.”
“I understand, sir,” Tony said sarcastically.
The German didn’t seem to hear it. He nodded to the officers and they left the office, taking Tony with them.
***
Bruce waited nervously in the courtyard for the new prisoner to emerge from Kommandant Kuntz’s office. With him stood Captain Rogers and Colonel Fury. They didn’t look pleased. Bruce could sympathize. He hated getting new prisoners straight from Gestapo custody. They were never in very good shape and the prison medical staff was basically Bruce and whatever the prisoners could scrounge up. Once in a while the Kommandant would see fit to send some supplies down from on high, and Bruce could sterilize a penknife if he had to operate, but it was never safe and it was never a good option. He hoped the new arrival wasn’t in too bad shape.
The door of Kuntz’s office opened and Bruce felt both Steve and Fury straighten. It was a point of pride to only show their best sides to their captors. The only prisoners who relaxed around the guards were the ones trying to get something from them.
Bruce watched as the S.S. officers escorted the new prisoner to the entrance of the prison. He didn’t look so good. He leaned heavily on the S.S. officers for support and the way he was blinking rapidly coupled with the blood on his head, Bruce was betting at least a concussion, plus whatever else the Gestapo welcoming committee had dished out.
The S.S. officers opened the gate to the prison and pushed the new prisoner in without ceremony. The man stumbled, and just like that, Rogers was up next to him, holding the man up before he could fall face-down in the dirt of the courtyard.
“Are you alright?” Rogers asked as Bruce and Fury approached.
The man nodded, but seemed to think better of the decision because he pushed the heel of his hand into his temple. Almost definitely a concussion, Bruce thought.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just had a bit of a brush-up with the Nazi party, is all. And let me tell you, they really know how to party.”
Bruce knelt down to get a better look at Stark. Rogers had caught him before he was to the ground, but Stark didn’t seem up to standing again, preferring to kneel on the ground and stare at spots in the dirt.
“Do you think you can get to my Hut…?” He asked, and realized they still don’t know the man’s name or rank. He was not wearing a uniform, just a pair of maybe-military issue trousers and a black undershirt. His accent would suggest American, but Bruce wasn’t sure.
“Sorry, soldier, nobody takes me home on the first date.”
Rogers blushed because despite being surrounded by a thousand sex-starved soldiers, he still somehow had a virgin’s disposition. Bruce just nodded to appease his patient.
“I need to get a look at your head, and you can’t stay out here in the courtyard forever. What’s your name, by the way?”
The man seemed to see the wisdom in that and looked to be working his way to standing up.
“I’m—“
“He’s Sergeant Anthony Stark,” Fury answered for him. “Of the New York Starks, isn’t it?”
Sergeant Stark smiled unpleasantly, revealing a streak of blood on his teeth.
“I like to think of myself as of the Naked Starks, but as you will,” Stark said as he levered himself to his feet. “Lead on, intrepid.”
***
Loki was waiting in Hut 12 when they arrived. Bruce was not surprised to see the tall man leaning in the doorway, but he was still a bit peeved. He and his patient didn’t need an audience.
“Mind shoving back, Lieutenant?” He puffed as he helped Steve haul Stark into the Hut. Apparently the Sergeant had overestimated his own endurance because halfway across the yard he’d gone down like a sack of potatoes.
Loki moved deliberately slowly, eying the bundle of soldier as he did. Bruce manhandled Stark onto a table and dismissed Rogers. The Med Bay had tight quarters and Bruce needed the room. He just glared at Loki but the Lieutenant ignored him.
“I heard the S.S. dropped him off,” Loki said as Bruce starts carefully stripping their new bunkmate. Normally he’d just cut the clothing off, but getting replacements would take time and leverage Bruce couldn’t spend
Bruce grunted in answer to Loki’s unasked question. Loki knew the S.S. had dropped the man off. He’d paid off Clint months ago to alert him if the S.S. came within a mile of the camp. Loki had a long and storied history with that organization. It hadn’t been that long ago that it was him on Bruce’s table and Bruce remembered that the wood had been considerably redder after that occurrence.
Bruce opened Stark’s shirt to reveal a number of violently colored bruises and wounds on his abdomen, the worst being a large, circular burn in the center of his chest.
Loki leant forward from his post at the door.
“Damn,” he murmured.
“Damn right.” Bruce muttered back. “You got anything that could help with this?”
“Ten minutes,” Loki said as he turned and left.
Bruce began to work with what he had. The burn seemed to be the worst wound, probably the oldest and already infected, but Bruce was more worried about the head injury. He closed the shutters and grabbed his flashlight.
He checked Stark’s pupils with the flashlight. They looked to be dilating normally, so the head injury wouldn’t be too much of an issue.
He returned to the burn. He didn’t have anything to treat it in his tiny med bag. He wasn’t supposed to have the med bag at all, but he’d always been a doctor and something like being locked in jail wasn’t going to change something that fundamental to him. But right now he felt the same helplessness he’d felt when he first came to Stalag III. There was nothing he could do and it made him angry.
Bruce took two deep breaths and let them out. Refocus, he told himself. Look after the other injuries.
Stark looked like he’d been run over by a tractor. The wounds were jagged and dirty, and some were beginning to get infected, their edges puffy and red. He pulled out the half-empty bottle of rubbing alcohol and a few swabs. They weren’t sterile, but they were as close as he could get with just a kettle and some strips of old long-john.
He carefully cleaned the wounds and bandaged a few of the worse ones. Stark probably wouldn’t need stitches, thank god for small favors.
Now there was just the burn.
Loki came in, holding a knapsack. He set the knapsack on the table beside Stark’s legs and opened the top.
He pulled out a number of dirty socks and put them to one side. Bruce just waited patiently. He knew Loki’s methods of hiding contraband.
Underneath the laundry Loki pulled out a number of supplies. Two bottles of burn creams, a number of bandages still in their packages, and a hot water bottle, presumably filled with cold water from the taps.
Bruce nodded to Loki and went to work, putting a dressing on the burn carefully and hoping that Stark wouldn’t wake.
Bruce finished tying the bandage around Stark’s chest and looked up to see Loki still there. This was not usual.
Loki was an odd man. He’d been captured when his brigade of British infantry-men had gotten lost on the way back to their unit. That was the official story, but Bruce was pretty sure that Loki had been a British spy. He certainly didn’t know why a common infantry-man would be tortured nearly to death by the S.S. He was almost certain the only reason Loki was still alive was because his father was some sort of Scandiwegian royalty.
When Loki had finally been able to move freely after his torture and imprisonment, the first thing he’d done was shave. He then proceeded to cut his hair neatly, brush his uniform, shine his shoes and con the Kommandant into getting Bruce his Med Kit against army regulations. He had even managed to get Bruce a tiny room designated for a Med Bay and a few rudimentary supplies like the flashlight and a stethoscope.
Bruce had looked awestruck from the kit to Loki and back again. Loki had shrugged as much as his injuries would allow and said, “For next time.” Bruce believed it was the closest the Lieutenant could come to saying a sincere thank you.
Since then Loki’s grifting skills had kept Bruce’s make-shift infirmary up and running. He treated everyone he could and kept the boys from getting in trouble with the Kommandant. After all, any doctor could deduce that rope burns on one prisoner and oxygen deficiencies in another might suggest tunneling.
Loki was still standing in the doorway, and Bruce wasn’t sure what to do. Bruce figured he had one of the closest relationships to Loki in the whole camp. Everyone knew that Loki could get you anything for a price, but they were also understandably frightened of him. Bruce had never been afraid of the Lieutenant and he believed Loki liked him for that. Nevertheless, Bruce knew next to nothing about his grifter friend, and wasn’t sure how to ask if he was alright.
Loki didn’t give him the chance to figure it out either.
“Let me know if you need anything else,” he said before sweeping out of the Hut and towards the kitchens. Bruce sighed. Just another mystery to shroud their most mysterious prisoner.