Admire (DJ x Commander)

Chapter 6 : DJ

Commander had disappeared after walking behind the large, rusty, shipping containers. The silence and the suspense of the wait was pretty bad, but DJ could bear it.

Eventually, Commander DID come back, but with a new person who was dressed in blue. He carried a paintball gun.

Some in the group remained cautious, and raised their guns in a ready position, but Commander gestured to lower them. "This is paintballer." Commander said, and pointed to him.

"This is Desolation Harbor. Feel free to break, burn, or vandalize anything, as long as someone doesn't say otherwise." Paintballer scoffed. "This place is basically a junkyard anyway." 

Commander put his hands together. "For now none of you are to break anything. Paintballer has been kind enough to let us stay here. This is our home for now." Commander said. "Understood?"

Collective murmurs of agreement rose from the troops.

"Oh, and, uh," Paintballer spoke up. "Don't mind Slugger, he's around here somewhere. He doesn't talk to many people, so keep your distance if you don't want to bother him. Anyways," 

Paintballer pointed to a building. "You guys can use the top-most floor for your medical needs. Don't go in the basement, I think they stored some nuclear waste in there or something. It's pretty unsafe." Paintballer shifted his stance. "Anyways, use anything else you'd like. See ya around."

Paintballer walked off to the staircase. The team waited for a bit before Commander said, "Well, what are you waiting for? Go ahead and look around."

The team gathered their belongings and some helped Medic bring Mortar and Sniper down the stairs as well. Commander picked up DJ, and trailed behind the rest of the group.

It was a bit embarrassing that DJ could barely walk on his own. He didn't like being so dependent on others. It was his job to be everyone else's support, so this just felt unnatural for him.

"Well, how'd it go?" DJ said.

"Alright." Commander stated. "I think we were both a little startled, he shot at me." 

"Are you okay? Why the hell didn't you say anything, man?" As much as DJ hated to admit it, Commander could be kind of stupid. Even when things were seriously wrong, he never spoke a word. 

"I don't know-" Commander said. "It probably wasn't a good idea to yell, Paintballer was just defending his ground anyways. We would do the same, right?"

Then again, sometimes Commander had reason to his words. "Heh, yeah. I guess so." 

Commander carried DJ down the long, winding, rusty, staircase. DJ worried that it was going to break, but he could tell Commander put in extra effort to step on the least damaged bits of the stairs. 

They reached the bottom, and followed Medic and the others to the top floor of the building Paintballer had directed them to. 

There was a thin layer of vines covering the walls and windows, but it was in great shape- considering what they were used to. 

The heavy door swung open with a rusty creak. A short staircase led up a few floors. What seemed to be thick blast doors guarded the stairs to basement of the building. 

Footsteps echoed throughout the room. It reeked of old gasoline- and something that DJ couldn't quite put his finger on.

The door to the second floor was opened, and a small hallway lined with glass walls greeted them. Medic pushed open the glass door, and as a slight joke flipped the light switch. 

The lights flickered on.

They hummed and shone dimly, but they had power, nonetheless. It had been so long since they had working power. 

The room was surprisingly well-maintained. It seemed like a hospital or something similar, like a lab. Slightly damaged beds lined the room. Bandages and small amounts of medicine were stocked in cabinets. 

It's like this place hadn't been touched since the outbreak.

"Alright people, lets get situated. These beds look like they're in the best shape so we'll lay Mortar, Sniper, and DJ down there." Medic pointed to an area of beds in the far side of the room.

Commander put DJ down on one of the beds. "Thanks, Commander." DJ gave him a thumbs up. "I really wish I could walk, sorry for forcing you to carry me, heh." DJ was sorry, even if it was out of his control.

"Don't worry about it." Commander hid his face. "There's most likely something in this junkyard that could be useful for a leg brace if you want to walk around." 

"Oh," DJ was surprised at the request. Commander wasn't the type to go out of his way to do a big favor. Though, DJ could be wrong about a lot of things. "that would be awesome! If you have time, of course." 

"I think I'll have enough time." Commander turned to leave. "I'll come back later, don't worry."

DJ gave him a smile and a small wave as he opened the big glass door and left.

"He seems awfully concerned about you, hm?" Medic walked over to DJ with a small bottle of pills.

"No?" DJ looked at her, confused and surprised. "I mean- we've all been through something pretty bad, he would be concerned about a lot of people."

Medic shrugged, but DJ could tell she knew something he didn't. "Why do you ask?"

"No reason, it's not my business anyway." Medic set the bottle of pills down on a table near DJ. "We have some painkillers now, so if you're hurting too bad take two. Try to make the bottle last- we don't exactly have an infinite supply." 

"Will do, doc." 

DJ wondered what Medic was hiding as he sat in the dimly lit room. His chest didn't hurt so bad anymore and he really wanted to get up and- do something. Pulling his own weight was impossible right now, so Commander was one of his only hopes to finally be part of the team again.

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Apologies for the abrupt end! I wanted to get this out ASAP because you guys have been without a chapter for a LONG time.

I hope you enjoyed Chapter 6! Feedback is greatly appreciated. Have a wonderful day <3

(Also almost 500 views?!? You guys are insane! Thank you!)