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eliwashere · 2 years ago

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Can't Hear You

summary: König gets a radio from you in the middle of battle. You tell him your hearing aids got busted, and he runs. tags: könig x gn!reader, hoh!reader, angst (?), fluff, pining, canon-typical violence, no use of Y/N, slightly proofread word count: 2.9k words

fyi this is my first fic on here!

and i'm also aware that hoh ppl can't join the military but i just like the feelings

requests are open !

The ride is bumpy.

König’s sniper hood scratches the tip of his nose as the van moves along gravel, the vehicle shaking, the engine revving. The sweat-caked fabric scrapes against his lips, a familiar feeling, one that he’s gotten used to over the years here with Kortac. He leans on the wall of the vehicle, eyes scanning over his squad.

The mission had sent them to the middle of South East Asia, the humidity sticking uncomfortably to König’s skin. He hears the quiet murmurs of the squad, silently complaining about the heat. His eyes land on you, seated across from him. You have your hearing aids turned off, your eyes closed as you simply wait till the van stops or gets attacked.

Your colonel knows you like to take moments to yourself, to let the noise muffle out. Well, you’d told everyone on your first day, when you’d just been shifted from another base due to your battle-earned hearing loss.

Your first day, when you first met König.

===

König remembers it well.

He remembers his superiors introducing you to the team, taking an extra moment to specially mention that you were hard of hearing. It surprised him, though he didn’t let it show (he couldn't anyway). Usually, they’d let soldiers go if they lost something on the field, a limb, a sense. But he figured that maybe they had a reason to keep you around, and that intrigued him.

“Sometimes I take them off, at night or during down time,” you said, pointing to your hearing aids as the Kortac squad stared you down, whether it be to size you up or… other actions with other motives. You had clocked König in the crowd from a mile away, his head sticking up among the others like a tower in a field. He had a tilt in his head, which he held unnecessarily high. You could almost hear the whirring behind his eyes, the churning cogs in his brain, trying to figure you out.

“And so, if anyone would like to partner up with your new teammate here, it would be greatly appreciated,” your superior had said, and you almost sighed. Someone had to keep an eye out for you, in case there was a drill, or an alarm you couldn’t hear. It bothered you that you needed to be followed around, that you’d likely be assigned a caretaker, or god forbid, a roommate. You need privacy, everyone in this base needed privacy, and having to share that space with someone felt akin to an intrusion.

But of course, the military couldn’t take any chances.

When no one answered, König couldn’t say he was surprised. Nobody would want to follow someone around all day on the off chance that there was a danger to the base, and he figured that you wouldn’t want that either, especially not with total strangers.

“Alright, then I guess we’ll have to–”

“I’ll do it.”

Heads whipped back to König, who only looked at his teammates once before looking back at you. He didn’t know why he said it. Maybe he pitied you, like you were the kid that got picked last during a game, or maybe he just related to the silence that you were met with, all too familiar.

“Well, that’s settled then.”

===

The van came to a stop at the edge off the main gravel road, the hood of the vehicle poking into the forest. You turn your hearing aids back on, the soft hum of the world flooding back into your senses. The team filed out of the back of the van, dirt and rock crunching under your boots. König checked his rifle for the nth time, before looking over to you. You met his gaze, an unspoken understanding for you to stay close by him filtering between the two of you.

The squad started north not long after, towards the enemy base. König, as colonel, leads the team. His head is on a swivel, looking out for any stray enemy soldiers, or landmines and traps on the forest floor. He spares a half a second to glance at you, your rifle held tight in your hands, expression focused, almost unreadable. It’s the expression you wore whenever you were training with the team, the expression that engraved itself into König’s retinas during your first few days with them, with him.

===

To your luck, they still let you have your own quarters, but also to your luck, you had to spend every other moment out of your room with König. Protocol, you had heard him say, accent deep set into his voice. You hadn’t expected it, to be honest, for a man his stature and size to have that voice. By no means did you not like it, in fact, there was something mesmerising about it whenever he was out on the battlefield. Crazed, you would describe it, crackling, like radio static.

König never did hear your voice often, one of the many silent types in the team, him included. He’d figured he’d leave it alone, but it was rare to find someone that spoke less than he did. He found himself observing you most of the time, which he had a lot of with you.

He noticed that you spoke more with your actions than anything.

When you were tired, you’d stretch the muscles in your neck, sucking a breath in as it emits a satisfying pop.

When you were frustrated, you’d clench your jaw, or you’d press your tongue into your cheek. If it was the other teammates bothering you, especially with their volume, you’d turn off your hearing aids, which has made König chuckle on more than one occasion. You’d never hear it though, but you could see the creasing of his eyes, and you couldn’t help the smile that tugged at the corner of your lips.

===

The base is fairly barren, though most of the people who are there are heavily armed by the looks of it. That means it’s easy for your team to pick them off without getting seen, but it means a longer process and a more distance between the team. König can’t help but worry when you weren’t near, your presence having been a constant in his life for months now. At base or at battle, you would be at his side. So, when he sees you more than ten feet away from him, he breathes in a little deeper.

All it takes is one mess up, one wrong move, and suddenly the base’s sirens go off, the enemy soldiers yelling and firing. On one hand, König’s annoyed, because he’s going to have to find out who messed up and come up with a way to set them straight, but he can’t deny the adrenaline that pumps through his veins as he guns down enemies like target practice. The colonel watches their bodies drop with a twisted sort of satisfaction, the chaos of the moment fueling his hands as he slams an enemy into the brick wall of the building, a sickening crack and choked wail emitting from the now limp body.

König is a soldier, has been for a long time, and this is his element, his work, his life.

The static from his radio brings him out of the moment, and he ducks behind a wall for cover as he brings the device closer to his face.

“König?”

Your voice rings in his ears, and it would’ve bloomed a warmth in his chest if it wasn’t for its shakiness, the uncertainty in your tone. He doesn’t even get time to answer before you speak again.

“They…they’re broken, König. My hearing aids,” you say over the radio, ragged breaths and stutters punctuating your words. His eyes widen, but he doesn’t answer, knowing you can’t hear it anyway. He could hardly stomach the fear in your voice. You’re never scared, at least you’ve never shown it like this. But not being able to hear on the battlefield, not knowing if someone is behind you, or if a grenade had landed nearby; it scared König more than it did you.

“Nor–northern building, second floor.”

It’s all the information König needs for him to start running, sprinting to you.

===

It took a while for König to open up to you, four months, if anyone was counting. But König didn’t have anyone to really compare your time to, because you were the first one to ever try.

It was late in the night, König remembers. He forgot why he was even up, likely due to a nightmare, or simply the inability to even fall asleep, but he found himself in the common room, sat on the couch with a cup of tea in hand, the type that was supposed to help with sleep. He took a sip, sniper hood draped over his lap, his face exposed. The tea was warm, soothing, and König sighs through his nose as the liquid down his throat.

Training had been rather rough that day, with most of the soldiers already fast asleep by the time it hit midnight (a rarity). So, König hadn’t expected anyone to walk in, until you did, half asleep, feet dragging across the floors. You hadn’t noticed him, and he watched you open the shared fridge, pulling out the milk carton.

König hadn’t even considered the fact that his hood was off, and made no move to put it on either. He simply watched as you poured yourself half a glass, drinking it till it was gone. Your hearing aids weren’t in, he noticed, just as he noticed everything else. The scrapes on your elbow from training, the mess your hair was in, the dark circles under your half-lidded eyes… you looking right at him.

You tilted your head, empty glass in hand, the other holding the milk carton. At first glance, you had no idea who he was. Perhaps it was the sleep eating away at your brain, or the fact that he was sat in the dark, none of the lights on in the common room. But the electric blue of his eyes was familiar, and you knew.

The first thing out your lips was a hurried apology, looking away in favour of returning the carton into the fridge, placing the empty glass in the sink. You knew König never took that mask off for anyone, so to see the face under it felt like a violation of sorts on your part.

“It’s fine,” König had said, only to realise that his words couldn’t reach you, words that he was surprised he said himself. ‘It’s fine’? Was it actually fine?

Was König actually fine that you saw his face?

That your brows raised ever so slightly, surprised.

That you took a second to scan his features, despite the darkness of the room.

That your apology was so quick and so soft, that he swore his heart stopped for just a moment.

As you washed the cup in the kitchen sink, a hand finds itself on your shoulder, and you turned to face König, who was still unmasked.

To the untrained eye, he would’ve looked absolutely terrifying. Scars slashed across his features, his expression set and serious, but you saw the hesitation in his eyes, which were somehow the most expressive part of his face, yet the one feature he didn't hide.

König stood back a little, preserving your respective personal spaces as he drew his hand back to his side. You saw his lips part for a moment, as if to say something. You looked up at him, had to, because he towered over you, but you saw the indecision in his body language, and you gave him a nod.

“I can read lips,” you reassured. König heard you loud and clear, and his eyes look back into yours as he swallowed, adam’s apple moving along his neck. He thought for a moment, about what he wanted to say to you. A hard decision, considering the fact that he wanted to say everything in that moment, but he had a tendency to swirl into German if he got too carried away. So, he kept it simple.

“I don’t mind,” he said, aloud. He didn’t want to go out of his way to mouth the words to you, it felt rather condescending. But you got the message anyway, shown by the upwards curve of your lips, the single breath that you let out through your nose.

König breathed in. It was shaky, and filled his lungs to the brim. It felt like how he’d feel post-battle. The feeling of sinking emotions, of deep breathing and a mouth running dry. The feeling of pupils dilated, of his hands flexing and clenching at his side because god did he touch your shoulder just now? He didn't mean to do that.

“Are you sure?” you asked, cocking your head to the side with that slight grin, almost like you were anticipating, excited by the prospect of him wanting to share this part of him with you, one that he keeps so heavily guarded at all times. The thought made your chest ache.

Your colonel nodded, wetting his lips.

“I trust you.”

===

König runs incredibly fast for a bulky 6’10 man with tactical gear on and a rifle in his hands.

Fuck stealth, fuck sneaking and scouting around corners because every second he's not running is a second that you're alone and in danger. If any enemies are in his way, he simply shoots, not caring to make sure that they’re dead, he just needs them out of his fucking way.

He kicks in the door to the northern building, the sound reverberating through the building that he’s sure that you can feel. The colonel steps over the limp body of an enemy soldier, the puddle of red pooling under their lifeless corpse, soaking their camo maroon. His throat tightens when he sees your hearing aids sitting in that pool of red, or what’s left of it. Blood seeps into the shattered plastic, finding its way into the cracks, into the torn wiring of the device.

Making his way up the second floor, König catches a glimpse of the barrel of your rifle sticking out from behind a wall. Reckless on your part, but he could hardly blame you. He steps towards the corner, unsure of how to approach without startling you. The last thing he wants is for you to shoot him when he’s already so close to you; just behind a brick wall.

===

König found out why the military kept you around.

The first ever mission you go on together was his favourite. Before that, he’d heard the other Kortac officers talk about you, about how you'd snipe down enemies like candles on a cake, how you could scan a room in a single swipe of the eyes, how you’d saved their asses from more traps than they knew possible to put in one room.

He’d believed them, of course, because he never wanted to assume anything more than the best from you. But seeing was believing, and god, he was never more certain of anything in his life.

It was like coming face to face with an angel from a religion he didn’t know existed. He watched your steady hands, the rise and fall of your chest that held whenever you fired. You hardly missed, but when you did you’d pay it back by taking two more enemies out. König almost missed the grenade that landed by his feet, to which you kicked away before he could even react.

The two of you had to get shrapnel removed from your legs that day, but König smiles whenever he sees those scars, a reminder of you and your magnetic monstrosity.

===

He was right, you do try to shoot him.

König is lucky that your reflexes are just as good when retracting your rifle. He stares down at you, hands splayed and raised at his sides, firearm hitting the hard concrete floor with a cloud of dust. You’ve backed yourself into a corner where you had the best vantage point, where no one could see you through any windows or balconies. There’s a dull ache in his chest when he sees you like this, reduced to frantic breaths and wide eyes.

“König,” you say, his callsign slicing through your breathlessness as you lower your weapon. The relief sends chills down your spine, stirring together with the adrenaline in your blood; a boiling broth of feelings. You had half-expected that König didn’t hear your radio distress call, that someone had gotten to him before you’d gotten through. It was an imaginable thought, that someone would be able to take down this hulking boulder of a man, but you thought the impossible.

You watch him lower his hands, reaching them out towards you instead. You push yourself from the corner, your back killing you as you grab onto his wrists. His hands clench around nothing, the muscles in his wrists flexing under your grip.

“König, I can’t… can’t hear you. I-I can’t–”

Without a second thought, König slips his arm from your hands and lifts his hood over his helmet.

“You’re safe,” he says aloud, making sure you have your eyes on him. Eye-black mixes with his sweat, a trail of ink running down his pale skin. He’d lowered himself to your eye-level, definitely straining his back. He holds onto your bicep, giving it a squeeze. The pressure is comforting, grounding you to reality, to König’s presence.

You nod, movements stuttered. König smiles, and so does his piercing blue eyes.

“You’re safe with me.”

#konig #cod x reader #konig x reader #konig mw2 #konig cod #angst #fluff #konig x gn!reader #canon typical violence #first fic #cod x gn!reader #no use of y/n #someone pls teach me how to use this hellsite #like what do i include in an intro or masterlist post #send help

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