The rain had stopped an hour ago, but the ground still squelched beneath Soap’s boots as he trudged back toward base. The early morning haze hadn't burned off yet—fog clinging low to the earth like the world was still deciding whether or not to wake up.

He wouldn’t even have seen it if he hadn’t stopped to retie his boot.

A soft sound. Almost nothing. A tiny, broken noise buried under the brush near the fence line.

He pushed aside a cluster of damp grass…and there it was.

A small bunny. Soaked, shaking, and tangled in a mess of wire. One ear was torn. Its breathing came in short, panicked huffs.

“Shite,” Soap breathed, dropping to his knees. “What happened to ye, wee one?”

Carefully, he reached out with a gentle hand. The bunny didn’t even try to run. Just trembled as he slipped his fingers beneath it. The wire was cutting in, tight and cruel, but not deep enough to kill.

He pulled his knife, hands steady. “Alright, hold still now... I got ye,” he murmured, careful not to tug the wire as he safely cut it away.

It took a few minutes, fingers wet with mud and blood, but finally the bunny was free. He wrapped it in the bottom of his shirt without thinking, cradled it like it was the most fragile thing on Earth, and stood.

The little creature nuzzled weakly against his stomach.

He stared down at it, heart doing something weird in his ribs. “Ye’ve got no idea how bloody lucky ye are.”

Quickly, quietly he rushed into base, not wanting anyone to see him with this little creature. There was only one person he thought could help him and not judge him to filth for cradling this ball of fluff. Your door was just ahead. Looking back, he checked to make sure no one was around. With urgency he knocked.

You were still half-asleep when the knock made you snap your head up.

It was too early for anything good, and you fully expected to open it to Ghost telling you someone broke a rib during training again.

But instead, standing in your doorway, soaked to the knees, shirt half-untucked, and cradling a very small, very broken bunny against his chest—was Soap.

He looked... sheepish.

“Can I use yer med kit?” he asked. “Not for me. For ‘im.” Soap tilted his arms just enough for you to see the bunny wrapped in his shirt. “Found ‘im outside the perimeter. Hurt. Couldn’t leave ‘im.”

Your heart cracked in seventeen places.

A day later, after patching up the small creature, the cheap fluorescent lights in the rec room buzzed like they were hanging on to life by a wire. Fitting, considering the emotional debate raging inside over what to name said bunny, everyone on the team having opinions.

At the center of it all sat Soap, legs splayed out on the couch, arms protectively curled around a small bundle of white fluff. The bunny, an absurdly round thing with floppy ears and one patch of fur over its eye like a pirate, was nestled snug in a folded-up hoodie from Soap's locker. Its back leg was gently bandaged with gauze and medical tape, courtesy of a skeptical medic, you, who insisted, "I went to school for humans, not rabbits.”

"It's not going to understand its name," Ghost deadpanned from where he leaned against the far wall, arms crossed.

"Doesn't matter," Soap shot back, defensive. "He's got personality. Ye don't name personality something boring like 'Buddy'"

All you could do was laugh, seeing Soap possessive over the bunny and what to name him.