Media: Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

Timeline: 1935, post-film

Genres: Adventure, Angst, Father/Son, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Whump

Summary: "Indy, I love you." The desperate plea did not fall on deaf ears, but a brainwashed mind, unable to return the words. After another heart-stopping escape, Indiana Jones is beaten and bruised, but alive as usual. Willie Scott was unharmed, but the same could not be said for Dr. Jones' fearless and loyal bodyguard.

Notes: The Temple of Doom movie scared me when I first watched it because of the human sacrifice scene, probably because I knew stuff like that used to happen in real life. It frightened me out of watching the rest of the series, which is a shame because I have discovered that it is a masterpiece. Yesterday, I decided to rewatch The Temple of Doom. I remembered a little bit, but what I did not remember was the adorable father/son relationship between Indy and Shorty. I melted watching them together and I wanted to write some fanfiction since there is almost no written fanfics about their wholesome bond. Please enjoy because I woke up at 5 a.m. to write this.

All Indy wanted was sleep. He was exhausted and in pain and he knew the best remedy was blissful unconsciousness for a few hours.

He stubbornly ignored Willie's insistent nagging to be checked over until he realized upon entering the hut he was housed in that a healer was already there waiting for him. She made him remove his leather jacket and bloodstained shirt to treat his numerous cuts, bruises, and whip lashes. Those wounds that were delivered by his own favored weapon that currently hung from his belt hurt the most and Indy had to restrain himself from flinching as the woman applied medicine and bandages. The tips of his whip were still stained red.

"Estuday," the archeologist thanked her in her native tongue when she had finished. The older woman smiled, nodded, and left the hut to let him rest.

He set the whip by his bed and was buttoning his shirt when his young bodyguard slowly entered their shared quarters.

Short Round looked as exhausted as Indiana Jones felt as he made a beeline straight for his child-sized cot. The dust from the mines still clung to him. There were bruises on his wrists and ankles from the shackles. On his cheek, a once red mark was beginning to turn black and blue, exactly where Indiana had struck him.

He remembered doing it. The boy had been tugging on his arm, calling to him by his nickname and begging him to snap out of it. He remembered backhanding the kid so hard he fell. He remembered the expression of disbelief and the tears on Shorty's face after the man he trusted most in this cruel world had hurt him. He remembered the twisted smile on his own face. He remembered how good it felt.

He remembered how he had so gently caressed the abused cheek after defeating their enemies before embracing his young friend.

Although he had no control over his actions, he was disgusted with himself. Guilt clawed at his heart and ripped it out of his chest like Mola Ram had nearly done on the broken bridge.

"Hey, Shorty. Come here."

Silently, which was unlike Short Round, the boy approached the archeologist.

"You okay?"

"Fine, Indy."

He was lying and Indiana knew it. Over the course of their friendship, Shorty had picked up some bad habits from him. Refusing treatment was one of them.

Gently, Indy picked the boy up and set him on his own bed where he had been sitting a moment before. Proving just how exhausted he was, Shorty did not even struggle. Instead, he sat there quietly as Jones gathered the clean, leftover nursing supplies.

"Take off your shirt, kid, please," he ordered softly. Shorty obeyed after removing his American baseball cap as well, wincing as he did so. At his friend's request, Shorty lay down on his stomach and Indy began to clean out the mine dirt from the whip lashes marring the boy's back.

Unlike Indiana Jones' wounds, which were cut by a bullwhip, the lashes on Short Round's back were shallow and gathered together from multiple leather strands.

The boy shifted under his touch as the cuts stung from the warm, damp rag, but he didn't make a sound.

Although Indy was facing the opposite direction as his own back was struck, he managed to hear over the familiar crack a different sounding crack and a loud gasp. All he could do was helplessly demand those bastards to leave the kid alone. His bodyguard had tried so hard to save him, and could only watch in a pain-filled daze as the dark blood was forced down his hero's throat. But he remembered hearing only one cry that cut into his heart. The multiple lashes he was cleaning indicated that the kid was also whipped while digging in the mines. The other bruises indicated that his sidekick was also beaten. Simply looking at those inflictions made his blood boil.

After applying some of the same medicine and bandaging the wounds, Indiana told the boy he could sit up now. That's when Indy noticed the dry blood surrounding a puncture mark on Shorty's left arm.

"When did you get this?" he asked as his hand hovered over the injury.

"I fought Zalim to help you. He got me with his knife before I snap him out of it."

Amazed, Indiana then cleaned and bandaged this wound as well. "You're tougher than you look, Shorty. But I guess I already knew that."

Short Round grinned and began to put his shirt back on, careful of his battle wounds. As he was buttoning his faded top, Shorty glanced up and caught Dr. Jones staring at the bruise on his cheek.

"It okay, Dr. Jones. Not your fault."

"I'm supposed to protect you. None of this should have happened. I'm sorry, kid."

"Don't blame yourself. I say 'not your fault'. And I protect you, Dr. Jones."

  Indy smiled and affectionately ruffled the boy's dark hair. "You sure do, Shorty. You saved both me and Willie back there. You're one special kid."

Straightening, Indy collected the medical supplies and put them back where he found them. Someone will throw them away later, and if not, he will after a nap. When he turned around, he found Short Round laying on his bed, seconds away from dreamland. Indy picked up the baseball cap off the floor as it had fallen from the boy's hand and placed it on Shorty's cot.

Instead of moving him, Indy crawled behind the child with some difficulty as he tried not to aggravate his injures nor disturb his sidekick. As he lay down beside him, Indiana wrapped one arm around the boy's small torso protectively while pillowing his head with the other. He could feel Shorty's relaxed breathing and steady heartbeat, telling him that his kid was sleeping.

As clearly as he remembered striking the boy, he also remembered Shorty's desperate words to him before burning him with a torch's flame to snap him out of that nightmare. "Indy, I love you." They were both a plea and an apology, but there was no lie or falsehood in his voice. "You're my best friend."

"I love you too, kid," Indiana whispered before drifting off into deep slumber.

And that's how Willie found them about an hour later, wishing she could capture the moment in a photograph as a memoir before they parted ways.