HOUSTON - Marine Corps veteran Sgt. Scott Fraser fought for his country in Iraq. Hurricane Harvey brought it all back.

"It made me flash back to patrolling the slums of Baghdad," Fraser said. "My Marine Corps training just kicked in."

Instead of doing nothing while the homes around him flooded, Fraser decided to help. But three days after the storm passed while volunteering with Heritage Park Baptist Church, he was the one who ended up needing help.

"My hand got punctured," Fraser said. "A nail went right into my hand it started bleeding."

This veteran needed a tetanus shot fast, so he walked into the nearby Kroger Pharmacy and talked to pharmacist Dennis Sims.

"He was very anxious to get back to work," Sims said. "He didn't like being in here when he could be working out there in a storm like that."

Sims had the vaccine in stock.

"I tried running it through insurance," Sims said. "It didn't work."

It wasn't covered, because the shot wasn't being administered at a veterans affairs clinic. The problem was there was no way to get to one.

"It was physically impossible," Fraser said.

The roads were still mostly impassable. So Sims didn't think twice.

"He swiped his personal credit card, paid for it himself and administered the shot to me," Fraser said.

"If I believe people need something I'm going to help them, that's just my faith," Sims said.

To Fraser, Sims is a hero.

"He did of his own willingness what the VA failed to do," Fraser said.

But Sims is as modest as they come.

"I felt that's my way to help," Sims said.

Now this soldier will never forget he found a helping hand far from the battlefield in a place he never thought he'd need it.

"In the military and Marine Corps, we have a term. When guys say, "I've got your six," it means, "I've got your back," and he had my six, and now I'd like him to know I got his," Fraser said.

A spokeswoman for the DeBakey VA Medical Center says they will reimburse the veteran so he can pay back the pharmacist.

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