Sometime in the middle of the night between Days 5 and 6
The infirmary is the second-largest building in the village, bigger than any of the houses but smaller than the commissary. Like all of them, it is constructed from wooden boards, but is painted bright red. The interior of the infirmary is set out much as one would expect. There is a smaller entrance and reception area and beyond that is a larger room with a collection of six beds, all with bedding present. At the back of this room is a storeroom that once would have contained a collection of medical equipment kept on wooden shelving, although all the equipment and medicine has been removed.
It was easy to do anything in victory—it was only in defeat that you found yourself.
For a moment, a brief moment, Ace felt the ecstasy of success as his attacker let go of the BR-18 and Ace was able to firmly get it in his grasp. In football, if you were thinking, you were losing: you needed to be a being of instinct and move before your brain told you too. Eleven bodies moving in unison to do one play: over and over and over again until they could do it in their sleep.
Or better yet concussed. Seein’ stars. Tweedy birds. Take your pick.
Ace did what he was trained to do—he got that goddamn gun back.
And then, in an irony that he was too dazed to really grasp…he got hit in the goddamn back.
THWACK!!!
“AUUUUGH!! SHIT! FUCK!”
He let go of the gun again—in SOTF if you weren’t thinking, you were losing: there was very little benefit of being a being of instinct.
Ace gripped towards his back and rolled over.
All he could do was spasm and scream.
"My man got too familiar and I’d ended up having to whoop his ass, man, you know. Because he would step across the line. Habitually. He’s a habitual line stepper.” -Charlie Murphy
"That's what you ffff..." Justin croaked. The rush given to him by standing over the body of somebody clearly tougher and more athletic than him writhing in pain... it was definitely a thing, empowering him and making him feel accomplished. Strong.
That feeling was dangerous. The aura of satisfaction and glee washed away into dread almost immediately when Justin realized he was in danger of getting carried away. But still, this was what success felt like! And if he wanted, he could get down on his knees and keep beating Ace until the screaming stopped. It was all too easy to do, following that basic 'unga bunga' instinct like a caveman whacking the hell out of somebody else with a mammoth's leg bone. But that would also be cruel, not to mention messy and inefficient. He needed to stop the screaming here and now, and as fast as possible.
As luck would have it, guns were very fast. There was no longer a competition for the rifle after all, so Justin felt at ease bending over to scoop it up by the stock. Finally, a gun in his hands! He could take the island by storm with this, and be a match for everybody else who was getting kills left and right. After killing its previous owner, that was.
"Okay..." he breathed, tucking the tire iron under his left armpit to free up his hand. He needed to squeeze with a good deal of force to get the heavy object to stay there and it felt none to great against his ribs, but he wasn't about to set it down either. With some effort, he was able to maneuver the gun around in his grasp and get it pointed at Ace. He aimed at the back of his head and squeezed the trigger.
His mind was blank and his body was on fire, but as he heard Justin pick up his weapon. Ace found his body moving in ways his mind didn’t direct. He turned himself onto his front and dragged himself on his butt, scooting and scampering as limply as he could.
He felt fear go down his spine—that was a lie. The only thing he felt in his spine was the persisting throbbing and sharp stabbing pain that seemed to begin at his shoulder blade and extend to the back of his ribs. That on top of the Grade A migraine courtesy of TireIron PM (Dosage: Way fuckin’ more than 500mg).
He was fucked in more ways than a porn star with seven mortgages.
And yet, taking in Justin, the kid didn’t look threatening—even with the BR-18 pointing at Ace. The tire-iron wedged in between his arm-pit, the awkward posture of how he pointed the weapon and those eyes. The ones that had tricked Ace in the first place. Poison to a sucker’s mind like his. There was both a child-like panic and anxiousness in 'em, Ace had seen the same look in countless undersized cornerbacks and sluggish linebackers who had faced him on the field. They spoke of something very much obvious...
This kid had no idea what the fuck he was doing.
Did that really matter though?
He had still bonked Ace twice with that tire iron.
He still pointed that gun -his gun- at him.
He still pulled that -his- trigger.
And then, both surprisingly and unsurprisingly...
Ace was hit with the overwhelming, crushing weight of nothing.
"My man got too familiar and I’d ended up having to whoop his ass, man, you know. Because he would step across the line. Habitually. He’s a habitual line stepper.” -Charlie Murphy
Henry only responded to Jackson by shaking his head. Given the bodies they were stepping over, he could only guess at what awaited them in the infirmary. More bodies? A proxy? Some wild animal that was thinning their ranks all by itself?
The barrel of the BFG led Henry’s way through the building, and with each step they took the sounds got louder. He kept the hammer cocked halfway. Not far enough that he might accidentally pull the trigger if something startled him. They’d seen goats on the island. Monkeys, bats. The occasional colourful tropical bird. He was hoping it was just something drawn to the smell of carrion in this place.
Rarely did he ascribe much credence to his gut feeling, but in this case he couldn’t help but trust it. There were people here. His thumb rested on the hammer of the BFG.
The sound of shouting ahead only confirmed that. He pulled the hammer all the way back, shooting his companions a glance.
“Alright fuck it, move up. Someone’s in trouble.”
A door stood ahead of them, open only a crack. The sounds of struggle were coming from beyond it. He checked to see if his companions were in position, ready to storm whatever situation was unfolding beyond it.
A fight? Most likely. Jackson could feel the hair on the back of his neck begin to stand up straight. He was sweating all of a sudden. Well, he’d been sweating all day in this godforsaken heat, but now it felt like his sweat gland had gone into overdrive. His mouth was dry, and his lips felt chapped. It was all he could do to just form a small bit of saliva to moisten his tongue. He licked his lips, his tongue swiping the hairs above his lip. It took a second for him to remember he hadn’t shaved in days. There were no mirrors out here. He hadn’t had a good look at himself in a while. A strange thing to come to mind now, wasn’t it? In a situation like this, where beyond the door ahead could be just about anything, he was thinking of how much he missed just looking in the mirror.
What a stupid thing to be missing at a time like this.
Henry said it. Someone was definitely in trouble. They’d decided, hadn’t they? They made a vow to help people who could be saved, even if it was only going to extend their lives by an hour. They were going to stop the killers, that’s what they promised! That’s what he promised Ariana, promised himself. He wasn’t going to freeze up again, and watch as someone he knew was killed right in front of him. He had to move. To do something. To make a goddamn impact. Even if he was just a stupid kid who would never amount to anything, he could at least do this. He could save somebody. He had the chance to be better than anyone ever thought he was before.
Not just some short ginger alcoholic loser who peaked in high school.
Not just some scared dumb kid who didn’t have the balls to tell the girl he loved his feelings when they went to prom.
Not just some poor kid from a broken home who had to work his whole life away to have what everyone else did.
No.
He could be more than that. Right here, right now.
He could be a hero.
Jackson took a deep breath, and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again there was determination in them, for the first time in a long while.His muscles tensed, but that was good. He wasn’t going to be a useless bystander, not again. Not here. These people, killing their friends, their classmates… it made his blood boil. It needed to be stopped. They couldn't be allowed to just do whatever they wanted anymore. Jackson was going to stop them. As many as he could. Starting here.
Without another second of hesitation, Jackson blew past his allies, not stopping to ask for backup, or to explain himself. Jackson ran to the door and burst through left shoulder first, the door swung heavily on its hinges and slammed against the wall. Jackson swung his arm up and pointed the gun out in front of him. He took in the scene before him, imagining the deafening sound of a gunshot tearing through his eardrums. Ace on the ground. Justin holding the gun.
Jackson wouldn’t hesitate this time.
He pointed the gun at Justin, his eyes red with fury and the veins on his forehead popping out.
“Stop, you fuck!” He screamed as his grip on the gun tightened and his finger danced over the trigger.
Sebastian Odegaard - Playing The Leading Man Yoona Lee - Rejecting Society Chanel Andersson-Joseph - Changing Her Aesthetic Marc Hines - Lazer-Focused on the Future
Justin never understood the phrase. How could silence be deafening? It's quiet, and only loud things deafen you. They can deafen you to the point where you only hear silence, but the silence itself can't be deafening. It didn't make any sense! So why did everybody keep repeating that phrase, deafening silence?
Well... if silence could ever deafen, it'd be blowing Justin's eardrums right about now. There was no bang, no shock in his hands, and no dead Ace. Even the trigger didn't feel right in his hands; it didn't pull back all the way and have the give he imagined it was, like it was stuck-
Fuckermother, the safety! The safety was on, that thing that happened in every stupid movie whenever a kid or a girl or anybody other than the macho hero got their hands on a gun and now it was happening to him. He whined, a throaty pitiful wheeze, and hastily fumbled with the weapons in his hands to wake it up. Fingers brushed over the side of the gun and he jostled the weapon until most of the weight rested in his other hand in order to sweep that side too. Still nothing. Ace wasn't going to stay down forever and the precious seconds were winding down, a window of opportunity hastily closing.
He was going to fuck it up.
"-ALL UP!" Justin yelped out the tail end of his thought, feverishly slapping the side of the gun and praying he'd hit something, ANYTHING, that served as the magic switch to turn on the death.
Somebody opened the door.
That somebody had a gun.
Justin had to prioritize, and right now Ace wasn't the highest priority to him - the gun was. He spun and squeezed the trigger, spraying a haphazard pattern over the doorway.
Even after everything. After steeling himself to do the deed. After watching Ariana killed right before his eyes. After hearing the names of his classmates spoken like a grocery list of death. After promising himself and those around him that he’d do what had to be done. Still, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t pull the trigger. His finger wouldn’t budge. Even when his life was on the line. He was just too weak. Too soft. Too ‘humane’ for this game. His sense of right and wrong was still tied to the world he grew up in. He couldn’t take a life.
Justin had no such reservations.
Before he could move, Justin turned the gun on him and let out a hail of bullets. Jackson could have tried to flee, but all he could think about were the two boys standing behind him, about to follow him into the line of fire. He’d been no help to them. He was a burden. At the shoe tree, and again here. In the end, at least he could shield them from his own mistake.
That, he could do.
The hail of bullets came screaming at him, planting themselves in and around his body in quick succession. Jackson felt the breath come out of his lungs as he felt the repeated punches of the bullets mow him down. His abdomen took an especially hard hit, blood spurting from the fresh wound and sending him gasping for air as if he'd been kicked in the stomach. A sickening snap could be heard as his arm took a blow, sending a shiver down his spine and a scream of pain to his brain. As quickly as it began, it ended. Jackson felt as if he couldn’t hear, but he knew he’d been screaming from the rawness of his throat.
His eyes and vision wavered, and he stumbled backwards, his injured arm falling to his side, but the gun still gripped tight in his hand. His other hand, shaking violently, came up to press on his stomach. His eyes followed his hand, and watched with eyes the size of saucers as he pressed into his stomach and warm stick red fluid came seeping out. The pain was there, but it was more of an afterthought. Again he stumbled a few steps back, before fully collapsing onto his back in between his two allies. His hat flew off his head, bouncing a few feet back from where he fell. His cheeks were stained with hot tears and his face was contorted in confusion and pain. He tried to speak but there was something caught in his throat.
He hacked and coughed, trying to clear the passage, filling his mouth with the taste of copper as a red mist spilled from his lips with every cough. In the back of his mind, he couldn't help but laugh at his own misfortune.
Sebastian Odegaard - Playing The Leading Man Yoona Lee - Rejecting Society Chanel Andersson-Joseph - Changing Her Aesthetic Marc Hines - Lazer-Focused on the Future
Henry had scarcely turned to look behind him when he saw Jackson pushing forward, eyes wild. The other boy brushed past him and Aurelien and threw open the door in front of them.
“Jacks-”
The world seemed to blur around him, the sound of his own voice fading into the background as gunfire erupted in front of them. Henry stumbled back amidst the spray of debris erupting from the nearby walls. Pain shot up his side as he noticed a dark spot slowly growing from a ragged tear in the sleeve of his jacket, shrapnel that he now could tell had exited through Jackson and struck him.
Maybe he’d said something, made some kind of exclamation. Maybe he’d just stood there stupidly, mouth agape at a turn of events any one of them should’ve seen coming. Henry didn’t know. He still couldn’t hear, and the pain was still too fresh. The feeling in his throat made him imagine screaming, shouting maybe.
His companion fell back through the doorway, and Henry did the only thing he knew he could do. His palm shot towards the hammer of the BFG, cocking it back as he tucked the wooden handle of the weapon under his arm. He didn’t aim the weapon so much as pointing it in the general direction of their attacker, hoping the spread wouldn’t inadvertently harm anyone else in the room, if there was anyone else in there left alive.
Pulling the trigger, Henry’s world went grey once more as the colossal shotgun blasted smoke and embers of still-burning gunpowder through the infirmary, returning the hail of lead and debris first sent by their attacker with the automatic rifle.
The recoil sent him stumbling backwards, stubbornness and willpower the only thing keeping him on a sure footing at this point.
Henry forced his attention to his weapon, forcing open the stiff breech and loading in another shell. Moments like these were poor vantage points on reality, more feeling than thought. You were shot at, you shoot back. There just wasn’t anything else.
That disturbed him almost as much as the sight of Jackson bleeding out.
Ace could tell by the look in Justin’s eyes that they were both thinking the same shit.
Then there was the sound of others…
And then the sound of gun fire…
And then that stupid slow-motion sensation crept it’s way back into Ace’s mind. The sound was more deafening than the silence. He felt like an idiot for even thinking that silence or nothing was overwhelming. It compared nothing to gun fire.
Gun fire was scary as shit.
Justin was firing the gun at the people who had come to save him—another group of folks sacrificing themselves for Ace’s life. Was Meilin not enough? Nah, let’s add some more bodies to this shit.
How many murders in one week? 50? 60? The situation was as crucial as it was wicked.
But it was the crucialness and wickedness of this situation that finally awakened what Ace had been counting on and praying for: his instincts.
Justin turned around and opened fire—Ace sprung up and launched himself at the boy, almost feeling like it was a 100-yard dash: you heard the gun, you turn on the jets.
Justin thought he could just forget about Ace? That he didn’t need to worry about the D-1 athlete he had just sucker punched and held at gunpoint?
Ace launched himself at Justin and wrapped his arms around his legs, the goal being to take them right from under him and send him to the ground.
“Fuckin’--Fuck you motherfucker!”, he grunted, “Gimme my shit back! You fuckin' crazy sonofa--”
"My man got too familiar and I’d ended up having to whoop his ass, man, you know. Because he would step across the line. Habitually. He’s a habitual line stepper.” -Charlie Murphy
Justin's finger clenched in a fear-driven spasm as the rifle in his hands belched hot lead from the muzzle. His brain told him to let go years before he actually managed, and by that point the gun had already stopped firing. Somebody had been in that doorway, and Justin had felled him. He heard the start of his name. Pieces and memories from a high school world that no longer existed came back to him, and he realized exactly who he'd shot.
There was no time to waste thing about that... is what Justin wanted to tell himself, but waste time staring was exactly what he did, backpedaling with the gun still in his arms in the beginnings of a getaway. He'd dropped one, maybe he'd injured one or two more, but the gun had emptied far quicker than he thought it would. No extra gunshots to kill Ace, nor to kill any intruder who may have survived.
And that was about all the thought processes Justin's scrambled brain could manage before weight crashed into his legs just above the knees. He made no noise during his descent, either from the shock of what was happening or because he happened to be inhaling at the time - either/or, really. When he struck the hard and slightly uneven floor of the infirmary, however, was a different story. The gun freed itself from Justin's grasp. "No-NNGH!" he gasped. It hurt to breathe. The fall had knocked the wind out of him. The tire iron had fallen with him and had become trapped under his ribs which hardly helped matters any. That was going to bruise, provided he had any blood left in his body to bruise it when this was all said and done.
The air above himself and Ace exploded with another gunshot, the aftershock after the first storm. "Letgoletgolego!" Justin cried out in fear, clawing at the floor and kicking his feet haphazardly behind him with equal intents to get himself free and get himself out of here. That became the goal now.
The best laid plans of mice and men fell apart in the blink of an eye.
He moved with the other two, swift as he could with a hunk of metal clutched in both hands, following the short, familiar path into the central hall of the infirmary. He didn’t bother trying to muffle his footsteps or the heavy breathing that came with lugging his belongings from one side of the island to the other. No point, with the sound of conflict growing louder and louder the further in they got.
This wasn’t like the last couple times he’d run into someone causing carnage. His target this time was an unknown, someone he was yet to form an opinion on. Not a maniac attacking his ally in front of him. Not a known killer, leaving their trail of dead loved ones in their wake, the announcement their calling card.
Yet there was still that feeling of blood rush in Aurelien’s head. Not nearly as strong as on the beach. But this path was so familiar, the echoing sounds of violence mirror copies of his experiences on the very first day. There were dark stains on the floor, unfamiliar solely because they were lacking the body that had been lying in them. The feeling of deja vu made him think of charging at Tirzah as she fired at them, at rounding on Ned for standing over Violet’s corpse. The feeling stirred him to react. To fight. To do.
He supposed that was the best way to be. Ready to strike and to enact justice on whoever the attacker behind the door was. But detached enough from who they were that he wouldn’t freeze up again, or lose himself in his own bloody fury.
So he waited next to the door, fingers drumming once against the handle of the mace, ready to launch himself through the entrance to the main hall. Best case scenario, this was a situation that could be resolved without too much violence. If they ran into someone who’d put themselves on the announcements multiple times, though, he felt ready. Ready to stop himself from going too far. Ready to stop himself from not going far enough.
There was nothing he could do, though, to stop Jackson.
The boy pushed past, slammed the door open, and froze for a moment, caught, hung in the frame. The swarm of bullets ripped into him, and Aurelien yelled, first Jackson’s name, then a cry of alarm as the few that missed flew overhead, streams of air blasting millimetres away from his head. There was a ripping sound, as one bullet caught the shoulder of his jacket, but there was nothing more. No pain, no bleeding. A lucky break. If only it hadn’t been at someone else’s expense.
His first instinct was to rush in there, mace raised high, screaming like a berserker, to launch himself at whoever had shot Jackson and to render them nothing more than a bloody pulp. But after a moment of thought, and thank God that he had the capacity to second guess himself and still do something, he knew all that would do would leave another body on the floor of the inventory. There was only one entrance into the room, a single doorway for the attacker to fire at. Even someone with lousy aim would struggle to miss, and from the sounds of it, this person’s gun meant that aiming could be a secondary concern. His mace could do many things. Deflecting bullets was not one of them.
He wasn’t going to be useless, though. Couldn’t be again. So as Henry took up position in the doorway and the sound of the massive fuck-off shotgun firing briefly deafened him, Aurelien slid to the floor, ripping his back off of his shoulders, the mace crashing into the ground beside him. He looked at Jackson, grimaced, but said nothing. What was there to say? They both knew the score. He was doing all he could as he rummaged around for the first-aid kit.
And that was something, right? He was doing everything he could, everything he knew what to do. Fighting right now was suicidal. He could try and help Jackson. He could do that. That was something he could do.
Dean Puchero - By July you'd made a whole bunch of brand new friends, people you used to look down on, and you'd figured out a way to make real money - Phone - Angel Pregame - Generation - Prince Memories - Star Prom - Sun - Luster
V6
Bryony Adams - Burning bright until the end, now you'll be missing from the photographs
Astrid Tate - So what became of loving man, and what became of you?
Mia Rose - You can't understand that I won't leave 'til we're finished here, and then you'll find out where it all went wrong
V5
Owen Kay - I fold my tie and ribbon to hide my scars, that's how it starts
Amy Bachelor - Can you whisper, as it crumbles and breaks, as you shiver, count up all your mistakes
Francis St. Ledger - So a day when you've lost yourself completely could be a night when your life ends
V4
George Leidman (Adopted from Blastinus) - Now if we jump together at least we can swim far away from the wreck that we made Beatrice - Jamie - Pippi - Tim - Ada - Tabby - Romeo - Lissa - Freddie - Trinity - Redd - Natalie - Kendra
Noises all around, but for Jackson, everything sounded muffled. It was like his ears had been stuffed with cotton. His vision, too, was unfocused and hazy. The only thing his mind seemed to be able to concentrate on was the blinding pain shooting through his body. His arm, especially, felt like it was on fire, the pain was so intense. Somehow, his grip remained firm on the pistol in his left hand, even with the terrible pain, but it was almost as if his grip was locked. Every time he tried to move his hand or arm, the pain would shoot directly to his brain and he’d abandon the motion.
His right hand was still pressed against the hole in his gut. He could feel the hot sticky fluid seeping between his fingers as he tried his best to stem the flow of blood. The pressure on the wound hurt, but not as much as his arm. Fuck… Was he going to die? Jackson hadn’t really thought about it. Sure, he wasn’t completely stupid, he knew the chances of him making it through this were slim at best, and nonexistent at worst, but he never really thought about what dying would be like. He was scared. The fear inside him was growing larger and larger with each passing second.
Suddenly he could feel someone beside him, and he turned his head to look. His focus was still hazy, but he could make out the person kneeling beside him as Aurelien. Jackson’s face contorted in pain and sorrow as he tried to look at his friend. Were they even friends? He supposed so. At this point, what else could they be. Four days together in this hellhole. Jackson felt tears start to stream down the sides of his face. He grimaced up at Aurelien and tried his best to speak through the pain.
“...M’sorry… I fuckin… Fucked up.” He choked out. Another harsh cough spilled from his lips, bloody mist fading into the air as he did.
Sebastian Odegaard - Playing The Leading Man Yoona Lee - Rejecting Society Chanel Andersson-Joseph - Changing Her Aesthetic Marc Hines - Lazer-Focused on the Future
But he felt the familiar pulse of adrenaline and the freeing power of his fight or flight instinct kicking in. He was grateful that the dice landed on fight this time.
He was lucky they had landed on fight this time—Meilin hadn’t been, whoever had just gotten turned to swiss cheese on his behalf hadn’t been. He didn't deserve the luck or the fight but he was very much full on flight. His wings needed resting. He had been running for far too long.
And now his metaphors were mixed, shit.
Fuck that and fuck this!
Justin kicked and scampered and panicked and Ace kept his hand gripping the boys calves, he hammer fisted and swung and Justin’s limbs trying to Charlie horse the boy. All Ace knew about wrestling or grappling was things he had picked up from Wyatt. More often than not Ace was the one in the Justin position scrambling and kicking to get out of the grasp of a bigger and stronger opponent.
Through his blurry vision and ringing ears he felt and sensed the gun hitting the floor and getting out of Justin’s grasp.
He let go of the boy.
This was how a game went, this was how games are supposed to go…
You make a mistake, they make a mistake, they make a play, you make a play, up and down, side to side and over and over again.
He fumbled, sure.
He also got the strip sack and the fumble recovery on the return.
You take the good and the bad.
He held the gun close to his chest and screamed.
Whether in glory or grief, he didn't know nor did he care.
"My man got too familiar and I’d ended up having to whoop his ass, man, you know. Because he would step across the line. Habitually. He’s a habitual line stepper.” -Charlie Murphy
The gun was a loss. Justin wrote it off as an acceptable one, because with the intrusion of others, it had become a situation of 'the gun or your life'. Throwing aside his short-sightedness and the notion of successfully killing Ace, Justin set about leaving yet another person who might come back for him in the ever-growing mob of people who wanted him dead.
Maybe it was pushing off the inevitable, but having a swarm of those who wished to kill you was still a preferable situation to being shot dead within the next ten seconds, a very real possibility until he made it out that window. The same window Camilla escaped through. Hell, any window would do, but wouldn't that just be poetry?
As an aside, Justin hated poetry.
He probably cleared half the length of the room stooped forward on his hands and feet, bashing his knuckles of one hand against the boards again and again because he still clutched the pipe. His advantage. His lifeline. Ace wasn't giving chase, maybe it was because he had his. And Justin didn't have to worry about getting shot (not by HIM anyway), not until Ace reloaded.
He'd reached the wall, practically crawling up it to reach the sill and pull on it to right himself. Up and over, fleeing from a bad situation just like Camilla did, clunkily tumbling out bag and all.
He ran until he thought it was safe.
Then he ran some more, just for good measure, hid behind a bush and puked his guts out.
Henry slammed the breech of his weapon shut, rushing past Aurelien and Jackson and towards the door. Smoke hung in the air above them, the acrid sulphur stench almost overpowering. His eyes scanned across the room, noting the nearby open window and the myriad holes punched through the wooden walls of the infirmary where he’d shot after their assailant.
And on the ground, the other half of the struggle. Henry found himself nearly aiming the BFG at Ace, before taking stock of the other boy’s condition. It wasn’t good. Cradling the assault rifle, not aiming it.
Henry shouted, wondering if he really was hoping that piece of shit would come back so he could shoot at him a second time or not. Barely able to maintain even a pretense of calm given the second time he’d let someone die.
“Ace? Ace! Who the fuck was that? Who-”
They were gone. Ace was barely there. Jackson was still alive. He hadn’t let him die. He wasn’t going to.
“Ace, just - just stay there, okay? Someone’s been shot.”
Henry turned away, back towards Jackson. Once again he shrugged off his duffel bag and set his weapon down next to Jackson, shooting Aurelien a grim look.
Just like with Beryl. Just as fucking inevitable as the rest of them.
“Jackson, it’s okay. You didn’t fuck up. You’re not going to die. Right Aurelien?”
What he knew about first aid came from survivalist books, nothing in practice. What he knew about gunshot wounds was few and far between, things he’d ignored because he assumed he’d never need to know. Altogether it amounted to a pretty simple concept. Blood was supposed to stay in the body. Keep things sterile. The same checklist he’d ran down when he ran to Beryl, after she’d been shot. Before they had to give up on her.
This seemed worse.
Henry winced, ignoring the shallow cut on his own arm. It could bleed. That wasn’t what would kill him. If Jackson passed here, shot to hell by someone who didn’t even see him, with his friends unable to even make him comfortable, that just might.
“You’re not going to die. You’re not going to fucking die. Aurelien, you’ve got to check his back. See if it went all the way through. We’ve got to deal with the body shot first. I’m sorry dude, this is going to hurt.”
He leaned in next to Aurelien, whispering, the act barely registering in between his frantic unwrapping of gauze and uncapping of a bottle of iodine.
“If Ace does anything, you take Ari’s gun or my gun and you make it stop.”
