Eighteen – 04

[This post is from J.T.’s point of view.]

“Dammit,” J.T. breathed the word, staring for a few seconds at the blood that soaked through Thom’s shirt, blood that obscured the wounds beneath. Camazotzi wounds might not fester the same way that dirae ones did, but this, he knew, would be bad enough—especially given Thom’s reaction to them.

Either something’s changed or—

He stopped the thought dead. He had work to do and he’d figure out what had changed—because something certainly had—later.

Head in the game.

One hand dove into his bag of medical gear, already digging out antiseptic and gauze as he shifted his position, using one arm to stretch Thom out on the floor of the watchtower. He’d need help getting his friend down from here if he didn’t wake up before it was time to move him—and given the color of Thom’s face, J.T. didn’t think that was very likely.

“He okay?” Paul asked, standing at the broken rail, shotgun leveled as he scanned for any new threats. With the dome of the wards solidly in place now, J.T. didn’t expect that anything new would get inside, but it paid to be cautious.

“Not yet,” J.T. said. “How many?”

“One left inside. Hundreds outside the walls.”

J.T. grunted, trying to clean the blood from Thom’s shoulders so he could get a better look at the gouges the camazotzi had left behind. “Tide turning?”

Paul hesitated before answering, long enough that J.T.’s hackles began to rise, though he didn’t dare look away from his work. The gouges were deep; he’d need to stitch them. He jammed some gauze against Thom’s wounds and started winding some bandages around them to at least temporarily staunch the bleeding.

“Paul.”

“I don’t know,” Paul said, his voice abruptly strained. “I don’t know, Jay. Something just happened out there.”

“What?”

“I don’t know,” Paul said, his voice still strange and strained all at once. “I really don’t know.”

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