Here you go!
"Hey, where's Alyssa?" Hal asked his father as Tom passed him in the hall. Tom paused, looking at his eldest son with a frown.
"Weaver sent her out on a scouting mission." Tom said, glancing out the window at the midday sun.
"Where? And when?" Hal asked in surprise.
"He sent her out to scout Porter's camp when Dai returned last night." Tom explained and Hal's eyes widened.
"He sent her out, alone, to where our fighter scout had just returned half-dead from?" Hal questioned slowly and Tom sighed, looking at his son sternly.
"I'm sure Weaver knew what he was doing, Hal. She's not due back for another hour, so don't worry yet." Tom paused, seeing his son was not assured by his words. "She can take care of herself, Hal. I'm sure she'll be fine."
"Son of a bitch!" I screamed as I ducked just in time for a Mechs stun to fly over my head. I looked over my shoulder at the following Mech with wide eyes, drawing my handgun and aiming at it while I used my free hand to control the dirt bike. I fired twice in rapid succession, but neither of the bullets hit the quickly moving mechanical creation. Damn it! I can't lead it back to the base! I thought, pushing the bike as fast as it would go.
Son of a- I cursed mentally as the Mech kept pace with me. With a snarl, I aimed my handgun again, this time aiming for a foot. I fired, and the Mech let out one of its metallic groaning noises, stumbling and falling to the ground. I gaped at it in amazement as I drove forward, the Mech attempting to stand up. "Shit… Shit, shit, shit." I cursed, my eyes widening. I looked ahead, my eyes widening even further when I realized there was a Skitter right in-fucking-front of me.
"Shit!" I cried out, jerking the bike to the side at the last second. I saw the Skitter swipe it's clawed hand out to grab me, but I managed to mostly dodge it. Pain tore through my face as two claw tips grazed me, my speed combined with the power behind its blow making the claws rip my flesh. I cried out at the pain, one of the gashes going from above my left eyebrow, through the corner of it, and down to the joint in my jaw. The other one went from just under my eye, missing it by a centimeter, down to halfway down my jawbone.
I squeezed my eye shut as blood seeped into it, making it burn painfully. I looked quickly over my shoulder to see the Skitter chasing, but falling behind, and the Mech still on the ground. I focused my attention to the road in front of me, driving as fast as the bike would go. Blood dripped down my chin, tickling like mad, but I didn't try to wipe it away, knowing my hands were filthy and I would just succeed in getting dirt in my wounds.
I looked at the left side mirror, grimacing at the amount of blood on my face. It covered the whole left half of my face, but I could tell that the gashes themselves weren't very deep. Facial wounds and forehead wounds just bled like crazy, a fact I knew from my brother. I shot down the roads, reaching the stretch of road leading to the school in only fifteen minutes. As I approached the school, I could see a ton of movement going on, people piling into vehicles.
Tom was the first person to notice me approaching, his eyes widening in alarm at the blood. He ran forward to meet me as I slowed the dirt bike to a stop. "I'm fine." I snapped at him when he tried to help me down from the bike. "Where's Weaver?" I asked him.
"Over there. What happened?" Tom demanded, but I ignored him, jogging in the given direction. I looked around carefully, and finding Weaver proved to be more difficult with only one working eye, but I found him after a minute.
"Captain!" I shouted, getting his attention. He turned to look at me, eyes widening with alarm.
"What happened?" He asked gruffly as I slowed to a stop in front of him.
"Skitter got me. Don't worry, I'm fine, but the whole place is overrun by Mechs and Skitters. I barely got away." I informed him. "I didn't see any sign of Porter or his men."
"I see… Go get yourself fixed up, Alyssa. You did good." Weaver said and I looked around skeptically.
"What's going on?"
"We're getting prepared to go through with the plan. Go to the infirmary before you bleed to death." He said sternly and I resisted the urge to growl in frustration, settling for whipping around and marching towards the school. I walked into the school and was almost immediately greeted by Ben.
"Hey, Alys- whoa!" He blanched at the blood of my face. "Holy crap. What happened?" Ben asked in alarm as he grabbed my hand.
"What are you- Hey!" I protested as Ben started jogging towards the infirmary, forcing me to keep up.
"Anne!" Ben called as he dragged me into the infirmary, and said woman looked up from where she was packing a box, instantly jumping to her feet.
"Come here, Alyssa." Anne said, her voice urgent. I frowned at that. Why was she being urgent? It wasn't that bad, it just bled a lot, I thought as I sat down. Anne grabbed a wash rag began dabbing the blood away, putting a bowl on my leg so the blood dripping off my face was dripping into it instead of all over her infirmary. "Hold still, Alyssa." Anne said and I held my head as still as I could as she put the wash rag back into her bowl of water. I watched as the blood turned the water a red color, my brows furrowing.
Well, tried to, anyways. Pain shot through my face at the movement, and I grimaced, the only non-painful thing I could do to show my distaste. "Ben, in the box in the corner over by the beds is a bottle of disinfectant. Could you please grab that for me?"
"Y-yeah." Ben stammered, his eyes fixed on my face for a moment longer before he ran over to the box quickly. What the hell? I wondered, frowning.
"Don't do that, Alyssa." Anne chided and I forced my expression to relax.
"Why are you guys freaking out? It's not that bad!" I exclaimed in frustration and Anne, not even looking away from her cleaning of my wounds, lifted up the bowl on my leg. My eyes- well, my eye since the other was closed, widened in surprise. There was way more blood in it then I'd thought there'd be. She silently set it back down as Ben came over, handing her a bottle of disinfectant.
"Thank you, Ben… Now, go to the box on my desk. There's a bottle of GluStitch in there that I'm going to need."
"Glue stitch?" I asked sharply and in alarm.
"Yes… I'd stitch it with regular stitching, but that requires someone to be there to remove them." Anne said calmly. "What happened to you? I heard you were sent to go find Porter."
"Lot of good that did me." I snapped, suddenly feeling twitchy and anxious as Anne continued to clean my face. She pulled the cloth away, turning around to clean it. "The whole damn place was swarmed by aliens. I couldn't even get remotely close before a Mech caught me." I sighed heavily. "I'm lucky that Weaver gave me some Mech bullets, though I didn't want to use them."
"Why not?" Anne asked, turning around again with a confused expression.
"I can't find it!" Ben called from across the room before I could respond.
"Check the box on the chair, then!" Anne called back before turning to me expectantly again.
"I didn't want to reveal our trump c-ARD!" I screamed the last syllable as she put the cloth back on my face, which, judging by the incredible burning it brought, was covered by the disinfectant. "Son of a-" I cursed loudly, letting out a string of curses, most of which I made up on the spot. Tears of pain filled my eyes as she disinfected my skin as fast as she could, then grabbed another wash rag, soaked it, and wiped the burning disinfectant quickly.
A couple of tears escape my eyes from the pain, and Anne looked at me apologetically. "I'm sorry, but it had to be done."
"I'd rather have risked it getting infected, thanks." I shot back, but with no bite since I knew she was right.
"Here, I found it." Ben said, appearing out of nowhere and offering a bottle to Anne.
"Thanks, Ben… You can go back to Uncle Scott now, if you'd like." Anne suggested but he shook his head.
"I'd rather stay here." Ben said and Anne nodded.
"Alright, then help me do this. This is called skin glue, Alyssa, Ben. It's going to seal your wound shut, and it'll stay in place on its own long enough for your skin to heal shut. That way you don't need a doctor to remove stitches for you… But it won't be as effective as stitching due to the size of your injuries." Anne added warningly. "It will still do its job, though."
"Alright." I agreed with a nod, easily seeing that this was the best option. Besides, I didn't want to have my face stitched back together by a needle and thread, especially since Anne didn't have any numbing shots. I shuddered at the thought of it as Anne began instructing Ben how to place it, and then the two set to work, Anne working on the cut that started above my eyebrow and Ben on the one below my eye. "I feel like I'm being experimented on." I said after a moment, and Anne raised an eyebrow at me.
"Never mind." I said with a small grin.
"So how did you get hurt?" Anne asked curiously.
"Well, when I was trying to get away from the Mech, it started to get really close to me. I tried to shoot it, but I missed twice." I sighed. "I took a third shot a few minutes later and blew a hole in the part that connects the foot to the leg, and it fell to the ground and couldn't get back up. When I turned around to face the road again, there was a Skitter right in front of me."
"Did you shoot it?" Ben asked with interest.
"No, it was too close. Even if I did shoot it, it'd be a corpse in front of me and I'd have to get off my bike and push it around the bastard. It would have taken too much time, so I just turned sharply to go around it." I frowned deeply, but relaxed my face when Anne shot me a look. "Anyways, the damned thing reached out to grab me, and I managed to dodge it, but two of its claws got me, and here I am… wondering why I have this noobie putting me back together instead of Lourdes." I added teasingly and Ben smirked in amusement.
"Lourdes is with the civilians at the moment, helping them pack." Anne explained. "You said that Porter's base was infested by aliens?" She asked, her expression worried.
"Yeah."
"No sign of any humans?"
"Nothing…" I sighed heavily. "But I couldn't get close. I didn't even get in a miles radius of the base before the Mech found me. I ran from the damn thing for three hours."
"Did you tell Weaver all this?"
"Yes, and he sent me here afterwards. Don't ask me what he plans, because I haven't got a clue."
"Yeah, you and the rest of the world." I thought I heard Anne mutter, but I couldn't be sure. "Alright, you're done." Anne said and I sighed in relief, hopping from the stool.
"Great! I need to go get my things together."
"So do I." Ben said with a groan and I laughed softly.
"Come on, procrastinator." I said teasingly, heading for the door with Ben following.
"Hey, I'm not the only one who hasn't packed." He said with a pointed look and I grinned.
"I got sent on a mission and slapped by a Skitter. What's your excuse?" I countered as we walked towards the room his family, Cecilia, and I were in.
"I was helping Scott with his transmitter thing." Ben said with a shrug and I grinned at him, nodding.
"Uh-huh. Suuuure." I said teasingly and he rolled his eyes, pushing past me to enter the room first. I laughed, following him in and walking over to my cot. I pulled out my duffle bag from underneath it, grabbing my stuff and just chucking things into the bag at random. After a few minutes of doing this, I reached to grab a book when I suddenly felt really woozy. "Whoa…" I mumbled, feeling myself threatening to topple over.
"What's wrong?" Ben asked as I sat down on the bed, hanging my head and taking deep breaths.
"Nothing, I'm fine… The blood loss is catching up to me, that's all." I assured him.
"I'll go get you some food." He said, and I moved to assure him that it was fine and I could do it myself, but turning my head made my vision swim dangerously.
"Thank you." Was all I managed to groan out weakly, fighting down the urge to vomit. He returned only a few minutes later with a bowl of soup, handing it to me quickly. "That was fast… and this is more than usual."
"I told Kate that you were hurt and lost a lot of blood, and she just shoved this at me." Ben said with a shrug.
"Thanks." I returned gratefully, eating the soup as fast as my stomach would permit.
"You're not looking much butter." Ben noted ten minutes later when he finished packing.
"It'll take a little while, but I'll be back on my feet in no time." I assured him, sighing.
"Well, let's go talk to Anne. You'll need your strength back as quick as possible since we're moving out tomorrow." He pointed out and I scowled at him.
"Quit using your logic on me." I snapped at him and he laughed.
"No wonder Hal likes you so much." He said and my playful demeanor dampened a bit.
"Alright, help me up, Mr. Know It All. I can walk on my own, probably, but standing up is a different matter." I said, offering him my arm. He took it, helping me onto my feet, steadying me when my vision blackened out at the movement. "Uhg… Alright, I'm already sick of this." I said as my vision started to clear. "Let's go."
We walked to the infirmary with relatively no problems, and Anne sighed in annoyance when she saw me. "I knew this would happen. Come on." Anne motioned to a bed and I walked over, sitting down on the edge of it.
"You don't have to shadow me, Ben." I said, looking at the blonde haired boy with a frown.
"I know, but it's not every day I get the chance to see you so subdued." He said lightly and I narrowed my eyes.
"You little-"
"Okay!" Anne clapped her hands together, cutting me off. "Ben, go to Aunt Kate-"
"I already got food for her and she ate it all." Ben interrupted and Anne nodded.
"Alright, then go and grab a few bottles of water from the lockers." She instructed and he nodded, hurrying out of the room to do that. "Usually, I'd put you on a saline IV to help, but I don't have anything like that." She said with a sigh. "So drinking a lot of water is the best you can do."
"Yes ma'am." I said with a nod, growling in annoyance when it made me dizzy.
"How's your eye? You were keeping it closed before."
"Oh, that was just because blood was getting in it." I assured her, closing my other eye and widening the one I'd previously kept closed so she could see it was fine.
"Alright, it looks fine." She said and I opened both eyes normally.
"Here." Ben called as he returned, four water bottles in his arms. He set two down beside me, took one for himself, and offered the fourth to Anne who took it gratefully. I opened one of mine and drank as much of it as I could at once, eager to feel better.
And there you have it! Have you ever lost a lot of blood? I once had a doctor who sent me in to get 26 vials of blood drawn in one sitting - My mom practically carried me to the car and into the next Chili's, where I had the meal of my life =P
and one time when I had surgery done, I lost over a liter of blood (fun fact: One liter is 20% of the total blood volume in an adult human) and ended up sleeping for 2 days from it xD
