"Thanks, guys. We'll take 'em,"
In a small forest camp further to the east of Portland, Doctor Cockroach and Susan helped take the injured men to a small medical tent. A few marines helped them. Surrounding them were several other tents or marines standing on guard, their eyes searching the trees to make sure the Kyzua had not followed them back here and were trying to sneak up on them. In a slightly larger tent, Monger was busy talking away onto a radio.
The camp had been established a few days prior and it was one of a small network in this area. The enormous convoy that had broken up into different groups and was now spread out in tiny camps so as to make it harder for the Kyzua to find them rather than all stay in one large camp and present themselves as a good target for them. They had managed to evade detection so far but they knew soon the Kyzua would track them, especially after the attack today and they would be raring to get revenge on those who had participated.
As the last of the wounded was taken away into the tent on a stretcher, Susan walked over to a small crate and sat down, clutching the upper part of her right arm with her hand. Dr Cockroach noticed this and walked over to her.
"Are you alright, my dear?" he asked her, a sense of worry in his voice as he knelt down next to her.
"Ye-Ow!" she gasped, clutching her arm tightly, wincing. "Sorry, my arm is killing me!"
"Let me take a look my dear,"
Susan gingerly moved her hand from her arm and revealed to her friend a small hole in the sleeve of her uniform. Dr Cockroach clutched her arm gently just below the hole but saw from her face as she winced and gritted her teeth that it was hurting her. He pulled open the sleeve with his other hand a little more and saw a huge burn mark on her forearm with a kind of red swelling in the middle. It looked extremely painful and it probably was.
"Sorry, Susan," he said to her sympathetically. He looked around him, hoping to find something that would neutralize the pain. He then remembered the medical supplies they had. "I'll go get you some morphine, my dear,"
"No, don't, doc!" she protested, stopping him as he was just about to get up. "Don't! I-Ow! I'll be alright,"
Dr Cockroach was aghast. "But my dear, you can't leave that!" he told her. "It could get worse!"
"Doc, It's fine!" she snapped back, annoyance filling her voice. "Trust me," she tried to move her arm, but found it hard to do so and almost fell over to the ground, as she tried to get up, if it had not been for the doctor, who grabbed her around the waist and hoisted her onto her feet. "Thank you," she said to him.
He sighed. "Look, Susan, if you don't get that treated, it could become infected or badly bruised or something,"
"Look, doc, I don't want it to be treated!" she snapped at him. A pause hung between them for a moment before she sighed again, though this time out of pity. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that," she said to him.
"It's alright, my dear," he replied. "I just…I just don't want you to get hurt. You and me are the…" he stopped when he saw Susan's face sadden, not liking him referring to their missing friends who they still had no idea where they were or if they were alright.
"You two okay?"
The two looked up to see Monger approaching them. He had heard them from inside the tent and had come out to see if they were alright.
"Oh, yes, we're fine, Monger," Dr Cockroach replied. "We just narrowly escaped being killed when we sprung our little ambush," he added.
"Yeah, I heard," he said. It was then he noticed the hole on Susan's arm and saw the wound. "Jesus, Ginormica! You better go and get that checked out,"
She glared at him. "I don't need it to be checked out, general!" she asserted. "It's fine!" but a flaring pain from her arm made her wince and caused her arm to shake slightly.
Monger raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't look okay to me," he commented.
By this point, Susan had really had enough. "Look, you will cut it out!" she shouted, drawing looks from just about everyone in the camp. "I'll be okay! Just…oh!" she stormed off away from them into the trees and sat down on a small boulder, bringing her knees up to her chest and embracing them tightly, resting her head on her knees and staring ahead into the peaceful and calm woods that surrounded them, trying to allow the nature around her to calm her down.
"Don't know what's been going on lately with her," Monger muttered. "She's being a lot more negative,"
Dr Cockroach shot him a glare. "Monger, she's fed up with this. Everyone is!" he snapped at him, which shocked Monger.
"Doc, there's no need to have a pop at me!" Monger replied, his voice rising also.
"Well, I expected you to understand what she and everyone else is going through!" he hissed. A pause. "I guess I was wrong," and he stormed off away from Monger, who was left completely dumbfounded by him. He never expected the doctor to be so mad or angry at him. Normally, he was a very relaxed person.
It was obvious this war was changing people. It had changed Susan as she was now more firm and Dr Cockroach as he was angrier than he usually was, and that was very rare for him.
Even though Monger was not exactly a fortune teller or anything like that, he knew that if this war kept up or if something did not happen soon that did not turn the tide of the war in Humanity's favour, then the group looked like it was going to split up once again and right now that was the last thing he needed.
Heaving a heavy sigh, Monger walked off into one of the nearby command tents to resume talking onto the radio.