Alternate Prompt: Carried to Safety
"There!" The pink-haired witch, hiding under the biggest black umbrella Claire had ever seen, pointed a finger at the heap of rubble before them.
Merlin gave her a sour look. "I think I can find my own apprentice-"
"Shove it up your rectum," Zoe snapped, pointing a sharp, manicured nail right under Merlin's chin. "You've been napping for nine hundred years, you old coot. I can find a member of my coven better than you can find your own ass with a map."
Worried as she was about Jim, Claire was really starting to like Zoe.
Meanwhile, the black... cat? Who was a dragon, apparently? had bounded ahead and made his way atop the rubble heap, sniffing at it. "He's definitely here," he reported. "I can smell him." His eyes widened. "And blood. Lots of blood."
"Move out of the way, Archibald," Merlin snapped, cranky as ever.
The dragon sprouted wings and leapt into the sky, swooping in a circle to hover behind Zoe as Merlin rapped his staff against the ground.
Green light surrounding it, the rubble began to levitate. Which was still impressive, no matter how many times Claire had seen it. Especially when it was this much debris that Merlin was moving with his magic.
She watched, straining her eyes for any sign of Jim. Merlin's apprentice had said he was with Jim, so if they'd found him, they'd found Jim too, right?
"Douxie!" the dragon cried, diving his way through the floating rubble, homing in on what was apparently his familiar.
Claire gasped at the sight of dusty, bloody, blue stone, and ran after the dragon.
"Jimbo!" Toby was hot on her heels, swatting floating rubble aside with his warhammer.
"He's out cold," the dragon reported as they both reached the two prone figures. "They both are."
"They're not the only ones," Toby reported, staring at a bunch of... well, what had been people, and were now smashed corpses, not twenty feet away.
"Who cares about them!" Claire snapped. "Toby, help me with Jim."
Merlin stalked through the debris, Zoe, despite her obvious antipathy, right by his side. The older wizard sniffed, looking at the pulverized bodies. "Vampires," he said. "Shed no tears over them."
Zoe's hands curled into claws. "You pathetic, bigoted-" she started.
"Not now, Zoe!" Archie said. "Douxie needs help."
She gave one last warning glare to Merlin, then stalked over, never letting her umbrella down. "Why, what's he-" She stopped, her face suddenly losing what little color it had. Her hand went to her mouth. "Oh, gods..."
"Magical tourniquet, now!" the dragon snapped.
Zoe did something complicated with her hands-Claire didn't quite see what-and a lash of pink light flew to the prone wizard's body, wrapping around his...
Claire swallowed.
Zoe's magic wrapped around the very raw stump of the other wizard's arm. It looked like something had bitten it off.
Zoe's blue eyes were big, shining with tears.
"He'll be all right," Archie said softly. He nudged his head against the unconscious wizard's. "You've got to be all right, Douxie," he pleaded. "We just found you."
Toby looked around, at all the buildings and walls which were rubble now. Claire didn't know if this was all of Area 49-B or not, but she did know it looked like a major earthquake had hit it. Not a single structure was left standing. "Okay, this place is giving me the creeps," Toby said. "Can we grab them and book it out of here?"
"On it," Claire reported, dusting off the knees of her armor as she stood. She held her hands before herself, summoning a giant shadow portal.
Zoe handed her umbrella to Archie, who hovered in the air, holding its handle in his teeth, as she cut off Merlin's attempt with a glare, picking up Douxie.
"Okay, up and at 'em, giant Jimbo," Toby said, grabbing onto Jim's hand and using the anti-gravity power of his warhammer to float into the air, drawing Jim's giant troll form up with him like they were both light as feathers.
Merlin walked through the portal last, and Claire scurried in after him as the green light surrounding all the rubble winked out, letting it all crash to the ground again.