Chapter Thirty – Don't Die
Wesley unsuccessfully tried to wrench his door open, but did manage to untangle himself from the airbag. They had to get out of there. Three more demons were still around. He felt like he had blacked out for a few moments. His head and hand hurt like they were going to fall off. Moving his wrist radiated pain down his arm. It must be broken.
He heard moaning coming from the backseat. As he looked over at Faith, he noticed she wasn't moving. She hadn't time to put the seatbelt on. Her face was badly bruised. He hoped to God she hadn't broken her neck.
Dawn moaned again. Where the hell was Connor? Had he been thrown from the vehicle? Wesley carefully unbuckled his seatbelt. Reaching over, he felt for Faith's pulse. Although he could see her chest rise and fall, the action still made him feel better.
"Faith, can you hear me?"
No answer.
"Wes, what happened?" Dawn called from the backseat. Her face had become pale from lose of blood. Sweat had broken out on her forehead. Shock couldn't be very far behind. He knew all the symptoms from a time long ago, in a dirty, urban alley, trying to help Gunn and his friends. He noticed that somehow she managed to get her seatbelt on before he crashed. Not dealing with two cases of head trauma was better.
"Dawn. Just hang on. I have to find Connor."
"Your head is bleeding."
Wesley reached up to feel the trickle of blood on his face. When he pushed on the door again, it didn't budge. So he took the fastest way out that he knew wasn't stuck, the sunroof.
As Wesley poked his head out the top, he heard fighting in the distance. Faith had said that there were three left. He ducked back down and searched for one of the guns. Faith stirred beside him.
"Faith, I have to go out now. Take care of Dawn." He placed a kiss on her forehead, and then climbed out the sunroof, which wasn't easy since he was one arm short.
Every movement jarred the injury. There wasn't bone poking through the skin thankfully, but he knew it was broken. Gritting through the pain, he jumped down to the ground to go and search for Connor. He bet the noise up on the roadway had something to do with it.
As he scrambled up a small hill to get to the pavement, he heard Connor's voice. It sounded like he was fighting with one of the demons. But when he reached the top, Wesley saw that Connor had already won the battle against two of them. He just kept hitting the demon consistently. The demon looked quite dead from where he was standing.
"Connor, I need your help." Connor kept whaling away on the dead demon. "Connor, stop. It's dead." He didn't hear Wesley.
Wesley walked over to stand beside Connor. His brain was still quite fuzzy from the crash. So he stood there a moment to gather his thoughts.
"Don't hurt her again. Can't take her away. They always go away. Can't do that," Connor kept telling the dead demon.
The boy must have head trauma. Or he had cracked under the pressure finally. Wesley sometimes felt like doing that also, but now he needed Connor. He had Dawn and Faith out of commission.
"Connor, listen to me. I need your help with Dawn and Faith. They're both badly injured. Please," he told Connor much too calmly.
Connor stopped what he was doing, but not because of Wesley. Faith had appeared on the roadway in front of him, slightly swaying. She was awake.
"What the fuck kind of driving was that?" Faith said before she started to tumble over. Connor ran to her rescue.
Wesley just stood there, looking down at the demon. He drew his pistol and put a bullet in its head. More than one way to get your aggression out. Then he walked over to where Faith had collapsed.
"Feel better?" she asked, sitting on the ground.
"Yes, much. You?"
"Head hurts like someone hit me with a brick. You look like someone hit you with a semi."
"Connor, go check on Dawn. I'll be down there in a minute. Faith, can you travel?"
"Do you mean, can I walk? Yeah. Just give me a minute."
Wesley sat down with her before he fell down. "Good. Can't carry you." He showed her the wrist.
"Damn. Does it hurt?"
"Can't feel it?"
"Head's hurting too much. You?"
"Yes. I suspect this headache I have is because of you. I need to help Dawn."
"Go, go."
Wesley climbed back down the hill to the wrecked SUV. Connor had gotten one of the doors open and was tending to Dawn inside.
"Has the bleeding stopped?" he asked Connor, laying his good hand on the boy's shoulder.
"Yeah. I got it to stop. For now." Connor took a couple of deep breaths to steady himself. "She going to make it?"
Did Connor want an honest answer? He'd had so many people die in his life. His mother, father, Holtz, Cordelia. Now this.
"I don't know. But I'll do all I can to see that it doesn't happen. We need to get to those coordinates. Can you carry her?"
"Yes."
"Good. Let me get some supplies together and we'll be off. She's a fighter, Connor. Just remember that."
TBC