Disclaimer: I don't own Dark Angel so don't sue me. Thanks. :-)
A/N: Thank you to wizziewoo123, BlueEyedPisces, x5, and tre for reviewing the last chapter! I hope you guys are really enjoying the story and like this chapter! :)
Ex Multus Familia: Part 2
Chapter 22
"Guys? Is everyone okay?" Robin scrambled through the splintered wreckage of easels, pieces of roof and random objects that had fallen from above. She coughed into her shirt sleeve; it was really hard to breathe, much less see, with all the thick white dust in here. Her wrist was exploding with pain, as if it had been shattered and the shards of bone were working their way out of her arm. And now the pain was fading away…a little…
She heard some faint moans, and her heart practically hammered with relief. Someone was alive. If they were hurt, whatever. She would keep them alive until help came.
"Robin? Over here." A rough, scratchy female voice, also struggling with the dust.
"Jaz?"
"Yeah, Dalton's here too. His face is covered with splinters." Robin's hand went to her mouth as she tried to suppress a gag reflex. The thought of Dalton, all cut up like that… she wished Seth was here. He was a trained field medic, she just knew first battle response aid… But then again, she was very glad that he was far away in that meeting.
"I'm coming," she said. She narrowed her eyes, trying to make shapes out through the haze. "Well, I'll try to come," she finished. She'd been lucky that she hadn't been pinned. There was wreckage everywhere, and Robin had a bad feeling that she was still trapped in a relatively small area.
Over a beam of wood, around a turned-over table…she almost stumbled over Joshua. And the huge block of wood sitting on his chest… it looked like it had been part of one of the sturdy drawing tables.
"Joshua!" she cried out, falling to her knees. She shoved the table section off his chest and waited for a moment to see if he'd answer back. He didn't respond so Robin quickly put her fingers to his pulse. It was steady and even. Ok, so just unconscious, thank God. A quick glance-over confirmed that her guess was probably right; there was a bloody mark on one side of his temple. Either way, he couldn't be moved. There was no telling what the table bit had done to him.
"Well then." Robin sighed and leaned back, surveying the wall of wreckage in front of her. "I can't get through, guys. I'm going to stay here with Joshua. You ok with that, Jaz?"
"Guess I'll have to be," Jaz murmured, her voice barely audible.
Robin leaned back against the wall and cradled her throbbing wrist to her chest. She was pretty sure she'd sprained it or broken it when she'd been flung against the ground. She was glad she couldn't see her face, because based on the soreness and the stickiness she'd felt when she'd touched it, it wasn't in such hot shape either.
Where was Sidda? Oh, God…in the other room…
She suddenly realized that there was an uncomfortable pressure against her thigh, and she suddenly remembered that she had her cell phone with her at the same time that it started buzzing.
"Please be Sidda," she whispered, pulling it out. She didn't like not having any way of knowing if her friend was ok or not. She knew Sidda had her phone with her, so it was possible… but when Robin glanced at the phone, it was Seth calling. Another voice she needed to hear, but one she knew was safe. Well, perhaps Sidda had only fainted from the stress and would wake up soon. Then maybe she would call Robin.
"Seth," she breathed into the phone.
"You're all right. Robin, I—I was worried."
"What happened?" she asked. "We were just sitting here, and then everything collapsed. It was almost like a bomb had gone off or something."
"It did," Seth said quietly. "Everett found out that Telic was going to do it, but not soon enough. He called us seconds after it went off."
"They did this?" she whispered. More emotional than usual, she couldn't stop tears from forming, but she brushed her eyes before they could fall. "How could they? Why? This isn't strategic, this is just hateful. The Cultural Center is the most peaceful place in Terminal City."
"They don't care," Seth said bitterly. There were some voices in the background, then Seth's voice became more businesslike, though it still had a caressing note to it. "Love, are you hurt? Is anyone else hurt? Any information you can give us would be helpful."
Robin drew a deep breath. "I'm not too bad…something might be wrong with my wrist, might've hit my face a little. But that's it. Joshua's unconscious, and he has a wound on his temple. Also, something really heavy fell on his chest. Jaz is….you ok, Jaz?" she called out.
"My leg's pinned and probably broken, but other than that, yeah," Jaz said.
Robin repeated that to Seth and then went on, listing out injuries. Then she hesitated. "And I don't know what's up with Sidda. She was in Joshua's small studio, and we haven't heard from her yet."
There was silence for a moment, then Seth's voice was softer. "Well, just keep trying to call her. She could be ok, maybe she just fainted…"
Robin smiled a bit. "I'm hoping that's the case too," Robin said.
"Well, we're digging now, so I'll see you soon, ok? Be careful of that wrist. I love you."
"Love you too." Robin hung up, then flinched as some of the debris settled around her and a few more pieces of stuff fell dangerously close.
"Wonderful," Jaz said. "It's not settled yet.
"My thoughts exactly," Robin muttered. She hunched in a little closer to what seemed like a relatively safe corner, then opened her cell phone again. She might as well keep trying to call Sidda; there wasn't much else she could do at the moment.
0000000000000000000000000000
"Oh…wow….That was fun." Sidda started to move, then flopped back against the couch. No, moving definitely wasn't a good idea yet. Her head was slightly dizzy, and things just felt weird and out of focus. Not a good time to move.
She was curled up on her knees on the couch… what, why? That wasn't comfortable. Cautiously, she looked out at the very-changed small studio. Was something wrong with her vision? Nope, there were definitely lots of dust particles in the air. She sneezed as they tickled her nose.
And then she focused in on the bits of wood and metal and… possibly part of a piano that littered the room. Oh yeah. Suddenly she remembered. Loud explosive noise, everything falling, her curling up to protect the baby. Well, she must have fainted again, damn it all.
She started to sit up properly so that she could get a better look at her stomach and make sure the baby was all right, but she didn't get very far before a sudden intense pain in her leg caused her to flop back to the couch, twisting sideways to land on her side.
"Okay, you've been through worse," Sidda coached herself. "At least you know the leg is there." Slowly, she moved again, bracing herself with her palms. Then she looked over her shoulder.
Oh. Her leg… well, it looked like some crazy-psycho torturer from the middle ages had decided she was a vampire, had then decided to kill her, and then had proved he had very bad aim. A huge stake of wood went all the way through her leg and into the couch, effectively pinning her in place.
"Alec is so going to kill me," she muttered, carefully easing herself back down again. She lay on her side as much as she could to relieve the pressure on Bean. She gasped as Bean gave her a good hard kick as if telling her that he wasn't pleased at all with the current situation that they were in.
"Yeah, I'm not thrilled either," she muttered. But hey, at least Bean was okay. And she wasn't bad off either. Which reminded her that she really should call Alec and reassure him. He was probably freaking out right about now, especially if she'd been unconscious for any length of time.
Sidda reached for the cell phone that had been on the table near the couch; miraculously, though the table had fallen over, the cell phone was still in easy reach. Good thing, because Sidda doubted that she could stand pulling the stake out of herself. With her luck today, she'd probably faint and then just bleed to death.
She had twenty something missed calls, so she must have definitely passed out. Most of them were from Alec and Robin, with a few from Seth and Max thrown in the mix. At least Robin was okay; she had to be if she was well enough to call her that many times. She called Alec's number back, and tried to find a comfortable position. She could hear banging somewhere distant, so she guessed that the rescue crew was already on its way.
Alec answered before the first ring was finished. "God, are you all right? Where are you?"
Relief washed through her, and Sidda let out the breath she didn't know she had been holding. She had hoped that Alec was perfectly safe, but still, it was nice to hear his voice. "Hey, schnookims," she tried joking, hopefully relieving some of his stress, "I'm in what was the Cultural Center. I think I passed out when it, uh, collapsed." She looked around the room, wondering how much of the Cultural Center was still standing and how much had landed around her. She was probably breathing in particles from paintings and sculptures. "What happened?"
"It was bombed by those Telic bastards," Alec spat. There was a pause. "Sidda, are you all right?"
She thought she had skillfully avoided that question, but Alec wasn't easy to fool. "Nothing's crushed or broken." That was the truth, if you were ignoring the fact that the stake had broke her skin and crushed some muscles and blood vessels. "Bean's fine."
Alec took a deep breath. "Sidda. One more time now. And don't lie to me. Are you hurt?"
Sidda sighed and leaned against the side of the couch. "Yes."
He sucked in his breath quickly and then gave a low growl. "How bad?"
"It's fixable," she replied. She could hear him talking to someone else, probably Seth, seeing how they had both been at the meeting with Max. "Oh, by the way, I'm really sorry about your piano." She glanced over at the piano that had fallen in the studio from one of the upper floors. "I actually can't tell if it's yours, but I'm guessing by size, shape and general condition that…"
"Are you bleeding?" Alec asked, paying full attention to her again. "Where are you hurt?"
"It's not bleeding because it's sort of keeping itself from bleeding," she said, knowing she wasn't making much sense. She didn't want to worry him, but if she didn't tell him, he would eventually hand the phone over to Seth, who would demand medical details, and then Seth would tell him anyway. "There's a two foot long one and a half inch wide wooden stake in my leg. I sort of can't move…I'm stuck to the couch." Sidda had an awful mental picture of her suffocating on the fumes and paint dust down here and then Alec finding her, stuck to the couch like a bug to a plaque. "I can still wiggle my toes, so it didn't sever any really important tendons." It was long, not wide.
Alec let out a few curses and then said in a softer tone, "Don't move, all right, Sidda? Don't take it out or anything. I'm coming for you…just stay still."
Sidda gave a small laugh. "I can't really go anywhere, Alec, so I don't think you need to worry."
"Look, stay close to the phone. Call Robin and keep talking. We're digging as fast as we can."
"Alec?" Sidda sat up a little straighter and pressed the phone to her ear as she remembered something important. "Mona was on the fifth floor, has she called Everett yet?" There was silence, and Sidda's heart started beating faster. "Alec?"
"No, nothing yet, but that doesn't mean anything, all right, Sidda?" Alec said, "Just…I'll be there soon. I love you, Sidda."
"Okay," Sidda said, chewing on her bottom lip. "I love you, too, Alec."
The phone clicked off after a moment. Sidda stared at it before scrolling down to Robin's number. She punched the call button and just like Alec, Robin picked up after the first ring was over.
"Are you okay?" Robin demanded, "I've been calling for half an hour now."
"I'm basically fine, and sorry, I must've dozed off." She felt bad about the joke, but she couldn't help it. She had to say something to lighten the mood. "Are you all right? How is everyone over there?"
"Nothing besides a sprained wrist—" which meant that it was probably actually broken and Robin was experiencing her usual injury euphoria "—and some minor facial injuries. Nothing to write Manticore about."
Sidda smiled at the old joke. "So you're okay?" She had to know that Robin was okay.
"Yes, I'll be fine," Robin said. There was no need to say she had had worse; they both knew Robin's history. As long as the unstable building didn't collapse around them, she would pull through.
"And the others?" Sidda asked.
"Joshua just woke up. He's a little out of it," Robin said, "He's trying to pretend he isn't injured."
"I'm starting to think that runs in the family," Sidda replied, "Is Dalton okay?" She remembered that her favorite X6 was over there.
"I don't know, really," Robin said, and Sidda grabbed the couch cushions to steady herself. "No, I mean, he's alive, it's just I'm not sure how injured he is. I can't get to him, there's stuff in the way." Her breathing was a little rapid, and Sidda guessed that the small enclosed space was probably bothering her. Robin wasn't really fond of small spaces and being trapped in one like this was probably going to make her crazy after a while.
"Well, hey, at least he's okay," Sidda said. A brief spell of dizziness passed over her, and she laid back down on her side as much as was possible. Damn leg. "I'm guessing you called Seth?"
"Yeah, he's with the digging crew," she said, "Turns out there was an Ordinary building crew nearby, and they saw what happened. They came over to help."
Sidda perked up, confusion taking over her. "Are they sure they're not Telic in disguise?"
"No, I don't think they are, not from what Seth said," Robin replied. Above them, the wreckage shifted again, sending small pieces of the building to the ground and more dust to fill the room. Sidda coughed, and she could hear Robin doing the same thing on the other end of the line. She let out a snorting laugh. "We can't go out like this," she said, "So we're not allowed to die, got it? We're going to die with guns blazing, fighting Familiars. And I'll kill more of them than you." It was better to joke right now, or she was either going to faint or collapse into tears.
"Doubt it," Robin said on the other line. She either humoring Sidda or needed the same treatment. "I'm better with guns than you are."
Sidda coughed a little more and moved the phone away for a moment as a spasm of pain from her leg climbed up her thigh. "Is this a challenge?"
"If that's what you need, then sure, consider it a challenge."
"You know me so well."
00000000000000000000000000000
"Shit." Alec said quietly. He closed his eyes and looked away, out towards Seattle. Not that he could really see it; piles of the debris they had already removed were in the way.
Seth looked the other way, farther along the building, to where Everett was frantically working with another digging crew. He had sent his whole batch of Ordinaries into awe over his determined one-man struggle with the building. He, unlike most of them, hadn't heard any news about his mate.
"I guess we have to tell him." Seth said. He didn't want to be the one to tell Everett, but better him than an Ordinary. Everett… Everett might lose it if an Ordinary told him. Especially since Ordinaries caused this.
"Are you kidding?" Alec asked. "Right now?"
"Would you want someone to not tell you?" Seth asked sharply. He would never want the news that something had happened to Robin, but even worse would be not knowing.
Seth knelt down next to Mona and stared at her blue and black cheek. He carefully turned her head; her neck had snapped when she'd either been hit or had fallen. He closed the eyelids over her blank, staring eyes and then sat back. At least Everett wouldn't see her in agony. She almost looked at peace now.
"We better get the rest of this off of her if we're going to tell Everett," Alec said, resigned to the idea. "We can at least do that much for him."
Seth nodded and the two of them set to clearing the stone away, quickly and efficiently. Both were quiet, thinking about how easily it could've been their mates they were uncovering. If their mates had been in their own studios, if they had been closer to the wall, closer to where the bomb was… anything could've been different.
"I'll go tell Everett if you want to keep working," Seth said, nodding towards the area where Joshua's studio was. Unfortunately, it was pretty close to the center of the building, but at least they were almost there.
Alec nodded, and Seth set off. Since Alec had been so reluctant to say anything, it wouldn't have been fair to ask him to talk to Everett. And Seth, being a field medic, had had a little practice delivering bad news before.
"Everett…" He drew Everett away from the rest of his team. Everett took one look at Seth's face, and Seth knew that Everett knew.
"You found her…"
Seth nodded and led Everett back to where Mona was. Everett didn't say anything; he simply half-crumbled to the ground next to her and gathered her body up in his arms. He pressed his face into her and stayed silent.
This was a good time for Seth to leave… he knew Everett needed to be alone right now. He'd have as much support as he needed, ready when he was. But now he needed to work through his grief, and unfortunately, his guilt. Seth knew that Everett was going to feel guilty because of his involvement with Telic. He would feel like he'd failed the mission.
As soon as Seth was closer to Alec he called Max and let her know what the situation with Everett was. Even if they left him alone, someone would need to keep an eye on him to make sure that he didn't do anything drastic. Max immediately knew what Seth was suggesting and agreed to have a few people keep an eye on him.
Once that was settled, Seth rejoined Alec in the clearing and digging.
They hated it, but they had to go slower now and be more careful. Every little bit moved around and caused things in the building to shift a bit more, and all they needed was another horrific collapse. It had already happened once on a small section on the right side of the building when the transgenics had stopped paying attention to the Ordinary crew there. No one was killed from the collapse, but they certainly weren't making that mistake again.
"We should be through in any minute," Alec grunted, taking out his frustration on the piece of rubble that he tossed farther away than was necessary.
"I think a few feet more and we'll be able to hear them," Seth said.
And then, there they were. The voices. A quiet murmur, but to transgenic hearing, it was possible to distinguish separate voices.
"Robin!" Seth started digging faster, barely stopping to remember and feel for any shifts that his digging might cause. "Robin, we're coming!"
"Seth!" He could hear movement on the other side, and more voices. "Seth, thank goodness, it's so closed in here…" He heard a hitch at the end of her voice, and he suddenly remembered Robin's fear of small spaces. His mate was down there, afraid, and in need of his help. He was desperate to get through now, to lift her up and out to safety.
"If Robin's there…" Alec paused, thinking and calculating based on the map of the layout that was in his head. He rushed off to the left. "Sidda!" he called. He had to be standing near the smaller studio now. He turned around and yelled at one of the bigger work crews. "Hey, we found some people! We could use your help!"
The small crew that Alec and Seth had been leading was still with Seth, digging out the bigger room. Which was only right. But still, one extra guy could be very helpful.
Alec returned to his digging, not even waiting to see if any of the Ordinaries were coming to help him. "Sidda?" he called again.
It was faint, but he heard a reply. "Yo, Alec, down here."
Alec chuckled, feeling almost giddy with relief. He'd found the right spot. He was a little more careful than Seth now; after all, Sidda wasn't panicking, and he didn't want anything else to fall in. He was joined by two Ordinaries, and it wasn't long before he got through, peeking his head into the hole they had made.
"Well, hey," Sidda said, drawing his attention to a dusty couch with her tiny form on it. She coughed and then gave him a weak grin. "Bad day to go spelunking, hun, but I ain't complaining."
He beamed back at her, intensely relieved to find her alive and joking around. "Go get one of the doctors," Alec ordered as soon as he saw Sidda lying on the couch. "Tell them we have a pregnant woman with a stake pinning her down."
They ran off, and Alec moved in as best he could; it was difficult to avoid knocking his head against things.
"Watch it, giant," Sidda said, smiling a tight smile and extending her hand to him. "We don't need more ceiling coming down."
He grasped her hand and knelt down next to her, stroking her arm, her face, her hair. They kissed for a moment—well, a long moment. His hands twined themselves in her hair and the kiss deepened into a French kiss before he remembered why she hadn't moved much. Alec then broke away and turned to look at her leg.
He automatically winced. "Damn."
"No kidding," Sidda said, shifting restlessly. "It's in at a very awkward angle too. But luckily you have your own crew of slaves now?"
"Oh, yeah, the world would love that one. I can see it in the papers now…" He spread out the hand that wasn't holding Sidda's in front of him. "Transgenic Plot to Takeover World: Humans Become Slaves!"
Sidda giggled, then tightened her hand as another spasm traveled up her leg. "Ugh, I can't wait to get this out," she said. "How far are the doctors?"
"Not too far, I think," he said. "They're sort of spread out." He glanced back at the hole he'd made in the debris. "I could go get Seth. He's nearby, digging Robin and them out. They should be through by now."
He started to stand up, but Sidda yanked him back down. "Oh, no, you don't," she said firmly. "Let them have their moment. And anyway, a few extra minutes won't hurt me." She looked at him seriously. "Speaking of hurt… has anyone? Been hurt, I mean."
Alec brushed his hand down the side of her face. "Yeah. I don't think anyone's getting out of here completely fine." He glanced down at her leg again and grimaced. "Of course, I don't think many were speared to furniture."
"I'm special like that," she mumbled. She pulled his hand close and rested the back of it against her forehead, taking some sort of comfort from the contact. He turned his hand around and brushed it down the side of her face, cupping her cheek. "Did anyone die?"
"Yes," he answered truthfully, after a couple moments had passed. He wanted to tell her that everything was fine, that no one had died during the bombing, but he wasn't going to lie to her. "There were people on the upper floors, and not many of them made it. We're down at least ten people."
"Anyone we…" Her hazel eyes peered at him through the dimness, asking a question that he didn't want to answer. She was probably thinking about people she had known were upstairs; she might have even thought of Mona immediately.
"Sidda, let it go for now," Alec said, trailing his fingers down her face, "You'll find out soon enough." He couldn't bear for her to burst into tears right now, or worse, faint.
Sidda gave a slow, defeated nod. "Okay…"
Sighing, he played with her hair, yet again relieved that it had been Mona and not her, and then feeling guilty for being so relieved. Damn it…He couldn't imagine being in Everett's place right now, though for the first few minutes after the call had come in, he had been certain that he was. Living without Sidda…He closed his eyes and held on tight to her hand, feeling her steady pulse through her skin. He'd rather not think about that.
There was scrambling at the hole Alec and the Ordinaries had made, and Alec turned to see Sibil and another medic hurrying through the wreckage. Both of them looked at the stake with visible shock for a second before leaping into action.
"Is she conscious?" Sibil asked as she bent down next to Alec, pressing her fingers against Sidda's throat to read a pulse.
Sidda squeezed Alec's hand and tossed a wry look at Sibil. "Couldn't you just ask me that question?"
Sibil snapped on a pair of gloves while her assistant started cutting Sidda's pant's leg away from the stake. "I could, but expecting a truthful answer about your health is sometimes a lost cause." She glanced at Alec. "I know this is hard, but if you could move to a more convenient location…"
Alec frowned for a moment before moving over, not letting Sidda's hand go since she had a death-grip on his. He could tell by the look on her face that she was trying not to cry out whenever the assistant touched the stake, and Alec had to remind himself that the medic was helping so he wouldn't snap at the guy.
While Alec resituated himself, Sibil reached into her EMT bag and started pulling out equipment. "Sidda, I need you to cooperate with me, all right? No complaining right now." she said.
"But complaining to you is so much fun," Sidda said, smirking at the other woman who went about her business, ignoring the younger transgenic.
While she fitted an oxygen mask over Sidda's nose and mouth and moved on to taking her blood pressure, Sibil looked over at Alec. "Do you think you can carry her out of here? She's not going to be walking anywhere on that leg, and she'd be in a lot less pain if we went ahead and sedated her."
"Yeah," Alec said, "No problem."
"You just like carrying me places," Sidda said, her voice muffled. She looked over at Sibil, her eyebrows knit together in suspicion. "Will it hurt the baby?"
"No, it'll be fine," Sibil tutted at her. "And it'd be better if you didn't talk and just breathed."
"Which is a hard request for you, I know," Alec said, keeping a smile on his face as he looked down at Sidda. He moved so that Sidda didn't have to strain to look up at him, putting his chin on the arm of the couch, and kept her attention on him while Sibil prepped a needle to sedate her with. "Hey, so what about those baby names? What do you think of the name Sophie? I sort of like it, since it starts with an 's,' like Sidda."
"No. Bean's a boy," Sidda said, her voice quiet but firm. "I told you hundred times."
He squeezed her hand, trying to keep her from fainting. "You're not psychic, and you're not supposed to talk."
"Too bad," she muttered, her cheeky smile obscured by the mask. Her eyes widened for a moment and then she slowly fell to her side, her hand going limp in his. He shot forward, ready to shake her back awake, but Sibil caught his arm.
"This is best, she won't feel it," Sibil said, dropping the used needle back into her bag, "Now come on and help Jex with the stake, that sedative a quick-acter, but it won't last long, you know."
000000000000
Back over the main studio, the work crews had finally found a safe way down into the studio. Seth was the first through, claiming that he was a medic, which he was, although at the moment that wasn't his first priority. He shoved himself through the small hole and looked around the dusty room through the fading light.
"Robin!" he shouted, uncertain of where his mate was in all this rubble.
"Seth, over here!" she replied, and he shot off toward where her voice had come from as fast as he could go through the wreckage. He vaulted over a couple of support beams that had fallen from two stories up. He knew that there were other people here who needed his help, but damn it, he was going to get to Robin first.
He found her leaning against the wall with her cell phone in her hand and her forehead pressed against her knees. She glanced up, her blue eyes wide with a fear he had never seen before.
"Seth," she whispered as he went immediately to her side, "I'm sorry, I didn't know it was going to happen…"
He dropped down beside her and gathered her to him, pulling her close and holding her tight, although he was careful of her obviously broken wrist. He kissed her, silencing her before she apologize for anything else that wasn't in any way her fault. He trailed his kisses from her mouth to her cheek, tasting the dust that had settled there from the air. They sat still for a moment, his cheek pressed against hers while he just listened to the reassuring sound of her breathing.
"Seth," she mumbled, her breath brushing over his skin, "You're sort of crushing me…"
"Sorry," he said, immediately loosening his hold, but he was reluctant to let go of her. More of the rescue team had come down through the opening and started assessing the other people in the studio. Glancing down at Robin, he tried to get a good look at her wrist, but she was holding it away from her.
Carefully, he moved out from under her and knelt beside her. "How are you feeling?" Now that he got a good look at her face, he was ready to go kick some Telic ass. She had a small series of abrasions across the right side of her face, probably from falling concrete. There was dried blood and gravel across her cheek, and he reached out to gently touch it. "Does this hurt?" he asked gently, knowing that it probably did. He brushed his hands over her arms and legs, looking for broken bones besides her wrist. "Are you aching anywhere in particular?"
Robin reached out and took his hands. "I just want to get out of here, Seth, please?" She looked longingly at the hole in the roof before looking back to him. "Just get me out of here, and you can examine me all you want once we're out, I just want out."
Her desperate insistence put Seth into immediate action. Although he knew her legs were fine, he swept her up into his arms. X5s were meant to endure a lot, but Robin had been underground for four hours and with her fear of enclosed spaces, that must have been torture. She put her arms around his neck and rested her head against his chest, listening to his heart beat.
Seth carried her up and out of the hole, past the crew of Ordinaries and transgenics who were working together to clear out more room. He headed straight to the makeshift ambulance, holding her close so she wouldn't look at the wreckage. He didn't want her to go into shock or anything right now.
When he reached the ambulance, which was really a truck they were using to shuttle people and supplies back and forth from the infirmary, he set her down on the edge and grabbed a nearby medkit.
"How's Taylor?" Robin asked. She sat still as he rummaged around in the bag.
"She's fine, she's with Elaine," Seth said. Headquarters and its adjacent buildings had been entirely unharmed; only the Cultural Center had been struck. "I'm more worried about you at the moment. Are you in pain?"
"I'll be fine, Seth," Robin said, letting out a sigh, "I'm just glad to be in open air instead of underground."
Seth wanted to tell him just how glad he was that she was safe, but he couldn't find the right words to express his relief. Instead, he brushed her hair back from her face and briefly kissed her lips."I'm going to take care of you."
"I know," she replied, smiling weakly at him.
Grey was sitting farther up in the bed of the truck, bent down and working on another transgenic, this one an X6 who had been crushed in the fall. The co-commander of the infirmary looked over at Seth. "Do you need help?"
Seth shook his head. At the moment, he didn't want anyone touching Robin besides him. He stood in front of her as he examined her, taking her pulse on her uninjured wrist. The other one was swollen, obviously from a bad break. He had known when she started to say that it was a sprain that it was bad; Robin's ability to ignore injury made it difficult to assess just how bad off she was unless she was right in front of you. Her heartbeat was slower than normal but steady.
"Robin, did anything fall on you?" he asked as he shone a penlight in her eyes.
Robin shook her head and the edges of her mouth twitched up. "Doctor mode much?"
He shook his head at her. "Just let me do this, all right?"
"I'm not complaining," she said, putting her hands in her lap. Seth glanced down at her wrist, wondering what exactly he could do for it out here in the field. It'd be better to just splint it down and wait to wrap it back in the infirmary, where he could make sure it was properly treated.
Robin turned to him. "Seth, do you know if—" The rest of her question was lost when she started coughing. Seth grabbed her shoulders, holding her steady until she stopped. He noticed that her breathing was ragged, probably from having breathed in all the dust from the building collapse.
"Here, she'll need this," Grey said. He leaned over and handed him an oxygen mask. "They breathed in too much of the dust."
"Thanks," Seth said, cursing himself for not thinking of it earlier. When he reached over to hook the mask behind Robin's head, she pushed it away.
"No, Seth, I don't need that," she said, shaking her head. She glanced over his shoulder at the wreckage that used to be the Cultural Center. "Are there others down there?"
He kissed the corner of her mouth. "Come on, Robin, you need to take care of yourself first." He handed her the mask. "Here, hold it to your mouth. You can pull it away if you feel panicked, but try to breathe through it. You'll feel better faster."
"They need my help," she said, pushing his hand away. She started to slide off the back of the truck, but Seth caught her, pinning her down to the truck bed with his hands on her legs.
"No," he growled softly. "You're not going back over there, Robin."
"But, Seth," she started, and he picked her up and put her forcefully back into the truck bed.
"I'm not going through this with you," he said, his face stony. It softened as he took her hand and rubbed his thumb across the back of it. "Please, don't try it."
He watched her look back toward the Cultural Center then turned her eyes back to him. "All right, if that's what you want."
"That's all I want." If he knew that if she was safe, he would be fine, no matter what.