The other woman was the first person to move as she lowered her gun then slid it into the large pocket on her lab-coat next to a stethoscope. Lori watched her wide-eyed, her heart still hammering in her chest. She jumped when Rick's fingers touched her bicep and she turned, alternating her gaze between him and the stranger. He motioned for her to lower her gun and she looked to the weapon in her hand to find it trembling in her white-knuckled grasp.
Lori took a deep breath and nodded, dropping her hand to the floor, the metal of her six-shooter chinking against the tile. The other woman seemed to also take a calming breath and she moved stiffly to kneel down beside Rick's injured and outstretched leg.
"Are you a doctor?" Rick asked, his hand moving over Lori's bicep reassuringly.
Lori watched the other woman push her straight blond hair behind her ears and nod, barely glancing up to meet his eyes. Lori caught a flash of intense green before the doctor was looking down at Rick's leg again.
"I can't treat this here," she muttered, pulling a pair of latex gloves out of her jeans pocket. She stretched them over her hands, the latex snapping at her wrists as she moved hastily, glancing up at Rick. "We'll have to get you into my exam room," her confidence seemed to be building as her eyes locked on Lori's. "You'll have to help me get him up."
Lori nodded, already pulling herself to her feet, bracing her weight on the metal shelf next to her.
"I can manage on my own," Rick assured them, his fingers sliding down over her arm as she rose, skating over her skin until he found hers. "You shouldn't be -" he was cut short by a grunt and Lori's eyes snapped frantically to where the doctor was securing a pressure bandage tightly around his calf, inches above his wound where Lori's shirt remained tightly tied. She could see it was already stained with his blood.
"Alright, we should be good now," the blonde woman pushed herself to her feet. "What's your name?" she looked to Lori as she stepped over Rick to his other side, crunching boxes and debris under her feet.
"Lori," she answered, following the other woman's lead by crouching down next to Rick. "This is my husband, Rick," she added, slipping under his arm. She hoped he wouldn't try to stop her again or say anything about her pregnancy – she wasn't sure she wanted to share that information yet with this stranger who was stupid enough to leave open traps where innocent people could step on them. A flash of anger sparked inside her at the thought and she looked around the store nervously, looking for any other visible dangers.
"Regina – call me Reggie," the doctor supplied, nodding for Lori to stand. Rick grunted as they rose, pulling him up with them. He quickly found his footing with his uninjured leg and he immediately eased up on Lori.
"You're alright," Lori assured him, pressing a kiss to his shoulder.
Rick turned towards the door behind a reception counter that had been closed earlier but now stood ajar. "Through there?" he clarified, indicating the direction with his chin.
"Yes, sir," Reggie answered, already heading in that direction.
It took them a few steps to coordinate their movements and Lori could see that their jarring steps were painful for Rick whose mouth had set into a grim line. Sweat formed along his brow, his face red with exertion and pain. Lori moved quickly to keep up and she shifted her attention between her husband's face and their destination. "Take your time, baby," she whispered, sliding her hand further around his waist to secure him.
They gave a collective sigh when they made it into the exam room and Rick nearly collapsed onto the table. Reggie immediately crossed to a counter where she pulled off her gloves and began sanitizing her hands with a wipe, her back to them. Lori quickly turned to Rick for some kind of indication about what he was thinking. She found him lying prone on the table with his eyes squeezed shut, the veins in his temples protruding drastically as he sucked in deep breaths.
Reaching out she smoothed her fingers over his temple and around his ear until she was cupping the side of his face in her palm. "Shhh," she soothed him, leaning over to press a kiss to his clammy forehead. "You're okay, Rick. I'm right here."
Slowly his eyes opened and she pulled back to search his face. He mouthed something that she didn't catch. Pinching her brow she shook her head.
Go.
Lori caught the word the second time and felt her frown deepen at his order. Of course she wasn't going to leave him, and he was crazy if he thought anything different. Shaking her head she caught his stubborn frustration. He always did think he knew what was best.
Bending over again she found his ear with her lips. "I'm not leaving you," she asserted – she could be stubborn too. Something jagged and hard pressed into her other palm and she looked down to find Rick pushing the keys into her hand. She accepted them and slid them into her pocket but didn't budge from her spot beside him.
"I don't have any local to stitch that up," Reggie announced approaching them with a tray. "Someone broke into the clinic when everything started to happen and cleaned me out," she explained, sitting down on a black stool. She wheeled herself over to Rick's side and placed her tray onto a small collapsible table.
Lori eyed the scissors, a clamp and some black thread in a clear plastic wrap. The instruments seemed to be clean enough, so she wasn't concerned about him catching something. The lack of pain-killers on the other hand…
"Do it anyway," Rick pushed himself onto his elbows as Reggie slowly removed the shirt Lori had tied around the wound. He looked down to the crimson-soaked garment and the deep punctures in his skin that continued to bubble up with fresh rivers of blood.
"I intend to," Reggie looked down shyly again. She cleared her throat. "You'll bleed out if I don't."
At the other woman's blunt announcement Lori felt her head swim as she processed the words. Rick could have been killed… he could still die. This person who they didn't even know was going to perform surgery on him without giving him any anesthetic or even Tylenol. She wavered on her feet as the room suddenly swayed before her eyes as she watched Reggie slide closer to Rick's leg.
"Hey," Rick's voice caught her attention and she felt a solid grip on her forearm, steadying her. She turned to him, the world passing in slow motion until she met his concerned eyes. Everything seemed to snap back into focus and she blinked rapidly to clear her vision that still seemed blurry. Rick's hand left her arm to wipe her cheek and she realized that they were wet with tears that were still building in the dams of her eyes.
Lori swallowed her panic and offered him a smile that she hoped was at least a fraction more convincing than it felt. "You just worry about yourself," she whispered, sliding her fingers through his hair.
Rick appeared to be unconvinced as his hand lingered on her cheek.
For good measure Lori chuckled softly and bent down to peck his mouth, though she couldn't for the life of her think of anything at all funny about their predicament. "Hormones," she assured him, resting her cheek against his. She closed her eyes, burying her face into the crook of his neck where it met his shoulder – she didn't care that he smelled faintly like sweat and dirty socks; she breathed him in all the same.
Rick's arms wound their way around her back to hold her to him, half on top of him and she felt him nod, his stubble brushing her hair. She knew that Reggie had begun her work because he immediately stiffened beneath her and his nails dug into her sides, burying into the flesh over her ribs. Lori sunk her teeth into her lower lip to keep from reacting to the sudden pain that he was inadvertently causing her, but she quickly pulled back, straightening up to stand beside him.
She gathered his hands in hers and looked down to find Reggie focused on her work. The other woman offered her an apologetic look and Lori fought the urge to roll her eyes as she felt her anger return. The temptation to lace into the woman was one that she could barely control, but she bit her tongue and turned her attention to her husband who had screwed his eyes shut again. His chest had risen off the bed as he arched his back and she released one of his hands to gently push him back down onto the bed. "Shhhh," she brought his hands to her lips and kissed his knuckles.
Lori watched him, helpless to do anything to actually help him. She wondered if this is how he had felt during her labour with Carl – powerless to do a single thing except watch him suffer. Time seemed to pass painstakingly slowly and it occurred to her that it had been some time since he'd taken a breath.
"Baby," her voice belied her alarm and she patted his cheek. "Rick, you gotta breathe," she looked to Reggie who had lifted her head to watch their interaction.
His body stiffened even more for a split second and then collapsed loosely against the table, his head lolling to the side, facing away from her. Lori immediately felt a rush of adrenaline and panic that morphed into instant relief when his chest shuttered, expanded, and then deflated.
"He passed out," Reggie surmised, ducking her head again. "I wasn't sure he'd last even that long – tough dude."
Lori sputtered at her words. "Are you insane?" her tone rose.
The doctor shrugged and continued her work. "I've seen it before… he's fine."
"Fine?" Lori demanded incredulously. "He is not fine. He is not fine because you left a bear trap out where someone could step on it an-," Reggie's expression shifted into slight amusement and Lori blinked, trying to understand what she could possibly find entertaining about her husband being injured.
"Planted," the doctor clarified. "To stop them from getting in here… safety measures."
Lori was suddenly too stunned to form words. She looked down at her hand wrapped around Rick's to process the woman's nonchalant and blunt words. "You're a doctor, for god's sake…" she muttered. "What kind of a doctor would do something so stupid and negligent?"
Reggie set her equipment down on the tray and began to clean Rick's leg. "One who is still alive… call it whatever you want but I'm still alive and I'll do whatever it takes to keep it that way. And you're the one who is stupid if you wouldn't."
Suddenly feeling incredibly drained, Lori nodded. "Look, I shouldn't hav-," lifting her head she was struck by a wave of dizziness that made the entire room tilt one way, then the other. "Whoa," she heard herself mutter as she swayed towards the table, her hip connecting with its stainless steal side. A cold draining sensation began at the top of her scalp then washed over her and she reached out for something to hold onto. Finding only dead air she swore softly and squeezed her eyes closed fighting the urge to vomit or faint, or both all at once.
Hands closed around her biceps, interrupting her downward slide to the floor and she found herself being steered and dragged.
"I- sit," she muttered, finding it impossible to form a cohesive sentence. She was pushed down and was vaguely aware that she was sitting on a chair as she slumped back into it. Fingers prodded her throat then slid up under her jaw, searching for her pulse.
"God, you're burning up," Reggie's voice was startled, and then she was tugging at Lori's clothes, pulling up her sleeves, inspecting her arms, yanking at her collar. "Are you bit?"
Lori's brain fought to process the question. She opened her mouth to answer but was cut short when she was violently shaken, her head snapping back then forth like an infants.
"Are. You. Bit?" Reggie demanded. "Scratched…"
Lori shook her head, her thoughts marginally more clear. "No," she frowned, a headache forming in her temples.
"Are you infected?"
Frowning at her words Lori nodded. "We're all infected," she lifted her eyes to find Reggie's startled ones. The woman looked around frantically then moved suddenly, reaching to her side. Lori barely had time to process what was happening before a flash of red crossed her periphery and then something struck her in the side of the head, blinding her – catapulting her into darkness.