The creature's dead weight collapsed down onto Takeda's legs and crushed them to the floor, but he barely noticed it. He stared at Jin instead.
The monster's teeth, piercing holes in Jin's flesh and stretching the skin away from the wound, pulled free with a moist sloshing sound. Skin ripped and popped. Jin's eyes flew wide. He peeled himself from the wall, wrapping his arms around his stomach, and Takeda lost sight of the injury. He doubled over, his knees buckled, and he dropped to his side on the ground, moaning through his clenched teeth. In the immediate silence after the monster's loud, crashing tirade, his cries sounded muted and quiet, hanging dead in the air. With each hitched breath his chest jerked and he curled tighter around himself.
"Jin!" Jacqui yelled. She and Cassie hurdled the monster while Takeda twisted and kicked the body off of him. For good measure he planted two more solid kicks to its dead, milky eyes. The body jerked but remained still. The girls knelt over Jin and Cassie grabbed his arm, pulling it away to inspect the damage. On impulse, Jin shrank away. He gasped and groaned out a real, gritty whine from the higher parts of his voice, choked as it was.
Cassie leaned further over him, craning her neck to the side to peer into his face.
"Jin, come on! I gotta see what's wrong!"
"R-ribs r' broken," he stuttered, dodging the worse injury entirely. "At least one."
"We'll fix it," she said. "I meant your stomach. Let me see."
He squirmed, holding his breath. His face contorted, and he raised his trembling arms for a moment. Cassie and Jacqui both peered down to look but he couldn't hold still. "C-can't. Hurts too bad." He coughed, a weak, rattling sound, and the breath he didn't use hissed out of him. He choked it back in short bursts, curling up again and covering the wound back up, and Takeda saw a smear of blood under his arms. Takeda grabbed the glowstick from his belt and held it up over them for better light than the dim yellow flames of the sconces. A thick and steady trail of blood leaked from between Jin's arms and fingers and down the sides of him. His red cloth belt was stained dark, and the brown leathers and green of his pants were beginning to turn a dark shade of reddish-black. "I'm in - in a lot of pain right now."
He was bleeding, heavily. Jacqui seemed to notice it too. She grabbed Jin's shoulder for what she could muster of comfort. "It's okay, Jin. We're here to help-"
"I know you're trying to help!" He coughed again, this one more forceful and wet. The sucking sound of mucous strained his throat, but when Jin turned his head to the side and spit it out, it was red and watery. Blood.
Jacqui's hands, previously gentle and calming, suddenly changed to holding him down with more force. "Jin, we need to treat this! Look at it! You're bleeding really badly-" Against the sheen of sweat on his brow and the haze of pain clouding his eyes, Takeda saw the spark of defiance light there and bring him back to more awareness. His mouth turned down into a frown and he swatted Jacqui's hand away, smacking an area of bandage. Her breath caught and she cradled her arm close to her chest, shaking off the agony of the burn. She glanced up and looked to Takeda for help, tears of pain. threatening to spill down her cheeks.
Takeda hauled himself to his feet and inched past the creature, standing over Jin. He was beginning to tremble on the ground, a combination of exhaustion from the fight, pain, and intense blood loss. Takeda reached out to his mind, sending his power out in a wave that easily broke past Jin's mental walls. As soon as he touched Jin's awareness, the only sensation that he picked up from him was agony, sharp and punching. Aching, stinging, deep in Takeda's stomach. Burning from the tearing of skin, stinging against the open air, an ache that constricted the heart in his chest and forced the breath out of Takeda's lungs. Each breath in drove sharp spikes deeper into his chest and stomach, and he couldn't overcome it. His vision went white, white hot like the pain.
Takeda withdrew, forgetting instantly what his intentions with Jin had been. He curled up as well, mirroring Jin's position, and barely managed to throw his palm flat to the floor to catch himself before he face-planted into the marble.
He breathed himself back to awareness and blinked his vision back into place, suddenly finding it easy to breathe. "J-Jesus Christ!" he cursed. "Yeah, that - mmmmm," he moaned, closing his eyes to steady himself. "That hurts." He sniffled, tears pricking his eyes in the aftermath of the pain. He crouched down where he was at Jin's left, not sure he'd be able to trust his shaking knees. He reached for Jin's right hand, curled into a tight fist and circled across his body. A steady stream of blood dripped down the line of his fingers and between them, and Takeda circled Jin's wrist. He pressed his fingers into Jin's palm, ripping and tearing at his hand, attempting to open it. The slick, flowing blood and the smooth leather of Takeda's glove worked against Jin, and he was able to slide his own hand between Jin's fingers. Jin clenched Takeda's hand instead. His grip was so tight Takeda swore he felt the bones in his hand gnash together, but compared to Jin's pain it barely registered in his mind. He kept a hold of his hand and squeezed back as hard as Jin's grip strength would allow, and moved behind his head.
With the better angle, Takeda dragged Jin's arm the other way and back across his body, intending to pin it to the ground so the girls could get to the wound. Jin resisted their arm wrestling match, muscles pulsing and trembling, and Takeda saw the glint of defiance again. Though, it was more out of self-preservation and protection, not childish opposition. With the better angle and the leverage, and with Jin's attention quickly diverted, Takeda managed to slam Jin's wrist to the ground and jam his knee into the crook of his elbow to keep him still.
"Ow! Ow, ow! Fine!" Jin shouted. His back arched off the ground but he gasped that awful, half-wet wheezing sound and reached for his side and ribs with his other hand. Takeda quickly averted his gaze from Jin's stomach while Cassie and Jacqui dove in to tend his wounds. Based on the pain that had been transmitted through Jin, he had already conjured a mental image in his head of what the wound looked like. It had felt like three or four sharp, damp blades had stabbed into the skin. They dragged downwards and cut through flesh, muscle, and organs, and then violently ripped side to side. Skin pulled and tore, ripped off in chucks with sickening ferocity. It felt like blood had burst in his chest cavity and stomach, like organs were shredded, tossed around and rearranged. He was afraid if he looked at it, he would see entrails. The thoughts of it and the sensations were enough to make him nauseous. He swallowed down the sensation of blood in his throat and stared at the walls, at the stone underneath them, at Jacqui and Cassie's faces - anywhere but their hands and Jin's wounds.
Cassie rummaged through her bag for the first aid kit, and as she dragged it free Takeda realized how often they had seen it on this mission. Far more than he'd ever seen a first aid kit used on any mission before, both with the Shirai Ryu and since joining Cassie's team. It was the unspoken sign to him that confirmed what he had thought all along and was simply unable to put into words, only feel intangibly in the form of his anxiety: that they were horribly underprepared for this place. There was something to be said about the life experience, skill-level, and sheer wisdom of the people that were lost here before the four of them. The number of missions that Hanzo and Kenshi had been on and survived no doubt gave them an edge. There couldn't possibly be much that they hadn't yet and seen and didn't know how to handle. Or, at the very least, they could analyze situations with the clarity and realism afforded them by their experience.
As he stared at Cassie and Jacqui's faces, he saw concern, fear, and a mounting sense of panic at the look of Jin's wounds. They both were supposed to have training in field medicine, but he could tell from the way Jacqui looked to Cassie and from the way Cassie's eyes flicked about uncertainly that they were unsure of exactly how to begin. It was the manifestation of their lack of experience as well. He realized he had no idea how to help either. He simply squeezed Jin's hand tighter while he coughed and moaned and lay there.
They tugged at his clothes and his sashes and belts and managed to expose a bit of the wound. Jin winced, lifting his head from the floor.
"How - how bad?" he tried to ask.
"Don't look at it," Takeda ordered half-heartedly, keeping his own eyes away. By then, Jin's breathing calmed to a shallow but steady gasp, but quickened again when he tried to catch a glimpse.
Jacqui's body shifted and she put her back to them, half-blocking their view. Takeda still accidentally caught a small glimpse of bare, bloody, yellowish-purple bruised skin, almost cartoon-like in its curved breakage. It was all he saw before he remembered to avert his gaze and before Jacqui placed herself between them.
Jin coughed again, even wetter sounding than before, and a thicker spray of blood shot from his mouth. He bit back the sound of pain and instead blew the air out of his mouth.
"How b-bad is it?" The stutter alerted Takeda that Jin's teeth were chattering.
"You cold, buddy?" he asked through a suddenly dry mouth. If Jin was getting colder, he was nearing the threshold of losing a dangerous amount of blood.
"I'm okay," he lied. He no doubt knew what it meant as well as Takeda did.
"Okay, let's put pressure on it," Cassie said, marking the beginning of their care. Jacqui leaned over him. He saw the muscles in her back and arms flex as she did what she was told. "I'm gonna . . . treat this like a dog bite," Cassie said slowly, timidly. "A severe, severe dog bite."
"Sh-shark," Jin huffed. Ever indignant.
"Hah!" Cassie barked. "Yeah, it is a shark bite." The sound was forced and if it was meant to lighten the mood it failed miserably. She reached behind her and grabbed something from the med kit: a bottle of clear, water-looking substance and a syringe with no needle, just an open tip. "Here, wash your hands," Cassie said suddenly, jerking and putting the items back. She grabbed her canteen and poured the rest of its contents out over her and Jacqui's hands. "Okay . . . now . . . I'm gonna flush it with saline." She took the bottle and plunger. "Wait," she said again. "Gloves."
She was scattered and confused. Overwhelmed. So was Jacqui, Takeda knew, but her reactions were more silent. Cassie was narrating to try and stay in control while Jacqui mentally tried to sort it all out first."Disinfectant will hurt too bad," Cassie continued. She removed the cap of the bottle and filled the plunger with saline, holding it over Jin. She let the solution flow slowly, filling and refilling the plunger five, six times until she felt it was well-flushed. In between passes Jacqui kept pressure on the area, using a cluster of bandages and a bit of Jin's clothes she bunched up accidentally.
Cassie sighed, wiping the sweat from her brow. "Jin, you okay?"
" . . . I'm awesome," his voice was growing weak, his shivering worse.
"We gotta stop the bleeding," Cassie said.
"And keep him warm, I think," Takeda said. "Right? Someone get me his sleeping bag." He realized they both were occupied, and figured Jin would know better than to mess with their attempts to heal him, so he released his hand and got up himself, grabbing his own sleeping bag from his pack. He draped it over Jin's shoulders to keep the area they were working on free. Jacqui kept persistent pressure on his stomach, occasionally eliciting deep coughs from him.
After a while, Cassie's hands moved, and whatever she did caused Jin to tense up and cry out. He threw his head back, his back arched ff the ground. His high-pitched "Nrgh!" echoed through the silent cave, bouncing off the walls and down the tunnels where they came. Like a chill shooting down his spine, Takeda was suddenly extremely aware that they killed a creature and made a huge mess of it. If the creature had any friends, they would no doubt have been alerted by this point.
"What all do you guys need to do for him?" Takeda asked.
"He needs . . . absorbable stitches. Like . . . sub-dermal shit," Cassie said.
"How long does that take?" Jin's vice-like grip relaxed for a moment. "Hey!" Takeda yelled, and a glassy glaze that formed over Jin's eyes cleared. "Stay awake, bud!"
"I got it," he said, putting some force behind his voice.
"I don't know," Cassie said.
"Well, I'm only asking because I don't think we should linger. I'm afraid if we stay here too long that monster's friends will come poking around. Can we move him? Will it hurt him?"
"I don't know," Cassie said, tone growing annoyed as she glared back at Takeda. She didn't reach for the things she needed, so he figured she understood his point and was debating.
"Hey! Hey!" Jacqui called, excitement lifting her voice. "I got the bleeding to slow down! I got it to slow down! Good sign!" She met eyes with Takeda and he saw genuine hope there, where before there was only panic and worry. Cassie's shoulders visibly relaxed and she sighed out her relief. He felt his own heart lift, wanting desperately to jump to the conclusion that Jin would be alright. "Only, moving now is a bad idea for sure," Jacqui added. "It'll aggravate the wound and he could bleed again, and then he'd be in serious trouble. And besides, where would we move him to? Back to the other room, where we rested?"
"Maybe, I guess," Takeda said. "I don't know, I just don't want more creatures hunting us down. If more are here and they smell the blood on him, we're fucked."
"We're fucked anyway," Cassie snapped. "If we move him they'll just follow the smell of the blood to wherever we take him. It won't make a difference."
"Yeah, but would moving him-"
"I don't fucking know!" Cassie snarled. "Do I look like a fucking surgeon?!"
"C-comforting," Jin quipped. "Very comforting. I'm in your capable hands."
"Shut up, Jin," Takeda warned.
Jacqui discarded the soiled bandages in her hands. She stared at the wound, still shielding Jin and Takeda's view. "I'm trying to think too. How do you figure about the sub-dermal stitches?" Jacqui swallowed, and the can-do attitude she had for just a second earlier was gone.
"I don't know. I just remember Lieutenant Johnston saying in Field Medicine that for wounds that you couldn't pinch or hold shut . . . " She paused, and Takeda assumed she was demonstrating it to Jacqui. " . . . Then you just close the deeper layers of skin by stitching the muscle and connective tissue shut. Then you have to leave the outer edges of the wound covered until the skin heals enough to stitch it shut completely."
"Sounds good to me," Jin muttered. "Can you hurry up?" His voice slurred at the edges. "I'm starting to feel light headed here."
"Hold on a sec, guys. I really think we should move first," Takeda tried again. "I'm not trying to hurt him or anything, I just think it'd be smart to get away from where the monster came from." Takeda gestured down the cave hallway in the direction of the creature's exit point. "If Jin's out of the danger zone-"
"Were you not listening?" Cassie interrupted. "Like, did you not hear a word me or Jacqui just said? No, we can't fucking move him! Not until I can stabilize the wound and make sure he doesn't loose any more blood. He hasn't lost enough to need transfusions yet, but moving him could put him back in the danger zone if the wound bleeds again."
"I heard what you said," he snapped back. "And I'm just looking out for him! And for us. You don't have to be so nasty about it just because you aren't sure how to help him."
"I never said I don't know how to help him! I actually do know how to help him, and if you had been listening to me explain it to Jacqui then you would know that!"
"Sure, but don't pretend you know everything, but then yell at me because you're so unsure of yourself."
She paused, blinking her surprise at him. "Stay the fuck out of my head-"
"I didn't read you! I don't have to to see it! You want to take control but don't know if you're making the right decision, and because of that you're taking it out on me-"
To end the discussion she grabbed the field manual from the kit and tore through it, intending on beginning the stitching before he could argue with her anymore. She smeared blood from her gloves onto the front over and on the pages she thumbed through.
"Don't tell me you don't know how to stitch me up-" Jin whined.
"Shut. the fuck. UP! I'm just checking if they're different from regular stitches!" She paused, eyes squinting and scanning the book.
"By all means, take your time."
Cassie leveled a glare so malicious over the edge of the book that Takeda nearly saw the black lines of anger rise off of her form and into her aura. "Don't antagonize me right now. I'm about to stitch you shut, you fucking asshole. I'll let you bleed out on this ground," she threatened.
Jin's bleary eyes understood her point. He jerked a deep breath in and coughed again. Jacqui pressed her hands on the wound again in case it began to bleed.
Cassie sighed, dutifully ignoring all of their gazes poring into her over the book. " . . . Blah, blah, blah . . . Okay. 'Tie off with square knot, ensuring no upward tension on the knot. If not tied properly, they could detach inside the body cavity.' Great. Got it." She snapped the book shut and hurled it to the side. It hit the ground with a lout crash, landing face-down and creasing some of the pages. She dug through the kit for the sutures, tweezers, needle, and all that she needed. She also grabbed a small syringe, pre-filled with a clear substance and capped. Before Jin could say anything else she ripped the lid off of the needle and jabbed it into Jin's side, near his hip bone. She squeezed the plunger, injecting the contents.
"Ow!" Jin yelped. "What the heck was that?!"
Cassie shrugged nonchalantly, the first calm gesture she made since running over to him despite wincing from her shoulder wound. "Tylenol. Or some kind of pain med."
Jacqui blinked. "There's a slate of ibuprofen tablets right there!"
Cassie shrugged again. "And?" she asked.
Jin actually laughed, cutting the sound off before it turned into a harsh cough. It still managed to lift his back off the ground, and Takeda placed his arms under him and held him up to relieve the pressure on his abdomen. "O-okay, okay," he finally said. "I deserved that one. Thanks for helping me out, guys."
It was like a bubble of tension burst. They all shared a chuckle, and all the anger Takeda was holding on to dissipated. He felt incredibly immature for fighting with Cassie so vehemently. The issue was still at hand and he wasn't about to let it go when he felt like they were in danger, but he shouldn't have fought with her for so long about it. He looked up and met her eye, nodding his apology. The corner of her mouth upturned into her version of a stiff smile, and she nodded back.
"Of course, Jin," Jacqui said softly, patting his arm and smiling her sincerity down at him.
"Don't thank me yet," Cassie said. "This is probably really gonna hurt." She sterilized the curved stitching needle in the med kit and fed the stitching threads through it.
"Well, it hurts. But if I'm not still dying, it can't be that bad-"
Cassie dove in, hands grabbing at the wound. Jin gasped, his legs kicked on impulse and he moved to reach down and push Cassie's hands away. Takeda quickly grabbed his wrist with both hands while Jacqui held his other hand at bay.
"OoooooOW!" he howled. "Tā mā de! Shénme tā mā de!"
Jacqui paused, glancing back at Takeda in horror. "What did he say?"
Takeda shook his head. "I don't speak Chinese. But it probably wasn't pleasant."
Cassie's face set and her lips pursed. Takeda watched her do two passes with the needle before pulling more of the string through. She moved down, stabbing down again.
Jin groaned. "Wǒ fēicháng tǎoyàn nǐ!"
"English," Cassie grumbled.
"You probably don't want to know what he said in English," Takeda said.
"Now I do," she said. Her voice was small and distant. Most of her attention was on her task at hand. "What'd he say?"
"I said I hate you so fucking much!" Jin growled, squirming again against the ground.
"Is that verbatim?" Cassie asked.
"I don't think the word 'fuck' translates literally in that way," Takeda said. "What he said probably translates to 'eggs!' or something." Jacqui chuckled out a laugh, and he smiled. "You'd be hard-pressed to find any Asian language that translates literally to anything that makes sense in a western language." The talking relaxed him, in an odd way. It took his attention away from the fact that they all were in serious peril staying in one place for very long, let alone the fact that Jin wasn't out of dangerous waters yet and they were literally stitching his insides up to keep them from falling out of his open abdominal cavity.
Cassie snorted. "Come on. Every language has some variation of 'fuck'. What all do you speak?"
"Thai, and Japanese. And English, of course. Thai is my first language, since I grew up in Thailand with my mother. I learned Japanese with Master Hasashi and I speak it with him and Kenshi since it's their first language. Master Hasashi taught me English, too. He probably taught me knowing he wanted me to join up with you guys."
"Jin, you speak anything other than Chinese and English?"
"Y-yeah, I'm conversational in Japanese. Could prob - ow, shit! Could probably could hold a simple conversation with a native speaker." Jin began to relax as well. The pain medication was finally starting to kick in. He still trembled, hands shaking in Takeda's grip, but the awful wheezing sound in his breath was less intense and he reacted less forcefully to each stab of Cassie's needle. "I read up on a lot of Outworld languages too, and started learning Osh-Tekk for if we ever talk to Kotal Kahn again."
Now that Jin was having an easier time, Takeda finally felt it safe to look at Jin's wounds. He leaned past Jacqui's right and saw Cassie closing a huge laceration, gaping jaggedly from the edge of his opposite hip to his navel. It looked like one of the teeth had caught a piece of Jin, and when it thrashed its head around, carved a line out of him. Thankfully, it hadn't gone deep enough to expose his insides. There were other small holes poked in and around it from teeth, but they seemed too small to warrant Cassie's attention and were only trickling blood. She looped the string with careful fluidity that concealed her insecurity and tied four tight knots before moving down the cut. Blood welled up from between the flaps of skin, but Jacqui was there with another wad of gauze to wipe it away. It looked like his outer layers of skin had taken most of the damage, with shredded skin and muscle and fibers strewn about randomly in a large, bruised, circular outer wound. He could see a small flash of white from near Jin's hip, but as Cassie grabbed two layers of deep tissue and stabbed the needle down into it, pulling the string, the bone was closed off.
"I'm learning Thai," Jacqui offered, keeping the conversation going.
"Are you?" Takeda asked. "You didn't tell me that!"
"Well, I wanted to surprise you, but . . . I was kind of waiting until I was good at it to try and speak to you in it."
"Wow, Jacqui," he said, and he caught her eye and small smile. "Thanks." His heart swelled up with affection for her and he found her compassion and capacity for concern so endearing. He smiled back to her, hoping she understood the sentiments he was trying to convey without having to use his power.
"Gag!" Cassie said out loud.
"We should practice together," he said, ignoring her. "I don't get to speak Thai very often, and you'll learn much, much faster if you practice in your target language!"
"Yeah, okay!" she agreed.
Cassie snapped her fingers, but the blood on the latex made them slick. All that sounded was a dull thumping. "Pay attention. I have one more set of stitches and then we gotta cover up the outer wound."
"Yes, Doctor Cage," Jacqui said.
"Don't call me that," Cassie said sharply. "That makes me feel like . . . just don't."
"Sorry."
"It's fine."
Jin was silent the rest of the time, even as Cassie cleaned out the outer wound a second time with more saline. She put the suture materials to the side and disposed of the needle in the kit's biohazard bag, and reached instead for a container of petroleum jelly. Setting it down in her lap, she reached for the field manual one more time. Flipping again through some of the blood-stained pages, she paused at another section and read for a moment. When she was satisfied she discarded the manual with better care and uncapped the container, scooping a generous amount of jelly onto her fingers, slathering it around the edges of his mangled skin. She prepared a fresh roll of bandages and sat back on her haunches. "Okay, how should we do this? I want to wrap this around his middle."
"I'll sit up," Jin mumbled, dragging his hand down the side of his face, inadvertently smearing a small bit of almost-dried blood down his face as well. He placed both hands over his face and groaned before holding his breath. He shifted his hips to the right towards the wall, once, twice, twisting his lower body but leaving his back against the floor. He clutched at his left side, and Jacqui helped roll him fully onto his right side. He clenched his teeth and pressed his hands flat against the floor, pushing himself up on shaking arms without flexing his stomach. He got about halfway before he stopped, face scrunching in pain, and Takeda helped push him the rest of the way up.
He swayed, leaning back against Takeda. "Woah. Dizzy. Feel like I just gave blood." He closed his eyes and Takeda let him sit there, back against his chest. Jin wiped at his mouth, noticing the blood there for the first time. "Give me a minute."
"You're fine."
"You kind of did just give blood," Cassie said. "A lot of it. Not enough for an emergency, but . . . enough." She reached into her bag and grabbed an energy bar and some other tablets from the kit. Jin eyed them warily. "They're iron," she said. "I promise I'm not trying to poison you." She paused. "Not today. Not after all the work I just did."
"Ha-ha," Jin huffed, taking the items from her. He grabbed his waterskin from his belt and took a swig, swirling it around in his mouth before spitting it to the side. "That was pretty clutch, Cassie. Thanks."
"No problem. I wasn't about to just let you bleed out. But don't get any ideas, I don't like you or anything." She inched forward and started circling the bandage around him. When she was finished she tore the gloves off and began packing up the kit. "I'll be real honest, though, I did not one hundred percent know what I was doing. If those stitches feel weird, or anything-"
"I honestly don't even feel them," he said.
"Yeah, but if they do, let me know."
"What about his ribs?" Jacqui asked.
"Not much you can do," Jin said. "I pretty much just need to rest a little, and when I do things I need to make sure they're not too strenuous. By the way, I know we just rested but would anybody object?"
"Nope," Takeda said quickly. "I still think we should move, though. Either we go back and rest back there again, or we keep going and see if we can find a stopping point. Can you keep going for just a little bit?"
"Yeah, I think so," Jin said. "When I was looking at the numbers on the wall earlier, I think I saw a door up there too. Let's check it out, and then if that doesn't pan out, we go back. Deal?"
"Deal," Cassie said. "Fuck the three hour thing. It was a great idea, but we never stick to it anyway."
As soon as the kit was properly packed and back in her bag, she hopped to her feet, rubbing out the kinks in her shoulder. "Everybody's been injured at least once, right? Can we all agree that that's it for injuries? Can no one else get injured?"
"I don't think Jin can make any promises," Jacqui said.
"Yeah, what was it you said to me? Before you charged headlong at the thing? 'I have a dumb idea?'" Takeda asked.
"Something like that," Jin said. "I'm ready to stand up. Help me."
They hauled Jin to his feet and Takeda steadied him from another dizzy spell. As soon as they were ready, they maneuvered down the hall, and Takeda let Jin lean on him whenever he had to. They passed the hole where the creature burst through the flagstone, and as they passed Jin took one last squinting glance at the numbers. He nodded when he was ready and Takeda helped lead him further.
They turned to the right and the path led straight ahead to another circular archway and a circular door to close it off. Takeda couldn't see the designs on the door from where they were, but it looked intricate. The cave was carved wide and round, arcing well overhead and giving it an unfamiliar welcoming feeling. Several huge sconces lined the path and lit the entire area brightly, and from their position Takeda could see two recesses on either side of the path, each with a pedestal fashioned there.
As the four of them approached the door, Takeda paused to look at the first pedestal on the left. It was simple in make and not at all elaborate - a square slab of stone without any sort of design or inlay or flare. The length of the stone was raised and slitted, and from between the slit sat a large lever-switch, with a horizontal bar fashioned to it for leverage. At the base of the pedestal were four carved spiders, offset diagonally from each other. Two on the top row with their heads facing up towards the lever, and two on the bottom row with their heads facing down. Their bodies were all set with two bright red jewels.
The urge to pull one of the levers sparked in the back of Takeda's mind, but was quickly quieted by a flashback to the pedestal where he took the Spider Gem. It had been much, much more elaborate and the gem seemed to be the focal point and not the spiders, but he couldn't shake the feeling that the pedestals were dangerous. Last time he had touched something he wasn't sure of, he set an entire army of spiders after them.
He led Jin back and to the right to inspect the pillar on the other side while Cassie and Jacqui continued the short distance to the door. The pedestal looked exactly the same as the other, but with three carved spiders instead of four.
"Hey!" he called to all of them. "What were the numbers back there? What did they say?"
"4, 1, 3, 2," Jin said. "Why?"
"Look at the pedestals! They're numbered. Someone left us a clue. Check the numbers! 4's up here. Where's 1?"
Cassie and Jacqui split to either side of the path, and Cassie trailed to the left. " . . . Here! This one's 1!"
"Jin, get this one. 3," Takeda said. "Jacqui, is that one 2?"
"Yeah, but um . . . "
"What?" Takeda asked.
"Someone's . . . here."
A violent chill spread down Takeda's spine, and he froze where he was. The panic he had pushed down to the deepest recesses of his heart in the wake of the creature's attack rose up instantly like bile, tightening his chest and forcing his heart to beat against the pressure. From Jacqui's reaction, it wasn't good and he knew. He knew whoever it was, they were gone. "Please," he prayed to whoever could hear him on any plane, "please don't let it be Kenshi or Hanzo. Or Jax."
Takeda looked over his shoulder and met eyes with Jin, and he could see Jin steeling himself as well. He placed a hand on his stomach to steady the wound and straightened up as tall as he could stand. He winced and walked out of his recess, down the path towards Jacqui's and Takeda rushed to his side, ready to catch him if he toppled over.
Slumped over Jacqui's pedestal was a form, clearly human. An arm was hooked around the lever, holding the limp body half-up. His neck was craned down from gravity and all Takeda could see of his face was smashed awkwardly against the stone, morphing his features beyond immediate recognition. The other arm hugged around the base, like he was trying to hold on for dear life. His legs trailed out of the recess and partly into the path, and a thick, spread out trail of blood traveled back down the path where they came. It wasn't a long, solid dragging stain, implying that he had struggled. It led straight back to wall, connecting to the leg of the two that had slanted down. It was clear that the person had written the message, and then had dragged himself down to this particular pedestal. Two was the last number in the sequence, so it looked like he had been trying to flip the switch and open the door and escape whatever had killed him.
"What's that?" Jin asked, his voice small. "What is that?" He pointed to the body.
"What's what?" Takeda asked.
"What is that?" Jin asked again, not clarifying. He pointed again. "On his back," he finally said.
The vestments had once been dark blue or maybe grey, but they had turned a dark brown and crimson red from dried and still-wet blood. He wore a red sash across his waist that looked vaguely familiar to Takeda, but he couldn't immediately place where he had seen someone else wearing it. He had wide, loose green pants with a decorative embroidery of a design he couldn't place that were gathered into tight leg wraps and flat shoes. Also familiar, and with a jolt he remembered that it looked similar to what Jin wore. He'd seen that red sash around Jin's waist and Jin's pants were of a green color.
"What is that?" Jin asked again. "What is that character?" His voice cracked on the last word.
He finally understood that Jin was pointing at a Chinese character, printed in red and square on the man's back. "I don't know." The man's long braid trailed from the nape of his neck and partially covered a piece of it, and Takeda inched forward, brushing it aside. It was clear that it wasn't Master Hasashi or Kenshi or Jax, but whatever the symbol meant upset Jin.
"Th-that's 'Wu'." Jin's breathing quickened, and that horrid wheezing picked up with each hitched intake. "For Wu Shi. The Shaolin Academy. No. No, no, no." He ran forward, shoving Takeda away from him. He stumbled to the side and crashed into the wall, taking a moment to steady himself. He hopped over the legs and dropped to his knees grabbing the man's shoulders and pulling him away from the pedestal. He flipped him over.
Kung Lao's bearded face and dull eyes stared back at him.
A/N: Of course, my first chapter back and somebody else gets it.
Poor Jin got hit hard these last few chapters and it doesn't even get better for him at this point lol.
The Chinese that he's speaking . . . I used the pīnyīn "alphabet" because it is the closest to a Latin alphabet and gives the readers some ease of reading rather than putting actual Chinese characters in there. I don't speak Chinese in the slightest, so based on my limited knowledge I figured that would be the easiest way to do it. Sorry if it sucks or if it's wrong.
Anyway, let me know what you thought of this chapter by leaving a comment! Or, if you have the time, drop by my Curious Cat and ask me anything about the Krypt! You can ask anonymously on there, so if you have reservations just hit the 'anon' button when you stop by!
Thanks so much for sticking with this story for this long, and thanks to my sparks! 3
~Keyblader