Chapter Text
Blinding pain greets Crosshair’s return to consciousness, and a sharp gasp ejects from his lungs. A hand clasps hard over his mouth, pressing so tight that finger shaped bruises will certainly form. Crosshair struggles against his captor, writhing, shaking his head frantically, but an arm wraps around his chest, and hot breath whispers against his ear, “We have to be absolutely silent, Cross, just a few more minutes.” The words are spoken on air, no voice, but Crosshair recognizes Hunter’s reg sounding cadence.
He sinks back into Hunter’s chest plate and nods. Hunter moves his hand, and Crosshair tries to breathe quietly, force himself to inhale and exhale steady, slow breaths. Agony stutters the attempt, making his breathing ragged.
An eternity and a lifetime goes by before Hunter’s grip around him relaxes. “They’re gone,” he says, voice still quiet, but present.
“What happened?” Crosshair manages to grit out. When he tries to sit up, his vision goes white. He barely suppresses the scream that tries to claw out of his throat.
“Don’t try to move,” Hunter warns.
Crosshair thinks of a choice comeback, but can’t make his voice form the words. He growls out a pathetic sound instead. He isn’t even sure where the pain is coming from, but it consumes him wholly.
“I’m going to lay you down,” Hunter says.
Crosshair offers a jerky nod.
In a few, excruciating movements, Hunter slides out from where he was holding Crosshair upright and lays him back on the ground. They are in a heavily forested area, evergreens looming over them, tops scraping an overcast sky. The underbrush is tall and dense, an excellent hiding place. Because they are hiding. Why are they hiding?
“What happened?” Crosshair asks again, more insistent, trying to ignore the pain induced nausea threatening to evacuate his stomach.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” Hunter asks instead, turning to rummage through his kit.
“If I remembered what happened, I wouldn’t be asking,” Crosshair hisses.
Hunter casts him a sidelong glance. “Answer my question, then I’ll answer yours.”
Crosshair closes his eyes, willing himself to remember anything past the pain. “We split up…from Wrecker and Echo. Tech is with the ship. Radio silence after Tech discovered our comms had been compromised. I fell…” The sound of bone snapping is another memory that conjures up, but instead of voicing it, Crosshair lifts his head to look down at his leg.
“Don’t,” Hunter says, reaching out to stop Crosshair.
It’s too late. Crosshair chokes on a gasp at the mangled state of his left leg just below the knee. There’s blood. A lot of blood. And bone. There shouldn’t be bone.
His skin burns cold.
Hunter pushes him back gently. “Breathe, Cross, breathe.”
But Crosshair can’t breathe. His chest feels tight, compressed. No matter how hard he tries, the humid air feels impossible to drag into his lungs.
“--with me, breathe with me,” Hunter is saying, exaggerating his own breathing for Crosshair to follow.
A hand wraps around Crosshair’s, and he clutches it like a lifeline. Hunter leans into his space, making it where he can’t see his injury even if he wants to. He doesn’t want to. “Nice slow breaths. Good.” Crosshair knows he is not doing good with his shallow, gasping breaths, but the encouragement helps nonetheless. His breathing begins to steady. “Good job, just breathe. In…out…good.”
Crosshair closes his eyes again, willing himself not to panic. Panicking won’t do them any good. He knows this. He focuses on his breathing.
“I’m going to stabilize the wound so that we’ll be ready for when the extraction comes,” Hunter says after several long moments of letting Crosshair regain his composure. “I have a hypo for the pain, but it’s probably going to only take the edge off…under the circumstances.”
Crosshair’s stomach turns, but he gives Hunter a tight nod without opening his eyes.
Hunter lets go of Crosshair’s hand, and the loss of physical grounding is more alarming than Crosshair will ever admit out loud. He fists his own hands together, hoping the action will be comforting, but it isn't the same.
He can hear Hunter rummaging through their med kit again, then Hunter says, “Hypo,” before a needle prick bites into the soft flesh of his neck. The relief is small but immediate, a numbing warmth coursing through blood.
“I need to stop the bleeding. Wrap the wound to prevent any more contamination,” Hunter begins to explain. He sounds like Tech a little, the words he’s using. It’s strangely reassuring.
Crosshair feels the foliage by his head move as Hunter shifts closer. “It’s going to hurt,” he says. “I’m going to have you bite down on something so that…you know.”
Another stiff nod is the only affirmative he can give, and some kind of knotted cloth is put in his mouth. Crosshair bites down on it hard, teeth sinking into the coarse fibers of fabric.
When Hunter begins to staunch the wound, it takes every ounce of resolve Crosshair can muster not to cry out, although he does cry. He can feel pain induced tears manage to escape, mixing with the cold sweat that begins to track down the sides of his face. His hands, still knotted together, unlatch to claw at the ground. He tries not to move, but his body writhes slightly of its own volition.
“Almost done, vod ,” Hunter says, voice barely breaking through the agonized haze.
Everything goes dark.
TBC