Mala…
I lean back just in time for the fist to go over my head and smash into the wall. The painful twinge from my lower back left over from the Leader’s Challenge takes me a second longer to get back up but I’m driving an elbow up into their throat on my way, trying to use my momentum to crush their larynx. My phone’s gone, spinning uselessly and its flashlight flickering over the wet ceiling of the tunnel, just quick glimmers of light moving over their body, not enough to see who’s trying to kill me.
My elbow hits true, there is a strangled grunt and they fall against the opposite wall, just enough time to pull Michael’s knife out of my ankle holster. Driving it into their thigh, I pull down as hard as I can. They hiss in pain but that fist is back, this time hitting me in the head, on my right temple and knocking me to the ground. They’re grabbing my kicking feet, trying to keep me on my back and in the oscillating light, I see the gleam of a blade as they pull it from a sheath.
There is darkness and snarling, thrashing and both of us swinging our knives wildly, feinting, looking for an opening and I find mine first. Still on my back, I swipe my blade along their ankles, severing their Achilles' tendons and now,nowthey finally drop.
Rolling over, I grunt painfully, bracing my back against the wall, pushing myself up. They may not be alone.
My shirt’s wet.
Shit.
“Nope, nope, nope…” I mumble, “No sitting back down. Keep moving…” Pressing my hand against my stomach where that son of a bitch managed to cut me, I keep my knife hand up and my back to the wall, watching the groaning man rolling back and forth, gripping his ankles. It’s a man, I can tell by his voice, choked with rage and pain. Clumsily stepping sideways, I head for the exit. I know it’s there. Probably ten feet. I want to go back for my phone but it’s too close to him and I don’t know how deep this cut is.
I hear a crackle and very faintly, someone’s voice. He must have an earpiece in. “Bitch is down here,” he croaks, “Mala. Cut me… knows the tunnel… hurry…fuck!” I step sideways faster on increasingly shaky legs.
Move Mala, move! Reinforcements.
My head turns from the sudden flare of sunlight blazing down another hatch. Someone jumps the eight feet down and it’s him. Cormac.
“Hey,” I manage.
“Gettin’ yourself into trouble, girl.” His hands are running over my stomach gently, trying to find the wound. Another man in ablack tach suit climbs down. I don’t know him, but he’s got the stern face and close-cropped blonde hair of a soldier.
“Pull his comm and silence it,” Cormac tells him, “let’s see if we can still draw more rats to the cage. Cuff him.” The man nods and strides past us.
“He’s not going to run,” I giggle. This is fucking hilarious. “Not onthosefeet. He’ll never wear high heels again.”
That blow to the head may be worse than I thought.
“You’re lucky, he missed any vital organs. This is just a surface wound.” Dr. Giardo says, sounding displeased about it. He ties off the last stitch, glaring at me. I think he’s pissed off because Cormac insisted he inject me with Lidocaine before he started sewing me up.
“I’m sorry?” I’m not sure how to respond but apparently, that isn’t right, because the doctor gives me a final glare and stomps out of the room.
“He really has the worst bedside manner,” Laosie murmurs.
Cormac had carried me out of the tunnel and wanted to stay with me and my refusal was almost violent. I can’t. I can’t let him take care of me again. I can never have him. I have to stop now before it kills me. My heart hurt worse than the gash in my stomach when he looked at me, so concerned.
“You- you need to go question that asshole,” I nodded firmly. “I’ll be fine.”
Finally, reluctantly he left, but before I could cry quietly to myself, Professor Fitzgerald showed up, sitting next to me and talking in her calm, quiet way as the doctor irritably tended to me.
“He does, right?” I agree, “I’ve never seen anyone look so outraged as Dr. Giardo when someone gets hurt.”
We’re in one of the back rooms in the gym. It is the closest building to the exit of the tunnel - just like I thought - and the little space smells like old leather and dirty towels.
“I know this is hard to believe,” she says, “but he actually cares very much about the student’s health and well-being. That’s why he gets so angry when someone gets hurt.”
“Yeah?” I say dubiously.
“It is true, I assure you.” She pushes back her dark hair, shot through with silver streaks. “You students are a constant source of stress, I think my hair will be completely gray by the end of the year.”
“If we make it that far,” I whisper.
Her gaze darts to the door before she leans closer. “You will survive this year,” she promises fiercely. “We will not lose another student on our watch. Everything is indeed coming to a head, but this fight will be on our terms. There is a plan.” She touches my shoulder lightly and I feel honored. Professor Fitzgerald is not a touchy-feely person. At all.
“As for now,” she says briskly, “you will rest and then head back to the dining hall with the others. Whether Colin’s message did or did not go through, if you show up looking perfectly healthy, they will question if you were actually in the tunnel, which takes the scrutiny off you.”
