Read Story: SEASON 2 EPISODE 53

Monday, September 9th, late evening

I was in the middle of opening a pouch containing something resembling chicken à la king when I heard someone call out, “It’s Chloe.”

It had been loud enough for me to hear her without being so loud that it would have carried much further than the immediate area. It startled me, and I was out of my crouch with the gun drawn and aimed in her direction before I processed what had been said. Two seconds later, I saw Chloe’s dark form emerge from a patch of trees, walking at a languid pace that made absolutely zero sound. Seriously… she could have been a freaking ghost.

“Nice reaction time,” Chloe murmured, not slowing her approach.

“God, Chloe. I was starting to worry about you,” I said as I lowered the pistol. I clicked the safety back into place and started to slide the gun into my back pocket.

“Don’t put it there,” Chloe said. “Back pocket’s too small for that thing, and the pants are too tight.”

I hesitated. “Where should I put it?”

“Preferably in your bag, which you should keep near you, but if you’re not gonna keep up with it, then in your waistband. Front or side.”

I sighed and tucked the gun in the front right side of my waistband. I felt like my mother was lecturing me, but Chloe was the expert. If she said having my gun in my back pocket was a dumb move, I wasn’t going to argue. It was also a little annoying that her first words at seeing me again were to praise and critique my use of a gun, but I had to remember who I was dealing with, here. Besides, whatever aggravation I felt was overshadowed by the fact that I was simply happy to have Chloe back.

“How’d it go?” I asked, striding toward her.

“Ugh,” she said.

That’s when I noticed her limp. “Hey! You okay?”

“I’ll live,” she said.

Yeah. Right. As I hurriedly closed the distance between us, I could faintly smell something metallic around Chloe. She was bleeding, and it had to be significant enough for me to smell it out here in the middle of the forest with all the other scents to contend with.

It didn’t take long for me to find it. The right portion of the back of her shirt was crimson.

“Chloe!” I gasped, touching the shirt and pulling back to examine fingers slick with blood.

“Can we not do this?” She said, side-eying me.

“You’re hurt!”

“Glad you noticed.”

I started to feel bad that she was sniping at me like this, but then I remembered who I was dealing with. Chloe was a woman who relied on and took pride in her strength. She must’ve felt vulnerable at that moment in front of her employer/lover… or whatever the hell we were.

So I tried to let the sarcasm wash over me. “Do you need help?”

“Not to walk,” she said. “I’m gonna need help stitching this gash up, though.”

My steps faltered a little as I walked beside her. “I can’t do that.”

“You’re gonna have to,” she said without looking back at me.

“Goddammit,” I muttered as I picked up the pace to follow her into the hut.

Once inside, she knelt near the edge with her eyes closed, waiting as I bunched up the parachute material into a semblance of a comfortable mattress for her to lie on. Then she unceremoniously face planted into it.

“Med kit,” she said. “You should have everything you need in there.”

“Don’t you need to remove your shirt first?”

“Give the boy a ride and he thinks he can get it whenever he wants.”

I could feel my cheeks flushing. “That’s not—”

“I know what you meant,” Chloe said. “There should be some scissors in there. Cut the shirt off. It’s

seen its final days anyway.”

She had a point there. The shirt had a large slice down the back just under the right shoulder, and it was thoroughly drenched in blood, so I set to work cutting away the shirt with a small pair of shears that were made specifically for this kind of thing.

“God, Chloe,” I said as I peeled away the bloody cloth. The cut looked deep, and the amount of blood she was losing… well, I wasn’t a medic, but I was pretty sure that she wasn’t going to last if she kept leaking blood like that. “What happened?”

“Got jumped,” she said, sounding more tired than I’d ever heard from her.

“You got jumped?” I asked, making sure I heard her correctly. By now, I was convinced she was nearly superhuman, so the idea that someone might have ambushed her was one part unbelievable and two parts terrifying. “By who? Batman?”

She gave half a chuckle and then winced. “No. I was engaged with two of them and was too focused to see the third one come up behind me.”

I gingerly touched her skin around the fresh wound and glanced down at the thread and needle in the small kit. “Three on one?” I asked. “And this is all they managed to do to you? You got lucky.”

“Real lucky,” Chloe agreed. “Still, it’s three fewer men that we have to deal with if we need to take the cabin.”

My stomach did a couple of flips as I pulled the needle and thread out of the box. Chloe’s final comment was meant to be some kind of encouraging word for both of us, but her tone made it sound hollow. Her voice had a thread of desperation that she just couldn’t repress.

“How long can we keep this up?” I asked as I threaded the needle, preparing to do something I didn’t want to do.

“I don’t know,” she said quietly.