7.03
In the movies and on TV, being aware of imminent harm is a good thing. You can brace yourself, dodge, do little things to minimize the impact of it.
In the movies and on TV, being in shock bought you time to function before the pain kicked in.
Wrong and wrong.
I was lucky that I wasn’t able to process what she was doing before it happened. I didn’t stand firm or go stiff, I bent. I went, even, as the claws hooked into fabric and skin, hurling me off to one side. I felt the scrape of claw-tip against bone. Going limp, it meant I’d been pushed, rather than stay there to let the claw carry through more flesh.
I’d been stabbed, once upon a time. I’d been hurt.
This was still something foreign. Too much to process. In the moment, I took it in as something wrong, like Pauz and the abstract demon were wrong.
Alarm.
Mindblowing pain, well beyond the point I could understand or frame it.
A stray thought, nonsensical, wondering for a moment if she sharpened her claws herself, more than realizing that the claws were hitting me.
And devastation, as I was torn away from Alexis, thrown against the nearest building like a rag doll, my ankle striking the corner of the window frame, my heel cracking against a window.
Because I was supposed to be helping Alexis, and she was hurt. She wasn’t supposed to be in the line of fire like this.
I hit ground, and the only thing that stopped me from rolling forward onto my stomach was the position of my arm beneath me, stretched out in front. In an impulse movement, some confused attempt to make sure I wasn’t dead, I moved the arm, and managed to leverage myself back, so I rolled onto my back instead.
The shock of landing and the pain in my leg seemed to wake up the rest of my body.
I only got the benefit of maybe two seconds of being in shock, if that.
Looking down, I couldn’t tell the difference between my gore-covered clothing and jacket and the gore itself. Tattered flaps and layers. Blood flowed out and ran along the side of my body down to my back, not nearly as warm as I’d expected it to be.
I raised my hands, convinced I should do something, apply pressure, staunch the flow of blood, but it was too much, too broad an area. I wasn’t sure if I’d be infecting myself by getting dirty coat sleeves in the wound.
My arms flopped limp to my sides, because I didn’t have the focus or the strength to keep them raised. I suspected something was wrong with my pectoral muscle.
Ty appeared in my field of vision, standing at a funny angle, bent over, arms outstretched, but his attention turned skyward, his posture overly shy.
Evan descended, his flying a little shaky, as if he’d almost forgotten how. He settled on my forehead, and I couldn’t bring myself to tell him to move.
His focus was on the same location as Ty’s.
They were focused on the sphinx.
“Can I help him?” Ty asked.
“No,” the sphinx said.
“Please,” Tiff said. “Let him help.”
“I would advise helping the young lady with the arrow through her midsection, or you could help Mr. Fell, if you wanted to put connections aside for the smarter option. You’ll need two people to save one, and the one you ignore is likely to die. I’d say Maggie there should help so you can have a chance at saving both, but I somehow doubt she will.”
“But Blake-”
“It’s easier to help them than Blake. Don’t pull it out. Put pressure around the entry and exit wounds, if you can.”
“I need to help Blake. He needs it more than them,” Ty said.
“I made a declaration of war, challenging him to a fight. My concern is with him and him alone. If you step in, I’ll include you in the challenge and I’ll deal with you the same way.”
She moved, stepping forward in a strangely graceful, steady movement, and it took me a second to make sense of it, she was so large. My perspective so warped by my position on the ground and my general disorientation.
Ty turned, keeping the Sphinx in front of him, keeping himself between the Sphinx and me. I wasn’t quite sure what he planned to do if she did go after either of us.
“It hurts,” Evan whispered.
I tried to respond, but I only managed a small sound, inflicting a whole lot of pain on myself.
“It really hurts,” he said. “But it’s all in my head, right? It looks really really bad.”
Don’t need the details.
“Out of my way, please,” the sphinx said.
“What if I say no?” Maggie replied.
“I could say you’re suicidal and stupid. Letting me by is better for the both of us.”
“That so? I could say things about you being a hypocrite, a supposed paragon of order and balance, pulling a dirty move like this.”
“Are you such an expert on sphinxes, stranger?”
I’m bleeding to death, and you’re arguing.
“As far as I can tell, you aren’t much of a sphinx.”
“My only answer is this: look.”
I couldn’t see what she was referring to.
Fuck me. Speaking wasn’t in the cards, but how was I even supposed to breathe like this? I felt pain in places where the claws hadn’t even touched me, as if the force of the swipe had torn my skin in other places, not just where I’d been scratched. Every little breath I managed prompted shuddering huffs of pain. More going out than in.
I felt lightheaded, and I wasn’t sure how much of that was the breathing and how much was blood.
“What are you doing?” Ty asked.
It was more inquisitive than accusatory.
“Only following through on my promise, now move,” Isadora said.
I heard a small grunt. I suspected that Maggie had been made to move.
Then, loud enough to make my vision go out of focus, louder than she should have been able to manage, even considering her size, she boomed, “Astrologer! Reconsider.”
I closed my eyes rather than try to recover from the sound. I twisted around, craning my head up to try to make out what was going on.
If my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me, the Astrologer’s creation was aiming skyward, almost straight up in the air.
Aiming over the sphinx?
Trying to hit me? I could almost imagine the arrow disappearing into the atmosphere, only to plunge down and catch me in the heart.
Too much all at once.
“Ev-” I managed.
“What- what do I do? What can I do?”
I shook my head. That much I could do. I tried to speak, and the pain was too bad, the air too short. If I’d known what to say, maybe I could have forced it, but I didn’t have an answer for him. I only screwed up my face in an expression of frustration.