Chapter 25 #3
“Then we’ll get him to the OR ourselves.” Castiel shifted closer to Zenko, clearly done waiting for anyone else to take charge.
Shaun finally risked looking over his shoulder at the man he’d assumed was a porter.
What the fuck?
“I want the damn trauma team right there when I pull my finger out of the hole in his neck. Got. It?”
The other man sighed and stepped back from the chopper as though Shaun’s demand was an inconvenience. “Follow me.” He turned away without making any move to help them transfer Zenko from the aircraft.
Shaun’s mouth dropped open when the man turned and started walking away. “Get back here, asshole, and help us fucking load him onto the gurney.”
The roof shifted beneath Shaun’s feet, forcing him to lock his knees as a wave of dizziness rolled through him.
Fucking stupidity is making me dizzy.
Shit, nope.
That’s the blood loss making me dizzy.
“They won’t let you back into the surgical area, Shaun.” Castiel kept close beside him, watching the transfusion line as they prepared to move Zenko. “A nurse with a bag of blood will take over before we get there.”
Shaun nodded.
Oh fuck, that was a bad idea.
The chopper seemed to tilt beneath him, and his stomach rolled hard enough that he had to fight to stay upright.
Somehow, he kept his fingers locked over the artery and his other arm steady while Castiel and Drax maneuvered Zenko out of the bird and onto the gurney.
Shaun moved with them one careful step at a time, refusing to let the dizziness interfere with either connection.
Castiel immediately worked the straps around Zenko, securing him in place for the run to surgery.
Once the straps had been secured, Shaun forced himself to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
One step at a time.
Keeping pace with the gurney while maintaining pressure on Zenko’s artery was taking everything he had left, and the edges of his vision had started to blur.
He had barely finished reminding himself how to move when a door across the roof burst open, and two nurses and a doctor came racing through with another gurney.
The man they had assumed was a porter suddenly reached for Shaun’s hand, his fingers closing around his wrist as he tried to wrench it away from Zenko’s neck.
Shaun locked his arm and pushed harder into the wound, refusing to let the bastard move him even as a gunshot cracked across the rooftop.
The man screamed and dropped, then a second shot followed as Drax put a round through each of his knees.
Shaun barely registered any of it. His entire focus remained on keeping his fingers in the hole, maintaining pressure and keeping Zenko alive.
“Secure him, Reese.” Drax kept his weapon trained on the man as the nurses and doctor raced toward Zenko. “Find out who the fuck he is.”
Another hand closed around his wrist, and Shaun immediately pushed harder into Zenko’s neck, fighting whoever was trying to move him until he realized the hand belonged to one of the medical team.
Zenko didn’t react to the increased pressure.
No groan, no attempt to pull away from what had to fucking hurt, and that scared Shaun more than the blood covering them both. Was he even still alive?
Shut the fuck up. You can feel his pulse under your finger.
“Shaun. Shaun.” Castiel’s voice cut through the noise around him, but it took a second for Shaun to drag his attention away from the pulse beneath his finger.
Shaun finally focused on Castiel and then on the doctor crouched beside Zenko, clamp ready in his gloved hand.
“Let him go now, Shaun. The doc’s got it.
He’s ready to clamp the artery the second you move your finger. ”
“Okay.” Shaun squeezed his eyes closed for a second and prayed to whatever god was up there that letting go wasn’t a mistake.
Every instinct screamed at him to keep his finger exactly where it was, because for what felt like forever that pressure had been the only thing standing between Zenko and bleeding out.
He forced himself to look at the doctor again, saw the clamp waiting, and before he could second-guess himself, pulled his finger free.
Gloved hands immediately replaced his, the clamp disappeared into the wound, and the gurney was moving almost before Shaun understood that Zenko was no longer beneath his hands.
He looked down at his other arm and blinked. Shit, when had they removed the transfusion needle? He had been so focused on Zenko that he hadn’t even felt it being taken out.
“Come on, Shaun, we’ll follow him down.” Drax caught Shaun by the arm as he stood staring after the gurney, giving him something solid to hold on to now that Zenko was no longer beneath his hands.
Drax’s words sounded distant, as though he were hearing them from underwater.
He tried to follow, managing two unsteady steps before his vision narrowed and his knees gave out beneath him.
Drax’s grip tightened on his arm, but Shaun was already going down, the rooftop disappearing as everything finally went black.