Beauty & The Beast (Book 1)

43. Seeing Red

(A/N: Season 1 Episode 10 - "Seeing Red")

"Is that her? Is that Cat?" Heather asks in a panic.

Evan unbuckles and starts to get out. "Stay in the car." He closes the door to her protests. He walks forward, looking into the darkness and seeing someone standing next to the crashed car, holding a body. "NYPD!" he yells and starts walking forward. "Who's out there?!" He can definitely see the silhouette of someone. When he blinks against the car's lights now dimming, there is no one. Only Cat.
He starts sprinting towards her.

"Cat?" he says, getting to his knees next to her. "Cat can you hear me?" Evan checks her eyes and head, seeing blood all over. Then he sees the bullet wound gushing blood. "My God," he starts to unbutton her coat. Leaning his head against her chest, he listens and hears faint beating. "Heather! I need you!" Evan takes his jacket off to use it to stop the bleeding.

Heather runs out of the car, panicking and crying. "Cat! Oh my God! Is she okay?!" She drops down onto the wet ground too. "Evan, she's bleeding everywhere!"

Evan looks at her intently, staying as calm as he can. "That's the least of her problems, she's barely breathing."

"What?!"

"Decreased inhilation on her right side."

"Well then get her to a hospital!"

"She won't make it to a hospital," he looks Heather straight in the eye. "Her lung is collapsing. I need you to go back to the car and get that flask of vodka you had. I need a knife and a glove and a rubber band."
Heather blinks and then she runs back to the car to get what he asked.
"You're gonna be alright, okay, just hang in there," he tells Cat, touching her cheek. "Just stay with me alright."
Evan looks up into the trees, feeling eyes on him but shaking it off. "Come on Heather!" he yells. 

Heather runs back to Evan and he takes the flask, glove and knife. "That's great, well done. I'm gonna use you as a compress, okay give me your hand," he grabs Heather's hand and pushes it down in the jacket over the wound. "Put pressure on it and hold down. Keep holding it down." She nods, sniffling. "Can't let any more air get in."

Heather looks behind them into the trees and back at Evan. "I think I saw something in the trees."

"There's nothing out there," he says, looking up fleetingly. If there was, it could wait, he had to help Catherine.
"Just stay focused okay?" Heather nods fast. "Everything's going to be fine." He takes the glove, after having cut one finger off and pulls the jacket away. "Now replace that with this glove." Heather presses down on the glove. Using a pen, he removes the ink and breaks it in half. He pushes one end into the piece of glove and ties the rubber band around it, creating an airpump that would have to do for now.
Evan pours the vodka over Cat's chest, counting where he needs to go with his fingers and takes the knife.

"Whoa whoa - "

"Trust me," Evan assures Heather before he stabs the knife into Cat's chest, making a deep enough hole to fit the pen inside. "Okay Cat, breathe."
They wait a few seconds and then Cat starts to inhale, her breath sounding raggedy and labored. "Breathe," he says and watches her chest go up and down. "That's it," he smiles in relief. "That's it." Heather smiles through the tears, barely able to see, rubbing Cat's hair. "She's gonna be fine." Evan takes out his phone. "You need to call 911. Tell them we have an officer down with a bullet wound okay. You need a meta vac to New York General immediately!" he yells after Heather.
He looks to the side at the body of a woman who is clearly dead and beyond help and then turns back to Cat. "You just keep breathing."

**********

Cat wakes up, groggily opening her tired eyes.

"Hey, you're awake," a far off sounding voice says next to her and she frowns, blinking her eyes.
"Don't worry, it's all gonna be fine."