The Virus Within (Original rough draft)

Chapter 85

Daniel kept his pace to something I could keep up with. I had to push for speed, but I managed it. He reached the door and furrowed his eyebrows as he realized that the handle was locked.

I called out, "Nina, Nicky, we are back. Can you please unlock the door before Daniel breaks it down?"

Daniel had his head tilted, obviously listening to their movements. I heard them unlock the bathroom door before coming to the front door. The door opened to reveal a worried looking Nina. She blinked in shock as she immediately noticed Daniel's arms were crisscrossed with numerous scratches, "What happened?"

She glanced at me and noticed that I also had scratches. Her eyes darted between the two of us in confusion. Nicky peered over Nina's shoulder as she also blinked in surprise. Daniel exhaled gustily, "I got ambushed by three Nightstalkers."

Nina's jaw dropped and her expression was incredulous, "In the daytime?"

Daniel shrugged, "They were sane and wearing sunglasses."

I snorted, "I don't count those three as sane. In control is a better term. They clearly had more screws loose than Nicky on a bad day."

Nina shook her head as she sighed in resignation, "Let me grab my medical kit and patch you two back up."

Daniel made a face as she turned to go back inside. Apparently he wasn't a fan of letting someone near his wounds either, although he didn't seem irritated or upset. I headed over to sit on a stump before digging into my backpack for my water bottle and some paper towel. I planned to beat Nina to cleaning my superficial wounds.

Nicky wandered over to look at bloodstained cloth wrapped around my forearm, "Shit. Did they have an axe?"

"No, he had a very sharp belt knife."

I had a dozen or so shallow scratches from where fingernails had barely grazed my skin. Several of them were a bit deeper. There were a few scrapes from when I hit the ground. I slowly exhaled as I carefully unwrapped the makeshift bandage over the worst cut.

It throbbed and hurt. The bleeding had mostly stopped, but the wound went deep. If it hadn't hit the bone, then it was awful close. I carefully used a damp paper towel to wipe away dry blood from the skin around the wound. Nicky stood beside me, "Anything I can do to help?"

I nodded toward my backpack, "If you open the main flap there should be a few leftover big adhesive bandages in the back compartment from when my leg was injured."

I tidied up the cut as Nicky found the bandage and passed it to me.

"Don't put that on yet. Let me clean it properly." I closed my eyes and exhaled slowly as Nina caught me. I hadn't been quite fast enough.

I turned my head to watch the scientist as she made her way over to me first. She hadn't even paused to patch up Daniel. It looks like she knew that I had taken the worst of the damage once more. It hadn't been by much this time though, and if it hadn't been for that one big cut, Daniel would have had the most tokens to show for our fight.

She already had gloves on and dampened a cloth with some sort of sharp smelling disinfectant. Daniel was watching to ensure that I didn't act up too much. I tried to will myself to be patient as Nina started wiping down my arms to get any dried blood I may have missed.

The cleaner stung in the shallow scratches and cuts. She was more careful around the deeper cut and examined it. "I assume a blade of some sort did this?"

"A belt knife."

She nodded as she pulled out a tube of salve and carefully spread gobs of it across the long cut. Nicky passed her the big square adhesive bandage and Nina carefully put it on. I was patched up to her satisfaction and she turned her attention to Daniel.