I look up and flinch at the light, subtly trying to push the tail of my dear reptilian acquaintance away from my body. I can't even make out Mr. Davis's face before a rope falls.
In an instant, I'm on my feet and ignoring the searing anguish in my shin as it tries to buckle, "You blithering idiot, do not come down here."
The gun in this cave is waterlogged and useless. I can't even shoot up to scare him. I have no plan. What is he doing out here in midnight?
He goes against my wishes and I notice the heel of his boot before I notice the flash of metal against the flashlight he now carries in his mouth. I barely have time to think before I hear the click of a safety being released and hardly register the sharp stinging in my neck when I jump in front of the growling, frustrated beast that now slithers behind me.
This is a tranq dart. They know it works. Fuck my life, man. I didn't want to feel this sluggish again. Instead of understanding what I'm doing, Mr. Davis hooks the rope between his legs as he stands just out of reach of Aska's posturing strike.
"Why would you— Dr. Moore, I almost had it! What do you think protecting a monster like that will do? After all the men it killed?" He shouts as me, aiming another shot towards the naga.
I stumble forward when the reptile pushes me away from it and I, instead, grab onto the rope as I lose what little strength I have left in my mostly lame leg. "You're in its home. You really think that will work fast enough for you to get out of here?"
He doesn't seem surprised that I'm alive.
The naga hasn't eaten or drank anything for who knows how long, he just recovered from his earlier encounter with this damnable drug. He might not survive another shot.
Still, the dart hit a vein directly in my neck. I don't have much time. I either have to get it out of my circulation or figure out a plan quickly. I can't think. I can't think.
I can do nothing as the dart gun fires again and Aska hisses loudly in pain, striking at the rope that dangles his prey from his grasp. I shake my head wildly as my vision blurs and try to grip onto the rope. I spend what feels like an eternity trying to simply climb high enough to reach his leg. All I need is this man's leg. Gravity will do the rest. He's scrawny, he can't carry both of us.
When I do manage to grab onto his entrapped foot, I very faintly notice the thrashing, envenomated bite of the naga on my dangling, useless leg. Will he regret biting me? I wonder if he even knows what's happening.
"Get off of me! Off! You'll bring me down—"
"That's the point, asshole." I cut Mr. Davis off with slightly slurred words, gripping his calf and letting go of the rope, very quickly grabbing his ankle with my hand as I now dangle. He tries to kick, much harder than I expected, but he's lost his secure footing on the rope.
I hardly notice the loud sound of the dart gun dropping as he, instead, tries to cling onto the rope out of a sudden desperation. It's too late for that, though, and he slides down with me until I hit the ground.
For a while, I lose all sense of sensation in my limbs as I press my bodyweight against his, not even registering the feeling of scales against my body. I'm sure Aska is somewhere next to me, but I am far more worried about trying to control the thrashing, kicking, and clawing man that's wrapped in my arms.
I push us with my failing strength into the water, dragging him under as I willingly let my lungs fill with the salty water that helps me sink, holding him tightly and kicking us down to the bottom of the surprisingly deep entrance to the cave. He lets out a scream and I hardly feel the sensation of the bubbles moving past my face, cradling his neck and pinning his arms to his torso with my other arm, continuously keeping us under the deathly cold water far after his tension leaves his body.
Did I just drown a man?
I stay like that for who knows how long, my eyelids lack and getting harder to keep open with my ebbing strength. I have to get back up, though. I need to know if Aska is alright. I won't be any warmth. I know I won't be. I still... I still need to let him see that this is what I meant. I need to apologize. I need to apologize and bring Mr. Davis's body back to the soldiers that twisted him to be so hateful.
I finally gather my strength and slowly use the rocky but slick underwater walls of the cave to pull myself upward, slowly inching my way along the bottom with the nearly weightless body in one of my arms as I feel the pressure decrease. I have to be close to the surface.
When I breach, my arm gives out and I drop the body I desperately need to hold onto, cursing myself mentally when I reach down to grab him again. I weakly pull him above the water and kick with my single leg towards the shallow edge, dropping his dead weight when it gets harder to pull him along the slick water. I sit and force my body to reject the water in my lungs, coughing even as it continues to get harder for me to move anything at all.
When I manage to take a shaky breath in, I find the sprawled body of Aska resting by the water's edge, his open eyes a familiar dull yellow as they meet mine. I smile slightly but turn my attention to the corpse now next to my feet, the glint of metal catching my eye from the moonlight.
A machete. A machete! I can cut off my leg!
I scramble forward and fumble with my shaky, stiff fingers, barely managing to unclasp it from Mr. Davis's back and sliding the soaked metal out of its sheathe. If I can get myself to bleed out, that will help the sedative get out of my system. I've never been so happy to my insane resistance to most of them. Whatever he used, I have a pretty decent immunity to it. I'm sluggish and nearly blind, but I'm still able to move. I can't say the same about Aska, but I can't focus on that.
A soft, almost frustrated hiss follows from Aska when I touch the gleaming blade to my knee. I ignore it. I have to ignore it. I have to get this damn leg off. Even if I have to stay here for a few hours longer, I need the damn thing to grow back healed. That, and I need to get as much of my blood out as possible.
I take a deep, shaky breath in before I raise the weapon, closing my eyes to brace before bringing it down right under my kneecap. I bite my tongue to try to stop from screaming from the pain, but a small whimper escapes anyway. The pain helps clear my head, if nothing else.
I work for far too long on cutting the flesh away and finally severing the tendons that connect my calf and all of its respective parts to my knee, ignoring as my blood spreads to every inch of my already cut, scraped, and disgusting pants from the knee up. I pant as I drop the weapon in my hand, my fingers slicked with blood as it slowly trickles into the water I still sit partially submerged in.
"It's off." I whisper weakly, ignoring the tightness and familiarly blinding pain from Aska's venom. With any luck, bleeding out and cutting off the site of the bite will also help with that. I need to leave before he regains motor control. I need to leave while I can fix this. I can't stay in this damn cave for another four days, not when Mr. Davis will start to decompose. Not when I can maybe use his dead body as a way to convince the soldiers to stop.
I've turned into the monster they think I am, haven't I? I've killed the very man I protected at the start and I feel nothing about it.
YOU ARE READING
Forever Captive
General Fiction****** Disclaimer! This book contains depictions of violence, gore, vulgar language, and *checks notes* the grammar and words of a man who has a habit of writing on his poor computer at 2 in the morning. That being said, it does also contain lemon...
