The Sleepwalkers

Chapter 21: Incomprehensible

Gavin lay there on the branch of the giant tree with bright yellow tent material lying across his body. The blankets were up to his neck to protect him from the cold nights and made him look like little child who had been bundled up by a parent. “Gavin!” Michael yelled, he jumped over to his friend and crouched down on the blankets next to him, “Gavin, are you there?” Belle rested her hand on Michael’s shoulder, “um, Michael, we found him yesterday collapsed on the ground, we assumed he’d gotten lost in the darkness. After we winched him up here unconscious and put him here, we found a,” she stopped mid-sentence and looked like she was about to burst into tears, “we found a, a bite.” Belle said with a tear rolling down her face. Lindsay gasped and Michael felt like his heart had just fallen out of the tree and splattered everywhere on the ground. “I-it was on his foot, and it looked really fresh,” she was stuttering between words and had more tears rolling down her cheeks, “where we found him, Jayden discovered a dead Crawler near his collapsed body. Gavin put up a fight, he really did!” Lindsay stopped her from continuing and lifted the teenage girl into a hug. “Why are you crying? You don’t even know him,” Lindsay asked her, unless she was a really emotional person, this wasn’t quite normal for a stranger to be acting like. The tears were streaking down the young girl’s cheeks and making clear lines on her dirty skin. “I- I actually know all of you. You guys work a-at Rooster Teeth.” Belle stuttered, wiping a tear from her nose.

Michael stood up and faced the girl that helped his friend, “Belle, is there any chance? Any chance at all that he is going to survive? How bad was it?” The teenager’s eyes lowered and looked quite guilty all of a sudden, “I'm pretty sure he’s going to be ok, since, since it was a bite to his foot, we were able to,” she stopped and looked out towards the mountains, “amputate it and save him.”

Michael pulled the covers back and saw that Gavin was indeed missing this right foot, in it’s place was a neatly bandaged stump at the bottom of his leg.