I don't know if I mentioned this before, but landings aren't really my strong point. In general, I'm a pretty strong jumper- I can sling myself and at most three other people back to wherever we need. It's one of the few reasons I managed to procure the Troy mission from the UK branch- they would have to chain three of their jumpers to get back to it, and many argued that it would be worth it, but Eliza Nihlo, the leader of the UK branch of 'time-travel' research, ended up succumbing and handing the mission papers over to us, the Asia branch. I should mention here that Seoul isn't the only base for the Asia time research: there's also an outpost in Beijing, but we don't contact them much. Anyway, back to the actual story.
The first part of Troy I saw was a tree. It zoomed towards me with worrying speed, and I didn't even have time to fully my mistake before I slammed into the base of said tree. In all honesty, the crack I made when I collided with the timber should have worried me than it did.
Johta had probably included a salve and bandages for dislocated bones in one of our sacks, I thought, staring cross-eyed at the thick wood of the Greek olive tree. It was an absolutely first-rate olive tree too, with pale, rough bark and nice waxy leaves, which were now scattered around me, having fallen like bright confetti upon my impact.
"Are you ok?" Seo Hyo peeled me back from the grasp of the shrub, and I exhaled deeply, the olive orchard spinning with black checkers. Suddenly, yet not unexpectedly, my nose began to spew blood like a fire hydrant. Coughing through the claret coppery liquid, I nodded, then accepted his proffered hand only to hear the sharp popping sound once more. Seo Hyo closed his eyes as if praying for help from the Four.
"By History, Lex, we haven't even been here for five minutes and you've already dislocated your right arm!" Seo Hyo shook his head and relieved me of my sack before leaning me up against the tree.
"Ab lease I'mb de only injured one," I tried and failed to speak clearly through the seemingly endless flow of blood.
At least it was true: from the look of Seo Hyo, I had managed to get at least him here safely. In the edge of my rapidly darkening vision, I could see Max, also unscathed. However, at the same moment that I sighed in relief, a fourth figure materialized beside Max. Perhaps it was the sheer shock and horror on his face or mine, but Max seemed to immediately find the wool chiton he was wearing incredibly intriguing. As the darkness closed in, I blinked, and before losing complete and total grip on reality I saw Kim Taehyung trying desperately to turn back on what I assumed was the cloaking device that wasn't supposed to exist yet.
The first bit of information I gathered as I slowly regained consciousness was an out-of-time scent of freshly baked bread, almost as if someone had lit a Yankee Candle in the immediate vicinity. The second thing I gathered through the persistent fog from loss of blood was the fact that someone was binding my arm with one of Johta's bandages. I tried to open my eyes but to no avail. In fact, as I attempted to lift my arm, I realized that my body was wholly unresponsive, head to toe. My head was spinning, my eyes seemed to turn within my brain like tops, gazing only at the back of my unmoving eyelids, and I couldn't move a single muscle that I had control of (since I could think and feel my heart thump, I assumed that the muscles I wasn't in control of were still fortunately functioning).
Whoever had been messing with my right arm finished, and sat back, a soft sigh escaping their lips. I mentally examined the area, trying to think like Jotha. Since I couldn't feel any particularly sharp pains from that area, the bone must have been pushed back into the socket without much incident. At any rate, whatever drug held me in its grasp was losing hold on me, and I felt, with an awful rush, pins and needles stabbing at every nerve.
I let out an involuntary gasp of pain, my eyes shooting opening as someone stepped on my foot with a crunch.
"By History!" I cried out, fingers twitching as I tried to pull my left foot from underneath the foot of Seo Hyo. "Time damn you, Hyo!" I swore, head spinning.
