Humans Alone (G/T)

Chapter Five

"Ow...ow hey. Ow hey! Careful!" Michael ripped his arm away from the giant hands tending to the deep wound. 

"If you'd hold still it wouldn't hurt as much. Calm down and let me take care of it." Heath huffed with a heavy sigh, using a hand to grab Michael's arm as gently as he could while still being able to hold it in place. "If I don't disinfect it and get it stitched, it'll only get worse. I would take you to the doctor but we don't have those buildings set up yet."

"If you'd be more gentle it wouldn't hurt as much! Ow! That was on purpose!" 

"Yes, now please stop your squirming Michael." Heath turned his eyes from the bloody wound to the human sitting on the table, finally taking in his ragged appearance. Dirt caked clothes and skin, greasy hair, and tired blue eyes. "I have a better idea, one moment."

Michael watched the Masonin rise to his full height and walk around the hut, picking up strips of bandage and a roll of plastic wrap. "What's that for?" He asked quietly, using a hand to scratch at the bandages already on his leg. 

"I'll get you stitched and bandaged, and then I'll wrap the bandages in plastic so you can bathe. The plastic will keep the bandages from getting wet and ruined." Heath replied, dumping the materials from his arms onto the table next to the injured human.

"I haven't had a bath in quite a while," Michael mumbled, watching Heath again pick up the needle and thread he had used previously to stitch his leg. Heath had sterilized the needle in a human-sized bottle of peroxide and had been so focused on taking care of his wounds. Probably because he just wanted to keep the extra worker he had.

"I can tell. This is going to hurt. But I need you to hold as still as you can or I may have to tie you down." In a warning tone, Heath glanced again to try and read Michael's expression before he began his work. 

He stuck the needle down into Michael's arm, pushing it through parts of the wound to poke it back out the opposite side. He felt Michael try to jerk away, but he kept his grip on him firm. He repeated the process several times, lacing the thread through the flesh until the wolf bite was at last stitched. 

"Is it done?" Michael whispered, his eyes closed tight and head turned away from Heath. His arm stung, but he could feel soft bandages being wrapped around it. Before he opened his eyes, he could hear the crinkle of plastic and feel the slightly cold material touch his skin.

Heath wrapped up his arm in bandages and both the wounded limbs in plastic before he spoke. "Now it's done. I have a bin you can use as a bathtub, and I'll go down to the well to get some water to boil." 

Remembering his confrontation with Donnie earlier, Michael suddenly reached out and gripped hard onto the adult Masonin's shirt. "No! I-I'll go with you, I'd rather stay away from your...uh..." he trailed off and began to ponder if Heath would believe him if he were to say Donnie threatened him.  Unsure, he simply shut his mouth and released Heath. "N-Nevermind."

With gentle, cat-like eyes, Heath lifted Michael from the table and stuck him on his shoulder like he had done before. "Here. I know you're afraid of Donnie, and I understand what you were going to say. So sure, you can come along. Just hang on and try not to fall." The Masonin patted the small legs dangling on his chest before making his way out of the hut to head in the direction of the well.

"I have a question too," Michael said quietly, trying to get rid of the fear in his mind and odd pinging in his chest. "Donnie...uh, he said something about us humans doing something to your kind. What was that supposed to mean?"

Heath stopped walking, his gaze fixed straight ahead with a deep frown. "Do you really not know? Is that a thing? Do not all humans know what you did?" Slowly, he turned his head to try and see Michael. 

"Not know what?" Getting irritated that everyone seemed to know what humans did besides humans, he grabbed onto Heath's shirt.

"A Masonin child was abducted from our planet not long before we came to Earth. A female. A baby, not even three months old. Her mother and father were devastated. And our officers spent months searching for her. Of course, at the time, we didn't know she'd been taken from the planet." Heath spoke solemnly, lowering his head to look at the ground. 

Michael had a feeling he knew where this story was going but decided to remain quiet and let Heath talk.

"When they found where the baby was it was too late. She'd been experimented on, tortured. She was malnourished and dirty. She was dead. It turned out she'd been taken by-" Heath stopped when he saw smoke rising in the distance and furrowed his brows. "Hang on to that thought, what's going on over there?"

Michael, now into the short story being told, finally got a whiff of smoke and looked in the direction Heath was looking. "I don't know. Should we go investigate?"

"I think so. Hang on." Heath shifted the human so one leg was on each side of his neck, and he made sure Michael was situated before he sprinted off into the night. The smell of smoke strong, the light of flames flickering in the distance. 

Michael gripped tight onto the Masonin's hair, able to without pulling. "The story will just have to wait," he muttered only to himself, watching shadows of trees and other huts whizz by as Heath ran.