I'm With You

Chapter 25

"EIRA!" Mackenzie screamed, sobbing and Miguel moved instantly closer to her, pushing her hands off of the wound and instantly taking over applying pressure. Eira didn't react at all, her blood already starting to seep through his fingers and he applied as much pressure as he could. Her breathing was still strained, still fast and uneven.

"I want you to go to the gate and lead the paramedics here, okay?" Miguel urged, his voice shaky as Eira lay completely motionless all besides her uneven breathing. She wasn't shivering even though she had complained she was cold - he was almost certain she was in the beginning phase of hypothermia, the same illness that almost killed her sister nearly a month ago.

"No! I can't leave her!" Mackenzie choked out.

"You can tell the paramedics what happened as you lead them here, it'll make sure they bring the right equipment and the right gauze to pack her wound with. Mackenzie, she needs you!" Miguel urged and Mackenzie let out a sob, looking down at her blood-soaked hands and she nodded her head, rushing out in the pouring rain and she ran to the gate as the sirens got nearer and nearer. Even the rain wasn't enough to wash away the thick layer of blood, it was staining her clothes as well as her skin but all Mackenzie cared about was making sure Eira was taken care of. She had no idea how they would pay her hospital bill but Eira needed all the help she could get. She couldn't let her big sister die on the streets, not after everything Eira had been through and all she'd done to protect her for the past seven years.

"You called for the ambulance?!" One of the paramedics called, raising her voice to be heard over the rain as her partner pulled the gurney and medical bag out of the back of the ambulance, the bag resting on top of the gurney to save them having to carry it.

"M-My friend did! Eira's my sister, sh-she's unconscious and she can't breathe and she's so cold... sh-she won't stop bleeding." Mackenzie sobbed.

"Take us to her, we're going to help her, alright?" The woman said calmly and Mackenzie nodded her head, rushing back towards where Miguel and Eira were and she cried impossibly harder seeing that Miguel had laid Eira down instead of her being propped up against the wall and he was using the thin, old blanket they had to cover her lower body to provide some kind of insulation. "Doctor Lagman!" The paramedic exclaimed and Miguel nodded in a greeting.

"She needs oxygen and her wound needs packing. She was stabbed, was conscious until about two minutes ago and was complaining of how cold she felt - she's homeless and at risk for hypothermia, she needs testing for it." Miguel recited, letting the paramedics take over examining and treating Eira and he looked around for Mackenzie, seeing her stood by the exit of the tunnel, shaking as she watched the paramedics cut through Eira's shirt to get to the wound so they could bandage it temporarily until they could get her to the hospital.

"How do you know this girl, Miguel? Did you just find them like this? Is the attacker nearby?" The male paramedic asked and Mackenzie spoke for him.

"The man who did it... h-he didn't mean to hurt her. He was desperate for money, he was only using it for a threat but Eira came to protect me, had no idea he had a knife and he... he stabbed her and he ran away." Mackenzie cried and the paramedics nodded.

"Explains why it's so deep." The woman said quietly to her partner and Mackenzie whimpered in fear, curling into Miguel as he wrapped an arm around her.

"And you found her like this?" The male paramedic asked of Miguel.

"Yes, but I know them... I-I treated Mackenzie here for hypothermia before, but I... I love Eira." Miguel admitted and Mackenzie couldn't help but cry impossibly harder. Gripping onto Miguel was all that was keeping her standing, her eyes tightly shut. She couldn't watch paramedics crowd her sister, she couldn't look at the wound that was very quickly killing her.

"We'll get her to the hospital as soon as we can, we'll alert the ER that we need a team waiting for our arrival. She'll need to be taken straight to surgery, I'm presuming, but they might want to run tests before and make sure she's on heated pads if she's suffering from hypothermia as well as the wound." The male explained.

"She's so stupid... she's so stupid! She does everything to protect me and she kills herself doing it!" Mackenzie sobbed and Miguel held onto her tighter.

"She's not going to die, Mackenzie... I won't let her die." He vowed, but he knew he couldn't promise anything. Eira was in a bad way, he knew it would be a miracle if she survived but he had to keep hoping - he couldn't let himself or Mackenzie lose hope in her.

She needed the treatment urgently, to give her the chance to fight.

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:)