16.06.202X - 17.06.202X - Autopilot

 Autopilot

Sayori sat at her table, bolt assembly in hand, furiously shaking it back and forth, occasionally wiping the solvent-carbon-soot mixture on the tissue in her other hand.

She'd just finished logging the evening's events in her journal.

Too many thoughts.
Too many of the negative kind, anyway, and judging by the last few days' events, her mindset wasn't about to improve any time soon. Losing the Humvee she'd grown to love so much, having to leave their loot behind, Izzy's old FAL, the argument with Mishka...

She sighed and got up, placed the bolt assembly on the table – she'd assemble the rifle later – and rummaged through the mess that was her medicine drawer until she found a 20mg Prozac tablet.

Swallowing pills without water had pretty much become second nature to her, but she took a swig anyway.

The day had been – as she'd put it – a “fucking scorcher”, and staving off dehydration was a fairly important aspect of survival.

She'd saved a small color chart featuring various shades of yellow, and although she'd largely memorized what color her urine should be, it was still handy to keep around – if for no other reason than for the motivational text “IF YOUR PEE IS CLEAR, YOU'RE IN THE CLEAR”, accompanied by a small picture of a bargain-bin Smokey the Bear giving a thumbs-up.

Hydration was important, but so was morale.

The helo was still around – she preferred keeping her curtains closed whenever she heard rotors. While she might only have been strafed once – by a terrible gunner, to boot – some of the others in the team had been less lucky.
Izzy had gotten winged – the same day they left for Redstone – and Mish had got shot at least twice now.

Whoever was manning the guns needed a new pair of glasses. While she'd seen hordes cut down with machine gun fire, the gunners mostly seemed to aim center-of-mass. Anyone who'd been around these things for longer than a minute knew that the only thing that worked reliably was a headshot. Enough mechanical damage would put them down, eventually, but destroying the brainstem was both quicker and more economical.

Still, maybe they did it on purpose? If “Exclusion Zone 15” as they called it was a free-fire zone now, then maybe the snipers and gunners up in the helicopters just took potshots, aiming to miss, paying lip service to the standing orders.

Sayori strongly doubted anyone would be willing to shoot an unarmed, immune noncombatant, especially from miles away, viewing their target through a sniper scope, orders be damned.

Despite her paranoia, Sayori decided to part the curtains – just to check – and suddenly felt her heart rate spike. No need for the sports watch – this was a proper spike, heart-in-throat, stomach churning, cold sweat breaking out...

There was blood on the sand, out in the yard, the dark red fluid glistening in the light from the trailer next to the strawberry patch.

Jenny knew to stay inside when the helos came around, but Mish...

Mish had been out of it, recently. Really out of it.

And before she knew it, Sayori was already bolting down the rusty metal staircase and past the old propane truck, towards the bloodstain, then she saw the trail leading through the passageway to the adjoining compound and silently cursed herself for not bringing a flashlight.

The moon above was barely a sliver, the weak lighting from the trailer close by was barely enough to illuminate the splatter, and the trail leading off into the darkness soon faded into total obscurity.

With a sigh, Sayori pulled the 9mm Smith & Wesson from her thigh holster and flicked on the taclight, letting the thin beam of light illuminate the trail of blood leading into the abandoned storage lot beyond the passageway.

There was something about the whole situation that made her uneasy – she did have a penchant for paranoia, but it often served her well.

That is, when she wasn't rushing into dangerous situations like an idiot, putting herself and her friends at risk, all due to a dangerous combination of tunnel vision, stubbornness, and thick-headedness...

Enough about that. She'd have time to beat herself up when the situation was clearer.

She hugged the wall, barrel pointing towards the ground at a 45-degree angle, occasionally wavering to follow the errant trail of blood, until she crossed the threshold of the U-Store-It they'd recently fortified.

Inside, she almost wanted to turn off the taclight and crouch down, to let her eyes adjust and to just listen for a moment.

Almost.

She crept onwards, slowly, one hand on the wall for guidance, the other holding her pistol steady, but almost physically recoiled when her hand touched something wet and sticky and still warm.

Her heart was now in definite overdrive, the familiar feeling of heightened adrenaline starting to course through her limbs.
She knew without a glance what it was, the smell was enough to tell her, but some form of morbid curiosity still led her to briefly shine the taclight on her left hand, showing a brief flash of crimson.

Turning her attention away from the trail of blood, she now let the light from her pistol dance across the wall, showing a series of handprints that gradually coalesced into a bloody smear that lead to a room with the door slightly ajar.

All pretense of confidence was gone now, and she held the pistol with both hands, her aim as steady as it could be.

She knew they were both immunes, but... Izzy had mentioned something about her mother turning after a bite.
Maybe it was a new mutation?
Mishka's legs were covered in bites, maybe she...

Sayori didn't want to finish that thought.

Enough people had died or gone missing already, she didn't need Mish to be among them. Her ampoules of Zomboxivir had broken in the panicked retreat from the Bedford roadblock after a nasty fall.

Despite her trying her best not to think about the possibility of Mishka turning, the sounds of ragged breathing growing more apparent as she drew closer to the door only made those invasive thoughts more apparent, more violent, and she imagined herself pulling the door open and Mish 1LT Sokolov lunging for her with dead eyes, black, rotten blood spattered across her unnaturally pale face, her mouth hanging open, showing bloodied, gnashing teeth and...

She'd have to put her down.

But then what?

Turn the gun on herself, most likely. There wouldn't be a point to this shit anymore.

And then morning would break and Jenny would go down to the storage lot to do her laundry and she'd find their corpses laying next to each other and...

Sayori mentally cursed, again. The well would have needed a lid and a lock, the rope they had should have been put away, the gun lockers should have been locked, the...

Sayori gently opened the door.

The taclight illuminated a trail of blood, then a small crimson pool, then a pair of bare, bloodied feet, then a pair of bandage-covered ghostly pale legs with an oozing hole in the thigh and a pair of blood-stained hands with scraps of skin and tissue hanging off and wedged under the fingernails and a stained red “CREI” t-shirt and a neck that looked like someone'd taken a cheese grater to it and then a face Sayori never wanted to ever see not even in her worst nightmares and the creature slowly turned towards her probably startled by the light and

Sayori pulled the trigger.

Even with the suppressor and her Sordins, it felt deafening.

Maybe because of what it implied, rather than the noise itself.

This was it.
The end of their friendship.
The end of everything.
She'd dig a new grave, one next to Izzy, and then plant flowers on it, and then tell Jenny that she was in command of Fort Muldraugh now, and then dig another grave, lay down in it, and finally pull the fucking trigger and finally end the fucking nightmare that she'd been living for almost four months now and...

Mishk the rotter didn't crumble, didn't respond. It just stared off into space, with those same, blank eyes, those same eyes she'd seen while changing her bandages earlier today and oh my fucking God did I just shoot Mishka is she still alive is she sti

Sayori took a wary step closer, the air was thick with copper and cordite and sadness.

She took another step, then another, then the pistol clattered to the floor and Sayori threw her arms around Mishka Mish, her Mish, and try as she might, she couldn't stop herself from quietly sobbing into the blood-stained red academy t-shirt and mumbling half-finished apologies that seemed to fall on deaf ears because Mish didn't so much as move a muscle, just stayed slumped over, leaning on the filthy concrete wall.

But Sayori felt some semblance of warmth, and a faint, irregular hearbeat, and almost broke down completely this time because she'd almost killed her best fucking friend but instead she went on autopilot and

place casualty on floor

elevate right leg

apply tourniquet at upper half of extremity

pour hemostatic powder on site of trauma

extract foreign object

apply second dose of hemostate

check rest of body for further injuries

pour hemostate on ear, wrap head in bandage

prepare casualty for evacuation

The trip from the storage lot to the trailer, while short, felt like a dream – there were unexplained spots, patches in her memory, things she couldn't remember...

She couldn't remember opening the front door, or how they'd squeezed through the doorway, or if she had dragged Mish or carried her, but they were in her Izzy's Mishka's bedroom now and she'd apparently remembered to put a double wrapping of surgical gloves on, so she discarded the first ones to avoid contamination and then got to work, disinfecting and stitching.

The ear wound was barely a nick, and while she was usually quite the markswoman with pistols she had – somehow – managed to miss a point-blank shot.

She wasn't particularly angry about it, however.

What the fuck was she thinking?

She was relieved enough to cry, but this wasn't the time. She'd do it later, in her room, as quietly as possible. Mishka needed to sleep in peace, she couldn't disturb her.

"Mish…" Sayori sighed, "Mish – I'm sorry... Please... please talk to me... p-please." she continued, lip quivering and voice shaking, fighting back tears.

Mish didn't move.

Sayori slapped herself on the cheek and blinked the tears out of her eyes, took another alcohol wipe and a deep breath, disinfected the scratches on Mish's face, then moved onto the hole in her thigh.

No reaction from the alcohol wipes.

A burst of anger hit her, and she pushed her finger into the bullet hole.

No reaction.

"RESPOND – DO SOMETHING!"

Sayori pulled her finger out, blood slowly oozing from the reopened wound until another application of hemostatic powder sealed it, the half-empty package flying across the room and hitting the wall with a smack.

“That is a direct fucking order, do you hear me? DO, YOU,” Sayori shook Mishka by the shoulders, the patient's head lolling back and forth. “FUCKING HEAR ME, LIEUTENANT?!”

With that, she let go of the girl, and Mishka flopped down on her blood-stained bed, still as unmoving as ever. The small heart rate and blood pressure monitor strapped to her right arm told her that the pulse was still there, but too fast, far above the normal 60.

systolic 106, diastolic 73

sudden blood loss in patient causing lowered blood pressure and rapid heartbeat

disinfect and stitch wound in thigh

apply sterilized bandage with added pressure

improvise pressure by disinfecting eraser and placing it on top of wound site wrapped between bandage layers

slowly loosen tourniquet to avoid blood vessel damage

prepare patient for intravenous saline and blood transfusion

prepa

pre

Sayori screamed, anguish and guilt and fear and anger forcing themselves out the only way they could, but Mish remained as unresponsive as ever, staring mutely at the ceiling.

“Why are you doing this to me?” Sayori started, calmly at first, her voice steadily growing in volume. "Are you doing this on purpose? Are you trying to make me feel like shit?! You're supposed to be this big strong soldier – STOP IT! Stop doing this to me!"

Before she could quite process what she was doing or what was even going on, she raised her hand, balling it into a fist as the latex glove squeaked in protest.

If i deck her in the jaw maybe i can wake her up and then she'll stop this stupid game and

She froze. What if...

administer naloxone 2mg

continue treatment as normal

prepare patient for intravenous saline and blood transfusion

Heat flushing her cheeks and forehead, Sayori ran over to the cupboard in the bathroom, bringing with her several IV catheters, two bags of saline, and a fresh pair of gloves. On the way back she pulled out a O- blood bag from the freezer and hung it on a nail jutting from the barricaded window in bedroom, waiting for it to defrost.

inject 2mg naloxone

clean spot for first catheter

administer saline drip

blood bag frozen

need alternative solution

...

insert cannula in donor artery

remove needle

ensure vaccuum in catheter

insert cannula in recipient vein

remove needle

blood transfusion ongoing

Sayori slowly reached for Mishka's hand, not caring enough to wipe the tears off her own face.
They must have appeared at some point.

She sat there, right arm elevated, watching the steady stream of red flood into Mishka's vein, holding onto her left hand for dear life, discarded medical supplies and wrappings littering the floor around her.

Sayori squeezed Mishka's hand, her Mishka's hand, and then, finally, she allowed herself to cry.