"Gahhh!" Will held his chest as it bled out.
"Hold on, buddy, we're almost there!" A man said in Spanish.
"You should see the other guy." Will groaned.
"If you have time to joke then take a deep breath because this is going to hurt." He said as he pulled Will out of the passenger seat of a military cargo truck. The windshield had a large hole in it on the driver side.
Will let out another grunt of pain as the man carried Will into a field hospital. As soon as he ran through the tent's flaps, he caught the attention of a young doctor—her long brown hair was tied back in a bun.
"What happened?" She demanded as she directed them to a hospital cot.
"Ehh...big cat, Category 1...maybe 2, surprise jump, window SMASH, driver scratch!" The man tried to explain with the little bit of English he knew while he moved his arms around wildly.
The young woman removed Will's hand to analyze the wound and spoke to the nurse beside her. "Multiple lacerations, he's losing a lot of blood, he's going to need a transfusion, A-positive." She looked up at Will as the nurse went to retrieve the blood. "Will, can you hear me? Hang in there, you're going to be alright. I'm closing the wound now."
"Sara?" Will mumbled.
Sara removed her right-hand glove and placed her hand over the wound. Suddenly, pieces of glass came out of the wound and fell off to the side. The deep wound began to slowly close up on its own. Although Will was feeling a little fatigued, he felt much better. All the pain had gone away.
The man gaped at the display of what looked like magic to him. "What about...dirty...dirt?" He asked.
"You mean disinfecting the wound? You don't need to worry about that, my ability removes it just like the glass-"
"Ahem." The nurse—Sara's minder, had returned with the blood and gave her a warning look.
At that moment, the warning alarms blared and loud gunfire came from around the outpost. A few giant wildcats suddenly barged into the field hospital. One of them ran straight for Will's group. Will reached for his sidearm as the beast jumped towards them.
Will was startled awake as he sat up from the bed and aimed his Glock at Francis who stood by the door petrified.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Francis held his hands up. "Easy there, buddy. I'm just here to tell you that the sun just finished setting. It's time for us to move."
The alarm on Will's watch chose that moment to beep.
"I guess, I didn't need to risk my life to tell you." Francis quipped, turning around to leave. "Let's hope we won't be doing the same out there."
Will let out a long breath and rose up from the bed. His back was completely drenched in sweat. Donny's bed was already empty and Will found him in the cafeteria with the others having a last minute snack and making friends.
Will entered one of the rooms they were using as a lookout and scanned the grounds with his binoculars. This one had night vision and thermal options on it.
"It was last seen over there." Bill—who had been on lookout, pointed to another building on the complex.
Will switched to thermal and could see a leg sticking out from behind the building.
"It's there, I think it's sleeping." Will said.
"Then we should sneak up on it and take it out while we have the chance."
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"We'll stick to the plan. Unless you're volunteering to sneak up on it?" Will turned to Bill, who shook his head.
The giant being asleep meant that they didn't need to worry as much about whether it had night vision or not. They could spend their time setting up.
"Wouldn't it be better to just leave then?"
It was Will's turn to shake his head. He needed to use the satellite so that wasn't an option for him.
"Ah, my two favourite people, Willy and Billy." Donny announced as he entered the room. "So, are we ready to take down Goliath? No wait, a boss raid makes more sense."
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Will, Donny, and Francis exited the building through an emergency exit. Donny and Francis moved towards the parking lot while Will headed to the jeep to grab his night vision goggles from the back.
Once that was done, he turned to the direction of the giant zero. Will found a good position out in the open but an appropriate distance away and raised his weapon, ready to fire. After waiting for a tense 3 minutes, he finally heard a car alarm on his right, followed shortly by another one from his left.
The giant woke up and immediately ran in the direction of the closer car alarm, ignoring Will—who was standing in the open.
Good he can't see me. Will thought, following it in his sights and taking as long as he needed to line up the perfect shot this time around. It soon slammed into the car on his right, and Will finally had the shot.
Bang!
"AHHHHHHH!" The giant gave out a roar of pain as it lost one of its eyes. It held up its arms to protect its face and ran in the direction of the gunshot.
Will immediately backed up and changed his position, heading in the direction of the other alarm but the giant turned towards him.
Shit, it's still following me. Does it have [Enhanced Hearing]? Or something like my [Seismic Sensitivity]?
Will burst into a sprint, changing directions again, and ran back to the jeep only to discover that someone was already in the driver seat when he arrived. Will was forced to enter the backseat instead.
"What are you doing here?" Will demanded with an undercurrent of fury in his voice.
"I-I..." Bill stuttered and stopped trying to hot wire the vehicle.
"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't blow your brains out right here?" Will shoved his gun in Bill's face.
"Please, my car was trashed...I just want to see my family again." He said in fear.
Donny had opened the passenger door while Bill was answering.
"What's going on here?" He looked at the scene before him with wide eyes. Something about the way Will was staring at Bill terrified him.
Will clicked his tongue and turned his attention back to the giant. It ran up to them and slammed right into the side of the jeep, sending a shockwave through it. Will had braced himself for it, quickly recovering, and rolled the window down slightly.
"Hey, over here!" He called out.
The moment it turned towards him, it got a face full of pepper spray. Will scooted over in his seat and exited from the other side as the giant raged against the jeep, smashing it against the backdoor and cracking the window multiple times.
Will quietly crept around the jeep and aimed his weapon.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
He fired multiple times into its kneecap, causing it to fall onto one knee.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Donny appeared on the other side and shot out the other knee. With it finally down, they had a clear shot at its head.
Bang! Bang!
And the giant fell at last.
"Is he...is Matthew...?" Francis called out from the distance.
"He's dead." Donny confirmed.
Francis soon arrived and did a cross gesture with his hand, saying a few private words for his fallen friend. Bill exited the car as some of the braver ones from the team arrived to check things out.
Donny arrived next to Will and gave him a questioning look. "What happened back in there, bro?"
"He almost got us killed, that's what."
Seeing what Bill had done had brought up memories for him, of people who took advantage of others for shortsighted gains at the cost of lives. It was people like Bill that destroyed the future.
"Didn't he say he just wanted to see his family?"
Will took a deep breath and composed himself down before speaking calmly.
"There are plenty of other cars in the lot for him to take." Will pointed at the parking lot where a few cars had disappeared during the commotion. "Other people had the same idea but he went for our jeep specifically, and at such a crucial moment. He didn't believe we would be able to take it down. Which means we were already dead in his eyes."
"I see..." Donny breathed. "You're...not going to do anything, are you?"
"Forget it." Will waved and went to the trunk to put away his night vision goggles.
As the others began to cover up Matthew's corpse to move to another location, and prepare to repair the generator, Bill approached Will.
"Look, I'm sorry about what happened there. I don't know what got over me. I panicked, and you had a bulletproof car and...I'm sorry, really." Bill held out his hand. "No hard feelings?"
Will stared it at for a moment, Bill becoming visibly uncomfortable before Will shook his hand. "Sure, I'll probably forget about it by tomorrow."
"Ha! Good man!" Bill gave Will a pat on the shoulder and walked away with a weight off his chest.
What Bill did not notice was Will tucking away a tiny spray bottle into his back pocket or the distinctive and musky odor his back now exuded. The odor of civetone was one that cats found attractive. Cats like those Canadian lynxes Will had spotted earlier in the day.