When I woke up again on my bed of rocks the pain struck immediately. My head hurt. My back hurt. My arm hurt. I smelled piss, blood, and vomit through the cold dank air. I sat up slowly, pushing with my bruised back just enough to free my left hand from under myself. I felt the fingers flex as I tested it.
Thank God, at least this one’s fine.
Gingerly, I reached up to my lamp and felt a thick grime on it. I started pressing the white light then stopped myself. I had no idea how long I’d been out, my eyes could be totally soft now. Not wanting another dazing, I moved to the left button and clicked it to turn on the red light.
And glorious wonders! Nothing happened.
I tried again, and nothing happened- Christ was I blind now too?
Okay, obviously my eyes were open. I mean, I could feel how cold they were from Draconis’ damp air. Carefully, not knowing if I had a head wound, I checked the helmet. There was a huge crack across the back and right side. Gently probing the crack with my left hand I found hair and felt scalp, tender, and wet with sweat, but not bleeding.
“Oh, thank God, okay.”
Now all I know about first aid is what I’ve seen on M*A*S*H, but if I wasn’t bleeding it was probably fine right? With one hand, I unclipped the helmet and slowly lifted it off my head.
Thankfully, my head didn’t start gushing anything, but it suddenly felt so heavy, almost waterlogged. I slowly set the helmet between my thighs and gasped- guess they’re fucked too.
Not wanting to lose my helmet in total darkness, I squeezed it between my wet thighs, wincing, and pulled off the velcro lamp. It gave way with an ear-piercing rip, harmonizing with my own rough breathing and filling the cave before the boxwork greedily sucked away the noise. I held the lamp up to where my eyes should be and the buttons still glowed a faint green, partially occluded with dark flakes of either mud or blood.
“Great,” my eyes were open, my head wasn’t split, and I wasn’t blind. What more could I fucking ask for?
I felt all over the lamp and nothing seemed broken. I rehelmeted and slumped back onto my pile of rocks to think. My thoughts came slowly, each word swimming its way through the fog and forming themselves at random like a bowl of alphabet soup.
“B-Batteries...” I muttered. It must be out of battery. I started to open the back to replace it.
Each battery lasts about a dozen hours. I charged mine last night and it usually only takes about three hours for the gang to reach Draconis. If we got here in say four hours I must have been….
I stopped fiddling with the battery. The gang. Oh God. They were in the chimney. If I was this hurt at the base….
I shuddered, sending a convulsion of pain down my bruised back. That’s not a productive thought. I need light. If I don’t have light I can’t help Mark, Mary, or myself. I’ll fix my light and then I’ll go look for them. Yeah. They’re fine. I probably won’t even need to find them. They're probably coming to find me right now. They probably got out when the shaking started. They’re probably up in Bert’s Landing planning how to get me out, maybe they even went for help. They’re fine. They-
They’re fine.