Special Episode: Night Rescue (Part II)
This episode is part of a larger story, Soft Touch. If you haven’t yet, you can go back and read it from the beginning right here.
A soft, fine rain begins to fall around Luca in the dark forest. He registers its quiet patter, even with his heart pounding in his ears.
The drizzly rain blankets the forest floor in thick fog, which catches and diffuses the glow of the moonlight. It gives Luca, Ralph, and Noah enough light to see by. Enough to follow the blue butterfly as it flutters ahead.
Luca sincerely hopes that Ralph and Noah haven’t noticed that they’re following it. It’s actually fine if they don’t know that this is the best plan he could come up with.
But Ralph and Noah are focused on their surroundings, not on the butterfly. They’re scanning the green, wet terrain, sweeping their eyes in slow arcs over the rustling trees and damp forest floor.
Crickets are singing softly around them. Spring is casting its natural green perfume into the cool air, which Luca takes deep breaths of, trying to steady himself out.
He imagines Roger getting back into the truck bay at the fire station, hopping down from the rig, maybe putting away his hydrant wrench - and then reading the text that Luca sent him.
Hey just so you know I’m out on a rescue, Aiden sent me but he isn’t here, I’m with two brothers who are friends of his I guess? We’re going really fast I don’t know exactly where we are I’ll explain later I love you!!❤️
Imagining Roger’s expression is nearly enough to make Luca let out a hysterical laugh. He’s gonna have to pay for sending such a rushed, poorly worded explanation, but it wasn’t on purpose. He’s just really wired up, right now.
He can’t believe he pulled a full shift at the hospital today already. He’s humming with energy again, full of adrenaline.
He and Roger are both experienced enough to be first-out on the serious calls. Their emergency trucks run like hell to get all over Ketterbridge, and to nearby towns or highways when the Ketterbridge hospital would be the closest trauma center to take the patients back to. Luca has seen a lot. He’s crawled into near-pancaked cars to make sure the person inside kept breathing until the firefighters could break them free.
He doesn’t get nervous or worked up too easily.
But these kinds of rescues - the ones where Luca has no idea what he’ll be facing down, what might happen, or what kind of danger he himself might be walking into - they’re a whole other ballpark. He’s not used to it yet.
The showers of nerves in Luca’s chest right now bring him back to his first few days as an EMT. Fidgeting anxiously with his brand-new uniform, falling for all the prank tasks the seasoned guys sent him on, trembling silently the first time he went out on a real call. He’s that kind of nervous.
Especially this time, when there’s no relying on any magical help. And this isn’t a car crash or a hiking accident, or something like that. Whatever this is, it feels like something completely different.
The dark car, carefully parked off the side of the road, where no one would see it… and someone is in life-threatening trouble.
The feeling of danger lighting up Luca’s nerves, he recognizes from calls where the other people in uniform at the scene weren’t firefighters, but cops.
There’s a reason that he, Noah, and Ralph wordlessly agreed on a slow and quiet search of the forest instead of a fast, loud one. Even taking the time crunch into consideration.
They all sensed it.
The feeling makes Luca clutch tight to the strap of his EMT pack.
But Ralph and Noah are with him, so that changes things. That makes him feel immeasurably better.
Luca has the sense that they’re both seasoned vets, just like him - only in a completely different field. What, exactly, Luca isn’t sure. But neither of them seem afraid.
Luca is sure that they’re aware of the nature of the danger, but he doesn’t see a single crack in their calm. At the most, Noah will suddenly draw a little closer to Luca or Ralph when they start to accidentally drift apart. Tightening up their formation, making sure they keep together. But that’s it.
Ralph is sticking close to Luca’s left, Noah to his right. Luca can only imagine what an incongruous picture the three of them make together. Once again, he could almost laugh.
“Doing alright, doc?” Noah murmurs quietly, as Ralph moves off to take a closer look at a mossy hill to their left.
“I - yeah, actually.” Luca casts Noah a grateful look. “I’m really glad you guys are here.”
Noah looks over at Luca, taking him in with his grey eyes. He seems to decide that Luca means it, because he gives him a small, sideways smile before he looks out at the forest again.
The fog swirls around his knees as he walks. Noah spreads his hands at his sides, trails his tattooed fingertips through it, and smiles a little, like it feels nice.
Luca stares at him, in disbelief at how remarkably at home in this situation the guy seems.
He knows that was supposed to be the end of his conversation with Noah, but EMTs are trained to do their thinking out loud. The habit sticks even off of work hours, after a while.
“I can’t believe you two are being so chill about this,” Luca admits, glancing over at Noah, keeping his voice to an almost-whisper. “This - this is fucking ridiculous. You’re both just willing to drop everything and walk right into danger with someone you don’t even know, just because Aiden-?”
“Aiden’s our brother, too,” Noah cuts in quietly.
There’s an expectant pause as Luca waits for further explanation, but apparently that’s it.
“I mean - you don’t have any questions?” he whispers, incredulous. “Aren’t you miles past confused, right now? How are you so fine with how - enigmatic all this shit is?”
Noah shrugs his shoulders, runs a thoughtful hand over his black hair as he weaves his way around a tree.
“Ah… I’m stumbling on some of your vocabulary, there, man,” he says quietly, grey eyes already back to roving the forest. “But I think I get what you’re asking. Can’t speak for Ralph, not with the brain on him, but - yeah, this shit we’re doing right now is mad confusing to me.”
“And that’s just fine with you?”
“Yeah. I guess… things have confused me a lot, since forever. I’m always kinda confused, to tell you the truth. At least a little bit, about something or other.” Noah glances down at the wedding band around his finger, breaking into a warm smile. “You think I know how the fuck I got my wife and husband, dude? No goddamn way. I still have no idea how I pulled that one off.”
Luca lets out a quiet laugh, and Noah does, too. He flashes Luca a bright, relaxed smile, shrugging his shoulders again.
“Figure if things are gonna be confusing anyways, the best tack to take is to just stay open to stuff, accept things as they come. Keep the vibes good, take it easy, have a good time, and things’ll be fine, even if I don’t totally get it.”
Noah pauses, then adds -
“Besides, if I ever need someone to do some hard thinking for me, I’ve got Ralph around.”
Luca stares at Noah, then glances to his left when he suddenly realizes that he hasn’t been the only one listening. Ralph silently rejoined the group, at some point.
He’s biting down on a small smile, carefully keeping his dark green eyes trained on the ground. But Luca can see the immense fraternal affection written all over his face.
Luca gives a moment’s consideration to asking Ralph about his reasons for not asking any questions, but he decides against it. He gets the impression that Ralph prefers to keep his thoughts to himself.
Luca looks forward again, then sucks in a sharp, dismayed breath. The butterfly is gone. He let it out of his sight for too long.
Before he can even process that, Ralph jolts to a stop and throws his arm out in front of Luca.
Luca and Noah freeze where they are, then look over at Ralph in questioning silence. He’s staring off into the trees, but not looking at anything. He’s - listening.
Luca stops to listen, too, and… hears voices.
Shouting, arguing voices, coming from somewhere deep in the woods. Ralph, Noah, and Luca all exchange a sharp glance.
As one, they set off running.
~~~~
Breathlessly racing through the woods, all Luca can see for a few minutes is a blur of moonlight and tree trunks and fog. All he can hear are his own footsteps, his own breaths.
Then Noah whistles softly, pulling Luca and Ralph’s attention to him. He slows down, panting, and nods at something up ahead.
There’s a rising slope in the forest floor before them. A small, wooded hill. The voices sound like they’re coming from the other side.
Ralph signals to slow down and stay low.
The three of them climb as quickly and quietly as possible up the wooded incline, weaving between the rain-wet tree trunks. Noah crests the top first, then instantly drops flat, taking cover behind a naturally-formed wall of leafy green brush. He urgently holds out a hand at Ralph and Luca, then lowers it, mouthing at them.
Get down.
Ralph and Luca finish the climb nearly at a crawl, staying as low as possible until they can join Noah. Luca comes up on his left side, and Ralph on his right, all of them panting to catch their breaths.
The three of them get up on their knees, then lean forward as one to peer through the leaves.
On the other side of the rise, the hill slopes down into a little valley, too narrow for any big trees to grow. It’s mostly open to the night sky, painted in the moonlight’s pale, silvery glow.
Noah set them up with a good vantage point. From here, Luca can clearly see the three men whose voices they heard echoing through the woods.
His breath catches sharply, his eyes widening in alarm.
Two of the men are big, blonde, and built. They’re on their feet, looming threateningly over the third man, who’s down on the ground like they threw him there.
He’s about half the size of the other two, and he’s trying to curl himself up even smaller, trembling in obvious terror. Panting with his whole body. One elbow lifted towards his own face protectively.
He has a scruffy head of dark brown hair, and there’s a tattoo on his shoulder, visible easily thanks to his sleeveless Nirvana shirt, but Luca can’t make out too much more about him from here.
One of the standing guys has a broken piece of pipe, Luca realizes abruptly. It’s grasped in his hand like he’s ready to swing it. Splintered steel, glittering darkly in the light of the moon.
“What the fuck?” Ralph whispers, echoing Luca’s thoughts.
The man with the pipe leans over the guy on the ground, his eyes flashing in anger.
“We want answers, and we’re done fucking around!” he snaps, in a scalding voice. “We’re out in the forest now, you understand what that means? No one’s gonna hear you scream. No one knows where you are. Nobody’s coming for you.”
The guy on the ground lets out a sharp sobbing sound, like he’s already realized that.
“I told y-you, I don’t - d-don’t know anything,” he wails, stammering over every word. “I told you, I’m nobody, I’m nothing, I’m not even really-”
He breaks off and flinches as one of the men seizes his arm, then twists it. Luca draws back in horror, but the man doesn’t break anything, only forces the guy to look down at his own shoulder.
“You got a tattoo marking you as one of the Warlord’s boys, don’t you?” he snarls in the guy’s face, stabbing a finger at his shoulder. “That means you know something.”
At the same time, Noah’s wide eyes snap to Ralph, and Ralph draws his head back sharply, blinking hard and fast.
Luca watches in bewilderment as Noah and Ralph stare at each other, having some kind of silent conversation. Ralph shakes his head, looking just as taken aback and confused as Noah. Noah makes a face at him like - are you sure?
Ralph nods immediately, earnestly, with certainty in his eyes.
“I’ve never seen that kid before in my life,” he murmurs, bewildered.
Luca takes a closer look at the guy on the forest floor, realizing with an unhappy lurch that he is just a kid. Just out of high school, at the most.
And his nose is bleeding. Luca didn’t see it before, not until the kid ran his hand over his face and it came away red.
“What’s the situation, here, Luca?” Ralph asks softly.
“I’m - not sure.” Luca squints at the kid, leaning as far forward as he can while keeping hidden. “I don’t know why his nose is bleeding, and I can’t exactly get his vitals from here, but I’m not seeing the signs of any severe traumatic event, not physically speaking…”
Luca fades off, going cold inside. Realizing that maybe this means it hasn’t happened yet. That maybe it’s about to happen. Noah did get them here really fast, probably in record time…
“-what you can tell us about the Warlord,” one of the tall, burly guys is saying angrily, glaring down at the shivering kid. “His plans, where he lives, what he-”
“I don’t know, I don’t know!” the kid blurts out desperately, panicked tears running down his face. “I’ve never m-met him! I heard he has - wolves, lots of wolves!”
“Something real, for fuck’s sake,” snaps the man with the pipe, as the other one throws his head back in frustration. “Are you really gonna die for the Warlord, instead of just telling us what we want to know?”
The kid lets out another sob, this one sounding completely defeated, helpless. “It’s l-looking like that, isn’t it?”
“I swear, Noosh,” Ralph murmurs softly to Noah, who’s staring at him with searching eyes. “I have no idea who he is.”
Noah absorbs that for a moment, then gives Ralph a slow nod. He turns his grey gaze back to the two towering men shouting in the face of the terrified kid, then makes a face at Ralph.
“Well - either way, fuck this, right?” he asks softly.
Ralph lets out a heavy, aggrieved sigh, but something tells Luca he’s already in agreement.
“God fucking damnit,” Ralph groans, carefully and quietly getting to his feet, staying low. “I said hanging around with Keane is making me too soft, didn’t I? That guy down there isn’t even one of mine, and here I am - Noah, what are you doing?”
“What are either of you doing?” Luca asks, beyond bewildered.
Noah is getting up, too, knotting his bun a little tighter. He flashes Ralph a look like he just said something unbelievably stupid. “I’m coming with you? Duh.”
“No, man,” Ralph protests, softly and earnestly, his dark green eyes filling with alarm. “You’re out of the game! You’ve got a wife and a husband and a baby, I’m not snagging you up in this type of shit anymore, no goddamn way-”
“You’re dumb as hell if you think I’m gonna let you go in alone,” Noah whispers back heatedly. “And you know I make my own decisions, these days. You promised to stop trying to make them for me.”
“I-” Ralph begins, then stops abruptly.
He runs a frustrated hand over his blonde hair, thinking hard, then curses under his breath. He looks like he doesn’t want to let this happen, but there’s also obvious, deep affection in his eyes.
He bites his lip, then cuffs Noah’s arm. “Still got the hooligan in you, Noosh?”
Noah cracks a grin, and this one - it’s different from the ones that have come before it tonight.
The expression on Noah’s face is wild, lightning-eyed, throwing off sparks. Dangerous, humming energy is radiating from him all of a sudden. He’s nearly rocking on his heels in excitement, in unleashed energy.
“Never goes away, man,” he answers, saluting Ralph with two fingers to his forehead.
Ralph tries to fight back a big grin of his own, but doesn’t quite manage it. He rolls his eyes as he pulls his hood back up over his hair, lets out a soft snicker of laughter.
Luca is glancing back and forth between him and Noah, completely lost. “I’m sorry, what’s-?”
“Stay here, doc,” Noah murmurs quietly, getting to his feet. “Let us take this part.”
“No, what?” Luca sputters, his growing alarm showing itself in his strangled words. “They have a pipe and who knows what else, we don’t have anything - you guys, no!”
“Don’t judge us on this, yeah?” Ralph calls back softly, walking backwards for a moment to talk to Luca. “It’s all for show.”
“No, no no no, don’t-”
Luca stops and lapses into panicked silence, breathing hard. Noah and Ralph have already melted into the darkness on either side of him, headed in opposite directions. Moving so silently into the shadows that Luca has completely lost sight of them by the next time he blinks.
He stares after them in dismay for a long moment, then twists to look down at the men at the bottom of the hill, his heart racing.
There’s no sign of movement in the trees, or in the fog at the edges of the clearing. Nothing to indicate that Noah and Ralph are out there somewhere, converging on the valley.
“Jesus Christ,” one of the blonde men is saying, looking down at the sobbing kid in obvious contempt. “Are we sure we got this right? I heard the Warlord’s boys are the hardest, craziest bastards of them all, so what is this shit?”
“Maybe this is what they look like right before they break,” the other one answers, staring at the kid with uneasy eyes. “Knowing what it means to sell out the Warlord.”
Both of the men seem deeply unsettled by that idea. They glance at each other, shifting from foot to foot. The one with the piece of pipe gives himself a shake, a burst of anger taking over his face.
“Alright, you know what?” He takes a step towards the kid, his grasp tightening on the pipe. “Fuck this. I’m done waiting ar-”
“He’ll save me!” the kid blurts out desperately, his words wracked with terrified shivers. “The Warlord - you better let me go, or he’ll c-come g-get me!”
The man with the pipe lets out a harsh, mocking laugh. “Maybe you didn’t hear me, kid. The Warlord can’t save y-”
He breaks off abruptly as, somewhere in the woods, someone starts laughing.
Noah, Luca realizes instantly.
But it doesn’t sound like that warm, sweet laugh that Luca has heard all night.
This one sounds wild, uncontrollable, unhinged - maniacal. It sounds like the way a man would laugh as he sprinted around smashing everything to pieces and ripping things apart for the pure fun of it. Side-splitting, breath-stealing laughter.
It bounces off of the wall of trees that encircles the moonlit clearing. Echoes off of the walls of the little valley, so that it seems to come from everywhere at once.
It completely unnerves the two men, who both whip around to stare at the trees, trying to pinpoint the source. The kid on the ground freezes, panting hard, his sobs falling silent. He stares around with wide, bewildered eyes, blinking back tears.
“You looking for the Warlord’s boys?” calls out a voice from the trees, in a cheerful, sing-song kind of way. “Say your prayers, ‘cause youuuuu found ‘em!”
The color instantly vanishes from the faces of the two goons. Their expressions make them look like two people who just realized the parachute strings are cut, while already falling through open air.
One of them takes a few stumbling steps back, rushing to get out of the way as his buddy spins around with the steel pipe defensively raised up, nearly taking him out with it. He staggers backwards towards the treeline, cursing violently, getting closer and closer to the forest.
An arm flashes out from the trees and wraps around his neck, wrenching him backwards.
The guy doesn’t even have time to make a noise before he vanishes into the darkness in a headlock. Just a soft, choked-off gasp, and his hand reaching out for help.
His friend freezes, staring open-mouthed at the place where he disappeared. Then he turns on his heel and runs for the opposite edge of the clearing, going at an all-out sprint.
Right as he reaches the treeline, Noah swings himself out from behind one of the tree trunks, catching him around the stomach. The force of Noah’s momentum sends both of them spinning around the tree, the pipe tumbling to the ground.
Noah keeps his grip on the tree, but lets go of the guy as they come out of the turn, throwing him with enough force to practically boomerang him right back to where he was in the clearing. At the same time, in perfect sync, Ralph shoves the guy he was holding out of the trees, so that he staggers back into the clearing, too.
The two men smack right into each other, hit hard, and go down in a tangle. They try to spring back up, but they’re both too dazed to get to their feet. The most they can do is scramble to sit upright on the forest floor, gasping.
Just like that, Ralph and Noah are the only two still standing.
Luca is watching with his hands pressed over his mouth, his eyes just as wide as the kid’s.
Noah is laughing again as he bounds across the clearing to the two fallen men, a wide grin on his face. He’s got the steel pipe resting on his shoulder like a rifle. He gives it a quick flip in the air as he gets closer, catches it, and pretends to take a swing at one of the men. Both of them flinch and drop their heads, gasping again.
“You guys wanna surrender right now?” Noah asks cheerfully, stopping in front of them. “Or d’you wanna wait until later, when you have to communicate it to us by blinking, since that’ll be the only way left?”
Both of the men hold up their hands to indicate surrender, their eyes darting to Ralph as his lighter flares brightly. He’s at the far end of the clearing, slowly lighting a cigarette. He’s standing half in the fog, and it curls around him in slow movement with the wind. With the shadows that always seem to find him.
The kid is staring at Ralph and Noah in open-mouthed, wide-eyed silence, his shock showing clearly all over his bloodied face.
“C’mere,” Ralph says suddenly, beckoning to the kid with a toss of his head. “Let me look at you.”
The kid stays frozen for a second, panting, then slowly, shakily gets to his feet. He staggers over to Ralph, blinking hard, looking too terrified to say anything.
Ralph runs his eyes over the kid’s face, the crimson mess of the nosebleed. Then he slowly, slowly turns his blazing, narrowed eyes back to the two men on the ground.
Luca can’t really see his expression from here, but both of the men flinch sharply, visibly shivering.
“Who do you work for?” Ralph asks quietly. “Who sent you to do this?”
No answer from the two goons. Both of them hesitate, breathing hard.
Ralph waits for a few seconds, then moves without warning. All of a sudden he’s striding across the clearing like a furious shadow. He drops his cigarette as he goes, stomps on it without looking down.
Before Luca can blink, he’s stopped in front of the nearest goon, and he has him by a fistful of his shirt. The guy flinches again as Ralph glares directly down into his eyes.
“You two roughed up a kid,” Ralph hisses, in a seething, icy voice, cold enough to burn. “I don’t have much patience for that type of shit. So tell me which goddamn outfit you’re with, or start planning your fucking funeral service.”
“I would answer, if I was you,” Noah laughs, grinning maniacally, then takes another practice swing with the steel pipe. “Or don’t, that’ll be twice as fun for me! I could use some batting practice.”
“Which outfit?” Ralph snaps again, staring down the goon with murderous eyes.
“Rig-” stammers the man, choking on his words. “Rig-”
His voice is so fractured and panicked that Luca can’t hear him. But Ralph can, apparently, because he straightens up, arching an eyebrow.
“Rigor Mortis?” he asks, and the man on the ground nods, wincing deeply as he does it.
Ralph tilts his head slightly to the side, his angry eyes narrowed. “And did Morty send his dogs out to play in the Warlord’s territory, or did you two come up with this plan all by your brilliant selves?”
The other man makes a sudden lurch to the side, tries to make a run for it.
Noah catches his arm, laughing as he shoves him back into place. “Nope, I don’t think so!”
“Answer the fucking question,” snaps Ralph, who hasn’t broken his gaze away from the man he’s holding up by his shirt.
“We - we came on our own,” gasps the guy he’s talking to. “Heard that one of the Warlord’s boys was walking around in plain sight, marked with a tattoo and everything-”
“Yeah, congratulations on falling for the most obvious trap of all time,” Ralph cuts in, tossing his head at the shivering kid. “And coming alone instead of running it up the chain of command? You two are some real geniuses.”
“It’s called taking initiative,” snaps the guy, his face reddening.
“It’s called fucking up badly,” Noah laughs, slinging the pipe onto his shoulder again. “Earning yourself a shallow grave. Ending up compost.”
“How did you even find us?” spits the man who tried to escape. “Out here? How the fuck?”
Ralph’s gaze slowly moves to him. He breaks into a slow, dark smile, somehow ten times more terrifying than the angry expression.
“The Warlord has eyes everywhere,” he answers quietly, stating it like a simple fact. “Everywhere.”
Both men stare at him in blank terror, frozen and silent.
“If you ever set foot in his territory again,” Ralph continues, in that perfectly calm, matter-of-fact voice, “He’ll feed you to the wolves. Piece by piece.”
“Wonder if they’re hungry right now?” Noah asks, in a conversational way.
“No,” Ralph says, straightening up with that dark smile on his face. “They’ve already eaten, tonight.”
Another visible shudder goes over the two men on the ground. One of them is starting to hyperventilate.
“But maybe they still feel like a hunt.” Ralph turns his eyes to Noah. “What d’you think? Could either of these two outrun a wolf?”
Noah cracks a devilish grin, rocking on his feet in excitement. “Let’s find out!”
“What?” stammers one of the men, recoiling. “There’s no fucking wolves in these woods!”
Ralph arches an eyebrow, still smiling. “You sure about that? I bet there are. I bet they’re close.”
Luca, seeing an opening to help, quickly and loudly snaps one of the branches of the bush he’s hiding behind. Both of the Rigor Mortis men twist around to stare at it, rising panic in their eyes.
“Better get running, boys, or you’ll see what we mean!” Noah laughs, then laughs harder as both men instantly scramble to their feet, practically shoving each other down in their rush to get away. “Faster, faster!”
The two men flee for the treeline like their lives depend on it. Noah laughs as they go, cups his hands around his mouth, and lets out a wolf howl. It echoes around the clearing, chasing the men like a phantom as they sprint pell-mell into the darkness.
Ralph watches until they’re out of sight, then glances at Noah, rolls his eyes. “Morty’s gonna kill them himself when he hears about this.”
Luca stares at Ralph in amazement, stunned by the way he sounds like himself again. Just like that. That harsh, arctic-cold voice that cut like a razorblade is gone.
“Yeah, right,” Noah snickers, and his voice is back to normal, too. Warm and easy again. “As if you weren’t being nice. Look at you, letting them get away unscathed.”
Luca drops his head into his hands. He’s so lost about what just happened, but he almost doesn’t care what any of it means. The relief spreading through him is overwhelming.
“That reminded me, I need to get home and feed Tycho,” Ralph mutters, checking his watch. He casts one more glare in the direction the Rigor Mortis men ran off in, then turns to the kid, gives him a nod. “You alright, man?”
The kid is standing there in shocked silence, his mouth slightly open, his fingers pressed to his lips.
“You - you guys are really with the Warlord?” he sputters softly, his eyes enormous.
“Clearly you’re not,” Ralph says in exasperation, as Luca pulls out his phone to text Jamie. “Who even are you?”
We did it, he’s okay! Luca types out, giddy with relief. He hits send, then gets to his knees, slipping his EMT pack back onto his shoulder.
“Jesus Christ, you guys are scary!” he calls out as he rushes down the hill, beaming at Ralph and Noah. “What the fuck! That was amazing!”
“Thanks for supplying some special effects, doc,” Noah laughs, as Luca stops beside him and clasps his shoulder happily.
“Hey, are you listening?” Ralph asks the kid, snapping his fingers in front of his face. “Who are you?”
“I’m - nobody,” the kid says, still breathing hard. He looks dizzy. “I just - I just - thought girls might think it was cool, you know, if I worked for the Warlord? Or at least if they thought I did? I always thought that would be cool, anyways. My dad was a cop, so I’d heard all about the Warlord, always thought it would be dope to, um - so I - got the tattoo, designed it myself, but I never actually thought anybody would notice - I mean, the girls haven’t, so-”
“Oh, my god,” Ralph cuts in, his voice full of disbelief. Noah presses a hand over his mouth behind him, suppressing a startled laugh. “Are you fucking serious, right now?”
“Yeah,” the kid mumbles, his eyes closing. “I - I…”
Luca looks down at his phone as it lights up, then freezes when he sees the text from Jamie.
No, Luca! Aiden says he’s still in trouble, he’s still not safe!!!
Luca looks up sharply, his smile instantly dropping away.
The kid is swaying on his feet, his eyes closed. Luca’s eyes scan him for an explanation, and land on a small, silver bracelet chained around his wrist. A red emergency symbol is printed onto the little silver plate at the front.
The kid suddenly drops to sit down on the forest floor, shuddering with his whole body. Ralph and Noah take a startled step back as he gasps in a few breaths, then convulses.
Luca dives for the kid as he falls flat onto his back. He catches the kid’s head just before it can smack into the mossy stone beneath him.
He lets out a gasp of relief, even as a flash of pain moves through his own fingers.
The kid is twitching and shivering and jolting sharply in Luca’s hands, slamming Luca’s knuckles into the rock with his head. His eyelashes are fluttering, his fingers curling up.
Luca looks up urgently at Ralph and Noah, who are watching in panicked, shocked silence. “I need something soft, please!”
Ralph unzips his hoodie and thrusts it into Luca’s hands. Luca tucks it into a cushion beneath the kid’s head, then carefully rolls him onto his side, moving him into the recovery position.
“What the fuck is happening, Luca?” Ralph sputters, his green eyes very wide. “Should we call an ambulance?”
“Nope, it’s okay!” Luca answers quickly, keeping his eyes on his watch. “That would be very expensive for him, and he doesn’t need one!”
“But, I mean,” Noah stammers, his fingertips pressed to his jawline, “Look at him, what’s-? Should we hold him down? He’s gonna hurt himself-”
“Nope, most definitely do not do that,” Luca says firmly, counting silently in time with his watch. He nods at the kid’s bracelet. “He’s epileptic, that’s all. He’ll be okay!”
His eyes briefly dart to his phone, which he dropped when the kid started to fall. It’s on the grass beside him, and it just lit up again.
Luca reads the text from Jamie very fast, then breaks into a huge, relieved smile.
YES! DID IT! AIDEN CONFIRMED :)
“Fuck yes!” Luca looks up at Ralph and Noah, beaming at their startled, bewildered faces. “We did it! We fucking did it!”
He lets out a broken, relieved laugh. He’s lost track of the time on his watch, but if Aiden says the kid is okay, that means the seizure shouldn’t last beyond five minutes.
As if in confirmation, the kid slowly starts to go still, aside from the hard breaths he’s taking. The shudders and convulsions draw to a slow stop.
The kid looks dazed, but after a long moment he rolls onto his back and takes a deep breath, his eyes tiredly blinking open.
“Hey, there,” Luca says very gently, pressing his fingers beneath the kid’s jaw, searching for his pulse. “What’s your name?”
“Tom,” the kid mumbles hoarsely, rubbing his eyes with shaky hands. “What’s…?”
“You had a seizure, Tom, but you’re alright.” Luca catches his hand, helps him as he starts to sit himself up. “Did you forget to take your epilepsy medication today, by any chance?”
“Was - gonna take it when I got home,” he mumbles quietly, pushing a hand through his dark brown hair. “They - caught me - before I got there.”
His pupils are reacting as they should to the moonlight, and the coherent answers he’s providing send another wave of relief through Luca. The bruises blossoming on his face aren’t going to be pretty, but there are no signs of fractures, or a hit that could’ve concussed him.
“Do you remember where you are, Tom?” Luca digs around in his EMT bag as he speaks, looking for something to clean up the kid’s nose. “You remember what happened?”
“Yeah... I… yeah.” Tom’s eyes light up, and he breaks into a huge, bloody-nosed grin, his eyes going right to Ralph and Noah. “The Warlord - sent his guys - to save me. To save me. Holy shit! I’m nobody, what the fuck-?”
Noah cuts him off with a groan. “Stop saying that shit about being a nobody, man! You’re gonna piss me off, and I don’t even know who to be pissed off at about it!”
“You’re gonna have to get that tattoo blacked out, you hear me?” Ralph growls, swiping an exasperated hand at Tom as he staggers to his feet with Noah’s help. “That’s an order directly from the Warlord.”
“An order directly from the Warlord?” Tom repeats, his eyes very wide. “Really?”
“Yes, really, Tommy Gun.” Ralph swats his shoulder, glowering at him. “Don’t you fucking argue with me. That’s as good as arguing with the Warlord.”
Tom swipes some blood from his face, then closes his eyes, grinning happily. “This is the best day of my life.”
Ralph stares at him blankly, then turns his gaze to Noah in disbelief. Noah drops his head and runs a hand over his mouth, clearly trying to hide a laugh.
“Noosh,” Ralph growls, staring at him.
“I think it’s kinda cute, man,” he laughs, then dodges when Ralph lets out a sharp sound of frustration and throws an elbow his way.
Now Luca is trying not to laugh, too. Tom slowly twists around to look at him, blinking hard.
“But how - how did you guys know…?” he begins, then stops and closes his eyes, swaying a little on his feet. “God, I’m so tired…”
“We need to get him home,” Luca tells the others, supporting Tom with an arm around his back. “What’s your address, Tom?”
“I live in Greenrock-” he mumbles.
“Fucking goddamnit,” Noah groans, tipping his head back.
“-but I’ve got a friend who lives pretty close to here who I can crash with. Farm off the highway, like twenty minutes away, I think…”
“That’s more like it.” Ralph slips his arm beneath Tom’s, taking some of his weight from Luca as they set off for the edge of the clearing. “That’s still plenty of time for you to forget our faces, which is exactly what you’re gonna do.”
“I lost my glasses,” Tom mumbles, still smiling happily. “S’all a little blurry. But I’m not gonna forget.”
“Glad you’re having fun, man,” Noah laughs, shaking his head in disbelief. “Jesus Christ.”
Ralph looks ready to argue with Tom about how much he’s allowed to remember, but his expression lapses into something half-exasperated, half like a smile. He shakes his head and keeps quiet. Lets it go.
They all walk in silence for a few minutes, navigating Tom over the brambles and onto a smoother pathway of forest floor. Noah takes over helping Ralph support Tom so that Luca can check the GPS on his phone, make sure they’re headed towards the road.
They are. Luca leads the way, taking long, deep breaths.
He’s beyond exhausted, beyond confused about what just happened. But he’s also elated, overcome completely with warm relief. Happy to know that he’s headed back to Roger, who must be worried. Grateful beyond words that Noah and Ralph were here, because he has no idea how things would have gone without them. Grateful, too, that they didn’t ask him too many questions he couldn’t answer.
“He knew,” Noah murmurs to Ralph, very softly, from behind Luca. “Aiden knew. Just like he did back then.”
“Yeah,” Ralph murmurs back, just as quietly. “I know.”
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