Light in the Night Sky [Levi/Rivaille x OC] (Heavy Editing)

Chapter 13: The Monster Inside Pt.1 [Expedition Pt.5]

I watched the muscles of his face grimace up, wincing in pain as my hand grasped onto his arm, pulling it over my shoulders. Stefan’s entire shirt was now soaked in blood, but I tried to ignore the smothering metallic smell and ushered him along by my side. Every once in a while, the young boy would stumble in the dark and it was up to me to pull him back up beside my tired figure again. His weight was leaning to my side as he weakly propped himself onto me. Instead of leaving behind a trail of white stones to mark our path in the moonlight, we were leaving behind a trail of blood across the dark dirt.

“Stop sulking and move.” I sneered into his ear, tugging him through the dimming shadows as the light of day started crawling back into the horizon again. My hand immediately clasped over Stefan’s mouth as my hearing picked up on light shuffling noises in the nearby bushes. After a while of silence, I began scurrying along forest ground again, picking up the speed as Stefan seemed to be getting worse. His condition doesn’t look too good and I didn't have all the time in the world. 

We all knew that time was never on our side.

A damp feeling was growing a little below my shoulder and I lowered my head where my eyes stared down in the dark, focussing on the wet spot where Stefan’s hand was beneath my cape. My eyes narrowed at his paling face.

“Is your arm bleeding?”

He shook his head immediately, gulping agitatedly at my interrogation. I didn’t buy that distrustful expression of his, and with one hasty move, I stripped his arm from beneath my green cape. My face scowled in horror as the sight of where his wrist was supposed to be had completely gone missing, leaving behind a bloody stump of bones and jagged flesh at the end. Blood was trickling out of the open wounded end where Stefan’s wrist had entirely been hacked off.

“You idiot,” I muttered under my breath, “What happened? Where’s your hand?”

Without waiting for further explanation, I pulled his arm away from my shoulder and grabbed hold of the end of my cape. The slow ripping sound was quite distinct in the quiet hazy morning as the fabric of my green cape tore into shabby rags. I reached my hand out, expecting for the output of his chopped off, now remaining stub of bones and flesh. He was hesitant and kept his wound be his side, shaking his head timidly.

“I don’t want to be a burd-”

“Shut up.” I hissed, pulling his arm towards me and swiftly bound the cloth over and around the bloody end. I seriously wasn’t in the mood to put up with his shit any longer. Stefan bit his lip to stop himself from yelping out in pain as I roughly tried to finish the whole process as quickly as possible. Finally tightening up the knot, I held his stump up to my face and examined my quick fix tourniquet. This should buy us at least another half an hour.

“You should probably tell me if you’re missing a hand.” I breathed, rolling my tired eyes as I pulled his arm over my shoulder again.

He was so stupid.

Stefan awkwardly placed his arm around me again as he listened to the annoyed expression of my tone. Even in this murky lighting where the sunlight was barely visible, my eyes could tell the guilty expression washing over his face. 

“No, seriously. You could have easily bled to death from a missing limb.” My additional clarification seemed to have put him to ease a bit, but he still appeared to be really twitchy around me. 

I sighed and escorted him across the uneven forest lands, watching out for rocks that we could potentially stumble over. Beads of sweat were starting to form on my forehead when I realized that Stefan was getting heavier and heavier, until he pretty much wasn’t moving his legs at all. Stefan had no co-ordination of his arm anymore, whoever who dug the dagger into his shoulder must have popped the entire thing off.