The girls hit the dirt as an invisible Brody flying-tackled them. Never before had they failed to locate an assassin before they'd been shot at. Brody flickered back into existence, blood drenching his right shoulder where Destiny's heart would have been, eyes rolling slightly in pain. Melody stood, firing randomly into the forest. A bullet blew past, missing the now-alert girls completely. Basing her last shot on the directionality of the assassin's previous aim, the bang that resounded from her gun proved to be the last.
"William!"
Destiny had her hands on both sides of the wound, cradling his head in her lap. Injuries were no joke when out in the wilderness. Brody gripped Destiny's arm, pulling himself up.
"You have to cauterize it. I'm a hemophiliac; the wound will bleed until I die. You'll have to find something metal, but there's a lighter in my bag. Hurry, please . . ."
His inability to finish his thought spurred Melody to action. Skidding to a stop next to his bag, she dug frantically for the lighter, almost dropping it when she managed to pull it from a side pocket. Working quickly and efficiently, she created a small fire and placed the blade of her pocket knife in it. Destiny still held Brody, wondering why, as they spent more time together, he seemed familiar. The idea was preposterous and quickly dispelled by alarm as his face took on a new shade of off-white and his eyes rolled into the back of his head. Never had she seen so much blood pouring from a living person; everyone she had watched bleed had been dead before this much could seep out.
"Destiny, hold him tight. The knife is ready.'
A scream broke from his mouth, shocking the two girls into silence. With strange tears in her eyes, Melody manipulated the blade so it would be on his skin the least amount of time but close most of the wound. He grew quiet as she finished the job, a cold sweat breaking out all over his muscular frame. Destiny moved him gently to the ground, eyes wide at the amount of red liquid staining her skin and clothes.
"You okay, Dess?"
"Yeah. It's just, cauterizing it will leave lasting damage there. He may never regain full use of his arm, and the build-up of blood around the area might kill him eventually. It may seem like we saved him, but we actually probably just prolonged his agony."
"I know he's going to die, and I'm willing to bet he does, too. The only thing we can do for him now is help him get better so he can do what he wants with the rest of his life. It's the least we can do for the man that's been protecting us since we were children."
Deep in the unconscious realms that had consumed him, Brody prayed that soon, his sisters would leave him. The recession of the blackness told him they had saved his life, but just being with them created too much danger. Should anyone see him, all the work he'd put into protecting Dess and Mel would be for naught. It truly was ironic, the thought that being their savior required being their only weakness they didn't even know they had.