Bombastic pt 15

Vas surged forward bounding forward at an angle toward the wall. He lept with a grunt using the wall to run along and to give him more distance. He landed hard on the lower landing skidding on the water.

Serena yelped, holding tight around his neck even after they’d landed.

Vas took a breath. “See? Wasn’t so bad! Maybe when you get taller you can jump it yourself.” He said putting the girl down.

“Maybe, when I’m a full grown Hellhound,” she snickered.

“Gunna need to eat lots of protein bars.” Vas joked. The next set of stairs was in better shape but there were a few more flights and it was getting a little iffy. Vas suspected that one of the many bombs that had exploded was in this stairwell, the water from the sprinkler though had long washed away and evidence for him to be able to determine that by eye.

“I’m okay with that,” Serena said, still trying to keep up. “An’ then I can make my own jumps.” She looked over the side, letting her shoulders drop again. “We can get through, right?”

“Sure … I think. Not much choice. Explosions, fire, mountain climbing, and leaping over gaps you think this is going to stop us? Hell no! We come too far to be stopped by a rickety stairwell.” Vas said his tone more confident than he was, giving the crumbling and cracker stairwell a wary look.

“Okay,” Serena said with less confidence and enthusiasm.”We… we’ll be okay.” She scanned the area nervously, as if the walls could collapse at any time.

“You … uh … wanna go first this time?” Vas offered.

“No thanks,” Serena said, shaking her head. “Just in case.”

Vas laughed. “Just … follow my step but after I get to the other side. Dunno if it can take both our weight at the same time.” He said taking a tentative step down the first step.

“I can do that,” Serena agreed. “I’m good at follow the leader.”

Vas put more weight on the stair step, taking another careful step, testing for the right spot to bear his weight. Then the whole thing collapsed out from under him, Vas’s surprised yell was drowned out by the sound of concrete and metal collapsing sending out a thick plum of dust into the air.

“Puppy!” Serena yelped, holding tight to the remaining stairwell. “Are you okay? Please don’t be dead! I’m coming to help you!”

Vas coughed painfully feeling the weight of the rubble on time of him. “Not … cool.” He groaned feeling a dull ache on his side. Vas took a second to just breathe and accept the fact that, yay, he was still alive, take THAT Nate, and two … how much he ached and wanted this damned day to end!

Serena gingerly climbed down the railing, holding tight to where it fastened to the wall, stepping on bits of rubble but never letting go. “It’s okay puppy!” She called again, looking for signs of life.

“Yep … I just … need a minute.” Vas wheezed. “That didn’t turn out the way I hoped.” He admitted from somewhere in the pile.

Serena started to dig though the rubble, looking for signs of him. Everything was heavy, or dusty or sharp.

Vas squirmed under rubble winced reaching out to push the heavy chuck out of his way and gloved hand poking out. “Over here.” He coughed again, trying to wriggle himself closer to the surface.

Serena scurried to the gloved hand, tossing chunks of concrete aside as she tried to dig him out, to get him air. The ground rumbled beneath them.

Vas was, once again coated from head to toe in dust and now had additional cuts and scraped all over him. His side had taken a nasty hit and is slowly bled through his torn shirt. It took a good five minutes with Serena's help to extract himself from his concrete coffin.

Vas made a face feeling exhausted as he inspected, the deep itch making him twitch and the the scraps and cute slowly went from blue to black as it worked on knitting the wounds.

“See? I got you,” Serena soothed, uneasily. “It’ll be okay.”

“I just need a sec.” Vas said wincing and trying to keep still. He was beat up in a lot of places and the itchy feeling was insane at the moment and he genuinely needed to catch his breath. “At least tell me we’re almost at ground level?” He asked watching the glossy black mites seal off the more shallow wounds.

“We’re almost at ground level,” Serena agreed. “Just let the nanomites do their job.” She wiggled her fingers in an insect like manner.

Vas leaned back shoulder’s slumping. “Okay … I'm starting to get tired …” He admitted. “... I’ve done cross-country runs less exhausting than this.”

Serena put his arm around her shoulder. “Just lean on me, I’ll get you out,” she promised. “Hellhounds don't get tired when there's work to do. I can get you out.”

Vas nodded numbly. He let out a breath as he got to his feet, he was feeling some deep pains, by now he was starving and he was slow to recover but he had enough in him that he could still heal up and get them out. Hopefully. He limped along leaning a bit on Serena as they navigated carefully down the pile.