Fight, Flight, or Freeze: The Healer's Story
Chapter 216: No Limbs Today!

Chapter 216: No Limbs Today!

I was happy and grateful to be here with Rip. There was no way I was going to be able to find my way out of these woods without him.

Everything looked the same, and while things were much brighter than they were at the Tree of Life, it was now easy to tell that the sun was just beginning its descent.

"Is there anything in these woods that can hurt us?" asked Rip as he continued to run. But while he might know where we were going, that didn’t mean that we were going to be there before night came. Or, at least, that was why I assumed he asked the question.

"There are lots of things in these woods that can hurt us, but none of them are," I assured him. It was weird to me just knowing the answer to any question asked. I didn’t have to think about it; I didn’t have to stress or worry. The answer was on my lips the second the other person had finished speaking.

And while I thought that it might be connected to my newly acquired spirit power, the only thing that I knew about oracles and prophecies came from the movie 300. And I didn’t think that was going to be a solid basis on which to assume anything was true.

I certainly wasn’t dancing naked in smoke every time I gave an answer. Half of the time, I wasn’t even paying attention to the question.

The caw of a crow broke me out of my thoughts, and I looked up into the trees.

The thing was massive, bigger than any crow that I had ever seen before, and it was staring down at me like it knew me.

Then it hit. "Sorry! No limbs today," I called out to it, confident that it was the same crow that was in the parking lot of the hospital. Maybe it had remembered that I had fed it once and came back looking for me.

As if displeased by my words, the crow called out again and took to the skies, flying back in the direction we were going.

Within seconds, I heard the sound of pounding feet coming at us.

"Get down," murmured Rip, pressing my face back into the corner of his neck. "If you don’t want people to see your eyes, just stay like this."

I nodded my head, but he never took his hand off the back of it.

Coming to a stop, he waited to see who approached.

"Found them!" grunted Fan Teng Fei as he came to a stop in front of us. I could hear him panting and the jingle of something metal near him. Then came the caw. "Sorry, your Highness, you found them," he grunted, clearly talking to someone.

I wanted to turn around to see what was going on, but Rip’s words echoed in my head.

"Finally!" sighed Bai Long Qiang as yet another set of footsteps came closer. "What the fuck was that?"

"Nothing you need to worry about," grunted Rip, and I could feel the tension rise in his shoulders. We hadn’t figured out an excuse yet, and I think Rip just came to the same conclusion. "You look like you wear sunglasses at night. Where are they?"

There was a bark of laughter as yet another person came to a stop around us. "He’s got you there," laughed Si Dong, but I could hear the strain in his voice as he spoke.

Now I felt bad about worrying them.

"Why do you need them?" asked Bai Long Qiang, sounding as defensive as ever. He might have accepted the fact that the guys were looking at me differently, but Rip still rubbed him the wrong way for some reason.

"I don’t," answered Rip. "She does."

I reached my hand around so I was waving to everyone, but my face was still firmly planted against Rip.

"It is going to look a lot weirder for her to be wearing sunglasses when the sun has gone down versus whatever it is that you are trying to hide," offered Si Dong, and I heard someone walk around Rip, only to stop behind him. "Let me see what you are hiding, Cuddles. Maybe I can come up with some idea."

I lifted my head so that only my eyes were peering over Rip’s shoulders.

"Beautiful," whispered Si Dong, so low that only Rip and I could hear him. "But it is so beautiful that I don’t want to share with anyone else." A bit louder, he leaned to the side and looked at Bai Long Qiang. "The Healer needs glasses."

Within seconds, Si Dong handed me a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses. "Nothing screams military prick quite like aviators," laughed Si Dong as he watched me put them on.

"I thought those were only for the Air Force," I smiled back. All of the guys were in the ground forces, but that didn’t mean that there wasn’t some laughter at the expense of the other branches.

"Or those that are just wannabes," chuckled Cheng Bo Jing. I hadn’t even heard him arrive yet. "But we need to get back to the others. They are still a good hour away from here, and it is getting dark fast."

I tried to nod my head in agreement, but the overly large sunglasses threatened to come off of their perch. I could see the faint outline of the guys through the lenses, but everything was that much darker with them on.

"We’ll figure out a better solution," assured Si Dong, remaining by my side as Bai Long Qiang and Cheng Bo Jing lead the way. Hearing two sets of footprints behind us, I turned to look over to see Fan Teng Fei and Ye Yao Zu bringing up the rear.

"The Doc thought it best to stay at camp to run any interference," said Ye Yao Zu, answering my unasked question. "We never told anyone that you two weren’t with us. We just said that you were tired and sleeping in your tent."

"Won’t they figure it out when we walk through camp?" I asked, somewhat confused. Was it really that big of a deal that we went off on our own?

"No, we put our tents at the back, closest to the forest. We’ll be fine."

"And the reason why we are being all sneaky?" I asked, still somewhat concerned about that fact.