Stitches
It wasn't the first time she had ever been injured, Aisha had a map of scars across her athletic frame that heralded to that. But the deep gash stretching across her back was more painful than any other wound she cared to remember. The guy who had cut her had been good, but the long knife he;d been using was obviously not his weapon of choice, because for all his skill, he'd put more work into shallow cuts rather than crippling stabs.
Clay and Jensen helped her limp painfully through the door of the motel room they'd been hiding in for the past few days. Each step she took sent lighting shocks of pain through her back and up into her skull and she bit her lip hard enough to draw blood as she tripped over something in the dark and nearly blacked out from the pain.
“There you go,” Clay said helping her lay on her front on the hard, musty bed. “We'll get you patched up in no time.” He turned back to look at something over his shoulder, “Cougs! Get your bag and get in here.”
Cougar walked in through the door, his gun slung over one shoulder, a small black duffel bag in the other hand. He set the gun next to the bed and the bag on a chair Pooch had dragged next to it. “Make sure Jensen lays down. No sleeping.” Cougar told Pooch as he set the bag on the chair and unzipped it.
A large mirror took up the entire wall at the head of the bed, and another covered the ceiling, so it was easy enough to track what everyone in the room was doing even from her prone position, and so she watched the team's 'doctor' dig through the black bag looking for any of the tools he needed. A box of sterile gloves, a package of gauze pads, medical tape, a large bottle of hand sanitizer and a slim silver case which she knew he used to hold several spools of heavy dark thread and two long thin needles.
He tied back his hair carefully before using the hand cleaner and donning a pair of the rubber gloves. He carefully peeled back the wads of shredded cloth that covered the wound, his face never changing expression as he inspected the damage. “Going to need twenty stitches. Maybe more.”
“Fuck.” Aisha said, burying her face in her arms, twenty stitches was going to be hell to sit still for. She already knew that the injury was probably too long for any sort of local anesthetic the sniper might have managed to get his hands on. A gloved hand offered her the rubber teething toy that Jensen had used to bite down on for that last time he'd needed to be stitched back together and she took it, setting it between her teeth without a fuss as she watched him work in the mirror.
Clay watched for a moment while the Spaniard worked, cleaning the would carefully and threading one of his long needles. “I'll be back once I finish checking on Jensen. He got knocked pretty hard by that last guy.” He shot Cougar an unreadable look before leaving.
“Just my luck, I get stuck with nothing to distract me.” Aisha muttered just as Cougar dug the needle through her skin and pulled.
“Bite down. I won't sew your tongue together.” Cougar told her shortly as she flinched against the pain. He was slow and methodical as he worked, each stitch exactly the same distance apart, and exactly the same size. He never rushed, even when she nearly screamed when the thread stuck in her skin.
She blinked. Her back was numb and cool, she could feel heavy bandages covering the wound and binding them tightly, wrapped around her middle. Cougar stood in the bathroom, his hair free again, washing his hands, all of his equipment packed back into the bag. Apparently she had passed out at some point and was just now coming to.
The Spaniard looked over and seeing her awake, dried his hands and filled a glass with water from the tap, and set it and a bottle of Tylenol on the bedside table. “You probably hurt your jaw. You tried too hard not to scream.” He told her.
“How long have I been out?” She asked, reaching for the water.
“Less than an hour.” He told her. Picking up his bag and weapon, he left the room without another word to her, although he did speak briefly to Clay who entered as he was packing up.
“I didn't know Cougar was trained to treat these kind of injuries.” She said as Clay came to sit down next to her on the bed.
“We all are, but Cougar's the best of us. Bastard actually went to med school and everything.” Clay informed her, settling with his back to wall and setting her head on his lap.
Aisha frowned. “I never saw that in his file.”
“You probably wouldn't. He joined the military so he could go to college, but some...things... happened and he ended up in special forces, and now he's one of the best damn snipers in the world. Army didn't care how well he can sew people back together, just how well he can kill them. Shame really.”
“So he never graduated?”
“He did, I think he's got a doctorate and everything. Not much use for something like that in the field, unless of course everyone gets shot to hell. Which is always best avoided.”
“I see.” Aisha settled down, clamping down on the reflex to break Clay's hand as he massaged her scalp instead allowing it to lull her back into sleep.
-*-
The next room over, Jensen sat upright against the headboard of the bed he and Cougar shared while the Spaniard carefully tied off the three tiny stitched holding the deep cut along his hairline closed. The blond man winced slightly as the knot was tugged carefully into place. A large band aid covered the stitches and he sighed, settling back while Cougar cleaned the needle and packed away his kit for the second time that evening. Two Ibuprofen and an icepack later, and he was nursing one mother of a headache but none the worse for wear.
“Aisha alright?” Jensen asked, his words slightly mumbled from exhaustion and his injury. He felt his partner nod once, slowly.
“Thats good.” Jensen said settling back and letting his eye droop slowly closed. “Don't need, any more casualties.”
Cougar was silent as he gazed down at the sleeping man. He wrapped his arm around Jensen's shoulder and rested his cheek on top of his head. He had considered harming Aisha in some way, petty maybe, but he felt that overwhelming urge to show her what happened to people who hurt the ones he cared about. It had actually been the mental image of his partner's disapproval that had stopped him from carrying anything out. He doubted anyone of the team actually realized how easy it would have been for him to cripple the woman permanently and blame it on the injury. But breaking the kind of trust Jensen and Clay had placed in him; he couldn't do that. Not even to her.
-*-
The next morning, the team packed up and made ready to move on to the next town, more intel on Max filtering through Jensen's web crawlers, pointing towards Santa Fe. Pooch had gone out earlier that morning, and Aisha, though still in pain, was mobile enough to be able to assist in packing up everyone's gear.
Once in the stolen mini van she lay across the wide middle seat, a pillow Jensen stole from one of the motel rooms under her arms, dressed in one of Clay's loose shirts. Cougar and Jensen sat side by side in the back, while Clay was up front with Pooch. She watched Cougar as he helped Jensen get settled in the back, but he offered her a long cold look before climbing in himself.
If you harm any of them again; you'll be dead the next time I get my hands on you.
The cold blooded woman shivered slightly before closing her eyes.