"Shh," you say, draping your mess of a hand over his back. "S'okay. We're goin' inna 'copter. T'th h'spital. S'okay." You fix the medic with pleading eyes. "He saved me. Brought me th'phone. N' covered me up. He's a good boy." She looks a bit more reassuring than confused or scared now, at least. "Keep him calm now, we need to strap you both down." "No..." Dad says, "You're going up to the chopper, kiddo, and it's windy. Just gotta put up with it. I'll be right behind you." He puts a hand on the medic's shoulder. "Corporal Daily will be with you the whole time. What's your first name, Corporal?" "Becca, sir." "Becca, this is my son Bel, and his furry hero bro Rusty." "Hi Bel," the medic says softly, smiling a little. "Hi, Rusty." "Hi, Becca," you mumble, petting Erskin's head contentedly. Something they gave you is making you less panicky already. Maybe just the oxygen. Your heart's steadying.
You're not happy when Alex assists in putting leads and straps and such on you. You are significantly less happy when it lifts off the ground. You howl. A lot. You're a werewolf, not some fucking flying pig, this is awful.
You pet him and mumble sympathetic noises, and Corporal Becca keeps up a reassuring monologue of what's going on and where everyone is while you're winched up to the rescue chopper. Then there are more medics inside, and you have to pet Erskin down all over again. "Bro, babe, buddy, I need you to chill," you say urgently. "Let them work. I need them to work. I need blood and antibiotics and shit. Please, settle the fuck down." It hurts your hands to pet him, but it's better than him biting some poor nursing corps airman, he'd feel terrible about that later. Someone's cutting your shirt off, and there's talk of gunshot wounds and internal organs and possible frostbite. Then Dad is there again, and he's got something purple and jingly. "I found Rusty's collar," he says, putting a warm hand on your wrist where it's draped across Erskin's back. "Your stuff was everywhere, but I found it." He moves -- slowly, awaiting permission -- to put it on Erskin. "Don't want anyone else mistaking you for a wolf, do we, pup?"
You whimper and let him put the collar on, then get painfully to your feet as the leads are undone. You have to let the humans work, and they can't do that if you're off your head, and Bel can't get better if he's spending all his time calming you down. At some point you need to just gamble on there being no more hunters right here at this moment. You back off the stretcher until you're crouched miserably between Alex's legs. "I don't like any of this," you tell him.
"I know, kiddo, I know," he says, resting a hand on Erskin's damp and snow-flecked head. "You're hurt too, huh? I didn't forget you. There's a vet waiting. You're gonna have to go with the vet, and be good for him, and then I'll bring you back to Bel. You won't be apart long, and it's my people taking care of you all the way." If any of the other personnel in the chopper notice him talking to the dog as if it can understand him, they don't give any sign they think it's odd. But Bel's got a lot of holes in him, and his face has gone slack in unconsciousness at last, so they're probably much too busy to care.
"Don't let them take me to the pound," you instruct nervously, letting him pull you out of the— room? area?— "Or neuter me. I like my balls. Your son likes my balls. I am suddenly pretty relieved you can't understand me right now. But you're definitely in trouble if I wake up without them."
Alex cannot, in fact, understand Wolf, but Erskin has an expressive face and is fussing a lot, so he keeps soothing him. It helps him stay calm himself, anyway. Seeing his son, his only son, his pride, his treasure, lying there being worked on by quietly very intense medics is even worse than knowing he was injured overseas or coming to find him in the VA hospital. What if, what if. "I'm going to take good care of you," he promises Erskin. "Like you took good care of him. You're such a good boy. I won't let anything bad happen." The trip takes an interminable half hour, because Alex insisted on Bel being taken to Duluth; the tiny 'hospital' in Ely is barely more than a clinic, he doesn't trust them to handle multiple gunshot wounds and an abdominal knife wound oh god. Plus the really good veterinarian he found and talked into coming to pick up Erskin is based in Duluth, and keeping Bel separated from his 'dog' for more than the absolute minimum time necessary sounds like a recipe for disaster. Dusk is falling as the chopper sets down on the roof of St. Luke's. Hospital personnel rush out to collect the stretcher, and Corporal Becca and her partner go with them. Alex keeps his fingers hooked in Erskin's collar and explains soothingly: "They won't let us go in while he's in surgery. He'll be okay. We need to get you fixed up. Let's go find the vet." It is possible the vet is the sort of baffled and awkward fat man in a lab coat standing at the edge of the helipad, clutching his doctor bag like he's expecting to be shooed away by someone important.
You don't immediately dislike the vet, which is a change from how much you hate everyone else right now, because he smells like terror-piss and medicine and is hence very obviously a vet. You can't imagine a werewolf hunter being a vet. Or this soft. You sniff his hand industriously when it's offered, then give it a lick. He owns ferrets. That's reassuring, ferrets are insane socks with bitey ends, murderers certainly couldn't put up with ferrets without murdering them.
The vet goes down one knee and greets Erskin in a soft voice full of what sounds like genuine concern and affection. "Hello, Rusty. You had a rough day, huh? Can I look at your side? Ouch, that doesn't look like fun. You shouldn't be walking on that." He looks up at Alex. "Sir, do you think you could carry him down to my car? I know your son is... I mean... but Rusty's a big boy..." "I need to keep busy," Alex says, and gently gathers Erskin up, shot side out so it doesn't rub against his shirt and hurt worse. "Also. Mr. Kadros. I mean. Colonel Kadros. Did you know your son's service dog is an endangered red wolf?" Alex gives him a steady look. "He's a very good service animal. He saved my son's life." "Okay," the vet says bemusedly. "Well, let's get him to the clinic, poor guy."
"Wolves are illegal to own or transport without permits," you say tiredly. This sounds like "Woof." Because you are a dog. Being carried feels incredibly awkward. But it's nice to get some weight off your paws.
Once they're in the vet's rattly little hatchback, pulling out of the parking lot, the man brings it up again. "I'm not trying to, to take your son's service dog away, sir, but I... how the hell did... sorry." "Look," Alex says, "he's probably part wolf, maybe even mostly wolf, but he's gentle and loyal and he's the light of my son's life. This doesn't need to be complicated." The vet looks at Alex and swallows hard. He nods. "No sir. It doesn't need to be complicated." "Good. When Bel wakes up he's going to have Rusty sleeping beside him, because he did not come home with a purple heart and a head full of God knows what just to have his best friend taken away because he looks like a wolf." Alex grinds the heel of his non-Erskin-soothing hand into his eye. "Sorry. Sorry." "I understand," the vet says softly. "He's a good dog." The word 'dog' is slightly emphasized. "I just... don't know what dose of anaesthetic to use for him now."
You're starting to doze off against Alex's side, and are startled into growling when the car stops and it's time to get out. "I don't wanna go in a preserve," you mumble. "I'm a good dog."
It's not a preserve, it's a vet clinic -- a little brick building with cedar hedges under the snow, waiting room full of woofs and yowls. The vet hustles them past the front desk to where an assistant is waiting in a prepared room. The assistant has a smock printed with yarn-chasing kittens, and looks about fifteen years old, but she's got the equipment all set out and doesn't blink at the size or wild look of her patient. Alex says, "Please don't tell me I have to go sit in a chair and wait." "No, you stay and help keep him calm, okay?" "Yes." Alex's relief is obvious. "I can do that." Then the vet is concerned only with Erskin, soothing him while taking his vitals and examining the wounds. "I think there's at least one pellet still in here. I can't tell yet how hard it'll be to get it out. Well, let's start with pain relief." The assistant hands him a syringe. Alex softly scratches Erskin's ears.
You cry a little when you see the syringe, but it doesn't hurt as much as you expect. It makes everything feel hot, and heavy, and then they're talking about anesthetic and you're going to be unconscious on this table and what if you never wake up? What if they figure out you're a werewolf and you wake up in a government lab somewhere, all dissected? You cry harder, making a stupid, panicky attempt to scramble off the metal table, but then there's tubes, and more needles, and tape, and you sort of lose track of everything. When you wake up, you've got a pounding headache, but you're curled between Bel's knees in a human hospital, which is a damn sight better than a little cage or spooky operating theater or a circus. You nose vaguely at his leg beneath the blankets, tremendously relieved.
Alex is asleep in a chair beside the bed, a hospital blanket over his knees. Bel is very still, gray-pale under his freckles, sunken-eyed, but his heart monitor beeps steadily and he's breathing on his own. Outside the door are two tall men in immaculate uniforms, with sidearms. They don't smell of silver. They smell of aftershave and boot polish and alertness.
You check yourself over: you've had big spots shaved, with white pads of gauze taped over, and underneath feel bruised and pinchy. Is this what stitches are like? You suppose you'll find out when someone tells you what happened. You're not exactly running on all four paws yet, here, but you know if you pull your bandages off to see you'll have no way of getting them back on and then someone's going to have to do it for you and be mad. And what if you get a shame cone? That would be horrific. You'll just leave it alone for now. Getting off the bed is a feat. You're tired, but too anxious to sleep in this strange room without having a sniff, but the bed's at least a meter off the ground and you absolutely don't want to just jump. You end up carefully scooting around backwards, stretching your good hind leg out as far as you can until you feel the floor, then easing your weight down. That accomplished, you do a careful, quiet circuit of the room, check on Alex— he looks tremendously old and tired and sad, poor bastard, this has been awful for everyone— and go to examine the men outside. "Wuf," you go, to let them know— quietly— that you are there, and examine their shoes. They've been indoors for a long time. Definitely not running around in the woods waving knives.
One of the men looks nervous, but the other takes one look around to make sure all's well and then squats down to greet Erskin. "Hi puppy!" he says soppily. "Lil' hero's checkin' us out. Make sure we're good enough for your Captain, right?" "Don't let him run off," the other guard says, remaining properly on guard. "He's not, look at him, he's earned a Purple Heart of his own. Yes you have, yes you have." "I can't believe you're fanboying Captain Kadros's dog. He's Army." "The dog's not." "All dogs are Army," the Air Force guard sniffs, but he's smiling.
You don't see how you're a hero when you didn't do a lick of the fighting and in fact only very barely didn't even bother to come back for Bel at all, but at least they're friendly. You sit down in the doorway and accept the pats and fussing. The bright light out here in the hallway is miserable, but you don't want to just go back and sleep, you don't think you can. You might as well be on the lookout with them.
"He wants to help us guard," the soppy one observes. "Good," says the professional one, "he'd probably smell it even if an assassin was disguised as a nurse or whatever." A thoughtful pause. "Jesus, though, why would someone target the Colonel's son? It's not even -- we're a Reserve base!" "Ours is not to question why," the soppy one says philosophically. "Yeah. No, we shouldn't be gossipping. It's just. Why would you do that." "Guy lost his whole unit in Afghanistan. The Captain, not the Colonel." "Yeah, I know." "Comes home and gets this PTSD dog, goes camping to get over shit, and that's when some asshole decides to put eight holes in him." "Nine. There was a knife too." "Jesus." "It's a cold world." "But there's dogs in it," the soppy one points out, and gives Erskin one last scritch before resuming his guard pose. They're quiet for a long time after that. The overnight business of the hospital goes on in the distance, but this end of the hallway is empty except for them. When Bel starts to wake up, it's easy to hear his soft grunts and whimpers.
When you hear Bel waking up, you hover for a moment, indecisive, then twitch your whiskers at the two humans warningly— stay alert!— and go padding over to check on him.
