Niki's voice sounded far away, as if he was under water or listening through a pipe. "What? My ears. I can't hear very well."
"It will pass. Stand up. Xander got a little beat up from the shrapnel."
He wiped away the blood from a cut to his jaw. "I'm fine. Nothing a few stitches and a stiff drink won't cure. They know where we are now, so don't be surprised if we get more thrown at us. Do you hear boots?"
"I'll get it." Niki grinned as he rounded the corner and squeezed the trigger. The volley of bullets sprayed into the hallway, sending five German soldiers falling over each other, bathing in their own blood. Four more rushed into the building, saw their fallen comrades and attempted to flee, but Niki cut them down as well. He stepped forward and shouted into the smoke-filled hallway. "Come on out! I dare you. I'll kill you all, you murderous bastards!"
Xander moved up behind the Time Knight and shoved him against the wall. "What the hell are you doing? This behavior is going to get you killed."
"Not if I kill them first."
"I get it, okay? It's blood-lust and adrenaline pumping in your veins, but you cannot allow that to turn off your critical thinking and cause you to be reckless. You still have a greater responsibility to take care of Jack. He is your number one priority in life, so don't do anything that can put him in danger or make it to where you aren't capable of defending him."
"I gotcha. Sorry."
"Just breathe, Nikolas. Calm down. You've done well. Now, we need to get to somewhere safe. There should be Soviet forces camped out in an apartment complex near here. They call it Pavlov's House in the history books. It's where the Soviet forces and citizens held their own for sixty days against everything the German Sixth Army could throw at them. We should be able to get in there and help. If Ellie escaped from the Syndicate base mark in this era and is somewhere around here, my money's on Pavlov's House."
Jack held his coat around himself tighter when the wind whistled through the building's shell and he leaned against the wall to keep himself from falling over with the sudden surge of lightheadedness. His stomach turned from all the tacos he ate and his heart rate fluttered. They were the lingering effects of a severe case of warp sickness that had wreaked havoc on his already worn-down body, he knew it. But there was nothing they could do to remedy it there. He smiled when Niki pulled his arm over his shoulders to help him walk.
"I've got you. You're too weak for this."
Jack choked back the tears of frustration. "I'm trying."
Xander snapped at him. "I know, but it's not enough."
Niki was not persuaded. "This is a war zone, Xander."
"Duh. What did you think was happening in Stalingrad in 1942? Music festivals?"
An explosion rang out from behind them, quickly engulfing the end of the building in a blazing inferno. Soldiers screamed as they jumped through the windows and rolled in the snow below, trying to extinguish the blaze that overtook them. Blackened bodies continued to writhe until they turned to coals in the falling snow.
"Damn it. Let's go."
"Go, Jack. I'll keep you safe from behind." Niki pushed him along, but quickly held up his Tommy gun when more German soldiers rushed down the stairs in the adjacent rooms. "We have company. Move!"
Jack took off running towards the adjacent brick building at the end of the hallway where lantern light flickered, welcoming him from behind a boarded door. The rapid shots of Niki's gun followed him while Xander picked up a live grenade and hurled it into a group of soldiers outside.
Time blurred together as Jack ran. His legs wavered under him, his head ached with a dizzying weakness, and the snow-packed boots did little to stem the growing threat of frostbite that nipped at his skin. The roar of approaching aircraft, rumbling of tanks engaging infantry in the muddy trenches, and the all too close cries of dying men and women who were shot down in the close combat warfare blended into one deafening sound. It encircled him, digging through his mind where it found every traumatic moment from his memories and dragged them into the light.
Like that day in middle school, the fear overtook him. His pulse fluttered and his breathing quickened into labored panting. Every part of him wanted to run to, leave this place and get as far away from the fighting as he could.
Xander, Opal, and Niki fought for him. The popping of their guns and their muffled shouting to each other as they mowed down enemy soldiers a constant reminder of that. They risked their lives to keep him safe. Yet all Jack could do was run. They knew he was weak in body and mind and prone to having emotional or mental breakdowns. They couldn't even trust him with a gun. The weight of his insecurities bore down on him. Was he truly that useless?
Only Niki's hand wrapping around the back of his neck forced him out of his panicked trance.
"Jack, get in."
Before he could react, he was shoved to the side. Jack tumbled into a closet of singed clothing, shoved out of the line of fire from an MG42 that ripped through the walls with violent ferocity. He looked up to see Niki standing in the doorway of the closet, protecting him like a human shield once again. Jack spotted a German officer in a long black coat stepping out of the overturned dining room with a Luger pointed at his friend. "Niki, behind you!"
Jack hid his face from the sound of the three shots being fired. The rapid chatter of an MP 40 answered, dropping the officer to the floor. When the shots stopped, Jack emerged from the closet, but he collapsed at Niki's feet. The dizziness swam through his head, his body broke out into a cold sweat, and his eyesight began to flash black on the edges.
Xander loaded another magazine into his MP40. "Your Chronomancer could use your help, Nikolas. Why are you just standing there? Pick him up, you lazy Avelayan. Nikolas! Are you even listening to me?"
After a few long seconds, Niki grasped his right hip and knelt down to help Jack sit up. "I-I'm, uh, sorry."
"Wait." Jack paused, noticing the same fear flash through Niki's eyes that he had seen in his own many times. Something was wrong, deeply wrong. He could sense it, the pain, the apprehension, the terror. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah. I'm good. Come on, Jack. Get on my back. I'll carry you."
"But I'm heavy."
"No, you're not. You're a stick. A tall stick, but a stick. Hop on up."
Jack climbed onto his friend's back, wrapping his arms around his shoulders like he used to do as a child on snow days when they would have snowball fights in the Mana Glen streets. He held on, but his heart sank when he heard Niki groaning as he stood. Why did he have to be so weak? Jack silently hated himself for not being stronger. He couldn't keep relying on Niki for everything. Fragile Iskaydrian genetics or not, he knew he had to do better.
A new sensation squished against his right knee. Wetness. Steaming, hot wetness that soaked through the leg of his pants. He tapped on Niki's shoulder then slid from his back to get a better look at whatever was the source of the liquid. Red. Dark crimson had penetrated the side of Niki's coat where it slid out of the torn fabric to drip by his boots.
"Niki . . . is that blood? Whose blood is that?"
Xander stopped and turned to him, the usual harshness in his voice being replaced with a tint of concern. "Nikolas, are you injured?"
Niki grabbed onto the wall and braced himself through his shivered panting. "I'm fine. We need to keep moving."
"No. Baby, what happened?" Opal climbed over the rubble to get to him. "Let me see."
Jack peered over Opal's shoulder and had to turn away when she peeled back the mass of wet fabric. Niki's side was a mangled mass of flesh and muscle, slicked with nearly black blood that poured from the hole above his right hipbone.
Niki drew a raspy breath. "During the fighting in the apartments, I guess a bullet grazed me."
"That looks like more than a graze. You're bleeding like a fountain. You don't look very good. You're pale."
"I just need to sit down for a minute."
Opal's lips quivered. "What happened to my arm a few days ago with Dean was a gra
ze. This is . . . oh my God. You've been shot, Niki. I think the bullet went all the way through. Get him a blanket. Xander, find a blanket."
Jack went to his friend's side and guided him to the floor so he could rest. He gathered him in his lap and kept his head propped up to make sure he could keep him from falling asleep. He had watched enough movies to know that he needed to stay awake. "Get him covered up."
Xander turned his back to them. "Leave him."
Was he serious? Jack pushed Niki's bangs out of his face. "I can't. I can't leave him!"
"You can get another Time Knight, a better Time Knight."
"I won't leave him. If he stays, I stay, too."
Niki groaned as he sat up, but he yelped and crumpled back to Jack's lap. "I can still fight, damn it. I'm not weak. It's my job to protect Jack, so I'll do that. And we'll find Ellie and we'll get her home."
"Xander, please!" Jack shouted through his fear. "I can't carry him."
Opal joined in. "I love him, Xander. I know you keep denying that, but it's true. Don't take him away from me because you refuse to help a dying Avelayan. I know they've, we've, hurt you before. But would you leave me to die if I was shot because I'm one of them?"
Xander let out a sigh before storming over and lifting Niki to his feet. He put an arm around his back to steady him. "Let's go, then. You'd better not die on me, for Opal's sake. Look up ahead. We're almost there."
The tan brick apartment building rose up from the wasteland around it. Its four stories had been battered by artillery fire, but it stood strong and sturdy. Machineguns were perched in the windows, mortars had been placed on the roof, and the numerous limbless corpses out front suggested that an extensive minefield had been planted for defense. Broken down tanks rested in shambles where the anti-tank rifle had rendered them useless.
A dark-haired man in an old and dirty Soviet winter coat approached them, lowering his rifle as he got close. His face was lined with fine wrinkles from months of stress and his mustache had turned grey on the ends from he amount of soot that collected there. He had the grizzled look of a man who had seen more than his fair share of hardship.
The stranger's hardened eyes softened a bit when he looked at Niki and the blood that had smeared behind him. He spoke in hushed Russian and slung his rifle onto his back.
Niki muttered a few pained words in response before going limp against Xander. All the healthy glow had drained from his face, leaving his tan skin dull and ashen. Even his eyes had lost their shine.
"What did he say?" Jack asked. "Who is he?"
"He is Sergeant Yakov Pavlov with the Red Army. He says we can come inside and get warmed up by the fire if we help defend the building. He says there's not much food, but they have a medic in the basement."
Opal slid her pistol into her pocket. "So, this is Pavlov's House. Let's get inside before another wave of troops storms this place. And before Niki bleeds out. We've gotta get him patched up. Xander, please let him know we'll help for as long as we're here."
While Xander spoke with Sergeant Pavlov, Jack turned to Opal. "Xander speaks Russian?"
"And Swahili, Japanese, Mandarin, Korean, Spanish, Italian, Greek, and like ten others. He was trained since before he could talk for this. Most Chronomancers and Time Knights are."
"Except me."
"I didn't-"
Xander called to them. "We're going, you two. Jack, you should get some medical attention, too. You're not looking very well."
"Just get Niki in there." Jack gasped when Opal took him in her arms. He stiffened, but relaxed with her gentle pats on his back and soft words.
"He'll be okay. He's strong."
If only he knew that to be true. "I can't lose him, Opal. I can't. He and Ellie are all I've ever had."
"I know. He's not going anywhere. He took a bullet for you, not because he had to, but because he waned to. Niki doesn't do anything that he doesn't want to do. You know that. He's too stubborn to let something like this defeat him. If anything, his responsibility to you will keep him from giving up."
Holding hands with Opal, Jack climbed over slabs of collapsed wall and into the first floor of the Soviet apartment building. Soldiers in white and tan uniforms manned the machine guns in the windows while others brought in the crates of what few supplies came in from the trench that had been dug to the river.
Xander returned from the basement, wiping away Niki's blood from his arms with a rag. "The medic is tending to him now. Have a seat, Jack. I cannot have you fainting on me."
With a glance towards the stairs leading into the basement, Jack sat against the wall and held his taco-lined coat closer. A few Stalingrad citizens stared at him from across the room where they were busy cleaning rifles in preparation for the next time they would have to fight to defend their homeland. He offered them a half smile before burying his face in his arms. He remained there for a long ten minutes before he was forced back into reality.
"Drink." Opal held out a bottle half-filled with amber-colored liquid. "Take a long drink. It will help, I promise."
"I think I'll go check on Niki. Thanks, though."
Jack struggled to stand then nearly fell down the rickety wooden steps into the lantern light that filled the otherwise pitch-black basement. Next to the flickering light, Niki was shirtless on a blanket with a bloody sheet covering his stomach and legs. The medic only shook her head before moving past Jack and going up the stairs without a word. All of her supplies were still on the table.
He knelt beside his friend and took his hand, but whimpered when he noticed it was ice cold. "Niki? Say something."
Niki spoke in hushed tones with a slight moaning to his words. "Go upstairs. It's warmer there."
"I don't care about that. I want to be here with you. I'm not leaving. You have to be freezing."
"I'm in a lot of pain. But I'll be fine. Go keep Opal company for me."
"What did she say?" Jack asked, allowing his eyes to trail down to the sheet that was sticky with blood from the wound that had obviously not been doctored. "The medic?"
"She said that I'll be fine. There's nothing to worry about. I just need some rest."
"Why aren't they fixing you? Why aren't they sewing you up?"
Niki closed his eyes. Tiny snowflakes drifted down from the holes in the floor above them to land on his cheeks. "She said I . . . that I don't need it. I'll be just fine."
He knew his Time Knight far too well to believe that. "You're lying to me. Isn't lying to me against Iskaydrian Law? Don't lie to me, Niki."
The silence of the basement grew stagnant for a few long moments until Niki whispered to him. "She said I'll be dead before midnight."
"No. She's wrong."
"I've lost too much blood for them to really help me. I need a hospital, a modern hospital."
There had to be something he could do. "We'll go. I'll take you."
"You barely lived through the warp here. Taking me back will kill you."
"I can do it."
Niki shivered through a pained breath. "You can't."
"I'll get Xander to do it."
"He won't help me. He wants me dead."
He was not about to let some bickering steal his friend from him. Jack ran up the steps and shouted for help, even if that help would have rather seen his friend die. "Xander! Xander, come with me."
"Right behind you."
Jack raced down the steps and tripped at the bottom when his exhausted legs buckled. He crawled over to his Time Knight and wiped the clammy sweat from Niki's face. "He's here. Talk to him."
Xander stood over the injured Avelayan. "Talk to me, Nikolas."
"I want you to . . . take Jack home. T-Take him home and away from all this. I don't want him here when I . . ."
"Niki, don't talk like that." Jack held Niki's hand to his lips. "You're not dying. You can't die."
"They can't patch you up?" Xander asked, squatting down beside Niki. He lifted the blood-stained sheet then looked away. "Hell."
"Not here. Not without . . . ugh . . . supplies."
"You're dying."
Niki nodded his head.
Xander rolled up his sleeve to expose his tattoo. "Not on my watch. I'm taking you to the present and you're going straight to the emergency room."
"No, he can't go there." Jack squeezed Niki's hand tighter. "The police will swarm the place and he'll go to prison."
"I have another option. Do you trust me, Jack?"
Jack nodded, blinking away the pressure in his stinging eyes. "Thank you, Xander."
"I'll be back. Opal will take care of you until then. If more Germans show up, you know what to do. This will hurt, Nikolas, but I can't help it." Xander hoisted Niki over his shoulder, making the Time Knight groan in agony. "Stay safe, Jack."
"Wait." Niki reached out his shaking hand towards Jack. "If I don't make it, know I loved you to the end, brother."
Jack took his friend's frozen face in his hands and placed his nose to his. There was no way he could have stopped the tears that pooled in his eyes. "Don't die, Niki. Don't leave me alone here."
With an air of finality to his whispered words, Niki spoke. "Let's go, Xander. It's my time."
"Don't die. Don't die on me! You can't."
Xander closed his eyes and drew out the date of the present over his hourglass tattoo. "Quiet now, Jack. Don't let his last time seeing you be one of sadness. I'll find a place to bury him, somewhere beautiful. Maybe by the ocean that he loved so much. We'll have a proper funeral once this is all sorted out. He will have all the honors of a loyal Time Knight who gave his life in service to his Chronomancer. You should be proud of him. He fulfilled his purpose."
"But I still need him. Niki, I still need you!" Jack watched as Xander and Niki vanished, carried away through time and space. His words became airy squeaks as he repeated his plea over and over with growing despair. "You can't die. Don't die. Don't die. Niki . . . don't leave me."
Chapter 13
Snow blew into the apartment building on the rushing winds that nearly drowned out the sounds of warfare that echoed through the city. Jack sat at the back of the first floor where the day's rations were being unloaded from a crate in the trench by Opal and two other women. Meanwhile, Sergeant Pavlov and his soldiers fired onto the approaching German troops that stormed into the courtyard. The small fire by the stairs had died down to glowing coals, but Jack still huddled beside it for whatever warmth remained.
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