🐺 ~PROJECT SAC-1~ ⚔️

Chapter 7 - If Given a Second Chance- 🤲🏻

'She deserves an apology.' His conscience insisted. Hunter briefly pressed his lips together in apprehension, putting his hand back on her shoulder, mentally cursing at her lack of a real name again. "Agent?" She groggily looked up at his face actually twisted in anxiety and self-loathing. "I'm... I'm so-"

Tech and everyone else in the search party burst into the cave and Tech quickly found his place on SAC-1's other side with bioscanner in hand, cutting off Hunter who looked down in shame at not being able to declare his remorse. The rest of the search crew held their lights up so Tech could see what he was doing, and everyone wore varying expressions of horror when seeing extent of her injuries.

SAC-1 tossed a tired grin to her brainy friend. "Heya Tech, how'sssit goin'?" She slurred.

In medic mode, Tech focused on the life-saving task at hand, the gridded blue hue of the scanner searching her body for any internal injuries. The results came back milliseconds later. "You sustained some serious blood loss from your lost limb, have three cracked ribs and a severe concussion."

Hunter swiped a hand over his face in exasperation.

Tech assessed the lost limb, seeing that she had torn off a strip from her kama-like sleeve to tie just above the injury. "Oh good you used a tourniquet, that probably saved your life."

At that comment, Hunter's eyes sparked with frustration. "Why did you do something so reckless?" He questioned to her above Tech's order for Crosshair to prepare the stretcher, "Do you realize that you could have been killed?" It came out more harshly than he intended, but he was just so upset over the awful situation that definitely could've been prevented.

It took a few seconds for the questions to be processed through SAC-1's muggy brain. "Even if I hadn't, I'da been killed anyway."

"What are you talking about?"

Her head bobbed a few times, signaling that she was trying to remain alert when her body threatened to shut down again. "I... I know about the deal with Nala Se, Sarge..."

Frown deepening, he averted his eyes guiltily.

"Nala Se also told me that... if I was returned to Kamino they'd rethink my usefulness to the army."

"She meant that you'd be trained in a different way, a more effective way." Hunter chose to believe firmly.

SAC-1 gave a sharp shake of her head in disagreement, causing more dizziness and her face screwed up in discomfort. "No, that's not what she meant -"

"Let's stop talking about this." Tech interjected. "This is aggravating your injuries, Agent."

"Stretcher's ready." Crosshair also cut in, 'cause this was sad to watch.

So Hunter not able to say another word on the subject, being promptly told to move.

The impromptu medic motioned for the Sniper to bring it over. They waited a few more minutes for the painkillers to fully kick in, so SAC-1 wasn't in too much pain when Wrecker moved her.

Then began the long trek back to the ship. It wasn't long as in distance, but long as in they had to stop multiple times to ease SAC-1's nausea, her concussion making her feel sick at any type of movement, and other injuries aggravated by the jostling. It took a couple of hours to go a few miles on mostly flat land, and the ship ride wasn't much better. Tech tried the best he could to ease her discomfort - putting a cold compress to the back of her neck, applying pressure to her inner wrist in circular motions, making her focus on her breathing and encouraged her to take sips of cool water - all things he had researched that was said to help with nausea at the very least. He couldn't do anything else for her pain, unfortunately, enhanced senses making it difficult to cut the pain entirely.