Time/Date Error (Damned of the 2/19th-Book Six) - Done

Drifting

I smiled at her around the belt, then looked down at the wound.

An inch into the meat, slightly to the right of the bullet hole. Slug was flattened, need to be careful pulling it out that I didn't catch the curled over edges on meat. It was going to hurt, and hurt bad, but I'd been hurt worse.

...nasty filthy disgusting vile boy, should have drowned you at birth...

I pushed the tip of the pliers into the wound and almost passed out from pain.

"You can do it, brother, just keep working. Concentrate on the job," John said.

"Almost there, twist a little, it's a bit to the right," Westlin told me, leaning forward till her nose was almost against the wound. I followed her instructions. "OK, a little deeper, then open up the pliers."

I just nodded. Sweat covered my body and my left knee was shaking, making me glad I was sitting down on the 5K generator.

"Open the pliers," She said. I did so. "Push a little deeper," she told me, and the pain grew more intense as the pliers widened in the wound. I pushed deeper, feeling everything. The way the teeth of the plier jaws tacked over the bullet. The way the bullet shifted slightly in the meat. The way the meat tore as the expanded jaws spread it open further. I could feel everything.

The skin divoted outward as I began pulling back to extract the bullet.

"The skin might split, but you've got good elasticity, Ant," Westlin said.

"Remember when that boxhead stabbed you, Ant? When he followed you into the bathroom and stuck his knife in your ass?" Bomber grinned. I grunted, staring at the wound.

Only an inch. I only had to pull it out an inch.

"Go slow. You yank it, you'll split everything open," Westlin told me.

I just groaned. Sweat was pouring down my face, dripping on the floor.

It was suddenly hot in the room.

In the corner of my vision the empty armored J-suit suddenly stood up.

"Injuries, both minor and severe, are to be expected during your performance of your duties," Staff Sergeant Blindon, USMC, barked from inside the suit. "This suit is your best line of defense during you exposure to the hazards you will face when the time comes to perform your mission."

The skin was deforming further, the plier jaws tight on the bullet, the skin bulging as I reached the halfway mark.

"Shift it slightly to the left," Westlin said.

"Remember how I was stitching up that stab wound in your ass, with you bent over the hood of that car with your pants down around your knees, when the cop showed up?" Bomber laughed.

"While you are in my care, while I am in charge of you, I will teach you to ignore pain, ignore thirst, ignore hunger. I will teach you that those sensations are nothing but weakness leaving the body," SSG Blindon stated, his cadenced voice clipped with the Marine accent.

"That cop thought we were having gay sex. You with your fist in your mouth to keep from making noise, your naked ass in the air, me standing behind you stitching you up," Bomber laughed. "I don't know which freaked him out more, the fact I was fixing you up, or the thought that he had assumed we were right out in the open engaged in ass fucking."

Westlin's breath was hot on my skin. "Twist slightly, it'll slide out easier," she told me.

I could see the end of the heavy .45 round now, clamped hard in the jaws of the pliers, slick with blood. The skin around the wound was white from pressure.