Don't Let Go (BxB) {COMPLETED} ✔️

CHAPTER 26- Collapsed.

GWEN
I FELT someone dragging me upward through the continuous cascade of dirt and clay, Anna pressed against my side, my cat huddled in my arms, and a strong arm around my waist. After what seemed like hours my head broke out of the dirt and I gasped, pulling myself the rest of the way out of the dirt and collapsing on my hands and knees to catch my breath. I let go of Ginny and she ran off, hopefully away from the danger. My hands were scratched and stuck with little shards of clay. Anna collapsed beside me, and I saw my mom and Jessie a little farther away.
    "Are you guys alright?" I heard someone say.
    "We're fine," Dad responded on my other side.
    I looked up and my heart nearly stopped. All around us there was wreckage of the restaurant and shattered bits of clay from the once-secret headquarters' tunnels. Choronuses were everywhere in the wreckage, and more were still digging their way to the surface. Choronian medics were running around between families, making sure that everyone was alright and had gotten out of the dirt. I saw Theo and his wife Katherine going around with the medics. What was most terrifying was that the Choronuses weren't the only ones here.
    There was a wrecking ball now exactly where the restaurant used to be. But instead of a de-construction crew, there was the entirety of the New York City Police Department and some of the Pennsylvania Police, their guns trained on us. There were maybe five or six different news channels reporting live.
   Suddenly Anna gasped and hurried over to a patch of dirt that was raised a little bit higher than the rest. She started digging at the top of the mound and uncovered a rung of metal. At first I was confused, but then something clicked in my mind.
   "Octaveus!" I screamed and ran over to help Anna dig up the chandelier. Theo and a bunch of other Choronuses heard and noticed us and came over to help, sensing that we were trying to get someone out of the dirt. Eventually Anna and I were pushed away while five other Choronuses uncovered more and more of the chandelier. Theo and three other medics came over to help too.
   The Choronuses dug up enough of the chandelier to fit their hands under it and lifted it out of the hole a little bit as one of the medics peered under it. I noticed with a sickening lurch that the nine points and eight downward curves of the chandelier were stained with a black liquid. The medic started digging frantically at the edges of the hole, the five holding the chandelier up lifting it completely out of the hole. The three medics reached into the hole, the human police officers watching in astonishment, and carefully maneuvered a body out of the dirt.
   They set Octaveus down on his back on top of the packed dirt next to them and Anna and I rushed over to them, Mom, Dad, and Jessie following.
   "Hold on," Theo blocked us from going up to them. "They need space."
'For what? He's not breathing!' I thought.
   Vee's loose-fitting tank top and once-grey sweatpants were shredded and had bits of tile threaded in the remaining fabric. His pale skin was covered in dirt, but the medics soon wiped it off, and he had small chips of clay in his hair and tail. His eyes were closed, his lips blue.
   One of the medics pinched Vee's nose shut and blew air into his mouth, pausing to press on his chest and stomach with his palms. The medic had repeated this process three times before Vee finally responded. His eyes half opened and he retched, dark chunky liquid pouring out of his mouth. For a sickening second I thought the liquid was blood, but then I remembered that he'd been pinned face-first to the dirt by the chandelier, and concluded that he had probably inhaled a lot of the dirt trying to get out. The medics quickly turned his head to the side before he could vomit on himself any more and what seemed like gallons of the dark chunky liquid soon covered the dirt. As soon as the mud was out of his lungs Vee started coughing violently and the medic that had given him mouth-to-mouth held him upright in a sitting position while the other two medics and Theo went around to find any more injured ones.
The humans gathered on the other side of the wreckage were watching all of the Choronuses in disbelief. I suppose some of them may recognize a few of the adults from their work, but I think the majority of the police officers and reporters were staring at Vee. Basically all of New York and probably the surrounding states had seen him on the news after he was attacked by the werewolf.
   Jessie walked up to the medic holding Vee and said something to him. The medic nodded, tapped Vee's forehead, and held Vee out to Jessie. To my great astonishment, Jessie took him and leaned him against his shoulder so that Vee's back was facing the medic. By now Vee had stopped coughing and just sat with his head over Jessie's shoulder with his eyes closed, his breathing rough. The medic looked up at us standing a little bit behind them.
   "Would you guys mind helping us out and finding more injured?" He asked us.
   "Not at all," Dad said and we dispersed to help the medics.