Page 63 of Dance Practice, Marooned: Part 2

I release her hand, and carefully hold her shoulders down. Rachel moves to her legs, keeping them still. Zeke is slow and careful as he brings the saw to the wood. Carefully, he moves it back and forth, back and forth, until finally, with a splintered thunk, it breaks off. Tatiana doesn’t make a single sound, but I can see the fear and agony twisted in her face.

“We gotta do the back,” Zeke says, staring at me. “You’re goin’ to have to sit her up, slowly, carefully.”

With shaky hands, I carefully, millimetre by millimetre, bring Tatiana up until Zeke can access the wood from the back. That’s when I notice it is attached to the side of the ship, like an old paddle or pole. It has broken down, and is just sticking right out, and we just piled all the other trash wood around it, not realising that it was so fucking dangerous.

The cutting of the back is very similar to the front, and when it’s done, Zeke drops the saw which is now covered in blood, as are his hands. “We need to get her inside and stable, then we can clean it. It isn’t sanitary out here.”

“How?” Rachel whispers.

“With all of us,” Aggie says, stepping closer. “We move slowly, all of us supporting a part of her body, that way we move the wood inside her as little as possible.”

Zeke nods. “Everyone find a spot, Grace, you are going to hold the stick as still as possible while we move.”

I stare at him, eyes wide. “Me?”

“Yeah, you.”

There is no time to argue, so I nod.

We all take our position, and carefully and slowly, lift Tatiana up. I am using both of my hands to keep the wood as still as possible, even though my heart is racing and my legs are trembling. I won’t let this go badly for her, I won’t. We move, step by slow step, until we’re inside. Then down the hall we go, moving at a pace that makes it feel like it takes hours, even though it’s only minutes.

We lay her on the mattress in her room, that Kaylee has put onto the floor. Every towel, t-shirt, and spare sheet gets piled around her so she doesn’t roll around. Zeke and Ace clean the wound as best they can, and we take any soiled sheets and towels away so we can attempt to clean them.

We need everything clean, and we need a lot of supplies.

Ace, who is covered in blood, walks over to me and takes my face in his hands. “You good?”

“Is she going to die?” I whisper, my bottom lip shaking.

“We’re goin’ to do everything we can to make sure that doesn’t happen, yeah?”

The worst part about that sentence, is that he didn’t say no.

No she won’t die.

She will be fine.

Everything will be fine.

Because the truth is, we don’t know if it will be fine.

We don’t even know if she will make it through the night.

How the hell are we going to fix this?

“SHE’S STABLE, I THINK,” Zeke says just as the morning sun cracks over the horizon.

It has been a long night.

“The bleeding has slowed down,” Kellen says, wiping his hands with a rag. “But we need to find help, as soon as possible.”

“How are we going to do that?” Aggie croaks, her face red and puffy from crying all night. “We have no way of communicating with anyone.”

“I found a radio.”

The voice comes from behind us, and we turn to see Adrian holding up what looks like a broken object with wires hanging off it.

My heart skips a beat.