Adrenaline is a temporary anesthetic. As it faded, the reality of their situation crashed down on Ethan with the force of a physical blow. He and Chloe half-dragged, half-carried Maya back to the shelter of the carved dwelling, her pained gasps echoing in the silent, luminous city. Outside, the enraged grunts of the boar herd faded, but the silence that replaced them was worse. It was the patient, watchful silence of their true enemy.
They laid Maya down on the smooth stone floor. Her face was ashen, her leg twisted at an obscene angle below the knee. A compound fracture. The jagged end of a bone pressed sickeningly against the torn fabric of her pants.
"Chloe," Ethan said, his voice strained. "We have to set it. Now."
Chloe, the geologist, stared at the wound, her scientific detachment completely gone, replaced by a mask of horror. "Ethan, I'm not a doctor! I study rocks!"
"You're the closest thing we've got," he insisted, grabbing their med-kit. It was hopelessly inadequate—bandages, antiseptic wipes, painkillers, a roll of medical tape. "I'll hold her. You guide the bone. We have to clean it and splint it, or she'll lose the leg. Or worse."
What followed was a nightmare of controlled violence. As Ethan held Maya's shoulders, whispering assurances she couldn't hear, Chloe, her hands trembling, cut away the pant leg. She irrigated the wound with their precious drinking water, her face a grim canvas of concentration. Then came the worst part. With a gut-wrenching crack that echoed in the small chamber, she forced the bone back into alignment. Maya screamed, a raw, piercing sound, before mercifully passing out.
Panting, covered in sweat, they worked frantically to splint the leg, using their trekking poles as supports and tearing strips from their spare clothes for padding and bindings.
As Chloe administered their strongest dose of painkillers, Ethan kept watch at the door. "They did this," he murmured, his voice laced with a cold fury. "They used those animals to test us. To wound us." He looked at the high, vaulted ceiling of the dwelling. "The scale of this place… the beings who built it… they're not just human-sized. I think they're larger. Taller. Their silence isn't just stealth; it's the confidence of a superior intelligence. They're studying us, like scientists studying rats in a maze."
Chloe looked up, her face pale. "So what happens now, Ethan? When the rats can't run the maze anymore?"
The question hung in the air, unanswered.
As if in response, a shadow fell across the doorway. Both of them froze, expecting an attack. But when the shadow retreated, something new had been left on the threshold, just beyond their reach.
It was a wide, flat leaf, on which rested a dark green, pungent poultice made of crushed herbs and glowing moss. Beside it, a simple ceramic bowl, filled to the brim with crystal-clear water.
They stared at the offering. It was an impossible gesture. An act of aid from the same beings who had just engineered Maya's brutal injury. It wasn't an act of mercy. It was a demonstration of power. A message that said: Your suffering and your survival both happen at our discretion.