Stolen Lives: A LitRPG/GameLit Novel (The Underhill Chronicles Book 1) by Keith Ahrens (interesting novels to read .TXT) 📕

can't breathe. In most folks, you have between four and six minutes to restart their heart or get them breathing again before irreversible brain damage and death happen.

Like I said, twenty minutes is way too long. Fourteen to sixteen minutes is still too long.

I kneel by the first body closest to me and put my fingers to his neck. No pulse. I move to the next. Same. I shift to another and feel a faint pulse at the carotid artery. I tilt his head back and wait for a spontaneous breath. It happens, but it is weak. I glance down and see most of the chainmail on his legs and abdomen have fused to the charred skin underneath. Massive burns, probably reaching the internal organs as well. For the most part, he's already dead, not much I can do for him. I shuffle over to the next victim. There are plenty of them, and some make small movements here and there.

I ask Des to go get the freshest water he can find and any bandages he can rustle up. I do a fast headcount as he goes to gather supplies. Thirty-two bodies all lay out on the cold, dirt floor. And all I have for medicine and equipment are rags, a bucket of water, and damaged bits of armor. I've had nightmares more cheerful than this. Deep breath and on to my next patient.

The concept of triage is ingrained deep in me from years of training and experience. Triage means doing the most good for the most people in a limited time. This requires you to pronounce people dead and try to move on to someone else you can help. It takes a certain mindset to do this while continuing to function at a useful level.

I press on, checking each person, triaging as I go. Of the thirty-two people, eighteen are already dead. Another five or six won't last the next few hours. The last fourteen have bad burns to their legs or faces, preventing them from walking around. Most of us are deaf to one degree or another, a few almost completely deaf and blind. I guess I'm luckier than I thought. Except for this damn headache. I think (or hope) the deafness is temporary, but time will tell if my eardrums are ruptured or not. Can't worry about that now.

Des indicates there are another twenty or so that were caught in the shock waves of the electrical currents, but they have minor injuries compared to the others. All of them are alive, but most have some broken bones or bad burns. These casualties have been moved to their own cells to make room around the tunnel entrance for the more severe injuries.

I get to work trying to set bones and apply crude splints with whatever armor pieces or sticks of wood I can scrounge up. Jesse and Des step up to help, but I can tell they are trying their best not to vomit or cry. Not everyone is built to deal with this kind of shit. But the important thing is, they're doing their best to lend a hand. A few of the more mobile ones wander around, checking on friends. Here and there, I see tattoos being activated. I count more skulls than I wish to see.

We cool the worst of the burns with soaked rags and the water we normally drink. Some of the wounds are horrific. Sightless eyes, hazed over from the heat of the lightning, gaze at nothing. Metal has liquefied and fused with melted skin. Jagged bone fragments have torn through skin, bright white sitting in the bloody flesh. The air remains thick and stale with sweat, burned hair, and smoldering skin.

I'm glad to be deaf for now and unable to hear the men and women scream as I force bones back to their original places. It hurts, and I empathize, but it must be done. Though I can't hear their cries, I know they are there. They echo in my head, even in my eerily silent world.

After what seems like hours, I feel a small hand on my back. I glance over my shoulder, and after my double vision resolves, I recognize Thorn. As usual, she's wrapped up in her usual blue ensemble. I sigh in relief, very happy to see her. I think she smiles back, but it’s difficult to tell from beneath her veil and in the dim light. She nods and moves off to the people I haven't made it to yet.

Reaching into her bag, I watch as she pulls out a small jar and dips two fingers into it. Thick, yellow paste sticks to her fingertips. She stoops down to apply the paste to someone’s burnt face. The man immediately seems to relax, and the look of pain slowly fades from his expression. She then wraps his wounds in a loose, clean bandage.

She looks over her shoulder to me, and I think she says something, but damned if I can hear. She tosses me another small jar of the yellow cream.

I manage to catch it, despite my blurred vision, and take her lead, beginning to use the salve to soothe the worst of the burns I can find. We work for a long time, exhausting ourselves and Thorn’s supply of medicines. After a long while, we run out of patients. My head is still pounding, and I’ve tried to move slowly so the dizziness doesn’t knock me out.

With nothing left to do, I drop the empty jar on the dirt floor and stumble my way back to my pallet in my cell. As I flop down to go to sleep, I find it more comfortable now than it ever has been. Yet, the stench of burnt skin stays thick in my nose.

Seconds or hours later, I am jarred awake by a powerful heat in my head and ears that travels down through my chest and flows into all my limbs. The heat intensifies, and I