After the Crash, They All Needed Me

Chapter 004

A wolf!

I kid you not - it was a real live wolf!

Its green eyes stared right into mine, and I dared not turn away. Mutely, I fumbled for my pants, drawing them back up and zipping up my fly. Elsa crouched right before me, burying her face in my thigh.

“Be quiet,” I hissed, trying to sound authoritative. Seconds passed, then a minute did. It seemed like the wolf was judging us just as much as I was trying to gauge whether it would pounce. However, our luck ran out - or rather, mine did. I could feel Elsa trembling against my leg, her chest heaving with poorly suppressed sobs.

“I’m so scared!” she finally wailed. Shit, shit, shit! Immediately, I crouched down and wrapped my arms around her before throwing ourselves to the side. If I had been a second slower, we would probably have been the wolf’s dinner. The spot where we had been standing was now occupied by the wolf, which was growling at us.

“Shut up, Elsa,” I snapped, reaching for a rock by my feet. “If you keep moving and screaming like that, you’re going to get us both killed. Put your hands over your mouth if you can’t shut yourself up.” The wolf growled, as if punctuating my words, and I flinched. Why the hell did I say so much? It’s going to be my fault if we’re both killed now! My hand finally closed over the smooth, fist-sized rock I had been groping about for, and my arm swung in a wide arc, launching the rock right at the wolf.

The wolf yelped, cowered away, then regained its ground and resumed growling at us. Only this time, its growls had taken on a different intensity. It seemed deeper and more intense than before.

Wrong move, wrong move! I thought frantically, fumbling for the kitchen knife I had stuck in the backpack slung over my shoulder. I leapt to the left just as the wolf charged, holding my right arm straight out. The knife dug into some part of the wolf, and I tightened my grip instinctively, knowing that losing the knife would mean certain death. From a few feet away, the wolf snarled, but it sounded shakier than before. Squinting to make out its form in the dim evening light, I managed to spot a steadily growing pool of liquid beneath the wolf’s belly.

Blood! I had managed to wound it. With the way that it was bleeding, I knew that the wolf was not going to last much longer. I was halfway to victory. Buoyed by my success, I seized another rock and waited. This time, when the wolf pounced again, I aimed right for its head. Even though my left hand was the one wielding the rock, adrenaline made me smash the rock down with all my might. It was enough. The wolf collapsed onto the ground, falling right at my feet.

“Die, you filthy thing!” I shrieked, gripping the knife with both hands and plunging it down blindly. Again and again my arms rose and fell, sinking the knife into the wolf’s body. I was barely aware of the way it howled and twitched, its paws reaching out as it convulsed in agony. “Die!” I roared again, before being interrupted by Elsa.

“Stop it, Forrest! Stop it! It’s dead!” she cried, seizing my hands to try and stop me. I got to my feet shakily and stumbled backward, staring in horror at the mangled body of the wolf. There was no question about what she had said - the wolf lay limply before me, blood puddling and soaking its way through the thin layer of grass we had scattered. Only then did I become aware of a stinging sensation on my right leg. My shin had been clawed, as had my thigh.

“I guess that’s the end of you, Mr Wolf,” I blurted out. My voice was far from bold. I took another few shaky steps backward before hitting the cave wall and sliding down with a thump. I let go of the knife, unable to stop looking at the carcass of the wolf.

“Are you alright?” Elsa asked, panic clear in her voice. “You kept stabbing the wolf again and again as though you’d been possessed.”

“I’m fine,” I sighed, trying to sound reassuring even though I felt sick to my stomach. There was blood all over my hands and arms, and the tacky sensation I was starting to pick up told me that my face had not been spared, too.

“I think you’re hurt!” Elsa fretted, reaching out to touch my leg.

“Don’t!” I grabbed her hand quickly, swallowing hard to try and sound a little more reasonable. “Let’s use the first-aid kit I left back with Yvonne. Since we haven’t washed our hands yet, I don’t want to risk an infection.”

“Okay,” Elsa stammered. She sounded as though she were on the verge of tears, and I could guess what she was thinking. She doesn’t know how to cook, and she doesn’t know how to clean and gut anything. We don’t know what Yvonne knows. We only know that she didn’t know how to start a fire before I showed her. I’m the only one with survival skills she can depend on. It’s time for me to man up.

I put the bloodied knife back in the backpack, then struggled to my feet with a grunt. Elsa inserted herself under my arm without a word, helping to take some of my weight as I limped back to the beach. She was terrified, yes, but at least she was trying to help.

“What happened?” Yvonne asked, hurrying over as soon as she saw us appear in the distance. She, too, ducked under my other arm to support my weight.

“We met a wolf,” I explained tiredly. I eased myself down by the campfire, glad to see that Yvonne was already reaching for the first-aid kit she had packed.

“Let me clean your wounds,” she offered quietly, unzipping the first-aid kit and removing a bottle of rubbing alcohol and some gauze. I nodded, stretching out my right leg. Now that the adrenaline had worn off, I was really feeling the pain. The stinging sensation had morphed into a burning one, and I could see that there was a line of shallow scratches on my shin. What really hurt, however, were the deeper gashes on the front of my thigh. There were only two, but they had to have been inflicted by the wolf as it thrashed about in the throes of death. No more bloodlust, I told myself, wincing as Yvonne rolled up the leg of my pants and dabbed at the cuts on my shin with rubbing alcohol.

“If it hurts, I can do it instead,” Elsa offered. She was seated next to me, pressed up against my side.

“Are you sure you can manage?” I teased. “I’ll bet you don’t even know how to administer first aid!” I was feeling rather jovial despite how much my wounds hurt. After all, I had two beautiful women tending to me. My hand drifted down toward Elsa’s ass, resting on the top of one cheek.

“There’s no need to be so mean,” Elsa retorted, pouting. I could see Yvonne purse her lips from where she was. Maybe our flirting was getting on her nerves.