4338.209 · July 28, 2018 AD
What the Teeth Didn't Touch
Dawn brings a diagnosis no one expected. The wound is healing — but something's wrong with the leg that was never touched. Glenda knows only one cure. Kain knows only that he'd rather face another shadow panther than return to those waters, and he can't say why.
Morning light softens the horror of the night before, but it can't erase the shadow panther carcass still lying by the fire. Glenda moves through the camp with purpose, rousing Chris and Karen, her mind already racing through contingencies. Kain survived. That's the floor. Now she needs to find the ceiling.
The medical tent holds answers she doesn't want. When Glenda tests Kain's wounded leg, the pain confirms the nerves still function. But his other leg — the one no teeth ever touched — has gone silent. Numbness spreading where it shouldn't be, in flesh that should be fine. The diagnosis makes no sense, but the prescription is clear: the lagoon. Whatever healing properties those waters possess, Kain needs them now.
His refusal is visceral. Not the lagoon. The words come out strangled, desperate, loaded with a fear he won't explain. Glenda pushes past it — she has to. Time is bleeding away, and she's watched too many limbs lost to hesitation.
Four people become a rescue team. Chris takes the bulk of Kain's weight. Karen supports his waist and legs. The first attempt collapses in a graceless heap, but the second holds. They move as one toward water that promises healing and threatens something Kain can't name.
The lagoon waits with deceptive calm. The first submersion proves worse than anyone prepared for — pleasure detonating through Kain's system, bypassing consent, dismantling control. Glenda's clinical assessment is two words: "He's fine." She has no idea what she's witnessing.
When the women leave him alone with Chris for more "treatment," Kain understands there's nowhere left to hide.
