Jake cracked his eyes open and was met by a dirty boot missing its laces next to his nose. Laces? Cael’s wrist. He lifted his head, followed ash-encrusted jeans up to see something that made him blink the sleep out of his eyes. Cael was sleeping nestled tightly to their father’s side. Their dad had his arms loosely wrapped around the kid, his features relaxed. The embers of the fire were a dull glow in the pre-dawn light.
“Dad?”
Henry’s eyes tracked over to him.
“Is Cael going to be all right?”
“He’s gonna be fine. He woke up a few hours ago, was alert and talking.”
Atta boy. It felt like Jake’s muscles had been tense for hours and finally loosened.
“Keep an eye on him for a while.” Henry started shifting out from under the teen, settling him back against the boulder.
“Where you going?” Jake eyed his father as he stood, stretching strained limbs. He grimaced as he worked a hand over his thigh.
“Down the slope. I just want to make sure the detonation took care of the cave and there isn’t a way for any gremlins to get out.” Jake’s nose crinkled at that, imagining the surviving beasties stuck inside with nothing to eat but each other. Talk about survival of the fittest.
As Henry shuffled out of view, Jake scooted up to sit next to his brother. His shoulder wasn’t as bad as it was yesterday and with his ankle splinted, it hardly hurt at all. Course he hadn’t put any weight on it yet. Walking out of here was going to suck big time. “Hey, Cael,” he nudged his sibling, wanting to see for himself that he was okay.
Cael’s face immediately crinkled. “What?”
“You okay?”
“I was.” Kid's eyes slipped open, bright in the streaked face. “Now my head hurts.”
“Sorry.” Cael was awake. He was being bitchy and he was okay. He’d been so still last night. “Is it bad?”
“He just went to make sure all the stupid gremtards are dead.”
“Are they?”
“Yeah.” Jake bumped his shoulder into Cael’s. “You know Dad, has to be sure.”
“Yeah, okay.” Cael started messing with the bark securing his wrist. “Hey, Jake?”
Jake turned to look directly at Cael and was surprised by the slight smile. Even with a pounding headache and after everything they’d just been through, Cael looked oddly happy…like he’d just figured out the algorithm of some geeky mathematics formula.
“Do you think next time Dad could just call in an air strike?”