The Treasure of Lei Fong Wu

Chapter Sixty-Four

HAMMERSTRIKE TEAM REMNANT –25:44

“Ta mah de!” Rel said, when he first realized that his eyes were open and that he was alive and conscious. Then the pain hit.

His head hurt. His chest hurt. Three of his four limbs hurt. His jaw felt like he’d been kicked by a mule. Hard. But nothing seemed broken . . . only hurt. The wild girl who had successfully defeated a vastly superior force – in bare feet – had left him alive. Looking around at his comrades, he couldn’t swear that she had extended them the same courtesy.

Sometimes you just had to appreciate the little things in life. Ma always said that.

Rel groaned and tried to get to his feet, and settled for getting to his knees. He steadied himself for a moment, took several painful breaths, and then forced himself up. A moment later he was leaning against a wall, looking at the scene of destruction. There were bodies all over, and all of them were wearing the same uniform as him. That had to be bad. He glanced over to the entrance of the Engine Room and knew without any real proof that there was no longer a conscious guard in there. That girl – River Tam, he remembered – had been through there. For all he knew she was still in there.

Rel looked around some more, more to kill time and come to his senses than anything else, and he considered:

In two months time he had gotten his ass righteously kicked by a girl no bigger than his mother. If she was that close, and chanced to encounter him once again, a third ass kicking was likely. Rel was not an educated man – literacy had come to him slow and painfully in the last two months – but he was wise enough to know the outcome of such a conflict. So he did what any seasoned criminal and all of his family members would do in a similar situation: he got the hell away from there as fast as his sore feet could carry him.

He looked down at his comrades for a moment, realizing that honor and chivalry and team spirit dictated he not leave a wou