"No!" I screamed, and Fimbs howled, as we dove toward our fallen comrade. Janius's eyes watered with tears, as his head shook involuntarily. He simply couldn't believe how this was possible. We had done everything right!
Fimbs was already weeping, as if he had perished before her eyes. "Janius," she pleaded, wetly, "Your leg... Oh, Great Blue! Are you okay?!"
"Zoel, help me! I can't get it off," he sobbed, desperately trying to pry its jaws apart with fingers as spry and deft as unripe carrots.
The caiman's jaws were among one of the mightiest clasping forces in The Sunset, and in its final act of defiance, had locked its maw around his bleeding appendage. I scrambled over, and hooked my fingers into its nostrils for a hopeful, mighty pull.
Nothing.
Even with our forces combined, I couldn't manage to budge the impending curse the creature had cast on our fallen friend. We were all too young to hope to ever go on the offense in this hazardous domain, and the clock was ticking.
"What do we do?!" Fimbs blubbered, unseemly; cradling Janny in her arms, and bawling openly into his shoulder.
I didn't have an answer. We did everything right. This shouldn't have happened. This should not have happened!
I could hear the chiding voice of Vassur in my head, echoing over and over, with a disapproving knowing glint in his eye. 'Give it up, son.' It was obvious that he knew something like this would happen.
The caiman was attracted to the torch, and soon there would be others. We should have been able to outmaneuver it, but we were too young to keep such speeds for any extended periods. There was no choice, but to fight.
It was hopeless. It was stupid. It was ...It was just as everyone said.
Children do not belong in The Sunset Domain.
I shook my head. 'No, we're not losing another friend today. I promised that we'd save her, together, and that's what I'mma make happen.'
"Fimbs!" I shouted, with only the fledgling hopes of a plan developing in my mind. Her eyes locked onto mine, as shocked as if I had kicked her. "Get over here, and help me. I need you to take over, here."
She nodded, climbing over his torso to take position on the opposite side of the creature's mouth. Janny croaked out a pitiful cry whenever something so much as jostled his open wounds, but it couldn't be helped.
"Sorry!" she offered, regardless. I started off towards the mandible of the jaw, holding the torch in my spare hand. "W-wait, where are you going?!"
"I don't know, it's a long shot, but I can't help but think about something Kilphy said, a long time ago. She was cooking some skink meat over the spit, and she told me the reason why we cook meat is so that the muscle fibers weaken, and they get easier to digest." I pressed the open flame against the tendons on the bottom of the jaw; not knowing what spot to target precisely, and hoping that the flame would simply be broad enough to reach the required muscle group.
Before long, the acrid stench of burning flesh, and sickly pond moisture filled our nostrils, as the flames did its cruel work of eating away at the tendons, and denaturing the proteins that made up the muscle fibers back into their constituent amino acids, and ash. Then, a bright squeak escaped Fimbs, as the jaw slacked for the first time, just the slightest increment.
"Zoel...!" Janny called. "Y-you're a genius! It's working!"
"Really?!" I shouted back, more in disbelief than either of them could ever hope to be.
Fimbs confirmed, "Yeah, It's not much, but the teeth lifted just about half an inch! Whatever you're doing, down there, keep it up!"
I nodded, wedging the torch between the throat of the caiman and the ground, and rushed back over to the pulling position I was in before, on the opposite side of Fimbs. Latching my fingers on top of hers, I ordered, more confidently this time, "On the count of three, we're going to both pull with all our might. Okay?"
"Okay," she nodded.
"One," I repeated, readying my stance for a proper lift, and curling the tips of my toes into the bottom lip on my right side, to match her anchored form on the left.
"Two," she continued, looking heedless and desperate from my eyes to Janny's, and back.
I furrowed my brow, as a subtle form of apology, as I locked eyes with him one last time, and I waited for him to nod back, before I shouted, "Three!" and lifted with all my might.
At first, it only budged that same miserable half-inch that Fimbs had described, but then, through both of our patient, concerted efforts, the snout slowly began to rise.
"Zoel!" Janny sounded absolutely besides himself. "Heavenly blue, it's actually moving, Zoel!"
Not willing to simply watch us doing all the hard work, he quickly forced his hands on either side of the snout, and added whatever little amounts of strength he had left.
It must have been waiting for that, as the force of all of us working together snapped whatever remaining tension existed, and it immediately flew out of the range of his reach; with enough force that both Fimbs and I were almost sent to the ground below with the blowback.
As soon as the teeth no longer remained clutched like daggers in his shin and calf, Janny removed his leg, and immediately set about pulling a roll of bandages from his bag; smiling and chuckling, and shaking his head all the while. "Zoel... You saved my life."
Drenched in sweat, and puffing loud, unheroic breaths, I didn't feel like much of a savior, but I scanned over to Fimbs' exhausted form squatting heedless with relief on the earth beyond the shadow of the terrible monstrous reptile. I shook my head. "It was a group effort. Fimbs, if you hadn't been here, I wouldn't have been able to free him. Thank you."
She blushed, and looked away, but I could tell that she appreciated the attention; despite her shy response.
I didn't want another accident to occur, so I slowly closed the caiman's heavy mouth, and proceeded to collect the torch from under its head; which had mercifully not burned out in such unideal conditions. Janny climbed to his feet, after wrapping his wound, and so he spoke before I could even ask.
"This isn't enough to make me quit."
Fimbs asked, "Are you sure?"
His response was without a shred of doubt, as he looked her in the eyes. "Sometimes, a man has to do the hard things, for the people he cares about. I would never give up, so easily."
The look she gave him back was enough to make me sick with jealousy. 'How's he even more charming, when he's injured?!'
I thought back to Rilah; out in sky-knows-where, doing who-knows-what. I looked into the retreating darkness, and pointed. "You hear that, Ri?! We're coming for you! Don't you dare give up on us...!"