Well this went to shit real fucking fast. Mud was clinging to Tyler’s boots like shit to a blanket, his side was absolutely killing him and he felt like his lungs were about to burn through his ribcage. Not to mention all the blood that was soaking his clothes. The more concerning part of the whole shebang was that the blood wasn’t his; not for the most part, anyway. As he dragged Dean’s limp body through the tree line at the beginning of the forest, he felt his knees giving up. The whole operation was obviously lost, and he could only hope that his signal to abandon that godawful factory came in time for everyone to run. This thing was supposed to be ridiculously easy, almost a formality, just to keep him warmed up for all the major shit to come. Just to flex his muscles and to some reconnaissance. But lo and fucking behold, he was currently grinding his teeth to powder just to be able to stand upright and get the kid to the checkpoint. Cause there was no way in hell Dean was kicking the bucket on his watch. He was pretty sure that the stray bullet that hit his side was still in there, or at least it felt like it. He was losing quite a bit of blood, too, and the knee got pretty fucked up as well. The weight of Dean on his shoulder was way more pressing, though. The entire left half of his body way slick with the boy’s blood; fuck, he was bleeding all over Tyler. That feeling of utter powerlessness and sheer force of will was giving him serious war flashbacks, but there was not time to feel sorry for himself, or give in to a delicious ptsd break in the narrative. His vision was starting to blur a little, when he finally heard the sound of familiar boots on dried leaves.
“Take him to the portkey, go on,” he breathed out and felt Nina taking over Dean’s body. The kid was pale, so pale, almost lifeless. Tyler cursed under his breath, leaned on Jack and limped to the other portkey. A swishing sound announced that Dean was being moved to the hospital wing. He would have loved to follow up, but there was so much shit he had to shovel through first. Number one was making sure that everyone made it back in one piece, more or less. His mind offered him an image of Jade’s smirk; that was something that he kept bitching about with Jade’s habits. But yeah, once you slipped into the leadership position for a sec, it was easy to see why the regard for his own health kind of came second. A third of his mind was still with Dean, although he knew that by now, several people would be running circles around him to keep him alive, activating all the protocols. He briefly wondered, whether Dean’s emergency contact was Jade or that girl he lived with. Cause the latter could be a problem. Tyler sighed and the black swirl of portkey swallowed him into nothingness.