The ambulance's shrill siren drew closer before cutting off abruptly outside the church. Flashing red and blue lights shone through the shattered stained glass, casting eerie, dancing patches of light across the ravaged interior.
"That efficient? Doesn't sound like Gotham standard time at all."
Two medics wearing masks, caps, and standard EMT uniforms hurried inside with a stretcher and a first-aid kit. Their eyes swept over the wrecked church, barely lingering on the dissolving monster remains before locking precisely onto the unconscious girl at the edge of the crater by the altar.
"The patient's here!" one of them called in a muffled voice.
Li Jie and Wilson instinctively made some room, watching as the medics deftly set down the stretcher and crouched beside the girl.
"Vitals?" the other asked, reaching for the girl's shoulder to roll her over.
"Wait!" Li Jie suddenly stopped them. He held his rifle with his finger still resting on the trigger guard, his sharp gaze fixed on the two medics. "What are you doing?"
The medic about to turn the girl paused and looked up, revealing a pair of unusually calm eyes above the mask. "Officer, we need to assess her injuries, then secure her to the stretcher and get her to the hospital as quickly as possible."
"Assessing her injuries means immediately rolling over a blast victim who might have a spinal injury?"
Li Jie raised his muzzle. "You didn't even bring a basic cervical collar, and you want to roll her over like a sack? Since when did Gotham General Hospital's emergency training get this sloppy?"
Wilson caught on too. He immediately raised his freshly reloaded shotgun and backed up two steps, angling the muzzle slightly downward to cover both medics' paths.
"Hey, buddy, follow procedure, right? First, assess the scene, then... then