Samantha, who had once created very useful technology for the government, and saved the life of the President, picked up the hot knife. There was a second one smoldering in the fire, and she tried not to think of how much more it would hurt. There was a shoelace tied around her upper thigh, cutting off the circulation, and she clenched her teeth as she pinched up the flesh around the nasty-smelling wound and thick, yellow clots ran out, rolled down her thigh.
"Don't need someone to ride the river with," she told herself, the leg of her sweat pants cut away from the thigh to the knee so if she passed out, she wouldn't freeze to death. "It's do or die time, Sammi."
The steel in her spine stiffened into an iron bar and with a quick prayer she had no real faith in, Sam drew in a deep breath and pushed the red hot knife into her swollen, discolored leg.
It sank into her flesh like it was butter and she screamed as pain like she'd never known, raced up her leg. White and yellow puss shot out, followed by scarlet streams, and she moved the blade again, her hoarse cry never completely stopping as a chunk of her leg slid to the sticky floor.
Stomach and teeth clenched, the sobbing woman forced her shaking hands to drop the knife and grab the full, open bottle of rubbing alcohol. She dumped it over the heavily-bleeding wound, snatching up the second knife with her other hand before the waves of agony could overwhelm her, moaning.
Tears blurring her vision, she shoved the red-hot end over the gaping hole, and her lungs burned before she stopped screaming.
Twice more to be sure she had gotten it all, Sam could feel her heart thudding in her chest, nothing else except the flames that had become her leg. She dropped the bloody metal back into the fire, grasping the syringe of morphine with jerking fingers.
Crying waves tears of misery, she only gave herself half of the liquid, and was grateful when the waves of pain immediately sank down into a nasty monster. The morphine was powerful, consuming, and she was unprepared for the strength of the liquid gold as it made her head swim.
When she was sure she had herself under control, she shot a generous dose of antibiotics into her thigh and then sat still, trying to stay awake, afraid of the wound breaking open, terrified of her dreams. Melvin and Henry were with her most nights, often joined by the Press Secretary from the bunker, and while she knew it was just her mind working through it all, she couldn't help being afraid, looking over her shoulder.