“Can you hold this while I suture it in place?” he asked her calmly.
Joss quickly grabbed it.
“Easy now,” he cautioned.
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay. I know you’re scared and more than a little nervous. Everything’s gonna be fine, alright?”
She nodded.
“That was fast. BP’s one hundred over seventy. Pulse is sixty-five. You’re doing good, Carlos,” she stated reassuringly as she smoothed his hair back off of his sweat soaked forehead.
As if he were running on auto pilot, Carlton wheeled around for the 1.0 silk to suture the tube to his body.
“You’re not gonna purse string suture that, are you?” Basilia asked.
“Hell no!” he answered incredulously. “I don’t want him to get skin necrosis. Mattress sutures work best for holding chest tubes in place.”
“What?!” Hoplite stated just as emphatically.
“You shush,” she replied as she rebuked the wounded man on her kitchen table. “He said he didn’t want you to get necrosis.”
After a minute or so, the stitching was done.
“You can let go, Joss. It’s not going anywhere.”
She gingerly released it, fearful that it would slide out. When she realized it didn’t move, she finally breathed.
“Now that that’s in place, I’ll quickly check the entry wound. It needs to be cleaned and debrided of any dead tissue. From there, we’ll apply an occlusive dressing and seal the chest cavity. As soon as that dressing is on, we’ll pack the tube site and get ready to drain.”
Joss stepped back and let the two doctor’s work. It felt like an eternity as she observed. To distract herself, she turned her attention to the blood donors and checked their bags.
Basilia worked on cleaning the flesh wound in Carlos’ bicep while Carlton handled the chest. When their aid returned to the room, she was tasked as their triage nurse. She spent the next several minutes handing each syringes of saline, dressings, and various implements as they called for them. They pair worked quickly and Hoplite’s anterior wounds were cleaned and bandaged in no time.
Carlton affixed the rubber tubing to the chest tube, cut it to length over the bucket, and let it dangle.
“Ever syphon gas from a car?” he asked Joss earnestly.
She shook her head slightly.
“We don’t have a pump so this is the next best thing,” he stated as he removed the remaining clamp from drain. He then proceeded to kneel. “If the fluid doesn’t exit on it’s on, sometimes you have to coax it out,” he said as the pair observed.
As predicted, the cavity began disgorging the watery liquid, but stopped midway. The former corpsman casually leaned over and began sucking ever so slightly on the end.
“There it goes,” Basilia declared and he quickly withdrew it from his mouth and let it drain into the makeshift container.
“Now we’re cooking!” Carlton stated. “Grab that empty water pitcher. We need to be able to measure how much comes out. Any more than a liter or so in thirty minutes and we’ve got bigger issues.”
Joss lunged across the counter, quickly grabbed the plastic container, then spun down to her knees and placed the tubing in the opening.
“Relax,” Basilia offered. “Is this your first surgery?”
The mother of two swallowed hard and nodded. “I unfortunately discovered during nursing school that I didn’t like blood. That’s why I chose geriatrics.”
“Well, look at it this way. You haven’t passed out from any of this,” Carlton offered reassuringly. “With time you’ll learn to relax. Just remember, the presence of blood doesn’t always mean that they are dying.”
“How long til we know it worked? When can we take that thing out? What about his other wound?” Heather asked from her recliner.
“We’ll leave him be for the next half an hour at a minimum,” he began to answer reassuringly. “If he doesn’t drain more than a liter or so, we should be good to go to remove the tube in about twenty four hours. That’s assuming the lung re-expands and we don’t collect more than 200 cc’s of serous fluid. As for his other wound, we’ll see what we can get to without turning him. It might have to wait awhile.”
Basilia chimed in and provided the remainder of the answer Heather was looking for. “Once the tube is out, we’ll pack that site with another occlusive dressing. His bandages have to be changed once or twice a day, maybe more depending on a variety of factors. After that, we’ll assess the need for sutures.”
“I’m sorry, Sweetie. Hoplite is out of commission for the next several weeks, probably a month,” Carlton added.
Chapter 18
“Rise and shine, dipshit!” Josh declared as he dumped the bucket of water.
The captive awoke with a start, but for all his flailing, he didn’t exit the chair he was bound to. Before him stood five of the angriest looking men he had ever seen.
“That was a stroke of genius to bolt it to the floor with those ‘L’ brackets,” Josh stated to the group. “That last one toppled over.”
“Thanks. I try,” Dallas replied.
“Look man,” James began. “I don’t know why we’s wastin’ time on this peckerwood. I’ve got my chainsaw right out in the truck. Why don’t we just cut ‘em up and cook ‘em? I don’t mind me some white meat.”
“You’ll have your chance,” Brent declared. “If he isn’t forthright with his answers, you can break ‘em down and chuck ‘em in the pot.”
“Whatever. Ya’ll ain’t gonna do that,” the prisoner pronounced.
“Alright,” Lt. Stokes replied. “It’s your funeral. Go get the chainsaw.”
“Sweet!” the big guy replied giddily as he exited Old Man Wrigley’s derelict farmhouse. Within seconds the sound of a chainsaw firing up could be heard outside.
All color drained from the bound man’s face.
When he re-entered the side door, James was carrying the now running chainsaw in one hand and had Heather’s meat cutting face shield in the other. Draped over his forearm was Katherine’s black leather butcher’s apron.
Playing on the man’s fear, he excitedly set the machine down. The thumping two-cycle engine started bouncing on the floor causing the joists to absorb the vibration. The rhythmic dancing of the saw could be felt throughout the house.
James quickly donned his borrowed meat cutting clothing and wheeled around to pick up the little tree trimmer.
“Ya’ll want legs or wings!” he joked from behind the face mask.
The others began uproariously laughing with him, and then he stopped to lift the shield.
“Oh, I almost forgot. Can some of you go get the bins? I promised Mimi I wouldn’t spill any more blood in the truck.”
Stokes and Dallas quickly exited. When they returned, they were noisily carrying stainless steel commercial size soup pots. The pair nonchalantly placed them in front of James with a clang.
“Thanks guys, how do you want ‘em?” he asked as he lowered the face shield.
“Just make sure he fits,” Josh answered. “Last time you had arms and legs sticking out and they took forever to cook!”
“Wait! Wait! Wait!” the man screamed. “You said I had to answer some questions!”
Dallas chucked Josh in the shoulder. “Damn it!”
“Sorry guys,” James declared as he shut off the engine and flipped his visor up. “That was my fault. I got excited about cuttin’ up another one. I guess I jumped the gun.”
“I asked them when we caught you at the crossroads,” their leader began. “Would you like to offer up some information now? Or…” he stated as his voice trailed off and he gestured to James and his saw.
“If I answer, you’ll let me go?! Right?!”
“Not only that, but we’ll give you your car back with a full tank of gas. How’d that be?” Brent offered.
The prisoner quickly nodded his agreement.
“Alright,” Josh replied with a sigh. “What’s your name?�
��
“Tyler. Tyler Chaffee,” he stammered as he answered.
“Okay, Tyler… you said you were a dead man earlier, why?”
“Because I keep messin’ up. I don’t know this stuff… guns, hunting. It’s just as foreign to me as Latin.”
The men stood there waiting for a more thorough explanation. No one offered any further commentary. The visual cues were lost on the prisoner until Lt. Stokes made a gesture then added, “And?”
“And TK’s getting tired of it. I heard him tell the other guys that if I screwed up again they were to leave me in a ditch.”
“Why were you and those men down in Logan?” Brent asked to start gathering intel.
“Food’s running low. We were scouting for a good place to setup a deer camp.”
“Along a main road, near a town your little gang in Columbus burned to the ground not two months ago? I find that hard to believe. You, sir, are either lying, or you’re one of the worst hunters I’ve ever seen,” Dallas rebutted.
“I’m not a hunter!” he declared. “I’m only a driver for the wolf pack. I was a freaking accountant! Okay?!”
“What’s that?” Brent asked.
“That’s just what TK calls them.”
“And who, pray tell, is that? He the leader of your little gang?” Dallas interjected.
Tyler scoffed.
“So how many are there?”
“I don’t know. A hundred if you count the whores and addicts,” he replied nonchalantly with a shrug.
“If you don’t include the working girls and addicted wastes of space?” Josh asked wanting clarification.
The man shrugged again and answered, “Twenty or thirty or so I guess.”
“Where are you guys based? Locations? Buildings? Downtown or suburbs?”
“Before I answer, what happened to the others?”
The inquisitor smiled, “What’s the line… ‘He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue’.”
“That's the Chicago way!” Stokes added for emphasis.
“Well, in this case, three went toes up,” Josh clarified.
“Good,” Tyler responded. “Sickest bastards I’ve met.”
“You seemed pretty lock step with them out there.”
“No I wasn’t. They were chasing after that girl so they could rape her. I could never do that. Not six months ago, not now, not ever!”
“That wasn’t what it looked like when I shot you,” the protective father intoned.
“She was coming on to me. I wasn’t forcing her to do anything. I thought I was gettin’ me a freebie til you skewered me in the leg.”
Josh realized the man was right. “Let’s leave that be for the time being. Now, where are TK and his merry band of miscreants?”
“They took over all of the luxury high rent condo buildings down by the old Huntington ballpark. Turned the entire outfield into a marijuana crop.”
“Weapons?”
“Big guns, little guns, some as big as your head! How the hell should I know!” Tyler volleyed back forcefully. “I’d never even held a gun, much less shot one, until all of this started.”
“Tell me about the area. Is it derelict? Are the buildings intact, in disrepair, or are they burned down?
“TK took over and united all of the gangs by spring. Then he appointed himself their defacto leader. He’s been directing traffic ever since. Most of the high rises are still there. They tried burning the Nationwide and AEP towers down, said they blocked his view. When that didn’t work they shot most of the windows out. Drunken idiots,” he stated adding a bit of commentary. “Whole place looks like a tornado went through there. Friggin’ glass and debris everywhere you go.”
“Any guards or sentries? Observation posts? Road blocks?” Brent asked.
“Isn’t much need. Anyone not in the organization either left or is rotting somewhere,” Tyler replied coldly.
“How’d you guys survive winter?”
“That guy is a master organizer. He had groups cleaning out cars, delivery trucks, and eighteen wheelers looking for anything that could be eaten. Teams of people were going restaurant by restaurant looking through each cabinet, cooler, and freezer for scraps of food. When that was done, they went floor by floor in the office buildings. They cleaned out every vending machine and desk drawer stash they could find.”
“Pretty resourceful,” Stokes interjected.
“You the guys that hit Chillicothe, burned Logan to the ground, and made a run on Athens?” Dallas asked.
“Yeah well, when everything in the city was consumed, TK expanded our territory. He called them his locust brigades. I think he’s actually trying to link up with gangs from Cincy and Cleveland for some trade.”
Silence permeated the room. The five men stood stoically as they contemplated Tyler’s responses.
“One last question before you go. This TK, he got a name?” I mean, a full name?”
“I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I heard some of the guys in his inner circle refer to him as ‘Tim’.”
“Tim?” Josh asked through his arched brow.
“Knight something or other. That’s it, I swear.”
Josh’s eyes became as big and white as saucers.
“Knightsbridge?”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s it! How’d you know that?”
“Okay, I’ve heard enough. You can cut him up now,” Josh responded as he turned and left Old Man Wrigley’s former living room. As he exited, he heard his friend pull the cord on the saw and fire it up.
“Hey! Wait!” Tyler begged. “You said if I answered your questions you’d let me go!”
At Dallas’ encouragement, the men remaining in the room started chanting ‘white meat… white meat’ in a taunting gesture. As James approached, he revved the engine several times to wind up the small two-stroke. Plumes of white smoke billowed out as it burned off the moisture in the fuel. Just as he laid the bar across Tyler’s thigh, the man emitted a shrill like scream and passed out.
The four men began raucously laughing as he shut the machine off. There was no chain.
* * *
The young Lieutenant from the UN detachment in Charleston, South Carolina couldn’t believe his eyes when he finished decoding the latest message. Just to be sure it was correct he decoded it a second time. There was no mistake. With paper in hand, he grabbed his notebook containing the peace keeping troop capabilities, bolted from his make shift communications room, and sprinted towards Brigadier Smythe’s office. His CO would definitely want to see this straight away.
Nigel entered the outer room in an almost full sprint. He didn’t bother waiting to be announced by the Brigadier’s staff officer.
As he bullied his way through the closed door, he proclaimed, “Sir! An urgent message from Whitehall!”
“Bloody hell, Lieutenant!” the Brigadier exclaimed as the papers were thrust at him.
“Read it, sir! You can reprimand me later!”
The General took a cursory glance at the hand written document and looked up with a start. He didn’t have to utter a single word.
“Decoded it twice,” the young Lt. offered.
“Excuse me, gentlemen,” he stated to the two officers seated before him. “Something’s come up.”
The men quickly excused themselves and closed the door behind them as they departed the room.
“Nigel,” the Brigadier began.
“Yes, sir,” he declared as he brought himself to attention and reprimanded himself. “I should have showed more restraint. I have no excuse. I’ll do better next time.”
“That’s a good lad. How much petrol do the dragoons have?”
The Lieutenant opened his notebook and began flipping pages. In just a few seconds he found what he was looking for.
“They have thirty six hundred liter’s, sir.”
“And what do they have in the form of APC’s (armored personnel carriers)?” his CO asked as a follow up.
&nbs
p; Nigel flipped back and forth as he counted up the unit’s available equipment list.
“If we are going for fuel economy, they have ten Husky’s which carry five men each and five Cobra’s carrying eleven. Call it eighty five with their gear.”
“Send the message,” the Brigadier stated flatly.
“Orders, sir?”
“Kill every single one of those French bastards and anyone else who gets in the way. Find the damn gold so we can get out of this God forsaken country.”
“Very good,” Nigel replied as he snapped a salute.
As the comms man was about to open the door, his CO stopped him.
“Any word from Omaha?”
The Lieutenant retracted his hand and turned to face him. “Only that she is a few days away from assuming control. No further details were offered, sir. I’m sorry.”
The officer nodded. “That woman will stop at nothing to be President… even if it’s a barren wasteland,” he stated more to the empty room than to anyone in particular. “Thank you, Lieutenant. That’ll be all.”
Once the Lieutenant had shut the door, the Brigadier reread the handwritten message and muttered, “Bloody French!”
* * *
“Whatever we decide, we need to get them back before Tim gets suspicious,” Katherine stated to her father and the rest of the group. “How long were you expected to be gone?” she asked as she directed the question to Tyler.
“A day or two is normal,” he replied. “Oh, and for the record, that crap with the chainsaw wasn’t funny.”
“Hell yeah it was!” James declared as the five men started giggling again.
“Alright, alright… focus,” Samantha scolded. “Here’s how I see it. Josh, Bryan, Dallas, and you, James, cannot be part of the equation… and neither can I for that matter. All of us are known, or were seen, by Tim when the plane crashed in Columbus. That goes for Agent Monahan too. Let’s not forget that someone is getting married tomorrow,” she continued with a wink in Josh’s direction. “Hoplite would have been the best candidate, but he’s out for the next month. Gregg’s out too, Emily’s not letting him out of her sight for the foreseeable future. That leaves Eustace, an engineer, or one of the recruits from the patrols.”
By the Dawn's Early Light Page 23