A Fallen Hero

by Sharon Kimbra Walsh

  She had showered, washed her hair and dressed herself in clean combat trousers and a strappy T-shirt. Feeling ridiculous, she had dabbed some perfume behind her ears and between her breasts. The bottle was the only luxury she had brought with her.

  Now, she felt restless. She wanted Joe here, yearned to be in his arms and have him kiss her with the reckless abandon that was a part of their passion for each other.

  She rested a hand on the small curve of her stomach and wondered whether she was carrying a boy or girl. She hoped it was a boy who would resemble Joe. She prayed that it would be healthy and felt guilt that her escapade in Afghanistan might have gone some way to harming her baby. She would never forgive herself if it had.

  Katie suddenly tensed as she heard a sound from out in the medical tent then soft footfalls walking toward her sleeping quarters. Even though she was expecting Joe, it could also be someone else coming to her for medical treatment and she was just about to get up when the mosquito netting was swept aside and Joe thrust his head through, a grin on his face.

  “Anyone waiting for me?” he asked.

  Katie bounced up from the bed and hurried toward him, almost throwing herself into his arms.

  “Whoa,” he said, staggering backward slightly, then Katie covered his mouth and face with kisses, effectively stopping his words, hugging him tightly. Eventually she stopped and leaned back to look up at him.

  “Wow,” he announced, “That was some welcome.”

  “I thought you weren’t coming,” Katie said, defending her actions with a little embarrassment.

  “Well, damn, I’m not complaining,” Joe responded. “Could we try that again?”

  Katie laughed softly. “I think that could be arranged,” she teased, “if you’re interested of course.”

  She backed away, took his hand, and began to lead him deeper into the tiny tent.

  “Oh, I’m interested all right,” he replied, complying with the direction his wife was leading him in.

  Katie suddenly stopped and turned back toward him. “Have you been okay?” she asked.

  Joe put his arms around her. “I’ve been good,” he replied.

  “I should look at your arm,” Katie announced, laughing inwardly at the impatient look appearing on her husband’s face.

  “Are you wasting time deliberately?” he asked.

  “Me?” Katie asked, “Now why on earth would I try to waste time?”

  “Because you’re a tease,” Joe growled, “and you know what I want.”

  “And what would that be?” Katie responded, her breath catching in her throat.

  Lowering his head, Joe gently kissed her ear then whispered, repeating. “You know what I want.”

  “Well, this is cozy!”

  Katie jumped and turned her head in the direction of the unexpected voice and as she did, she felt Joe’s body grow rigid against hers. When she saw who had appeared inside her tent, Katie froze.

  Sergeant Dana Edwards was standing with her arms folded, glaring at them both, a look of anger and jealousy twisting her beautiful features.

  Joe, with his arms still around Katie, snapped, “What the fuck are you doing here?”

  “Just checking on what you’re up to, Joe,” Dana answered. She turned her attention to Katie, who noticed that the other woman’s eyes gleamed balefully at her and her ire began to rise.

  “You followed me here?” Joe asked, speaking as though he was gritting his teeth.

  Dana had the audacity to say, without any embarrassment, “Of course. How else was I going to find out about this little…fling.”

  Joe’s body give the slightest of twitches and Katie knew that an explosion was imminent. What he would do to the smirking woman, she had no idea, but whatever it turned out to be, it wouldn’t be good.

  With quick reflexes and before he could move anymore, she grabbed his hand and clenched it. She winced as his hand squeezed hers hard enough to grind the fragile bones together. His features looked grim, as though carved from stone.

  She turned back to Dana. “Get out of here,” she ordered rudely. “This is none of your business.”

  “Remember our little talk?” Dana asked. “Looks like you decided to ignore my advice. Then again, I suppose Joe needed a fuck buddy and you were readily available.”

  Katie felt her own temper begin to fray at the edges. “If he was my fuck buddy, as you so delicately put it, then it would be your loss,” she snapped.

  “You really have lowered your worth, Dana,” Joe suddenly stated angrily. “Didn’t you get my fucking message when you stopped me the other day? Not clear enough for you?”

  Dana’s face flushed and some of her smugness began to dissipate. “I think you don’t know what you want, Joe,” she replied.

  “Well, fuck you, Dana,” Joe exclaimed, his tone steely with fury. “I get it. You want it put in layman’s terms. Okay. Here you go. Fuck off!”

  Katie saw an expression of disbelief cross Dana’s face.

  “Joe! We used to have something so good. We could have it again.”

  “Enough, Dana!” Joe began, his voice rising. “You’re living in a dream world.”

  Katie, feeling Joe struggling to free his hand, used her other hand to grab his arm.

  “Joe,” she said quietly, attempting to get his attention. When he ignored her, she spoke his name louder and finally, he glanced down at her.

  “What?” he snapped sharply.

  “It’s okay,” Katie murmured. “Calm down.”

  Joe continued to stare at her with eyes that were almost black in color and she thought uneasily that he was going to refuse to listen to her. Suddenly, he relaxed completely and squeezed her hand gently.

  “Yeah,” he agreed and took a deep breath.

  Katie turned to Dana. She almost felt sorry for the sergeant. Dana Edwards was obviously deeply in love with her husband—that she could understand—but she was making a fool of herself and Katie thought that it was about time that she imparted a few facts.

  It didn’t matter anymore. Whether she told the sergeant about her marriage to Joe or anything else of a personal nature, she and Joe would be out of Afghanistan in a few weeks and she didn’t think that, at this moment in time, the brass would kick them both out of the country while they were on a mission.

  “Sergeant Edwards,” she began. “I think it’s about time you learned a few facts. It might change your view of matters.”

  Dana almost sneered at her. “What could you possibly tell me that would change my feelings?” she asked.

  “Joe is my husband,” Katie explained as gently as she could. “We were married a few months ago and we have a baby daughter.”

  Katie watched the mixture of emotions cross the sergeant’s face—anger, hurt, disbelief and jealousy—before her face finally began to crumple with grief.

  Then all hell broke loose.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The horrifying sound of an explosion—almost directly outside the medical tent—ripped apart the silence of the FOB, followed almost immediately by a second and a third.

  The ground shook beneath their feet, the canvas material of the roof and walls of the tent first billowing upward then inward with the sound of a strained crackling, as though a gale-force wind had materialized from nowhere.

  There was a strange tearing sound from the medical tent and a muffled thud as something landed on the floor, followed by a thunderous pattering on the roof and against the sides, as though the heavens had unleashed a monsoon. Almost at the same time as the explosions, there was a rending screech of metal, which seemed to go on unendingly. In the background was the continuous and unrelenting sound of gunfire.

  For a split second, everyone in Katie’s sleeping quarters froze, expressions of horror showing on each face, then Joe ran, shoving Dana out of the way. Then she also turned to head outside.

  Katie grabbed for her equipment, quickly pulling the body armor over her head then fumbling with suddenly nerveless fi
ngers to fasten the Velcro. After slamming her helmet on, she quickly picked up her weapon, slung the strap over her shoulder then ran into the medical tent to pick up the medical pack. Sealing it shut, preparing to leave the tent, she stopped dead in her tracks as an unearthly scream suddenly rent the air. It went on and on for what seemed like an eternity before it tapered off, then the yelling started.

  “Medic, men down. Medic!”

  “RPG attack!”

  Katie ran, her mind now totally focused on getting to the casualty or however many there were and helping them. Once outside the tent she stopped, gasping in horror at the scene unfolding before her.

  It was pitch dark, and this made the scene seem even more like Dante’s Inferno. Flickering flames lit up the FOB with a red-gold, strobe-like effect from a burning MRAP, its hulk twisted and warped from tremendous percussive forces, completely unrecognizable as a vehicle. Whatever fuel that was in the tank burned with a fierce hissing roar. Two marines were attempting to put the conflagration out but the fire extinguishers they were using seemed pitiful.

  Beyond the burning vehicle and lit by the flames—at a guess—at least twenty-five meters of the FOB wall had been obliterated, chunks of Hesco lying in piles, some of it still burning. Greasy smoke from the burning tires of the MRAP and thick clouds of dust hung unmoving in the air. Katie’s nostrils burned and her eyes stung from the pungent odors of burning rubber, oil, fuel, and smoke.

  Coughing as the smoke congealed in her throat and feeling sick, Katie glanced hastily around for casualties and eventually saw, through the shimmering firelight, a figure lying on the ground with another dark outline crouching beside it. Katie jogged over to them and as she grew closer, an ANA medic who had been tending the marine glanced up at her.

  Recognizing a member of the Afghanistan National Army, Katie crouched down beside him and nodded at him. “And you are?” she asked.

  “As-salamu alaykum. I am Corporal Afzaal Bakht. I am ANA and a medic. You will need my help.”

  Katie wasted no time in general chit chat. Getting straight to the point she asked, “What have we got?” She wished that there was more light to see by but started a full body assessment to see if she could find any obvious injuries.

  “He has no injuries,” Corporal Bakht began. “I have already carried out an assessment. I believe the concussion of explosions has rendered him unconscious.”

  Confirming that indeed there was no bleeding or any apparent injuries, Katie glanced at the medic.

  “I’m sorry, Corporal Bakht. It’s automatic for me to carry out a full assessment. I meant no offense or to undermine your experience. We can’t do anything more out here in the dark. We need more light.”

  She looked around them to see if there was any help available, but there were too many people running around through the smoke haze with more important things to do such as holding off enemy forces, and Katie realized that she and the ANA medic were on their own.

  “It looks like we’ll need to get him inside the medical tent ourselves,” she continued. “I’ll take his head if you’ll take his feet.”

  Katie crouched and lifted the unconscious marine’s head and shoulders while Corporal Bakht took his feet. Slowly, and with a great degree of effort, they managed to carry the injured man across to the medical tent and inside, where they laid him on the examination table.

  “You are able to deal with this casualty alone?” Corporal Bakht asked. “I will go to find more casualties and bring them back here.”

  Dragging her gaze away from her patient, Katie stared at the corporal and nodded. As he hurriedly left, she turned back to the unconscious casualty and quickly and thoroughly checked out his face and neck.

  There were small but deep scratches on his young face, which appeared to have bled very little but needed to be cleaned. She gently ran her hands over his skull, trying to gauge by feeling alone whether there were any concavities which could indicate fractures or contusions, but found none which could have caused him to remain unconscious.

  Katie raised each eyelid to check the pupils and found them slightly dilated. She realized that this symptom went some way to confirming her unskilled assessment that the young marine lying in front of her had sustained some sort of brain injury.

  Without any visible injuries to his skull, she guessed that it was more than likely that he was the victim of a tertiary blast injury from the concussive wind caused by the explosions. He had probably been at ground zero when the three explosions had occurred and the combined force might have thrown him some distance. Without the patient being conscious, she was unable to carry out the most basic of tests and so therefore had no idea how severe the damage to his brain was.

  Katie quickly cleaned the scratches on the man’s face then stood staring at him, biting the knuckle of a finger anxiously, her mind turning over treatment possibilities.

  The primary treatment was for shock. There was no visible bleeding unless it was inside the cranium. He had dilated pupils, so there was obviously some swelling of the brain. She couldn’t give him too much intravenous fluid in case of internal injuries.

  Discarding various ideas, she was left with setting up a simple IV infusion of plasma volume expander that would keep shock to a minimum and keep his body hydrated.

  Katie quickly collected together the plasma cannula and a chart on which she could record the patient’s vital signs. She finally wheeled an IV stand over to the examination table.

  Quickly, she began to check pulse, respiration and blood pressure. She wasn’t happy with the BP reading but the other results appeared to be within normal parameters and after noting them meticulously on the chart, she proceeded to insert the cannula into the back of the man’s hand and set up the IV. As she was doing this, Corporal Bakht appeared in the tent, assisting a second casualty.

  Katie hooked the clear bag onto the IV stand, made sure that the tubing into the cannula was free of kinks and that the fluid was dripping at the appropriate rate. She looked up and with a quick glance, assessed the outward appearance of the new patient. She pointed to a bed.

  “Sit him there, please,” she said, “then could you come and help me put this one to bed.”

  Corporal Bakht did as he was told then joined Katie at the examination table.

  “He is still unconscious?” he asked.

  Katie nodded. “I think he has a traumatic brain injury, which isn’t good. I haven’t been able to do a proper assessment of him because he’s out of it. He really needs to be medevacked out of here urgently.”

  Katie and Corporal Bakht managed to lift the first patient off the examination table and, awkwardly maneuvering the IV stand, they carried the comatose man to the closest camp bed. After laying him down, Katie left the ANA medic undressing the marine and covering him up while she assisted the second patient to the examination table.

  Again, she carried out a quick body assessment before asking, “Any dizziness, double vision or nausea?”

  She was relieved when the marine answered in the negative to each symptom. She noted the answers on another chart, checked his pupils and found them normal, then studied the presenting head wound.

  The gash on the man’s temple was deep, long and ragged and had bled profusely. There were also a number of grazes on his face and these she cleaned before proceeding to the main wound. She used steri-strips to close the gash, put a dressing on it and gave the man two painkillers to take with a plastic cup of water.

  Corporal Bakht left again to search for more casualties, arriving back with a third. Katie had the second patient moved to a bed where she advised him, much to his irritation, that he would need to remain in the medical tent under twenty-four-hour observation.

  The third patient had sustained a shrapnel wound to the upper arm. A piece of flying metal had gouged out a triangular wedge of skin and muscle approximately three-inches in diameter.

  After carrying out a body assessment, Katie also discovered a very large severe bruise on the right
side of his body in the location of his ribs and wondered whether it was just bruising or cracked ribs.

  She cleaned the shrapnel wound then packed it with hemostatic gauze and dressed and bandaged it before ordering him to bed. She gave both the conscious patients their antibiotics then a sleeping tablet each to allow them the opportunity to rest.

  With the three patients settled and asleep, Katie sank down onto one of the vacant beds and began to fill out the requisite casualty reports. Once finished, she left Corporal Bakht completing twenty-minute observations on all three and went wearily through to her sleeping quarters, where she perched on the edge of her bed.

  She rubbed her face tiredly. It was after 0200 hours and she felt exhausted. She could still hear gunfire and shouting. The air inside the medical tent smelled of smoke and burning rubber and it was beginning to turn her stomach. All she wanted to do was curl up on her bed and go to sleep but even though she had the assistance of the ANA medic, she knew that she could not leave him to handle the casualties or anyone else that might come in for treatment.

  She wondered where Joe was and tried not to picture him out there with the gunfire. She hoped fervently that he was all right. If anything happened to him… She didn’t want to even entertain the remotest idea that he could be shot and injured. She needed him with her desperately and had the feeling that the next twenty-four hours was going to be hell for everyone, including herself.

  * * * *

  It was 0400 hours in the morning and Katie had sent Corporal Bakht to get a couple of hours’ sleep. She was carrying out observations on her three patients, two of whom were sleeping comfortably, the third still worryingly unconscious. She was engrossed in writing up her notes on the respective charts when she heard movement at the entrance to the tent. Expecting to see another casualty for treatment, she saw Joe standing watching her.

  “Joe!” she exclaimed then was running toward him. His presence had triggered all the repressed fears in her for his safety that she had been trying to dismiss. To try and stop herself from launching at him was impossible.