by Terry Yates
“Look!” Sgt. Cohen said loudly, his finger pointing across the courtyard area. Before Kyler even saw the direction that the sergeant had been pointing, the man had taken off running. Not knowing what he had seen, Kyler began to run after him, guessing he would find out soon enough what was going on with Pvt. Fulton. Sgt. Cohen must be in impeccable shape, Kyler thought to himself. The man was twenty years older than he was and Kyler wasn’t able to keep up with him. Of course, Sgt. Cohen had kept his helmet on the whole time, which kept at least some of the rain out of his eyes, while Kyler ran face to the ground, the rain pouring down his forehead, eyes, nose, and chin.
He looked up to see that the sergeant had stopped just ahead of him. He could see Pvt. Fulton now and she was helping a naked man, his arm draped around her shoulder. He was at least six inches taller than she was so she was having some trouble holding him up. When he reached the trio, Sgt. Cohen had already taken the man’s other arm and was relieving FranAnne of some of the weight. Kyler removed his raincoat and put it over the man, but not before noticing that the man had small, round, red welts all over his body. He saw that the stranger was only an inch or two shorter than his own six foot one. He had almost jet black shoulder length hair, and when Kyler cupped his hands to the man’s face, he opened his eyes to reveal a pair of dark brown orbs looking blankly back at him.
Kyler took the man’s other arm to give Pvt. Fulton a much-needed rest. As they began moving toward the mess hall, Gringo and Zack Olsen joined them.
“Who is he?” Zack asked.
“Don’t know yet,” Kyler answered trying to get the man’s legs to move with his and Sgt. Cohen’s.
“He sure looks beat to shit,” Gringo added.
“Come on, let’s get him inside or he’ll catch his death,” Sgt. Cohen said, already grunting from the weight of the man.
As they neared the canteen, they could see several of the others looking out the doorway at them. They would have to turn over another empty table to set this guy on. God, I need sleep, Kyler thought to himself…if not sleep, then at least some rest.
The onlookers moved out of the doorway as they reached the mess hall, the man’s back legs almost dragging the last twenty or so feet. Once inside, Kyler ordered a few of them to make another hospital table, which they immediately did. They put a sheet that they’d found in the remaining barracks over the top and laid the man down on it. The man’s eyelids opened and closed and would occasionally roll into the back of his head for a moment before going back to normal again. They were normal now, because Kyler no longer saw the big brown orbs. The eyes were still brown, but they didn’t take up the whole socket like they seemed to before. He stared up at the group, his nervous eyes scanning each of their faces.
“Who are you, Buddy?” Gringo asked breaking the silence. Kyler shot him a look that said…”Who’s the doctor here?” Gringo shrugged his shoulders and stepped back. Kyler silently motioned for everyone else to also step back to give the man some breathing room. Naturally, Nurse Walling remained where she was.
“So…uh…who are you, Buddy?” Kyler asked in a hushed tone.
The man tried to lift his head, but couldn’t. His mouth opened as if trying to speak, but only short grunts were coming out. Kyler ran his hand over the man’s head looking for possible cuts or abrasions. What he found was a huge knot on the side of the man’s head that was almost the size of his fist.
“Ah…” Kyler told him, “There’s the reason for your dilemma. My guess is that something very large bonked you on the head and gave you a bit of a concussion.
“Who are you?”
Kyler looked up. The man had spoken, his voice barely above a whisper, but he had spoken. The rest of the group that could walk began to move towards the table again, but Kyler held them back with a gesture of his arm.
“I’m…uh…my name’s Richard Kyler,” he answered, smiling down at the man. “I’m a doctor.”
The man carefully looked at the ceiling, then slowly turned his head from side to side, silently checking out the rest of the room before looking back up at Kyler.
“Where am I?” he asked in a voice that was almost inaudible to even Kyler.
“You’re on an island,” Kyler answered. “No Name Island, to be specific.”
The man looked confused. “An island? Why am I on an island?” His voice had become a little stronger, but not much. He also seemed to choose his words deliberately and carefully.
“You tell me,” was the only answer that Kyler could think of at that moment. Boy, he could sound so stupid sometimes. “You tell me”. Brilliant.
“I don’t know…” he stammered. “I…don’t remember…anything.”
“Do you know who you are?” Great, Kyler. The man just told you that he couldn’t remember ANYTHING and you ask him his name! Doy-dee-doy-dee-doy!
The man tried to sit up again but Kyler again, eased him back down.
“Take it easy now,” Kyler said, hoping his doctor voice sounded at least, a little authoritative. “I’ve got to look at your head. You’ve got a knot the size of Krakatoa on your coconut,” he finished, a small chuckle escaping his lips that sounded like Jerry Lewis’ Nutty Professor. The man stared blankly back at him.
The man tried to sit up again and once again, Kyler tried to ease him back down, but this man was way more muscular than he was, and pushed back against him, until he had forced his way into a sitting position. As soon as he had sat completely up, he grabbed his head again and fell back down on the hard table.
“See? I told you. Now listen to your doctor,” Kyler told the man. “I need to look at your head. “You can ask all of the questions you want, but I’m going to look at that knot. “
Kyler turned the patient’s head to the side to get a better look at the knot. He separated the hairs just around it.
“Could someone give me a flashlight, please?”
Before anyone could do anything, Sam Fong stepped up, pulling his flashlight from his belt like a gunfighter drawing his six-shooter.
“Here you go,” he said, placing it into Kyler’s outstretched hand.
“Thanks, Sam. Nurse Walling, would you shine the light here, please?”
Nurse Walling took the flashlight from his hand. “Of course, Doctor.” She shined the light down between the hairs as best she could. Kyler saw what looked to him like a recent cut, but not recent enough to have happened in the last two days. This cut was healing like he’d gotten it four or five days ago, but it was indeed smack dab on top of the knot. And what a knot, it was. It should have its own zip code. He wished they had some ice, but it was doubtful that there was any left in any refrigerators. The electricity had been off far too long for any water to have stayed hard.
“Are you hungry?” asked Kyler, still looking at the knot. The man shook his head no.
“Water would be nice, though,” the man answered.
“Of course. Nurse.”
As Nurse Walling walked away, the man turned on his side and sat up on his elbow. He looked up to see for the first time all of those people who had crowded around when he’d first been brought in. None of them looked familiar to him except maybe the old lady who was smiling rather creepily at him. The boy with the glasses and the splint on his leg looked warily at him…as did most of the rest of them. He saw a sleeping woman with a baby, and a young girl who also appeared to be sleeping…either that or she was unconscious. The rather tall striking woman…was she a nurse…looked quite comely as did the shorter lady with the dark eyes and dark wavy hair.
“Who in Bea Benederet’s balls are you?”
The man looked up to see an army officer, complete with white flattop haircut, perfectly pleated pants, and squeaky-clean shoes. He didn’t look unkempt and disheveled like the rest of them. He was clean and dry.
“My quarters are still in pretty good shape,” he told the group. “I just changed clothes, people. Most of you should be able to as well. There are a lot of spare uniforms in ‘C’ barracks
. I want everybody to go in there and find something that you can wear for the time being. We’ll build us a fire somewhere and let our clothes dry out. Come on. Move people!”
The man watched as those in the group that could walk, silently trudged away to this ‘C’ barracks.
“Bring something to wear for those that can’t walk,” he hollered over his shoulder to no one in particularly. “Now, what’s going on here? Who are you?” he bellowed towards the man.
“Nurse Walling, go change into something dry, will ya’? You’ll catch your death.”
“We wouldn’t want that, would we?” Potts asked sarcastically.
“Go now,” Kyler told the nurse before she and Potts could get into it again.
Nurse Walling glared at Potts for a moment, and Potts in turn, gave her a “don’t you have a tree to perch on somewhere” look just before she left the room.
“I’ll ask you again, friend,” Potts started, walking up to the man and stopping no more than three feet in front of him. “Who are you and what are doing on my base?”
“He doesn’t seem to know who he is, Colonel,” Kyler answered for the man,” or where he is, or how he got here.”
“Amazing,” Potts exclaimed, “How did this man get his hand up your ass without me seeing it?” He looked to the man. “Are you a ventriloquist, or something?”
The stranger looked up at Kyler, not sure of who this person was. Kyler looked down at him and shrugged.
“The doctor’s right…uh… Sir,” he started, rubbing his head gently, “ I can’t remember who I am or how I got here.”
“You’ve gotta remember something,” Potts told him, as if ordering the man to remember.
The man closed his eyes and tried to concentrate, but everything was a blank. “It seems like it’s all on the tip of my tongue…like I might remember at any moment.”
Potts closed the gap between the two even more, now only about a foot and a half from the man. “Well, let’s see…you’re obviously American…even though your skin’s a bit olive colored…and you’re hair’s too long to be military.”
“Maybe he’s one of the island scientists,” Kyler said, trying to at least be a little helpful in the inquiry.
“Who knows, he could be a spy, he could be one of those UFO nuts, but we do know one thing…he didn’t just fall out of the sky.”
The three of them stood in silence for a few moments before Potts stepped away and motioned for Kyler to follow him. The doctor looked at his patient for a moment, shrugged, then walked away toward Potts who was now standing far enough away from the table to be out of earshot.
“What do you think?” Potts asked him, looking back at the stranger.
Kyler also looked back at the stranger, then leaned in towards Potts. “About what?” he asked.
“Don’t play stupid, Doc.”
“Believe me…I’m not playing.”
“Do you really think he doesn’t know who or where he is?”
“Yes, I do believe him. He has a knot on his head that you could play King of the Mountain on. He took some sort of blow to the head.”
“What about those little round bruises all over him?”
Kyler had been too busy with the man’s head to really pay attention to the round, red welts that had already begun to darken into bruises.
“I don’t know…my guess would be hail. Come to think of it, maybe it was a big piece of hail that conked him on the head. It and the bruises together would make sense. What’s the big deal anyway?”
Potts looked at him as if he were a kindergartner. “Because this island has a top secret project going on.”
“What is it?” asked Kyler.
“How the shit do I know? I’m only in charge of the base. The big brass generals and the scientists are the only ones with top clearance and I don’t think any of them has total clearance.”
“So, you’re in charge of the whole island, but you’re not allowed in on the project?”
“That’s the way the government works, Son. The left hand never knows what the right is doing. My job is to see that no unqualified personnel comes onto this island. We didn’t have any choice with the civilians that were already here. Too many of them were too powerful with the big brass for us to relocate them.”
“That must’ve hurt.” Kyler said sarcastically.
“A little,” Potts answered quickly, the sarcasm lost on him. “I don’t know how that ape, Ringo, managed to get a bunch of generals to let him run loose on the island with that coochy mama of his and a camera. I guess maybe she had to polish a few knobs to get the okay on that one.”
Kyler looked down at the little colonel, amazed at the simplicity of the man and yet the complexity of him. He’d only seen Potts off and on for a few months, but he saw Potts as the type of man who would save a child from a burning building, but would then shoot the kid if it weren’t cleared to be in that building.
Potts rubbed his chin for a moment. He was deep in thought. Now that he was all clean and neat again, he looked like a colonel again instead of a wet, deranged, megalomaniac with a Napoleon complex that he had looked like for the last twelve hours.
After what seemed like an eternity to Kyler, Potts looked up at him.
“Just keep an eye on him for me, would you?” he asked with as much sincerity as a person like him could possibly muster.
“You bet,” Kyler told him, figuring that now was one of those times to let the colonel feel like a colonel.
With this, Potts walked away, seemingly a little embarrassed at himself for conferring with a civilian. Kyler smiled. Potts had almost made him feel like a member of the human race. Interesting.
“Doctor?” It was the stranger.
Kyler walked back over to the man who was still sitting up on the table, the raincoat bunched up around his waist. No wonder Potts was worried about him. This guy was fairly well built. He hadn’t really noticed it before except when the man had pushed against him when he had tried to sit up. He had close to six-pack abs, if not six, then at least five. His chest stuck out farther than Hugh Jackman’s and his legs were sinewy, but muscular. This guy could play James Bond…if James Bond were more olive skinned…and had brown eyes…and longish hair.
“What is it, Mister…uh…sorry.”
“What’s happening in this place? Everything…everybody seems so…”
“Hurt, heartbroken, disheveled, wet, and at the end of their ropes?” Kyler answered for him.
“Yes. What’s going on here?”
“Let’s see…where to start?”
Kyler told the man about the jet crash and the hurricane. He thought he’d seen the man squint his eyes a little at the mention of the jet crash, but he wasn’t sure. He neglected to tell him about the hospital incident with the werewolf. He couldn’t think the word, much less, say it. Werewolf. Werewolf. Werewolf. Nope, he couldn’t make the word roll off his tongue even when he was just thinking it. He figured he’d hold off on that little bit of news for as long as he could. The man had absolutely no memories right then, and Kyler didn’t want the man to find himself lost in a real life Stephen King novel.
“I’m guessing New England somewhere,” Kyler said.
“New England? What about New England?” the man asked, confused.
“Your voice. It’s sounds sort of…New Englandish.”
“Oh…” The man put his hand to his again. “Doesn’t really ring a bell. New England. What states are in New England? I know there’s…Vermont…and Delaware…and…”
“New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island…” Kyler was hoping that one of the states sounded familiar to the man. If he could remember something…one little thing, it might completely jog his memory.
The man held his head while Kyler finished calling out the New England states, forgetting Pennsylvania. The man shook his head.
“Nothing.” He looked up at Kyler. “It’s very frightening, not knowing who you are.”
“Why don�
��t you lie back down? Tell ya’ what. I’ll give you something to ease the pain a little. How ‘bout that? Do you know if you’re allergic…eh…uh…oh…ah…of course you don’t…know if you’re…alleg…”
He couldn’t finish the sentence because that cartoon donkey moment was happening again. He had just asked a man with no memory if he knew of anything that he might be allergic to.
He stood smiling with what he knew to be an idiot grin. He had the biggest urge to say “George is gonna let me tend the rabbits”.
“I’ll just get something for that headache now…” he stuttered and walked across the room where another table held everything that they needed, medicine wise.
The man watched the doctor for a moment before lying back down and closing his eyes, his arm resting over his forehead. His head ached from both the injury and the lack of memory. Who am I? Where am I from? He tried to think of anything that might jog his memory. He tried to think of anything that he might know. He had mentioned several New England states, so he must be at least somewhat educated. He closed his eyes tighter trying to concentrate. What else did he know? He opened his eyes and turned his head and looked across the mess hall towards the open doorway. It was daylight, but cloudy. He obviously knew words like daylight and cloudy, even though they sounded like a stranger in his head was actually saying them because he couldn’t remember having ever said those words. As he continued to gaze at the doorway, he tried to think of other things that he might know. He had to think. He knew that the sun rose in the east and set in the west. The man was happy that he knew this, but he didn’t feel terribly confident that knowing how the sun rose and set was anything spectacular. He tried to go deeper. The doctor had said something about a plane crashing…no, a jet crashing. He tried thinking of jets. He knew what they were, but could he fly one? No he couldn’t. He knew that. Good. He at least knew he wasn’t a pilot. That only left about two million jobs to go. What other occupations could he think of? Buses…trains…drivers…engineers…teachers…professors…doctors…lawyers…school…lawsuit…moon. Moon. Why had he thought of the moon? Was he an astronaut? No. Moon…moon…moon.