"Yes, ma'am." Private Clark tried to smile but suddenly grimaced. She muttered, "My leg! It feels like it's on fire."
With genuine pleasure, Major Sherman smiled, "You may not believe me, but that's an incredibly good sign. Now, can you move either of your legs, yet?"
Major Sherman held up the young woman's head so she could see her own feet and watched as the young woman grimaced with effort. Private Clark had grown up in Gallup and had followed her four older brothers into the military as soon as she was out of high school—the day after graduation, in fact. She had proven herself such a hard worker that she seemed to her buddies in the service to be twice her size. After a moment that seemed like an eternity, the young woman's left boot moved ever so slightly. The major lowered her head back to the makeshift pillow and said, "That may not have seemed like much, but you just took a huge step."
The major turned to her other two patients and asked, "How are you two doing?"
Lieutenant William Carter, a country boy from Sweetwater who was Kerrigan's wingman and maybe the second-best pilot at Crockett, replied, "Wish I was flying," with a forced smile that belied the pain he was in. He had been in hanger seven when the bombs fell and his right leg had been broken when he was slammed against a wall. When Hanson had found him he had been unconscious and the bone had been protruding through his skin. Hanson had fetched the major, who had been able to set Carter's leg before he woke up. He had awakened screaming with pain, but seemed to finally have it somewhat under control.
"We'll get you back up there soon enough," the Major smiled. The break had been clean and she had no doubt he would be back in the blue pretty soon. If she knew him, too soon. When he had gotten a concussion about three months before, she had almost had to have him thrown in the lock-up to keep him from going back to flying too soon.
She turned to her other broken-legged patient, a Sergeant Ben White from Haskell that everyone called "Whitey." He had thinning brown hair and a nose that looked like he had been in a fight or two—some sanctioned, some not. The Major had fixed him up after at least one of those fights. She asked, "How are you feeling, Sergeant?"
"I'd rather be up there flying with him, but I'm all right, I guess. That pain medicine you gave me worked pretty well." He added with a smile, "Though I knew a fellow back home over towards Rule that used to bottle his own stuff that probably would have worked even better."
"I don't doubt it," the major laughed. "I had an uncle that used to refer to his corn crop based on how many jugs he thought he could get from it rather than bushels." She pointed to her black locks and said, "My hair was blonde up until the day I took a sip of that stuff."
They heard a rumbling in the distance just then and all four heads jerked up. They were quickly relieved—and then excited—to see Corporal Luis slinging dirt with Jennings' motorcycle and heading towards Marathon. Whitey gave out with a good ol' Texas yell that he quickly regretted, but not too much. The sound of the motorcycle diminished into the distance and they all sat there in the tarpaulin shade of the jury-rigged field hospital and prayed that he would have a safe and quick journey.
"All gone?" the general asked in disbelief as the sound of the rescue teams could be heard mobilizing in the difference.
"I only took one pass over the base, sir," Bronwyn told him. "But all I saw was smoke, fire and craters. The flight line was gone and the runways looked almost as bad. The command center was," she choked a moment, then finished, "It was a hole in the ground, sir."
"Could you see any movement at all down there?"
"Maybe. It was so smoky I can't say for sure, sir. What movement I did think I saw—it wasn't much. Not like you would expect, anyway, sir."
"What about the rest of the 187th?"
"I'm pretty sure I saw two chutes—and possibly a third. I wasn't able to see where they landed—or if they landed safely. And I didn't want to draw attention to them, sir."
"I understand, Lieutenant." The general rose, as did the lieutenant, then he said, "Lieutenant, why don't you go get cleaned up and maybe get something to drink while we try to sort through all this."
"I'd really like to go with the rescue teams, sir."
"I know you would, Lieutenant. But right now, you're operating on pure adrenaline. When that wears off, you're going to need to rest."
"Then I'm requesting permission to join the rescue team, sir."
"Request denied. Now, go get cleaned up, get something to drink, and lay down. That's an order, Lieutenant."
Finding a tire had turned out to be a simple process. There had been a stack of new ones behind the motor pool that had been "protected" when a wall fell on them.
Putting the new tire on the potato truck had been a problem. With no real jack, they had finally created a sort of lever with which Avery, Kerrigan, Hanson and Davies could lift the truck while Rivera and Fernandez hastily traded the new tire for the old one. When they lowered the truck to the ground and the tire held air, they all cheered.
Hanson and Davies had been fairly successful in their search for fuel and had been able to bring the tank up to a little over three-quarters full, which they guessed would be more than enough to get them to Marathon. With it gassed up and ready to go, Kerrigan had Rivera drive the potato truck over to the makeshift infirmary.
"All right," Major Sherman told her patients, "This is probably going to hurt. Don't be afraid to cry or scream or whatever." With a smile she added, "Just try not to scream in my ear if you can help it."
She turned to the healthy survivors and instructed, "We're going to put Private Clark in first. Then Carter and Whitey, next. Then, I want one of you—Davies—to squeeze in at the head of the truck bed and cradle Private Clark's head in your hands. You keeping her neck from being jostled could be the difference between her walking and—" she hesitated, then said, "Hold her head." She whispered softly, "And keep her talking if you can. We need to keep her awake."
"Yessir," Davies nodded.
Private Clark couldn't have weighed more than ninety pounds soaking wet, but Major Sherman made sure the board they had placed her on was picked up by four strong men. With great care, they lifted the board and Private Clark into the back of the potato truck. After Carter and Whitey were aboard, Sergeant Major Justine Davies, a fiery redhead from Clayton who could take any man on the base in any sport they named, climbed into the truck with grace that belied her size and sportsmanship and gently took her position with Clark's head in her hands.
"How do you feel?" Davies asked the diminutive Clark.
"Horrible," Clark replied. She wanted to reach up and pat Davies' hand to reassure her, but couldn't get her arm to cooperate. So she smiled and said, "But I'll make it."
"So, what do you do here, Clark?"
"Motor pool," the small blonde replied. "My father owned a garage back in Gallup and I grew up working on cars. I really wanted to help you get this truck running. I'm the best mechanic on this base. I can," she winced from some pain, "I can take apart a V-8 and put it back together."
"No kidding? I can't do a thing with engines. Maybe when this is all over you can teach me."
"Love to," Clark smiled, though the grimace of pain was never far from her eyes. "What do you do?"
"Barber," Davies replied with a smile. "You come by my chair sometime and I'll give you the most attractive haircut you can get and still be under regs." When Clark only smiled in return, Davies asked, "So, you got a boy friend?"
"Yeah," Clark replied weakly. "He's stationed in the gulf on a carrier. We're getting—" she coughed, then winced from the strain, "We're getting married next Christmas if we can both get leave. What about you? Got a boyfriend?"
Davies replied with a smile, "If it wasn't for the fact that I'm supposed to hold your head, I'd show you my engagement ring. My guy's over in Europe. But he's supposed to be back come fall."
"Maybe we can have a double wedding," Clark offered as the truck started up.
Kerrigan at first suggested that the Major r
ide up front but realized that she needed to be with the patients in the open-air back. So Kerrigan and Hanson rode up front with Rivera while everyone else either piled into the back or hung onto the side. They eased out at a crawl and—at fifteen miles per hour—Major Sherman shouted out that that was about all the speed they should attempt. To Jason it seemed interminably slow, but he wasn't sure if that was because he was still on an adrenaline rush or because of the actual speed. Even he had to admit, though, that the road was so rough as to not allow much more speed even if they hadn't been carrying wounded.
It was one of those open-air showers so popular in the desert that Bronwyn had always hated. It had cinder-block walls that came up to about six foot and effectively kept anyone from seeing in, but she had always been uncomfortable about being naked in a room with no roof. Still, there had been a couple nights when the stars had been out and she had taken a shower under their twinkling brightness that she had almost liked it.
This wasn't one of those times. It was a hot, dusty, day in Marathon and getting wet just gave the dust another surface to cling to. And she knew that the reason there was so much dust in the air was because it was being stirred up by all the people taking off on the search and rescue mission to Crockett. And she knew she ought to be with them.
It crossed her mind to leave the water running so it would sound like she was still showering, then quickly get dressed and hop the wall. From there she could hook up with the convoy heading south. Surely they would welcome all the help they could get. But the problem with that was that the two Matron MPs standing outside the shower cube had probably been warned to watch for just such a thing. And Bronwyn couldn't see any way should could climb the wall, anyway.
Better than half an hour later in the hot Texas sun they had finally passed the Chisos Mountains and were onto the better road that would take them to Marathon. Major Sherman said they might could take a little more speed so Rivera kicked it up to twenty-five and suddenly, to everyone on board, they really felt like they were flying.
"It won't be long now," Davies told Clark over the roar of the engine. "How are you feeling?"
Clark generated a wan smile, which was all the reply she could come up with, knowing she couldn't make her voice heard over the roar of the engine. When she saw Clark's mouth moving, Davies leaned her ear right over Clark's mouth and heard, "I feel terrible. But why do I keep smelling potatoes?"
Rivera was watching the road and the speedometer and Kerrigan was looking over his shoulder at the people in the back—making sure they weren't travelling too fast for the doctor's tastes—when Hanson blurted out, "Airborne! Twelve o'clock!"
Rivera and Kerrigan looked up—as well as the two men riding on the outside of the truck on the running boards—to see a pair of fighter planes coming in from the north. Everyone was apprehensive as the planes began to descend, but then they waggled their wings at the truck below and everyone cheered. Someone in the back shouted, "Luis made it!" and they all cheered again.
The two planes zoomed off toward the south, presumably to survey the damage of Crockett, and maybe to see if any survivors of the 187th were still out in the desert. Everyone with a free hand saluted the two fighters as they disappeared over the Chisos.
"How're our patients?" Kerrigan shouted out to the major.
The major, holding Private Clark's hand, said something to the prone woman, then smiled back up at Kerrigan and shouted, "She' says she's going to make it and I believe her!" Kerrigan gave her a thumbs up, then went back to watching the road.
He turned to Rivera and said, "Put on a little more speed if you can do it without it getting too bumpy."
Rivera nodded and eased the truck up to thirty-five miles an hour. He knew that even on the best road in the world that old potato truck wasn't going to take much more speed without starting to shake like a hula dancer.
Fifteen minutes later, Hanson announced as he pointed up the road ahead of them, "Dust cloud. Someone's coming!"
"Slow down," Kerrigan told Rivera.
"Why are we slowing?" someone shouted from the back, only to be told that someone was coming from the other direction by one of the men on the running boards.
In seconds, they had met up with a convoy consisting of two ambulances, several jeeps with mounted guns and an armored personnel carrier. Rivera pulled the truck to a stop as gently as he could and Kerrigan jumped out.
He ran over to where the corpsmen were pulling gurneys from the ambulance and told them, "We've got two men with broken legs and a woman we believe has a broken back."
"Yessir," the four corpsmen replied, almost in unison.
They rushed over to the back of the truck to be greeted by Major Sherman saying, "Don't bother with vitals or any of that. Just get this young woman into an ambulance and let's go to Marathon. ASAP."
"Yes ma'am," two of them replied. Hanson and Rivera helped the two corpsmen get Private Clark onto one of the gurneys with Sergeant Davies holding Clark's head all the while. The look of determination on her face said she was trying her best to will Private Clark to get better from sheer strength of mind.
Once Clark was on the gurney and strapped down—the plywood board still below her—Major Sherman turned to Davies and asked, "How're your hands, Sergeant? Can you keep this up to Marathon?"
"As long as it takes, ma'am," Davies replied, almost like a new recruit replying to a drill sergeant.
Major Sherman took Clark's hand and asked, "What about you, Private? Ready for some R&R in Marathon?"
Clark gave the doctor a wink, then winced from another wave of pain.
Major Sherman told the other two corpsmen what she had done for Carter and Whitey and what they needed to do then followed Clark's entourage over to one of the ambulances. They soon had her locked down inside and were on their way, a brace of jeeps driving escort over what the day before had seemed like the safest terrain this side of Big Spring. The ambulance didn't travel much faster than Rivera had driven—if at all—but Major Sherman was able to begin taking vital signs with real equipment other than just her hand and her watch. She was also able to give the private a shot of pain killer that would lessen the pain but, hopefully, not knock her out. It was troubling her that the private wasn't squeezing her hand anymore, but she had nothing she could do about it at the moment. She turned to the corpsman who was assisting her and asked, "Get me a radio link to the ER at Marathon. I want them ready as soon as we hit the driveway."
"Yessir!" he responded, quickly linking actions to words.
As the remaining corpsmen loaded the remaining patients in the other ambulance, Kerrigan came over and said, "Whitey, I'll see you back in front of Hassens when this is all over."
Whitey smiled at his fellow Haskell native and said, "I'll be there. Maybe see you back here—fighting on the front—before this is over. You know they ain't going to be able to keep the jeeps running in all this sand without me."
"I'll be here," Kerrigan nodded. He saluted his longtime friend and his wingman and watched as Carter and Whitey were soon in the other ambulance and on their way to Marathon, guarded by the other two jeeps.
Kerrigan asked the man in charge of those with the personnel carrier, "You ready to head back with us?"
Colonel McRae shook his head and said, "There's another convoy behind that one that ought to be here in a few minutes. We're going after some downed pilots. Next group ought to be coming with the dogs any minute."
Kerrigan looked up brightly, "Someone made it from the 187th?"
McRae nodded and replied, "Lieutenant Dalmouth was the only one able to fly out of it. But she says she's pretty sure she saw at least two 'chutes. So maybe a couple more made it out that she didn't see for sure."
"I'd sure like to join you on the search, sir," Jason told him anxiously.
The rest of the Crockett contingent voiced their agreement, but the colonel shook his head and told them, "I understand how you feel, boys, but Command wants all of you back in Marathon as soon as poss
ible and giving your statements."
"Can't that wait?" Rivera demanded. He quickly added, "Sir. I mean, what we've got to tell isn't going to change!"
Colonel McCrae ignored the breach of protocol and said, "If it were a matter of minutes, I'd say yes. But you boys know we could be at this all night. If you aren't back there in Marathon soon, they'll have my hide."
Hanson spoke up, "I know that desert, sir. Better than any man on the base."
Kerrigan agreed, "He's right, sir. If you want seven statements—plus those of Carter, Whitey and the Major—we'll give 'em. But your best chance of finding those pilots—especially before dark—is to take Hanson here with you. He spends his days off hiking in the desert. He knows it like the rest of us know our bedrooms, sir."
The Colonel looked at Hanson then nodded, "Alright, son. As of this moment, you're with me. Captain, when you fill out your forms, don't make any mention of Hanson here. As far as anyone knows, we found him when we went looking for the downed pilots. We'll straighten it all out later. Got that?"
"Loud and clear, sir," Jason returned with a smile and a salute. Just then they heard the rumble of the search and rescue convoy coming near. Jason turned toward the Crockett men and said, "Let's head for Marathon, men."
They all looked wistfully at Hanson—hating to leave when some of their fellows could still be alive back there and needing help—but obeyed and got in the truck. As soon as they were all onboard, Kerrigan told Rivera, "Get us to Marathon."
"Yessir. And if we come up on the ambulances before we get there?"
"It's likely. Just hop around the last jeep and let them ride drag. We're not getting in before the wounded, Corporal—even if we can."
The Legend of Garison Fitch (Book 3): Lost Time Page 3