Does it Hurt to Die

by Anderson, Paul G

  ‘Hold on tight, Issy. Remove the pins, Christian,’ said Mike. He then started slowly counting, ‘One, two, three, four, five, six—OK release.’

  They all released and peered down into the blackness as the grenades tumbled towards Van der Walt. Christian hoped he had the maths right. Two seconds later they heard the grenades hit the roof of the lift and the sound reverberate up the shaft. For half a second nothing happened, but then there was a flash, an explosion, accompanied by a chilling yell from Van der Walt and a gust of wind as the grenade blast blew up the shaft past them.

  ‘Yours wasn’t a stun grenade,’ said Mike to Galela, in the quiet darkness now surrounding them.

  In the murky greenness that night vision goggles provided, Christian saw Galela’s smile like a small bright light and realised his father’s death had been avenged.

  Christian opened his throttle as Mike pointed upward, aware that the pain in his left shoulder was spreading. When he went to pass Isabella, he noticed she was not moving upwards and so stopped his monkey climber a metre above her.

  ‘Isabella, what’s happening?’

  ‘Her cable has been severed,’ said Mike, who had also stopped. ‘It must have been the explosions. The monkey climber is only designed to work on a tense cable.’

  ‘How do I reverse this thing?’ said Christian.

  ‘You can’t,’ said Galela. ‘They only go up.’

  ‘Well, she can’t climb the cable,’ said Christian as he felt the tension in him rise and the blood continue to trickle down his front.

  ‘Isabella, your climber won’t work. The only chance is for you to transfer to mine. You’re going to have to climb up to me. I’ll hang down so you can grab my ankles.’

  Isabella looked up into the blackness and saw Christian’s feet just above her. Locking her climber, she grasped the cable and stood on her seat. She took hold of his ankles and prayed that she had the strength to pull herself up. As she reached his knees, she could feel her arms shaking and, with a desperate lunge, went for a firm hold on his belt. Her hand dug into his belt and, as he took her full weight, she heard him cry out in pain. Momentarily she swung in the blackness; his belt digging into his hips was all that stood between her and the lift below. Christian slowly took his one good arm off the T-bar, knowing that she was struggling to hold on and reached down.

  ‘Issy, your other arm,’ he called as he fought to control the pain in his shoulder. ‘Don’t let go, no matter what.’

  Christian watched as she reached up to his outstretched arm, the pain in his left shoulder now enormous as it took the full strain. He directed Isabella’s hand to his belt before he put both hands back on his T-bar. He could then swing his legs to encircle Isabella, hoping that he would have the strength to pull them both up. As she pulled up on his legs, he moved her enough to transfer her hands to his T-bar. She then reached around his legs and pulled herself the rest of the way up so that she ended up sitting across his hips.

  Catching her breath she whispered in his ear, ‘If that’s what you do for your half-sister, what wouldn’t you do for your girlfriend?’

  ‘Well done, mate,’ said Mike, interrupting and deliberately used the Australianism to convey the fact that he was impressed.

  ‘There’s something you can do for me before we start again,’ said Christian.

  ‘Anything.’

  ‘Put pressure on my left shoulder to try to stop the bleeding.’

  As Isabella put her hand against Christian’s shoulder Mike called across to her, ‘How heavy are you, Isabella?’

  ‘Fifty kilograms.’

  ‘And you, Christian?’

  ‘Ninety. Why?’

  ‘Well the climber is rated to carry one hundred and twenty.’

  Christian thought, this could not be it. Surely, they were not committed to stay in the shaft forever. He released the cable brake and revved the motor slightly. There was a jerk as they inched forward, the tiny engine straining.

  As he pulled level with Galela and Mike he said, ‘Our speed is so reduced it will take us two hours to get out. When is the explosion due to go off?’

  ‘Wait,’ said Mike, ignoring the question. ‘Christian, allow Isabella to run the throttle, and we’ll hook a foot each under your seat and share the extra weight on our machines.’

  Isabella turned the throttle slowly and their ascent restarted. They were now travelling faster than previously, and as Christian looked up, he could see the light above getting brighter. Ten minutes later, it was bright enough that it was hurting their eyes, and Mike indicated that they ditch the night vision goggles. They did so, and all looked up at the light coming from the entrance to the shaft. Christian calculated they must be ten minutes from the entrance at this rate but he was starting to feel light headed.

  ‘Mike, I think it’s the blood I’m losing. I don’t think I can hold on.’

  ‘Hang on. We’re almost there,’ Mike shouted. ‘Isabella, reach behind him with one arm and Galela and I’ll grab it to stop him from falling back.’

  Christian could feel the three arms on his back as Mike and Galela locked fingers. Just as he thought he would have to let go, they were in the barn. There were, he could make out, half a dozen people standing at the lift entrance reaching out to help them off the monkey climbers. Christian struggled to get off his as Isabella was helped inside. He felt really faint and thought if Mike and Galela let go he may not make it into the barn.

  Just as Christian was about to pass out, he heard Mike say, ‘On the count of three, Christian, you step towards the barn and we’ll push. Are you ready?’

  Christian looked at Mike and nodded but wondered still whether he would have the strength to make it or whether he would join Van der Walt at the bottom of the shaft.

  ‘OK, ready, here we go, one, two and three.’

  Christian felt Mike and Galela lift him and then propel him and his monkey climber towards where the lift opened on to the barn floor a metre away. As his monkey climber swung close to the door, he reached out to one of the waiting hands with his uninjured arm. He felt the hand lock on to his and then felt another reach down to secure his belt. For a moment, he hung on the edge of the lift opening, two hands frantically pulling at him to prevent him falling back down the shaft.

  ‘Pull,’ someone shouted as the two men grappled with his full weight and pulled him safely into the barn.

  Once inside Christian immediately tried to stand, but with the ongoing blood loss, he was too weak and collapsed into the hay. As he started to lose consciousness, he was aware that someone in a white jacket ran towards him and then watched semi-dazed as the doctor tore off his shirt and placed a pack into the wound.

  ‘Glad you made it,’ he said as he placed a tourniquet around Christian’s arm and started to run in intravenous fluids.

  Christian watched as in the background Mike hurriedly organised everyone into vans that were parked with engines running.

  Two black uniformed officers, with National Intelligence Service written on their shoulders, came to Christian with a stretcher. They introduced themselves and quickly retrieved him to the back of the nearest van.

  Mike then poked his head in the back door.

  ‘We need to get out as quickly as we can. We’ve set explosives down there and we don’t know whether they’ll interact with the chemicals or how big the reaction will be. We just need to get as far away as we can in the next twenty minutes.’

  As the van raced out of the barn, Christian wondered how much time they had left. He sat up and looked out of the back window wondering whether there would be any evidence of the destruction down below. They were travelling for about fifteen minutes when he felt the van start to sway and shake. The driver pulled over as the second wave hit them. The shaking from the second wave then caused the back door of the van to spring open. Christian sat up and looked out—the barn, which was now a few kilometres away, disappeared from view, as the earth appeared to roll towards them like waves in the sea. Aft
er a few minutes, there was absolute quietness and the shaking stopped. Christian thought neither man nor chemicals could have survived the explosion below.

  ‘We cut that a bit fine, didn’t we?’ said Mike, smiling as he popped his head into the van.

  Christian nodded, still stunned that they were out and had all survived.

  ‘OK, my Aussie friend. Let’s get you to Johannesburg and have that wound cleaned up. I see the pressure is working so there mustn’t be any major damage—possibly a clean through-and-through wound is what our doctor in the barn thought. You’re going to be fine. Well done.’

  Christian nodded weakly as Mike closed the door.

  Chapter 34

  When they arrived in Johannesburg, they drove straight to the Hilton. They were taken to a private entrance where they were met by more NIS members, who greeted both Mike and Galela with hugs and high fives. Christian and Isabella climbed out of their van, Mike and Galela chatted briefly, before suggesting that they should all shower and freshen up. Mike had a quick look at Christian’s shoulder to ensure the bleeding had stopped.

  ‘OK, let’s clean up and then debrief.’

  ‘All questions answered then, Mike?’ said Christian.

  ‘As best we can, but give Galela and me an hour to sort out a few things. We need to have a look at this together to see what information they had,’ he said, taking the folder from a special pack strapped beneath his shirt.

  ‘It may provide the National Intelligence Service, and you, with some of the answers that we’ve been looking for for quite some time. Thank you for passing it to me down there, Isabella.’

  Christian looked at the folder which he had last seen down the mine in Isabella’s hand, thinking that at last he might at least have some understanding of what his father had been involved in, or at least an interpretation from Mike and Galela. Christian suggested they all meet in his room at six o’clock, which would allow for his wound to be sutured and to be a little more recovered grasping whatever Mike and Galela told them.

  ‘That’s good,’ said Galela, ‘and each room will have a uniformed officer from NIS outside until the future of the folder is decided.’

  Christian felt like it was a week since he had showered and shaved. He delighted in the feeling of water and being able to shampoo his hair. He looked at the wound on his shoulder with the bruising spreading down on to his chest. He kept it out of the water as best he could, and the dressing was now only a faint pink, which meant the bleeding had stopped. As he thought about what they had been through and discovered, he realised that he now had a certain peace about his father’s life; it was as though he could now close this chapter. He wondered whether Isabella would feel the same and if they both would be more settled. There were still many unanswered questions, especially as to why someone with his father’s intelligence could not have foreseen the extent to which a government and organisation would go to preserve it, but he thought that would probably remain one of the unanswered questions. He changed and found the clean set of clothes that Mike had mentioned in the wardrobe. He thought it was interesting that they knew his size, but then again he reasoned he had been staying with them for a couple of weeks. Mike had probably phoned Sian. But this being Africa, it would not surprise him if those details were on some NIS file somewhere.

  Getting his shirt on was a little difficult, and he was wondering if he could call his sister to help when there was a knock at the door. He pushed through the pain getting his arm into the shirt and with his shirt still hanging out looked through the security eyepiece in the door. Next to the policeman, he could see Isabella standing and smiling. He opened the door and noted the freshness of perfume as she walked in.

  ‘Well,’ she said, twirling in front of him, ‘not bad for a half-sister, huh?’

  ‘No, you scrub up quite well,’ he said, laughing before giving her a hug with his good arm. ‘Are brother and sister allowed to do that?’ he said, letting her go.

  ‘They are, especially when the brother saves the sister’s life.’

  ‘Issy, there’s one thing I want you to know; down there I think you were incredible in so many ways.’

  ‘And now that we’re up here you don’t?’ she teased.

  ‘No,’ he laughed, ‘I think you’re incredible full stop. I was just thinking how much we would have had to look forward to now if we hadn’t discovered we were brother and sister.’

  ‘We’ll look at it this way; we’ve both discovered a great friend, and that great friend is now family — so cheer up, Big Brother, life is going to be wonderful even if we’re related.’

  ‘Shall we have a glass of wine and drink to that,’ said Christian, ‘before Mike and Galela get here for their debrief?’

  Christian poured a glass of wine for Isabella, but before they could drink a toast there was another knock at the door. He peered through the security eyepiece and saw Mike and Galela smiling and laughing. That was somewhat strange, he thought, after what they had all been through. He turned to where Isabella was standing and saw that she too had a strange look of satisfaction on her face. He was obviously out of the loop, or maybe he was in shock. There was another knock.

  ‘Come on, open it,’ he heard Isabella say from behind him as he reached for the lock.

  As Mike and Galela walked in Christian turned to look at Isabella, again hopeful for an explanation. However, as he looked in her direction he noticed she was looking through the open door. He turned to follow her gaze and saw Renata, Nadine and Sibokwe standing in the doorway.

  ‘Mum, what are you doing here?’ said Christian.

  ‘Honey, you don’t think we were going to miss out on a good ending, do you? We’ve known what’s been going on for quite some time through Mike and the National Intelligence Service.’

  She paused for a moment to consider how she could explain her actions to him. ‘They insisted I give permission to allow you to be involved, which I was reluctant to do at first. Nevertheless, they felt that the white supremacists were threatening the future of the new South Africa and that unless they were stopped, thousands of black people may have died and civil war could have resulted. Your father’s sacrifice would then have been in vain. Of course, I also knew how much it meant to you to find out about your father. Mike reassured me that you would be in no danger! Had I known what was going to happen I’d never have given permission! Are you alright? Mike told me you were wounded.’

  ‘I’m fine, Mum, a bit sore, but it’s mostly a flesh wound. Mike thinks it will be healed in a week.’

  Christian felt overwhelmed. Although he was amazed that they were all here together, clearly with some understanding and involvement of what had gone on, he still needed time to reflect on his experiences. As Isabella extracted herself from Nadine’s prolonged hug, Christian re-gathered his senses and introduced Isabella to his mother and ushered them to the lounge.

  As they sat down around the coffee table Christian looked at his Mum and with a wry smile said, ‘So, Mum, having the GPS Explorer watch paid off?’

  ‘Yes, honey. It took five minutes to establish your precise location and then I was able to let Mike and Galela know where you were. The rest, as they say, fortunately, is history.’

  ‘Did you know that we’d been taken hostage?’ said Isabella, looking at both Renata and Nadine.

  ‘Yes we did, Issy,’ said Nadine. ‘Mike had been in touch from the time there was the break-in at his place in Cape Town. He’d told us quite some time back about his role with the National Intelligence Service and their concern about the underground white supremacists’ resistance army. They wanted them to have the folder because they thought that might lead them to the underground laboratories, which they previously hadn’t been able to find.’

  ‘But we weren’t planning on you being kidnapped and held hostage,’ said Mike. ‘We didn’t realise they had an informant in the office of the National Intelligence Service in Johannesburg.’

  ‘By that time they already had the fo
lder and had worked out that the key to the code was missing. Because we had found the folder, they thought we may have the key?’ said Christian.

  ‘Correct,’ said Galela, ‘but then when you were held underground they overheard your conversation and realised that the key to the code was probably on the photograph that your mother had in Australia.’

  ‘When you set off your GPS Explorer watch, your mother contacted me and explained what you had asked for. We realised then that those numbers were obviously the key to the code, and your mother very cleverly altered some of the figures so that even if we had not been able to get you out they wouldn’t have had access to your father’s genetic research. We figured that at least it would take them a few days to realise the code was incorrect and we were hoping to have found you and got you out by then,’ explained Mike.

  ‘Did you bring the real code with you, Mum? It would be interesting to know what our father did actually discover since we still have the folder.’

  ‘I’ve brought with me the real code that was on the back of the photograph that I gave to Mike.’

  Renata held up a photocopy of the back of the photograph so that Christian could see again the combination of numbers and letters that had puzzled him for so long. ‘C4n5392ul92i4n1 4n 68c46in5.’ Christian looked at Mike.

  ‘Has that helped you understand any of my father’s research yet?’

  ‘It has, and I’ll tell you about that in a minute, but there are several important decisions that need to be made that we think you should be part of. So Galela and I’ll just go through some of the important things that we’ve uncovered and then I’ll tell you about what your father discovered.’

  Christian looked at his mother and Nadine, thinking that they seemed to be remarkably friendly given that they had both shared his father at some stage. In fact, sitting next to each other they even looked like old friends who really liked each other. As he puzzled about that fact, Mike started to explain some of the folder.