Arctic Wargame - Страница 47

“Hey, hey, driver,” Justin shouted at a man in the driver’s seat of a truck by the airport terminal. “We need your truck. Hurry up!”

The man stepped on the gas and rolled the truck to a stop by Justin’s feet.

“Open the door, the back door,” Justin said.

They placed Carrie in the back seats, her head resting carefully on a jacket rolled up as a pillow. Her arms and feet hung unnaturally.

“I’ll take over from here.” Justin dismissed the men and climbed in the driver’s seat. “Hold on, Carrie,” he said. “I will not let you die.”

Only if we had a doctor out here.

Chapter Twenty-nine

Nanisivik, Canada

April 14, 11:54 a.m.

“Emily, what in the world are you doing here?” Justin could not contain his enthusiasm in seeing the nurse awaiting their arrival at the top the hill. She was holding a box in her left hand. The words FIRST AID and a large white cross were embossed on its side.

“I told you I was coming. But it seems I missed most of the party. Then they told me you were bringing up a patient.” Emily hurried to the other side of the truck. “How is Carrie doing?”

“I don’t know. She’s unconscious.”

Emily looked for Carrie’s pulse at the side of her neck and began to check her vitals. She lifted Carrie’s head up to make sure there were no obstructions in her airways. Then, she leaned closer to Carrie’s mouth, feeling for any sign of respiration.

“Unzip her jacket and lift up her sweater,” Emily said.

The skin of Carrie’s neck and upper chest had turned a yellowish-gray. It felt numb and frozen. Her chest was rising and falling, but very slowly and scarcely noticeable.

“Her breathing’s shallow, but her lungs are getting some oxygen,” Emily said. “Which is good, at least for now.”

Justin’s eyes were glued to a blue blister on Carrie’s neck.

“Cryopathy, I mean frostbite, hasn’t set in yet,” Emily said after catching Justin’s gaze. “Once we warm her up, the skin will be fully restored, since superficial frostbite is reversible.”

Justin nodded in silence. Emily listened for a heartbeat.

“The heart rate is slow, very slow and irregular. What exactly happened to her?”

“She was in the chopper, piloting the Seahawk, when it was shot down. She had to jump out of the chopper.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah, it was quite a distance.”

Emily examined Carrie’s arms and legs, paying special attention not to move her, and focusing mostly on her joints.

“At first sight, it looks like her legs are fractured, but I can’t be sure. There may be internal bleeding in her chest and also in the abdomen, since the ribcage is easily affected by blunt trauma.”

Justin swallowed and looked away.

“Carrie’s alive,” Emily said, “but we need to take her to a hospital as fast as we can. I have a few things in the truck to stabilize her for a while, but we’ve got to get her to a hospital. ASAP.”

* * *

Joe arrived in his truck when Justin was getting ready for the drive to Nanisivik. Ned was riding in the passenger’s seat. His eyes were puffy and red, bearing the clear marks of tears, even though he had tried to dry them out. “How’s she doing?” Joe asked, while Ned stared out the window.

“Still out of it,” Justin replied and walked over to Joe’s truck parked a few feet away from his. “Emily, the nurse, says she’s gonna make it, but we’ve got to rush her to a hospital.”

“Arctic Bay?”

“No. Emily just drove from there and said they don’t have the necessary equipment. Carrie may have broken ribs and fractured legs. She’ll need surgeries. One of the defense contractor’s choppers is in Nanisivik, so I’m heading that way. Our Eurocopter is still in Arctic Bay, so that will be our last resort. But I don’t want to lose that much time.”

“I wish I could tell you to use that Bell.” Joe jabbed his finger toward the airport terminal. A red helicopter stood outside the hangar. “But it got damaged in the fight. We couldn’t save it. And I couldn’t stop those jerks from taking off in the Herc.”

“No worries. We’ve won the battle, and that’s the important thing.”

All of a sudden, Ned broke into a low sob.

“What’s the matter? Amaruq’s d…” Justin stopped in mid-sentence, as Joe’s rested his arm on Ned’s shoulder.

Ned’s weeping grew louder. “I called him names… but he, he just saved us all. I’m… I’m so stupid.”

“Don’t say that,” Justin said. “You were trying to look out for him.”

“No, no, I… I screwed up.”

“Amaruq lived a hunter’s life and died a warrior’s death,” Joe said. “Ned, we should be proud of him, instead of shedding tears. Amaruq, he would want us to do just that.”

Justin nodded. “That’s right. Has anyone told Kiawak yet?”

Joe and Ned shook their heads.

“He’s not doing that well either,” Joe said.

“What’s our death toll?” Justin asked.

“I’m not sure. I don’t have all the numbers. Could be somewhere between twenty and fifty, dead and wounded. The Danes, on the other hand, were wiped out completely. We only saved, what?” Joe turned his head toward Ned, who was trying to appear composed. “Seven, eight guys?”

“Seven,” Ned replied. “The eighth is a woman. Her name is Valgerda.”

“See, he’s good with the gun and also has a perfect memory.” Joe tapped Ned on his shoulders.

Ned replied with a shy, broken smile. “She surrendered when we took over the terminal. Her partner claims to be the tactical commander of their operation. His name is Magnus. Magnus Torbjorn.”

“Magnus,” Justin repeated.

He had hardly finished breathing the man’s name, when a great explosion flashed in the sky. Far away, at the point where some white clouds were floating over the horizon, the bright yellow glow of an airburst flamed for a few long moments.

“What the hell was that?” Joe asked.

“Isn’t that where the Herc was headed?” Ned said.

“The Super Hercules? You think that son of a gun found his doom up there?” Joe rubbed his long beard thoughtfully.

“Fire raining down from heaven?” Justin said. “A lightening rod up the Hercules’s aft?”

They all laughed.

As their chuckle dwindled, another loud rumble came from the sky, from the same direction of the explosion. This time it was constant and ever increasing.

“Airplanes?” Ned wondered.

Joe shook his head. “It sounds like choppers, two, maybe more.” He reached for his binoculars in the back seat of the truck. “Yeah,” he added a second later, “three choppers.”

“Canadian Forces?” Justin asked.

“Stars and Stripes.” Joe handed Justin the binoculars. “They look to me like the one Carrie was flying.”

“Seahawks?” Ned shouted. “American fighter helos? What’s this turning into, the Third World War?”

Justin gazed through the binoculars at the approaching Seahawks. Other men had spotted the helicopters, and they were gathering around Justin’s truck.

“How do the Americans know where we are?” Joe asked, stepping out of his truck.

“No idea.” Justin stepped out of the truck, still peering at the helicopters. “Maybe there was a GPS transmitter in Carrie’s chopper.”

“Or maybe someone radioed them in,” one of the men suggested.

“We’ve got to get ready,” Joe shouted, holding up his M-16 in his right hand. “Ned, set up positions—”

“No!” A woman’s voice interrupted them.

Justin turned around and saw Emily waving her arms in the air, striving to push her way through the group of men and reach Joe’s truck. “They’re not here to fight,” she shouted.

“Oh, really? So, what do they want?” Joe asked Emily.

“It’s Richard,” Emily said to Justin. She got closer to him. “Colonel Richard Clark. You remember him. Commander of the Thule Air Base.”

Justin nodded. “Did you call them?”

“Yes. I asked… I begged him to help you, to send in troops, but he refused. I’m surprised they’re showing up here and now, but… hmmm, at least they can take Carrie and the other wounded to a hospital.”

“Really? They come in peace?” Joe said. “Like the Danes?”

“Joe, calm down,” Justin replied. “Emily has no reason to lie. She didn’t have to come here. We left her in Arctic Bay, and if she wanted to save herself, she could have asked the Americans to come and rescue her there.”

“She’s seeking revenge for the time you kidnapped her,” Joe said. “That’s why she called Uncle Sam.”

Emily frowned and shook her head. “Of course not. If I wanted revenge, I would have stayed in Arctic Bay. The helicopters would have dropped bombs over your heads as we flew over. I helped Justin and Kiawak and your other wounded friends. What a great way to seek revenge!”

Joe swallowed and looked around. A few men were nodding in approval of Emily’s words. Some of them held up their gauze-wrapped arms.

“Well, maybe they want revenge, this Richard guy,” Joe said. “I still say we need to set up positions.”

Justin looked up at the helicopters. Their shape was now visible to the naked eye. Flying in a triangular formation, their rumble began to shake Justin’s eardrums.

“How about this,” Justin said. “Joe, you set up a defense line, while I go and meet up with them.”