Crucial spoke soothingly. ‘It’s OK, it’s all right, take it. There’s nothing we can do here. Just take the pain.’
There was something Tim was more concerned about than pain. ‘The bag . . . the bag . . .’
I moved my hand behind me, feeling for the strap. ‘Crucial, we’ve got medic kit here.’
Crucial didn’t turn. ‘I need surgical gloves – find some.’
Tim’s screams had been too much for Silky. She was well out of cover, hobbling across the valley floor. ‘No! Stay there! Stay there!’
She wasn’t listening.
There was no time for a debate. I got up and started running as fast as she could with her bad foot trailing.
‘Fire! Fire!’ I screamed at the guns.
My head was going at a hundred miles an hour but my legs were only doing fifty.
I held a hand out as I ran. ‘Come on! Come on!’
She was nearly halfway before they worked out what I wanted and the rounds started hitting the treeline again.
I stopped with my hand outstretched, like a relay runner waiting for the baton. I got hold of her hand, pulled it towards me, bent down and hoisted her cleanly over my shoulder.
I staggered back to Crucial on adrenalin power.
11
‘You think this is a game?’ I dumped her behind Crucial, who was still kneeling over Tim. He now had the gloves on and was getting stuck in.
Silky crawled round him, and looked horrified at the mess of blood and bone that confronted her. She burst into tears. ‘
She needed to get a grip on herself.
‘God can’t do anything for him,’ I muttered.
Crucial glared up at me: maybe he didn’t like his boss being given a hard time. ‘She’s a doctor. She can take over.’ He stepped aside and pulled off the gloves. ‘You and I have things to do, Nick.’
Silky knelt the other side of Tim, taking deep breaths to regain control. He tried to comfort her, smiling up at her through the pain, mumbling that everything was OK. Was it fuck . . .
I dived into the bag. ‘We got any fluids in there, Crucial? Any giving sets?’
‘Nothing like that. Just medicines and dressings.’
Silky got to work. ‘Tim, I’ve got to arrest the bleeding, OK?’
His femoral artery wasn’t severed or litres of the stuff would have been pouring out of his leg, but if he kept leaking like this he would eventually go into shock and die.
Crucial had already stopped the worst of the fluid loss by wrapping bandages tightly round the wound. The binding would also help immobilize the fracture. Tim could have done with a few plates of chips to get a bit of lard on him, something for Crucial to apply pressure to. There was too much bone and not enough meat.
‘Nick, we have to go. You have a claymore to make, I have to get more ANFO, man.’
Silky had already made a bandage tourniquet and fixed it round Tim’s thigh. She fed a bit of stick through the loop and started to twist.
I looked around. All the sangars were now stood-to, the guys inside hyped up and eager for anything to shoot at.
‘We’ve got to get him up to the tents.’
Silky gave a last twist. They should only be applied for fifteen minutes max, then you have to let some blood through or all the good tissue below the tourniquet will be at risk. Oxygen starvation can cause the death of the limb. What you get then is a very bad smell, followed by amputation – if you’re lucky.
Tim was out of it. His face was screwed up, eyes shut tight, teeth clenched. He could only take so much; now and again he’d let out a whimper, and claw at the mud with his fingers.
Crucial rattled off another set of instructions. His orders were relayed round the valley and sangars stood down. The squaddies sat back and lit up.
He turned to me. ‘You need to finish the claymores.’
‘These two need to get up to the tents.’
‘I’ll see to it – but until I get back, you’ll have to shift the bags yourself. No one will want to go out there.’
‘Apart from you?’
He turned and ran back into the valley.
Silky was in the process of easing Tim’s good leg towards the bad one. It obviously hurt like fuck, but that wasn’t his main priority right now: his patients were. He gripped her arm. ‘We need to get to them, and soon . . .’
She stroked the sweat from his face. ‘Soon.’
She started bandaging his legs together. Tim could be moved to a safer place now – though it wouldn’t be where he expected.
I went over to them. ‘Listen, I’ve got to go. Crucial’s getting a couple of the boys to move you.’
She concentrated hard on what she was doing with the tourniquet, but I got a nod.
As I turned away, Tim croaked, ‘Nick?’
‘What?’
‘Thank you.’
Silky looked up and gave me the kind of smile I’d have walked across hot coals for ten days ago. Who knows? Maybe I still would. ‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘Thank you. For everything . . .’
Fuck that. There wasn’t time for medal ceremonies. I picked up my AK and yelled at the gunners up ahead to warn them I was on the move.
12
It wasn’t hard to find a site. Every inch of the place had been dug into at one time or another. I started humping the bags myself, following a route that took me past Silky and Tim, past the mound and on to the entrance. The dugout was six or seven metres up the hillside, and only a little smaller than the one I’d already prepped.
Crucial bellowed at the ANFO boys in the valley to start shifting more bags and metal up to me. No one looked too happy at the prospect.
I screwed up my eyes and hoicked another bag on to my back. It wasn’t my aching body I was worried about – the adrenalin would take care of that – it was the constant banging inside my head.
Fuck the LRA, fuck child soldiers, fuck everyone. I was in my own little world too. I just wanted this over and done with, and to be out of here.
Next time I came down, Crucial was standing over Tim and Silky.
Tim was ready to be shifted.
I nodded at Crucial. ‘Let’s get him up to the tents.’
‘No, Nick.’ Silky got to her feet. ‘We want to go back to the villagers.’
Tim’s voice came in at ankle level. ‘I can still help them.’
‘Silky . . .’ I looked down at Tim. ‘And you . . .’ I pointed past the growing pile of ANFO bags. ‘Very soon there’s going to be a ton of shit pouring through that gap. You need to be up by the tents with us.’
Silky was shaking her head even before I’d finished. ‘We understand what might happen, Nick. That’s why we’re not going to leave these people.’
