She walked into the Emergency Room tent and stopped as she realised that Major Clarke was still in the middle of the teaching session. Lizzie stood by the door until she managed to catch Ronald’s eye. He was sitting next to Emma, who looked as if she was hanging off every word that the Major was saying. Poor thing, Lizzie thought. She’d got no idea about the effect that she had on men. Lizzie had tried to have that chat with her several times, but Emma just wasn’t getting it.
Ronald looked up towards Lizzie and, when she managed to catch his eye, she tapped her watch. Ronald nodded and then shrugged his shoulders ever so slightly, telling Lizzie that he was stuck where he was for the time being. Emma looked up at Lizzie as well and gave her a small wave.
Lizzie walked slowly back into the main corridor of the hospital, wondering how she could kill some time before they went down to the helicopter. She didn’t want to go back to the TRT tent, as she was still annoyed with Adams and would also have to help load up the Land Rover if she went back there too soon. She ambled down the corridor before deciding to go down to the Ops Room at the far end of the hospital. The main reason for going there, she told herself, was to let the Ops Officer know that they were going down to the pan. It wasn’t as if there was a particularly good mobile phone signal where they were, so they had to let the Ops Room know if the TRT was leaving the hospital for any reason, and exactly where they would be. The second reason was that the young Lieutenant in the Ops Room was particularly cute.
Reaching the Ops Room, she knocked on the wooden door. This was about the only secure area in the entire hospital and had a proper door instead of canvas flaps. As she waited for someone to answer the door, she wondered what the point of having a wooden door on a canvas tent was. If anyone wanted to get in, they could just use a Stanley knife on one of the walls and walk straight in. The door was swung open, and a stern face looked out. It wasn’t the Lieutenant that she was hoping to see, but the Garrison Sergeant Major.
‘What?’ he barked.
‘Er, hello GSM. Sergeant Jarman from the TRT.’
‘Yes, I know who you are,’ the GSM replied. ‘What do you want? We’re busy.’
‘Oh, sorry, sir. I just wanted to let the Ops Room know that the TRT’s heading down to the pan to do some training with the new FP team. We’ll probably be down there until lunchtime, and I’ll check back in when–’
‘Right, well don’t go too far,’ the GSM interrupted. ‘There’re some troops in contact up near Kajaki, so you lot might be needed if it goes tits up.’
‘Ok, sir,’ Lizzie said. ’Will do.’ She turned to walk back to the TRT tent, disappointed that she’d not had the chance to see — let alone talk to — the Lieutenant.
‘And don’t drive too bloody fast, Jarman,’ the GSM added as he closed the door to the Ops Room.
Lizzie wandered back to the TRT tent. When she walked in, Adams was sitting where she’d left him a few minutes ago, still engrossed in her crossword magazine. She glanced to her left and saw all the medical kit still stacked up in the corner. Lizzie put her hands on her hips and pursed her lips.
‘For God’s sake, Adams,’ she said. ‘You’ve not even put the bloody med kit in the wagon.’ Marching across to where he was sitting, she grabbed the magazine out of his hands. ‘Lazy bastard.’
‘For God’s sake — sir — is what I think you meant to say,’ Adams said, laughing. ‘I’m an officer. You’re supposed to at least call me sir when you insult me.’
Lizzie rolled the magazine up in her hands and started hitting Adams with it.
‘Sir, you are a lazy bastard,’ she punctuated each word with a swipe at him.
Adams reached his hands out and grabbed the magazine with one hand, pinching her side with the other. Lizzie laughed and tried to wrestle the magazine from him while also trying to stop him tickling her. She pushed against him as he pulled the magazine away from her until, suddenly off balance, Lizzie stumbled and ended up sitting on the same chair as Adams. She grabbed his tickling hand and was trying to bend his fingers back to make him stop when they both heard a discrete cough from the direction of the door. They looked up together and saw Ronald and Colonel Nick standing at the door to the TRT tent looking at them.
Lizzie felt her face start to colour instantly. She pushed herself to her feet, taking the opportunity to grab the magazine as she did so. Avoiding the incredulous stare of Colonel Nick, she said to Ronald.
‘He was doing my crossword.’
18
Ronald picked up the medical bag from the TRT tent and carried it out to the Land Rover. Well, that was awkward, he thought. But well worth Lizzie and the Boss’s embarrassment just to see the look on Colonel Nick’s face.
‘Fucking priceless,’ he said to himself as he heaved the heavy bag into the back of the Land Rover. Turning around, he found himself face to face with Lizzie. Unable to help himself, he started laughing.
‘The fuck are you laughing at, McDonald?’ Lizzie asked. Ronald carried on laughing.
‘Sorry, Lizzie,’ he said, ‘but that was bloody priceless. Why were you sitting in Adams's lap?’
‘I wasn’t,’ she replied. ‘I was trying to get my magazine back.’
‘Bollocks. If there was nothing in it, then you wouldn’t have gone like a tomato.’
‘Oh, come on Ronald. You know me. It doesn’t take much to make me blush, you know that.’
‘Yeah, well. I guess getting caught giving a private dance to your boss would do that,’ Ronald replied. Lizzie looked at him and started laughing. Ronald continued, ‘Did you see the look on the Colonel’s face?’
‘Yep.’
‘I don’t think he likes us much, Lizzie.’
‘I don’t think he does,’ Lizzie said. 'Maybe he’s jealous.’ Ronald laughed again and turned to Lizzie.
‘Well, he’s not made of wood, is he?’ Lizzie looked at Ronald and started to go red again.
‘Shut up, Ronald,’ she said, nodding in the direction of the TRT tent. ‘They’re coming.’
Ronald climbed up into the front seat of the Land Rover and watched the two officers throw their medical bags into the back. Lizzie opened the passenger door and got in, ignoring Ronald who was looking across at her.
‘Piss off,’ she whispered to him, finally smiling. Ronald looked into the rear-view mirror to make sure that the other two had got on board and put the Land Rover into gear.
‘Right then, Sergeant Jarman,’ he said. ‘Let’s go and have a look at this helicopter.’
‘Oh, I forgot to say, I spoke to the GSM in the Ops Room. There’s a contact going on upcountry somewhere.’
‘You’d better let them know in the back.’ Ronald nodded towards the rear of the Land Rover. Lizzie turned around and opened up the small window that separated the front cabin and shouted through it.
‘Sirs, I was just in the Ops Room at the hospital. Just so you know, there’s a contact going on somewhere.’ She turned back to face the front, closing the window. ‘Well, they look like they’re having a right laugh in the back there.’
The window opened up again a few seconds later, and Ronald saw Adams lean his head through as far as he could.
‘Question for you, Jarman,’ he asked.
‘Yes, sir?’ Lizzie replied.
‘Why’s he driving?
‘Sorry, sir?’
‘Why is Corporal McDonald Driving, Sergeant Jarman?’ Ronald looked up in his mirror and caught the mock-serious expression on Adams's face. ‘He’s not got a blue light license, has he?’ Adams continued. ‘Even if we don’t actually have a blue light?’
‘Er.’ Lizzie paused for a second. ‘On the job training, sir. I’m prepping him for the exam for when he gets back to the UK.’ Ronald kept his eyes firmly to the front, knowing that if he looked at either Lizzie or Adams he would start laughing. He heard the window close behind him.
‘Slow down, Ronald, for fuck’s sake,’ Lizzie barked, pointing at a tented complex to the side of the road. ‘There’
s the HQ.’
‘I thought you said that the GSM was back in the Ops Room?’ Ronald said.
‘Doesn’t matter, mate,’ Lizzie replied. ‘He’ll still know.’
A few minutes later, the Land Rover pulled up at the side of the helicopter landing site. Colonel Nick opened the door to the back and jumped down. He was irritated that he’d ended up in the bloody back of the Land Rover again, and even more irritated that the two juniors were in the front. He’d thought about raising it with Adams on the way down, but it was too hot and noisy in the back, and being bounced around made it difficult to say anything, let alone have a conversation. Adams didn’t look in the slightest bit fussed anyway. One thing he did need to speak to the RAF officer about though was his over-familiarity with the troops. That had to be stopped.
Colonel Nick walked to the front of the Land Rover where Lizzie and Ronald were standing. As Adams walked around to join them, he waved at the pilot who was over by the side of the helicopter. They left their medical kit in the vehicle and walked the couple of hundred yards to where the pilot was standing.
‘Hello, sirs,’ Davies said as the group of medics reached him. ‘Lizzie, Ronald. How’re tricks? Are you–’
‘We’ve come to have a look at the damage to the helicopter,’ Colonel Nick said, cutting the pilot off. ‘Seeing as we were actually in the back when it was damaged, we thought maybe we should have a look, assess the battle damage.’ Davies looked at the Colonel blankly in response. ‘Is it this one?’ Nick asked, nodding at the helicopter they were standing next to.
‘Yep, this is her,’ the pilot said. ‘I’ve just taken over, so need to finish off my handover checks. Then I’ll tell you what the score is, and show you the damage so that you can assess it.’ Davies turned his back on Colonel Nick and walked past the FM aerials on the side of the helicopter, flicking them as he walked past.
Colonel Nick knew full well that the pilot was fucking him about. He watched as the Flight Lieutenant knelt down by the huge tyres, checking them with his hands. After running his hands over them, Davies looked at his palms in much the same way that medics did when looking for bleeding.
‘Tosser,’ Colonel Nick mumbled under his breath. Davies got back to his feet and walked back past them to get to the side door of the helicopter.
‘Wheels look good,’ he said as he walked past. ‘No hydraulic fluid leaking from the brakes.’ Colonel Nick was certain that as the pilot walked past to the stairs, he smirked at Adams.
‘Where’re the toilets, Adams?’ Nick asked.
‘Over there if it’s number one,’ Adams replied, nodding at a length of drainpipe a few hundred yards beyond the helicopter pan. The pipe was set into the ground at a forty-five-degree angle with the open end at waist height. ‘The indomitable desert rose. It’s a bit further if you need a sh–’
‘Thank you, Adams,’ Nick interrupted, looking at the makeshift urinal and wondering for a moment if he could wait until he got back to the hospital. Even though the drainpipe was buried in the sand and was supposed to drain urine away straight into the ground, desert roses stank at the best of times. In the middle of the day, this one would be eye-watering. So pungent that he would be able to taste it for the rest of the day, no matter how many times he cleaned his teeth.
‘Great,’ he mumbled as he wandered off, deciding that he couldn’t wait.
When Nick got back to the medical team, they were sitting in the shade under the helicopter. Davies was just making his way down the ramp at the back of the helicopter. He nodded at the Colonel, who ignored him on general principle.
‘Okay, I give up, Ronald,’ Colonel Nick heard Lizzie say. ‘What is it that begins with “S”?’
‘Sand!’ Ronald replied, looking pleased with himself. Nick looked at them incredulously. The idiots were playing ‘I-Spy’.
‘Ready when you are, sir,’ Davies said.
‘Finally,’ Nick said. ‘All your handover checks okay, were they?’
‘Peachy creamy, Colonel,’ Davies replied with a smile. He patted the side of the helicopter with the flat of his hand. ‘She’s good to go.’
‘This one? I thought it was battle damaged?’
‘The engineers are pretty good, sir,’ Davies said. ‘They worked most of last night to assess the damage, and it was just superficial. No major arteries hit, as it were.’ Davies walked towards the rear of the helicopter and pointed at a black square patch on the side. ‘That was one of the holes,’ he pointed at another similar patch a few inches away. ‘That was another.’
Colonel Nick peered closely at the patches on the fuselage.
‘Are you having a laugh?’ he said to the pilot.
‘Er, no sir,’ Davies replied.
‘But that’s bodge tape,’ the Colonel said. ‘Your engineers have fixed a bunch of bullet holes with bodge tape?’
Staff Sergeant Partridge parked his Land Rover next to the one with the red cross on the side and hopped out. After telling the other soldiers in the Land Rover to stay put, he wandered over to join the small group he could see standing by one of the helicopters on the pan.
As he approached, he could see the pilot talking to a Lieutenant Colonel with a red cross on his arm. Partridge coughed to get their attention. As the Colonel turned around, the Staff Sergeant braced up with his arms rigid by his side.
‘Sir, Staff Sergeant Partridge from Three Para,’ he said.
‘At ease, Staff,’ Colonel Nick replied. ‘What can we do for you?’
‘I’m the temporary Force Protection Team, Sir,’ Partridge said. ‘Well, there’s six of us altogether. The rest of them are back in the Land Rover, but I thought I should come down and introduce myself before they all turn up and start scaring people.’
‘Good job, Staff. I’m Colonel Hickman. The senior officer on the TRT. Welcome aboard.’ He pointed at the other members of the medical team. ‘These are the rest of the medics. Flight Lieutenant Adams, Sergeant Jarman, and Corporal McDonald.’ Partridge nodded at them in turn.
‘Morning, sir. Chaps.’ Adams looked at the Staff Sergeant closely.
‘Didn’t we pick you up with one of your lads the other day?’ he asked. ‘GSW to the chest?’ Partridge nodded.
‘Yes sir, that’s kind of how I ended up being reassigned to the FP team,’ he said. ‘Turns out I shouldn’t have come back to the hospital with him, according to the CO anyway.’ Lizzie started laughing.
‘Let me guess,’ she said. ‘He thinks that as you obviously like helicopters so much, you can fly about on them for a bit?’ Partridge nodded, smiling.
‘Yes, something like that anyway,’ he said. ‘His language was a bit more colourful though, to be honest. It’ll only be for a day or so, just until we can get a lift back to the forward operating base.’
Partridge looked across at the Flight Lieutenant in the flying suit, who was standing just behind the rest of the group.
‘I’m guessing you must be the pilot, sir,’ he said.
‘Yep, I’m the driver. Davies,’ he replied, extending his hand for a handshake. ‘Good to have you aboard. Partridge, was it?’
‘Yes, sir, that’s me.’
‘Anyone call you Alan?’ Davies asked.
‘Not for long, sir,’ Partridge replied with a smile. ‘Not for long.’
‘Ah, I see,’ Davies laughed. ‘Okay, so are you and your chaps happy with stage one drills, or do you want me to get the loadmaster to go through them with you?’ He was referring to the basic training that all troops had to go through to work in and around helicopters.
‘Well, I think we’re good sir, but a refresh might be worthwhile. The lads should be down in a minute. I was hoping to do a spot of training with them anyway, bus and de-bus, that sort of thing.
Two loud rings sounded from the direction of the crew tent next to the pan, cutting off any further conversation. Davies turned and started running back towards the tent, while Adams, Lizzie, and Ronald all started running back towards the Land Rover.
The Staff Sergeant watched them all running in different directions, before starting to run in the direction of his own Land Rover.
Exactly eight minutes later, Davies climbed into the right-hand seat of the Chinook and shouted ‘helmets’ to the rest of the crew to let them know that any further communication would be via their headsets. On his left, Flight Lieutenant Taff, his co-pilot, was shrugging himself into his harness. Once he was settled, the co-pilot flicked his comms switch.
‘Just waiting on authorisation, Kinkers,’ Taff said. ‘You good to go in the back?’
‘Yep, we’ve got six FP and four TRT on board,’ the disembodied Australian voice of the loadmaster came back.
‘What’s the score, then?’ Davies asked. ‘Any news from the scene?’
‘Three footballs apparently,’ Taff replied, using the generic terms for casualties among the aircrew. ‘I had to double check the location though — it’s in the arse end of nowhere. Nothing at prayers this morning about action in that area, so I reckon it’s the North Face gang.’ The North Face gang was a nickname for anyone in any of the various British special forces units that were operating in the area and was based on the fact that all they seemed to wear was clothing branded with the distinctive North Face logo. Taff held up his hand to silence Davies for a second. ‘Auth’s come through,’ he said, his Welsh accent elongating the words. ‘We’re good.’
‘Good in the back?’ Davies asked.
‘Clear above and behind,’ Kinkers replied.
‘Lifting.’ Davies pulled back on the cyclic to lift the helicopter into the air.
19
Colonel Nick closed his eyes as the helicopter touched down in the freshly ploughed field almost twenty minutes after taking off from the relative safety of Camp Bastion. He reached up and pulled his goggles down, blinking furiously to clear the dust that had rushed in during the final descent. Trying to ignore the grit behind his eyelids, he fumbled around for his weapon which had fallen to the floor as they had landed.
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