by Fiona Field
27
The hot sun was low and the sky was turning a coppery orange as the ten-man patrol headed back to base. They were tired, the heat had been relentless – how could it have been so Baltic just a couple of weeks ago and now it was baking? – and their supplies of water were almost exhausted. It wasn’t an issue: in less than an hour they should be back in the safety of the compound, tucking into their evening meal and with as much water as they could drink, but until then they were all aware that maybe it would be wise not to be too profligate with what water they did have in their Bergens. Lee tabbed along behind Sergeant Adams and Johnny, keeping his mind on the job as much as he could. Even so, every now and again he caught himself drifting into thinking about his bank account. Could he, he wondered, make it so that Jenna couldn’t access it? But if he did, how would she pay the bills? Was he being unfair? After all, he was going to qualify for an end of tour bonus and that would pay off the debts. He’d planned on buying a nice Audi, but that could wait. Except why should it? He’d earned it…
Stop it, he told himself.
Up ahead, Johnny’s mine detector let out the occasional squeak or squeal, as it passed over odd bits of rubbish on the dusty track that led towards the last village before the Neb Canal: cans, horseshoe nails, spent cartridge cases from other encounters, detritus you’d never normally notice, but you did now the Vallon picked it out. The pale surface was in contrast to the fields on either side, which now had thigh-high plants growing in them. Opium poppies. In another few weeks they’d be flowering, and by the time that happened it would be almost time for 2 Herts and the rest of the soldiers on this phase of Operation Herrick to leave and the new batch of troops to take their place.
Lee watched the tall green foliage swaying. It all looked quite peaceful: the neat fields with crops, the irrigation canals flanked by reeds and trees, with a few goats tethered to stakes in the ground, nibbling on the foliage. It was hard to believe how blood-soaked the soil of this country was. Lee watched the foliage move again. It was then he realised there hadn’t been a breath of wind all day. It wasn’t the breeze moving the plants…
The reality of what he’d spotted jolted him into action. Someone was lying in wait in the plants. Ambush!
‘Take cover,’ he yelled, as he threw himself to the ground.
As his comrades followed his lead, there was the most almighty explosion. Lee, flat on the ground, felt the shock wave ripple the length of his body like a wave under a lilo. A chemical, just-lit-sparkler smell wafted past as dust, stones and other shit pattered down on his body armour and his helmet. The shock of the explosion at such close proximity left him feeling unbelievably shaky and his ears were ringing so much that the sound of someone shouting was muffled.
‘Man down, man down!’ he managed to discern. He raised his head. Sergeant Adams was already up and running forward. Shit, it was Johnny. Despite feeling as though his legs weren’t properly under control, Lee also raced forward. As he ran, he could see that Johnny’s left leg was horribly shortened. Fear and panic nearly took control before training began to kick in.
‘Send a nine-liner,’ he yelled at the radio operator. ‘We need a MERT.’
‘Get Ryan up here,’ screamed Adams. Ryan was the patrol medic, the guy with the specialist training and kit.
Lee threw his Bergen off his back and crouched behind it. He was sure the IED had been detonated from the poppy field. The terrorist was probably still in there, lying low or leopard-crawling his way to safety. In your dreams, you fucker, thought Lee. His fear was now morphing into anger – white-hot rage that his mate, his best buddy, had been catastrophically injured.
His hunch was vindicated when a crackle of automatic fire spat through the air. Once again the soldiers dropped to the ground. Lee, emboldened by the slight protection his Bergen afforded, watched to see where the shots had come from. He had a rough idea anyway; he knew where he’d seen the poppies moving. He could get this bastard. He was going to get this bastard. If it were the last thing he did, he owed that much to Johnny.
And over his anger and his desire for revenge he felt guilt. Maybe, if he’d been just a bit more on the ball, if he hadn’t been thinking about bloody Jenna and his finances, he’d have made the connection about the movement in the field before Johnny had got too near the bomb. Fuck!
Lee opened fire on the area of the poppy field he was sure would hold the terrorist. But then he could hear the bullets zinging in from another direction. Shit, the ambush was even better organised than he’d first thought.
‘Nine o’clock,’ he yelled, hoping his voice would be heard over the noise and confusion of the firefight.
Other members of the patrol joined Lee, also sheltering behind their own Bergens, and followed Lee’s direction of fire. It was difficult to tell if they were having any success as bullets, lit by red tracer, poured back and forth. Had they hit any of the gunmen?
‘Get air support,’ screamed the sergeant, from where he was helping Ryan tend Johnny. The radio operator jabbered instructions into his set.
The firing from the centre of the field seemed to have died down.
‘I’m moving in,’ said Lee. ‘Give me covering fire.’
His comrades began to let rip with their SA80s, the bullets skimming over Lee’s head as he ran, half crouched, into the lush green crop. He felt a tug at his jacket. He dropped to his knees, hiding in the plants. He had a hole in his sleeve. Shit, that was close. He hoped to fuck it was the enemy, not his own side. He didn’t want to think that one of his colleagues couldn’t aim a gun properly. Not a good thought.
He popped up, meerkat-like, to get a quick bearing. Twenty yards away, the poppies were swaying again. He brought up his rifle and pumped a magazine’s worth into the area. Ducking down he rapidly unclipped the spent container, reached into his belt kit, and replaced it. It only took seconds. Then he ran forward a second time. Slumped in the plants was the body of a young lad. He could only have been about fifteen. Lee felt for a pulse but he could tell the boy was dead, and he didn’t care. By the boy was the switch that had detonated the IED – the one that had injured, maybe killed, Johnny.
‘Live by the sword,’ said Lee to his dead opponent, ‘and you’re going to get fucked.’
Without thinking, he stood up to make his way back to the rest of the patrol and as he did so pain exploded. He collapsed while the sky darkened and all he could hear, before he passed out, was the sound of someone screaming – himself.
The nine-liner came into the crew room and instantly papers were thrown on the floor, books dropped, as the immediate readiness crew exchanged board games and reading materials for emergency medical equipment, and headed for the helipad. Shit, Chrissie thought, as she grabbed a bag of medical equipment, her body armour and her helmet and raced from the air-conditioned cool of the crew room into the oven-hot heat outside, another poor bastard maimed.
Like everyone, she watched the newscasts beamed to them by the BFBS, and was bemused by how little from Afghanistan ever made it onto the British news. Deaths did, sometimes repatriations if it was a slow news day, but injuries? Not a chance. The British public, she thought, had no idea what the attrition rate was. Not a Scooby-doo. And now another soldier was down and the knowledge made her feel sick. Another young man whose life had changed for ever. The soldiers could joke all they liked about how they would be going to Rio to the next Olympics, the humourless reality was so very different. Maybe, when the guys got back to England, got to the rehabilitation stage, got their prosthetic limbs fitted, they found life looking up; but here at the field hospital, it was pretty grim. There was bloody little joking on the major trauma ward.
When she got to the helipad and ran up the rear ramp of the huge helicopter, the rotors were already starting to spin. There was no mucking about getting MERTs off the ground. Pre-flight checks on a normal mission could take twenty minutes; now time was of the essence, and everything, except the absolute basic safety procedures, was jettisoned
in favour of gaining precious seconds. The stabilisation of casualties was still largely carried out on the battlefield and might have become the platinum ten minutes, kicking the idea of a golden hour right down the line, but the speed at which the injured could be got to the operating table was still crucial, and the pilots did all they could to help.
The speed of the rotors and the noise of the engine increased as Chrissie found a seat. The entire aircraft began to shake and, through the open tail ramp, the dust around the helipad began to kick up. One of the Force Protection Unit, the soldiers who guarded them on the ground at the sharp end, was busy strapping himself to the safety lines at the side of the helicopter and then kneeling behind a heavy machine gun, which he’d positioned on a tripod, at the very edge of the ramp. As if the body armour and helmet weren’t enough to remind you this trip was really dangerous, that, thought Chrissie, surely left you in no doubt. That, and the Apache which would fly alongside providing some even more serious fire support.
She and the others were settling into their webbing seats hooked to the sides of the Chinook, when the news was relayed to the MERT medics that it wasn’t going to be one casualty. There’d been a second incident in the battle now raging. Nervously the medical team smiled at each other, trying to convince both themselves and their colleagues that they weren’t actually shitting themselves. The soldiers flying with them, the guys who would deploy as soon as they landed, to secure the LZ, looked pumped up and full of adrenalin. But then, this was what they’d been trained for; this was their primary role.
The second nine-liner was passed back down the helicopter. Chrissie scanned the proforma: one patient, T1, stretcher case, urgent surgical, UK soldier, area under sustained enemy attack, flares to mark the pick-up, she read. She didn’t like the phrase ‘area under sustained enemy attack’. Still, the worry over what might greet them when they landed at their destination took her mind off the discomfort she was feeling right now. The body of the Chinook was a metal box, which had been sitting in the desert sun the whole day – it was now oven-like and Chrissie felt her whole body prickling with sweat. She could feel rivulets of perspiration trickle down her spine, pour off her forehead, down her neck. Jeez, and she was only sitting still. What must it be like for the poor bloody infantry on the ground, fighting for their lives?
Her heart jolted up a notch as the shaking of the helicopter changed into a more violent trembling, and then everything suddenly swayed as the wheels lifted off the ground and they were airborne. She checked her lap strap and glanced out of the window. On the horizon, the sun was a blood-red disc as it slid behind the dust-laden air. Below, the camp was already flooded with light but, beyond the perimeter fence, away to the east, where night had already fallen, the darkness was Stone Age. Not a flicker, not a glimmer of light for as far as she could see. She turned back to look into the cabin and tried to keep her nerves under control.
Ten minutes later, she could tell they had to be near their destination. The movement of the Chinook had altered and once again they were swaying and bobbing in the air, not thrusting forwards. And then, bump, they were down.
The soldiers raced down the ramp into the hot, black night, guns cocked and ready, to form a defensive ring around the Chinook, while the medics waited on board for the casualties to be brought to them by their comrades. They were ready, the drips were set up, the kit had been unpacked around the stretcher in the centre of the helicopter, and they waited. Above them the rotors spun; inside, the noise was still intense.
From where Chrissie was, she could see the surgeon talking into the head mic which connected him to the pilots. She could tell from his body language that something deeply frustrating was going on. A message, like Chinese whispers, was passed down the line.
Phil punched her arm. ‘Come on,’ he yelled in her ear. ‘We’ve got to get him.’
Chrissie stared at him, not quite comprehending, but Phil was getting two other medics on side.
‘Come on, Chrissie.’
Suddenly she understood what he meant. They had to go out, into the battle, to retrieve the soldier. Fuck! Scared, adrenalin pumping, she unclipped her belt and followed Phil off the chopper, thundering down the ramp into the dust kicked up by the Chinook and the smoke from the flare which had guided the pilot to the LZ. Even with the noise of the rotors and the whine of the engine, she could hear the crackle and pop of gunfire. Suddenly she was back on Exercise Autumn Armour, scared of what she might see, scared of what might happen. Only this time it was for real: real bullets, real injuries. She pulled herself together. She’d come a long way in six months – this time she’d cope, she knew it.
Ahead, she could see four soldiers racing towards them, weighed down by a shape being carried in a poncho. The ambushed patrol could spare guys to get one of the casualties on board but it would be quicker for Phil and his team to grab the second man down while the first casualty was lifted into the helicopter and into the hands of the surgeon. The soldiers ran past them and into the Chinook while Phil led his team off to one side, towards a field of some sort of crop. Phil was in comms with the troops and the pilots and was obviously receiving instructions from someone with night vision goggles as, barely pausing, he led them through the tall plants.
Chrissie followed him, keeping as close as she could, trying not to admit to herself that she was using his body as a shield. She could see red tracer, arcing lazily through the sky, like a low-grade fireworks display. She breathed a sigh of relief that the bullets weren’t heading their way. Then Phil stopped, so suddenly she almost cannoned into him. At his feet was a youth in a dirty white kaftan, eyes wide open and obviously dead. T4, thought Chrissie, and not a priority. But beside him was a soldier being worked on by the patrol’s medic. If the medic was still working, the lad was still alive. The old adage – where there’s life there’s hope – was never so true as when the MERT arrived.
Phil whipped off his backpack and extricated a lightweight aluminium collapsible stretcher. In seconds it was assembled and the soldier was rolled onto it. It was then that Chrissie saw his face.
Lee!
Oh my God, Lee. And suddenly all her professional detachment, all her training went by the board as her insides went into freefall and two fat tears of love, fear and shock rolled down her cheeks.
And then someone punched her hard in the arm. What the fuck? And as the pain set in she realised it wasn’t a punch – she’d been shot.
28
It was the doorbell that woke Jenna. She rolled over in bed to look at the digital alarm beside her. Seven o’clock? Give it a rest. She rolled onto her back and decided that going on to brandy after the best part of a bottle of wine might have been a mistake.
The bell rang again.
For fuck’s sake. What could be so urgent?
‘Are you going to get that?’
Jenna froze. Uh-oh. Cautiously, she turned her head. Shit. How did that happen? What the hell was Dan doing in her bed? She shut her eyes as the bed spun and tried to think back to the previous evening. She’d driven back to Coronet Foods, she’d collected her pay and some half-decent praise, been asked to report back tonight at five for another job and then she’d driven to the Six Bells. So far so good.
Dan had been waiting for her there and he’d suggested dinner. Great idea, she was starving, and there was nothing wrong with sharing a steak and chips and a bottle of wine with a friend, she remembered thinking. He’d suggested ringing for a taxi and collecting her car the next day, which was also a good shout. And the brandy after had seemed a good plan. But maybe not the second one. And that’s when it became fuzzy. No, not fuzzy; after that second brandy it was a total fucking blank. She couldn’t remember how she’d got home or anything, and she certainly couldn’t remember inviting Dan into bed. Fuck!
The bell rang again. Feeling shaky, she clambered out of bed, dragged on her dressing gown and made her way downstairs. She glanced out of the landing window and her heart stopped. A black saloon car wa
s parked outside.
No! Dear God, no! Every wife knew what that meant. Every wife lived in fear that a strange unmarked black car would stop at their door and now one had. And across the road were a couple of wives, staring out of their open front doors, their faces frozen with the shock that bad news was being delivered so close to home.
Even more shakily, Jenna got to the bottom stair and crossed the hall to open the door. Captain Fanshaw was there with Major Milward. Her heart was thumping and her mouth was dry; she opened the door wide enough to let them in. She knew with certainty what this was about. All she needed to know was how bad the news was going to be. If Lee was dead, she’d lose this house; with no military husband she’d have no entitlement to stay in it – and she hadn’t finished paying for the improvements yet.
‘Mrs Perkins…’ began Milward.
‘Tell me,’ she said. ‘Just tell me.’
‘Let’s sit down,’ said Seb.
‘Just fucking tell me,’ screamed Jenna.
‘Lee’s injured. He was shot. He’s critical.’
Jenna stumbled into the sitting room and slumped on one of the new sofas. ‘So he’s still alive.’ She saw the look exchanged between Milward and her husband’s platoon commander. ‘Is he or isn’t he?’
‘As far as we know,’ said Seb, cautiously.
‘What does that mean?’ Jenna felt terrified. If Lee died, her security was completely gone; she’d have no income, she’d have nothing except debts. It was all a terrifying prospect.
‘It means that the last update we had is that he’s back at the hospital in Bastion, he was alive when they got him there, and because of that, his chances are good. They’ll stabilise him and then, all being well, he’ll fly back to the UK.’
