The Last Run: A Novella

by Stephen Knight

  “Scott,” CJ said, her voice small.

  “Jesus, CJ,” Mulligan said, his voice barely more than a whisper as he stared up at the goliath cloud. “Can you see that fucker?”

  “Can’t see…anything,” she gasped. “Peter…Peter…?”

  Mulligan tore his eyes away from the mushroom cloud and looked at her. Her face was ashen, and her eyes gleamed dully in the afternoon light. She was in shock. As he watched, a small trickle of blood emerged from beneath her hairline, oozing down the side of her face. She wasn’t moving. Her left arm dangled listlessly, the fingers of her hand slightly curled. Her feet were spread far apart, or as far as they could get inside the foot well. She took deep but uneven breaths, breathing through her mouth.

  “Where are you hurt?” Mulligan hit the quick-release on his harness, and the straps dutifully retracted on their gravity reels. He leaned toward her, but the pain in his back and neck tempered his actions, forcing him to move like an old man with very bad arthritis.

  “I’m blind,” she said. “Can’t breathe. Can’t feel anything. Where’s Peter?”

  “Pete?” Mulligan called out, his voice louder. The SCEV was absolutely silent, a quiet as a tomb. There were no sounds at all, no movements of air, no working pumps, no whirring fans. The rig had been severely damaged by the nuclear detonation and ensuing thermal and physical shock waves that had hammered it. Though built tough and designed to survive even the harshest of environments, there wasn’t a vehicle manufactured that could remain fully operational after a near-miss from a nuclear weapon that had a yield in the megaton range. Mulligan slowly clambered out of the pilot’s seat, using all the handholds he had routinely ignored over the previous years. He’d never needed them—even though he was six foot six, he had always been able to fold himself into an SCEV’s cockpit without doing anything more than grabbing a hold of a headrest to move in and out of the rig’s front office. Now, it was a different story. It took him almost a minute to clear the seat, and then he had to cling to the padded bulkhead, gasping against the agony that seared his nerves in his back, shoulders, and neck. He peered into the next compartment, and he saw Peter Lopez curled up in a ball before the inner airlock door. His back was toward Mulligan, but Peter’s face was turned upward toward the ceiling at an odd angle. A thin trail of blood oozed out of his right ear, and his eyes were half-open.

  “Pete?” Mulligan slowly eased toward the motionless engineer. He grabbed onto the back of the chair at the engineer’s station and leaned against it. It tilted forward on its base, causing Mulligan to stumble a bit as he fought for his balance, releasing his breath in a long hiss as new torture flashed through his body. He fell to one knee with a groan and stayed where he was for a good thirty seconds, giving himself time to recover from the pain. Behind him, he could hear CJ breathing laboriously from the cockpit.

  “Pete,” she whispered.

  “Hold on, CJ. I’m checking on him.” Mulligan edged forward, sliding on the slightly stippled deck plating on his knees. He found it was easier to cover the last four feet on his hands and knees. When he put his hand on Peter’s shoulder, there was no response. There was a substantial depression in his forehead, and the skin around the indentation was purple from blood pooling just beneath the skin. Mulligan reached for the man’s neck, which had an unusual bend to it. He felt for the carotid, but there was no pulse.

  Fuck.

  Mulligan clambered to his feet and headed for the medical locker. He pulled out the automatic external defibrillator and returned to Peter’s side. He rolled Peter onto his back, ignoring the pain of his injuries. He opened Peter’s uniform blouse and pulled up his T-shirt, exposing his chest. Removing the AED from its case, he set it on the deck and pulled out the shock pads. A small display came to life on the unit, and the STANDBY light illuminated. Mulligan released a small sigh of relief. He had been worried that the EMP might have fried the unit, but apparently after traveling through the SCEV’s external shielding, the pulse no longer possessed a charge substantial enough to destroy the defibrillator. He stuck the pads to Peter’s motionless chest. The AED ran a patient assessment, and a moment later, the orange SHOCK button illuminated. Mulligan wasted no time. He pressed the glowing button, and Peter convulsed slightly as the electrical current passed through his body cavity, arcing between the two pads. It was over in a moment, and the SHOCK button flashed while the unit recharged from its internal battery. After three seconds, the button illuminated and held steady. Mulligan pressed it, and Peter spasmed once more. He repeated the process two more times, and by then, the AED was useless, its battery exhausted.

  Mulligan started administering CPR, compressing the center of Peter’s chest thirty times, as he’d been taught, alternating with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. He kept it up for five minutes straight, but Peter’s status did not change. Mulligan kept at it, even though the actions caused his own agony to increase.

  Come on, man, come on—!

  After another five minutes of compressions and assisted breathing, it became clear that Peter was dead—perhaps he could have been saved at Harmony, where there were surgeons and a vast array of medical equipment tailored for such an event, but the SCEV’s offerings were just too Spartan to be effective in treating his injuries. Mulligan looked down at his friend, and was surprised he felt a vague, misplaced anger.

  Why weren’t you strapped in? Why didn’t you let me drop you off?

  From up front, CJ whispered, “Scott…”

  Mulligan turned toward the cockpit. He heard CJ fighting to breathe, so he returned to the medical locker and pulled out a bottle of oxygen. The O2 might come in handy. Laboriously, he returned to the cockpit, finding he had a remarkable amount of difficulty stepping over Peter’s body. Later, he would move him to the sleeping area in the back.

  “I’m here,” he said to CJ as he reentered the cockpit. She was still slumped against the right side of the chamber, head lolling, staring out through the viewports at a vista she couldn’t see—a towering mushroom cloud that emitted copious amounts of radioactive waste.

  “Peter,” she said again.

  Mulligan debated on what to say as he fumbled with the oxygen mask. He turned the knob at the top of the green tank, and air whistled slightly as it surged out of the tank and into the small facemask. He gently slipped the mask over CJ’s face and tightened the elastic strap around her head, ensuring the plastic cover was properly positioned over her nose and mouth.

  “Here, this should help,” he said, his voice rough. “It’s oxygen. You relax, there.”

  “What…about…Peter,” she said, the words muffled by the mask and the soft hiss of rushing gas.

  “I’m sorry, hon. Peter’s dead,” Mulligan said, wishing there was a way to soften the words so they didn’t sound so harsh. But standing in the shadow of a growing, radioactive giant, he found he had no skill for that at the moment.

  CJ closed her eyes in response and said nothing.

  “I’m going to release your harness and straighten you out in your seat,” he told her. “Then, I’m going to go back to the medical locker and get a cervical collar for you. I’m not sure, but I think you’re neck might be broken. Can you move at all? Your hands, your toes, anything?” When she didn’t answer, Mulligan leaned closer to her. He smelled the sharp tang of urine, then. CJ had wet herself, apparently without knowing. Or caring.

  “CJ!” he said, louder.

  “No,” she said after a long moment. “Can’t…move.”

  Placing a hand on her shoulder to hold her in place, Mulligan released the safety harness. One strap retracted, while the one that had failed just hung there, fouled in its gravity reel. He put the oxygen tank in her damp lap and straightened out the kinks in the plastic hose, then gently eased her back into the seat. CJ lay there like a rag doll, almost lifeless except for the sounds of her breathing. Tears seeped out from beneath her eyelids.

  “I’ll be right back,” Mulligan said. When she didn’t respond, Mulligan gr
abbed a handhold and slowly pulled himself upright. He returned to the second compartment and stepped over Peter’s body as he had his way back to the medical locker. He rummaged through it, looking for what he might need. He removed the hard plastic Aspen collar there, as well as some extra pads and cold packs in the event CJ might have more blunt trauma impacts that might need attention. He also pulled out an orange shock blanket, still in its cellophane wrapper. As an afterthought, he shoved some painkillers and a bottle of water in his pockets. It was tough for him to carry everything, for he had to move carefully because of his injuries, as well as due to the items that had been scattered across the SCEV’s deck—cushions from the dining settee, the contents of several lockers that had sprung open, even one portion of the decking itself, which had popped upward and formed a hazardous ledge which threatened to trip him up. And, of course, Peter Lopez’s slowly-cooling body.

  Mulligan returned to the cockpit. CJ stared out the viewports now, her tears drying on her cheeks. For a moment, he feared she might have died while he was in the second compartment, but he could see the slow rise and fall of her chest as he eased inside the tight space. The mushroom could still loomed overhead, and as he slowly squatted down beside her and dumped the items he carried onto the deck, he found himself staring up at its great bloom. As horrifying as it was, there was something awe-inspiring about the cloud, something that bordered on being beautiful. He had no idea how he could even consider that.

  Tess. The kids…

  “Are you…you back?” CJ gasped beneath the mask.

  “Yeah. Let me help you get squared away.”

  “How…did Peter…die?”

  Mulligan fussed with the cervical collar, opening it and examining the various tabs that would hold it in place once he had it fitted around CJ’s neck. He would have to move carefully. He had already adjusted her position once, and he didn’t want to cause further injury when he put the collar on her. Thankfully, the copilot’s seat offered a lot of support, so he wouldn’t have to move her all that much.

  “I guess we rolled over,” Mulligan said. “I’m sorry. He was already gone when I found him. I did my best, CJ. Really.”

  “I know,” CJ whispered.

  “I need to put this collar on you. I’m going to try to be as gentle as I can, but if you feel any pain, let me know. All right?”

  “Yeah.”

  Mulligan removed the oxygen mask from her face. He supported her head as he elevated the seat and slowly raised the back slightly, just enough to tilt CJ forward. He then slipped on the cervical collar and closed it around her neck, pulling the straps as tight as he felt was safe. Gently, he pushed her back into the seat and reclined it a bit, then slipped the O2 mask back onto her face. He tore open the plastic bag wrapped around the shock blanket, then draped the orange fabric over her body.

  “How do you feel?”

  “Neck hurts,” she said. “Bad.”

  “All right. I’ll give you something for that in a bit. Do you hurt anywhere else?”

  “No. Can’t…can’t feel…anything else.”

  Mulligan lifted the blanket and did a check of her extremities, being as thorough as he could under the circumstances. “Can you breathe any better? Is the oxygen helping?”

  “Not really,” CJ said. “My sight…starting to come back. Outside…is that…the cloud?”

  “Yeah. The glare is starting to go away?” Mulligan thought that was a good sign. He knew a nuclear flash caused bleaching of the visual pigment in the retina, allowing the optic nerves to overload. He’d been told it would last only for a few minutes, but clearly the clinicians who had made the observations had never had a case study that had been sitting in ringside seats to a nuclear explosion.

  “Better.” CJ took a deep, troubling breath. “You should…go.”

  Mulligan looked up. “What?”

  “Go…your family. Get some suits…you should…hurry.”

  Mulligan didn’t know what to say. Leaving CJ was out of the question…but then, so was staying with her. There was practically zero chance that help would ever arrive, and the odds of being able to make it to the house and then back to Harmony in MOPP gear was effectively the same.

  “I don’t think I can leave you like this,” he said woodenly, and found he was disgusted with himself when he found a small part of him had already been considering it.

  “Scott…you have to…live.” CJ’s eyes moved, as if casting about, hoping to see him, despite her blindness. “Someone has to take care…of Rachel. You…you have to live.”

  Mulligan swallowed. “Rachel’s in a safe place, CJ. She’s going to be fine. Don’t worry about her.”

  “You…need to go,” CJ said, her voice a light murmur beneath the mask. “You…need…to save…them. No chance…for me.”

  “CJ…”

  She closed her eyes. “Rachel,” she said. “Oh, baby…”

  CJ stopped breathing.

  “CJ!” Mulligan grabbed one of her hands, and pried one of her eyes open. The pupil there was already dilating, as the muscles in her eye slowly relaxed, growing slack. Mulligan tightened the straps holding the mask in place, then reclined the seat as far back as it would go. It would be better to remove CJ from the copilot’s seat and stretch her out on the deck, but he was afraid to do so—her injuries were obviously severe, and the movement might make the damage irreparable.

  He began CPR for the second time that day, and as hot tears burned his eyes, a small voice inside him begged him to let CJ go, and stop wasting time.

  ***

  BY THE TIME he stopped trying to revive CJ, the mushroom cloud had begun to break up, courtesy of the higher winds at altitude. It was just a mass of dirty smoke now, slowly fading away, a black, crooked finger reaching into the sky. His back, neck, and arms were on fire. The oxygen canister had depleted its charge long ago, rendering the mask useless. Mulligan left it on CJ’s face. Her skin was damp from his tears, and his throat was raw from shouting at her to come back. He had worked on her for more than twice as long as he had Peter, and he was exhausted, completely wrung out. He finally collapsed to the deck between the two cockpit seats, his lower back pressed against the center console, its hard metal edge biting into him. He ignored it. Compared to the rest of his pain, it was practically a lover’s kiss.

  “I killed my friends,” he said to himself. His voice sounded ragged and hollow inside the silent vehicle. “Oh fuck me, I killed both of them.”

  He looked down the length of the rig. While large on the outside, SCEVs weren’t exactly cavernous on the inside—all the room was taken up by gear and machinery, leaving just a little over four hundred square feet of living space. From the cockpit, he could look down the entire length of the rig, where lockers had popped open, strewing unsecured articles across the decking. Maintenance panels in the overhead had popped open as well, exposing ductwork and electrical components. In the rear of the rig, the door to the latrine hung crazily on one hinge, and the emergency light back there flickered irregularly, like a faulty heart threatening to quit. From his perspective, Mulligan could see the cabin’s lines were slightly off, as if the rig had been slightly twisted when it rolled over. Judging by the debris field he had seen through the viewports, that didn’t seem like a very farfetched notion. It was a wonder the rig’s pressure seals hadn’t been compromised.

  His friends were dead, and there was nothing he could do about that. And their passing had left him with the time to finally consider what to do next. His family was still out there, somewhere. He didn’t know what condition they were in—the house was far enough from the explosion to have probably been spared most of the effects of the shockwave that had raced across the plain and tossed One Truck aside like a child’s toy, but the radiation was all-encompassing. Rationally, he knew that things had progressed past the “they don’t have much time” point. While they might not be dead yet, that condition was certainly going to become a reality, much sooner than any loving God would have arran
ged.

  Not giving up on them. No fucking way.

  Ignoring the pain that shot through him, Mulligan hauled himself to his feet. He stepped over Peter’s body without even looking at it, and went to the Extra-Vehicular Activity locker, where the MOPP suits were stored. The white Mission Oriented Protective Posture suits were specially-made, full-body garments constructed specifically for Harmony Base. The exteriors were made from monacrylic fibers, which were in turn reinforced with polyamide fibers, giving each suit a strong, hard-wearing outside surface. The monacrylic fibers ensured high fire-retardance, and a silicone treatment had been applied to make the garment waterproof. This permitted the rapid spreading of liquid chemicals, which would in turn speed up evaporation. The second layer of each suit acted as biological and chemical barrier that would serve to protect the wearer from exposure to non-nuclear threats. Each suit would fit a wide range of anthropomorphic sizes, though Mulligan wondered how effective they would be when it came to his daughters. The SCEV carried nothing suitable for children. All those were back at Harmony, since kids hadn’t been envisioned serving on any of the field teams. He stuffed the suits into a sturdy, weatherproof duffel bag, then threw in several masks and air filters. He couldn’t possibly carry air supplies for everyone, not in his current condition, but if they could make it back to the rig, he could reprovision everyone easily enough. He added medical supplies to the bag—bandages, sterilizers, antibacterial cleansers, combat gauze, cravats, a sling, three flashlights. Then he added pouches of sterile drinking water. It would be a long hike back to Harmony, especially for his kids.