Gale Force

60

There was a Coast Guard petty officer waiting for Court Harrington when the nurse wheeled him out through the lobby of the Iliuliuk Family and Health Services clinic in Dutch Harbor. She was a young woman with a short, clipped haircut, who looked him over, skeptical, as he struggled up from the wheelchair.

“Good morning, Mr. Harrington,” she said, handing him a cup of coffee. “Are you sure you’re up for this?”

“Pretty sure,” Harrington replied. That might have been a stretch. He ached all over, his head swam, and every breath felt like a stab wound. Walking, too, wasn’t the most fun in the world. But this petty officer probably jumped out of helicopters for a living, Harrington figured. She wasn’t going to sympathize with a couple bumps and scrapes.

He shook his head. Winced. “I mean, definitely. Once we get going, I’ll be fine.”

The petty officer didn’t look convinced. Behind Harrington, the nurse grumbled her protest, handed Harrington a couple of forms to sign. He did, and then he was free, and the petty officer was leading him out through the parking lot to a waiting van. She helped him into the passenger seat and closed the door for him, waited until he was settled before driving away from the building.

It was a ten-minute drive to the airport. Harrington focused on trying to breathe without hurting, on trying to remember the fall. Wondered, briefly, if he was making a mistake, but he knew that the crew of the Gale Force couldn’t do this without him.

The petty officer pulled into the airport, parked the van at the far end of the runway. Directly ahead was a Coast Guard helicopter, low slung and military-looking, like some kind of robot bug.

“Jayhawk,” the petty officer said. “You’re riding in style this morning.”

THE HELICOPTER didn’t do much to help Harrington’s pain threshold. The engines roared and rattled, and the whole machine shook as it sped westward, jarring Harrington’s brain inside his skull, the seat belt digging tight into his bandaged midsection, the broken ribs wrapped tight under his brand-new UNALASKA! tourist T-shirt. Outside, the view was nothing but gray clouds; the pilot must have been navigating by computer alone.

Two technicians joined Harrington in the back of the helicopter, both young, friendly looking guys in orange jumpsuits and helmets. They’d given Harrington a helmet to wear, too, with ear protection but no radio, so he couldn’t hear what the crew members were saying. He sat and looked out the window, found a grab bar to steady himself, hoped he wouldn’t be sick or pass out in front of these tough guys.

The Jayhawk flew west for an hour or so. Then the pilot said something to the copilot, and one of the flight technicians smiled at Harrington and yelled something he couldn’t make out over the roar of the engine.

He could feel the helicopter slowing down, though, and beginning its descent, and then clouds were gone and the helicopter was dropping, down toward a cold-looking black sea surrounded by rocky cliffs and featureless, verdant green mountains, and in the middle of the water was the Pacific Lion, lying on her side just as Harrington remembered, the Coast Guard cutter on one side, and the Gale Force, looking impossibly small, on the other.

The pilot aimed for the tug, and as he descended, Harrington could see the cluster of crew waiting on the deck aft of the wheelhouse, watching the Jayhawk as it dropped to a hover forty feet above.

The flight technician slid open the side door while his partner readied the basket, and Harrington inched across to the open door and climbed into the basket, felt the sudden blast of wind, the chill air, the basket swaying with every movement, and every movement sending spasms of pain through his chest. Suddenly, the hospital didn’t seem so bad anymore.

The technicians worked the hoist, winching him down, and as the basket descended, Harrington could pick out the crew, Matt and Stacey, and Al and Jason, and Ridley, who caught the basket and helped Harrington to the deck, led him back to where McKenna stood, watching, looking him over.

“Welcome back, Court,” she said. “You look like shit.”