The Chimera Secret

33

The dawn broke cold and damp and was enveloped in an eternity of silence, as though the thick veils of mist draped across the hills had trapped all sound somewhere above. Ethan rolled out of the warmth of his sleeping bag and let the cold air caress his skin. He rubbed his face with one hand and then clambered out of his tent.

The chill air was sharp in his nose, tainted by the smell of wood smoke as Duran Wilkes tended to the flames of a meager fire in the center of the camp. Mary was gathering firewood nearby on the edge of the treeline, Klein watching her protectively with his rifle in his grasp.

‘Any word?’

Duran looked up at Ethan and shook his head. Ethan made his way across the camp to where a tent slightly larger than the rest had been erected close to the fire, its entrance facing the warmth of the flames. Inside, he could see Kurt Agry tending to the injured soldier, who lay comatose and silent. Ethan crouched down at the tent entrance.

‘How’s Simmons doing?’

Kurt glanced briefly at Ethan as he checked a saline drip jury-rigged to the roof spar of the tent. He shook his head.

‘Not good,’ he admitted. ‘Hard to do a proper analysis in the field, but I’m thinking multiple skull fractures, probable hemorrhaging and it’s quite likely his neck’s broken.’

Ethan felt his guts plunge inside him as he looked at the stricken, unconscious man and knew that without a hospital and professional care he was doomed.

‘We’ve got to get him off the mountain,’ he replied. ‘There’s nothing we can do while he’s here and I’m not willing to risk his life for this expedition. One of us could head back down and call in a helicopter.’

Kurt Agry turned to face Ethan.

‘We came here to get a job done and we’re not leaving until we’re finished.’

Kurt made his way past Ethan and out of the tent.

‘We can’t carry on with this guy on a stretcher,’ Ethan protested. ‘One false move and you’re talking about the difference between him walking again or spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair.’

‘Simmons knew the risks.’

Ethan stared at Kurt Agry in disbelief and was joined by a sudden chorus of voices. Dana Ford and Proctor were alongside him in moments, along with Lopez.

‘He’s dying,’ Dana said. ‘He’s our priority now.’

‘Abandon the search for somebody who’s already dead,’ Lopez agreed. ‘This is about keeping your man alive.’

Kurt whirled to face them all.

‘Yes it is, and that man is my responsibility, not yours! I’ll decide how and when we get him back to civilization.’

‘The longer you wait, the greater the chance it is that we’ll have two dead bodies coming back with us,’ Lopez pointed out.

Kurt Agry barged past her as he replied. ‘Maybe. Maybe not.’

‘The hell’s that supposed to mean?’

Duran Wilkes stood up from the fire when Kurt did not reply, and spoke quietly.

‘We can’t move him safely at all, whether up or down the mountain. The risk is too great to his injuries, especially his neck. Only way that boy’s going off this mountain is by helicopter and that’s no option at all right now.’

Ethan realized the truth of Duran’s words and turned to look at the camp around them. The military radio carried by the soldiers was smashed beyond repair, as though somebody had taken a sledgehammer to it. Many of the cellphones, the satellite phone and other radios and emergency beacons had been burned and melted in the fire that had taken down the supply tent the night before.

The bergens were carefully cached beneath the watchful eye of Corporal Jenkins.

Ethan looked at Kurt Agry. ‘What’s your real mission here, Kurt?’

‘This is a milk-run,’ Kurt shot back. ‘It’s not a real mission at all. Riggins is only twenty miles away. We could march out of here in six fucking hours if we wanted to.’

‘Not now you can’t,’ Ethan said, ‘and in my experience there’s no such thing as a milk-run.’

‘Your experience?’ Kurt uttered in disgust. ‘And what would that be?’

‘Lieutenant, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, 1st Battalion, 4th Marines,’ Ethan shot back. ‘Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.’

The other soldiers looked up at Ethan with renewed interest in their eyes, but they said nothing as Kurt screwed his face up at Ethan.

‘Congratulations, you got your colors and I’ve got mine. Right now it’s not worth rat shit.’ He gestured to the tent. ‘Best option is to leave him here and pick him up on our way out once the job’s done.’

Duran Wilkes took a pace toward Kurt and pointed at him.

‘That’s as good as a death sentence, son, and you know it. If he’s hemorrhaging then he may only have a few hours left to live.’

Kurt nodded, his features hardened by years of learning to bury emotion.

‘That’s right, so we’d better get movin’, hadn’t we?’

‘Lieutenant Watson wouldn’t have left him here,’ Lopez pointed out.

‘Lieutenant Watson is dead,’ Agry snarled. ‘I’m in command now and this is the way it’s going to be. Any of you don’t like it, you’re free to leave.’

Duran Wilkes watched as Kurt turned his back on them and walked toward his tent. The old man shook his head as he called after the sergeant.

‘Am I the only one here who thinks that leaving this poor man to die is the wrong thing to do?’

‘No,’ Lopez cut in. ‘You’re not.’

‘Me either,’ Ethan said, facing Kurt. ‘You ever hear of the saying “No man left behind”, Kurt? Or would that be something that gets in the way of the mission?’

‘The mission objective is my priority,’ Kurt replied as he hauled his bergen onto his back. ‘Everything else is secondary.’

‘You ever get left behind, Kurt?’ Ethan pressed, already sure of the answer.

‘You wanna stay here and baby-sit his ass, you go ahead!’ Kurt snapped, pointing directly at Ethan. ‘But we’ve got a job to do and I’m not going to let you and a bunch of crackpot scientists stand in our way.’

‘That’s funny,’ Lopez murmured, ‘I could have sworn you were sent out here to escort us.’

Ethan saw Kurt hesitate and glance across at the other soldiers. They were watching their sergeant with interest, as though they had never seen him challenged in this way before. Fact was, he probably never had been. Military troops most often dealt with their tasks using the black and white logic of mission goals. They did not often have to deal with the annoying gray area of civilian morality and compassion.

Kurt stared out at the trees for a long moment and then back at the lonely tent stranded in the middle of a cold, desolate forest. Ethan saw the man, not the military machine, make the decision.

‘Prepare him for movement,’ he snapped finally at the soldiers. ‘We’ll get him below the six-thousand-foot line and secure him there on one of the ranger trails.’

Duran Wilkes nodded at Kurt as the soldiers dashed into action. ‘Relief to see you’re still a human being.’

Kurt didn’t respond. Ethan was about to say something when Mary’s voice screamed out across the camp.

‘Grandpa!’