Chapter 3
Tara crouched down beside Brodie as another shower of blows from the primates battered the sturdy door, the metal buckling slightly under the onslaught. But it held. She heard a snuffling noise following the line of the small building, and then a big, almost human paw appeared in one of the two small windows, fingers linking through the heavy mesh and beginning to pull.
In a second Tara had Brodie’s big knife in her hands, and she attacked the paw with determination, driving the blade through the mesh and into the leathery palm. Blood spurted and a scream of pain and fury roared outside as the paw slipped from the window.
“Help me up …”
Tara turned to discover Brodie trying to heave himself upright, teeth set in a jaw-clenching determination to get to his feet.
She was torn between keeping watch at the window and trying to do something about Brodie. The man was barely conscious, yet here he was attempting to stand! Her concern for Brodie won, and she dropped down beside him, catching him by the shoulder and pushing him back down against the wall. He cried out at the pain in his body, but Tara couldn’t be gentle, there was too much at stake. If he moved too much, his wounds would reopen and he would quite likely bleed to death.
“Easy, Frank … what the hell are you trying to do? Kill yourself?” Tara placed her hand on his chest, the man so weak he couldn’t fight the slight pressure she exerted to keep him still.
“Godammit, woman …” His voice was a weak snarl. “You can’t … I have to … let me get up - ”
“Frank, just stay put. I have the knife and the petrol bombs. What can you do? Absolutely nothing except worry me half to death, so stay where you are, please …”
He sank back against the wall exhausted, but Tara was interrupted by another series of hoots and screams, the baboons now increasingly frustrated at their lack of success at gaining entry to the building. Paws once more appeared at the meshed window, this time grabbing hold of the mesh and pulling in a concerted effort to rip it from its moorings deep in the concrete wall.
Tara returned to the window, slashing at the fingers gripping the wire, when suddenly another banging assault started at the other window to her right, and to her horror she realised the mesh in that window was rusted and weak. With a grating rip the mesh was hauled out of the window frame and a huge paw smashed through the wooden slats to clear the way into the generator room.
A roaring bedlam began outside as the baboons sensed triumph, Tara becoming disorientated by the noise and unsure which window she should cover.
“Tara … ” Brodie’s voice could hardly be heard against the din outside. “Tara!!”
She turned to him in bewilderment. He sat upright against the wall, his good hand indicating the hammer lying beside the generator. She ran and lifted it, then helped him ease himself into a more comfortable position where he could swing the tool with more freedom. Then he managed to pry his old ‘Zippo’ lighter from his pocket and pushed it into her hand.
“Here … it’s time …” He nodded at the petrol bombs. “Just make sure … you manage to throw ‘em far enough away from the building … so you don’t incinerate us into the bargain, will ya?”
She nodded, then lifted one of the fuel-filled soda bottles, the neck stuffed with an old oily rag. She just hoped she could throw the thing before it exploded in her face …
A long arm suddenly groped in the window, followed by the glimpse of a long, dog-like face armed with a mouthful of teeth that would have frightened a shark. Tara yelled and buried the knife to the hilt in the muscular forearm, and the animal roared with pain, falling backwards. Shakily she lit one of the bombs and heaved it as far as she could through the window, the bottle shattering as it hit the ground twenty feet away.
A wall of flame boomed upwards, splatters of ignited fuel spraying the gathered baboons, sending half-a-dozen of them screaming in agony away from the generator room, pelts aflame in the afternoon sun. But there were still some hanging around outside, terrified but unwilling to run, and they turned their anger on the hated humans inside the building.
Tara bent to lift another soda-bottle but then she was knocked flying by a heavy, hairy blur that struggled its way in through the window. It was a female, only half the size of the males and a youngster to boot, but she still weighed a good two hundred pounds and had long yellow canines that shone in the gloom of the interior of the generator room.
The baboon headed straight for Brodie. He was male and he was wounded, and therefore a prime target. The human female would be dealt with afterwards. Brodie hefted the hammer, wondering if he had any strength at all to actually swing the thing, when his eyes widened with shock.
“Tara!!! The window!!”
The yell took most of his energy and then he yelped with agony as the baboon barrelled into him, canines flashing, ready for the kill.
Tara turned at the yell, and to her horror saw two more young females
trying to crawl in through the window. She raised the knife
and slashed at the looming bodies, screaming both in terror for Brodie
and
anger at her own uselessness. The knife connected and she stabbed again
and again, her vision filled with blood and fur and teeth, the curiously
expressive amber eyes glaring hatefully at this human female that dared
to defy them.
Then, miraculously, they were gone, sun streaming in through the window where only moments before had been heavy, fur-clad bodies.
Breathing heavily she turned to see Brodie trying to beat off the heavy baboon now towering over him, teeth bared for the final killing blow, the creature screaming in anger as Brodie pooled all of his energies and swung the hammer one last time. The steel head connected dully with bone. The baboon staggered, the hammer sending a spray of blood – Tara couldn’t make out whether it was the animal’s or Brodie’s – against the wall. She took advantage of its momentary agony to catch the baboon around its powerful neck and bring the knife downward in one heavy, determined blow. The blade sliced inwards, deep, deep into the broad hairy chest, the razor edge neatly severing the aorta that carried the beast’s life-blood to its massive heart. She pulled out the blade and stabbed the creature once more, sensing victory, and this time the blade went into the neck, slicing open the carotid artery.
The baboon staggered sideways away from Brodie, the knife wrenching out of Tara’s unresisting hand, and collapsed in a lifeless twitching heap in the corner of the room.
Tara dropped down beside the wounded man, terrified that it was his blood she had seen spray from the creature’s mouth, but she was relieved to discover that although he had once more been bitten severely on the shoulder, the injury wasn’t bleeding too much. Pressing her hand against the twin puncture wounds under his collarbone, she frantically listened for more baboons gathering outside.
But there was nothing but an eerie silence.
They were gone.
In the ensuing quiet she busied herself checking Brodie out, the big ex-soldier barely conscious. Tara was now beginning to panic. It was obvious Brodie was beginning to succumb to shock, his skin clammy and his pulse rapid. She tucked the blanket around him, trying to keep him warm but knowing it was futile. Without help he would die soon.
She swore to herself, the stress finally getting to her, and she loosened a deep, wrenching sob of anger and futility.
“Don’t you die on me, Frank. I’ve just got to know you, and I care about your worthless hide, so don’t you dare think about dying on me - ”
Then she saw him trying to form words, his eyes closed, his throat working as he attempted to speak. She couldn’t make it out and leaned closer. The one word came in a sighing whisper.
“Listen …”
Tara blinked … then listened, her ears straining to pick up any sound out of the ordinary, anything that did not come from the hostile semi-tropical jungle around them.
And then she heard it, a soft, rhythmic whop-whop-whop, far away to the west. But it was getting closer, the noise getting louder and louder in the heat of the afternoon sun.
She grinned.
It was a helicopter and it was coming for them, she knew. Kelsey had kept her promise.
*********************
The soft hum of the machines in the small hospital room was mesmeric, Tara thought.
For the past five hours she had sat next to Brodie, here in the small but well-equipped private hospital at Santa Teresa. The helicopter that brought them here had been plain and unmarked, the men on board silent, well-armed and well-trained. The baboons had gone, but Tara had no doubt that if they had stayed, the heavy M16 rifles these men carried would have made short work of them. Two medics had loaded Tara and Brodie on board, the wounded man was quickly assessed and a cannula inserted in his wrist swiftly delivered plasma and saline to his severely shocked and dehydrated body.
Tara tried to get information from the grim-looking men beside her, but they didn’t answer – and her questions had still not been answered, even as the doctors cleaned up her injuries and gave her a back-up anti-tetanus shot. They were friendly and business-like, and had treated her with respect and courtesy – but they did not reply to her questions.
Brodie lay pale and motionless in the hospital bed, connected to wires and drips, his skin sheened with sweat. His injuries had been cleaned and dressed, but some of the more severe bites couldn’t be stitched due to the raggedness of the tears and the swelling around the damaged tissue. The doctor had gently explained to her that monkey and primate bites carried a severe risk of infection and she was to expect Brodie to have a high fever until the penicillin-based antibiotic now being fed into him via an IV line took effect.
Tara sighed and settled back in the comfortable sofa the staff had supplied without a murmur. Whoever was paying for the treatment here had obviously told the staff to supply Tara and Brodie with whatever they needed.
She cradled a hot cup of coffee in her hands and watched the rise and
fall of his bare chest, partially hidden beneath the white 
dressings
over his wounds. She remembered the play of the muscles in his chest as
he had moved over her in his ecstasy, the muscular arms holding her as
he came to completion. She would never have thought such a powerful frame
could look as fragile as it did now, but he seemed very vulnerable lying
prone under the blankets.
She stretched out her legs, now encased in lightweight brand-new pants that had been handed to her by a smiling but uninformative nurse along with a comfortable tee-shirt, and prepared to settle down and doze.
She pondered on what would happen next. She could go back to nursing, she supposed. Or stay in San Miguel. But why should she do that? She and Brodie were not exactly ‘involved’, and he was a stubborn sonofabitch, that was plain. Now they were away from the island they had nothing in common whatsoever, and their joining in a moment of desperation was just that – a moment of mutual comfort in the face of death. But they had lived. Tara had not taken that option into account, and now she was at a loss as to what to do. Her thoughts began to meander as she drifted into sleep.
“Hey …”
The low whisper startled her into wakefulness. Hazy azure eyes watched her, dulled by pain medication and exhaustion, and Tara smiled with relief.
“Brodie … good to see you awake. You had me worried there for a while.”
Frank Brodie felt just goddamn’ awful. He hurt all over, the pain meds made him feel nauseous, and the light hurt his eyes. He was surrounded by the smell of antiseptic, a smell he loathed, and he was lying wired-up to God only knew what kind of crap, monitoring everything from his heartbeat to how many times he pissed himself, he was sure.
“Too bright …” His voice sounded like a bullfrog’s, it was so dry. He watched Tara move stiffly over to the light switch and dim them to a more comfortable level, then she came to sit beside him on the edge of the bed. Brodie thought she looked like death warmed up, but then, that wasn’t something you told a woman. But he decided to throw caution to the wind.
“You … you look like shit …”
Tara raised an eyebrow in surprise, then grinned when she realised he was probably right.
“Have you taken a look at yourself lately, Brodie? I’ve seen better looking corpses.”
She saw the ghost of a lop-sided grin, his cheek dimpling momentarily at the feeble attempt at humour. He suddenly licked his cracked lips, obviously thirsty, and she leaned forward to give him a sip of the iced water beside his bed. He managed a couple of mouthfuls and would have swallowed more, but Tara stopped him, knowing his stomach would rebel at the intake of too much fluid.
“Easy now, you’ll throw it up if you take too much.” She replaced the cup on his bedside table and sat watching him, unable to get used to the idea that they had made it off the island.
But she had left people behind … Kovacs, their sweet but impatient techno-wizard who had died there on the beach, and the pilot of Kelsey’s plane, oh, and that idiot of a man that had tried to sell the island to Kelsey’s father as a holiday resort. All dead. And then there was Eddie. Eddie Mendoza, Davis’ second-in-command. A good man, a kind man, a man who had saved Tara’s life with his last burst of strength as he lay dying on the tower. The same Eddie Mendoza who had been the only one of them to see the truth in Frank Brodie, saw him to be a tortured, haunted man trying to make things right even though deep down he was scared half to death. Brodie and Eddie had understood one another, and Tara remembered the night they had found Kelsey as the baboons attacked the downed plane.
She had seen Brodie firing at the marauding beasts, then running full pelt towards the plane and Kelsey, Eddie only seconds behind. She heard Brodie roar Eddie’s name and simultaneously throw the old M16-A1 backwards, just knowing instinctively that Eddie would be there to catch it. And he was. That kind of trust was rare, and she had admired the easy silence between the two of them.
She sighed. She felt a touch on her fingers.
Brodie had caught them with his good right hand, squeezing them gently.
“Thinking about Eddie, huh?”
Tara frowned.
“Yeah – how did you know?”
Brodie grinned tiredly, eyes already beginning to close. He had used up his tiny reserves of strength just stringing together a few sentences.
“Guessed.”
Tara watched as his eyes finally stayed closed and his breathing began to even out in sleep. His temperature was beginning to come down, and no doubt in a few days he would be back to his irascible self, eager to get out of bed – no, out of the hospital – and she could let him get on with his recovery. Then she would decide whether she would stay, or leave San Miguel forever.
She slipped off the bed and was on the point of returning to the comfortable sofa to get some sleep, when his hand tightened on hers before she could remove it. Surprised, she saw his haunted eyes watching her, sleep already dragging him down into blessed oblivion.
“Tara …”
She could hardly hear him. She sat back on the bed for a moment as his lips formed another word. She leaned towards him so she could hear it properly.
“Stay …”
His fingers squeezed hers once more as he finally drifted into sleep.
For the next hour she sat with him, his hand holding hers as he slept and she watched him in his slumber, all the while trying to make some sense out of the jumble of feelings that one single word had caused.
********************
The next morning Brodie was considerably brighter. Through the night the doctors had decided to reduce his pain medication, and although the pain was sharper and more pronounced, he was more alert and less nauseous. His temperature had continued to drop and was beginning to approach normal, so they decided to remove the saline drip, which just left the antibiotic dripping slowly into his system. That too would be removed in a day or two if he continued to improve.
He managed to eat a little breakfast and was even slightly cheerful, especially since he actually kept the food in his stomach even though it growled and threatened to evict the few mouthfuls of scrambled egg and orange juice. But, he kept the food down by sheer willpower and decided he was entitled to be quite proud of himself for doing so.
When he had wakened he had discovered he was alone, and he was shaken to discover a surge of panic shoot adrenaline through his system. But the nurses assured him Tara was only in her own room catching up on her sleep – what they didn’t tell him was that she had stubbornly refused until the doctor had informed her Brodie had no living relatives. When she asked why that was important, they explained that they needed to talk to him in the morning, and he might need some support.
The sudden look of concern on her face made the young doctor hasten to assure her that Brodie’s life was in no danger, but there were some medical concerns that he would have to discuss with the big ex-soldier, and having someone he knew with him as they talked might help a little.
Tara knew then that there was a problem, but she resigned herself to a good night’s sleep before she had to tackle Brodie in the morning.
As it turned out, it was a good thing she did.
********************
“What did you say?” Brodie’s voice was a soft growl.
Doctor Joaquin Recillos sighed. He had already been through this with Brodie once. Saying it again didn’t make the facts any easier to explain.
“The nerves are badly damaged, as is the flexor tendon at the back of the thigh – surgery can correct some of the damage in time, and physiotherapy will help considerably, but … there is only so much we can do. Even the very best prognosis means that you will probably spend the rest of your life needing a walking aid.”
Tara sat beside Brodie in one of those hard, uncomfortable chairs hospitals seem to specialise in and watched Brodie’s face change from disbelief to anger in a matter of seconds.
“You’re telling me I’m crippled.”
The doctor shook his head vehemently, denying the implication.
“No, no, not crippled as such. You will be able to get around, drive, carry on working, that sort of thing. It’s just … well, you’ll need a stick to help you get about. It means elevators instead of stairs and no running four minute miles, that’s all.”
Brodie watched the young man try to minimalize the impact, but he felt like the bottom had just dropped out of his world. He lay back on the pillows feeling suddenly very tired. His whole body ached, his wrist was sore from the cannula still inserted in the vein, and his left leg was on fire.
The leg the doctor had told him was now almost useless.
“Get out.” Brodie couldn’t even bear to look at the young medic.
Doctor Joaquin Recillos took the hint and left, knowing that sooner or later, Frank Brodie would have to come to terms with the fact that his life was about to change for ever, and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
Tara sat for long moments watching Brodie try to marshal his thoughts, try to make some sense out of what had happened to him in the past seventy-two hours. He rolled his head on the pillow and looked at her with something akin to fear deep in the blue eyes.
“Is he telling me the truth?”
Tara couldn’t lie to him, not now.
“Yes, Frank – he’s telling you the truth.”
Brodie’s eyes widened as the reality of it hit him, and he suddenly let out a gusty breath of stress, his face beginning to crumple.
“I thought – I thought going back would make it right, that I could
somehow … instead it all went to shit.” He sucked in a ragged sigh. “You
should have gone … you should have left me. You made me live
, dammit!”
Now Tara was confused.
“Frank, it’s not the end of the world! You’ll still be pretty mobile, able to get about …”
Brodie choked back pure misery.
“Before I went back to the island I was nothin’ but a drunk. A bum. Now all I am is a crippled drunk.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “You tell whether that’s an improvement or not. Well is it?”
Tara felt her stomach churn with pain at the tone in his voice, but she knew in her heart of hearts there was nothing she could say. So she sat quietly beside him, not touching, just silently wishing she could reach out and take his pain. But she couldn’t.
Slowly Brodie’s anger settled into cold unhappiness, and he turned his face away from her, not wanting her to see the deadness in his eyes. After a while his breathing deepened as tiredness overwhelmed his pain, and he slipped into a restless sleep.
Tara watched him for a few moments longer, then she stood and leaned over him, kissing the damp curls on his brow … and left.
*******************