Dominic Conlon - Silent Warpath

Before Lomax knew what was happening he was down on the floor, struggling with the biggest dog he had ever seen. The collar of the protective suit he was wearing was strong and the dog failed to get its teeth around his throat properly. Even so, Lomax felt his breath being squeezed out of him. He put both of his hands around the neck of the dog and started to strangle it. It made no difference — the dog wouldn’t let go. Next, Lomax used stiff fingers to jab and poke its eyes out. The dog simply closed both eyelids, moved to the side to avoid further attacks and started to yank on his throat. Lomax felt the approaching blackness of unconsciousness.

He heard a thud before starting to drift away. Then someone was shaking his shoulder roughly. Lomax opened his eyes and recognised Sean.

‘Come on’ Sean said in a whisper.

'The dog?’ croaked Lomax.

‘Taken care of.’ Sean helped Lomax to his feet as the first of the police cars swept into the drive. They hobbled to the fence under the protection of the trees, Sean holding Lomax with one arm under his shoulder.

Sean went over the fence first with difficulty. When he stretched over the top to help Lomax clamber up, the pain in his side flared.

Sean almost threw Lomax into the passenger seat, then collected up the stool Lomax had used to get over the fence. He drove slowly to the telegraph pole. He got out and yanked the thin rope attached to the listening equipment, packing it all away into the rucksack.

Quietly and carefully, Sean pulled onto the road and drove away.

Natasha heard a loud knocking at the door. She rose quickly and looked through the spy hole. She saw Sean supporting Lomax and she opened the door quickly.

Sean lowered Lomax onto the settee. There was blood all down the front of his overalls. She noticed that Sean was also hurt, but was not immediately able to see where his wounds were.

‘Bandages, I need bandages and water’ said Sean tersely.

‘Right away’. Natasha leapt to the kitchen and put the kettle on. She brought out some unopened bottles of water from the fridge and found some kitchen towels. She thrust them into Sean’s hands. ‘I’ll get you some cloths — take the kitchen towels and do what you can with them for now.’

While Sean was busy she went back to the wardrobe where she had seen some spare bed sheets. Using a kitchen knife she started ripping it up into strips. She poured out some hot water into a bowl and took the water and bandages to Sean. Lomax was laid out on the settee looking very pale.

Sean grabbed the cloths and began to wrap them around Lomax’s neck wound. The blood soaked through immediately. Sean wound another and then another. Natasha helped to raise Lomax up onto pillows and the blood flow reduced. She brought some more pillows in and together they arranged them under Lomax’s head and feet. Sean took out his mobile and called for the doctor.

Natasha noticed that Sean wasn’t too steady on his feet either and she made him sit down on a chair. She saw the blood stains on his pullover and slowly eased it off. His tea shirt was badly stained and she helped take it off too. She used a wet cloth to remove the worst of the blood which revealed a wound in his side. It wasn’t very deep but Natasha worried how the doctor would treat it. The channel was too wide to stitch the sides together.

As she pressed a clean dry pad over it, she heard a knock. She looked up to Sean. He removed a gun and nodded. Looking through the spy hole, she saw a man carrying a doctor’s bag and felt relieved. He hurried in, not stopping to say a word.

Within a short space of time the doctor had examined Lomax and given him a pain killing injection. He cleaned the neck wound with sterilised wipes and applied a lint pad and bandage from his own supply. He looked at Sean’s wound next and shook some white powder onto it. He then applied lint gauze which was held in place by a bandage stretching around his midriff and over his shoulder to keep it from slipping.

As he worked the doctor muttered to himself all the time. For once Sean didn’t appear to mind his grumblings. After issuing stern warnings to Sean not to get into trouble again, the doctor left.

Natasha’s mobile sounded and she found it in her bag. ‘Mike? Oh, that’s fantastic!’

Natasha noticed Sean listening intently.

‘I’m sorry to hear that. But at least he’s OK now. Where did you say?’ Natasha paused. ‘Let me write that down.’ She fished in her bag for a pen and paper, sat at the table and began to write. ‘South Miami hospital in Miami.’

Natasha wrote out the address. ‘Oh God, how is he?’ she asked. She listened a while and then looked up encouragingly at Sean. Covering the mouthpiece, she spoke quietly. ‘Mike’s telling me about one of the survivors from the sea trials. His name is Louis and he’s the chief software architect for the project. The rescue ship flew him to Miami hospital for specialist treatment.’

She listened again for a minute and ended the call. Collecting her thoughts, she turned to Sean.

‘Right, the call was about Louis Deverell. He was on the original sea trials and was rescued about 24 hours after their ship sunk. He suffered badly from exposure and went into a coma shortly after reaching the hospital. But he’s doing well now. He designed most of the communications systems on board the Cetus.’

‘Who is Mike?’

‘One of the techies I worked with. He and Louis were close friends. When Louis was admitted to hospital they couldn’t find any identification on him, except for his phone. It wasn’t working properly, but they were able to see his contacts once it had dried out.’

Sean looked thoughtful. ‘We need him. Can he be discharged?’

‘They didn’t say, but we could find out.’

‘Right. Talk to your NSA contact and have him flown up straight away — if necessary by ambulance helicopter.’ Sean looked at his watch. ‘We’ve three hours left until the deadline. Oh, and by the way, ask the NSA to hustle DD out of police custody. We might need him too.’

‘Can I introduce you to Gene Santer — my contact with the NSA?’

‘Pleased to meet you Gene.’ Sean shook hands. The man was short with dark hair and wore a razor thin moustache. ‘May I ask why we’re here?’ Sean indicated the huge white hanger they were standing in.

‘Otis air base? We needed a place to meet. And a jumping off point for the Barents sea.’

Sean looked around. ‘Will we be meeting Mr Deverell?’

‘Yes, he landed ten minutes ago.’

‘And my colleague DD?’

‘Come with me.’ The man certainly didn’t want to lose any time, thought Sean. Though with barely an hour to go to the deadline he felt it was all too little and far too late.

A little way ahead, Sean saw Natasha run towards DD. She folded her arms around him like a long lost relative, kissing him several times on the cheek.

Lucky kid, thought Sean as he went to meet him.

Shambling towards the group was a bear-like figure, assisted by a man in a blue overall. Santer turned. ‘May I introduce Louis Deverell.’ He named everyone in the group: Natasha, Lomax, DD, Sean. Amongst the general reunion, Sean found himself in front of Natasha.

Sean reached for her hand and held it briefly in his. A movement caught his eye and he saw Louis lumbering over. He couldn’t help but notice what he was wearing on his wrist. ‘Nice timepiece.’

‘You could say’ said Louis. ‘It’s still going after being immersed in Atlantic sea water for God knows how long.’ He turned to Natasha and gave her a big hug, before turning to the rest of the group. ‘Which is more than you can say for me’ he growled.