William Meikle - The Hole

“Doc, we really need you out here,” Charlie shouted.

“We need some light,” Doc’s voice came from the dark in the back of the truck.

Charlie shone the beam back towards the truck to show Doc the way and the truck rocked and creaked as the three people in the rear started to pull themselves out.

Fred’s eyes were starting to adjust to the darkness. The truck was little more than a black shadow, but it still had some power—the dashboard lights were on, shining bright in the gloom. While Doc got down out of the truck, Fred went to check on the two men up front.

The driver hadn’t made it. He lay, slumped in his belt, neck obviously broken, his head hanging limply at too sharp an angle. If that hadn’t killed him, the steering wheel embedded in his chest would have finished the job.

The man in the passenger seat was still alive, breathing heavily, but out cold. His face looked red in the dashboard lights.

Like one of Big Bill’s demons.

He fought down an urge to flee, and opened the passenger door, having to tear it forcibly away from its hinges before he could reach the injured man. The guard moaned in response to the tearing of metal, but he didn’t wake up. When Fred tried to get the guard out of the seat, he quickly found that the man was pinned in position by a mass of crushed metal and plastic below his waist. Fred smelled gasoline, oil—and blood.

“If you’ve got time, Doc,” he said. “We’ve got a man in bad shape here too.”

Fred lifted the automatic rifle from where it lay on the man’s belly. He made sure he did it slowly and carefully.

It wouldn’t do to shoot the guy I’m trying to save.

He put the gun on the ground, just as Doc spoke.

“Mullins needs me,” she said. “How’s your guy doing?”

“Trapped by the legs and losing blood, but I don’t know how much.”

“I’ll give you a hand,” the sheriff said, climbing down out of the truck.

But even between the two of them they couldn’t shift the mangled mass that was tangled around the trapped man’s legs. The sheriff put his whole strength into it, and only managed to shift the wreckage an inch. Fred leaned across the wounded man, feeling hot breath on the back of his neck, as warm as a hair dryer.

“It’s no use, Sheriff,” he said. “He’s held tight. We ain’t getting him out of here anytime soon.”

As Fred bent over him again to try a different angle of approach, the man’s radio crackled, so loud that Fred jumped and banged his head on the roof.

“Find that radio,” the sheriff said. “It might be our way out of here.”

It took a few seconds to locate the small radio that was tucked deep inside the man’s flak vest. As Fred got it out, it crackled again.

“Winton. This is home base. Come in.”

Fred held the radio up, then realized he had no idea which button to press to reply. He handed it to the sheriff. The big man pressed a button and spoke.

“Sheriff Wozniak here. We need help, and we need it now.”

To the credit of the man on the other end, he wasted no time asking futile questions.

“How many are you?”

“Six civilians, and three of your folks, one dead, two wounded and not ready to be moved. We’re at the bottom of a hole in the Western Road, and I’ve no idea how deep we are.”

“Sit tight. We’re on our way.”

The trapped man woke up a couple of minutes later and immediately moaned in pain.

“What happened?”

As if it came naturally to him, Charlie took charge of the situation. He handed the wounded man the bottle of JD.

“We crashed,” he said, dryly. “And you’re stuck until help gets here. I ain’t got nothing for the pain but old Jack here, so I suggest you get it down you while you can.”

“There’s a field kit under my seat,” the man said. “But I’ll take my medicine any way I can get it.”

While Charlie tried to get under the seat, the man drank from the mouth of the JD bottle, and the level of liquor inside had dropped markedly when he passed it to Fred.

“Don’t give me any more unless you have to,” the soldier said. His eyes were dark pits in a pale face, lit red by the dashboard lights. The sheriff passed the man the radio.

“They’re on their way,” he said. “Just hang tight.”

Doc looked up from where she knelt by Mullins.

“They’ll have to be quick,” she said softly.

Fred looked down. Mullins was unconscious, her face a bloody mask.

“Her left lung’s punctured, I think,” Doc said, rising “And there may be other internal bleeding.”

Charlie drew a squat case out from under the passenger seat.

“Anything here that will help?”

The case contained a field medical kit. Doc opened it and checked the contents.

“Not much that’ll help the internal bleeding. The best I can do is to make sure she’s not in pain. There’s enough morphine here to keep an elephant quiet.”

“Morphine is always good,” the wounded soldier in the passenger seat said. “I wouldn’t mind some myself.”

“Move aside,” Doc said to Fred and the sheriff. “Let’s see if there’s at least someone here I can help.”

Sarah was still on her knees by Mullins, head down and not speaking. Fred stepped away to stand beside the sheriff and Ellen Simmons, who, for once, seemed struck speechless by the situation. The only sound came from the intermittent tumble of fresh dirt down the walls of the hole.

Fred saw that the sheriff had the army man’s rifle in his hands.

“It’s more light we need,” Fred said. “Not bullets.”

The sheriff smiled, and flicked a switch on the gun. A powerful beam shone out from a top-mounted flashlight, just for a second or so before he switched it off.

“Best to save it until we really need it,” the big man said.

The trapped man spoke.

“There’s spare clips in my vest. Probably best if you have them too.”

Doc helped the man shuck off the flak vest. Big Bill managed to put it on, a tight fit over his large frame.

“Anything else in the truck we can use?” the sheriff asked.

The trapped man tried to speak, coughed, and bubbled blood down his front. He wiped it away, and finally spoke.

“Nope. Sorry. All the good stuff is back at base camp. But don’t worry. They’ll get us out soon enough.”

Doc turned away from the soldier. She looked worried.

“Did they say how long they’d be?”

The sheriff shook his head. Doc leaned over and whispered in the sheriff’s ear. Fred didn’t need to be a lip-reader to catch her gist.

He’s not going to make it.

Ellen Simmons chose that moment to do something stupid again.

“Well, I’m not waiting here. We were nearly at the town limits. It can’t be far.”

She walked off into the gloom. Charlie shone the flashlight after her, lighting her up and throwing a huge shadow up the hill. The woman scrambled up the slope of stone and earth left by the collapse, each step bringing fresh falls of rock and rubble.

“Ellen,” the sheriff shouted. “Get your ass back here. You’re going to bring it all down around us.”

The woman showed no signs of hearing him. Her scrambling got more frantic as it became obvious she was achieving little more than climbing in the same spot as more pebbles and dirt tumbled around her.

“I’ll get her,” Charlie said, when the sheriff moved to head in that direction. The older man walked over and started to clamber after the woman, the flashlight waving wildly as he climbed. Fred heard Charlie shout.

“You really are a stupid bitch, Ellen.”

The only other sound was the rapidly growing tumble and rush of dirt as the pair scrambled up the slope.