Chapter One. #2
We slowly began heading over, not knowing what we’d find. Debris was scattered everywhere, and it was like an assault course as we kept out of range of the inferno. A person staggered in front of me and gazed at me from blackened skin and wide, terrified eyes.
“Yo! I’ve got a survivor!” I yelled.
The others headed my way in stunned amazement.
“Sit down,” Inglorious ordered the man. He reached out and grasped him as the guy stared blankly.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Get Doc!” Inglorious snapped. Hercules rushed away to direct Doc to us. They reappeared moments later.
“Set up here,” I directed, noting it was a fairly clear part of the field.
The others unpacked some of the items from Drew’s vehicle and moved into action.
A tent was erected, and huge searchlights were switched on, chasing away the darkness and providing a beacon for those who had survived.
A second tent popped up, this one for triage. The first would be the control centre.
“Got a body,” Lasher called out from close by.
“Tag it, but don’t move it,” Drew replied.
“Head out, use torches. If you find a body, tag it and move on. If they’re alive, radio back,” Inglorious ordered as Doc took over caring for the survivor.
I headed out, unsure what I would discover. The field was littered with debris. I stumbled over a body and nearly puked at the sight of it. It was a burn victim, and they weren’t breathing.
There was nothing I could do, so I tagged it and carried on. Several more bodies were discovered; they must have fallen as the zeppelin nosedived.
“Survivor!” Moon called over the radio. “A woman.”
“Can you bring her in?”
“Need a stretcher, her legs are in a bad way,” Moon replied.
“Sending Rory, pop a flare,” Oil ordered from the command centre.
I flinched as something exploded, and I spun to see what. It was another piece of the zeppelin. Headlights shone, and I guessed Onyx had arrived. The Riders of Vengeance were the closest MC to us, and it made sense they’d arrive first.
“Found a kid, he’s alive,” Razor called in. “Bringing him in.”
Ten minutes passed as we got deeper into the field. We moved slowly because there was so much debris that a person could be under it and we’d miss them. We discovered more bodies, all with various degrees of burns.
Suddenly, a woman stumbled into my path. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, and her clothes were torn. Her skin was as white as a ghost, and she had a bruise on her face.
“Ma’am, are you hurt?” I demanded as she gripped my arms as if I were a lifeline.
“It blew up,” she gasped.
“Yeah. Are you injured?”
“I don’t think so; I might be in shock,” she replied as she tried to focus on me. I glanced behind her. If she had come from the broken gondola, she wandered across half the field when I’d found her.
“What’s your name?” I asked, trying to prolong her talking. “I’m going to inspect you quickly for wounds.”
“Amy Wright. I was on the zeppelin having a late dinner with a friend, but I can’t find her.”
“We’ll keep looking,” I replied.
“She’s called Natasha. She’s blonde with green eyes, and about five feet six.”
A quick check of Amy showed no obvious injuries, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have internal ones.
“Amy, we’ve got a triage tent over there. Can I walk you to it?”
“What about Natasha?” Amy demanded, peering around her. I didn’t think she was really taking anything in.
“Let me shout someone to keep searching,” I said. Amy nodded but didn’t move, and I realised she was waiting for me to radio in.
“This is Vortex. I’ve a survivor. She’s alert and coherent, and she’s lost her friend. Can any person come to my flare? Popping it now,” I reported. I sent the coloured smoke into the air.
Onyx radioed a reply. “Think I’m closest to you. On my way.”
Onyx appeared moments later, looming out of the smoke and making Amy flinch back. Onyx immediately tried to shrink his bulk down and appear non-threatening.
“Shall I take her or you?” Onyx asked.
“Please let me go with him!” Amy cried, latching onto my arm.
“No probs,” Onyx replied.
“Natasha is here somewhere. We were eating when the floor fell out. There were explosions, she might be hurt,” Amy babbled and gave Onyx Natasha’s description.
“Honey, I’ll look for her,” Onyx promised, and I began leading Amy away.
The poor woman kept looking around her in shock and horror. When something exploded close by, she dropped to the ground and covered her head. It took me minutes to get her moving again.
The emotions Amy felt were easy to understand.
The chilly night turned amber and yellow as the hot flames from the zeppelin climbed into the sky.
There was an orange glow lighting the field, and it was so bright we didn’t really need the lights we’d brought.
The air stank of burning rubber, flesh, oil, and cotton.
The wreckage cast spooky shadows that even had me jumping in fear.
It was a nightmarish situation, and I tried to remember where the bodies were so I could avoid them for Amy’s sake.
But we still stumbled across two, and each time Amy gazed upon them in horror.
When she realised they weren’t her friends, guilty relief crossed her face.
The wind blew embers from the fire, creating dozens of smaller ones that needed putting out.
Men were carrying extinguishers and tackling them, and I guessed they were other MCs.
Slowly, Amy and I made our way to the triage tent, my arm wrapped firmly around her waist to protect her. I was unaware of how much time had passed, but I saw Axel from Rage MC in the operation tent, standing with Jailbait from the Devil’s Damned Disciples MC.
The command centre had expanded. Multiple fire engines were here or screaming towards us.
Four ambulances had arrived, and more would arrive soon.
The triage tent was also larger, as another tent had been added.
I was shocked to see Tiger, President of Satan’s Warriors, in there with an EMT wrapping his arm.
“Hey, I’ve got a survivor,” I stated as I entered.
“Over here,” a paramedic called, and I walked Amy to a gurney. The paramedic had her climb up, and I tried to move aside.
Amy grabbed my hand. “Don’t leave me, please don’t go,” she begged.
Shit, I didn’t want to refuse Amy, but I was needed out there.
“The allied MCs are on scene. Local search and rescue teams are also piling in. They don’t need you, Vortex,” Tiger stated from two spaces away.
“Please,” Amy whispered as silent tears began making tracks down her dirty face.
“I’ll stay, honey, don’t worry,” I murmured.
“You did your duty. Vortex, you brought her out safe,” Tiger said and frowned.
“What happened to you?”
“Exploding fuckin’ metal got me,” Tiger complained.
“Who’s in charge?”
“Doc Paul for triage and Drew in the command tent,” Tiger replied. “Other law enforcement officers are arriving, but Drew is Merritt’s sheriff and in control. He’s handling it well.”
We looked up as two men approached. It was King from my MC; Drake was helping him along.
“What happened?” I demanded as Drake dumped King on his ass on a stretcher between Tiger and Amy.
“King fell into a pothole and twisted his ankle,” Drake stated.
“I did find another survivor,” King argued, and Drake agreed.
“That he did,” Drake nodded to where his own VP carried in a woman.
“That’s three women, one kid and two men,” Tiger said.
“All alive?” I asked.
“Yup. A lot of dead out there,” Drake lowered his voice, seeing Amy look over.
“Titanic of the Skies,” Amy suddenly spoke. “They named it well.”
I nodded, unsure how to respond.
“Natasha and I shouldn’t have been on it. A friend won tickets and decided she had no desire to go. Said she had a bad feeling about it. Shit, Kristal wasn’t wrong. Who’d have thought it would explode?”
“Nobody, honey,” I replied, uncertain what to say.
Amy’s gaze focused on the blaze that engines were trying to tackle. “How many died inside that thing? How many didn’t even have a chance once the explosion happened?”
Behind us, an ambulance wailed and pulled away. No doubt on board was a critical survivor. Amy’s eyes became unfocused, and I guessed she was shutting down.
“What do you do, Amy?” I asked, and the paramedic nodded in approval as he continued taking her blood pressure.
“I worked in a kindergarten and also arranged child-friendly events. I was an assistant teacher and earned my teaching degree a year ago. Guess what’s ironic?
I’m looking for a job local to Rapid City.
Funny how I crash-landed here. Almost as if I’m meant to be here,” Amy bit out and laughed.
There was a tinge of mild hysteria in it.
“Don’t flake out on me now, brave girl,” I ordered.
Amy glanced at me in surprise and nodded. She gritted her teeth together and clung to me.
“Fuckin’ strong woman,” Tiger added in approval.
Amy acknowledged, but her grip tightened on my hand. I let her; it was the least I could do.