Chapter Eighteen
Creed
A long moment went by, then Mandy was back in his ear, “Creed, I’ve added Tamara Bailing to our Parker team. Be advised, I have communicated the situation to Striker. He has sent two teammates to your location with a stretcher. I’m handing you over to Tamara.”
“Creed? Tamara here, I’m on the engineering staff.
That’s a vintage trap from around the nineteen hundreds.
They are generally more dangerous than modern traps because they lack contemporary safety features.
Mainly, the problem was that they are indiscriminate, catching anything that walks over top.
And looking at the images, it’s hard to see the damage to the victim’s ankle. Is the trap attached to something?”
Camera in hand, Creed followed the chain to a stake that had been driven into the soil, and a tree had formed around it. “I have cutters that will probably go through this.”
“That’s the question. Hey, Doc,” Tamara called, “I need you here for decision-making.”
“What are we looking at here?”
Came a fourth voice.
“Creed, Cerberus team Charlie. I was on a search and rescue for a middle-aged male. He stepped into the trap that you see on your screen. He’s wearing hard-soled shoes and dress pants.
There is blood being absorbed by the pants.
The question is how do I move forward, being of the most help and causing the least amount of trauma. ”
“Tamara,” the doctor asked, “what can be done about getting the man out of the trap? What are the risks?”
“Looking at it, obviously, it's rusted. Medically, that can be handled when Parker gets to a hospital. Structurally, though, it makes opening the trap risky. My concern is that those old steel parts may be brittle, and an attempt to open the jaws may cause them to snap back, creating more damage.”
“What kind of force are we talking about here?” Doc asked.
“One that size was made to hold a large animal,” Tamara said. “Given the location, I’m assuming it was set out for a bear or a wild boar. The closing mechanism can crush bones, dislocate joints, lacerate muscles and tendons, and break the skin. Creed sees blood.”
“Can you tip the phone up, please, Creed, and let me see the man’s face?” Doc asked.
Creed thought the guy looked like he’d left his body.
That happened sometimes on the battlefield.
When their teammate Deep dove out of the way of the grenade and he was burned over much of his body, he had the same look on his face.
It wasn’t shock; shock had its own white-faced, slack look.
This was like the man’s body was vacant.
Like his soul slipped away from its earthly vessel and was sitting off on a tree stump somewhere, watching.
Rou had settled with her chin draped over the man’s shoulder, and Creed thought that if this was shock, his doggo’s body heat would help.
“Given your present situation, you and your team will have to carry this guy out. Any instability of the trap can further damage the leg. I think if Creed can get it off, it’s best that it come off.
Creed, you’ll want to have your first aid kit out.
Any bleeding needs to be packed. The foot and leg need to be immobilized.
Emergency management is bringing in lighting systems because they plan to be at this all night, so you won’t get much help up on the road.
Don’t wait for the ambulance crew. If you can get him into a civilian car on the other side of the pile-up, he needs to be treated quickly.
We need to get hands-on to preserve his future mobility.
Tell his transport to take him to a hospital in D.C.
Give Mandy a rundown of what you’re finding, so they can get staff prepped for his arrival. Does he have support there?”
“His grandmother is among the wounded.”
“Doc!” The call was urgent from the other side of the room.
Creed now had Mandy and Tamara as his support.
“Here’s what you’re going to do, Creed,” Tamara said. “Go ahead and get your first aid station set up. Then get your leather gloves out. I’ll hold.”
“Tamara, if it’s helpful,” Mandy said. “My search indicates that’s probably a vintage Bradly-McGuire long-spring bear trap.”
“Let me read that,” Tamara replied.
Creed worked on pulling his equipment from his bag and setting it up for a one-handed grab. “I’m prepped.”
“This is going to take significant force,” Tamara said.
“You’ll want to make sure that your body mechanics are on point.
Make sure that there’s nothing that’s going to stab into your knee, nothing that is going to come loose and make you slip, or the ground give way.
You’ll want to position yourself straight on so that either arm of the long spring is lined up with your hands.
Imagine that you’re going to perform chest compressions.
Straight arms, using your body weight as well as your strength.
Do you think the victim will be able to pull his foot free once it’s open? ”
“No,” Creed still thought Parker’s soul was floating out in the tree branches overhead, watching all this.
“And no one’s there who can assist? The grandmother?” Tamara asked.
“The team will be here soon. Parker’s losing quite a bit of blood between his head wound and the leg.”
“Give me a second, let me think this through,” Creed said. “I need to rig something.”
Creed and Parker were the only humans around, but he had Rou. In his mind, Creed went through the various skills that Rou had been developing with Cerberus, trying to figure out which ones could be combined to work in this circumstance.
He finally had a plan in place. He pulled a roll of tarred bankline from his daypack. He unwound a length and then tossed the line up and over a tree limb above where a branch was located, so the cordage wouldn’t slip.
Creed took one end of the loose line and slipped it under the crook of the man’s knee and tied it below the patella in the front. Walking over to the roll, Creed pulled more length free, then cut it and tied it to Rou’s water bowl, setting it down a few inches away.
In his mind’s eye, this was going to work fine.
Would he have liked to have tested the theory?
Damned straight.
Would he leave this man in agony for a second longer than absolutely necessary?
Hell to the no.
He was winging it. “St. Jude of desperate situations, I call on you again,” he mouthed as he reflexively made the sign of the cross. “Alright, Tamara, I’m set up.” He said into his phone that lay in the dirt, giving his helpers a view of the gray sky.”
“Creed, you’re going to use the heel of your hand and slowly exert pressure until you’ve compressed the bands of steel and they come together. That should open the teeth.”
Creed talked to Parker the whole time. He told him what was happening, and though he hated doing it, Creed called Rou to him. Rou did as she was instructed, though it was with obvious reluctance.
“Rou, get your bowl.”
Once again, aware that the strange red shoes still wrapped her feet, Rou side-kicked and danced, making her way to the bowl.
Creed shot a glance at Parker to see if her antics caught his attention. But he was still gone.
Rou picked up her bowl and turned to Creed for her next assignment. “Rou, hold.”
With a final adjustment of his knees, Creed took a deep breath and pressed down, doing as he’d been instructed, keeping his arms straight and using his weight. And the damned thing didn’t budge.
Not even a little bit.
Slowly, Creed released his breath and lifted his weight from the sides, easing back onto his heels. “Fail,” he called out.
“Nothing?” Tamara asked.
“Affirmative. It didn’t budge.”
“Do you have any oil, a lubricant?” Tamara asked.
“Affirmative. I have a penetrating oil.”
“Try that. Just keep it away from any lacerations.”
Creed had reached for his bag and pulled out the small bottle, dribbling the formula around all the places that he wanted to move.
He checked in on Parker, and he was still out of his body. He hadn’t even moved or shifted when Rou got down from her place in his lap.
Creed spun to look over his shoulder, and little Rou sat like a soldier with her bowl in her mouth.
“Going in again,” Creed said as he once again adjusted, inching up a bit and curling his toes under so he could hike his hips into the air as if he were getting ready to dive off the high board.
Creed placed his palms down, and this time, as he pressed, he thrust into his toes, driving them into the ground with the strength of his thigh muscles, shoving everything he had into compressing the level.
It gave, and wobbled.
He’d hoped that once it was open, there would be a catch that held it in place. He hadn’t seen a mechanism to do that; it just made sense to him that it would be part of the design.
Creed pressed harder into his toes as he growled and flexed his muscles into action, and the teeth spread out to release Parker’s pants.
“Rou!” Creed panted his command. “Back up. Pull. Back up. Pull.”
He couldn’t see what she was doing, but the string overhead grew taut.
“Good girl, Rou. Pull hard. Pull. Back up.”
And little Rou dragged and tugged until the string pulled Parker’s leg up. Yes, there was an angle to it. No, it wasn’t by any stretch of the imagination perfect. But Creed was able to shimmy and adjust the trap so that Parker’s foot could come free.
Then, leaning his weight onto his left hand, Creed shifted his right hand under the man’s slick-soled shoes to make sure it was clear of the trap as it snapped back in place.
“Good girl, Rourou. Release.”
Once again, there was slack in the line.
Creed kicked the closed trap out of the way and eased Parker to the ground, laying him flat on his back.
“Rou, come cuddle.” Creed snapped his fingers and pointed at the man. The day was chilly, made even colder by the gusts of wind. And Rou’s warmth would help until Creed could get the man’s leg stabilized.
Rou didn’t have to be told twice, though the way she hopped and danced her way forward made her look like a court jester or the town drunk.
“Parker is clear from the trap.”
From the phone line, Creed heard the high fives and sighs of relief from Mandy and Tamara.
With his rescue shears, Creed cut Parker’s dress pants from the cuff to the knee. He carefully unlaced his shoe, pulled it free, and then cut into the sock.
Creed had already decided that he would treat this as a worst-case scenario.
He was walking a tight rope here. With Parker being uncommunicative, Creed didn’t know if he should call the man’s attention back to the situation or let him cope as best he could in his own mind.
Creed simply didn’t have enough information.
He decided to narrate to the wind, to tell the tree what he was doing and what it might feel like.
“There is a bleeding cut. I’m going to put gauze over the cut and apply pressure to stop the flow of blood.
This is the gauze. Here is more gauze. And the last piece of gauze.
Now I’m applying pressure all the way around the leg with my big hands. This pressure is to stop the blood.
Each and every step, he told the trees.
He kept his voice gentle but firm, conveying that he was there to be kind but dependable.
Was he doing the right thing?
He had no idea.
But the drips that the wind shook loose on the way in gave way to a sky that was opening back up.
Getting Parker stabilized and back to shelter took on a dangerous urgency.
And to Creed’s deep relief, Jack and Deep moved into view, carrying a stretcher between them.
Deep called out. “The evacuation team is on the scene.”