Murmansk-13

Tor was in the Medical Bay again, although he couldn’t recall the journey. It had been three in the morning. How long ago was that? He could feel the cold trying to steal in through the folds in his bathrobe. He swaddled his hands inside the voluminous sleeves of the robe and pinched the ends closed, cuddling himself in the process.

He was inside the ward. Pregnant beads of sweat dotted Mihailov’s wide forehead. The Bulgarians eyelids fluttered, occasionally parting to reveal bloodshot whites. The corners of his lips twitched spastically. His upper lips were cracked and parched, yet moisture gathered in his philtrum.

Mihailov was fighting and losing. Necroticism slowly claiming the flesh around the wound. The skin had become a blackish green; wizened. The tracks of coagulated blood spread beyond the elbow. Isolate spots of decay bloomed on his exposed chest, mottling him as mould mottled old bread.

The mahogany grip of the bone saw felt smooth and cool in Tor’s hand. Unsure how it had found its way there, Tor turned the tool over and felt its weight, surgical steel scattered flashes of rationed light into the darkened recesses of the ward. Tor flicked the switch for the operating lamp, but the lamp stayed dead.

That was okay, Tor could see where the infection ended. Knew what had to be done.

Tor licked his lips and hunched over Mihailov, lowering the handrail so he could gain easier access.

In his mind’s eye, Tor negotiated the positioning of the blade like an indecisive student in shop class. Beside him, Mihailov whispered in Bulgarian tongues his lips inches from Tor’s ear.

Finally, Tor decided on a transhumeral amputation, cutting six inches above the elbow. While he couldn’t guarantee an easier operation would stop the infection, he could almost totally guarantee this operation would kill the Second Mate. Mihailov has seen what he will become.

In the dim light, Tor lined the blade lengthways across the meat of Mihailov’s upper arm. Up close, he could see the veins clotted with thickened blood bulge and throb through red blotched, diaphanous flesh. Holding his breath, Tor drew a line across Mihailov’s skin as one would a piece of wood. The singular motion elicited a high pitched moan from the Bulgarian. Healthy blood welled in dots across the line then coalesced, dripping to the unprotected bed sheets.

Tor watched the slowly pooling blood run from his subordinates new wound, hypnotized.

“What are you doing?”

Tor froze and dropped the saw to the deck. It fell with a flexing metallic clatter. Behind him the door opened with a pneumatic whoosh. Tor stood and looked down on Mihailov, the spell broken. Tears formed in the clenching corners of Mihailov’s eyes.

“Tor?” Nilsen put a long boned hand on his shoulder.

“He’s going to die,” stammered Tor in the cold, his bathrobe falling open.

Tor felt hot tears anew sting his already raw cheeks. Nilsen put his arm around Tor and guided him gently from the ward. “Tor, you have to try and rest.”

“I can’t,” Tor answered, staring into Nilsen’s face. “When I close my eyes, I see things. Things I don’t want to see, things I can’t explain. Jan, I know I sound crazy, but you haven’t seen them.”

☣☭☠

Nilsen was not familiar with providing emotional support or comfort. Where he grew up men didn’t cry. Men were also often found deep within the woods having swallowed their shotguns during the long lightless winters. It was easy in Nilsen’s mind to step back and preach a stiff upper lip, to believe that Tor, a proud Norwegian like himself, had softened in the hot and emotive Salvadorian climes. But then he recalled his own fears on that first day awake. He’d been close to tears in Tor’s office, although he would never admit it, and since then it was becoming apparent that any possible radiation was the least of the horrors heaped upon them.

Awkwardly, Nilsen tightened his grip around the sobbing Captain. Tor seemed to shrink in his grasp, trying to wipe the unseemly water from his eyes with the sleeves of his robe.

“I’m okay,” Tor said, hoarsely, shaking himself free of the Chief Engineer. Still wiping his face, Nilsen watched Tor walk away between the rows of empty cryo beds, never turning to acknowledge the look of despair and sympathy etched in Nilsen’s narrow features.

Chapter 13

“Oh God, the faces!” Katja flailed off the side of the roll mat. Her eyes remained closed though, and aside from indecipherable utterances, remained asleep. A cherubic cheek pressed to the wood vinyl.

Tala wasn’t asleep, hadn’t been for some time. She watched the girl with overslept eyes, her back pressed to the cold bulkhead. The skin around her eyes felt tight, but when she pressed the flesh, the swelling appeared to have subsided.