Grid Attack (Cyber War #1) (10 page)

The sound of the wind was so loud. I had never heard it like this before. It sounded like a bunch of trains all converging all at once.

I lifted the shades to see if I could see anything when Carl came across the yard with Alice Chen wrapped under a blanket. I quickly went and opened the door.

“Where’s Mr. Chen?” I asked, pulling Mrs. Chen inside.

“He’s trapped under something. I’m going back to see if we can get him.” Carl said.

I directed Mrs. Chen over to the chair that was near the fireplace and told her I would be right back with some towels. She was shivering and shaking so bad and mumbling something I couldn’t understand.

I rushed to grab a bunch of dry towels to help dry her off.

“Ambulance.” Was all she could say.

Shaking my head, I looked at her. “There are no ambulance’s anymore.” I said, not knowing how we would call them anyway.

She began to cry and I hugged her.

“Don’t worry. Tony and Carl will get him.” I assured her. I had no idea if they would be able to help him or even if he was alive at this time.

The wind shook the windows and they rattled furiously as if they were arguing with the wind as to who would win this battle. I prayed no more trees would fall.

At least our house was two stories and there was a huge steel beam in between floors. If we had a tree drop on our house, most likely we would be fine on the main floor or basement.

I heard the sound of Tony’s voice calling out to me. I couldn’t tell what he was saying so I just went and opened the door.

Carl and Tony were carrying Mr. Chen across their shoulders. They brought him into the living room as I quickly closed the door and locked it behind them, trying to keep the wind and sleet from coming inside.

They carefully placed Mr. Chen in the recliner as Mrs. Chen hurriedly went over to him. They were speaking to each other in Chinese as she knelt down and kissed him over and over on the face. They were both crying and holding onto each other. It was heartbreaking, and Tony and I looked at each other with tears in our eyes.

“Is he okay? Is he hurt?” I asked, hoping I could be of some help.

She said something to him. Then she turned back towards me.

“His leg is broken.” She said, the tears falling down her cheeks.

I looked up at Tony. None of us had any medical experience. What were we going to do?

I took a breath and asked her to ask him if it was okay if I took a look. He nodded his head as I squatted down with the flashlight.

Carefully, I pulled the leg of his pants up where it had been ripped, revealing the area that had been under the weight of the tree.

As I moved around I could see the leg was sitting crooked. It appeared to have been crushed. There were no bones sticking out, but it was misshapen and turning purple.

He said something to her in Chinese.

“He says his side also hurts.” She translated.

“Can you help him get his shirt off?” I asked her. She carefully helped him out of the wet shirt.

I could see the side of his body had started to swell and was turning black. I remember in a movie seeing this, he was bleeding internally.

I tried to think of what I could do or say. There was no way any of us could help him. We had to get him medical treatment, or he would lose his leg, or possibly even die.

Rubbing my eyes, I pulled Tony and Carl into the kitchen.

“I don’t know anything about broken bones, other than to set them with sticks like you see in the movies. I don’t even know if that works with something like this.” I said, hoping they would have some better options.

Then, it occurred to me that the radio was a HAM radio. Maybe we could call for help.

“Carl, did you take any HAM radio training at all? Do you know how to use it to call out? Maybe we could find someone to get him to a hospital?” I asked.

“Well, no, but I don’t the FCC is going to worry too much about it right now. HAM’s are the only thing working at the moment, so I am sure it would be okay to try.” He said.

Carl went and grabbed the radio. Turning it on, he began to try different channels in the hopes of finding someone that spoke English.

I heard Mrs. Chen call out when he heard what sounded like Chinese coming from the radio. Mrs. Chen said she understood what they were saying.

“Okay, but are they here in the States?” I asked her.

“No, they are in Beijing.” She said.

“Well, let’s try to find someone that can help us with your husband’s broken leg, then we can come back to that, okay?”

She nodded and went back to her husband as Carl kept going up the dial trying to get someone to respond.

“Hello? Is anyone out there?” he would ask. Then wait for a few seconds before asking again.

“Yeah, who is this?” said a voice on the other end. We all got excited that someone actually responded back.

“Uh, Hi, uh…this is Carl. We are in St. Louis and in the middle of a bad storm. We have someone with a broken leg we need an ambulance.” Carl pleaded.

“Oh, I’m sorry son. We are up in Ottawa. I wish we could help you.”

Carl’s shoulders drooped.

“Well, okay, thank you. I was hoping to find someone to help us here.” He said, as he shook his head.

“Hold on there a minute. Let me see if I can find some of the old station numbers list.” There were a couple of minutes we waited before the man on the radio came back on.

“I have about 10 different channels that used to be in your area. Maybe you can see if they can help.” He said.

I scrounged up a piece of paper and a pen to give to Carl. He quickly wrote down each of the channels and thanked the Ottawa man for his help.

Mr. Chen let out a loud yell. The pain must have been agonizing.

“Carl, you keep trying to see if you can find anyone here that can help us. I am going to see if I can find a way to make him more comfortable.” I said.

I pulled Tony aside so I could whisper to him.

“If we can’t get someone here soon, he won’t make it.” I said. Tony knew I was right.

We really needed an ambulance.

Carl worked through each of the channels with no response.

“Last one.” He said as he pushed in the number and began to call out.

“This is Carl in St. Louis. Is anyone there?” He said.

We waited for a few moments before a young woman’s voice came on the radio.

“Hi Carl, this is Shelly.” She said.

“Hi Shelly, thank you for responding. May I ask where you are?”

He figured it made no sense to carry on a conversation unless she could get an ambulance to him.

“I am at Clayton Memorial Hospital, where are you?” she responded.

“Hallelujah!” Carl said. “We are just north of you. We need an ambulance sent to us right away. We have a man with a broken leg. A tree fell on their house.”

There was a long pause before Shelly responded.

“I’m sorry Carl. There are no ambulances left. All the drivers went home to their families. Most of the staff left too because of the weather. Plus, we had a bunch of looters come through and take all the medicines they could find.”

We all heard what Shelly said.

“Even if you could get him here, I’m not sure there would be anyone to treat him. And the trip might actually make things worse for him. What I would advise is to make him as comfortable as possible and expect the worst.”

I looked over at Alice. She knew what that meant. She knew that most likely he wouldn’t make it.

I felt horrible and useless. Why couldn’t I have taken those emergency medical classes I read about? They were cheap and sometimes free. I always said I would do it later, but never did.

“Go down into the basement and get me several boxes and some tape if you can find it.” I asked Tony, who looked at me quizzically.

He nodded and headed downstairs with the flashlight, returning with some boxes and duct tape.

“Alice, tell him that I am going to try to put a splint around his leg to hold it in place and steady. It will probably hurt a lot, but it will help if he can let me get it in place.”

She translated and he nodded as I took the cardboard boxes and broke them down flat, then rolled them into hard stick like pieces that I could use around his calf.

It was hard listening to him yell as I managed to get all four pieces around his leg and taped. He eventually passed out from the pain.

“Quick, we need to move him to the cot before he wakes up.” I said to Carl and Tony, who gently lifted the man and put him down on the cot.

I sighed as he was laid flat near the fireplace, hoping that it wouldn’t be too painful for him.

A part of me wanted to give him pain killers, but I wasn’t sure if that would cause the internal bleeding to be worse. Especially, since I didn’t really know WHAT was causing it.

I gave Alice some clothes that would be way to big for her. She was tiny and petite compared to my robust German roots. But they were dry and warm, and she was thankful. She put her clothes near the fire to dry, as she sat on the floor and held Ernie’s hand.

Tony brought down a bunch of quilts to make a bed next to him for her. We were all exhausted and decided to see if we could get a few hours of sleep.

All I could think about is what if that would have been Tony. I can’t imagine losing him.

Chapter 14 - Anthony

I woke to the sound of crying and the sun pushing its way past the roll down shade. The storm had passed quick and furiously, taking roofs, trees and lots of other things with it.

As I turned towards the sound, I could see that Mr. Chen had passed in the night. She must have held his hand through it all.

I looked over at Kat, who was lying there with tears pouring out of her eyes. I had no idea how long she had been awake. But she knew he didn’t make it.

The internal bleeding had been too much.

Kat got up and went over to Alice and gave her a hug.

“I’m so sorry, Alice.” She said, handing her a box of tissues.

Carl had fallen asleep on the recliner that had been pushed into the dining room. I went and woke him up quietly.

“Ernie didn’t make it.” I whispered.

“Oh, man.” Carl said, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

The sun forced its way into the kitchen window now. I looked out back and the roof had been blown off the chicken coop. If we had not brought them in the day before, they would all be dead as well.

I leaned over and told Carl, we needed to move his body somewhere. He nodded and got up, and we both went out the back to talk.

“Do you think we should offer to bury him in their back yard or something?” Carl asked.

“I dunno, man. They may have certain customs or something. I can’t imagine burying someone I care about in the back yard anyway. But he needs to be kept cold or buried or cremated.” I said.

Kat came out the back and looked around.

“Wow, the chicken coop…” she said.

I nodded. “Yeah, glad we put them inside.”

“Alice asks if you would mind putting Ernie in their garage. It’s cold enough to hold him until she can have him cremated.” Said Kat.

Carl and I looked at each other and nodded.

We went inside and carefully wrapped up the body in the quilt that he had died on. He was a small man so he wasn’t heavy for us to move. We went through the back yard to their garage but realized that it was on an electric opener.

Carl made his way through part of the house that was opened up from the tree falling on it, finding the manual lock and lifting the door.

We placed him in between the two cars since that was really the only place to put him and be able to move him again easily.