Hunters: A Trilogy (33 page)

‘Needs must…’ he’d murmured, turning away in embarrassment. He told them that he thought Ken must have been hit on the head by the dish whilst running for cover, a blow such as that would have felled him like an ox, causing him to tumble into the bottom of the bunker’s stairwell. Mike gave details of how he’d sawed through the three-foot pole that had speared Ken through the back of his skull, and left the remaining five inches, three of them actually in Ken’s brain, where they were, before stabilising his other injuries, which included a smashed cheekbone and a badly broken femur of the right thigh. Then the medics had arrived and the rest was history.

The irony of it sickened Jane. She had listened to Ken’s tales, heard about the horrendous places he had been to, and she had seen the photographs he kept. Jane knew that hers was only half the story. Ken’s was a tale of which only he knew the true meaning, he had been there, seen those things, and he kept the memories safe. ‘Locked in a box lying hidden in the back of my head…’ is what he would say. She thought about how ironic that comment had turned out to be.

Occasionally, whilst in some hotel, or on the white sands of a far-off holiday beach, Ken, with a belly full of brandy, would let her peek into his nightmarish treasure chest. The detached but detailed stories he shared with her during those precious moments never ceased to amaze the tall, dark-haired woman. His ability to separate himself from some of the horrors he had encountered, laugh about them, make wicked jokes of them even, had filled her with awe at his ability to cope.

Jane knew that should it have been her, then the chances of spending the rest of her days ensconced in some nuthouse or another would have been very likely. Indeed, quite a few of Ken’s mates had apparently gone that same way – he never talked about them specifically, only referring to such incidents by saying things like: ‘Old Smudger, yeah, he was a good guy, I think he went nuts back in ’93,’ or something similar. Ken would grin and then flash that devil-may-care wink at her.

The medical staff had said he was going to be okay, said his recovery had been quite incredible and that even whilst they were busy removing a piece of his head, a chunk the size of a Kiwi fruit, Ken’s brain waves had still been going haywire. The surgeon, Professor George, said that he had never seen anything quite like it. At one stage, whilst Ken was being operated on, the hospital staff had feared some sort of epileptic fit, his brain waves were going crazy, almost as though he was on some adrenaline-inducing fairground ride. They had administered more drugs, however, the truth is that they had little or no effect upon her husband, and Ken’s mind had continued firing its endless electrical currents. So, with no other choices left to make, the surgeons had to let it be whilst they finished ‘taking some of him away’.

He was alive and she counted her blessings, they had said he would live, but, as with all these type of injuries, no-one was sure as to what the outcome would be. The prognosis was as much an unknown as were his private, coma-induced, thoughts. The sprightly Professor had patted her on the arm.

‘We have done everything possible, my dear,’ he said. ‘He is very strong and I believe in him!’ He smiled and held her hand, saying: ‘Please trust me, Jane. I will not lie to you.’ He showed her the X-ray of Ken’s head, the metal plate, which they had fitted to cover the gaping hole on the back of his skull, gleamed against the illuminated background of the monitor. The Professor said the plate was a marvel of medicine. It certainly did appear to be very high-tech, the weird shape reminded her of a spearhead, or something similar. Jane had thought it would be pretty difficult not to trust the old man with those clear blue eyes. She liked him.

Afterwards, after the operation, the surgical team had placed Ken into an artificial coma. ‘Just to let him recover for a while,’ they’d said. Well, that ‘while’ had become six weeks and Ken still hadn’t woken up. He slept peacefully, occasionally calling out – perhaps a name, a curse, or sometimes just pure gibberish. Often he had laughed, the tubes in his face disguising the strangled sounds, but he did laugh. Once he had cried, too, the strangled sobs leaving tears streaming down his stubbled face.

She fetched his iPod player into their private room, then spent ten minutes looking for the Favourites file before she found it and pushed ‘play-repeat’. The tunes flowed endlessly around the unconscious man and his handsomely-featured wife. She decorated the room with his favourite candles, the ones that smelt of cinnamon. In addition, she also brought in an endless supply of his preferred food and drink. Sitting beside the bed, she would talk him through the menu, describing it in tantalising detail and wafting the items of food under his nose, occasionally wiping a piece across his lips, just enough for him to get the flavour, something to remind him of where he should be.

Jane also went to the extremes of bringing in some cigarettes. When the nurses weren’t looking she would light one, blow the smoke at his face and then frantically open all of the windows to let the smell out. She also sneaked in a bottle of his special Spanish brandy – the one with a taste like fire and honey – and, dipping her finger in the liquid, she would run a trace of the drink around his cracked lips. Jane did all of these things in the certain knowledge that she had to do anything and everything to keep him on this side of the black chasm, which, whilst sitting and dozing in the chair next to Ken’s bed, she had dreamed of.

She saw him sliding toward the pit, and as the sound of an awful chuckle filled the air, Ken had begun to scream. He had turned to stare at her with eyes wide, and Jane had seen the madness in his eyes, they were filled with fire, green fire. She had snapped awake and immediately made a hot drink, sitting and talking to him in a soft voice whilst blowing the coffee’s aroma into his face.

She tried anything and everything, but most of all she never gave up. Jane loved him and wanted him back. ‘Any time now, please!’ she would say. Yes, she told him that one all the time. That one, and also: ‘Get up, Ken, get up now!’ Jane told him that one all right, told it to him almost every five minutes. She told him stories as well, and sometimes late at night, when the duty nurse was at the other end of the ward, she told him quite dirty stories, stories about what she was going to do when…‘You get your arse out of that damned bed, Kenneth Robinson, move it, man!’

She knew her efforts were working. Something was definitely going on; something in his head was firing away. The machines Ken was hooked up to never ceased their flashing and beeping. All the while soft tunes continued to play in the background. ‘If I hear that track one more time…’ Jane thought, hearing The Eagles start their routine yet again. She looked away from the music player and stood smiling down at her husband, his eyelids twitching away underneath the white, adhesive tape.

Whilst she was by his side, a willing partner in Ken’s prison, Jane also received an endless stream of calls from people they knew. The callers would ring the hospital switchboard, ‘Extension 7712, room 32A….’ they would say.

Once they were connected to Ken’s room, Jane would do her best to dispel their concerns. She told them not to visit, that it would be better to wait until he came round. ‘Give it time,’ she said to them. ‘There’s nothing you can do at the moment anyway, he’s sleeping right now.’ Secretly, she didn’t want anyone else to come and visit, this was hers and Ken’s problem and they would sort it out themselves, like they always sorted everything out – together.

Mike had been her near-constant companion for the best part of four weeks; he had returned upon the Medevac flight with Ken and had put everything in place before they’d even landed. The boys were quite wealthy and the top-line insurance in which they had invested paid them back handsomely. Ken had received the ultimate in care right from the moment Mikey had found him, and all the way through to the present day.

Jane was also worried about Mike. He looked somewhat withdrawn, almost pensive, and most definitely green around the gills. When he had heard Jane described him that way, ‘green’, Mike had appeared about ready to break down and cry. She put it all down to him being upset about Ken, because after all, they were very good friends – best friends. Mike had stayed around for several weeks. Then one morning, very early, he’d rushed into Ken’s room. There was a gleam in his eye, which Jane hadn’t seen before, and such was his animation that he appeared to be almost possessed. He stood and stared down at Ken for a while, and then looked back to Jane.

‘Hey babe, I have to go back to work for a bit,’ he said, ‘not back to the ‘Ghan though, only here in England, down in Wiltshire somewhere. And then, well, I’m not really sure, but either way I won’t be too long.’ Shrugging, he delved into his jacket pockets and pulled out two objects. ‘Give these to Ken when he wakes up will you? He wouldn’t want to lose them,’ he said, leaning over to place the Zippo lighter upon the bedside table. It was followed by a pebble, one that wobbled slightly as he laid it to rest on the table next to the lighter.

Bending forward, he kissed her cheek and said, ‘Listen, don’t let yourself worry too much about things, Ken will wake up and you must have no doubt of that, whatsoever! I know he’ll wake up – I know he will.’ He smiled. It wasn’t a question, it was a statement, and she felt the truth radiate from him. Mike walked over to the door. Turning back, he said, ‘When he does wake up, just tell him that I’ve gone to sort out that business with Red...Oh, and tell him to get his lazy arse out of that bloody bed, too!’ He turned the handle and opened the door. With one last smile at her, Mike left as quickly as he had arrived.

‘Okay Mike…’ she whispered, at the closing door, before turning to pick up the lighter. It wasn’t one she’d seen before and Jane guessed it was just another one of those trinkets that Ken had picked up on his travels. She smiled at the memory of the endless gadgets, trophies and old military stuff that her man hoarded. ‘Boys will be boys,’ she guessed.

But the pebble was a strange one, why would a little stone with smooth sides be of any interest? She supposed that it must have had some importance, otherwise why would Mike have bothered? It fitted neatly into the palm of her hand and had a strange, brown mark burned into its surface. She knew that Ken would give her the story when he awoke. ‘Ken will wake up…’ Mike’s conviction gave her a warm feeling. Returning to her chair, Jane sat back down next to her husband and held his hand again.

It was that same night when Ken had died.

All his vital signs had been good and he had appeared to be sleeping peacefully, when all of a sudden, Ken had stopped breathing – the machines went haywire and Jane hit the red button, hit it hard, several times. The nurses poured, en masse, into the room and were in the process of giving him help when Ken had suffered a seizure of some sort. The monitor stopped its regular alarm to begin a terrifyingly-loud, single-toned
‘Beeeeee…’
noise. They raced his castor-wheeled bed out of the room, all four of them madly pushing him toward the resuscitation suite, Jane flying along behind them with a forgotten magazine still clutched in her hand, sprinting through the white corridors as though the very Devil himself was on their heels.

As they tore into the Crash Room, Ken’s flailing body had almost pitched over the right side of the bed – he was only prevented from falling by the strong arms of those in attendance. The emergency Crash Team had immediately taken over the situation. Right before Jane’s widened eyes, and as though it was the most normal thing in the world, they’d simply restarted Ken’s motionless heart. Without even needing a machine, the team leader had calmly leaned over Ken’s chest and started pumping his arms downward, Jane couldn’t see exactly what was happening as there was a flurry of medical staff around the bed. However, she did hear the sound of Ken’s ribs cracking – the ghastly sound sliced through her and she had very nearly run out of the room to be sick.

Ken tried to sit up. One moment he’d been dead to the world, literally, and in the next he was fighting to get into a sitting position – Jane stood and stared in utter amazement. As the nurses held him down, she heard Ken shout.

‘Mikey!’

It was only the once and the tubes in his mouth muffled the sound, but Jane had still heard what he’d said. The team of medical technicians had quickly begun to disassemble the tubes, sliding them out of his throat, wiping his mouth and fiddling with the other wires and contraptions still attached to his body.

Ken fought like a demon against them and they struggled to restrain his unbelievable strength. There was no way someone who had been in a coma for at least six weeks should have been even able to sit up, never mind put up a physical resistance so strong that it would have surprised a cage fighter.

‘Okay, everybody please stand back, Charlie, hold his left arm for me, will you? Good. Okay, here we go, Mr Robinson – everything is going to be just fine!’ the team leader said, stepping forward.

Then, without any further fuss, and one jab of an expertly-wielded hypodermic needle later, it was all over for Jane’s distraught husband. Ken sank back into the bed, coughed painfully and then softened. He relaxed back onto his pillow and Jane watched as his straining neck muscles disappeared. As the nurse removed the tape from his eyes, Ken stared into the bright lights above him and unclenched his balled fists. He turned and looked straight past the others in the room, right through them as if they weren’t there.

With his eyes directly focused upon Jane, he whispered. ‘Tickets please…’

Jane made her way to the bed. ‘Come on, baby, come on, it’s okay now, ssshhh, Ken. It’s okay, I’m here,’ she said, crying softly.

His eyes were now focused on some distant spot beyond her. Jane caressed his sweating forehead and leaned forward to lovingly kiss his cracked lips. For one moment those faded green eyes focused back onto her face. He smiled, just the once, then relaxed and immediately fell into an exhausted sleep.

Ken had awakened and Jane would make him well again.

She needed him back, needed to hear his voice…