Page 39 - Archangel

the long way home

Remaining below the gunwales another minute to increase their margin
and avoid another lucky shot, the two captains passed the final sandbar
into a safer position. Thanking Ndara for the incredible seaman’s skills
which had saved their lives, MacIain spotted the growing trickle of blood
down his face, and said, ‘You’re hit, Brother.”
“I’ve had worse,” the Kenyan said, surprised by the amount of crimson
dripping from his hand with a wipe over his scalp.
MacIain grabbed his medical kit from the captain’s bag and shinnied
back to Ndara at the helm. He examined the wound, applied a field
dressing to the Kenyan’s head, and quickly buried a morphine syringe into
his huge bicep without permission.
“You damned mzungu! Now I can’t help captain us back to Bukuvu,”
Ndara fumed.
Skye admitted, “I know. Now stop arguing, move forward, and try not to
bounce out of the bateau. Neither DRC nor Rwandan border vessels
will hesitate to fire on us if they know we were involved here. We’ve got
to move!”
Taking the helm from his friend over his stinging if increasingly
slurred Swahili protests, Kenyatta finally splayed out on a tarp as he lost
acuity and then consciousness. Before he did, Skye finally broke a long
silence common to life-threatening engagements and shared, “You saved
us, buddy.”
Starting to drift off, Ndara mumbled, “I’m so sorry, Skye. God bless
Layla. She saved hundreds, and deserved our best effort to rescue her.
All that’s left of her is a desecrated corpse swinging in the wind.”
Skye later gently shook Ndara’s leg to ensure the Kenyan was out cold.
Slipping his hand back into the captain’s bag, he felt for and seized the
grip of the H&K. Letting the life-saving machine gun slip into the deep
Rwandan waters, Skye looked skyward and prayed, “I hope you know we
did our best, Layla. I’m sorry I failed you.” While leaning over to commit
the HK-91 to the deep, he felt a sharp pain and noticed a gash in his side
which had begun to bleed. Checking that an all–weather blanket remained
snug over the Kenyan, MacIain again looked skyward and added, “We
couldn’t save you, but we’ll care for your son as our own. I swear it, Layla.”

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