Missing by Darrell Maloney Read Free Book Online Page A

her?”
         “No. And that’s not all the bad news. John and Hannah are missing too. They were due back from San Antonio on an Army helicopter two hours ago.”
         “Holy crap. Any distress signal, or SOS transmission?”
         “Nope.”
         “How long will the Army wait before they send out their own search parties?”
         “My guess is that they’re already searching.”
         “Won’t they send somebody here, to see if they’ve arrived?”
         “Not if they were in contact with the pilots. They have much better range on their radios than we do. It’s entirely likely they were in radio contact with their helicopter the entire trip. If they had engine trouble or some other malfunction and had to land, then the pilots probably notified San Antonio. And San Antonio wouldn’t have any reason to contact us to see if the chopper arrived.”
         “So, you think that’s what happened? The chopper malfunctioned and got delayed?”
         “I sure hope so. Ordinarily I’d have someone in a vehicle, speeding full steam toward Kelly Air Force Base to find out. But right now I can’t spare any men. We have to give Sarah our top priority for now.”
         “Understood. Can I have a fresh battery for my radio?”
         “Sure. Call Sami at the control center and she’ll have somebody run one out for you. And Marty…”
         “Yes?”
         “Thanks for your help.”
         “Don’t mention it. You guys are the only family I’ve got left.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 9
     
         Hannah awoke for the second time, still in a daze and still in a world of pain. She still couldn’t move the lower part of her body. Couldn’t even feel it, as a matter of fact.
         The huge piece of wreckage that covered her hips and legs kept her from even seeing whether her lower body was still intact. The tingling she felt occasionally came in waves, first barely perceptible and then very intense.
        Had her lower body been severed in the crash? Was that why she couldn’t feel her legs and feet?
         Was the tingling merely her body’s way of trying to convince her she was still whole? Or was her hip bone as far as her body extended now?
         Was the weight of the huge chunk of metal which covered her from the pubic bone to her ankles the only thing keeping her from bleeding to death from legs that were no longer there?
         She’d had little formal training in medicine while in college. She’d always been amazed when she told people she was an astrophysicist, how many thought that had something to do with medicine.
         Many of her friends had asked her casual questions about their ailments, as though she were formally trained in the medical field.
         The truth was, the few medical courses she took in college were merely block fillers: elective courses she took because they interested her and she needed the credits. She took two semesters of basic medical principles and first aid techniques. Another on emergency medicine.
         She tried her best to remember. Her abdomen was sensitive to the touch, and was warm and hard. That meant internal bleeding, she was almost positive. And that wasn’t good.
         She tried again to cry out. But her lungs just wouldn’t inflate enough to allow her to do it. Even now, three hours after the crash, she was still breathing in very short, very labored breaths. Whenever she tried to inhale deeply, the stabbing pain from her fractured ribs made her feel like passing out.
         She looked once again at the arm.
         Oh, she tried not to. The pain it caused her was even worse than the pain in her abdomen or the pain in her lungs.
         This pain was in her heart.
         But the arm kept drawing her back. It wouldn’t let her not look.
         It was as though the limb, peeking out from beneath a  chunk of Army green