‘Oh, hi,’ she replied, surprised to see the other nurse. ‘Are you ready for this?’
Ellie nodded and Lucy pushed a little closer to her. It had been one of the most unexpected parts of the transfer, meeting Scarlet and Ellie and finding herself in the midst of women who had accepted her immediately. She’d thought she didn’t need friends, that she needed to spend every thought and moment focused on her work, but she was starting to see that there was only so long she could rely on herself and herself alone. There was nothing wrong with accepting friends, nothing weak about enjoying the company of others.
A rumble signalled the first of the ambulances arriving, maybe more than one, and Lucy felt a familiar flutter in her stomach. Doctors were talking, someone was issuing instructions, but she was in her own world. One where she couldn’t hear anything other than her own voice.
You can save them. You will do everything you can to save every soldier you treat.
‘Something’s happened. What’s happened?’
Ellie was tugging on her arm like an insistent child, the panic in her voice pulling Lucy from her thoughts. And then she realised what was going on, that it was about to happen all over again.
Boom!
She let out a scream that she couldn’t even believe came from her body and propelled herself forwards. Why was everyone standing around? Why was no one helping?
She would be damned if she’d let the enemy get away with blowing up their ambulances and the good men and women inside.
‘Over my dead body,’ she muttered as she ran faster than she’d ever run in her life.
Lucy ran towards the ambulance, the rain on the canvas above where she’d been sheltering the only thing she heard as she pumped her arms at her sides, desperate to help. Flames simmered orange in front of her, rising higher and turning redder, or maybe it was her eyes playing tricks on her. She didn’t know and she didn’t care; all she cared about was making sure another nurse or doctor didn’t die because no one was brave enough to help them.
She glanced to her right, sensing someone, ready to push anyone away who tried to stop her and tell her it was too dangerous, and then she saw Doctor Black and that he was rushing to the ambulance’s aid, too. The smoke was strong, sickly, and the crashing sound nearby told her she could be flattened at any moment, but she couldn’t worry about that.
Spencer yanked the mangled door to the ambulance, the truck on its side in front of them as Lucy’s boots skidded on the mud, stopping her abruptly.
‘Help me pull this!’ Spencer yelled.
She grimaced, pain tearing through her arm as she pulled as hard as she could, pressed against the doctor as they both put everything they had into opening the door. Eventually it came away, sending Lucy reeling backwards when it finally yielded.
‘Help!’ Lucy screamed out, looking back and seeing that more men were coming, orderlies who’d probably only just arrived for duty.
A handful of nurses stood watching, but Lucy didn’t have time to think about that. The fire was in the front of the heavy truck; she knew it was only so long before it exploded.
‘Help him out!’ Spencer yelled at her. ‘I need to check up front.’
She didn’t bother to tell him to be careful, just like he hadn’t told her to turn back. Instead she carefully climbed in, coughing as the smoke swirled around and filled her nostrils.
‘Help.’
Lucy paused, certain she’d heard a whisper. Her eyes adjusted, the inside of the ambulance dark with only the one door thrown open. She saw a body, moved carefully and felt straight away for a pulse. Nothing.
‘Help.’
The whisper was weaker now, but she’d heard it. She moved over the body, then saw another, slammed into the corner.
‘I need help in here!’ she called out. ‘We have a live soldier to get out!’
She reached for him, touched her fingers to his. They were cold, but the slight movement of his fingertips against her hand told her he was alive, that she needed to do everything she could to get him out.
‘Get that nurse out of there!’
‘This thing’s going to blow!’
Lucy sucked back a breath, fear starting to creep in when earlier there’d been nothing other than adrenaline.
‘Go.’ The soldier’s barely audible whisper made her look up.
She shook her head. ‘I’m not leaving you. We’ll get you out of here, soldier.’
Hands grabbed at her, yanked her back, pulling her away from the soldier who was surely so close to death.
‘No!’ she screamed.
‘Get that damn nurse out of there!’ a man yelled, his voice cutting through her as she was dragged back.
‘He’s alive! He needs us!’
Spencer pushed past then and she gave up fighting, certain he wouldn’t leave a man in there.
‘Get everyone back. Now!’ he shouted. ‘If I can get him out I’ll do it.’ He pointed at her. ‘Go back, all of you.’
She obeyed him, not about to defy his orders and distract him from hauling the soldier out. They all moved, far back, and he disappeared.
‘Spencer!’
Lucy turned and saw Ellie drop to her knees, hand to her mouth as she sobbed. She quickly ran to her, all the way back to the hospital entrance, dropping beside her and putting her arms around her.
‘He’ll be fine,’ she soothed, hoping she wasn’t telling a lie as she coughed from the smoke. ‘He’s so brave and there’s a soldier in there. Alive. I was holding his hand myself.’
Lucy looked back to the ambulance. Even though it must have been only a minute or less, it felt like an age since Spencer had gone back into the truck.
Then she saw him. Staggering under the weight of a man easily as big as he was, emerging from the back of the fallen ambulance.
‘Help him!’ she insisted, moving forward, not able to watch and do nothing.
Orderlies and doctors rushed past her, finally spurred into action and going to Spencer and taking the weight of the soldier from him. He looked like he was going to collapse and she took his arm, helped him in. It wasn’t until they were all under canvas again, Spencer sitting on the ground and the injured soldier being lowered on to a bed, that the truck outside exploded, the noise deafening. Some of the nurses around her fell to the ground, covering their heads, their screams echoing past her. But Lucy simply cringed and refused to surrender to her fear, taking the hand of the soldier who’d whispered to her in the dark only moments earlier.
‘Shhh,’ she whispered, the noise outside and around them subsiding. ‘Everything’s going to be fine. We’ve got you.’
One of his eyes was so badly swollen he couldn’t see from it, but there was a glint in his other eye that told her he might just pull through. A doctor cut through his trouser leg and she glanced down, saw it was bloody and hoped he wouldn’t lose it. Then as he lifted his hand to her, the one she hadn’t held earlier, she saw it was covered in blood, too.
‘Your hand,’ she said, ‘let me—’