an: thank you so much for the reviews guys, i really appreciate it! so here's our next chapter, where we see buffer's pov. i found him really hard to write, so please let me know what you think, if i've written him wildly out of character, or he seems okay. we also briefly check back in with the hammersley crew.
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RHIB team
Location: Unidentified Island, Coral Sea
2105 hours
"Shit, Swaino! Bomber," Pete calls out, watching Swain collapse onto the sand. He shifts, ready to jump up and help when the X shifts in his arms, groaning. He looks down at her, and frowns. He can't leave the X right now, but Swain…
"I got him Buffer," Bomber says, quickly moving towards Swain's prone body. Pete watches as she snaps another glow stick, adding to the light coming from the stick near 2Dads. She quickly checks Swain over, exclaiming as her hands come away bloody. "Crap!"
"What?" Pete asks, his body tense.
"He's scraped his back and side up pretty badly," she says, before she frowns. "It's bleeding, but not enough to have caused him to pass out."
"So what's wrong with him?" 2Dads limps over, clearly trying not to put any weight on his leg. Bomber turns to them and shrugs, before turning back to Swain to see if there's something she's missed.
"I need to wash this blood off," she says, cutting through Swain's t-shirt with the knife still lying in the sand from where Swain had dropped it, before running to the water and dunking the scraps.
Pete watches as she carefully cleans the blood away, revealing a long, shallow gash along Swain's skin. It's too dark to see anything clearly from his position, but he can see Bomber's face fall. "Bomber?"
"Uh, looks like he's been stung by something, Buff," she says, her hands tentatively pressing around the wound.
"What, like a jellyfish?" 2Dads asks, awkwardly sitting down near Swain's body. "Oh, yeah, that's deffo a sting," he says, whistling. "Looks like there's more than one, too."
Pete swore under his breath. This mission has been one fucking mess after another. "Could it have caused him to pass out Bomb?"
"Yeah, maybe," she said, checking his pulse. "His pulse is steady, but we need to keep an eye out for him. If it caused him to pass out, there's a chance he's going to get worse."
"Irukandji?" Pete asks, his mind quickly turning to their last encounter with jelly fish.
"That's a bit of a leap, Buffer," Bomber says, laughing it off, though he can see the small shift in her expression. "It could have been a bluebottle," she adds.
"Man-of-war's shouldn't have caused him to pass out like that. And it wouldn't be the first time we've encountered Irukandji," Pete counters, his expression grim. Jaffa had died then.
"We can only keep an eye on him Buff." Bomber says, though Pete is quickly distracted by the X moving against him. She groans again, and her head lifts slightly before her body tenses.
"Hey, X," Pete says quietly, reaching up to stop her shifting around. "Take it easy."
"Wha – ?" She murmurs, her voice raspy. "What's going on?"
"You've taken a few hits, X," Pete says, though he knows that's a bit of an understatement.
She raises her right hand, flinching as she touches the back of her skull. As if realizing she's been leaning on him, she moves forward, though he pulls her back softly as she inhaled sharply. "Easy, X," he says, waiting until she catches her breath before continuing, giving her a sit rep. "We've made it to shore, you've got broken ribs, a concussion, and a dislocated shoulder, though Swain's set it. 2Dads has a bit of a gash on his leg, but he's walking fine. Bomber and I are okay."
She takes a moment to process what he's said, and when she stiffens he knows she's picked up on what he hasn't said. "Swain?"
"Looks like he's been stung by jelly fish," he replies. "He's been scraped up a fair bit, and he's bleeding, but that can't have been the reason he's passed out," he finished.
"Irukandji?" She asks quietly, so clearly, they're on the same wavelength regarding that.
"Bomber doesn't think so, but there's no way of knowing right now." Pete doesn't want to think about what will happen if it is Irukandji poisoning. It was bad enough on the ship where they had access to medical care. Here, on this island …
"Okay," the X says, shifting forward again, slowly enough this time that he lets her move. "Help me up, Buffer," she turns her head, looking over at Bomber and 2Dads, who are still huddled over Swain, before looking back at Pete. Her pupils are blown, her voice is strained, and he isn't sure this is the best idea, but he helps her up anyway, watching carefully as she sways in place.
"X," he starts, before she cuts him off.
"I'm alright Buff, but we need to get ourselves off this beach." She gestures vaguely at the water. "Tide's gotta be coming in soon, and I'm surprised that it hasn't started raining again."
"Okay X, but you've gotta take it easy," Pete says, looking up at the sky. It's pitch black, cloud cover hiding any sight of the moon, or stars, the only light coming from the glow sticks lying on the sand, and the odd flash of lighting in the distance. "How's your head?"
"Feels like there's a heavy metal band playing up a storm," she says, wincing as she rubbed her chest. "What happened to my ribs?" Pete shrugs, not sure how to tell her that she'd had to be revived via CPR. "I was in the water," the X said suddenly, glancing at the sea, where the waves were crashing heavily against the shore. "I think I hit the rocks," she trailed off, looking down at herself for the first time since she'd awoken.
"Uh, yeah," he says. Eloquent as always, Pete, he thinks. "Swain pulled you out. You weren't breathing, Kate." He lets her have a moment, before he continues. "Swain and Bomber had to do CPR to bring you back."
She doesn't say anything in response, merely adjusting her left shoulder in the makeshift sling Swain had mocked up, before she shivers as the wind picks up. Pete frowns, and shrugs off his DPNU shirt, helping her thread her good arm through a sleeve before wrapping the other around her injured shoulder and buttoning it up quickly. It wouldn't provide a lot of warmth, but at least it covered her bare skin from the elements. He brushes off the grateful smile she gives him, turning to the others.
"Okay, listen up," he calls out, gaining their attention. "The X is right, tide's gonna start coming in soon, so we need to get off the beach. 2Dads, you and the X help each other to the tree line, Bomber, you and I will get Swain." He cuts off the X's protest. "You can barely walk X," he says firmly, waiting until 2Dads limps over and holds out an arm for Kate to take, before they slowly make their way to the shadowed tree line, merely hulking shapes in the dark.
Pete moves towards Swain, and with Bomber's help, moves him to join the others. Leaning Swain's body against a tree, he takes a moment to assess the situation. The wind has picked up again, and they're all shivering in the cold wake it leaves behind. Swain's out cold, the X is barely keeping herself upright, and 2Dads, while not injured badly, isn't going to be mobile enough to help much.
"Okay, Bomber, we need to get some sort of shelter sorted. If it starts raining, things are going to get worse. I need you to get whatever you can from the RHIB – if the tide comes in, we have no way of stopping Lightning from floating away." She nods, and taking one of the glow sticks, makes her way to the shoreline and into the RHIB. He turns to 2Dads – "Keep an eye out, 2Dads, I'm going to see if I can find some dry wood, get a fire started."
"I'll keep an eye on Swain," the X says, slowly lowering herself to the ground, and then sighs as the rain starts up again, slowly at first, then becoming a deluge in seconds.
Pete nods, and leaves them with the second glow stick, before he snaps a new one, blinking through the rain dripping down his face as the green light throws shadows across the ground. He looks back at his team, casting a worried look at Swain before turning back to the dark forest in front of him.
"Be careful, Buff," he hears the X call from behind him, and raises a hand in acknowledgement before he enters the dense brush, eyes searching through the dark.
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HMAS Hammersley
Location: Arafura Sea
2050 Hours
It's quiet on the bridge, Billy thinks. He's acting helmsman while Nav has the ship, but Charge and RO are both at their desks, and Charge, at least, is usually more talkative than this. "They're okay, right" he questions before he realizes it.
"Spider?" Nav turns away from the radar to look at him. He fidgets, but meets her eyes.
"Buffer, and the X, and the guys," he expands, "they're okay, right?" He'd twisted his wrist after taking a fall, so he'd been icing it in the ward room when the boss'd called boarding stations. He'd wanted to join them, but the X and Swain had told him to rest up, and now they were miles away and Billy can't help but think that he should've been on the SIEV with them.
"Yeah, Spider, they're fine," she says, but he can tell that she's worried.
Billy nods, and says nothing for a while, his eyes trained on the dark waves in front of him. Eventually, he turns back to RO. "Have we tried them on the SIEV's radio?"
RO gives him a withering glare. "No, Spider, that hadn't occurred to us at all," he says sarcastically.
"Radio on the SIEV was trashed," Charge interrupts. "We had contact with them while we were in range of the motorola's, but…" he trails off, and Billy can fill in the blanks. They're out of range now, so they have no way of contacting the team.
"And you said there's a storm?" He persists, turning back to Nav. Billy's been on more than a few SIEV's since he's been posted on to the Hammersley, and not all of them had been sea worthy. "This SIEV, it can handle that?"
Nav shrugs. "Buffer and 2Dads seemed to think so," she says, and is about to continue before she's interrupted by RO.
"Uh, Nav, I have a call coming in for the boss, looks like it's Commander Marshall," he says, placing a hand over the receiver. Nav reaches for the tannoy, and calls for the boss to come to the bridge. He must have already been on his way, because he walks up the stairs within a minute. Billy looks back at the water, though his attention is on the boss.
He exchanges a glance with Nav, as they both strain to hear the conversation, though the boss is talking quiet enough the Billy can't hear much. The sound of the satellite phone being slammed back into its cradle breaks the silence, and Billy can hear the boss sigh, before he moves to the tannoy.
"Do you hear, this is the captain speaking." They all turn to watch the boss, and Billy can see that he's not the only one alarmed at the expression on his face. "We've just received word from NAVCOM, the Kingston was passing through the Coral sea, and offered to check in on our crew for us." He paused, and Billy feels his gut clench, knowing that the captain's next words aren't going to be good. "According to them, the SIEV is no longer at the coordinates we left her at." He waits for the outcry to die out, before continuing. "Now, the storm seems to have hit the area quite severely, so there is a chance that the X made the call to head back to shore. However, the Kingston is going to stay in the area and wait for the storm to clear up, before starting a search. We have no other details yet, but I'll keep you informed. Captain out."
"Boss?" Charge asks, leaving his desk to join them near the captain's seat. "The X wouldn't have made that call."
The boss nods, "no, she wouldn't have."
"So where are they?" Billy's question echoes in the sudden silence, and he looks from Charge to the boss, hoping they'll have an answer.
"Right now, we just don't know Spider," the boss replies, his voice grim, as he stares out at the water. "Captain has the boat," he calls. Nav nods, and follows the routine, confirms that he has the boat.
"We're going to go find them, right, Boss?" Billy shifts forward, waits for the boss's commands to get the ship going.
"'course we are," Charge says, before he catches sight of the boss's face. "Sir?"
"Look, I don't like it any more than you do, Charge, but for now, orders are for us to sit tight. The Kingston will be heading up the search party until we've completed handover with AFP."
"This is crap," Charge says, and Billy can't help but agree. The boss doesn't respond, but Billy can tell that he feels the same.
"It's the X, and Buffer, and Swain," Nav says. "Between them, they can handle anything."
"Yeah," Billy agrees, though he's not as confident as she sounds. He thinks of the crew, riding out the storm on a SIEV that could be falling apart right now. He glances at his watch, and then back at the boss, who seems to be scowling at the clear sea in front of him. Morning can't come quick enough, Billy thinks. The sooner they handover with AFP, the sooner they can find their team.
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so i'm not gonna lie, i did forget about spider in the first couple of chapters, and then had to scramble to come up with a reason for him not being present on the boarding party. whoops? as always, would love to know what you think.