Chapter 10

Wary eyes watched Tremelo depart, their owner fervently hoping that this was their last encounter. Mark's whole body was shaking from the emotional strain of his performance during the last few minutes. To convince the hitman that Steve was dead, he had had to almost accept it himself. Only his left hand, surreptitiously monitoring the terrifyingly weak but still beating pulse in his son's wrist, maintained a link with reality which lent him the strength to perpetuate the crucial deception.

Having given Tremelo as much time as he dared to disappear in the woods, Mark lowered his son gently to the ground. Steve still clung tenaciously to life, but his state of deep unconsciousness indicated that this wouldn't be the case for long unless Mark operated now. The irony was that the man designated to take his son's life had just provided the means to save it. Mark had furtively coveted the water bottle from the moment he'd seen it on Tremelo's back and recognised its life-saving potential. He had been determined to wrest it from the hitman in one way or another, but he hadn't anticipated the curious sympathy that had motivated the hitman to hand it over. Mark didn't have time to ponder the vagaries of the universe. The water in the bottle would be perfect for restoring negative pressure in the lung, but first he had to insert the tube. This was not a sanitary operating theatre with a sterilised scalpel. The rather dull knife would make for a procedure bordering on butchery, and Mark was supremely glad that Steve would be insensible during the proceedings. He gripped the knife tightly, struggling for a measure of professional detachment that failed to materialise. Although he attempted to concentrate on the familiarity of the operation to guide his hands, he couldn't banish the awareness of whom he was operating on.

Still seeking emotional balance, he took a couple of deep breaths and glanced up at the sunlight fading through the colourful foliage of the trees. It was amazingly peaceful, but suddenly the silence of the forest descended in a vertiginous rush, the scene swam dizzily before his eyes, and he had to fight a surge of nausea. His own physical condition had deteriorated considerably, and he only had himself to blame. He fought to maintain consciousness. There was no time for delay; his son needed him now. He wiped his sweaty hands on his trousers, but only succeeded in smearing them with blood. With all his formidable will, he cleared his mind of distractions and narrowed his focus to the inert chest in front of him. As he penetrated the chest wall, his efforts were rewarded by the rush of escaping air. Insertion of the tube was made more difficult by the persistent trembling in his hands, but finally he succeeded. The water in the bottle would act as a one-way valve preventing the air from being sucked back into the chest and allowing the lung to reinflate. Almost immediately it was easy to see the improvement in Steve's breathing, and his colour improved slightly. Mark could only pray that it would be sufficient to keep him alive until help arrived; he would worry about infection from the improvised instruments and the likelihood of pneumonia later.

Mark sat back on his heels, exhaustion seeping into his awareness as he completed the makeshift operation. He was shivering from cold and emotional reaction, and realised belatedly how cold Steve must be. He sat down beside him to share what body heat he could, forced once again to sit and wait. His eyes didn't move from the almost imperceptible rise and fall of his son's chest, measuring out his life in shallow increments of exhalations, and his fingers again sought out the rapid pulse in the wrist, comforting at least in its regularity. He resumed reminiscing in a soft voice, no longer believing that Steve could hear him, but needing to do something constructive, because sitting without taking any action was intolerable.

It could have been hours later, but was probably only minutes, when he heard shouting in the distance. Trusting it was the police and not the hitman returning, Mark picked up the gun and, holding it somewhat distractedly, fired off three shots as the universal signal for help. Hope choked him as, perversely, fear increased with the promise of help so near.

Footsteps approached fast, and it was Cheryl who burst into the clearing first. She stopped, aghast at the gory scene in front of her. Mark didn't give her a chance to contemplate its implications, but started to bark out orders in a voice harsh with overuse and stress.

"Steve doesn't have a lot of time. Call for a medical chopper now. The open area back there will be an adequate landing site."

Cheryl obeyed, and soon the chopper could be heard in the distance, and a stretcher arrived to carry Steve to meet it. Mark supervised his transportation and walked beside the stretcher, steadying the water bottle, being careful not to dislodge the tube.

Cheryl observed Mark's extreme pallor and slightly unsteady gait. A sudden thought struck her, and she grasped his arm supportively.

"Are you hurt?" she asked anxiously, the first thought automatically entering her head being, Steve will kill me if anything happens to him.

"I wasn't shot," he answered rather evasively. "It was Steve they were after, not me."

Further explanation was interrupted by the arrival of the helicopter. Mark accompanied Steve back, but the actual flight was forever a void in his memory. He concentrated his waning resources on his son, making sure that an IV was installed to replenish his fluid levels and mitigate the shock of blood loss, but all his movements were mechanical. His thoughts revolved relentlessly as he watched the still body of his son, blood and bruises standing out starkly against the shocking pallor of his face. 'Still' was not a word he usually associated with his son. Steve was normally so vibrantly alive, his steady, strong presence effortlessly commanding attention in any environment.

As they arrived at the hospital, Jesse and Amanda were waiting. Steve was removed from the chopper and rushed down into the operating room while Amanda helped Mark towards the stairs. She eyed his blood-encrusted clothes with concern, but, when he denied that he was hurt, she concluded that all the blood was Steve's.

Mark's sight narrowed down to the vision of his son disappearing into the elevator, and as he vanished from view, the tunnel collapsed. As the responsibility for his son passed into other hands, the determination that had been all that was keeping him on his feet melted with the speed of a snowball in hell, his knees buckled and the floor rose up to greet him.

Amanda was horrified when he collapsed, and guilt-stricken. She had observed the signs of shock he had displayed on arrival, but had attributed them to the trauma of recent events. She knew how devastating it was for him when Steve's life was hanging in the balance. Now she realised that the shock could be as much due to blood loss and injury as it was psychological, and that, despite his assurances, she was negligent to have assumed otherwise. With assistance, she hurried Mark to the ER where he was carefully examined. To her relief, there were no life-threatening injuries, just multiple contusions, the most severe of which was the head injury. However, she was extremely puzzled when the blood loss was identified as originating from two deep nicks in the veins of Mark's left arm.

The attending looked at Amanda doubtfully. "Should I call in a psych consult?"

"What are you talking about? You think that's self-inflicted?" Amanda asked incredulously.

"Don't you?" was the immediate retort.

"No," Amanda said with complete conviction. "Mark Sloan would never attempt suicide."

"Are you sure? If he thought his son was dying..."

Amanda knew that Mark would be destroyed if Steve died. She could imagine him slowly fading away, closing himself off from the world, but never deliberately taking his own life. Besides, Steve wasn't dead, and Amanda knew with absolute certainty that Mark would never give up on his son.

"There's a logical explanation," she argued stubbornly. "If he really wanted to kill himself, he would do a far more efficient job. Wait till he wakes up and give him a chance to clear this up. I'll accept full responsibility and stay in his room."

With the IV replacing his lost fluids, Mark's vitals soon rebounded, and he recovered consciousness a few hours later. He lay still for a minute, his whole body aching, but unable to account for such unaccustomed soreness. As memory surged back, he struggled to rise, and Amanda moved to his side from the chair she was occupying.

"Steve?" he questioned desperately.

"He's in ICU." Amanda gently reassured him. "He came through surgery well, and, although he's not out of the woods yet, things are looking good. Jesse's with him and...where do you think you're going?"

Mark was swinging his legs round in an attempt to get out of bed. "I need to see him, Amanda."

"You can't help him if you collapse again." Amanda cautioned.

The doctor in him acknowledged the sense in this but was overridden by the anxious father. He needed to see his son to banish the gory images and painful interaction they had last shared. He had to assess his condition for himself.

"Amanda, I need to be there when he wakes up. If I'm not, he'll assume the worst, and you know what he's like."

"Yes, just as bad as you," she said with asperity. "Honestly, Mark, with the drugs he's on there's no chance he'll wake up before morning, so you can get a good night's sleep in a nice comfortable bed and see him then."

Mark hesitated, running out of arguments. "I'm willing to compromise," he offered. "Just let me see him tonight, then you can bring me back and I'll sleep here." Sensing her weakening, he pressed on. "I won't be able to rest properly until I see him."

Unable to resist the plea and the vulnerability in those gentle eyes, Amanda capitulated.

"I'll take you there." Now it was her turn to hesitate. "Mark, before I do that, I have to know what happened to you. How did you ... get hurt?"

Understanding dawned in Mark's eyes and a hint of mischief. "I needed the blood." He explained the crisis he had faced and his unique solution. "For me to convince Tremelo that Steve was dead, it had to be immediately convincing, because if it even occurred to him to check, well..." Mark broke off, unable to contemplate, far less articulate, the agony of helplessly witnessing the cold-blooded murder of his son. "Steve had already contributed more than his share," he continued dryly. "I merely added a soupcon for colour, so to speak." He shrugged. "It worked, so I suppose I was convincing."

Amanda smiled, "I think it was very creative and, as you say, it worked. Come on, I'll take you to see Steve." She wheeled him in a chair to Steve's room. He subconsciously noted the presence of an armed guard at his door and at Steve's, but was too focused on his son to draw inferences at the time.

He greeted Jesse with a distracted smile, drinking in the sight of his son lying peacefully in the bed, no longer drenched in blood and wracked with pain. However, resting his hand on his forehead, he could feel the fever that raged within.

"You saved his life, Mark," Jesse assured him quietly, observing the worry in his friend's eyes. "He would never have made it to the hospital without your intervention. Now, his vital signs are remarkably strong, considering all that's happened. An infection was inevitable, given the circumstances, but we should know soon if he's going to respond to the antibiotics."

"He's going to be fine," Mark asserted with all the confidence he could muster, partly because the alternative was unthinkable and partly because he couldn't believe that Steve could have survived the primitive conditions of his earlier ministrations to die now, surrounded by the latest life-saving technology. He fought back the insidious doubts that suggested otherwise, knowing that pessimism would merely sap his strength.

He turned to Amanda. "I'm sorry, honey, I can't leave him, not until he's out of danger." He couldn't explain his superstitious notion that Steve wouldn't die if he was there. It made no medical sense, but it was a faith he subconsciously clung to.

Amanda nodded reluctantly, realising the futility of further protest, but unwilling to support any further stresses on his system.

"I'll get you something to eat."

Mark made himself as comfortable as possible while Amanda hurried off. Out of the corner of his eye, Mark saw the guard outside, before the door shut behind her. Startled, he turned to Jesse.

"Didn't they catch Tremelo?"

Jesse shook his head, loathe to pass on the bad news. "There was no sign of him, although they threw up quite a dragnet in the mountains."

Mark digested the implications of that information. "Do the police have any idea yet who's behind it all?"

"Not as far as I know," was Jesse's quiet reply.

Mark stared grimly at his son's vulnerable form lying so still on the bed. "Then it's not over yet."