Saturday afternoon: Jamie and Terry, Horton Plaza, San Diego

[x-crowdofone.livejournal.com]

Jamie and Terry, out combing the ruins for survivors, find one in a ruined store.



Three days. Three days after the earthquakes and tsunami and there was still nothing like order in San Diego. Law enforcement was doing what they could but it was no secret that rioting and looting was still a real threat. The Red Cross headquarters had guards and everyone worked in pairs or better yet teams as they ranged through the rubble, looking for missing persons and salvaging supplies whenever they found them. The Red-X crew was in demand for just those kind of tasks. The various mutants who had volunteered in the years since its inception were, to a man, well trained and willing to use their powers to help people. Aside from a great PR opportunity, Red X did important work.

Terry had been paired with Jamie, if the word could be used when there were four of your partner around at any given moment. They were assigned to the mostly destroyed Gaslamp District. The mall at the heart of it was cavernous and though it had been swept on numerous occasions, there was still a chance of people missing. Terry wiped her face with her grey t-shirt. "I don't hear anything. How about you?"

"Nothing on this end of this floor, that I can tell," Jamie said tiredly. It was all very well to be able to be the six people he was doing the work of, but he couldn’t sleep in shifts. Much more of this and he was afraid he was going to start seeing why Lorna loved coffee so much. "We’re getting pretty close to the Zales, though, so we’ll wanna watch out. Unless it’s been hit already, I suppose."

Terry nodded and took a deep breath, walking forward slowly. Suddenly she stopped and grabbed his arm. "Jamie, wait. There’s something wrong." She closed her eyes, the better to hear the faint fast gasping noise at the edge of her hearing, like a broken hiss. "I don’t know..."

"Looters wrong or victims wrong?" Jamie asked, fanning dupes out around the area to try to get an idea what had caught her attention. "I don't have your ears."

Terry shook her head, "No, its not that. It’s like...air coming out of a balloon. It’s really faint." She turned in a slow circle ending up facing the way they were going, "I think it's up ahead. Just be careful. Don't get too far ahead."

Jamie nodded and brought the array of dupes in a little closer. "Might be--and damn, I hope it's not, but it might be a gas leak." He took a careful sniff--nothing yet, but there was still dust thick in the air, it was hard to smell anything. "If it is, we'd better be ready to run."

Terry paled slightly, "Isn't the food court behind us?" They rounded the corner and stepped into a puddle of water, dirty and brown. A mini-lake spread out before them. "What do you think we should do? We haven't even cleared this level yet."

Jamie rubbed his chin apprehensively. "I dunno. If it is gas . . . we should probably find out and call it in so they can get people down here. Are we close enough yet you can tell anything else?" The sound was just pricking on the edges of his hearing now, too quiet to take note of if he hadn't already known it was there.

"As I've never heard a gas leak before, I'm afraid not." She listened more intently and grimaced as she heard a faint scraping noise followed by an even fainter groan. Terry sighed, "It doesn't really matter. There's someone up there, I think. We'll just have to be careful. Call back anyway, maybe?"

Jamie's expression went a little blank for a moment as he reached for one of the dupes working in other parts of the city, and he blinked slowly as he let the connection subside again. "Done. But it’ll be a while before they can get anybody out here, everybody's stretched way too thin." He dashed the back of one hand across his eyes and stepped to the edge of the waterline. "We're gonna want to avoid actually going through the water if we can--no telling if there's broken glass or whatever under there--maybe there?" He pointed to where a fallen column bridged the flooded area, its surface barely visible under an inch or so of water. "How’s your balance beam?"

"Well, I'm not Jubilee..." Terry took a deep breath and shrugged, "We'll just have to be careful." She looked around and spotted a sporting goods store. "Hang on." She dashed off, crawling carefully through the shattered front window. Inside everything was dark. The floor was littered with product, shelves knocked over and displays broken. Terry ignored it all and grabbed two short oars before making her way back out to Jamie, "Walking stick. For balance."

"Good idea," Jamie said, taking one. "Was worried about swinging around a metal staff in here, if there's maybe gas." He set off across the submerged column, moving low, and as quickly as he could without losing his balance. "It’s a little slippery, but not too bad--come on across, but watch your step."

Terry nodded and followed him, her tennis shoes thankfully steady enough on the concrete provided she moved slowly enough. For a while all she could hear was the sound of the water splashing over their feet, loud enough to cover the hissing for now. She only had to balance once with her improvised crutch before they were across and back on drier ground. She held them there, listening again, "Over there I think."

Jamie nodded and moved in the direction she pointed, toward a ruined storefront, its shattered front window displaying only rubble. Another column, probably from an upper level, had slammed through it like a battering ram. "Hello?" he called. "Red Cross emergency workers--if anybody can hear me, call out if you can."

The call in return was rasping and faint, the sound of a voice that had already screamed itself out, wordless and pained and hopeless. Terry heard it clearly but didn't know if Jamie would. She pitched her voice to carry a little better than his had, "We're going to come in there to get you. Just stay calm, okay?" She dropped her voice to a low murmur, "How do we get in?"

"The door looks mostly clear, if it's not jammed or wedged from the other side." Jamie gave it a tentative push, and it grated open a fraction; he put his shoulder into it and managed to get it open enough for them to pass through. He clicked on his flashlight and played it over the ruined interior; devastated shelves of expensive glassware littered the floor, and it looked like the broken column had crashed headlong into the back wall, bringing parts of it down. "Oh, hell, be careful walking in here," he told Terry, then raised his voice again. "We're coming in. Help's on the way. Can you let us know where you are?"

"It's a small store. Let's just look." Terry moved carefully passed him, brushing glass out of her way with the sweep of her foot before stepping down, trying to minimize the amount of noise pollution. "I'll go to the backroom, you look out here."

"Right. Be careful." Dupes were only going to get in the way here; he started quartering the store, stepping carefully between the glass shards. It was a lot more likely that somebody would be trapped back where the column had crashed into the wall, he suddenly realized, and headed in that direction.

The oar doubled nicely as a quick way to sweep glass chunks out of her way and did an admirable job levering the heavy stockroom door open. "Hello? If you can hear me, please make a noise. Anything." The first little corridor was empty, flattened cardboard boxes carpeting the floor. Turning the corner into the actual storage was a different matter. The shelving had once towered over her head, she could still see some of it nailed to the walls, twice her height. An enormous box teetered right above her head and she ducked back. "Hello?" There was a heavy rasping sound but no voice.

Jamie reached the back wall and winced at the damage. Rubble was everywhere, and he had to jump out of the way as a dangling light finally let go, crashing to the floor. "I'm fine!" he called to Terry. "But I don't see anybody out here. How about you?"

The crash actually got a reaction. Not from Terry but from the storeroom. Over her head, there was a nearly breathless moan. Terry looked up at the box again and then down, realizing there was a ladder under all the mess. "Jamie, come here, quick!" She scrambled over the tumble of broken statuary and glass and cardboard, swearing in Irish when she sliced her hand open. There must be a crawl space above the shelves.

Jamie vaulted over broken glass and hurdled the fallen column, skidding through the storeroom door. "Where--shit, your hand. You take care of that, where's our rescuee?"

"Watch out above you!" Terry backed up a little further and saw she was right, there was a larger loft over the corridor, which explained why the ceiling there was so much lower. "Up there, I think. There's a ladder...” She was already yanking a bandage out of her bag and wrapping it around her hand.

"Okay." Jamie found the ladder after a moment's searching, and looked it over--a little bent, but it should support his weight all right. "See what you can do about clearing a better path back, maybe, in case we need to rig a stretcher?" He shoved his flashlight through his belt and started climbing, carefully; when he could see into the crawlspace, he grabbed it again and shone the beam around. "Anybody up here?"

There was a soft whimpering sound then the rasp of 'help me.' The only sound in the silent shop, it sounded like gunfire despite its near voiceless power.

Terry paled and nodded. "Sure. Give me another set of hands? And get that box out of the way." She bent to work immediately, without waiting for a response.

Jamie stretched his hand down and dropped a dupe the short distance to the floor, then clambered the rest of the way up into the crawlspace, his light finding the crumpled form in one corner. "Hey, there you are," he said soothingly. "My name's Jamie, I'm with the Red Cross, I'm here to help you. Can you move at all?"

Terry and Jamie worked quickly to clear the way through the storeroom and out into the shop. Up in the loft, the pale terrified young man shook his head faintly and tried to pull his arm free of the box it was caught under. A harsh scraping sound filled the space and he moaned. "Stuck." he whispered. There was blood on his shirt and his face, tear streaking cutting through the grime. His other arm was twisted in a way that clearly showed why he hadn't moved the box himself.

"Got at least one broken arm up there and maybe some other injuries," the Jamie helping Terry told her. Up in the loft, the other one moved closer and looked for a good handhold on the box. "If I lift this off you, can you pull your arm out from under?"

Terry frowned and shoved a heavy box out of the way. "Any idea when someone will get here to help? You can carry him but if he's got more injuries, moving him might be bad."

The man whimpered and blinked, "I'll try." As the box's weight left him, he was able to drag his arm out. His long sleeve had been sliced to ribbons, glass still stuck out of his skin, thin, pale white and curved. Thousand of shards rained down from bottom of the box, with wire and metal following.

"Jesus Christ," both Jamies muttered. The one in the main store continued "Faster than they were thirty seconds ago--the arm that's not broken is all sliced to hell, I really don't think we should move him until he gets it looked at by somebody competent to take the glass out. Let's get this nice and clear."

Upstairs, the other Jamie set the box of former fluorescent lightbulbs back down. "There's an ambulance on its way--they'll take care of you as soon as they get here. Let's try and keep that arm elevated until they do, huh?" At least it wasn't bleeding a whole lot. He found an empty box, around the right height, and set it next to the man. "Could you rest your arm on there for me? And I've got water here, if you want some."

The man blinked several times then rasped out, "Yes," in his shattered, over-worked voice. He moved his arm carefully though the agony it caused him was clear to see.

Terry looked a bit ill, "He's been there for days, right?" She shook her head so that Jamie wouldn't answer and just went back to clearing a path out of the store. She kept an ear open and prayed silently that someone would get here soon. There was still a lot of mall left to clear.

The Jamie upstairs kept a wary eye on the lacerated arm in case the movement caused the scabs to tear, then held his water bottle so the injured man could sip from it. "Not too fast, now--you don't want to just bring it right back up."

A moment later, both Jamies breathed a sigh of relief. "Ambulance just pulled up," he reported to Terry. "I'm leading them straight here."

Terry cleared the last bit of debris and nodded, pushing sweat-damp hair off her foreheard. "We should go on. The medics can take it from here and you can catch up. I'm still worried about that hissing noise and we have a lot to do before our shift is over."

"Miles to go before we, um, nap for a few hours and start all over again, probably fortified by lukewarm MREs?" Jamie shot her a wan smile. "Don't tell anybody, but the me back at the mansion has a secret stash of barbecue leftovers with our names on it."

"Once more into the breach, dear friends." Terry sighed and gave him a tired grin, "That sounds great. Smuggle it back here will ya?" She clapped him on the shoulder and headed back out into the mall, looking for the next missing person.