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Chapter 8
4 months earlier
Shay
“What you see out of this room is to remain unspoken of.”
I nod at Keir as he adjusts the walking aids he gave me a few days ago to use for support. My wounds have healed up as much as possible under these circumstances, but my legs and muscles are very weak. If I was back at home, I would be going through an extensive therapy program to rebuild strength in the muscles I’ve lost. There is no such thing here. Keir has done the best he could with the supplies he has. Without him, I wouldn’t have survived much longer. I owe him and Josh everything.
“Ready?” he asks.
“I’ve been ready for weeks. It was you that kept me locked in here like some prisoner.”
“For your own good. You’ll be thanking me after you see what I face daily. Trust me, these walls are a sanctuary, even for me. Why do you think I come in here to work on files? It wasn’t just to keep you company, as entertaining as you are.”
I shake my head. I don’t think anything can shock me. I’ve seen people shot, beheaded, and blown apart in front of me. I doubt anything can be as bad as what I’ve witnessed in the army. But, like a good girl, I keep my mouth shut and concentrate on moving toward the door. It’s amazing how much thought it takes to walk when you feel like an invalid. It takes so much energy to get from A to B. Besides, I promised to behave, and that takes all my power to do. Anyone who knows me well knows I’m a hothead, especially where the wellbeing of others is concerned. I’d give up my life to protect someone else. It’s the way I was brought up, even before I joined the army.
“This way.” Keir points to the left and he walks at my pace beside me. He never once rushes me or gets impatient. He’s the perfect caregiver. His skills are wasted here.
I gaze into a couple of passing rooms, but nothing is out of the ordinary. Patients lie in white beds, hooked up to machines. By the look of things, they’ve been injured in wars. Everything is clean and tidy. Exactly what I’d expect from a medical wing.
“This is the ICU wing,” Keir tells me.
“How do people end up here? It doesn’t look like the surrounding area is much of a warzone. The chaos seems far enough away.”
“Most of these patients are Iraqi soldiers. They come here to get emergency health care. I try my best. We’re getting more and more supplies sent over from the States, but sometimes it just isn’t enough to deal with the number of patients we get. We have to revert back to old techniques often.”
I nod, even though I have so many unanswered questions rattling around my head. I can’t help but wonder why the U.S.A is involved in such a project. It doesn’t make sense. These soldiers are the enemy. American soldiers come over here to put an end to the war. Something doesn’t sit right with me.
We walk through a set of double doors and I stop to catch my breath. My body and mind haven’t caught up with one another yet. I want to do more to help around here, but my body is still weak and easily exhausted. It’s frustrating the life out of me because I’m not one to sit around and mope. I’m the active type, never sitting still for too long.
“We’re now entering the mother and baby wing,” Keir informs me.
“And this is where a mother and child come for help?”
Keir shrugs and we carry on walking. “They come here to give birth.”
“Okay.”
That doesn’t sound too bad. Then I’m broken out of my thoughts by a blood-curdling scream. I look into the first window we approach, and a baby is being ripped out of her mother’s arms by three men dressed in camouflage. The man standing to the side is holding a gun to the woman’s head. I try to move to her aid, but Keir grabs my arm and stops me. He shakes his head and I look back toward the woman as she falls to the floor in tears. She looks broken. The men barge past me, knocking me into Keir. He catches me and straightens me up. I walk into the room and find the woman a sobbing mess.
“Please, get my baby back,” she cries in broken English.
“She speaks English. Why did they do that?” I ask Keir.
I lay my walking sticks alongside the bed and bend down to help the woman back into a chair.
Keir is watching me. He doesn’t answer my question, but as soon as I have the woman in the chair, I limp toward him and hit his shoulder. “Why. Did. They. Do. That?”
“It’s their rules, Shay. We don’t question them.”
“So where will that child go?” I whisper shout.
“To a new paying family.” He turns away and walks out of the room.
“I’ll be back,” I tell the woman as I pick up my sticks and march out of the room faster than I’ve moved in weeks.
Witnessing that baby being snatched away from its mother does something to me inside. It’s made me feel murderous. What is this place? Who would do that for money?
