Li tried to call for help, but her lungs didn"t seem to work properly and only a whimper came out. Her head was wrenched back as the Scorpion grabbed a fistful of her hair and pulled hard, exposing her neck. She kneeled on the concrete lip of the well, clutching at her belly as the Scorpion stroked his bloodstained knife across the pale curve of her neck, preparing to slit her throat.
Li could feel herself starting to pa.s.s out. A red mist was coming down over her eyes. She marshalled the last of her strength, stiffened her arm and sent it catapulting back against the Scorpion"s legs. It caught him squarely across the knees as he stood on the concrete wall beside her. The knife flew from his hand and he staggered backwards. The heels of his cowboy boots slipped over the edge of the well shaft and he windmilled his arms, trying to regain his balance. For an instant it seemed as though he would make it, but the remains of the henbane in his system made his legs fail him at the last second. He fell back into the well, grabbing at Li"s long black hair as he went.
Li felt a huge pain in her head and her whole body jerked back, following the Scorpion down the well. Then the clump of hair the Scorpion was holding came out at the roots and she sprawled on the wall with the top half of her body inside the shaft. The Scorpion fell without a cry but she could hear his bones cracking as he hit the walls on the way down.
"That"s for Hakim," she whispered as she heard the body hit the bottom of the shaft with a dull thud and a splash of water. She hung balanced over the well and a red mist filled her head, then turned to deepest black.
TWENTY SIX There was a bright light.
Li swatted at the light with her hand but it wouldn"t go away.
"Li. Wake up."
Someone was pinching her earlobe with sharp little nips. Li frowned in annoyance and heard Paulo laugh softly beside her.
She opened her eyes and squinted up into his face. "Will you stop that?" she tried to say, but all that came out was a moan.
"h.e.l.lo," said Paulo, smiling down at her.
"Where am I?" asked Li.
"Oh, that"s an original line," drawled Hex from the other side of her. Li turned to him in annoyance and wished she hadn"t. She closed her eyes until her head stopped spinning.
"You"re in a private hospital in Rabat," said Alex, his face swimming into view above her.
"Rabat?" asked Li faintly.
"Its the capital of Morocco, dummy," said Amber, appearing beside Alex.
Li scowled again. Here she was, lying in a hospital bed after defeating the Scorpion single-handed and all they could do was insult her.
The Scorpion!
Li"s eyes widened suddenly and she tried to sit up. An iron band of pain around her belly made her sink back into the bed again. "The Scorpion," she whispered. "In the well."
"Not any more," said Alex. "He"s lying in a morgue."
"And his men and his mother are under arrest and telling lots of tales," added Amber.
Li gave a satisfied smile. She had vowed to get the Scorpion and his mother and she had succeeded. Her hand reached down, exploring her belly. There was a surprisingly small dressing on the left side of her stomach, which hardly seemed to account for the amount of pain she was in. "What happened?" she asked.
"Another original line," drawled Hex. "They just keep coming."
"Shut up, Hex," said Paulo mildly.
"But I"m allowed to tease her, now she"s out of danger," said Hex.
"I was in danger?" asked Li.
"The knife sliced through your intestines," explained Alex. "And there was a lot of internal bleeding. By the time Amber"s uncle arrived with the helicopters, you were in a bit of a state."
"That is an understatement," said Paulo, his face becoming serious for a minute as he remembered how they had nearly lost Li.
When Hakim"s mother had come running into the main square to warn them that the Scorpion had escaped with one of the Kalashnikovs, they had wasted valuable time searching the village before they had discovered Li, lying still and pale beside the well in a spreading pool of her own blood.
"Helicopters," said Li, and a vague memory came back to her of three black shapes cutting across the desert sky with their searchlights trawling the ground below. She remembered the blatting of the rotors and Paulo shielding her with his body from the blast of sand as the helicopters landed.
"You were airlifted here and went straight into surgery," said Alex. "That was two days ago."
"Two days!" gasped Li. "How did I lose two days?"
"Drugs," said Hex briefly. "Lots of drugs."
"Sedatives and painkillers," explained Alex.
"And am I OK now?"
"Why don"t we let the surgeon tell you that?" said Paulo. He moved back and Philippe Larousse took his place, smiling down at her.
"Philippe!" she cried, then winced as a stabbing pain shot through her.
"That will get better soon," said Philippe. "I repaired your intestine and st.i.tched you up. You"ve been on intravenous, high-dosage antibiotics to prevent peritonitis."
"That"s when your belly fills up with all the icky stuff from your punctured intestines and gets infected," explained Amber with relish.
"The antibiotics should counteract any infection," said Philippe, giving Amber a look. "You"re going to be left with a scar in your side, but otherwise you should make a complete recovery."
"Thank you," said Li, reaching out to squeeze the French surgeon"s hand. She licked her lips thirstily. "Can I have some water?"
They raised her bed slightly and poured out a beaker of iced water. Paulo held it to her mouth and Li sipped carefully. As she sipped, she spotted a familiar scarred face grinning at her from the bottom of the bed.
"Khalid!"
"He would not leave," said Philippe. "Not until he knew you were recovering."
Khalid moved up to the side of the bed. "I have news," he said. "Amber, her uncle, he give me a-" He stopped and looked over to Amber for help.
"A grant," said Amber.
"Yes! A grant. I am to go to school, then when I old enough, I train to be a doctor. I go back to help in the camps, just like Dr Philippe!"
"That"s wonderful, Khalid," smiled Li. "You"ll really make a difference."
"Is a better way, I think, than the path my friends take. They all die for nothing."
"So it was was your friends at the oil installation?" asked Li. your friends at the oil installation?" asked Li.
Khalid nodded.
"I"m sorry," whispered Li, remembering the three small body bags in the oil workers" compound. "I wish our minefield footage had been shown. It might just have stopped them."
"Oh, it was shown," said Hex, with a touch of bitterness. "But only after the attack on the oil installation. The attack was the big news, not the Sahawari camps or the minefields. It seems we value oil more than people."
"What about Jumoke and the others?" asked Li. "Where are they?"
Amber took over. "That"s where my uncle is now. He"s gone with the aid agencies to return them to their home villages. Philippe made sure Kesia"s arm was sorted before she went. The aid agencies are going to see what they can do in the villages, with my uncle"s help. No-one should be so poor they have to sell their children in the hope of giving them a better life. Oh, and Jumoke left this for you."
Amber laid a square of sugar paper on the bed. Li looked down at it and her eyes filled with tears. Jumoke had drawn a picture of herself standing between her mother and father. All three of them were smiling broadly, and a bright yellow sun shone overhead. Underneath the picture Jumoke had written, "Beloved One".
"We did good," whispered Li, looking round at the others.
"We did good," agreed the rest of Alpha Force.
"Excuse me?" said Khalid. "We did good?" He raised his one eyebrow disapprovingly. "That is not correct English."
The four of them looked at Khalid, then turned and looked questioningly at Li.
"Bed bath," she ordered.
Minutes later, the two young Moroccan women at the nurses" station jumped as a series of high screams came from the room at the end of the corridor. They both dropped their charts and began to run towards the closed door, but it suddenly burst open and a young Arab boy with a badly scarred face came running out. He was soaking wet and clutching his shirt to his chest. His eyes were bright with laughter as he skidded past the nurses, followed in quick succession by five people waving dripping flannels. There was a fair-haired boy, a tall black girl, a South American boy who winked at them as he ran past, a green-eyed boy and, finally, the respected French surgeon who had arrived at the hospital by helicopter two days earlier.
The horrified nurses watched them disappear round the corner at the other end of the corridor, then hurried into the room to check on their patient. Li was lying in the bed, clutching her side and gasping. Tears were running down her face.
"Do you have some pains?" asked one of the nurses, leaning over her.
"No," gasped Li, trying to stop laughing. "They all just left."
CHRIS RYAN"S TOP TEN TIPS FOR SURVIVAL IN A DESERT Near the beginning of this story, Alex gets the rest of the Alpha Force team to recite back to him the basic rules of any survival situation shelter, water, food and fire and these four factors certainly are vital for survival in a desert. However, if travelling into a desert anywhere in the world, you really do need to know a little more if you are to survive the merciless heat of some of the hottest areas in the world. Temperatures can rise to over 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer months!
1. PLANNING.
First off, never ever set out into a desert region without others knowing your travel plans, how long you plan to be away and the exact route you are aiming to take. Desert regions can be vast (the Sahara covers thousands of square miles!) and it will help in any rescue attempt if you stick to your plans as much as possible.
Equipment is also vital. When the Alpha Force team set out in the Unimog, they take sand ladders, shovels, spare fuel, plenty of water, communication equipment etc, and Alex is never without his basic survival kit. Members of the SAS are trained in survival techniques, yet if setting out on foot into a hot, dry area like a desert, each man would probably carry something like up to 100 lbs (or 45 kg) of equipment and that would be mostly water and supplies to ensure survival.
2. WATER.
This is absolutely VITAL to your survival you"ve all seen the movies of people staggering around in deserts dying of thirst and the heat of the environment will make you lose fluids quickly as heat makes you sweat (sweating is a way of the body trying to cool itself down). Without water, you could only last about two and a half days maximum in a hot desert and that"s if you stay in the shade and don"t move! On the move, in full sun, without water, you"d be lucky to get as far as seven kilometres before you start pa.s.sing out.
Fluid loss will produce a range of symptoms, from thirst, flushed skin, sleepiness and feeling sick to dizziness, a headache and an inability to walk even a swollen tongue if it gets serious. At the first signs, stop, rest and drink some water. Once I walked until I collapsed, I had really bad dreams, hallucinations and felt really sick.
Make sure you carry sufficient water with you on any desert expedition, and plan your route to pa.s.s by oases, wells and waterholes (these will be marked on maps). Remember, though, that wells may be deep and there might not be a handy bucket available; take a container and some rope with you so you can refill at wells wherever possible. If you are in a group, and you don"t know when rescue might be coming, ration your water to be on the safe side.
The Tuareg also showed Alpha Force a handy hint too: there could be water available at the lowest point between dunes and you can dig for this, just like they did. Make sure, though, that you wait until it"s dark; if you try digging in full sun, you"ll lose precious fluid through sweating.
TO KEEP FLUID-LOSS DOWN TO A MINIMUM:.
Find shade. Get out of the sun. If possible, don"t lie directly on hot sand try to raise yourself up from its surface so that air circulates all around you.
Don"t waste energy and fluids by moving about. Try to rest whenever you can.
Save your breath talk as little as possible, and breathe through your nose, not your mouth.
Eat only if essential; food requires water to be digested.
If a shortage of water is likely to be a problem, you can collect as much as a litre over a 24-hour-period if you make a solar still to collect evaporated water at night. Dig a hole about half a metre deep and about a metre across, then lay a sheet of plastic loosely across it, dipping in the centre to make the water run to a point. Then simply place a container under this point to collect the water.
3. SHELTER.
Shade and shelter is really important to protect you from the sun. Just like the creatures that live in the desert, you need to learn to make the most of any available shade shadows from the walls of wadis, or rock outcrops, for instance. You could also use the night-time to collect rocks and build a small shelter as a windbreak, draping clothing over it during the day to provide some protection from the sun.
If you"re in a broken-down vehicle, and you have told people where you are going and for how long, you should stay with the vehicle, making it easier for rescuers to find you, and providing shelter for you during the day. Don"t stay inside it, though metal containers get really hot in desert sun; it"s better to use its shade or rig up a shelter alongside it.
4. CLOTHING.
Learn from the locals the people who live in and travel through the desert. Wear flowing shirts and baggy trousers to increase air circulation and help prevent excessive sweating. Keep it loose.
Headgear is also important to protect your head and neck from the sun"s rays. Again, copy the desert peoples and fashion protection from any piece of cloth, draped over your head so that it hangs loosely down over your neck. You can wrap it round your face for warmth at night, or pull it across your face if caught in a sandstorm.
You should also protect your eyes from the glare of the sun. Your equipment should include sungla.s.ses or goggles made specially for desert conditions. If you don"t have these, protect your eyes from any sand blown around in the wind by covering them with cloth, cutting small eyeholes to enable you to see.
It"s also amazing how painful it can be to walk with sand in your boots, so wrap cloth round your boots to try and keep out the sand. And a final tip: if you do take your boots off, make sure you shake them well before you put them back on again you could find a scorpion or small snake has decided your boot will make a nice new home! I once found a snake in my sleeping bag; it was a cold night and the snake had crawled in there to keep warm. They curl up and go quite docile. I got out of my sleeping bag and shook it out!
5. FIRE.
In such hot conditions, fire might be the last thing on your mind, but the temperature can drop very rapidly overnight during winter months and a fire will provide much-needed warmth. Most desert scrub is very dry and will burn easily and, if you are following trails used by others, you might well find camel droppings too, which make great fuel.
You can use the fire to boil water for hot drinks, food (crumble a stock cube into hot water for an instant pick-me-up) or for treating any injuries. Its smoke will also be useful if there are rescuers out looking for you.
If you find yourself without matches, use the power of the sun"s rays focused through a piece of broken gla.s.s or a magnifying gla.s.s, camera lens or similar to form a pinpoint of light on your unlit fire. If you keep it steady, the fire should catch alight (you might need to blow on it gently once you get a glow).
6. FOOD.
It"s time for a diet, I"m afraid, if you"re stuck in a desert. Food may be one of the four survival essentials, but you can actually live for about three weeks without food, and as food requires water for digestion, it"s best to eat as little as possible. Fortunately, you probably won"t feel very hungry! If in a group, ration out supplies to the barest minimum, eating anything perishable first as it will spoil very quickly in these conditions. Avoid eating foods that are fatty, however, as fats take a lot of fluid to digest.
When I was escaping through the desert in the Gulf War, I had no food and that wasn"t really a problem, because I didn"t miss it. Your stomach shrinks so you don"t feel any hunger.
7. NAVIGATION.
In the middle of a desert, every dune can look the same and it is possible to convince yourself you are walking in a straight line and then find you have walked a circle. What a waste of energy! Some basic navigation skills can really help save your life if you have to be on the move.
Firstly, check out the position of the sun. In the northern northern hemisphere, when the sun is at its highest point in the sky, it will be due hemisphere, when the sun is at its highest point in the sky, it will be due south south. In the southern southern hemisphere, at midday, it will be due hemisphere, at midday, it will be due north north. A stick about a metre long will help you find north too, at any time of the day the sun is in the sky. Find a patch of clear ground and stand the stick upright in the ground. Mark where the end of its shadow falls use a pebble then wait at least fifteen minutes and mark the new position. If you join these two points, this will be an east-west line and northsouth will be at right angles to this. Remember, the sun rises in the east east, and sets in the west west, so you should now know which direction is which. You can do this at regular intervals if you are moving to make sure you are keeping going in the direction you want.
Secondly, it"s worth learning before you go anywhere dangerous how to recognize some of the major stars in the sky. In the northern hemisphere, the Pole Star is exactly due north and in the southern hemisphere, a constellation called the Southern Cross can be used to find south. Why not check out some books on the skies from your local library and try identifying the stars? It"s a useful skill that could, one day, save your life.