Seal Team Seven by Keith Douglass Page B

shock, then scrambled away, clutching his briefcase to his chest. Roselli turned back to Ellsworth.
    â€œHow’s the L-T, Doc? Just a shoulder, right?”
    â€œShut up, Razor.” Something in his voice, the intensity of his expression as he lifted Cotter’s arm and probed his side with bloody fingers, told Roselli that it was more than a flesh wound. He could see the blood welling up beneath the Lieutenant’s bullet-proof vest, coming through the vest’s armhole just beneath his arm. Ellsworth started packing the space with whole rolls of gauze.
    Cotter’s head rolled to one side. “Doc . . .”
    â€œYou lay still, Skipper. You took a round in the side.”
    â€œCan’t . . . feel m’legs.”
    â€œShit.” Ellsworth looked at Roselli. “Damn it, Razor, make yourself useful! Get me a Stokes from the helo!”
    â€œRight, Doc.”
    The UN people had finished off-loading the cardboard boxes from the two Land Rovers onto the first Sea Stallion, then pulled back as the pilot fed power to the rotors and lifted from the tarmac with shrill thunder. Seconds later, the number-two Sea Stallion touched down in the beacon-lit spot evacuated by the first. As the crew chief lowered the rear ramp, Roselli ran up and jumped aboard. “We got a man down!” he yelled. “Gimme a Stokes!”
    The crew chief pulled a Stokes stretcher off the bulkhead, a lightweight, open coffin-shape of wire mesh and white canvas straps used for transporting wounded. Roselli carried it back to Ellsworth on the double, then helped the corpsman gently lift Cotter into the basket.
    â€œHe took a round right through the armhole in his vest,” Ellsworth said as they strapped him down securely. He spoke rapidly, and Roselli had the impression that he wasn’t even speaking directly to him. “Collapsed his right lung and I think it went out through his spine! Damned, damned bad luck the Kevlar didn’t catch it! Shit! Shit! Friggin’ blood loss. Did it nick the post-caval? Gotta get him BVEs, stat.” Doc looked up at Roselli suddenly. “C’mon! Help me with him. Easy now.”
    Wildly, fragments of first-aid training flitted through Roselli’s mind. Don’t move a victim with a back injury! Except when leaving him where he was would be more dangerous.
    The second Sea Stallion was loading now, the rescued UN inspectors and Hercules crewmen filing aboard between two SEALs standing guard. Among them, Roselli glimpsed the man Cotter had saved, marked by the white bandages on his arm, his briefcase clutched to his chest like a shield. Good riddance to the bastard. If the L-T hadn’t been trying to save his ass . . .
    Commands crackled over Roselli’s radio, but none included his call sign and he ignored them. The SEAL platoon was starting to pull back from the airport buildings. The Sea Stallion was loaded, its ramp closing like the jaw of some gape-mouthed fish. The helo rose from the tarmac in a whirlwind of noise and dust, then swung low across the runway, angling toward the west and vanishing into night. One of the SuperCobras paced it.
    Ellsworth and Roselli positioned themselves on either side of Cotter’s Stokes, grabbed the carry straps, and lugged him toward the LZ where the third transport chopper was just touching down. Together, with an assist from the Marine crew chief, they hoisted him onto the Sea Stallion before the rear ramp was all the way down, then scrambled aboard themselves. Two by two, the rest of the SEALs followed. Three savage explosions ripped through the night as the trucks parked next to the terminal exploded one after the other. Garcia and Frazier, Gold Squad’s demo man, had been busy setting charges while the rest of the SEALs covered the perimeter.
    That perimeter was shrinking now as more and more of the SEALs climbed up the Sea Stallion’s ramp. MacKenzie and Lieutenant j.g. DeWitt were the last two men