Disaster Among the Heavens, Don E Peavy Sr [reading rainbow books txt] 📗

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Chapter 5
Meanwhile, in a bunker two-plus miles beneath the earth’s surface at a place called NORAD, Colorado, the Doctor watched his patient take his last few breaths before passing from this world into the next.
He had done all he could do with limited supplies given that his patient refused to be taken to a hospital. As an emergency room doctor, he had seen many patients die before – one cannot work in a county medical facility without death and dying being constant companions. Yet, this particular patient, whom he had only come to know over the past few days, affected him in a way unmatched by any previous patient, including those whom he had known a lot longer and even those who were related to him.
Of course, Johnny Mark Diggs was no longer a staff member of the county hospital. In what was to him a devastating blow, he had been “placed on administrative leave” from the county hospital. With the revolution going on, many of the white patients and administrators felt endangered by the presence of Negroes who might sabotage the hospital and pose a threat to the “health and life of its white patients and staff,” as the hospital administrator put it.
Dr. Diggs felt particularly victimized by his dismissal since he not only had not participated in the revolution; he had not even considered doing so. His record was free of any hint of subversive activity. Nor could his discharge be sustained on guilt by association grounds -- he did not know any of the participants in the revolution.
Diggs responded by retaining a local civil rights attorney to get him a restraining order to keep the hospital from barring him from his work. Thus far he had only thrown good money after bad, as the saying goes. He was still waiting for a court date. The lawyer had promised one within three days, and that had been two weeks ago. And so on that day when he received a telephone call from his present patient telling him he was a close friend of the Doctor’s wife and needed his help, Diggs was more than eager to respond – that was, until he learned who was on the other end of the telephone. After all, if one is going to be hanged at sunrise, one ought to take full advantage of the reprieve since additional misdeeds can neither enlarge the noose nor prolong the agony. There is a self-fulfilling prophecy to injustice in that it brings about the very thing which did not exist prior to its “fingering” of the accused.
“Can’t you do anything to make him more comfortable?” pleaded Fredda Turner. She wiped the patient’s forehead with a moist cloth and rubbed his hairy cheeks.
The Doctor let go of his thoughts. He turned his attention to his patient. “No, I’m out of what medication I brought and what little I found in the ambulance. I’m surprised he’s held on this long. He’s determined to see this thing through.”
The Patient tried to speak but the words would not come; instead, only blood issued forth from his mouth. The Doctor moved over to him and knelt beside him where he lay on an Army cot. The Doctor took hold of his patient’s hand.
“Try not to speak. Everything’s going as planned. You gotta hold on for another 48 hours and we’ll have you out of here,” offered the Doctor. He took hold of the Patient’s right hand while Fredda held his left and continued to wipe his forehead.
“Why is he sweating so?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. Maybe he is trying to sweat out the great pain he’s in,” answered the Doctor. Again, the Patient tried again to speak. He opened his eyes for the first time in several days and tried again and again to speak, but each time only moans and blood escaped his lips. He moved his eyes between Fredda and Diggs and squeezed each of their hands then convulsed into a violent cough.
Fredda moved quickly to a nearby first aid kit from which she extracted some cloth and returned to wipe the Patient’s mouth as the Doctor elevated his head and massaged the Patient’s neck, chest and patted him lightly on his back. The coughing subsided.
“Shit, Doc, I thought he was a goner for sure,” exclaimed Fredda. She threw the cloths into a nearby trash can. She then wiped the Patient’s face with a damp towel which she picked up off the floor next to his cot.
Somewhat relaxed, the Patient took the Doctor’s pen from his shirt pocket and motioned for a piece of paper which Fredda tore from a notebook in which the Doctor had been scribbling and handed it to the Patient. The Doctor gave her a questioning look. Fredda realized her error and handed the Doctor the notebook which he held for the Patient who wrote on the paper, “Codes?”
“Yes, dawlin', I got 'em,” answered Fredda, who also knelt beside the Patient. Her smile dissipated and her demeanour grew tenser at the mentioning of the word “codes” which brought to mind the Director.
Fredda’s heart was torn asunder by the decision to kill only the second man in her life to ever treat her like she was somebody. The Director’s Assistant, now her patient, had been the first. She begged the group sent to get the codes to let the Director live. They could not come up with a suitable plan that would allow him to live and give them the time they needed to get to Colorado. And thus, she found herself torn between the two men she loved the most.
Yes, she loved them. It mattered not what they thought of her or how they felt about her. She loved them both with an unconditional, unwavering love that now pierced her heart and caused her to ache in the depths of her soul.
She felt like Rahab of the Scarlet Cord, who must have lamented the loss of her people even as she escaped to be with the invading Israelites. But unlike Rahab, Fredda would find no resting place among rebels. For this woman, torn between two lovers, there was no sunshine or future hope to eclipse the setting of her past. Thus she looked at her patient as the knife of pain dug deeper into her soul.
She did not understand what this rebel whom she loved so much hoped to achieve through his revolution. Yet, she could not resist admiring him for his efforts. At least he was doing more than just standing on the corner crying the blues as so many were doing in her home of Barbados and her adopted home of Chicago. Neither politician nor prophet, Fredda knew that violence was an ill tribute to Dr. King’s peace movement – a movement in which she believed. Further, she doubted violence could succeed in a nation such as America which has been built and sustained with violence and which had won every conflict fought on its soil. She smiled at this later thought for it was the Assistant who had taught her the history of America and yet she had reached a conclusion quite contrary to what he hoped to teach her. Thus it was that she worried and wondered and kept all these things to herself.
Fredda loved the Assistant in a special way – a way far different from how she loved the Director and which she could not quite explain – though she had tried. Oh, how she had tried to bring peace to her mind and calm her aching heart incited by her actions in bringing about the death of the man she loved and who loved her and cared for her so deeply.
How could you do such a thing? The question not only tortured her mind, it pierced her soul.
Fredda tried to remember the words of Ayn Rand in her book, “The Virtue of Selfishness,” which had such a profound impact on her when the Director gave it to her as a gift on the seventh day of their courtship. She struggled to recall the dichotomy between sacrifice and surrender in an attempt to take refuge under the concept of sacrifice. It was her understanding of the difference between sacrifice and surrender that had helped Fredda to reconcile herself with prostitution given the greater life and good she was able to do as a result of her work.
However, she could never articulate just what the “greater” good is she gave up the director to get. After all, she did not believe in the violent revolution of the Assistant and did not think it would achieve anything. Yet, she chose the Assistant over the director and in silence consented to the death of the man she loved. Hence, the question persisted and grew in intensity as did the pain it caused her.
Though she tried and tried, she could never answer the question and this inability led to the silence which engulfed and confounded her even now despite the urge within her to say something to this suffering man she loved so much and gave so much for. There are times in one’s life when the greatest act of love is silence. Fredda was silent; though silence exacerbated rather than ameliorated her pain.
“Uh-uhhhhhhhhh!” Fredda jumped at the groans of the Assistant. She returned to the cot and sat on the floor beside it opposite Doctor Diggs.
Again, the Assistant tried to speak but only air and blood issued forth. Fredda wiped away the blood. Groans and moans followed as the Assistant tried to sit up. He was restrained by the Doctor.
“Easy, easy,” cautioned the Doctor.
However, the Assistant began to struggle with all the might of one caught in the arms of death. He threw off the Army blanket which covered him and with a frail and stiff right hand tried to unbuckle his belt.
“Here, let me help you with that,” offered Fredda.
Doctor Diggs looked in astonished wonder at the dexterity of his bunker mate as she unbuckled and removed the belt, almost in one swift movement. In return, he got a “say it and die” look from Fredda.
She was about to toss the belt aside but the Assistant moaned and groaned and pointed at it.
“What is it, honey?” she asked. More moans and groans.
“Let me see that,” offered the Doctor. He took hold of the belt and examined it skilfully close, first on the outside then on its inside. It was on the inside of the black leather belt that he saw the thin slit which he forced open and from which he extracted a small folded piece of paper. This caused the Patient to settle down.
“What is it?” asked Fredda.
“I don’t know,” answered Diggs. He showed her the paper on which was printed five lines of cryptic text. He showed the paper to the Assistant.
“What the hell is this?” he asked.
The Assistant moved his eyes slowly over the five lines of cryptic writing. He motioned for a pen and paper which the Doctor handed him.
With great difficulty and amidst further groans and moans, the Assistant wrote, “Type in first three lines.”
Fredda and the Doctor exchanged looks of bewilderment. Doctor Diggs shifted his gaze toward his Patient.
“Will that fire the missiles?” The Doctor’s voice was shaken and barely audible.
The Assistant shook his head to indicate no. Fredda then moved over to the console which was just a few steps away and against the wall.
“Hold it! Just what