Survival Reflex. Don Pendleton

Grosso State, Brazil

      The battle never really ends. It’s true that guns stop firing, smoke clears from the field and politicians mutter through negotiations in the name of statesmanship—but what about those who fight and bleed?

      Who tends the ragged wounds and clips the severed arteries? Who stitches or removes the ravaged organs? Who sets shattered bones and searches for new skin to cover burns?

      I do, the surgeon answered silently. For all the good it does.

      One truth Nathan Weiss had learned in years of military practice dogged his thoughts through every waking hour and in nightmares: no wound ever truly healed.

      Bones mended. Torn flesh produced scar tissue. Spilled blood could be replaced. Some organs were expendable.

      But what about the soul?

      How did a man really recover after he’d been shot, stabbed, tortured, set on fire or blasted with explosives? Even if he learned to walk again without a cane or limp, if he could show a more or less unblemished visage to the world, what was going on inside?

      What did he wish, hope, dream, regret?

      How did he claim the life he had before?

      Weiss couldn’t answer that one, and he’d long since given up on trying. Elbow-deep in blood again, he concentrated on the open body that demanded his attention at the moment. It was male, peppered with shrapnel wounds that seemed almost innocuous from the outside, but which wreaked havoc with the vital parts inside.

      “Do something, please,” he said, “about these goddamned flies.”

      His two assistants blinked at each other, each raising a bloody hand to point accusingly. They didn’t speak, but the expressive eyes above their surgical masks said everything the surgeon needed to hear.

      “I’m sorry, never mind,” he told them. “Please, just keep them from the wounds.”

      Heads bobbed in unison. They could do that, at least.

      Flies were a part of working in the field, along with ants and roaches, the occasional pit viper, leaky tents and wheezing generators that could fail at any time and plunge the operating tent into lethal darkness with the job unfinished.

      Just another day at the office.

      The young man before him had suffered wounds to both kidneys, but one of them could probably be saved. The spleen was gone, which meant that the young man—assuming he survived the night—would have some difficulty fighting off infections in the years to come. His perforated stomach had been sutured and its spillage cleared away. Two feet of shredded small intestine had been excised, the remainder spliced. A deep wound to the prostate might or might not leave him impotent.

      But none of that would kill the young man.

      In the operation’s second bloody hour now, Weiss had moved on to things that took a bit more time. Two surgeons might’ve finished up the job by now, but he was on his own, as usual. There were no shortcuts, no Get Out of the OR Free cards in this life-or-death game.

      He was the only surgeon in the area—or, anyway, the only one who’d work on battle wounds without a hotline heads-up to the same men who’d inflicted them.

      And so he did it all, with two assistants who were learning as they went, eye-rolling when the blood flowed freely, grimacing as charnel odors filtered through their masks.

      “Forehead, someone, please,” he requested. “I’ve got my hands full.”

      One of his helpers found a sponge and moved around the table, careful not to block the surgeon’s field of vision as he dabbed sweat from the tan expanse of forehead.

      “Thanks,” Weiss said. “Let’s clean this up and close.”

      TEAM PANTHER WAS on schedule, closing on the target with determination borne of knowledge that there might not be another chance. They had already missed the target twice during the past six months. A third failure was bound to have unpleasant repercussions.

      Following his point man down a muddy jungle trail, Team Panther’s leader thought, Strike three. You’re out.

      A third miss wouldn’t cost his life, but it would be embarrassing. He’d lose prestige and likely be passed over on the next attempt. He might be shuffled to some post in the middle of nowhere, with nothing to do but slap mosquitoes and type his resignation on a rusty portable.

      An air strike might’ve done the trick more swiftly and effectively, but killing from the sky was not always reliable. The air force had no “smart” bombs in their inventory, and they could’ve strafed the jungle all day long without scoring a verified hit on the target.

      So much for high technology.

      When wet work was required, it still came down to men who weren’t afraid of dirtying their hands.

      Behind their leader and the point man, moving through the rain forest in single file, two dozen soldiers focused single-mindedly upon their goal. It helped distract them from the swarms of biting insects, mud that tried to pull their boots off, lukewarm rain that fell just long enough to soak them to the skin then waited for their camouflage fatigues to nearly dry before it started up again.

      The nagging irritations made them anxious for a fight.

      Eager to kill.

      They were the best at what they did, these men. Team Panther had a reputation to defend, which had been sullied by their failed attempts to burn the target in October and December. Now they had another chance, and every member of the team had sworn a blood oath to succeed this time.

      The leader checked his compact GPS unit. Assuming that their information was correct, they had another half mile left to go, dense jungle all the way.

      WEISS’S FIFTH PATIENT had once been fairly handsome, if his eyes and brow were any indication, but the bullets that had ripped into his cheek and jaw had spoiled his face forever. It was something of a miracle they hadn’t killed him on the spot, in fact, but there was grim determination in those eyes, before the morphine blessed him with oblivion.

      Why do you bother? asked the small voice in his head. Why heal them, so that they can maim and kill?

      Because somebody had to do it.

      And Weiss wasn’t altogether sure that they were wrong.

      Shouting outside the operating tent distracted him, but he recovered so quickly his aides never noticed. Split-second hesitation on the scalpel stroke, but when he made the cut it was deep, clean and sure.

      A runner burst into the tent and stopped short on the threshold, gaping at the deconstructed form in front of him.

      Shifting to half-baked Portuguese, Weiss told the newcomer, “You’re risking this man’s life by coming in here. Turn around and leave.”

      The interloper stood his ground, though he was trembling as he said, “They’re coming, Doctor.”

      “Who is they? More casualties?”

      “The enemy.”

      That made the surgeon pause. He glanced up at his two assistants, found them staring back at him, and swiveled toward the messenger. “How long?”

      “Perhaps a quarter of an hour.”

      “That’s too soon. I still have work to do.”

      He knew the words were nonsense, even as he spoke. The surgeon’s enemies wouldn’t withdraw until he finished with his patients. They had come to stop him, after all. If they could finish off the job they’d started with the wounded, it would just be icing on the cake.

      “What should we do?” the messenger inquired.

      “Get ready to evacuate. And buy some time.”

      “We’ll try,” he said, and fled the tent. Weiss wondered whether he had sent the messenger to meet