Riders of B E R K

Part 22: Gotcha

I burst through the doors to IT/2 and saw Hiccup standing motionless, hyperventilating. I advanced towards him-and then I saw what he was staring at in utter horror. My heart skipped a beat but then my training cut in and I raced forward, pushing past the frozen Hiccup and staring at Ozzie. I pressed my fingers against his carotid, feeling for the pulse.

"Ozzie...no..." Hiccup breathed, blinking slowly. I glanced up, seeing a colourless, horrified face with wide, green eyes dark and filled with shock. I tried to recall that he wasn't a soldier, wasn't a medic and wasn't a secret agent: he was a kid dragged from his High School to join this crazy project in the middle of nowhere. And he was looking at the corpse of his friend. There was nothing he had ever done to prepare him for this. Then he turned and ran, visibly shaking as he erupted out of the doors and vanished. I took a shuddering breath and moved to follow him-and then I froze.

There was a pulse under my fingers: very slow but still there. After a few seconds, it repeated. I stared at the motionless body: there was no breathing but his eyes...I lifted my phone, flipped on the light and flicked it across his eyes. The pupils constricted slightly.

"Shit," I breathed then slammed my hand onto my wrist com. "MEDALERT! CARDIAC ARREST I.T. LAB TWO!"

And then I saw the darts: two small red darts buried in the opposite side of his neck. I dragged him to the floor and tilted his head back, beginning CPR. Mouth to mouth has long gone out of fashion but I had no hesitation in administering artificial respiration to Ozzie because Hiccup's words when I woke came flooding back:

"If we hadn't got you here when we did, you would have died. You stopped breathing, Astrid..."

He had stopped breathing first because Dragon's Ear is a powerful neuro-suppressant in humans. His chest rose and fell as I lifted my head. Then I began pumping his chest, knowing his extremely slow heart rate wouldn't deliver any oxygen to his brain. He could still die-he probably would-but I couldn't live with myself if I didn't try. If I didn't use every skill I possessed to fight for him.

"It's very poisonous....your conscious mind was shut down. Apparently, if you'd had a much larger dose, you may not have ever woken..."

Ozzie had taken two darts: this time, the attacker wasn't taking any chances. Then I glanced up and read the message. I felt fear trickle down my throat and focussed on my work as the door slammed open and the arrest team burst in. Ragnar, Trevor and Galina all set to work and took over the arrest and I rose from my knees, watching an efficient unit performing in a textbook fashion. I turned to the message, added myself to the recipient list and sent it, then copied all his messages to Hiccup to my BERK mainframe address. But I was listening to the Team as well.

"Output?"

"Bradycardic but palpable...just. Likely brainstem suppression. If we lose the cardiovascular centre, he may need pacing. And he's completely vasodilated-he'll need epi, stat. We need to get him to Resus One now."

"Tubed. Good air entry bilaterally. Asynchronous CPR continuing. Airway secure and safe to transfer."

"Giving one amp epi stat...in...OK, ready to move-on my mark..." And they lifted him rapidly onto a trolley the next responder had brought and ran him from the room. I half wanted to follow them but I knew Ozzie was in good hands-while Hiccup was in total shock. He needed me more. I interrogated the computer.

"Location: Commander Hiccup Haddock?"

"Pen One."

He had gone for Toothless. Shit! He was going... I reached for my com and thumbed it on.

"Astrid to Hiccup-don't do anything stupid. I'm here for you. You don't have to do this alone. I'm on my way!"

"You don't understand," the rough voice rasped through the com. It was Hiccup and he sounded completely broken. "He was there because I asked him. I put him there. It is MY FAULT."