The silver-haired man with Ming turned and looked at her.His expressionless eyes made a chill go up her back.Without a word, he went into the outer room.Ming followed him.
“This man is injured!”she yelled.
Seconds later, the man returned with a red bag, the white cross on the outside identifying it as a first aid kit.He unzipped the bag and removed the shears, checked the other contents, then tossed it in through the bars.
“Thank you,” she said.
He didn’t speak.Not long after he left, she heard the sound of the outer door clanging shut.
“Can you help me?”she asked.
Emanuel stepped forward and helped her roll the man over.He gasped when he saw his face.“That’s First Officer Jun,” he said.
The nametag on his uniform read,Hao Jun, Hong Kong.
“Nasty blow to the head,” Olive observed, pulling a pair of gloves out of the kit.She took his pulse first, then probed the wound.“Can you see if there is any superglue or butterflies or anything like that in the kit?”
While Emanuel searched, she took the bottle of saline and a stack of cotton pads and gently irrigated the wound, pushing the hair out of the way while checking for any kind of debris.Then she pressed a stack of pads against it and looked at the bottle that Emanuel held up.“This?”
She nodded.“Open it, please.”
She released the pressure on the wound and lifted the pads.The bleeding had slowed considerably.“I’m going to press the skin together.I need you to squeeze the glue along the top of the seam I’ll make.”
Emanuel nodded, and she pressed the wound together, then cleaned up the blood that covered the seam.She nodded to Emanuel, and he squeezed the glue slowly along the gash, following Olive’s directions.The sharp, chemical sting of superglue fumes bit her nostrils, mingling with the underlying coppery reek of fresh blood seeping through.
She maintained the pressure on the wound for about a minute, letting the glue dry.As she gently released it, she held her breath, praying that the glue would hold.
“Great job,” she said.
“First time I’ve ever done that,” Emanuel said, sitting back on his heels.“But this doesn’t look like your first day.”
She chuckled as she taped a cotton pad over the wound.“Correct.I’m a surgical nurse.This is not my first day.”
After she pulled the gloves off, she started to stand, but First Officer Jun moaned and his eyelids fluttered.She put a hand on his forehead, wanting to comfort him.Instead, he moved quicker than she would have thought possible and grabbed her wrist.
“Ahh,” she said, pain flooding her arm.She wrenched her hand free.
His eyes opened all the way, and he blinked, then looked at each of them.He muttered in Chinese.Olive shook her head.“I’m sorry,” she said, “I speak English.”
He moaned again and put his hand to his temple.“What happened?”he asked, his voice hoarse.
Emanuel put himself in his view.“We don’t know, sir.Two men brought you here already unconscious.”
“Two men?”He gasped and sat up quickly.“I was on the bridge.There was a ship, then I don’t remember anything else.”
“Where is the Captain, sir?”Emanuel asked.
“He...”he winced and touched the bandage.“He was at a wedding.”
Olive started to speak, but reconsidered.She didn’t know either of these men.If Jerry and his friends had managed to evade capture, she didn’t want to say anything that might put them in danger.
When they reached the first level of the dining room, Norton broadcast, “This is Coppertop.Deck one.Over.”
Anderson replied, “Roger, Coppertop.Kitchen to your port side.Over.”
Fisher guided Peña’s team while Anderson guided theirs.They worked their way toward the kitchen.Hundreds of abandoned cellphones littered the hallways.
“Trout to Colada.Move to starboard and standby.Over.”
