Creed
This day reminded Creed of war as he jumped from one critical mission to the next. His mind and body were inured to heavy task loads.
As Creed and Rou jogged toward the Iniquus transport to grab ropes and pulleys, his gaze caught on a minivan that was one of the last vehicles he’d called in to Mandy before he was rerouted to find Parker.
Creed had knocked on the window and said, “If you’re walking wounded, get out. Get the kids out. Get up the hill.” The family seemed fine. For them, it had been a fender bender that set off their airbags, but they’d looked no worse for wear.
But the dynamic had drastically shifted. The front of their minivan had rammed under the frame of a jacked-up truck in front of them. Without the airbag there to cushion the blow, they’d taken the full force of the impact. And even with an airbag, it didn’t look survivable.
“Mandy, it’s Creed. Pin this location.”
“I have you on the board.”
“The parents in the van were walking wounded. I don’t have the doors open. Their new triage ranking should be red or black. They’re trapped under this guy’s tailgate. Male and female in their late-twenties or early-thirties. We need a first responder to assess.”
“I have a minivan in that location with three children, about five, about three, and an infant.”
“Affirmative. The children are in their car seats and seem unharmed.”
He was going to get these kids out of here. They couldn’t be in the back seat calling for mama when her mom was dying in front of them. They needed to eat and drink, get warm, and the baby probably needed a diaper change.
Frustrated by the delay to get back to Auralia, damned straight. But he wasn’t conflicted. Auralia had the resources and know-how, and she had her feet on solid ground. She wasn’t in danger; the babies were.
“The infant is in an infant carrier?”
“Affirmative.”
“Any access to a stroller?”
“No. I don’t see that. There’s a diaper bag. And a woman’s purse on the back floorboard.”
“We’ll need to get the children forward to support. See if you can’t get a diaper bag and if the woman has a purse so we can try to identify kin.”
Creed moved Rou to the other side of the ditch, took off his pack, and told her to down-stay.
The doors were locked, and Creed decided to break the mother’s window to protect the babies from the glass. Surely, if she were conscious, she’d agree.
He reached in and felt for a pulse, but from the angle of her head, the fact that he couldn’t find one wasn’t definitive. Creed wouldn’t call that in unless it was certain, lest it put her name on the black triage list if it didn’t belong there.
Reaching in, he pressed the door unlock buttons and heard a click and a shift at the doors.
Pulling up on the handle, Creed was surprised it had no give. He checked again to make sure the locks were unlatched. Next, he placed his booted foot on the side of the car and thrust out with his leg as he yanked on the door, but the vehicle’s body was too buckled.
He reached into the mother’s window again on the off chance that he could roll down the back window, and to his great surprise, that worked.
Creed grabbed the purse and diaper bag and flung them toward Rou, taking a moment to assure himself that she was on task.
From there, he unlocked the doors.
The oldest child was facing front and was positioned behind her dad. There was no access to their car from that side. The car had buckled inward from the pressure of the other crash vehicles. He wouldn’t be able to reach her.
She had stopped crying and was blinking overly wide eyes at him.
“Sweet girl, do you know how to take off your seat belt?”
She gave him a solemn nod.
“Could you show me how you do that?”
