Chapter 2 - The Other Kit
Nia turned back to Eli before Hale could answer.
“Look at me. Help is coming.”
His eyes found hers. He tried to speak, and she told him he didn’t have to.
The hangar filled with movement. Someone called the emergency number. An instructor cleared the aisle. Another medic arrived with the separate equipment, and Nia worked beside her until the response team took over.
She gave a brief account: collapse during exertion, breathing distress, symptoms apparent before the fall, defective cylinder excluded from use.
Hale kept asking whether his son was dying.
Nobody offered him an answer they didn’t have.
When Eli finally responded to the paramedic’s questions, the change was small but unmistakable. His fingers loosened from Nia’s sleeve.
The stretcher wheels caught briefly in a seam near the door.
“Easy,” she said, although the crew had already corrected it.
Hale followed the stretcher. At the threshold, he turned back.
“Thank you.”
She nodded.
Then his gaze shifted toward the cart.
“We’ll straighten out that paperwork when I get back.”
Nia felt the relief leave her body.
Lieutenant Colonel Ruth Lang, the program deputy, arrived as the ambulance departed. She stopped training, restricted access to the equipment, and arranged for the incident to be reported outside Hale’s immediate supervision.
Nia identified the cylinder by its serial number, ending in 624. She described the tag, the leak, and the inspection form.
Lang asked whether she had used the cylinder on Eli.
“No, ma’am. We used the separate kit.”
“Did it cause him to collapse?”
“I didn’t see any equipment connected to him before he fell. I can tell you it wasn’t reliable equipment to have waiting for an emergency. I can’t diagnose the cause of his collapse.”
Lang wrote that down without improving it into a stronger accusation.
A medic examined Nia’s bruised chest. Her badge had cut the inside of her lip. She hadn’t noticed until the water she drank tasted faintly of blood.
Reyes stood near the secured cart, holding his keys so tightly they left marks in his palm.
“Don’t take anything off that cylinder,” Nia told him.
“I know.”
“Even if somebody asks.”
He looked at her, then away.
Lang asked for the equipment history. Reyes produced a binder from the supply office. On its first page, a row of inspection initials ran beside dates.
NB.
Nia recognized her own handwriting.
The entry was from twelve days earlier, attached to a trainee evaluation she had reviewed between two patient-transport assignments.
AIRMAN WARD: INCOMPLETE EQUIPMENT CHECK.
At the time, she had accepted a supervisor’s explanation.
May you like
She looked through the glass at the cart.
The same serial number ended the line beneath her initials.
