Snow Angel: Rebirth

Chapter Three

The forty‑five minutes crawled by like a slow bleed.

The woman hadn’t stirred when Jake removed the warming blankets and wrapped her chest tight the way Doc instructed. He moved slowly, carefully, grabbing one of his flannel shirts from the closet and easing it over her shoulders, guiding her limp arms through the sleeves. When he finished, he sat on the edge of the bed, two fingers locked on her pulse, counting the frantic, fluttering beats against his watch. Every few minutes he adjusted the duct tape holding the folded towel against her shattered ribs, bracing her chest each time it hitched in a desperate, uneven spasm.

He kept his voice steady, his hands steady — but inside, he was unraveling. He’d done everything Doc told him to do. Everything he could. And it still wasn’t enough.

Her skin had turned a dull, clay‑gray. Her breaths were shallow, losing heat. Her pulse fluttered like a dying bird under his fingertips.

Stay with me, he thought, over and over, the words pounding in his skull. Don’t you quit on me. Not now. Not like this.

He’d carried men through firefights, dragged friends out of burning vehicles, held dying soldiers in his arms — but nothing had ever felt like this. Nothing had ever felt this helpless. This wrong. This personal.

He pressed his palm harder against the towel on her ribs, trying to stop the grinding motion. “Come on ,” he whispered, voice cracking. “Hold on.”

Her pulse stuttered. His stomach dropped.

He wasn’t losing her. He wasn’t.

Then — finally — the high‑pitched whine of a twin‑cylinder engine cut through the suffocating silence.

Jake’s head snapped up. Relief slammed into him so hard his vision blurred.

Headlights swept across the frosted cabin windows in jittering arcs. The engine died, and a heartbeat later the heavy wooden door slammed open, blasting the room with cold air and snow.

Jason “Doc” Masters filled the doorway like a storm — broad, imposing, parka dusted white, a massive tactical medical ruck slung over his shoulders.

Jake exhaled a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. His shoulders sagged. His chest loosened. For the first time in what seemed a lifetime, he wasn’t alone.

Doc didn’t waste breath on greetings. He kicked the door shut, ripped off his goggles, and locked his sharp eyes onto Jake.

“Vitals,” Doc barked, voice raw from the freezing ride.

Jake stood so fast he nearly stumbled. “Pulse one‑forty‑five, thready. Respiration six a minute, erratic. Chest wall’s still grinding under the tape. Packing on her back is holding. No fresh blood.”

Doc dropped the ruck beside the bed with a heavy thud and unzipped the main compartment with the speed of muscle memory. “Move the blankets. Expose the chest and right thigh.”

Jake peeled back the layers of Mylar, canvas and wool, hands shaking now that help had arrived. He fumbled with the buttons of the shirt, his hands shaking. He let it fall open exposing her bruised ribs. The adrenaline that had kept him functioning was draining from him in a rush.

Doc reached into a thermal pouch and pulled out a thick plastic bag of dark red liquid. “O‑negative whole blood,” he muttered, handing it over. “Body temp. Keep it warm.” Jake held it like it was the most precious thing he’d ever touched.

Doc grabbed an i‑STAT analyzer, pricked her finger, and fed a drop of blood into the cartridge. Thirty seconds later, the machine beeped.

Doc’s jaw tightened. “pH is tanking. Her blood’s turning acidic. Organs are suffocating. We’ve got twenty minutes before her heart stops coordinating.”

Jake swallowed hard. His throat burned. Twenty minutes. Jesus.

Doc pulled out a long, thick needle and clear tubing. “No time for collapsed arm veins. Going femoral. Hold her. She may twitch.”

Jake braced her shoulders, whispering, “I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”

With the precision of a hundred combat drops, Doc palpated her inner thigh, found the landmark, and drove the large‑bore needle home. A flash of dark, sluggish blood filled the hub.

“Line’s in.” He hooked up the tubing and spiked the blood bag. “Squeeze it, Jake. Push that volume.”

Jake squeezed, forcing life back into her collapsing circulatory system. His hands steadied. His breathing steadied. Doc was here. She had a chance.

Doc was already moving to her head. He handed Jake a second blood bag. “Switch it out. Get it in her.”

Jake obeyed instantly.

Doc pulled a laryngoscope, a plastic trach tube, and a syringe of ketamine from his pack.

“I’m taking over her respiratory drive,” Doc said, pushing the sedative through the line. “Ketamine will keep her out of pain without crashing her pressure. Once the tube’s in, you bag her. Ten breaths a minute. No more or you’ll blow her heart out.”

Jake nodded, jaw clenched. “I’ve got it.”

Doc tilted her head back, pulled the temporary nasal tube free, and slid the lighted blade into her mouth. His eyes narrowed.

“I see the cords… tube passing… now.”

He withdrew the stylet, attached the blue squeeze‑bag, and handed it to Jake. “Bag her. Go.”

Jake squeezed. Her chest rose — smoothly this time, without the horrific clicking. The sedative and airway relaxed her frantic spasms.

Doc pulled a compact transport ventilator from his ruck, the casing scuffed from years of field use. He set it beside Gemma’s stretcher and powered it on, the soft hum rising beneath the storm’s distant roar.

“Keep bagging,” he told Jake without looking up.

Jake kept the rhythm steady — one breath every six seconds — Gemma’s chest rising smoothly under his hands. Her color was still too pale, but her pupils tracked Doc’s penlight now, sluggish but responsive.

Doc connected the ventilator tubing to the endotracheal tube, checked the seal, then glanced at Jake. “On my count.”

Jake nodded, never breaking cadence.

“Three… two… one.”

Doc clipped the line into place and switched the ventilator to active mode. The machine took over with a quiet, mechanical precision, delivering controlled breaths through the tube.

The injured woman’s chest rose again — this time without Jake’s hands.

Doc watched the monitor for a full ten seconds, then exhaled. “She’s ventilating. Good tidal volume. Oxygenation’s stabilizing.”

Jake let go of the squeeze‑bag, his fingers stiff from the effort. Relief hit him so hard he had to brace a hand on the cot to stay upright.

Doc adjusted the straps securing the tube. “She’s breathing with the machine now. You bought her the time she needed.”

The woman didn’t open her eyes, but her shoulders eased, the tension draining from her body as the ventilator carried the work she could no longer do.

Doc checked her pupils with a penlight. “Good. Reactive. Blood volume’s hitting her brain.”

Jake’s knees nearly buckled with relief. “Okay,” he said as the adrenaline rush released him. “Okay.”

Doc leaned back against the headboard, exhaling hard. Sweat slicked his face despite the freezing air leaking through the door. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand, then looked at Jake.

“You did good, Jake.You kept her alive,” Doc said quietly. “Most men couldn’t have done that.”

Jake swallowed, emotion burning behind his eyes. “Just… don’t let her die, Doc.”

Doc’s voice softened. “Not on my watch.”