US Embassy, Mexico City, Mexico
“Is that gunfire?”
“Ping Pong, get away from that fucking window!”
Harris roughly pulled his wife to the side where she wasn’t framed by the large window facing Paseo de la Reforma. Cautiously, he looked down the street. He heard gunfire again and a group of men in plain fatigues went running down the street.
“Who the hell are they fighting?”
“Looks like the Mexican marines.”
“Jesus Christ.” Harris took another peek. Are we supposed to believe this is the cartels? No way they are this organized.
Just then the security alarm went off. “All diplomatic personnel report to secure level one.”
“OK, let’s go.”
“I’m not going to sit in a panic room for days not knowing what the hell is going on.”
“Yes, you are, if I have to pick you up and carry you there.”
Nancy turned and looked at her husband. He had a concerned, almost panicked look on his face. She took his face in her hands and smiled. “Neil. I’m not made from spun glass. I took the SERE course just like any other pilot.”
“Nancy, please. This is different. You had a job to do, you had to do your duty. The risks were balanced with the mission.” He gestured helplessly outside. “But this? You’re just a spectator. This isn’t our war. You could be shot completely at random for no reason. Please, be reasonable.”
“You’re worried, aren’t you?”
“Hell yes! This scares the hell out of me. I would rather be back on the Kidd with a hundred missiles coming down range at me than just sitting here waiting for some asshole to blow up the building. At least I could move my ship if I needed to. You can find this fucking building on Google Maps for God’s sake.”
Nancy laughed. “All right, I’ll go down and sit with the other wives and let you men folk do the war stuff.”
“Godammit! This isn’t about you being a woman.”
Nancy laughed harder. “Just giving you shit. You are going to pay for this later, you know that, right?”
“Yeah, gladly. Just be safe, OK?”
She gave him a kiss. “OK.”
To be fair, the safe area in the basement was quite nice. It had a dining area, comfortable seating, a couple of TVs and even internet access. Ping Pong was disgusted to note that most of the dependants in the room were women. About two dozen non-critical staffers and family members were scattered around the spacious underground room. It wasn’t the idea of taking shelter that bothered Ping Pong, it was the idea that she didn’t have a job to do. She had known that being an embassy wife wasn’t for her, but she had agreed to accompany her husband for a one-year assignment at the embassy. This really was a good job for him, and she didn’t really know what she wanted to do anyway. She was supposed to be using the year in Mexico City to figure that out.
After several hours of surfing the internet and not getting any real information about what was happening outside, she eventually fell asleep on one of the couches.
“BOOM!”
The loud explosion echoed through the room and hit Ping Pong in the chest. That wasn’t a good sound. She hadn’t spent much time around ground troops, but she had fired dozens of missiles, and she knew what an explosion could do to a building like this.
The lights flickered as another explosion rocked the building, dust filtering down from the ceiling. She got up and dashed over to the door and the Marine standing guard. He was trying to raise the ops center on his radio.
“Anyone?”
He shook his head. “No ma’am.”
He was armed with an M4 carbine and a pistol. “Give me your M18.”
“What?”
“I’m rated for the pistol, give it to me.”
“Ma’am, I’m not giving you my weapon.”
“Marine, I’m a naval officer, we are clearly under attack. You have to stay at your post, but I am going to go upstairs and find out what is going on.”
He was going to argue further until a third, much louder explosion knocked out the lights in the room. Emergency lights flickered on a few seconds later. A few screams rang out in the dark room.
“Be careful, ma’am.” He handed her the pistol.
Ping Pong checked the weapon and then nudged the door open, only to be greeted with more dust and the sharp smell of smoke. “Keep the civilians here. I’ll come back or send help.”
“Yes ma’am.”
Now that she was committed, she reflected that this hadn’t been the smartest thing she had ever decided to do, but the not knowing was driving her crazy. She just hoped Neil was OK.
Walking up the stairs, she could hear shouting above. Opening the door to the first floor, she was greeted with a scene of abject chaos. After a moment, she realized what had happened. A large explosion had taken down a part of the exterior wall and had spread debris throughout the lobby. Several Marines in combat fatigues were moving around, looking for survivors. She flagged down a stressed out looking corporal.
“Corporal! What’s going on?”
“We’re under attack, get to the shelter and stay there!”
As if she couldn’t tell for herself a bomb had gone off. Well, shit. I’m not hiding in the basement. She made sure her pistol was on safe and slid the pistol into the top of her pants at the small of her back. Something her small arms instructor would have had a heart attack about had he been there. Heading up the main staircase, she realized that this had been a missile attack, not a bombing. There was a large impact crater on the side of the building up on the second floor. Car bombs didn’t do that, but missiles did.
She was trying to find Neil’s office, but the scene was very confused. She had no idea where her husband was supposed to be in an emergency, so she realized it was pointless just wandering around looking for him. Another Marine was coming down the hallway she was in with an unconscious civilian in a fireman’s carry.
“Give me that lady, where is the aid station?”
“Outside, in the motor pool.”
“Alright, get back to your duties, I’ll get this one.”
Carrying a 130-pound woman was something useful she could do at least. Ping Pong was only five eight herself but she worked out regularly and practiced martial arts almost daily, the unconscious woman was heavy, but not difficult for the very fit Ping Pong. While the US embassy in Mexico City was crammed into a standard city block, it did have a small area in the rear where the embassy kept official vehicles. Ping Pong headed that way, only to find a scene of complete confusion: marines yelling, doctors screaming for supplies, cries of the wounded and worse. The small cadre of marine guards were attempting to maintain order, but they were not EMTs, and the embassy’s small medical staff was completely overwhelmed. She was able to hand her patient off to a nurse who started checking the woman for vital signs.
She hadn’t heard any additional explosions, so she assumed the attack was over, at least for now. She could hear ambulances on their way. She grabbed a harried doctor by the shoulder. “How can I help?”
“We have triaged the immediate surgery cases over there,” she pointed to a group of stretchers on the far side of the parking lot, by the rear gate. “Get them into ambulances as they arrive. We need to clear those cases first.”
“Gotcha.”
Running over to the area where the most serious cases had been moved, she flagged down another marine and the two of them picked up the stretcher indicated by the nurse running triage. Ambulances were beginning to arrive, and they were able to load a dozen patients in as many minutes.
Picking up the next patient, she looked down and was stunned to realize it was Neil. He had a bloody bandage around his head and wasn’t moving. OH MY GOD, NEIL! As they came up to the next ambulance in line, she got in the back with the admiral. The ambulance attendant tried to push her out of the vehicle, but she showed him the pistol. Either the gun or the look on her face convinced the man to allow her to stay. He banged the doors shut and the ambulance started to move.
Ping Pong had been frightened by Mexico City traffic before. It was like New York, but with an almost cavalier disregard for injury. Not as bad as Bangalore, but bad enough that she had decided not to drive herself in the city. Navigating the famous Mexico City traffic in an ambulance was a new layer of terror, with the driver making sudden darts right or left and traveling at what Ping Pong felt was an insanely high speed.
It felt like an hour, but after about 10 minutes of furious driving, they came to a hospital. Passing through the gates marked “MedicaSur”, Ping Pong was fairly shocked to see what looked exactly like a hospital in the United States. While Mexico was a very advanced country in many ways, it wasn’t uncommon to see buildings that were a bit run down or dilapidated, even here in Mexico City. That wasn’t true of this hospital.
The doors to the ambulance banged open and the crew rolled the gurney across a small entry area and through a set of automated double doors. Walking in, she noticed armed guards stationed near the entrance but kept close to her husband. She pulled her shirt out of her pants to hide the weapon. The ambulance crew spoke in rapid Spanish and were directed to a curtained exam room. A man in surgical scrubs was just finishing gloving up and moved to examine Neil. He spoke sharply to Ping Pong in Spanish with a gesture to move out of the room.
“I am a consular official; this man is a member of the US embassy staff. I do not leave his presence for any reason.”
“Lady, I don’t care if you are Nuestra Señora Maria herself. I need to treat this man right now. Get out of my treatment room.” Ping Pong was slightly shocked by the Boston accent coming from the obviously Latino man but not by the attitude. She had met plenty of doctors in her time and they were even worse than pilots when it came to ordering people around. Ping Pong nodded and stepped out of the curtained off area which was swiftly enclosed with an abrupt jerk of the curtain.
“Ma’am, are you American?”
Ping Pong turned to see a short woman wearing a white nurse’s uniform behind her. “Yes, I am with the American Embassy. That man in there is a member of the consular staff.”
“Yes ma’am, we were alerted that your patients would be transported here. If you would follow me, I will get you settled in with the concierge.”
“Concierge?”
“Yes, ma’am. MedicaSur is dedicated to our patients and their families’ comfort, please come this way.”
It wasn’t until she was settled into the very comfortable waiting room that she realized that her cell phone had been going crazy since the attack. She had over 100 text messages from various sources, official and unofficial. Belatedly, she realized that she had never sent any help down to the basement either. She attacked the phone with a purpose.
