Chapter 314 - He Won't Die Before Me - mtres
Alfredo
I started charging again. Her brother had sat down next to her, not knowing what to do, gripped by pain and desperation. I started charging again, and as I did, I set it aside, began manual resuscitation and mouth-to-mouth, waited for it to charge, and shocked her heart again. Her signs returned. At that moment, I shouted, everything was trembling, Rasca's hand cradled his sister's face.
"You came back, Pato." He looked at me and placed his hand on my cheek. "Thank you, brother."
"We need to get her to the plane, I don't have a stretcher." "I'll get it." Her brother ran, the shots continued, the fights too, but I only had eyes for her. I approached.
"Don't scare me like this again." I kissed her, her brother was running, the shots were dying down. "Don't disobey me again, Big Butt. Scold me and insult me when you're recovered for the nickname I just gave you."
Gustavo arrived, we lifted her onto the stretcher, I packed my gear, grabbed my bag, and together we ran to the plane.
"Carlina!"
Lobo's woman came out of the room, and seeing the scene, she knew she would be my partner. I asked her to heat some water and help me clean her up. I covered her chest with a blanket, she looked very pale.
"Patricia, what blood type are you?"
"O positive," she managed to say. I checked her type and started an IV.
"Are you allergic to penicillin?" She shook her head.
But still, I did a test to be sure, and she had no reaction, so I added a few milligrams to the dextrose. Carlina arrived and carefully cleaned her.
"I need to get back to that massacre, change her bandages, you know where I keep more."
"Alfredo." She called me weakly, I leaned closer. "Will you give me a kiss?" I smiled. My lips pressed against hers.
"Get better so I can show you what a real kiss is."
I almost lost her, and I don't want to feel that again. She nodded. I winked at her, grabbed my bag, and packed the portable war stretcher. Everything was trembling, but she was stable. I looked at Lobo.
"I'll protect her with my life."
"Thank you, let's end this crap, quickly."
"It's already over, now the boss is settling scores with Nikolay."
……
Simón
Seeing Roland in the role of a cold, unscrupulous man, with no feelings other than resentment, rage, and hatred, was a bit shocking. We had gotten used to the new person he was, and seeing him once more as he used to be before Vero arrived was striking.
In fact, all my men reverted to what we were a little over six years ago. We had brought a chair, Roland sat Nikolay in it, removed the tape from his legs, and now faced him.
"Look at him, Rat. Did Medrano leave you alone?"
He said to me. Many men were injured, Rino was going from one to another. Patricia's incident was yet another confirmation for me that our women should never be involved in our missions; they undoubtedly throw us off balance. Roland took off his hood, the rest kept theirs on, although Rino didn't have his on either.
"Look, asshole, if you hadn't messed with my kids, I might have let you live to face justice for all your crimes, but you dared to mock me, desecrated my sanctuary, disturbed the peace of my woman who, unlike you, I only see, breathe, and live through her."
"Go to hell!" the Russian said. "Kill me already!"
The laugh that came from Roland made anyone's skin crawl. He wasn't just intelligent; he had a gift for instilling fear in people, as if he harbored a demon within him that fed on fear. Nikolay began to tremble.
"That's it, now you're getting it, you won't die so easily."
He pulled a knife from his right leg, then another from his left leg, clinked the two knives together as if deciding what to do with them, he looked like a psychopath.
"If you kill me, you'll never see your kids again!" The laugh was even worse.
"Do you think I would expose my babies? Look, I'll confess something." He seemed like his opponent's best friend. I smiled. "My kids; my Princess and my Little One have been in my care for a long time, and your known third wife must be in the hands of the feds and will face charges of kidnapping and murder."
"And now... I proceed to punish you for desecrating my sanctuary!"
He took a knife and stabbed it into Nikolay's right leg from the top, then did the same with the left leg. Nikolay screamed. I knew what was coming.
"Remember something, you're a son of a bitch, a fucking asshole. With this, I confirm who I am, and you'll never forget. That I have always been, am, and will be the fucking boss!"
After saying that, he dragged each knife down the leg until he reached the knees, slicing open the thighs. Then he began stabbing him in various non-lethal places, just to make him scream.
His gaze, that of a man without a drop of humanity. Everyone present watched as he pierced his enemy with more than twenty stabs, never hitting vital spots.
We, his team, who had seen him do this many times in the past, now observed him. The people who survived and the mafia bosses knew why Roland Sandoval, a kid, managed to position himself at the head of the cartel in Colombia. The wounded man screamed in pain.
"With this, I end the game, checkmate! I'll let someone else settle the score with you. After all, I swore never to kill anyone again unless my children were dying or about to die." He continued in his role as a psychopath.
"But since you only brought them to see my land, I spare your life. But that's just me! I don't know what Yan thinks." At the mention of his name, Nikolay turned even whiter.
"When you called me, rising from the dead to tell me you had the son of a bitch who killed my family, you earned my eternal gratitude, Don Roland.
When we investigated everything, we discovered it was him behind that massacre and the attack with the Cárdenas where so many of our people, including Lorena, died.
"I am also a father and have a wife. He's all yours, Yan. He was the mastermind behind the massacre that took your family."
"Thank you."
Yan pulled out his gun and began to shoot him, naming all the people who died in that massacre: wife, children, brothers, mothers, cousins, and close friends. In total, Nikolay received twenty-three shots, plus the twenty stabs from the boss.
He had emptied his two weapons. I only saw a man who trafficked minors die, a man who didn't care that innocent children were subjected to those acts, a man who trafficked women, drugging them to keep them under control.
I know I'll go to hell, but if I can rid the world of this scum first, I'll gladly pay the infernal penalty.
"I hope you feel better," Roland said, approaching Yan, who nodded.
"Since that trip to Santa Marta, where I don't know if I should be grateful for surviving, I never found the author of my family's tragedy. Thank you, Don Roland."
"Well, it's time to go back. The only favor I ask is that you let me stay dead." Several smiled. "Any, you can clean up now." She must be watching us.
"My whole body hurts," said Churrusco next to Roland. "The difference with my skin is that it won't show the world map as much as yours."
We laughed. At that moment, everything changed. Churrusco screamed, and then I saw him pull the boss and cover his exposed head with his body, right after we heard a shot.
We saw Aníbal fly strangely. Roland shouted his name as we watched our comrade fall to the ground. Time slowed in my mind, registering everything.
The boss stood by our friend on the floor. Rino ran to meet him while the five of us started shooting at the warehouse. Mole, Zombie, Mueco, and Cuajao joined the gunfight. Once we emptied our clips, Zombie and Mole approached the place to bring the son of a bitch who shot. I looked back. Roland was deactivating Aníbal's suit while the doctor cut the hood in the only place he could. It was a modification we had made to the suit.
"This is the vermin."
Mole said after throwing Medrano's bullet-riddled body. The police arrived, Cooper once again at the forefront of the mess we left behind.
"Rata, you need to go."
"We can't move him yet!"
Rino shouted. Roland was silent, looking at the body of one of his brothers. The doctor once again connected many devices. In these cases, you could see the effort from the training. He always did it with a backpack full of stones. How many instruments does he have in that backpack? He bandaged his head, but Aníbal seemed dead, if not for the vital signs monitor showing he was still breathing and his heart was beating.
"Rino." The boss finally spoke.
"Boss, we need to run a thousand tests and scan his brain. He took a hit to the head. The suit prevented his brain from exploding, but internally it might have. We need to get him out of here urgently."
"None of my brothers should die before me," he said.
We loaded Aníbal onto the stretcher under the doctor's instructions and ran to the plane. Each of us silently took our positions. Some of Cooper's agents helped us get the plane on the runway.
Cebolla and Cereza, in the most sepulchral silence, began the takeoff. Once in the air, Rino continued his work. Roland didn't leave Aníbal's side. He hasn't cried, but I know him well enough to know he's blaming himself.
This is what war leaves behind, pain and misery. Each of my brothers, Miguel and Daniel, piloting the plane as quickly as possible, Gustavo and Arnold calling the necessary people so that specialized ambulances for the wounded would be waiting for us upon arrival in San Antonio.
Inés hasn't stopped crying since she saw Aníbal's body on the stretcher. Carlina, Arinka, and Carmela just hugged Inés. Lupe, walking carefully, approached her husband, who was lost, staring out one of the plane's windows with his phone in hand.
Feeling her close, we saw Arnold take refuge in his wife's arms. How I wish I were in my Pelinegra's arms right now. May nothing happen, but I don't like Rino's look. We must be prepared for the worst, but it's my brother on that stretcher, and this time it wouldn't be a lie like it was with Roland.