She thought it was an old fashioned word,
something they used in the First World War, maybe the second. What she did know was they say it three
times, to show it’s a real emergency and not just someone talking about or a
mis-hearing.
So she imagined they’d use wind up bush
telephones to call from the trenches, not from a barren street in Afghanistan.
He’d not been the one to make the
call. It was too late for him by then
and for most of the men. They’d heard a
baby crying hard and followed the sound into a deserted building. Only it wasn’t a baby and it wasn’t
deserted. It was a reel-to-reel
recording and an ambush.
The first three men were shot down at the
doorway. The others ran but were met in
the street outside by loyalist fighters with firepower sold by a friendly
government in friendlier times. Those
who ran on even after being shot didn’t outrun the grenades lobbed by the
retreating fighters.
One sapper, seventeen and already lived too
long, managed to operate his radio with his remaining hand. He managed two maydays and no location before
passing out for the last time. It took
hours to decide if a rescue mission should follow them, more to eventually get
there. By then it was too late for them
all.
She rested a hand on a boy’s small blond
head, stroking hair as he slept. Eight
years old. Too young to have many
special memories of a father at war most of his life and too old to forget him
without any effort. She would have to
tell him, soon anyway.
She wanted to call out mayday and not stop,
certainly not at three times. She would
stop when it was no longer a tragedy.
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