Chapter 609: Post-earthquake Rescue
Chapter 609: Chapter 609: Post-earthquake Rescue
The rescue efforts continued, and more and more people joined in. Rhys Chase and Ryan Rowe led a group to the shelter. The shelter’s canopy was made of a special material. Although the walls had collapsed, the canopy itself hadn’t shattered, leaving many survivors trapped underneath.
Three hours later, the hospital ruins were cleared of all survivors and victims. The living were placed on the right, the deceased on the left. The woman who had been wailing to the heavens found her husband and child among the survivors. Fortunately, they were all still alive.
The woman wept as she held her child, thanking God for his protection. As Evelyn Ford passed by, the woman shot her a glare.
"Why are you letting that dog run around? What if it bites my child?"
Evelyn glanced at her. "This dog is the one who found your husband and child’s location, allowing them to be dug out and reunited with you."
"Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?"
Evelyn’s expression turned cold. Sensing her mood, the wolfdog lunged forward, knocking the woman to the ground. In the ensuing scuffle, it tore out a chunk of her hair.
The woman shrieked and cursed hysterically. Evelyn pulled the wolfdog back. "Good boy, stop. Ingrates are filthy."
The woman howled in pain. Unable to watch any longer, Quincy and Ethan Dawson each grabbed an arm, dragged her to a nearby muddy puddle, and tossed her in.
"The rescue here is finished. Let’s go support the efforts at the shelter," Evelyn announced. "Quincy, Miles Vaughn, you two stay here. Get the survivors to the main square immediately. It’s not safe here; there could be more aftershocks."
"Alright. You guys be careful."
Evelyn nodded. She called over Ronan Kendrick, and the two of them, along with the wolfdog, led the entire search and rescue team toward the shelter.
As soon as they reached Shelter No. 1, Evelyn saw Rhys Chase and his group. They were gathered together, discussing a rescue plan. The canopy was pressing down on the completely collapsed walls. Unless they could lift the canopy or cut an opening into it, there was no way to get inside and save anyone.
’There is another way,’ she thought. ’I could pull the canopy into my space. But with so many people coming and going, making it disappear would definitely attract attention. It’s too risky. Still, it’ll be dark in a few hours. I could give it a try after nightfall.’
Just as they were discussing their options, the ground began to shake. Evelyn tightened her grip on the leash. She was surrounded by people and couldn’t just vanish in plain sight without causing trouble. Ronan Kendrick quickly ran to her side. Fortunately, the tremor only lasted a few seconds and caused no casualties.
"Are you okay?" Ronan asked, looking at Evelyn nervously.
Evelyn shook her head. "I’m fine. But I just heard a crash. I think the post for the Solar Lamp over there collapsed."
"No one was over there. Good thing the Solar Lamp was already removed. If it had fallen and the glass cover had shattered, the ground would be dangerously littered with shards."
The two of them walked over to Rhys Chase. Evelyn explained her plan: wait until dark, pull the canopy into her space, and then begin the rescue.
Rhys had no objections. The base had three shelters: two in Flumen and one in the resettlement housing area. The situations in Flumen and the resettlement area were likely even more severe. They were situated on lower ground, right on the fault line. Experts had previously predicted that if the tectonic plates shifted and tore apart, Flumen would be split in two, with the rift forming a massive chasm.
The population of Flumen and the resettlement area combined was in the hundreds of thousands, and they needed rescuing too. After dark, Evelyn and Ronan would have to make the trip to absorb the collapsed shelter canopies into their space.
An even more severe problem was that the base and its surrounding lands had been torn apart by countless deep fissures and chasms. It was no longer possible to live here. The base’s residents were about to face a new round of mass migration and flight.
At eight o’clock that night, the sky was completely dark and a light rain was falling. Evelyn and Ronan split up, each heading to a different shelter to pull the canopy into their space.
Rhys Chase followed closely behind with the others to rescue the people trapped underneath.
At ten-thirty at night, the pair arrived at the Flumen shelter. The roads were filled with residents carrying their belongings, preparing to leave. Some had set up simple tents by the roadside and had even built fires inside them.
After absorbing all the shelter canopies into their space, the two returned to the base without a moment’s rest. Ronan went to the factory district to collect supplies, while Evelyn returned to the main square to help the injured. The factory district still had a lot of machinery, and the food, pharmaceutical, and clothing factories held plenty of supplies. They had to grab as much as they could.
Ethan Dawson, Miles Vaughn, and Peter Owens all went with Ronan to collect supplies. Over at the shelter, Liam Sterling and Ryan Rowe were directing the rescue. Evelyn, Quincy, and Wendy remained in the main square, tending to the wounded.
"Evelyn," Wendy called out, "there’s a man over here who’s seriously injured. I felt around... I think his ribs are broken. A rib might have punctured his lung. What should I do?"
"Don’t move the seriously injured. Wendy, treat his external wounds first."
Evelyn grabbed a nearby megaphone and recorded a message calling for doctors. She tied the megaphone to a tent pole and set it to play on a loop. Not even fifteen minutes later, three doctors came limping over.
"We’re all doctors."
Evelyn breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness. We’re desperately short on doctors right now. There are several critical patients here who need immediate treatment. Are you able to perform surgery?"
Two of the doctors raised their hands. "We can."
A steady stream of critically injured patients was being carried over from the shelter. Some of them died before even reaching the main square. The deceased were placed in another large tent, where the bodies were already piling up.
At nine in the morning, the rain stopped and the sun suddenly rose. Evelyn had just finished treating a patient’s leg injury. As she went to stand up, she felt a wave of dizziness. She had been squatting for too long and her blood sugar was low. Just then, Ronan returned with Ethan Dawson and the others.
Rhys Chase called over twenty people to deal with the bodies of the deceased. With the sun out, the bodies would quickly decompose if left exposed, and that could lead to outbreaks of infectious diseases or attract disease-carrying flies. He ordered the bodies to be transported to the cornfield for cremation. Some of the victims’ families objected, wailing and trying to block the way, but the bodyguards behind Rhys drew their guns to intimidate them, forcing the families to comply.
Everyone trapped under the shelter had been pulled out, including all the deceased. For the past two days, aftershocks had been constant. With each tremor, the fissures and chasms in the ground widened. According to Liam Sterling, Rhys had sent people to check the reservoir. The Source River Dam was gone, vanished after the earthquake. The chasm running through the middle of Flumen had split the city in two. The rift was five hundred meters wide. Unless a massive bridge was built across it, the people on either side could only stare at each other from afar.
Fortunately, both shelters were on the same side.
The resettlement housing shelter had the most casualties. Rhys said that the shelter’s construction had been handled by the base’s construction department. To save on materials, they had used all the substandard supplies on the resettlement housing side.