Helpless

The village was looking much, much closer now; but I could no longer feel my legs. My whole body was numb. My walking speed was only a bit faster than that of a turtle's. I could try jumping on one of the cows, but the poor animals were struggling enough by themselves as well. And besides, they were not my animals and I had to bring them back to the village in a good condition.

Trying to breathe the cold, lung-piercing air in, I looked down. Just then I could notice the red trail we were leaving behind on the snow.

"What the-"

The red trail was pouring down from the cow's body on my left side.

"Oh my, are you hurt?"

I stopped walking, and so did the cows I was guiding. I got a closer look at the blood marks. They were not coming from the cow, they were coming from Mr. Yunus, the man I was transporting on the cow's back.

"No, not again!" I said. "Not in the middle of nothing... At least make it back to the village, damn it!"

I had no equipment with me, and I really didn't want to put my patient on the freezing snow for treatment. If we could just make it back to my little clinic, it would be okay.

"Come on, walk!"

With this new source of unpleasant encouragement, I started walking fastly again.

"Are you still there?" I loudly asked my patient. This time, he did not make grumbling sounds like he did before. I looked at his motionless body for some time, and decided to slap him. This time, he did make a sound.

"Alright, just like that. Stay awake."

Just before I continued walking, I heard something.

"Doct... Doctor..." The voice was very weak, and the man's pain was embedded into it.

"Yunus?" I said.

"Hhhhurts..."

These were the first words I had heard from him, so I was a bit surprised.

"I know, I konw it does." I said. "There is nothing I can do here. You will have to endure."

I knew people could pass out just by the amount of pain they were receiving, but I was telling the truth... There was really nothing I could do.

"Can't... stand it..."

"I know, man, I know." I said. "Look at the bright side, it will keep you awake in the cold."

I didn't get a reply from him until we arrived back at the village. There, I tied the cows to my neighbour's fence and got my patient back to my own house. I had no time to wake my neighbour up again.

I knocked the door of my house. After peeking out from one of the windows, Aya came and unlocked the door. She was sleepy.

"You didn't go." she said to me.

"I couldn't." I said. "Get me my stuff."

"Yes, father." she said and went to my room. Meanwhile, I got Mr. Yunus laying on his back and stripped his clothes open to reach his stomach.

Aya came back from my room with boxes of medical whatnot. Only a small percentage of those were professionally manufactured goods, most of them were things I have improvised with my medical knowledge; but if they could get the job done, it was enough for me. That was the best I could do as the only doctor in this forgotten, poor village.

"Okay, let's stop your bleeding once again."

I poured down a solution from one of my bottles and pressed some cloth against the man's stomach.

I looked at my patient's face to see how he was holding up. He was in tears.

"Okay, easy there..."

The bleeding on his stomach took a while to stop. During that time, Aya was watching me from the far corner of the room in wonder.

After I managed to stop the bleeding, I examined the man's stomach in detail, over and over again.

"Aya, can you bring the lantern closer?" I asked. "Careful, it might be hot. Don't burn yourself."

"Okay, dad." she said. She got the lantern from it's hanging spot on the wall and walked closer.

"What the hell is this!?" I was talking to myself, looking at the red spots and holes on the man's body. "Did you fall and land in a bush of poisonous roses?"

The man shook his head with difficulty, trying to say 'no'.

"Okay, I know." I said. "If it is poison, let's try to stop it first... Aya, you stay here."

Aya nodded.

I got my patient to the bathroom, and completely stripped his clothes off. I carefully washed him with slightly cold water, then went back to take some bottles from my boxes. I was assuming the man was poisoned, but since I did not know what kind of poison it was, I had to rely on trial and error to stop it.

I dropped small bits of different basic and acidic solutions onto different parts of the man's body to see their effects.

"Burns!.." complained the man.

"I know it does, yeah, I know." I told the man. "Fine, let me try to relieve it a bit."

I went back to my room to search for a plant that I have bought from a farmer a while ago. It was a pretty uncommon plant around here, but it was said to have benumbing effects.

"There, there."

I found a few leaves and took them with me. I went back to the bathroom and held the leaves to the man's nose.

"Can you smell it?"

The man shook his head. I crushed the leaves in my hand and held them again.

"Okay, this time, even I can smell it from the distance." I said. "Now, breathe in and out. It should help a bit."

The man's eyelids dropped slowly. He was about to pass out.

"DAD!" Aya cried suddenly. I left the man there and immediately went back to the room Aya was in. She was looking out of the window. She pointed outside for me to look.

In the completely white, snowy background, there was a dark human silhouette. S/he had loose clothes, and s/he was trying to walk, but shaking and tumbling around like s/he was drunk.

"Who is that?" I said.

"He is terrifying me." Aya commented.

Just after that, the silhouette stopped and collapsed into the snow.

"Oh, you are kidding me!" I said.

I quickly got something to protect myself from the cold and went to help that person. I got out of the house and ran to where the silhouette collapsed. There, a woman was laying facedown.

"Oh no..."

A red trail was ending and turning into a puddle where she was laying down.