My Whumpy Side Blog

The lightkeeper, known to most as Doc, stepped forward, illuminating the tear-stained face with warm light. The soldier’s gaze searched through the lantern’s glow, his eyes half-lidded and his skin draining of color. He wanted to face the disappointment that sat beyond the light.

Blood spilled from the gurney, a drop of red painting the black leather surface of the medic’s boot. Doc didn’t need to see the red in order to understand the urgency of the situation, for the stench of iron already manifested in the stuffy air.

“Sargeant, status?” Doc sprinted alongside them, breaking first into the backroom.

In a great sweeping motion, he threw everything off the table. Tin cups and maps clattered to the floor. He cleared the way just in time as the wounded soldier was dumped off the stretcher unceremoniously. A pained moan gurgled from the poor man’s throat. 

The supposed sergeant that Doc called on answered, “He’s lost a lot of blood. We could probably patch him up, but I don’t think he’ll survive without a transfusion-”

“Patch him up then!” Doc spouted, “Let me handle the transfusion.”

On command the remaining hands at help surrounded the table, popping open a medkit, and passing a long trail of gauze around. Shaky-handed, the sergeant prepared a set of forceps. He dug it into the spurting wound, dabbing an old rag repeatedly into the fleshy hole, only to obtain a glimpse of the lead bullet, before it was drowned in blood again. He worked, unbothered by the cries of pain.

His comrades held the wounded’s arms and legs down. Getting a slick hold onto the metal surface after a few slippery tries, he managed to draw the bullet into the air. A string of now aggravated red followed after, the blood spraying out.

Doc, who cradled the soldier’s dog tag, reading, only noticed the vibrant color in the peripheral of his vision. He shoved one of his assistants aside, diving in to plug the wound.

“Gauze- Now.” He hissed. 

The material barely touched his gloves, and Doc was already packing it deep inside the bullet hole. Freed from his total restraint, the wounded soldier gasped and gagged like a fish lying on the wood of the dock. He clawed at the doctor’s arms only to be ignored. Doc was focused on the slowing flow of blood, watching the steady stream become absorbed by the bandages, until finally the life-saving dam was finished. 

“By the gods.” Doc stepped away, his entire back rising and falling with a great sigh.

He replayed over and over in his mind the dog tag’s information.

Blood Type: O-

Looking over, his eye contact crossed the sergeant’s. The man’s serious face was now camouflaged by a hapless smear of blood. He knew the doctor had something to say, and he awaited it dutifully.

“You O negative?”

“Sorry sir.” As if directed to it, the sergeant fiddled with his own dog tag, rubbing the B positive imprint as if it would erase everything he just experienced from his future memory.

“You there, you-” Doc chased down the next closest man, but the shellshocked soldier shared a frantic head shake in return. The doctor cursed knowing his own blood type would be useless to the circumstances.

“I’m sorry.” The faint voice came from behind.

He refused to turn around, and see the sunken and forcefully aged face that most of his patients arrive with. This time things were different. It tugged on more than just his heart strings, and the deep aching in his chest seemed to take over more than just his cry-sore throat. The beating of his heart pounded against the pain, resuscitating its fresh pangs with each throb.

This was just another soul he couldn’t save. He’s closed the eyes to plentiful of men that he recognized the names of, and yet Doc’s soles froze to the floor.

Trembling, the voice tried again, “I should’ve listened… It’s all my fault…”

Silence filled the grim atmosphere, completing it, but the wounded man didn’t give up. Using the last of his energy, he caught the medic’s attention, “Donavan…”

Given no other choice, Donavan turned around. He were no older than the eyes staring through him. They were both soldiers at the end of the night. It didn’t matter who held what in their hands, a lantern or a rifle, or what decorated their helms, a vibrant cross insignia or black painted sigil of luck.

Drafted into this mess, they were once strangers, but now the pale face that required blood quick to survive was more familiar than a brother. The trenches of the west turned them into comrades. Time spent together, flourishing despite this hellish year and hellish handful of years, made them friends whether Doc liked it or not.

As the wounded man’s doctor, he answered, “Yes?”

“Don’t blame yourself… when I die-”

“No-” Donavan rushed to the wounded man’s side, gripping tight the weakly curled hand extended towards him. He promised, hysterically so, “You’re not going to die here Cam. You’re not dying here.”

The doctor whipped his head around, frantically searching the dank environment of the bunker for an answer, or a miracle. He became overwhelmed by a dark spark of an idea that flicked itself into the dry bush, starting an all-consuming fire to the mind. No matter how it broke down the man’s morals, the idea remained. 

His comrades watched on in silence. By the direction in which he stomped, they understood who he was going after. Not a soul tried to stop him though. They gathered around their wounded friend, watching the life twitch within his lost eyes.

These lightless halls were rarely graced with the glow of the doctor’s lamp. Even if a prisoner’s cries echoed off the concrete walls, the doctor stayed wary to venture across the damp floor and see what awaited. He didn’t trust the enemy on the battlefield or off.

They were vicious, their angered faces becoming animalistic visages of blood thirst that haunted him. Doc envisioned blood running off their bayonets. He saw grenades releasing from their hands.

And so he holed himself up in this bunker the first chance he got, and yet he still heard their foreign screams, fresh as if they were only meters away.

Being here a few days, hidden under the earth, was nothing. If he survives this war, the shouts will still be in his ears then, their shellshocked eyes illuminating the landscape of his homeland forever. And he’d stare, absorbed by their disgusting humanness.

Not a lick of their language rubbed off on him. Maybe a few words here and there, like fire and run. There were more reasons though than avoiding the enemy for the development of this bunker. Important people made good prisoners to be taken, their underling colleagues were not as lucky.

Doc was as equally in charge of the prisoners as he is his fellows of war, but currently the bunker was more yet to be used vacant space than a med bay, and only a sole prisoner wasted away in the rich darkness of the cells.

The prisoner’s head hung from his neck, his nose dipping towards the ground. His arms were kept high above him, hands clamped together by shackles that chained him to the wall.

There wasn’t enough chain for him lay, so his body became partially suspended to the wall, and the exhaustion of so was evident in the way the his skin sank in, creating soot-like rings around his eyes. Despite this, the soldier-prisoner startled wide-awake at the jingling of great iron keys.

Ear-piercing scraping erupted as the heavy steel door budged, then slid open. Doc stood in the doorway, his lips pressed thin and his gaze fixated on his target. The high-ranking prisoner made a sort of aggravated huff, before pulling against his own restraints to face away from the medic. Mutterings hissed underneath his breath, as he settled into this new uncomfortable position. An uncontrollable breathlessness finished the image of a shuddering and strained man.

His uniform, stiff and fancy compared to most soldiers seen on the battlefield, had seen better days. Whether or not it was the ceaseless war, his capture, or the days spent chained here that had ruined the fine jacket was another story.

Doc ignored everything he could, his boots pressing over a few dried blood stains. He snatched the prisoner by his dog tag, pulling him close enough in order to read it.

Hissing, the prisoner’s confusion still managed to show through a puffy black eye and busted lip. His widened good eye and upturned brows were all the average person needed to understand the building fear he found through this strange procedure.

O negative. Perfect.

Sensing the dread exuding from the doctor’s nonexistent response, the prisoner was soon let go, and left to stew in the following silence. He sniffled, catching a whiff of the blood on the doctor’s hands. Looking down he saw it imprinted onto his tag, a thick smudge of red smeared over the metallic letters of his name.

This was it. His captors must’ve grown tired of his breathing. He were a better asset dead, and soon one less burden to worry about in the throws of desperation and war.

His stomach growled, making him feel every inch of the cavernous entity, his empty insides. This body felt hollow and faint, and his wrists stung as cold oxygen kissed the shackle-cut wounds. As the world faded back into the obscurity of drowsiness, his eyelids falling heavy, the iron keys sounded again.

A chair was dragged into the room. Two grim-faced soldiers hobbled in alongside the doctor, their hands clenching tightly to an assemblage of equipment. They evaded eye contact; from each other, from the doctor, and especially from their prisoner.

Medical straps scratched against the frigid surface of the concrete, dangling out of their grasp, the ground rough and uneven beneath their boots. 

Gathered in Doc’s arms, plastic tubes and their attachments stuck out every which way. It took the hanging blood bag, its starved-dry insides catching the lantern’s orange glare, for their target to panic.

He jolted up from his slacking posture, tugging away from the wall. The chains made a sharp clink as they straightened out. His boots grated against the ground, slipping as his feet went out from under him, before he repeated the action in some attempt to fight back. A pained yelp escaped from him as he felt the hot buzz of human touch, the assistants locking their arms around his.

“Nein. Nein.” Shouting for his life, the voice cracked and the throat croaked. He pleaded, “Bitte. Mach das nicht-”

Doc snatched the man by his jaw, his blood-caked nails digging into the skin. He seethed,  “Shut. Up.”

There wasn’t a care to listen to the warning. The soldier seemed to lower his head, whispering, maddened or near possessed by the words hissing between his teeth, “Mögen die wahren Götter unseren Seelen gnädig sein. Mögen die wahren Götter unseren Seelen gnädig sein.”

“What’s he rambling?” Leaning into his comrade, a wobbly-kneed private, the sergeant asked.

“I think a prayer, sir.” He responded matter-of-factly.

The private’s hollow eyes found themselves elsewhere. His sergeant could care less if it was out of a hatred for his fellow men, or if the youthful soul daydreamed about the comfort of home, condemning this horrific snapshot as a consequential trial in his journey to eventually ring the vintage doorbell of his mama’s porch and soon bask in the embrace of her fireplace.

The sergeant shook his head, “Let him pray then. He’ll need it.” 

Nudging the private, he directed his eyes pointedly towards Donavan. The doctor held the serious grimace of man devoted to the craft of life and death. It mattered little if today he was playing the role of the undertaker, surgeon, or reaper.

Methodically, he fumbled with the steel restraints until the thick metal cuffs released raw and skinny wrists. They dragged the squirming prisoner of war into the chair. He clasped together his hands, intertwining the fingers as tight as he could possibly lock them, continuing his mumbling.

“Möge das göttliche Schwert meine Sünden wegschneiden-”

His head jerked as they strapped him down, yet his incessant prayer didn’t hitch. Doc had to latch down onto the soldier’s sleeves, and pry his hands free.

He grumbled, “Fucking Steelwards. Help me remove his jacket.”

Stripping the jacket down past his chest, they next got ahold of the prisoner’s arms, forcing each one flat against a wooden arm rest. Doc instructed them, “Tie him down loosely. We can’t restrict the blood flow.”

Fervent nodding, and they did exactly as he demanded, becoming two misfortuned half-participants to bystanders. 

As soldiers at least, the sergeant had received general medic training in the beginning, despite his rusty skills. His job is more so shoot to kill, not raise the dead and damned. The private was late to the party. Bullet holes riddled his education of war. His marksmanship took the largest hit, but after dodging whipping bullets and trying to stop the bleeding of his recruit-peers, he understood the force pumping veins better than average man back home. He knew the gun more intimately too. Even as Doc’s assistants, their attentiveness quelled, and instead their focus lowered to the texture of the walls and floor. 

“Möge mein Blut dem Plan der Götter dienen-” The soldier’s commitment dampened. His upper arm stung as the soft muscles were constricted, restrained by a sturdy rubber strap. Doc prodded along the forearm at visible veins.

“Shit.” He lamented, “He’s too dehydrated.”

“Doc…” The sergeant gave his friend an awkward nod, receiving the silence as his only brief opportunity to garner the truth. “Doc, we should just-”

“No! Get some water. We’ve got time.” He freed the arm from its fate for now, pacing in a quick circle, before hounding the private next. “Go tell Emmett to give Cameron saline.”

Barely, the sergeant had returned when Doc intercepted him, snagging the little tin of water out of his hands. He rushed over to chair, and pressed the cup to prisoner’s lips. He commanded, “Drink.”

Urgency stood steady in Doc’s strong voice. The foreign speech bounced off of the prisoner’s face in the form of hot mist. Although the words true meaning were illegible, there was an obvious understanding in the harsh gesture.

That didn’t stop the prisoner from unveiling his penchant for defiance. He turned his head, a light chuckle escaping him in a uncontrollable manner.

“Oh really-” Donavan took a gentle moment to set the tin cup down, before composing himself. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. He gripped the man by the base of his neck, shaking him and the chair together in fast jerky movements. Doc threatened, “Weren’t you just praying? I’ll-”

“Focus!” The sergeant interjected.

He pointed at the pale patch of skin that managed to avoid tanning on his forearm, where a watch once sat, its shape molded onto his complexion. Someone stole it recently. The lightly shadow of time worked though, for the doctor’s posture curled, and he backed away from the prisoner’s chair, a scolded dog with his tail between his legs.

Doc picked the cup back off the floor. He snatched the prisoner by his ear, the cartilage jagged between thumb and index. Before the soldier managed to react, Donavan shoved the tin to his lips.

Choking up the sip of water that slipped into his mouth, there was a muffled struggle of words, before he accepted his fate, stale water going down his throat in large gulps. Impatiently so, the sergeant and doctor waited, prepped more water, and waited, until Donavan couldn’t take it anymore.

Breaking a weighted silence that proliferated the cell, he warranted, “That should be enough. Let’s get this over with.”

The strap was retied hastily, Doc manhandling the prisoner’s arm into place. He slapped at the skin until the message of stop clenching got across. Colorful lines bulging beneath intersected one over another, purple and blue stripes, extra vibrant beneath the prisoner’s whitely pigmentation.

Doc located the perfect one, running his fingers against them, feeling for the beating rush of blood inside. Satisfied, he punctured his vein of choice, scrambling to get it taped into place.

In an instant the human body’s natural pressure pushed the prisoner’s blood into the thin tubing with a light hiss, creating a solid crimson pathway out. Tied to the chair, the prisoner’s hands trembled at the pinch of the needle. His breath hitched, giving way to a startled sigh, enduring the hungering sensation of energy seeping out of him. Looking at the injection site only made matters worse. Nausea bubbled up inside his chest, frothing up the saliva held in his mouth. 

Blood lead into the bag, slowly filling it with life. Doc watched, his breath baited like a dog waiting for a bite. One pint went by quickly, an eight minute endeavor that was an eternity for the doctor and prisoner alike. He replaced the bag for another.

The soldier-prisoner managed to quell his panic for this long. Relief congested his stiff posture. Conjoined by a sickly heat, the feeling dispersed in all the wrong ways, creating a void filled by dread and horror.

“Do you know how to do a blood transfusion?” Donavan didn’t take his eyes off the prisoner. His head budged in a somewhat turn, his little gesture showing his comrade that he was talking to him.

“Unfortunately no.” He answered knowing what the doctor was going to say next.

“Watch him then. I hope I can trust you to switch out bags.”

“How much are we taking?”

“As much as Cameron needs.”

Enough blood pooled around the table in the initial room that it were still wet across the floor, and would be for likely hours. Cameron, the wounded soldier, no longer writhed in place. Instead a ghostly labored sound wheezed from his throat. He were barely awake, and barely alive. The blank look in his eyes would relay that info to any onlooker. There was little movement inside them as Donavan walked up to his friend. He clasped one hand tightly, before searching for a viable vein.

But it wasn’t enough blood, and so the cycle began.

He went all throughout the bunker, back and forth, demanding more and more. The prisoner understood by the third pint drawn, as his breathing hastened, and his arm hurt sorer and sorer, what this meant for him. His naturally drowsy eyes stared down the doctor each time he entered the room, but it didn’t matter what was said. The initial fear he held was right all along, and so he prayed again.

The doc blabbered foreign words. His aura was angry, his brows furrowed deep into his face, accentuating the mature ridges of his face. Swapping out one plastic bag after another, his teeth gritted, and in the silence of bunker you could hear them grinding against each other inside his mouth. Unable to translate, but painfully able to listen, he simply sat bound to this situation, watching the sergeant and doctor trade sentences. A dissent formed, and their strange voices raised.

Soon the doctor was shouting at his fellow. The sergeant shook his head, before stomping out of the room. Now they were completely alone, this prisoner and this doctor.

Donavan’s back rose up and down, the anger and adrenaline wracking his body. He needed more blood. Cameron needed more blood. A fourth pint. A fifth.

Prayers whispered, weak and disjointed, as the prisoner fought the blackened edges of his vision, “Möge mein Blut… Stahl für mein Land… schmieden….”

The doctor too, was a soldier. He had killed with the rifle, so what difference did any of this make. Changing out the blood bag he got to hear the shuddering breath of his prisoner, yes, and incidentally he caught some glimpses of hazy eyes more defined than ever, but was it any different.

The prisoner watched him closely, the prayers seeming to mindlessly come to him, as if he were possessed by their rites. Donavan had to switch to the other arm. He dried up his original pick, the first forearm decorated now by a colorful bruise still forming in the needle’s stead. Tomorrow, if his body makes it, it will have blackened.

“Mein… hhh… hh-”

A sharp exhale cut the prisoner off. He failed to regain his voice, a shaky yet manic inhale following. There was a semblance of wince, but instead of tensing, his shoulders slumped and is head lowered. Unable to catch his breath the panic overflowed. Shallow breathing set in.

“Hey.” Doc snapped a few times right in front of the guy’s nose his mind wasn’t on the prisoner though.

Every thought centered around Cameron. Each pint raised the low chances of his survival, yet the young soldier’s skin was still pale, his eyes sunken and his once lively energy reduced to a zombified half-slumber. If only Cameron heeded his advice. If only…

He just needed a little more-

“Donavan, we both know this is pointless.” His partner-in-crime figured last chance to change the medic’s mind was worth it, despite the time impeding on his sleep.

The distance housed the heart-shaking booms of bombardments, war still ongoing. Soon more soldiers would need him. Doc wouldn’t do this for every single man that ended up on his table, and his brain, now troubled by the daze off sleepless nights barely understood why Cameron was different.

He wasn’t losing a brother in arms. This was a friend, someone he truly knew, who made this all seem worth it. Cameron was supposed to survive this shit. He has to go home.

What difference were the man that he gunned down and this one here, strapped to this chair, close enough to notice the necklace that was tucked underneath his jacket. A simple sword with a red gem dripping off of it, a classic choice for a steelward this necklace.

How many wandered aimlessly into this fight believing that their gods were guiding them? They were a rare breed nowadays, killed off in mass during the previous war, and now what? The tides had changed. Was the very nation, that’s ready to throw them out at any moment, now worthy of their valiant defense? 

Doc knew the truth. He wanted to pretend it wasn’t real, to allow cognitive dissonance to possess him, but he were too smart a man. An educated soldier was still a soldier, and an educated corpse was useless.

When these miniscule moments settled amongst the sediment of war, then his intelligence shined, a trivial thing. He knew that the steelwards faced similar fates no matter their choice. Their options were to die like cattle in some primitive death camp, or be blown to bits by foreign men.

The prisoner’s hands were freezing, the cold autumn air that sealed itself within the bunker long since reduced his temperature to nothing. Discolored fingers were connected to numb palms. Doc pressed down to feel for blood pressure. A rushing pulse, beating out of rhythm, called back.

“Are you done?”

Donavan flinched as the sergeant clamped a hand down on his shoulder. He opened his mouth to speak, his fingers clenching into fists, but stuttering gasp answered the sergeant’s question.

The prisoner begged breathlessly, “...Bitte …Bitte”

The necklace dangled adjacent to the dog tag, a sword dripping with blood. Doc sighed, “Yeah I’m… I’m done, just… Help me lay him out.”

Trading a wary glare between a doctor’s set of sunken eyes, the sergeant agreed, not an ounce of hesitation following his next course of action. Freeing the prisoner, they hooked their arms underneath his.

There was nothing to lay the man on. He didn’t struggle. He didn’t even pray. A pained sense of a sound seethed through his gritted teeth as they lifted him into the air. His body hung in their hands, the heaviest it’s ever been and several pints lighter.

“Careful.” Donavan’s advice was instinctive.

The sergeant wasted no time to jab, not glancing up from the prisoner as they lowered him to the concrete, “As if you even care.”

A quip died on the doctor’s tongue, smothered to death by the bitter taste of regret. Instead he forced his attention to the prisoner and prisoner only, but it was already too late.

Wheezing, the prisoner flattened out on his back, his limbs easily maneuverable as he acted like a limp ragdoll, unresponsive to the enemy medic. His hazy stare couldn’t reach the ceiling. He were elsewhere, standing in the doorway of life and death, lost in a whirlpool of fatigue.

“Hopefully…” The sergeant debated closely his next thought, “He’s dreaming of someplace far from here.”

In the remaining silence, the distant pops of gunfire and continuous barrages haunted the bunker. The eerie howl of bomber planes pierced through the early morning sky, its shadow almost masked in the clouds. Doc double-checked the thin bandages he wrapped around the prisoner’s arms. Deciding that this was the best he could do about the damage he caused, he lifted up off the floor, halting at his friend’s discretion.

“And what about Cameron?”

“He… might make it to tomorrow.” Doc’s answer was honest. He added, the shame starting to weigh against the back of his neck, “They… They both might make it to tomorrow.”

“And was it worth it?”

Several comebacks jumped at the gun, close to being spoken, but instead the medic allowed silence to smog over, deciphering the sergeant intentions, letting the guilt reach the bottom of the river, settling amongst the sandy sediment of his mind. The wind was picking up. It howled against the bunker, shuttling leaves off their branches.

Friendly uniforms would soon reach them. They could bring in wounded of all sort, or guns, or crates of rations, or useless scrap, or nothing at all. Maybe they’d make it to tomorrow, just in time to drink tasteless soup and boil water that the factory workers back home would be wary to try.

The closest battle found soldiers only checking the bunker occasionally, but the brunt of war couldn’t stay distant forever. Maybe the desperate fight of today would mean nothing. Cameron could awake, recover, and three days letter step on a landmine, never to be seen, but the doctor answered himself and he answered the sergeant.

“I did my job.”

There was nothing else to say. Doc exited first, followed shortly after by the sergeant. The prisoner listened to the iron key jingle, and the metal door lock.

Despite the exhaustion, the soreness riddling his shoulders, how his eyes were glued mostly shut by weary tears and his skin stung as the cold air kissed it, he stretched to the best of his ability. 

No longer was the concrete ceiling recognizable. It spun around, blurred and sprawling. His heartbeat was deafening in his ear, accompanied by the acoustics of his shallow breathing.

Each limb felt like a useless mass of flesh and bone attached to him, pained by its emptiness. Part of him understood that he were close to death, and that the sunlight might not wait for him, but a hysterical sense of euphoria buzzed within his hoarse throat.

No binds, no shackles, no arms stretched above his head. He weakly pushed his arms into the sleeves of his jacket. Not enough energy left, his hands slacked up against his chest, the fingers unable to get ahold of his buttons.