Yet another one on his way. The orderly rolled the stretcher through the makeshift curtains of the Med tent at a run, just managing to pull it to a stop in front of him. He took another breath, and readied himself for the thirteenth of the morning. This wasn't a very good day for them. Hell, only morning.

Despite himself, he couldn't but shudder at the shredded man that lay before him. His right arm - he doubted he could do anything about that, the thing was a bloody mess. His left - equally bloody, but it could be saved. He would have to work fast. He took a precious few seconds to glance over the rest of the body. Two bullet holes, one making a sucking wound in the chest, the other passing through the mushy mess of the right arm. That one didn't matter. The chest wound did.

'Get me a plastic sheet,' he barked, holding out his right hand. With his left, he snatched up a scalpel, already bloodied from the days work, and held it under the running tap that flew into the red drain. The sheet was immediately stuffed into his hands. Seconds saved lives. He got to work.

First, he spread the plastic sheet over the man's chest. Almost immediately, due to the ragged breathing of the man, the sheet was pulled slightly into the wound. Next, he bunched up the sheet and spread it uniformly over the wound entrance to prevent the entire sheet from being sucked in. The bullet had passed cleanly through, but the vital question was, had it damaged the lungs too much for him to do anything? He would soon find out. Now that he had tended to the chest wound - he could now only wait - he turned his attention to the right arm. He grimaced again. No doubt about it. Amputation.

'Give him a shot of morphine. Neck.'

The poor guy was slowly stirring. His left eyelid fluttered, and he tried to say something. All that came out was a gurgling sound. Consistent with a lung wound. He had to shut the man up, or it would get worse.

As it turned out, he didn't have to do a thing. The man gave an involuntary gasp, shuddered, and then sank back into the stretcher, his ravaged face settling into an expression of piece. He wasn't dead, simply reacting to the morphine. Usually patients didn't sink into unconsciousness under the effect of a single shot - they just felt a general numbness - but this guy was weak, very weak - he seemed to have lost a few pints of blood - medicines weren't going to have an ordinary effect on him. He would have to be careful with the morphine. Too much, and his heart would stop.

He got to work. This was the part he hated, the raw truth of what he was about to do to this man, to his future - he could visualize the scene when the man woke up, at first the stunned disbelief, the accusatory look, then the crying, the relentless sobbing, until even that stopped, and they just stared blankly into the air. He hated it, but he had to do it. Duty.

'Hacksaw. Quickly, he's losing blood.'

Taking the saw in one hand, he moved over to the other side of the stretcher and, using his right, pushed the man into position.

'Hold him down.'

He got to work. The saw cut through the outer skin and flesh like a hot knife through butter, and then came the grinding. He gritted his teeth. What a job. He pushed harder, the grinding noise became worse and he could feel the saw eating its toothed way through bone, and then without warning, he hit the material of the stretcher. It was through, and the job was done. Working quickly, he dropped the hacksaw into the small bucket by his side, where it swam in a sea of red and glinting metal, and moved back to the man's left side. Some work might be done here. He could save this one. Shrapnel wound. Without hesitation, he gripped the shard of metal firmly and pulled. The effect of the morphine was waning. The man let out an involuntary gasp of pain.

He shut his ears to it. This wasn't the time to bother about pain. There would be more ahead. More important was this conscript's life. He kept telling himself that. It was a truth, but a hard truth.

His work with the left arm complete - he left the bandaging to the orderly - he took another glance at the chest wound. His brows furrowed. It was getting worse. The bleeding should have stopped by now. Instead, small gouts of blood were pouring out of the small gaping hole in his chest and spilling out under the plastic. Finding nowhere to go, the blood tried to seep back into the wound, but was prevented by the relentless flow of even more. This was a bad situation getting worse. He started to panic. Turning away from the stretcher for a second, he took a deep calming breath. A man's life is at stake here - get a damn grip on yourself!

He turned back. How to stop the bleeding? Why the hell was it bleeding so much in the first place? Unless the bullet had nicked an artery. Then the man was in trouble. He removed the plastic sheet and used his hands to press down on the wound. The blood kept gushing out, only this time it was through his fingers. He applied more pressure.

'Help me out here,' he grunted.

He got the help, but it was a little too late. The man lurched up, coughed up blood and something else - he had a horrible feeling that the man was coughing up bits of himself - and then with what almost amounted to a shriek, the man sank back onto the stretcher, into peace. He felt for a pulse, but he knew that there wouldn't be one.

He felt an irrational rage well up in him. Not his fault, but dozens of men died at his hands every day. Could he have saved this one? Maybe? Maybe if he hadn't spread the plastic sheet, if he hadn't spent a few seconds gathering himself, so many maybe's and no time to answer them. He smashed his fist into the wall. The sheer futility of it all frustrated him.

The curtains parted again, and a stretcher was wheeled into this Theatre of Life and Death. Time to move on.

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