Life is Like a Journey – Chapter 58
by Little PandaVolume 2: Inheritance
Hand in Hand
With the fire’s light as a blue and white backdrop
Gu Yanzhi moved the person to the entrance of the storeroom, half-lifting his upper body, gently shaking his neck: “Troublemaker, wake up, hold on! Damn it, hold on for me!”
She then picked up the communicator and yelled frantically: “Is the doctor here yet?! Doctor!”
Through the earpiece came her calm and steady voice, slightly out of breath: “Three minutes, first open his clothes for ventilation. Do you have anything on hand to stop the bleeding?”
The twenty kilograms of load, plus the weight of the emergency kit, made it difficult for the doctor to move. The long run from outside the security line to entering the factory area was indeed taking a toll on the body.
Lu Qingshi bent down, propping her hands on her knees, taking deep breaths of oxygen. The firefighter leading the way ahead turned back to help her, and took her emergency kit, swinging it onto his back, to which the doctor cast a grateful glance.
“Thank you.”
The moment she heard her voice, Gu Yanzhi felt a mix of emotions, a relief like a heavy stone landing, and also an urge to blurt out, “Why is it you?!”
Lu Qingshi spoke before her: “Then who do you think has better medical skills and more emergency experience than I do?”
Truly… so confident it’s hard to believe.
Gu Yanzhi gave a wry smile: “It’s a good thing it’s you.”
Thankfully, it’s you.
“Get out of the way!” Three minutes later, the doctor, panting heavily, crouched down beside the troublemaker and pushed her aside.
“What exactly happened, how was the injury sustained?!” Her speech was rapid as she spoke, simultaneously retrieving medication from the emergency kit, taking out a vial of adrenaline, and quickly connecting it to the life monitor, seamlessly establishing an intravenous line.
“Fell from a height…”
Before Gu Yanzhi could finish speaking, Lu Qingshi immediately frowned: “No, there’s damage to the eyes, ears, and nostrils.”
She gently opened the troublemaker’s eyelids to check, finding them already a bloody mess, with parts missing.
Gu Yanzhi steadied herself: “Before the fall from a height, he was standing at the upwind end of the ventilation hood, repairing a malfunction. After the ventilation hood started working normally, he leaned in to take a look, and then I heard a scream…”
Lu Qingshi took out saline from the bag and poured it over his eyes, nostrils, and ears to clean them: “He might have been irritated by toxic gases.”
As she spoke, her other hand was rummaging through the bag, unable to find what she was looking for, a thin layer of sweat appearing on her forehead.
“What do you need? I’ll get it for you.”
Gu Yanzhi brought the bag over, and Lu Qingshi, without turning her head, said: “Prepare for intubation.”
During her time in the military, there were also medics in the unit. Although Gu Yanzhi wasn’t exactly proficient with these instruments, she could at least name and recognize them, so she handed them over to her.
Lu Qingshi lay on the ground, her gloved hands stained with blood, her hair slightly falling over her eyes, and gently inserted the tube into the troublemaker’s throat. After several attempts, she was unsuccessful.
Lu Qingshi got up and glanced at the life monitor: “Scalpel.”
Without much hesitation, Gu Yanzhi opened the bag of a disposable detachable scalpel. Lu Qingshi grabbed it, poured iodine over his neck, while Gu Yanzhi astutely laid out the sterile drape for her.
As the scalpel made its cut, dark red blood oozed out. Lu Qingshi wiped it away with gauze and extended her left hand.
“Hemostat.”
“Is it this one?” Gu Yanzhi rummaged through the emergency kit for a while.
Lu Qingshi glanced over: “Yes!”
After separating the anterior tracheal tissues, Lu Qingshi inserted two fingers to probe cautiously, as she had to be extremely careful without surgical navigation.
“Alright, give me the curved clamp.”
Lu Qingshi used one hand to hold the curved clamp to open the trachea, while her other hand took the tracheal tube, removed the stylet, suctioned out the secretions, then stopped the bleeding for him, and tied the strap of the tracheal tube around his neck in a secure knot.
“Alright, tracheotomy completed.”
The blood oxygen level on the life monitor began to slowly rise. Lu Qingshi supported his head: “Help me lift him up, I need to check his wounds.”
“Okay,” Gu Yanzhi took a large step over to her position and crouched down. Lu Qingshi freed her hands to feel down from the back of his head, and when she reached the cervical spine, she paused slightly.
“Spinal cord injury.”
With an injury to the fourth cervical spinal cord, Lu Qingshi glanced at the young face of the troublemaker. Even if he survived, he would not be able to stand again.
Gu Yanzhi swallowed and looked at her with eager eyes: “Is there still hope?”
Lu Qingshi was silent for a moment: “It can’t be realigned now. If we send him to the hospital immediately, there might still be hope.”
“Okay,” Gu Yanzhi didn’t say more and, along with two other firefighters, lifted the person onto a stretcher. The monitor began to beep.
“Wait!” Lu Qingshi rushed over, cutting open his clothes with scissors: “No, there must be some bleeding that hasn’t been stopped. Put him down!”
As soon as she finished speaking, the green line on the monitor flattened. The doctor knelt on the ground, extending her arms to perform CPR.
“One, two, three…” Lu Qingshi counted while watching the numbers on the cardiac monitor, hoping for a miracle.
Gu Yanzhi was also so nervous that her hands were sweating profusely.
“Defibrillator!”
She quickly handed it over, and Lu Qingshi took it and placed it on his chest.
“Charging 200J, charge complete, clear!”
“Second defibrillation, charging 200J, charge complete, clear!”
“Third defibrillation, charge complete, clear!”
“Fourth defibrillation, charge complete, clear!”
…
The doctor was panting heavily, drenched in sweat. The prolonged CPR had exhausted her, and there was no one else available to take over her work. Lu Qingshi gritted her teeth and lifted her sore wrist.
“Scalpel, I need to perform an open-chest exploration.”
Theoretically, after the heart stops for five minutes, there is almost no chance of survival, and even if survival is possible by chance, brain function would be severely impaired due to lack of oxygen—in other words, a vegetative state.
But she was Lu Qingshi, and the troublemaker was still so young. She could not fail; this was also her promise to Gu Yanzhi.
“Administer mannitol.”
Gu Yanzhi found a bag of liquid labeled with the large characters “Mannitol” and quickly hung it up.
“Flashlight, shine a light for me,” she said, and several firefighters came over, turning on their high-beam flashlights to illuminate the opened chest cavity.
Lu Qingshi half-kneeled on the ground, reaching her hand inside, taking a deep breath, and feeling for the bleeding area by touch.
The organs were warm and slippery, the heavy scent of blood filling her nostrils, and blood flowed gently through her palm. Lu Qingshi slightly closed her eyes, sensing the direction of the blood flow.
“Hemostatic clamp.”
Gu Yanzhi handed the instrument to her without hesitation, and Lu Qingshi used her left hand to insert the hemostatic clamp, quickly clamping down and letting out a slight sigh of relief.
“6.0 absorbable suture, the coronary artery is ruptured, it needs to be stitched up.”
“Here, right now?” For some reason, the mist was becoming increasingly dense. Even with a positive-pressure respirator, the pungent smell of chlorine was pervasive, seeping into their nostrils. The vinyl chloride hadn’t fully dissipated, and if it accumulated to a certain concentration, it could still explode. The medical environment was truly harsh.
“Yes, it must be stitched, otherwise he won’t make it to the hospital.”
Lu Qingshi had only temporarily clamped the blood vessel; to achieve perfect hemostasis, it needed to be stitched. As she spoke, she was already reaching in with a needle holder.
This was Gu Yanzhi’s first time watching her perform surgery up close. There was no shadowless lamp, no advanced surgical instruments, and no clear surgical navigation. The more extreme and harsh the environment, the more it tested a doctor’s skills and psychological resilience.
Lu Qingshi’s gloved hands were very steady, maintaining a stable and rapid pace. One hand stitched while the other tied knots, working together seamlessly. From Gu Yanzhi’s angle, she could see the sweat on Lu Qingshi’s forehead and her slightly dirty face, yet those eyes remained bright, filled with unwavering determination, inexplicably putting her at ease.
It was strange that someone who often hovered between life and death could feel a long-lost sense of security from a seemingly weak woman.
She used to rely on her sidearm, then on her fists, and now she had to add Lu Qingshi to that list.
As this realization became increasingly clear along with her heartbeat, Gu Yanzhi watched her gentle profile, her throat moving slightly.
She wanted to say something, but a burst of static and the anxious voice of the fire captain came through her earpiece.
“Gu Yanzhi, evacuate! Evacuate immediately! The switch you just pressed didn’t close the main valve and open the ventilation hood; it closed the ventilation hood and opened the gas valve. According to the monitoring, the vinyl chloride concentration in the factory has now reached a critical threshold! It could explode at any moment! Evacuate immediately! Evacuate immediately!”
Gu Yanzhi glanced back at Lu Qingshi, who was intently focused on the surgery: “No…”
“Abandon the injured! Get out now!” The on-site commander grabbed the communicator and shouted, “This is a government order!!!”
The firefighting instructor, who rarely showed tears, clenched his fists, his eyes reddening: “F*ck with the orders, I can’t abandon my own brothers!!!”
“Do you want to sacrifice all the rescue personnel around you for just one person?! They all went into the factory to save lives, too. Everyone’s intentions were right, and no one wants to see this outcome! Blame that f*cking Chen Guoli for lining his pockets and building that shoddy, substandard project with the government funds!”
She didn’t want to know the ins and outs of the vinyl chloride leak. Gu Yanzhi’s gaze fell on her comrades beside her, on the troublemaker lying on the ground, and finally on the doctor in the white coat.
The taut string in her heart wavered slightly, and Gu Yanzhi pressed her lips tightly together. This decision was too painful for her, causing tears to well up in her eyes.
Sensing her gaze, Lu Qingshi seemed aware but still didn’t look up, continuing with her work.
“Let them go out first; I’ll stay here with you.”
It felt as if a heavy stone had been lifted, and there was an indescribable sense of gratitude. They were no longer the kind of people who would be overwhelmed by emotions. Gu Yanzhi stood up and relayed the evacuation order to the other two firefighters.
Those two people struggled and hesitated, but still couldn’t resist the orders from their superiors, picking up their equipment and preparing to withdraw.
The unexpected change occurred at this moment. The large door of the warehouse, five steps away from them, emitted a heavy, muffled sound. The noise of the iron door scraping made one’s teeth ache. Gu Yanzhi looked up, and the automatic shielding door, heavy as a thousand jun, slowly descended.
It must be that the emergency device had been triggered. Once the concentration of vinyl chloride in the workshop reached a certain level, it would automatically trigger an emergency brake. That was a bulletproof steel door, she recognized. Its purpose was to completely block the leakage of vinyl chloride, or rather, even if an explosion occurred, it wouldn’t threaten the outside world in the slightest. As for the people inside…
Gu Yanzhi glanced at Lu Qingshi, who was bent over suturing. Cold sweat slid down her forehead. No one had expected that she would suddenly stand up, dash forward in one swift move, and use her body to block the gradually descending steel door.
The pain of muscles and bones seemingly tearing apart instantly made the usually strong fire instructor cry out. The heavy steel door pressed down on her shoulders. Gu Yanzhi fell heavily to one knee with a thud, kicking up a cloud of dust.
She gritted her teeth, her eyes bulging as if about to split open, yet she didn’t urge Lu Qingshi. She was only supporting herself with a burst of lone courage and the belief that she absolutely couldn’t let her get hurt.
The other two firefighters also threw down their heavy equipment and rushed over, but in the eyes of machinery, human strength was as insignificant as ants, not worth mentioning. Even with two more people added, it only slowed down the speed of the steel door’s descent a little.
The knees of all three people sank into the dust. Lu Qingshi worked with focus; this was her stage. She had to concentrate without distraction. With the slightest carelessness, the patient wouldn’t have a chance to start over. It was with this belief that she became the Lu Qingshi of today.
If her hand speed had been maintaining a steady frequency before, now it was purely aiming for speed, dazzling to the eye. Suturing, knotting, and pulling the thread were completed in one fluid motion, as smooth as flowing water.
Gu Yanzhi was now on both knees, completely kneeling on the ground. Her hands could no longer support the weight of the shielding door. When the steel door fell on her shoulders, her whole body gritted teeth, her eyes bulging as if about to split open. The pain made all the muscles in her body convulse.
“Go… quickly go…” Gu Yanzhi hissed, gasping for air, spitting out short sentences through clenched teeth, but she was speaking to her comrades.
“Captain!” The other two weren’t faring much better, drenched in sweat, their faces flushed red from exertion, their knees sunk into the dust.
Gu Yanzhi used the base of her palm to brace against the continuously descending shielding door. The sharp lower edge of the door cut through her glove, leaving a gash on her palm.
“Hurry… I’m… running out of strength…”
She wasn’t oblivious to the situation unfolding over there. When she failed to pick up the suture needle once again, the doctor seemed to lose patience with herself, cursing under her breath, “F*ck!”
Lu Qingshi took a deep breath. Calm down, stay composed, there’s enough time, there must be enough time. The troublemaker won’t die here, she won’t die here, and Gu Yanzhi certainly won’t die here.
French Fries were still waiting for her to come home, she still had things she needed to accomplish.
Her trembling fingers finally nimbly tied the last knot. Lu Qingshi grabbed the suture scissors and cut the thread end: “Done!”
Gu Yanzhi suddenly turned her head: “Quickly come over!”
The other two firefighters also let go to help. When the full weight of the heavy shielding door pressed down on her shoulders, there was a crisp sound from her bones. Gu Yanzhi’s other leg also heavily fell to her knee on the ground, the cement floor slightly indenting.
The tough fire instructor didn’t make a sound, until the troublemaker was safely sent out the door, the doctor crawled out through the gap in front of her, and her comrades had all crawled out one by one.
Lu Qingshi turned back: “Quickly come out!”
Gu Yanzhi didn’t speak, her entire body bent and pressed to the ground. She knew that if she let go at this moment, it would be like one of the ten cruel tortures of the Qing Dynasty – waist-cutting or decapitation.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want to let go, she simply couldn’t let go. Gu Yanzhi glimpsed the doctor’s extremely beautiful face through that faint sliver of daylight under the door gap. She tilted her head, using her teeth to bite the communicator on her chest to say goodbye to her.
“You should go quickly. Tomorrow… you’ll have to go pick up French Fries alone to bring home… and Hamburger… mm… take good care of it… and also…”
The doctor’s intense and slightly choked voice came through the earpiece: “Gu Yanzhi! You must keep the promises you make to others! I won’t let you die! Stop dumping Hamburger on me, I’ve had enough of that stupid dog of yours!!!”
The fire instructor coughed twice, then chuckled softly. Due to her hoarse throat, her voice sounded particularly magnetic.
“Qingshi… I…”
Before she could finish speaking, a pair of hands reached in through the gap under the door. The doctor used her most precious possession to cushion between Gu Yanzhi’s body and the continuously descending shielding door.
Lu Qingshi shouted, her eyes slightly red: “Shut up!!!”
The words yet to be spoken were abruptly cut off, but the warmth spreading continuously in her heart gradually reddened her eyes.
In a place where Lu Qingshi couldn’t see, Gu Yanzhi’s throat moved slightly, and crystalline liquid slid from the corner of her eye.
“Captain, hold on!” Another firefighter also rushed over, following the same method, using his hands to lift the heavy steel door. His face turned red from the strain as he fought to give her a chance at survival.
The other firefighter grabbed her feet: “One, two, three, lift!”
Lu Qingshi and the firefighter bracing against the door exerted force together. Who knows where such great strength came from, but they actually managed to create a tiny gap.
Watching her being pulled out, Lu Qingshi let out a sigh of relief. Only then did she feel the muscle ache. The two looked at each other: “One, two, three, ready, let go!”
The heavy steel door fell before their eyes, kicking up a cloud of dust. Lu Qingshi fell sitting on her bottom, gasping for breath. From her fingers to her palms were a mass of blue, purple, red, and swollen, and the muscles in her forearms were unbearably sore.
The joy of surviving this ordeal hadn’t lasted long before a rumbling sound like muffled thunder rose up behind them.
Gu Yanzhi scrambled up and helped her to her feet: “Quick, let’s go!”
The other two firefighters also lifted the stretcher and turned to run. That faint glimmer of fire rose together with the morning sun, piercing through the mist and shooting towards the sky. The earth trembled slightly, and the water on the small table in the ambulance teetered on the brink of spilling.
The instant noodle box in Hao Renjie’s hand shook slightly. He kicked Yu Gui: “Stop shaking your leg, damn it!”
Yu Gui was curled up in the ambulance, dozing off. Suddenly kicked awake, before she could utter a “F*ck,” the enormous sound from the factory area deafened her ears, and she scurried away, covering her head.
Tongues of flame licked the earth, heat waves swept away all evil, dust, chunks of lime, broken steel bars, shattered wooden planks… came crashing down like rain.
At some point, Gu Yanzhi’s hand holding her arm had become tightly clasped together. She pulled her along as they ran for their lives through the fire scene. The strong wind lifted her uniform jacket, a bullet shell hanging on her neck swayed in the wind, with the fire’s light as a blue and white backdrop.
“Gu… Gu Yanzhi… I can’t run anymore…” The doctor wanted to stop and catch her breath. The person pulling her suddenly turned back and hugged her tightly.
“Get down, watch out!”
0 Comments