Chapter 60 — Why Aren't You Dead Yet? (Please Vote, Please Bookmark — Today's First Update)

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"Injured? How were you injured?" Wei Zhao asked.

"That time, after we came back from North Africa, I was handed a new assignment — to track down a major international drug lord. But I never expected they'd have a real expert among them. I was wounded..." Here Yang Huaijun gave a bitter smile. "I suppose my life was charmed. When they saw me go down, they took me for dead and didn't bother finishing me off. But Pangolin and the others..."

"Pangolin? What happened to him?" Wei Zhao's heart lurched, and he asked at once.

"Pangolin died in the line of duty..." Yang Huaijun said, his voice somewhat bleak.

"What?" Wei Zhao's face turned terrifying in an instant. Pangolin — that short little fellow, always with a brilliant smile on his face... He had never imagined that a comrade who had fought shoulder to shoulder with him two years ago would go like that...

Seeing Wei Zhao's expression, Yang Huaijun could feel the same thing keenly in his own chest. Pangolin had been Wei Zhao's comrade, and his comrade too. Back when he first learned of Pangolin's death, Yang Huaijun, grown man that he was, had been unable to keep from weeping.

"Maybe he isn't dead after all..." Fearing Wei Zhao would grieve, Yang Huaijun hurried to console him.

"They never found the body?" A flicker of hope crossed Wei Zhao's eyes. Pangolin was a shrewd young man; perhaps he really had escaped that disaster.

"The bodies were all thrown into the drug refining furnaces by those traffickers... I only learned that later." Yang Huaijun sighed. "When I came to, the pain all over my body was so bad I couldn't think of much else. I found a hiding place first and crawled into it. Then I lost consciousness again, until someone rescued me..."

"Motherfuckers!" Wei Zhao slammed his fist down on the tea table in front of him. The fine solid-wood table was instantly smashed into a heap of splinters.

Yang Huaijun clicked his tongue inwardly. Worthy of Eagle — still that ferocious. Yang Huaijun privately admitted he could never have done such a thing himself.

"I'm sorry. I was hurt too badly at the time to go and check on my comrades..." Every time Yang Huaijun thought of it, his heart filled with guilt.

"That's not your fault." Wei Zhao shook his head. Under those circumstances, he could well understand: going forward would only have been suicide. In such a situation, preserving one's strength was the only right course. "Were you badly hurt?"

"Wounds all over my body... I spent over half a year recovering, and once I was well, I retired." Yang Huaijun sighed. "Western medicine calls them aftereffects; Chinese medicine calls it a complete severing of the meridians. I can't get emotional, I can't do high-intensity work for long stretches, and I have to keep myself going with medication."

Wei Zhao put the matter of Pangolin to the back of his mind for the moment and began to study Yang Huaijun carefully. "Give me your hand."

"What are you going to do?" Yang Huaijun found it odd, but held out his hand as asked.

"I'm taking your pulse." As he spoke, Wei Zhao laid his hand on Yang Huaijun's wrist, and his expression grew grave.

"You know how to take a pulse? No way. Eagle, I thought you were good at killing people — you can save them too?" Yang Huaijun looked at Wei Zhao in some astonishment — this comrade who had shared life and death with him through hails of bullets.

"There's a great deal you don't know." Wei Zhao smiled. "What, you don't believe me?"

"Don't believe you?" Yang Huaijun's eyes went wide. "Whoever else I might not believe, would I not believe you? On the battlefield back then, I could hand you my back without a second thought."

"Don't make it sound so mushy." Wei Zhao was joking aloud, but his heart was growing heavier and heavier. Yang Huaijun's pulse was very poor. He could sense that although the man had recovered on the surface, the internal injuries were severe; several of his organs had not fully healed, and some even showed signs of continuing to fail.

"Well? My body's not in bad shape, is it?" Seeing that Wei Zhao really was taking his pulse, Yang Huaijun asked, a little puzzled.

"You've been dealing with your troubles with nothing but painkillers?" Wei Zhao answered the question with another.

"That's right. Is something wrong?" Yang Huaijun asked.

"Then how are you not dead yet?" Wei Zhao frowned.

"..." Yang Huaijun was speechless for a moment. "Damn it, are you cursing me to die?"

"It's not a curse. It's that your condition is very bad. Your injuries from last time never healed completely at all — they've kept getting worse. I don't know how you've held on this long on painkillers, but generally speaking, anyone else would have died of the pain long ago." Wei Zhao spoke with great gravity. He was not trying to frighten him; he was stating a fact. And with a man like Yang Huaijun, there was no need to deceive him either. Men who had been to war had long since put life and death beyond their concern. Even if Wei Zhao told him he would die tomorrow, Yang Huaijun would not react much.

"An old Chinese doctor told me the same thing before — said I wouldn't live past half a year. And look, here I am, alive and well, aren't I?" Yang Huaijun indeed was not shaken by Wei Zhao's words; he stretched his arms and legs with easy nonchalance.

"He was right. Half a year was flattering you." Wei Zhao nodded.

"Eagle, can you not jinx me? Do I look like a dying man to you?" Yang Huaijun glared at Wei Zhao, somewhat displeased.

"My name is Wei Zhao. Don't call me Eagle anymore." Wei Zhao glanced at Yang Huaijun and went on: "So the fact that you're alive today is a miracle. It may have something to do with your tenacious willpower."

"And what's wrong with that?" Yang Huaijun pressed.

"You can still use painkillers to ease the pain in your body, but from now on... it will only get worse." Wei Zhao said. "You've probably noticed already: the frequency and the dosage of your medication are both greater than before."

"You... really do know medicine?" Yang Huaijun was astonished that Wei Zhao had hit upon his condition exactly.

"What do you think?" Wei Zhao released Yang Huaijun's hand. He had already gained a rough understanding of the man's illness. Yang Huaijun's situation was extremely complicated. As the saying goes, every medicine is three parts poison; every herb will damage the organs in the body to a greater or lesser degree. That is to say, if Wei Zhao prescribed a remedy for the heart, it might affect Yang Huaijun's spleen or liver; but if he treated the liver, it might affect the heart or kidneys. In short, no matter which part he treated, it would cause side effects in the others. In that case, treating him would be worse than not treating him at all — it would only hasten his death.

Seeing Wei Zhao sink into thought, Yang Huaijun could not help asking: "What's wrong? What are you thinking about?"

"Your condition." Wei Zhao sighed softly. "It's very complicated. With conventional Chinese herbal treatment, whatever I do will affect other organs. It might help one particular organ, but it would accelerate the failure of the others. And if I treat them all at once, it amounts to no treatment at all — or death by poisoning outright."

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