Doctors Without Boundaries

"First, to root means to put your donger in her cunt. Second a wombat is a critter and also a cozy name for chap. A human wombat roots, shoots cum, and leaves. That's a selfish fella in other words. It is supposed to be funny, because a real wombat eats roots, shoots, and leaves. Ay, mate, what am I going to do with you?"

The evening was the first quiet evening. Drinking beer with another English man let Jarrik's mind escape for a while. He pretended to be back in America. The distance let him reflect and process the events of his time in Africa. The cheap foldout chairs with the plastic bands for a seat cushion stretching almost to the hard floor became oddly familiar. Kyden's laughing ruddy face with the curly blond hair stayed in Jarrik's memory.

The morning brought a headache and an empty clinic. Not a single person was in the waiting room. Jarrik scratched his head. In his room, he found Kyden sitting on his exam table merrily swinging his sandal clad feet back and force: "Brother, we are going on a trip to track gorillas. It is time for our excursion. A buddy offered me his prop plane for a couple days. Get packing!"

The pickup truck drove them to a field strip at the edge of the capital. There was a shed with rusty red roof. It was made from corrugated steel. A meshed fence surrounded the air field. The fence was bent almost to the floor in many places. That's why someone had laid coiled of barbed wired behind it. The weeds rose higher than the barbed wire coils. There were only about five Cessna planes next to the air field. A grease faced chubby man stood next to a plane. He was holding the kerosene pump from a kerosene truck. His blue overall was rolled down to his hip. It equally showed his gut hanging out and the streams of sweat running down his bare torso.

Sitting in the cockpit with the propeller spinning in front of them, Jarrik yelled to Kyden: "I did not know that you are a pilot."

"I am not a pilot. It is easy like driving a car. See pulling on this knob controls the acceleration. The steering wheel is self explanatory. Left is left. Right is right. Forward is down. Backward is up. That's it in a nutshell."

"What!"

"Don't be a wuss!"

Kyden slightly pulled on the gas knob. The propellers roared higher and the plane tugged a little forward. "Oh, and the foot pedals are left and right as well!" The plane rolled into the center of the landing strip. The landing strip was bare and slightly cracked dirt. A few lights lined it. "Isn't there a need to radio?"

"This is Africa ain't nobody care." Kyden pulled the gas knob all the way out. The plane started accelerating slowly forward. For Jarrik's taste, the plane gained speed uncomfortably slow. Kyden kept looking at the palm of his hand. There were a few numbers written. Half way down the field, Kyden yelled to Jarrik: "That's my cheat sheet! At 70 knots, we need to pull off the ground."

As the speedometer reached 70 knots, Kyden pulled back on the steering gently. Jarrik's stomach dropped down both from the sudden lift and the realization that he was in the air. Kyden laughed loud: "Getting to this point in Australia would have been $2,000 already." The plane steadily climbed. The buildings got smaller. The suburbs were indeed mostly rubble and waste land torched pale by a harsh sun. The wind stiffly blew through a two inch hole in the side window, their only ventilation.

At 2,000 feet altitude, Kyden was still cheering to himself for flying a plane. Perhaps, it was the first time that he flew a plane. He waved his palm with the cheat notes to Jarrik. He pointed at his second note: 127.2. Then, he dialed the number into a little box that was labeled Nav1. A little white line started moving around on a horizontal scale. Kyden circled the plane, until the white line was captured in the middle of the scale. "That's the radio beacon for our destination."

The noise of the propeller and wind drag made it hard to talk. Jarrik was anyway mesmerized by the landscape: dirt patches, lush green forests, dirt roads, rolling hills, primitive villages. Once he spotted an elephant. The sky was bright blue with a few white clouds at the horizon. The plane shifted sideways and vertically randomly leaving Jarrik the choice of either becoming tense and nauseated or relaxed and dreamy. He went for letting himself go and enjoying the excursion.

"I lied to you, mate."

"Oh, good, you are a trained pilot."

"No, we are not going to track gorillas. We are going to the Impenetrable National Forest. However, we are dispatched there to meet Mister Kon. His son is sick. He offered to leave me head on my shoulders in exchange for our services. We can't let anybody know about this business. He is a wanted man. He outlived many special ops teams sent to kill him by his secrecy."

"What the fuck!"

"Relax, mate. Everything will be fine."

Jarrik wanted to get out of the little Cessna. However, he realized that he was stuck here 3,000 feet over the ground. He would be stuck there hours away from civilization. Kyden noticed Jarrik's anxiety crawling on his face like ants. Kyden quickly pushed the steering forward and back. The dip had everything in the plane flying up and falling down. Jarrik jolted out of his worry thoughts. "Jarrik, go fly for a while." Kyden let go of the steering. Jarrik held the steering in place with the utmost precision and whole body tension.

A seeming eternity later, Kyden suggested Jarrik to go a little left and right. Jarrik turned the steering a little. He was shocked with the responsiveness of the plane. What had seemed to him the tiniest amount left actually moved the plane quite a bit. He tried a bit the other direction. He smiled for a moment, before he let the plane turn far enough to be five dashes away from the center of the horizontal navigation scale.

A little portable radio blared the song "Bad Things" from Jace Everett. Kyden dialed the sound up to the maximum. That gave the radio a fighting chance against the noise in the cockpit, yet distorted the tune as well. However, Jarrik attempted to fly the plane to the music. As the singer sang "When you came in the air went out," the plane pulled up and right. As the singer deeply threatened "I wanna do bad things with you," Jarrik steered the plane down and tried to make it twist left and right to the rhythm as it gained speed. The propeller wine raised in pitch.

Kyden took over the steering. He pulled the plane higher. Kyden seemed like a buzz kill until the plane had climbed 6,000 feet. Kyden turned the steering all the way right. The plane started turning itself over. Jarrik panicked at first. When he found himself upside down hanging from the lap belt with all the little crap of the plane lying on the roof under his head, he started laughing. Kyden kept the steering on right. The plane rolled sideways over and over. With each roll the aim of the plane's nose changed its angle. After a few rolls, they had a hard time figuring out, if the plane pointed up or down. They let the plane go its merry way for a moment, until their sense of balance was restored. The plane was heading down. The pulled the nose up and pointed it again towards the direction of the radio beacon.

Jarrik looked out of the window and observed the slow progression from plain flora to forest. The forest became thicker, greener, and taller. Kyden was reading a ring boned manual for the plane. He occasionally flicked switches and turned knobs that he read about in the manual. "We have to find something called flap." Kyden pointed at the third note scribbled on his palm: "Flap." There were a lot of dials and switches in the Cessna. Near the center bottom was a lever called flap. "Okay, before landing, we have to push that down to make the landing easier."

The destination was still hours away. A little red cooler with a white lid had sandwiches and beverages. Jarrik snoozed for a while lulled by the vibrations and steady humming. A mountain in the way required them to climb in circles before crossing the mountain. A large lake tempted Kyden to fly low in the hopes of scurrying a flock of flamingoes into the air. There were no flamingoes flying up. A large black bird almost hitting the plane made them think twice about chasing birds again.

Finally, a clearing in the forest contained the airstrip. There were no man made improvements to the patch of dirt. A truck contained rebel militia waiting for them. A fly-by of the airstrip discovered no particularly deep holes or rocks in the way. A deep crack in the center seemed a bit sketchy. They made a mental mark to stay left of it, because there was more space.

Turning around to approach the air field, Kyden bit his lip as he aligned the flight path of the plane with the air field. Then, he pushed the speed stick a little in. He waited for the speed to lower. He pressed the flaps down. Something moved on the wings of the plane. He checked the palm of his hand again to read 50 knots. He carefully pushed the speed stick in further until the speed was close to 50 knots. As the plane nose pointed down to get nearer the ground, the speed ticked up. Kyden pushed the speed stick further in. As the plane descent equaled, the speed ticked down. Kyden swiftly pulled the speed stuck to prevent a stall. He seemed quite tense about the adjustment.

Jarrik's pulse started beating in his throat like a river during a flash flood. The beginning of the landing strip was tacitly close. The dirt blurring by suddenly indicted the speed that they were going by. Close to the ground, Kyden violently pulled back on the steering. The plane stalled and fell the last three feet out of the sky. The dinky shifted and bounced a little bit as it got used to racing on the dirt. Kyden pushed the speed stick all the way in. He searched for the brake. He couldn't find it in time before he had to steer the plane left of the sketchy center crack. Passing the crack, the plane was still going pretty fast. The tall trees at the end of the air field came rushing closer. Jarrik was the hapless victim of his own collision. Kyden found the button to engage the breaks. The engine immediately dropped its pitch to a bass mumbling sound. The plane stopped.

The door was quickly clipped open. Jarrik fumbled his way through the narrow door onto the wing. He jumped down and his sleepy legs almost let him fall face down. A few feet away from the plane and its moving part, he declared "I am feeling good right here." He looked at the rebel militia truck rumbling closer to them. A cloud of brown dust was following the truck. Kyden piled medical bags onto the wing of the plane. The rebel soldiers arrived. These soldiers were smarter. Instead of holy water, they carried old style Soviet Union guns. The leader had an automatic rifle and red cap.

The ride on the truck bed was eerie silent. The falling darkness of dusk painted the large trees even more in the light of a horror movie. The first black body hanging from a tree startled Jarrik. Perhaps, the missing limbs and object like setup most horrified Jarrik. Kyden offered Jarrik oral diazepam to calm down and warned him to neither judge the rebels in their presence nor display gay seeming behavior. The next shocking site was a pile of limbs next to the road. Apparently, villagers had been literally chopped into pieces.

Half the rebel soldiers in the open air truck were kids. They obviously lacked mothers to tell them, to pick clothes that fit them and wash themselves. Apparently, they were poorly trained. They seemed awkward holding the weapons. No attention was paid to pointing the gun at safe places. A little boy near the back of the truck was resting his cheek bone on the barrel of the gun with the finger on the trigger. Large pieces of dirt were lying on the floor of the truck. They did not maintain their equipment either.

The truck stopped middle in the road. A soldier was sent into the thick of the forest. A pee break seemed unlikely, because everyone was starring in his directions. At least Westerners did not like attention while urinating. The soldier, or digger as Kayden calls all soldiers, returned with a new group of soldiers. The new soldiers were larger fully grown males. They wore proper uniform and had camouflage colored knee and elbow pads. They moved swiftly and with focus.

The new group of soldiers took the medical supply bags and distributed them among themselves. They told us to follow them into the thick of the forest. The going was slow as they had to walk around trees and other obstacles. Jarrik feared panthers and poisonous animals. Considering the company of trained and armed militia rebels, he was probably safe from wildlife. An hour in, lights of an encampment appeared. Under the trees and out of the sight of Western spy satellites was the master rebel camp. Kayden left Jarrik. Kayden would talk to Mister Kon. Jarrik would immediately attend Mister Kon's son.

The tent was a dark green military tent. Supplies were stacked high near the entrance. Mister Kon's son was a nineteen year old tall, skinny lad. The son lay on a low wooden frame with stretched fabric as a mattress. His forehead was sweaty. His face was tense with pain. The vitals were normal. So, there was no immediately life threatening situation. The abdominal exam showed hardness. The son had not eaten in two days and not eliminated in a week. All signs pointed to a regular constipation.

Upon the diagnosis, the son demanded immediately laxatives. Jarrik had to educate the son first. His feces had been dried and compacted into very hard pellets. If the intestinal muscles would be induced into contractions with medication, there would be a lot of damage. He had to drink a lot of oil, any kind, for lubrication. He had to eat fiber food like leaves to provide matter to push out the pellets. Jarrik guided the son through the forced dietary regiment and gave him a stool softener pill. An hour or two was mostly spent calming the anxious young man down and have patience to let the process work.

Kyden arrived for the glorious moment, when Jarrik allowed the son to take the laxative pills. The son over eagerly grabbed them. Suddenly, the abdominal pain that had near immobilized him was gone until he swallowed the pills and waited for them to work. Jarrik turned to the silently observing Kyden: "Most common cause for expeditions to evacuate, a simply constipation." Both waited for the son to feel better and eliminated for the first time. They were sitting on the bare ground and leaned against the stack of supplies.

The son eliminated. He finally went for a restful sleep. Apparently, the wise doctors were expected to stay in the son's tent for the night. Kyden rolled himself on the ground using his bicep as a pillow. Jarrik struggled and remained. His eyes fell shut. He fell asleep. His body was sore, when the morning light woke him. The cheery young man called on them. He promised them that he would build them an African Disney Land to express his gratitude. He added that he would complete the glorious task by afternoon. The son left the tent. Kyden hissed only for Jarrik to hear: "The fucker is keeping us longer."

The day was extremely trying. Mister Kon had cheap plastic chairs lined in a triangle. His commanders and consultants were sitting with him. Kyden and Jarrik were the honorary guests. That did not imply that they were expected to talk. Mister Kon mostly talked about his vision that it were natural for all children to carry guns and fight as soldiers. He threatened the president for committing war crimes in his name. He insisted that he never used child soldiers. The biblical diatribes were equally nonsensical. The two men sitting next to the doctors insisted that Mister Kon could see the future and was immortal even when directly hit by a hail of bullets.

Lunch consisted of two MRE's from our medical bags, because Kyden didn't trust the food to be clean enough for Westerners. Luckily, Mister Kon's son came running after lunch. He announced that the first African Disney World had been built. He welcomed us as the honorary guests for the premier. Mister Kon was very proud of his son and rose up. The whole congregation followed the son's proud steps. A strict order was observed: Mister Kon followed by the doctors. The advisors followed in the order of their rank.

"Indiana Jones ride," announced the son standing next to a World War II Range Rover with the top completely taken off including the wind shield. It looked a bit like a large bathtub on wheels. A driver took the wheel. Mister Kon sat shotgun. The doctors were seated in the back next to the son. The driver took off at a comfortable twenty miles an hour. The car quickly came onto potholes that were rhythmically offset left and right to rattle the car from side to side. A log on the right side lifted the right tires higher and higher, until the Range Rover was driving on the left two tires. The driver showed a bit off before he let the car fall back on all four tires.

The driver was infected by madness and floored the gas. At the end of the road, two people jumped out of the forest and pushed a man-high ball made of branches in front of them. The son screamed: "Oh my god, the rock is going to crush us." The game of chicken seemed rather unfair to Jarrik. The heavy Range Rover would bolt through the branches with mere scratches, perhaps a passenger or two would get impaled, and the two pushers were gone for sure. The last moment, the driver pulled sharply left into the forest.

We quickly encountered a steep slope. A shaky driveway had been built with thick branches and thin logs. There were two poles for the tires to fit on. The driver had to place the tires exactly. The Range Rover drove high over them. They creaked and swayed under the heavy car. The driver muttered: "I hope the logs don't crack again." The son ignored him and bellowed: "Look the holy grail is ahead." A soccer tournament cup was standing at the end of the wooden driveway.

The son climbed out of the car and down the scaffolding. Everyone followed. Jarrik wondered, if it were safer to risk the car falling on top of them or remaining in the car precariously up in the air. The driver silently cursed for having to back up over the thing logs. Mister Kon was very proud of his son's Western education and creativity. Kyden was tickled by the ridiculous display and pastime of one of the world's most hated war crime criminal.

An abandoned cabin patiently waited for the group. A throng of local tribal women stood next to door. They wore skirts with their brown tops exposed. Their breasts hung down like the invention of the bra was desperately necessary. Their faces looked a bit distraught. Apparently, they were freshly collected from a nearby village. The son proudly announced: "The Haunted House"

The first two women got on their hands and knees. They moved side to side facing towards the cabin. Mister Kon straddled their backs. The son explained to press the right button to go and the left button to stop. Evidently, he was referring to the breasts of the women. Mister Kon squeezed the right breast of the right women. The women started crawling forward with Mister Kon on their back. It was a bit uneven as they stepped forward at different times. The son punctuated "fully electronic button." Mister Kon disappeared in the dark cabin.

Kyden followed next. He had a bit of fun with the whole thing. He straddled the two women and yelled like a cowboy while wielding his fist in the hand. Then, he slapped one of the women on the ass. The son politely reminded Kyden to push the button. The two women shuffled off with Kyden into the cabin.

Jarrik was okay with sitting down on the women, because it reminded him of playing horse as a kid with his parents. Yet, touching the boobs of the woman felt a little weird. He leaned forward and reached under the torso. The tribal boob was a rather flabby mass. Out of curiosity, he checked the nipple. It felt large and soft. He wondered how the other woman's boob felt. As he touched it, the women stopped. The left woman's boob was plenty of skin and little fat. Her nipple was rather large though. He squeezed the right boob again to continue. He looked down at the naked women's back beneath him. The right one was a bit darker. The left one had more defined muscles.