The Invasion Day – Chapter 17

Table of Contents | Character Guide

Chapter 17

Fu Shiwu was really at his wits’ end now!

He could never expect that after solving the most difficult part, he would be sitting here struggling with the most basic issue.

“You don’t know and neither do I. What should we do?” Fu Shiwu said desperately.

If Tang Xuhai burnt himself to death because Fu Shiwu didn’t know how to give injection, Fu Shiwu would be so angry he could vomit blood!

The corner of Wen Zhaoming’s mouth twitched. He thought for a moment and said: “You can try to find his thickest vein.”

“Even if I find the thickest one, I may not pierce the needle into it correctly.” Fu Shiwu really didn’t have this ability. This was way out of his profession!

Fu Shiwu pulled Tang Xuhai’s arm and touched the slightly raised veins on it: “So thin!”

Fu Shiwu compared it with his own arm. His arm was all soft flesh, with a layer of fat under the skin, and the veins exposed on the surface were all flat. Tang Xuhai’s arm was sturdy and full of muscles, with zero excess fat and only a thin layer of skin, and the veins were slightly bulging up.

Even if Tang Xuhai’s veins were more obvious than his, it didn’t mean that he could do it right at once.

There had been plenty of news about disputes between hospitals and patients because of the nurses’ failure to inject correctly into the blood veins. Let’s think about it: even professional nurses might not get it right, let alone Fu Shiwu who was nowhere near being a nurse.

“Do we have to pick the veins? Can’t we directly inject into the muscles?” Fu Shiwu negotiated with Wen Zhaoming.

Wen Zhaoming shook his head: “This is a normal saline injection, not a subcutaneous injection. It may cause bruises, and the normal saline won’t enter his body if you inject just below the skin.”

Fu Shiwu took out the thermometer from Tang Xuhai’s mouth, then he pointed it against the light to get a serious shock: “41°!”

He put down the thermometer and quickly turned around: “He needs normal saline!”

Wen Zhaoming comforted him: “Don’t hurry, you can practise first.”

“Practise? On his arm?” Fu Shi Wu looked back at him immediately.

Wen Zhaoming quickly shook his head: “You take the IV drip and look for the thinnest tube. I have seen nurses practice with that kind of tube, they say it’s similar to a blood vein!”

Fu Shiwu immediately searched for the IV drips and opened one pack. Sure enough, the IV drip had a particularly thin, short tube that connected to the needle. 

Fu Shiwu wiped his hands, pulled the needle off and started the experiment of piercing the thin tube with the needle.

It wasn’t easy to push the needle in and stick it along the thin tube. For several times, Fu Shiwu used too much force and almost punctured through the tube.

His movements became lighter over time, and he learnt the art of tilting the needle to accurately enter the tube. After a dozen attempts, he was getting adept at this.

“Almost there! This should be it!” Fu Shiwu said.

With confidence, Fu Shiwu looked for the disinfectant, then used a cotton swab to disinfect Tang Xuhai’s elbow pit.

By right, the back of the hand was the easiest place to inject a needle and was convenient for the patient to move around while being injected. But Fu Shiwu felt that the veins in the elbow pit were thicker and most obvious. The important thing was how to get the needle through, not where! At worst, they could tie up Tang Xuhai’s arm to make sure he wouldn’t move. 

Fu Shiwu inserted one end of the IV drip into the normal saline bag, used the practice tube to hang it from the lamp then picked up the needle at the other end of the IV drip.

“Now!” Fu Shiwu took a deep breath and focused all his mind trying to inject into Tang Xuhai’s elbow pit.

No one knew if it was thanks to the practice or just pure luck, but he succeeded in just one go.

“Done!” Fu Shiwu said happily as he pressed the plastic tip above the needle.

“Then put a tape.” Wen Zhaoming reminded him.

Two non-professional nurses now remembered that they couldn’t press the needle with their hands all the time. They needed a tape to fix it in place.

“I forgot to take it!” Fu Shiwu was stunned. It was hard to imagine that he would make such a mistake.

But he instantly recalled that he had taken some band-aids, so he rummaged through the bag with one hand and Wen Zhaoming helped him tear the package away.

Still pressing firmly on Tang Xuhai’s arm, Fu Shiwu took out the band-aid and glued it nicely across the plastic tip of the needle.

When the flow controller was turned to maximum, the normal saline immediately passed along the tube and flowed into Tang Xuhai’s body.

Finally, Tang Xuhai was successfully infused with more liquid. The two of them could breathe out a sigh of relief now.

But things were not finished here. Fu Shiwu found a disposable syringe and pulled out two tubes of Acetaminophen1Basically refers to paracetamol in liquid form, to be used to inject into the body to relieve pains and fever., then used the syringe to put it into the injection port.

“It’s best to add some anti-inflammatory medicine too.” Wen Zhaoming said as he watched Fu Shiwu’s movements.

“I know.” Fu Shiwu took out the first aid kit prepared by Tang Xuhai himself, crushed the antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medicine into powder, then sucked the powder into the syringe with the needle removed and injected it all into the port.

Of course, the powder stuck to the inside of the syringe because of the liquid residue and couldn’t be injected. Eventually, Fu Shiwu had to pump in some saline from the drip chamber in the middle of the IV drip. After shaking the syringe for a while, the powder was finally melted and successfully injected. 

Upon completing these tasks, Fu Shiwu broke out in a sweat even in a place as cool as this bomb shelter.

Although he was sweating all over, Fu Shiwu had to admit that he was in a surprisingly good mood. It would be even better if all these sweats and tears of his could help Tang Xuhai’s fever to go down.

Now that he had loosened up, Fu Shiwu felt terribly hungry.

“It’s already past 1 o’clock!” Fu Shiwu looked at his watch in surprise: “No wonder I’m so hungry.” 

He turned to look at Wen Zhaoming: “Are you not hungry?”

Wen Zhaoming smiled lightly: “I’m fine. I guess I don’t move much so I don’t feel hungry. You’ve been doing a lot, you must be famished.”

Convinced by this logic, Fu Shiwu didn’t think much and immediately prepared to cook noodles.

“Which flavour should we have?” Fu Shiwu asked Wen Zhaoming hesitantly, holding a handful of seasoning packets in his hand.

“Up to you. Anyway, it seems that Tang Xuhai won’t wake up even if we call, so we don’t have to care about his taste.” Wen Zhaoming said.

“Okay! Then braised beef!” Fu Shiwu pulled out a pack from the middle and put the others back.

The solid alcohol was really quite durable. In any case, Fu Shiwu only boiled noodles and didn’t use up much fire. 

Looking at Fu Shiwu being all busy and running around, Wen Zhaoming unconsciously rubbed his arms.

He glanced at Fu Shiwu and became deep in his own thoughts. With his physical condition, he must rely on others in this crisis-ridden, extremely uncertain situation. Tang Xuhai was strong but not an easy man to communicate with. Although Fu Shiwu didn’t look strong, he treated others with much care and had a decisive temperament.

It was hard to say what would happen in the future, but at the present, it seemed that Tang Xuhai and Fu Shiwu were his talisman for survival, the two people that he definitely must stick with. No one liked a hindrance, so his next goal was to make them feel that he was valuable.

“What’s the matter?” Fu Shiwu asked him worriedly: “Your face is very pale.” 

“Huh?” Wen Zhaoming sat upright, put his arms down and forced himself to smile: “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine at all, you know?” Fu Shiwu’s face turned solemn at once and he stared at Wen Zhaoming with those sharp eyes.

Tang Xuhai was a guy who believed in his strength too stubbornly, and Fu Shiwu would never want Wen Zhaoming to follow suit.

“If you feel uncomfortable anywhere, don’t hide it! You have to tell me, understand?” Fu Shiwu said slowly but each sentence was tinged with pressure.

Wen Zhaoming seemed to think of something, then his face turned even paler and his voice broke: “I’m sorry!!!”

Fu Shiwu maintained his indifferent face just like every day. Watching a bead of sweat falling down Wen Zhaoming’s face, he wondered why Wen Zhaoming was so scared. Did I say something wrong? Am I not being kind?

Before Fu Shiwu could cast him a questioning look, Wen Zhaoming’s eyes rolled up and he fainted!

Fu Shiwu almost dropped dead in his tracks!

“I… was I that scary?” Fu Shiwu felt very much wronged, but he threw away the thought and rushed over in a flash.

Wen Zhaoming was sitting in the electric wheelchair with his head tilted to one side. The scene was as frightening as someone suddenly breathing his last breath in a movie. Fu Shiwu raised his head and patted his face.

He stretched out one hand. It was completely covered with Wen Zhaoming’s sweat, but Wen Zhaoming’s body was extremely cold.

“Wen Zhaoming! Zhaoming!!!” Fu Shiwu shook him vigorously. All of a sudden, Wen Zhaoming’s body quivered.

Fu Shiwu understood that this wasn’t because he was scared, but he was sick!

“Shit!” Fu Shiwu cursed his extremely bad luck. He carried Wen Zhaoming from the electric wheelchair to his bed.

The bomb shelter was a very cool place, to the extent that there seemed to be a hint of chill lingering in the air. They all slept directly on the ground sheathed with a layer of seat covers. Wen Zhaoming and Fu Shiwu didn’t have any blankets to cover themselves like Tang Xuhai, so they used clothes instead.

Wen Zhaoming’s body hadn’t been very good since the accident. Unlike Tang Xuhai, who was obsessed with exercising and had trained his body to be full of muscles, Wen Zhaoming naturally couldn’t resist the coldness on the ground.

Wen Zhaoming already felt a little bit cold since morning but he didn’t care. When Fu Shiwu came back and was caught up with helping Tang Xuhai, he felt slightly uncomfortable inside, but he swallowed it all and kept silent.

This little cold would pass as long as he drank water and ate some medicine, but in such an environment, there was no way he could get out of it safely!

After feeding Wen Zhaoming with some cold medicine and water, Fu Shi ate a quick meal, wiped the metal cup and checked on Wen Zhaoming’s temperature. He looked at the thermometer: 38.7°!

This guy is also burning!

Fu Shiwu knelt on both knees in the middle of the two patients. He looked left and right, feeling that his situation right now could quite literally spell out m-i-s-e-r-y.

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The translator has something to say: As pointed out by a reader (thanks Bone balloon!), I think it’s important to remark that the act of crushing a tablet, mixing it with liquid then injecting it into human veins comes with risks and may potentially cause death, so please don’t try this without doctor’s advice (」゜ロ゜)」.