The woman who appeared in the doorway looked to be in her late twenties or early thirties. She was wearing a faded green dress that had been mended in several places, and had a baby balanced on her left hip. The baby couldn't have been more than six or seven months old, wrapped in a thin blanket despite the afternoon chill, and even from where I was standing near the window I could see that something was wrong. The child's face was flushed, sweaty, and its breathing looked rapid and shallow.

  Dr. Voss turned toward her immediately, her entire posture shifting from frustrated waiting to focused attention. She took two steps toward the door and then stopped, like she was deliberately not crowding the woman, and said in a calm voice, "Hello. Welcome. Please, come inside. We're here to help."

  The woman hesitated in the doorway. Her eyes darted from Dr. Voss to the rest of us standing around in our white coats, to the examination tables, to the shelves where we'd organized our supplies. Her hand tightened protectively on the baby's back.

  "It's okay," Dr. Voss said. She gestured toward the nearest examination table, the one we'd cleaned most thoroughly and positioned closest to the front of the room. "Please, have a seat. Let us look at your baby."

  The woman took one step inside. Then another. She moved slowly, cautiously, like she was walking into a trap and knew it but didn't have any other choice. When she reached the examination table, she didn't sit down on it. She stood next to it, shifting the baby slightly in her arms.

  Dr. Voss glanced over at me and Murin, then at two other students standing near the supply area. She jerked her head slightly, a silent command to come closer. I grabbed the blood pressure cuff from the hook on the wall and walked over, Murin right behind me carrying a stethoscope and thermometer.

  "What's your name?" Dr. Voss asked the woman, her voice gentle.

  "Amara," the woman said. Her voice was quiet, almost a whisper.

  "And your baby's name?"

  "Samuel."

  "How old is Samuel?"

  "Seven months." Amara adjusted her grip on the baby, bouncing him slightly on her hip.

  "What's wrong with him today?" Dr. Voss asked.

  "He's sick," Amara said. "He's been sick for... for two or three weeks now. His breathing is bad. He coughs all the time. He won't eat. He's hot, all the time."

  I could hear it now that she'd mentioned it, the wet, rattling quality of the baby's breathing. Each inhale sounded labored, like there was something blocking the air from getting where it needed to go.

  "Can I examine him?" Dr. Voss asked. She held out her hands, not reaching for the baby but offering. "I need to listen to his chest, check his temperature, see what's going on."

  Amara looked down at Samuel, then back at Dr. Voss. She was chewing on her lower lip, a nervous gesture that told me she was still deciding whether or not to trust us. Finally, after what felt like a very long pause, she nodded.

  "Here," Dr. Voss said, gesturing to the examination table again. "Lay him down here so I can get a good look at him."

  Amara laid Samuel on the table, carefully unwrapping the blanket from around his small body. The baby immediately started to fuss, making small whimpering sounds that turned into weak coughs. His chest moved rapidly with each breath, the ribs standing out sharply under his skin, and I could see that he was way underweight for his age.

  Dr. Voss stepped up to the table and placed her hand gently on Samuel's chest, feeling the rise and fall. Then she picked up the stethoscope that Murin had brought over and warmed the diaphragm between her hands before placing it on the baby's chest.

  She listened for a long time, moving the stethoscope from spot to spot, front and back. Then she straightened up and looked at me. "Ashrahan, take his temperature and respiratory rate."

  I stepped forward, fumbling slightly with the thermometer before managing to get it under the baby's armpit. Samuel squirmed and cried. Amara reached out like she was going to pick him up, then pulled her hand back when Dr. Voss gave a small shake of her head.

  The thermometer beeped. I pulled it out and looked at the reading. "38.9 degrees Celsius," I said.

  "Count his respirations," Dr. Voss said.

  I put my hand lightly on Samuel's chest, feeling the rapid rise and fall, and started counting in my head, using my watch to time it. Fifteen seconds. Multiply by four. "Sixty-four breaths per minute," I said.

  Dr. Voss's mouth tightened into a thin line. "Oxygen saturation?" she asked, looking around.

  One of the fourth-years hurried over with a pulse oximeter. He tried to clip it onto Samuel's tiny finger, but the device kept slipping off. Finally, he managed to get it to stay on his toe long enough to get a reading.

  "Eighty-eight percent," the fourth-year said.

  That was bad. Normal oxygen saturation should be above ninety-five percent, preferably closer to one hundred. Eighty-eight meant Samuel's lungs weren't doing their job properly, weren't getting enough oxygen into his blood.

  I activated the System.

  I blinked, dismissing the overlay so I could focus on what Dr. Voss was doing. She was leaning over the examination table, palpating Samuel's abdomen now, her fingers pressing gently into the soft tissue. Samuel whimpered and turned his head away.

  "Has he been eating?" Dr. Voss asked Amara without looking up.

  "No," Amara said. "Not much. Maybe a little breast milk, but he keeps spitting it up. He doesn't have the energy to feed properly."

  "And the cough? You said it started two or three weeks ago?"

  "Yes. At first it wasn't so bad. Just a little cough here and there. But then it got worse. And then he got the fever, and now..." She trailed off, her voice catching slightly.

  Dr. Voss straightened up and looked at Amara. "Your son has pneumonia," she said. "A lung infection. It's serious, but it's treatable. We have antibiotics here that can help him, but he needs them now. He also needs oxygen because he's not getting enough on his own."

  Amara stared at her. "Pneumonia?"

  "Yes."

  "But I've been giving him medicine," Amara said, and there was something defensive in her tone now, like she was trying to justify herself. "The healer gave me herbs. He said they would help. He said Samuel just had a weak constitution and the herbs would strengthen him."

  Dr. Voss's expression didn't change. "The herbs aren't helping," she said, and her voice was very, very calm. "They can't help with pneumonia. Your son needs antibiotics. Real medicine. Without it, he's going to get worse."

  "But the healer said—"

  "I don't care what the healer said," Dr. Voss interrupted, and there was an edge to her voice now. "I care about what's happening in your son's lungs right now. He can't breathe properly. His oxygen levels are dangerously low. If we don't treat this, he could die."

  Amara flinched as if Dr. Voss had struck her. "Die?" she whispered.

  "Yes," Dr. Voss said. "Pneumonia kills children Samuel's age all the time, especially when it's left untreated for this long. But we can fix this. We have the medicine. We have oxygen. We can help him. But you need to let us."

  Amara looked down at Samuel, who was still lying on the examination table, his tiny chest rising and falling too quickly. His eyes were half-closed, and he didn't seem to have the energy to cry anymore, just made small whimpering sounds with each breath.

  "What do I have to do?" Amara asked.

  "You need to let us admit him," Dr. Voss said. "We'll give him oxygen through a mask or a nasal tube. We'll start him on antibiotics through an IV, which means we'll put a small needle in his arm to give him the medicine directly into his blood. We'll give him fluids because he's dehydrated from not eating. And we'll monitor him closely to make sure he's improving."

  "For how long?"

  "At least three days. Maybe longer if he doesn't respond quickly."

  Amara looked around the room. "Here? He'll stay here?"

  "Yes," Dr. Voss said. "We don't have a proper hospital, but we have what we need to treat him. And if he gets worse, if we can't handle it here, we'll evacuate him to the district hospital. But I think we can manage this if we start treatment now."

  Amara was quiet for a long moment. Then she nodded, a small, jerky movement. "Okay," she said. "Okay, help him. Please."

  "Good," Dr. Voss said. She turned to one of the interns standing nearby. "Set up oxygen. Nasal cannula if he'll tolerate it, mask if not. And get me an IV start kit. I need to get a line in so we can start antibiotics and fluids."

  The intern hurried off toward the supply area. Dr. Voss looked at me and Murin. "You two, go get the portable oxygen concentrator from the back. It should be in one of the large duffel bags we brought. Bring it here and set it up next to this table."

  Murin and I turned and practically jogged to the back room where we'd piled most of our equipment. It took us a minute to find the oxygen concentrator and another minute to figure out how to carry it between us without dropping it. We hauled it back to the examination table and set it down next to Samuel, and the intern who'd gone to get the IV supplies was already back, tearing open sterile packages and laying out equipment on a metal tray.

  Dr. Voss picked up the nasal cannula, a thin tube with two small prongs that would go in Samuel's nose, and showed it to Amara. "This is going to give him extra oxygen," she explained. "It might be a little uncomfortable at first, but it will help him breathe."

  She gently inserted the prongs into Samuel's nostrils. The baby fussed, turning his head away and trying to reach up to pull at the tubing, but Dr. Voss held it in place and adjusted the flow on the oxygen concentrator. I could hear the soft hiss of oxygen flowing through the tube.

  "Watch his oxygen saturation," Dr. Voss said to the fourth-year who was still holding the pulse oximeter. "It should start coming up now."

  We all watched the small screen on the pulse oximeter. Eighty-eight. Eighty-nine. Ninety. Ninety-two. Ninety-four.

  "Good," Dr. Voss said. "Okay. Now the IV."

  She turned to the intern and took the IV catheter from him, a small needle attached to a plastic tube. She wrapped a tourniquet around Samuel's tiny arm, just above the elbow, and waited for a vein to become visible. Samuel started crying again, a thin wail that made Amara reach out instinctively before stopping herself.

  "Hold him still," Dr. Voss said to me. "Gently. Just keep his arm from moving."

  I put my hands on Samuel's arm, holding it as still as I could without squeezing too hard. His skin was hot under my fingers, slick with sweat from the fever. Dr. Voss positioned the needle over a vein on the back of his hand, so small I could barely see it, and then she pushed it in. Samuel screamed.

  "Got it," Dr. Voss said, ignoring the crying. She pulled the needle out, leaving the plastic catheter in place, and taped it down securely. Then she attached the IV tubing and opened the line, letting saline start flowing into Samuel's vein. "Okay. Get me the amoxicillin. We'll start with that and see how he responds."

  One of the students ran to the pharmacy area and came back with a vial of amoxicillin, a liquid antibiotic that could be given through the IV. Dr. Voss drew it up into a syringe, double-checked the dose, and then slowly pushed it into the IV port.

  "There," she said, stepping back slightly. "That should start working within a few hours. We'll give him another dose in eight hours, and we'll keep him on oxygen and fluids in the meantime."

  She looked at Amara. "You can stay with him if you want. There's a chair over there. We'll bring you something to eat and drink. And we'll check on him regularly to make sure he's improving."

  Amara nodded, tears running down her face now. She reached out and touched Samuel's foot, a tentative gesture. "Thank you," she whispered.

  Dr. Voss nodded once, then turned away. "Ashrahan, Murin, with me," she said, walking toward the back of the room.

  We followed her into the small side room where we'd set up the pharmacy. She closed the door behind us and then let out a long breath, running one hand through her hair in a gesture of exhaustion.

  "That baby is lucky his mother brought him in when she did," she said. "Another day or two and we'd be having a very different conversation."

  "Will he be okay?" I asked.

  "Probably," Dr. Voss said. "Pneumonia responds well to antibiotics in most cases, especially if we catch it before it progresses to severe sepsis or respiratory failure. But he's going to need close monitoring. I want one of you checking his vitals every two hours. Oxygen saturation, heart rate, respiratory rate, temperature. Write everything down. If anything changes—if his oxygen drops, if his breathing gets worse, if he develops new symptoms—you come find me immediately. Understood?"

  "Understood," Murin and I said in unison.

  "Good." She opened the door again and stepped back into the main room, where Amara was now sitting in a chair next to the examination table, one hand resting on Samuel's leg. The oxygen was definitely helping; his breathing looked less labored already, the rapid, shallow breaths slowing down slightly.

  Dr. Voss looked around at the rest of us. "All right," she said, raising her voice slightly so everyone could hear her. "That's one patient. Let's see if anyone else decides to come in."

  But nobody else came. We waited. Two o'clock came and went. Then three. Dr. Voss stood near the door, arms crossed, staring out at the village. A few people walked past on their way to or from the market. They glanced at the health center, at us, but they didn't stop. They didn't even slow down.

  At 3:15, Dr. Voss turned away from the door and looked at all of us. "All right," she said. "If they won't come to us, we go to them. Door-to-door. Split into pairs. One senior student with one junior. Each pair gets a medical kit with basics—stethoscope, blood pressure cuff, thermometer, tongue depressors, a few essential meds for minor issues. Go around, knock on doors, introduce yourselves. Ask if anyone needs medical help. Don't push. Don't be aggressive. Just offer. Make sure they know it's free, no charge, no strings attached. Got it?"

  Everyone nodded.

  Dr. Voss started dividing us into pairs. When she got to me and Murin because no senior left to pair with us, she said, "You two take the western edge of the village. Past the market, there's a cluster of houses near the fields. Start there and work your way back. If you find anyone who needs help, either bring them back here or come get me if they can't walk. Clear?"

  "Clear," I said.

  She handed me a medical kit, a canvas bag with a shoulder strap containing the basics she'd mentioned. I slung it over my shoulder and looked at Murin. "Ready?"

  "Yeah," he said.

  We walked out of the health center together, stepping into the afternoon sunlight. It was colder now than it had been when we arrived, the sun starting to dip lower in the sky. I pulled my jacket tighter around myself and started walking toward the market area, Murin beside me.

  The market was busier now than it had been this morning. There were maybe twenty or thirty people moving between the small shops, buying vegetables and rice. A couple of kids were playing in the dirt, kicking a deflated soccer ball back and forth. An old man sat on a wooden stool outside one of the shops, smoking a cigarette and watching the world go by.

  As we walked past, people noticed us. I could feel their eyes tracking us, conversations pausing mid-sentence. Nobody said anything. Nobody smiled or waved or acknowledged us in any way. It felt like walking through a room full of people who were all pretending you didn't exist.

  We kept walking, past the market, onto a dirt path that led toward a cluster of houses maybe a hundred meters away. The houses were small. A few chickens wandered loose, pecking at the ground. A goat was tied to a post near one house, chewing on something.

  Murin stopped at the first house and knocked on the wooden door frame. "Hello?" he called. "We're medical students from the city. We're here to help if anyone needs it. Free of charge."

  Nothing. No response.

  He tried again, louder this time. "Hello? Is anyone home?"