The cabin of the helicopter is completely dark and crowded with gore-sticky vampires, quickly slipping into comatose states. Still, I don’t mind the knees sticking into my back or the rotten meat stench. My hands cradle my mother’s head delicately.

Strapped to a gurney once more, to prevent any unnecessary jostling, my mother looks more like someone pried from an Egyptian sarcophagus than ever. Her heavy eyelids barely quiver. Her flat chest rises and falls in an irregular ...