Wandering through the breathtakingly landscape filled with ancient trees, brightly coloured fauna, a determined woman scoured for a clue, something to show she was on the right track in her quest.
Muttering under her breath as she stubbornly went over grassy knolls, the woman briefly looked down at her compass, showing her veering east, when she should be heading west.
Correcting course, the woman continued in her quest, mindful of the steep drops, watching the large flowers that blanketed much of the ground as she walked.
Swirling in her mind, the thoughts and dreams that kept her spirits high when she ventured out looking for a supposed doctor that lived somewhere nearby, capable of changing anyone's appearance, down to even a molecule of their being, far more meticulous than other doctors, she wouldn't even have to worry about silicone implants!
Envisioning herself coming across this doctor, pleading her case, him accepting it, and giving her the look, she desired, drove the woman to force herself through tangling weeds.
Once she finds the doctor, she'll become the person she envisions herself since she was a child, that nobody would know any different.
Whispers of his appearance have been far and between, many unsure if he even existed, but there were claims that he did exist, and that people successfully had their appearances changed by him.
Desperate, the woman sought every avenue that would've led her to the doctor, scrounging every bit of money she can muster, she must've brought along at least a quarter of a million pounds, just in the hopes that the doctor accepts her generous payment for the chance of changing her appearance.
Running her hand through her heavily dyed blond hair, dark roots determined to shown through despite her attempts hiding them, the woman exhaled sharply as she went west, following her compass as it guided her.
This doctor's supposed to be found in an old hospital left behind when the Germans invaded this part of Poland back in WWII, but with everything overgrown, it made things complicated, and people questioned the validity of these stories, since no doctor would reasonably perform surgeries in an unsanitary location.
Or have needless cosmetic surgeries in an abandoned hospital, like a perverted injustice to the oath.
Undeterred, the woman refused to allow naysayers to sway her from seeking her treasure, having planned everything down to the finite, she's planned on scouring every corner of the forest until she finds the doctor who performs miracles.
Once she does and she gets what her heart desires, she'll be the talk of the town from sunup to sundown, nobody would know its her, and when she tells them the truth, she imagined the looks when they heard that she succeeded.
Just have to keep looking for the doctor.
Going back to her map, the woman wrote off the areas she went through, seeing where she's heading, making markers on the map what direction she came from.
Only a few hours until the sun sets over the horizon, but the woman wasn't deterred, prepared to look for the doctor well-into the night until sunup.
Having brought supplies for at least a three-day search, the woman's prepared to camp underneath the stars.
She hadn't told anyone what she was up to, didn't want them intervening, trying to talk her out of it, didn't want them thinking she was crazy going through the effort of finding this supposed doctor she didn't know for sure existed.
Oh, she could see her parents hell-bent trying to lock her in her room, convinced she gone mad, but she wasn't, she'll show them, yet!
Once they see their daughter come through those doors, the way she should've looked, they'll know she was right!
"Where are you?" Murmured the woman as she glimpsed around, trying to look for the abandoned hospital that was a relic from the before-times, somehow surviving the bombing, overtook by the forest that erupted after the evacuations, and the denizens unable to return.
Due to land mines that have littered the forest, it's impossible for military personnel to reasonably uproot and disarm the land mines that they cordoned off the whole area, forbidding people from traversing the forest, out of worry that they somehow trip an abandoned land mine, still capable of going off.
Still didn't deter the woman, she even brought along a metal detector, set to the specifications of the military for detecting the land mines used in WWII.
It was particularly difficult obtaining the metal detector much less having it calibrated just right to detect any active land mine within a feet of her without rousing suspicions, but the woman didn't get this far to turn back, now.
Mindful of her steps, quick to use the metal detector, the woman hadn't blown herself up by stepping on a land mine, yet, certainly not going to, now.
"Come on, where are you?" the woman continued to murmur, desperate finding the hospital and the doctor.
She went over another grassy knoll, much slicker than the others, and it sent her sliding down, like a water park, she slid through the tall reeds, until the force generated sent her over, and into the arms of someone.
The shock from sliding down the grassy knoll quickly went away, fear took over as she proceeded to fight someone, who shouted over her attempts with, "I'm not going to hurt you!"
Her panic fading, the woman lowered her arms to see a man, trimmed chestnut hair, an odd outfit that wouldn't look out of place in a theatre, angel eyes, at least his early thirties, though it's difficult to know for sure.
He's just as much surprised as her finding someone else out here.
"Who… who are you?" The woman asks him as he meekly looked back.
Pulling on his green sleeves, the man goes, "Well, I'm the Doctor."
He struggled in her grip as the woman pleadingly shouts, "Please! Make me the person I want to be!"
Squirming in her tight grip, the Doctor struggles to speak, "Ma'am, I'm not the person you seek!"
Finally, after spending minutes of trying, and the arrival of Taylor who heard the commotion, did the woman release her vice grip over the Doctor.
Pulling away, the woman goes, "You're not the doctor?"
A bedeviled look as he pulled on his coat, Taylor tending to him, the Doctor asserts, "I am, but not who you're looking for."
Accusingly, the woman responded with, "You're looking for him, too, aren't you?"
She believed the Doctor and Taylor were investigating the doctor she sought after and though they tried convincing her otherwise, the woman stubbornly won't believe them.
"I'm going to find him, first!" The woman cried out.
Raising her hands, Taylor asserts, "We're not looking for the… the doctor… we're looking for… a monster!"
Swearing to the woman, Taylor pleads that she and Paul (the Doctor) weren't looking for the doctor, rather something unusual, a monster said lurking through these woods.
Not exactly a doctor, now, is it?
"A monster?" The woman echoed as she looked at them with her brown eyes and Taylor nods, stating that they heard rumours of a monster lurking in the woods, said to prey on people who foolishly wandered too far in.
Describing what she and Paul found, Taylor sees the woman calming down, curious, frightened, and she says, "I heard those too, something about it coming out at night, but those are just stories parents tell their kids so they don't roam here at night. How are you getting by without tripping a land mine?"
She saw confusion as the two echoed, "Land… mines?"