While revolution hangs in the air in Moscow, the young doctor feels increasingly isolated in the tiny and remote village of Muryovo.

Longing for cigarettes, a newspaper and "a knock on the door that isn't a dying girl", he packs his trunk for the day-round trip to the nearest shop, only to learn that it doesn't open until August. Desperate to escape, he jokes about how many people he might have to let die before he is stripped of his licence and allowed to return to the bright lights and shops of Moscow.

Meanwhile, his older self begins to suffer from the unsavoury side effects of his acute morphine addiction.

The doctor is hit by terrible stomach pains when an unconscious girl is carried into the surgery. To his horror, he realises he will need to perform a complicated tracheotomy; however, the hardest part is convincing her family that the girl's problem cannot be solved with drops or pills.

After also assisting during a tragic birth in the snow, the doctor takes to his bed, bent double with stomach ache. Desperate to stop the pain and to escape the snow and boredom of Muryovo, he reaches for his medical bag. And, despite the protests of his older self, fills a syringe with morphine.