It was called Voidus. It was the newest parasite to strike the world[Voidus sounds like a lame name for a parasite. It would have been better to go with a scientific name, or a name which refers to its appearance (often harkening back to Classical mythology). What kind of "parasite" is it?]. No one knew where it had come from, but it was spreading like wild fire[Avoid cliches like "wild fire". Cliches make a work seem less exciting and creative] in Japan and surrounding nations. Though the infection had initially been easily contained, it soon began to resist treatment and spread like mad throughout the Eastern Asian area. [paragraph break here would be a good idea. Try to seperate different elements more. Some paragraphs can actually run as little as 25-30 words (about two sentences) in some cases.] Danielle Breziek was running her first World Health Organization project here in Japan. She had always had a passion for helping the sick, first working in a children's hospital in London, before joining the U.N back in 2008. Now two years later, she had already become a senior medical advisor to the U.N Security Council and it was her who suggested they send aid to a failing Japanese nation[They promote a doctor of paedriatrics into a situation that requires those that specialise in "parasites"?]. She was beginning to regret it though as she saw the line ups of infected, most of them looking completely fine, but for some nausea and coughing[Doctors see far worse on a daily basis. Show us why she regrets this particular situation]. Due to the paranoia ensued by the plague, thousands of the people at each camp were most likely fine, or had a small cold, but they couldn't turn any away.
Danielle's patients, for the most part seemed normal, lining up to get the vaccination thanking her and leaving. Her last patient for the day would prove to be a catalyst in ending Danielle's stunning ["stunning" sounds too glib. "Impeccable" might be more appropriate] career forever. The woman carried a small child with her, wrapped in a ragged blanket. You could tell that she was poor, most likely one of the few who lived on the street. The corners of her mouth were coated in red saliva, a sure sign of infection. Danielle knew that she shouldn't be scared, she had been vaccinated before she came to the country, but she worried all the same as the woman, no older than 19 brought the small child to her, "私の子供、彼女は燃えている [My child, she is burning up]," the woman almost threw the child into Danielle's arms, "彼女を、彼女ある私が持っているすべてが直しなさい [Please heal her, she is all I have.]"
Danielle took the small child in her arms and noticed that immediately something was amiss; the child was stiff in her arms and instead of being warm, as the mother had described her, she was cold as ice[Interesting image, though a dead body that has been wrapped up in warm blankets, in Japan's climate, and held against a live person for a prolonged period will not actually be cold]. Shaking slightly Danielle brought her stethoscope to the girl's chest and listened for a heartbeat. There was none. The mother immediately noticed the looked in Danielle's eyes and began to shriek and babble in quick, broken Japanese. Danielle was able to get the words "Murderer" and "Baby" before the mother lost all comprehensibility and jumped at Danielle, much to the surprise of the U.N guard standing near her. The men in blue helmets pulled the screaming woman off of the startled and scared doctor. The woman then began to hack and cough and pun over so her stomach was pressed onto the ground, where she continued to cough, seemingly oblivious to the people around her. She was given a wide berth as the cough changed from a dry one to a wet hacking sound and a thin spray of blood spewed from her mouth onto the pavement. Soon she was still just like the baby that she had given Danielle to try and heal. Danielle couldn't help but tear up when she saw the woman's corpse, her baby, laying on her chest, carried away to be burned with the rest of the corpses.[Now would be a good time for Danielle to start feeling the regret: she has a proper, personal reason now to feel apprehensive about the place.].
Danielle wasn't the same for the rest of her shift in Japan. She woke up in a cold sweat[another cliche. It is all too-easy to use them without realising it.], shaking, her dreams of the woman and her child preventing her from getting proper sleep. Soon the other supervisors took notice and sent word to the World Health Organization. They concluded she was under severe depression and stress and told her to return to London as soon as possible. She was to undergo therapy when she returned and would be welcomed back to work after she was deemed fit to resume. Danielle was devastated, her work with medical diseases was her life and she didn't know what she would do without it. She boarded the plane home and began the long trip home.
She awoke from a nap on her plane ride with a small coughing fit. Excusing herself from her window seat to the angry scowls of an older couple she ran to the bathroom stall where the coughing intensified greatly until she felt like she was about to cough up one of her lungs. Finally the cough subsided and she removed her hands from her mouth, where she saw the thin spray of blood across them. Wiping them clean on a paper towel in a panic and leaving the bathroom stall she sat back down in her seat. She felt a small cough erupting again so she asked the nearest flight attendant for a glass of water. She took a small sip and felt the fit relax as she sat back in her seat again and began to sleep, her mind at rest. That couldn't be said about the elderly couple beside her. They saw the red rim that wasn't lipstick along the cup she had just drunk. They chose to ignore it and just pretended they hadn't seen anything.[A tad unprofessional for the doctor to be ignoring such obvious symptoms, don't you think? Considering how contagious this parasite is supposed to be and how she has seen the devestation it has caused at first hand, why the hell is she doing her darndest to hide the fact that she may be a carrier? This kind of thing is a breach in plausability. A work does not have to be realistic, but it does has to be plausable; the reader has to be able to accept the logic of characters and actions.].
The flight ended without incident and Danielle began her life of therapy. His name was Micah Smith, a well-known expert in depression and anxiety issues in people after their post-war returns. He was fascinated by Danielle's quick decline and he immediately took her case on. She spoke of the incident with the woman quite frequently and Micah noted that she grew paler and shallower with each day she saw him. He made a note and put her under suicide watch with someone to check on her each day. [More detail would be appreciated here, regarding her personal problems and depression.]
One day Danielle woke up, in a cold sweat as usual. She had grown used to this in the two weeks she had been home. She took two of the Prozac that Micah had prescribed for her depression. She always had trouble keeping them down and today was no different. After the glass of water she stumbled to the bathroom where she began to vomit violently, spewing not food, but blood into the toilet. She realized that she was in trouble and began to move towards the phone, feeling her body growing weaker. Her head was spinning and he had trouble remembering what she was trying to do. Soon she was hit with another coughing fit and she sank to the floor coughing into the floor unable to move. She felt the world fading around her and she closed her eyes.
[Closing comments:
You managed to remain within the perspective of the single character, which was good. Lots of writers make the mistake of shifting from the closed third person perspective to a more omnipresent one which describes stuff going on the protagonist can't even see. Good work in not making that all-too common mistake.
We don't know much about Danielle besides her vocation. What about her character? Or her age? For her to be were she was, she'd most likely be at least middle-aged. I needed more of a sense of this, as well as her personality. Much of this could have been achieved by adding some actual dialogue. If this character spoke, what would she say? How would she say it? Would she say much? Dialogue is very useful, and shouldn't go unused unless there is a good reason.
We shift locales too quickly; what about some more description of Japan, or the clinics or whatever? It doesn't feel like we are specifically in Japan, or anywhere for that matter. I'd add some kind of description of the locale so the reader can really get the feel for the place. Appealing to all five senses is a good idea - what does Japan look, feel, smell, sound and (perhaps) taste like?
What this work chiefly needs is fleshing out. It feels to brief at the moment. Spend more time on character building, description, thoughts, etc. and the work will improve a great deal.]
