1 Prologue

It was stormy night outside and just as chaos was pouring out there, the inside of the hospital was also ridden with chaos. It was two in the morning and the emergency room was swarming with paramedics that brought in a medico-legal case.

Everyone was looking at me. Waiting for my orders.

I could hear myself breathing, calming myself and rationally deciding what course of action I should take to cleanly deal with the case.

The patient was a victim of firearm injury. Which meant there wasn't much we could do aside from giving basic life-saving management. And so that's what I did. I got the nurse to expose him and saw three bleeding holes in the abdomen and his right leg was broken.

Although I'm only just a junior doctor, today it was my call. I controlled the bleeding and packed his wounds then I started him on painkillers and antibiotics along with some fluids to keep him from going into hypovolemic shock.

"Poor guy," Sara, who was the head nurse and also my friend, said from beside me. "He was found lying in a deserted alley, would've bled to death if not for a stray dog that called people over. Someone messed him up good. But despite everything he went through, he never lost consciousness."

Only when she said it did I focus on the patient's face. His face was as pale as a sheet of paper and his dark hair in contrast was disheveled and matted. His grey eyes were wide open, there were beads of sweat gathering around his forehead and it looked like he was struggling with the pain but he kept staring at me intently.

I frowned. His clothes were strange now that I looked at the mass of fabric on the floor beside his bed. Was he cosplaying as character from medieval times?

I turned away. "Arrange blood and cross match it. Also get his abdominal ultrasound and cect. We have enough time until the police arrives." I advised the nurse. "Oh and sedate him."

"Roger, doctor," Sara said and I went to check up on the other patients. A few moments later she returned only to tell me that the patient despite being sedated wasn't loosing consciousness and his condition was worsening.

Of course it was, I thought. He was bleeding internally. In a few more hours he'll be suffering from peritonitis. Then sepsis. And then death.

"The police aren't going to come." she complained. "You know how these cases always end up, don't you? They'll say they had a lot of paperwork to go through, follow protocol and the like. And then the patient dies and they say there was nothing they could do about it." Sara spoke dejectedly.

I sighed. "He will definitely die."

"I hate it when you do that. Every time you predict something bad, it always comes true."

"It's not a prediction. It's a fact. If he doesn't get treatment soon, he really will die."

The look on Sara's face wilted. I looked at the patient who was refusing to sleep. He was quite handsome. No wonder Sara looked so smitten and was already mourning the loss.

I went up to his bed and asked, "What's your name?"

He looked at me for a moment without replying and just when I thought he wouldn't answer, he began mumbling something. I got closer to him to hear what he said: "—can't die here."

I turned to look at his face and within his eyes I only saw steely conviction. His body started shivering. I glanced at the beeping monitor and his ECG spiked. He was going into shock.

"There's something..." He suddenly grabbed my hand. "....I have to do. I can't die."

The both of us stared into each other's eyes. His unwillingness to die was what kept him conscious this far. And right now, his desperation was apparent in his eyes. He wanted me to save him. I pulled my hand away and stumbled back.

A paramedic nurse rushed over to the bed. "Doc, I think he's crashing out!"

I couldn't hear what he said. I couldn't hear anything. My hands were trembling. I looked down at them and for a second they were full of someone's blood, beneath me was a dead body. I felt myself stop breathing and my mask started suffocating me.

Someone grabbed my hand. I looked up and saw Sara, she pulled down her mask and mouthed, "Breathe."

I did what she said and started exhaling the breath that I was holding. Slowly, as I calmed down I saw the patient from before, on the verge of death. He was still refusing to loose consciousness and this time, I was thankful for it.

"Alice, it's your call now."

Everyone was looking at me. I had to make a decision now.

I wasn't the same person that I was from the past.

Right now, I had the choice to save him. And despite the repercussions I would face for doing so, I found myself wanting to save him. There was something about the look in his eyes that effected me.

With my decision made, I looked up. "Prepare the OT. We're going into surgery."

At that time, I believed with all my heart that I made the right decision. I didn't want to regret having someone die on my watch and live with that decision. And so I thought, I would never come to regret saving this man, despite the consequences.

If I had known the consequences, I would have never saved him.

*