Chapter 3
"Ninety-eight..."
"Ninety-nine..."
"One hundred."
Sloane collapsed weakly onto the blood-stained floor. Her forehead was a mangled mess of torn flesh, and her entire body convulsed violently from the sheer magnitude of terror and pain.
"Good." Alistair nodded in satisfaction, looking for all the world like a general who had just finished inspecting his troops.
He turned around, snatched the surgical consent form from the hands of the frantic nurse, pulled a steel fountain pen from his breast pocket, and signed his name with a flamboyant, sweeping flourish.
"Take it." Alistair slapped the clipboard directly against the nurse's chest, a mocking smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Tell Elara that's enough acting for one day. Sloane has learned her lesson, so she can wake up now. If she keeps pretending, I'll wash my hands of her entirely."
The nurse didn't say a word. She merely stared at Alistair as if she were looking at a literal monster, before grabbing the clipboard and sprinting madly toward the trauma bay doors.
However, just as her fingers were about to graze the metal doorknob—
The glaring red "Surgery In Progress" light situated above the doors—the same one that had been glowing this entire time—suddenly flicked off without warning.
It felt as though all the air in the corridor had been vacuumed out in a single instant. Every sound vanished, leaving behind only Sloane's faint, pathetic whimpers.
The doors to the emergency room were pushed open slowly.
Dr. Evans walked out once more. His scrubs were entirely drenched in dark red blood that had already begun to coagulate, radiating a nauseating, metallic stench. He pulled down his surgical mask, revealing a face utterly drained of energy and consumed by an unfathomable rage.
He didn't look at Alistair, nor did he look at Robert or Martha. Instead, he walked straight past them and leaned weakly against the adjacent wall.
"Doctor, when is Elara coming out?" Martha stepped forward, her tone still laced with that same condescending nonchalance. "We need to take Sloane to get her forehead bandaged up soon, and we don't have time to waste here. Go in there and tell her to stop throwing her little tantrum, get dressed, and come out."
Dr. Evans slowly lifted his head, his bloodshot eyes locking fiercely onto Martha.
"She is not coming out."
The doctor's voice was as raspy as heavy grit sandpaper, each word forced out forcefully through his teeth.
"The patient, Elara, suffered a penetrating chest wound resulting in the rupture of her major cardiac vessels and hemorrhagic shock. Resuscitation efforts have failed." He paused, his gaze slicing like a hot knife across Alistair's abruptly frozen face. "Time of death: 11:45 p.m."
A dead, absolute silence fell over the hallway.
"W-what did you say?" The muscles in Robert's face twitched as he let out a dry, hollow laugh. "Doctor, this joke isn't funny in the slightest. How much did Elara pay you to say this? Ten thousand? Twenty thousand? I'll pay you double. Tell her to get the hell out here right now!"
"Go fuck yourself!"
Dr. Evans suddenly exploded. He lunged forward, grabbed Robert by the collar, and slammed the respectable older gentleman violently against the wall.
"There is a corpse lying in that room! A corpse that bled to death purely because of the arrogant, cold-blooded cruelty of you absolute animals!" Dr. Evans's eyes were blood-red, spittle flying into Robert's face as he roared. "The bullet pierced her lung and the edge of her heart! If you had signed that paper sooner, I could have snatched her back from the grim reaper! It was you people. You killed her!"
Alistair stood rooted to the spot, his pupils contracting violently. For the very first time, a visible crack appeared on a face that had perpetually maintained a composure of cold indifference.
"Impossible," he muttered to himself. Suddenly, he shoved aside the nurse blocking his path and stormed right into the trauma bay.
"Sir, you can't go in there!"
Like a wild, crazed beast, Alistair ripped the white sheet off the operating table.
Floating near the ceiling, I watched him quietly.
He saw my corpse.
He saw my utterly bloodless face. He saw my half-open eyes, permanently stripped of whatever light they once held. He saw the gaping, bottomless bloody hole in my chest.
Alistair's hand froze suspended in mid-air. He stared at me intently, his chest heaving rapidly.
"Elara..." He reached out, desperately wanting to touch my cheek, but the moment his fingertips were about to brush my skin, he snapped his hand back as if he had been burned by actual fire.
It was too cold.
There was not a single trace of warmth left in my body.
"Get up." Alistair's voice began to tremble, yet he stubbornly tried to maintain his commanding tone. "Elara, I order you to get up. Sloane groveled and admitted her mistake. You won. You can get up now."
No response.
I lay there peacefully. Never again would I submissively crawl to his feet just because of his orders, and never again would I tremble in terrified anxiety over his scolding.
"Get up!" Alistair suddenly snapped, letting out a guttural roar. He grabbed my shoulders with both hands and began shaking my lifeless body violently. "You liar! Do you think playing dead will make me admit I was wrong? Wake up! Do you hear me?! Wake up!"
