"Medico?" Emilio's voice echoed in my ears, and I shook myself awake, looking over at the alarm as if to question why it hadn't woken me yet. Then I realised I wasn't in my bed, I was in a bed at Caduceus, and every muscle screamed, along with the worst headache I'd ever experienced. But my thoughts didn't leave Emilio.
First, he was a 'Sinner' then I saved him. Angie and I destroyed GUILT and took down Delphi, but since then, he was re-infected. There was an outbreak at Elysium, a terrorist attack, and everyone got infected with Kyriaki, the sturgeon-like GUILT we'd encountered before. Only this one was a new strain, it could reproduce. Kyriaki forms lacerations on the organ they've infected, which send the vitals into shock, knocking them by about 20 per attack, and unless cut with the scalpel and burned with the laser, Kyriaki just keep cutting the organ up, until the patient bleeds to death.
In case you didn't know about GUILT, it's a man-made disease, used by the likes of death doctors, and those who foolishly don't know the effects until it goes wrong.
Back to Emilio though, and that moment I thought I had lost everything. Two patients, and then Heather and Emilio. I thought I had more time, that my Healing Touch could save him...
Luckily, Angie brought me to my senses, and called Dr Tulba, Adel, to operate on the second patient in my place. I defeated the Kyriaki in Heather and moved onto Emilio. We nearly lost him...
No. I nearly lost him. The Kyriaki had cut him up badly, his vitals were at 10, he'd gone into cardiac arrest, and the defibrillator wasn't shocking life back into him. I watched in horror as blood soaked his body, so young and vulnerable, and my hand began to glow.
At that moment, the only thing that mattered to me was saving Emilio's life, and even if it killed me, I was going to do it. Pushing the defib and the nurses aside, including a distraught Angie, I put my hand directly onto his heart, massaging it rapidly, willing it to beat, and after five minutes of imitating a pulse, I felt my vision start to fade. My limbs grew heavy, my eyes fell closed. We had lost him. And it was my fault.
But...
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
The flatline suddenly perked up again, depicting a weakly, but nonetheless beating heart. I awakened, my body energised with hope, shoved the laser into Angie's hands, grabbed my scalpel, disinfected the skin, and cut Emilio open. Healing Touch still in action, I was quick enough to cut and laser every one of the Kyriaki, with Angie's help.
His vitals dropped to five, and I injected him with stabiliser rapidly, but couldn't get more than thirty. Still, it kept him out of the red zone, and as I sutured the wound and bandaged it, the scalpel clinked softly on the floor, and I made a much larger thud beside it.
"Medico?" Emilio repeated, lightly touching my shoulder, and gaining no response, this was followed by a much softer, feminine voice. "Doctor Stiles?" Heather's gentle tone elicited a faint murmur from me, and my gaze drifted up to the duo, who were warmly smiling down at me, as if I was some kind of hero. They looked happy together. Emilio had described Heather as a sister, and it hurt me to think of how much she'd have been grieving if I'd failed.
"Doctor." Angie walked in through the sliding doors, and settled on the edge of my bed. She did not look happy. "Angie, I-" Trying to explain, I began to speak, but she cut me off, talking over me. "You're leaving Caduceus. Doctor Hoffman has requested you be transferred to a clinic that doesn't research GUILT, and that you give up your Healing Touch." Her eyes darkened, "You became arrogant with it, and because of that, a patient died! It was only the most extreme luck that allowed you to revive him, and a second's delay would have made you lose him completely! You relied on your power, instead of thinking emotionally and logically. You don't deserve the Healing Touch!"
With that stinging blow, she left again.