Hey guys, this is a short transitionary chapter... as for whether Neil is a foe or ally, I'll let you decide for now :P


"You… are the head of the new department?" Reine asked, baffled.

"Yeah," Mark replied. "And I know you'll be the Physician-in-Charge as fate may have it."

"Which is why get out from my office, and get to your office," Neil retorted, emphasising the word "my" and "your"—as if the division between them couldn't be any clearer.

His office used to be hers, too, and just a few days ago they talked about dreams in this very same room. How could something change so drastically in just a few days?

Mark, ever sensitive, sensed the rising tension in the room. "Why, no rush," he said. "I just came to say hi, actually… so there's no need to rush over—we're just doing the transfers today."

"I'll be right there," Reine said. "I'll just wait for… Chels."

"Oh, right, she's taking over you, right?" Mark asked. "Sure, like I said, no rush."

Mark left the room as neither Neil nor Reine made any move.

"You knew this would happen, right?" Reine finally asked, her voice strained as she tried to hold back her tears that seemed to go on infinite mode today. "You knew who I was, you knew why I asked for the transfer, you knew Mark would head it…"

"I do, I do, and I do—can't you just… move on?!"

Reine remembered the days he poured endless flow of paperwork for her—especially during the recovery period of her leg. It was an unusual work allocation for an internist, but since she could infiltrate the hospital's database while working on those papers, she never minded doing that. Killing two birds with one stone, or so she thought.

What if…

"Are you an ally or a foe?" she asked hopelessly. Please, please, she said inwardly. Be my ally.

"I am who you believe me to be," Neil echoed the long bygone statement. "For the love of God, Reine, what makes it so hard for you to leave?!"

Reine turned and for the first time she faced Neil again after their earlier confrontation. "If you are a foe, why don't you just kill me?!" she growled. "Kill me. Be over with it. WHY?!"

"I have my reasons," Neil stated at the brink of his temper. "When will you stop questioning and start working?!"

"Can you answer at least one of my questions?" she pleaded. "Please, Neil, if not for me… do it… just out of what remains in your heart…"

She wept all over again. She felt disgusted at herself, for hopelessly loving him the way she did. Yet, she found herself not regretting it—just mere disgust at her own capability of such love.

Neil looked at the woman whose heart he had just crushed and trampled on. She looked just like a string puppet whose strings were just cut—crumbling away, hopeless, lifeless. But, maybe he wasn't so different from that, too.

"Can a happiness for one ever worth the danger for another?"

"What…?"

Neil sighed heavily as he brought his hand over his face. "Not all I told you was a lie, Reine Kreiss," he murmured.


She wasn't surprised when she found out that out of the twelve names, ten could be found in the new department—the two exceptions being Neil Forrester, the Head of Trauma Surgery and Nicholas McNamara, the Chief of Internal Medicine. However, she knew that this department would work closely with these other two sections.

Reine didn't rule Neil Forrester out from her suspect list. She couldn't—not after what he had done. Not even if she loved him—that mattered not.

She loathed admitting it, but he turned out to be right. In this line of work, emotions were… a deadweight loss.

She remembered he told her that quite early in their acquaintanceship, and only now she realized he had used the plural "jobs" instead of "job" back then.

So… ever since then?

"…Dr Kreiss?"

Reine snapped back to the present and saw Felicity looking at her worriedly. "Yes?" she asked, trying to maintain a form of professionalism.

"Are you all right?" she asked. "Your face is so pale…"

"Must be because of the smell of the new paint," Reine replied. "I'll go get some air."


"So, twelve names, huh?" Helena asked over the phone.

Reine made the call at a hidden corner on the hospital's roof, after ensuring that the perimeter was clear. She knew it was still risky, but she couldn't help it. Inwardly, what she needed was not the voice of her superior officer, but the substitute of the motherly voice she yearned for.

"Is it not a bit too much of work to do for one person?" Helena asked with a kind tone. "Why don't you… cut the list down?"

"How?"

"Use your hea—"

"No," Reine interjected once she knew what was coming. "No feelings. I can't let my feelings interfere anymore."

"Oh, dear, now you sound like someone I know really well," Helena said. "Why, dear? You used to believe in your heart… why the change of heart?"

"I can't, Helena," she replied. "I believed in it once, and it costs me… that break-in."

"Oh, yes, I heard you requested for a new password," she said. "But I also knew that you didn't put very critical information in that hard disk… don't be so hard on yourself."

"A break-in is still a break-in," she insisted. "I am an agent. I should've known better."

"But, aren't you a human before you are an agent?"

Reine cut the line off abruptly after a moment of silence, but Helena knew it wasn't for emergency. She knew the girl needed to calm down after what she went through. Helena glanced at the frame on her table, where she put on a picture of a younger Reine together with Gwen. They were still around eight years old then, and things were much simpler back then. Some siblings' spat, but not yet boys.

Guess she still have some growing up to do, huh?


"You've done it," the voice across the line said. "Congratulations."

He could hear the cynical tone in that congratulatory message. "If you're only here to mock me…"

He couldn't find the words. He knew she had every right to do it.

"You know, Forrester," she said. "You know this is why I warned you three years ago."

How could he forget that? It was her call that prevented him from going to that French restaurant. He thought things would end then, but he was horribly wrong.

With the ending, came a new beginning. And that was basically what happened. Such a cruel loop of fate.

He cut off the line and threw himself back on his chair. He was exhausted; for theirs was really the kind of fire-and-brimstone love, full of destructive passion.

If he had to choose between destroying what they had and destroying her person, he knew his choice was already written at the back of his head and at the bottom of his tongue, but never the core of his heart.

So he stripped his heart bare for her to see for those eleven days so that she could take it away with her when she left. So that he could just do it. And he knew she did. That's why he did.


Stay tuned for the next update!

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