03: Doctor

     Suzy opened her eyes to the sound of nightingales chirping. She stared at the ceiling, noticing that her room wasn't.. quite like her room. 

"Holy crap," 

     She gasped and sat up. Everybody was asleep on their bed, and the sun was half up. She was still here in this crazy place, and none of this was a dream. She slapped herself, but the only thing she got back was the burning pain that oozed from her hits. She felt her eyes welling up with tears of fear as she looked around the place, remembering everything that Myungsoo had said about death in this dreaded place. 

All these thoughts were hitting her so early in the morning, she didn't even know where to start. 

Her heart yearned for Joo-hyuk, who she probably could never see again. 

     "It's a dream no more," a soft voice came from the opposite side. Suzy flinched, staring at the source of the voice. On the opposite side sat Sae-ron the calm fourteen year girl, gracefully reading a book. She was so young, Suzy had no idea what she was doing in this horrible place. She was too young to be here, not to mention how she saw another boy around the same age last night. 

"What's the time?" 

"5:30."

Suzy sighed. 

     "You know, you can't act like a stranger forever." the girl said quaintly. "I won't spoil too much, but the circumstances here will make you want to start getting used to this place. Once you're in, there ain't a way out." She shrugged and returned to her book. Suzy was still adamant about this whole thing, regardless of what everybody told her. She wasn't going to believe a bit of this unless she saw it with her own eyes. 

"Why are you here?" Suzy asked, genuinly curious.

The girl blinked twice and took off her reading glasses. 

      "Well, i don't really remember the details because i've been here for some time. But i just know that some man suddenly took me and Chan-hee away to this shelter and did certain things to us that made us pass out. The next minute, we're here." 

"Chanhee..?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "He was my desk buddy at school when we were still back there. Now we're just stuck here together."

"Exactly.. how long have you been here?"

"Well, i got here when i was 9. So i guess that accumulates to a total of five years." 

"You haven't fought in the games-"

"We're trying to sleep here," a sharp voice shrilled under the sheets. "SHUT UP!"

"You might as well as wake up Soo-Jung," Sae-ron shrugged. "You're always the last to wake up." 

"UGH," the girl seethed and rose from the bed, glaring at Suzy as she excused herself to the restroom. 

"Don't mind her," Sae-ron returned back to her book. "She's always moody in the mornings." 

"Yeah, i can tell.."

"No one really likes to disturb her," Sae-ron whispered. "She's never lost a single game."

"Wh-"

      The abrupt exit of Soo-Jung was enough to fill the sleeping room with a deafening silence. Everyone around here seemed to have a glare so cold that Suzy was almost starting to take it personally. Everyone here seemed to keep a certain distance to themselves regardless of them being one district. She always thought that in times of dire circumstances, people were more prone to stick to each other. 

But then again, this was a parallel universe.

-----

     "Did first night work out alright for you?"

     Myungsoo asked, walking alongside Suzy. His hair was all unkempt and his attire pretty informal, but none of that seemed to matter down here. The streets were starting to fill up with people opening up their vendors and shops. Everyone greeted Myungsoo as he walked past, oddly eyeing Suzy as she trailed alongside him. Myungsoo had called Suzy out early in the morning for some business he claimed important.

"You brought the map i gave you yesterday, right?"

"Yeah," Suzy slipped it out of her pocket. 

"This ain't the average world," he glanced at Suzy. "But, you've still got to work."

     Myungsoo took the map and opened the page labelled with all the numbers and listings of different departments. There were a total of six departments, each with its own category and the sub-categories within the category. 

"There are six departments, but you're only going to choose one out of five."

"Five? why?"

     "You see this?" he pointed to the taller section of the map with a picture of a grandiose palace. "That's the Head Department Ministry. In other words, it's really the government. Nothing you have to worry about."

Suzy scanned the remaining five departments, but nothing really seemed appealing to her. The sections consisted of the Entertainment, Food, Retail, Academics, and Medicine, but none of tho

     The sections consisted of the Entertainment, Food, Retail, Academics, and Medicalogy, but none of those appealed to her. She knew that Medicalogy would be the only thing she could do, but she wanted to get away from it so bad she wasn't sure if she wanted to go back to it. She was sure it would always be flooding with injured people, bleeding. 

"Do you have any special skills or a field you're confident in?"

"I'm actually a medical student," Suzy bit her lips. 

Why did i say that?

"Oh," Myungsoo nodded, impressed. "Then we know just the spot for you."

     Suzy followed as Myungsoo cut a corner into a more modern section of the area, all plastered with white everywhere. Even the air smellt like sterilizer, and the entire place suddenly void of greenery. Suzy was regretting her choice, but what else could she do? It had to be better than working at some other shabby shop. 

     The two came upon a large mansion; almost a palace. The entire building was pure white without a single stain and at the top, hung a bright red medical cross sign in the middle. The front porch held up with ostentatiously detailed pillars painted in brilliant white. Suzy peeked up to see that instead of peeks in the roof, there were pure white domes instead. It was the most grand hospital Suzy had ever seen in her life, and she was starting to like her choices.

Myungsoo knocked on the door twice and the door swung open automatically, letting the two in. 

"What is this place Myungsoo?"

"Sh," he whispered. "We don't want to be a ruckus."

     The inside was pitch silent, so silent that it almost hurt Suzy's ears. She could hear faint ringing inside her ear as the two walked across the pristine marble floor, so clean that she could see her reflection off it without even trying. She looked around, seeing a few nurses here and there walking by with tacky nurse uniforms and a clip-board in their arm. All this white cleanliness was starting to hurt her eyes.

"May i come in?"

Myungsoo chuckled, peeking his head through a tall door that was once again, white. 

     Myungsoo grabbed Suzy's wrist and guided her inside. Suzy felt a sense of relief as she entered the room; the room looked extremely similar to a normal doctor's office. It was appropriately messy, and actually contained colors. Suzy looked around the office, seeing medical devices hung all around the room purely for exhibition. On the corner behind who seemed like the doctor were a bunch of X-ray papers stuck onto the light board.

"Long time no see," the doctor shook hands with Myungsoo and gestured for Myungsoo to take a seat.

Dr. Kim Nam-Joon

Suzy glanced at the doctor, sniggering inside her head.

"I see you've brought another one," the doctor pushed up his spectacles, his eyes focused on the bunch of paperwork before him on the big desk. Suzy didn't know what paperwork was even required in this world; was there really a need for complicated methods?

"Just came in last night."

The doctor paused his writing and pushed up his glasses, examining Suzy.

"You sure she's not one of them?" The doctor asked, slightly frowning. Myungsoo was hesitant but nodded with a look of doubt in his face. Suzy had no idea what they were talking about, but it sure offended her.

'Well young lady," The doctor smiled. "Tell me a bit about yourself."

"Uh," she raised an eyebrow. "What exactly.. would you like to know?"

"Just the usual," he nodded.

"Well," she paused. "I'm a medical student."

"Which category?"

"Neuroscience."

The doctor let out a soft breath, nodding fervently.

"We'll put her on testing to see how far she goes with her knowledge. Shouldn't take too long this time, we have an incoming patient who punctured her brain in the games. I assume you've already gone past Lumbar Puncture, right?"

"Yeah," Suzy nodded, finally feeling like she was back at earth.  

"She's planned for 8AM," The doctor rose and put on his doctor gown, tossing one to Suzy. She was starting to feel a little nervous, because she hadn't particularly paid alot of attention during her intern apprentice at school. She thought it wouldn't matter too much, since people were living and dying everyday in this place. 

"Uh, isn't this a little too extreme for a test?"

Suzy asked as she trailed behind Dr.Kim Nam-Joon who pushed his spectacles up every five steps.

"If i get this wrong i could potentially kill this person and you'd probably never forgive me for saving a person who could have lived."

The doctor halted infront of a big operation room and glanced at Suzy.

"We'll two other professional neurosurgeons in the room with us," he laughed. "Wipe your sweat." 

He scanned his thumb on the small detector beside the door and the door slid open to a white operation room. She looked around the room, intidimated by the tense atmosphere that the doctor was giving her. He tossed her a hair net and a pair of Latex gloves, busy preparing the scene for the operation. Suzy could hear ruckus approaching the operation room, followed by a small quarrel as the door slid open to reveal Taehyung and Zico in their doctor coats.

Taehyung and Zico.

Suzy stared at the two, wondering what was going on.

"Well what are you doing?!" Zico grit his teeth, glaring at Suzy who only held her gloves in her hands. "The patient's going to come in any minute now!" 

Before Suzy could do a thing, the door slid open and a girl limped inside supported by two nurses on each side. She watched as they seated her on the bed, laying her on the side for her Lumbar Puncture. All of this was scaring Suzy, because she had never performed practice on an actual patient and she wasn't sure if she was even doing this correctly. 

"Oh my god," Zico seethed as he clutched Suzy's wrist and roughly dragged her infront of the girl. "Well do your thing, doctor girl." 

Zico said sarcastically, waiting for her actions.

"Uh," she stuttered. "Did you perform a MRI scan on her?"

"Yes," Taehyung pushed in. "She's had a swelling tumor in the brain." 

"No," Suzy groaned. "You know it's not safe. It'll cause bleeding into the cerebrospinal fluid and cause a brain hemorrahge."

"Then what are we going to do?"

"Ventricular Puncture. Getting the CSF fluid from the lumbar area will cause infection, so we have to collect the fluid from the upper spinal canal at the base of the skull."

The three nodded in unison, proceeding the operation.

---

     Suzy stood at the rooftop, her head feeling dizzy. Her hands were shaking and she didn't know if she really wanted to work in this department, both here at Rubicon and later when she would hopefully.. return to Earth. She felt so much uncertainty about herself,  and the thought of her not being able to save someone haunted her. On top of that, she was scared of blood. 

"You okay?" 

Tae-hyung caught Suzy as she lost balance and nearly tripped. 

"Yeah," she murmured. "Just feeling a little nauseous."

Taehyung chuckled and passed her a bottle of water with Panadol. 

"Take it. It should help with first-time nausea."

"Thanks," she murmured and gulped the pill down. 

"You're pretty tough," Taehyung said as he took a large gulp of water and looked out into the horizon. "I puked all over the place on my test to get into this place."

"I didn't know you're a medical student," she said impressively. 

"It's way better than the other departments," he snorted. "way better."

"What's up with the other ones?"

"Baekhyun's in the Entertainment department and it's pretty foul there," he said worridly. "It's also one of the most dangerous departments that us humans could apply for."

"What could be that bad about the Entertainment department?"

"It requires performing up North," he whispered. "That's why Zico transferred into our department." 

"Zico?"

"I see you're talking crap behind my back,"

Zico approached the two with a cigarette inbetween his fingers. Unlike Suzy, Taehyung was so calm and composed at his unexpected entrances. She had to admit, he sort of frightened her. But it wasn't as if saying so would stop it; he was the type to do more.

"What do you want this time?" Taehyung rolled his eyes. 

Zico tossed a small scroll at Suzy and took a seat on the bench. He dropped his cigarette and crushed it with his shoes, watching as Suzy stared at the scroll with a blank expression.

"Freaking read the thing, will you?" Zico yelled. "How you're in this department, it's a wonder."

"Says the one who got down on his knees to get in here." Taehyung snorted. 

Suzy unrolled the scroll to reveal a bunch of small writings that was so small she had to cringe to read properly. 

"Great," Tae-hyung pat her on the shoulder. "We're your sunbaes now."

"Welcome to the Neurosurgeon department, Bae Suzy." 

Tae-hyung smiled.

But if there was one thing that irked her the most about this place; it was Zico.

My information for the Medical scenes may not be accurate.

I did not do a thorough research on Lumbar Puncture so please forgive me if i get it wrong.