”Over here,” a man shouts as he lets a gurney through the large sliding doors. White-dressed nurses and doctors flit in and out of the room, commands shouted everywhere as the patient on the gurney lies bleeding from a wound in his stomach. A small man comes running from the hallways and barges in through the doors to the room just as the patient history is explained.

“Patient, male 38 years old, was attacked by ex-girlfriend who stabbed a knife through his abdomen. It looks like a puncture wound to the liver and the intestines,” the paramedic says while he hands over papers with the patient’s medical information thus far.

“Blood pressure 96 over 58, pulse is weak.”

A phlebotomist pushes his way through the crowd to draw blood from the already bleeding patient. The man stands in the corner and watches everything as it unfolds. He takes note of everything until he makes his way to the trauma leader and pats his shoulder.

“The patient is about to go into hypovolemic shock. Get him to my OR asap,” he says and the trauma leader turns to him.

“Minseok?” It’s a surprised question and the small ER doctor sends him a gummy smile. “What are you doing here?”

Minseok chuckles a little amidst the chaos.

“Doing my job, Yixing. Send the patient to my OR immediately. He’ll die on your table if I don’t get to operate on him. Forget the blood tests, the x-rays and the cat-scans. On my OR table within 2 minutes. I’ll see you there,” Minseok says and pats Yixing’s shoulder again. Then he leaves the chaos behind as he exits the door and walks down the hallway towards the OR and his domain.

Minseok is technically an ER doctor. He’s also a strauma urgeon. Most of his patients don’t really remember being treated but the end result is always outstanding. He’s in high standing, highly regarded and very appreciated by colleagues and younger doctors at the hospital. It’s not because he’s intelligent or passed his exams with flying colors. No, if one was counting skill alone, Yixing would’ve been a much better doctor than he. But Minseok has a secret, a secret that has his death rate be the lowest in the country.

He’s removed from his thoughts when the attending doctor, the anesthesiologist and a couple of nurses come with the patient. Soon the bleeding man is placed on the OR table and asleep, the only two people in the OR apart from the patient being Minseok and his trusted anesthesiologist, Junghae.

“Are you sure about this Minseok?” she asks and Minseok nods. The patient will die otherwise. She shrugs a little and looks towards her monitors before she confirms the patient is fully asleep. He removes bandages and opens the wound gently with his gloved fingers. The more he digs in, the clearer the damage becomes. A faint blue light starts glowing around his fingers as he touches the wounds and leaves nothing but healthy tissue behind. No scaring, no bleeding, no wound. He works his way through the liver wound before he moves on to the intestines and carefully they too begin to heal themselves. When he reaches the epidermis of the skin he lets go and the soft glow from his fingers slowly dissipate and disappear. He clamps the wound shut and bandages it, leaving behind a visible scar of the procedure and the past, even if there is none on the inside. That’s how he operates on a daily basis, leaving the patients without a clue of what has actually happened inside the OR.

“You can wake him up now,” Minseok says as he puts the last bandage on the wound and sends Junghae a smile.

She knows his secret. That’s why they work together. They’re a team of two, a great team. Junghae has sworn never to tell anybody what is really going on in the OR when they’re together and how Dr. Kim is so successful with his surgeries. At first, Junghae didn’t believe Minseok’s secret when he told her, but she has seen enough to believe his words. She doesn’t always condone his secrecy, but she admires his constant wish to better life for those less unfortunate than he. Or perhaps, those smarter than he.

The orderly comes to move the patient back to the ICU where he’ll fully wake up and be nursed back to health. Minseok stares at the empty table when everything has quieted down and he’s alone in the room. He removes his latex gloves and throws them into the bin beside him. Another life saved but Minseok doesn’t feel very accomplished. It’s always like this after a procedure to save lives; a silent reminder of his gift and his curse. The beeping from his pager is a welcome distraction and Minseok turns his back to the unclean OR when he leaves it behind, fetches his doctor’s coat and starts walking towards the ER again, back on duty.

As a child, Minseok made a deal with the devil.

// There is a plot behind, but I just never got to write it. But technically, Minseok made a deal with the devil (literally) to save his mother as a child, so he can heal people magically except the one thing he gave the devil in return is his biggest love. Like kid!Minseok doesn't believe he can love someone as much as his mother, but then he meets Jongin, a man he falls in love with. When Jongin falls ill, Minseok realizes he can't heal him and thus knows that he's about to lose the one man he will love the most, a love he will never get to experience again. 

Love is evil like that. (and so am I when I get story ideas lmao)

Also, the title should probably be "Curses in Disguise" instead LOL. I don't know why I thought of blessings in disguise when I wrote that excerpt hundred years ago. It's certainly not a blessing to Minseok.