This…

“Male, 29, head injury, possible concussion, unresponsive. His license says his name is Lee Jinki…”

This is starting to get ridiculous.

“And he’s the head of Cardiac Surgery at Seoul National University Hospital.”

“I know.”

You know because this is not the first time this has happened. Lee Jinki has paid your ER three visits this year, and while you do love being an acclaimed traumatologist in an acclaimed hospital in a very dangerous foreign country and taking up the most exciting cases of your career…

“What happened this time?”

You hate getting patients like him.

Your nurses shoot you embarrassed look, and one of your interns looks downright ashamed of what he’s about to say. “Uh, he was just getting out of the OR from a successful surgical ventricular restoration case.”

“Doesn’t he work on the other side of the city?”

“He came out to lunch with friends to celebrate.”

“And?”

“He slipped.”

“Hit himself on a concrete statue on the way down, actually,” another intern clarifies, referring to the full patient report.

Yeah, that sounds like the kind of thing that would happen to him. You sigh and look down at his furrowed eyebrows and pouty lips, and you think it’d have been nice to have met him under literally any other circumstance. Because he’s actually adorable in an oddly hunky way.

“His friends called our ER and…” your intern pulls out the chestnut haired man’s arm, “they wrote his chart down on his forearm, Doctor.”

“I swear to everything holy… ” you’re going to kill him when he wakes up. No matter how cute his KO’d expression is, you’re going to at least kick him in the shin when he’s conscious. 

Oh, wait. You’re never around for that part. You’re only ever back in time to find his hospital bed deserted, someone in a crisp suit or in military gear to tell you that Doctor Lee had to leave because he’s needed in the Medi Cube outside the city walls. They congratulate you for your good work, too, commend your bravery on this side of the war zone and wish you good fortune and health.

Then every trace of Lee Jinki vanishes. Until he bangs his head again.

“Why do they never take him back to his Cube? Why send him here?”

“We can ask him that when he wakes up,” your right hand man rushes up to your side, and you smile at the head of jet black hair. “Let’s get an MRI and some CT scans done on him.”

He’s pretty, Kim Kibum. Most people can’t believe you went through all of med school together, because you’re both in your mid-twenties but he still looks like he’s seventeen and his voice is what waterfalls would sound like if they could talk. That, and he has the body of a dancer, and he can sing. He can act, too, you remember he was in every drama trope in college. And he went into military service early.

A perfect 10 if you ask absolutely anyone, really.

“Stop staring at me,” he snaps, his cat-like eyes narrow despite the smirk tugging at his bow-shaped lips, “and let go of my patient.”

You’re laughing as you finally let go of the stretcher, and you marvel at the way Kibum naturally runs his hands through his hair to push it up and off his forehead, how good it looks because you know no one else could pull off a crew cut like him, and you think you may be in possession of the prettiest best friend in the world. It must be tough, though, you think as you watch him turn a corner… being that handsome, that honourable, being one of the top intensivists in Korea…

And doubling up as the youngest Colonel in the Korean Army’s Medical Corps.

You’ve been working in this war zone for about two years now, and being a relief doctor, you’re actually pretty lucky to have retained all of the humor and sass that your residency at Asan Hospital gave you.

It’s obvious you were not the only one.

“What do the scans look like?”

You ask mostly because you don’t want to tell them what you see; Lee Jinki is just shaken up like he has been his last two trips here…

But something’s totally off.

“There’s something really wrong with him, but I can’t tell what,” Kibum has his arms crossed over his chest behind you, and the two interns by your side nod in agreement. Because they have absolutely nothing else to add.

“We can see that there’s mild swelling, which is consistent with his concussion injury,” Kibum starts to point out the inflamed bits of the scan, as well as the parts of Lee Jinki’s head that are starting to show fluid retention, “though this is all stuff that some NSAIDs and rest can help bring down.”

“This isn’t his first head trauma, though. They do build up,” you add, and Kibum purses his lips, “he could be developing SIS.”

“Is he awake right now?” Kibum turns to one of the interns, who shakes his head quickly.

“He’s been getting woken up by the nurses every three hours.”

“How many has it been?”

“Six. I believe he actually just fell back asleep after he saw his Cube colleagues.”

“Has he said anything?”

“Just asked for water, and his mother.”

Very attractive, you think to yourself, and Kibum catches your eyes and narrows his own and you try to smile as innocently as possible.

“Did he ask for discharge papers yet?”

The interns shake their heads, and Kibum purses his lips. “Good. Let’s keep him overnight and run another MRI in the morning, and when he wakes up again, page me.”

“I’m sure he’ll be very happy to know we’re grounding him here for a whole day with how hectic it’s been in the city,” you add sarcastically, and Kibum makes a faux amused expression. You’re right, though. There’ve been two air raids and a suicide bomb that left 20 dead this week, and it’s only Wednesday. The only reason why a leading traumatologist and a highly acclaimed intensivist were paged up here is because everyone else has been deployed elsewhere. This city needs as many doctors as possible available and ready to take on anything, and you don’t know Lee Jinki but he looks like he has at least some guts.

While it is really important for both Medi Cubes in the city walls to be fully staffed, someone needs to make sure the real hospitals attending to civilians are up to par, which is why Asan doctors are nearly always stationed between Medi Cubes and city hospitals (because you did come here for more than immunization rounds and educational talks at schools). Your relationship to this specific hospital is nothing less than amazing. They help keep your supplies in full stock, give you the space you need and you lend them as many hands as are needed to help keep civilians, diplomats, soldiers, and sometimes even adversaries safe. A win-win situation if you’ve ever seen one, really.

“Consider yourself lucky, Miss Head of Traumatology and Neurology in two countries. He’s a very important asset to this country and to the Medical Corps,” the cat-eyed young man retorts, “we have to have the best of our team attending to him.”

“What does he have to do with the Army or the Medical Corps?”

Kibum blinks at you blankly. “Didn’t you read his chart?”

You skimmed through, to be honest. It’s probably all the time you’ve spent in ERs but you only look over the pivotal parts of your patient’s charts as you go into the OR, and then you only trust what you see with your own two eyes. It’s the best way to do it round these parts, anyway, where politics and money are above the law and above it all.

And it’s not that different in Korea, now you think about it.

Kibum takes your spacing out as a no, and he sighs. “He’s the highest ranked Army Surgeon in any relief region right now. Lieutenant Colonel Lee Jinki.”

No way. “He’s higher ranked than you are?”

“Hell yeah, and for a good reason. Taught me everything I know when I first started service.”

“Army Surgeon?” 

“Best of the best.”

What? That doesn’t make sense. “Two left feet and all?”

“He’s kind of clumsy, but he’s amazing at what he does. Way above my level, actually. Maybe just a bit above yours.”

You’re too confused to process the compliment, looking back to the MRI scan with furrowed eyebrows.

“He’s never in uniform, though,” you add pensively, not really meaning to talk out loud. Kibum lands next to you and the floof his chair releases with his weight makes you frown. “He’s weird.”

“That sounds about right,” Kibum nods along with you, and then he sends off the interns to go do their rounds in the ICU. “He went into early retirement last year after a really nasty run in with the IS in Syria.”

You nod, mostly because you don’t know what else to say.

“His wife was killed. She was a soldier, too. The Corps gave him as many medals as they could and promoted him to Lieutenant Colonel. It’s all they could do, in the end.”

“So now he just tours war zones and helps out?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t seen him since the funeral.” So that’s why he was so eager to take over his case when he rolled into the ER. When Kibum has had too much white wine and your lodging finally looks comfortable, he talks about what it’s like to be an active solider. Just last night he told you how the only time he ever sees his colleagues anymore is at funerals, and your heart still aches when you remember the look on his face. And now you wonder just what Lee Jinki is beyond the klutz and the pretty face.

Then there’s loud bustling outside the MRI lab doors, nondescript yelling.

The loud, booming, deafening and unmistakable noises of fire and gunpowder.

“Everyone in the medical team on duty! We need to move, now! Now, now!!”

And it’s only Wednesday.

“I don’t have SIS.”

“Don’t be so quick to rule it out,” Choi Minho is annoyingly right once again, and Jinki plops down on one of the stools in the Cube’s ICU with a loud sigh. “You’re the clumsiest, most clueless person I have met to date.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“What did you have for breakfast today?” he presses his lips into a flat line and narrows his eyes slightly. The expression makes Jinki blush just a tinge as he scrambles through the mess of his own brain to remember.

How the hell can he have time to remember what he eats when he’s busy performing life saving surgeries out here? He just got out of a really tricky procedure, too. Getting glass out of the thoracic cavity is really no joke, especially when it calls for a valve replacement and a prescription for a pacemaker.

“I don’t know, some stew? And rice?”

Minho actually laughs. “Omurice. They’ve served omurice and coffee every single morning since we got here. Which was, by the way, eight months ago.”

“I know that. Eight months,” he’s still trying to make it look like he forgets on purpose, but there’s a little bit of panic bouncing between the walls of his ribcage now.

Eight months. He thinks back to his first night here, how he felt more at home than he ever did in Seoul the moment his feet fell upon this soil. Life hasn’t been easy after what happened two years ago. There’s something really comforting in desolation, in not seeing the same streets and the same political and the same of everything every day, something so comforting about going somewhere nobody knows he’s a widower, where nobody calls him a hero, barely anyone outside this Cube knows he’s a veteran.

“And within those eight months, you’ve paid three visits to that hospital downtown. All for blunt traumas to the head.”

“You said it yourself,” Jinki gets up only to swing a leg over one of the patient beds, “I’m clumsy. And they have the best Traumatology department in the region.”

“It’s not normal, sunbae,” Minho reasons, and Jinki shrugs, “your memory’s gotten funky and your motor functions are weird. You tripped on your own feet while going down three steps yesterday.”

“I forget that they’re there, Minho.”

“You shouldn’t! They’ve been there since we got here!”

“Can we stop talking about this?” Jinki leans his head back and heaves a sigh, “I’m tired and I want to nap before something crazy happens.”

Obviously, Jinki was tempting every devil on and under God’s green earth, because seconds later he can hear a low thrum that starts to shake the entirety of the Medi Cube.

“Oh, for ’s sake.”

“Is everyone okay?!” Jinki knows it’s of very little use to scream. Even though the quaking settled barely two minutes ago, most of the Medi Cube staff have been accounted for and all of the patients have been secured. But there are still some nurses he hasn’t caught a glance of in a while. He hears muffled screams of ‘yes!’, others even calling out his name and title because they recognize his voice.

Jinki himself, miraculously, managed to run out of the Cube unscathed. In fact, he didn’t even stumble on his way to the patch of open space behind the abandoned church on their side of the region’s no man’s land.

He helps the two missing nurses out from under some shelves when they do scream out their location, and leads them behind the church to join the rest of the crew.

There, he is met with a slew of men in uniform looking at him with eyes of extreme need and a little admiration.

“Lieutenant Colonel,” he hates hearing those words but he stands to attention, and the familiar salute rolls off his lips like he was wearing his uniform just this morning. “We have just confirmed an earthquake of magnitude 6.3 with its epicentre located two miles west of the city’s biggest hospital. The building has collapsed completely but all patients were evacuated. Some of the staff, however, are missing. Possibly trapped, maybe even dead.”

Jinki doesn’t know why this is his concern or why he’s still being addressed as a soldier and not a doctor, but then the General removes his hat and his eyes suddenly look very somber. “At least one of the staff members unaccounted for is a Korean citizen, and part of the Army’s Medical Corps.”

It’s all he needs to hear.

The truth is, though he considers himself a retired soldier, he never really was. And Minho wasn’t surprised to find out that Lee Jinki kept his uniform in the same locker where he kept a secret stash of candy, extra spicy ramen and a fat bottle of port wine for emergencies. Sure, he was not actively on duty with the Army, but he never failed to report to his previous superiors when something happened. It’s why he’s always in the busiest war zones, the ones where the Korean Army is the most active. Because he can’t bear to think of anyone else losing someone they love in the line of duty like he did. 

As such, he’s in full uniform and in a van to the disaster site minutes later, with Minho sitting uncomfortably at his side because he’s not used to seeing Jinki’s stony eyes.

He thinks he prefers the lost boy look in them, not a trace of which can be seen right now.

“What are you looking at?” even his tone is different now, and Minho blinks wordlessly at his elder because he can really feel the years Jinki has on him, “you’ll be wearing one of these eventually, you know.”

Sometimes Jinki forgets that Minho’s only 24.

“Aren’t you breaking the dress code with that haircut?”

Jinki finds it in him to smile, to relax a little bit and release some of the tension in his body, and he’s suddenly very grateful to have taken Minho under his wing during his cardiology residency at Seoul National a year ago. The kid is the closest thing to a brother Jinki’s ever had, and he can’t imagine life without his antics anymore. In Minho, Jinki was able to find brotherhood, which was something he’d only had as a soldier before.

“I’m retired,” Jinki responds, “this is just a favor to my colleagues.”

“You look weird,” Minho crosses his arms over his chest and pouts slightly, “and I don’t like it.”

“Am I your boyfriend? Why do you have to like anything I do?”

Minho’s lips flatten and his entire expression goes deadpan like it did just this morning, and he looks like a frog now more than ever. “Just don’t do dangerous , alright? You had a concussion five days ago and your innards are still swollen.”

“I’m fine.”

“Yeah? Which movie did the team watch last night?”

The van is pulling over already, coming to a slow stop just as Jinki gathers his wits to answer. “The Avengers?”

Minho narrows his eyes at Jinki suspiciously. “Lucky guess.”

The hospital is pure rubble by the time Jinki manages to jog up the cluttered square. An entire squadron of soldiers are behind him, joined by the doctors from Seoul National. Near a viable entrance, Jinki spots another squadron, already wearing safety helmets and carrying first aid equipment. As soon as they spot the newcomers, they look elated and relieved.

“Dan-gyeol!”

The Lieutenant Colonel stands to attention automatically, and a roaring echo of the words resonates throughout the entire area. A Captain then rushes up to Jinki for briefing. “We’ve confirmed that there are two survivors left in the building. One of them is a member of the Medical Corps; Colonel Kim Kibum.”

Jinki’s heart sinks to his stomach and the panic in his chest starts to bounce inside him again. “K-Kim Kibum?”

“Yes, Kim Kibum. Born in Daegu, September 23rd, 1991.  He recently completed his intensivist residency at Asan Hospital—”

Jinki doesn’t wait to hear the rest, already moving to take a spare safety helmet to wear. He ensures he has a working flashlight, eight feet’s worth of sturdy rope and his boots tied on before he joins in the ranks of the group of soldiers about to enter the ruins. “I’ll find him,” is all he says, and then he gives the order to advance.

“Kim Kibum!”

“Colonel Kim Kibum!”

“Kibum-ah! Key-yah!”

There’s an echo of something in the darkness of this place, and Jinki moves the head of his flashlight around frantically for any signs of life. He can hear an echo of his younger mate’s name in other sections of the area. It’s been roughly an hour and they’ve heard no noises besides their own, and Jinki’s starting to get worried.

Kim Kibum is a ghost of his past that should have never been a ghost. If Jinki had been better at keeping in touch, maybe he’d know a better way to find Kibum. Maybe Kibum wouldn’t be stuck here at all.

What the hell is he doing out here anyway?

“Kim Kibum, you punk!!”

And then he can hear yelling.

“Sunbae-nim!! SUNBAE-NIM, WATCH YOUR HEAD, WE HAVE TO GET AN MRI DONE ON YOU IN TWO DAYS!!”

What? How does he know that?

“Colonel Kim Kibum!!”

“YES, SIR, LIEUTENANT COLONEL! YOU CAN’T GET ANOTHER CONCUSSION IN HERE!”

The voice is getting louder and Jinki’s feet are moving more quickly. He’s actually clutching his helmet closer to his head with his increasing speed, and the low hum of Kim Kibum’s voice starts to boom when Jinki stands before a giant, lopsided piece of wall that doesn’t quite look like it belongs there. It actually looks like it may have slipped down from an upper floor.

“How do you know I had a concussion?”

“I was one of your attending physicians, sir!”

Oh yeah, he’s never actually met any of the doctors that put him through all of those brain scans when he’s gone downtown with a head ouchie. Go figure.

Six men are crowding the piece of wall now, already drawing a plan to move it. “Are you alright, Colonel?”

“Fine! I dislocated my shoulder when I fell from the second floor.”

“Understood. Do you have space to stand back or something to take cover with?”

“I’m stuck between two walls, I think! Quite snugly, actually.”

“We may have to use explo—  ”

“Do not blow up this wall! I’m not the only survivor left in here and we don’t want things shaking up any more than they already have,” there’s the familiar commandingly condescending voice of Colonel Kim Kibum, which Jinki hadn’t heard in years, and he cannot help but smile.

“Alright, punk,” Jinki laughs, “then stand back, as far away from our voices as you can. We’re going to drill through.” Then he takes hold of the drill one of the Majors in his team is holding and picks out three others to help him out. “The rest of you, go help find the other survivor.”

Another round of roaring salutes, and they’re off.

It takes forty minutes of drilling to finally get a chunk big enough to kick down and free Kim Kibum. And boy, is he surprised to see Lee Jinki in uniform.

“S-sunbae-nim!” the young man stands to attention as Minho rushes over to inspect him for external injuries, “it’s been a while!”

“At ease, Colonel. It’s weird to be formal with you.”

“Are you okay?” Kibum’s more relaxed now, and winces when Minho confirms that he does have a dislocated shoulder. “Did you hurt yourself? You didn’t, right?”

“No,” and Jinki brushes Minho off to grab Kibum’s arm, “let’s pop this back in now, hm?”

But he doesn’t wait for Kibum to answer, immediately pushing his shoulder back into place and smiling guiltily when Kibum lets out a shrill scream.

“You haven’t changed at all,” there’s still pain in the younger’s voice, and his tone is surprisingly familiar despite the formality in his words. “It’s nice to see you again.”

“Likewise,” Jinki claps the young man in the back (to which Kibum yelps again) and moves out of the way so Minho can finish his inspection.

“Did you find my traumatologist?” and Kibum shares your name and your title, but Jinki shakes his head. 

“I’m sure the squadron are looking for the rest of the survivors to the best of their ability.”

“Let me join in the search. I’m fine, you just painfully took care of the only injury I had. Please, Lieutenant Colonel.”

Jinki sighs and looks to Minho, who shrugs and nods because Kibum is right. He’s in better shape than any other survivors they’ve found, and he’s also a doctor.

“You’re still so bossy,” Jinki relents, turning around to draw a path further into the ruins, “how’s mom and dad?”

“Still bossier than I am.”

Jinki bites back a smile, but Kibum’s booming laughter is contagious and he can’t help but join.

God, your head hurts. Your back hurts. Your chest hurts. Everything hurts.

Where the did you land? Why can’t you move? Your chest feels so heavy. Breathing is really hard and it feels weird, your lungs are trying to keep up with how fast your heart is beating but every breath you take feels like you’re inhaling dust and slivers of hot air and nothing else.

Maybe you hit your head. Maybe you hit it real bad, so you quickly run through your basic personal information to make sure you remember everything. Your full name, date and place of birth, your parents’ names, their professions, your profession, where you work, you first pet’s name, your best friend’s name…

“Ki-Kibum…” you haven’t seen him, you don’t know if he’s okay. You don’t know if your patients are okay, if your Cube collapsed, if your colleagues are okay. You need to move, and you need to do it now.

You feel so ing heavy.

You think you hear footsteps near you, but you can’t move or open your eyes to make sure. You try to cry out but your throat is sandy and your lungs feel weird, something’s really wrong but you can’t tell what.

You must have fallen on your stomach or on your side, because your chest really hurts. How did you get on your back? Something’s wrong, so, very wrong—

You hear Kibum calling out your name, and you manage to smile and turn your head to where you can see a tiny crack between the rocks. There, you see his shiny black boots, Kibum’s favourites, and you think you can reach out a hand and maybe knock on this rock so they know you’re here…

But you feel so weak.

“I’m h-here,” you croak, and it takes all of your energy to grab a pebble and throw it against the giant rock, “I’m h-here!” you wonder if you’re the only one that’s still trapped, if anyone else is hurt… you worry, you wonder if that soldier doctor with the concussion is safe…  

And then your body surrenders entirely.

“I heard something!” Kibum is outright screaming as he approaches a huge pile of concrete shards, “I swear I heard a voice!”

And then he hears the pebble hit the pile, and he knows it’s you in there. “Give me a hand here!”

It takes all six men and three whole nerve wracking minutes of lift and throw, lift and throw before they find you lying on the floor. Your lab coat is stained red, and Kibum blanches.

“, , ,” he’s rushing over to you and ripping your coat open, and he presses around your chest cavity to find one of your ribs is broken. He looks up to Jinki immediately, even sparing a look to Minho. “First rib fracture. I think the blood is from external injuries, but I can’t be s-sure,” and he doesn’t want to check, “h-hand me a sphygmo.”

Jinki stops Minho before the younger can pull the monitor out of his bag. “No,” he says flatly, moving towards Kibum and pushing him out of the way.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m taking over,” and Jinki’s almost innocently cutting through your stained shirt to complete the examination because Kibum is in no shape to do it and everyone in the site knows it, “check for low blood pressure.” Jinki watches as both Minho and Kibum kneel around their newest patient, Minho sliding the sphygmomanometer into your arm as Kibum readies gauze and saline solution.

“Let’s see,” he goes on, looking at you in the face as if you were awake and actually discussing your condition with him, “your breathing’s weak and irregular and it doesn’t look like you’ve been passed out for very long,” he smiles a little as he watches Kibum scrambling to accommodate your clothes so that you’re still decent while exposing your ribcage, and a few seconds later Minho confirms your blood pressure. “60/40,” he repeats for your sake, “not what I wanted to hear. I’m thinking myocardial contusion. Am I right?”

Kibum’s close to fainting now.

Then Jinki presses around your ribcage, and feels the crunch of bone and tenderness in your skin. “Hm, not good. Damage to the first rib, not sure I can put my money on a full-on fracture. Tenderness isn’t too concerning and there’s no abnormal chest movement in your breathing so I’m going to rule out pulmonary damage. Do we have something we can make a stretcher out of?”

Minho’s prepared for anything, and he nods when Jinki stands up before turning to Kibum and the rest of the soldiers.

“Alright, folks. Let’s party.”

Lee Jinki is most comfortable in a set of well-worn scrubs and with a mask over his face. The glasses are just a formality because he’s fully aware of every inch of what he sees before him right now, and it’s actually much prettier than he thought initially.

Myocardial contusion was a spot on guess, and now that he has you on oxygen and your blood pressure is increasing, he can get down to business.

“External bleeding came mostly from superficial lacerations, most likely caused by the rubbing of skin against the rough concrete as the patient fell from the second story,” he reports, watching as his assistants clean up the shallow wounds, “let’s open up to check the level of fracturing and take care of that before we check for any residue within the thoracic cavity. Where’s our ortho?”

“On vacation in Maui.”

“Wonderful,” Jinki answers through gritted teeth, calling out for a scalpel a second later, “good thing I have that diploma, too, right?”

He’s quiet as he cuts through the thorax, and with the help of his assistants, he gets a full view of all the damage. Then he looks up to see Kibum beyond the OR’s doors, and he sighs in relief.

“As predicted, there is damage to the first rib on the right side. The periosteum looks good. We have some scattered bone fragments around the cavity but it’s nothing too concerning. Let’s collect them and put them back to place as best as we can. I think we can leave this to heal on its own.” He anyways believes bone healing is the best way to go about subtle fractures. The body tends to know where things are supposed to go, and it’s never one to let itself down.

“Even from here I can see mild contusions to the myocardium. There’s also some bruising in the right heart. No blood vessel damage, but I do see some fluid buildup around the affected area. Let’s intubate and drain that out,” and it happens almost mechanically. Minho’s in awe at Jinki the surgeon, a guy that can read the human body like a book. No, it’s almost like he can talk to the human body and convince it to talk back, to tell him what’s wrong and how to fix it.

The whole team is nothing short of incredible, in fact. Jinki and Minho and the nurses move in perfect harmony, and every instruction is carried out to perfection with only minor changes to your heart rate and blood pressure.

The moment the last of the fluid is drained out, your breathing regulates. Your entire chest cavity moves as it should again, and Jinki breathes out another sigh of relief and looks back up at Kibum. The younger male has watery eyes, and Jinki gives him two thumbs up, which effectively brings him to sobs.

“Alright, alright, alright,” Jinki mocks in an American Southern accent as he looks back down to you, and the head nurse laughs, “our patient is officially stable. Keep running EKGs straight through the next twenty four hours. Good job, everyone. Now, let’s wrap this up. It’s been a long day.”

The entire team breaks into applause, and Jinki walks off to get rid of his mask and glasses as the nurses move in to stitch up the thoracotomy.

When he tries to turn on his heel to take a well-deserved bow, he falls sideways on his asscheek, and that’s how Minho and Kibum know that things are actually going to be okay.

Beep, beep, beep, beep…

Did you fall asleep in the ICU again? You’ve got to stop that, maybe you should hit up the NICU if you really want to nap, the hospital director has caught you in here too many times—  

Wait, breathing doesn’t hurt so much anymore. But your chest hurts and you want to wake up… What happened? What’s going on?

Jinki watches you stir from the ICU’s entryway, and he’s the last doctor to do his rounds so he’s a bit nervous to walk up to you alone.

Especially after Kibum told him that he just saved the life of the person who’s been treating his concussions, the person who may have correctly diagnosed him with SIS, the traumatologist from Asan that people have been raving about since before he got here.

Maybe he should page Kibum, he really should be the first to know you’re awake. But you have no idea what’s gone on, what even happened to you, how you’ll have to move forward from now on.

And once again, his sense of duty is carrying his feet instead of his own weak will.

That doesn’t mean he isn’t careful. He’s walking on the tips of his toes on his way towards you, and he can see that your eyes still haven’t opened fully. He wonders if you’re in pain, and checks his coat pockets for any analgesics. He may still have that hydrocodone from this morning’s VIP case…

He does, and he sighs when he finds a medical stool to sit on right as you start to stir again. Jinki gulps as he waits for you to fully come to, his hands knotted on his lap and his lip caught between his teeth. Why is he nervous? When is he ever nervous anymore? This is so unfamiliar, you make him feel really weird and…

You’re, like, intensely pretty. He didn’t have a chance to notice in the OR, but you’re kind of hauntingly beautiful, caught between slumber and alertness.

Your hauntingly beautiful patient, Dr. Lee. Snap out if it, stop it with the googly eyes, dammit…

But pretty, really pretty, and you’re starting to wake up and he’s not rolling away because your eyes are kind of cloudy and really pretty, too.

And then his eyes widen when the first thing you do is raise a hand to cup his cheek, and oh, no, you’re smiling and it’s really, really charming and he hasn’t seen something so pretty in years and his heart’s beating kind of fast. He’s trying to keep level by remembering that he needs to tell you that you have to be really careful with your heart from now on, that you should set up an appointment with your cardiologist as soon as possible, or he’ll just make himself your cardiologist and yeah, follow up very, very closely and maybe give you some flowers and chocolate because you’ve been a real trooper, like with your heart and stuff and what was he supposed to be doing again?

“Are you okay?”

What?

“What?”

He’s so handsome with his eyes open, you think to yourself. They’re sparkly, his eyes, and a shade of brown that reminds you of honey and tree bark and autumn. He’s wearing white, a crisp white shirt under his white coat and he looks angelic and you’re definitely 100% staring and he doesn’t look like he cares. He’s warm, too, warmer than he felt in that stretcher, warmer than he looked in his hospital rooms and you think he might be blushing and maybe you are, too.

“Are you okay?” you repeat, your voice stronger, firmer, and it’s dreamy as hell so Jinki only blinks because why are you asking if he’s okay? You’re the one you should be worried about. 

“I think?”

“Are you hurt?”

“N-no, I’m fine.”

His voice is gorgeous.

“Good.”

Kibum must have supersonic hearing because he’s in the ICU in seconds, yelling your name and waking up every other patient in the unit because he’s so ing happy. 

“I thought you were so dead, ing hell, I’m so glad you’re awake!” and you’re laughing and trying to sit up but Kibum pushes you back onto the bed because no, you can’t do that yet, and he’s babbling half to himself about what happened and how they found you and you can’t help but smile, and then you realise…

The hand you’d held up to the young doctor’s face is now clasped around his own. And he’s clutching yours right back, inching forward on the stool every so often for reasons you dare not question right now. Kibum’s still talking but you’re looking at the brown-haired man’s smiley eyes and they’re like sunshine. It’s weird but you feel like you know what he’s thinking, that he’s glad you’re okay, too, that he’s glad you were found under all that rubble. And you think he can hear the apology that sits behind your lips and you think he’s hiding an apology of his own in the corner of his own lips. He hasn’t said anything but you’re pretty sure he’s the hand behind the stitches on your chest. 

“Looks like you saved my life,” you say as Kibum wraps up the tale of today’s events, never talking over him because you really only want Jinki to hear you. “Thank you.”

“I helped, yeah,” Jinki smiles, and you squeeze his hand and his heart legitimately leaps. He thought it couldn’t do that anymore. “Had to return the favor somehow.”

“I didn’t save your life.”

“You are.”

He doesn’t elaborate, just smiles and leaves you hanging before Kibum starts to talk over you and says something about you not introducing yourself properly. It doesn’t feel like the best timing, but you give Lee Jinki your name without a title, without your profession attached to it, and he beams. 

“Lee Jinki,” he says, squeezing the hand he’s already holding, and he hasn’t felt this honest in almost three years. “Retired soldier, widower and highly regarded but very humble surgeon. I also may have to get a pacemaker in you if you don’t take care of your heart from now on.”

“I’m sure I’ll be just fine,” you brush the urgency of his words off and somehow you can’t shake that dumb smile off your lips and maybe you should ask for some painkillers because your chest really hurts right now. 

“Oh, I’ll make sure of it,” Jinki chuckles, “you might not know but I’m pretty good at heart stuff.”

“What about you? One more bump in the head and we could be dealing with some permanent brain damage, Dr Lee.”

“Oh my God, are you flirting?” Kibum is starting to belch.

“That’d be really bad,” Jinki responds conversationally, as if you were talking about anyone else’s brain and not his own. “But I think we can keep it under control with constant monitoring. Myocardial contusions are not to be taken lightly, so I’ll think I’ll step up as your cardiologist before you can step up as my neuro.”

“I’d hate to die before I see a perfectly normal scan of your grey matter.”

“This is disgusting.” 

“Let’s not see each other in hospital beds or ORs, though,” you add after giggling at Kibum’s cold words, “I can handle the Imaging labs and maybe the Medi Cubes, but let’s not meet while unconscious anymore.”

Jinki laughs and moves so he can hold your hand in both of his. “I kind of like hanging out in here, but we can mix it up. Have you been to the new coffee shop that just opened downtown? They make the best espresso I’ve ever had.”

“I like coffee,” you hum, and Jinki laughs again and Kibum looks like he really might vomit. “When can I get out of here?”

“Are you legit asking each other out right now?” But his words are totally ignored, it’s like he doesn’t even exist. “Are you serious? Sunbae-nim. Sunbae-nim!” 

“I think we can discharge you soon,” totally ignored, Kibum feels like he’s watching a really bad rom-com and he’s getting up to leave but he kind of wants to know how this pathetic conversation is going to end, and Jinki’s starting to blush deeper and the Lieutenant Colonel is kind of cute, yuck. “We’ll monitor your heart tonight and run another set of scans tomorrow. Your prognosis is good, so I’m estimating two days or so.”

“Look at that. Just in time to get your own MRI and CT scans done.”

Funny how things work out in life. “I definitely will need coffee after being in that loud machine for an hour.”

You laugh outright now, enchanted and thrilled and kind of giddy, and he’s floored, ecstatic and so glad.

“Perfect,” you’re trying to bite back the grin on your face but it’s no use, “it’s a date.”