Rookie 2 | Ethan Ramsey

Chapter 36~ Deciding Check

Deciding Check

"I suppose your bunch is not completely intolerable."
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Anyone would have been creeped out by the eerie silence of the totally blacked out atrium.

However, Ethan found a certain peace to it as he laid down at the centre of the it, surrounded by empty walls and furnitures, and yet he felt full under the stars that shone through the glass roof.

Edenbrook had seen numerous patients. Many lives were saved, and at the same time, many lives were lost. For a moment, it almost felt like the patients who had not made it, had reincarnated as the stars above him, thanking the staff for doing the best that they could and fought till the end to keep them alive.

Ethan fought the urge to scoff at himself. He was never one to think like this. All that good, positive and banal things would be something the old him would have rolled his eyes at. However, the new him felt that there was a possibilty that it was true. No matter how cynical one may be, there would always be the slightest possibility.

"Can't leave this place just yet, either?"

Ethan looked up, the peace and quiet of the atrium broken by his mentor walking up to him, his briefcase in one hand. "What are you still doing here?" he asked.

"Same as you." Naveen chuckled, dropping his briefcase right next to Ethan's box of things. "Took a trip down memory lane by taking a walk all over the hospital." Naveen slowly lowered himself, Ethan's hand shooting up on instinct to help his mentor lay down on the floor next to him.

"You really didn't have to take all the effort to lie down just because I am, you know." Ethan laughed lightly as he watched his mentor squirm to get comfortable on the floor.

"It's not for you, son." Naveen smiled wistfully, as he looked at the stars above them just like Ethan did earlier. "Thirty years..." he breathed out, and Ethan sighed.

Naveen had been working at Edenbrook for almost thirty years, and he was a lead figure of the hospital.

The Chief of Medicine.

He was sure to miss the place, much more than anyone else did, especially as he had devoted almost his whole life working there.

"You have practically made this place." Ethan said, resting a hand under the back of his head. "If I myself feel this way, I can only imagine how hard it is for you to see the lights off around here."

Naveen nodded his head silently. "You know, when I was on death's door, missing out on life was one of my main regrets. I never once regretted the work I've done here, though it is the main reason why I never really lived." He took a deep breath, and for the first time, Ethan heard his mentor's voice waver ever since the day Ethan had performed the phage therapy on him. "But now I realize, that the reason why I loved my work so much was because of Edenbrook. This place has made me love medicine even more, from the people, to the community, to the great things we have achieved together, to you."

For the almost fifth time that day, Ethan felt his eyes water, as he heard Naveen's words. "I was okay with not having a family of my own because I had you. The son I never got to have. And now that I see things in a brighter light, everyone here was-- is a family to me." Naveen turned his head to look at the side of his mentee's face. "Even so Ethan, I don't want you to make the same mistakes as me."

"I don't intend to."

Ethan's reply was instantaneous, and it was relieving to the man next to him who had gone his whole life without seeking happiness outside of his profession.