"Gently!" Joy's voice rang out as Sungjae dropped Peniel roughly onto the lone steel table in the room.
"We need to work quickly," Sungjae shot back, already moving towards the cupboards where Dohwan should have stored his supplies. He ripped the cupboard doors open, ignoring the disturbed dust that flew into his face.
Joy made sure that Peniel's vitals were at a decent level before she went to help Sungjae, who had already grabbed a cart and began to stack it with items that seemed useful.
"Headlamps?" she asked, noticing the random array of items.
"We don't have surgical lights here," Sungjae said as he looked for something to disinfect the surgical instruments. He glanced back at Peniel, who was now quiet. "And the sterilization machine is broken."
Joy's face paled slightly but she nodded. "Any good news you want to tell me?"
"We have a camp stove with maybe half a tank of fuel left in it," Sungjae said grimly. "We can use that for sterilizing our instruments.
"It seems that even though Dohwan didn't have a family to support him anymore, he still had some equipment. We have gloves, masks, some blood that I found in a freezer, and saline that we can hang from this pole," he tapped the pole beside him.
"How much blood?" Joy asked, fearing the worst, as she started to push the cart over to Peniel's side.
Sungjae scowled as he moved the pole over and inserted it into a notch in the table, "Only three packets of O-negative, I don't know his blood type."
Joy scanned the cart and the room, "And anaesthesia?"
Sungjae shook his head, "He's going to be feeling it."
"Get dressed," he told her as he took off his jacket and tossed it aside, watching Joy do the same to hers. He made sure that camp stove was secured tightly to the cylindrical fuel canister before he switched it on, causing a powerful blue ring of fire to spark into existence.
He placed several of the instruments on the grate, each of their tips directly in the ring of fire's flame to begin sterilizing them. Once they were red hot, they would extract the instrument and let it cool down before using it.
Joy turned around to ask Moonbyul for a favour, but to her surprise, the woman had disappeared without leaving a trace behind.
"Where's Moonbyul?" Joy asked Sungjae, who shook his head impatiently.
"We don't have time to waste on her," he said as he anxiously watched the instruments in the flame, willing them to heat up faster.
Joy nodded hesitantly before she heard a familiar clattering of wheels come for the distance.
"Sungjae..." she breathed as she saw a pair of paramedics wearing the easily recognizable orange jumpsuit run towards them, pushing a stretcher between them.
Sungjae spared a glance in their direction before he rose up slowly in disbelief.
"Hello, I'm Im Hyunsik, I'm here- I know you two!" Hyunsik said as he looked at the unlikely pair in front of him.
"Hyunsik? What are you doing here?" Joy asked in disbelief before she turned to Sungjae. "Am I seeing things?"
Sungjae shook his head slowly, "I'm seeing him too," he answered before he stooped down to turn off the gas. "Who called you here?"
"I did."
From behind the paramedics, Moonbyul re-entered the room. "I called them before I came down here myself," she explained. "I left one of my men out there to notify me when they arrived."
"Why?" Sungjae asked tersely.
"Because I believe in proper planning," Moonbyul replied calmly. "And because whatever you were about to do, Doctor Yoo, would not be beneficial for your associate's career.
"The moment that she gave her assessment on Peniel's condition, you began to run around like headless chickens. Both of you," Moonbyul added with a displeased look on her face. "I don't know if that was what you called synchronization, but I expected more from someone who I allowed to operate on my father."
Sungjae looked mutinous, while Joy felt embarrassment seep through her body. The two of them stepped aside to clear a path for the paramedics to load Peniel onto the stretcher, and Joy went along with them to assist them. Working in tandem together, they managed to insert painkillers and other sorely needed fluids intravenously into Peniel.
"See to it that he lives," Moonbyul ordered Sungjae, nodding towards Peniel's direction. "It would be a shame if we lost the Gatekeeper."
Sungjae could only nod curtly as she left once again, leaving a small trail of dust swirling in her wake.
"Doctor Yook?" Hyunsik asked as they pushed Peniel towards the door. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Sungjae replied, his voice slightly feral. He turned to gather his things but realized that Joy had already recovered them and was holding them out towards him.
"You're coming with me," she told him flatly. Sungjae silently accepted his belongings as he heard Joy give instructions to the two paramedics.
"We're going to transport the patient to Yeoreum University Hospital," she ordered. "Contact the trauma centre there and have them set up a portable CT scanner on arrival."
Sungjae looked at Joy and she returned his gaze with confidence.
"I said, you're coming with me," she repeated in a tone that brokered no discussion. "I need your help if we're going to save him.
"This is our best option."
Joy watched Sungjae carefully before he nodded, acquiescing to her demands. She felt a slight twinge of guilt as she remembered what Chorong said.
"Being at Yeoreum hurt him."
As they followed Hyunsik and the other paramedic to the ambulance, Joy could only hope that she was making the right decision.
--
In spite of the not-so-silent giggles that surrounded him at the nurse's station, Eunwoo was laser-focused as he concentrated on filling out the rest of the form that he had been working on.
"No... further... observations..." he muttered as he finished off the sentence with a flourish of his pen. "Done!"
Feeling satisfied, Eunwoo clicked his pen and submitted the form over to the waiting matronly-looking nurse, who looked over and saw the gaggle of younger nurses who were almost fighting to submit it to the shift supervisor.
"I'll just submit this myself, shall I?" she asked Eunwoo conspiratorially.
Eunwoo shrugged with a sheepish smile on his face.
"Working hard son?"
The nurses instantly straightened up as Eunwoo turned around to greet his father, who was walking towards him jovially with Seunggi by his side.
"Just finished a follow-up," Eunwoo replied casually before he greeted Seunggi with a bow.
Director Cha clapped his son's arm, "You've been busy recently," he praised him. "Have you been resting enough?"
"Just doing my best," Eunwoo bowed his head.
"Speaking of rest," Director Cha said, remembering something. "I saw you out in the garden with Doctor Park."
Eunwoo's face reddened slightly, "That was..." he stammered.
"Was it a date?" Director Cha asked loudly while Seunggi watched the faces of the younger nurses change darkly behind them in amusement.
"Father!" Eunwoo's face blushed brilliantly as Director Cha chortled. "It was just a coincidence. I saw her at the Golden Pavilion."
"Oh?" Director Cha seemed interested. "What was she doing there?"
Eunwoo shrugged, "She was with Chairman Kim."
Director Cha's demeanour changed imperceptibly. "And do you know what they were talking about?" he asked lightly.
Eunwoo shook his head. "By the time I got there, the chairman was already getting ready to leave."
"Is that so," Director Cha murmured distractedly.
"Father?" Eunwoo asked, unsure of his father's reactions. "Is something wrong?"
Director Cha shook his head, his good-natured attitude seemingly restored. "Nothing," he assured his son.
Eunwoo watched his father carefully for a few more seconds before he heard Seunggi clear his throat.
"Speaking of Doctor Park, she didn't show up for her shift today," Seunggi told Eunwoo. "We tried calling and leaving messages, but no one seems to know what happened to her."
Eunwoo immediately took out his phone, but Seunggi stopped him. "We're sure that she's alright, but at the moment, we're missing a man down in the ER. I was wondering if you would be able to cover for her."
Eunwoo nodded, "Of course."
Seunggi smiled, pleased with the outcome. "Well, I think we've solved that problem," he told the director who still seemed slightly out of it.
"Oh, what? Oh, yes, of course," the director said as he recovered. "Do your best down there, son."
And with that, he waved Seunggi and Eunwoo goodbye before he departed the nurse's station himself, a scowl growing on his face.
Even the chairman had noticed her, he thought as he broke into a swift walk back towards his office.
--
Hyunsik knocked on the back of the driver's chassis twice. "Let's get going!" he said.
In response, the driver immediately activated the sirens, the shrill claxon echoing as the ambulance pulled out into the oncoming traffic.
"We're going to be at Yeoreum in ten minutes," he told Joy, who was working with his partner paramedic, documenting Peniel's vitals for his reception at the hospital.
Ten minutes, Sungjae thought as he scavenged some dressing from the compartments. His eyes flickered over to his watch.
"Thanks," Joy told him as she continued to work. She spared a glance at Sungjae who was working across from her, now covering Peniel's wounds with the wrappings he had found.
"I gotta say, I didn't expect to see you two at that scene," Hyunsik said as he continued to observe Peniel's condition via the heart rate monitor.
"Same goes for you. Thought you were an air ambulance paramedic," Joy said, deflecting Hyunsik's question.
"I'm back on ground rotation at the moment," Hyunsik answered. "Need to keep this qualification current."
"Did you call the hospital?" Sungjae cut in abruptly.
Hyunsik nodded, "I told them to get the portable CT ready for you two."
Sungjae checked his watch again. To his growing irritation, only a minute and a half had passed.
From across, Joy looked up, feeling his mounting anger and frustration, and reached out with her hand. "We'll get there in time," she told him with more confidence than she felt.
Sungjae looked back at her, his expression flat and emotionless, and said nothing as he continued to do his best to staunch Peniel's breathing.
Eight more minutes.
--
With Irene and her team already in another surgery in the trauma centre, it had fallen to Seunggi to receive the incoming ambulance. As the Emergency Room Head Professor, Lee Seunggi took pride in the fact that he was rarely taken by surprise by whatever came through the doors. However, when he realized that the instructions being relayed by the paramedic were being given by Joy, he couldn't help but be stupefied by the turn of events.
Seunggi was waiting outside the doors to the trauma centre as the ambulance pulled up, lights flashing and siren blaring. Clearly, the patient inside was in dire straits, he thought as the rear doors opened.
For the second time that day, Lee Seunggi found himself surprised as out came his former protégé, covered in blood and with a look in his eyes that sent shivers down his spine. In all his time of knowing Yook Sungjae, Seunggi had never seen him so... unbalanced. The Sungjae that he knew was calm and methodical, but the Sungjae in front of him seemed to be a different person altogether.
"Professor Lee!" Joy greeted him as she noticed him waiting to receive them. "Where's Irene?"
"Doctor Bae is currently in another surgery," Seunggi said as he grabbed the stretcher's railing and began pulling Peniel in as Hyunsik continued to assist with administering blood from the bag.
"He's having trouble breathing," Sungjae cut in, as he grabbed a hand pump respirator that he had stolen from the ambulance and placed it over Peniel's mouth as Peniel coughed, spraying blood on the inside of the mouth guard.
Joy watched Seunggi look at Sungjae with a weird look and immediately felt compelled to explain. "Doctor Lee, this is-"
But Seunggi silenced her with a raised hand. "You can tell me how you met Sungjae later, Doctor Park," he told her. "Right now, there's a life at stake. Trauma Bay 6 is already prepped for you. What else do you need?"
"Nothing."
Sungjae's curt response forced both Yeoreum doctors to look back at him, almost steering the stretcher into a wall if it hadn't been for Hyunsik's quick reflexes.
"What do you mean nothing, Sungjae?" Joy asked, her shock evident in her voice. "We need a team to help us. We have a team here that knows how you work."
"They knew how I work," Sungjae corrected her. "If you want me to help you, you're going to have to trust me on this one. If we have too many people, they're just going to get in the way."
Joy looked over at Seunggi who had been listening with an intent expression on his face. "Professor?" she prompted.
"I believe that Sungjae believes in what he's saying," he said as they arrived in front of the doors of Trauma Bay 6.
Joy turned around to make one more plea. "You can't just do this on your own," she rebuked him.
Sungjae ignored her, as he watched as the doors slid open, his eyes looking at the monitor beside the inner doors that displayed the current status of the surgery.
Preparing...
Was he prepared? He had sworn that he wouldn't enter Yeoreum again, but here he was, and with a patient no less. If it hadn't been for Peniel and the state he was in now, he would've stayed away from the place until the day he died.
There were just too many painful memories associated with this place...
"Doctor Yook?" Hyunsik asked, waiting to push Peniel in. He was right beside Sungjae, but Sungjae felt as if he was calling from somewhere far away.
He wasn't in the right state of mind to operate, that much he knew. He should be listening to Joy, calling down his old team and Sohyun. They would be able to help him. Together, they'd be able to save Peniel...
But there was a side of him that wanted to prove that he could do it by himself. That if he could save Peniel, it would somehow, inexplicably, mean that he could have saved her if he had the skills that he possessed now.
"I'm not doing it by myself," he said at last, as he began to push Peniel into the operating room. "Joy's coming with me."
And with that said, the doors closed, leaving Joy feeling worried and angry at the same time.
"You didn't stop him," she accused Seunggi quietly.
Seunggi shook his head as he stared at the doors that Sungjae had disappeared behind. "I didn't think I could stop him if I tried."
"And so why did you let me try?" Joy knew that she was being disrespectful, but the situation was stressing her out.
"Because I thought that you could do it," Seunggi said patiently, his tone causing Joy to look at him.
"I still think that you can do it," he told her. "Help him find himself before he goes too far again."
Joy stared as Seunggi turned to walk away from her.
"I'll get your team on standby, just in case," he told her.
With a disgruntled look on her face, Joy breathed in deeply, exhaling as she remembered what Moonbyul had said.
"You began to run around like headless chickens."
It had been unlike her to do something like that, Joy now realized. She should have been calm and taken the situation in account like she always did, but instead, she had been swept up by Sungjae's pace, almost having lost herself in the confusion.
Once more, Joy found her fingers unconsciously grasping at the space where her little chick doll would have been. She squeezed the air there and, in her mind, felt the felt of the doll brush against her fingertips.
It was time for her lesson.
--
Chaos. A maelstrom of pandemonium and mayhem.
If her previous synchronization experiences had been like an orchestra in perfect harmony, then this experience was like a howling tempest screaming constantly, erratically, almost assaulting Joy with violent slashes of negative emotion.
It was all Joy could do to find herself in the storm.
The moment the surgery started, the moment she felt herself being sucked into the synchronized state with Sungjae, she knew that something had gone terribly wrong with him.
No, she already knew that something had gone wrong the moment she saw his eyes change when Dohwan mentioned the chairman's late daughter.
She just hadn't been prepared for the emotional barrage that it would take on her.
And the worse part is, she can barely feel Sungjae in their shared synchronized state. He was there, but only just.
It was like he was in a cocoon, wrapping himself in anger and rage, as he caused the feel of their synchronization to run rampant.
But there was more to it than just anger. There's resentment, sadness, pain, and guilt.
And above it all, crippling grief.
Joy knew that despite all that Yook Sungjae taught her about synchronization being about balance, there was no balance between them right now.
He was like a feral animal, just waiting for her to make a mistake so he could devour her.
--
From above, members of Sungjae's old team looked down at their former lead surgeon with a mixture of horror and fascination in their eyes.
The moment that Seunggi had called Namjoo and told her that Sungjae had returned to Yeoreum, she had gathered everyone had rushed down to the trauma bay's observation deck, but what greeted them was unlike anything they had ever witnessed before.
"How did he manage to get this fast since he was gone?" Namjoo murmured, her eyes barely able to follow the speed with which Sungjae was wielding his instruments.
"The question is, will Joy be able to keep up with him?" Minhyuk muttered, his hands gripping the railing, his knuckles bone white.
"But look at his movements," Ilhoon said as he observed Sungjae's work. "Half of those cuts weren't even needed. He's being so rough."
"He's doing it on purpose."
Changsub's voice penetrated the room, as the three of them looked behind them. Sohyun sat with Changsub, who had been sweating profusely ever since he entered the room.
"You can feel it, can't you?" he asked them, his voice shaky.
Of course, they could. Even if they didn't possess innate synchronization, the moment they entered the room, it was like being overwhelmed by an oppressive force.
It was suffocating them, feeding on their discomfort, and returning with even more intensity.
And it all came from the man below.
It scared them.
All of the rough movements that Ilhoon had noticed, every extra cut, every extra-tight knot that he tied off, it caused them to flinch.
Because every time he made a cut, a dark and perverse pleasure exuded from Sungjae as if he derived pleasure from the pain he was causing the patient's body and revelling in it.
Sohyun looked up at the monitor, where a close-up of Sungjae's face was being displayed. There was a twisted smile on her childhood friend's face that they could see through the surgical mask. His eyes reeked of addiction and intoxication. It was like it gave him a thrill.
Almost as if he was flirting with death.
Sohyun shivered, a sentiment that no one in the room blamed her for. She would hate to be down there right now.
And yet, all they could do was admire the woman who stood alongside him down there. Amidst the darkness, she was the one source of light that shone like a beacon for them.
--
She was scared. Scared that she had gotten in way over her head, scared that she was going to lose herself.
She was scared of Sungjae.
Amidst all of the chaos, Joy almost lost herself, before she felt something in the synchronized state.
She felt another presence.
It was impossible. There were only two of them in the surgery.
But the presence was there, faint, but persistent. It called out for her, begging for her help.
And who was she to deny it?
The presence fueled her, giving her energy and resources that she thought had long been drained away.
And she used it to fight back.
Inch by inch, piece by piece, she began to claw back her way into their shared bond. Against Sungjae's overwhelming presence, Joy began to make her counterattack, creating an impenetrable shield to push against Sungjae's constant onslaught. She found his vulnerabilities and latched on, willing herself further into Sungjae's mind.
The feelings of chaos slowly subsided as she gained control of both synchronization and surgery, but her initial thoughts of balance were quickly thrown aside as Joy realized that if she wanted to keep Peniel alive, she was going to have to be the one in control, dictating the flow and forcing Sungjae to match her.
She wanted to be Joy, to be the one who would always smile and stay calm, no matter what the situation, no matter what the cost. Her mind wandered back to the thought of her chick doll and the promise that she made when she received it.
And Park Sooyoung is Joy again.
She fought back with whatever weapon she had. There weren't many, but she had some. She sent him reminders of Chorong, Sohyun, Changsub, Namjoo and her team, the old man from the train, the boy from the school, even herself.
She saved her trump card for last.
"I need you to help me here," she said, the first words that they've shared since the surgery started. "I need the doctor here. Not the Fallen Doctor, not this twisted version of yourself that you've created, but the doctor that inspired me, the doctor that decided that he would be Hyunjoo's doctor!
"I need him back right now!" she told him ferociously as they fought against the clock, their hands moving quicker than before. Around them, machines beep incessantly, but she's numbed herself to the sounds.
And somehow, she's managed to break through. She felt the mayhem and pandemonium fade away and she could breathe easier. First, the rage and anger left, before Sungjae's guilt and pain were all that remained. Within her mind, Joy could see flashes of what could only be Sungjae's memories, suggesting what the source of his grief and sorrow could be before they disappeared just as quickly as they came.
The presence thanked her as it too faded away before she could register its gratitude as the machines slowed their beeping.
Sungjae was back, she realized as she looked at him, at his eyes. She didn't know how she knew, but she just did.
Just like how he knew that she was the one that pulled him back.
They were intertwined now, entangled, whatever you want to call it. After an experience like that, there's no way that they couldn't be.
And that scared the both of them.
--
Not my usual surgical scene, but I hope that you'll forgive me. While I did intend on writing a surgical scene, I was more interested in exploring the emotional side of synchronization this time, especially since we all know that Joy and Sungjae's characters are skilled surgeons.
Ahh, it's been a rough time for Reveluvs, but I hope that each and every one of you are doing okay! Let's continue to support Red Velvet and wait patiently for OT5 to come back! Also, new SM girl group soon! Red Velvet are finally going to have a in-label junior girl group!
I was really happy when I read comments from readers that said that they were getting anxious! It really makes me really happy because it tells me that I've done a good job of conveying my thoughts to you! I'm really happy that you're enjoying the start of this final arc!
As always, thank you for reading, your votes, story list adds, follows, comments, and support! I was having a bit of writer's block this week but reading your comments really cheered me up!
See you next Wednesday!