The Man Who Wouldn't Die

Calista Rivers' POV

The emergency room smelled like disinfectant and blood tonight.

I pulled on fresh gloves, my hands steady even though my body screamed for sleep. Sixteen hours into my shift, and I still had four surgeries waiting. This was normal. This was life.

Outside the operating room, sirens wailed. Another accident victim rolled through the doors on a stretcher, and I moved toward him automatically.

Nurse Jenna grabbed my arm. Her face was pale. "Dr. Rivers, this one is bad. Real bad."

I looked at the man on the gurney. His chest was crushed. Blood soaked through the bandages the paramedics had wrapped around him. His clothes were torn, and I could see exposed bone through the gashes on his arms. No one survived injuries like this.

But his heart monitor beeped. Slow. Steady. Impossibly calm.

"Get him into OR-3," I ordered. "Now."

We moved fast, rolling him down the hallway. I checked his vitals on the portable monitor. His pulse was forty beats per minute. That should have meant he was dying. But his oxygen levels were perfect. His blood pressure was stable. Nothing about this man made sense.

"Who is he?" I asked.

"No ID," the paramedic said. "Found him in the wreckage of a car on the highway. The whole vehicle was crushed like a soda can. Everyone else died on impact." I nodded and pushed through the operating room doors.

Inside, I scrubbed my hands and took my position. My team surrounded the table, ready. I made the first incision across his chest to assess the internal damage.

Then I stopped.

The wound I had just seen outside, the one with exposed ribs and torn muscle, was smaller now. The edges of the gash were closing. Not quickly, but enough that I could see it happening.

"Dr. Rivers?" Marcus, my colleague, stood across from me. His eyes were wide behind his surgical mask. "Are you seeing this?"

I was watching it. I just did not believe it.

"Keep working," I said, my voice tight. "Stabilize the bleeding."

We worked in silence. Every few minutes, I checked the wounds. They kept healing. Slowly. Like his body was stitching itself back together.

This was impossible.

I had gone to medical school. I had spent years learning how the human body worked. And nothing, nothing I had ever learned explained what I was seeing.

"His heart rate is dropping," one of the nurses said.

I looked at the monitor. Thirty-five beats per minute. Then thirty. But he was not coding. He was just slowing down, like he was falling asleep.

"Increase the oxygen," I ordered.

Then his eyes opened.

Silver. Glowing. Like molten metal in the harsh operating room lights.

I stumbled back, my hands shaking. The man's head turned toward me, and even though he should have been unconscious, even though he should have been dead, he looked directly at me.

His lips moved. He whispered something I could not hear over the sound of the machines.

Then his hand shot out and grabbed my wrist.

His grip was iron. His skin burned like fire. I tried to pull away, but I could not move.

"Calista," he whispered.

My name. He said my name.

But I had never seen this man before in my life.

Security rushed into the room. They pulled him off me, shouting. The man released me and went limp, his eyes closing again like nothing had happened.

I stared at my wrist. There was no mark, no bruise. But I could still feel the heat of his touch sinking into my bones.

"Dr. Rivers, are you okay?" Marcus grabbed my shoulders, his face full of concern.

I nodded, even though I was not okay. Nothing about this was okay.

"Finish the surgery," I said. My voice sounded far away. "I need some air."

I walked out of the operating room and down the hallway. My legs felt weak. My heart pounded so hard I thought it might burst.

In the bathroom, I locked the door and leaned against the sink. I looked at myself in the mirror. Dark circles under my eyes. Hair pulled back in a messy bun. Same face I saw every day.

But something felt different.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

And then I saw it.

A forest. Trees burning. Smoke filling the sky. I was running, my bare feet bleeding on the ground. Someone was chasing me. No, not chasing. Hunting.

I spun around and saw a man. Tall. Dark hair. Silver eyes that glowed in the firelight.

He was holding a dagger.

And he was walking toward me.

I screamed and my eyes flew open.

I was back in the bathroom. Alone. Safe.

But my hands would not stop shaking.

That man in the operating room. Those silver eyes.

I had seen them before.