Cerita Pendek & Novel Doctor Face Slapping

I was the sole heir to the Thirteen Needles of Revival, a legendary healing art. My consultation fee was twenty thousand dollars per visit, yet every year countless tycoons, politicians, and powerful elites lined up outside my door. As long as a patient still drew breath, the Thirteen Needles of Revival could pull them back from Death's doorstep. Over the past five years, I had awakened a wealthy businessman who had been declared brain-dead after a car accident. I had also prolonged the life of a centenarian suffering from multiple organ failure. Even terminally ill patients whose families had already been told to prepare for the worst were able to walk out of the hospital on their own after receiving my treatment. There was only one ironclad rule. I treated no more than ten patients a year. Once those ten slots were filled, no amount of money, power, or influence could change my mind. Whoever came next would have to wait until the following year. This year, only one slot remained. Suddenly, a group of bodyguards dressed in black burst through the door. They carried in a man covered in blood and dropped to their knees before me. “Please save our boss! We'll pay whatever it takes!” I looked at the man they carried inside and spoke coldly. “Take him out. I wouldn't save this man even if it killed me.”

My mother's condition suddenly takes a turn for the worse. She begins coughing up blood, and the doctor says she must undergo surgery as soon as possible. I call my girlfriend, Daniella Dooley, who is working in another state. She is the leading gynecologist in the field and the only doctor with any hope of saving my mother. The moment she receives my call, she sets out without hesitation. But halfway through the journey, she tells me that an emergency surgery has cropped up and that she can't make it back. I crouch in the hospital corridor in despair, calling her again and again. All I can do is watch as my mother's heartbeat on the monitor grows weaker and weaker. On the 99th call, she finally answers. My voice is almost pleading as I say, "Daniella, my mother's condition is really critical right now. You're the only one who can perform this surgery. I'm begging you, please come back!" For a long time, she says nothing. I wait and wait, only for her to hang up without uttering a single word. Then, I see a post from her junior, Jackson Bleeth. It shows a sunny-side-up egg that she has just made for him with her precious hands. Accompanying it is a caption that feels almost provocative. "I had a little accident during surgery today. Not only did Daniella not blame me, but she even encouraged me." So the "emergency surgery" she mentioned is actually cleaning up Jackson's mess. At the moment when I am at my most desperate, she abandons me and chooses to go to another man.

One day, at work, there was an emergency surgery. As the doctor in charge, I reassigned the hospital’s only remaining dose of a highly sought-after specialty drug. The moment I stepped out of the operating room, I was escorted away by the Office of Medical Affairs and Governance. They accused me of improperly authorizing the use of a restricted medication and informed me that my medical license could be revoked. As I struggled to defend myself, a new intern hired by the chief of my department sent me a message. [Dr. Britton, how could you reassign a restricted medication without approval? Dr. Guzman worked incredibly hard to secure that drug for the department. You can’t just take it because you feel like it! I have a responsibility to help the chief keep things running smoothly, so I reported you to Medical Affairs. Doctors are supposed to put patients first. Someone like you doesn’t deserve to wear a white coat. From now on, every medication request in this department will require both my review and signature!] I could not help but laugh when I read it. That intern had only been in the department for a month. Seeing how approachable and easygoing the department chief was, she had apparently decided that it was her job to police everyone else. What she did not know was that my grandfather owned the hospital. That imported miracle drug everyone had been fighting to obtain? I had led the research team that developed it. In fact, I held the patent. Even the eight-hundred-dollar monthly stipend she received as an intern came from the funding allocated to my research program. How could using a drug I myself had invented ever constitute a protocol violation?

In the third year of my wolf decay, I was dying. It was a rare condition. I wanted to donate my body to research. I called my mother, three years since I'd last seen her, and asked her to sign the donation consent form. Without her signature, there'd be no one to handle my remains. She was busy with work. "Are you really making up something like this just to get attention?" she snapped. But I begged, and she gave a cold laugh and agreed. "What a miserable thing to deal with. You better actually be dying." Later, my wolf heart ended up on her dissection table. And that woman, who had nothing but contempt for me, actually killed three people for me.

When my ex-wife, Blaire Sutton, rushes her childhood friend, Malcolm Pierce, who has suffered from a papercut, into the emergency room, I'm in the middle of saving a patient, whose heart has stopped beating. Upon noticing that I'm not rushing to treat Malcolm's cut at once, Blaire lashes out at me furiously. After that, she lodges a complaint about me intending to get revenge on her due to our relationship problems, which means I have very poor ethics as a doctor. I don't even bother explaining myself to anyone. Instead, I just take off my white coat and accept the suspension and investigation notice that the hospital has issued to me. Soon, Blaire uploads a photo of Malcolm's finger, which is taped with a plaster. The caption absolutely reeks of her smugness. "Only narrow-minded men tend to get revenge for the pettiest things at work. His white coat should've gotten ripped off him a long time ago. That way, he'll definitely learn his lesson." Five days later, Malcolm suddenly suffers from a ruptured aortic dissection, leaving him in critical condition. The thing is, I'm the only one capable of performing this surgery in the entire state. Blaire keeps sobbing to the point that she's suffering from an emotional breakdown over the phone. She begs me to save Malcolm's life. I merely cut her off coolly, "Sorry, but I'm serving my suspension notice and reflecting on my mistakes at the moment. I don't even have the right to prescribe Malcolm any medication. You should find someone else to save his life."

My wife has a severe sex addiction. But in the seven years we've been married, she never lets me touch her. To suppress her urges, she spends all day submerged in ice-cold water, and her arms are covered in needle marks. Several times, I try to initiate intimacy out of concern for her, but her reaction is terrifying. She even threatens to kill herself. "I told you, I only want a Platonic relationship in this lifetime. Can you stop being so selfish? If you insist on making me do that, I'd rather die!" she exclaims. She maintains this unusual obsession for seven years. Even after ending up in the hospital multiple times from suppressing her desires, she refuses to cross that line. Then, on our wedding anniversary, a man comes in for a pre-check of his phalloplasty enlargement for the ninth time. After the anesthesia takes effect, he begins rambling incoherently. "Honey, I love you so much." Looking at the surgical scars, I shake my head, thinking this guy is really willing to go to extreme lengths for his wife. Then, I hear his final murmur. "Tasha, aren't I so much better compared to your useless husband?" My hand jerks, and I nearly drop the scalpel. It is because my wife's name is Tasha Snyder.

I understood babies. The baby in Room 403 cried out, "My butt itches! It is not a stomachache!" A newborn in the ER screamed, "Something is stuck under my belly button!" A preemie babbled softly, "I want my mommy..." None of that prepared me for that day. Dr. Margot Aldrich, the country's foremost authority in pediatrics, stood before a packed auditorium and examined a baby who had screamed himself purple. "We will keep observing." The mother fell to her knees. "Please, my baby is dying..." Margot let out a short laugh. "Am I the expert here, or are you?" The room went silent. In my ears, a tiny voice raged. "Are you grown-ups blind? Something is stuck under my belly button! It is not a stomachache! Somebody cut me open already!" I did not stop to think. I pushed through the crowd, dropped beside the crib, and looked Margot in the eye. "Dr. Aldrich, let me try."

My mother had been a murderer. Her surgery skills had been top-notch, yet on the day my father and I had almost died in a car accident, she turned into another man's arms to help him with a physical therapy massage. After they finished, they went on a date at a cafe while they chatted happily, while my father died on the cold surgery table. It had only been the next day when the staff from the morgue found me on the brink of death. My grandmother raised me with her callused hands for the past 40 years. She put me through the best medical schools, and when I became the hospital's medical director, a young man was admitted to the hospital after he had been involved in an accident. His wife grabbed my hand and begged me, "You're the only person who can save my husband, Dr. Corbin!" I read his medical records carefully, and I was taken aback when I saw his name and address. I stared at his picture for a long time before I looked up and replied softly, "I'm sorry. I can't save him."

I'm a top healer at the Neutral Territory Sanctuary. The full moon watch had been draining. I'd barely stepped out the Sanctuary's grand doors when my phone blew up. It was the trauma wing. "Cora, get back here. Now. A patient just came in, severe wolfsbane poisoning. The Head Elder wants you leading the team!" My healer's instinct took over. I turned without a second thought. But then, a string of bizarre, floating red words appeared before my eyes—a fatal warning. 【DON'T YOU DARE STEP INTO THE ADVANCED HEALING ROOM! DON'T JOIN THIS RESCUE!】 【THE LUNA IS ALREADY DEAD. IF YOU GO IN NOW, YOU'RE JUST A SCAPEGOAT FOR THE ELDER'S DAUGHTER!】 【THIS PATIENT IS THE IRONCLAW PACK'S LUNA. THE ENRAGED ALPHA WILL TEAR YOU TO SHREDS. YOUR MATE AND FAMILY WILL BE DRAGGED DOWN WITH YOU!】 My feet froze to the spot. After a few seconds of dead silence, panic and a raw will to survive squeezed my heart. I decided to bet my life on those red lines. I was going all in. My Lycan vision scanned the dark street. My eyes locked onto it—an abandoned wolf trap at the corner of the street. The metal grate was gone, leaving it exposed. I clenched my jaw, squeezed my eyes shut, and without a second of hesitation, I leaped into that bottomless black hole.

On my very first night working the overnight shift at the new hospital I've been transferred to, I run into my wife, Willow Jensen, who claimed she needed to be away on a year-long business trip. Now, she's lying on a gurney outside the delivery room, heavily pregnant, with blood pouring from beneath her. The man kneeling beside her grabs my hand tightly, his desperate pleas ringing in my ears. "Doctor, please! You have to save her!"

After passing my veterinary licensing exam, I posted the news online to celebrate. My elderly neighbor, Gloria Vance, immediately fired off a string of messages. [Miles, my grandson's sick. Could you treat him?] [I'm really worried about the boy. He's had a fever for days now.] I slowly typed out a single: [?] Another message came through. [We're neighbors, after all. Just show a little compassion and save the child.] Trying to be kind, I wrote back, [Mrs. Vance, if your grandson's sick, you need to get him to a hospital right away. I can't treat him.] To my surprise, she fired back a voice message. "Aren't you studying medicine? What's the harm in taking a look at my grandson? How can a person be so stingy? "If you won't help, I'll report you to your university and have them expel a student with character as rotten as yours!" I was floored. I study veterinary medicine. How am I supposed to treat a human child?

I was the most renowned OB-GYN in the state, with ten consecutive years of deliveries and not a single complication to my name. That changed the day I was accused of a surgical error that killed a mother and her unborn child. However, by the time I arrived, the patient was already dead. With witnesses, physical evidence and surveillance footage all stacked against me, I had no way to defend myself. Overnight, my name was ruined and I was sentenced to death. The harassment drove my parents to throw themselves off a building. Then I opened my eyes and found myself back behind the wheel, driving toward the hospital. Up ahead, a traffic officer was directing cars away from the intersection. I gritted my teeth and slammed my arm into the steering wheel. A sharp crack echoed through the car. I felt it in my right arm immediately. It was broken. I would rather break my own bones than wait around to die. One hand was a small price to pay for a chance at survival.

A patient was dying in the ER when my neighbor offered to drive me to the hospital. But the second we hit the highway, she slammed on the brakes and slowed the car to ten miles an hour. I begged her to go faster. Every second could cost that patient their life. She sneered, “In such a hurry to see your lover? Don’t play dumb. I know you’ve been seducing my husband behind my back! “I called him twenty times, and he never picked up. His location is right beside your hospital! “Then I’ll drive as slowly as I want. I’ll make sure you two adulterers suffer every inch of the way.” But when we reached the hospital and she saw who the patient was, she dropped to her knees before me and smashed her forehead bloody.

To prove she was fair, Valerie forced me into the family's live-fire drill. She knew I had a severe heart condition. She knew I couldn't stand the sight of blood. Three hours under the blistering sun. My hands shook wildly. I stared at the trembling rabbit tied to the target, terrified to pull the trigger. "You can't even kill a freaking rabbit? How are you supposed to lead this family?" Valerie's icy voice lashed at me from behind. Tears filled my eyes. I finally pulled the trigger. The bullet tore through the rabbit. Blood spattered everywhere. The smell and all that red triggered my blood phobia instantly. Everything went pitch black. Chloe, the intern medic, walked over and grabbed me roughly. Her eyes were full of pure malice. "Underboss, her vitals are totally fine. Is she faking it just to escape training?" Valerie looked down at my pale face. Disgust and disappointment covered her face. "Gemma, is this how I raised you? Everyone else finished. You don't get special treatment." "You finish this drill today—even if it kills you!" Then, my chest stopped moving. Dead silence. My soul floated into the air. I looked down at Mom, filled with guilt and despair. I'm sorry, Mom. This time, I really couldn't hold on.

I'm Xavier Russell, a legendary surgeon currently ranked number one in the world. Three years ago, I performed 37 surgeries in a war zone with minimal equipment and saved 37 lives, earning me the moniker "God's Hand". On my first day interning at Wessen Hospital, the hospital director, Dylan Lewis, welcomes me at the entrance. He shakes my hand excitedly, then asks why I wanted to become an intern. "I wanted a break from wielding the scalpel," I reply. However, I accidentally bump into the hospital's star surgeon, Sylvia Chase. "A new intern? I have an important neurosurgery to perform. I'll have you know that the patient is a renowned diplomat," she says with a light scoff. She then declares, "You have three seconds to pick up those medical charts." My eyes remain glued to the medical report in her hand, which clearly contains a misdiagnosis. If she performs the surgery, the aforementioned diplomat is guaranteed to die.

Ten days after giving birth, I told my husband, Ethan Reed, that something was wrong with me. He turned his phone face-down on the coffee table and looked at me for a full three seconds. "Sophia, you just had a baby. It's normal to feel tired." Then he flipped the phone back over and went on texting his office nurse, Serena Blake. That was the last time I brought it up. Everything that happened after that, I assumed was my own fault. That changed when I reached into his coat pocket and felt a collar I'd never seen before. Real leather, brand new, with a round metal tag hanging from it. It wasn't my size.

It took me three years to thaw the frozen heart of Theo, the Mafia's top surgeon, just to marry him. To be his wife, I shut down my documentary studio and locked my Best Director trophy from the independent film festival inside a drawer. I was willing to put away my camera and stay in the shadows as the woman behind the Family's chief surgeon. After he said having a kid in this business was a death sentence, I went to a clinic the very next day and got an IUD. Everyone in our circle was absolutely certain that we would be the perfect power couple. But today, on our fifth wedding anniversary, I decided to get a divorce. My lawyer was my best friend, Jade. She twirled her pen before stopping. "Are you out of your mind? You threw away the title of North America's best independent director for him back then, and now you are telling me you want a divorce?" I swallowed the bitter ache in my chest. "Just draft the divorce papers for me. As soon as possible." She frowned. "But why, Harper?" I looked at the black velvet gift box on the dining table. Inside lay a carefully preserved peony. After a long hesitation, I gave her my answer. "Because of a flower."

A highway pursuit of a fugitive ended in a crash. I was rushed to the hospital alongside a death-row convict. "The patient's left chest cavity has been pierced by rebar. He needs emergency surgery immediately. Get his family on the line!" I did not want my mother, who was thousands of miles away, to worry. I forced myself to stay conscious and prepared to sign the consent form on my own. Yet the deputy chief of the military hospital snatched the form out of my hands. He ordered the staff to wheel me out of the operating room by force, all so they could treat the barely scratched convict instead. "Save him first. He has a clotting disorder. If the bleeding isn't stopped now, it'll be fatal!" The staff stared at him in disbelief. "But this patient is a police academy cadet. His condition's clearly more critical." The man spared me a single indifferent glance. "Trust my judgment. He won't die. Save the fugitive first." I bit back the pain and reached for the hem of his coat with trembling hands, but he shook me off without a second thought. He spoke again without looking at me. "I'm his father. I'll sign the liability waiver."

Three days before our wedding, I brought supper for my fiancee, Zoe Anderson, at the hospital. I opened the door of the on-call room and heard moaning sounds. Under the dim lights, the intern, Jack Reid, buried his head against Zoe’s fair shoulder. His hand slipped beneath her open white coat. After Zoe saw me, she pushed him away and tidied her clothes. She looked very calm. “Jack’s pursuing me. He’s infatuated with me, and when he found out that we’re getting married, he threatened to kill himself with a scalpel. “I was worried he’d hurt himself, so I comforted him this way. Our wedding will still go on three days later. “You’ve always been very kind. I believe you won’t mind me saving a life this way, right?”