It was supposed to be a normal goddamn shift. You were a few hours into your trauma rotation, running mostly on cold coffee and muscle memory, when the paramedics wheeled in two college kids from some off-campus frat party gone sideways. Shirtless, stumbling, reeking of booze and whatever cocktail of drugs they’d decided to poison themselves with. The kind of patients who thought being obnoxious was charming and that hospital staff were there to babysit their breakdowns.

You were already on edge. PTMC had been short-staffed all week, and you’d just come out of a back-to-back code in Trauma 2. You were tired. Your head hurt. But still—you were the senior resident, and you handled your shit. So, you did what you always did: clipped on your badge, took a deep breath, and tried to calm the guy down as he flailed on the gurney.

He was loud, glassy-eyed, twitchy as hell. One of the nurses handed you the syringe for morphine—you were just about to push the dose when, out of nowhere, crash.

You didn’t even see it coming.

Somehow, the idiot still had a half-shattered beer bottle in his grip. The paramedics had missed it, or maybe he’d snagged it back. Whatever the reason, that bottle slammed into the side of your head with a force that sent your ears ringing and your legs giving out.

The world spun. Lights above blurred. Shouts faded in and out like someone was playing with the volume knob on your brain. You could feel warm blood trickling down the side of your face, taste iron in your mouth. Your hands were still clenched, reflexively trying to keep hold of the morphine.

You remember flashes—people shouting, someone restraining the patient, a nurse yelling for help. You think someone said your name, maybe twice. You think you heard Robby’s voice.

Next thing you knew, you were on a stretcher yourself, a pressure bandage pressed against your head, and Robby’s face came into view. He looked pale—paler than usual—and his voice cracked when he said your name again.

“You’re okay. You’re gonna be okay,” he kept repeating, more to himself than to you.

And all you could think, in that stupid haze, was fuck, what a way to get off the clock.