Fireworks crack somewhere outside. Too close, too loud.

The ER is already a war zone.

Someone’s yelling about a burn victim. Someone’s bleeding through a makeshift bandage. A nurse is arguing with a man who insists he “definitely still has all his fingers.”

Michael Robinavitch is mid-sentence, barking orders he’s said a thousand times before, when the automatic doors slam open.

Everyone looks.

She steps inside like she owns the place.

Blood up her forearms. Smoke residue on her clothes. And in her hands, carefully balanced, absurdly calm a red, white, and blue hard-sided cooler.

“Hi,” she says, raising her voice just enough to cut through the noise. “I need a trauma bay. Preferably now.”

Michael’s head snaps up.

His brain stutters.

Of course it’s her.

Jack Abbott, jogging backward while shouting for labs, clocks the scene and slows to a dead stop.

“…Is that a cooler,” he asks faintly.

“Yes,” she says. “And before you ask. No, it’s not beer.”

Michael’s already moving, pure muscle memory overriding the part of his brain currently screaming.

“What happened,” he demands, closing the distance.

“Backyard fireworks,” she replies. “Illegal, homemade, deeply stupid. One patient, conscious when I got there. Lost a hand.”

Jack chokes. “Lost like—lost lost?”

She lifts the cooler slightly. “Found.”

The ER goes quiet in that very specific way. The kind that only happens when something impressive and horrifying enters the room.

Michael stops walking.

Slowly, deliberately, he looks at her.

“…You brought me a hand.”

“I brought you a chance,” she corrects.

Jack is already pointing down the hall. “Trauma two. Call plastics. Call ortho. Call literally everyone. And somebody get gloves—why are none of you wearing gloves?”

Michael falls into step beside her again, low and sharp. “You couldn’t call ahead?”

“I tried,” she says, unfazed. “You still don’t answer unknown numbers.”

“That’s because unknown numbers are usually—”

“—telemarketers or ex-wives,” she finishes. “I know.”

Dana, behind them: “Let’s save this reunion for later, huh?”

They reach the trauma bay.

Michael finally blocks her path, just for a second.

“When did you get here,” he asks.

“Ten minutes ago.”

“And you decided to what play courier?”

She pulls on gloves, snapping them into place with practiced ease.

“I decided not to let a guy lose his dominant hand because of patriotic negligence.”

A beat.

Fireworks crack again outside. Red flashes briefly through the bay windows.

Michael exhales, slow and controlled.

“…Fourth of July,” he mutters.

She meets his eyes, steady, familiar, infuriating.

“Happy birthday, America.”

Another beat.

Then he steps aside.

“Let’s save it,” he says. “Now.”