Nikita

I want to wake up this guy so he can give me the answers I so desperately need, but I can't. He's dead, and there's nothing I can do about it. I feel so stupid for coming here and getting only more unanswered questions.

How could the guy who killed my whole family show up here just when I want to sell off the family ȧssets and leave for another place?

I have never been a believer of coincidences, and maybe it's because of my career in the medical field, but I'm smart enough to understand that someone is on the other end of the gun.

Someone is playing with me, and I need to know before it's too late. Someone does not want me to leave this town, and that's bothering me even more.

I feel stupid.

I look stupid, and everyone else is looking at me like my admission into the mental wing of this hospital is way overdue. I can't blame them since I'm still in my pajamas, and I'm still bȧrėfooted. I look at the body now lying at my feet, his eyes wide open as if they're staring into my soul.

The evidence of the kill switch is screaming at me, and I want to find something to do. I want to move, but my feet are glued.

The hospital is calm today, but a dead person on the benches and that is also at the feet of a chief surgeon who is so sleep-deprived and still in pink pajamas should be scary. The patients and their families make a move for the other seats, moving to stay away from me, and I can't blame them.

I don't know who I am, nor do I know what I'm capable of right now. I look around the hospital, hoping to spot the person who did this, but maybe I've been watching way too many movies.

Maybe I'm hoping for things that are just in my head; who knows, perhaps I'm still at the estate and sleeping, maybe this is just another nightmare. God, I wish it was a nightmare because I can't take any more of this. I just can't.

First, the Yuri nightmares and flashbacks, and now, I'm here where people don't even know anything about how I feel. I bend down to the man, searching his body in the hope that there's something I might be able to do.

Maybe I will find something that could lead me to whoever is doing this. I need answers, and dead or alive, this man must have some clue on him. He must have known that this would happen if he showed up.

Was it a spike in his heartbeat that told them that he would not stick to their plan anymore?

My heart beats faster at the realization that my brother is alive and out there, but it drives me crazy knowing that he might be held captive too, or why else would they release footage of the BlackBox today?

Maybe I'm overthinking, but what if I'm right? What if there really is more to this? What if, for the first time, I am right about the accident? Of course, it was not an accident, but what if my theories have been true all this while?

What do I do with all that information?

My excitement makes me ransack the body for anything, and while at it, I slide my hands down his face. I didn't want him staring at my soul like some creep. I've seen enough dead bodies in my tenure at this hospital, but he is different.

With that, I look hurriedly as if scared that he will evaporate. Everyone is staring at me, shamelessly judging me as they have never been in such states before, but I don't care. The guards look at me, wondering what I'm doing, but at least they understand my desperation.

When my family's plane crashed, everyone at Todorov expected me to stay away from the hospital and go heal, but what was it to recover from? I sank myself in my work, performing multiple surgeries to make everything better.

The hospital administration had been worried, hell they still are, but at that time, they were worried that I would get too attached to my patients. So they tried to minimize my surgeries, but I had to tell them to let me do my work.

I tried to make them believe I was fine, but we were all doctors, and losing the whole family in one day could break anyone. My exams had been around the corner then and my projects.

They could have kept me out of the patient's rooms, but they knew that was where my peace was. So today, here and now, with the man dead and me frisking him like he stole my favorite toy, I could only hope they let me be. I was sick, and I was aware of that.

I was sick of the pain, sick of everything around me. There were times I wanted to let go and just die, but I had to find out why my family had been killed. And today, I also found out that there was a chance my brother was alive.

I had to stay sane for Yuri.

I had to be okay with my brother. I have to find him no matter what it takes, but that doesn't mean I'd stay in this place. I couldn't think straight in Todorov. I had proven that to myself more times than enough.

I could go to Moscow and start over. I would get a new life and think clearly about what had happened. I would hire investigators to do what I was unable to while I worked at the Moscow hospital.

Only then would I get my peace. If my brother were in captivity, he'd have to hold on for a moment. I had to pretend that all of this didn't affect me too much. I had to be strong. I had to be there for him but from a distance.

I would find him later.

Hopefully, he will understand why I chose this.