Chapter 3
I tried to speak, trying hard to defend myself, but it was useless since no one could hear me.
It was then that the scene suddenly shifted to when I had been assigned a difficult case—an eight-year-old boy named Levi Hall with a rare heart condition.
There wasn't a single doctor in the entire country who was willing to perform the operation. They were terrified that a failed surgery would ruin their reputation, but that didn't stop me.
I held Levi in my arms and said, "You have nothing to be afraid of, as I'm going to make your heart all better, Levi."
Levi asked hesitantly, "Can I run around like the other children after the surgery?"
I nodded with a smile, replying, "You'll definitely be able to do that."
It was a surgery that lasted for 16 hours. I was drenched in sweat all over my back as I opened the chest, performed the surgery, and finished the sutures—each step was executed perfectly.
I finally breathed a sigh of relief and let out a satisfied smile once the suturing was done and Levi's heart began to beat on its own.
It was then that someone in the crowd said softly, "That's the eight-year-old boy. Matthew saved him, then had him killed."
Harvey immediately picked up on the remark. "That's right! He saved that boy, which means he knew the condition better than anyone! He did it on purpose! He must have deliberately made a mistake!"
There were more murmurs of agreement from the crowd, though some doctors couldn't help but furrow their brows.
"Why would he kill the boy after going through the trouble of saving him, though?"
Harvey bit his lip. "It's hard to tell. It might have been for the money."
It was then that the screen went black and then flickered to life, showing the gore of the OR. It was a multi-organ transplant involving five patients at once, all receiving different parts from the same donor, and among them was Levi, the eight-year-old boy.
It was an extremely difficult and high-risk surgery. There were 23 people on the surgical team. I was the lead surgeon, while Harvey served as my primary assistant.
In my memory, I stood at the central operating table, my expression intense and focused. "Get ready—we're starting!"
I opened the chest cavity with a scalpel, and as blood began to surge, I moved with speed and precision. I was three hours into the procedure, and everything was right on track—until Levi's heart rate monitor suddenly let out a piercing wail.
"Patient No. 5's blood pressure is crashing. He's showing signs of acute rejection, Dr. Sullivan!"
I immediately looked over. "Get one milligram of epinephrine and administer it intravenously now!"
I accepted the syringe from the nurse and was on the verge of administering the injection.
Harvey suddenly cried out as he stumbled. He slammed hard into my arm and caused the syringe to fly out of my hand and shatter on the floor, causing the fluid to spill across the floor. He then apologized frantically, saying, "I-I'm so sorry, Dr. Sullivan! I-I just lost my footing!"
I had no time to deal with him and shouted for the nurse to prepare another dose, but during those few seconds of delay, the heart monitor flatlined. There was ultimately nothing we could do after half an hour of resuscitation efforts.
That was when everything started falling apart. Levi's death caused the donor organ chain to collapse, and the other four patients soon developed complications as well, with one after another dying right before my eyes. That day, five families were destroyed in an instant.
I dropped to my knees on the floor, feeling cold all over as the sound of a dead flatline echoed in my ears.
It was then that the crowd in the hall erupted into commotion.
"There he is! He's the one who made the mistake!"
"If he had kept a steady grip and moved faster, those lives wouldn't have been lost!"
Harvey hid his face in his hands and hung his head in distress. "It's all my fault. It wouldn't have turned out this way if I hadn't knocked into Dr. Sullivan…"
Wanda patted Harvey's shoulder, her gaze fixed on the screen with burning resentment. "It's not your fault, Harvey. It was Matthew's need to show off that caused this."
She pointed at the screen, where I collapsed on the floor, and spoke slowly and sharply, as if sentencing a criminal.
She gritted her teeth as she said, "If he had just played it safe and done those surgeries one at a time, those four people would still be alive. It is clear that men like him, who prioritize their reputation over their patients, deserve no sympathy."
In the meantime, on the screen, I felt a crushing sensation in my heart, making every breath a struggle. I was completely unresponsive when the investigation team arrived to escort me from the OR, as if I were nothing more than a puppet that had lost its soul.
I was being escorted out of the hospital when a woman suddenly forced her way past security and lunged at me. She threw the sulfuric acid she had hidden beforehand in the midst of the chaos.
I felt a scorching heat as the fluid hit me and burned my throat—my mind went blank as a loud ringing filled my ears. I then heard that woman yell, "You monster!"
It was unclear who struck first, but a mob of reporters and relatives swarmed me in a frenzy. I felt my hair being wrenched, and my scalp stung with a splitting pain, while my white coat was torn to pieces in the chaos.
"You murdered my father! You deserve to die!"
It was then that a man rushed over, screaming and kicking me hard in the stomach. I curled up on the ground as a wave of intense pain washed over me, my body trembling all over.
Wanda's gaze was fixed on the screen, her fists clenched so tightly that her knuckles were turning pale.
In the meantime, cheers broke out among the crowd. "He had it coming! He deserves to be doused in acid after killing all those people!"
"Well done! That piece of trash deserves to suffer!"
It was then that the memory playback froze, and the AI system's mechanical voice echoed through the hall. "Data stream abnormality detected—executing deep recovery…"