Chapter 73: 第 73 章

“How is Chen General doing?”

“Low-risk group, condition is stable. The director just had breakfast with him.”

“Good. I’ll go put my things away first. See who hasn’t signed in today; I’ll go find them later to get their fingerprints.”

“Okay.”

On the seventh floor of the Union Army 195th Field Hospital, an Omega who had put away his bag and changed into his nurse’s uniform emerged from the locker room, returned to the main desk, took the sign-in device from another nurse, and glanced at the list of personnel who had not signed in for the day displayed on the screen.

“Four busy people. I’ll go find them first, then.”

“Alright. Oh, wait — one’s coming right now.” The nurse’s eyes brightened as she waved at an Alpha who had just stepped out of the elevator, smiling. “Doctor Xu, you forgot to sign in again today!”

The doctor, who had been reading a pathology report, looked up, revealing a pair of deep gray eyes behind thin lenses. He was very tall, with straight shoulders and a long-legged, well-proportioned build that gave his white coat a distinctive air, making him stand out sharply in the crowd. The Alpha paused, then walked over to the main desk, hooked his finger under the upper edge of his mask, and pulled it down to his chin. “Sorry, I forgot.”

“Doctor Xu came in past four and has been holed up in the lab until now; forgetting is normal.” The nurse looked up at the Alpha’s face, smiling as she handed him the sign-in device. The Alpha extended a finger and pressed it against the fingerprint recognition frame.

The device emitted a beep. “Pheromone and Blood Department, Xu Ze, sign-in successful.”

The two nurses nudged each other slightly with their elbows. Finally, one of them spoke up. “Doctor Xu, there’s a dinner gathering tonight. Are you going?”

More than one person had already asked him this question. Xu Ze thought for a moment before replying, “I have to go back to the school lab tonight. I probably won’t be able to make it.”

“Alright.” The nurse sounded a little regretful as she joked, “Doctor Xu is running between the hospital and school; it must be tiring. We won’t bother you.”

“It’s fine.” Xu Ze wasn’t good at handling jokes; he could only offer a sincere promise. “I’ll definitely go next time.”

“Really? Then it’s settled. You can’t refuse when we invite you next time.”

“Mm.” Xu Ze gave a nod. “I’ll go to the wards first.”

“See you later, Doctor Xu!”

Xu Ze pulled his mask back up, turned, and headed toward the wards. The nurses watched his retreating back for a moment before sitting down one after another in front of their computers.

“Do you think Doctor Xu is actually single?”

“Here we go again — the unsolved mystery of the 195th Hospital.”

“I think he is. Doctor Xu is too cold; you can’t get close at all. I can’t imagine what he’d be like in a relationship.”

“Yeah. Even if he had someone, I suspect he’d talk to them from a meter away.”

The other nurse laughed for a bit, then added, “But Doctor Xu seems to get along pretty well with Doctor Chi. Probably not a romantic thing, though — just good friends.”

“Doctor Chi from the Dental Department? They were high school classmates, I heard. They’ve known each other since way back.”

“No wonder… Oh, enough. Gossip affects work. Shut up, shut up.”

Xu Ze walked to the special area designated on each floor, showed his work ID to the guard, then pressed his fingerprint to unlock the door. The blast-proof glass doors slid open automatically to either side. Xu Ze walked in, crossed the bright lobby, and arrived at the door of a patient room.

The guard outside the room saluted him. Xu Ze showed his work ID again. After checking it, the guard gently knocked on the door for him. Upon hearing a “Come in” from inside, the guard pushed the door open. “It’s Doctor Xu from the Pheromone and Blood Department.”

“Xu Ze, come on in.” The department head was also there. He beckoned to Xu Ze. “You’ve got all the reports sorted, right?”

“Yes.” Xu Ze walked in, gave a slight bow to the old general on the hospital bed, then handed the file to the department head.

“Xu Ze, Master’s in Internal Medicine from the Army Medical University, currently rotating in our department.” The hospital director introduced him to the general. “After his high school interview that year, Professor Huang personally made several phone calls to snatch him for the Military Medical University.”

Catching the implication, the old general looked at Xu Ze kindly and asked, “After this, do you plan to stay at the 195th Hospital, or go to the Military District?”

Before Xu Ze could speak, the department head intercepted the question for him. “You’re asking too early. Old Huang already said to let Xu Ze finish his doctorate before considering it.”

The old general smiled faintly. “So Professor Huang can’t bear to let him go.”

Leaving the patient room, Xu Ze checked the time and planned to go get breakfast. But the next second, his mobile phone rang. On the other end of the line, Chi Jiahán first sneezed, then sniffled before asking, “Should I leave breakfast in your office?”

The Dental Department was on the eighth floor. Chi Jiahán knew Xu Ze would forget to eat when he was busy, so he often brought him a meal on his way, then walked down one flight of stairs back to the Dental Department to complete his pitiful daily exercise quota.

“I’ll wait for you by the elevator.” Xu Ze headed toward the elevators. “Do you have a cold?”

“A little. Probably from staying up late the past few days.” Ding — the elevator doors opened. Chi Jiahán hung up the call, walked out carrying breakfast, and shoved it into Xu Ze’s hands. “I’ll go find some medicine later.”

He took out the 195th Hospital’s internal communicator and checked it; there were no urgent messages at the moment. Xu Ze’s communicator was already clipped to the chest pocket of his white coat, and its message light wasn’t lit either, so the two of them went to the break area to eat breakfast together.

Chi Jiahán was currently rotating in the Maxillofacial Surgery Department. He had done his undergraduate studies at a medical school abroad and returned to the Capital City’s Military Hospital for his postgraduate degree. Chi Jiahán’s reason for coming back was simple — his father, due to a promotion, had taken his stepmother to another country.

“The Southern Theater has ceased hostilities.”

Xu Ze unscrewed the cap of a milk bottle and placed it in front of Chi Jiahán, replying with an “Mm.”

“I heard several army units have already returned to the Capital City. They’ll probably organize physicals and injury assessments very soon.”

Chi Jiahán saw Xu Ze’s hands pause very briefly as he unwrapped his sandwich. Then Xu Ze answered, “Probably.”

There was actually more he wanted to say, but Chi Jiahán wasn’t sure if the news he’d heard was reliable. He glanced at Xu Ze again, sniffled, and started eating his breakfast without saying anything further.

Halfway through the meal, the communicator on Xu Ze’s chest lit up with a red light. He reached out and pressed to silence it. Before leaving, he fetched the tissue box from the other end of the table and placed it beside Chi Jiahán’s hand. “I have to go.”

“Okay.”

Chi Jiahán watched Xu Ze’s retreating back. He was a little taller than he had been in high school, a little more mature, but aside from that, not much had changed.

To remain unchanged amid the countless transformations brought by the long passage of time required enduring a great many things.

After finishing rounds, a patient scheduled for a bone marrow aspiration at past ten, Xu Ze returned to his office to put away his notebook, planning to hand the stamped blood requisition form to the nurse before heading to the aspiration room.

The path from his office to the main nurses’ station passed by the elevator bank. The whole building had an atrium design; looking down, he could see the doctors, nurses, patients, and family members coming and going in the lobby on the first floor. Only a few meters from the main station, Xu Ze stopped by the curved transparent railing. His mobile phone had been vibrating — messages from his school project group chat. He read through the chat history carefully and typed a reply.

At the same moment he was typing, across the wide, bright corridor, a ding sounded as an elevator arrived on the seventh floor. The doors opened, and a gust of cold air from inside the cabin drifted out, mingling with the air on the seventh floor, brushing against Xu Ze’s side before swirling past him and blowing onward.

Xu Ze suddenly stopped moving, staring fixedly at the screen. A sentence was already typed out; all he had to do was tap send to post it. Only his thumb hovered half a centimeter above the screen, stiff, unable to press down any further.

He lifted his head. Before him was the familiar scene he saw every day, the various pheromones he could smell at any time — familiar or unfamiliar, so many of them. Only in this second, a pheromone he had never imagined would appear, made faint by the suppression of a wristband, was both intensely familiar and intensely foreign, like a hallucination.

He turned his head and saw an Alpha in a deep navy combat training uniform step out of the elevator. His frame was so tall it felt somewhat imposing; he had to lower his head slightly to avoid brushing the top of the elevator door. The training cap covered half his face, revealing a rather sharp jawline.

The Alpha put down the military communicator in his hand, clipped it to his waist, turned past the elevator bank, and walked onto the corridor. The surroundings noticeably quieted somewhat; some people instinctively held their breath the moment they saw him.

The nurse was also momentarily stunned, then stood up. The Alpha took off his cap, leaned slightly over the consultation desk, and said something. The nurse immediately nodded, raised her hand, pointed in a certain direction, and said a few words to the Alpha.

The Alpha turned following her gesture, his gaze landing on the face of the young doctor he had passed by just moments before.

The message ultimately wasn’t sent; the phone screen automatically went dark. Xu Ze stood where he was, motionless, watching the Alpha walk toward him. The other’s gaze was direct, sharp, utterly unflinching. Xu Ze felt himself being observed with professional coolness, along with an indescribable sense of pressure that grew increasingly palpable, impossible to ignore, as the Alpha drew closer.

Closer now, Xu Ze saw the Air Force Colonel shoulder insignia on the shoulders of his uniform, the golden eagle-wing emblem gleaming as if about to take flight.

“Doctor Xu, hello.” The Alpha extended his hand toward Xu Ze, introducing himself in a straightforward, concise manner, without any mention of military rank or title. “Lu Heyang.”