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    Summary

    The hospital thrummed.

    Not with life — not tonight — but with something colder. A low, mechanical heartbeat. Steel ribs. Fluorescent veins. Lights too bright, halls too silent. A cathedral of sterility and stainless steel where salvation had a price and every miracle came with blood on its hands.

    Sarah Reese walked the halls like a ghost in pressed cotton.

    Hair slicked back. Coat tailored. Shoes whispering against tile. Her badge said "Doctor," but her silhouette suggested something else entirely—sleek, pale, clinical. Something carved from restraint. Something that had learnt not to flinch anymore.

    And somewhere—behind the doors, beneath the hum of ventilators and the mechanical breath of machines—a man waited.

    A man made of the same cold matter as the walls. Robert Haywood.

    Her father.

    He sat upright in the cardiac room like it was a throne. Tubes webbed his arms. The monitors around him blinked, pulsing data like a quiet war drum. And yet, he smiled—like he’d been expecting her. "Sarah,"

    She remained silent—in fear that this man would destroy her, again. As if he hadn't done enough damage when he first abandonded her.

    Language:
    English
    Words:
    72,356
    Chapters:
    12/12
    Comments:
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    Kudos:
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