Chapter Text
The first half of the shift is mercifully uneventful.
Not quiet.
The Pitt is never quiet.
But manageable.
Robby spends most of the morning trying—and failing—not to look at Dennis Whitaker.
Every time he glances up from a chart, the kid is somewhere nearby.
Following King through an assessment.
Writing notes.
Listening carefully when either Langdon or Collins wete teaching them important information about a certain procedure.
Asking good questions.
Too good, sometimes.
Questions that remind Robby unpleasantly of someone else.
Someone who used to sit beside him in lecture halls with his hand halfway in the air before the professor had even finished speaking.
Someone who had driven him absolutely insane.
Someone who—
No.
Robby drags his attention back to the chart in front of him.
Dennis Whitaker.
Twenty-three years old.
The file had said so.
He'd checked.
Twice.
Then a third time because apparently he had finally reached the age where he doubted his own eyesight.
Dennis Whitaker.
Age twenty-three.
Born decades after Vladimir should have been.
The math was impossible.
The resemblance was unfortunate.
That was all.
Robby signs off on a medication order and forces himself to move on.
Across the department, Dennis is having significantly less success pretending everything is normal.
Because Robby keeps looking at him.
Not constantly.
That would somehow be easier.
Instead it's these quick glances.
Tiny moments.
Little flickers of attention that make Vlad feel like a rabbit standing in an open field wondering whether the hawk circling overhead has spotted him yet.
Thirty years.
Thirty years of careful distance.
Thirty years of aliases and moving and never staying in one place too long.
And somehow he'd managed to run directly into Michael Robinavitch.
The universe was a comedian.
A cruel one. Mocking him from wherever they are.
"Whitaker?"
Vlad jumps.
Melissa raises an eyebrow.
"You alright?"
"Yep."
"You looked like you were having a stroke."
"Just thinking."
"Dangerous habit."
Vlad snorts despite himself.
Before he can answer, a voice calls from across the department.
"Incoming trauma."
The atmosphere changes instantly.
Like somebody has flipped a switch.
The Pitt shifts gears.
Conversations cut off mid-sentence.
Nurses peel away from stations. People move faster.
The familiar undercurrent of urgency becomes something sharper.
Dana is already checking rooms.
Langdon is pulling gloves from a box.
Melissa straightens immediately.
"Let's go."
The ambulance bay doors burst open hard enough to rattle the glass.
Paramedics flood inside.
Robby is already moving before the stretcher clears the doors.
"Thirty-four-year-old male!" one shouts. "Single GSW to the left chest! BP eighty systolic and falling!"
The patient looks terrible.
Pale.
Sweating.
Barely conscious.
Blood saturates the dressings pressed against his side.
Everything else seems to disappear.
Vlad had forgotten this part.
Forgotten what Robby looked like when somebody needed saving.
The exhaustion vanishes.
The uncertainty vanishes.
Even the grief vanishes.
There is only focus.
Only purpose.
Only the patient.
"What do we know?"
The room starts moving around him.
Information flies.
Vitals.
Mechanism.
Medications.
Procedures already attempted.
Robby absorbs it all.
Sorts it.
Prioritises it.
The way he always used to.
The way he always did.
For one ridiculous moment, Vlad is twenty-three again.
Watching Robby take control of a simulation lab.
Watching him explain treatment plans at three in the morning.
Watching him become exactly the doctor everyone knew he would be.
"Whitaker."
Vlad blinks.
Robby is looking at him.
"With me."
The words hit harder than they should.
Vlad nods.
"Yes, Dr. Robby."
The patient suddenly cries out.
The monitor begins alarming.
Dana glances up.
"Pressure's dropping."
"Seventy over forty."
"Diminished breath sounds left side."
Robby's expression hardens.
"Tension pneumo."
Everything speeds up.
"Chest tube tray."
"On it."
"More fluids."
"Coming."
The patient suddenly jerks with a strangled cry, blood bubbling at his lips.
A wet cough sprays blood across the sheets.
Langdon swears and mumbles something along the lines of being disgusted then proceeds to try and wipe the blood off his goggles to no avail .
The monitor screams.
And then—
Without thinking.
Without hesitation.
Without even realising he's saying it.
"Vlad—"
The room freezes.
Robby freezes.
Vlad freezes.
The name hangs there.
Small.
Quiet.
Devastating.
A ghost dragged into the light.
Nobody moves.
Nobody speaks.
For one horrible second the only sound is the monitor.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Robby's face goes completely still.
But it happens.
A sharp, terrible second where the entire trauma bay seems to notice.
Melissa’s eyes flick upward.
Dana stills briefly beside the monitor.
Even Santos, halfway through pulling on gloves near the doorway, slowly turns her head.
Then—
"Whitaker," he says sharply. "Suction."
But it's too late.
The damage is already done.
Because Vlad is already moving before the correction leaves his mouth.
Like muscle memory.
Like instinct.
Like he’s done this a thousand times before.
He steps beside Robby and places the suction into his waiting hand without needing to be told where.
Before the sentence was finished.
Before conscious thought could catch up.
His hand already reaching for the suction.
Already stepping toward the bedside.
Already knowing exactly what Robby needed.
The realization hits both of them at the same time.
Shit.
"Here."
The suction lands in Robby's waiting hand.
Perfect timing.
Perfect placement.
Exactly where Robby expects it.
His stomach drops.
Because he remembers this.
Not the hospital.
Not the patient.
The rhythm. The way Vlad always anticipated things.
Exactly the way he used to back in anatomy labs.
In Simulation exercises. And in clinical skills workshops.
Exactly the same. Like he’s done this multiple times. Like he’s got decades of experience with scenarios like these.
They'd spent years moving around each other.
Learning each other's habits.
Finishing each other's thoughts.
Apparently neither of them had forgotten.
"Scalpel."
Vlad hands it over immediately.
"Clamp."
Already there.
"Gauze."
Done.
Neither of them has to think.
The room notices.
Robby can feel it.
The strange looks.
The curious glances.
The subtle shift in attention.
Because this doesn't look like an attending working with a student.
It looks like two people who have done this together for years.
The chest tube goes in.
Blood pours through it immediately.
The patient gasps.
Dana checks the monitor.
"Oh thank God."
"Pressure's coming up."
The room collectively exhales.
Relief spreads.
The crisis begins to pass.
But Robby can't stop staring.
Because Vlad has already reached for tape.
Already anticipated the next step.
Already—
The exact same way.
Thirty years later.
Exactly the same.
Vlad finally notices.
Looks up.
Their eyes meet.
And suddenly neither of them is looking at the patient anymore.
They're looking at each other.
At thirty years of absence.
At unanswered questions.
At old wounds.
At everything.
Then Santos breaks the tension.
"Oh my God."
Nobody acknowledges her.
So naturally she keeps going.
"You two are weird."
"Santos."
"No, seriously."
"Santos."
"That was the most divorced-couple thing I've ever seen."
Javadi makes a choking noise.
Dana turns away suspiciously fast.
Langdon pinches the bridge of his nose.
Vlad wants the floor to open and consume him.
Robby closes his eyes briefly.
"Santos."
"I'm just saying."
"Stop saying."
"Stoppinggggg now."
A pause.
"I'm thinking it very loudly though."
The room erupts into suppressed laughter.
And somehow that makes it worse.
Because Robby is still looking at him.
Still trying to reconcile Dennis Whitaker.
Twenty-three years old.
With Vladimir.
The friend he lost.
The man who vanished.
The man he'd spent three decades wondering about.
The man who should be fifty-three.
Not twenty-three.
Not standing ten feet away wearing somebody else's name.
And for the first time since Dennis Whitaker walked into the Pitt—
Robby stops trusting what the file says.
Because every instinct he has is screaming the same thing.
Impossible or not.
That's Vlad.