Chapter 1
The lights suddenly went dark, and the beeping of the monitors stopped.
“Oh no, the power’s out,” I blurted out.
Emily pretended to ask anxiously, “Dad, what do we do now?”
I calmly turned on my phone’s flashlight and looked around.
Emily had just started her medical residency at the hospital where I worked after getting her master’s degree. I had been supervising her.
In my previous life, the power also went out at this time. She told me to stay and connect the backup power while she went to report to the hospital director.
But she never came back until everything went wrong.
“Dad!” Emily stomped her foot impatiently when she saw me not reacting. “What do we do now? If all these elderly patients die, we’re finished!”
She knew how serious the situation was, so why did she disappear without a trace last time?
Some of the more lucid elderly patients noticed the monitors had gone silent and started calling for help.
The patients relying on ventilators to stay alive were struggling to breathe, their faces turning red.
I felt terrible for them, but I knew they wouldn’t be in immediate danger, so I continued to feign calm.
Emily was as anxious as an ant on a hot pan, yelling at me: “You’re the head of the ICU, these are all your patients. Are you really going to just let them die?”
In my previous life, I would have rushed to check on the patients and sternly scolded her.
But after going through that experience, I was no longer so panicked.
I noticed that although she seemed anxious on the surface, her eyes couldn’t hide her malicious intent.
I suddenly wondered - could the power outage be related to her?
I shrugged and snapped back irritably:
“How am I supposed to save them? There are nearly 200 elderly patients in the ICU. Do you expect me to push them all out one by one?”
Emily was suddenly at a loss for words, looking very displeased. She spoke even more harshly:
“So you’re just going to watch them all die here? Are you even human?”
I sat down helplessly and glanced at the elderly patients.
“What can I do? It would take over three hours to get all these elderly patients out. This one might die before I can save that one. Whether one dies or a hundred die, I’m screwed either way. Might as well stay here and watch them all die. I’ll take whatever punishment comes.”
As I spoke, I gently stroked her face and smiled resignedly.
“At least my daughter will be by my father’s side when he dies. I guess my love for you wasn’t wasted after all.”
Emily violently pulled her hand away and screamed at me like a madwoman:
“You’re insane! You want to drag me down with you? I don’t have a father like you.”
With that, she ran away like crazy, looking back as if afraid I would chase after her and implicate her.
Watching her fleeing figure, my mood instantly plummeted.
I had cherished and doted on her since she was little, but now when trouble came, she abandoned me without a second thought and even said she didn’t have a father like me.
More and more elderly patients were calling for help, their voices rising and falling. The situation was growing dire.
Looking at the closed door, I smiled bitterly.
For a full ten hours, not a single person came from the hospital. It was as if we had been completely abandoned.
At 10 AM the next day, family members coming to visit all gathered outside the ICU.
Seeing it pitch black inside, they instantly panicked and started shouting.
“Why are there no lights at all? Don’t tell me the power’s out?”
“Shit, don’t scare me. My dad’s 90 years old and relies entirely on a ventilator. If the power’s out, what will happen to him?”
“Let’s break down the door and push the elderly patients out. Maybe we can still save them.”
The other family members thought this was a good idea and were about to do it.
Just as they were about to break down the door, I opened it from the inside and walked out.
“Oh, Dr. James, you’re inside. Then we have nothing to worry about.”
“That’s right, I was just about to tell you all. Dr. James has impeccable ethics. With him there, everything will be fine.”
“Dr. James, I haven’t had any news about my dad for 7-8 days. How is he doing? Can I see him?”
The family members’ eyes were filled with tears. The elderly patients in the ICU were all critically ill.
The only filial duty they could fulfill was the weekly visit.
Seeing their pleading eyes, I was about to speak when suddenly someone pushed through the crowd and publicly accused me.
“James, even if you’re my dad, I absolutely won’t be your accomplice.”
“You knew that after the power went out, those 200 elderly patients could die at any moment. Yet you did nothing and watched them suffocate to death with your own eyes. You even wanted to drag me down with you!”
“You’re not fit to be a doctor, let alone a father! I’m ashamed of you!”
Emily glared at me furiously, as if we had some deep, irreconcilable grudge.
She was my own daughter. With her coming forward to accuse me, the family members instantly broke down.
Several women collapsed to the ground in despair, covering their faces and wailing loudly.
Some men gritted their teeth and glared at me as if they wanted to tear me to pieces.
Others had already pushed past me to kick at the door, hoping to save their parents.
But it was a steel airtight door with a passcode lock. Only I could open it.
Before I could say anything, another person squeezed into the crowd.
It was my wife Linda.
In my previous life, if I hadn’t drunk the coffee she bought me, I wouldn’t have slept so deeply, and those elderly patients wouldn’t have died so mysteriously.
Things were becoming clear.
Fine, since you want to frame me, I’ll make sure everyone knows about it.