Chapter 3
1732words
The base was holding a flag-raising ceremony, the national anthem playing through old speakers with a static crackle that seemed particularly jarring on foreign soil. I stood with the medical team, but my gaze drifted across the crowd to the figure at the front. Leo wore crisp desert camo, standing straight as a spear, head slightly raised as he watched the Stars and Stripes being hoisted. Morning light cast a golden halo on his blond hair. As if sensing my gaze, his eyes suddenly shifted from the flag, finding me instantly in the crowd.
Our gazes met for just a brief second before he quickly returned his attention to the flag. But that fleeting smile in his deep blue eyes was like a stone thrown into a still lake, creating ripples across my heart. Since that kiss in Shipwreck Bay, bathed in sand and sunset, something indefinable had grown between us.
"Focus, Captain Rostova!" Mark's stern reprimand echoed across the training ground, interrupting my thoughts.
I turned to see Eva picking herself up after botching a tactical roll, while Mark stood before her like a stone statue.
"If this were a battlefield, you'd be dead! Your status won't save you here. We don't need pampered princesses!" His words were poisoned daggers, each striking Eva's vulnerable points.
Eva bit her lip and raised her head defiantly, her eyes filled with pain and determination.
"I didn't come here to impress you, Hades! I'm a doctor and a soldier! I just want to—"
"I don't want to hear your explanations," Mark coldly interrupted. "If your score in afternoon shooting practice is B- again, get back to your operating room."
After speaking, he turned and left without looking back, leaving Eva staring at his retreating form. Just then, Leo's orderly hurriedly crossed the drill ground, ran straight to him, and whispered something in his ear.
I saw Leo's face instantly turn serious. He quickly issued several orders, then strode toward the command center.
As he passed me, he left only a brief, urgent message: "Chloe, get your medical team on high alert. VIP incoming, situation critical."
The VIP arrived faster than I'd imagined, and in worse shape. Within thirty minutes, a bullet-riddled Black Hawk made a forced landing on the helipad, its rotors kicking up such a massive cloud of sand that we could barely keep our eyes open.
When the cabin door opened and several nervous bodyguards in traditional Arab attire rushed out escorting a stretcher, I immediately grasped the severity of the situation.
On the stretcher lay an elderly man with an ashen face and purple lips, his white robe soaked with fresh blood around the abdomen. He was the country's head of state, ambushed while his convoy was en route to a neighboring nation for secret talks.
"Patient has a gunshot wound to the abdomen, BP 80/50, heart rate 140, showing signs of shock!" While quickly assessing his condition, I barked orders to my team. "Establish two IV lines stat, prep O negative blood, and get him to the OR!" Our team sprang into action, but just as we were about to move the stretcher, several burly bodyguards drew their weapons and blocked our path. "No entry!" the lead guard shouted in broken English. "You cannot touch him! The leader's body is sacred and must not be defiled by infidel blood!"
"Are you kidding me?" I could hardly believe my ears. "He needs immediate surgery. In a few minutes he'll be dead! I'm a doctor!"
"We will wait for our own doctors!" The bodyguard stubbornly held his gun, eyes fierce. "Special plane is coming. You just keep him alive."
"Wait for a special plane? That'll take at least three hours! By then you'll be collecting his corpse!" I shouted in anger. The air in the medical bay instantly froze. The cardiac monitor emitted a piercing alarm as the heartbeat line grew increasingly faint.
Leo rushed in with his fully armed SEAL team, positioning themselves between us and the bodyguards. "Lower your weapons!" Leo's voice was calm yet commanding. "This is a US military base, a medical zone. Follow regulations."
"Captain Kane," the head bodyguard clearly recognized Leo but showed no sign of backing down, "we follow only our leader's will and our faith. Unless our doctors arrive, no one touches him."
The situation reached a standoff—on one side a life hanging by a thread, on the other immovable religious taboos and political positions. Time ticked away, each second like a dull knife cutting into the dying man.
Just then, Leo's communicator crackled. It was Mark's voice, carrying a hint of solemnity and resignation: "Apollo, urgent orders from the Pentagon.
Red directive: Do not intervene in any form, avoid triggering diplomatic disputes, wait for their special aircraft to arrive." The order was clear and cold, like ice water down my spine.
I looked at Leo, his face expressionless, but a storm gathered in those blue eyes. He silently listened to the order, then lifted his head, his gaze passing over the confronting crowd to land directly on my face. Without words, he was questioning me with his eyes.
"I can save him," I said, my voice quiet but firm. At that moment, I wasn't his lover or the New York doctor he'd toyed with, but a warrior standing on the boundary between life and death, with absolute confidence in my profession.
My eyes told him that given one chance, I could create a miracle.
Leo stared at me for three full seconds. Then I saw him make a decision that shocked everyone present—including Mark. He switched off his communicator and slowly drew his sidearm. "Hades," his voice wasn't loud but carried clearly, "execute Plan B." Mark was stunned momentarily, then seemed to understand, his expression instantly complicated, but he unhesitatingly ordered his team: "Protect the medical team! Form a defensive line!" The SEAL team members immediately sprang into action, quickly shielding my team behind them, weapons aimed outward.
"Captain Kane! Have you gone mad? Do you know what you're doing?" the security team leader shouted in horror, clearly not expecting armed confrontation.
"All I know is my duty is to protect everyone on this base, including your leader." Leo's voice was terrifyingly calm, his gun pointed steadily, those blue eyes burning with unquestionable resolve. "My doctor says she can save him. Now you have two choices. First, put down your guns and let us save him. Second, find out whose bullets are faster—yours or mine." With his gloved finger, he gently but threateningly tapped the trigger. The air in the corridor froze. I could see cold sweat beading on the bodyguards' foreheads; facing the SEAL team's weapons, their resolve began to waver. At that moment, Leo's voice came through my earpiece: "Chloe, how long do you need?"
"Forty minutes if my assistant is quick." I answered promptly, my heart racing, adrenaline surging.
"I'll give you one hour." His voice carried reassuring certainty. "Go do what you need to do, Doctor. I'll handle this." At that moment, no extra words were needed between us.
Under the gun barrels, on the edge between life and death, we became true comrades-in-arms for the first time, entrusting our lives and beliefs to each other.
The surgery was successful. As I tied the final suture, I nearly collapsed from exhaustion. Eva supported me, and we exchanged smiles—the kind that belong to warriors who've survived catastrophe. When we walked out of the OR, calm had been restored outside.
The bodyguards had been disarmed and were squatting dejectedly in the corner, while the leader had been transferred to the ICU with stable vital signs. But Leo was nowhere to be seen. Mark told me that the moment surgery ended, orders from command had arrived.
Leo had been stripped of command on the spot for openly defying military orders, inciting armed confrontation, and causing severe diplomatic risks. He was in solitary confinement, awaiting judgment from a military court.
My heart sank. Guilt, gratitude, and an indescribable heartache overwhelmed me like a tidal wave. It was I who had pushed him to this point; for my statement "I can save him," he had wagered his entire career.
That night, the base was eerily silent. Carrying a dinner tray, I walked to the isolation cell in the most remote corner of the base—a prison converted from a shipping container, with only a tiny observation window and a heavy iron door.
"Leo?" I placed the tray beside the door and called softly. No response came from inside. I pressed my forehead against the cold iron door; the metal blocked his body heat but couldn't block my racing heart. "I know you're in there. I'm sorry... and thank you."
I whispered, "I didn't know things would turn out like this..."
"This isn't your fault, Chloe." In the darkness, his hoarse voice finally came through, carrying fatigue yet remaining steady. "This was my choice. As a soldier, perhaps I was wrong. But as a man, I did nothing wrong."
His voice was close to the door, as if only this thin sheet of metal separated us.
"What will they do to you?" My voice held a barely perceptible tremor.
"Best case, I'll be dismissed from the military. Worst case... the military court will give me a fair judgment." He chuckled lightly, though it sounded bitter. "But it was worth it.
At least I got to see Dr. Sterling work her magic one more time. That was far more pleasing than watching the flag rise."
Through the cold iron door, I listened to his irreverent banter, my eyes growing wet.
I couldn't speak, just quietly stood outside the door, keeping him company.
In this desolate desert, inside and outside this cage of punishment and isolation, we seemed closer than ever before.
I reached out and gently placed my palm against the iron door.
"Leo," I said softly, "no matter what happens, I'll wait for you here."
Just then, hurried footsteps echoed from the distance.
Followed by the crackling of the intercom: "Attention! The leader has developed complications and needs emergency secondary surgery! Dr. Sterling, report to the operating room immediately!"
My hand froze against the iron door, my heart racing.
If the surgery failed, what would become of Leo's court-martial?
