Lewis Pov
I’d seen residents burn out before.
Some quit after a year.
Others transferred to easier specialties where they could pretend medicine had normal working hours.
The unlucky ones stayed, dragging themselves through endless shifts until they stopped caring.
They still treated patients.
They still filled out charts.
But somewhere along the way, the spark that made them become doctors simply…
disappeared.
That was how most people survived residency.
Ezra wasn’t like them.
If anything, the idiot was trying to speedrun burnout.
Leaning against the nurses’ station with two paper cups of coffee, I watched him finish another patient chart.
The digital clock above the hallway flashed 04:12 AM.
Thirty-three hours.
I’d checked twice already, hoping I’d counted wrong.
I hadn’t.
The kid should’ve been asleep hours ago.
Instead, he was still buried under paperwork.
Shaking my head, I walked over and placed one of the coffees beside his mountain of charts.
“You’re still here?”
Ezra didn’t answer immediately.
He finished writing the last sentence, signed the page, then finally looked up at me with tired eyes.
“I was hoping everyone would forget I existed.”
A laugh escaped me.
“Not with that pile.”
I nudged the coffee toward him.
“Drink.”
He picked it up, took a cautious sip, and immediately grimaced.
“…This is terrible.”
“It’s hospital coffee.” I shrugged.
“Terrible is as good as it gets.”
For a brief moment, the corner of his mouth twitched upward.
Good.
At least he still had enough energy to complain.
Then I really looked at him.
His shoulders drooped before he unconsciously straightened them again.
His blinks were slower than they should’ve been, and more than once I’d caught him staring at a chart for several seconds before his pen started moving.
I’d seen those signs before.
Exhaustion.
Not the kind another cup of coffee could fix.
“How long?” I asked, though I already knew the answer.
Ezra leaned back until something in his shoulders cracked.
“Thirty-three hours.”
I let out a slow breath.
“Go sleep.”
“I will.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“When?”
He gestured at the stack of charts with his pen.
“As soon as I finish these.”
“You told me that an hour ago.”
“I meant it then too.”
Despite myself, I chuckled.
“There really is something wrong with you.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“I’m serious.” Folding my arms across my chest, I nodded toward the charts.
“Residents take breaks for a reason.”
Ezra looked genuinely confused.
“So they can complain about the coffee?”
“So they don’t start hallucinating halfway through a shift.”
“I’m not hallucinating.”
I stared at him.
“You spent five minutes arguing with the vending machine.”
“It ate my money.”
“It gave it back.”
He looked away, muttering, “…Eventually.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“That’s not the point.”
While I was talking, he’d already uncapped his pen and started reading the next chart.
“I’ve only got twelve left.”
“Only?” I repeated, unable to stop myself.
“You’ve been awake for thirty-three hours, and you’re calling twelve patient charts only?”
“They won’t finish themselves.”
“No,” I replied, resting a hand on the desk, “but someone else can.”
His pen stopped.
For the first time since I’d walked over, he met my eyes.
“And if they miss something?”
The question caught me off guard.
There it was.
That tone.
Most people would’ve called it arrogance.
They’d be wrong.
This wasn’t arrogance.
It was conviction.
Ezra genuinely believed that if he walked away, someone might overlook something important.
A missed allergy.
An abnormal rhythm.
A lab result buried beneath dozens of normal ones.
He wasn’t trying to be a hero.
He simply couldn’t convince himself to leave.
I’d worked with doctors like that before.
They either became some of the finest physicians I’d ever known…
Or they destroyed themselves trying.
I sighed.
“You’re not responsible for every patient in this hospital.”
“No,” Ezra answered quietly.
He glanced down at the chart for a second before looking back at me.
“Just the ones assigned to me.”
That was it.
I’d lost.
Without arguing anymore, I placed my untouched coffee beside his paperwork.
“Drink it before it gets cold.”
Ezra looked at the cup, then back at me.
“…It’s already cold.”
I couldn’t help smiling.
“I was trying to be optimistic.”
A faint smile crossed his face before disappearing as quickly as it had come.
His attention drifted back to the charts.
Stubborn idiot.
I’d seen that expression before.
It always ended the same way.
“Five more minutes.”
Then another five.
Then another.
Turning away, I started down the hallway.
“Two hours,” I called over my shoulder.
“That’s all I’m asking.”
“I’ll think about it,” Ezra replied without looking up.
I smiled to myself.
No…
You won’t.
Still, I hoped that when I came back, his desk would finally be empty.
Ezra Pov
Lewis disappeared around the corner, his footsteps fading beneath the steady hum of fluorescent lights.
I watched him go until he was out of sight before looking back at the untouched coffee sitting beside my charts.
He wasn’t wrong.
Thirty-three hours.
Even I had to admit that number sounded ridiculous.
I wrapped my hands around the paper cup, hoping the warmth would wake me up.
It didn’t.
The coffee was already cold.
Figures.
Setting it aside, I glanced at the remaining charts.
Twelve.
It looked worse than it actually was.
Half of them only needed discharge summaries, a couple were waiting on lab results, and the rest just needed final notes before the morning team took over.
Nothing complicated.
Still…
They weren’t finished.
I uncapped my pen and got back to work.
The scratching of ink against paper blended into the familiar rhythm of the night shift.
A nurse stopped beside my desk a few minutes later, holding a patient’s file against her chest.
“Doctor?”
I looked up.
“Mrs.
Campbell in 408 is asking if she can have something stronger for the pain.”
I reached for her chart, scanning the latest notes before shaking my head.
“Not yet.
Her blood pressure’s still low.” I handed the file back.
“Let’s wait another hour and reassess.”
She nodded.
“Alright.”
As she walked away, I moved on to the next chart.
One became two.
Two became five.
By the time I signed the last page, my wrist ached and my vision had started blurring around the edges again.
I leaned back, letting out a long breath.
Done.
For the first time all night, there wasn’t another chart waiting for me.
I should’ve felt relieved.
Instead, all I felt was tired.
Really tired.
I rubbed my eyes, hoping it would clear the haze.
It didn’t.
Maybe Lewis is right.
The thought lingered longer than I wanted it to.
Sleep sounded nice.
I stood, stretching until something in my back cracked loudly enough that a passing nurse looked over.
“You okay, Doctor?”
I gave her a tired smile.
“I’ve had better days.”
She laughed softly.
“You look like you haven’t slept in a week.”
“Only a day and a half.”
“…That’s not as reassuring as you think it is.”
“I’ve been told.”
She shook her head as she continued down the hallway, muttering something about stubborn doctors.
She wasn’t the first.
Probably wouldn’t be the last.
The hospital felt strangely quiet as I made my way toward the staff lounge.
The usual rush of conversations had died down, leaving behind little more than the distant beeping of heart monitors and the occasional squeak of rubber wheels rolling across polished floors.
Rain tapped gently against the windows overlooking the parking lot.
The break room was empty when I stepped inside.
Good.
Silence was exactly what I needed.
I dropped into the worn vinyl chair, the old springs creaking beneath me as I let my head fall back.
Every muscle in my body thanked me for sitting down.
Five minutes.
That was all I needed.
The humming vending machine filled the silence while rain tapped softly against the windows.
Somewhere beyond the break room, a cardiac monitor beeped its steady rhythm before fading into the background.
Hospitals were never truly quiet.
There was always another page, another emergency, another family waiting for answers.
Tonight, though, the silence felt almost peaceful.
I closed my eyes.
Just five minutes.
The warmth from the chair settled into my aching muscles.
My breathing slowed, and the pounding behind my eyes finally began to ease.
Maybe Lewis had been right.
Maybe I should’ve listened.
A dull thud echoed somewhere down the hallway.
I barely reacted.
Probably someone dropping a tray.
It happened every night.
Silence returned.
Then—
CRACK!
The sound ripped through the break room like a gunshot.
My eyes snapped open.
The door exploded inward, slamming against the wall hard enough to leave a dent in the drywall.
Splintered wood skidded across the floor as the twisted metal latch bounced beneath one of the tables.
For a heartbeat, I simply stared.
What the…
A man stumbled through the doorway.
His clothes were drenched from the rain, water dripping from his sleeves onto the linoleum.
His breathing came in ragged gasps, and his hands shook so violently I wondered if he was about to collapse.
Then he looked at me.
Not at the room.
Not at the shattered door or the untouched cup of coffee.
At me.
“There…”
He swallowed hard.
“There you are…”
Slowly, I pushed myself to my feet, keeping both hands where he could see them.
The man looked exhausted, soaked to the bone, and barely able to stand.
I’d seen people in worse conditions walk into the emergency room.
None of them had looked at me like that.
“Sir…” I kept my voice calm, careful not to make any sudden movements.
“Are you alright?”
He didn’t answer.
His chest rose and fell in uneven gasps while tears mixed with the rain running down his face.
I’d seen that expression before—family members, parents, spouses.
People whose worlds had just fallen apart.
Most of the time, all they needed was someone willing to listen.
I took a cautious step toward him.
“If something happened, we can—”
“You killed her!”
The scream hit me like a physical blow.
Every muscle in my body locked as the words echoed through the break room.
I opened my mouth to respond, but nothing came out.
“I…”
The apology died before it even formed.
His hand disappeared beneath his soaked jacket, and for one brief, exhausted second, my mind refused to understand what I was seeing.
Then steel caught the fluorescent light.
A scalpel.
Hospital issue.
My stomach dropped.
“No—”
He lunged.
The distance between us vanished before I could react.
I tried to step back, but my body felt sluggish after more than thirty hours without sleep.
Something slammed into my chest, driving me backward until my spine crashed into the wall behind me.
For a heartbeat, I didn’t feel anything.
Then the pain arrived.
It wasn’t the sharp sting I’d expected.
It felt as though someone had driven a steel rod straight through my ribs, forcing every breath from my lungs.
A wet gasp escaped me as I looked down at the scalpel buried in my chest, its handle trembling between us.
No…
The man crashed into me with everything he had, pinning me against the wall.
Warm blood spread beneath my scrubs as another wave of pain tore through my body.
Instinct took over.
I grabbed his wrist with one hand and the front of his jacket with the other, trying to force him away.
He didn’t move.
For someone who looked ready to collapse, he was terrifyingly strong.
Or maybe I was simply too exhausted to fight back.
His face was only inches from mine now, tears streaming freely down his cheeks as he shoved the scalpel deeper into my chest.
“You let her die!” he screamed.
Agony ripped through me, so intense it stole every breath before I could even cry out.
My grip faltered as he twisted the blade, his entire body trembling with grief.
“You were sleeping!”
“My wife…” he sobbed, his voice cracking under the weight of those two words.
“She trusted you.”
He shoved the scalpel again.
“My son…” His shoulders shook as another sob escaped him.
“My son never even got to be born.”
The strength drained from my arms.
I could barely keep hold of his wrist anymore, my vision already beginning to blur around the edges.
“I begged them…” he whispered, almost to himself.
“I begged them to save her.”
Then he looked straight into my eyes.
“I’m sorry,” he choked.
“I don’t know what else to do.”
Those words hit harder than the scalpel ever could.
This wasn’t hatred.
It was grief.
Pure, unbearable grief.
He swallowed hard before whispering the words that made everything else disappear.
“You were supposed to check on her.”
The sentence echoed through my mind, drowning out the pain in my chest.
Check on her?
Room 412.
The number surfaced before I could stop it.
High-risk pregnancy.
Eclampsia.
I remembered reviewing her chart.
I remembered glancing at the clock.
02:00 AM.
I remembered standing up…
Didn’t I?
A frown crossed my face as I desperately searched for the next memory.
I remembered the break room.
The bitter taste of hospital coffee.
Lewis telling me to get some sleep.
Then…
Nothing.
There was no hallway.
No patient’s room.
No nurse calling my name.
Just an empty stretch of darkness where my memories should have been.
Cold spread through my body.
No.
That couldn’t be right.
I searched frantically for anything—a conversation, a monitor alarm, even the sound of footsteps—but every memory ended the moment I sat down.
“I…”
The word caught in my throat.
I couldn’t remember leaving the chair.
I couldn’t remember checking Room 412.
I couldn’t remember seeing her.
The man wasn’t lying.
His wife was dead.
His son was dead.
And I couldn’t remember doing the one thing I’d been trusted to do.
My fingers slowly loosened around his wrist as the truth settled over me.
He wasn’t standing in front of me as my killer.
He was standing there as a husband who had lost his wife…
and a father who would never meet his son.
Because of me.
I opened my mouth.
“I’m…”
The apology never came.
Not warmth.
Blood.
The last thing I saw was the man collapsing to his knees beside me, his shoulders shaking as he cried.
Not because he’d killed me…
Because he’d already lost everything.
I failed them.
Darkness swallowed me whole.
……………….
Author’s Note:
Thanks for reading!
This is a complete rewrite of Reborn with the Dread Core.
After reading your feedback and looking back at my own writing, I realized I could tell this story much better than I did the first time.
The overall premise remains the same, but many scenes, character interactions, pacing, and future plot setup have been rewritten or expanded.
Some events may happen differently, and some details have changed entirely.
Whether you’re returning from the original version or reading this story for the first time, I hope you enjoy the journey.
As always, criticism is welcome—don’t hold back.
Let me know what works, what doesn’t, and where you think I can improve.
Thanks again, and enjoy the story!
Thank you so much for your support.
It truly means a lot and helps me continue writing this story.
As always, comments, reviews, and ratings are greatly appreciated.