Andrew''s shout, wild with ecstatic relief, shattered the heavy gloom of theb like a lightning strike.


    "Hurry! Draw the serum now! Ultra-purify it—maximum concentration! Move!" His voice shook with excitement as he summoned his team.


    The assistants sprang into action without missing a beat.


    Andrew took charge himself, hands steady but moving fast, drawing out the vital blood from Charles''s battered veins veins that had barely survived heart failure and a toxic onught.


    That blood held hope: rare antibodies, shimmering with the promise of a miracle.


    Every second was precious.


    The purification machines whirred at full tilt, the concentration process racing the clock.


    Within minutes, Andrew was clutching a vial of potent antibody serum in his hand.


    He didn''t hesitate. Sprinting down the corridor, he crashed through the door of the next treatment room.


    "Now! Give this to Charlie-right now!"


    Andrew''s arrival snapped Francis out of his hopeless daze.


    Just moments earlier, Charlie''s heart monitor was barely flickering her life hanging by a thread.


    Francis had given Charles his word: he''d save Charlie. He couldn''t let her slip away now.


    "Everyone, move!"


    Francis''smand scattered the team around Charlie''s bed, clearing a path for Andrew.


    Without pause, Andrew injected the serum straight into Charlie''s fragile vein.


    The moment it entered, an invisible warmth seemed to flood Charlie''s icy, bluish skin, washing away the chill of death.


    Next door, Charles-fresh from his own brush with death, his heart barely coaxed back to life-struggled to find consciousness, desperate to be near his daughter. Francis understood. He signaled the team to wheel Charles to Charlie''s bedside.


    "Charlie..."


    Charles''s lips were cracked, his voice little more than a whisper, but he called her


    name.


    His bloodshot eyes, unfocused and weary, searched for his daughter.


    He couldn''t rest until he saw her through this storm.


    Despite the pain, Charles fought to stay awake, every second a battle. Everyone held their breath, waiting, watching Charlie for any sign of life. Charles didn''t have the strength to reach for her hand.


    Francis gently ced Charlie''s cold little hand in Charles''s trembling palm.


    Charles managed to curl his fingers around hers, weak but determined. No one said a word.


    Time dragged. Every heartbeat felt like forever.


    Just as doubt began to eat at


    Andrew, just as hope started to stip away, the monitor beside Charlie''s bed-its line nearly t-suddenly jumped, pulsing with a strong, steady beat.


    Her heart kicked back, the rhythm clear and powerful.


    The shrill rms faded, reced by steady, gentle beeping-the sound of life itself.


    Charles felt it: Charlie''s hand warmed within his.


    She was back.


    Andrew and Francis''s team rushed to check her vitals, running full tests.


    Once they were sure everything was stable, they turned to Charles, voices trembling with relief. "Charles, she''s out of danger! The antibodies worked! She''s back. Her vitals are steady!"


    "Charles, you did it. You saved her."


    As the words washed over him, Charles finally let go of the breath he''d been


    holding for so long.


    His vision swam.


    The tension that kept him going


    weet


    through agony, through heart failure, through the long, torturous Suddenly snapped, like thest


    wait


    beam in a crumbling building.


    His eyes, locked on Andrew, slowly lost focus.


    His fist, nails digging into his palm, fell open.


    His body-rigid with pain and strain-went ck, copsing like a marite with


    its strings cut on the cold hospital bed.


    Beep beep beep-


    On the monitor, Charles''s newly recovered heartbeat faltered, the line weakening,


    blood pressure nosediving, oxygen dropping.


    The rms red again, sharp and urgent.