Nikita

[NIKITA]

The morning that followed was a little too lonely,  but it wasn't the kind of loneliness that made Nikita want to disappear. It was the aftermath of celebrating his comeback with his people, and the Rostova legion had been too excited to see him as he was.

They had spent their evening drinking and catching up. Of course, they had to be responsible because, at the end of the day, they were Rostova soldiers, and Nikita liked his people always to be alert.

The parties had both put in more effort to get to where they were, and nothing would change how they had been trained. They were like a system, one that was fully functional. However,  despite all the expectations, what was important was that they were together and could protect themselves.

"Morning, Maggie," Nikita said as he walked into the hospital.

It had been a while since he was last sighted, and frankly, no one had expected the young Pavlenko to be back so soon. His pain was still fresh in the media, and the chaos that surrounded him didn't seem like it would end any time soon.

Anyone in his place could have stayed from the public eye and tried to salvage whatever was left of it. He could have stayed on the sidelines and let everything slow down,  but what was the point, right?

No matter what happened,  no matter how shit happened,  there was no changing anything. They already had their opinions of him, and Nikita wouldn't spend his life defending things that didn't interest him.

Sure he was sometimes worried about himself and his friends; however,  today,  here and now,  as he stood in the hospital talking to the older doctor, Nikita knew he had a plan he would have to see through no matter what the media and the society deemed of him.

He didn't have time to care about people whose intentions were marred by their decisions and wanted to force their life's decisions on him. He was who he was, and as much as that was the primary crazy sensation in Todorov, Mykolajki Pavvlenko couldn't have given a fuċk about it.

"Morning, Nikita, you're here when you should be on leave?" Maggie asked worriedly. 

The young doctor wasn't supposed to be here. 

Granted, the hospital was technically his,  but still,  he needed to recover. He needed a break from all of this, and he needed a break from everything. So him being here just didn't make any sense.

Whatever it was, it wasn't going to make anything better, and Nikita couldn't let the lives of his patients be at risk because of his unsolved issues. That was something everyone knew, even Liza, the director.

"Oh, Maggie, you worry too much. I have come to get my stuff and leave for a while," Nikita said nonchalantly like it didn't mean anything when it meant everything to him. He had loved his profession.

He had worshiped his profession, and if it were his wish, he wouldn't have to leave. But there was so much toxicity around him for him to still stay.

There was so much he needed to work on and, more than anything, more than the dėsɨrė to get away and even get a new life; Nikita knew he would never be able to focus if he didn't know shit about Yuri.

He knew it would take a while, sure, but he was willing to stay for longer if there was a pointer in the direction where his brother was. He was a loyal man, and to the end, he was going to fight for his family.

He was bȧrėly away from the hospital, but they didn't need to know that. Here, with Maggie looking at him like he was the hope of all of the Todorov hospital, Nikita knew he needed to take a temporary now.

It wouldn't take long, and it wouldn't make him forget who he was or what he was fighting for. Instead, he would recover.

He would heal.

He would unbreak himself, and if there were a chance that Yuri was genuinely dead, he would accept that and give properly, then he would come back. He would make things better and continue with his mission to save lives.

"Leave? You really decided, huh, kid," Maggie said dejectedly. She had hoped Nikita would stay a little longer, and maybe they could work things through. But being a retired doctor,  Maggie knew the burden the young doctor was facing.

There was always the invisible pressure of ensuring the patients they interacted with were healed. It was always the fight between life and death when in reality, all they could do was fix their patients and leave the rest to the higher-ups.

Some decisions were hard to make because how else would she be able to decide who needed to live or who had to die? It was all out of their hands and no matter what happened, no matter how hard they tried, they could never change destiny.

It was already written in stone.

All they could do was try to live beyond the pain and try to see life in a better light. Maybe that would make things really better.

"Yeah, it's the only way I know of for me to decide whether I can continue being who I am or if I can just move to another country and start over," Nikita said with his shoulders slumped.

This time, he wasn't pitying himself; he was just absorbing the grief of leaving the one place he had known as home for so many years. But he would come back. If not for his patients, then he would come back for himself.

"Oh child, don't say that. We still need you," Maggie said, understanding everything Nikita meant.

To anyone, he was just speaking a language everyone could understand, but if they listened carefully to him, they could hear him give up on everything.

He was trying to hold on, but it was hard to hold on when he had nothing much to anchor him to the land of the living, and he couldn't stop himself off to the land of the dead because he had to confirm if his brother was alive or dead.

Yuri Maksim was the weakest link Nikita had, but today, he was the most vital link to the doctor's survival.

"You guys are doing okay without me. Anyway, is Liza in her office?" Nikita asked.

"Not yet, but she should be here soon," Maggie said with a tiny smile on her face. She knew what would happen next, but she knew it was the right thing for the young doctor to do for the first time.

"Alright, I'll be in my office packing if you need me," Nikita said even though he knew Maggie would respect his space and peace. That was mainly why he loved that older woman.

She knew her boundaries and knew how to stay within them.