I tried the other hand. This time I took a breath, visualized the anatomy in my head without the System's help. Shallow angle. Steady hands and feel for the pop. There. Blood flash, advanced the catheter and... Success.

  I moved to the next patient. Young guy, good veins. Easy stick. Got it first try. Then a construction worker with scarred arms from years of rough work. It took two attempts but got it. An elderly man with paper-thin skin. Failed once, succeeded on the second try. The System kept counting. 5/20. 7/20. 10/20.

  Each one was different. Different arm anatomy, different vein quality, different patient cooperation. Some were textbook easy, others were exercises in frustration.

  A woman with obesity, her veins were deep, barely palpable even with a tourniquet. I tried twice and failed both times. So I had to call Dr. Chen.

  She got it on the first attempt, finding a vein I'd completely missed. "You need to palpate more, not just look. Feel for the bounce. Veins have give. Tendons and arteries don't."

  I watched her hands, tried to memorize the technique. Next patient. I focused on palpating first, feeling for that bounce Dr. Chen mentioned. Found a vein that was barely visible but felt right. Got it first try.

  By patient fifteen my hands had stopped shaking. The process was becoming automatic. Tourniquet, palpate, prep, position, insert, advance, secure.

  Patient sixteen was a teenager who'd been in the bus crash, terrified of needles. She was crying before I even touched her.

  "It's going to hurt, isn't it?"

  "Just a pinch," I said. "Look away if that helps."

  She turned her head. I found a good vein, got it first try. She didn't even flinch. "Done."

  "Wait, that's it?"

  "That's it."

  Four more to go. My back ached from bending over stretchers, but I couldn't stop.

  Patient nineteen: An elderly woman with the worst veins I'd seen yet. Tried three times, finally had to call Dr. Chen again. She got it but it took her two tries too.

  "Don't beat yourself up," she said. "Some patients are just hard sticks. You did everything right, sometimes the anatomy just doesn't cooperate."

  Patient twenty was a middle-aged man, calm, with decent veins. Now it felt like a piece of cake. I did it with confidence. Done.

  I stood there in the hallway, blood on my gloves, completely exhausted. Wow, I'd actually placed twenty functioning IV lines in real patients. I couldn't even believe, looking at my own hand.

  Dr. Chen appeared again, looking at her tablet. "Okay, IV team, good work. We need people for wound care now. Basic cleaning and bandaging. You—" She pointed at me. "Ever done wound care?"

  "In simulation, not on real patients."

  "Today's your lucky day. Follow me."

  She led me to another section where patients with lacerations and abrasions were waiting. A senior nurse was setting up supplies. "These are minor wounds," Dr. Chen explained. "Clean them thoroughly, debride any obvious debris, apply antiseptic, bandage appropriately. Call for help if you see anything that needs sutures or looks infected. Clear?"

  We nodded. Another notification appeared.

  Twenty-five wounds. After twenty IVs, what was twenty-five more?

  The first patient was a woman in her thirties with road rash on her right shoulder. It looked painful as hell.

  "I'm going to clean this," I said. "It's going to sting."

  "Just get it over with."

  I opened a bottle of normal saline and started irrigating the wound. Dirt and debris washed away. I used gauze to gently remove embedded gravel.

  The System showed me a 3D cross-section of the wound layers. I followed the protocol. Irrigate thoroughly, debride non-viable tissue, apply antiseptic, dress with non-adherent pad. The patient hissed through her teeth but didn't pull away.

  The next several patients were straightforward. Abrasions, road rash, shallow cuts. I cleaned them, dressed them, moved to the next. Progress: 5/25. 8/25. 12/25.

  Around patient fifteen, I hit one that made me stop. Elderly man, deep laceration across his palm. But when I irrigated it, the wound gaped more than it should. And when I asked him to move his fingers, his index and middle finger didn't flex properly. The System flickered on.

  I called for the nurse. She examined his hand, tested his finger flexion. "This is going to hand surgery immediately." I kept working. Progress: 18/25. 20/25. 23/25.

  Patient twenty-four was a child with scraped knees. She was crying, reaching for her mother who was being treated somewhere else.

  I knelt down to her level. "I'm going to clean your knees, okay? It might sting but then we'll put a bandage on."

  She sniffled but nodded.

  I worked as gently as possible, talking to her about cartoons and her favorite color. By the time I finished both knees, she'd stopped crying. The last patient was a teenage girl with a laceration on her forearm. Straightforward, I cleaned it thoroughly, dressed it properly. Done.

  I peeled off my gloves, dropped them in the bin. My hands were shaking from exhaustion. That's when I heard a gurgling sound from one of the trauma bays. Then urgent voices.

  "Losing pressure!"

  "Push another unit!"

  "Where's the attending?"

  I shouldn't have looked, should've walked away. But my feet moved toward the commotion. Through the gap in the curtain I could see a woman on the bed. Her face had a pale blue-gray color that meant not enough oxygen. Blood everywhere. The trauma team was working frantically but I could see it in their movements, that shift from fighting to just going through the motions.

  Dr. Hayes was there, hands pressed on her abdomen trying to control bleeding that wouldn't stop. A nurse was squeezing a bag of blood, trying to push it in faster. Another was doing chest compressions.

  The woman's eyes were half-open without focus. But then I felt her eyes focus on me. Her hand moved, just slightly. Fingers twitching.

  I stepped closer without thinking. She was trying to say something. Her lips were moving but no sound came out. I leaned down, putting my ear near her mouth. Her hand grabbed my collar. Weak grip but desperate, pulling me closer.

  I could feel her trying to form words. Her breath hit my ear. Once. Twice. Three times. Then stopped. Her hand went slack, fell away from my collar. The monitor flatlined.

  Dr. Hayes kept compressing. "Come on. Come on." Another two minutes. He stopped and looked at the clock. "Time of death, 22:47."

  The team stepped back. One of the nurses pulled the sheet up slowly, covering the woman's face.

  I stood there, couldn't move. Her last breath was still in my ear. Whatever she'd wanted to say, whatever final words she'd tried to get out, they died with her.

  "Student." Dr. Hayes's voice. He was looking at me. Blood all over his gloves. "You shouldn't be here."

  "I just..."

  "Out."

  I walked out of the bay. The ER was still full of patients, still full of noise and movement and life. I made it to the hallway before I had to lean against the wall. The System flickered.

  "Fuck off," I whispered. The notification disappeared.

  Someone touched my shoulder. Dr. Chen. She had that look, the one that meant she knew. "It doesn't get easier," she said. "It just becomes familiar. Come on. Still have patients who need help."

  She was right. There were still people waiting. People who were alive and needed care. I pushed off the wall and followed her back into the organized chaos.

  The ER didn't really empty out until almost midnight. The critical patients had been moved to surgery or ICU. The stable ones had been admitted or discharged. The last few stragglers were getting final checks before going home.

  I'd lost count of how many patients I'd seen after the wound care quest completed. Maybe ten more? Fifteen? Just kept moving from bed to bed, doing whatever needed doing. Changing dressings. Checking vitals. Helping people to the bathroom.

  Around one-thirty Dr. Hayes called all the students together near the nurses' station. "Good work today. All of you." He looked exhausted. We probably all did. "You showed up when it mattered. That's what counts. Go home. Get some sleep."

  People started leaving. I should've left too but my legs didn't seem to want to move. I ended up sitting in one of the plastic chairs in the hallway. Watching the few remaining staff finish their documentation.

  The woman's face kept coming back. What had she wanted to say? Maybe nothing. Maybe it was just reflex. The body trying to hold on to something, anything, in those final moments. Or maybe she'd had something important. Some last message that died in her throat because her lungs had filled with blood and her heart had stopped beating. I'd never know.

  A cleaning crew came through with mops and disinfectant. They worked around me without asking questions. Probably used to medical students sitting in hallways looking shell-shocked.

  My phone buzzed. I pulled it out. The college group chat had blown up with messages. Seventy-three unread. I scrolled through them. People complaining about the trek, making plans to meet at the gate, asking what supplies to bring.

  Then I saw the official reminder, posted by the Dean's office:

  REMINDER: Hill Trek departure 6:00 AM Saturday. Attendance MANDATORY. No exceptions.

  Saturday. Tomorrow. In about four hours I was supposed to be at the main gate with hiking gear for some stupid team-building exercise. The System chimed.

  The System was right. I stood up. My back cracked. My feet hurt. Everything hurt actually. I walked out of the hospital, towards the hostel. I didn’t know what tomorrow would bring. I only knew I was too tired to care.