Getting to work on the patients, the doctor was about to start with Gabbie, but after one look, he turned to the detective.
Eyes narrowing, Riven reached out and grabbed the doctor's arm. "I said I need you to save Gabbie; she is more of a priority."
"I know what I'm doing," he shot back before snatching his arm away. "She is not as critical as he is because of what, I assume, is your handiwork."
"However, he is going to get blood poisoning from that piece of metal in his torso soon. If you indeed want to save both of them, let me work or take them to a new doctor," he continued before turning his attention back to the detective.
Relenting, Riven sighed shortly before apologizing, briefly shocking the doc. He'd never heard an apology or even a thank you come out of that boy, not even when he brought back his arm after getting it blown off in a fight with that Ryuji kid.
"Don't apologize; just get over here and help me remove this spike," he said while gesturing for him to come over.
Walking over, the doc ordered Riven to put his hand at the base of the protruding object.
"I need you to pull it straight; any other way and you might slash something vital, and he'll die before I can use my magic or anything else to save him," he explained while standing to the side, hands hovering over the affected area and preparing for him to do just that.
"Okay," Riven replied while nodding.
"Alright, on three. One...two..." he started as his hands started to glow a faint green.
"Three," Riven ended.
He ripped the rebar straight out, and in the same instant, the doc's hand glowed a bright green. Before the blood could gush out, the muscles and tissues formed at an almost immediate pace, closing the wound up.
Breathing a sigh of relief, the doctor wiped the sweat that had formed on his brow.
"Time to get to the real work," he stated as he cracked his knuckles.
The doctor began with the burns. Placing both glowing hands an inch above the detective's ravaged backside. The green light spread outward in fractal patterns that looked half-organic, half-circuit board.
"Third degree bordering on fourth," he muttered. "Charred muscle, exposed fascia, nerve death in patches. Standard regen would take weeks or months."
"But I'm me," he said with a grin.
Then with a low hum, the green energy sank into the tissue like roots seeking water.
Dead skin sloshed away in fine ash-like flakes that the doctor's secondary spell vacuumed into a sterile collector jar. Beneath, fresh pink granulation tissue bloomed at an accelerated rate, knitting upward in visible waves.
Capillaries spiderwebbed across the new surface, then larger veins. Not even taking a second, he quickly moved on to the next afflicted area.
"Science and magic aren't really that different," he said, more to himself than to anyone else.
"Both have their own laws that have to be followed for a proper solution, and while both contradict each other, they can't outright beat or disapprove of each other," he said, muttering his favorite quote that he came up with to focus and take off the buzz he was just drowning in not five minutes ago.
Reaching for a sleek chrome injector on the nearby tray—his own design, a hybrid of nanite delivery and alchemic catalyst—he pressed the needle into the detective's neck. He pushed down on the syringe, unleashing millions of tiny blue machines that flooded the bloodstream, racing like rats to the worst-damaged zones.
Where the detective's own magic was used as a power source to rebuild the macrostructure, the nanites targeted cellular repair.
Looking down at his patient, he muttered to himself, "Mitochondria revival, DNA fidelity checks, and scar-tissue suppression."
The burns visibly receded, layer by layer, being replaced with healthier cells until only fresh, unscarred skin remained—paler than the rest of his body.
Riven watched in silence, arms crossed. The detective let in a full breath, his first since he got injured.
"Now the woman," the doctor said, while already in motion.
Turning his attention to Gabbie, Riven gazed at her as she lay on her side, her breathing slow and her eyes fully closed.
She held out as long as she could, he thought. Still pale and getting subtly paler, the smoke seal on her lower back was a glossy black patch that pulsed faintly in harmony with Riven's heartbeat.
The doctor gestured with a gentle wave—Riven let it dissolve without protest—and immediately the doctor placed his glowing palms to either side of the spinal injury.
"The renal arteries were nicked, and so was one of the inferior vena cava, and there are possible aortic micro-tears. Which has been leaking into the retroperitoneum. Your quick thinking bought her thirty minutes and a definite possibility of a full recovery," he explained while looking up at Riven just to see if his face would react to this.
But no, not a hint. Just a plain glare that made him seem like a statue.
What happened to him? The doctor wondered. But that thought had to be put on pause as a groan from his patient took him back to his task at hand.
"After this is done, you're going to answer all my questions," he demanded, more as a statement than a request.
Raising his hands as before, green light erupted from them once again, but this time it split, with one stream tracing the spinal cord like a glowing filament and the other diving deep toward the major muscles.
The doctor used his free hand to operate a holographic interface that projected above the bed while he whispered locations, "L1-L2 vertebrae, T12 nerve roots."
The scan rotated in midair, revealing what the doctor continued to whisper: "Fractured spinous process pinching nerves in the cauda equina area, a slow seep from the inferior vena cava, and torn connective tissue of the renal artery."
He began with the bleeding. In a matter of seconds, a concentrated green energy pulse cauterized and regenerated the vascular endothelium, sealing the renal arteries with fresh, supple tissue. Then came the vena cava, which he wove back together.
To treat the microtears in her descending aorta, he employed a different injector that contained precursors of regenerative stem cells combined with an anti-clotting agent. The blood pressure almost instantly stabilized, and all of the holographic vitals spiked green.
It was more difficult with the spine. He made a circuit with one hand at the base of her skull and the other at her sacrum. "Hematoma pressing on the nerves, cord contusion..."
A slow, oscillating wave of green light moved up and down the spine like a purifying tide. Inflammation markers decreased on the holo-display, and swelling was clearly reduced. While the nanites removed cellular debris and encouraged remyelination, damaged myelin sheaths rebuilt themselves strand by strand under the guidance of the magic.
Gabbie's breathing deepened. Her fingers twitched—once, twice—then curled weakly.
Narrowing his eyes, the doctor moved down her body before laying his hand on her legs and pinching hard. Seeing a wince of pain across her face and her leg jerk away from his grasp, he smiled.
Exhaling hard, the temporary smile vanished from his face before he stepped back.
"She'll be up and walking again by tomorrow. But the man might need a couple of days of bed rest," he said as he turned to him and wrapped up the finishing touches.
With a final sweep of green light, he erased the last traces of internal bruising and stabilized fractured ribs that the rebar had cracked on its way through.
The man's chest rose and fell evenly now, color returning to his lips.
"Are you sure that it's—" Riven asked, only to get an ugly look from an ugly face.
"Do I look like an amateur to you? Who do you think you're talking to, brat?"
Looking at him, he just apologized.
Stripping off his gloves, the doctor tossed them into a biohazard chute.
"Stop saying that; if you're going to say it with that tone, it's like you're mocking me," he stated as he turned to look at Riven, who was still examining Gabbie with a blank stare.
"Now," he started, grabbing his attention. "Are you going to tell me what the hell happened to you? Because whatever you are now... it isn't what you were."