The Neurosurgeon

My first and hopefully one of many short stories about humans, purpose and what if.

The face in the mirror looked tired. She hadn’t taken a break for too long and needed to get ready for the next surgery. Her colleagues were waiting for her in the operating room, one of the most modern rooms in the clinic. They specialized in difficult surgeries for high-society patients and individuals who had to maintain a low profile. That was the exciting part.

The next patient was delivered to the operating room. Andrew handed her the trauma report and gave a brief overview. The patient had suffered a skull fracture from a car accident, but internal bleeding had been stopped, and the patient was stable. However, the frontal lobe was fractured into multiple pieces and needed to be carefully separated from the surrounding brain tissue. It wasn’t a particularly complex procedure for her.

But who was the patient? The name had been censored and replaced with an anonymous number, suggesting that the individual might be a politician or a multi-billionaire. As she glanced into the observation room, she noticed several stern-looking men donning surgical attire. Clearly, they were part of the patient’s security. But she did not care and began to prepare for the operation.

The patient was put on the table and she immediately recognized the face. It was Felon Boar, the notorious billionaire known for his recklessness and destructiveness. It was his car that had taken the life of Brian. Her one and only love. A wave of pain, sorrow, and anger washed over her. Memories too dark remember. She struggled to contain her emotions, reminding herself to focus. “Carole, are you ready?” the anesthesiologist called out. “Yes, sorry,” she replied, trying to compose herself.

As the surgery began, her thoughts betrayed her. “Tissue!” she requested, while thinking “Doubt” to herself. “Pincer!” she asked, feeling a surge of Sadness. “Clamps!” she prompted, aware of the growing Frustration. The sound of the Drill seemed to whisper Anger in her ear. As she reached for the Gripper and felt an overwhelming sense of Hate. When she finally picked up the Scalpel, Fury had taken hold of her. Her mind went blank and she lost all sense.

She heard the voices of her colleagues – “Carole!”, “What the …?”, “What are you doing?” – but their words were drowned out. She stared, frozen, as the scalpel dug into the frontal lobe. The security personnel sprang into action, shouting, “Move aside from the patient!”.

Carole released her grip on the scalpel and walked mindlessly toward the exit.

Note from author: An LLM was used to check this story for typos and fix sentence structure.