Ben hid in his bunk for two days. He left to get food, not that he had much of an appetite, but he didn't see a point to getting out much—it wasn't like the Navy was going to let him do anything useful. If he wasn't working and being useful he'd have to stop to think, and he'd have to think about Zahi. He didn't want to think about Zahi right now.

What would Zahi think about him today, anyway? He liked to think Zahi would be proud. Zahi had always encouraged him to help others, even when Ben's family pushed for him to focus on more idle pursuits. Hopefully Zahi was out there somewhere, wherever good men went when their bodies died.

He didn't think Zahi would fault him for being attracted to any of the SEALs. It had been a long time, after all, and Zahi got it. Zahi would have been the first one to encourage him to get right back out there and try again. It wasn't like Zahi was coming back, so if the mood was right, why not?

The only problem was the mood wasn't right. The mood hadn't been right since Zahi's life ebbed out before his eyes. A hospital ship filled with hostile Sailors wouldn't be the best place to get in the mood, even if Ben were looking. Maybe Ben was starting to get better, because he could at least acknowledge that some of the SEALs were hot, but he still didn't want to start up a relationship with them. He just wanted to get back to work, doing what he did best.

The crew of the ship, in contrast to the SEALs, tried to help out. They brought him a tablet, one that allowed him to connect with the outside world. The location of the Solace wasn't exactly classified information, so he was allowed to correspond with anyone he wanted. He didn't exactly have anyone to check in with, outside of Borderless, but his supervisor just told him to sit tight and "take it easy."

He downloaded books and read them, bored out of his mind. He knew there was something going on out there, but he couldn't begin to guess what. If they didn't want his services, though, he couldn't force himself on them.

On the third day, someone knocked on his door. He expected to find one of the occasional administrative personnel who showed up to check on him, or maybe Aziza or Carmela. Instead, he found Boone, the second officer with the white beard. All the SEALs seemed to have a lot of respect for him. Ben's jury was still out, but he guessed it wasn't up to him. "Master Chief Boone." He forced a thin smile to his face. Boredom hadn't ever done wonders for his mood. "How can I help you?"

Boone scratched at his beard. "Look. I know we told you they wouldn't be comfortable taking help in the OR that didn't come up through the Navy."

Ben nodded. "It makes sense. No hard feelings. I'm sure the insurance alone would be a huge issue."

Boone scoffed. "The Navy is self-insuring. We've got a bunch of guys coming in. They thought they'd only be evacuating a dozen wounded. Turns out there are hundreds. ISIS decided it would be a barrel of fun to hide out in an office building. A pro-government group decided to bomb it anyway." He looked away. "There aren't enough surgeons on board."

Ben could have pushed back. A tiny part of him, the younger brother who wanted attention more than anything else, told him to make some kind of demand. He should get something, after all. His services had been declined already.

Instead, he slid out into the corridor and closed the door behind himself. "Lead the way. I'm well-rested. I'll do whatever they need."

He didn't have to ask why the head corpsman didn't come himself to ask Ben to help out. If they had that many casualties, they wouldn't be able to spare anyone to come and play nice with the civilian. It wasn't their job. Ben certainly wasn't going to take offense to that. He found Aziza and Carmela down in the prep room already, and he started to relax as soon as he saw them. He might not know what he was going to face, but he knew they'd have his back no matter what.

A Navy corpsman introduced himself as their anesthesiologist, Horn. He gave them a tour of the OR they'd be using and promised to translate if any issues came up between civilian and Navy terminology. Two minutes later, their first case was brought in on a stretcher. The Sailors bringing the man in brought film with him, which they set up on a light box in the corner.

Ben didn't have to look at the film to know what was wrong with the guy. "Blunt force trauma to the abdomen, probable hemorrhage." He took a look at the film and winced. "He must have been close to the center of the blast."

Horn was already working his magic with the anesthesia. "Do you think we can save him, Doc?"

"I think we can try." He switched to Arabic for the benefit of his nurses. "We're going to do a laparotomy. We've done a hundred of these over the past few months, and I'm sure we'll do a thousand more. What I'm concerned about is right here." He indicated a spot on the patient's film. "We may see complications in another part of the patient's intestine. If we do, we'll fix it when we come to it. All right?"

The women both nodded, and they got right to work. Ordinarily Aziza and Carmela would have already covered the patient up, but they hadn't been given the opportunity during this particular trip. They covered the man now, while Horn monitored his signs.

Ben hadn't been exaggerating when he'd said they'd done a hundred of these. He worked in areas that saw a lot of bomb blasts, and trauma to the abdomen was just part of the game. It was sad and ugly, but it was the way things worked out. The standard of care was generally to use non-surgical methods to try to resolve the bleeds, but when the bleeding was too fast or the patient couldn't be stabilized, surgery had to happen.

Ben could do it in his sleep at this point.

He sutured the holes in his patient's intestine. Once that was done, he explored the abdominal cavity for any debris that would cause the man trouble down the road. He didn't need to look at the monitor. He could hear the electronic blips to tell him the man's vitals were getting better already. The poor guy was a mess, with fractures on the bones Ben could see, but nothing could be done for those. All he could do was wait for the bones to heal.

Aziza hooked the man up to a broad spectrum antibiotic while Ben and Carmela sewed him shut. He would continue to be in pain for some time, and Ben could only hope he recovered fully. For the time being, though, he would live.

They headed into the prep room to scrub down and change for the next surgery, while another team sterilized the OR for their next guest. Ben didn't think about it, he just moved.

Their next guest came in with a massive piece of twisted green metal sticking out of her upper arm. Horn winced when he saw her, and Ben could easily understand why. She was more or less unconscious. She'd lost a lot of blood already, and if someone had removed that piece of metal she'd have lost more. It was the only thing keeping her from bleeding out. The fluid dripping from her ears, though, was the biggest issue.

Horn would put her out, because that was his job. Whether or not she'd wake up, or if the anesthesia would do more damage, was a different story.

Ben pushed those concerns to the back of his mind. If she bled out, they'd never find out just how bad the brain damage was. Maybe the affected parts of her brain were too major to ever allow her to walk, talk, or interact with the outside world again. Maybe the only thing that would change would be a slight shift in the way things tasted. It wasn't up to Ben to decide if it was worth it to find out.

He turned to Aziza and Carmela. "Okay. As soon as I pull that thing out I'm going to need you to clamp down on the artery, okay? We're going to have to work fast."

Ben could work fast. He got ready to move, grabbed his needle and thread, and sutured like his life depended on it. If you'd moved a little faster, maybe Zahi would still be alive.

It wasn't true. Zahi had too many injuries for anyone to save him, and Ben knew it. That didn't stop him from believing if he'd just tried harder, moved faster, been better, he could have stopped it. Knowledge and belief were two different things, after all.

He moved fast enough that the patient's arm didn't have a chance to get cold. He sewed up the cut left behind by the metal and helped clean the young woman up. Maybe she would be lucky. Maybe she'd get through this.

They scrubbed out and scrubbed in again. Ben operated on a patient with a penetrating abdominal wound, and then on one with a crushing injury to the leg. He removed part of a lung that was so mangled by shrapnel as to be unusable. He pulled a pen out of a man's chest after it had been turned into a missile by the blast, which was a new one for him.

He wasn't an orthopedist, but the Solace didn't have orthopedic specialists on board. He set bones and amputated one foot so badly mangled it couldn't survive. He removed a kidney, and then he pulled out a spleen.

He didn't feel tired until the Chief Medical Officer, Captain Franko, stepped into the prep room as he and the nurses were scrubbing out. "Dr. Michaud? Nurses? Are you really still working?"

Ben blinked, and then his fatigue hit him. His knees ached. His feet throbbed in his borrowed boots. "Yes, sir." He kept his back straight. "How long is the queue?"

The captain frowned. "For you? It's empty. The next shift is coming on. You've been working for twenty-four straight hours. We don't ask that of our people here. Horn, you know better."

Aziza translated for Carmela, who frowned at the captain. "We're happy to help," she said, after she finished. "It's what we're here for, and we don't have much else to do in our cabins. We really don't mind."

"I do." The captain crossed his arms over his chest. "Now look, I get that this is your normal, and it is what it is. But here on board the ship, we rotate. We do that because we've found it's the best way to keep our patients and each other safe. I should have had someone come back here and check on you four, and for that I apologize. Go eat something, get some sleep, and we'll be more than happy to accept your help when you've taken care of yourselves." He paused and looked away for a second, like he wasn't used to addressing people this way. "You've saved a lot of lives today. Thank you, all of you."

He left the room, leaving the whole OR team to look to each other in confusion. "I guess we can go sleep it off?" Ben said, stepping back.

Aziza tried to stretch her lower back. "I wasn't even tired until he came in here."

Carmela gave a soft laugh. "Right? Let's go get something to eat. We'll feel better after a nap."

Horn escorted them to the mess hall. For the first time, Ben went into that compartment as part of a team, instead of as someone lurking around the back of the room and hoping no one noticed. The corpsmen around him all treated him like a colleague, and they made room for him and the nurses at their table when it came time to sit down.

He wasn't really one of them, of course. The lingo they used was alien to him, and their training was very different from traditional medical education. While some had civilian medical training, others had learned everything they had through the Navy, and nothing differentiated them from one another.

He thought he liked it.

He noticed a handful of SEALs entering the mess hall. Even if he hadn't recognized some of them, like the tall handsome jerk named Hopper, the way the corpsmen all rolled their eyes would have tipped him off. "Great." Horn plopped his spoon down into his oatmeal in disgust. "Just what we needed. It's the crazies."

"Not fans, I take it." Ben kept his voice down.

The other corpsmen stayed quiet for a moment, and then another one spoke. "Look, the work they do is important. No one's pretending it isn't. If you want a couple hundred terrorists taken out, you just send them on in there, and take them off their leash." She licked her lips. "But here's the thing. We're a hospital ship. They're not supposed to be on board at all. They're certainly not supposed to be launching ops from this ship."

Ben's eyes bulged as the impact of her words hit him. "Crap. That would make you all fair game."

"And our patients." She glared at the SEALs. "We don't even have offensive weaponry on board. They're supposedly just going out to rescue patients and bring them back, but who do they really think they're kidding?"

"Right?" Another of the corpsmen snorted and picked up his coffee. "I mean for real, though. Brass isn't going to send in the freaking SEALs to pull civilians out of rubble. They spend too much to train them. They're not going to risk them getting hurt unless it's on a high value target."

"No, no, you're right." Ben pushed his bagel away. "I hadn't thought about that."

"Then they're interrogating patients who can still talk." Horn made a face. "Hell, they interrogated you, didn't they? Came and asked you a bunch of questions?"

"They had a few." Ben could feel a headache coming on. The SEALs obviously thought they'd been discreet. It wasn't Ben's job to fix it for them. He was a doctor. He was there to save lives, not help a bunch of Special Forces guys kill more discreetly.

But they were going up against white supremacists. And if they were going up against white supremacists, Ben couldn't just let them screw up and hope they learned their lesson. Helping them to cover their tracks might get a few bad people hurt in the short term, but it would save a lot of lives in the long term.

He'd track down Chief Boone later on. For now, he needed to go to sleep. There was no way the captain was going to let him work again without it.

* * *

Dave glanced over at the little knot of corpsmen giving the SEALs the hairy eyeball. Then he looked away. They'd all been busy, and from what Dave had seen they had their work cut out for them too. They'd evacuated anyone with a pulse, but he personally thought most of them weren't likely to survive. He'd be cranky too, if he had to spend his precious time working to save a bunch of people who couldn't be saved.

Van Heel had a different take on it, but then again Van Heel would. "The hell is their problem?" He scratched at the delicate skin right by the side of his eyebrow, where the butterfly stitches were still holding his face together. Some jackass in a leather jacket, they still didn't know whose side he'd been on, had taken a knife to him. Hopefully it wouldn't scar too badly.

"Who knows?" Iñiguez shrugged and took a big bite of his bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich. The guy loved those things. He was loaded, and he'd never eat anything like them back home, but when he was with the guys he ate them all the time. It just went to show money couldn't do much for you that you couldn't do for yourself. "They hate us 'cause they ain't us, and that's a fact. Don't worry your pretty little head about it, Van Heel. You've got enough to worry about."

"Ah, crap." Dave frowned as he picked up on a familiar shock of dark hair. "What the hell is he doing there? Is he buddying up to the corpsmen?" He did a double take. "And the nurses? They don't even speak English!"

Van Heel twisted up his face into a parody of a smile. "I thought we weren't supposed to worry our pretty little heads about them, huh?"

Dave tossed a chunk of toast at him. "The corpsmen, yeah. The civilians are another story." He scratched at his hair. He was as tough as any of his buddies, but once the danger was past, going without a shower for any length of time just made him feel gross. "They don't need to be involved with Navy stuff, man. They'll screw something up. They're not part of all this."

"I don't know." Floyd shrugged. "It's so not my problem. They don't pay us to make those decisions. But we did bring back a whole lot of wounded. I mean a fuck ton. Maybe they were desperate."

Dave grimaced. "Okay, but still. Aren't they supposed to be staffed up and stuff? They shouldn't have to resort to civilians. I thought their bosses wanted them to rest and relax."

Iñiguez snickered. "What part of 'not paid to make those decisions' is escaping you, hm? Come on. Finish your food, and let's go check in with the Chief, okay?"

Dave couldn't argue with that. It wasn't like anyone would listen to him, even if he did argue. He finished his breakfast and headed back to the briefing room Chief and DeWitt were using for their office.

The rest of the team was in there too. A couple of them looked pretty beat up, but most of them looked okay. Once they'd found out about the building collapse they'd gone all in with the rescue. Technically they should have waited to be invited, but there weren't any more hospitals left in this governorate anymore. The last one had been the one Michaud and his nurses had abandoned. And Dave didn't know if his government had the kind of relationship with any of the players on the ground in Syria right now that would allow for an invitation, but saving lives trumped diplomatic niceties.

Chief, knuckles bloody and fingernails torn, looked around at the rest of them. "The bombing of the Assad Office Tower had a death toll of three hundred seventy, counting the people who died waiting for medical care. You successfully rescued five thousand, six hundred two souls. You brought one thousand patients on board this ship, all of whom would be dead now without the care you helped them get.

"So much of what we do is just destructive. And we did have to fight while we were on the ground there. What we did today, though, was different. What we did was constructive. We saved lives. A thousand of them. I don't know about you boys, but that feels pretty damn good to me."

Dave looked down, overcome. He tried not to think too much about the destructive side of what they did. It was a job. It wasn't like they got sent after people who didn't deserve it, for crying out loud. He had to admit it did wear on him sometimes, though. He had to try not to let it eat at him. Knowing they'd saved a thousand people, maybe more, helped.

"Now, as for what we found while we were out there." DeWitt tugged at his collar. "I got a message from Baldinotti in Intel. We know where Bogdanovic is. He's out there, in the city, and we're going to bring him in before we ship out. I promise you that."

Kelly raised his hand. "Sir, not to be insubordinate, but how exactly are we going to do that? This is a hospital ship. We're technically not even supposed to be here." He gestured to the platoon. "We get away with it because of the situation, but if we're grabbing people and taking them prisoner, we run the risk of endangering the Solace's free status."

DeWitt rolled his shoulders. "That's a risk we'll have to take. I suppose we can make sure he's in a position to require a hospital ship when we catch him. The guy did kill thousands of people in Orlando."

"Understood, sir." Kelly had a little line between his eyebrows, but he didn't make a fuss. He wouldn't. Kelly wasn't the kind of guy prone to questioning their superiors, at least not where anyone else could see him.

Chief looked around at the rest of them. "The ship is full to capacity. We're going to have to evacuate some patients, and I'm not sure some staff aren't going to have to rotate off. This might cause some delays in our plan to take Bogdanovic."

"That's going to give us time to get rid of the civilians." Dave shrugged. "They're just taking up space."

Chief gave Dave a long, measuring look. "I wouldn't go that far, Hopper. Those three people who are 'just taking up space' spent twenty-four straight hours in the OR yesterday, saving lives. Michaud and his team saved lives the Captain of this ship said couldn't be saved. They were brought in to help because the corpsmen were overwhelmed; we should all be grateful they were there."

Dave bit his tongue. He didn't want to get into trouble about this. He had to trust that the Captain and Chief knew what they were doing, and he did not. As long as he didn't get hurt, he guessed it wasn't any skin off his nose.

Chief did grab him and pull him aside as they were dismissed to go about their day. "I could see by your face that you're not exactly on board with letting the crew from Borderless treat patients. You want to talk about this? Informally." He held up his hand. "I won't write you up for insubordination."

Dave pressed his lips together. Chief didn't generally work that way, but Dave knew his place. Still, Chief had asked. "I know it's not my job to think about these things, but I do worry that the folks from Borderless don't know Navy systems or procedures. That should be properly neutral and deferential, right?”

Chief nodded and leaned against the bulkhead. He didn't look pissed, not yet. "Yeah. That was a concern. They had a corpsman in there with them, just in case of any confusion or conflicts. None of which came up, by the way. They deferred to the Navy in anything that didn't involve something inside a human body. I think they're used to working under a variety of conditions, so they're not going to complain about being in a proper hospital that just happens to float."

"Maybe." Dave licked his lips. "I'm just—I can't be sure that Michaud didn't use his dad's money, or his mom's money, or someone's influence, to kind of bully his way into that OR. That just doesn't sit right with me, you know? The Solace was doing just fine before he showed up, and then here he comes along and bam! He's got to be getting his hands all over everything? Nah, I'm not okay with that."

Chief's face darkened, just a little bit. "Actually, that's not what happened at all, Hopper. He volunteered when he first came aboard. We pushed him off, and he took it gracefully. You were there. Then we filled the ship to capacity, literally, and the Captain needed help. He didn't push back, he didn't even give me any shit about asking for help after turning him down. He just followed me out the door. You don't have to like the guy. You don't have to like his dad's policies or his mom's movies. I ain't even asking you to like the French. Something ain't right about all that cheese they eat. But what I am asking you to do is to not assume he's out there buying influence and flinging money at people who tell him no. You should trust the Navy more than that right now."

Dave bowed his head. "Of course, Chief. I'm just—"

"Just what, Sailor?"

"Even you have to admit, it's a little hard to trust the Navy around money when we keep getting yanked off every White Dawn-adjacent case." Dave bit down on the inside of his cheek. He'd said too much.

Chief just huffed out a little laugh. "Well, our guy ain't exactly White Dawn's biggest fan. So maybe that's not something we need to worry about right now." He patted Dave on the arm. "How about you let me worry about the stuff at that level, and you worry about what exactly it is about this guy that has you acting like a hothead? That's not usually like you."

Dave couldn't deny the truth of his superior's statement. He went about his daily activities when Chief dismissed him, turning the issues over in his head. He was reacting much more strongly to Michaud than he normally would, which was something he couldn't be proud of. He didn't have to look far to understand why, but he couldn't be proud of it. He should be better than this, damn it.

He headed out onto the deck to get some fresh air when he'd finished his duties, only to find the focus of his resentment out there too. Michaud didn't look like he should be all that threatening. He stared out at the water, hands folded together. He didn't look like someone who'd just saved however many people. He looked frustrated or caged. He looked sad.

Damn it. Dave couldn't ignore anyone who looked like that. He walked up to the doctor. "You doing okay?"

Michaud's smile looked forced. It didn't reach his eyes. "I'm fine. Just not used to being idle."

"I hear that." Dave leaned on the railing. "I hear they put you to work."

Michaud snorted. "Yeah. Yeah, it was good to be useful. For a few hours, anyway." Then he straightened up a little. "But they do things differently in the Navy, and I appreciate they have a different approach to resources. And it's probably healthier, really. We all train to work twenty-four or thirty-six hour shifts, but they aren't exactly good for you."

"But you don't have to be in that position." Dave blurted the words out before he could stop himself. "You don't have to be working at all."

Michaud made a face. "What, did you do research or something? I know neither of them exactly advertises me." He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "Technically, you're right. I don't need the money. I donate it. I want to work. I want to help people. That's why I work in trauma care. That's why I picked Borderless."

Dave blinked. "Okay…" He wasn't sure what he was supposed to say to that. Maybe there wasn't anything to say to that. "So you could just be out there playing polo or whatever it is rich fuckers do, and you decided to go do the thirty-six hour shift thing…"

Michaud barked out a laugh. "Polo's not my thing. I think it's too rough on the horses. I like what I do. I like to think I'm doing some good. I'm probably flattering myself, but hey. What else would I do?" He looked back out over the Mediterranean.

"I don't know." Dave moistened his lips. "I'm from rural West Virginia. We don't have a lot of rich people. I can't exactly recommend a list of hobbies without sounding like Beverly Hillbillies come to life, so I'll just pass."

Michaud snickered. "If you're curious about it, you can take my place at Mom's next film release. We've both got dark hair. She won't know the difference." He waved a hand. "Trust me. You'll be asleep by the time the lights go down or else your trigger finger would get itchy and you'd have to leave."

"Aw, hell, you make it sound so glamorous." Dave laughed, but he had to wonder about that. Would Michaud's mother really not know the difference? They looked nothing alike. At least Dave had his aunt. "Come on. You must have some good memories."

Michaud shrugged. "It wasn't all bad. It just wasn't particularly good, either. I like being useful. Sitting around and doing all that stuff isn't useful. I wasn't ever going to be an actor or a singer. I'm not entirely sure what the point of 'celebrity culture' is. So." He gestured to his scrubs. "It's not going to get me a cover on GQ, but I can hold a beating heart in my hands and not cause it to stop. So."

"See, when you put it like that, it sounds all manner of hot." Dave grinned at Michaud.

"Ah, if only you knew." Michaud waggled his eyebrows at Dave.

Dave, acting on instinct, bent down and touched his lips to Michaud's. The doctor tasted like coffee and mint.

Time stopped. It wasn't a deep kiss, or a long one. Dave didn't know what he'd do with a longer kiss. He hadn't planned this one, and he felt so hot with Michaud's lips on his he'd probably have to jump overboard to cool off if he took another.

"Sorry. That was inappropriate of me." Dave blushed and looked down. "I shouldn't have presumed."

Michaud's cheeks were pink underneath his carefully cultivated stubble. "It's okay." He grinned, just a little bit. "It was unexpected, but nice." He stuffed his hands into his pockets. "Thanks for that. It's, ah. It's been a little while." He turned on his heel and walked back below decks.

Dave watched him go. He still had no idea what had possessed him to kiss the doctor. Nothing had changed. Michaud was still a child of wealth and privilege, Dave was still Dave, and they'd probably never see each other again once they got into a port.

The only thing that was different was that Dave now wished he had a little more time, and he wasn't sure what to make of that.