Dedication...

She was going over her notes one more time. She probably didn't need to, but she was always very thorough and careful. You never knew what you'd miss if you got sloppy. When she was in school her instructors always commented on how perfect her chart notes were. Clear, concise and legible. Which wasn't the case for a lot of them. The jokes about doctor's handwriting being bad weren't always jokes, and some of her classmates seemed to think that it was a mandate. 

She had always been this way. Precise. Careful. She felt it was a sign of respect. Show the care that you wished others would show to you.

Thinking about school her brow furrowed as she remembered one particular lab partner. They had been assigned a cadaver to work on. A study body they called it. They would be dissecting their cadaver all year. Peeling back layers of skin to expose the fatty tissue then the muscle structures and finally the organs. Each cut needed to be precise, not too deep or you would ruin your next section, not too shallow or you would have to recut and could end up with jagged edges that, if you were in an operating room, would not sew together neatly and leave your patient with a nasty scar.

As they uncovered their body for the first time her lab partner had laughed. Her eyes snapped up from the body they were to be working on to her partner's face. "He wasn't very fit was he?" Her lab partner had said poking the abdomen of their study body. She hadn't said anything. Just continued to look at him until he settled down and took their work seriously. 

Later she was called into their instructor's office. She had apparently come across as unpleasant and they needed to discuss what made a good lab partner. She suggested that her partner was the one who should be in the office. She hadn't appreciated the disrespect he had shown. That the cadaver might now be their study body, but it had been a man. A man who thought their education was important enough that he donated his body to their studies. That was worthy of respect, not mockery. If they were going to learn to be good physicians they needed to learn to treat every patient with respect. And this was practice for that as well. In her opinion.

Then she had stared at her instructor with the same expression she had used on her lab partner. 

That night over dinner her instructor would tell her husband that she had felt a chill when her student had looked at her like that. But that she had been right, disrespecting the body on their table was never okay. Even if the patient wasn't really there to hear it. 

She got a new lab partner.

Her work in cadaver lab was as pristine as her chart notes. Her cuts were clean and exact, they never had to redo a section or face the dreaded replacement organ needed due to a mangled attempt at a microsection. She was also a good lab partner, teaching him how to hold his scalpel at the correct angle, what pressure to apply, how to visualize not only what they were cutting but what was underneath. By the time the semester was over they were both on the fast track for the prime surgical rotation. He had asked her once how she was already so good at this, she hadn't lied to him. She had told him that she couldn't explain why, she just was. 

He had introduced her to the great love of her life. She had seen him around campus a few times. Quite a few times. Possibly she had even made sure she was going to be places where she would see him. He was handsome, but that wasn't all that drew her to him. It was something else. Something intangible. The way he moved, the way he commanded attention but without seeming to do anything to do so. He wasn't loud. He wasn't showy. He just was. And people turned toward him like he was the sun. She wanted to know what that was. That piece. That spark. But she would never have dared approach him. Not at school. Her studies were too important to her. 

One day she and her lab partner were having lunch between classes and he walked into the cafeteria. She noticed him, of course she noticed him, but looked away quickly. Her partner had smiled at her and then waved and shouted, "Z! Hey, Z!" She hadn't realized that she had been obvious in her attentions. She was embarassed that he had noticed, that she had given him something to notice. But it was too late. Z was headed their way. Z. No name attached, just the letter. She fleetingly thought about the alpha and omega. He might not have been the first but could he be the last?

It had been an instant connection. She was drawn in to his orbit just like everyone else seemed to be. But he also was drawn into hers. That was the difference. Something about her intrigued him. Made him want to seek her out in the lunchroom, in the library, waiting outside the lab. Eventually they became inseparable. 

She hadn't expected that. She hadn't really understood how to process that. How she would process that. 

Z was her type. Tall, dark hair, blue eyes, fit but not muscle bound. Popular without being surrounded at all times. He had that it factor that she was drawn to. Over and over again. She had never expected to find it in someone on campus. And she absolutely hadn't expected to form this relationship. 

But she had. She loved him. He was different. She was different when she was with him. 

Mostly different.

But she was still herself too. The one she had always been. 

She sighed, time to stop reminiscing and get back to her notes. 

One more review and then she gowned up and entered the room where he was waiting. 

"Hello, Z, today we're going to try something different."

The man strapped to the bed turned his blue eyes toward her, "I'm not Z. I've told you over and over that's not my name. I don't know what you want, but it's not me. Please..."

"Shhh...it's okay, Z. It's normal to feel a little nervous before a session."

He started to cry. He knew at any moment he would be put under anesthesia only to wake up with another series of incisions. He wasn't sure how many more of her sessions she would do but he knew he wasn't going to survive. Eventually he would have nothing left to give her. 

She had been practicing her trade since she was 15. She could keep them alive, or kill them quickly. She had skinned them, dissected them, reassembled them after splitting every joint from their core. She was precise and neat and calm. 

She had a type. Tall, dark hair, blue eyes, fit but not muscle bound. They all had to have that spark. The one she had spent a lifetime trying to find. What was it about them that called to her. She was going to find it. It was her life's work. 

But she was careful. Precise. She had a type, and her husband happened to match that type. If she had to find a thousand men who looked like Z to find that spark she would. Anything to keep her from looking inside her beloved for it. She snapped her gloves and said, "Shall we begin, Z?" If she had to make them Z she would. 

She would do anything to keep him alive.