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Beneath the White Coat

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CHAPTER THREE: THE QUIET ONES

The hospital issued a brief, sanitized statement.

"Accidental death. Tragic fall. A young technician, barely twenty-four. Our thoughts are with his family."

No mention of the rumors.

No mention of the blood on the stairs.

No mention of the fact that Aditya Menon was the second person in six months to die during a night shift.

In the halls, the whispers still came.

Not loud — never loud. The hospital hated noise.

But the staff whispered all the same. In supply closets. In elevator corners. Just loud enough to keep the fear alive.

The Morgue

Detective Aryan Khatri was not a man easily unnerved.

But even he felt it — that pressure in the air when he stepped into the hospital’s lower level. The morgue always seemed colder than necessary. It wasn't just the temperature. It was the stillness. As though time itself had frozen down here.

The coroner handed him the report without a word, her face grim. Aryan glanced over the top page, then paused.

“No clear defensive wounds. But look at the base of the skull,” she said quietly. “Thin fracture. Linear. Not what you'd expect from a fall.”

Aryan frowned and leaned closer. “Sub-occipital?”

She nodded. “Clean strike. Almost surgical. Whoever did this knew anatomy.”

His brow furrowed. “And the fingernails?”

She passed him a sealed envelope. “Traces of synthetic fabric. Not cotton. Blended — like hospital uniforms.”

Aryan’s fingers tapped the edge of the file. Twice. Then again. A habit he’d picked up when his instincts were whispering.

He looked up. “Pull the report on Dr. Ananya Mehra.”

The coroner stiffened. “The suicide?”

Aryan’s eyes narrowed.

“The suicide,” he echoed.

His tone made it sound like a punchline.

Just without the joke.

The Nurses' Station – Later That Morning

Nurse Sara D’Mello stared at her locker like it had grown fangs.

Another note.

Slipped through the vents this time — not even the door.

Not typed. Handwritten. Block letters. Precise.

YOU SAW TOO MUCH.

AND NOW ANOTHER ONE IS GONE.

Her hands trembled as she tore it into small pieces and stuffed them into her pocket. She looked around. No one was watching. But that didn’t mean no one was there.

The hospital had too many eyes.

Diagnostics Lab – Afternoon Shift

Ravi Sen hadn’t spoken much since Aditya’s death.

He moved through his tasks like a machine — precise, quiet, untouchable. Blood samples. Test orders. Glucose panels. Over and over. Everything clinical. Nothing personal.

The same oversized gray sweater. The same hunched shoulders. The same haunted eyes.

Dr. Veer Malhotra had approached him the evening before.

“He was young,” Veer said softly. “Bright. We’ll make sure he’s remembered.”

Ravi only nodded.

But something inside him shifted.

He had seen something — he knew he had.

He just couldn’t pull it from the fog that had settled over his memory.

There were fragments:

The cold tile.

The overwhelming scent of antiseptic.

Something floral underneath.

A whisper in the dark.

A hand clamping over his mouth.

Cabinets open — not in the hospital, but in a kitchen. Ananya’s kitchen.

His fingers twitched at the memory.

The Third Floor Stairwell

Aryan traced the path Aditya would have taken.

He’d already seen the medical report. Aditya had a minor anxiety prescription. Nothing heavy. No hallucinogens. Nothing sedating.

The stairwell felt wrong. Too clean. The railing had no scuffs, no blood. But the floor — the floor had a faint mark still visible in the corner. Not red. But darker. Almost like the concrete itself hadn’t recovered from impact.

He leaned over and examined the doorframe.

Scratched.

Small, tight abrasions. Not from shoes. From fingernails.

“He didn’t fall,” Aryan murmured.

Hospital Archives – Night Shift

Later that week, Aryan returned. This time under the pretense of reviewing old patient records related to a case with overlapping dates. The admin didn’t like it, but no one had the nerve to stop him.

He wandered. Slowly. Intentionally.

Talked to nurses.

Talked to the janitor.

Talked to Ravi.

Talked to Sara — last.

She cornered him in the supply room.

“There's something wrong here,” she whispered, voice barely audible beneath the hum of the old refrigerator unit. “It’s like... the hospital wants to forget her. Forget everything.”

Aryan’s eyes sharpened.

“You’ve received letters?”

Sara flinched.

Her eyes darted toward the closed door.

“I didn’t tell anyone. I—I thought maybe it was just grief. But now Aditya’s dead, and... someone’s watching me. I know it.”

Aryan stepped back out into the corridor.

Two deaths.

One nurse with threatening notes.

One technician who remembered fragments.

And a diary that had mysteriously vanished from Ananya’s effects.

And a doctor who grieved too well.

Too quickly.

Too quietly.

Dr. Veer’s Office – Midnight

Veer sipped tea from a bone-white cup, legs crossed, back straight, a subtle smirk playing at his lips. He sat alone, the soft glow of a tablet screen casting shadows across his angular features.

He tapped the screen once.

Paused the footage.

A still frame.

Ravi Sen, standing near the old records room.

Just... standing.

Looking over his shoulder. Right at the camera.

But his eyes weren’t frightened.

They were searching.

Veer tilted his head, as though examining an interesting species in a jar.

He zoomed in.

The camera timestamp blinked.

02:41:09

The exact minute Aditya Menon’s chart was altered in the system.

Ravi was on-screen.

Nowhere near a computer.

Veer smiled.

He didn’t delete the footage.

He didn’t need to.

He simply renamed the file, encrypted it, and sent it to a private folder.

Then he opened a second file.

Ananya’s voice.

From a phone call recording, months ago. She was laughing.

“…don’t be dramatic, Veer. I’m not abandoning anyone. I just need change. A new country, new challenge—maybe research. You’ll be fine without me.”

Click.

The sound stopped.

Veer stared at the screen for a long moment, unmoving.

Then he whispered, to no one:

“They always say that. And they’re always wrong.”

Nurses' Lounge – 3:00 A.M.

Sara couldn’t sleep.

She sat with a cup of lukewarm tea in her hands, staring at the TV in the corner playing a muted soap opera. The drama on-screen was simple, predictable. She preferred it that way.

A soft knock came at the lounge door.

She turned.

Ravi stood there.

“Can I… sit?” he asked softly.

She nodded.

They sat in silence for a while.

Finally, he spoke.

“I think I saw something the night Aditya died.”

Sara turned slowly. “What?”

“I remember… a voice. Two people talking. One of them said: ‘She said she was leaving. She can’t leave.’”

Sara’s face drained of color.

Ravi looked at her. “You’ve heard it too, haven’t you?”

She nodded. Just once.

Neither of them spoke again for a long time.

Detective Aryan’s Apartment – Dawn

The city light bled in through the blinds like diluted blood.

Aryan sat at his desk, surrounded by case files. Photographs. Timelines. Scans of records that had been deleted but still existed in paper form — in places where no one looked anymore.

His phone buzzed.

Unknown number.

He answered.

Silence.

Then — a whisper.

“Don’t trust him. Veer isn’t who he seems.”

Click.

The line went dead.

Aryan stared at the phone.

Then he opened a drawer and pulled out the only physical artifact from Ananya’s personal locker that hadn't been logged — a single printed page. Torn. Smudged with tea. Almost overlooked.

The handwriting matched her journal.

“He’s like a brother. But even brothers can drown you if you stop swimming.”

Aryan’s fingers stopped tapping.

FINAL SCENE – Security Basement (Restricted Zone)

Late that night, in a dim corridor beneath the hospital, a motion-activated camera blinked to life.

Footsteps.

A figure approached.

Ravi.

He was holding something. A keycard.

He stopped at a locked security room — the kind only administrators accessed.

Swiped the card.

The light turned green.