"That's… not supposed to happen."
Gabriel blinked. "That's a phrase that inspires an extraordinary amount of confidence."
There was no smile in his voice.
The physician looked up from the screen, and something in his posture shifted—not panicked, not stunned, but very much the kind of stillness that came from realizing the thing in front of you wasn't in the manual.
He lowered the device.
"Gabriel," he said, and it wasn't Consort, not Sir, not even Your Grace—just his name, plain and deliberate.
Gabriel blinked. The use of his name was rare. Rare enough that he straightened slightly.
The physician glanced at the data again, flicked through panels, and turned the reader once in his hand as if its shape might explain something its readings would not.
"Are you… a walking wonder?" he asked at last, as if the words themselves were half a joke and half a diagnosis, and he still wasn't sure which side to fall on.
Gabriel gave him a flat look. "Is that supposed to be medical?"
