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“Oh, I like that,” a different department head said. “So not a medical spa but medical outreach and education addition. The next step in the best healthcare and knowledge for supes so that we continue peace and the harmony we all want.”

“We could work in something free for vampires so they feel valued,” Dr. Greer suggested, clearly knowing as much as Da and I did. “The humans have their support groups. We could do more of them for our police and—we have to do better. Fine, our military doesn’t kill, but even support groups about how they feel pigeonholed into roles could help.”

“Agreed,” Ellie muttered, jotting down more. “Speaking as someone who was pigeonholed for a role—yes, it would help. It’s not lost on many of us that we went from one type of pigeonholed role to another, and most aren’t thinking it was a step in the right direction.”

A thrill of fear raced through me. That was worse than even Da or I knew. I really needed to talk to him that this was serious and a concern he needed to make more understand.

There was actually a great discussion and more points brought up. More and more was thrown out there for different species and how to evolve the foundation of my idea. After another twenty minutes, Ellie called it and told all of the department heads to seriously consider this and discuss it with their senior attendings.

But not to tell them where the idea originated.

She shot me an apologetic look and I understood. I had too many gold stars on my name already and they didn’t want to start trouble.

Well, that kind of trouble.

Fair enough, and I accepted it mostly because I knew Ellie would be fair withmelater when people learned the truth and how things actually came about.

“This was really great, and we will include you in the meetings going forward,” Dr. Carpenter promised as the others stood. “We’ll get something scheduled for next week after office hours and another round of brainstorming after we talk with our respective attendings. Both ideas were impressive, and clearly bringing you on was the right move to—”

“He’s not done, Alan,” Dr. James chuckled.

“Pardon?” Dr. Carpenter asked, glancing between us.

“I’m not done,” I confirmed. “I have two more ideas.”

“The last one is the one I think will be your favorite,” Dr. James added with a smirk. “It’s something you’re always pushing for but the board shut down.”

“Huh,” Dr. Carpenter huffed, blinking at me for a full minute. “Okay, well, I need to use the restroom and then I think we reschedule the other appointments, yeah? I want to hear what Clark has to say.”

“Whatever you all agree to,” Ellie accepted. “I think it’s best I abstain.” She gave me a subtle wink when they all agreed they wanted to hear my ideas over whoever was scheduled.

Nice.

After the break, I jumped right into my idea of scheduling portals to be opened all around the world just for appointments at ASH. Also for them to be opened back to the same area at certain intervals throughout the day starting from a few hours later. There was no need for every hour or at will. That would be too costly but five times starting at noon was worthwhile.

The tension in the room shocked me and I was just about to crack and demand what was going on when Dr. Carpenter cleared his throat. He gave Ellie a look and nodded.

She sighed. “You aren’t the only one with this idea. That’s what you’re feeling.”

“More than that, it’s the map,” Dr. Bass muttered. “It’s been a few days since I’ve seen it, but—seriously, pull it up.”

Ellie sighed again and pulled a drive out of her bag before coming over to the laptop I was using. She checked that she could interject and seemed tense when I agreed.

I understood when she brought up what Dr. Bass had referred to. It was a world map marked up like I had for my presentation.

Now I understood, and they were worried I would think someone stole my work—or someone would think I stole theirs. Shit.

“I presented this to my last hospital and I can prove that,” I hedged.

“No one worries you stole an idea and we know it wasn’t stolen either as it was presented here at ASH before as well,” Dr. Carpenter said firmly.

“I knew the idea briefly, but—I didn’t see the map,” Dr. James confessed. “His other ideas had my focus and I zoned out as he spoke about getting more patients in. I apologize, Ellie.”

Right, this wasted time. Double shit.

I slapped on a calm smile. “Theirs is even a better map with more information than I’m privy to.” I moved closer and pointed to a few spots in Asia. “I didn’t know any of this or the issues—even this development. This is someone better connected than I am.”

“I am, thank you,” Ellie said with an amused tone.