The siren did not sound.It could not.
Doctor Truck No. 3 was stopped at the edge of the road.The engine was running.Oxygen tank pressure was normal.The defibrillator was powered on.
Everything was ready.
Everything except one thing.
Authorization to deploy.
A single sheet of paper was taped inside the windshield.
"Deployment Suspension Order – Effective ImmediatelyPursuant to Article ○○ of the Public Healthcare Act."
Song Jaemin stared at the paper for a long moment, then laughed.
It was too dry to be called laughter.
"Funny," he said."You can stop a human heart,but paper never seems to stop."
The voices coming through the radio were no longer medical terminology.
"Doctor, he can't breathe.""Haven't you arrived yet?""They say the ambulance will take at least twenty-five minutes here."
Song Jaemin didn't answer.
Instead, he folded and unfolded the order resting on the passenger seat.The paper was thin.
But that thin paper weighed more than a human life.
"If we go, it's illegal, right?"the nurse asked carefully.
"Yes."
"Then if we don't go?"
"It's legal."
Silence followed.
And within that silence,someone was probably no longer breathing.
Then Song Jaemin spoke.
"A medical license isn't permissionto let people die legally."
But he didn't move.
He couldn't.
This wasn't a question of courage.It was a question of system.
The deployment suspension was wrapped in the language of accident prevention.
Incomplete medical safety review.Institutional gaps.Unclear responsibility.
Every sentence in the document sounded reasonable.
Except for one thing.
Nowhere in it was theresomeone collapsing right now.
At the Same Time, the TF Situation Room
Han Seojin clenched her teeth as she stared at the coordinates on the screen.
"This isn't medical administration," she said.
"Then what is it?" someone asked.
"It's selection.""Not choosing who can be saved—but choosing who is allowed to be saved."
Someone muttered from the corner of the room,"If someone dies because of this, who takes responsibility?"
Han Seojin looked up.
"No one," she said."That's exactly why it's done this way."
That night, Doctor Trucks did not deploy even once.
Exactly two hours later, a post appeared on a local community forum.
"The Doctor Truck was right there,but it didn't come."
"They said it was illegal."
"So does that mean we're dying legally?"
The comments exploded.
"This isn't a country.""Doctors playing hero and getting shut down."Some cursed the trucks.Some cursed the administration.
But they all shared one thing in common.
For the first time,people began asking why it didn't come.
The next morning, Song Jaemin stood in front of the cameras.
No one told him to.There was no script.
"Doctor Truck is free," he said."We don't send a bill after saving a life.""We don't wait for a 'chance to charge,' like an emergency room."
A reporter asked,"Then why did you stop?"
Song Jaemin swallowed once.
Then answered simply.
"Because saving livesis not a permitted activity."
That evening, an international news agency quoted the scene briefly.
The headline was simple.
"Life-Saving Without Authorization."
And in the final line of the article, it read:
"On the day this system stopped,no sirens were heard."