The air in the Cabinet meeting room was heavy.The air conditioning was running,but no one felt cool.
On every tablet on the table,the same footage played on repeat.
A child's face.An oxygen saturation line plunging—then climbing back.And Song Jaemin lifting his eyes toward the camera.
"Isn't there a way to take this video down?"someone asked.
No one answered.
Because everyone knew—it was already too late.
The Vice Minister of Health spoke carefully.
"The suspension order is legally valid.The problem is…the public no longer recognizes it."
That sentence split the room in two.
Law.Recognition.
Between them,a crack was forming—one no one had anticipated.
At the same time —
Temporary container conference room on the outskirts of Truck City
Four Doctor Trucks stood in a row.
Their engines were off,but the monitors inside kept flashing.
Deployment request.Deployment request.Deployment request.
One doctor lowered his head.
"Another cardiac arrest just came in… even now."
No one responded.
The suspension order was still in effect.Move, and it meant discipline.License suspension.Possibly criminal charges.
Then Kang Doyun spoke.
"If we stay stopped like this…will this city remember us?"
Someone gave a bitter smile.
"They'll remember.As the ones who didn't move."
Silence.
Then Song Jaemin said,
"The Doctor Truck was born inside the system.But it cannot live outside its conscience."
It didn't sound like resolve.It sounded like a fact.
Meanwhile, the media shifted its framing.
At first, it was "Illegal deployment."Then, "Institutional conflict."
Now the headlines read—
〈Why did the state order it to stop?〉〈Who wrote the document that blocked deployment?〉
And then, a document leaked.
A draft of the suspension order.
The drafting department.The approval chain.And a final annotation.
"If the Doctor Truck model expands,there is concern it will causesignificant disruptionto the existing medical fee structureand large-hospital–centered system."
People read that sentencelike this—
— "They're protecting the money structure."— "Hospitals are the system. People are variables."— "So they tried to eliminate the variables."
Anger exploded again.
This time, not from emotion—but from understanding.
An elderly man at the square said in an interview,
"If the law can't save people,it's not a law.It's just a rule.
And rules can be changed."
That night,the President's approval rating vanished from the graph.
It dropped so lowthat displaying it had become meaningless.
And at dawn,another international headline appeared.
"Ukraine requests Korean Doctor Truck deployment for frontline civilian aid.""Russian border NGOs also express interest."
Even on the battlefield,they were calling for the truck.
The state said stop.The world said come.
Song Jaemin read the newsand spoke quietly.
"The choice is clear now."
Kang Doyun asked,
"Where to?"
Song thought for a moment, then answered—
"Where people need us first."
At that moment,one Doctor Truck's engine started.
The order had not been lifted.There was no authorization.
But the sound was unmistakable.
The sound of movement.
And as that engine noise filled the screen,the image faded to blackwith a single line.
"Where the state stopped,medicine began to stand."