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Chapter Text

Zoe liked making vision boards. It was a form of therapy to sit on the floor for hours, cutting out tiny buildings and items and gluing them into a creative disarray. She would then hang her new vision board on the wall and start each morning analyzing it.

Was she going in the right direction? Was she getting closer to what she desired her life to be?

Safe to say that Zoe had never envisioned the Pittsburgh Medical Trauma Centre in her future. People cut out stuff like Yale or Paris for their vision boards, not PMTC. 

Upon her move to Pittsburgh (another event that she would never wish for herself), Zoe decided not to put up her vision board on the wall. She had grand plans for the year 2025, which would never come true. She did not need to hang a house decoration that would serve as a sore reminder of that. 

Although it was not as bad as Zoe thought it would be. It was all fairly similar to working back home, except for the obvious difference of having different doctors as colleagues. There were still the same drunks, the same worried parents of a newborn with a simple colic, the same unfortunate accidents that killed someone too soon that haunted Zoe in the night.

There was Langdon, however, who was Zoe’s walking nightmare. Every hospital has its own cocky man with an ego the size of Manhattan, who believes he has been chosen by the Gods to do the work no one else can. And Langdon was the Pitts. Zoe had a similar fellow resident back home in Chicago, and it took her around six months to figure out how to not stab him with a scalpel at any given moment. She feared it would take her at least eight months to figure out how not to do the same to Langdon.

There was also Dr. Robinavitch, who was generally nice towards Zoe, but there was undeniably something brewing in his head. Zoe couldn’t figure out if it was directly related to her or if it was something else entirely that occupied Robby’s mind and made him come on as too strong and demanding. Whatever it may be, it was putting a lot of pressure on Zoe to overperform; she did not want Dr Robby’s disapproving stare at her.

Perhaps it was actually her entirely, and her own need for the approval of older men.

In addition, there was McKay, who, for reasons unknown to Zoe, did not like her. And Santos, who belonged as a torturer in hell. Whitaker, who always found a way to cause an accident and involve Zoe in it. Garcia, who never let Zoe do procedures on her own. Dana, who told Zoe she needed to toughen up at least three times during a shift. 

So actually, no, it was really as bad as Zoe thought it would be. It was the worst. She had to go to work every day and make peace with a bunch of people who wanted nothing to do with her. She had to play nice and accept their criticism, even though she had only been part of their staff for a month.

Whenever a disturbed patient came to the Pitt, Zoe volunteered to take them. Because she secretly wished that they would attack her and send her to the ICU for a week or two.

And then, when Zoe thought that it couldn’t get worse, she was rotated to the night shift. Therefore, her whole life was about to become a never-ending ER. And on top of that, she was going to have to deal with a whole new staff and hence, a whole new round of humiliation.

Everything was awesome.

Zoe arrived with time to spare, a whole twenty minutes before the day shift clocked off. She wasn’t sure whether that would win her some favour points, but trying didn’t hurt. She knew very little about the night shift attending Dr Abbot; their first and only meeting was brief and consisted of about four words, three of which were ‘mhm’. 

As a result, she truly didn’t know what to expect.

The Pitt was busy as usual, with some screams coming down the hall (thankfully, the fighting kind and not the dying kind) and a weird smell coming from several rooms. The central station was overloaded, with nurses and doctors coming and going as they tried to wrap up their shift. A pool of something oddly similar to urine was in the middle of the room. Zoe looked around, trying to meet the eye of any nurse, and her lucky catch was Princess, rounding a corner. 

“Again?” Princess exclaimed. “Who let Mr. Gray on the loose? Jesse, can we get the cleaner here?”

Zoe turned away and took the opposite route to the hub. Dr Robby was standing in the middle of it all, his glasses threatening to fall off the edge of his nose as he reviewed notes. 

“Hi,” Zoe said, avoiding making eye contact.

“Mh?” Robby said, pushing his glasses up and giving her a brief glance. “Ah, Kasprzyk, great.” He put down the chart and scanned the room before calling over Dr. King. 

“Pass your patients to Dr. Kasprzyk and go home,” Robby instructed.

Mel nodded, clasping her hands in front. “Okay.” King smiled at Zoe, and she did her best to return the gesture.

Pulling the strap of her bag higher, Zoe followed Mel, listening to her fellow resident and trying to commit what she was saying to her brain.

“Not much, honestly, to be worried about,” Mel said, rubbing a thumb on her palm as she walked. “Room seven is Mrs. Cones. She is ready to be discharged. We are waiting on her next of kin to pick her up; hopefully, they should get here in the next hour.”

There was a little boy, Sam, with a severe case of strep. Parents waited until the last minute to go to the hospital, and were sure they could treat the little one themselves. In turn, he developed an abscess at the back of the throat. It has been drained, and now he was on antibiotics. IV, half-normal saline, check every hour.

“Pedes won’t take him for the night?” Zoe asked, looking at the little boy. His face was hollow, and the wires surrounding him seemed to be swallowing him whole. 

“No beds,” Mel said solemnly. 

“Right, of course.” Zoe sighed, shaking her head.

Then there was an old man who accidentally took a double dose of his meds. He was stable, hopefully clear for discharge in hours to come.

“And Mr. Gray,” Mel said, staring at a man, somewhere in his late seventies, who was being led down the corridor by nurse Perlah. Dr King rushed over, taking the patient over.

“I told you we should restrain him,” Perlah said, her forehead creased.

“I need to get to Kalamunda!” Mr. Gray exclaimed.

Zoe looked over at Perlah, who sighed, shrugged her shoulders, and turned away, leaving the two doctors to deal with an obviously mentally unstable patient.

“They are waiting for me!” Mr. Gray continued. “Kalamunda at 0800.”

“Mr. Gray, as I told you, we are waiting for your friends to come and pick you up for the expedition. My colleague here, Dr Kasprzyk, will let you know the moment they arrive. But you need to remain in your bed so that we can find you.” Mel said.

Mr Gray was hesitant to follow her. “They are coming?”

“Yes, they are on their way.”

“The expedition starts at 0800.”

“Yes, Mr Gray, I remember.”

Mr. Gray followed Mel and, with great uncertainty, sat down on his assigned bed. “I’m finding the tiger snake today. Have you ever seen a tiger snake?” He asked Zoe.

“No, sir, unfortunately, I have not.”

“You young people know nothing.” He swung his hand in the air.

“Came to the ER with a laceration on his leg,” Mel whispered to Zoe as she adjusted Mr Gray’s IV bag. “Couldn’t tell us who he was for the first hour until eventually he landed on the name Mr. Gray. We couldn’t find any record of him. Best guess is dementia. Paged psych and social services about two hours ago.”

“No response, obviously,” Zoe stated.

“Yeah.” Mel clasped her hands. “They promised to come down as soon as they have the chance.” They stepped away from Mr Gray's bed, Mel pulling the curtain to a close. 

“What's Kalamunda?” Zoe asked.

Mel shrugged her shoulders. Her guess was as good as Zoe’s.

The two returned to the hub. By that point, Dr Jack Abbot had arrived; he was deep in a conversation with Robby and Dana, his backpack still hanging off his shoulder. He wore the same black tight shirt as the first time Zoe saw him.

“All done,” Mel said, shoving her hands deep into her pockets. “I’ll log the last information and then I’m off.” 

“Great.” Robby padded her shoulder, sending her on her merry way. “Abbot, you know Kasprzyk?” 

Abbot turned to look at Zoe, giving her a quick scan of unimportance. She might as well not have been there. 

“Yes, right, you are starting the night shift today?” He grabbed a piece of paper from Dana’s station, scanning the names written down until he found Zoe. “Resident?”

“Second year, yes.” The strap of her bag was weighing her down. She should have disposed of it before doing rounds. Maybe then she wouldn’t look so utterly stupid, standing there, shifting from one leg to another, trying to keep her back straight.

“Good. Hopefully, you’ll be a lot more useful than that shaking dead meat in the corner.” Abbot said, monotone, pointing his thumb to somewhere behind him.

Sure enough, in the corner of the room stood a young guy, rubbing his palms together as he analyzed his new surroundings.

“Who is that?” Zoe asked.

“Med student from the surgical floor. Ross something.” Robby scratched his head. “He is like Whitaker. Only ten times worse.”

“Oh, don’t be like that,” Dana said, sliding in between the two doctors to gain access to her computer. “Whitaker has gotten a lot better.”

Robby didn’t say anything in response, simply snorted. Abbot eyed the medical student again, giving him the same empty stare as he did to Zoe, only with slight more disgust. 

“Maybe I’ll give him to you. You can guide a med student, right?” Abbot asked Zoe.

She felt the colour drain out of her. Zoe forced the corners of her mouth to turn at least slightly upward and slowly nodded.

Abbot choked a laugh then. “Relax, I already assigned him to Shen.”

“Ha, and who are you attempting to torture with that, Shen or Ross?” Dana asked.

“Hopefully both.” Abbot patted Robby's back as he exited the hub. “Maybe I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Maybe?” Robby echoed.

“Gotta see how the night goes,” Abbot said, looking at Zoe. She pursed her lips, finding herself yet again simply slowly nodding in response.

He turned in the direction of the locker room, and Zoe followed suit, for she really wanted to get rid of this unwanted baggage. Unfortunately, their little walk together entailed that they would either spend it in painful silence or in painful small talk.

For some reason, Abbot chose the latter.

“Where were you before?”

“UChicago.” Zoe sighed.

“Done night shift?”

“Plenty.” 

Abbot raised a hand in greeting to a doctor at the end of the hall as they turned into the locker room.

“Then I guess it won’t shock you.” He opened his locker, shoving the bag inside in one swift movement. “Kasprzyk, what's that? Polish?”

That took Zoe by surprise. She fumbled with the code on her locker as she said, “Yeah.”

Abbot closed his locker then and simply left the room, and Zoe took a deep, long breath. She took her time situating her belongings and changing her shoes to the ones that she wouldn’t be upset to ruin. She was actually far from used to it. She feared that it would indeed shock her, but Zoe pretended that everything was totally normal as she emerged back into the bright fluorescent lights of the ER.

The night shift crew gathered like flies around the hub, listening to Abbot's not-so-encouraging speech. Actually, one probably couldn’t even title it as a speech. Simply a collection of instructions and a quick introduction. 

“Go do something.” He said, and with that, the speech was over. 

Zoe made sure to remember the name of the charge nurse first, Faith Shaw; she was the queen bee, and getting on her good side was the main task of night one for Kasprzyk. She could learn the rest of the names later.

“Whose patient is Mrs Cones?” A nurse called over. 

Zoe was logging into the system, balancing at the edge of the stool as she quickly typed in her name and number.

“Whose patient is Mrs Cones?” The nurse called loudly.

The name sounded oddly familiar, perhaps because it was indeed a patient of Zoe’s. “Shit.” She whispered. “Mine!”

The nurse was on the edge of rolling her eyes as she said. “Her kids are here to pick her up.”

“Great, thanks!” Zoe logged off before she even had the chance to log on and went on to check on her patient. 

She made sure that Mrs Cones was a hundred percent fine, got her discharge papers, reiterated the course of treatment, and made sure her children also knew what meds she was to take. And then it was one patient less hanging above her head for the time being.

Zoe returned to the hub, sat down at the computer once again. 

“Kasprzyk? Second year resident?”

Zoe turned around to see Dr Ellis, an intimidating and overly attractive resident. 

“That’s me,” Zoe responded. 

“How do you feel about a rectal?” Ellis smiled, leaning against the table.

Zoe bit her lower lip, staring at the computer that had finally loaded her into the system. Ellis fumbled with the papers she was holding until she produced an X-ray and extended it right in front of Zoe’s face. 

“Holy shit.” Zoe gasped. She was staring at an object that looked oddly like a lamp inside someone's anus.

“Right?” Ellis smirked. “Cmon, it's either that or helping Shen restrain a guy coming off drugs.” She nodded towards the behavioural room, where a man knocked down a cart and was kicking his feet against Dr Shen.

Tempting. Potentially could result in an injury for Zoe. But light bulb… Not something one sees every day.

“Light bulb it is,” Zoe said, shutting down the computer and following Ellis to room 1. 

Ray Huffman assured the doctors that the light bulb ended up there by accident.

“I fell.” He answered before either Ellis or Kasprzyk could ask. 

That usually tended to be the cover-up story in 99 out of 100 patients. They had simply fallen on a prolonged shaped object, which was naturally covered with protection. (Who doesn’t keep a condom on their light bulb?)

“Why a light bulb? That’s what's so confusing to me. Like, there are so many other, a lot safer alternatives.” Zoe said as they exited the room, throwing her gloves in a nearby bin.

“I truly don’t want to know.” Ellis shook her head. 

Zoe used her time going around her patients, making sure Mr. Gray was still in place and that little Sam’s fever had not spiked up. The overdose was also doing fine, sleeping soundly. 

She stitched up two lacerations, one caused by an accident during dinner prep time and the other by falling off a skateboard face-first into a bench. Then there was a kid with a bad allergic reaction and a regular UTI. 

Zoe was making her way to the hub to grab another patient when the distress call came in.

“Incoming trauma!” Faith shouted towards the ambulance bay. “GSW to the chest, five minutes out.”

“A GSW?” Zoe whispered to herself and looked down at her watch. The time was only coming around 2130, a bit early for the night craziness. 

“Kasprzyk?” Abbot called, standing by the ambulance entrance, throwing on a gown. 

Zoe took in a deep breath and rushed over, grabbing a gown for herself on the way. But before she could reach Abbot, Shen cut right in front of her, already dressed for the occasion.

“I can take it,” he told Abbot.

“Uh, I think Kasprzyk should assist.” Abbot walked out into the fresh summer air, looking out for the upcoming ambulance. Shen threw a confused glance at the night shift attending. “It’s her first night shift in the Pitt; she needs to be baptized.” What he really meant was that he wanted to see her at work, assess her skills, and determine whether she could be a proper asset to their crew.

“Right, you are the UChicago res?” Shen asked, crossing his hands on his chest. 

“Yes, I am.” Zoe caught up to them, trying to tie her gown at the back and failing miserably. 

“Been there once a few years ago.” Shen moved her hands away and did a quick (and loose) knot at the top of her gown. “That med conference was held there. I met Dr Gao, he must have been one of your attendings?”

Something pinched at her heart. “Yeah.”

The ambulance turned the corner and stopped promptly in front of the ambulance bay. The EMTs jumped out, the doors flying open to reveal a man, mid-forties, bleeding all over the back of the car. He moaned in pain, a hand hanging uselessly by his side.

“He was really insightful; his research on bioprinting of organs was top-notch.” Shen carried on.

Zoe nodded, but she was not listening to him at all. The gurney was lowered from the ambulance, and the EMT accompanied as they sprinted into the hospital.

“An unidentified male, mid-forties, singular gunshot to the chest, BP 90 over 60, Pulse 92, resps 24,” EMT said. 

The four of them pushed the gurney into the Pitt and straight to trauma one. 

“Sir, can you tell us your name?” Zoe asked, to which the only response she received was a collection of rasps from the man.

“What else did you expect? The lung probably collapsed.” Shen said.

Zoe took her place at the front of the gurney. 

“What's the plan of action, Kasprzyk?” Abbot asked, pulling on gloves.

Zoe looked around the room, two attendings and a couple of nurses staring at her, the patient on the table slowly becoming more and more unresponsive.

“Two large-bore IVs, start a liter of warm saline. Also, let’s start on two CC’s of O-neg.” She pulled down the stethoscope from around her neck to listen to the patient. “Shen right, I believe he has pneumothorax, prep for left-sided chest tube. Oxygen on high flow, if he desats or GCS drops, we intubate. Let’s get a portable chest X-ray now.”

“Yep, she got it, let’s get moving, folks,” Abbot said. “I assume you know how to put in a chest tube?” 

Zoe nodded. Back at UChicago, Zoe avoided the ER as if it would burn her the moment she stepped over the threshold. High pressure was something Zoe had, not something she could handle. Therefore, her experience of putting in a chest tube was actually unbelievably limited, but she could get it done when needed.

But that is not something you confess to when you want to make a good impression.

But definitely something one should confess to when someone's life depends on it. 

“Pressure’s falling, eighty-five systolic.” Someone shouted.

“He is out.” Someone else said.

There was no time to confess, whether Zoe wanted to or not. She simply started to move.

From then on, Zoe went on muscle memory, going through the steps she was taught as a med student. 10 of Lidocaine, get the 36 French tube, and locate the 5th intercostal space. 

“Did you attend Dr Gao’s lecture?” Shen asked. “Maybe we have crossed paths there. That was what, three years ago? You would have still been a med student, right?”

Place a clamp on the tip for insertion, make an incision (big enough for an index finger to go in), dissect cephalad, get to the rib, and the clamp goes in. 

“You got sweet research grants there.” Shen carried on blabbing in Zoe’s ear. “I actually considered for a whole second to put in a transfer request. But Chicago just isn’t for me. I took the EL once, and once was enough.”

Secure drainage system, secure clamp in place.

“Yep, got output, air, and blood coming out.” Nurse confirmed.

“That was a sweet insertion,” Abbot said. “Go on, apply dressing. Is the X-ray on the way?”

“They are hogging it upstairs.” A nurse replied, phone in hand.

“How nice of them,” Abbot murmured to himself.

“Are you Chicago-born and raised?” Shen asked. “Actually, you don’t look like it. Lemme guess, Detroit? No wait, scratch that, let me think.”

“Stats?” Zoe shot over her shoulder.

The answer came from another nurse. “He is steady, BP 95 over 62, pulse 110.” 

“We should try and get an ID on him. Do we know what happened?” Zoe asked.

“EMT already left,” Abbot said, patting the pockets of the patient's pants. “Gotta wait until he wakes up and tells us who decided to feed him some lead tonight.” He retrieved a wallet from the front left pocket. “Trevor Norman.”

He passed the ID to a nurse. “Let’s see if we can find his family. And page surgery.”

“Milwaukee?” Shen asked.

“Shouldn’t you be with your med student?” Abbot shot at him.

“Eh, left him to stitch up an old fella, he should be fine. This is a lot more fun.” Shen rubbed his gloved hands together, smiling. The gesture was not reciprocated. “Fine, I’ll go find our new friend Ross. Just tell me, did I guess right? Are you from Milwaukee?” 

Zoe sighed. “No.”

“Damn it,” Shen said and walked out of the trauma room.

Zoe eyed the stats. Trevor Norman was still stable, but they really needed the X-ray and to get him moving.

“So what is it?” A nurse asked.

“Pardon?”

“Where are you from?”

Zoe raised her eyebrows and smiled. “Milwaukee.”

That earned her a laugh from Abbot, but that expression didn’t stay on his face for too long. Charge nurse Faith walked in, her face carried the anguish one could only acquire after many years of working in her position.

“We got a hit and run coming in,” She said.

Abbot took off his gloves, tossing them aside and grabbing a new pair. “Kasprzyk, wait for that X-ray and Dr Walsh, and hopefully send him up to the OR.”

“Got it.”

It took the X-ray to come down 10 minutes, Walsh 20. Thankfully, Trevor Norman lived up until he reached the OR. What happened to him after was outside of Zoe’s responsibility. 

Her main concern was treating those coming in. A woman with a severe and persistent cough. Food poisoning. A lady who was convinced she was carrying alien babies.

“I feel it moving within me, doctor.” She said. “The pain has become severe; they are ready to come out.”

“How long have you been experiencing pain?” Zoe asked, examining the lady by pressing on her abdomen.

“Three days.” The last winced when Zoe got to her bowl.

“Have you by chance had blood in your stool?”

The lady was caught off guard, thinking. Her mouth widened. “Now that you mention it, yes, I have… I think my body is rejecting the alien babies. Doctor, am I going to die? Oh my God, they will kill me! They abducted me, and I turned out not to be strong enough to prolong their kind.”

“Miss Ackermann, I assure you, you will be fine. You are not dying. Nor are you… rejecting alien babies.” Zoe grabbed her chart, putting down some notes. “A nurse will be with you shortly to do some tests.”

Miss Ackermann grabbed Zoe by her sleeve. “I can’t lose my babies.” 

“You won’t.”

Zoe left the room, composing herself and slapping herself awake. She walked over to the closest nurse hub, catching the eye of a sweet-looking guy. 5’3 at most, with the wildest collection of curls.

“Hi, I’m Doctor Zoe Kasprzyk. I’m usually on the day shift.” She extended her hand to him.

“I’m Lordes.” He shook her hand. “So what did you do to get punished with the night shift?”

Zoe chuckled. “Oh, I’m not being punished, I’m just on rotation. So I will be on and off every three weeks.”

“So who did you piss off when applying for residency here?” Lordes laughed, and all Zoe could do was shake her head. “I assume you need something from me?”

“Yes, please.” Zoe pleaded. “Patient in Room 12 is convinced she is pregnant with alien babies, and well, I am ninety-nine percent certain she is just severely constipated. Could you run labs on her? CBC, electrolytes, TSH, and UA. I would highly appreciate it.” 

Lordes took over the chart. “She will need a rectal.”

“Yep, very aware of that, I’ll-” At the end of the corridor, she saw two figures walking past, Shen and his little med student. “I’ll send someone over. Hey Shen!”

Zoe put on her best smile as she walked over. Dr Shen had somehow produced a fresh, large cup of coffee that was steaming up his med student's glasses.

“Ah Kasprzyk, this is Ross.” Shen pointed at the student.

“Paul Greg Ross.” The student said, shaking Zoe’s hand before she even got a chance to extend it forward.

“Paul Greg Ross?” Zoe repeated, biting her lower lip to prevent herself from laughing. “Done much today?”

“Just some stitches.” He laughed through his nose, hugging his notepad close to his chest. 

“I got a procedure for you, of course, if Dr Shen doesn’t mind.” Paul Greg Ross’s eyes lit up, circular glasses sliding down his nose as his face extended in joy.

“Not at all,” Shen replied, taking a large, loud sip of his coffee.

“Perfect. Room 12, Nurse Lordes is waiting for you. Find me when you are done.”

Paul Greg Ross practically hopped down the hall with excitement. There was a slight sense of guilt brewing inside Zoe for doing an evil deed to a clueless guy. But she had already done one rectal, and one was enough. 

“What did you send him to do?” Shen asked through a smile.

Zoe allowed herself to feel the tiniest sense of glee. “A rectal.”

The two doctors stood with large smiles as they watched the student walk into room 12, completely oblivious to what lay ahead. 

“Are you from Cleveland?”  Shen asked.

“What? No. No, I’m not from Cleveland.”

“I’ll get it right one day.” He took another sip of his coffee. “I smell a trauma coming in, let’s go.”

And indeed there was. A heart attack. Arrested at the scene, by the time she arrived at the ER, she had been gone for 15 minutes. Pupils were fixed and dilated. No pulse. 3 rounds of epi and 3 rounds of shocks, and no response. Pronounced dead at 00:12. 

Zoe was on her way to check on alien babies and whether her labs came in when she passed by Room 16, Mr. Gray’s room. 

“Oh fuck.” She whispered to herself before opening the door, her heart beating as she was filled with horror. Zoe has completely forgotten about Mr. Gray, and the last time she saw him must have been… three hours ago?

And sure enough, the room was empty. 

Zoe rushed over to the hub. “Anyone seen Mr Gray? Room 16? Elderly disoriented, asking to go to Kalamunda?”

“To where?” One of the nurses asked.

“So you haven't?" Zoe repeated, and everyone shook their heads in a synced ‘no’. Zoe set off in a jog, looking into every room, knocking on the bathroom door, and even searching through the main waiting area. 

“Hey, have you guys seen a disoriented elderly man wandering around?” She asked the staff who sat in the admission booth. Their response was the same as the nurses. No. No one has seen Mr Gray. 

With the sense of her life being over, Zoe made her way to the hub and searched for Faith Shaw. Zoe put on a brave smile as she delivered the news.

“I lost a patient.”

Faith closed her eyes, reaching towards the telephone. “When did you last see them?”

Zoe swallowed. “Around, uh, nine pm.”

Faith rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Patient's name?”

“Mr. Gray.”

Faith snapped at Zoe, lowering the phone back onto its station. “Your lucky day, doctor…” She reached towards Zoe’s scrubs and pulled at her ID. “Kasp- Kasprdziyk or whatever. Break room.”

“Thank you, God bless you, I love you.” Zoe stuttered and rushed towards the break room. She opened the doors with such a rush that one might think the entire building was on fire. The occupants of the break room were more than startled, with Mr Gray letting out a long string of profanity and Dr Abbot nearly spilling his drink.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” Zoe tried her best to smile through her heaving. “Mr. Gray, I’ve been searching for you. I told you not to leave your room.”

“I was hungry!” The man yelled.

“So you are the doctor to whom he belongs. I was getting worried that we had an unaccounted patient.” Abbot said, setting down his cup on the table.

“Yes, I’m terribly sorry, I’m not sure how that happened.” Zoe cleaned invisible dust off her scrubs as she let the door close behind her. “Mr Gray, how about we return to your room and-”

“That’s quite alright, Gray and I are having a very interesting conversation.” Abbot intervened.

“Yes, Jack is going to take me to Kalamunda!”

“Well, not sure that it will be me specifically, but we’ll find someone.” Abbot smiled. 

Mr Gray turned towards Zoe. “Have you been to Kalamunda?”

“No, Mr Gray, I have not.”

“You are no good of a doctor. Why aren’t you my doctor?” Mr Gray asked Abbot. “He has been to Kalamunda; he deserves to be my doctor.”

“Wait, really?” Zoe walked a bit closer, still not confident enough to sit down at the table with them. 

“Not exactly. I’ve been to Perth, I guess that’s close enough.” 

Zoe thought about it all some more. “Kalamunda is a real place?”

“Of course it is! Do you think I made up a place? Do you think I’m crazy?” Mr Gray exclaimed. “Kalamunda, Australia! We are catching the tiger snake!”

“Gray here is a part of an expedition group dedicated to studying different reptiles, isn’t that right?” Abbot explained.

“Yes, last week we were in Indonesia, faced an indian krait face to face, fang to fang. I was sure I was going to be a goner!”

Abbot smiled and shook his head before turning to look at Zoe, whose hands were awkwardly resting against the back of a chair. “I’ll handle him. Please go and check your other patients, I assume they have also been left unattended.”

Zoe nodded and headed for the door.

“Oh, and Kasprzyk, stay out of the ambulance bay for tonight. Handle what you got now and assist patients from the waiting area, okay?”

“Alright, got it.” She smiled faintly and left the break room.

The message was clear.

Kasprzyk, don’t put a finger on incoming trauma because you cannot even handle the patients you have. Kasprzyk can’t multitask. ‘Kasprzyk do the basics and don’t try to score in the big league. ’

First impression on the night shift has been screwed. And it started off so well… The night shift attending will now only see her as incompetent. 

Abbot did not talk to her for the rest of the night. He and Ellis handled all the trauma coming in. Paul Greg Ross was obviously disturbed by the procedure Kasprzyk gifted him. Her only potential conversationalist was Dr Shen.

Boston, Cincinnati, Columbus, Tampa. Those were the guesses Shen put forward in the rest of the shift.

Zoe tried to take on as few patients as possible and monitor little Sam and the overdose man. She kept the latter one for a few extra hours, simply because she was worried she had missed something. 

A lifetime passed before Zoe walked into the locker room to get her bag and head home. 

“That can’t happen again,” Abbot said, standing at the entrance. 

Zoe jumped at his voice slightly, dropping her zip-up.

“I don’t think I need to tell you that forgetting about patients is a serious offence. Especially the mentally confused ones.”

“How is he?”

Abbot frowned. “Uh, fine. His nursing home reached out.”

“Good, good.” She bent down to pick up her zip-up. “Sorry, I have never forgotten to check up on patients before, let alone lose one. I can assure you that-”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure you are sorry.” Abbot waved her off. “Look, it's your first night shift, I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt. Call it a grace period. If it happens again, I’m reporting to Robby for your reassessment. Please come alert and ready for today’s shift.”

“Of course.”

Chapter Text

“Dr Kasprzyk, you shadow me tonight,” Abbot said at the beginning of Zoe’s second night shift. “No patients of your own, we do everything together, so pray to whomever you believe in that the night won’t be rough.”

“Is it a form of punishment?” Zoe asked, trying to keep up next to Abbot.

“Punishment, pff.” He scoffed as he grabbed a chart off one of the nurses' tables and flipped through it. “It’s a learning experience. More for you than for me.” The latter part of the sentence was a whisper, an afterthought more than a proper sentence. 

Whatever was written in the chart did not satisfy Abbot, and he plopped it back onto the table. “Maybe I really should’ve sent you with Shen and Paul.. Doug Ross.”

“Fairly sure it's Greg.”

“With a name like that, does it really matter?”

The two of them reached the central hub, and Abbot looked up at the screens, hands placed on his hips. 

“Dana, do you know to whom I can pass my patients so I can dip?” Dr Santos asked, walking towards the hub, hands resting on the stethoscope around her neck.

Dana didn’t look up as she answered, “Kasprzyk just got here.”

“So she can abandon them and let them code?” Santos shook her head, looking Zoe up and down. “Oh, absolutely not. I’ll go search for someone myself.”

“What did she say?” Kasprzyk asked, obviously knowing the answer and understanding its implication. “I thought you let me go on that.” She whispered to Abbot.

“Mhm?” He kept reading the screen, squinting his eyes ever so slightly. “Oh, yeah, I did,” Abbot said after a beat when Kasprzyk’s question finally registered. “Nurses talk Kasprzyk, not me.” 

“Great.” Zoe sighed. “That means Dr Robinavich knows?”

“Mh.” Was all Abbot said in response.

“Did he say anything to you about it?” 

“Eh.”

“I mean, it’s not that bad of an offense, right? No one was hurt; it was an honest mistake. I have not caused an accident in the Pitt yet. I mean, max what can happen is, what, probation? It’s not the type of offence you get fired for at all.”

Abbot raised his hand. “Dr Kasprzyk, if you want to pester someone about it, how about going to Robby and talking to him, eh? You're giving me an aneurysm.”

“Knock on wood,” Dana called from the other end of the hub.

Abbot finally turned to face Kasprzyk, towering slightly above her. “See? Nurses listen and then they talk.” He smirked and then rubbed his palms together. “You gonna continue having a crisis, or are we going to work?”

“I’m done.” Zoe raised her hands in surrender.

“Good, cus we got something,” Abbot said, eyes narrowing at the rising action at the end of the hall.

A couple was running, a mother in hysterics, and a father holding a child in his hands.

“Please help!” The mother screamed. “I don’t think she is breathing.”

Abbot and Kasprzyk rushed over, meeting the parents halfway. Nurse Lordes was accompanying them, his eyes halfway up his forehead. 

“Lordes, a gurney!” Abbot instructed.

“Sir, yes, sir,” Lordes said, pulling an empty bed from around the corner. 

“What happened?” Abbot asked the parents, trying to get a look at the kid. 

“We are not sure,” the father said through a heavy breath. “She was fine, and then she was out cold.”

Abbot assisted the father in lowering the girl onto the gurney. “Trauma one.”

They started rolling the gurney across the hall. While in action, Kasprzyk examined the girl, opening her eyes and flashing a light into them. “Her pupils are pinpoint.” 

Abbot eyed Kasprzyk. One of the common reasons for miotic pupils was opioids.  “Did she eat something?” 

“No, well, yes, but we all had the same food for dinner.” The mother said. She had a strong grip on the gurney, her knuckles turning white. 

They rolled the girl into trauma one. Under the bright lights, Kasprzyk could see better the buildup of sweat on the little girl's forehead. 

“Prep for an IV,” Abbot said, and Zoe grabbed a pair of gloves. “Any conditions we need to know about?”

“She’s always been really healthy.” The mother said, refusing to step away. 

“Miss…?” Zoe asked. 

The mother answered weakly. “Owens.”

“Miss Owens, what did your daughter do today?” 

“Uh, well, school. She went to school, that's it. What is happening? Is she breathing?”

“BP’s 85 over 45, pulse 50,” Lordes said.

“Football!” Mr. Owens exclaimed. “Before dinner, she went to play football with her friends.” 

“She’s bradycardic and hypotensive,” Kasprzyk whispered to herself as she prepped to start the IV. 

Just as Zoe was about to put the needle through, the little girl started seizing. Her mother yelped loudly, trying to grab hold of her daughter. “What's going on?”

“Miss Owens, I need you to step away, your daughter is seizing,” Abbot said, but the mother didn’t budge. Abbot crossed around to reach Kasprzyk, grabbing the IV out of her hands and putting it in as the girl continued seizing. “Push 4 milligrams of Diazepam.” Mr. Owens watched everything from a distance, his face pale, back pressed into the corner.

“Maya, Maya…” He kept whispering.

“No change, push another round of Diazepam,” Abbot ordered.

The doors to trauma one opened, “What do we got?” Dr Ellis asked as she put on her gloves.

“A young female, unconscious, pupils are bilaterally miotic, started seizing…” Kasprzyk started reciting. She leaned in closer towards the girl until her nose was hovering above her shirt and took a deep breath in.

“What are you..?” Ellis asked with a slight disgust on her face. 

“Could it be insecticide poisoning?” Kasprzyk suggested. “She played football in a field?”

Mr Owens nodded in response. Maya stopped seizing by then.

Abbot and Ellis stared at each other, exchanging a conversation without words, considering. “Did she exhibit signs of strong weakness after?” He asked the parents.

“She wanted to go to bed right after dinner.” Ms Owens replied, her palms pressed against her lips. 

“Heart rate’s dropping, 47,” Lordes called.

“Fuck it,” Abbot whispered, “1.5 Atropine.” 

Lordes sprang into action. Kasprzyk did as well, grabbing a needle to draw blood while Ellis waved a different nurse over.

“Cholinesterase levels, both plasma and RBC, stat. Like right this second.” Ellis said as she waited for Kasprzyk to drop a tube of blood into her hand. 

With the first dose of atropine, there was little to no change. “Let’s prep for an intubation and hope we don’t need it,”  Abbot said. 

“Should we have 2-PAM ready just in case?” Kasprzyk suggested.

“Yeah, let’s do that.” Abbot agreed. “One more minute and we do another round of Atropine.”

It took four doses of atropine to get to the so-called "atropinization". Labs confirmed, plasma cholinesterase was undetectable, RBC AChE’s severely depressed. Organophosphate poisoning. They started Maya on 2-PAM slowly, ensuring that they don’t cause cardiac arrest in the little girl. 

Her clothes were to be disposed of, and once she is more stable, Maya needed to undergo at least three rounds of washing.

“We should all get changed as well, just in case,” Abbot said as he took off his gloves. “Lordes, get the ICU on the line. Keep an eye on her. If anything changes, you get me.”

After a long round of reassurance to the parents, Abbot and Kasprzyk finally left trauma room one. Soon enough, Maya was taken up to the ICU where she would spend at least three days as the doctors ensured her safe recovery.

Maya Owens wasn’t far from being the only patient who would have a prolonged stay at the PTMC. The Kraken from the day before, the one that kicked Shen with his feet, was still in the behavioural room. Still as aggressive, still without a place to go.

“No ID?” Abbot asked Faith Shaw.

The charge nurse was typing fast on the computer, her mouth slightly opened as she focused. “No.”

“Any luck in having a conversation with him?” Abbot leaned onto the desk.

Faith snorted. “Do you wanna have a go with him?”

“Why would I?” Abbot straightened out. “Besides, we got trauma coming in.”

“I haven’t heard anything yet.” Faith retorted. 

Abbot drummed his hands against the desk as he turned away. “Just wait.”

Abbot was right, two minutes later, they got a dispatch call. Trauma was ten minutes out. A woman fell out of the second-storey window.

Kasprzyk did fairly well during the shift. She did misdiagnose a patient with a heart attack, and also dropped two scalpels onto the ground during a high-tension procedure, but other than that, she held up. Towards the end of the shift, she was let go by Abbot to go and join Paul Pete Ross (that's what Abbot called him this time) in the stitching-up duty. She would have read that as a form of punishment if not for Abbots:

“Good work.”

As he sent her on her merry way.

After that shift, she was allowed to have patients, but for the first week, Zoe was to report to Dr Ellis every hour on what she was thinking, how her patients were doing, and ask for assistance if the case presented any challenges. 

Dr Ellis kept a careful and judging eye on Kasprzyk. Zoe forgetting about three of her patients and losing one of them was a serious offence in Dr Ellis's eyes. 

“If it was up to me, I’d sign you up for rectal duty until the end of your rotation,” Ellis remarked one night.

The only person who seemed not to care at all about what Kasprzyk did or didn’t do was Dr Shen; his only concern was discussing White Lotus, gossiping about other departments, and guessing where Zoe was from.

“Denver?” He asked as they made coffee in the break room, Kasprzyk putting in four spoons of sugar into hers.

“No.”

“You gotta tell me whether I am getting warmer or colder.”

“Eh, you are cold.”

Shen took a sip of his coffee. “Wait, you are not from Warsaw or something?”

Kasprzyk shook her head, “Nope.”

“You been there?”

“Once,” Zoe tasted her coffee to see whether it needed some cream, “When I was like fourteen.”

Shen shook his head, “I’ve never been. I’m more of a Paris guy. Or Rome.” And then he proceeded to give a long story of his travels through Europe before he started med school, because, naturally, Shen was the type of man to gather all his guy friends and spend several months drinking in Germany and the Czech Republic. 

And of course, he took an annual vacation either on the Amalfi coast or in Majorca. And naturally Zoe had to listen to it, even when they had a patient to attend to. 

The worst case of the first night shift rotation happened on Zoe’s last night, when a mother and her son came in after being hit by a drunk driver. For three hours, it was total and utter chaos between the trauma rooms. The patients kept coming in and out of consciousness and asking to see the other. When the mother was asking for her son, he was out cold. When the son was asking for his mother, she was out cold. 

The trauma was severe, Zoe’s shoes were soaked with blood to the point of no return. She would feel it when she walked for the next couple of days. Hands buried deep inside the abdomen of an adolescent, trying to prevent him from bleeding out. His broken hand was trying to grab hold of her as he cried out in pain.

The sound of the machine when he flatlined. The hard silence after four rounds of epi. The sound of feet shuffling out of the room when the time of death was pronounced. The heavy sigh of the team next door when they walked out with the same news.

The sight of two bodies being rolled out. The attempt to comprehend that they needed to keep working because there was still an hour left of the shift.

By the end of it all, all Zoe wanted was a cigarette. But, she couldn’t wait until she got away from the hospital. If the nicotine did not hit her system within the next ten minutes, she would shove her fingers into her eye sockets and pull her brain matter out.

There was no way Kasprzyk would smoke right outside the hospital, but she did know that there was a roof access. Sure that no one would be there, Zoe grabbed her pack of cigarettes, shoved it into her pocket, and headed for the stairs, stepping over two steps at a time.

She walked instead of taking the elevator, naturally, for she needed to walk off whatever it was that had happened during this shift. The cigarette rested in her lips as she climbed the last flight and saw the roof access door up ahead. 

Zoe lit the cigarette the moment the door opened, and took the first drag as the metal slammed loudly behind her.

“Jesus,” a grunt came from somewhere. 

Zoe stopped and stared at Dr Abbot as he stood behind the railing, hands deep in his pockets, visibly startled by the loud sound. Like a teenager getting caught, Kasprzyk hid the cigarette behind her back.

Abbot simply turned around, looking at the view of Pittsburgh in the early sunlight. He then extended his palm out, signalling Zoe over. Kasprzyk walked slowly as Abbot kept his hand raised, waiting.

She put the cigarette between her lips and then gave the pack to Abbot. He took one cigarette out, stared at it resting between his fingers, and then asked for the lighter.

“They say this shit kills you,” He said, “One way to find out.” Abbot blew out a cloud of smoke, turning his head away from Kasprzyk.

Zoe rested against the railing, shoving the pack back into her pocket and staring forward. The two stood in silence, the sun shining bright orange, light reflecting off the building in front and blinding Zoe. The cars gathered into the morning traffic, an occasional blasting of a horn from an impatient driver, and the sound of an approaching ambulance reached the doctors on the roof. 

The air was crisp with the smell of June that signalled that it would get hot by noon. However, it wasn’t as hot as it was in Chicago around this time. Zoe was still getting used to the new city. Pittsburgh felt like a collection of small towns clustered together compared to Chicago. It was less busy and full of hills and valleys. She liked that aspect of Pittsburgh; she could go to Frick Park and pretend she wasn’t in the city at all. Chicago never properly allowed her that illusion.

She did miss taking the EL, even though it was always loud and full of craziness, like people smoking drugs on the train and the trash everywhere. But Zoe had no business driving a car, hated it, avoided it. So the EL was a blessing, and Pittsburgh severely lacked in its public transportation for Zoe. 

Despite her technically being from Milwaukee, her life always revolved around Chicago. It was her home, and looking out at the skyline of Pittsburgh, she couldn’t stop thinking about it. About how much she felt when standing on the roof of UChicago and how little she felt now, on top of PTMC. 

“You back on day shift?” Abbot asked. 

Zoe extinguished her cigarette. The urge to chain smoke was strong, but she felt that it would be too much to do in front of her attending. “Yeah…”

Abbot snorted, shook his head, and climbed over the railing. “Good luck.” And with that, he headed down, leaving Zoe alone. Kasprzyk took it as an opportunity to quickly light a second cigarette. And then the third. 

It may be hard to believe that she was not a smoker at all. She kept a pack on her just in case. Specifically for days like this. And today she was glad she did that.

With three cigarettes down, Zoe felt ready to go back to the Pitt and get going.

She headed to the locker room, seeing the day shift arrive, no one but Santos looked rested and ready to work. Robby stood at the hub, talking with Abbot and other members of the staff. A joke passed between them, but Zoe couldn’t hear it, nor did she really care to catch it. She wanted to leave and prayed that she could do it without interacting with anyone from the day shift.

But of course Langdon was in the locker room, and of course he had to make a remark about Kasprzyk's fiasco at the beginning of her first night shift. Christ, it has been three weeks, why would anyone even care anymore?

With the bag slumped on her shoulder, Zoe headed for the exit.

“Dr Kasprzyk?” Robby called her over. 

She stopped in her tracks, closed her eyes briefly, and turned to face her attending with a smile.

“Tomorrow, 7 am.” He said.

“Yep, I remember.” How could she not?

“See you then.” 

Zoe had a little less than twenty-four hours for herself. And as much as she wanted nothing more than to plop on her bed and not move for all those hours, she had business to attend to. So she took her sweet time walking home, soaking in the moments of solitude.

Chapter Text

The reason for Zoe’s move to Pittsburgh sat in front of her. Every Sunday at 11 am, the two of them met at a little corner cafe where they ordered the same thing every time: pancakes with maple syrup, a full English breakfast, coffee, and orange juice.

“But he doesn’t remember who he is!” Evan said, with maple syrup dripping down his chin. “He ends up in this Roman camp, and obviously no one knows him.”

He waved his fork around as he told Zoe about this book he had been reading. It was Percy Jackson, but “It’s like an addition, so you have five Percy Jackson books and then there are Heroes of Olympus, but really, it's the same thing. Like the story and the characters.” He explained.

Zoe didn’t particularly care to understand the plot; she just wanted Evan to be able to express himself. She was glad to see him talking as much as he was. When she called him a few months, just after their father's passing, he barely talked. 

Death was a hard thing to comprehend and deal with for everyone. But for a little child, it was as confusing as it could get. As unbearable as it could get. 

We are never prepared for our parents to die.

But Zoe was. Not only had she been prepared for her father's death, but she had wished for it. And afterward, she found herself feeling sick at the very thought. The guilt crept up on her only on Sundays, when she was forced to look at Evan, whose life was now forever ruined, and learn how to live with the fact that she had wanted it to happen.

Because for Evan, Randy was a father. For Zoe, he was a man who happened to be her father. A name that was whispered in the dead of night by her mother when she talked to someone on a phone. A figure that Zoe vaguely remembered in the doorway. A voice that always yelled.

Evan didn’t know the wrath of that man. Zoe was glad.

But also indescribably and horrifyingly jealous.

“And how is school?” Zoe asked, mouth half full of sausage.

“Eh.” Evan shrugged his shoulders. “We are out in a week, so teachers gave up on teaching us.”

“And then it’s what, eighth grade?”

“Yeah, and then it’s freshman year and all of high school and then university and then that’s it. I’m kinda done when you think about it.” Evan took such a big gulp of his drink that it spilled all over his chin and the table.

Zoe passed him a set of napkins, which he threw uselessly at the newly formed puddle, wiping his face with his sleeve instead. “Don’t rush, you've got plenty of life up ahead.”

“Argh, that’s what sucks. I wish I was an adult already.”

“No, you don’t,” Zoe laughed.

“Wait, did you work today?” Evan asked, and Zoe nodded in response. “How was it? Was it gory? Did someone’s intestines fall out?”

The only intestines that had fallen out were Zoe’s when she had gotten home after the shift. She spent at least thirty minutes above the toilet bowl before she could gather herself up to go and meet Evan. The thought of going back to the hospital was making her spiral. 

She was going to walk in the next morning and be greeted by Dr Robby’s already disappointed face. She would have to go through patients at the speed of lightning, with nurses stressing out and the waiting area filling up faster than a football arena. She would make at least three mistakes, hear at least four remarks, and get about zero bathroom breaks.

Zoe didn’t need a third eye to know all of that.

And sure enough, she was right.

“Dr Kasprzyk.” Dr Robby said in a greeting, but it sounded as if Zoe was a dead weight that just got attached to his body.

“Good morning,” she responded, smiling. If she had reciprocated Dr Robby's constant dread for living, she wouldn’t have been standing on her feet much longer.

Zoe got to the locker rooms and was greeted by Mel. “I heard you got to do a clamshell thoracotomy!” She smiled.

Kasprsyk sighed. “Not really, Dr Abbot did all the work.”

“But still! You've got to watch it, and I think that’s really cool. And next time you could assist.” Mel clasped her hands together, bringing them to rest just below her chin as she watched Zoe put her stuff away. It took Kasprzyk a few beats to realize that Mel was waiting for her.

So she picked up the pace, grabbed her badge, and shut the locker. 

“Christ, did the night shift even do anything today?” Zoe asked, staring at the boards as they approached the hub.

“We collapsed without you, Kasper.” Dr Shen said, heading for the exit.

“Kasprsyk, please and thank you.” She corrected him and carried on walking, attempting to ignore Shen. 

But Shen had other plans. He followed suit and extended a tablet towards Kasprzyk. 

“What is that?” She asked.

“My patients. I’m off, someone's gotta take them.” 

Zoe shook her head. “I’m not taking over your patients.”

“I can take some,” Mel proposed.

Shen smiled and let go of the tablet, which left Zoe with no choice but to take it. 

“Here you go, Dr…” Shen squinted his eyes at Mel until she caught on.

“King.”

“Dr King, right, sorry, night shift amnesia. Dr King can help you out!” He patted Zoe’s back, which, with his heavy hand, felt like a murder attempt. “Five patients. One is waiting on labs, one needs monitoring every hour, and this one is in restraints for the next four hours. This one got a nasty kidney stone, but no place to admit him. And this one is waiting for a surgical consult.” He said as he swiped quickly on the tablet.

“Which I believe is Garcia today, so good luck, she might be worse than Walsh.”  

Zoe sighed. “Yeah, I know Garcia fairly well.”

“This is your redemption arc,” Shen said, making an explosion with his hands and walking away.

“Can I?” Mel asked, extending her hand for the tablet. “I can take the surgical consult and-” 

Mel continued talking, suggesting how she may help Zoe, but Kasprzyk became fixated on the hub, where Abbot was saying goodbye to Robby. The two were mirror images of each other, both bowed by years of tending to others, shoulders heavy with the weight of borrowed baggage. Yet even though Robby stood higher, Abbot somehow seemed taller. You could tell that something was eating at Robby. For Abbot, one had to guess. 

“You missed a nasty GSW,” Abbot said as he walked past Kasprzyk.

“How nasty?”

“Tarantino level of blood.”

“Did they make it?”

“Somehow.” Abbot shook his head and raised a hand in goodbye, heading for the exit with a backpack slumped over his shoulder. 

“So, you cool with this?” Mel asked, lips pursed.

Kasprzyk wasn’t sure what Dr King was referring to, but she agreed to her suggestion. Being thrown back to the day shift hit Zoe with a wave of realization that she was a lot more anxious standing in the pitt during daylight.

She spent the whole rotation thinking about it, trying to figure out the reason. Each morning, she would catch a glimpse of the night shift, with Shen walking without a care in the world and Ellis throwing a snarky remark at anyone who got caught up under her feet. Faith would yell at someone on the staff, and then she would sigh and give up, letting the anger die down. 

Abbot always looked solemn, but he would make a remark so depressing it became funny, and he would find it genuinely amusing. 

The night shift was simply on a different wavelength. And Zoe was learning a lot about herself. Because she was nowhere near their spiritual acceptance of how much the world sucked, but she longed for it. 

Two weeks into the day shift rotation, Kasprzyk showed up early by a mile. The clock was just coming to six o’clock, but Zoe couldn’t sleep and decided that maybe she could come down to the pitt and look over her charts and reports from last night. She remembered pretty much nothing from the day before and was afraid that she had forgotten to write something down.

Kasprzyk was greeted by Faith's never-wavering annoyance towards anyone younger than 55. “You lot got nothing better to do than to show up here?” She asked. 

“Unfortunately, yes,” Zoe said, sliding into a chair by an empty station. 

All was quiet in the pitt. An omen of something bad on the horizon. But Zoe was in a complete zone of dissociation that she couldn’t even process if anything was happening around her. She reviewed her charts, which looked all good, meaning that her coming early was an absolute waste of time.

She clicked from file to file, everything filled, everything approved. 

“That’s just sad.” A voice echoed somewhere to her left. Abbot walked into the central bay, setting a cup of coffee in front of himself. 

“What is?” Zoe asked, her cheek resting against her palm.

“You being here.”

“I work here.”

“Not for another hour.”

“As if you don’t always come in before your shift.” Kasprzyk logged off the computer and pushed the chair away from the table, looking around.

“I’m an attending and you are…” 

Abbot didn’t finish the sentence, taking a sip of his coffee instead. Kasprzyk spun her chair around, hands crossed across her chest.

“Do enlighten me.” She said. “What am I?”

Abbot pondered, analyzing the patient board. “An abscess.” He pointed at the patient log S_15.

“How sweet,” Kaspryzk whispered to herself as she got up. “Talking about sweet, where is Shen?”

Lordes cruised by the station, hands on his heart. “Missing him? Sad that you are alone on the day shift?”

Zoe shook her head. A tiny part of her very early breakfast made its way up her throat. “No, I actually want to avoid him.”

Lordes nodded in understanding, “Fairly sure he is taking a nap in the family room.”

Abbot raised his hands in question but quickly put them down, not being able to actually bother. 

“Awesome, I’ll head to the chair then.” Zoe took her ID, clipped it to the waistband of her scrubs, and headed across the central bay. 

It’s a true miracle when she noticed something happening in room 9, for Zoe kept her gaze glued to the ground. But that one split second of her looking around was enough for her to catch a seizing patient. The body hanging halfway down from the bed, palm hitting the ground over and over as a young girl convulses.

“Crash cart!” That's all Zoe said before swinging the door open and hurrying towards the patient, trying to lift her back up onto the bed.

There was no time to focus on a second pair of hands that appeared by her side and get the girl up. She was young, eighteen at most, wearing a simple pajama set. Her brown hair was plastered all over her face, sticking to the sweat that formed on her forehead. 

“Kasprzyk start an IV.” Abbot ordered, trying to do the quickest examination of the patient possible. 

Lordes rushed inside, chart in hand.

“Whose patient is it?” Abbot asked. 

“No one’s,” Lordes answered, assisting Kasprzyk as she asked for Ativan. 

“Do I push four?” Zoe asked.

“Push four.” Abbot agreed. “What do you mean it’s no one’s patient?”

“She just came in!” Nurse Yang said with horror from the doorway. “Three minutes ago, I left her to order labs.” Yang gloved up, running towards the bed and gripping its side.

Abbot asked. “What did she complain of?”

“Fever and shortness of breath.” Yang replied. 

Slowly, the girl stops seizing. 

“Diagnosis?” Abbot lifts his eyes to meet Kasprzyk.

Zoe steps closer, examining the girl's neck. “Stiff, fever, seizure, this could be meningitis? But can’t say without any labs.”

“Which is why we're gonna prepare for a spinal tap.” Abbot rubs his hands together, looking over the patient as Yang and Lordes get moving. “Scratch that, actually, we are going to bag her because she just stopped breathing.” 

Kaspryzk froze. The monitor behind her was showing normal stats, and she just had her hands against the girl’s neck; the pulse was there. 

But sure enough, the oxygen started dropping. 90. 88. 82. 

“How did you-” Kasprzyk asked, hands hovering in the air.

Abbot raised his hands to mimic her. “Bag her Kaspryzk!”

She nodded. “Right.”

With a steady hand, Kasprzyk squeezed the bag, watching the monitor, hoping to see the oxygen level rise.

“You know what that means,” Abbot said when the oxygen level did not climb up.

“We are intubating, yay,” Kasprzyk said deadpan.

“You are,” Abbot took off his gloves. “You know how it goes and what to do after?”

Zoe nodded, accepting suction from Lordes. “Normal saline, norepi if hypotensive, CBC, CMP, all that jazz, and I assume we are not waiting to do LP for antibiotics?”

“Rocephin two grams, vanco IV and-”

“Dex with first abx.” Kasprzyk finished.

“Why am I even here?” Abbot tossed his gloves, but never ended up actually leaving the room. “Did the day shift decide to throw an early morning party, or why is everyone here?”

Zoe had just pushed the patient's bed away from the wall to get a better angle. The blade was sturdy in her hand, but there he was, Doctor Robinavitch, like in her worst nightmares. A vulture ready to swallow her whole.

“Kaspryzk stop. What’s going on?” Robby asked.

“Seizure, fever, and… uh, all that jazz,” Abbot quickly pointed at Zoe. “Kasprzyk is intubating. Probably meningitis, she’s gonna-”

“Why is Kasprzyk intubating alone?” Robby asked.

Abbot was slightly dumbfounded, which happened rarely whenever in conversation with Robby. “She is a resident?”

“Why is Kasprzyk intubating alone?” Robby repeated.

Zoe kept standing there, patient's airway in front of her, the monitor over her shoulder showing the oxygen dropping.

“She’s done it before,” Abbott reassured Robby, crossing his hands over his chest. 

“Am I or you intrubating her, or are we planning on calling her time of death soon?” Kasprzyk said, looking at the monitor to avoid the attending's eyes.

Dr Robby gloved up and pushed her out of the way, taking over the intubation. Kasprzyk did not stick around to watch him do it. She tossed her gloves into the trash bin and walked out.

“Lordes, Yang, you can go,” Abbot said, holding the door for them and shutting it promptly after the nurses had disappeared. He watched as Robby pushed the tube into the airway.

“You are an ass to her,” Abbot observed, “You don’t like her.”

Robby didn’t respond. He waited to see the oxygen levels go up and confirm that his intubation was successful.

“This can’t be about her night shift fuck up, so did she do something during the day shift that I should be aware of?” Abbot asked. 

“She is a fine resident," Robby said, his eyebrows going up his forehead.

“Robby, I need to be aware if I’m working with a doctor who can present a threat to patients.”

Robby sighed. “I don’t think she can present a threat.”

“Then what is it?” 

The two doctors stood at the head of a patient's bed. She was stable now, but she had a mile to go before being anywhere close to healthy. They both knew that. And so did the nurse Yang, who floated outside the room, ominously staring at the doctors.

“She got here through Dr Gao’s recommendation.”

Abbot stared at his friend, frowning. “Okay, and you know that Dr Gao or what’s the problem?”

“She got here past admissions on an urgent transfer, which went directly to Gloria because apparently she and Dr Gao are old pals.”

“I don’t understand.”

Robby sighed once again, Yang getting on his nerves. 

“You don't like that Kasprzyk has connections?” Abbot asked.

Robby headed for the door. “I don’t like the situation. That Dr Gao isn’t even an ER doctor.”

“Are you concerned that she is not qualified, then?”

“I’m concerned that she appeared out of nowhere when we are understaffed due to budget cuts. Hell is breaking loose, but Gloria finds her a spot.”

“So is it Kasprzyk or Gloria that you have a problem with?”

“Both.” Robby finally opened the door and was greeted with an aggravated look from Yang, who rushed in to get the patient on antibiotics.

With the nurse in the way, Robby got a head start towards the central hub, leaving Abbot behind. He did a quick scan of his surroundings, but Kasprzyk was nowhere to be seen. He pitied her, for she was about to go through a whole day shift. 

At least he was off. 

Whatever drama was to unveil now was none of his concern.