Chapter Text
The sirens were wrong.
Robby knew that before he even knew his own name.
They weren’t the controlled, purposeful wail he had spent decades trusting, the sound that meant movement, action, intervention. These sirens were jagged, tearing through his skull in uneven bursts, like something wounded and screaming instead of something racing to save a life. His life. Or what was left of it. The world came to him in fragments: heat pressed against his skin, the thick, suffocating warmth of a July night clinging to him like a second body; the acrid tang of gasoline and burned rubber coating the back of his throat; something wet and sticky along his ribs. Blood, distantly, clinically, he recognized it…too much of it. Not arterial spray. Slower. Internal, maybe. That thought should have alarmed him. It didn’t. Nothing did. Not anymore.
He tried to open his eyes, and light stabbed through him so violently it felt like a physical weapon. His head pulsed in response, a deep, nauseating throb that radiated from the base of his skull forward, blooming behind his eyes like a migraine turned catastrophic. Concussion, his brain supplied automatically. Possibly worse. The word bleed hovered somewhere just out of reach. Subdural? Epidural? He couldn’t hold onto the thought long enough to decide.
“—hey! HEY! Stay with me!”
The voice was too loud. Too sharp. It cut through him, and he flinched, or tried to. His body didn’t respond the way it should. Something was wrong with his arm—no, his arm was not where it was supposed to be. There was a sickening, grinding shift when he attempted to move, and pain exploded up his shoulder in a blinding wave.
Fracture. Displaced. Possibly humerus. Possibly multiple.
“Don’t move him like that—”
“We don’t have time, he’s combative!”
Hands were on him. Rough hands. Not careful. Not deliberate. They grabbed his arm—that arm—and the world went white. The scream never made it out of his throat; it existed only inside his skull, a silent rupture of sound that ricocheted against bone and thought and memory. His mouth opened anyway, jaw trembling, but nothing came. No words. No protest. Just air.
“I said hold him still!”
“I am—he keeps fighting—”
He wasn’t fighting.
He was trying to breathe.
The oxygen mask was forced over his face too hard, the plastic biting into his cheekbones, the elastic snapping against the back of his head. He sucked in air that tasted sterile and wrong, his lungs stuttering around it like they didn’t remember how to do this anymore. His chest hurt. Not sharp…no, not a clean break. Deep. Bruising. Maybe contusions. Maybe worse. He tried to take a deeper breath and couldn’t.
“BP’s dropping—”
“Yeah, no kidding—”
“Sir, can you tell me your name?”
Robby tried.
God, he tried.
He knew it. He knew it. It sat right there at the edge of his mind, something familiar and solid and important, but when he reached for it, it slipped through his fingers like water. His tongue felt too heavy, his lips numb. He forced them to move anyway.
“R—”
Nothing.
His head lolled to the side. The inside of the ambulance blurred past him in streaks of white and red and motion. The sirens kept screaming.
This is it, he thought distantly. This is how it happens.
And somewhere beneath that thought, quieter but sharper, something answered:
Good.
The doors burst open with a violent clang, and the world shifted again, brighter, louder, colder. The emergency department swallowed him whole, fluorescent lights glaring down like interrogation lamps, voices overlapping in a chaotic chorus that should have been familiar, should have been grounding, but instead felt alien, like he had stumbled into someone else’s life.
“Male, late forties to early fifties, MVC versus motorcycle—no helmet—”
No helmet.
Right.
That had been intentional.
“—GCS fluctuating, currently thirteen but dropping, possible head injury, obvious deformity to left upper extremity, hypotensive en route—”
“Any allergies?”
“No ID on him—”
“No ID?”
The words echoed strangely in Robby’s ears, like they didn’t belong to him. No ID. Of course not. He hadn’t brought anything. He hadn’t planned to need it.
Hands again. More of them. Pulling, shifting, transferring. His back screamed in protest when they moved him off the stretcher, a deep, grinding pain that stole what little breath he had left. He gasped—or tried to—and the sound came out wet, broken.
“Easy, easy—”
“He’s fighting—”
I am not—
The words never formed.
He lifted his hand, or thought he did, and tried to push them away, to create space, to make them stop just for a second so he could understand what was happening, but his coordination was gone, his movement sloppy and delayed. Someone caught his wrist mid-air and forced it down.
“Yeah, he’s combative.”
I’m not—
Still nothing.
“Let’s move him to psych observation, we don’t have time for this—”
Psych observation room.
The words hit something deep, something instinctive, something that tried to rise up through the fog and panic and confusion and scream no, but it got lost somewhere along the way. He couldn’t organize the thought fast enough. Couldn’t make them understand.
I’m a doctor, he tried to say.
His mouth opened.
Silence.
The leather straps were too tight.
They dug into his wrists with a biting, unyielding pressure, pinning him to the bed like he was something dangerous, something unpredictable, something that needed to be contained. His legs were restrained too, he could feel the tension across his ankles, the way even the smallest movement pulled against the bindings. His broken arm lay at an unnatural angle, unsupported, throbbing with every beat of his heart.
“Stop moving,” a voice snapped.
I—
Nothing.
His head rolled to the side, vision swimming. The room was wrong. Smaller. Dimmer. Not a trauma bay. Not resus. No monitors screaming overhead, no organized chaos, no team moving in practiced synchrony. Just… this. A holding space. A place for problems, not patients.
His chest tightened.
No.
Something wasn’t right.
Think.
Think.
His eyes drifted across the room, unfocused at first, then slowly, slowly, things began to click into place. The layout. The walls. The faint scuff marks near the door where gurneys always clipped the frame on the way in.
Recognition hit him like a second impact.
PTMC.
His hospital.
A flicker of relief sparked in his chest, weak but real. Okay. Okay. That was good. That meant—
Jack.
Jack would be here.
Night shift.
Jack would fix this.
Jack would walk in, take one look at the situation, and everything would fall back into place because that’s what Jack did—intense, relentless, unyielding Jack, who never let things stay broken if he could help it. Robby tried to hold onto that thought, tried to anchor himself to it, to the idea of familiar footsteps and a sharp voice cutting through the noise—
And then it hit him.
Harder than the crash.
Jack wouldn’t be here.
Because Dana had sent everyone home.
Because the strike—
Because Jesse—
Because Emma—
Because everything had already been falling apart long before Robby ever got on that bike.
A cold, hollow feeling spread through his chest, heavier than the blood loss, heavier than the pain. Dana hadn’t picked up. He remembered that now. The ringing. The voicemail. The silence.
Dana always picked up.
Except this time.
She’s done with you, something in his mind whispered.
And maybe she should be.
The ER had survived without him before. It would again. Dr. Baran Al-Hashimi would take over, brilliant and composed. The residents would adapt. They always did.
Robby swallowed, or tried to. His throat was dry, tight.
You were never necessary, the voice continued. Just… convenient.
His gaze drifted upward, unfocused, tracing the harsh fluorescent light above him. It buzzed faintly, an irritating, persistent hum that he couldn’t tune out.
The ER had been the only thing holding him together.
The only thing louder than the memories.
The only place where the noise in his head made sense.
And now—
Nothing.
No reason.
No anchor.
No Jack.
Jack, who was angry.
Jack, who had looked at him like he didn’t recognize him anymore.
Jack, who had heard what Robby said to Mohan and hadn’t defended him, hadn’t understood, hadn’t—
Robby’s chest tightened, a different kind of pain this time, sharp and suffocating and far too familiar.
He had burned that bridge himself.
Of course he had.
Anger was easier than grief.
Cruelty was easier than guilt.
If everyone hated him, he didn’t have to explain why he couldn’t save them. Why he couldn’t save anyone.
Why he couldn’t save himself.
The room felt colder.
Or maybe that was him.
He shivered, a subtle, involuntary tremor that ran through his body despite the warmth of the July night still clinging faintly to his skin. His fingers felt numb. His lips, too.
Shock, his mind supplied weakly.
Untreated.
Ignored.
Of course.
“Vitals?” someone asked from somewhere beyond the door.
“Stable enough,” another voice replied dismissively. “He’ll be fine.”
Robby almost laughed.
It came out as a shallow, broken exhale.
He’ll be fine.
He closed his eyes.
The darkness was immediate, heavy, almost comforting.
For a moment, he let himself imagine something different—Jack’s voice, low and steady, cutting through the chaos; Dana’s hand on his shoulder, firm and grounding; the familiar rhythm of the ER when it worked the way it was supposed to, when people cared, when they tried.
For a moment, he let himself pretend he wasn’t alone.
Then even that slipped away.
His breathing slowed, shallow and uneven.
His pulse, he could feel it now, faint and distant, like it belonged to someone else.
Cold spread deeper into his bones.
This is it, he thought again, softer this time. Not afraid. Not relieved. Just… certain.
He was going to die in his own ER.
Alone.
And as the darkness closed in completely, swallowing the last fragments of light and sound and pain, Robby realized something with a clarity that cut deeper than anything else had that night—
He didn’t know if he wanted to be alone.
But he had made sure he would be.
Robby surfaced slowly, like something dragged up from the bottom of the ocean. too fast to adjust, too slow to fight it. Consciousness didn’t return cleanly, it came in jagged edges, in pulses of sensation that hit before thought could catch up. Pain arrived first, absolute and consuming, blooming through him in layers. His head throbbed with a deep, relentless pressure, each heartbeat a hammer strike against the inside of his skull. His arm screamed next—a sharp, unstable agony that told him nothing had been set, nothing had been stabilized, the fracture left to grind against itself every time he so much as breathed. Then his back, a dull, spreading fire, radiating outward with every shallow inhale.
He gasped.
Or tried to.
The air felt wrong, too dry, too thin, and it scraped down his throat like sandpaper, leaving behind a raw, burning ache. He swallowed reflexively and immediately regretted it. His mouth was parched, lips cracked, tongue heavy and uncooperative.
Dehydrated, some distant, clinical part of him noted. Possibly febrile.
And then the cold hit him.
It wasn’t just discomfort, it was invasive, creeping under his skin and settling into his bones. His body trembled faintly, the kind of tremor that wasn’t entirely voluntary, a physiological response spiraling just out of his control. He felt clammy and burning at the same time, skin slick in some places, dry and hot in others.
Fever, his mind insisted.
Or shock.
Or both.
His eyes fluttered open, but the light was dimmer now, muted, artificial. Time had passed. Hours, maybe. The room hadn’t changed, but something about it felt heavier, quieter. Abandoned.
He shifted slightly.
The straps reminded him instantly.
Leather bit into his wrists, rough and unforgiving, the pressure sharper now that he was more aware. He instinctively tried to pull away, but the movement sent a spike of pain through his arm so intense it stole the breath from his lungs. A broken, voiceless sound tore through his chest, his body arching helplessly against the restraints before collapsing back down.
“—h—”
Nothing.
Still nothing.
His throat worked uselessly, vocal cords refusing to cooperate. Whether it was damage, dehydration, or sheer exhaustion, he couldn’t tell. All he knew was that he couldn’t call out. Couldn’t ask for help. Couldn’t do anything except lie there and feel every inch of what was happening to him.
His gaze drifted weakly to the side.
The call button was there.
Of course it was.
Just out of reach.
A cruel kind of proximity—close enough to see, far enough to be meaningless.
His fingers twitched, numb and unresponsive. That was new. He frowned faintly, or thought he did. His hand didn’t feel like his own. There was a dull, buzzing absence where sensation should have been, like static filling the space between nerve and brain.
Not good, he thought vaguely. Circulation? Nerve compression?
The restraints.
Too tight.
Too long.
His legs, he couldn’t feel those properly either. Not pain, not pressure. Just… absence.
A flicker of something like unease stirred in his chest, but it didn’t have the strength to become panic. Not anymore. He was too tired for panic. Too far gone.
Instead, his thoughts drifted somewhere quieter. Darker.
Is this what you deserve?
The question didn’t feel accusatory.
Just… factual.
Robby let his eyes fall closed again, the weight of them unbearable. His breathing came shallow and uneven, each inhale a conscious effort.
Maybe it was.
He thought about the shift. About the sharpness in his voice, the way he had snapped at people who didn’t deserve it. The way he had pushed, harder and harder, because if he stopped pushing, everything underneath might finally catch up to him. He thought about the looks on their faces—hurt, frustration, disappointment—and how he had ignored all of it because anger was easier. Anger was clean. Simple.
Grief was not.
Guilt was not.
Jack—
The thought faltered, splintered, but the feeling remained. Heavy. Aching.
Jack had looked at him like he was a stranger.
Worse.
Like he wasn’t worth the effort.
Robby swallowed again, throat protesting violently.
“I—”
Still nothing.
The silence swallowed him whole.
His body shifted slightly, involuntarily this time, and that’s when he felt it.
The pressure.
Low in his abdomen, insistent and growing. His bladder.
He went still.
No.
No, no—
He tried to move, to adjust, to relieve it somehow, but the restraints held him firm, unyielding. His muscles tensed instinctively, fighting to maintain control, but his body was already too compromised, too exhausted.
You can hold it, he told himself. Just hold it.
He had done harder things.
He had endured worse.
Minutes passed.
Or maybe seconds.
Time didn’t make sense anymore.
The pressure built, sharp and unbearable, his body trembling with the effort of resisting it. His breath hitched, shallow and erratic, his entire focus narrowing down to that one, singular need for control.
Control.
He had lost so much of it already.
He couldn’t lose this too.
But his body didn’t care about pride.
Didn’t care about dignity.
Didn’t care that he was the Chief of Emergency Medicine, that he had spent his entire career being the one in control, the one who fixed things, who kept people from falling apart like this.
His body just… failed.
It happened slowly at first, a weakening he couldn’t stop, muscles giving way despite everything he tried to do. Then all at once.
Warmth spread beneath him.
Immediate.
Humiliating.
Unstoppable.
Robby froze.
For a second, his mind refused to process it. Refused to acknowledge what had just happened. But the sensation was undeniable, soaking through fabric, pooling beneath him, the heat already beginning to cool against his skin.
A broken sound caught in his throat, somewhere between a sob and a gasp, but it never made it out.
Shame hit harder than the pain.
Hot, suffocating, all-consuming.
Great, a distant, bitter thought whispered. This is how they’ll find you.
Swollen.
Broken.
Lying in your own piss like you were never anything more than a problem to be restrained and ignored.
His chest tightened painfully, his breathing hitching in uneven, fragile bursts.
He pulled weakly at the restraints again, more out of instinct than hope. The leather cut deeper into his wrists, scraping against already damaged skin, leaving angry red marks that would bruise, maybe worse. His numb fingers barely registered the effort.
It didn’t matter.
Nothing did.
His head pounded relentlessly, vision blurring at the edges even behind closed eyes. His throat burned. His body ached in places he couldn’t even name anymore.
He was so tired.
God, he was so tired.
What time is it? he wondered vaguely.
Night still?
Morning?
Did it matter?
Would anyone come?
Would anyone even notice?
The ER was quieter than it should have been. Not silent—but wrong. Hollow. Like something essential had been stripped out, leaving behind only the shell of what it used to be.
Like him.
Robby let out a slow, trembling breath, the sound barely there.
He had thought he wanted this.
An end.
An escape.
A way to make the noise stop.
But lying there now, broken and cold and utterly alone, something inside him shifted—small, fragile, but undeniable.
He didn’t want to die like this.
Not here.
Not like this.
Not alone.
The realization came too late to matter.
Or maybe it didn’t.
He didn’t know.
His thoughts were slipping again, edges softening, consciousness fraying at the seams. The pain dulled slightly, not because it was lessening, but because he was losing the ability to feel it properly.
His body was shutting down.
He knew the signs.
He had seen them a hundred times before.
A thousand.
Now he was the one fading out.
His breathing slowed.
Shallowed.
The cold deepened.
And with one last, fragile thread of awareness, Robby closed his eyes again—
And let himself drift.
Across the city, far from the fluorescent hum of the emergency department, the night refused to settle.
Dana lay on her back, staring at the ceiling, the slow rotation of the fan casting soft, uneven shadows across the room. The air was warm, thick with the kind of humidity that usually made her drowsy, but not tonight. Tonight, her body wouldn’t let her rest. Every time she drifted, even for a moment, something yanked her back—l. an unfinished thought, a sharp edge of memory, a voice that wouldn’t quiet.
Robby’s voice.
Sharp. Cutting. Exhausted.
She turned onto her side with a frustrated exhale, tugging the sheet higher even though she wasn’t cold. Her jaw tightened.
“He needed to hear it,” she muttered into the empty room, the words firm, grounded, something she had repeated to herself more than once since the shift ended. “God knows he did.”
And it was true.
Every word she had said.
Every hard line she had drawn.
Every refusal to let him bulldoze his way through another shift like nothing was wrong while everything—everything—was clearly falling apart under his feet. Dana had been a nurse too long, had seen too many brilliant, broken men burn themselves into the ground because no one stopped them soon enough. She wasn’t going to be one of the people who stood back and watched it happen.
Not to Robby.
Not to her kid.
Her chest tightened at that thought, something softer pushing past the steel of her resolve. She rolled onto her back again, eyes closing briefly, but sleep still wouldn’t come.
Because knowing she was right didn’t make the worry go away.
Didn’t stop the gnawing feeling low in her gut that something wasn’t sitting right.
Robby had been off.
Not just stressed. Not just sharp-tongued and overworked.
Off.
Quieter in the wrong moments. Louder in the wrong ones. Like he was trying to outrun something that had already caught up to him.
Dana sat up abruptly, the decision made before she fully processed it. The bedside lamp clicked on, flooding the room with a soft yellow glow. She reached for her phone, her movements quick, purposeful, like if she hesitated too long she might talk herself out of it.
Her thumb hovered over the screen for half a second.
Then she tapped.
Dana: You awake?
She didn’t have to wait long.
The reply came almost instantly.
Jack: Yeah.
Of course he was.
Dana huffed a quiet, fond breath, shaking her head slightly. Some things didn’t change. Jack Abbot had always been like that. wired tight, coiled energy even at rest, the kind of man who didn’t sleep so much as pause between battles.
Dana: Figured.
There was a pause this time. Then—
Jack: Still pissed.
Dana smiled faintly despite herself, leaning back against the headboard.
Dana: About not working?
The typing bubble appeared. Disappeared. Reappeared.
Jack: Yeah.
Jack: But I meant what I said.
Jack: I’m not crossing the line.
Jack: They deserve better than what they’ve been getting.
Dana’s smile deepened, something warm and proud settling in her chest. That was Jack. Intense, stubborn, sometimes impossible. but when it mattered, when it really mattered, he stood exactly where he was supposed to. When the nurses went on strike Jack followed.
Dana: Good.
A beat passed.
Then she typed again.
Dana: You talk to him?
This time, the pause stretched longer.
Dana watched the screen, her expression shifting, the earlier warmth dimming slightly.
Finally—
Jack: No.
Another message followed quickly.
Jack: Didn’t want to say something I couldn’t take back.
Dana exhaled slowly through her nose, her gaze dropping to her lap for a moment. She could picture it too easily—Jack, jaw tight, shoulders rigid, anger simmering just under the surface. Not explosive. Not loud.
Worse.
Controlled.
Dana: He deserved some of it.
She didn’t soften it. Didn’t cushion the truth.
The response came back sharp.
Jack: Yeah. He did.
A pause.
Then—
Jack: Didn’t mean I wanted to hear it from him.
Dana winced faintly, the words landing heavier than she expected. She adjusted her grip on the phone, thumbs hovering as she considered what to say next.
Because that was the part none of them knew how to handle.
Robby lashing out.
Robby pushing people away before they could get close enough to see what was underneath.
Robby, who would rather be hated than pitied.
Dana: He’s not okay.
Simple.
Blunt.
True.
The typing bubble appeared again, almost immediately this time.
Jack: I know.
Two words.
Heavy enough to fill the room.
Dana leaned her head back against the wall, closing her eyes briefly. For a moment, neither of them said anything. The silence stretched, but it wasn’t empty, it was full of everything they weren’t saying. Everything they couldn’t say.
Finally, Dana opened her eyes again.
Dana: I’m going in tomorrow.
There was no hesitation this time.
Dana: Strike or no strike, those kids need someone watching their backs.
The reply came faster than she expected.
Jack: Yeah.
A beat.
Then—
Jack: I might come with you.
Dana’s lips curved into a small, tired smile.
Of course he would.
Dana: Figured you might.
She hesitated for a second, her thumb hovering again, then added:
Dana: Get some rest, Jack.
There was a pause.
Then—
Jack: You too.
She let out a quiet breath, something in her chest easing just a fraction. It wasn’t much. It didn’t fix anything.
But it helped.
Dana set the phone back on the nightstand and reached over to switch off the lamp. The room fell into darkness again, the soft hum of the fan returning to prominence.
This time, when she lay back, her body didn’t fight her quite as hard.
Her thoughts still drifted, still circled back to the same place, Robby’s face, drawn tight with something he refused to name, the way his eyes had looked at her when she finally said what needed to be said.
Hurt.
Angry.
Tired.
So damn tired.
“You better still be there in the morning,” she murmured softly into the dark, the words barely more than a breath.
It wasn’t a prayer.
Dana Evans didn’t pray.
But it was close.
And with that thought lingering quietly at the edge of her mind, she finally let her eyes close—
And, eventually, sleep found her.
Morning didn’t arrive so much as it crept in, pale and reluctant, slipping through the edges of the city without conviction. The hospital lights didn’t change with it, they never did, but something in the air shifted, a subtle transition from night’s isolation to the fragile expectation of day.
Dr. McKay felt it the second she walked into the emergency department.
Wrong.
That was the only word for it.
Not just quiet, quiet she could handle. Quiet sometimes meant control. Quiet sometimes meant a breath between storms. But this wasn’t that kind of quiet. This was hollow. Artificial. Like someone had taken the living, breathing machine that was the PTMC ER and stripped out its heart, leaving the structure behind to echo.
Her sneakers squeaked faintly against the polished floor as she stepped fully inside, her eyes scanning automatically, habit ingrained too deep to turn off. The waiting room, too empty. The nurses’ station, staffed, but not right. Faces she didn’t recognize. Postures too relaxed. No urgency. No rhythm.
No Dana.
That alone was enough to set her teeth on edge.
Cassie adjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder and approached the desk, her expression already tightening. One of the nurses, young, unfamiliar, leaned back in her chair, lazily scrolling through her phone, chewing gum with an audible, rhythmic snap that grated against Cassie’s nerves like sandpaper.
“Where’s the night shift?” Cassie asked, not bothering to soften her tone.
The nurse didn’t even look up.
“I dunno,” she said around the gum, popping it lightly. “Left, probably.”
Cassie blinked, thrown for half a second by the sheer indifference.
“Left,” she repeated flatly. “All of them?”
A shrug. Casual. Dismissive.
“Told there were tech issues or whatever. Most cases got diverted anyway.”
Cassie’s jaw tightened.
“Have any patients been seen?”
Another shrug.
“Not really. Couple minor things earlier. Sent most of it out.” The nurse finally glanced up, briefly, her expression bored. “Honestly? Pretty dead night. Kinda surprising.”
Cassie let out a slow breath through her nose, the irritation simmering just beneath the surface threatening to boil over. Dead night. In this ER? That didn’t happen. Not without a reason. Not without someone actively making it happen.
Her gaze flicked toward the board.
Too clean.
Too empty.
Her stomach sank slightly.
“You have anyone in a room?” she pressed.
The nurse nodded, already looking back down at her phone.
“Yeah.”
Cassie waited.
When nothing else came, she exhaled sharply. “Okay. Who?”
“Some combative SOB,” the nurse said, tone completely devoid of concern. “Came in after an accident. Motorcycle or something. Didn’t feel like dealing with it.” She popped her gum again. “Another nurse got hurt last week, so we just restrained him. Let him chill till he calms down.”
Cassie went very still.
“…You restrained him,” she repeated carefully, each word precise.
“Yeah.”
“And then what?”
The nurse shrugged again, thumbs still moving across her screen. “Left him. He was fighting. Didn’t wanna get bit or punched or whatever.”
Cassie’s pulse kicked up, sharp and immediate.
“Why isn’t he on the board?”
Another shrug.
“I dunno. Not my patient.”
Cassie stared at her, disbelief bleeding into something colder, sharper.
“Then whose patient is he?”
The nurse snorted lightly, not even bothering to look up this time.
“I really don’t care.”
Silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating.
Cassie felt something inside her snap into place, not panic, not yet, but a focused, rising urgency that burned away the last remnants of grogginess from the early hour.
“Right,” she said shortly, already turning away. “Of course you don’t.”
Her mind was moving fast now, piecing things together, running through worst-case scenarios with clinical efficiency. Unmonitored patient. Post-accident. Restrained. No charting. No board entry.
No one watching him.
Her chest tightened.
Call Dana, she thought immediately. Now.
But her feet were already moving.
She could make the call in a minute.
First, she needed to see the patient.
The hallway felt longer than usual, each step echoing too loudly in the unnatural quiet. Doors lined the corridor, most of them dark, unused. It felt like walking through a ghost of a place she knew better than her own home.
Room three.
The door was slightly ajar.
Cassie reached it in seconds, her hand already pushing it open as her other hand flipped open the tablet she’d grabbed on instinct from the station.
“Hi, I’m Dr. McKay,” she started automatically, her voice steady, professional, eyes dropping briefly to the blank, useless screen—
—and then she looked up.
And froze.
For a second, her brain refused to process what she was seeing.
Because it didn’t make sense.
It couldn’t make sense.
The man on the bed—restrained, pale, soaked, barely moving—wasn’t just a patient.
It was—
“…Dr. Robinavitch?”
The words came out as a whisper, fractured and disbelieving.
Robby lay there, barely recognizable under the harsh overhead light. His skin had taken on a sickly pallor, stretched too tight over sharp cheekbones, lips dry and cracked. Sweat clung to him in uneven patches, dampening his hair, his clothes twisted and partially soaked beneath him in a way that made Cassie’s stomach drop instantly.
His left arm—
God.
The deformity was unmistakable. Mid-shaft humerus fracture, completely unsupported, the limb resting at an unnatural angle that made her own arm ache in sympathy. No splint. No sling. Nothing.
His wrists—
The restraints had been tightened too far. Angry red indentations dug into his skin, the beginnings of bruising already forming, fingers slightly discolored.
And he wasn’t moving.
Not really.
Just… barely breathing.
Shallow.
Too shallow.
“Oh my God—”
The tablet clattered to the floor, forgotten.
Cassie was at his side in an instant, every instinct snapping into overdrive.
“Dr. Robinavitch—Robby—hey, can you hear me?”
No response.
She reached for his neck, fingers pressing urgently against his carotid artery.
Pulse.
Weak.
Thready.
Fast.
“Shit—”
Her other hand moved to his forehead.
Burning.
“Okay, okay—” she muttered, more to herself than him, her voice tight but controlled as adrenaline surged through her system. “You’re not doing this today. Absolutely not.”
She turned sharply toward the door, her voice cutting through the empty ER like a blade.
“I NEED HELP IN HERE—NOW!”
No immediate response.
Of course not.
Cassie’s jaw clenched, fury and fear tangling together in a volatile mix as she turned back to Robby, already moving.
“Alright,” she said, breath unsteady but determined as she reached for the restraints. “We’re fixing this.”
Because this—
This was not how their Chief of Emergency Medicine was going to die.
Not restrained.
Not ignored.
Not alone.
“I NEED HELP—NOW!”
Cassie’s voice cracked through the department again, louder this time, sharper, panic bleeding into the edges despite every ounce of training telling her to stay controlled. She didn’t wait. Her hand slammed down on the code blue button mounted on the wall.
Nothing.
No alarm.
No overhead call.
No pounding footsteps racing toward the room.
Just… silence.
For a split second, the world seemed to stall around her, the absence of response louder than any crash cart or siren could have been. Then reality snapped back into place, cold and unforgiving.
“Are you kidding me?!” she snapped, the words ripping out of her as her pulse spiked.
No time.
No team.
Just her.
Cassie turned back to the bed, adrenaline surging hard now, washing away hesitation, leaving only action in its wake.
“Robby—hey—stay with me, come on,” she urged, her hands already moving, one coming up to cradle his head more carefully now that she could actually see it.
And then she saw it.
“—oh God.”
Blood.
Not fresh, not actively pouring, but dried and matted, caked into his hair, streaked along the side of his face, trailing down behind his ear. Her fingers shifted slightly, probing with practiced caution despite the urgency, and—
Her stomach dropped.
She felt it.
Not bone intact.
Not smooth.
There was a depression. A break in what should have been solid.
“Possible skull fracture,” she breathed, her voice going tight and clinical even as her chest constricted. “Behind the ear—temporal? No—lower—”
Basilar.
Her mind filled in the rest, fast and brutal.
Head injury. Untreated. Hours.
Her gaze flicked down, scanning rapidly, cataloging everything at once. She grabbed a pair of trauma shears from the wall and didn’t hesitate, slicing straight through the front of his shirt.
Fabric parted.
And the damage underneath made her suck in a sharp breath.
Bruising—deep, spreading, ugly.
Across his chest. His ribs.
Worse along his abdomen, a darkening bloom of internal bleeding that hadn’t been addressed, hadn’t even been noticed. The kind of bruising that didn’t just sit on the surface.
The kind that meant organs.
“Shit… Robby, what did they do to you…” she whispered, the words trembling despite her best effort to stay steady.
Then the smell hit her.
Sharp.
Ammonia.
Immediate.
Cassie froze for half a second, the realization landing heavy and cruel.
He’d been lying here.
Like this.
Alone.
For hours.
Shame twisted briefly through her chest—his shame, reflected back at her—and then burned away into something hotter, angrier.
“Yeah, no,” she muttered under her breath, shaking her head sharply. “We’re not doing that. Not today.”
Her hands moved faster now, efficient despite the chaos. She reached for the monitor leads, fingers working quickly to attach them to his chest, her eyes flicking between his face and the screen as it struggled to come to life.
“Come on… come on…”
The machine flickered, then stabilized.
Heart rate—high. Too high.
Blood pressure—low. Dangerously low.
Oxygen—
“Okay, okay,” she said quickly, forcing her voice into something calm, something grounding. “You’re in shock. We can fix that. We can fix that.”
She reached for the restraints next, fumbling only slightly as she worked to loosen them, careful of his injured arm, of the compromised circulation.
“Who the hell thought this was a good idea…” she hissed, more to herself than anything else.
The leather gave slowly.
Too slowly.
“Hurry up—”
A sound.
Soft.
Barely there.
Cassie froze.
Her eyes snapped back to his face.
Robby’s eyelids fluttered, sluggish, like they weighed too much for him to fully open. Then, inch by inch, they lifted.
His eyes—
God.
They were wrong.
Bloodshot, the whites streaked red, vessels blown from strain or injury or both. His pupils were blown wide, swallowing what little color remained, unfocused and drifting before finally—finally—locking onto something.
Her.
“Hey—hey, okay, good,” Cassie said immediately, relief and urgency crashing together in her voice as she leaned closer, one hand coming up instinctively to steady his shoulder. “Robby, it’s me. It’s Cassie. You’re okay—well, not okay, but I’ve got you, alright? Stay with me.”
His gaze didn’t quite track right. It lagged, like his brain was a step behind what his eyes were seeing.
His lips parted.
No sound came out.
“I know,” she said quickly, nodding like he had spoken. “I know, don’t try to talk. You’ve got a head injury, okay? Just focus on me.”
His breathing hitched, shallow and uneven, chest barely rising under the weight of bruising.
“Can you hear me?” she pressed, her tone firm but gentle. “Blink if you can hear me.”
There was a delay.
A long one.
Then—
A slow, uneven blink.
Relief punched through her hard enough to make her dizzy.
“Good,” she breathed. “Good, okay. Stay right there. Don’t go anywhere, alright? I need you to hang on for me.”
Her hand moved to his neck again, checking his pulse, grounding herself in the rhythm—fast, weak, but still there.
Still fighting.
“Alright,” she said, more to herself now, her voice tightening as she forced her brain into the next steps. “We need fluids. We need access. We need—”
Her gaze flicked toward the empty doorway.
Still no one.
No crash cart.
No team.
Just her.
Cassie swallowed hard, then leaned in closer again, her voice dropping, softer now, steadier in a different way.
“Hey… hey,” she said quietly. “You’re not alone, okay? I’m right here.” She felt like sobbing.
Robby’s eyes shifted slightly, unfocused but searching, like he was trying to make sense of her words through the fog.
His brow twitched faintly.
Confusion.
Pain.
Fear.
And something else.
Something deeper.
Cassie felt her chest tighten.
“I know,” she murmured, her thumb brushing lightly—carefully—against his shoulder in a grounding gesture. “I know it hurts. I know. Just… stay with me.”
His lips moved again.
This time, something almost came out.
A whisper of air.
A shape of a word that didn’t quite form.
Cassie leaned closer, straining to hear it.
“—d—”
It broke apart before it finished.
Her heart stuttered.
“Dana?” she guessed softly.
Or—
“Jack?”
Robby’s eyes flickered again, something like recognition, or maybe just exhaustion, passing through them.
Cassie exhaled shakily.
“Yeah,” she said, even though she wasn’t sure which name he had meant. “We’ll get them. I promise.”
She straightened slightly, her movements snapping back into urgency as she grabbed for supplies, hands moving with renewed determination.
Because now—
Now he was awake.
Now he was fighting.
And Cassie McKay was not about to let him lose.
Cassie’s hands were shaking now.
Not enough to stop her—but enough that she noticed.
“Stay with me, stay with me…” she muttered under her breath, half to Robby, half to herself, as she fumbled one-handed for her phone in the pocket of her scrubs. Her other hand stayed planted against his shoulder, grounding him, grounding her, fingers pressing lightly like she could physically keep him tethered to consciousness if she just didn’t let go.
She yanked the phone free, thumb sliding across the screen, already pulling up Dana’s contact—because Dana would know what to do, Dana would fix this, Dana would make this nightmare make sense—
The door slammed open.
Cassie flinched, her head snapping up so fast it made her dizzy.
Frank.
Dr. Frank Langdon stood in the doorway, chest rising and falling a little too fast, like he’d run the last stretch of hallway. For a fraction of a second, he just looked—and Cassie watched the exact moment recognition hit him.
He went pale.
“Frank—” Cassie’s voice broke, the word tearing out of her before she could stop it. A sob hidden under pure terror and panic. “Help me.”
It wasn’t a request.
It was a lifeline.
Frank didn’t hesitate.
He was at the bedside in two strides, whatever shock had hit him shoved down instantly, replaced by something steadier. Focused. The kind of calm that only came from being broken enough times to know how to function anyway.
“What do we have?” he asked, voice low but firm, already reaching for gloves, already scanning Robby with sharp, practiced eyes.
“MVC, motorcycle, no helmet,” Cassie rattled off, forcing herself into rhythm, into medicine. “Hours untreated. Hypotensive, tachycardic, febrile. Possible basilar skull fracture—there’s a depression behind the ear. Abdomen’s rigid, bruising—internal bleed, maybe spleen, maybe liver. Left humerus is definitely fractured, no stabilization. He was restrained—circulation’s compromised—”
Frank nodded once, fast, absorbing it all.
“Okay. Okay.” His voice stayed even, controlled, but his hands moved quickly, efficiently. “We work the problem.”
Cassie let out a shaky breath that almost turned into a sob—but didn’t. Not yet. Not while there was still something to do.
They moved around each other instinctively, muscle memory taking over where thought might have faltered. Cassie grabbed IV supplies, hands steadier now that she wasn’t alone, while Frank reached for the restraints, undoing the last of them carefully but quickly.
“Easy—easy—” he murmured, more to Robby than anyone else, his tone softening in a way that didn’t match the urgency of his movements.
Robby’s head shifted slightly, uncontrolled, his eyes open but wrong—so wrong. They didn’t fix on anything, didn’t track the way they should. Instead, they drifted, rolling subtly, like his brain couldn’t quite hold onto the world long enough to process it.
“Pupils are blown,” Cassie said tightly, glancing up at Frank. “He’s not tracking.”
“I see it,” Frank replied quietly.
But he didn’t look away.
He leaned in slightly, positioning himself directly in Robby’s line of sight, even if that line was unstable, fractured.
“Hey,” Frank said, voice dropping lower, softer—steady in a way that cut through the chaos. “Hey, Chief. It’s me.”
Cassie froze for half a second, watching.
Frank didn’t rush.
Didn’t push.
He just… stayed there.
Present.
“Robby,” he tried again, gentler this time. “You with me?”
For a moment, nothing changed.
Robby’s eyes continued their slow, disoriented movement, unfocused, slipping past Frank like he wasn’t there at all.
And then—
Just for a second—
They caught.
Not perfectly.
Not cleanly.
But enough.
Cassie sucked in a quiet breath.
“Yeah,” Frank murmured, softer still, like he was coaxing something fragile back into place. “There you go. Stay right there. Stay with me.”
Robby’s lips twitched.
It was barely anything. So small Cassie might have missed it if she hadn’t been watching so closely.
But it was there.
A faint, uneven curl at the corner of his mouth.
A smile.
Broken.
Fleeting.
But unmistakable.
Frank’s breath hitched.
Just for a second.
Emotion cracked through the composure, sharp and sudden, his eyes glassing over before he could stop it. He swallowed hard, jaw tightening, but he didn’t look away.
Didn’t let go.
“I got you, Chief,” he said, voice rough now but still steady, still anchored. “Alright? I got you.”
Cassie felt something in her chest twist painfully at that, but she forced herself back into motion, snapping the IV line into place with practiced precision.
“Line’s in,” she said quickly. “We need fluids—wide open.”
“Do it.”
She opened the fluids, watching as they began to run, praying it was enough, praying it wasn’t already too late.
Frank’s hand hovered briefly near Robby’s shoulder, not quite touching, but close enough to be felt.
A promise.
“I’m right here,” he added quietly.
Robby’s eyes slipped again, drifting, the fragile connection breaking as quickly as it had formed. The faint hint of a smile faded, his expression slackening as exhaustion dragged him back under.
“No, no—stay with me,” Cassie urged, leaning in again, her voice sharper now. “Robby, I need you to stay awake, okay? Just a little longer.”
His breathing stuttered.
Shallow.
Uneven.
Frank glanced up at the monitor, then back at Cassie.
“We’re losing him if we don’t move faster,” he said, the words calm but urgent. “We need blood. We need imaging. We need a team—”
“I know!” Cassie snapped, then immediately shook her head, breath catching. “I know, I’m sorry—there’s just—there’s no one—”
For a moment, the weight of that pressed down on both of them.
No team.
No backup.
Just two doctors and a man who had spent his life saving everyone else—
Now slipping through their hands.
Frank exhaled slowly, forcing the panic down, forcing himself to focus.
“Then we are the team,” he said firmly.
Cassie met his eyes.
And nodded.
“Okay,” she said, voice steadier now. “Okay. We’ve got him.”
They turned back to Robby in unison.
And went to war.
“Robby—squeeze my hand.”
Frank’s voice was calm. Controlled. The kind of calm that came from years of practice, from knowing that panic only made things worse. But underneath it, buried deep, there was something fraying.
Robby didn’t respond.
Frank adjusted his grip slightly, pressing his fingers more firmly into Robby’s palm, watching his face, his eyes, anything that might indicate comprehension.
“Hey. Come on. Squeeze.”
Nothing.
Not even a twitch.
Cassie felt her stomach drop.
“Try pain stimulus,” she said quickly, already knowing what the answer would be, already bracing for it.
Frank nodded once, jaw tight, and pressed hard along Robby’s nail bed.
There should have been a reaction.
A flinch. A pull. A grimace.
Anything.
Instead—
Robby’s eyes rolled again, unfocused, drifting away from them like they were too heavy to hold still. His breathing hitched faintly, but it wasn’t purposeful. It wasn’t responsive.
It was just… happening.
Cassie swallowed hard.
“Frank…” Her voice came out quieter this time. Not panicked. Not sharp.
Just… heavy.
“The brain injury is bad.”
It wasn’t a guess.
It was a statement.
Frank didn’t argue.
Didn’t try to soften it.
He just nodded once, slow, deliberate, his gaze still fixed on Robby like if he looked away, even for a second, he might lose him completely.
“Yeah,” he said, voice low. “Yeah, it is.”
A beat passed.
Then, more firmly—
“We need more help.”
Cassie let out a shaky breath, nodding quickly. “Yeah. Yeah, we do.”
They both knew it.
This wasn’t a two-person job.
This was a full trauma team, neurosurgery consult, blood bank, imaging—everything.
And they had… none of it.
Frank forced himself into motion again, pushing past the frustration, the fear.
“Alright. We need to get him exposed,” he said, shifting into action. “Full assessment. We can’t miss anything else.”
Cassie nodded, already reaching for the edges of what remained of Robby’s clothing, her hands careful but quick.
“Okay—on three—”
The door opened.
All three of them turned.
Dr. Mohan stood in the doorway, slightly out of breath, eyes scanning the room—and then landing on the bed.
She froze.
The color drained from her face almost instantly, her expression shifting from confusion to shock to something deeper, something heavier.
“…Oh my God.”
For a second, no one spoke.
Then Mohan moved.
Fast.
“What do you need?” she asked, already stepping in, already pulling on gloves with shaking hands.
Cassie didn’t hesitate. “Help us get him undressed. We need a full trauma assessment.”
Mohan nodded, swallowing hard as she moved to the opposite side of the bed, her gaze flickering over Robby’s face for just a fraction too long before she forced herself to focus.
“Okay. Okay.”
They started carefully.
Or as carefully as they could.
Cassie and Frank worked at the fabric first, trying to peel it away without causing more damage—but it didn’t take long for them to realize the problem.
The road rash.
It was bad.
Worse than they’d initially seen.
The fabric had adhered in places, stuck to torn skin, dried blood binding it down like glue. When Cassie tried to lift the edge of his shirt, it didn’t come cleanly—it pulled.
Robby’s body reacted instantly.
A sharp, involuntary jerk, his back arching slightly despite the pain, a broken, voiceless cry tearing through him as his entire system lit up in protest.
Cassie froze. “Shit—okay—okay—”
“We need to go slower,” Frank said quickly, though his own hands were tightening with frustration. “Or we’re going to do more damage.”
“Or we leave him like this and miss something worse,” Cassie shot back, breath unsteady.
Another sound from Robby, raw, fractured, hurt.
Mohan stepped in.
“Switch,” she said, her voice soft but firm.
Frank didn’t argue. He moved immediately, trading places with her.
Mohan didn’t reach for the fabric.
She reached for him.
“Hey,” she said quietly, her tone completely different now, gentle, grounding, the kind of voice you used when someone was teetering on the edge of panic. “Hey… it’s okay. I’ve got you.”
Her hand slipped into his, careful of the IV, careful of the swelling, fingers curling around his as much as they could.
His skin was cold.
Too cold.
Her chest tightened.
Her other hand came up, hesitating only briefly before she let it rest against his hair—blood-matted curls sticking against her fingers as she brushed them back as gently as she could.
“It’s me,” she murmured. “You’re okay. You’re not alone.”
Behind her, Cassie and Frank resumed their work.
More carefully now.
Peeling.
Lifting.
Separating fabric from skin in slow, agonizing increments.
Every time the material pulled, Robby reacted, his body tensing, breath catching, a low, broken sound escaping his throat despite his inability to form words. It was pain stripped down to its most basic form. raw, unfiltered, impossible to ignore.
At one point, his arm twitched sharply, muscles spasming, his body instinctively trying to fight.
“Watch it—he’s going to swing,” Cassie warned, her voice tight.
Mohan tightened her grip on his hand immediately.
“Hey—hey, no, no,” she soothed, leaning closer, her voice dropping even softer. “Stay with me. Stay here. You’re okay.”
Her thumb brushed lightly against his knuckles, a steady, repetitive motion.
Grounding.
“Focus on me,” she continued quietly. “You’re doing good. You’re doing so good.”
Her hand in his hair shifted slightly, fingers threading carefully, avoiding the worst of the injury but still offering contact, something real.
Something human.
Her throat tightened.
Because she remembered.
What he had said.
The words still lingered, sharp and cutting, the kind that didn’t just bounce off, they stuck. They had hurt. More than she wanted to admit. More than she had let anyone see.
For a moment, that memory flickered through her mind, Robby’s voice, harsh and dismissive, pushing her away like she didn’t matter.
And then she looked at him now.
Broken.
Bleeding.
Alone.
And something inside her twisted painfully.
Because she hadn’t seen it.
Not really.
Not the way she should have.
Not the way a doctor, his doctor, should have.
She swallowed hard, blinking rapidly as she forced the emotion back, forcing herself to stay present.
“I’m here,” she whispered, more to herself than to him now. “I’m here.”
Behind her, Cassie finally freed another section of fabric, revealing more torn skin beneath.
“Jesus…” she muttered under her breath.
Frank didn’t respond.
He couldn’t.
Not without his voice breaking.
Robby’s breathing hitched again, his body trembling faintly under the combined assault of pain, shock, and exhaustion. His fingers twitched weakly in Mohan’s grasp, not a squeeze, not intentional, but enough to make her breath catch.
“I’ve got you,” she said again, firmer this time, her grip steady. “I’m not going anywhere.”
And for the first time since they had found him—
Robby stopped fighting.
Not because the pain had lessened.
Not because anything had gotten easier.
But because, finally—
There was someone there to hold on to.
“I’ll keep working on this,” Frank said, his voice tight but controlled as he carefully peeled another section of fabric away from torn skin, his hands deliberate despite the urgency clawing at him. “Cass—call everyone. I don’t care who. Anyone with a pulse and a license.”
Cassie didn’t argue.
She couldn’t.
She just nodded sharply, already backing toward the wall, phone pressed to her ear as she scrolled frantically through her contacts.
“Dana, pick up—come on, come on—” she muttered under her breath as it rang.
Voicemail.
“Dammit—” She hung up immediately, already dialing the next. “Jack—answer your fucking phone—”
Ring.
Ring.
Nothing.
She didn’t wait.
“Shen—please—”
Another call.
Another ring.
Her voice grew sharper with each attempt, more desperate, the edges fraying as she paced, one hand dragging through her hair.
“Anybody—anybody—we need help now—”
She didn’t even remember half the names she tapped. Residents. Attendings. Hell—she called med students, her voice turning urgent and clipped as she left half-formed messages.
“This is Dr. McKay at PTMC—we have a critical trauma—no staff—if you can get here, get here now—”
Behind her, the room had turned into something frantic and fragile all at once.
Mohan had shifted position, her focus narrowing as she leaned closer to Robby’s head, her hands gentle but precise as she tried to assess the damage without causing more.
“Robby, I need you to try to look at me,” she murmured softly, her voice steady despite the fear threading through it. “Just try, okay?”
His eyes didn’t cooperate.
They drifted.
Rolled.
One lagging behind the other for just a fraction too long.
Mohan’s stomach dropped.
“Frank…” she said quietly, not taking her eyes off him. “This is… this is bad.”
Frank didn’t look up.
“I know,” he said, the words almost too calm.
Because the more they saw—
The worse it got.
Every inch they exposed told the same story: neglect, delay, damage compounding on damage. Bruising deepening. Skin torn and raw. Swelling where there shouldn’t be swelling.
Time had not been kind to him.
Time had been taken from him.
“We need to move him,” Frank said suddenly, sharper now, urgency cutting through the controlled tone. “He shouldn’t be in here. We need a trauma bay—monitors, airway, everything.”
Cassie turned, her phone still in her hand, her face pale. “We can’t move him like this,” she shot back. “Not without a board, not without a team—he could crash on the way—”
“I know,” Frank snapped, then caught himself, dragging in a breath. “I know. But if we don’t—”
The door burst open again.
All of them turned.
Dr. Santos and Dr. Javadi stood in the doorway, both slightly out of breath, like they’d rushed the second they got the call—or maybe the second something in their gut told them something was wrong.
They stopped dead.
Horror washed over their faces in real time.
“What—” Javadi started, her voice faltering.
“Oh my God…” Santos whispered.
Cassie didn’t waste a second.
“Javadi—get in here,” she said sharply, gesturing her over. “We need hands—now.”
Javadi snapped into motion immediately, dropping her bag, pulling on gloves as she moved toward the bed, her expression tightening into focus even as shock lingered in her eyes.
But Santos—
Santos didn’t move.
She just stood there.
Frozen.
Her gaze locked on Robby, her face pale, her usual sharpness gone, replaced by something raw and unguarded. Fear. Real fear. The kind that rooted you to the spot and made your lungs forget how to work.
Frank noticed.
Of course he did.
Even now.
Even here.
For a brief second, something old flickered between them—tension, resentment, the unresolved weight of arguments that had never really ended. Santos, who had challenged him, doubted him, pushed back when he came back from rehab like he hadn’t earned his place. Frank, who had carried that anger quietly, who hadn’t quite forgiven the way she had looked at him.
But that—
That didn’t matter now.
Not with Robby lying there.
Not like this.
Frank’s hands stilled for just a moment, his gaze lifting to her, really seeing her—not the sharp-tongued resident, not the rival, not the one who had called him out.
Just—
A terrified doctor.
A person watching someone they respected, someone they needed, slipping away in front of them.
And just like that—
The anger dissolved.
Gone.
Meaningless.
“Trinity,” he said softly.
Not sharp.
Not biting.
Just… her name.
It cut through the fog.
Santos blinked, like she’d just surfaced from underwater, her chest rising sharply as she sucked in a breath.
Frank held her gaze, steady, grounding.
“We need your help,” he said, voice firm but gentle. “Robby could really use your help right now.”
The words landed.
Something in her expression shifted—fear still there, but now anchored by purpose.
She swallowed hard, straightening slightly, her hands clenching once at her sides before she stepped forward.
“Okay,” she said, her voice shaky at first, then stronger. “Okay—what do you need from me?”
Relief flickered briefly across Frank’s face.
“Help me stabilize him,” he said immediately. “We need to get him ready to move—carefully. Spine precautions, minimal shift—we can’t risk making the head injury worse.”
Santos nodded quickly, stepping in beside him, her earlier hesitation gone, replaced by focused urgency.
“Got it.”
Javadi was already at the other side with Cassie, hooking up additional monitors, her movements quick and precise despite the tension in her shoulders.
Mohan didn’t let go of Robby’s hand.
Didn’t move from his side.
For the first time since this started—
They weren’t alone.
It wasn’t enough.
Not yet.
But it was something.
And sometimes—
Something was all you had to start with.
“Alright—on me,” Frank said, his voice steadier now that there were more hands, more minds in the room. Not calm, never calm,but anchored. Directed. “We stabilize first. Then we move.”
Santos nodded immediately, sliding into position opposite him, her earlier hesitation burned away by adrenaline and purpose. “C-spine first,” she said, already reaching for Robby’s head, her hands hovering for just a second before settling,firm, careful, on either side of his skull. “I’ve got manual stabilization.”
“Good,” Frank replied. “Don’t let him move.”
“I won’t.”
Her voice was tight—but certain.
Cassie and Javadi worked in tandem at his lower half, fingers fumbling only slightly as they wrestled off his shoes, each tug sending small, involuntary reactions through Robby’s body. His muscles twitched, his breathing catching, pain radiating through him in waves he couldn’t control.
“Easy—easy—” Cassie murmured automatically, even as she worked faster. “We’ve got you. Just a second more.”
Frank didn’t waste time. Once the shirt was finally free, peeled away inch by agonizing inc, he grabbed the trauma shears again and moved to Robby’s pants.
“Cutting,” he warned.
“Do it,” Cassie said, not even looking up.
The shears slid through fabric quickly, efficiently, splitting denim and whatever else remained without resistance. What was resistant, what fought them every step of the way, was the damage underneath. Bruising extended further than they’d first thought, deeper, darker, spreading like ink beneath his skin. Road rash continued down his hips, his thighs, angry and raw.
“Jesus…” Javadi breathed under her breath.
“Yeah,” Frank muttered. “Focus.”
They worked as carefully as they could, but there was no version of this that wasn’t brutal. Every movement risked something worse, internal bleeding shifting, fractures grinding, brain injury worsening with even the smallest misalignment.
They were threading a needle in the dark.
Once the last of his clothing was removed, Cassie grabbed a blanket and draped it over him quickly, instinct overriding everything else. Modesty. Dignity. Even now—even here—it mattered.
“The gown’s useless,” she said under her breath.
“No kidding,” Frank replied.
Mohan hadn’t moved from his side.
Her hand still wrapped around his, her other still resting gently in his hair, her voice the only constant thread of calm in the room.
“Hey… stay with me,” she murmured softly, her thumb brushing against his skin in slow, repetitive motions. “You’re doing so good. Just keep your eyes open, okay? Just a little longer.”
His eyes fluttered weakly, still not tracking right, still slipping in and out of focus like reality itself was too heavy to hold onto.
“We don’t know if he’ll come back if he goes out,” Mohan added quietly, glancing up at the others, the fear she’d been holding back finally breaking through. “We have to keep him awake.”
Cassie nodded immediately. “Yeah. Yeah, we do.”
Frank swallowed hard but didn’t argue.
Because she was right.
If Robby slipped under now—
There was no guarantee they’d get him back.
“Okay,” Frank said, forcing his voice into something firm again. “We move him. Carefully. Santos, you keep C-spine. You’re in charge of his head—no movement unless you say.”
“Got it,” Santos said, her grip tightening just slightly.
“Cass, Javadi—you’re on torso and hips. Watch the abdomen—if that bleed’s as bad as it looks—”
“It is,” Cassie cut in grimly.
“—then we don’t jostle him more than we have to.”
They nodded.
Mohan hesitated for half a second.
“And me?” she asked quietly.
Frank looked at her—really looked—taking in her position, her hand still holding Robby’s, the way Robby had responded—however faintly—to her voice.
“Stay with him,” Frank said.
Her breath caught slightly.
“Keep him here,” he added, softer. “We need that.”
She nodded.
“I’ve got him.”
They positioned themselves carefully, each movement deliberate, discussed in low, urgent voices as they tried to map out the safest way to do something inherently unsafe.
“On three,” Frank said. “Minimal lift. Keep him straight.”
“Wait—” Cassie said suddenly. “His arm—”
“I know,” Frank replied, jaw tightening. “We stabilize as best we can. It’s going to hurt him no matter what.”
A beat.
No one argued.
Because there was no alternative.
“Alright,” Frank said again, quieter now. “On three.”
“One—”
Robby made a sound.
It wasn’t loud.
It wasn’t clear.
But it was there.
A low, broken, almost animal sound that tore out of him without permission.
Everyone froze.
Every single one of them.
Because for all their training, all their knowledge—
They were still new.
Still learning.
Still standing in a room where everything was wrong, where nothing was straightforward, where every decision felt like it could be the one that made things worse.
And in that moment—
They didn’t know what to do.
Frank felt it hit him like a wall.
The weight of it.
The responsibility.
The terrifying, suffocating realization that he was the most senior doctor in the room—
And he didn’t know if he was enough.
Not for this.
Not for him.
Robby’s breathing stuttered again, uneven, fragile, his body trembling faintly under the blanket.
Mohan tightened her grip on his hand instinctively.
“It’s okay,” she whispered, even though she wasn’t sure if it was true. “We’re here. We’re right here.”
Her eyes flicked up to the others.
“We should move him,” she said softly, but firmly. “We can’t keep him here.”
Cassie nodded quickly, swallowing hard. “Yeah. We just—we keep his neck stable. No twisting, no sudden movement.”
Santos adjusted her stance slightly, grounding herself. “I’ve got his head,” she said again, more to reassure herself than anyone else.
Javadi shifted her grip, repositioning carefully. “We do this slow.”
Frank looked at each of them in turn.
Young.
Brilliant.
Terrified.
And still here.
Still trying.
He drew in a slow breath.
“Okay,” he said.
Not perfect.
Not certain.
But enough.
“We do it together.”
Mohan leaned in slightly, her voice soft but insistent as she focused back on Robby.
“Hey,” she murmured. “We’re going to move you, okay? It’s going to hurt—but we’ve got you. Just stay with me. Stay right here.”
Robby’s eyes fluttered again, unfocused—but something in his expression shifted, like some small part of him understood.
Or maybe just trusted.
Frank nodded once.
“Alright,” he said quietly. “On three.”
And this time—
They didn’t stop.
Robby didn’t understand all of it.
Not the words. Not the movement. Not the sharp, overlapping voices trying to stay calm and failing at the edges.
But he understood enough.
Pain had a language of its own.
It roared through him, his head splitting, his body screaming in a dozen different places, heat and cold chasing each other under his skin. Every breath felt wrong. Too shallow. Too heavy. Like something inside him wasn’t working the way it should.
He felt… sick.
Deep down sick.
And somewhere beneath the confusion, beneath the haze—
He knew.
Thirty years in the ER didn’t just disappear.
It sat in his bones. In his instincts.
In the quiet, clinical part of his mind that was still trying, desperately,to assess, to categorize, to understand.
Head injury.
Bad one.
Internal bleeding.
Abdomen… chest…
Too much time.
Too much delay.
Infection… already setting in. He could feel it. That creeping, systemic wrongness. The fever building, the weakness that didn’t belong to trauma alone.
He knew what this looked like.
Knew what it meant.
He might have made it… if they’d treated him sooner.
The thought came and went, oddly calm.
Not angry.
Just… factual.
And that was the strangest part.
He wasn’t angry.
Not about the pain.
Not about the neglect.
Not even about the fact that, somewhere deep down, he knew—
He was dying.
His thoughts drifted.
Not to the hospital.
Not to the injuries.
But to them.
The kids.
Cassie. Mohan. Santos. Javadi. Langdon.
His team.
His… people.
A weak, fractured part of him couldn’t quite reconcile it.
He had been hard on them.
Too hard.
Sharp. Cutting. Unforgiving when they messed up, when they hesitated, when they didn’t meet the standard he carried in his head.
He’d pushed them.
Sometimes past what was fair.
And yet—
They were here.
All of them.
Fighting for him.
Not because they had to.
Because they wanted to.
Why?
The question flickered faintly, blurred by the pain.
He didn’t understand it.
Didn’t think he deserved it.
And that—
That hurt in a different way.
Something warm slipped down his temple.
He didn’t notice it at first.
Didn’t register it.
Not until Mohan’s voice changed.
“Stop—wait—”
Everything paused.
Hands stilled.
Movement halted instantly.
Mohan leaned in closer, her grip tightening slightly around his hand.
“Robby… hey…” her voice softened, gentler now, threaded with something deeper. “You’re crying.”
Crying?
The word didn’t make sense at first.
But then—
Another tear slipped free.
And another.
Oh.
Cassie was suddenly there too, crowding into his line of vision, her face pale but focused, eyes scanning him quickly.
“Hey, hey—stay with us,” she said, her voice firm but not unkind.
Langdon moved in on the other side, his presence quieter, steadier. Less frantic now—more deliberate.
“Robby,” he said, and there was something different in his tone. Respect. Care. Not just attending to patient, but to him.“We’re going to move you to a better room, alright? We just need to get you onto another stretcher.”
Robby’s eyes tried to focus.
Tried to find them.
Failed—but he tried.
Langdon took that as enough.
“You’re doing good,” he added quietly. “Just hang on a little longer.”
Mohan’s thumb brushed against his hand again.
“We’ve got you,” she whispered.
They repositioned.
Carefully.
Every movement was slower now, more intentional. No rushed motions. No guesswork.
“Okay,” Cassie said under her breath. “On three. Minimal lift—keep him straight.”
Santos adjusted at his head. “C-spine secure.”
Javadi nodded from the side. “Ready.”
Frank met each of their eyes.
“Together,” he said.
A breath.
“One—”
Robby tensed instinctively.
“Two—”
Mohan leaned closer. “Stay with me. Just a second—”
“Three.”
They lifted.
It wasn’t smooth.
It couldn’t be.
Even done perfectly, it was agony.
A broken sound tore from Robby’s throat, his body reacting despite their care, despite their efforts to minimize everything.
“Easy—easy—” Cassie murmured, even as her arms strained.
“Almost—” Javadi added, breath tight.
“Don’t move his head—” Santos snapped, her focus absolute.
“I’ve got it,” Frank replied immediately.
They shifted him over.
Lowered him.
Carefully.
Carefully.
Carefully—
Until finally—
He was on the new stretcher.
They didn’t move right away.
Didn’t speak.
Because for a moment—
All of them looked down.
At where he had been.
And the room seemed to go very, very quiet.
The sheet beneath the old bed was soaked.
Dark.
Spreading.
Blood.
Urine.
Dirt and debris ground into fabric.
Proof.
Of how long he’d been there.
Of how badly he’d been left.
Cassie’s stomach turned.
Javadi looked away first, her jaw tightening hard.
Mohan’s grip on Robby’s hand didn’t falter—but her eyes glistened.
Santos went still again—but this time, it wasn’t fear that held her.
It was something heavier.
Something angrier.
Frank exhaled slowly through his nose, his gaze lingering for just a second longer before he forced himself to look away.
“We’re not leaving him here again,” he said quietly.
Not a suggestion.
A promise.
Cassie nodded immediately, her voice rough. “No. Not a chance.”
Mohan leaned in close to Robby again, her voice soft but fierce in its own way.
“You hear that?” she murmured. “We’re not going anywhere.”
Robby didn’t know if he could respond.
Didn’t know if his body would let him.
But somewhere—
Deep down—
He heard them.
And for the first time since this started—
He wasn’t alone.