K Darblyne - The Fellowship

"Lori, call CT and tell them we’ll need an abdomen scan for this patient," she said leaning into the doorway of the trauma room.

"Sure thing, Dr. Potter." The insecure nurse was beginning to regain her composure. Her shyness was something that she had trouble with all of her life. She loved being a nurse, but felt at times somewhat overwhelmed by the emotional demands of her patients. Her conservatively styled blonde hair and tall shapely body made her look older, but when she smiled, the illusion was gone in an instant as the youthful appearance of braces glistened in the light.

Jamie was now watching, as the X-rays of the lower extremities were becoming available. Shaking her head at the multiple fractures that were very evident on the X-rays, she advised the young nurse, "It may be a while until Ortho has all of the splinting done. You may want to let them know in CT."

The nurse reached for the phone and did the doctor’s bidding. Hanging up, she informed the physician, "They’re just finishing up that second trauma now, so whenever we are ready will be all right with them."

"Good, and here comes Ortho now." She waited for the tall, lanky form to come closer to her before addressing him. "Hi! I don’t believe that I’ve met you," she held out her hand to him.

His large hand was gentle at the touch of the handshake. "I’m Dr. Armand Selep, I’m covering for your regulars tonight." His eyes held her in his gaze.

"Jamie Potter, E.R. Attending." She smiled pleasantly at him, her hand lingering in his grasp.

The young nurse looked at the two, feeling embarrassed by her intrusion on the intimate moment, she nervously coughed trying to bring them back to the realization of where they were. "Dr. Potter," Lori spoke softly. "CT Scan is waiting for the patient," she reminded her.

Surprised at her reactions to the tall dark-haired man, the physician could feel her face begin to flush. Trying as hard as she might to subdue her inner feelings, she quickly started rattling off a brief report of the patient’s mode of trauma and her findings. "Thirty year old male, unrestrained driver of a tractor trailer that was involved in a head-on crash with an SUV. Obvious deformity to the right leg and ankle, complaining of severe pain in both lower extremities." She pointed to the viewer where the X-rays of his legs were displayed. Clearing her throat, she continued. "There was a reported death in the SUV. We would like to have those legs splinted before he goes to CT Scan to check out his abdomen."

The tall doctor stood with his hand rubbing his face and the barely visible growth of beard, studying the X-rays. Blinking several times as he compared one view of the leg to the other, he began to shake his head. "Those are some pretty bad fractures." He paused and looked into the trauma room at the patient. "Seems pretty quiet for the likes of those injuries," he mused.

"Well, you should have been here when he first came in." Jamie chuckled, "We snowed him pretty good. He was disturbing the entire E.R. with his screaming."

"Yeah, I bet." Armand smiled down at the physician. "Let me get started splinting then," he said. "While he’s in the scanner, I’ll notify my attending. I’m sure he’ll want to take him to the O.R. tonight."

"All right, then." The red-haired doctor nodded in agreement. Adjusting her glasses on her face, Jamie watched as the orthopedic surgeon assembled his supplies to splint the legs.

The long, eerie-toned note was all that was heard, as the surgical team stood transfixed to the electronic monitoring devices. Garrett sniffed as she looked over to the large clock on the wall, "Time of death, 2113."

The anesthesiologist slowly turned off his monitoring devices. Suddenly the room became deafeningly loud with the silence.

She stepped back from the lifeless body on the operating table, snapping her gloves as she ripped them off of her hands and threw them into the waste bucket on the floor. She pulled at the mask on her face, ripping the ties with a strong yank of her hand. She spat into the waste bucket, using the mask to wipe her mouth and discarded it. Death always left a bad taste in her mouth, even if there was nothing she could do to prevent it.

Rob Kreger let his eyes fall into the gaping chest cavity that had been his center of attention for the last hour or so. He let his mind go over his actions and questioned the patient’s outcome. Perhaps he should have called sooner for the talented surgeon to assist him. Would that have made a difference? Had he allowed himself to become arrogant in thinking that he could do the job himself? Alone?

Slowly his hands busied themselves with the task of removing the rib spreaders that were used to gain access to the chest cavity and its contents. The draping was being removed from the face of the woman and he felt compelled to look at her features. He studied them intently, so as to burn them into his memory. This was the face of his first patient lost during an operation that he would call to mind during the rest of his career. He owed it to her and to all the patients he would treat in his lifetime. The lesson being to keep him humble, never denying to ask for help not for him but for his patient.

Long dark hair moved gently with the breeze as the tall form stood staring at the landing sight for the helicopter. The marker lights in the darkening twilight hours illuminated the helipad. Her back faced the trauma doors to the emergency area of the hospital, but she could somehow feel the presence of another human walking towards her. Sensing no danger, she remained absorbed in her thoughts.

The small hand reached out to touch her arm. "Gar…I mean, Dr. Trivoli,

Mom told me you were out here," Danni used her most comforting tone of voice.

"You were right the first time. I don’t much feel like a doctor right about now." She nodded absent-mindedly to herself.

"I’m sorry."

"No need to be, Danni." The surgeon turned to face her friend. "Some things just happen. We all tried the best we could." She shrugged her shoulders, "It just wasn’t meant to be."

Danni looked off into the distance, "I know that, but it’s hard knowing that you lost two from the same vehicle."

The surgeon cleared her throat, "Ah… actually it was all three that were in the same vehicle."

Danni’s head snapped around peering into the blue eyes of her roommate, "What do you mean, all three?"

"The driver of the vehicle was the one dead on the scene. The last flight crew showed me a Polaroid of him." She licked her teeth, making a dissatisfied expression, "It looked like a classic traumatic asphyxiation. He was dead before he knew what hit him."

"Oh," was all that the petite woman said, nodding her head knowingly. Her gaze fell to the ground as she stood there, pondering the results of the catastrophic accident. Her gentle nature was always thinking about the victim or the effect that the trauma would befall the survivors. She closed her eyes and prayed for strength to carry her through until morning when her shift would end.

Garrett broke the silence, "Any word yet on family?"

"No, but Alex said that she would let us know."

"She’ll notify C.O.R.E. then, when she finds out?"

The nurse nodded, "Yes, she thought that would be the best. Just in case there is no one with the authority to deal with the situation."

They stood there for several moments, each absorbed in their own thoughts. The air was turning colder and brought a shiver to the small blonde nurse. Rubbing her arms to get warm, "I’m going back in." She turned, taking several steps, then stopped abruptly, "Garrett?"

"Hmmm?"

"Would you like your duffel bag now, before we get too busy again?"

"Yeah, I guess I could use something to freshen up with right about now," her voice was teasing as she sniffed at her scrub top. "Whew!"

This action brought a smile to both of them as they headed back inside. The two roommates nudging one another with their elbows and giggling as they walked along was letting the tension of the last few hours ease on both of them. For a minute or two, they were able to act as though they still possessed the innocence of childhood.

Entering the E.R., the two were meet by an agitated charge nurse. "Oh, so there you are!" The older nurse shook her finger at the pair. "I’ve been looking all over for you two. You’re the hardest people I know of to find when there is good news."

Danni and Garrett exchanged glances with each other, shrugging their shoulders in unison, then slowly both looked down at the pagers on their clothing.

"Gee, Mom, it’s not like you couldn’t page us or something," Danni teased.

"Yeah, there for a while tonight, you were reading my thoughts like you were inside of my head. What happened?" An eyebrow raised as Garrett looked in her direction.

"Well, next time, short of setting off those darn trauma pagers again, I just might do that," she was becoming flustered.

"So what’s the good news, Mom?" The petite nurse tried to help Karen get back on track with her thoughts.

"Ah…oh! Yeah, you won the baby pool."

"Which one of us, mom?" She glanced up at Garrett, "We both guessed Nine fifteen."

"Well apparently you both won, Rene and his wife had twins; a girl at nine sixteen and a boy at nine eighteen. Surprised everyone including themselves," she chuckled. "They finally took her for a C-section. Seems you two were the closest to the actual times."

Danni looked up to the surgeon, noticing the lopsided grin on her face, "Well, how about that, roommate?" She winked. "We make a pretty good team, you and I," and her soft chuckle became infectious for all three.

The surgeon was taken by surprise at her permutation into a team player, even if that team only consisted of two. She chuckled along with them, but her laugh was more on the side of nervousness at this odd sensation, which was binding her to the small nurse.

Garrett thought about the time of delivery. "You know, it only seems fitting that those babies be born around that time."

"Why is that?" Danni had a half laugh sound to her voice.

"I pronounced the woman in the O.R. at 2113." The surgeon’s voice was somber with the reflection.

"Oh, I see." There was silence for a moment of reverent thought before the young nurse spoke. "You know, they say that when one spirit leaves this earth, another one comes to take its place." She shrugged her shoulders. "Life goes on."

"Hmm…interesting thought, Danni. Interesting in a lot of ways." Garrett wondered who would be the one to take over the place that was vacated in her life. She’d have to give this concept more thought when she had the time. Right now, she was just too tired to put forth the effort.

The aroma of the strongly brewed coffee acted like a homing device to the sleep-deprived surgeon as she made her way to the doctors’ lounge, adjacent to the O.R. locker room. She knew this was the most powerful coffee within the entire complex and she was desperate to stay awake after the long night of monitoring the critically injured trauma patient. It was close to noon and still there was no word of any family members or next of kin for her patient. She hated to think that there was no one in the world that would care whether or not the young man even existed. She made a mental note to get in touch with the social worker and see if there was any progress in the case, but first she would get her cup of caffeine enriched coffee. Her mind drifted to thoughts of her bed at Danni’s house and she found herself envying the nurse for only having to work twelve hour shifts, unlike the thirty-six hours that her night of call held for her. ‘She’ll be fast asleep by now.’ She looked at her watch. It registered as eleven hundred hours in her military mind.

She reached out for the door handle only to have it swing open towards her. Her forward momentum halted as she saw a haggard figure before her. The rumpled and unshaven man was none other than her colleague, Rene Chabot. His eyelids barely open, he tilted his head back to view the obstacle in front of him. After a long moment, he recognized the tall, raven-haired figure as his replacement for the trauma team the previous day. Too tired to speak, he grinned from ear to ear, the way all new fathers do, and held up his hand showing two fingers raised side by side. His nervous giggle was all that was needed to realize that the arrival of twins had taken him by surprise also. So much for modern medicine and being able to predict with any certainty the number and gender of the fetuses, but then again, it may have been their choice not to know ahead of time.