A/N: Putting Mike and Marion temporarily on hold (due to a new found love of Nick Burnett) a little bit M/N to entertain you all :D A few other themes to discover along the way as well. This story is set just after the episode "Compromising Positions" and before "Counting Chickens". Basically (for those who may not have seen either episodes) Bobby (the ambulance driver) was stabbed, practically as Nick showed up at the scene. I'm also aiming to try and explain the disappearance of and Nick and Marian....so not too much to go on!! Sorry for the short chapter, just a bit of scene setting. Enjoy etc.....Roll on Chapter 1......
The world became suddenly still.
He sat there, like a child, his thoughts not really there at all. He didn't want to move, think, talk. He just wanted to sit, as he was now, staring. She was there somewhere; she'd hovered at the door, just watching him. His eyes had caught matron pulling her away, leading her. They were talking about him, but right now, for the first time, he didn't care who he was upsetting, he just wanted to sit.
Nick wished he was in a coma, not because he wished he was dead, he just wished he could no longer feel. The senses that he usually craved, bathed in, he wished were gone. Every inch of his body he could feel, every minute felt like an hour, every noise seemed a mile away. His eyes turned to his hands, held out before him like a child, red. He could feel the dampness of it all, the warmth that still lingered. They talked of murderers having blood on their hands, never doctors; it was all he could do not to vomit.
Marion had stood by the treatment room door, arms folding, watching him sit there. It worried her that he didn't move, didn't seem to be noticing the dark pattern of blood that had sprinkled itself onto his face. Like a girl, she had stood there, daring herself to go in, but fate had intervened. Matron's hand on her shoulder had stopped her, the words "Let's talk in my office" drawing her from her vigil.
In his office, Mr. Carnegie placed the phone gently back onto the receiver. The conversations of the last hour had not been easy. The first, a phone call to Bobby's parents about his death, had been received somewhat too lightly by his mother. The incoming calls that followed consisted of a torrent of hungry press, eager to interview him about the mortality rate of the staff at St. Aiden's.
Adam sat back in his chair and pondered the situation in his mind. All the phone calls seemed so trivial in the scale of things; it was his job, yet seemingly nothing against the lives that had been lost. He'd been here, what, two years now? Yet he'd never felt this sentimental before. It was as though Bobby had been his brother, his friend, yet he hardly had known him. The whole hospital was grieving more than the boy's own mother, and what was stranger was that Adam was grieving with them. Hell, he'd become part of the family.
His mind flashed back to his first day; Middleditch shaking hands with Gordon, kissing Matron on the cheek, making her blush profoundly, saying goodbye to his colleagues; only they'd been more than that. Adam hadn't understood how employees could be friends. When he'd talked about it to Middleditch later, insistent he could never become that close, his words had been simple as he'd handed Adam the slip of paper, 'Just in Case'.
Now Carnegie stood by the old safe that he had refused to use, turning the dial to the numbers on the same slip of paper; "1-8-8-6". The door swung, albeit stiffly, open. It was hardly what he had expected, but it felt all right all the same. A bottle of Whiskey and a piece of paper with two simple words "Welcome Home". Scotch. Adam had to admit, Middleditch had taste.