"Excuse me, I'm looking for a Dr Mark Greene. Is he here?"
Randi looked up with a blank expression on her face. "Dr Greene? Sure. He's... he's over there." She gestured with her pen towards a lean, balding figure heading towards the admit desk.
"Hi... excuse me, I'm Lucy Knight; I'm new here."
Mark stretched out his hand. "Hi. Welcome to the ER!"
Lucy smiled. "I know I'm not officially starting yet, but I wanted to come in and get a feel for the place..."
"That's fine. I can show you round a bit if you like - so long as you don't mind us all rushing round frantically. In between seasons like this we get kinda rushed with all the fanfic..." He pulled Lucy towards the wall as four paramedics rushed towards them with a gurney piled high with scripts, calling out the bullet:
"OK, we got a six-parter! 27-year old female author, D-C fan, lotsa sex! Ross, Hathaway, Charlie, Greene, Weaver and miscellaneous extras!"
Mark deftly plucked a script from the pile on the gurney as it was rolled past, and flicked through it. He made a face. "Not too bad for me... Doug's gonna need to break out the Viagra again though..."
"Viagra?" asked Lucy.
"Yeah... you wouldn't believe the number of sex scenes he has to do over the summer!" He read on. "Oh and Kerry's gonna be pissed - another SWOB scene..." Seeing Lucy's blank look he explained: "Standard Walk-On Bitch scene... she has to walk on, say something bitchy, and walk off again. She says they 'ignore the true complexity of her character'". Mark smirked.
Lucy followed him into a trauma room and stopped, aghast at the bloody scene before them. "What's the matter with him?" she asked. A man lay on the table before them, his face pale and sweaty, tubes hanging out of all his arms and legs and machines beeping wildly all over the place, while an attractive young doctor with boyishly tousled hair massaged his heart. "Shouldn't he be dead with his heart practically out of
his body like that?" she added.
"Oh probably... but we have to play it the way the fanfic authors write it... He'll be okay. Hey, Carter, how're you doing? Meet Lucy - she'll be starting work in season five."
"Hi Lucy!" Carter smiled then went back to massaging the man's heart with one hand while intubating him with the other. Just then, the doors from the next trauma room were smashed open by a man in blue surgical scrubs, who skidded to a halt, gasping for breath. "Dr Benton! At last!" Carter whipped his hand out of the man's chest cavity and stripped off his gloves. "I have to be in an exam room in two minutes, holding Dr Weaver's hand!"
"Sorry... I'm... late... Carter." Benton took a couple of deep breaths. "I had to... uh... do a big scene with Elizabeth."
Carter winked at him and nudged him hard in the ribs with his elbow. "Tired, Dr Benton?" He grinned at Lucy and Mark. "Dr Benton has a reputation... I hope he was careful this time! Anyway, I have to go."
"Actually, you should meet Kerry Weaver" said Mark to Lucy. "Want to come watch?"
She nodded and followed Mark out of the trauma room as Benton took over the patient. In exam one, they found Carter already sitting at the bedside of a slight, attractive redhead, with a determined look even to her sleeping face, who lay back wanly while another doctor with a mass of long curly hair and slightly rumpled clothing looked at her leg.
"Carter..." murmured Kerry woozily as she drifted off again.
"Dr Weaver... are you okay?"
Lucy was impressed by the change in Carter's manner. Only two minutes ago he had been frantically working on the patient in the trauma room with what she could only describe as a devil-may-care manner, but now he seemed to be showing a much more sensitive side of his character.
"She'll be fine", said the elegant doctor with the curly hair, who breathed as if she had been running and was surreptitiously straightening her clothing with one hand. "She just needs a good long sleep to get her strength up before we fix this leg."
"Dr Elizabeth Corday", whispered Mark. "British; dating Peter Benton. Does a great act with an egg!"
"Thanks, Dr Corday, I guess we should leave her to it then - I'll come back and see her later." said Carter. He let Kerry's hand fall back and stood up, fixing her with a long, considered gaze, before turning away.
Watching the pale figure in the bed, Lucy wondered if she was really asleep. She started as she saw Kerry's long dark lashes move and the gleam of eyes beneath them, and realized that she was being watched herself. Just then, Mark's pager went off and he checked it.
"Uh-oh... gotta go. Big death scene coming up. You're in that too Carter - you're done with this one for now, right?" He didn't elaborate. "Lucy, will you be okay with Kerry and Elizabeth for now? Kerry, Elizabeth, this is Lucy Knight - new med student."
Elizabeth smiled at her and she nodded. "Sure." Mark waved and he and Carter walked rapidly out and back towards the admit area, Carter hastily checking a crumpled script he'd pulled out of his back pocket.
"Whose death scene?" asked Lucy.
"Probably Doug or Carol's" The voice came from the bed, and was now clear and commanding. Kerry Weaver sat up and swung her legs over the edge. Elizabeth passed her her crutch and she stood up and stretched. "I hate lying down half the day. Still, at least I'm getting to be more than just a bitch in this one!"
"Who wrote it? And how can Dr Ross die in the one Dr Greene's in?" Lucy was puzzled. Doug Ross was one person she'd already heard of; surely he wasn't going to die even before she'd started work!
Kerry laughed. "Who didn't write it, you mean!"
"The one we just did that scene from is a round robin" explained Elizabeth. "Different parts of the story are being written by different people. Kerry's lucky, she has her own list of dedicated authors, only three-quarters of whom regularly kill or maim her." Elizabeth smiled mischievously at Kerry, who grimaced.
"It can certainly be painful... and these are the people who like me!" she exclaimed, although Lucy got the impression she was secretly rather pleased.
"As for people dying," continued Elizabeth, "well obviously we don't, actually, or none of us would be here now. If it's written into one of the main-season scripts, then it happens. But even then if there's enough demand you can still get fanfic work over the summers, I'm told."
"Think Tinkerbell in Peter Pan," added Kerry. "The more strongly people believe in you, and the more work you get, the longer you exist. It's simple really."
Lucy nodded. Kerry checked her watch. "I need to go sign some scripts. Did you meet any of the other staff yet Lucy, apart from Carter and Dr Greene?"
She shook her head. "No, not yet."
"Come with me then. Elizabeth, I'll see you later on the surgical ward, okay?"
Back at the admit desk Kerry took a pile of fanfic scripts and glanced through them. "Done... done... done... OK, these are all finished with." She signed them quickly and gave them to Randi. "Randi, get these up to the fanfic archives right away."
"Yes Dr Weaver..." Randi didn't sound at all enthusiastic. "Oh and Dr Weaver, I got a call on the radio... there's another one coming in any minute... from somewhere in north-east England?"
Kerry went pale, even as the doors from the ambulance bay were thrust open and another gurney was rushed in.
"OK people, we got a Kerry Weaver special in 18 parts!" shouted out one of the paramedics. "One MVA, one assault, two bereavements and a big fight scene! Weaver, Ross, Greene, Hathaway, one cop, one family member and Mickey Mouse! Take it away!"
The paramedics were gone almost as quickly as they had appeared, leaving the gurney piled with scripts. Lucy noticed that the corner of each one had been fastened with particularly large, fearsome-looking staples, and wondered about the author. Kerry's face lightened a little as she looked through one of them. "Well, nothing too bad happens to me in part one anyway... and whatever happens it should be interesting..." She paused
as a dark-haired nurse in dusky pink scrubs walked up with a slim woman in a white coat, and made the introductions.
"Carol, Jeannie, meet Lucy Knight. Lucy's our new med student in season five. Lucy, meet Carol Hathaway, our head nurse, and Doug Ross's fiancee, and Jeannie Boulet. Jeannie's a physician's assistant."
Carol smiled warmly at Lucy. "Hi Lucy." She gestured towards the gurney. "What's this Kerry? Anything in it for me?"
"Not in this part, no. Might be in the next ones. Here's one for you, though, Jeannie". She passed Jeannie a script and the PA's brow creased as she walked slowly away again, reading. Kerry continued with a look of concern towards Carol: "How are you, anyway? Are the... uh... back problems clearing up?"
Carol was embarrassed. "The painkillers are helping. But I have to say I'm looking forward to the start of the season when Doug and I have most of our sex scenes off-camera and I can have a rest!" She turned back to Lucy. "Any idea who they might be hooking you up with in the main season, Lucy?"
Lucy shook her head. "No idea. I was hoping one of you might be able to tell me!" She hoped secretly that if it was anyone it would be the good-looking Dr Carter.
"Hmmm... what do you think, Kerry? Carter's not due for another romance yet, I'm sure. Could be an unrequited crush on Doug or Mark, I guess?" Carol chuckled at the thought.
Kerry agreed. "Either of those. Or maybe no one at all. Anyway, I need to go work on this. Is Doug around anywhere, Carol? We've got a big fight in this part, and I'd like to go through some of it with him. He's just too cavalier when it comes to going into these things unrehearsed."
Carol rolled her eyes. "Honestly, Kerry, you worry too much about all that. You know Doug always comes through okay in the end. Anyway, he's in a death scene right now." It was Carol's turn to check her watch. "I should be there in a minute to hold his hand and tell him I love him just before he dies. And then we're going to meet Mark and and go help Susan
rehearse for a fic that came in yesterday. She's kinda out of practice..."
Kerry looked worried. "Lucy, we have to go. Will you be okay on your own for a while? Feel free to look around - the lounge is just through there if you want coffee."
"Thanks, Dr Weaver. I'll be fine." Lucy was secretly pleased to be left on her own. There seemed to be such a lot going on. Kerry and Carol took leave of her and headed off in their separate directions with their scripts, and she turned round to study the scene around her. She wished she knew a bit more about what she was supposed to be like in the next
season, so she could imagine a bit more who she might be working with and what she might be doing.
She stayed by the admit desk for the next half hour, while all around her nurses, clerks and doctors bustled, gently moving her out of the way when they needed to get past her, signing scripts, reading up on medical procedures, and arguing about their motivation in different scenes. A clerk called Jerry explained that he was in fact the linchpin of the
whole ER operation, tried to get her to place a bet on what terrible accident Doug Ross would next get to rescue Hathaway from, and then went back to playing Doom on one of the computers. A nurse whose name badge said Chuny, and whose whole face lit up when she smiled, brought her a mug of coffee, which she sipped gratefully.
Her eye was suddenly caught by a small, balding man, who wore blue scrubs like Dr Benton's, and who was eyeing her lasciviously. She blushed and looked away. "Ignore him", a voice said dryly from behind her. "That's Rocket Romano, ego the size of a house, everything else probably... not". Lucy turned round to see Elizabeth Corday again,
with a tall, dark-haired doctor who greeted her with a wide smile and yet another outstretched hand.
"I'm Maggie Doyle. Dr Corday said we had a new student in. You must be Lucy, right?"
Lucy nodded, as Elizabeth winked and deftly steered Rocket Romano away from them towards the lifts.
"Elizabeth said you'd be here. How would you like to come meet some of the recurring characters? You won't see them running round here that often, but you could have to work with any of them at any time..." Lucy didn't protest and Maggie led her away from the admit desk and down a barely lit corridor to a set of double doors. "You won't see this in any of the main-season scenes; it's more like a dormitory. Of course, some of us do have apartments or other places away from the ER to hang out in, but not everyone does." She pushed open one of the doors and stood to one side to let Lucy through.
Lucy gasped. She found herself in an enormous room like a gym, filled with row upon row of chairs, camp beds, lockers and coffee machines, but mainly with people. Everywhere, doctors, nurses, patients and extras were sitting and standing, talking together, rehearsing or sleeping. At the end nearest them was an area roped off with heavy red cord and filled with more comfortable looking chairs. Maggie led her into it, got them some coffee, and sat her down. "This is where the recurring characters who got most work last season hang out when they're 'resting'", she confided.
Lucy found herself next to a handsome well dressed man who sat, head bowed, turning a photograph over and over in his hands and occasionally letting out sighs that would probably register high on the Beaufort scale. "Isn't that a photograph of Dr Weaver?" Lucy asked Maggie out of the corner of her mouth.
Maggie nodded. "That's Ellis West", she whispered. "Had a thing going with Weaver last year but she thought he was only dating her to get a contract to run the ER, so she dumped him. I don't know what he was doing but he sure wants to get back with her now!" Maggie reached past Lucy and patted Ellis comfortingly on the shoulder. "Don't know what he sees in her myself - I mean, the red hair's nice but..." Maggie didn't go on.
Lucy noticed a distinguished looking woman in surgical scrubs playing backgammon with a slightly vague-looking blonde in a white coat. "Hi Dr Hicks, Dr Keaton" called Maggie. The two women smiled politely at them, then returned to their game. Maggie whispered: "They're surgeons. Dr Keaton had a fling with Carter once. too. No one thinks either of them will be back in the main season, but they're popular. Susan Lewis is the same - she's in here a lot nowadays but she still gets occasional fanfic scripts over the summer."
"What about you?" asked Lucy.
"Oh I'm in plenty of fanfics." Maggie answered quickly. "As for the main season, I'll be back a lot more this year, obviously. There's a lot of demand for me..." She trailed off, and Lucy got the impression she wasn't as confident as she wanted her to believe. The young med student shivered slightly as she looked out over the room. There was an air of
desperation about the people in there which increased the further they were from the double doors. In fact Lucy realized with a shock that she couldn't actually see the end of the room. When she stared down there, it all seemed to blur before her eyes. The people furthest away seemed vague and ill-formed, just blobs in white coats or green, pink or blue scrubs.
"What's happened to the end of the room?" she asked Maggie urgently, and far too loudly, she realized. The area around them fell into a sudden cold silence and Maggie frowned.
"We don't talk about that", she said, standing up quickly. "Come on, Lucy, I think we'd better get back to the ER." She forced a smile.
"I... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ask something I shouldn't..." Lucy felt guilty.
As they passed out through the double doors and back into the ER, Maggie reassured her. "Don't worry. It's just that... down there... is where characters go when people stop believing in them. When there's no more main-season work... and the fanfics dry up. They just seem to slip further and further away, until one day... they just aren't there any
more. Virtually no one comes back from that, you see..."
Back at the admit desk again, Maggie left her with a smile and a cheerful wave. "Gotta go read up on bullet types - might need to save Carter's neck again soon! Always helps with popularity, saving Carter!"
Three and a half hours later, the shifts were preparing to change over and Lucy was ready to drop. She'd met a lot more people, and even helped out as an 'unnamed med student' in a scene from a fanfic. Two nurses called Lydia and Haleh were now regaling her with gossip, over a coffee and doughnuts supplied by Jerry. "So who's the person who's really in
charge?" Lucy asked Lydia and Haleh, having been told in no uncertain terms that Jerry was not.
Haleh leaned forward. "Wish we knew!" she answered, and went on: "Dr Morgenstern - you may have seen him in the hall back there - he was, but he's not coming back, and Dr Weaver was doing his job, but she quit at the end of the last season."
"She wasn't doing it properly," interjected Lydia. "Just acting."
"Right," said Haleh, "only now she's not even doing that - we hope!"
"She's that bad?" asked Lucy, puzzled. Dr Weaver had seemed friendly enough.
Lydia made a face. "She's a good doctor" she said grudgingly. "But she's a real pain in the... uh... a real stickler for rules and regulations. I guess you'll find out soon enough. And whatever you do, don't get between her and Dr Ross!"
"Someone taking my name in vain?" A good-looking man in his mid-thirties, with salt-and-pepper hair, folded himself into a chair beside them. He smiled at her and winked. "Hi, you must be Lucy. I'm Doug. I look after kids and annoy Kerry Weaver."
"Hi," she said shyly. "Have you died yet?"
Doug chuckled. "Died, and gone to hell for the sin of disagreeing with our beloved ex-Acting Chief of Emergency Medicine!" He grinned, and Lucy guessed that he wasn't too bothered about the fact that he didn't get on with the fiery attending physician. "So, Lucy, had a good day? What do you think of our ER? Like it?"
Lucy was nodding when suddenly the door flew open and Malik rushed in. "They're coming!" he gasped, and her companions looked up, startled. The faint humming in the background she had been vaguely aware of for a while had grown louder, and Lucy realized that what she was hearing was a helicopter. Lydia, Haleh and Doug pushed back their chairs simultaneously and ran out of the lounge after Malik. Lucy followed them,
wondering what was going on.
By the admit desk, they found a scene of frantic activity and excitement. Mark Greene came up, pushing a gurney, while Kerry Weaver stood, in total and impressive command despite her small stature and her crutch, issuing a flood of instructions to a rapidly growing group of doctors, nurses and other staff who were running towards the desk from
all corners of the ER.
"Carter, get up to the roof with Dr Greene to the helicopter! Carol, you go with them; Doug, you too! Jerry, call surgery, personnel, psych, paeds, radiology, MRI, the ICUs and Doc Magoo's and tell them to get ready for incoming season-five scripts, incoming season-five scripts, OK?" Jerry, who had even dropped his doughnut, nodded and reached
with surprising speed for a phone, his game forgotten. Kerry continued: "Chuny and Lily, check the equipment in the exam rooms and suture rooms; Malik and Wendy, do the trauma rooms; Yosh and Conni, check the drug locker. Randi..." she paused and took a deep breath "...Randi, call despatch and close us to fanfic."
Suddenly Lucy understood. This was the moment when it all began! She saw Susan Lewis moving reluctantly away towards the dim corridor with several other characters of uncertain status. A stout man in a white coat with the name Donald Anspaugh embroidered on it came up: "Well, everyone, do as Dr Weaver says. And good luck to all of you this season!" Nodding to Kerry he went off towards the stairs, closely followed by Peter Benton,
Elizabeth Corday and various other doctors and nurses who were officially based in other parts of the hospital. Elizabeth smiled at Lucy as she went past and whispered to her: "Good luck!"
Kerry paused and looked around. "Lucy, get out into the ambulance bay and wait there, you shouldn't be here yet! Jeannie, check the whole ER for people who shouldn't be here. Call security to help. No dead characters, no characters who have left, no extras who've been in once already. You all know the routine, we've done it before, now do it again!" For a second no one moved, as the rumbling from the helicopter sounded loudly overhead, and Lucy could feel the tension and suppressed excitement of the moment. This was it! These were the season-five scripts arriving! Kerry looked to where Mark was standing with Doug, Carol and Carter for confirmation. "Ready, Mark?".
Mark took a deep breath and nodded, as the rumbling grew louder then cut off as the helicopter landed, to be replaced by a familiar theme tune.
"We're ready! Let's go, people!"