Disclaimer: All characters involved are owned by someone who ain't me…

One of my first attempts at fic, so be nice, please R/R so I can see what you think

Disclaimer: All characters involved are owned by someone who ain't me…

Set sometime after "Witch Hunt"

Lovers Lost

It was a familiar situation.

The same old crash, through the same old doors and the same old voices calling out the situation to the same old doctors stood at reception. This time I just happened to be one of them.

 It was me who followed behind as the patient was sped down the corridor, across the same old linoleum, into the same old rooms, with the same old equipment and the same old smell, like chemicals and disease.

It was me who the attending paramedic fired facts at, each one crucial to the survival of the patient, all implanting themselves securely into my short-term memory, as each was trained hard to do.

And all this time, during the same-old routine, I never once looked at the patient, never once asked for a name, not once did I think to myself that the moment I looked into the face of the person laying on the nearby gurney my world would fall apart at the seams. Taking an eternity to stitch itself back together into only a shred of what it used to be.

"Severe Gunshot wound to the chest, fired point blank, severe loss of blood, O-positive, unconscious when we arrived, found by passers-by who heard the shot…"

I digested the information bit by bit, as the gurney was pulled up beside the bed and the patient, wrapped in blood-soaked clothing was moved (on the count of three…) onto the already secured bed.

I don't know at what point it was that I actually looked up, or what it was that made my stomach churn with terror. Perhaps it was the hair, long and thick, matted with blood around gently curving shoulders. Or perhaps it was the hand, so long and delicate that lie gently over the side of the gurney, a simple line of blood curling its way through the crook of the thumb and first finger. Or perhaps it was Carter when he said flatly:

"Isn't this our psych. consult?"

My breath snagged in my throat, refusing to leave. Fear closed in, wrapping its long cold fingers round my still beating heart, squeezing. In slow motion I watched as the paramedic looked down at the chart she had brought in with her, at the name she had jotted without acknowledging, without caring.

"One, Kimberly Legaspi…"

Fear tightened its grip.

"Okay we're gonna to need a chest tube…" Carter said steadily as he finished examining the patient. "Kerry, could you do this for me"

His hands were full, attending to the wound in my lovers' chest, he needed my help, I was her only hope.

And I couldn't move.

I was rooted to the spot, fear encompassing my body, shutting down all bodily functions, breathing seemed to have slowed to a minimum and my heart beat along with the heart monitor linked up to the patient lying on the table.

"Kerry!" His voice was shrill, desperate, finally pushing me into action, switching me as best I could into doctor mode.

Hurriedly I snatched up the chest tube kit, tipping back her head to allow the mouth to fall open and inserting… I couldn't do it, I froze, the thought of ramming such a large object down through such a delicate throat was beginning to make me feel ill. I felt faint, dizzy, felt as if I wasn't part of the room at all but watching the scene as it happened to another person.

"Kerry, you not done yet?" The effort to control the bleeding meant Carter didn't look up, instead a distraction was offered

"Stats are dropping!" Cried Haleh behind us as the high-pitched beep that mapped out the life of the patient began its terrified fibrillating.

"Okay give up on that, I need you to do CPR" He was treating me like a med student, like an inferior, like a child.

It was how I was acting.

This time I didn't even try to act out his bidding, I couldn't do it, I couldn't perform such a violent act on her, even if it would save her life.

Terrified I stepped back from the gurney, backing up against the wall, watching as Haleh took my place, standing where I should have been, placing her linked fist where mine should be, compressing the chest cavity, breathing life into the person I loved most in the world, the person I couldn't save.

"Clear!" It was Carter's voice, as he pressed the defibrillator paddles to her delicate chest. I watched as her body spasmed into the air, rising, falling, Haleh resuming chest compressions

"Clear!" Carer called again.

Slowly the violence and hustle of the emergency room slowed before my eyes. The desperation of the calling, the force of the chest compressions, the dash of the nurse sent to seek another lifeline for the patient, all moved into slow motion. Nothing seemed real, everything before me became detached from the situation.

The same old room, with the same old occupants revolving round a different patient, a different life hanging in the balance.

Kim's life.

Time ticked by like an eternity. Slow, pain-driven minutes, each one branding itself into my soul. Silently I watched the events in the room as they unfolded, the monotonous repetition of the same old movements…1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 Clear! 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 Clear! Causing the same old effect.

I became acutely aware of my own breathing, the beat of my heart, the warmth of my skin, and the lack of hers.

I don't think a space of time as ever lasted so long, each second ticked by within years, the minutes dragging by through centuries. Noiselessly I aged in the corner of Trauma room one, my life dying before me, each attempt to save it causing only more pain, sending me one step closer to the inevitable end.

"Cease compressions"

I'd heard it hundreds of times before, each time over a different patient, each time just as disappointing and painful as the last, but never had it hurt this much.

Time ceased to move at all then, it slowed to a stop, the moment captured in my mind, its negative inscribed onto my soul, to be developed and scrutinised many times in the years to come.

"Kerry…" someone was talking to me, I didn't feel like talking back. Time sped up around me as I turned, somewhat unsteady on my feet, from the last scene in which I would see her again. Numb with the pain and shock of losing her too fast I limped from the room, my heart as heavy as the crutch hanging from my right arm.

Reception was a blur of faces, each with its own private problems, experiences, losses, pain –none registered in my mind, each was only a shadow of the person, an outline with no substance, an obstruction to move around.

I felt no emotion, sitting in the doctors' lounge I felt as if I should cry for my loss, crumble into hysterical tears on the lap of some friendly co-worker, but I couldn't squeeze a drop. Without sensation I sat at the small table staring fixatedly on the refrigerator before me as it hummed quietly to the sound of my heart: strong, rhythmic, alive. Random thoughts and images flashed through my mind, things she'd said, I'd said, things we'd done, places we'd seen, experiences we'd had, the first time we kissed, our first "date"…

"You're a very beautiful woman…" The phase rang round inside my head, at the time I wish I hadn't said it, tried to erase it from my memory, put it to the back of my mind so I wouldn't have to deal with the feelings surrounding it. Now I dwelled on it, pulling it to pieces, fitting it next to her image in my mind, filing it away deep in my heart, storing it, keeping it.

"Kerry, are you okay?" Carters voice clicked me out of my dreams and into reality. Nothing seemed different, for some reason I'd expected everything to have changed…

I can't remember if I answered or not, whichever I did it caused him to take a seat across from me, his boyish innocence staring back at me under a floppy fringe, the concern there warming my heart a little.

"What was up with you in there?"

Opening my mouth I prepared to spill everything, her, me, our time together, the reason for my actions. But nothing would come out, nothing emerged from parted lips, I shut my mouth again.

"I don't know," I said finally, lying through my teeth. There was a long pause, neither of us spoke, neither knew what to say. Suddenly I rose from the table, moving determinedly toward my locker and taking out my coat.

"I'm not feeling to good, I think I'm going to take the rest of my shift off" roughly I pulled off my lab coat and stuffed it in the open locker, slamming the door hard before it fell back out again, not caring "Kovac will be in in an hour, before then I'll leave the ER in your capable hands…"

Carter rose as I left, his expression of shock, I didn't care how out of character my decision was, it was simply a case of having to leave, put everything behind me, the emergency room, the memories …her.

What's going to happen to Kerry?

Was it really wise to leave the ER under Carters supervision?

What happened to Kim?

Find out in the exciting conclusion of Lovers Lost