At a time when her life was spiraling out of her control Lauren found herself very grateful for the moments she had to herself at an empty nurses' station. Through centrally divided time slots of worrying about keeping the department stable and caring for the masses that did not seem to understand using their heads to break their fall will lead to stitches no matter how insistent they are about being fine, there wasn't much time for anything else. The week was just getting started and already it was showing signs of just being one of those that made her consider starting the weekend early by taking a few of those vacations days off. It was so tempting but the obvious argument against it was that come next Monday the problems of the week would be there, waiting, along with another week's worth problems.

A stolen glance towards the artificial light of the lobby had long turned into an obsessive stare as the doctor examined every detail of the color that stood out as such a stark contrast to the pitch-black night that was threatening to sneak past the glass walls. It was a no doubt strange thing to do but a thought had taken hold that would not release from her mind. The world around her was always bright because the lights never turned off. That was all that stopped the darkness from sweeping the hospital and consuming her, a false light that she had left on but that would eventually give out.

That was what Lauren feared. At any moment during the night someone could simply turn off the lights and she would be lost in the dark, swept away from everything as she became fully engulfed by it all until there was no way to separate the woman from the void. The very person that she was would be negated by the complete eclipse and the woman would be left blind to the world around her, left to the whims of her environment with no control over where she would end up as she moved through it. She could see it approaching; she could see the day that turned into a night so dark where even the torches would not burn through it and she felt herself slip into the darkness.

Little bits of light begun to return and soon the subtle noise of privacy curtains drawn and monitors filled the Lauren's head, which began to feel every sound as a painful vibration. After a few attempts resulting in sheer agonizing torments, the woman finally got a look at her surroundings without the light torturing her senses. She was in the ER, still near the nurses' station, but she was no longer on her feet and given the sudden pain in her back the change in position had not been intentional.

Not wanting for someone to find her lying on the hospital floor, the doctor was about to sit up when a rather loud noise made her shut her eyes again and hope that whatever the sound was it would go away. Instead, the noise came again, louder, and too close to the woman's ringing ears to come from a distant patient or departing nurse. It took a few seconds for Lauren to realize someone was talking to her.

A few blinks confirmed that whoever it was they were not in front of her but as she went to turn her head a pair of hands were suddenly holding it in place. The grip confirmed a presence but she had no conformation of who would get to ridicule her for passing out in her own emergency room. Someone asking her to stay still before they stuck a light in her eyes was a not a pleasant experience and, despite the value of the test for medical conformation of injuries, Lauren really just wanted to get to her feet and find the nearest bottle of aspirin.

As the particularly obnoxious light went away, and the annoyingly bright emergency room came back into focus, she felt a hand on the side of her head again. This time it moved down to her neck for a few seconds before both hands lifted her head slightly before being placing it back down on something that was far softer than the cold tile. Lauren knew the event likely only took a few seconds but suddenly it felt like an eternity had passed of laying there why someone kept their hand on her neck, which she suddenly hoped was as far as the hand was going to go. There was no chance of actually being able to see whoever was behind her and trying to find them by moving her eyes backwards only made her head spin.

Almost on cue, the person behind her moved to her side and picked up her arm before fingers pressed against her radial artery. Rather hoping the person would be satisfied with those two measurements of her heart rate, and not pursue a full medical exam why she was laying on the floor, Lauren finally got a look on the person manhandling her. The persistent examiner was wearing a simple black shirt came to rest just at the top of dark pants with no medical coat in sight. She could not figure why some random passerby would go through the basic steps in checking for head trauma instead of yelling for a doctor.

With the world slowly starting to come into focus, still not a place that seemed to make much sense, she noted the clothes covering the woman's frame seemed familiar and looked towards the long brown hair that covered a face of someone still counting her pulse added to the familiarity. Each second that ticked by brought less pain and more clarity to the woman's temporarily oxygen starved brain and suddenly she realized the mystery woman was her latest hiring. Well hiring was a strong word, technically Doctor McCorrigan now worked in the ER because Hale had placed her there without caring if she wanted to hire the woman or not.

Most of the time it was not hard not to notice Doctor McCorrigan based entirely off her attire. There were few doctors that did not come to work in a full suit, or end up spending all but ten minutes a day dressed in scrubs, yet the v-neck shirt and leather pants with the white lab coat that was now missing never seemed out-of-place.

"Doctor Lewis, what happened?" Bo had known from an early age that being a doctor was going to lead to her seeing some strange things, but a passed out department head wasn't one of the sights she had expected in the slightest.

Lauren did her best to straighten up and look like she had not been staring into an empty lobby, blacked out and then started staring at the other doctor in a span of what was probably less than a minute if the clock on the wall was believable.

"Can you hear me? Are you alright?" There wasn't any blood, and pupil reaction had been in a safe range, but Bo felt panic start to build as the woman didn't respond to her questions.

"I am fine Doctor McCorrigan." It was a rude reaction to have but the fallen doctor felt surprised about the concern she could hear coming from the new hiring about her well-being. After all the slightly younger woman was a doctor and one that had shown far more interest in the wellbeing of patients than a lot of the white coats that ended up in the ER instead of a more specialized department. Yet she did not trust her, not in the way she trusted her other colleagues. There was just something different about the woman, something that bothered her. She treated patients better than many other doctors did. They sick and injured all able to face the world after an encounter with the young doctor. Yet the effort was casual, almost fleeting, and certainly did not match that shielding touch that Lewis made sure to place on all of her patients.

"I just had a few more reports to file before I headed home." Realizing that verbal communication was a good way to rule out severe head trauma Lewis tried to think of what else to say sounded half away intelligent at the moment because 'I slipped' was not going to get her out of this situation any faster. To her surprise the brown eyes of the other looked straight into her own as she felt her arm touching the cool tile again.

"So you decided the best way to celebrate putting your signature on the forms was to pass out in the ER?" Bo was no stranger to the cold responses of her boss that seemed like a constant reaction to her presence. In fact it was rather pleasant at the moment as the woman's words were clear and precise, reducing the likelihood that she had suffered a concussion.

Lauren was not actually sure how her luck was so bad that she could manage to completely fail at stopping herself from hitting the floor and somehow end up as the informal patient of the second most sarcastic doctor to work there, all after midnight and in her own department. Sure, she had spoken to Doctor McCorrigan before but discussing possible treatments on a few cases, a bit of occasional small talk why in the cafeteria and assigning the woman patients were not exactly friendly chats that left with them with plenty to discuss later on. Still recognizing that seemingly patented sarcasm that Doctor McCorrigan spoke to everyone with was something Lauren felt surprisingly comforted by it. After all, she would not be able to separate the sarcastic nature of the question if she had suffered major trauma from the fall.

"It is an emergency room Doctor McCorrigan; people generally only show up here when they are losing consciousness and it is not usually a pleasant experience for anyone." The new doctor's reaction was almost instantaneous as her eyebrows raised in surprise before a small smirk came across the woman's lips. Obviously, the woman had not entirely considered just whom she was talking to before speaking. Lauren Lewis had earned her role as head of a department after years of being overlooked by her superiors why putting up with years of her best friend's sarcastic, albeit teasing, abuse. A single remark from the elusive Bo was not going to disrupt her thoughts, although it did seem to linger among them.

"Now I think we can both agree that the floor is no place for an examination or conversation. If you don't mind I would appreciate it if you moved so I could get to my feet before someone from legal rushes down here with some waiver of liability forms they want me to sign." Lauren assumed she was free to go when the brunette stepped away from her side but found she was staring again as the other woman suddenly put one leg over to her other side creating a position where the brunette was standing over her. Whatever was happening was lost on the blonde as she became fixated on the brown eyes before the woman suddenly, and literally, snapped her out of the trance. The sound of a finger snapping at her, twice none of the less, brought her eyes to the hands that had previously examined her that were now being extended down towards her. She did not appreciate having someone snap at her but accepted the help up all the same.

Slowly pulled to her feet by slender fingers wrapped tightly around her wrists Lauren got back to her feet, feeling slightly dizzy from the change but well enough to free herself from Doctor McCorrigan's grip. Fixing her scrubs with one hand and keeping the other firmly on the counter as her rescuer calmly walked passed her and picked up a haphazardly folded lab coat from the tile floor. She could only watched as the mystery that was Bo moved towards a vacant part of the hospital without a word.

The ER doctor considered her choices, as she knew the other woman would be taking the coat that just moments ago kindly placed behind her head to its resting place within a locker before heading home. If she followed her, or remained at the station, there would be no doubt she would be able to thank Doctor McCorrigan for her help but if she returned to her office they would miss each other entirely. Realizing it was not really much of a choice, Lauren grabbed the files that had caused her recent troubles and headed off.


After about six months between stories for my beloved doccubus pairing, I started on this over the weekend and amazing enough isn't a one shot! It's a bit different from my usual style of writing, but I've got some other doccubus stuff in the works and I wanted to do something different with this one. Hope it was an enjoyable read and look for updates fairly regularly as most of the chapters on this are already written.