The unforgettable, a chicago fire fanfic

Hello there! Here is a new one-shot from me

I was deeply frightened and marked by this new shooting in Las Vegas (October 1st, 2017) and within a few days, we're about to remember the Bataclan shooting two years ago (November 13th, 2015) in France. And I really wanted to pay tribute to those who lost life, who got wounded physically and/or mentally. I decided to write this just after the event in Vegas, I think I needed it because... Well, I am really emotional, and writing makes me feel better after a bad day. And I hope that reading this will make you feel the same way. These days are unforgettable, but we have to push them aside to move forward, and that's the hardest part of our lives.

However, I hope you will enjoy this story and I want you to be cheered up after having read entirely this story. Please, leave me a review at the end of it, so that I can see that I did something good today.

The unforgettable

When he regained consciousness, he growled, confused. The world encircling him only seemed pain and cries. His ears were ringing sharply, each breath he could hear his body take gave him the urge of screaming in agony, he felt wet at several places on his body. Was it rain? Was it because he hadn't held back his urge to pee? He tried to remember what happened, but confusion, pain but also this gigantic and opaque fog scrambling his mind avoided him to think properly. He wanted so much to open his eyes but his eyelids were not cooperating, too heavy that he couldn't fight against them. The least movement he risked sent him signals of intense pain. Why was it painful? His hearing became clearer, he could distinguish around him some things: fear, angst, pain, cry even. Suddenly, he felt some kind of weight on his chest; something rubbing at the level of his sternum. Should he open his eyes? Did he even have the strength to do so? Even though he appeared confused, his reflexes as a firefighter were still intact; someone was trying to make him open his eyes. This hand, this fist scorching his sternum gradually stronger was becoming insistent. The initial shock being over, his brain unlocked and he remembered quickly what just happened; a simple concert, shots fired, pain, people screaming around him, the black hole when he collapsed on the ground. Kelly. His best friend, his brother was with him. Where was he? Was he helping people? Had he been hurt as well? Pain coming from his chest increased, so he decided to do his best to open his eyes. His eyelids were so heavy, his mind still in a fog but he had to open them, for his own good.

Matt. The last time he had seen him, he was on the ground, he wasn't moving. Or rather not anymore. The crowd, frightened by all these shots fired had shoved him and had taken him away from his brother.

"MATT!" he screamed in an empty place, the only remaining people being the injured ones and those who wanted to help them. "Matt!"

The more the seconds passed, the more his heart sank and he became worried sick. Why wasn't he able to find his best friend? He was turning his head on both sides, trying to take a 360 degrees vision in order to visualize everything around him, to recognize a face, a body or anything. At each step he was taking, his breath was becoming faster, anxiety growing inside of him. Would he be able to find him in all this mess? His ears were still whistling like bullets that had been fired at the crowd gathered for the gigs, these innocent people who came for the sole purpose of entertaining. They had become in a blink of an eye targets for slaughter, cattle to be hunted. It was a vision of horror that Kelly refused to engrave in his memory. In any case, not until he had found the one he had been looking for long minutes. And finally, at the turn of a body lying there lifeless, drowned in his own blood, he stopped; something had just had his attention. An orange shirt, just like the one Matt decided to wear for this supposedly unforgettable moment. Unforgettable indeed, but not in the way they had unfortunately hoped. Everyone would remember this moment like the worst Chicago had endured, the State of Illinois as well, probably the entire country even. The pavement was only littered by livid bodies bathed in reddish pools, the gray of the asphalt being barely visible. Intrigued by this unusual orange and in spite of the near darkness, he advanced towards this stain clearer than the others, his heart racing again, his stomach tying, his mind not wanting to think of the worst scenario. So, despite his jelly legs weighing a ton, he walked faster, running even at a time.

"Matt!"

An orange shirt, dark blond hair with wicks turning red, blue jeans as he liked them. He had finally found his little brother, the one he cherished more than anyone else, the one who had always been there for him, like a family he had almost never had. When he came near him, he threw himself on the ground, scraping his knees as he crawled to come to him.

"God…"

His voice got lost on its way out. He had no word to describe what was in front of him; the shock was extremely violent. There was so much blood; he didn't know where to start. What he was seeing, it was Hell. After the initial shock, he hardened quickly; he came around to help his friend. He passed the back of his hand on his face as if he wished to wipe away the tears he wouldn't allow himself to shed and went into action. He denied all foreign feeling, all signs of anxiety, of terror; he even buried his soul deep inside of him. His gaze, filled with the pain he felt for the person lying on the ground in front of him, changed into something darker, more impartial. He had to be there for Matt, but he had to keep an ounce of objectivity. In the distance, he could hear the sound of sirens; ambulances, fire trucks, police. SWAT probably as well. But for now, he had to stay focused on one thing. With his trembling hands, he clenched his fingers, placing his right hand on Matt's chest, his left one allowing him to keep a secure support on the concreted and icy ground.

"Matt? Matt, can you hear me?" he asked, shaking his hand on his sternum.

His only answer was a long grunt. A huge relief invaded him within a second, but it wasn't enough. He had to see his eyes, he needed to see his spirit open to him, to understand in the oceanic blue of his iris that he was alive. Therefore, he accelerated the movement, shaking his fist more sharply until he could see a head lean, and finally, eyes opened. Briefly, but he had seen them. He stopped for several seconds, letting go of the appeasement that this blue gave him before starting all over again. This time, he decided to lean on him in order to block the light from the still lit lights. Perhaps that was why he immediately closed his eyes?

"Come on bud', come on…"

And this time, he could admire them longer. A frown, a grimace more than forced. His brother was suffering and he couldn't blame him for that.

"Keep your eyes open", he ordered, although he suspected that this instruction was going to be hard to follow for him.

After all, he was surely in shock. Maybe he had hit his head when it met the ground and his mind was confused? Maybe this clear blue only foreshadowed an ounce of lucidity from him? His breathing was worrying him, the red concrete on which he was lying also. Everything was worrying him in reality. He let go of Matt's face to spot the wounds he had, but all this blood didn't bode well. He quickly noticed three points redder than the rest, all three in the chest; one was in the upper right of his chest, the second was on the right side of his pelvis, and the last one in the middle, under his ribs. No wonder why he was in pain and why it was definitely hard to breathe. This vision of horror would remain stuck in his head for quite a while. The sirens had stopped shouting; help had finally arrived. But how long would they take to reach them, knowing that Matt was literally bleeding to death in front of him? No other choice: he took off his shirt, tore it apart and decided to apply a pressure on the two wounds bleeding the most abundantly, that was to say the one in his chest and the one from his pelvis. He formed a ball with each piece of shirt and pressed them on each wound. A simple pain response would have been enough to reassure Kelly at that time, but Matt didn't make any sound, not even another grunt. He had lost consciousness again.

Getting out of their respective ambulance and fire trucks, each first responder could finally understand the extent of this disaster. A deserted concert place, bodies covering the pavement, slaughtered in cold blood by one or more shooters, people braving the danger in order to rescue those who had managed to stay alive, screams, cries, tears. Hell on Earth. They had experienced the attack of Lakeshore couples years ago, they had heard about the kamikaze attack at MED two years prior, they faced all the possible situations together. That was what they had thought until tonight. A shooting, a mass murder, that wasn't written down a paramedic book, that wasn't studied at the Firefighter Academy. The scene was of such rare violence that everyone had kept their distance, attached to their respected vehicle. How would they proceed? How many victims there were? How many people had been injured? Were they going to get shot while trying to save as many lives as possible?

"Alright, guys!" Chief Walker started. "Let's spread up to cover the entire scene! Take some tags and give them to everyone you meet! Ambulance 127, you supervise the triage until Chief Hatcher arrives on scene! Let's go!"

He clapped his hands, the muffled sound of the gloves he was wearing finally reaching the ears of the firefighters. They hesitated, but they had a job to do, lives to save. So they separated, about twenty people covering the site with tags separated in four colors; green signaling a superficial wound or non-threatening injuries, yellow signifying deeper injuries, red signaling a highly critical injury and black... It was simply the end: either death or a wound so important that the person couldn't survive the trip to the nearest hospital. Everyone had in their mind that there would be a lot of blag tags distributed tonight. A paramedic, followed by three colleagues, decided to get around the whole scene in order to start doing his job on the other side; there were certainly as many wounded people as where they had parked their vehicles. He stopped near a young woman who was almost inert on the ground. Her shirt was stained with blood, her head revealing a round open wound; she had been shot in the head and in her chest. To make sure that she was dead, he placed two fingers on her neck, on her carotid. But the worst came: she was still alive. It was when his work became difficult because he had to choose either to treat her or to let her die. Unfortunately, a bullet in the temple left almost no chance for the victim to survive. He had to make up his mind to make the most difficult choice. He took a tag and took the first three colors in his hands, leaving the black color intact, then put the rope around her neck. That was what each of them feared in a situation where they had to put in place a triage; sometimes they had to let people die for the survival of others, and that was the case. But he didn't have the time to be sentimental, to mourn the fate of the woman he was giving up on. He had to continue, he had to save people. He could mourn all those people later when all this nightmare would be over. He looked up and straightened up, continuing his way to the next victim. Among all the people he could distinguish, among all the cries he could hear, two of them attracted his attention. One was lying on the ground, the other leaning over him, apparently keeping him alive the moment for the help to come to them. He frowned, leaving his colleagues to advance towards them. The victim was wearing an orange shirt, reddened by the blood he had already lost, his complexion was as pale as ghosts, defying them to who would be the whitest, the person above him was bare-chested and applying pressure on two different areas of the body below him with two parts of what had once been his own shirt to try to stop the hemorrhages that were killing the victim slowly. He stopped behind the two men and kneeled down, putting his medical bag on the ground to do a first exam.

"Sir?"

But his only answer was cruses for the person he was trying to save. After shaking him again, he decided to observe; breathing, pulse, injuries. The lips of the victim had a pale pink tint that was turning slightly into a blue shade, his chest raised intermittently and very briefly, meaning that the man was agonizing. He then passed two of his fingers in his neck, as he had done for his first victim to know his heart rate. The latter seemed high but difficult to distinguish; the man was in shock and apparently seriously wounded. Finally, he acceded to the wounds. With the hands of the brown-haired man who continued to insult in a whisper, he saw two gunshot wounds which he was trying to clog to stem the bleeding and a third wound in the stomach. He looked down the ground; the latter was covered with blood. The victim had already lost at least two liters of blood, and he didn't count any internal bleeding. Knowing that an average adult human had about five to six liters of blood and that he had already lost at least a third of it, he was going to die in a short time. There were so many victims, he didn't know what to do for this man. He nevertheless took a tag, continuing to think about what he was going to give to him as color: red or black?

"Don't you dare black tagging him!" the brown-haired man screamed, startling the paramedic.

"W-what?"

Surprised, he didn't know what else to say. Had he heard correctly, or…

"I said: don't you dare black tagging him", the man stated one more time, darker.

The paramedic didn't move, his fingers frozen on the paper he was holding. He didn't understand how this man could know this black-tag-thing; either he was a first responder or he had already experienced such a situation.

"Can you tell me your name, sir?" he asked, trying to remain calm and unimpressed.

"Lieutenant Kelly Severide, Firehouse 51."

Now, he understood: he was a colleague.

"Who is this man?"

"Captain Matt Casey, same firehouse. He's my little brother."

That was why he wanted to save the life of this man inert on the ground. Although he was almost sure that he wasn't his biological brother, he remembered a story told by many firefighters, the story of two of them that everything opposed but had a very symbiotic brotherly relationship; when one of them thought of something or was injured, the other thought the same or knew what was going on, like a sixth sense. However, they never told their names. Maybe they talked about them? No matter what the story was about, he had to act quickly if he really wanted to save his victim. There were no lieutenant and captain here, he only saw a man trying to save the life of his little brother. He destroyed the first two colors _green and yellow_ and put the tag on Casey's torso in order to grab his radio to turn it on.

"Chief, this is McAllister. I have a gunshot victim in highly critical care. He needs to go to the hospital ASAP. C/D corner."

"Copy that, what do you need?"

"A backboard and an ambulance ready to go."

Numerous seconds passed in an almost silence, this calm only interrupted by cries and screams afar before the radio crackled one more time.

"Morgenstern and ambulance 86 will join you with all the equipment that you need."

"Thank you, Chief. McAllister over."

While waiting for his colleague, he had to at least provide first care and know what happened before he found his victim.

"Tell me everything you know", he asked Kelly.

While remaining focused on his task, he replied.

"Matt Casey, thirty-six years old, triple gunshot wound; right chest, abdomen and right pelvis. I managed to wake him up but he doesn't answer anymore. I covered two wounds to try to stop the bleeding."

"Okay, keep applying pressure on the wounds, I'll check his breathing and his heart", he explained, telling himself afterward that he didn't need to give any details since he was with a colleague.

But he had to remain impartial and objective; with each victim, he gave as much detail as possible to reassure them, and this probably must have been the case also for the lieutenant who seemed really disturbed by the situation.

"We'll take care of your little brother. Together", he reassured.

He took the stethoscope stuck in his medical kit, blocked the tips in his ears and placed the bell on the captain's red chest. First left lung near the heart, then right lung. Something was wrong; his breathing seemed to be diminished to the left, where he had been shot. He watched Kelly's hand to see where exactly the wound was and arrived at a brief conclusion to confirm. He removed the tips and wrapped his equipment around his neck to take the BP-cuff in order to wrap it around Casey's right arm. He had to know his blood pressure to confirm and invalidate his theory. In just thirty seconds, he could read it correctly; he had had the right diagnosis.

"Tension pneumothorax, we have to release the pressure, or…"

He didn't dare to continue his sentence. If he didn't reduce the pressure in his rib cage, his lung wouldn't redirect the blood to the heart as Casey would try to inhale, and he would asphyxiate slowly until death. This phase was going very quickly, faster than anyone could imagine. McAllister then rummaged through his bag to find a needle large enough to fit into the right pleural space to drain the air that had accumulated out of the lung and thus re-inflate it to increase oxygenation and blood pressure.

"Kelly, right?"

The latter shook his head, confirming his name without breaking eye contact with his best friend.

"I will ask you to remove your hand from your brother's chest so that I can insert the needle. Very slowly", he ordered calmly.

Kelly nodded again and did what asked carefully to not destroy his work. Sweat was profusely staining his face despite the cold encircling him because of the remaining tension of the situation and his hands were now moist. He watched the paramedic carefully as he was working on Matt; he wasn't used to work with anyone but his best friend's wife. Usually cold, Kelly gritted his teeth at the sight of the size of that needle that was going to pierce his skin. Once the paramedic found the perfect place, he inserted it almost entirely, releasing a long whistle; the operation had apparently succeeded. To make sure that this was the case, he picked up his stethoscope again and replaced it on his right chest to listen to his breathing. Even if it remained laborious, it was better; his lung was filled with air and was better oxygenated. He also made sure that his blood pressure had gone up, if only slightly.

"BP up to 95 over 56", he said more for himself than for someone else.

Ambulance 86 finally approached, and his colleague Morgernstern he had seen running towards him arrived as well.

"What do we got", he asked, kneeling down on the other side of Casey's inert body.

"Matt Casey, thirty-six, triple GSW, right hypochondrium, right iliac and umbilical region. Tension pneumothorax drained, BP up to 95 over 56, heart rate at 140. his O2 stats shouldn't be high. And this is Kelly Severide, his big brother", he added without hesitation. "He applied a constant pressure on the two worst wounds the time for us to come."

"Did he remain conscious?"

"He opened his eyes once, but nothing ever since", Kelly confirmed before McAllister could reply.

"Okay, let's get him to the rig. MED is the nearest hospital from here."

Soon after, he was overwhelmed by the emotions he had been repressing for more than ten minutes now, he remained frozen, as struck by a tetany crisis while the paramedic was bringing a backboard and the one who had helped him with Matt placed an oxygen mask on his face.

"You've been hurt?" the third paramedic driving Ambulance 86 asked.

He was staring at his bare chest covered in blood. Intrigued, Kelly looked down, only to see all this blood on him. He raised his trembling hands, his vision blurring as he kept watching them.

"Uh… Not mine…"

He could no longer say a word, but pointed Matt, explaining dully that it was Matt's blood. He held back the tears he didn't want to shed; he didn't want to appear emotionally damaged by the events. Not now, not when his brother needed him.

Cold. So cold. And also pain. What an incredible pain. Each breath was so hard to take, each one more difficult than the previous one, but now… It was like someone gave him a second life. It still hurt when he breathed, but less. Something was blocking his face, it was covering his nose and his mouth as well as his cheeks, and the icy wind that was liberating this thing was both annoying and welcome, full of good feeling. The pressure exerted on his rib cage had almost disappeared, although he could feel a slight push on the right side. Why was he so cold? And suddenly, all the images of the night overwhelmed his mind: Kelly picking him up where he lived to go to a rock gig on Navy Pier, him and his best friend taking a beer and a deep dish pizza, him and Kelly laughing… Then panicking as they heard gunshots fired. He remembered having kneeled down before starting to run, to turn around and hear this panic wave. All this before being seized by a violent pain in the chest and in the abdomen and then collapse on the ground and hit his head on the pavement. And then, total blackout. Something brought him back to the world: he just felt a sharp pain in his right arm. Sharp but quick, a pain that faded soon. It really hurt everywhere, the least movement he was trying to take made him suffer terribly, and all he wanted was to go back in this dark and painless world he just left without knowing why or how. He felt his body filled with a shiver, surrounded by cold, trapped in a tornado of suffering and loneliness. His brain kept telling him that he was in shock, undoubtedly because he had hit his head or he had been shot, probably several times. Or it hurt because he had hit his head and because he had been shot? Despite the shock, he decided to see that his hearing was working better than the last time he had opened his eyes. It was weird; the sounds were like muffled, but he no longer heard these distant screams that gave him a huge headache. No. Now, he could distinguish four voices close to him. One of these voices seemed familiar, but he couldn't remember to whom it was precisely. The three other voices were only whispers, uttering words he knew or couldn't understand.

"... Shock… Fast… Morphine… Line."

Morphine? Would he be in less pain now? Very soon, his body relaxed, each muscle of it released, and he felt better. The pain was still here, but it had gone from 'I'm gonna pull the trigger' to 'I can handle it'. Maybe now that he was less focused on the pain, he could try to open his eyes again? The vision he had had before didn't encourage him, but he had to know. Slowly and cautiously, his eyelids opened without him having to force or tire. Everything was blurry and black, with a kind of halo surrounding a shadow. An object or a person he didn't know. Suddenly, a light came to blind him; it moved in almost every direction. He blinked, trying to make it go away. After several endless seconds, he could relax a little bit as the light disappeared.

"... Name?"

Who? Who what? Matt couldn't focus on anything as everything was a blur and slow. Did these shadows he didn't know need his name? He was badly injured, he could feel it. Maybe they were paramedics accessing his state? He used almost all his strength just to separate his lips, and as he was trying to make a sound, something weird happened: he felt something rising inside of him, coming from his lungs and wanting to get out. Quickly, this something came along his airways, almost choking him as he tried to breathe. His eyes shut while he coughed harder. It stopped after what he felt a long time, but he no longer had the strength to open his eyes again. The dull agony in which he was ended when he came back into the painless and dark word…

The man on the ground was really in pretty bad shape. Morgenstern had quickly taken the portable EKG in order to check the vitals of this victim who seemed so familiar to the paramedics. And the man next to them trying to save his life but obviously in shock terribly looked like a firefighter Lieutenant they knew. But it wasn't the time to procrastinate and drown their mind with useless information; what they had to do was concentrate on their mission, that is to keep alive the man in agony before he reached the hospital. The paramedic in charge took three electrodes and placed them on Casey's bloody torso, two on the upper left and right of his chest, the last one on his left side. He then connected the EKG wires and switched on the device. He also grabbed a temporary oximeter on the index finger of Matt's left hand in order to know his oxygen saturation in his blood.

"Okay, pulse at 140 and sats at 94%", Morgenstern confirmed.

"Add a blood pressure at 95 over 56."

"He's in shock. We have to move fast, or we'll lose him", the paramedic explained. "Push 5 of morphine and place a second line", he ordered his colleague.

McAllister promptly executed: he took a syringe and a vial filled with morphine, he inserted the needle into the bottle and took about five ml of medication before removing it and pushing it into the intravenous port in order to send the opioid into Matt's blood system. Within two seconds, his heart rate calmed down and his oxygen saturation rose slightly, signs that morphine had taken effect.

"Heart rate down to 130, sats at 97% and…"

Morgenstern then took the sphygmomanometer to have another look on his tension and find out if it was better.

"BP at 94 over 54."

Within the following second, surprise stroke the paramedics: two blue eyes were fixing them. They weren't wide open but enough to guess that Matt was conscious.

"He's waking up!"

Soon, one paramedic bent over him, examining the reaction of his pupils. He swung his torch from left to right at the level of the two eyes. Matt blinked many times at the repeated assaults of this invading light until Morgernstern extinguished his penlight.

"Pupils are reactive and slightly dilated. Kelly, right?"

Kelly startled, surprised by this attention. He really was in psychological shock, although he was used to respond to these kinds of situation. But this time, instead of saving lives, he was a victim. He couldn't do anything but to nod, unable to utter a word.

"Do you know if he hit his head?"

Once again, he nodded but negatively. He hadn't seen him fall. He just realized he wasn't next to him when the crowd was embarking him on the other end of the place. Initially, he thought that his brother had been carried away by the second crowd that was going in the opposite direction. He would never have thought he was going to be so badly wounded. He watched, could only do that anyway, how the three paramedics coordinated to both put pressure on the wounds to avoid a hemorrhage as well as try to make Matt talk.

"Sir? Sir, if you can hear me, can you tell me your name?"

Of course, they knew his name; it was mostly to see if there weren't any brain damage because of a theoretical fall by getting a coherent and verbal answer. They saw his lips ajar, but as he was going to talk, he frowned and started coughing. Coughing blood, which splattered the inside of the oxygen mask and startled the four people around him. The paramedics looked each other, knowing what they had to do.

"We gotta move. Now."

Kelly was scared to death. The amount of blood his brother was losing was incommensurable, and he became paler every second that passed. The compresses affixed by the paramedics to the wounds were already stained with red, his vitals were slowly coming down. They really had to move fast. The paramedic he didn't know got up to bring the stretcher. He came back less than thirty seconds later and lowered it to its lowest level to transfer Matt from the grass to the ambulance's bed. He was so paralyzed by the situation that he didn't even move when they placed him on the white sheet, quickly soaked with blood he was still losing profusely. They took this moment to place gauze on his back, where the bullets exited. When they had gone through his body; apparently, the bullet near his stomach was still inside, somewhere. When they all headed toward the back of the ambulance, McAllister had to shake him in order to bring him back to reason. He stared at him blankly, trying to understand what he was saying, but his brain was like off as if he was trying to protect itself from what was going on around him.

"You come with us?" he repeated for the fourth time before Kelly could react to that.

Once again, he couldn't say a word, merely nodding or shaking his head from left to right. Hardly, he stood up, his legs trembling to the point that he didn't know if he would be able to do the whole trip to the back of the ambulance without any kind of support. Fortunately, the paramedics had well noticed Kelly's white complexion and trembling body state, and McAllister helped him get into the ambulance. The third paramedic who came to lend a hand to his two colleagues closed the doors behind Kelly and Morgenstern and slammed his hand twice on the window to give the signal of departure, McAllister doing very quick to take the wheel to start the ambulance and leave as soon as possible for the nearest hospital. And he remained still, inflexible and stoic before the almost inanimate body of one of the people whom he cherished the most in the world. He remained incredulous when the paramedic grabbed his radio to warn the ER of Chicago MED of their arrival and remained frozen like a statue when he settled a second intravenous line to keep Matt as stable as possible by sending into his bloodstream more saline. He remained motionless for the five-minute journey, the time for McAllister and other people to come and greet them at the doors of the ambulance.

The famous Code Red had been activated in the ER of Chicago MED. As the nearest hospital to the esplanade where rock fans had been shot, all the medical staff and nursing staff of the possible concerned departments had been called to the emergency room to strengthen the medical system in the face of the influx of wounded coming. The first injured people sent there were always the most injured ones, and everyone was already fearing the worst. Despite their job, they all had to put their sensitivity aside in order to help people, without qualms. It was the hardest part of what they were asked for as doctors or nurses. Maggie had all the rooms prepared with all the equipment the doctors would need and had asked the patients still in the waiting room to continue to wait. The latter, watching the television and the last minute information, had sympathized with the situation the doctors were going to experience. Some were even willing to help the staff if they lacked arms. Unfortunately, some of the rooms were not immediately available, including the polytrauma room everyone was calling Baghdad. It was the room reserved for unstable and highly wounded patients, with all the equipment needed to do medical examinations without moving the stretcher on which the patient was. All stock had been hastily checked, and the blood bank had been warned of a massive arrival of wounded; it had made a bunch of O negative blood bags, and several other piles of different blood groups for the wounded when they knew their blood type and rhesus. It had even installed all these piles in trauma room two of the ER so that all the rooms could be constantly filled with blood bag for the patients. The doctors waited firmly under the portico outside the hospital to receive the first wounded, despite the cold autumn evening. In the distance, all could hear the first sirens advancing towards them in a hubbub undoubtedly audible for miles around. They were probably going to live one of the most horrible and eventful evenings of their careers. And some had seen many of them already. Maggie joined them for several seconds in order to tell the staff that there were six people coming within the next minutes. All were ready to meet them while the first ambulance came in sight of everyone. It stopped, and the paramedic behind the wheel got out to open the doors in the back of the vehicle, revealing his colleague and their victim.

"Carlie Hamilton, twenty-six, GSW in the neck and parasternal area. Pulse at 150, BP at 83 over 37, O2 sats at 88%. Unable to intubate."

"She's with me!" Dr. Rhodes screamed as he was a cardiothoracic surgeon now. "Dr. Choi, with me!"

The latter turned and followed his coworker without a word. They entered in the ER through the automatic doors and passed the desk.

"Maggie? Any room?"

"Bagdad just opened!"

"Bagdad it is!"

They entered the room, putting the victim on the hospital bed and making an assessment of the wounds.

"Penetrating wound in the neck at the level of the carotid artery, and gunshot wounds on the parasternal line. I want CBC, ABG, BMP, HBG, tox screen, hematocrit and call the OR! Tell them we're here within five minutes, top!"

A nurse then turned and picked up the phone to call the nurse attending the operating room while a second nurse was taking some blood for the examinations that Dr. Rhodes had requested, the latter taking a scalpel in hand in order to realize what the paramedics had failed to do. Meanwhile, other doctors were busy saving lives. Five cases had already arrived and the staff was now submerged. And so it was for nearly five minutes until an ambulance arrived more slowly than the others; it indicated either that the patient was already dead or that he was in a more than critical condition. Two doctors, Dr. Halstead and Dr. Manning, who were used to working in tandem, opened the doors of the ambulance and immediately recognized the person sitting bare-chested in the back. Everyone knew who he was; Lieutenant Kelly Severide. He seemed in shock but not hurt despite the amount of blood they could see on him. On the other hand, this was not the case for the victim on the stretcher.

"Matt Casey, thirty-six, triple GSW including two through and through; right hypochondrium, right iliac and umbilical region. Heavy blood loss", the paramedic in charge started, followed by Kelly while his colleague came near him.

The physicians stared at him, surprised. Nobody expected to see someone they considered like one of their own among the wounded. But despite this, they had to remain objective. They watched each other one last time before plunging into their work. While they rolled the stretcher, the paramedic continued.

"Pneumothorax on his right side with hemoptysis, drained. Possible head trauma, pupils slightly dilated. In and out of consciousness. GSC at 9, pulse fast and thready at 140, BP at 94 over 52, sats up to 95% with the oxygen mask. Three liters of saline and five of morphine on the way here."

"Maggie? Bagdad is free?" Dr. Halstead asked.

"The last patient is gone!"

They took these words as a yes, and took the corner to enter the room; leaving Kelly outside as he couldn't join them. The doctors glued the stretcher to the hospital bed and took one corner of the sheet each, helped by the paramedics.

"On my count! One, two three!"

In a big thud, Matt got uneasily placed on the bed as a nurse was placing back the wires of an EKG on the three electrodes still attached to his bare chest. She turned on the machine and read the information on it as the second nurse was placing an oximeter on his index finger.

"Heart rate at 145, BP at 92 over 49, O2 sats at 94%."

"Remy, push two more liters of ringer on the rapid transfuser as well as two bags of A positive", Will ordered as he was reading his file to know his blood type and rhesus.

He did it right away as Dr. Manning was asking for a chest tube in replacement of the needle inserted between two of his ribs. For that, she made an incision with the help of a scalpel and took the chest tube handed by Will in order to insert it in the hole. She then connected the device to the thoracyl, so that it could suction the air coming out of his lungs for the time to repair it in a surgery.

"O2 sats coming up to 97%."

"Alright! I want CBC, ABG, BMP, HBG, and hematocrit for a start. And we do a chest x-ray to see if the chest tube is in place, then pelvis x-ray, ultrasound of the abdomen and a CT-scan."

A complete blood count was ordered to count the cells in your blood that included information on the number, shape and sizes of them. An arterial blood gas was asked for measuring the blood gas tension (partial pressure of oxygen mainly), the arterial partial pressure of carbon dioxide and the blood's pH. The arterial oxygen saturation could be determined as well. The basic metabolic panel was commonly used to check the electrolyte and mineral levels in the blood that were important for keeping your muscles, heart, kidneys and other organs working properly. Hemoglobin was to measure the oxygen-carrying proteins in the blood. And hematocrit measured the percentage of red blood cells in a given volume of blood. "He might need a central line as well", Dr. Manning added to Dr. Halstead.

The nurses resumed their work; one of them taking blood samples as the other one was preparing a Foley catheter. In less than thirty seconds, Matt was hooked to it in order to see if his body and especially his kidneys could produce urine properly.

"Let's do the x-ray first!"

With the help of the radiologist who came down especially to help in the ER, they took the picture and placed it on the light in order to see what was going on inside his chest.

"His right lung is… Still opaque?"

"Could be the tension pneumothorax to drain", Dr. Halstead hurried to say. "For now, he really needs a central line."

As Matt was severely injured, he needed one for sure. And as they got prepared to settle it, everyone stopped what they were doing when an alarm started invading the space in the room.

"O2 sats dropping to 87%", a nurse explained.

"His lungs aren't getting enough oxygen. We need to intubate", Dr. Manning continued, taking place at the head of the bed. "Let's push 50 of roc and 3 of fentanyl", she ordered them.

Fentanyl was used to sedate the patient for a short time, especially the time to intubate a patient. And rocuronium was commonly used to relax and suppress gag reflex. So, after one of the nurses pushed these two medications into an IV, Natalie tilted Matt's head to have a better access to his mouth and vocal cords. She spread his lips and passed the laryngoscope inside his mouth, but soon, she sighed.

"Can't see anything", she whispered as the alarm continued to scream, faster with time.

"Sats down to 84%."

The physician tried again, moving the material from left to right, but nothing happened.

"Damn!" she said, removing the laryngoscope and taking the ambu bag to breathe for Matt the time to find a way to intubate him. "I can't find the cord, his trachea is deviated!"

Will stared blankly at his coworker, then the chest x-ray. He had something in mind for several minutes now, but now he had the confirmation. With a deviated trachea, his diagnosis fitted. He rushed to the crash cart, opening the drawers to find what he wished to, and after having found one, he came back to Matt's left side, near his rib cage.

"What are you doing?" Natalie asked, unsure of what he was going to do.

"Do you remember his right lung? It was quite weird, wasn't it?"

"Yeah, I do remember, but..."

"It's blood! Behind his lung, due to the GSW. It's compressing it to the first chest tube, that's why he's having trouble with his breathing and sats! He needs a second chest tube!"

"And it fits the deviated trachea", Dr. Manning finally said after a few seconds of reflexion.

She didn't have time to finish her sentence, Will was already cutting his skin with a scalpel to insert the second tube. But as soon as he did it, the continuous blood flow splashed over his feet, making him take a step back the time for the flow to end.

"Damnit! Over a liter of blood on the chest!"

Immediately, a second alarm rang into the room.

"Pressure dropping at 82 over 49, heart racing at 170."

"Natalie, try again. Paula, more blood on the rapid infuser please."

"Right away."

As she said this, Natalie removed the ambu bag from Matt's face and tilted his head again to try to intubate for the second time. She plunged the laryngoscope again into his mouth to find the vocal cord. In vain.

"It's still deviated."

Will came to help her; he placed his fingers on Matt's each side of his neck, carefully trying to realign his trachea to help his friend.

"Stop!"

He froze, remaining as a statue while she pushed deeper the material. She took an ET tube, not taking into account the alarms resonating around her. She slid the tube down his throat, finally passing the vocal cord and removing the laryngoscope and the stylet while Will removed his hand from his neck.

"Let's bag him."

A nurse came near her, taking her place as she placed the ambu bag on its place at the end of the ET tube to push air into Matt's lung and to try to calm all the alarms. It took about twenty seconds for them to stop and take back their almost normal pace. Will grabbed his stethoscope to see if the tube was indeed in place; he carefully listened on each side if his lungs were working correctly despite the two chest tubes and the gunshot wound.

"Persistent unequal breath sounds on the right side", he said while putting his stethoscope back to its place around his neck.

Natalie did her best to finish placing the secured device so that Matt wouldn't be able to bite the endotracheal tube when he would wake up, and came near his left side to settle a central line. It wasn't an obligation, but after the surgeries _because he might need more than one_ he would really need one. So, she sterilized the area and inserted the device inside his subclavian vein after having found it. They did another chest x-ray to figure out whether it was in place and checked if the second chest tube was also correctly inserted, then she secured the whole material with two stitches, as usual. After that, a nurse pushed blood into it, allowing Matt's body to gain some of it instead of losing it through his gunshot wounds.

"Alright, let's push 7.5 mg of dopamine per minute to keep his pressure up, and…"

A new alarm rang before Paula could inject the dopamine into the central line, and she stopped immediately what she was doing to check the monitor.

"His heart rate is at 185", she said, not turning her head toward the physicians.

"He's going into v-tach", Will stated, thinking about a solution at the same time.

"What about shocking him?"

"Cardioversion? To have him back into a correct sinus rhythm?"

Natalie nodded, waiting for an answer from his colleague.

"Ok, let's do this. Give me the crash cart."

Remy approached what asked by Dr. Halstead while Dr. Manning was placing two self-adhesive electrodes on Matt's chest, one on the upper right of his rib cage, carefully paying attention to the gunshot wound which wasn't far from the electrodes and the other one below his left arm, so that the electric shock could travel between the two electrodes. Indeed, the heart always had to be on the road of the electricity sent in the body of the patient.

"Start to 100", Will said, the medical staff getting ready to get away and not touching Matt when the shock would be given.

Once the defibrillator charged, the doctor gave the signal to stay back while he was delivering the shock. Everyone raised their hands, even Paula who was insufflating pure oxygen on Matt's lungs, so that Will could do what he had to do.

"Clear!"

He pushed the button, and immediately, Matt's body jerked a little on the bed. Once done, Paula resumed her duty to keep his breathing intact and Natalie placed two of her fingers on his carotid to see if she could feel his pulse again while checking on the monitor if the cardioversion had worked.

"Heart rate dropping at 150… 135… 120… It's working", she said as she finally could feel his blood flow on his carotid again.

"Let's push the dopamine."

As asked, Remy pushed 7.5 mg of product into the central line in order to have his pressure back to a weak but good level. Slowly, the systolic and diastolic increased to 95 over 64. It's wasn't very good, but considering that he had already lost at least half of his blood, it was already a miracle. Of course, his heart was now pumping more blood again, so his heart rate increased a little to 134, but given the circumstances…

"He's stable", Natalie finally announced, relieved. "Remy, call the OR to see if they have a free room."

The nurse nodded, heading toward the phone and dialing the OR number to have any available room.

While the doctors were treating Matt, Kelly remained there, frozen behind the window of the second trauma room, where his brother had been lead. He was there in the passage of all the stretchers coming, lost, half-naked, stared by everyone in the waiting room. His chest was covered in Matt's blood, the color of his skin could easily beat the white on the walls, and even if he was still, he was trembling like a leaf. Maggie could see that while busy; she was worried. So, to check on him, she stopped her work to go see him. She gently placed her left hand on his right shoulder, trying to get his attention. But as soon as she did so, he jumped, frightened. Cold sweat was running down his forehead as he was staring blankly at the nurse. He almost immediately understood that he shouldn't have done that.

"Let's get you something warm, and a calm place", Maggie said with a peaceful voice.

As a nurse, her empathy was strong and she could feel in which distress Kelly was. Hardly, he assimilated the words from Maggie and nodded weakly, resuming his position so that he could watch attentively the room in which Matt was treating. She hardly headed him into the doctors' restroom to separate him from all the chaos that was going to arrive in the emergency room. She left him a few seconds to find a warm blanket, having felt that his skin was icy. Being shirtless, his body was much more exposed to the cold and the emotional shock he had suffered didn't help at all. Gently, she wrapped the two blankets she had found around Kelly and she gave him the corners of them so that they wouldn't slip to the ground. Maggie knew that he was in a state of having company and there was so much work to do for quite awhile; she couldn't stay with him. She promised to come back and left him, closing the door behind her to resume her work at the desk. She asked Dr. Charles who was there to reassure the first people who would come to the ER to have news on their relatives if he could stay with Kelly the time to call Gabby, but when she turned to Kelly, she saw that he had his phone in hand. She probably had called him and she was surely coming here as soon as possible...

Gabby was watching the television, the living room was calm with only the volume of the tv resonating in the room. Settled comfortably on the couch with a blanket minutely made by her mother and a mint tea in her hands, she was covering all the channels with the remote, trying to find the perfect entertainment? She quickly passed over the breaking news channel; these news from across the world made her sick. But suddenly, she zapped back to this channel as a word had appeared on the screen. Just one word: Chicago. She stared attentively, turning even more the volume of the television to understand what was happening. Soon, she dropped her tea, getting up wincing as the hot drink splashed on her laps and grabbing her phone while she felt her heart squeeze and her stomach turn upside down. On the screen, the media was announcing a massive shooting at the Navy Pier, where the rock concert had taken place. It was the concert Kelly and Matt were assisting. A bad feeling invaded her as she understood that something just happened there. They were already announcing multiple deaths and a huge amount of injured people. Her first reflex was dialing the phone number of her husband; hearing his voice would reassure her. Unfortunately, she had the voice mail almost immediately. It wasn't normal, but with the amount of wounded, either he had escaped this shooting and was helping people, or her husband had been injured. Or... No, she didn't want to think about this. She couldn't think about it. She tried Kelly's number, her concern growing at each second.

"Pick up... Pick up..." she whispered to herself with each ring.

She was pacing around, tears already wishing to drop on her cheeks, her fingers playing with her cold lips while waiting for a possible answer from Kelly. And finally...

"Gabby?"

"Oh, thank God, Kelly! Matt isn't picking up, I got worried sick!" she said smiling, relieved to hear his voice.

But Kelly didn't utter a word after hers. Her gaze darkened, her smile faded while she could discern noise around him. Sounds were like stifled, as if he was in a room, isolated from everything. He wasn't at the gig, at least not anymore. Where was he? What was happening? Why these sounds were so... Distant and... And mitigated? She tried to take a deep breath, wondering why her husband wasn't picking up as Kelly did, concern growing again quickly.

"Kelly, where are you?" she asked with a trembling voice.

"Uh... At MED."

Her fingers stopped moving on her lips, her legs froze, her blood almost stopped circulating inside her body, her heart stopped beating for a second, realizing what all this meant. As her beloved and his best friend couldn't be separated at any moment and for any reason, if Kelly was at MED, Matt was there too. If she couldn't reach her husband, it was because he had been hurt. Kelly's voice seemed so lost and hurt. And shocked. Something bad happened for sure.

"I'm on my way."

She hung up before Kelly could say something and headed toward the entrance to grab her coat and put her shoes on, not taking care of the stain of mint tea on her pants. She took her keys, closing the door as best and quick as she could while her hands were trembling in concern. She didn't know how she started the engine of her car, she didn't know how much time she took to arrive at the hospital, how she parked her vehicle, but one thing was known for sure; within five minutes, she was there, looking at this ambulance parade. She got out of her car, closing the door behind her and headed as fast as possible to the ER. She could understand the chaos in which the shooting had plunged the city. Between the stretchers placed there all along the corridors where there was some place, she made her way in search of Kelly. She reached the desk where Maggie usually was standing, heading the ER as a real doctor. She looked around, trying to have a glimpse of him, and soon, her gaze stopped on the resting room, where the doctors changed their dress to a medical blouse. She turned, heading toward this room as she could see Kelly's face, not losing sight of him. She carefully entered, looking at him as he seemed psychologically hurt and damaged. She looked at him from head to toes; he was wrapped in a warm blanket, the skin on his face was so white that she could confound the white of the walls with the white he was sporting. She could perceive cold sweat coming down from his forehead of the ground. His gaze seemed lost, staring blankly to only one direction.

"Kelly?" she tried, but he didn't move an inch.

She raised her hand in order to reach his right shoulder. He jumped slightly, turning his head to the right to finally see Gabby. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He sighed, closing his eyes and... Breaking up. She had never seen Kelly in such a state of mind.

"I'm sorry..."

Why was he sorry? What happened? Matt had been hurt several times but never had she seen him like this, broken, emotionally on edge and crying. He curled into a ball, wrapping his arms around his legs and burying his head on the ball he had formed with his body. She now could see how bad it was. What happened had broken his shield in thousands of pieces.

He would never do this. As he still uttered how sorry he was, she kneeled down in front of him and gently placed her two hands on his arms, placing back the blankets where they belonged. She could see that he was bare chest, but something caught her sight; red. Something red and dry all over his torso and arms, especially his hands. Was it… Was it Matt's blood? She kept for herself her wish to scream and cry, trying to reassure Kelly as best she could. A door opened and Gabby turned around; Dr. Halstead was there with them, staring at Kelly with a sad face. She couldn't help but to straighten, facing the doctor to ask him something.

"Do you know where Matt is?" she requested with a trembling voice.

"I do. We just headed him to surgery", he gently explained, his voice being in a low tone.

"W-we? S-surgery?"

Her eyes widened, shocked by what she had heard. Surgery?

"I treated him in the ER with Dr. Manning."

She turned her head toward Kelly, still in his blanket and still crying. What was why he said that he was sorry: Matt had been seriously injured at the concert and he felt responsible about this because he had asked for Matt to accompany him at the Navy Pier.

"How is he? How is my husband?" she asked while turning her head back to Will.

"I can't tell you much right now, but he's been shot three times. Two bullets went through the right area of his chest and his pelvis, and one is still inside near his stomach. His right lung has collapsed and he has developed a tension pneumothorax then a hemothorax. We had trouble stabilizing him before getting him to the OR, but he was stable when he got down there. He's very badly injured, but he was stable."

Will slipped his gaze from Gabby to behind her, where Kelly was sobbing.

"What you did at the Navy Pier, it saved his life, Kelly."

Gabby was seized by amazement: Kelly did save her husband? That was why he had so much blood on his hands and his chest? That was why he was shirtless? Dr. Halstead couldn't say much more as Casey was no longer his patient. And they needed him in the ER to treat other patients.

"I am sorry, I have to go. His doctor will see you when the surgery will be over."

He left the room, even though he wanted to stay in order to reassure Kelly and Gabby even more. But he had a job to do, lives to save. Within the following ten minutes, Gabby felt her phone vibrate in the pocket of her pants. She didn't want to answer, as she was more worried about Matt and Kelly's state of mind. But with time, it became annoying, and she decided to have a look at it, to see what was going on. There were several missed calls from Herrmann and Boden, as well as some texting from them; they were wondering if Kelly and Casey were safe. Apparently, they knew that they were going to the concert at the Navy Pier. She answered back, telling them that she was at Chicago MED with Kelly because Matt had been injured. They immediately said that there were going to be there within fifteen minutes to be with her. Christopher and Wallace were like fathers for her; she could always count on them if something would turn wrong. She could tell them everything at any time of the day or night. She turned to Kelly, still curled and sobbing. She felt so bad for him; how could she sheer him up in such a moment? Thirteen minutes later, she got surprised as Herrmann arrived with Cindy. They entered the room, hugged Gabby to reassure her, telling her that Matt was a fighter and that he wouldn't give up on her. But after that, they got worried by seeing Kelly who never moved from where he was.

"He didn't move since I got here", she whispered to Herrmann and Cindy. "I think he feels guilty about what happened."

"How he could even know that something would happen?" Herrmann whispered back to Gabby, his wife and Boden. "There was no way he could anticipate this. No one could."

Gabby looked down a little; she knew that Kelly was not to blame for that, of course. But inwardly, she couldn't help but feel a little angry about this; she had never been aware of this rock concert, it had been all planned behind her back. And apparently, everyone knew that Kelly had taken two places for himself and Matt. Everyone but her. She felt so… Betrayed and angry, because if they didn't have planned this, Matt wouldn't have been in such a critical condition. But on the other side, she couldn't blame her best friend because he couldn't know that something terrible would happen tonight. She shook her head, trying to avoid and push all the negative thoughts aside. She needed to focus on her husband, on Matt. He needed her prayers. But a question came in head.

"Who's babysitting your kids?" Gabby asked timidly.

"Oh don't worry about this, Gabby!" Cindy said with a smile, trying to cheer her up as well. "My parents were there for dinner, they are taking care of them", she assured. "Right now, we need to stay focus on Matt and send him positive vibes."

Gabby couldn't help but smile after what Herrmann's wife said to her, hugging her again. She was so kind and generous. She turned her gaze toward Kelly, finally finding the courage to face him once again. She kneeled back to where she was when the couple and Boden arrived, placing back her hands on his arms.

"Kelly... You need to sit", she said with a low voice, wondering if Kelly could hear her and understand what she meant.

At least, he stopped saying how sorry he was. In a huge effort, he raised his head, deciding to confront her angry features, but he didn't find any. How couldn't she be angry at him after what happened? His eyes were red, swollen by his cries. As he got up to do what Gabby asked for, the blankets fell to the ground, Kelly's bare chest appearing to them. Cindy couldn't avoid her left hand to come over her mouth, shocked by all the blood on his chest. She shared a look with her husband, Kelly understanding the shock and trying to cover his torso again. He felt ashamed. And everyone in the room what Kelly was going through; he almost lost his brother tonight, he kept him alive. They couldn't blame him for his actual state of mind. Herrmann, in a pure gesture of friendship, joined Gabby and took his left arm, trying to smile and not looking down to his chest.

"Come on. Let's get you clean."

Kelly stared at him for a long time, nodding after thirty seconds. He followed Herrmann outside the restroom, Boden joining them to go to the bathroom. Gabby was now alone with Cindy, who quickly turned toward her.

"Now that we're on our own, tell me."

Surprised, Gabby didn't utter a word. She knew what Cindy meant, but she didn't want to say anything. She was so scared and angry, and she didn't even know why she was even angry.

"You know you can tell me everything."

And suddenly, Gabby couldn't hold her concern any longer. She burst into tears, crying endlessly while Cindy now understood in which distress Gabby was. She already felt that when her husband had been stabbed two years back, she knew what Gabby was going through. She knew that she couldn't say that everything was fine, quite the contrary. She took her in her arms while Gabby sobbed on her shoulders. She couldn't even believe what was happening to her. Why now? Why Matt? Her Matt? Why had someone been crazy enough to shoot at people only entertaining at a concert? So many why, and she had no answer. Was her husband going to pull through? After what Will told her, she couldn't believe that Matt was still alive.

"It's gonna be okay, Gabby. Matt is strong. He will fight for you."

"I almost lost him not a long time ago, and... And now this?" Gabby whispered between two sobs. "Tell me it's a nightmare, Cindy... Please, tell me I am in the middle of a nightmare..."

But Cindy couldn't say this because it was the reality. It wasn't a nightmare at all. They were bright awake, in the hospital and waiting for any news on Matt. But it was gonna take some time before having some. Matt was in surgery and it might take a while. For the remaining next hours, everyone sat in the restroom. Kelly had been cleaned up and Cindy had brought him a shirt, a sweat, and new pants from his house as Gabby had given her his keys and told her where he was currently living. She crossed Stella's path at home, and as soon as she got aware of what was going on, she decided to join the group at Chicago MED. Now, Kelly had his face on her left shoulder, too tired to stay awake after his outburst. He was deeply asleep now. Everyone was there with a coffee in hand, watching the television through the window and wondering how many people died and how many had been injured. For now, they were talking about forty-nine people killed and three hundred and eighty-four wounded, including sixty-seven in absolute critical condition. Matt was surely one of them; those people who got so badly injured that doctors weren't sure that they were going to make it. They earlier had a visit from Dr. Charles, he let them alone after five minutes, but he knew that they were going to need a psychological follow, especially Kelly. As he knew firefighters so well, he already had the answers he wanted; they wouldn't talk to him, but to someone they knew well. He had already asked Chaplain Orlovsky to come by and help the entire firehouse to face this as a united family, but he wouldn't be there before the morning because he was already helping people. At three in the morning, after five hours of surgery, a doctor knocked on the door and entered the restroom, frightening everyone at first.

"You are the family of Matthew Casey?"

"Yeah!" Gabby said, getting up with Christopher, Cindy and Wallace, waking Kelly up at the same time. "I am his wife."

"And I am his brother", Kelly said firmly, still groggy from his deep sleep.

The physician turned his head toward the group behind the two people facing him, asking them who they were without any word.

"We are his family", Herrmann explained. "All of us."

"I see."

He turned again his gaze toward Kelly and Gabby, weaving at them to sit down to have a chat with them.

"It's that bad?"

"I've seen much worse, trust me", the doctor tried to say in order to cheer the group up. "I am Dr. Laniewski, I operated on Mr. Casey."

"Matt."

"Sorry?"

"He... He doesn't like being called Mr. Casey. He prefers Matt."

"Matt it is then. As I was saying, I have seen people in much worse condition than your... husband?"

Gabby nodded, waiting for his explanations.

"It was really touch and go for quite awhile; he flatlined four times but we got him back each time. The bullet in his chest tore his lung and we had to repair it. It also went through his scapula and nicked his anterior jugular. That was why the blood loss was severe. The bullet hitting his pelvis didn't do any real damage, just muscles. But as they are really tender there, he lost a really huge amount of blood as well from here. The bullet in his abdomen did more damage than the others; it ricocheted in his abdomen several times before heading toward his stomach. Its content had already spread into his abdominal cavity, increasing the possibility of sepsis for the next couple days. We are giving him blood, we will keep him sedated the necessary time for his body to start healing properly and to fight the possible infection. We are giving him some antibiotics and he's on a ventilator. I have to tell you that he's very lucky: the bullets didn't hit any real important organs and any important blood vessels. It could have been much worse in fact. Right now, he's headed toward a room in the ICU."

Gabby couldn't believe what the doctor was saying. Matt was in really bad shape. With each word he uttered, her wish to cry increased. Fortunately, Cindy was there to give her the hug she needed. Kelly was shocked as well.

"As I understood, you were back there too?" the doctor said to Kelly.

As he couldn't say a word, he nodded, looking down, still ashamed.

"What you did before the paramedics arrived really saved his life. If you didn't have put pressure on his wounds, he would be dead by now. You did good, really good even. He's alive thanks to you."

Kelly couldn't believe it; despite his shape, he really saved his best friend.

"Can we... Can we see him?"

"His brother and you? Sure, but you can't stay long, unfortunately."

"We know, we just... We just want to see him. We need it."

"I understand, I really do. I can give you ten minutes with him. Come with me, nurses are settling him to the ICU."

He turned, opening the door as Kelly and Gabby followed him. She looked at the restroom one more time, seeing everyone inside giving her a reassuring smile. All three went to the ICU, near the room in which Matt was resting and forcibly plunged into a deep sleep. The doctor stopped them and turned around, facing the two friends.

"I should tell you one more thing before entering the room. He is not completely stable, and he looks like a ghost. He is also in a medically induced coma, so be careful with all the equipment around him."

They both nodded, and the doctor agreed to let them open the door and enter the room. One vision caught them really fast and hard. His face was obstructed by the holding device of an endotracheal tube coming down from his throat to his lungs; it was here to make sure that he wasn't going to bite what was keeping him alive at his awakening. His chest was bare, lightly covered by sheets from his legs to his stomach. Both chest tubes were visible below his right arm and there was a thick bandage to the right of his rib cage. At the level of his left arm, the redness of the blood which was transfusing to him broke with his livid complexion as two other IV were tearing his skin and going to his bloodstream for the necessary providing care. He needed antibiotics, nutrients, painkillers and an anesthetic to keep him in a repairing sleep, plus he had to get fed through a nasogastric tube glued to the oxygen tubes of the ventilator. He seemed so serene though, as if in peace. Gabby could feel Kelly's agitation, even though she didn't see it beside her. She could hear his hard breathing, undoubtedly cut by tears he was forced to hide and keep for himself. She tried to find his hand with hers, her gaze still on Matt's almost lifeless body and suddenly, she reached his fingers. She wrapped them with her own fingers, shivering as the contrast of their temperature hit her. His hand was frozen, trembling. She squeezed it hard, signaling her presence next to him, and authorized herself to move her eyes from Matt to her friend. She was right: Kelly was crying, torn by guilt because he gave up on his best friend, the husband of Gabby. He remained there, comforted by warm hands, and finally, she hugged him.

"I... I shouldn't... I..."

"Kelly, none of this is your fault", she reassured her as she saw him finding his words.

She broke the hug, observing each feature of his face to read his emotions. He always had a shield as hard as steel, but with this shooting, he had reached his breaking point.

"The only responsible of this is the guy who did this. He is the one who shot you, who hurt and killed all those innocent people. He is the one who put Matt into this bed."

Gabby didn't blame Kelly, quite the contrary. How could he have predicted this massive shooting?

"You kept him alive the time for the paramedics to come to you. You're not guilty, you're his savior. So... Thank you... Thank you so much."

Kelly looked at her with his eyes wide open, surprised by this speech Gabby had reserved for him. She didn't blame him at all; she still saw him like before despite what happened. Slowly, he nodded while closing his eyes, reassured and emptied of any guilt. For now. With the back of his left hand, he wiped away the tears, turning slightly to the doctor who was trying in vain to get away without a noise to let the two friends with his patient.

"How long he... You know... Uh..."

"How long he will stay in an induced coma?" the physician tried.

Once again, Kelly nodded.

"Well, all will depend on your brother's will and the ability of his body to break the infection, and of course to heal from its injuries. At least a couple days, the time for his vitals to stabilize and to get over the incident."

"He's still... I mean... He's not out of the wood?"

"Unfortunately no. Not until his vitals are out of their normal place and there is a risk of sepsis. He will remain in critical condition until then. A few hours ago, he was in emergency critical condition, but that's no longer the case. As I said to you in the restroom, Mr. Casey is a real fighter."

Gabby couldn't help but have a slight smile as the doctor was exiting the room to give them a tiny bit of intimacy with his patient. They needed this for sure. Gabby squeezed his right hand hard; she wanted to tell him that he was near him for the next couple minutes. She also gave him a kiss on his forehead, as she couldn't kiss him on his lips because of the ventilator, closing her eyes while doing so.

"I am so glad that you are alive. You... Don't do that to me again", she said, a tear escaping her right eye when she sat down next to her husband.

Kelly remained on his feet, appreciating what Gabby had told him about Matt; that she didn't blame him for that but she was thankful that he kept her husband alive. With this mass shooting, seventy-three people died and three hundred and sixty people had been injured, most of them because of the shooting itself, others from the panic following the first shots fired. Apparently, the shooter wanted to commit suicide when the police arrived near him, but he didn't have time to pull the trigger. He had been shot in the arm before doing so and had been arrested. This insane man said to the police that he had shot people at the Navy Pier because his wife had been found dead in a rock concert at the last rock concert there. A heart attack. It was just for that. Just because he lost someone he loved, he killed nearly eighty people and hurt hundreds more. In which crazy world they were living?

Days passed and followed each other. A routine had settled in the intensive care unit. At six in the morning, Dr. Leniewski started her round to meet every patient she was treating. For four days now, she began it with the room 401, Matt's. With her resident and a nurse, she always checked at first his vitals while the nurse accompanying her was taking care of checking his temperature. After having had a fever for two days, the doctor had decided to change the antibiotics for stronger ones, and Casey seemed to tolerate them. His fever had gone down from 102,6 to 100 and his vitals had finally been stabilized: his heart was beating regularly at 84 for more than ten hours and his blood pressure had gone up to 112 over 74 after the blood transfusion. He was urinating correctly and his head had never been this strong, although Kelly was always asking nurses and doctors if it was indeed the case. Everyone looked good but a moderate concussion, Matt had no further head injury, his ct-scan and MRI were normal and his EEG showed no sign of anomaly. His state had so much improved these last few hours that the medical staff had decided to start reducing sedation keeping Matt in an induced coma. According to the doctor taking care of him, it would take about one to two days to wake up properly, and the latter had vividly recommended Kelly to come home to come back the next day when Matt was about to wake up. But he remained there, near his best friend, watching over him as day one. He had hardly moved since that horrible, nightmarish night. The only time he allowed himself out of the room was when he was forced to do so when the visiting hours were over. Sometimes, he hid in the bathroom to stay a little longer beside his friend, but the nurses caught him quickly when they were doing their rounds. They were now used to let him stay, and even Dr. Laniewski kept telling that this could be a good idea for both her patient and Kelly. She had seen him in shock after what had happened; she had seen him destroyed and broken into tiny pieces when he had seen Matt for the first time after surgery, how he had felt guilty about what had happened while he had nothing to do with that. Kelly needed to stay next to Matt to feel relieved, to tell himself that his brother was getting better and that he was going to pull through. And on the other side, Matt needed to feel a familiar presence to keep fighting in order to stay alive, to heal. Having someone next to you helped the patients a lot, even in the deepest coma. The body could feel what was going on around, even when the patient was out of it. The nurses had almost begged Kelly to go home in order to come back in a good shape for his brother, but he refused to leave the room. He was fading: his beard had grown, he had barely eaten or drunk since that night, he fell asleep near Matt to wake up a couple hours later in cold sweat because he had nightmares. All he could see when he was awake was his best friend lying in this hospital bed while guilt was gnawing at him from the inside. And all he could see when he was sleeping was all this blood on his hands while saving Matt's life. All over again. No one managed to get him out of the room, to get him eat or drink something. He just… He just fell asleep again, not deeply, but enough to not be aware of his surroundings because the nurses kept coming inside to reduce slowly the sedation. After another day, Matt kept showing signs of consciousness; moving eyelids, moving fingers… They removed the breathing tube down his throat for a rebreather mask for a couples hours before changing for a nasal cannula, providing the much-needed oxygen to his body. And finally, a few hours after the first signs of awakening from Matt, Kelly could see his eyelids slightly open. It wasn't much, rather weak, but it was a good start.

"Matt?"

It took a while before he could react. His body was still struggling to respond to his orders. He seemed heavy, very heavy. The slightest attempt at a gesture ended in failure, his chest bothered him. It wasn't painful, but it was as if something was pulling in his chest and he did not know why. He knew he was in a hospital, listening to each sound with prudence and silence; the heart monitor, the oxygen entering his nostrils through the cannula, the feeling of a left arm sometimes numb when the BP cuff was doing its work every minute or so... He might have been asleep for several days, his mind was enough lucid to know many things except one. What had happened to him?

"Kel…", he managed to whisper when he recognized the voice of his best friend.

He frowned immediately at the sound of his voice. It seemed stifled, hurt, tired, almost absent. Kelly understood quickly what was going on. He straightened up, thinking that days of intubation could have caused some damage to his vocal cords, but after much thought, not talking for several days and having a tube embedded in his throat to get to the lungs and breathe in their place could also do this kind of effects. He stood up slowly, still staring at his brother and backing up to almost crash into the table on which was a glass of water with a straw and a carafe of water. A nurse had brought it earlier for the moment Matt was going to wake up, she said he would need it. He poured the water into the glass, taking it with one hand and grasping the straw of the other to return to sit near the bed. He put the goblet up to Casey's face, he still had his eyes closed, and placed the straw in front of his mouth.

"Open your mouth, there's a straw", Kelly explained calmly to Matt.

Very slowly, when his mouth opened, he slid the straw on his lips, and Matt caught him to suck the precious liquid. Within a second, his discomfort at the level of his throat faded, he could now swallow without any difficulties. He rejected the straw, showing that he no longer wanted to drink; or rather, he wanted to continue, but he suspected that he wasn't allowed to drink all the water. Kelly then put it on the ground, not wanting to get up again and move away from Matt.

"Why… Why I'm here?"

Kelly straightened up again. Why was Matt asking this? Did he want to know if all this was real or… Or had he really forgotten?

"What do you remember?"

"Uh…"

Matt thought, fighting the painkillers coursing his bloodstream.

"I… I remember… You came home to pick me up for the rock concert… At the Navy Pier, and… I remember the deep dish pizza and the beer, although non-alcoholic."

The two friends couldn't help but smile: they hated non-alcoholic beer, but alcohol had been strictly forbidden at the gig, so they had stretched a point.

"And… And after that, it's the black hole… What happened?"

Matt fully opened his eyes, turning his head towards his best friend. The latter looked down when he met Matt's gaze, as if ashamed. But he could see beyond this apparent shame: he was hurt, shocked. Kelly was like him, never showing any negative parts of himself, only positive parts. What happened to let Kelly in such a state?

"He… A guy… A guy fired at the crowd", he admitted then, still avoiding Matt's look. "We… We got separated, and… And I looked for you everywhere for… For more than ten minutes? And… And I saw you there, lying down and…. You were bleeding out…"

Matt could see how much this had affected Kelly: as he didn't remember anything, he was trying to imagine it. Panic rushing over Kelly when he finally managed to find him, fear surrounding him when he saw all that blood. And worse: he had surely thought that bringing him to the concert that day had been the worst idea he had ever had, although planned at the last minute.

"I… I thought that… I really thought that… That I was going to lose you too…"

Broken. Tetanized. Shocked. These words came to mind when Matt saw Kelly in such a state of confidence. He did not hold back his tears or his tremors, thinking back to all that. It hurt so much to see him that way. Matt couldn't help but catch his brother's hand and squeeze it tightly, asking Kelly without a word to look him straight in the eye. There was no word needed between them, just a look at each other was sufficient. Kelly turned his head, his eyes wet with tears he finally allowed himself to shed after days and days of anguish.

"I know what you're thinking… You think that this is all your fault… But… It isn't. The one who had shot us… He's the one guilty, not you."

"But… You've been hurt… Badly… There have been deaths and wounded people, and…"

"There is no 'buts', Kelly", he continued to affirm, shaking his head. "None of this is your fault. You couldn't predict such a… Such a horrible thing."

Kelly didn't dare to continue.

"I am alive… That's all that matters, isn't it?"

"I really thought that… That I was going to lose you. There was so much blood, and… And I could barely press your wounds…"

"Kelly… I am alive… Thanks to you. You are… My savior, my hero."

Matt smiled despite his extreme tiredness. He was thinking about a way to cheer his brother up for minutes now.

"I don't remember the shooting, so… So I can say what I am going to tell you."

Kelly plunged his gaze into Matt's, trying to understand what he meant by this.

"I… I had one of the best nights of my life at this concert."

Kelly's eyes grew, almost shocked by what he had just heard from Matt. How could he say such a thing, that he had loved this evening while he ended up badly injured and almost died?

"A rock concert with my best friend, a deep dish pizza, and beer, even non-alcoholic… It is undoubtedly the best way to spend your night with. So… Thank you… Thanks for having brought me out there… I loved it."

Kelly couldn't help but let escape a few tears out of his eyes again. But this time, they weren't tears of sadness or fear, they were tears of relief; Matt didn't care of the shooting, he only cared about the moment he remembered with him. He had decided to keep the good memories in mind, this good time with his brother. He nodded, squeezing back Matt's hand, thanking him without a word.

"You… You should go home. And take care of yourself. Like shave your beard, take a shower… And eat. You… You look like a homeless guy."

The two friends burst into a laugh, the painkillers helping Matt to not feel any pain from his body.

"Don't worry about me, I am fine… Go home…"

"Alright, alright… I go home… I just call Gabby so that she can be there in no time."

Gabby. After everything he apparently had gone through, he had almost forgotten about his wife. The first thing he had seen while waking up was his best friend in a state of intense lamentation, and what he had wanted at this moment was to comfort him. He was almost ashamed of not having had his first thought for Gabby.

"He… How many victims?"

"Uh… At the last account, there have been… About 80 deaths and 350 wounded, I think."

Matt nodded, not wanting to know more about this. He didn't remember anything, and he hoped inwardly that it would remain this way.

"Go home… I am fine now."

"Yeah…"

Kelly got up, smiling slightly at his brother before heading to the door to get out, taking the glass of water with him to place it back to the table. He loved his brother, more than anything in this world. Closing the door behind him, he staggered down the aisle, finally knocking on a wall. He stopped, putting his back on it and slid to the ground. Why did he feel relieved all of a sudden? He felt tears burning his eyes, threatening to slide down his cheeks, but he felt no longer sad and guilty, he was... Happy. Happy and serene, relieved. He smiled, starting to laugh slightly while wiping his eyes with the back of his sweater sleeve. A nurse passed by, recognizing Kelly. Worried, she knelt down in front of him and placed one of her hands on his lap.

"Kelly, everything is alright?"

He raised his head, tears coming back to his eyes and this time flowing profusely on his face, a slight smile on his lips.

"Yeah… Yeah, I'm fine, I… I've never felt so fine in my entire life."

The nurse smiled back, satisfied to see good thoughts taking place inside the man in front of her, this man she had seen slipping away for days at the bedside of Matt.

"I… Matt woke up, he… He sent me back home."

"A wise man despite his shape, huh?"

It made Kelly smile again.

"He… He always put his family before him, even when... Even in difficult situations. He always thinks of the positive sides before the negative sides. He is an optimist. That's why I love my little brother."

"I understand now why you seemed to affected by Matt's condition; you are fusional, you are like one person. You know what the other wants from you without a word. A perfect symbiosis."

"He… He told me that… That he had spent the best night of his life… Despite the shooting, he… Spending time with me has been his best memory of that night."

"He took away all the guilt you had, didn't he?"

Kelly couldn't utter a word: he simply nodded, the nurse still having her hand on his knee.

"Then keep that same memory in mind, push this terrible moment aside. Think back to that moment when we were together enjoying this concert, enjoying each other. Think back at these moments of happiness, just like him. And everything will be fine."

The nurse straightened up, helping Kelly to get up before continuing her rounds by entering Matt's room. He couldn't help but to smile, thinking back to this joy invading Matt's face when he had showered up at his threshold, handing him two tickets for the concert. He thought back to his laugh when they had eaten this part of deep dish pizza waiting for them and his pouting head when someone had told them that alcohol was prohibited. He burst into a laugh in the hallway. Matt was right: he had spent the best night of his life too.