A/N: I just wanted to say beforehand, this section is from the surgeon's point of view. I tried to get Dean in this chapter but he apparently wanted to stay unconscious…I'm sorry! Stubborn Winchester. He should be coming back up in one of the next few though, which should be posted soon since I'm about to go through SPN withdrawals due to the lack of a new episode this week and will most likely be on SPN fanfic overload as a result…
"Alright, let's get him to recovery and keep him closely monitored for any signs of a relapse. Well done, everyone."
"Mark? The patient's brother is still in the waiting room. Would you like me to update him?"
The surgeon, Mark, allowed himself a heavy sigh. A six hour surgery with a patient that had some of the worst vitals he had ever had to deal with, who had coded twice on the table, had made for one hell of a late night. He glanced at the clock. Make that an early morning. He sighed again.
"No, it's alright. I've got it. Thank you."
He twisted his arms back, working out the kinks in his shoulders. That was something they never clued you in on in med school, how friggen sore you could get with your arms in someone's chest cavity for hours.
He leaned forward to the sink, stripping off his bloodstained gloves, mask, cap, and gown and tossing them into the disposal next to it. The sight of blood never bothered him—wouldn't have been a surgeon if it did—but to see someone coughing it up was a sight he wasn't sure he could get used to. Blood belonged on the inside of a person's body, and his job was to make sure it stayed there.
He let the water flow over his hands, scrubbing them clean once again, and let his thoughts turn to the patient's brother and what he could say to the man. That was one thing they did stress in med school, how important it was to deal with people properly. In a world where medicine was filled with more lawsuits and red tape than actual healing, every word and expression and movement had to be made with care to avoid getting the backlash. The typical phrases to say to the patients and their loved ones, taught by the professors and chorused by the students, echoed in his head: I'll have an update soon; you need to think about your options; we just have to wait and see; we'll do everything we can; I can make them as comfortable as possible. Offering slight smiles and a hand on the shoulder, but never too much, never for too long to run the risk of offering false hope. Never a promise or a guarantee, detachment, professional demeanor. The end result was protection of their patients and themselves. They could become the perfect doctors, intelligent, proficient, and cold. He might be young, but he had plenty of practice at perfecting the character.
But this case was different; it was more difficult to distance himself from the family. The patient was so young, younger than he was, with serious injuries and nowhere near out of the woods, and a brother who was likely sitting terrified in the waiting room. As a younger brother, Mark knew how strong that bond was, how important it was and how much it hurt when something got in the way of it. These two were obviously close and he could only imagine what his patient's brother must be feeling. For crying out loud, the guy had carried his older sibling bloody to the doors of the hospital, broken protocol to sprint down the hall and see him again, and according to Marie had not left the place since then, waiting on news.
How the hell do you confront someone who's that devoted?
Mark looked down to see the water still rushing over his skin, slowly filling the basin beneath his hands. He sighed once again and turned off the tap, drying his hands off and running his fingers through his hair as he turned to face the man's family.
He found the patient's brother still in the waiting room, looking even more exhausted and disheveled than expected as he was confronted by an officer, no doubt looking for details on how the patient had received his injuries. Mark knew the stress that put on the family members, and thought it more prudent for the man to know about his brother first.
"Excuse me? Are you Mr. Bloom's brother?"
The man immediately whirled around, looking with wide eyes at the surgeon before him. "Yeah, it's Sam. Are you his doctor? Is he alright?"
"Sir, we need to—"
Sam turned on his heel to face the cop again. "Just wait, just for a second. Please, Dean, is he alright? No one's told me anything, I've been here all night, just, please." He twisted to face Mark, eyes brimming with emotions, concern and fear the most prominent among them.
Mark took in the sight before him. A grown man probably six inches taller than him, falling apart over a night of devastation. He took a breath and braced himself.
"I'm Mark, Mr. Bloom's—Dean's—surgeon. He's out of surgery now and we've taken him to recovery. He'll be transferred to the ICU soon. Why don't you come with me, and we can discuss this further?"
A/N: Just want to finish this one up by saying my bit about doctors being cold is relevant to the story, and not my personal opinion; there is absolutely no offense intended here. I have nothing but respect for the medical profession, and all the incredible work they do. Particularly when I can use them to fix up the boys after I break them…after all, CW might be angry if I didn't return them at least somewhat intact