Casey frantically ran to the nurses' station as soon as she got to the hospital.
"Have you seen my baby's father?" She exclaimed. "He was in some form of accident."
"Alright. Try to relax. Name please." One of the nurses said.
Before Casey could answer, Rusty came running up to her.
"Casey!" He exclaimed.
"What happened?" She panicked. "Is he ok?"
"After laser tag we went go-karting and Cappie thought he'd be cool and not wear a helmet. He wanted to prove a college guy could beat a bunch of high schoolers, so he was going way too fast; even the track workers said he was nuts. He took a corner a little too tight, and well, here we are." Rusty explained.
"How could he do something so stupid?" Casey yelled. "Does he not want to be here for this baby because that's what it sounds like?"
"I'm sure that's not it. He loves the baby more than any of us." Rusty said, trying to calm his sister.
"So this was just Cappie being Cappie." Casey said, trying to make sense of everything.
"Basically." Rusty replied.
"So is he ok?" Casey desperately wanted to know.
"I'm sure you want to see for yourself." Rusty said, escorting his sister to Cappie's room.
When she got there, she couldn't believe what she saw. Cappie looked so helpless. His cute little baby face was now covered in blood soaked bandages. A neck brace now protected his neck and supported his head.
"What the hell Cap!" Casey said, tears now starting to fall down her face as she finished examining him. He was covered in road rash from head to toe, and his arms and legs were mangled as if someone had used his body as the football during the Superbowl.
"I can't believe you were that stupid!" She continued to cry.
Rusty held onto his sister and tried to calm her down. "Case, you yelling at him isn't helping."
"Well what is going to help him, mister super genius?" Casey argued as a nurse walked in.
"That would be me." The nurse replied sweetly, sensing Casey's distress. "I've been with Cappie here since this nice young guy brought him in."
The nurse looked to be in her twenties, which scared Casey. She didn't want some chick just out of nursing school being the one holding Cappie's life in her hands.
"Anything bad happens to him and I swear to god I will kick your ass. Are we clear, you little…Elliot! No, not even an Elliot, more like an Izzy." Casey snapped.
"Ok miss; I'm going to ignore your last comment considering how emotional this must be." The nurse said. She turned back to Rusty. "Rusty, is there anyone who can be contacted to sign these surgery consent forms. Normally since he's over 18 we'd just have him sign them, but as you can see, that's not really possible."
"You mean like his parents." Rusty said, knowing that getting in contact with them was nearly impossible.
"It could be his parents, but if that's not possible than any other relative will do." The nurse replied.
"What about the woman carrying his child?" Casey asked somberly. She might be the only one that was able to save him. And just like Cappie wasn't going to let anything bad happen to little KT, she wasn't going to let anything bad happen to him.
"If that is the only available relative…" The nurse began. Rusty and Casey both nodded.
"Then miss…?" The nurse said.
"Casey. Casey Cartwright." Casey interrupted.
"Alright, Casey; now Cappie here needs surgery to repair all the broken bones, and possibly will need skin grafts on some of his burns. Are you ok with that?" The nurse explained, handing Casey the paperwork.
"What about the rest of it?" Casey asked. "Will he be able to go back to being…Cappie?"
"One thing at a time; that's my motto. Even in medicine you can't run a marathon before learning to crawl. Baby steps always get the best result." The nurse replied very kindly.
"Who's going to be operating on him?" Casey asked a final question before signing the papers.
"We've got the best orthopedic surgeon on his case; Dr. Keenan." The nurse replied.
"The best?" Casey wanted to make sure.
"The best." The nurse assured her.
Casey absorbed everything the nurse said and signed the paper. She couldn't believe she had to making these kinds of decisions. The biggest decisions of her life all seemed to be piling up at once. Not only did she have her baby's life in her hands, but now she had its father's too.
When she handed the papers back to the nurse, the nurse replied, "Well alright, we'd better get him up to surgery. The sooner we get him up there, the better the outcome will be."
A few more nurses came in and started to pull Cappie's bed out of the room. While Rusty stood back and let them do their job, Casey couldn't.
"I'm going with you." She said to the nurses.
"Visitors are not allowed into the OR." Another nurse replied, much less friendly than the one Casey originally talked to. Luckily that one was still there.
"Casey, you're welcome to go with him up to the OR entrance, but that's as far as we can allow you to go." She said nicely. Casey wondered why the other nurse couldn't be that nice.
"Thank you." Casey said on the verge of tears again as she walked right next to Cappie's bed the entire way to the operating room.
Rusty followed close behind; making sure his sister was ok. His head was flooded with just as many thoughts as Casey's. He needed Cappie to get better too. The Kappa Tau house wouldn't be the same without its fun-loving president, and he would end up big brother-less. How could he become a good big brother to one of the new pledges if he didn't have a big brother to look up to?
"Alright you guys, it's the end of the road; don't worry, we'll take excellent care of him." The nice nurse smiled.
Casey leaned over and said goodbye to Cappie. "Now listen you stupid idiot; you need to get better. I'm not raising little ZBZ here by myself." Casey giggled through her tears, trying to piss Cappie off enough for him to come back and argue his side and call the baby little KT. "Rusty and I will be right here when you get out of surgery."
Casey backed away and the nurses brought Cappie into the OR. She immediately ran into her brother's arms, completely overwhelmed by everything that was going on.
"Hey, hey…it's going to be alright." Rusty tried calming his sister. "Cappie will be back in a couple of hours all bandaged up and ready to go home."
Casey sighed, "I hope you're right. He needs to get better. He needs to be Cappie."