Chapter 70.

October 12, 2020.

The Hangman.

"Best five out of seven."

"Cristina." Alex placed a folder on the table between them, giving one of his winning smiles. "If we go again, I'll win, and then this will be twice as embarrassing for you."

She held out her hand, "Sounds like something a little bitch would say."

He snorted. "I have the right to refuse a thumb war."

"Forfeit is the word."

They were alone in a conference room, halfway through lunch. Cristina had stress-eaten two slices of cake and Alex was feigning interest in a burger. His focus was on the folder. It was his reason for interrupting her peaceful lunch alone in the on-call room. Grey-Sloan was a madhouse. She wanted a few precious moments to think about nothing but calories.

Alex said, "We made a deal."

"I was under duress." Cristina relented and flipped through the little file. It was a chronic case, a kid with every condition under the sun. While she was browsing, she said, "Did I tell you my mother decided to relocate to Seattle? She's top-tier overbearing." Cristina paused on an MRI, "What do you want me to do for this kid, exactly? His heart isn't even the worst body part he has. His valves are six kinds of crazy. His arteries look thin…"

It was like he didn't hear her. His tone was urgent, a little delusional. "You're working on a trial for an artificial valve that would solve his regurgitation problem."

Cristina flipped back and forth between focused MRIs, unbelieving, "I'm not touching this."

"It's his only chance."

"Are you kidding? He wouldn't survive the surgery in the first place, and looking at this deformity, there's no way his body would accept the artificial valve."

Alex ran his hand down his face, appearing more tired than angry. Cristina tried to get a read on him, tried to figure out why this case was so important to him. It would have been clear from the moment the kid arrived that there was no help for him. Pediatric surgeons could be bleeding hearts, sure, but they were also the most grounded in reality of all the disciplines. Working with kids taught them to be careful where they put their hope, their faith – Cristina had learned that through her research. It didn't make them immune to getting attached, just aware of where it would lead.

She said, "Who is this kid to you?"

"No one."

"Don't give me that. Do you know him?"

Alex turned a page in the folder, showing a photo of a blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy smiling against a white wall. He had an oxygen tube going to his nostrils, an IV line just visible off to the left. His ribcage was visibly deformed, his body pitched at an angle.

"Not exactly."

Cristina studied the photo, "He better not be a long-lost love child…"

He snorted, "No. It's stupid. Sorry I asked."

"If you care about it this much, it's not stupid."

He groaned, rolled his head back. "I don't wanna do this heart-to-heart thing right now."

"That sucks, because we're already here, and my lunch break is almost over. So cough it up."

Alex pressed his lips, his tone soft, almost childlike. "He's the spitting image of Aaron when he was a kid."

"Your little brother?"

"Yeah." Alex smiled. "The first time I met him it just hit me. I can't shake it."

She hated to have to say it. "I can't do the surgery, Alex."

"I know. I know that. I just had to… try."

Cristina sat back, folded her arms, prepared to finish telling him about her mother moving to town, but her beeper went off before she could get a word out. She checked the code. "Shit. GSW in route to the ER. Gotta go. Good talk."

XxXxX

She had barely step foot in the ER when the bay doors opened. A pair of paramedics rushed a gurney inside, accompanied by a parade of cops, dozens of police scanners buzzing and beeping. Blue lights filled the room until the doors swung shut.

A cop.

Cristina beckoned the gurney, swept up the case. "I'm Dr. Yang."

She got stats, a description. He was shot in the center of the chest while not wearing a vest. He had been unconscious for approximately ten minutes. His vitals were in a sharp decline. He had left a trail of blood from the doors, down the hall, and he was still hemorrhaging.

"Prep OR 1," Cristina said, summoning nurses, residents, "Get me a team. Page Dr. Pierce."

Her routine came to a screeching halt when she got a look at the cop's face.

Detective Terry Swartz.

"Holy shit…" Cristina let the gurney go on toward the OR, taking a breath before she followed.

Another cop blocked her path. His badge read Wilson. He had blood going down his crisp uniform, and the wild eyes of someone who had just watched a comrade fall. He had the typical questions – is he going to make it? What are the odds? – but she had no time to answer. She swerved around him, making for the OR in a jog.

Swartz was a friend. He came to their house for dinner, drank their wine, hung out with Owen when they were both off work. He had been the one to take the case and find Derek, the one to bring him home.

And he was the head detective on the Hangman case.

Cristina took control of the chaos in the OR. She set up a transfusion, rushed to stop the bleeding, gave out orders for anesthetics and blood typing. Maggie Pierce joined her and they worked in tandem, too caught up in the case to continue their rivalry.

It could have been minutes, or hours.

Cristina sensed her husband arriving and turned on him when the OR doors were only half open. He was scrubbed in, masked up, wild-eyed. She said, "No. Get out. Right now."

He paused, surprised, "What? Why?"

"He's your friend. You can't be in here."

"Exactly. I can-"

"Owen, I'm serious. I'm in charge of this case. Get out or get escorted out. Your choice."

He was wounded, but it was for his own good. Swartz was a close friend of his. Cristina knew him, had him over, joked around sometimes. She could still be objective in this situation. Owen could not. She had no doubt in his abilities. He was a brilliant surgeon, a good man. But she had to make the call.

Owen looked pissed off, lingering, debating.

Cristina turned back to the table, too busy to worry that he would make the wrong choice. She heard the doors swing a moment later. He was going to have a lot to say about that at home.

"That was harsh," Maggie commented.

Cristina said, "I know. I take the kid gloves off when I put the blue gloves on."

"Is that your catchphrase?"

"I'm working on it. Do you like it?"

Maggie gave a small smile, saying nothing. A rocky start had led them to a mutual understanding, at the very least. Cristina had put little effort into their relationship apart from forgoing any more hostility. Maggie was not her type, but she was a good doctor, and a good person.

While she worked, Cristina felt eyes on her. She avoided looking up, imagining Owen in the observation bay, watching one of his best friends lay motionless on the table.

XxXxX

It took three hours to stop the bleeding.

Cristina stepped away from the table, her arms trembling from making hundreds of precise movements. She had already done a surgery that morning – a scheduled atherectomy – and consulted on a few other visiting cases. Her day was packed.

"I can finish up," Maggie said, not looking up from her work.

She was already suturing the incision they made over his ribs. The bullet had broken three of them, ricocheted past his heart, and exited in his underarm, unfortunately lodging itself in his bicep. It was still there, low down on his list of problems. In the coming days, he would undergo more surgeries to get his ribs back in working order and remove the bullet from his arm. His heart was under pressure, his body stressed, his blood volume low. He needed rest.

Cristina left the OR, stretching, a little raw from how hard she scrubbed out. It felt weird to have his blood on her. She had been a doctor for a long, long time, fiddled around inside living bodies, and felt totally normal after washing their blood away. Swartz was different.

Her beeper went off as she stepped into the ER. GSW incoming ETA 5 minutes.

She hoped it was a mistake.

A swarm of cops populated the ER, politely declining orders to leave. A sergeant was just arriving, organizing his people, sending some away and assigning others to work with the hospital staff to guard Detective Swartz.

"We stopped the bleeding for now," Cristina said, when the Sergeant crossed the floor to speak to her. He was a burly guy, tatted up, no hair. His eyes were rimmed with red, his jaw stiff.

He nodded along, "I want my officers watching over him. What do you think his odds are?"

"Like I said, we stopped the bleeding for now, but he needs to rest before we can operate again. I'm doing everything I can to help him."

He seemed placated by that, lost in thought.

Cristina said, "Is this GSW that's coming in related to Detective Swartz getting shot?"

The Sergeant stirred, "Likely. We'll get the story."

Five minutes later, another ambulance arrived, and another pair of EMTs rolled a gurney into the ER. The patient was wide awake, chatting away.

"… if you ever want to stop by. But give me a call first."

His shoulder was packed heavily in gauze. When the gurney stopped, he moved to get up, but one of the EMTs put a hand flat on his chest to keep him down. "Please, sir."

A handful.

Cristina received vitals from the EMTs, and then said, "Put him in ER 1."

A queue has formed in the other rooms. Multiple cases had come in since she was with Swartz. Now that the cops were clearing out, construction workers were filing in, battered and bruised. And drunk. Cristina shut the door on the chaos, isolating herself with the second GSW victim.

"It's not that serious," the guy said, trying to sit up again.

Cristina put her hand on his chest, like the EMT had, and kept him lying down. "I'll judge how serious it is. What happened?"

"Some nutjob shot me."

Cristina peeked under the gauze, "I can see that."

A cop tapped on the door. "I've been assigned to guard Mr. Abernathy."

Cristina glanced up, sighed. "Okay. Stand outside. You can't be in here with the patient." Cristina noticed the Sergeant looking her way. She shut the blinds. Cops were the worst. They had the concern and fear of families looking for answers, but also the authority to be annoying.

The patient was watching the door, "They think it was that serial killer, huh?"

"What's your first name, Mr. Abernathy?"

"Paul."

"Well, Paul, I don't really care what they think. I'm gonna unwrap your shoulder now."

Cristina found a through-and-through gunshot wound on his left shoulder. It was barely bleeding, almost masterfully bypassing important structures. It had torn through the muscle, and she suspected that shock was the only thing keeping Paul Abernathy alert and talking. When the pain set in, it would floor him.

She requested an intern, gave the cop outside the door a quick, "If anyone comes to interview him, let them know I'll open the blinds when he can talk."

Her intern was from the trauma department. Owen might have said her name a few times – Sikes. She was a kid, way younger than Cristina ever remembered being, but eager to help. She had been floating around the ER all day.

"So you saw the guy?" Cristina said conversationally, while she oversaw the kid putting stitches in the entry wound.

Paul nodded, smiling, very upbeat for someone who was recently shot. "He was running down the sidewalk and he slammed into me, and I was like, come on, man, and he just turned around and shot me. It was wild."

"Are you in pain?"

"Stings, I guess."

Cristina snorted. "You're taking this really well."

When the intern was done, Cristina surveyed her work, nodding along. "Wrap him up, restrict mobility for now. We're going to keep him under observation."

Paul said, "Does that mean I have to stay here?"

"Yeah. It does." Cristina glanced at the door, debated. "I think the police need to ask you some questions. Are you up for that?"

Paul shrugged, and then winced.

"Yeah, probably don't shrug for a while."

His interview with the police produced few details. He gave a description of the guy – white, maybe thirties, dark hair and eyes, wearing jogging pants and a T-shirt – and little else. The officer informed him that he was shot only a mile from where a detective was attacked, that he was lucky to be alive.

Paul seemed grounded by that statement, "Is he gonna be okay?"

The officer looked to Cristina.

She said, "You're a lot luckier, Mr. Abernathy."

An officer remained by the door, and the rest stationed themselves around the hospital, both to show support for their downed brother, and to keep an eye out for the man who shot him. Cristina gave the intern the appropriate amount of praise and criticism and sent her off, finished by writing up an order for morphine and observation.

Paul watched her work, still bright-eyed. "Have you ever been shot before?"

She paused, hesitated, "No, but I came really close."

He seemed deep in thought. "Ironically, I was just playing laser tag like an hour before this happened."

Cristina kind of liked Paul. She opened the door. "I'm moving you to one of the open beds. You're gonna hang out for a little while so we can observe you. I'll come back to reevaluate you later. That sound good?"

He nodded. "Thanks for putting up with me. You're a nice doctor."

"I can count the number of times I've heard that on one hand," Cristina said. "Do you feel like you can walk, or do you want-?"

He hopped off the table, grinning, "I'm good. Which bed are we going to?"