Emergency Procedures

The doctor's lounge had gradually become the accepted meeting place as the ER had emptied out. Mark had replaced Amanda so that she could go to Ron, and was now sitting next to his grandson, as grateful for the support he was getting as that he was giving.

Alex had gone to check on Rae once he had spoken with Wil, who was on his way to the OR to operate on Jo. Dane was with Rae, and had said that he would stay until his son came out of surgery. Alex was now in the lounge too, although as he was on duty he didn't expect to stay there very long.

Cheryl was sitting slightly apart from the others, trying to tell herself that Martin would be ok, that the piece of wood that had pierced his skull would be taken out as easily as a splinter and everything would be fine, but she had been in this hospital too many times to know that the short time he had spent in the ER before being rushed to the OR was not a good sign.

Apart from Alex they had all been sitting almost silently for just over an hour when the door opened again and Steve moved slowly into the room.

"Dad!" Daniel jumped up and rushed to the man, and then just stood, tears falling onto Steve's bloodied shirt, taking all the strength and love offered by the arms encircling him.

"Son, come and sit down, you should at least be resting, if not laying in a bed yourself." Mark came over and guided the two of them towards the saggy sofa.

"No, I'm fine, Dad, I just needed to take it easy for a little while, which I've done, now I … I just need to know how she is… Dad, please." Steve let himself be led and then sat, never once letting go of his hold on his son.

"She's in a bad way, but she will be fine, physically at least, and I think you have Jesse to thank for that."

"What? I … I don't understand, Dad, Jesse's not even here." Steve looked at his father, and Mark could see the worry and exhaustion had yet to leave him. His eyes were haunted, and his face was tight and grim.

"Steve, she could have gone into shock, and given the lack of medical care, even died right where she was after she lost her finger, but there isn't even any infection in the wound, he stitched it up, made sure that it was clean, he did a great job, and in fact, under the circumstances, I would say he worked miracles." Mark kept on looking at his son; he was worried that he might be suffering from shock himself.

"I guess I owe him a lot, huh?" Steve's voice was a little distant, but Mark watched as he moved back towards him, and was able to relax himself. "Who saw Jesse?"

"I did." Alex had been hoping that nobody would ask him for a prognosis, but he knew now that he wouldn't be able to keep it to himself.

"And?" Steve realised his voice came out far more sternly than he had meant. "Sorry, Alex."

"Hey, no problem." He raised his hand in acknowledgement of his friend's situation. "I wish that I could say the same things about Jesse that Mark just did about Jo." Alex knew that he was hedging, but he didn't really want to say anything more.

"Alex, just tell us, please." Steve's voice cut through Alex's thoughts.

"He has toxic strep, but you knew that, probably caused when his arm was … skinned, he will need grafts there. He has crush injuries to his legs, the left one is worst, but I don't think it's broken, and he has a few shrapnel wounds and burns, although I have to say they aren't as bad as I would have thought. The blast didn't do him anywhere near as much damage as it could have, but the guy who held him, well, he nearly killed him, and there is no way round this, he is very, very sick." Alex stopped; he could almost recite the injuries like they were a shopping list. Finally, after a sigh he began again. "There will be a lot of physical problems, but I think that psychologically it will be even worse. I can't even begin to imagine what either of them went through, but it would have been as close to hell as they would have wanted to get. They are gonna need a lot of help, and some of it we won't be able to give, or even understand why they need it, I think it will take a lot longer than any of us can imagine to get anything like the Jo and Jesse back that we lost at the beginning of the week."

'Doctor Martin to the ER STAT, Doctor Alex Martin to the ER STAT.' The disembodied voice floated into the room and with a grimace Alex got to his feet.

"I'll see you all later … and I'm sorry I didn't have anything better to say." As the young man left the room they all saw him square his shoulders, and knew that it would take him a little while to get over what he had seen too.

The OR department had been working at full capacity since the first FBI agent had been brought in. So far they hadn't lost anyone, and they had no intention of doing so now. Wil Collins was preparing in the operating theatre usually used when students were observing. It was larger than the others, and he was glad of the space.  Wil knew that in the room next to his Doctor Marlon South, and one of the newer doctors to the hospital, Jonah Lyle were already working on Jesse. He didn't know Josephine Sloan that well, but he did know that she was married to a man he liked and admired, and was the best friend of one of his ex-patients. Rae. He thought of her haunted face as she had lain propped up on a gurney in one of the trauma suites. He could tell that she was seriously troubled by what had happened to her husband and her friend, if only by the fact that she had been completely unaware of the serious burns to the palms of her hands until he had begun to treat them. Her conversation came back to him as he carefully went through the almost mechanical routine to ensure that he was as clean and sterile as he could be.

"Rae, this may hurt your hands, but I have to do it, ok?" He had gently laid Rae's left hand, palm up on the tray across the gurney she was sitting on.

"What? Why? I didn't hurt myself, I banged my head, but it's Jesse who is hurt, Wil, please, he is being treated isn't he?" Rae had looked down then and her eyes had widened as she saw the burnt and blistered areas that had replaced her palms and the backs of her fingers.

He had gently begun cleaning the area, and was relieved to feel her flinch as he did so.

"I … I didn't know I had done this … how can that be?"

Wil was glad she was talking to him; he had been extremely concerned about her when she had first come into the hospital, and had even been considering admitting her to an intermediate care unit with shock. But gradually she had responded to his questions, and he could see that although she was extremely worried, she would be ok in a normal room as long as she had someone with her. "If there are parts you can't feel it's normally because once the initial contact has been made they very quickly become third degree burns. There is no sensation, and the nerve endings have probably been destroyed by the heat." He stopped, not wanting to tell her too much, but knowing from the past that if he didn't tell her she would find out somehow anyway.

"Oh. That's bad, isn't it?"

"Yeah, but we are treating you right away and you can feel this, so don't worry. I'll get you hooked up to an antibiotic IV, once I have dressed and positioned your hands so that they heal properly. But I think there was another reason you didn't feel these burns, most of them are second degree, which are normally extremely painful."

"I can't believe I didn't know I had done this." The wonderment was apparent in her voice, and Wil looked up and smiled.

"You wanted to save your husband, nothing else mattered, am I right?"

"He called out to me … there was fire where he was, but I didn't even think about it … I just had to get to him and … and when I did, he said 'you're here' and I could tell that he was better because he knew … Oh, God, Wil, what will I do if he dies?"

"Rae, you're exhausted, and now that you know about these injuries I'm guessing they hurt, correct?"

"A little." Rae had agreed, albeit reluctantly.

"Where the blisters are?" Wil carefully pointed to the telltale areas on the edges of her palms.

"Mmm, do you burst them? I'm never sure whether to or not."

"No, I don't, but other doctors do. There is no hard and fast rule about it… Are you all right?" Will had seen her move slightly on the bed and a wave of pain pass across her face.

"I wish I could say I was, but my back really hurts."

"Rae, from what I understand you had a dead weight on you. I'll get you x-rayed and checked out before you're taken to your room."

He had finished treating and dressing her hands in silence, but it had been a different type of silence. He had been heartened by the level of her conversation, and now he knew that his patient was shocked, but didn't think she was suffering from shock and he also had a feeling that everything they had discussed was now whirring around her brain.  Once he was finished he had made some notes on her chart and then spoken again. "I'll get the nurse to take you to your room straight from x-ray and I'll leave notes to say that if you can't sleep that you are to be given some sedation, but I know how much you hate it, and I think you will be fine without it anyway." He had doggedly continued speaking, even though he could see that Rae was desperate to butt in. Once he hadn't insisted on the medication though she had waited for him to finish.

"Thank you, Wil."

"Doctor Collins?" The voice of a young nurse came into his thoughts as he finished scrubbing.

"Yes?"

"Mrs Sloan has been to x-ray, and is ready for you."

"Thank you, nurse." Wil allowed her to pull on his gloves for him and then holding his hands out in front of him he moved through into the theatre. His patient was laying on her stomach, the back of the hospital gown laying open on the gurney and a blue sheet covering everything except the part where he could see two large pieces of wood sticking out of her back. He looked at them from all angles before he even considered how he was going to take them out. They were three to four inches across and although he could see about two inches above her skin, Wil had an idea that they could be like an iceberg and have more hidden than showing. After the injuries to Rae he was pleased to see that there appeared to be no burns on this patient, at least none that needed his attention.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The nurse on duty in the OR who was in charge of admissions was called Lila Norley, and she was up to her eyes in paperwork. The sudden influx of patients with such serious injuries had resulted in an emergency being declared, and not only had she been admitting patients but she had also been contacting and cancelling those whose operations were not deemed vital. Now though, she had five minutes to make sure that nothing had been forgotten or overlooked, and she began to read through the paperwork on the patients who had already been taken to the ICU.

Lila picked up the file on Ronald Wagner and smiled. She knew that he was engaged to Doctor Bentley, and she was pleased to see that he had no more than some second degree burns, abrasions, a concussion and shock. It was the last condition that had meant he was being monitored continually and kept real close to a ventilator in case he should suddenly take a turn for the worse.

Jackson Manning, Lila shook her head, he hadn't been so lucky, and was fighting for his life in the ICU. The piece of wood that had been imbedded in his chest had smashed through his rib cage as if it wasn't there, and punctured his lung. He was alive, but only just.

Her eyes flicked through the other folders, she really ought to file them away, all the duplicates had been sent with the patient to their rooms, and these were no longer needed. As she began to put them into alphabetical order a young nurse in slightly less than pristine scrubs came out and placed another one on the desk, she shook her head as she did so, and then walked away. Lila looked down, Martin Robertson; it wasn't a name she recognised.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Marlon South had never worked with Jonah Lyle before, but he had to admit the young man seemed to know what he was doing. The injuries to Jesse Travis's leg had been quite nasty and it was difficult to decide which area to concentrate on first. Initially it had been decided that Jonah would work on the burns and crush injuries whilst Marlon decided how to deal with the gaping wounds on Jesse's arm and the raw skin on the side of his head.

In the end, despite the infection rampant in their colleague's body both Marlon and Jonah had realised that they should concentrate on the grafts, cleaning the other wounds and keeping a close eye on them in case they needed further intervention.

The x-rays taken had shown that Jesse had no fracture of the left leg although it had received some second degree burns and was very swollen. The right leg miraculously seemed to have escaped serious injury. It was swollen and bruised, but that was all.

Marlon had then moved over to the wound on Jesse's arm and considered it. He had already assessed it, and knew exactly what had to be done, the location of the donor site, where he would take the skin from, and the sizes he needed, but he used the few minutes that he stood silently to re-group and collect his thoughts. Jonah stretched out his aching back muscles for a moment. They had, so far, only cleaned and stitched wounds, removing a small pile of shrapnel in the process, and made sure that the legs were dressed and elevated. That had taken them a little over an hour and the main task still lay ahead of them.

Doctor South was a surgeon who liked to talk as he worked. His usual practice was to have a recorder underneath his scrubs and a tiny microphone hooked over his ear, beneath his hat. Jonah waited for his instructions, knowing that his colleague was a specialist plastic surgeon, which wasn't a field he had ever considered, but he had worked with Jesse and liked and admired the man, if he could help then he wanted to do so.

Marlon's deep voice reverberated around the room and Jonah listened intently to every word. "The patient is a 38 year old male with three wounds on the left forearm. Each one measures approximately 5cm by 8cm and will require a full thickness skin graft. All three grafts will be started with a purse string suture." He paused for breath as he finished the first one. Then he carefully picked up the foil package that he had removed his suture from and made himself a template. Once that was done and he was happy with everything so far he took the small instrument passed to him by the OR nurse. As always the doctor was impressed by the level of professionality in the theatre, and also by the fact that everyone seemed to know what to do without actually being told.

"The grafts will be taken from the upper left arm and will be harvested with a Davol dermatome, Doctor Lyle, if you would be so kind?" Jonah moved so that he was in position on the other side of the operating table and then, taking the sterile tongue depressor that he was handed, so that he had one hand on either end of it, he began to press down, flattening the skin on the inside of Jesse's upper arm so that Marlon could take the skin he needed for the first graft.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Susannah Millar was the anaesthetist in charge of Jesse's medication, and sat, perched on a small stool keeping an ever watchful eye on her patient. He had been unconscious for almost six and a half hours before the last graft was begun and she was about to update them once more on the condition of her charge.

"Gentlemen, my patient is stable and still tolerating his anaesthetic well, do you know how much longer he will be required to be anaesthetized?"

"I have one more graft to go, maybe another hour and a half. I have already harvested the skin."

"That's fine, thank you, Doctor." Susannah made herself a little more comfy on the stool and looked back down at the young man under her care.

Marlon waved a scalpel in acknowledgement of her words, and she could see that his concentration was immediately as complete as it had been before she spoke.

Finally, after Jesse had been on the operating table for almost eight hours, the last set of basting sutures had been put in, and the pressure dressing applied, the orderlies took him back out of the theatre the way he had come in and Marlon, Jonah and Susannah, as well as the other theatre staff, let out a collective sigh of relief.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The procedure to remove the wood from Jo had taken longer than any of them would have hoped. The muscles surrounding each piece had tightened so that they were held in a vice-like grip. Wil had removed knives and other weapons from patients before, the most notable being Alex Martin a couple of years earlier, and, as long as they were careful, and the blade wasn't designed to cause further damage, or wasn't in a vital organ, they did little or no more harm taking them out than had already been done putting them in. That hadn't been the case this time. The main pieces had been removed with a great deal of effort, but they had left splinters of various sizes in the wound, some deeper than others, and by the time he had been sure that every piece had been removed they had been in the operating room for over three hours.

The notes that had been sent down with the patient had been written by Mark Sloan, and so Wil had glanced at her hand but had done nothing to it. The back of her head was another matter though, and he knew that she would need some skin grafts to cover up the raw wound where she had lost her hair.  Mark had cleaned it a little in the ER, but it needed the sterile conditions of the OR to be flushed out. He had just begun this when they hit a problem.

The anaesthetist had expressed concern at the condition of his patient and the decision had been made to just make sure that the wound was as clean as could be and reassess the situation in twenty-four hours.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Daniel had finally fallen asleep in Steve's arms as night drew in. The room was dark and quiet, nobody had anything to say, but nobody could leave, not even to stretch their legs in the hallway. Alex had returned at the end of his shift and was sitting quietly, a cup of coffee warming his hands. Mark, knowing that Amanda would be suffering the guilt pangs of being a mother and a partner had gone to relieve her so that she could go home and reassure her children before she returned to her vigil.

It was this silent scene that greeted Wil as he entered the doctor's lounge, still in his sweat soaked scrubs, knowing that there were anxious people that he needed to see before he could shower and head for home.

Steve went to stand up as he saw the doctor open the door, disturbing his son in the process. Daniel peered bleary eyed for a moment and then realised that at last he could find out about his mom.

"Steve?" Wil looked at the man in front of him, he had treated him for a gunshot wound in the past and found him to be a genuinely pleasant guy and his heart went out to him.

Steve nodded his head. "How is she, Wil? Can we go see her? Is she gonna be all right?"

"Ok, first of all, she survived the surgery, she will need more, but for now she is in recovery, and will be transferred to the ICU in a little while, then you can go see her." Wil smiled a little as he spoke. He wasn't sure who the young boy was, but he seemed very close to the big man in front of him. "I wish I could tell you that she is going to be all right, but as of now I don't know. We stopped the surgery because she had cardiac arrhythmia and the anaesthetist was worried about her, is still worried about her; he's with her in recovery. We will reassess the situation in the morning, but she will need the extra surgery for skin grafts."

Steve had his eyes closed as Wil finished speaking, but he looked directly at the man as he considered his words. "My dad said she would be ok, are you telling me different?" The words were accusing and they stung the doctor.

"I'm telling you that she had problems in surgery that your father couldn't have known about, and we will reassess the situation in the morning." Wil hadn't meant his words to be hard but he was unable to keep the strain out of them.

Steve had the grace to look down for a moment before continuing. "I'm sorry, Wil, I know you have done all that you can." Steve was silent as he tried to keep his emotions under better control. "Wil, this is our foster son, Daniel, can you let him know what to expect when we go up to ICU?"

Wil tried not to look shocked, but he would never have guessed that the boy was Steve Sloan's son. "Uh, yeah, ok. Daniel?" He wasn't sure he had heard right, and didn't want to call the child by the wrong name.

"That's me." Daniel tried a smile, but it wasn't very successful.

"Ok, well, your … mom?" He paused again, but both Steve and Daniel nodded, and he continued, "she will be on a ventilator, so even if she were conscious, which she won't be, she'd be unable to talk. There will be a heart monitor and she will be hooked up to a couple of IV's, one for the antibiotics she needs to prevent any infection, the other will be giving her nutrients, there will be a high protein compound, and vitamins and minerals. She'll need them to keep her body strong enough to put up with everything we are putting her through."

"Can … Can I hold her hand?" Daniel was already having trouble keeping tears at bay and Wil knew that the whole experience may be too much for the youngster.

"Yes, of course and talk with her. She may even remember it later, sometimes things filter through, although that is more if people are in a coma, and your mom certainly isn't in one of those." Thank God.

"Doctor Collins, could I have a word with you?" Steve gently disentangled himself from Daniel, "I'll be right back, ok?" The boy just nodded his head and, grateful that he didn't question him further, Steve moved over towards the coffee machine. "I don't think that Daniel can handle very much more today," Steve's voice was hushed, but full of emotion, "I'll take him to see his mom and then I plan to take him home."

"I think that would be the best thing, and, I would suggest that you stay with him… No, hear me out, what he sees is going to be very traumatic for him, he may well have bad dreams about it, and will need you. Steve, she won't wake up until at least mid morning, maybe not even then. You will gain nothing by staying here tonight except a stiff neck and back, and a very upset son."

Steve sighed and closed his eyes for a second. He had never before been in the position where he had to consider anyone but himself. Not in every day life, he had always tried to be helpful and thoughtful, but in an emergency situation he had been able to go where he needed to go, do what he had to do, without it impinging on anybody else, but now he wanted to be with two of the most important people in his life, and he had to make a choice. He knew that what Wil said was correct, Jo would be asleep until the morning at least, Daniel would be home, worried and vulnerable, he guessed that there was no choice to be made after all. "Ok, thank you. If I go home … and … and anything happens, you'll call me, right?" Steve watched the doctor nod his head. "Do you think we can go up yet?"

"I'll just check for you."

"Wil?" Steve called him back before he had even moved.

"Could you find out about some of the others? Jesse, Ron, Rae? There was an FBI guy who had a terrible chest injury, and Martin, oh, God." For a moment the room and the situation seemed to move away from Steve, and he felt the whole earth shift around him.

"Dad!" Daniel's arm was suddenly there, trying to hold him up, and then he heard Wil's voice.

"Steve, sit, there's a chair behind you, just let yourself down onto it and lower your head for a while, that's it, now, breath slowly and carefully, in … out … that's it, and again, in … out …" Wil had Steve's wrist beneath his fingers, taking his pulse, whilst still speaking in a rhythmic, almost sing song way. He noticed that Daniel had his arm around his father's shoulder and was gently and, Wil was sure, completely unconsciously, rubbing his hand up and down in a gesture that showed the doctor just how close the two of them were.

As Steve had realised just how many people had been involved and subsequently injured in what had happened that day he felt himself sliding into a daze, and his head had spun. The feel of Daniel's hand on his arm had helped him find his centre again, and when Wil had begun to treat him he had just obeyed everything he said, now the world was coming back into focus, and so he raised his head. "Thank you, both of you, and I'm sorry." Steve looked round; he had been so concerned with what Wil had been saying he had ignored Cheryl and Alex ever since the other doctor had entered the room. "Cheryl, I'm sure there will be news of Martin real soon."

Cheryl smiled and then she stood up and moved over to where her ex-partner was sitting. As Wil Collins straightened back up she crouched down. "Steve, you have enough to worry about, go see Jo and then take your family home. Please, God, we will all still be here in the morning, and if not, whether you like it or not, you being home instead of here isn't going to make that much difference."

Steve stood up himself then, and as Cheryl followed suit, to her amazement he took her into his arms and hugged her. "You make sure that you tell that man of yours that he'll have me to answer to if there is any trouble, ok?" His voice was gruff, and Cheryl, more touched than she could have ever imagined by what he had just said and done, nodded her head and then moved away.

Wil, satisfied that Steve was ok once more, and knowing that Alex would take care of him anyway, had left the room and made his way to the reception desk in the ER.

"Could you check on the patients who were brought in from the Murietta Avenue incident this afternoon please, Nurse?"

"Yes, Doctor." The hallway was silent for a few minutes apart from the hushed tones of the nurse on the phone to various departments and wards around the hospital. Finally a piece of paper was handed to him, and after studying it for a while Wil made his way back towards the four anxious people in the doctor's lounge, but was stopped by Mark making his way to the same place, and for a minute or two they could be seen deep in conversation.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Much to Dane's surprise Rae had woken up just after ten in the evening, not rested, but fretful from her ordeal and fearful of what had happened since. As soon as she had shown signs of stirring Dane had pressed the buzzer and asked the nurse who answered it to check if Doctor Martin could attend his patient. It had been ten minutes before the young man had arrived, and in that time Rae had gradually begun to return to the cruel world that her sleep had taken her away from.

While she had been sleeping Rae had been on her back, her injured hands raised high in slings above the bedclothes, white in their bandaged covers. Alex studied her as she struggled through the final stages between sleeping and waking, anxiously watching as the pain returned to her features. He moved a little closer so that she would be aware of his presence.

"Rae? Honey, can you hear me?" Alex stole a glance at Dane, remembering how the man had disliked their close relationship only a day or so earlier, but this time there was no reaction.

"Alex?" Her voice was faint, and he could tell that her throat was dry. He placed a couple of ice slivers onto her tongue.

"Better?" Alex watched as she began to nod her head.

"Arghhh." The pain that crossed Rae's face and the cry of anguish that accompanied it chilled him to the bone.

"Rae, Honey, what happened?"

That one movement had taken even the small amount of strength that she had seemed to have just seconds before, and she was no longer lying back on the pillows, but collapsed against them.

"No … Alex, please … no!" The horror in Rae's voice only served to fuel his feeling of dread. He reached out gently, placed his hand underneath her right wrist and lifted it tenderly, just an inch in the sling.

"Arghhh, NO! Don't, Alex, no, please … no … not again… Put them down … please put them down." Rae was devoid of all colour, her breathing became ragged, and he knew that he would lose her into the darkness if he didn't hurry. Reaching over Alex pulled the oxygen mask from its stand and put it over her face, seeing the terror in her eyes, but hardening his heart in order to ignore it.

"Ok, let the mask do its job, take it in, Rae, slowly and deeply. As soon as you get under control I can take it away… It's all right… shhh… it's all right… They have to stay up … shhh, I'll give you some pain relief … But we don't know yet… I'll book some tests… close your eyes… nothing is certain… in … and out, deeply… in … and out."

The same sing song tone that had worked with Steve began to cut through her panic and gradually Rae responded to the voice of the man beside her, but she knew he was lying, they both recognised the signs, and they weren't good.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The door to Jo's room was closed, and Steve and Daniel looked at each other, gaining strength as they did so, allowing Wil to move inside the room before them. Steve had tried to brace himself, knowing that seeing his wife lying on a ventilator would be hard not only for him, but for his son, and also knowing that he would need to be strong for both of them, but she looked so vulnerable, so ill, that he had paused in the doorway, not sure if he could enter.

"Dad?" Daniel looked into his father's eyes, and was concerned by what he saw. Suddenly he realised that he needed to be as strong for his dad as he needed his dad to be for him, and so, taking him by the hand, he smiled. "I guess we need to do this together."

The paternal pride that rushed through Steve brought him out of his stupor and, as his son had said, they moved into the room, together.

Jo was lying on a hospital bed, but not the normal type, and instead of there just being the noise of the ventilator Steve could hear the sound of a motor. He must have looked puzzled because Wil smiled at him. "Your wife is lying on a flexicair air mattress, the sound you can hear is the pump which is providing a constant airflow. It's designed to relieve pressure and prevent bed sores, but when there are serious back wounds we tend to use them for that too."

"Back wounds?"  The puzzlement on Steve's face was now evident in his voice. "I don't understand."

"Steve, everybody who was injured today, apart from Rae, has shrapnel wounds, some to their fronts, some to their backs. Your wife had two large pieces in her upper body, which I removed, but I don't want her putting any pressure on the stitches, or the areas surrounding them. This way we can monitor the condition of her injuries and, if this bed doesn't seem to be doing the trick, then there are three or four others we can try."

Steve just nodded, his brain was overloaded with information as it was, but he knew that when he came back tomorrow he would be in a better frame of mind to take it all in.

Daniel let go of Steve's hand and moved a little closer, looking at Wil as he did so. He saw the doctor nod his head and so, feeling a little bolder, he sat in the chair next to Jo's head and gently placed his hand over hers. Then he let his breath out, and relaxed slightly in the seat.

Steve moved behind him and placed his hands on his son's shoulders, and watched as the ventilator moved up and down, up and down, and the display peaked and fell on the heart monitor. He was aware of Wil taking a couple of readings, and then felt him touch his arm.

"I'll be in the hospital for about another thirty minutes, I would suggest you should be going about the same time as me."

"Yeah, I guess. Thanks, Wil." Steve spoke almost absently, and the doctor looked at the three occupants of the room for a few more seconds before leaving them alone together.

There was another chair against the wall of the room and Steve pulled it over and sat next to Daniel. Jo was lying, her eyes closed, with the ventilator tube going into the right side of her mouth. Her long hair was cleaner than it had been, and Steve realised that it would have been washed to remove the dust and dirt that could cause infection. He could see a wound membrane, he thought they were called, stretched over the back of Jo's head, and he remembered that Wil had said she would need to go back to the OR for skin grafts. Finally, reluctantly, Steve looked down at Jo's left hand. He knew what he would see, but even so the sight of her with just a thumb and three fingers was almost too much to bear. Tentatively he reached out and ran his own finger across the back of her hand, shutting his eyes on the tears that threatened him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Mark had spoken with Wil for a few minutes and then made his way back to the doctor's lounge. Ron was sleeping peacefully, and he knew that in the circumstances Amanda would understand him being someplace else for a while.

Mark had been sitting with Ron, trying to comprehend what could make one human being be so cruel to another, when a nurse he had a great deal of respect for, Lila Norley, had come to see him. Now he was going to break some devastating news to an old friend.

Cheryl had walked with Mark up to the ICU, although she had no recollection of doing so. The room that he took her into was cool and quiet and Martin was lying completely at peace. She walked slowly up to the bed and pulled a chair up and underneath her. Then carefully she took his hand in her own and began to sob.