Chapter 3

Jack was talking to Lenny Copeland while he waited for Audrey to get ready to go when he heard that an officer was down. Len said a quick goodbye to Jack and ran to the trauma room to get ready. Jack stepped back so he would be out of the way when the medics came in.

Audrey had just walked out and met up with Jack as the door opened and the gurney was pushed in.

"My God, Jack!" Audrey said her hand covering her mouth. "That's Tony."

Jack closed his eyes and turned away for a second. Two of the SWAT team members helped wheel the gurney into medical. Once they were inside of the unit, they let medical unit employees take over. They stepped back for a moment and watched the gurney disappear into the trauma room.

Jack recognized one of the officers and approached him. "Where was he hit? How bad does it look?"

The officer shook his head. "It's bad, Jack. He was hit twice in the chest. He's barely breathing."

"How did it happen?"

"A sniper on the roof next door was apparently trying to take out the programming expert that they were bringing in. Tony got caught in the crossfire."

"A sniper! How did he know we were bringing in the programmer?"

"We've obviously got a mole, Jack."

"Is security locking the place down?"

"Completely, but they want to do it silently. They don't want to spook the mole. They're monitoring phone calls and all computer and electronics transmissions. The exits are covered as well."

"Does Michelle know yet?"

"I'm sure she knows about the sniper. I doubt that she knows Tony was hit. It just happened a couple of minutes ago. I need to go talk to her now."

"That's okay. I'll talk to her," Jack offered.

"Thanks, I've never been very good at delivering bad news. Some people know how to do it, but I've never figured it out."

"Audrey, there's a little waiting area over there," he pointed to his left. "As soon as I talk to Michelle, I'll arrange for someone to take you back to the hotel."

"Take your time. I can arrange a ride when I'm ready. I'd like to stay and see how Tony's doing. He saved our lives; I haven't had a chance to thank him for that."

Jack nodded and moved off to find Michelle. After talking to a couple of people he knew, he found that she had gone to the Director's office to take a call. He set off silently to his old office wondering what he was going to say to Michelle. Guilt had started to set in. If he hadn't called Tony to help him this morning, none of this would have happened. Of course, he and Audrey would be dead, but Tony would be safe. He wouldn't be lying on a gurney fighting for his life.

Inside the trauma room Dr. Copeland and his team of nurses and technicians worked frantically to keep Tony alive.

"Looks like two gunshot wounds to the chest, Doc," called one of the medics as they brought Tony into the trauma room.

Lenny Copeland was waiting for them. "Do you have vital signs?"

"Yeah, BP is 60 over palp and dropping, heart rate is around 140, respirations are about 30 and labored."

Copeland snapped on a pair of gloves and put a stethoscope to Tony's chest. "Suction his airway, please," he told a nurse. "Tony, can you hear me? Tony," he said loudly but got no response.

"There's blood in the airway, Doctor," she said.

"We're losing him," Copeland said. He started barking out orders. "Get me an intubation kit. I need to put him on a ventilator. I need IV access. Get two large bore IVs started and run normal saline wide open. I also need a central line kit and dopamine and dobutamine drips. Get a med-evac helicopter and call UCLA trauma center. If we can stabilize him here, he can be flown to them for surgery."

Team members jumped in every direction to follow Copeland's orders. Many of them had worked under Tony while he was CTU Director. Like most CTU employees, Len and his medical team felt Tony had been given a raw deal by the government. Clearly Brad Hammond and the federal prosecutor had decided that they were going to make an example of Tony. Those, like Len, who knew that Tony had fallen on hard times since he was pardoned by President Palmer, felt bad about it and hoped that he would be able to get his life together again. Right now they weren't quite sure if they could keep him alive to get the second chance they believed that he deserved.

Jack walked slowly up the steps to Michelle's office. Her door wasn't completely closed and he could hear her end of a heated phone conversation. He slipped his hand in the door and pushed it open enough so that she knew that he was there. She waved him in and he sat in the chair across the desk from her.

"Brad," she said, the exasperation clear in her voice. She looked at Jack and rolled her eyes. "We've got a silent lock down in place. That's the best we can do right now," she paused while she listened. "You're way off base, Brad. We have no reason to believe that Tony is in any way involved in this. I know how you feel, you've already told me. What do you want me to do? He wants to leave as much as you want him to go, but right now he's helping us. He saved the life of Secretary Heller's daughter. Needless to say, the Secretary is very grateful and trusts him implicitly."

Michelle was silent while she listened to the other end of the conversation.

"No, Brad, you're wrong. I can be objective about this and I am. Tony stays until he signs the transcript of his debriefing and he is finished helping us with the override. I have someone waiting to see me, Brad. I'll talk to you later." She hung up the phone harder than necessary.

"I'm sorry about that, Jack." She looked up and noticed the flat expression on his face. "Any word on the sniper? Is Rachel Piper safe?"

"The SWAT team took out the sniper. We're trying to identify him right now," he said in a soft, gentle voice. "Rachel Piper is shaken up, but she wasn't hurt."

"That's good news. Is she calm enough to work on breaking the code on the override?"

"I think if you give her a few minutes, she'll be alright."

"Jack, what's wrong? There's something you're not telling me."

"We have an officer down, Michelle."

"An officer down? Who? Why didn't you tell me right away?" An expression of dread came across Michelle's face. "Oh no, Jack," she said slowly as realization of what he was saying set in. She shook her head. "No, Jack. Don't do this to me." Her lip was quivering. "No," she whispered as tears filled her eyes. "No, not again."

"I'm sorry, Michelle," Jack said shaking his head. "Len Copeland is treating him now."

"Where was he hit?"

"Twice in the chest," he told her.

"Is he going to make it?"

"I don't know. I think it's probably too early to tell."

"Oh, God! Why did I send him out to get her? I thought he could brief her on the way in. He understood the code better than Chloe or I did," Michelle asked. She stood and moved toward the door. "I've got to see him. I've got to see him now. He has to know that I'm there for him."

She ran down the steps from her office and quickly crossed the bullpen. Jack was close behind her when she ran into the medical unit. Once inside she crossed the unit and pushed open the door to the trauma room before Jack could stop her.

She stumbled forward toward the table that was surrounded by the medical team. The controlled chaos in the room was such that no one saw her enter.

"Lenny, is he going to be alright?"

"Jesus, Michelle, what are you doing in here? Somebody get her out of here."

"No, no!" she shouted as a nurse tried to gently usher her from the room. "I need to be with him. Lenny, please!"

Jack was waiting outside of the door when the nurse brought her out. "I'll take her," he told the nurse as he put his arms around her.

"No, Jack," she sobbed as she struggled against him. "I want to be with him."

Jack held her firmly and tried to calm her. "I know, Michelle, I know," he whispered. "There's a lot going on in there right now and it's better if you're out here. Let's go over to the waiting room so you can sit down."

"No!" she screamed as she held her ground. "I'm staying right here. I need to be here when Lenny has any news."

"Okay," Jack whispered. This was not a battle worth fighting. He stood with her in front of the trauma room. Michelle leaned heavily against him as she wept bitterly, her face pressed against his chest. Audrey, who had come out of the waiting room, put a gentle hand on Michelle's shoulder to try and lend support.

Inside the trauma room things were getting tense. Thanks to the ventilator, Tony was breathing, but even with the ventilator set at its highest level, he was barely getting enough oxygen. Len could hear air in both lungs, but ordered a chest x-ray to make sure the ventilator was positioned correctly. They were giving him fluids and drugs to support his blood pressure, but despite that his blood pressure was dropping.

"I can't keep him alive here much longer," Copeland said. "How long until the med-evac arrives?"

"Another five minutes," one of the technicians informed him. "As soon as you have time, UCLA is on the phone; their trauma surgeon is ready to talk to you."

"Tell him I'll call him as soon as the helicopter takes off," he said. He turned his attention back to Tony as the alarm on the heart monitor went off. "He's in V fib! We need to shock him," Len shouted. "Damn it! Now he's flat-lining."

He grabbed the cart with the defibrillator on it and pushed it to the bedside. He talked absently to Tony while he turned it on and put the gel on the paddles. "Come on, Tony. I will not let you die on me. Hang on! You need to get into surgery."

Lenny pressed the paddles to Tony's chest and yelled "Clear!" Everyone took a step backward as the electrical shock was applied to Tony's chest. They all looked expectantly at the monitor but it still didn't show an effective heartbeat.

"Give me an amp of epinephrine," he told the nurse next to him.

She reached into a cart and pulled out the prefilled syringe. She handed the syringe to Copeland who injected it into an IV.

"I'm going to shock him again," Copeland said. "Clear!" The second shock was of a higher voltage than the first. Again everyone watched the monitor. They were relieved to see a weak but steady heartbeat.

"Let's start an epinephrine drip," Copeland told the pharmacist who stood near the cart full of emergency drugs.

"Dr. Copeland, the helicopter just landed," one of the technicians told him. "And UCLA faxed over their surgery consent. They were hoping that his wife could sign it and it could be sent with him. That way they can get started immediately."

"I'll talk to his wife. Make sure copies of all Almeida's blood work and that chest x-ray go with him. That'll speed up the process over there, too." Copeland was talking while he was walking toward the door. He pushed it open to find Michelle and Jack standing right next to it.

"Lenny, how is he? Is he okay?"

Copeland sighed, "He's alive, Michelle. If we can keep him alive until he gets to UCLA and they can get him into surgery, he has a chance. He's lost a lot of blood and we're having trouble maintaining a blood pressure. That doesn't surprise me. What does surprise me is that we're having a lot of trouble keeping his oxygen level up. He's not a smoker, is he?"

"No, until recently he was always a health nut. You know that, he ran every day and lifted weights. He never smoked."

Jack looked at Lenny, "I don't know if this means anything, but today he seemed to get winded easily. I just thought he was out of shape. He also had a cough."

"He did have a cough," Michelle said. "I said something to him about it and he said he had a cold that he couldn't shake. He hasn't taken care of himself recently."

"I ordered an x-ray; I'll have to take a look at it. Maybe he has a mild pneumonia. That plus the damage from the bullets may be the problem."

The three of them watched as the medics from the helicopter came in. Lenny directed them into the trauma room. "Michelle, I have the consent papers for surgery here. The surgeon from UCLA asked me to have you sign them so they could take him right to surgery when he arrives. I could stand here and go through all of the possible risks of surgery, but the bottom line is that without it, he'll die."

"I know," she said. "Give me a pen." Lenny handed her a pen and Michelle scrawled her signature, Michelle Dessler Almeida, across the bottom of the page. She had rarely used "Almeida" in the past, but she thought it was time to start.

"The trauma surgeon that's on call today is one of the best. We went to medical school together at Stanford," Len told her. "His name is Nick Lombardo. He'll do everything possible, I promise."

By the time she finished signing, the medics were bringing Tony out of the trauma room on a stretcher. Michelle reached for his hand.

"Hang in there, Baby," she whispered. "I'll be waiting for you when you get out of surgery. I love you."

"Ma'am, we have to go," one of the medics told Michelle as they hurriedly pushed the stretcher through the door.

Lenny addressed the lead medic as the others left the area. "Here's the surgery consent. The surgeon at UCLA will need that." The medic added it papers to a folder he was carrying.

Lenny continued, "You should also have a copy of all of his labs and we did a chest x-ray, which should be in there as well."

"The nurse said the x-ray wasn't developed yet. Maybe you can call the surgeon when you get a chance to read it."

"I'll call him as soon as it's ready," Lenny agreed. "Just hurry up and get him over there. He's not going to hang on much longer."

"Will do, sir," the medic answered as he left the room.

Lenny looked at Michelle, "I'm going to go help them put him on the helicopter. When I get back, I'll get someone to take you over to UCLA," he told her as he hurried out the door.

"I'll take you," Jack said.

"Thanks, Jack, but you were supposed to take Audrey back to the hotel," Michelle answered.

"No," Audrey said. "I'll go with you to the hospital, if you don't mind. I know that I don't really know you Michelle, but I feel really close to Tony after what he did for Jack and me today."

"Are you sure you feel up to it?" Jack asked her.

"Yeah," she answered. "I'd just as soon be near you. It would be really lonely at the hotel and I'd just worry about Tony anyway."

"Okay, then let's go," Jack said. He held the door for Michelle and Audrey as the three of them made their way out of the medical unit.

Chloe O'Brien met them in the hallway. "I'm sorry about Tony, Michelle," she said. "I just wanted you to know that Rachel Piper got herself together and broke the code. She was able to take control of the override. All of the reactors are cooling down. None of them are critical anymore. I thought you might like to know that before you went to the hospital."

"Thanks, Chloe," Michelle managed a smile. "Call Hammond and bring him up to date. Tell him that he needs to bring in an acting director immediately. I'll be at the hospital and I don't want to be disturbed for any reason."

Lenny Copeland finished helping them load Tony on the helicopter and he watched as it took off. The flight to UCLA medical center was about 15 minutes. He just hoped that Tony could hold on that long. He headed back to the medical unit to call the trauma surgeon.

As he opened the door to the unit, he was met by one of the nurses. "Dr. Copeland, I thought you should see this right away." She was holding an x-ray film.

"Is this Almeida's chest x-ray?"

"Yeah, you better take a look," her tone displayed no emotion.

Lenny held the x-ray up to the light, but couldn't get a good view. He pulled out his reading glasses and walked to the flat, lighted screen where x-rays were viewed. He turned on the background light and peered at the film.

"Jesus Christ!" he said slowly. "Jesus Christ!" he said again. "Get me the trauma surgeon on the phone immediately. No wonder we had trouble getting enough oxygen to his lungs."

Copeland stared at the x-ray as he paced the area and finally dropped into the nearest chair. "I can't believe this," he said to no one in particular. "I can't fucking believe this."

"Dr. Copeland, I've got the surgeon on line one," the unit secretary said over the intercom.

Lenny picked up the nearest phone. "Nick, are you guys ready to go over there? I just read Almeida's chest x-ray and we need to talk about it."