Disclaimer: still, nothing, I do not own them.

Winters, Kerry, Susan and Jake were all in the lounge disusing other treatment options for Abby, when Winters' pager suddenly went off. Susan watched as her face suddenly lost all of its color, and immediately both her and Jake knew something had happened.

"It's Abby, something happened, they're bringing her down here now," all four flew out of the lounge, heading to meet them at the elevators.

"Sam, clear a trauma room!" Kerry shouted.

The staff anxiously awaited the arrival of the elevator into the ER. Patience was not something that any of them had right now. And within minutes of those door opening they were on their way down the hall, all of them had their own questions of how something like this could happen but none of them waited to answer them.

Through the double doors of Trauma one they rolled the gurney doctors and nurses working in tandem to discover what injuries lie being the exterior surface of this well worn and ragged body. Once again they all had to swallow horrible feeling that accompanied working on one of their own. Lines where started, medicine to stabilize her falling blood pressure was given and they started to squeeze in units of blood to try to get ahead of the blood that was pouring from the holes in her stomach.

"She needs an airway Kerry," Pratt said, as he kept a close eye on the monitors.

Kerry nodded and grabbed the necessary tools to intubate Abby, "5 of sux and 10 of atomidate," she announced as she went to Abby's head. Kerry was surprised to see Abby actually making direct eye contact with her. "We're going to help you Abby, just hold on for us," she whispered watching Sam administer the medicine.

"Kerry," for the first time in over three weeks, Abby's voice was heard. But it wasn't the same voice they were use to. Her voice was scared and weak, not at all confident like it use to be. It caused everyone in the room, to stop, and become silent, the only sound was coming from the frantic beeping of the monitors. She didn't say much more at that moment, but tears began to fall. "Don't," her oxygen level was falling dangerously low now, they didn't have time to argue with her, and it seemed as though Abby didn't have the energy to speak anymore.

Kerry, like everyone else in that trauma room, needed to hear no more words, they knew and understood perfectly well what Abby was telling them, she didn't want their help.

"Abby.." she started knowing that Abby would know that Kerry had to do it. The color of Abby's face was deathly pale, but it was not that which was scaring Kerry, but the fact that Abby's lips were blue. Kerry couldn't waste any more time, the lack of oxygen was starting to take effect on Abby's frail body.

"No" she reached up to push Kerry's hand, and the tube that would possibly save her life, away. Kerry watched as Abby attempted to form her next sentence. "Kerry, please don't," it was hardly a whisper, and if it weren't for the complete silence aside from the frantic beeping of the machines and monitors, nobody would have heard Abby's voice, Abby's plea. And those were her last words before she completely lost consciences. Nobody said anything while Kerry guided the tube down her throat. Her emotions being thrown many different directions. Abby wanted to die, she'd made it crystal clear, and there was Kerry, torn between the two options. Do her job or fail. Save her friend or respect her wishes. Her soul was torn, and it reflected so clearly in her eyes. Finally, after precious seconds, she gritted her teeth, and set the tube in Abby's throat.

"I'm in," she said, and everyone went back to work. Still not able to believe that Abby had actually spoken to them, but what was still even more shocking was that Abby had tried to kill herself, and she might still have. She was not out of the woods yet, not even close.

Emergency medicine was a race against the clock and for one of their own it made that race seem even more short, ever minute precious in keeping her from tumbling over the edge, she was on the brink of death. Gun shot wounds were serious and where the bullet entered was just the start of the story, an ultrasound was ordered to see if they could find a trail, the path that the bullet would have taken as it ripped it's way through her body. Blood filled her abdominal cavity, it was as if everything that they were giving her was pooling in there, but from where the entrance wound was she couldn't have hit her spleen or had the bullet ricocheted off another organ, or bony structure of the body to cause even more hidden damage.

Dubenko was the surgeon on call, called down to help, the victim whose name he hadn't learned before leaving the surgical floor, all he had was a 9-1-1 to the ER on his pager. Once he was inside, things looked grim and he knew it. Abby's body was pale compared to what he normally saw when he saw the intern working in the ER.

It settled in over everyone that Abby was the one who needed to have the will to fight this and it broke their hearts to think that she might not have that will left inside her right now after everything that she had been through, everything that she had fought to overcome, the accumulation of her hard work, had all come down to whether or not she had the will to fight this.

Everyone let out a giant sigh and tears started to flow once again as the door to the elevator closed with Dubenko and it's precious cargo on it's way up to the OR. No one wanted to think that this was real, it was a kick in the gut, insult added to injury that someone could have broken such a beautiful spirit so badly.

Hours passes, the long wait slowly passing by, pacing occurred in the ER, staff downed coffee and a runner went up every 10 to 15 minutes no one waiting to wait for them to call down with news, they all needed to know as soon as they could how she was doing, if she made it through the surgery all right, if they would still have their beloved friend in the morning.

Dubenko worked frantically to fix the extensive damage left, one gun shot a single gunshot had done a lot of damage to Abby's fragile internal organs. The way that the gun had been aimed from the struggle, sent it at an angle up and through her body, her liver was bleeding profusely, which they stopped by removing a portion of it, a kidney had been hit and was no longer making urine, a sign that it was going to have to come out, it was no longer viable. The damage to her intestines was extensive several holes had been ripped it had been nearly severed in a few places and after several long and grueling hours, struggling to keep up with the blood loss as he made the repairs, he honestly didn't know how Abby was going to pull through this.

She was taken to the ICU and word was sent downstairs that for now, Abby was in critical condition and no one could say for sure what was going to happen or how she was going to fair from the damage that had been inflicted. No one would dare use the word self-inflicted, no that just wasn't acceptable to them, something had cause their friend to snap and while they may never know, Abby knew the reason and perhaps with a little faith, a whole lot of prayers, and fast medical attention she stood a shot of having the chance to tell them what had caused that.